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The openSUSE Project is proud to announce the 1.0 release of the openSUSE Build Service. The 1.0 release provides all the features necessary to support building openSUSE in the public build systems and allowing direct contributions to openSUSE from all contributors. Developers can now submit contributions to openSUSE directly at build.opensuse.org.

The openSUSE Build Service allows developers to create and maintain packages for openSUSE and many other Linux distributions, including CentOS, Debian, Fedora, Mandriva, Red Hat, and Ubuntu. With the 1.0 release, the openSUSE Build Service expands its scope to building the entire openSUSE release, and provides everyone with the same access and transparent interface to work on the openSUSE distribution.

The openSUSE Build Service has offered a simple collaboration system since its inception for groups to work closely together on packages or solutions stacks. The 1.0 release improves on existing functionality to allow the Build Service to scale to larger projects like openSUSE’s Factory distribution, and to allow building openSUSE’s stable releases in the open.

What the changes mean for contributors:

• Anyone can find a package’s working copy as maintained by the official packager or packaging team. Contributors can submit changes against the working copy.
• The submission handling and notification system has been put in place, allowing any contributor to request a merge of their changes to a project.
• Quality assurance happens before contributions are merged. Test builds of a suggested change are accessible to anyone.
• Improved branch handling. It is easy to set up a branch of a package. The branch will build in the same way as the original package, but can be modified.
• Source handling is improved in 1.0. It’s now possible to easily maintain a branch, and modifications are stored without creating a full copy. This makes it easier to maintain features based on the latest copy of package. The Build Service builds the latest packages, including modifications, automatically.

The majority of this functionality is implemented on the server side. The rest can be implemented by the various Build Service clients, so that contributors can take advantage of the new features.

The Build Service team has also introduced a number of smaller improvements and bugfixes to make the system more scalable and usable.

The openSUSE Build Service is now considered “feature complete” for collaboration. The Build Service team is looking for additional feedback on improving the openSUSE Build Service as it will now be the standard tool for working on the distribution.

Article By: SuSEBlog

Another one of those days that I look forward to …. yes, openSUSE 11.0 has been officially released.

“Looking at the list of Top500 supercomputers, we find that 20 of the top 50 run SUSE Linux. This ratio extends to the entire Top500 – around 40% run SUSE.”

If you have never heard of this distro, as is now known as Mercedes-Benz of Linux, openSUSE originated in 2005, with Novell’s decision to begin developing the existing Suse Linux Professional product in collaboration with external developers, including bringing the community into the beta-testing process. Previously all development had been done in-house.

A lot has changed since openSUSE 10.3, and a lot of work has gone into improving openSUSE. In this release you’ll find updated versions of almost every program, a vastly improved installer, faster and easier package management, and much more. Features added to OpenSuse 11.0 since version 10.3, the latest stable version, include Linux kernel 2.6.25, Xen 3.2 virtualisation, windowing engine X.Org 7.3.

openSUSE 11.0 includes two branches of KDE — the KDE 3.5.x series, which is the stable and older KDE series that many openSUSE users are already familiar with, and the cutting edge KDE4. GNOME users will find a lot to like in openSUSE 11.0. openSUSE’s GNOME is very close to upstream GNOME, because Novell and openSUSE want to do as much work as possible in the upstream release. OpenOffice.org 2.4 provides openSUSE users with a top-notch office suite with a word processor (Writer), spreadsheet (Calc), presentation tool (Impress), and drawing software (Draw). Here’s some of the improvements you’ll see in openSUSE 11.0:

• Rewritten installer that makes installation even easier
• Faster and easier package management
• Easier system updates with PackageKit
• Easier 3-D effects with Compi z-Fusion and CCSM
• KDE 4 - The next generation KDE Desktop
• GNOME 2.22 - Latest and greatest GNOME release
• Firefox 3.0 - openSUSE ships with Firefox 3.0 beta 5, will update to 3.0 final
• OpenOffice.org 2.4 - Latest OpenOffice.org, with dozens of improvments and new features, including better VBA support, 3-D transitions in Impress, and import support for Microsoft Office 2007 document formats.
• Banshee 1.0 - Major update to Novell-sponsored multimedia application.
• Tasque - Simple and elegant to-do application.
• NetworkManager 0.7 - Cutting edge release of NetworkManager, which includes support for EV-DO/UMTS cards.
• PulseAudio - Better sound management in GNOME.
• Linux kernel 2.6.25 - Most recent major release of the Linux kernel
• Nearly every application has been updated since 10.3
• More than 200 new features specific to openSUSE

It’s now easy to enable and configure Compiz in KDE and GNOME, using Simple CCSM, which is labeled Desktop Effects in the main menu. Using the Simple CCSM dialog you can enable/disable Compiz, and change some of the more prominent Compiz features without getting deep into all of the functionality of Compiz. From here you can choose effects profiles which vary from lightweight profiles with a few effects to more comprehensive sets of effects which may have a more marked effect on performance. More advanced users may want to delve deep into Compiz functionality with the CompizConfig Settings Manager (ccsm), which is also part of openSUSE 11.0’s default package set.

Check out the list of more than 200 new features specific to openSUSE.

Users have two options for installation — the live CDs, which feature a simplified installer that doesn’t require the user to make any decisions about package selection, and the openSUSE DVDs, which allow users to choose their desktop (including KDE 3.5 and Xfce, or no desktop at all) and other packages not included on the live CDs.

LiveCD Installer

DVD Installer

KDE 4.0.x Desktop

KDE 3.5.x Desktop

Gnome 2.22 Desktop

Wine with its monumental 1.0 release

Download openSUSE 10.3:

To install from the DVD, see openSUSE 11.0 DVD Installation. For live CDs, see openSUSE 11.0 Live-CD Installation. As usually I recommend, use torrents so not to overload ftp servers.

Download: Software.opensuse.org
Buy it: http://en.opensuse.org/Buy_openSUSE

Instructions are available as follows:

Installation from DVD/CD:

Official openSUSE 11.0 Start-Up guide
Step-by-step installation guide

Network Installation:

Internet Installation

Don’t forget to check out the openSUSE-Community.org website … a great place for information.

To get help, provide any feedback, ask questions, or get involved and help contribute to the openSUSE distribution, please communicate. There are several ways to get in touch with the openSUSE community, including:

• IRC: #opensuse on irc.freenode.net
• Discussion Forums: newly launched openSUSE Forum
• Mailing Lists: in particular, the opensuse@opensuse.org (subscribe) is available for all support questions. For additional help with subscribing, check here
• For other ways such as Jabber and Usenet, see the Communicate page.

If you find a bug report it http://bugzilla.novell.com and will help openSUSE mature more.

Expect posts on openSUSE from me. If you have some questions, or topics that you would like me to cover, regarding 11.0, let me know and I’ll see if I can.

A huge thanks to all those involved in the release, particularly all the community contributors, for making this an excellent openSUSE release!

Read the following to get yourself introduced to 11.0:

• openSUSE 11.0: Installing ATI and nVidia Video Drivers
• OpenSUSE 11 a redemptive OS with a Mactastic shine

Article By: E@zyVG

Free and open source full-stack enterprise framework for agile development of secure database-driven web-based applications, written and programmable in Python.

• No installation, no configuration, no dependencies. All in one package. You can run it off a USB drive
• Runs on Windows, OSX, Unix/Linux, and Windows CE phones.
• Allows development, debugging, testing, deployment, maintenance and administration, including database administration, via the provided web interface.
• Enforces good Software Engineer practices, like the Model-View-Controller design, validation and self-submission of forms.
• Strong on security. Prevents the most common types of vulnerabilities: Cross Site Scripting, Injection Flaws, and Malicious File Execution.
• Talks HTML, XML, RSS, ATOM, AJAX, JSON, RTF, CSV, WIKI, XML-RPC, REST, Flash, etc.
• Dynamically and transparently generates SQL queries for you for SQLite, MySQL, PostgreSQL and Oracle. Even creates and alters tables for you when required. Performs automatic transactions.
• Allows you to create apps easily, byte-code compile them, and distribute them in open or closed source under any license you like.
• Faster then the competition, designed for small as well as large projects, includes the ability to upload/download/stream large files, internationalization support, distributed transactions, …

Get it here

Spicebird was created by a group called Synovel Technologies, “an opensource technology startup based in Hyderabad, India. They develop and contribute to Free and Open Source applications, especially in the enterprise communication and collaboration space.”

Spicebird is a collection of contact and collaboration tools, including Chat, Email, Calendar, Tasks and Contacts. What’s nice about the integrative approach to these tools is that, for example, you can check on a contact, and not only do you get basic contact information, you also see your contact’s online status, so you can IM this user via the built-in Chat window, or contact him via Jabber, if you choose. The application is built on top of mozilla Thunderbird, Sunbird, Xmpp4moz and adds more features and integration. The extensibility of the mozilla platform makes adding new tools and customization of the suite easy. Spicebird has a long road ahead to become a comprehensive communications suite.

Check out the Video Demo of the product.

Article By: E@zyVG

Redbook allows you to log your daily activities during the day and comes with a great reporting function.

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rush is a replacement for the unix shell (bash, zsh, etc) which uses pure Ruby syntax. Grep through files, find and kill processes, copy files - everything you do in the shell, now in Ruby.

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I will be back to posting after this weekends Linux Expo here in Los Angleses, CA. Sorry for the long wait…

Hello,

I came across this site of all kinds of the greatest open-source  software while browsing Linux & Open Source Blog. Please check it out. I’ll be adding it to my links page. This is my last post for the year 2007 and I hope all of you Happy Holidays and Happy New Year!.

I was browsing the net for a decent way to configure Apache and Rails and came across this article. I hope all you Ruby developers enjoy this…

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