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

Surprise! Microsoft Ending Free Upgrades to Windows 10

By Christine Hall on May 9, 2016 |

Business, News and Operating Systems

Surprise! Microsoft Ending Free Upgrades to Windows 10

Microsoft announced on Thursday that the end-of-life is coming soon to its free upgrade-to-Windows 10 scheme. Afterwards, the operating system won’t be cheap.

Just because Steve Ballmer is no longer at the helm in Redmond doesn’t mean Microsoft doesn’t go completely bonkers on occasion. On Thursday, the company announced in a blog that free upgrades to Windows 10 are coming to an end.

While this is a totally expected move — Microsoft always said the free upgrades were for a limited time — it’s not going to happen the way many had anticipated, or in a way that would make sense in today’s market. There’s not going to be a pay-as-you-go subscription model, nor is Windows 10 going to be offered at “attractive” prices. Instead, it’s going to be the same old game. Despite all the talk we’ve heard from Redmond about how Windows in no longer the backbone of the company, the operating system is evidently still seen as a cash cow to be milked for more than it’s worth.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Toronto Getting a Free Meshnet, Six New Distro Releases & More…

By Christine Hall on May 6, 2016 |

Community, Distros, News and Software

FOSS Week in Review

Also: We hear more from DuckDuckGo about its open source donations and welcome Robin “Roblimo” Miller to the FOSS Force team.

While the big news in FOSS media this week was the Ubuntu Online Summit, I wasn’t there. Too far to travel. However, the big news seems to be that Mir and Unity 8 won’t be the defaults when Canonical ships Ubuntu 16.10 on October 20, although both “will be available as an ‘alternative session,’” according to OMG! Ubuntu! Ho-hum. Now on to some real FOSS news…

The most interesting story this week, to me at least, was a report by Motherboard on efforts underway to bring a free encrypted mesh network to Toronto. A mesh network relies on a series of wireless nodes which only need to be connected to the Internet at a single point. The plan is the brainchild of two local developers, Mark Iantorno and Benedict Lau, who plan to deploy Raspberry Pis as nodes. Meshnets already exist in Barcelona, Berlin, and New York City.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Rule 41: Getting Around the Constitution and Having It Too

By Christine Hall on May 4, 2016 |

Politics and Security

You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to understand what’s wrong with the proposed federal court updates to Rule 41.

Anyone who’s even halfway following the news of the proposed updates to Rule 41 probably can’t help but be struck by the irony of the situation. It’s actually humorous, in a Vonnegutian tragicomic sort of way.

In case you haven’t been following the news, the proposed changes from the advisory committee on criminal rules for the Judicial Conference of the United States would update Rule 41 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and broadly expand law enforcement’s legal authority when it comes to hacking and surveillance. The Supreme Court has already passed the proposal to Congress, which must disavow the changes by December 1 or it becomes the governing rule for every federal court in the country.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

DuckDuckGo Gives $225,000 to Open Source Projects

By Christine Hall on May 4, 2016 |

Community, News and Software

DuckDuckGo, “the search engine that doesn’t track you,” involves its users in the selection process as it hands out nine $25,000 awards to mostly FOSS projects.

It appears as if people have been using DuckDuckGo’s privacy centered search enough to make the company successful. Certainly not we-control-the-world successful like Google, but successful enough to give it some cash-on-hand breathing room. Also successful enough for the company to give back to the community by handing out $225,000 to some free and open source projects.

This isn’t the first time they’ve done this. Last year they handed out $125,000 to five projects — meaning that this year they’ve nearly doubled down on their bet. Last year’s donations included money going to the Electronic Frontier Foundations Privacy Badger — a browser add-on that stops advertisers and other trackers from following users — and Girl Develop It for its Open Source Mentorship program.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

A Down and Dirty Look at Xubuntu 16.04

A Down and Dirty Look at Xubuntu 16.04

By Christine Hall on May 2, 2016 |

Distros, Operating Systems and Reviews

In our look at Xubuntu 16.04, we find it to be stable, quick and intuitive. It’s a distro that makes our short list of recommendations for those wishing to move from Windows to GNU/Linux.

For a look at Ubuntu’s new LTS release, 16.04 or Xenial Xerus, I decided to forgo “Ubuntu prime” in favor of one of the officially sanctioned “baby *buntus,” choosing Xubuntu, the distro’s Xfce implementation. We use Xfce on Mint on nearly all of the computers here at FOSS Force’s office, so I figured this would put me in familiar territory, especially since Mint is also a Ubuntu based distro.

Xubuntu 16.04 default — Xubuntu 16.04 out-of-the-box.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

RMS Gets Award, OwnCloud Founder Resigns & More…

RMS Gets Award, OwnCloud Founder Resigns & More…

By Christine Hall on April 29, 2016 |

Community, Distros, News, Software and Web Apps

FOSS Week in Review

Also: Ubuntu gets ready for Yakkety Yak (don’t talk back), Tails has a new release with an updated TOR browser and Android apps are coming to a Chromebook near you.

Here in the Tar Heel State, MerleFest, featuring performances by John Prine and John Oates sans Daryl Hall, dominates the news. That’s mainly because there are no college hoops being played now that this year’s NCAA March Madness thing has been entered into the record books.

There’s not much talk about this year’s NCAA tourney around here anymore, as “we’re number two” just doesn’t have the proper ring to it. So we talk about other things instead, with how fast the grass is growing topping most people’s list and MerleFest a close second.

Me? I talk about FOSS, and there’s plenty to talk about this week…

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Mozilla a Step Closer to Thunderbird Decision

By Christine Hall on April 26, 2016 |

News and Software

The Mozilla Foundation has hired Simon Phipps to examine and evaluate options for the Thunderbird desktop client, which is seeking a new home. His initial report was made public on Monday.

On Monday, Mozilla’s executive director Mark Surman posted an update on Mozilla’s efforts to find a new home for its Thunderbird email client on his personal blog. In early December, Mozilla announced that it wanted to shed itself of Thunderbird, a project that’s been associated with Mozilla since the start of the foundation.

In a nutshell, the Mozilla Foundation finds that continuing to maintain and development Thunderbird distracts from its current focus of getting Firefox back on track. Thunderbird is a huge project, requiring much in the way of resources, but has a user base that’s been in decline since 2012, as many users are turning away from desktop email clients in favor of web based email services.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Running Windows on System76

Running Windows on System76

By Christine Hall on April 25, 2016 |

Hardware and Operating Systems

System76 is known throughout the world as one of the few companies exclusively selling new PCs and laptops preinstalled with GNU/Linux. The question is, will they run Windows?

Some things are so counterintuitive that they seem just plain wrong, like a crime against natural order. Things like running Windows on a System76 machine, which is something that would never have occurred to me to do, not even if it was the only computer available and I absolutely had to boot into Windows. It would be like putting ketchup on a delicately seasoned and perfectly grilled spencer steak.

It’s something I would never do, and yet, I am responsible.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Microsoft’s Becoming the New, but Successful, Novell

Microsoft’s Becoming the New, but Successful, Novell

By Christine Hall on April 22, 2016 |

Business and Operating Systems

If there was ever a time to make the distinction between OSS and FOSS, it is now. Microsoft may be the largest open source company on the planet, but it will never be a FOSS company.

It was only a couple of years ago that the FOSS world was proclaiming that Microsoft was a dead company walking. The king was dead. Sales of new Windows releases were flat and Android was seriously kicking its butt in the mobile marketplace. FOSSers were sure they wouldn’t have Redmond to kick around for much longer.

Times have changed. Android is still winning on mobile, but other than that, Microsoft is back on track and is maybe more secure than ever. That’s not good for FOSS.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

JavaZone Sells Open Source in TV Parodies

By Christine Hall on April 22, 2016 |

Humor and Video

The Video Screening Room

This movie trailer spoof sells a movie that’s definitely not coming soon to a theater near you. If it were, however, you can bet your booty it’d be released under a Creative Commons license.

When I found out that I was going to have the opportunity to substitute for Phil Shapiro for today’s video column, I jumped at the chance. Why? Because I want to share with you one of the great TV parodies that the JavaZone conference produces each year.

In case you don’t know, since its beginning fifteen years ago, JavaZone has grown to be the largest independent conference for Java developers on the planet. The conference is held each year in Oslo, Norway, with this year’s event scheduled for September 7-8.

You don’t have to be a big Java fan to really like these folks, for they are 100 percent — that means totally for those of you who have trouble with numbers — behind open source. For the past six years or so, they’ve produced annual video parodies of popular television shows, which over time have become increasingly lavish productions.

Christine Hall

FOSSForce.com

Open Source Summit Japan 2025

Black Hat Europe

Everything Open 2026

FOSDEM ’26

SCaLE 23X

Posts published by “Christine Hall”

Surprise! Microsoft Ending Free Upgrades to Windows 10

Microsoft announced on Thursday that the end-of-life is coming soon to its free upgrade-to-Windows 10 scheme. Afterwards, the operating system won’t be cheap.

Toronto Getting a Free Meshnet, Six New Distro Releases & More…

FOSS Week in Review

Also: We hear more from DuckDuckGo about its open source donations and welcome Robin “Roblimo” Miller to the FOSS Force team.

Rule 41: Getting Around the Constitution and Having It Too

You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to understand what’s wrong with the proposed federal court updates to Rule 41.

DuckDuckGo Gives $225,000 to Open Source Projects

DuckDuckGo, “the search engine that doesn’t track you,” involves its users in the selection process as it hands out nine $25,000 awards to mostly FOSS projects.

A Down and Dirty Look at Xubuntu 16.04

In our look at Xubuntu 16.04, we find it to be stable, quick and intuitive. It’s a distro that makes our short list of recommendations for those wishing to move from Windows to GNU/Linux.

RMS Gets Award, OwnCloud Founder Resigns & More…

FOSS Week in Review

Also: Ubuntu gets ready for Yakkety Yak (don’t talk back), Tails has a new release with an updated TOR browser and Android apps are coming to a Chromebook near you.

Mozilla a Step Closer to Thunderbird Decision

The Mozilla Foundation has hired Simon Phipps to examine and evaluate options for the Thunderbird desktop client, which is seeking a new home. His initial report was made public on Monday.

Running Windows on System76

System76 is known throughout the world as one of the few companies exclusively selling new PCs and laptops preinstalled with GNU/Linux. The question is, will they run Windows?

Microsoft’s Becoming the New, but Successful, Novell

If there was ever a time to make the distinction between OSS and FOSS, it is now. Microsoft may be the largest open source company on the planet, but it will never be a FOSS company.

JavaZone Sells Open Source in TV Parodies

The Video Screening Room

This movie trailer spoof sells a movie that’s definitely not coming soon to a theater near you. If it were, however, you can bet your booty it’d be released under a Creative Commons license.