2109713
submission
TuringTest writes:
I was surprised to learn that Chandler, the open-source Personal Information Manager (covered on Slashdot after releasing some stable versions), has silently reached its 1.0 milestone this summer only to (or maybe because of) having its financial support removed at the end of 2008. Chandler inherits organization concepts from Lotus Agenda and is a brainchild of Mitch Kapor (of Firefox, EFF and Lotus fame). It shares an approach to unified information representation with recent PIMs like MIT's Haystack and KDE's
Nepomuk. What happened to the persistent universal data storage that object-oriented desktops and metadata filesystems were never able to provide? Did it finally arrive as a userland application, and nobody cared?
824265
submission
TuringTest writes:
With the controversy over the recent release of OpenGL 3.0, people is debating wether OpenGL is dead or it isn't. In this situation, a new low-level library called Gallium3D promises to ease development and refactoring of drivers for OpenGL (or any other 3D API) by acting as an efficient middleware between the API and the metal. Gallium3D seems to be gaining traction within the community with talks at several FOSS conferences (e.g. FOSDEM and aKademy).
822237
submission
TuringTest writes:
In an attempt to bring the Wii closer to the hardcore gamers taste, Sega is preparing to releaseMadWorld, a violent 'hack and slash' game. This has brought attention from family-conscious lobbies: "The decision to release a violent game on a console which has based its reputation on family fun has shocked anti-violence pressure groups. Mediawatch-UK, Britains longest running pressure group campaigning for decency in TV, films and games, said MadWorld will 'spoil' the Wii."
The game features black & white cel-shaded graphics, except for the blood blobs wich are in brilliant red.
MadWorld is announced to be released in early 2009.
560114
submission
TuringTest writes:
The code for ENSO, a keyboard-based command launcher in the line of Mac OS' Quicksilver, has been released under the revised BSD license. ENSO can be explained as an expanded application launcher that aims to combine the power of a command line interface integrated within a desktop GUI. Its design is inspired by the ideas of Jef Raskin's The Humane Interface. It currently allows to invoke arbitrary commands such as launching applications, universal spell-checking, translation and web search from any text field, google-maps integration, remote control, and search-based task switching. ENSO is programmed in Python. Thanks to being open sourced, this Windows native application is currently being ported to Mac and Linux.
560112
submission
TuringTest writes:
The code for ENSO, a keyboard-based command launcher in the line of Mac OS' Quicksilver, has been released under the revised BSD license. ENSO can be explained as an expanded application launcher that aims to combine the power of a command line interface integrated within a desktop GUI. It currently allows to invoke arbitrary commands such as launching applications, universal spell-checking, translation and web search from any text field, google-maps integration, remote control, and search-based task switching. ENSO is programmed in Python. Thanks to being open sourced, this Windows native application is currently being ported to Mac and Linux.
398333
submission
TuringTest writes:
Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, of international fame, recently sued the city of Bilbao (Spain) for violation of intellectual property after his Zubizuri bridge was modified by the city council to add a new footbridge on its side. Now a judge has sentenced against Calatrava saying that public right prevails over intellectual property. Altough the ruling acknowledges that the building design has intellectual property, it also concludes that a bridge is to walk on it. (Beware, some links are in Spanish. Translate at your own risk.)
44246
submission
TuringTest writes:
Jensen Harris, the Group Program Manager of the Microsoft Office User Experience Team, blogs about Microsoft's recent licensing agreement to share its new inteface IP:
"Today, we're announcing a licensing program for the 2007 Microsoft
Office system user interface which allows virtually anyone to obtain a
royalty-free license to use the new Office UI in a software product,
including the Ribbon, galleries, the Mini Toolbar, and the rest of the
user interface." (see the press release). Is there any precedent for this? Can Microsoft actually require
licensing of the UI? Is it enforceable? Is this a good precedent?
