GNOME Wars! Red Hat Vs Ubuntu

Dave Neary, GNOME developer, has posted his GNOME Census which indicates where contributions to GNOME come from.

The “Census” is a combination of data mining and surveys that gives a snapshot of gnome activity and the profile of a GNOME contributor. Apparently, the aim of the census project was to identify three particular areas.

What does the developer community look like? What companies are investing in GNOME, and how? What does the commercial ecosystem around the GNOME project look like?

An interesting element of the census is the revelation that 70% of the GNOME developers are identified as “volunteers”. Whilst I’m sure that the definition of “volunteer” remains quite ambiguous, what cannot be ignored is the tension between Red Hat and Canonical.The census suggests that Red Hat have contributed 16% of the GNOME upstreams whilst Canonical have only offered 1%. As a result of the findings, there have been a number of interesting arguments.

Former Red Hat employee Greg DeKoenigsberg, has written a blog totally slamming Canonical’s contribution to GNOME, suggesting that they have been “riding on Red Hat’s coat tails for years”!

But as the guys from OMG!Ubuntu have pointed out, Canonical do a lot of work on improving GNOME downstream for Ubuntu, with projects such as the application indicators, notification system, Unity and the Me Menu; just to name a few.GNOME is very picky when it comes to accepting commits upstream into the core GNOME modules, for example, Seif Lotfy’s work on Zeitgeist was denied.

It’s also definitely worth reading the points of view from Ubuntu legend, Jono Bacon, who is happy to clarify with everyone, Canonical’s contribution to GNOME.

Even NASA use Ubuntu!

With Billions of dollars and massive technology needs that are literally out-of-this-world, NASA has a lot of unique computing requirements. As it turns out, some of those requirements can be fulfilled by technology that isn’t all that different from what regular enterprises need too.

In order to save the data from distant spacecraft, satellites and other scientific endeavours, NASA is leveraging Open Source tech (including Ubuntu Linux) and regular enterprise networking components to meet their mission.

Read the full article by Sean Michael Kerner.

Is the Dell and Ubuntu love affair coming to an end?

Dell has previously shown fairly unflinching support for Linux. It has offered Ubuntu, which has steadily become more graphical, more compatible and easier to use, as a pre-loaded option for a long time. The company even drew headlines recently for proclaiming Ubuntu “safer” than Windows from a security standpoint.

Now, though, whether pressure from Microsoft is the explanation or for any number of other reasons, the company appears to be backpedaling from that stance. A look at the company’s U.K.-based site shows some questionable positioning of Ubuntu.

According to Dell’s U.K. site, users should choose Ubuntu if they do not plan to use Windows, and if they are “interested in open source programming.” The site also recommends Windows if “you are new to using computers.” Is that a realistic positioning of Ubuntu at this stage of the game? Why doesn’t the site note that Ubuntu does steer clear of the vast majority of security concerns that plague Windows, among other advantages it has?

Make Your Own Android Apps with Google App Inventor

Google App Inventor is a new piece of online software that helps users create Android apps quickly and easily.

The website says that app creation is not reserved only to those with programming skills. “To use App Inventor, you do not need to be a developer. App Inventor requires NO programming knowledge,” it says. Users have options of what to include in the app, and the rest of the development process is done by the App Inventor.

The Google App Inventor website helps users create all kinds of applications, from simple games to informative and educational applications, ones that make full use of the Android-powered smartphones’ hardware capabilities. App Inventor provides access to the smartphones’ GPS sensor, enabling the creation of location-aware applications, it uses Android’s text-to-speech capabilities in order to create apps that can speak aloud and it uses internet connection routines in order to allow you to create apps that can communicate with other users or services online.

The Google App Inventor can be used on Mac OS X 10.5 and 10.6, Windows XP, Vista and 7, GNU/Linux, Ubuntu 8+, Debian 5+ operating systems, using all today’s major browsers on computers capable of running Java 6. App Inventor can also be used on smartphones with Google’s own Android operating systems.

Clonezilla

Clonezilla is an Open Source disaster recovery, disk cloning and deployment solution. Clonezilla is designed by Steven Shaiu and developed by the NCHC Free Software Labs in Taiwan. Clonezilla SE provides multicast support similar to Norton Ghost Corporate Edition.

‘Clonezilla Live’ enables a user to clone a single computer’s storage media, or a single partition on the media, to a separate medium device. The cloned data can be saved as an image-file or as a duplicated copy of the data. The data can be saved to locally attached storage device, an SSH server, Samba Server or a NFS file-share. The clone file can then be used to restore the original when needed.

The Clonezilla application can be run from a USB-flash-drive, a CD-ROM, or a DVD-ROM. Clonezilla requires no modification to the computer; the software runs in its own booted environment.

Download Clonezilla.

How to Install Ubuntu on Your Nexus One/Android!

The latest hacker buzz of the week is a step by step guide regarding How-to install Ubuntu on a Nexus One phone.

The relatively simple method involves installing Ubuntu into a chroot on the SD Card and using VNC to connect with the X Server. The end result is an Ubuntu desktop running on a phone.

Follow this link to give it a go!

Dell cuddles Canonical

Dell is working with Canonical to provide “Amazon-cloud-ready” Ubuntu powered servers running on Poweredge C 100, 2100 and 6100 1U-to-4U.

This is an effort by Dell to further move into software implementations and not just provide hardware. John Igoe, an employee
in Dell’s Data Center Solutions Group, has this to say regarding Canonical’s involvement; “Canonical has a credible solution with people, based on the Eucalyptus and Amazon cloud.”

For the full story, read below:

Indicator Panel Menu Rocks The House!

Jono Bacon writes about the new Indicator Panel Menu that is scheduled to be shipped in Ubuntu 10.10 version of the Ubuntu Netbook Edition.

The article also contains a link to download, test and play with the new panel menu.  Don’t want to downlaod it but are curious as to what it looks like?  Jono provides screenshots in this posts as well.

Jono states, ” Now I can absolutely see and feel the benefits; I am loving having the menu there and my desktop feels sleeker and more consistent.”

He also notes that there is still many things that need to be tested and fixed but the pros seem to out weight the cons.

Click here to read more.

Debian vs Ubuntu

Bruce Byfield addresses the philosophical and some of the technical differences between Ubuntu and it’s ancestral roots, Debian.

Many common misconceptions are addressed as well as an overview of the technical similarities between the cousin distros.

Bruce ends the article on the philosophical and community oriented differences between Ubuntu and Debian; citing, as one example, Ubuntu’s Code of Conduct and how it has helped maintain an overall polite and courteous discussion in forums and mailing lists.

For the full article and the accompanying in-depth discussion, read more:

Ubuntu Brainstorm – A great way to share and develop ideas!

Ubuntu Brainstorm is a community site geared toward letting you add your ideas for Ubuntu.

You can submit your own idea, or vote for or against another idea.

If you haven’t already visited the Ubuntu Brainstorm site, it’s well worth having a look.