Early Christmas for KeePassX Users – KeePassX 2.0 Out

 Products, Security  Comments Off on Early Christmas for KeePassX Users – KeePassX 2.0 Out
Dec 072015
 

KeepassxFolks, Christmas has arrived 18 days early for password manager KeePassX users.

After five years of development, version 2.0 of KeePassX has been released.

The previous stable version of KeePassX was 0.4.3, which was released way back in March 2010.

Clearing Confusion

Let’s first clear up lingering confusion.

In the minds of end users, there’s considerable confusion between the two major password management utilities. KeePassX and KeePass.

Here’s the key difference between the two utilities.

KeePass is primarily a password management utility developed for various versions of Windows although it can run on other platforms like Mac OS X and Linux via Mono.

Unofficial ports of KeePass for different platforms are also available.

KeePassX, on the other hand, was developed from the get-go as a cross-platform password management utility.

KeePassX (written in QT) was originally known as KeePass/L since it was a Linux port of Keepass Password Safe.

After the utility became cross-platform in 2006, the L was dropped and the name was changed to KeePassX.

New Features in KeePassX 2.0

KeePassX developers have highlighted various new features in version 2.0: Continue reading »

Yawn! Another Open Source E-Mail Client

 Open Source, Products  Comments Off on Yawn! Another Open Source E-Mail Client
Oct 062015
 

Seriously, does the world need another open source e-mail client?

Answer: Does America need another TRUMPeting mountebank with a weird hairdo?

In Silicon Valley, people (VCs) with tons of money far too frequently knock into entrepreneurs full of gusto and gumption but often short of creative brilliance.

Voila, a partnership is quickly formed, money changes hands and a new startup announces a few millions in funding.

Case in point – San Francisco startup Nylas with its N1 desktop open source mail client.

Nyla’s free N1 e-mail client does not leverage the familiar mail protocols SMTP or IMAP but relies on its custom Platform APIs.

This means your mail passes through Nyla’s cloud server, which is a huge no-no in today’s world of vulnerable security, inadequate privacy and constant snooping. Continue reading »

LibreOffice 5: Good Office Suite Gets Better

 Open Source, Products  Comments Off on LibreOffice 5: Good Office Suite Gets Better
Aug 062015
 

LibreOffice Upgraded to Version 5Popular open source office application suite LibreOffice has been updated to version 5.0 giving it compatibility with Microsoft’s new Windows 10 operating system.

The tenth major release of the free cross-platform office suite, LibreOffice 5.0 includes a word processor (Writer), spreadsheet (Calc), drawing and flowcharting tool (Draw), database (Base), presentation software (Impress) and an equations and formula editor (Math).

Besides compatibility with Windows 10, other highlights of LibreOffice 5 include an improved user interface, better management of screen space, a cleaner look and new spreadsheet features supporting complex formulae, new functions and conditional formatting. Continue reading »

8 Devices Doomed to Fail

 Linux, Products, Smartphones, Tablets  Comments Off on 8 Devices Doomed to Fail
Jul 082015
 

In the digital media world, failure is the norm and success an aberration.

For every Xiaomi, MacBook, iPod and iPhone that rock the world and win millions of happy fans, there are countless Surface, Google Glass, Apple Watch, Windows Phone and Zune devices that should never have seen the light of day and ultimately kiss the dust after blowing through hundreds of millions of dollars!

And the story of failed music players, stick PCs, tablets, mini PCs and smartphones plays on year after year with scores of devices shunned by customers, languishing on store shelves and ultimately ending in fire sales.

No Hope Devices

In this post, we’ll look at eight consumer electronics eight devices that are currently available but have an extremely slim chance of success in the marketplace.

Intel Linux Compute StickIntel Ubuntu Stick

1. Intel Ubuntu Stick – It’s hard to believe thinking minds in Intel conjured up a Linux PC stick with 1GB RAM and 8GB of storage (actual storage is lower because of space taken up by the OS). Onboard storage is pitiful and the RAM so woefully inadequate that the device offers little value. If this gadget is around for even six-months, it’ll be a big surprise. Truth be said, it’s doubtful if Intel can get traction even for the Windows stick PC which comes with slightly better specs.

2. Sony Xperia Z4 Tablet – Against the backdrop of declining tablet sales, Sony executives must be living in la la land to dream that the pricey Xperia Z4 tablet has any hope of winning the favor of consumers. A modest improvement over the company’s Z2 Android tablet, the 10.1-inch Z4 tablet made it to Europe in June 2015 after its debut at the Mobile World Congress.

Sony Xperia Z4 TabletSony Xperia Z4

Poor quality speakers, bloatware apps, compulsory bundling of a mediocre dock (in UK), disappointing camera and a ridiculous price ($771 with the keyboard) guarantees that consumers will show little interest in the Sony Xperia Z4 tablet. The LTE version (available for pre-order) costs $897 (including the keyboard). Continue reading »

Samsung’s New 2TB SSDs Cost More than Most PCs

 Products  Comments Off on Samsung’s New 2TB SSDs Cost More than Most PCs
Jul 072015
 

Samsung 2TB SSD are Very Expensive
Solid state drive prices continue to remain at obscene levels.

Samsung has put out two new 2TB solid state drives targeted at consumers that cost more than an average PC.

Expensive SSDs

An average desktop PC (excluding gaming and iMacs) costs $400-$700 in the US depending on the specs.

Samsung’s new 2TB 850 PRO and 850 EVO solid state drives cost $1,000 and $800 respectively. Continue reading »

How To Install Atom 1.0 on Ubuntu

 Open Source, Products  Comments Off on How To Install Atom 1.0 on Ubuntu
Jun 252015
 

The free Atom open source text editor, a handy tool for programmers, moved into Release 1.0 today.

Developed by code sharing site Github, Atom is built on the Electron framework that lets developers write cross-platform desktop applications using JavaScript, HTML and CSS.

How to Install Atom Text Editor on Ubuntu

Available to the public for a little over a year, Atom has been downloaded 1.3 million times, and serves 350,000 monthly active users.

Developers can extend the capabilities of and add new features to Atom by picking from over 2,000 packages.

The Atom community has created 660 themes, and 2,090 packages including popular ones like linter, autocomplete-plus, minimap and Emmet (a pre-existing package for the Sublime-Text code editor). Continue reading »