opensource

Android hackers are working overtime to bring Ice Cream Sandwich into the real world, and early fruits of their labor are starting to emerge--if you have the right phone.

The CyanogenMod project to build unofficial versions of Android is working on CM9, the version based on the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich source code from Google. Early CM9 buildsare available in alpha for the Samsung Nexus S and beta for the Samsung Galaxy S.

"CyanogenMod 9 Alpha 11 for Nexus S is definitely worth checking out," programmer Koushik "Koush" Dutta said on Google+ yesterday. And … Read more

Running a newly released version of Windows or Mac OS X on a 3-year-old personal computer is an unremarkable feat.

But it's a lot more difficult in the smartphone world, where hardware and software have been changing at a breakneck pace. That's why I recommend watching this brief demonstration of Ice Cream Sandwich, aka Android 4.0, on the first-generation Android phone, the T-Mobile G1 from October 2008.

XDA Developers forum member jcarrz1 posted the video and an alpha version of his OS build yesterday, nine days after Google released the Ice Cream Sandwich source code.

As you may expect, the new OS drags on the comparatively ancient hardware, with slow app launches and long lags between a touch action and the phone's response. But all the ICS apps work.

What doesn't work at this stage, jcarrz1 said: Wi-Fi networking, Bluetooth, and screen rotation. … Read more

Growl, a widely used open-source notification tool that lets Mac OS X applications tell users about events such as incoming instant messages, is no longer free.

And not everybody is happy about that.

Starting with version 1.3, Growl became a $1.99 purchase. Growl developer Chris Forsythe described the changes this way yesterday:

Growl as a paid application allows for good changes. We now have people working on Growl full time. Money earned through purchases in the App Store go directly to benefiting Growl...Without changing to this paid Growl model, Growl would have died off and would no … Read more

Heads up, Skype.

Shortly after releasing software for audio and video chat as an open-source project called WebRTC as open-source software, Google is beginning to build it into its Chrome browser.

The real-time chat software originated from Google's 2010 acquisition of Global IP Solutions (GIPS), a company specializing in Internet telephony and videoconferencing.

The obvious beneficiary for the project is Gmail, whose audio and video communications ability today requires use of a proprietary plug-in. Gmail chat is getting more important as Google's VoIP (voice over Internet Protocol) efforts mature and integrate with the Google Voice service.

But Google … Read more

The bottom line: If you like living your digital life in the browser, then Chrome OS could be a clarion call that's hard to resist. It's fast, it's geared for an Internet tether yet able to function on its own, and it's a bold step into the future of how operating systems work. However, it's untested on a large scale, and concerns about its effectiveness and utility are not without merit.

Review: Welcome to the Chrome channel. Available on laptops from Samsung and Acer, Google's new operating system is all Chrome, all the time. … Read more

Mozilla, taking interest in the Node.js project to run JavaScript programs on servers, not just browsers, has passed an early milestone with its own flavor of the software.

Node.js is built with the V8 JavaScript engine from Google's Chrome browser, but Mozilla is transplanting Firefox's JavaScript technology in a project called SpiderNode. (The JavaScript engine in Firefox is called SpiderMonkey, and the hybrid technology used in SpiderNode is called V8Monkey.)

"We now have a Node executable running on V8Monkey," though it still crashes at this early stage, said SpiderNode project member Paul O'Shannessy … Read more

The bottom line: If you like living your digital life in the browser, then Chrome OS will be a siren that's hard to resist. It's fast, geared for an Internet tether yet able function on its own, and it's a bold step into the future of how operating systems work.

Review: It's the Chrome channel. Google's new operating system, currently available to readers only in beta and only on Google's specially designed, limited-edition prototype notebook called the Cr-48, is all Chrome, all the time. If you absolutely loathe the Chrome browser, it's highly … Read more

Coverity, a company with tools to check for programming problems that pose security risks, has found 359 of them in a scan of the Android source code.

There are 88 high-risk problems and 271 medium-risk problems in the source code underlying the Android kernel used in HTC's Incredible phone, the company said Tuesday. Android uses the Linux kernel, but the Android-specific components have a higher defect rate than mainstream Linux, Coverity said.

Some good news for Google, though, is that the defect rate is still lower than the industry average of one defect per 1,000 lines of code. … Read more

Mozilla has pushed back the planned Firefox 4 release to 2011, a delay that's no surprise given the difficulties in releasing the first full-featured beta of the open-source browser--but that also gives breathing room for several competitors.

Mozilla had hoped to release Firefox 4 in 2010, but a newly updated Firefox 4 schedule shows the first release candidate arriving in early 2011.

"Development on Firefox 4 has not slowed down, and strong progress is being made daily. However, based on the delays in completing the 'feature complete' Beta 7 milestone against which our add-on developers and third-party software developers can develop, as well as considering the amount of work remaining to prepare Firefox 4 for final release, we have revised our beta and release candidate schedule," said Mike Beltzner, vice president of engineering for Firefox, in a mailing list message yesterday. "The frequent beta releases have been extremely helpful in identifying compatibility issues with existing web content, so we plan on continuing to release beta milestones through the end of December. Our estimate is now that release candidate builds will ship in early 2011, with a final release date close behind."

Six beta versions have arrived in recent weeks, but Firefox 4 beta 7 hasn't appeared, despite more than six weeks of frenzied development. One big issue holding up release has been the integration of Firefox's older Tracemonkey engine for running Web-based JavaScript programs and the new JaegerMonkey engine that draws on Google's V8 engine in Chrome.

Mozilla's arewefastyet.com site shows progress matching Safari and Chrome JavaScript execution speed, but new JavaScript engines can be tough to tune. Several JavaScript bugs are blocking Firefox 4 beta 7. … Read more