Monthly Archive for October, 2008

Ubuntu 8.10 codename Intrepid Ibex has been released

ubuntulogo Ubuntu 8.10 codename Intrepid Ibex has been released Ubuntu version 8.10 codename Intrepid Ibex has just been released!

Most important changes;

  • Support for 3G devices
  • Run Ubuntu from a USB-stick
  • Guest sessions
  • Play BBC content
  • Gnome 2.24
  • Linux Kernel 2.6.27
  • Xserver 1.4 / xOrg 7.4

Most important changes for the server version;

  • Improved virtualisation
  • Complete Java Stack
  • Enhanced Mail Server Capabilities
  • Improved RAID support (dmraid)
  • Encrypted Private Directory
  • Hardening the Packages
  • Uncomplicated Firewall is Getting Even Simpler
  • Landscape Client Bundled within Ubuntu

For more info check out http://www.ubuntu.com/products/whatisubuntu/810features/ 

Download;
http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/downloadmirrors

Mirrors Netherlands (EU)

Mirrors Netherlands (other)

Flock 2.0 has been released

The creators of the Flock browser have just released version 2.0 of their Social Networking browser Flock. Flock 2 uses the same technology as FireFox 3 along with many new features for those who use social networkingsites like Digg, MySpace, YouTube, Facebook etc.

Flock is available for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux, and available in many languages.

Download link; http://www.flock.com/versions

The official announcement;

Flock 2.0, Out Of Beta And Ready To Rock

Less than a year after the initial release of Flock 1.0, we are proud to release Flock 2.0. Flock 2.0 has been through three beta cycles, enjoyed tremendous feedback from our community of users and is a significant step forward in capability and quality. And, this final release of Flock 2.0 has some great new capabilities that have not been made available in any prior 2.0 beta release. Let me take a moment to tell you what to expect in Flock 2.0.

Flock 2.0 is built on the latest Firefox 3 technology from Mozilla, so you’ll find it to be snappy, safe and easier to use. Flock 2.0 also comes with some great new features not found in any other browser today.

First of all, we’re very pleased to announce that we’ve added MySpace as a major new addition to our suite of 23 other popular services integrated within Flock. MySpace was the #1 most requested service from our community. Now MySpace lovers can stay up to date with their MySpace friends and activities no matter where they are on the web. MySpace users will also find that Flock offers the easiest way to upload photos, insert photos and videos in MySpace comment fields and share most any web content by simply dragging and dropping it into the Flock People sidebar.

Flock 2 also incorporates Media RSS (MRSS) detection capability so that you can subscribe to media streams being made available by websites, even if the site isn’t one of the 23 integrated with Flock. Once you’ve subscribed to a media stream via Media RSS, you will be notified about the arrival of new photos and videos posted by your favorite sites and they will flow right into your MyWorld page in Flock, so you never miss out on updates to your favorite media streams. We’ll go into this great new capability in depth in a later blog post.

For the first time, we are also making themes available for Flock 2. Check out extensions.flock.com and install a theme to customize the look of Flock. We’re shipping today with two new themes, and will be adding many more over the coming weeks and months.

If you’re already a Flock user – thank you! And, get ready for the best version of Flock ever! If you are new to Flock, give Flock 2.0 a test drive and discover what users from 165 countries and territories all around the world already know – with Flock you will rock the web! With the latest Firefox 3 architecture under the hood, you’ve now got the latest technology with the most innovative features available in any browser today. If you’ve been using the 2.0 beta, we highly recommend you upgrade…there’s a lot in this release that you haven’t seen yet.

Check it out and let us know what you think. Your feedback has been essential in developing Flock 2, and we have been growing with the strong global support of satisfied Flockstars everywhere who have been telling their friends: “get ready to meet your new favorite browser”.

-Cheers
Shawn Hardin, Chief Flockstar

Adobe Flash Player 10 has been released

Adobe has released the 10th version of their famous Flash Player, which is available for Windows, Linux and Mac OS X in combination with browsers like Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera, Safari, and Netscape.

Most important new features are;

  • New text rendering engine
  • New anti-alias engine
  • Better hardware acceleration
  • Better sound engine

Check their website to get the latest version; http://www.adobe.com/go/getflash

New features:

3D effects
Create more intuitive, engaging interfaces using built-in support for 3D effects. Get started quickly without being a 3D master by designing in 2D and easily transforming and animating in 3D. Fast, extremely lightweight, and simple-to-use APIs, along with 3D tools in Adobe® Flash® CS4 Professional software, make motion that was previously accessible only to expert users via ActionScript® language or custom third-party libraries available to everyone.

Custom filters and effects
Create high-performance, real-time effects for cinematic experiences that quickly engage users. With new Adobe Pixel Bender™, the same technology behind many filters and effects in Adobe After Effects® software, these dynamic and interactive effects can be used both in production with After Effects CS4 and live with Flash Player 10. The Pixel Bender just-in- time (JIT) compiler can also be used to process other types of data, such as sound or mathematical functions, asynchronously in a separate thread.

Advanced text support
Take advantage of a new, flexible text layout engine that brings print-quality publishing to the web, building on more than 25 years of Adobe expertise in typography. Gain more control over text layout using an extensible library of ActionScript 3.0 text components to flow text and sophisticated typographic elements such as ligatures across multiple columns, around inline images, bidirectionally, vertically, or chained together. Create multilingual rich Internet applications (RIAs) using device fonts that can now be anti-aliased, rotated, and styled, or build your own unique text components.

Dynamic sound generation
Use enhanced sound APIs to dynamically generate audio and create new types of audio applications such as music mixers and sequencers, real-time audio for games, and even audio visualizers. Work with loaded MP3 audio at a lower level by extracting audio data and supplying it to the sound buffer. Process, filter, and mix audio in real time through the Pixel Bender JIT compiler to extend creative freedom beyond the visual experience.

Drawing API
Perform runtime drawing more easily with restyleable properties, 3D APIs, and a new way of drawing sophisticated shapes without having to code them line by line. Developers can tweak parts of curves, change styling, replace parts, and use custom filters and effects, delivering improved throughput, creative control, and greater productivity. Enhancements to the Drawing API add the z dimension, real perspective, textured meshes in 3D space, a retained graphics model, read/write rendering, and triangle drawing with UV coordinates, while adding memory and improving performance.

Hardware acceleration
Use the hardware processing power of the graphics card to paint SWF files into the browser and accelerate compositing calculations of bitmaps, filters, blend modes, and video overlays faster than would be performed in software.

Vector data type
Use the new typed array class for better performance, efficiency, and error checking of data.

Dynamic Streaming
Show exceptional video with streams that automatically adjust to changing network conditions. Leverage new quality-of-service metrics to provide a better streaming experience.

Speex audio codec
Take advantage of the new, high-fidelity and open source Speex voice codec, which offers a low-latency alternative for voice encoding. Flash Player also supports ADPCM, HE-AAC, MP3, and Nellymoser audio.

File upload and download APIs
Bring users into the experience by letting them load and save files from your web application. New file reference runtime access allows local processing of data without roundtripping to the server.

Microsoft Silverlight 2 has been released

Microsoft has released Silverlight 2, which is a direct concurent for Adobe Flash and Flex. It works as a plugin for Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari on both Mac OS X and Windows.

The setup can be found at; http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/resources/install.aspx

Highlights of new Silverlight 2 features include the following:

  • .NET Framework support with a rich base class library. This is a compatible subset of the full .NET Framework.
  • Powerful built-in controls. These include DataGrid, ListBox, Slider, ScrollViewer, Calendar controls and more.
  • Advanced skinning and templating support. This makes it easy to customize the look and feel of an application.
  • Deep zoom. This enables unparalleled interactivity and navigation of ultrahigh resolution imagery.
  • Comprehensive networking support. Out-of-the-box support allows calling REST, WS*/SOAP, POX, RSS and standard HTTP services, enabling users to create applications that easily integrate with existing back-end systems.
  • Expanded .NET Framework language support. Unlike other runtimes, Silverlight 2 supports a variety of programming languages, including Visual Basic, C#, JavaScript, IronPython and IronRuby, making it easier for developers already familiar with one of these languages to repurpose their existing skill sets.
  • Advanced content protection. This now includes Silverlight DRM, powered by PlayReady, offering robust content protection for connected Silverlight experiences.
  • Improved server scalability and expanded advertiser support. This includes new streaming and progressive download capabilities, superior search engine optimization techniques, and next-generation in-stream advertising support.
  • Vibrant partner ecosystem. Visual Studio Industry Partners such as ComponentOne LLC, Infragistics Inc. and Telerik Inc. are providing products that further enhance developer capabilities when creating Silverlight applications using Visual Studio.
  • Cross-platform and cross-browser support. This includes support for Mac, Windows and Linux in Firefox, Safari and Windows Internet Explorer.

More information and details about Silverlight 2 are available by reading the Silverlight 2 fact sheet.

Mono 2.0 has been released

Version 2.0 of Mono has been released.

Mono is a portable and open source implementation of the .NET framework for Unix, Windows, MacOS and other operating systems.

Downloads can be found at http://www.go-mono.com/mono-downloads/

Release notes;

Microsoft Compatible APIs

  • ADO.NET 2.0 API for accessing databases.
  • ASP.NET 2.0 API for developing Web-based applications.
  • Windows.Forms 2.0 API to create desktop applications.
  • System.XML 2.0: An API to manipulate XML documents.
  • System.Core: Provides support for the Language Integrated Query (LINQ).
  • System.Xml.Linq: Provides a LINQ provider for XML.
  • System.Drawing 2.0 API: A portable graphics rendering API.

Mono APIs

  • Gtk# 2.12: A binding to the Gtk+ 2.12 and GNOME libraries for creating desktop applications on Linux, Windows and MacOS X.
  • Mono.Cecil: A library to manipulate ECMA CLI files (the native format used for executables and libraries).
  • Mono.Cairo: A binding to the Cairo Graphics library to produce 2D graphics and render them into a variety of forms (images, windows, postscript and PDF).
  • Mono’s SQLite support: a library to create and consume databases created with SQLite.
  • Mono.Posix: a library to access Linux and Unix specific functionality from your managed application. With both a low-level interface as well as higher level interfaces.

Third Party APIs bundled with Mono

  • Extensive support for databases: PostgreSQL, DB2, Oracle, Sybase, SQL server, SQLite and Firebird.
  • C5 Generics Library: we are bundling the C5 generics collection class library as part of Mono.

Compilers included in Mono 2.0

  • C# 3.0 compiler implementation, with full support for LINQ.
  • Visual Basic 8 compiler.
  • IL assembler and disassembler and the development toolchain required to create libraries and applications.