laodan's favorite open-source pages, page 1

Last login: 10 hours agoLaodan: laodan is a guy from Milford, Pennsylvania, USA.; Likes 1,599 pages, 24 videos, 8 photos • 228 fans • Received 65 reviews; Member since Aug 08, 2005

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Computerworld & Open source 3D printer copies itself: Apr 8, 9:27am 8 reviews open-source, economy, freetools
http://computerworld.co.nz/news.nsf/tech/2F5C3C5D68A380EDCC257423006E71CD; Open source 3D printer copies itself via kurzweilai.net, in ComputerWorld by Ulrika Hedquist
Based in the Waitakeres, in West Auckland, software developer and artist Vik Olliver is part of a team developing an open-source, self-copying 3D printer. The RepRap (Replicating Rapid-prototyper) printer can replicate and update itself. It can print its own parts, including updates, says Olliver, who is one of the core members of the RepRap team. Open source 3D printer copies itself Great. Open Source goes to Open Production. This is an initiative that should be given wide diffusion.

Linux is about to take over the low end of PCs: Dec 15, 2007 10:35am 6 reviews software, linux, open-source, freetools
http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS2414535067.html; Linux is about to take over the low end of PCs in DesktopLinux by Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols
In the next few quarters, low-end Linux-based PCs are going to quickly take over the bottom rung of computing. Then, as businesses continue to get comfortable with SAAS (software as a service) and open-source software, the price benefits will start leading them toward switching to the new Linux/SAAS office model. You'll see this really kick into gear once Vista Service Pack 1 appears and business customers start seriously looking at what it will cost to migrate to Vista. That Tiffany-level price tag will make all but the most Microsoft-centric businesses start considering the Linux/SAAS alternative. Microsoft will fight this trend tooth and nail. It will cut prices to the point where it'll be bleeding ink on some of its product lines. And Windows XP is going to stick around much longer than Microsoft ever wanted it to. Still, it won't be enough. By attacking from the bottom, where Microsoft can no longer successfully compete, Linux will finally cut itself a large slice of the desktop market pie. Linux is about to take over the low end of PCs Everex TC2502 Green gPC w/ Via C7-D Processor sold at Walmart for $ 199. Did you notice how the SAAS initiative is coming not from the US but from the EU? Microsoft's last decade costly monopoly on software seems to come to an end. The cost structure of Linux + SAAS is so advantageous that it simply can't be missed by individuals and small companies and Microsoft has no way of answering that challenge with its bulky and costly products.

Linux desktop revolution: Aug 8, 2007 11:40am 1 review linux, open-source
http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS4537608418.html; Linux desktop revolution in Linux Desktop by Steven J. Vaughan Nichols
Why is this finally happening? I could go on and on, but I think it's a combination of two major factors. The first is simply that the Linux desktop has gotten to the point where anyone or any business can use it to do useful work. The other is that Microsoft -- and I don't care what numbers people quote -- has a lemon in Vista. Linux desktop revolution Windows users you better read that article if you want to stay ahead of the curve, for, as Steven writes "As for Microsoft and Windows, maybe the real reason Microsoft has been making deals with Linux companies isn't to entrap them into helping with patent FUD. Maybe the real answer is that Microsoft wants to make darn sure it's on the winning side too. MS-Linux? No, you won't see that anytime soon, but come the 2010s... well, let's just say I wouldn't be surprised to see it."

Open Library (Open Library): Jul 16, 2007 4:26pm 9 reviews open-source, books, archives, freetools
http://demo.openlibrary.org/; The Open Library via Metafilter / chunking express, in The Open Library
What if there was a library which held every book? Not every book on sale, or every important book, or even every book in English, but simply every book's key part of our planet's cultural legacy. First, the library must be on the Internet. No physical space could be as big or as universally accessible as a public web site. The site would be like Wikipedia's public resource that anyone in any country could access and that others could rework into different formats. Second, it must be grandly comprehensive. It would take catalog entries from every library and publisher and random Internet user who is willing to donate them. It would link to places where each book could be bought, borrowed, or downloaded. It would collect reviews and references and discussions and every other piece of data about the book it could get its hands on. But most importantly, such a library must be fully open. Not simply "free to the people," as the grand banner across the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh proclaims, but a product of the people: letting them create and curate its catalog, contribute to its content, participate in its governance, and have full, free access to its data. In an era where library data and Internet databases are being run by money-seeking companies behind closed doors, it's more important than ever to be open. The Open Library A grandiose project that I hope succeeds. Try to imagine a place on the net where all the books of the world could be found. That's quite exciting indeed.

Required Reading: the next 10 years (Lessig Blog): Jun 19, 2007 8:29am 0 review culture, internet, open-source, society
http://www.lessig.org/blog/archives/003800.shtml

http://applications.linux.com/article.pl?sid=07/04/27/2035215&from=rss: May 11, 2007 8:32pm 1 review linux, open-source, archives, freetools
http://applications.linux.com/article.pl?sid=07/04/27/2035215&from=rss; Open Office Extensions repository
As with Firefox, you can add new features and extend OpenOffice.org's functionality by installing extensions. Visit the Extensions Repository page of the OpenOffice.org wiki. Open Office Extensions repository
A good extension archive for those who use Open Office as i do. Great.

The Simple eXperience: Mar 5, 2007 3:06pm 9 reviews software, linux, open-source, freetools
http://tsx.nl/index.php?p=winexs; WineXS in The Simple Experience, Frank Hendriksen's website.
... I'm working hard on howtos to get Windows applications and games working on Linux using Wine. WineXS is a fun project and was made to make using Wine a little easier. WineXS The easy, Wine way to run Windows apps on Linux

Wow! Great. At last I'm finding my way with wine and Windows applications on Ubuntu... Thanks Frank, this is a great tool indeed.

Open source hardware - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: Jan 28, 2007 8:45am 1 review open-source, open-access, worldviews
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_hardware; Will everything be open source in the future? via Metafilter / MrMerlot; in Wikipedia
Can you build an open source car? Or a three-dimensional printer? Or a new kind of handheld computer? Can open source ideas thrive in the physical world? Or is there something fundementally different? Are we seeing a new type of production or just a filip for hobbyists and dreamers? Open source hardware
An old dream. Could it one day become reality? I guess that it is fair to say that there is something like a dance going on between The logic of capital (capital holders) and the Logic of knowledge (knowledge holders). - in the view of capital holders profit is central and the idea that production could be "Open" is anathema for it would mean the disappearance of the source of their profits, the destruction of the Logic of Capital. So capital holders will resist the idea and only adapt to it when consumers massively flock to it ... - in the view of knowledge holders the advance of science is central and the idea that production could be "Open" is thus somehow seen as a dream that they hope could become true. That's how some spend all their free time and also part of the time they work for capital holders to make their dream come true. But, in the end, one should not forget that the logic of capital is what makes the system run. And I should argue that the dependence of knowledge holders upon capital holders to satisfy the financing of their daily needs is what assures to the logic of capital its dominance of modernity (hegemony). From a philosophical standpoint this is what leads me to conclude that rationality, and science as its functional instrumentality, are no more than the ideology evolved through the application of the logic of capital over many centuries. Reality being unattainable to us, for its infinity, the best we can do is to approximate it through one or another system of perception. So we can start to understand how humanity evolved different systems to approximate the nature of the whole of reality: - animistic (like a systemic view of the whole into which we are no more than tiny particles... the tribal societal organization is then based on pragmatism in satisfying daily necessities) - spiritual (the animistic view of the self as connected to the other elements in our environment: the tree, the animal, the clouds,...) - religious (an extension of the animistic spiritual view adapted to the new power form of societal organization evolved out of agriculture and the higher population densities that it permits. The justification of the leader's power through his spiritual connection to the creator of the whole.) - modern (applied over centuries the logic of capital evolves its reason of things: rationality and its functional instrument: science)

Open of Course: Jan 19, 2007 5:15pm 5 reviews open-source, freetools
http://www.open-of-course.org/home/index.php; Free and open content courses and tutorials. via Open Business, in Open-of-course
http://www.open-of-course.org is a multilingual portal for free and open content courses and tutorials. What sets us apart from other open content educational initiatives, like for example Mitt, is that we focus on practical courses where people can benefit from in their daily life. At the moment we offer mostly software and language courses but our goal is to cover many more subjects of interest. Open-of-course is an initiative of Mingos and Freelancenetwerk, two small dutch companies that work together. One of our other projects is a Dutch portal for online courses, named Cursusnetwerk. Open-Of-Course

Great initiative!

OpenBusiness & Blog Archive & Interview with Michael Bauwens: Jan 15, 2007 9:18am 1 review open-source, society
http://www.openbusiness.cc/2007/01/15/interview-with-michael-bauwens/; Interview with Michael Bauwens in Open Business by Michael Holloway
Michel Bauwens is an contemporary thinker and Peer-to-Peer theorist who has just been interviewed by Michael Holloway on behalf of OpenBusiness. Bauwens has worked as an internet consultant, information analyst for the United States Information Agency, information manager for British Petroleum (where he created one of the first virtual information centers), and is former editor-in-chief of the first European digital convergence magazine Wave. With Frank Theys, Bauwens is the co-creator of a 3 hour documentary TechnoCalyps. He taught and co-edited two French language anthologies on the Anthropology of Digital Society. Bauwens is the author of a number of on-line essays, including a seminal thesis Peer to Peer and Human Evolution. He is editor of P2P News. He now lives in Chiang Mai, Thailand, where he created the Foundation for P2P Alternatives. He has taught courses on the anthropology of digital society to postgraduate students at ICHEC/St. Louis in Brussels, Belgium and a related course at Payap University and Chiang Mai University in Thailand. Interview with Michael Bauwens

Interesting. This Open model... of distributed networks with absence of external or hierarchical coercion is somehow the old dream of the anarchists and of the counter culture movement of the sixties that has found a strong societal resonance through the actions of Google and the likes. This comes right in time to answer the harrowing side-effects of modernity that are threatening to annihilate life on earth...