Posts published by “Christine Hall”

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

Five FOSS Wishes for the New Year

By Christine Hall on December 23, 2015 |

Gaming, Hardware, Operating Systems and Software

It’s almost Christmas, which means that the day isn’t far off when ol’ Father Time rolls the odometer over yet again. This, of course, is the time of year when news writers like to publish lists, partly because they’re easier to write than real news stories. It’s not that we’re lazy, mind you, we’re just too busy shopping and decorating and drinking egg nog…especially drinking egg nog. We love drinking egg nog.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Turn a WebP Graphic File Into Something Useful on Linux

By Christine Hall on December 20, 2015 |

Browsers, Internet and Tutorial

Like it or not, Google’s open source WebP image format is here to stay. At this point, the only thing holding back widespread adoption on the Internet is browser support. At present, the format is supported in Chrome, Opera, Opera Mini, Android Browser and Chrome for Android. However, with the folks at Mozilla working fast and furious to improve the Firefox experience in hopes of giving Chrome some competition, you can bet that Firefox support for WebP will be coming soon. When that happens, the two other major holdouts, Internet Explorer (now Microsoft Edge) and Safari, will be sure to follow suit.

When all browsers are on board, it’s certain that high traffic websites will adopt WebP as their graphics format of choice. Google is already converting most if not all graphics uploaded to Google+ to WebP to deliver to browsers supporting the format.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Linux Foundation’s Deal With the Devil

By Christine Hall on December 14, 2015 |

Admin, Business, Community and Operating Systems

Last week when Microsoft and the Linux Foundation separately announced a partnership that would see Redmond issuing a Linux certification called Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate Linux (MCSA), Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols felt the need to add the words “not a typo” to the headline of his coverage on ZDNet. A couple of days later, when the story made the pages of The Register the headline included, “Do not adjust your set. This is not an error.”

We were just as surprised here at FOSS Force, and Larry Cafiero pulled no punches when breaking the story in Friday’s Week in Review. “There’s the argument that because Microsoft ‘loves’ Linux…we should be more inclusive,” he wrote, “but this is the company that considered Linux a cancer and has fought FOSS for decades. Rather than throw the Microsoft that is treading water a life preserver, I still think throwing it an anchor would be more fitting.”

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Google’s ‘Inbox’: Should Privacy Advocates Be Concerned?

By Christine Hall on December 7, 2015 |

Internet, Mobile and News

Google is getting ready to migrate all Gmail users to Inbox, which should be something of a concern for those worried about privacy, but no one seems to be noticing. The current efforts seem to be directed at users of the Gmail mobile app, but it’s my guess that desktop users of Gmail will be getting be getting the same treatment soon.

Except for those using a free version of Android such as Replicant, and who install apps from free and open software sources such as F-Droid or Fossdroid, the protection of privacy on mobile devices, by design, is hopeless. Users have come to accept that most apps from Google’s store demand a whole slew of privileges whether they need them or not, and even when not being used, many apps happily go about the business of collecting and reporting everything they’re permitted to find out about us.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Thunderbird up for Adoption

By Christine Hall on December 2, 2015 |

Business, News, Polls and Software

Thunderbird logo Mozilla wants to shed itself of Thunderbird, its popular cross platform email client. Although widely used on GNU/Linux, OS X and on Windows, the organization now seems to pretty much view it as a liability.

According to Mozilla executive chairperson Mitchell Baker in a company-wide memo written Monday and widely published online, the Thunderbird project is now seen as a “tax” by Mozilla because it distracts and takes time away from the organization’s software engineers.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

$89 Symple PC Project Evidently Dead

$89 Symple PC Project Evidently Dead

By Christine Hall on November 30, 2015 |

Business, Hardware and News

Phoenix based Symple PC, which offered refurbished “web workstations” running Ubuntu for $89, has evidently ridden off into the night of no return. Since at least August 24, the company’s website has said the product is “No Longer Availabe,” although the website remains operational. Numerous attempts to contact the company for clarification have gone unanswered.

The venture was the brainchild of Jason Spisak, whose history with Linux and FOSS goes back to being the co-founder and marketing director Lycoris, which made news in 2003 when Walmart offered the Linux distro preinstalled on $199 PCs. FOSS Force first told you about the Symple PC back in March, not long after the company’s official launch.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Dell, Comcast, Intel & Who Knows Who Else Are Out to Get You

By Christine Hall on November 26, 2015 |

Hardware, News and Security

You might be excused for thinking that every tech company is out to get you, especially if you still use Windows, which we like to think of as “yesterday’s operating system.”

We’ll start with the poor Windows user.

News came out on Tuesday that since August Dell computers have been coming out-of-the-box with a root certificate preinstalled that is an “unintended security vulnerability.” The source of the quote, by the way, is Dell itself.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Patreon Hack: Users Now Receiving Threatening Emails

By Christine Hall on November 21, 2015 |

News and Security

Members of the popular Patreon crowdfunding site for makers and artists who had accounts that were open before the beginning of October are now receiving threatening emails demanding payment of one Bitcoin (about $325 U.S) or else personal information such as Social Security number, tax id, tax forms, name, address, and credit card details will be made public.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Using Paris Attacks as Excuse to Expand Domestic Spying

Using Paris Attacks as Excuse to Expand Domestic Spying

By Christine Hall on November 19, 2015 |

News and Politics

It’s no surprise that Friday’s Paris attacks are already being used to push for both more and continued surveillance here in the U.S.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler was on Capitol Hill on Tuesday speaking before a House subcommittee, making the case for expanding the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) which compelled telecom companies, Internet providers and some VoIP services to make their networks easier for law enforcement to access. Wheeler would like Congress to consider expanding the scope of the law to include devices such as gaming platforms, which now have capabilities that go beyond mere gaming.

“You read in the press that [the Paris attackers] were using PlayStation 4 games to communicate on,” Wheeler told the subcommittee, “which is outside the scope of anything considered in CALEA, so there’s probably opportunities to update the ‘lawful intercept’ concept.”

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Debian Live Dead, Linux Ransomware & More…

By Christine Hall on November 13, 2015 |

Distros, Internet, News, Security and Web Apps

FOSS Week in Review

Larry’s away today, hiding beneath his tinfoil hat and hoping to escape the ravishes of Friday the thirteenth, so I was volunteered to write this week’s review. Sorry. Larry will return next week.

G’bye Debian Live: By now you’ve probably heard the news that evidently the Debian Live project is no more. This according to the project’s leader, Daniel Baumann, who posted An Abrupt End to Debian Live on the Debian website on Monday. According to him, the project was “hijacked by the Debian-cd and the Debian-installer teams.”

Reading the post, you might be excused for thinking it’s not all wine and roses over in Debian-land. “Debian can be great,” Baumann wrote. “But depending on who you are, where you come from, and who your friends are, Debian can also be hateful and full of deceit.”

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Six WordPress Plugins Vulnerable

By Christine Hall on November 12, 2015 |

News, Security and Web Apps

In the same week that we learned from W3Techs that the popular open source content management system (CMS) WordPress now powers a full 25 percent of all sites on the web, we learn that six popular WordPress plugins contain serious security vulnerabilities. The later news comes to us by way of security firm Wordfence, which specializes in WordPress security and develops the Wordfence security plugin for the platform.

This news isn’t surprising, nor is it cause for alarm. Because WordPress is by far the most popular content management platform on the web, it’s an obvious target for hackers, and third party plugins are the most obvious way inside. However, the folks at Automattic, which develops the platform, have proven themselves to be diligent at finding vulnerabilities and keeping them patched.