Phoronix releases Phoronix Test Suite 2.4!

The fine people over at Phoronix have recently announced the release of version 2.4 of the Phoronix Test Suite.

Among the new features:

• New Operating System support -- PTS 2.4 now has enhanced compatibilty for OSes such as Palm WebOS, OpenSolaris FreeBSD 8.0, OpenBSD, NetBSD, as well as initial OS support for Windows 7. Imagine running the same benchmark on your Palm Pre, OpenBSD server, and Win 7 home machine!
• Actual image quality comparisons -- PTS 2.4 is introducing tests that provide tools for examining rendered images on a pixel by pixel basis to look for rendering or artifacting differences. Initial tests are available for Nexuiz and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars, though they are looking to expand support in future versions.

Another announcement that was made is regarding the Live DVD project of the Phoronix Test Suite, called PTS Desktop Live. It appears that a new version of the Live DVD will be coming this month, followed by the first release of a testing suite specifically designed for netbooks, called PTS Netbook Live. They're still light on the details for PTS Netbook Live, but keep your eyes peeled as developments continue.

Multi-Touch coming to Google's Chrome OS?

It looks like Chrome OS development is starting to get interesting. Recently, this UI video and multiple UI concept pictures were released onto the Chromium dev site:

It looks like we're going to see a lot more of these types of features in Google's arsenal now that Google's relationship with Apple has gone sour, seeing them starting to compete directly in several categories, such as the Iphone versus the Droid and Nexus One. I am looking forward to the competition in the tablet category- it is a category that could use some user interface improvements.

VGA Boot Codes- Help with live CD/DVD video resolutions

If you ever find yourself in with a live CD or DVD that doesn't default to the correct video mode, here is a handy cheat sheet of video modes to put into the boot parameters. For example, if you wish to have a 1024X768 resolution with 16 bit color, type vga=791 in addition to the regular boot parameters.

Enjoy!

VGA Resolution and Color Depth reference Chart:

Depth	800×600	1024×768		1280×1024	1600×1200
8 bit	vga=771	vga=773		vga=775	vga=796
16 bit	vga=788	vga=791		vga=794	vga=798
24 bit	vga=789	vga=792		vga=795	vga=799

Android running on the Pandora!

This just in- cpasjuste is working on a port of Android to the Pandora console. Here is a video to show the progress so far:

Hackable ARM-based systems are going to be the playground for hackers and innovators in these next couple years. It is amazing to see a small device that is capable of so much!

A Preview of Qimo 2.0

Recently, the Qimo4Kids website released a description of Qimo 2.0, due in late April. Among the updates are a new mascot, named Illa (pronounced eee- lah), as well as a pinkish, girly theme to go along with the current blue theme.

The Qimo 2.0 packages are planned to be Ubuntu 10.04 compatible, so you can add them to an existing Ubuntu 10.04 install if you don't wish to install Qimo from scratch.

For more Qimo news, feel free to visit the Qimo for Kids website, Facebook page, or Twitter feed.

Ubuntu 9.10's integrated font installer

TrueType Font fans, rejoice! Ubuntu 9.10 has an integrated font installer which is quite easy to use. I'll give you a quick overview of how it works.

First, find someplace on the Internet that is giving away free fonts. In this case, I'm using Halloweenfonts.com:

In this case, fonts are stored inside of zip files. Open the zip file with Archive Manager.


When the TTF file appears, double-click it.


After double-clicking the TTF font, the Ubuntu font installer should come up automatically. Click "Install Font":



The font should now be installed:


Start up a program such as OpenOffice to verify that the font has been properly added:


Now, use your new font! Enjoy!

Help Shawn Powers!

My favorite Linux columnist, Shawn Powers, recently was victim of a house fire. His family survived, though all of his pets perished in the fire. Linux Journal recently created a chipin page to help out his family during this difficult time.

I don't usually post non-tech stuff on this blog, but I wish Shawn the best, and I encourage you to help him out if you have the means to do so.