william_lorenz writes: "With the recent release of KDE 3.2 and KDevelop 3.0, and with the forming of the KDE Quality team as mentioned on Slashdot just days ago, it was an opportune time to read my newest book, C++ GUI Programming with Qt 3. (Qt is of course TrollTech's multi-platform windowing toolkit -- Win32, Linux, UNIX, and the embedded space with Qt/Embedded -- upon which KDE is built. There's a free version licensed under the GPL for non-commercial use and also a commercial version.)" Read on for the rest of Lorenz' review.

floppy-less asks: "In nearly every modern GUI, the floppy disk icon is used to symbolize saving files. With the fate of floppy disks becoming apparent, what will become of the esteemed 'Save to Disk' icon? Will it become a CD-R? a hard drive? a portrait of Jesus?"

PHPee (Rob Maeder) writes "Scott Fullam's Hardware Hacking Projects for Geeks is an excellent book outlining all you need to know to get started in the wonderful world of hardware hacking. With step-by-step guides to fifteen useful, amusing and off the wall projects, even a novice hacker can be up and running with some basic hacks in a few hours. The book demonstrates various ways consumer electronics can be modified to do things they were never intended to do, and shows you just how much fun voiding your warranty can be." (We mentioned this book yesterday, too.) Read on for PHPee's review.

Peter Millerchip writes "Apparently Microsoft have forced wxWindows, the popular cross-platform C++ GUI library, to change its name to wxWidgets over the UK trademark of the seemingly generic word 'Windows.' Hot on the heels of the MikeRoweSoft.com incident, you have to wonder if their overactive legal team will be targetting double glazing manufacturers next?"

WhoDaresWins writes "Ever wonder how to make a Knoppix-like live Windows bootable CD (or DVD)? Well its now possible using Bart's Preinstalled Environment (BartPE) bootable live windows CD/DVD. It's basically an expansion of the Microsoft's own Windows PE (Preinstallation Environment) idea which is a minimal Windows (XP/2K3) based bootable live CD with a command prompt and the ability to run some basic Windows GUI. Bart's PE allows anyone to make a bootable CD using their own Windows XP/2K3 media with Bart's PE Builder. What's more many people have contributed quite a few plugins that allow you to use the BartPE discs as quite a nifty system administration tool and with some work an almost usable quick system."

SilentBob4 writes "Adam Doxtater of Mad Penguin has published a preliminary layout for his proposed cross-distribution package manager capable of adding/removing software from any locale. He is suggesting the interface will basically allow for installation of several major package formats including RPM, DEB, TGZ, as well as source code with the ability to pass build time options. All of this will come at the price of standards of course, including naming, documentation, and package structuring. If this idea were to catch on, it would signify a major leap in desktop Linux usability. This might be a project that UserLinux might benefit from. Read the full column here (complete with GUI mockups)."

asdren writes " Steven Garrity has written a short article highlighting some 'user interface niceties' found in Gnome with regards to file renaming, screen captures, fonts and file zooming." Garrity points out that "... tiny details can have a significant impact on the user experience on operating systems. Inconsistencies that seem insignificant when considering individually, but together they degrade the overall polish and sense of stability in the system," and points out a few places where Gnome manages to avoid such inconsistency.

Siddly asks: "OK, I've used databases in DOS, like dBase2, dBase3 and others. None of those mentioned needing a knowledge of database theory, they allowed you to layout and manipulate data quite easily. In Linux, we have MySQL, Postgres, SQLite, and more. None of these are intuitive, even the GUI's aren't very helpful to any casual or very occasional user, who just wants to create a simple database and forget it until something significant needs to be added, deleted or amended. I obviously don't posses the skills or time to undertake writing such an animal. Does anyone else suffer this frustration? Has anyone managed to get something like dBase3 working under dosemu?" The problem isn't necessarily the underlying RBDMS, but the interface presented to the user. Are there front-ends for the various Unix database offerings that simplify database concepts to the level of what a dBase3 user would feel comfortable with?

hype7 writes "There's an article at SecurityFocus describing a visit an FBI agent to Washington University. His visit was ostensibly about computer security and the general public's complete lack of any idea on computer security whatsoever: 'I have spent a considerable amount in the computer underground and have seen many ways in which clever individuals trick unsuspecting users. I don't think most people have a clue just how bad things are.' His talk ranged from some of the pranks he's seen played on unsuspecting users, to Eastern European extortion of big banks." WeakGeek added, "FBI security guys are using Macs because, 'those machines can do just about anything: run software for Mac, Unix, or Windows, using either a GUI or the command line. And they're secure out of the box.' Another good quote: 'If you're a bad guy and you want to frustrate law enforcement, use a Mac.'"

Martin writes "Brookhaven National Lab's RHIC Computing Facility (RCF) announced yesterday that the amount of data from the physics experiments at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) crossed the 1 PetaByte mark. A mail that was sent around to the RCF users contained a GUI screen shot (which is removed from the mail archive) that showed the number of MegaBytes transferred as 1,000,400,143. The RCF web pages have some pictures of the tape silos that hold the data. RHIC and the experiments have been discussed on ./ a few times, look here, here, and here."

Alex Moskalyuk writes "Before Sun monopolized the notion of 'write once, run everywhere,' those who enjoy programming in C++ had the choice of using Qt libraries that provide cross-platform GUI support. C++ GUI Programming with Qt3 is written by the employees of TrollTech, the company that created and currently distributes the Qt environment." Read on for the rest of Alex's review.

orzetto writes "Jon Lech Johansen, known as DVD-Jon, and aquitted in a trial in Norway, after being accused of infringement for making a GUI for DeCSS, is now demanding that Norwegian Oekokrim pay for all the time and money he has lost to the trial, claiming 150,000 NOK (about 17,500 euros)."

Cibressus Lybir asks: "We've had icons, folders and menu's for a long time. I currently use two monitors, both filled to the brim with icons and several drawers on each desktop. My Start Menu, on my Windows machine is never used, because it's flimsy and too hard to navigate around. In movies you always see cool 3D desktops with stuff flying around and some kind of cool gesture or spoken word used to start up applications. The future will only bring more applications, more icons, and more time spent navigating around launching your programs. What are your ideas for the future of desktops? How can we rid our selves of the icon jungles that we call our GUI's?"

In yesterday's article, I gave an overview of Mac OS X Server, and described some of the features. Read on for some detail of the specific services that Server offers, and the final verdict.

ChopsMIDI writes "Announced today at MySQL, is the new GUI for MySQL: The MySQL Administrator. This integrates database management and maintenance into a 'seamless' GUI. 'Easily perform all the command line operations visually including configuring servers, administering users, and dynamically monitoring database health. Other common administrative tasks such as monitoring replication status, backup and restore, and viewing logs can also be performed through the MySQL Administrator graphical console.' This sounds like a pretty sweet tool, but sadly, it's not available for downlodad yet, but it does have some nice screenshots."

Ursus Maximus writes "Eagerly awaited by many, this book reached bookstores just after Christmas, and updates the 1999 edition. Learning Python is O'Reilly's introduction to Python programming and at 591 pages, this is a major upgrade to the 366 page original. Furthermore, the Python language has undergone extensive improvements and additions in the last five years, and the new book does a good job of covering these changes."

dhunley writes "According to TechCentral, a recent story on Novell's plans following the acquisition of both SuSE and Ximian comments that 'SuSE will continue (to operate) as a business unit of its own', according to John Phillips, Novell's corporate technology strategist for the Asia Pacific region. 'We don't expect to make Ximian the default user interface, and for the medium term KDE will remain the default GUI on SuSE Linux'."

An anonymous reader writes "This article discusses various ways data gets into your program, emphasizing how to deal appropriately with them; you might not even know about them all! It first discusses how to design your program to limit the ways data can get into your program, and how your design influences what is an input. It then discusses various input channels and what to do about them, including environment variables, files, file descriptors, the command line, the graphical user interface (GUI), network data, and miscellaneous inputs."

Alex Moskalyuk writes "Remember those 'how-to' and 'home improvement' books that you enjoyed reading as a little kid? In the first half of the last century there was a variety of books, with names like 'Boy Mechanic' or '1,000 Projects for a Boy,' which would give a teenager a variety of projects to work on productively. Building bird houses, creatively reusing helmets from World War I, and later different projects that had to do with radio and transistors - in the pre-television age all that guaranteed some creative time for geeks (whether kids or adults) and allowed them pick up skills, necessary perhaps in real life." Alex reviews below a book that fills a similar niche for the present day, outlining all 13 projects in Linux Toys: 13 Cool Projects for Home, Office and Entertainment. Whether you'd consider all of the projects toys is up to you.

An anonymous reader writes "Following up the earlier Slashdot item on this, LinuxWorld is carrying both sides of the discussion as to whether UserLinux GUI should be GNOME only, as Bruce Perens last week decided "by fiat," or include KDE."