September 4 - 3:40pm EDT   The latest entry in the browser wars is Google’s Chrome, an open source project with a special emphasis on speeding up JavaScript performance. Although a beta of the browser is only available for Windows (Mac and Linux versions are coming soon), the browser already promises a handful of features to separate it from its competitors. [full story]

September 2 - 3:55pm EDT   The last hurdle in Nokia's attempts to buy out the Symbian software firm and make it into an open source group has been passed, as Samsung accepted Nokia's offer to buy out its stake in Symbian, says a Tuesday report. Back in June, Nokia announced it would buy out the shares of the other shareholders for a total of $410 million and then make the Symbian cellular phone operating system open-source, making it available without royalties to members of the Symbian Foundation founded by Nokia. [full story]

August 26 - 4:00pm EDT   If you’re interested in writing a screenplay, a teleplay, or a stage play, you could use an ordinary word processor. Unfortunately, each script style requires different page margins and formatting conventions. You could take the time to define these formatting styles yourself, or you could just use a special scriptwriting program that does this for you automatically. Rather than pay $200 or more for a commercial screenwriting program, try the open source Celtx scriptwriter instead. [full story]

August 12 - 12:45am EDT   Android is allegedly closer to release than previously believed, according to one insider who foresees a September 17th, 2008 pre-order date. The news comes after many in the industry pushed the highly-anticipated Google-produced open source operating system back to 2009. T-Mobile is expected to see Android via the HTC Dream (G1), which will supposedly ship in white, brown, and black finishes, and will sport a 3G data connection. [full story]

July 17 - 8:25pm EDT   A development team at the University of Washington recently unveiled Adeona – named after the Roman goddess of safe returns – Open Source security software that parallels functionality of paid services such as LoJack. The dev team claims that the software is privacy-preserving, in that no one other than the owner of the device can track a stolen computer through Adeona. Users are merely required to install Adeona, and do not have to rely on a third-party service to track the device. [full story]

June 30 - 1:10pm EDT   For the past six years, a group of developers scattered across the globe has been quietly working to reinvent the way we watch movies and listen to music. The result is Boxee -- a media player based on the XBMC Open Source platform -- released in alpha form this month initially on the Mac. The developers says Boxee was born of frustration over what they saw as the somewhat clunky way computers gather and display content. Separate applications are needed to display photos or play music and movies, and content is often delivered in formats requiring proprietary media players. The ambitious end game for Boxee is to become the “one-size-fits-all” media center that works ... [full story]

June 23 - 12:05pm EDT   For years, Internet Explorer defined the standard for web browsers. After years of neglect and security flaws however, the browser grew less popular, prompting the release of a number of rivals. Perhaps the most successful competition has been the open source Firefox browser, which emphasizes security foremost. Now with version 3, the browser also boasts faster speed along with a host of other improvements. [full story]

June 17 - 1:20pm EDT   Though servers offering the software are currently buckling and inaccessible to many users, Firefox 3.0 on Tuesday has made its debut with the Mozilla organization looking to set a record for browser downloads. The major new release of the open source Web browser is available today in approximately 50 languages, and is purportedly three times faster than its predecessor, offering "15,000 improvements" including a smart location bar and malware protection. The new Firefox 3 smart location bar, dubbed "Awesome Bar" by Mozilla, adapts to user entries over time. The Firefox 3 Library archives browsing history, bookmarks, and tags, where they can be searched and organized. [full story]

June 17 - 3:30am EDT   OsiriX has released version 3.2 of its open-source medical and scientific imaging software, boasting improved performance and a host of new features. Based on the VTK, ITK and decmtk software development kits, OsiriX is fully natively compliant with the DICOM standard for medical images, as well as JPEG, TIFF PDF and AVI. In addition to an already extensive feature set, most notable developments in version 3.2 of the software include 80 percent faster rendering speed than previous versions and the return of 64-bit support on PowerPC G5-based systems. The full list of new features as documented in the release notes, is as follows: [full story]

June 16 - 10:25am EDT   TuneConnect 2.1 is a re-written revision of the open-source 'iTunes remote' software for Mac OS X. Written in 100 percent native code, Tuneconnect 2.1 uses a 'specially developed 'neural iTunes HTTP API' called Tunage to allow many different types of devices to share iTunes information, offering almost complete control of iTunes across a network. Version 2.1 of the web-based utility fixes some of the bugs that cropped up in the initial release and adds support for a small handful of the most-requested features from users. [full story]

June 3 - 7:15pm EDT   The WebKit development team on Tuesday unveiled a new JavaScript rendering engine called SquirrelFish for the open source browser, making the browser perform 1.6 times faster on the SunSpider benchmark. SquirrelFish is billed as a register-based, direct threaded, high-level bytecode engine with a sliding register window calling convention. The engine was designed around current theories and research progress performed by professors, and developers of the Lua programming language. [full story]

May 9 - 12:55pm EDT   Sun Microsystems on Friday introduced a new update for xVM VirtualBox, adding support for Mac OS X and Solaris, making it the first open sourcevirtual machine to support both operating systems. According to The Inquirer, Sun is offering both a free open source version which has no usage restrictions, as well as a free licensed version with more features for individual home users. Business customers are required to pay for licenses, should they want the full version. [full story]

April 25 - 12:35am EDT   The GRASS Development Team today unveiled GRASS GIS 6.3.0, a beta update to its popular geographic information system, adding hundreds of new module features, among other inclusions. The developers say that the version is merely the first step to a stable v6.4, and the impending v7.0. GRASS 6.3.0 introduces the wxPython user interface, the first change from the VAX 11/780 interface used since 1983. GRASS is open source, and is available from the project website. [full story]

March 8 - 4:40pm EST   Northern Softworks recently unveiled LockDown 1.0, its new software that allows users to encrypt their files and data. LockDown makes use of OpenSSL to provide six encryption ciphers, which the developer claims are "industrial strength". Users simply drag-and-drop their data onto the application, and LockDown can even function with the clipboard. Northern Softworks is currently selling Lockdown 1.0 for $10 from its website. [full story]

February 5 - 3:45pm EST   Hutchings Software today unveiled Bosco's Screen Share 3, an update to its free cross-platform screen sharing software, adding Universal Binary code and various improvements to the clients. In addition, a number of performance enhancements were made to both Mac and Windows clients. Bosco's screen share is designed to make setup and usage relatively simple; the author points out that most open source screen sharing utilities require complex setup. Hutchings Software is currently distributing Bosco's Screen Share 3 for free from its website. [full story]