Thank God for Linux. No, seriously, regardless of your beliefs, you should be thankful that we have the Linux kernel to provide us with a free alternative to Windows 10. Lately, Microsoft's operating system has been plagued by buggy updates, causing some Windows users to lose faith in it. Hell, even Dona Sarkar -- the now-former leader of the Windows Insider program -- has been relieved of her duties and transitioned to a new role within the company (read into that what you will).

While these are indeed dark times for Windows, Linux remains that shining beacon of light. When Windows becomes unbearable, you can simply use Chrome OS, Android, Fedora, Manjaro, or some other Linux distribution. Today, following the beta period, one of the best and most popular Linux-based desktop operating systems reaches a major milestone -- you can now download Ubuntu 19.10! Code-named "Eoan Ermine" (yes, I know, it's a terrible name), the distro is better and faster then ever.

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Continuing its embracing of open source, Microsoft has today announced two new open source projects. The first is Open Application Model (OAM), a new standard for developing and operating applications on Kubernetes and other platforms

The second project is Dapr (Distributed Application Runtime), designed to make it easier to build microservice applications. Microsoft says that both OAM and Dapr "help developers remove barriers when building applications for cloud and edge".

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All organizations want to get more value from their data, but can be hampered by the lack of reliable information within data lakes.

The Delta Lake project addresses data reliability challenges by making transactions ACID (Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation, Durability) compliant enabling concurrent reads and writes. It also helps to ensure that the data lake is free of corrupt and not-conformant data.

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IBM is reinforcing its commitment to diversity and inclusion in the open source field with the launch of the IBM Open Source Community Grant.

Announced at this week's All Things Open conference in Raleigh, NC, the grant -- which will be awarded quarterly -- will see the winner receive $25k in cash and $25k in Cloud Credits in order to support their efforts dedicated to education and skill building for women, minorities, and/or under-served communities.

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Well, folks... they did it. The people over at System76 finally achieved one of their dreams -- selling laptops with open source firmware! This is quite an impressive feat.

System76 has long been a proponent of both Linux and open source, and over the years, it never deviated from that. And now, two of its laptops will come with open source firmware based on Coreboot. Thrilling stuff, eh? Also exciting, however, is both computers can be be configured with some excellent specifications too, such as 10th gen Intel Core processors, up to 32GB RAM, and Thunderbolt 3.

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Ransomware attacks are a major problem and they often gain access to systems via brute-force attacks against open and exposed remote access points such as Remote Desktop Protocol.

Cloud-native virtual application delivery platform Cameyo is launching its new RDP Port Shield security technology, along with a free, open source monitoring tool that any organization can use to identify attacks taking place over RDP in their environment.

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Fedora may not be the flashiest or most exciting Linux distribution, but it is very reliable. You can always depend on the operating system to be rock solid and very modern. Best of all, it focuses on true open source ideology -- there are no non-free packages by default. I tend to "distro hop" out of curiosity, but no matter what, I always find my way back to Fedora.

Fedora 31 is due later this year, but first, there needs to be some beta testing. And so, today, Fedora 31 Beta is made available for download. Unfortunately, details surrounding version 31 are a bit sparse. With that said, one big change involves Fedora users with ARM 64-based single board computers, such as a Raspberry Pi. Those folks will get access to an additional desktop spin -- the lightweight Xfce.

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There are many Linux desktop environments from which to choose -- some are good, others are bad, but only one can be best -- GNOME. Whether you choose Ubuntu, Fedora, Manjaro, or some other different Linux distribution, GNOME will provide you with a superior user experience. Not only is it ideal for productivity, but GNOME is quite pretty too. And yes, there are plenty of customization options. Not to mention, the excellent stock GNOME apps create a very cohesive experience overall.

Today, GNOME 3.34 is finally released. Code-named "Thessaloniki," the newest version of the desktop environment is chock full of new features, bug fixes, visual improvements, and updated apps. One of the most apparent changes to users will be the ability to group icons into folders using drag-and-drop within the application overview -- very cool.

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Sandboxie -- the sandboxing tool with the tagline "Trust no program" -- has been made into a free utility. But more than this, Sophos also plans to make the software open source in the near future.

The company says that it was a difficult decision to make, pointing out that Sandboxie has never been a significant component of its business. While simply shutting down the app would have been the easiest and cheapest thing to do, Sophos says: "we love the technology too much to see it fade away".

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Some people may think a company focused on Linux can never be successful. That’s false thinking, actually. True, some people use Linux as just a hobby, but it is so much more than that. As Red Hat shows us, Linux can be a billion dollar business. Plus, System76, for example, has been selling personal computers running Linux for many years. So, yeah, a Linux-focused company can be a success.

Of course, that does not mean a Linux-focused company is guaranteed to be a success. Case in point, today, popular Linux distribution Manjaro announces that it has formed a limited partnership business entity. The question, however, is whether or not creating such a company is a good idea.

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MX Linux is apparently becoming increasingly more popular these days, and I am not really sure why. Lately, I have been testing out the open source operating system, and I simply don't understand the hype.

Xfce, which MX uses, remains one of the worst desktop environment for end users -- it is lightweight, but that aside, it offers nothing over the superior GNOME or KDE. If you own a HiDPI monitor (which more and more people have), Xfce remains a terrible experience.

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Google has today announced the launch of an open-source version of the differential privacy framework that powers many of the company’s data analysis systems.

Differentially-private data analysis is an approach that enables organizations to learn from the majority of their data while simultaneously ensuring that those results don't allow any individual's data to be distinguished or re-identified.

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Officially, Kodi is not for piracy, but the reality is... it sort of is. Look, not everyone uses the software for nefarious purposes, but let's be honest here, folks, in these days of inexpensive streaming media, people setting up a media center to access locally stored files are few and far between. So, yeah, Kodi is a platform used by many pirates.

Regardless of what you use Kodi for, you should be excited today. Why? Well, a new version of the open source software is now available for download. No, it is not a monumental release by any means -- Kodi 18.4 "Leia" is pretty much all about bug fixes. In fact, end users may not even notice any changes.

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Another day, another Linux distribution. Yeah, it can get a bit tedious reading about so many operating systems based on the open source kernel, so here at BetaNews we typically try to inform you about the better ones. You see, there are many garbage Linux distributions that can simply be ignored -- they are either low-quality or overly redundant. Ultimately, it all becomes noise, harming the Linux community overall. Yes, having too much choice can be a negative.

Today, a wildly popular operating system achieves Beta status, and you should be interested -- it is worth your attention. Called "MX Linux," it has quietly gained a fairly large following, topping the charts at the legendary DistroWatch. MX Linux 19 Beta 1 is based on Debian 10 Buster and features the recently released Xfce 4.14 desktop environment. So, yeah, this is fairly bleeding edge stuff, although the Linux kernel is only at 4.19.5.

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Microsoft, Google, Red Hat, IBM and Intel are among those to join the newly formed Confidential Computing Consortium (CCC). The new organization will be hosted at the Linux Foundation, having been established to help define and accelerate the adoption of confidential computing.

The company explains that, "confidential computing technologies offer the opportunity for organizations to collaborate on their data sets without giving access to that data, to gain shared insights and to innovate for the common good". Microsoft will be contributing the Open Enclave SDK that allows developers to build Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) applications using a single enclaving abstraction.

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