Oracle extends Linux support to 10 years
Oracle has reaffirmed that it's in the Linux business to stay by extending the support lifecycle of its own-brand build to ten years, and tempting Red Hat users with a trial offer of its Ksplice patching system.
While the extended lifecycle may provide enough reassurance to win over a few customers, Oracle hopes the 30-day free trial of Ksplice for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 (release 5.4 on) and Linux 6 users will prove more of an enticement. Ksplice, which Oracle bought last year, allows Linux kernel patching without the tiresome necessity of a reboot. Oracle Linux Premier Support customers will now get Ksplice as a standard part of their packages, and Fedora and Ubuntu Linux users get it for free. Read more...
Google adds Do Not Track button to Chrome
Google's Chrome browser has added a Do Not Track option that will prevent websites using your browser history to target ads at you.
Pioneered by Mozilla Firefox, the Do Not Track convention adds a field in the HTTP header of each web page instructing websites not to take info about you from your browser. Commonly used to prevent overly personal targeted ads, Do Not Track also stops web visitors having their data picked through by websites' social features and analytics engines. Microsoft claims that Internet Explorer doesn't track its users and Do not Track is an option in Safari. Read more...
Obama online privacy plan faces challenge
Privacy advocates Thursday welcomed a White House privacy plan that would give consumers more control over how personal data is collected, used, stored and shared by websites and online advertisers.
In a 60-page Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights released today, the Obama Administration spelled out a series of proposals aimed at getting various Internet stakeholders to develop baseline codes of conduct for handling consumer data.
The document makes it clear that the Administration will work with Congress to enact legislation that would implement the codes of conduct.
But the larger focus of the plan is to get Internet companies, privacy and consumer advocacy groups, state attorneys general, law enforcement agencies and academicians to jointly develop voluntary standards for ensuring the security of consumer data. Read more...
HP caught with SIX Windows 8 PC packages up its sleeve
Windows 8 is being re-packaged into six versions in a move that looks like it might kill off four editions of the desktop client currently sold.
Documents posted on PC-partner Hewlett-Packard’s website here and picked up here say Windows 8 will come as a Windows 8 32- and 64-bit Edition, and an Enterprise and Professional Edition – both in 32-and 64-bit flavors.
It’s not clear, based on these documents, whether these are all the SKUs Microsoft has planned for the forthcoming Windows 8 or whether these are just the versions of Windows 8 that will be available on machines sold by HP.
If this is everything, then it’s almost certainly the end of Windows 7 Ultimate at the high end and also of Windows 7 Home Premium and Home Basic. Read more...
Chinese court rejects injunction to stop iPad sales at Apple stores
A request for a legal injunction that would have forced Apple to halt iPad sales in its Shanghai stores has been rejected, giving the U.S. tech giant a small victory as it faces an ongoing trademark dispute in China over the iPad name.
A Shanghai court said in a statement on Thursday that it would not grant the injunction requested by Chinese company Proview, which acquired the iPad trademark in 2001 and is fighting with Apple over its ownership. The court said it would postpone further hearings until a ruling was made in another Chinese court, where ownership of the trademark is expected to be decided. Read more...
Carrier Ethernet 2.0 soups up service delivery for the cloud
Ethernet creator and former InfoWorld columnist Bob Metcalfe this week announced Carrier Ethernet (CE) 2.0, representing an array of advances to the networking technology that will be a boon for both service providers and customers in an increasingly cloud-based, service-oriented world.
The idea behind CE 2.0 is to make the delivery of Internet-based services faster, more reliable, more predictable, and less expensive, thanks to support for multiple classes of services, increased interconnectivity, and superior management capabilities. In a nutshell, whereas CE 1.0 was geared toward delivering standardized Ethernet services over a single provider network, CE 2.0 aims to deliver multiple classes of service and manageability over interconnected networks. Read more...
Quad-core smartphones and tablets will soon get LTE
Nvidia has partnered with modem chipmakers GCT Semiconductor and Renesas Mobile to make it easier to build LTE (Long-Term Evolution) smartphones and tablets using its quad-core Tegra 3 processor, the company said on Thursday.
The companies' plan to jointly develop and support the modems will make it possible for phone manufacturers to speed the process of developing and building Tegra 3 devices for LTE networks, Nvidia said in a blog post.
The addition of LTE will result in "even better multiplayer gaming options, lightning-fast web browsing, and supercharged app downloads," according to Nvidia. Read more...
Dell buys AppAssure for software backup
Dell said Friday it has purchased backup software vendor AppAssure, in the first of an expected run of acquisitions following Dell's appointment of former CA CEO John Swainson as head of a new software division.
Analysts have predicted that Swainson, a veteran IBM executive and former CEO of CA Technologies, will build out Dell's software portfolio with a focus on system management and cloud services, and the AppAssure deal seems to fit that profile. Read more...
Tumblr bans anorexia, bulimia and other self-harm
Tumblr has been known to struggle with an overwhelming amount of content which promotes or glorifies many forms of self-harm including — though unfortunately not limited to — eating disorders, self-mutilation and even suicide. Now the micro-blogging service's staff has made the decision to fight this phenomenon by officially prohibiting blogs "that actively promote self-harm."
An announcement on the official Tumblr staff blog explains that the decision to revise the service's content policy is not being taken lightly as its staff is "deeply committed to supporting and defending [its] users’ freedom of speech." But as a company, those folks have decided that certain and specific types of content — including spam and identity theft — "aren't welcome on Tumblr." Read more...
Strategy Analytics: Nokia became the world’s biggest Windows Phone vendor in Q4
A new report by research firm Strategy Analytics has revealed that Finnish mobile manufacturer Nokia became the world’s biggest Windows Phone vendor in the fourth quarter, as global shipments grew 36% to top 2.7 million units.
Accounting for almost a third of all Windows Phone shipments (33.1%), Nokia captured the top position for the first time in its history — replacing Taiwanese vendor HTC — helped by sales of its Lumia 800 and Lumia 710 smartphones which both launched in November 2011.
Strategy Analytics puts Nokia’s global Windows Phone shipments at around 0.9 million units, although the company itself announced that it had sold over 1 million units in its fourth quarter financial report. Read more...