Mozilla updates Firefox for Android: Improved Speed and Stability
Mozilla has released an updated version of Firefox 4 for Android that is both faster and more stable.
Yesterday Mozilla released the latest Firefox 4 beta for Android and Nokia N900 (Maemo). According to Mozilla, this will be the last test version released before the final version is ready in a few weeks.
The latest version should be much more stable than the previous test version of the browser that was released just over a week ago. Performance should also be improved significantly.
Firefox 4 for Android supports syncing bookmarks, passwords and open tabs if the user also uses the latest version of Firefox 4 on other computesr.
The latest beta of Firefox 4 for Android available for download from firefox.com, or download the browser from the Android Market.
Microsoft Bans Open Source for Windows Phone 7
Open source is not welcome on the official marketplace for Windows Phone 7 apps. Application developers who want to publish their work on Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 Marketplace may not license the code under licenses such as GPLv3, Affero GPLv3 or LGPLv3, it is clear from the licensing agreements that developers have to accept when they use the service.
Here are parts of the agreement:
“The Application must not include software, documentation, or other materials that, in whole or in part, are governed by or subject to an Excluded License, or that would otherwise cause the Application to be subject to the terms of an Excluded License.”
“Excluded Licenses include, but are not limited to the GPLv3 Licenses. For the purpose of this definition, “GPLv3 Licenses” means the GNU General Public License version 3, the GNU Affero General Public License version 3, the GNU Lesser General Public License version 3, and any equivalents to the foregoing.”
This comes from Red Hat’s open source prophet Jan Wildeboer who has looked into the agreement. Jan emphasizes that he is not a lawyer and that the blog reflects his own personal opinions. All open licenses are not prohibited, however. BSD, MIT/X11, the Apache license and Microsoft’s own MS-PL (permissive license) is fine to use.
Open Office Challenger gets Flying Start
The OfficeLibre beta has already been downloaded over 80,000 times already weeks after the code was made available. Large parts of the open source community have ganged up against Oracle and started its own version of the open office suite Open Office with a competitor named LibreOffice.
On-board amenities include Ubuntu, Red Hat, Novell, Gnome and Google. The week after the release of the beta, the program has been downloaded over 80,000 times and the servers that mirrors the software has grown from 25 to of 45 in 25 countries.
The organization behind it, The Document Foundation, writes that the number of mirrors is close to half the number that reflects the Open Office which is ten years old. The developers have also begun working with the new codebase. One hundred developers are on the IRC channel # libreoffice, which is bubbling with activity.
The Document Foundation says that they do not believe that Oracle will support their foundation on which Oracle has issued the statement that they “invest substantial resources in OpenOffice.org ‘and that they urge the community to continue contributing to www.openoffice.org.
