Wednesday, October 20, 2004

Novell Expands GNOME, KDE Choices for Linux Desktop - "At Gartner Inc.'s Symposium/ITxpo, eWEEK.com got a sneak peek of Novell Inc.'s forthcoming Linux Desktop. According to company officials, the anticipated software package may arrive sooner than expected and offer customers a choice of looks and feels. Contrary to earlier reports, the Waltham, Mass.-based Novell has changed its plans and will not release a "best of breed" Linux desktop that combines the best features from the GNOME and KDE environments, said Ted Haeger, the Linux Desktop's director of marketing. Instead, users will be offered an option for either KDE or GNOME during the installation process. " 3:01:51 PM

Welcome Ubuntu!. Today's the official release date of Ubuntu Linux, the most exciting development in Linux distributions since Fedora. [O'Reilly Weblogs] 1:57:47 PM

Microsoft Extends IM, VOIP with Istanbul. At the VON Conference in Boston, Microsoft introduced an early beta of "Istanbul," a next generation messaging client that will integrate with Live Communications Server 2005. Istanbul not only enables IM, VOIP, video and Web conferencing, but also works with current PBX telephony systems. [BetaNews.Com] 11:25:59 AM

Which VNC Software Is Best? Which VNC Software Is Best? Posted by timothy on Tuesday October 19, @10:08PM from the connect-the-dots dept. Futurepower(R) writes "Which VNC software do you think is best, and why? There are several free programs, for example, TightVNC, RealVNC, UltraVNC, and TridiaVNC. Or, is it better to pay for VNC software, like Tridia VNC Pro or Radmin? Which is fastest, most secure, and the least hassle? Which has video resolution scaling of the remote desktop?" [Slashdot:] 11:24:56 AM

Howie The Chatterbot 0.6.0. Howie is an artificial intelligence agent with a natural language interface (a "chatterbot"). It is designed to be simple to install, configure, and extend. The emphasis is less on simulating a human conversation, and more on providing a "virtual assistant" which provides useful services to visitors through a natural, conversational interface. [freshmeat.net] 11:22:30 AM

OpenOffice.org's integrated development environment. An integrated development environment (IDE) is a set of programming tools used to facilitate the creation of software. OpenOffice.org includes a very capable IDE with tools that run, edit, and find errors in your macros. It is worth the time to become familiar with its features. The central display area where macro code is listed is the editor window. Many of the features, such as Stop, Breakpoint, Single Step, and the Watch pane serve as a simple yet effective debugger for macro code. [NewsForge] 11:15:45 AM

Microsoft to Debut 'Istanbul' Application (AP). AP - Microsoft Corp. introduced on Tuesday a desktop computer application that aims to seamlessly integrate e-mail, instant messaging, video conferencing, traditional phone service and Internet-based calling. [Yahoo! News: Technology] 11:13:37 AM