The developers of the Ubuntu Linux operating system for desktop, notebook, and server computers are working on a touch-friendly version for smartphones and tablets, with the first Ubuntu phones expected to go on sale this year.

What is open source? Simply put, it is source code (used to develop software programs) that is freely available and modifiable on the Internet. Open source developers from all over the world contribute to various projects, which are hosted on various websites—GitHub, a popular code hosting site, has over 8 million users and over 19 million code “repositories.”

Four citizens of the German city of Dortmund have started a citizens’ initiative, asking the city council to seriously consider the use of free and open source software. “The city needs to recognise free software as a topic in the public interest”, the DO-FOSS initiators write.

The latest work landing in the DRM-Next code-base for the Linux 3.20 kernel merge window is the Tegra DRM driver updates.

The Tegra DRM driver is primarily designed to support the Tegra 4 and older SoCs while the Tegra K1 and newer is supported by the Nouveau DRM driver due to the graphics core now being common with their mainline desktop architecture. The Tegra K1's GK20A graphics core is derived directly from Kepler while the brand new Tegra X1 is derived from Maxwell. Regardless, the Tegra DRM driver continues to be actively developed by NVIDIA stakeholders.

We are very close to release LibreOffice 4.4 and I thought I’d share my thoughts on the work that has been put into this new branch and what the general idea is about it. LibreOffice 4.4 is unusual; as a major release you may expect some important underlying change in its architecture, or the inclusion of a set of major features. The 4.4 does include several important features and improvements, most notably for Impress and the much forgotten HTML editor (the comprehensive release notes may be found here). But the most important details are not to be found in this area. If you want to understand where the 4.4 branch is headed, I think it is useful to keep two fundamental trends in mind.

The Embedded Linux Conference + Android Builders Summit on Mar. 23-25 in San Jose is about “Drones, Things, and Automobiles,” but drones get the most love.

Maybe it’s just our imagination, but the Linux Foundation’s Embedded Linux Conference seems to be getting more interesting than ever. The program increasingly reflects new opportunities for Linux in areas such as drones, robots, automotive computers, IoT gizmos, 3D sensing, modular phones, and much more. For those of you worried that ELC North America is skimping on the basics as it explores the more colorful sides of Linux, rest your mind at ease. There are still plenty of sessions on booting, trace analysis, NAND support, PHY frameworks, power management, defragmenting, systemd, device tree, and toolchain. Geeks still rule!

Apple just reported a record number of iPhone sales in its Q1 earnings.

But while iPhones might be selling like hot-cakes, there are still a bunch of reasons why Android phones are better.

Read at LinuxAndUbuntu

Mobie is a new kind of 2-in-1 tablet developed in Finland that is capable to dual-boot Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and Windows 8.1. It's being launched in a couple of months and it already looks very good, at least on paper.

What I love about open source is that it’s a “can” world by default. You can do anything you think needs doing and nobody will tell you that you can’t. (They may not take your patch but they won’t tell you that you can’t create it!)

It’s often easier to define things by what they are not or what we can’t do. And the danger of that is you create a culture of “can’t”. Any one who has raised kids or animals knows this. “No, don’t jump.” You can’t jump on people. “No, off the sofa.” You can’t be on the furniture. “No, don’t lick!” You can’t slobber on me. And hopefully when you realize it, you can fix it. “You can have this stuffed animal (instead of my favorite shoe). Good dog!”

IT professionals are expected to move away from proprietary to open source software in 2015, according to new research.

A survey by Ponemon Institute and Zimbra shows 67 per cent of EMEA IT professionals agree that commercial open source software offers better business continuity.

74 per cent in the US also agree open source is better for business continuity, compared to propriety software.

Online torrent repository IsoHunt has launched a $100,000 (£66,000) competition to encourage open-source development of The Old Pirate Bay, the popular torrent site set up in the wake of The Pirate Bay's shutdown.

The unprecedented move to offer prize money will mean that an open-source community will be responsible for developing the site rather than a closed team, therefore making the site more difficult to take down.

Also: IsoHunt Is Sick of Closed-Development; Offers $100,000 for Open-Source Developers

isoHunt offers $100,000 to ‘most active’ Old Pirate Bay contributors

Android continued, in the Q3 2014, to dominate the market according to IDC, having gained 84.4% of the market by the end of the quarter, compared to 81.2% for the same period in 2013.

Variscite unveiled a Linux-friendly, SODIMM-style COM based on TI’s Sitara AM437x, supporting the updated SoC’s quad-core Programmable Real-time Unit (PRU).

The VAR-SOM-AM43 is the first computer-on-module we’ve seen to use the Texas Instruments Sitara AM437x, a single-core Cortex-A9 system-on-chip that clocks to 1GHz. Last month, Adeneo announced an Android 4.4 BSP for TI’s Sitara AM437x development platform. Variscite is supporting its VAR-SOM-AM43 with a Yocto Linux, and soon, Android-ready hardware/software development kit of its own, which includes a VAR-AM43 CustomBoard development board, touchscreens, cables, and more

They said in working up hardware, they carefully designed the laptop "chip by chip" to work with open source software. The 4.4-pound laptop runs Linux. This is a GNU-based distribution, more specifically, the Trisquel GNU/Linux, "the strictest of distributions and strips all binary blobs from the Linux kernel." At the same time, they said laptop owners, if they want, can easily install anything less strict, such as Debian and Ubuntu. The machine has a 15.6" display in either 1920x1080 or 3840x2160 with a 60Hz refresh rate, 720p camera and HD Audio. It has a CD/DVD ROM drive. They used Intel Iris Pro Graphics 5200. It has a 48 Wh lithium polymer battery with about eight hours of usage.

We spend a lot of time talking about Lollipop and OS-level issues with Android -- but you know what's just as important as the operating system on your phone or tablet? The apps that surround it.

The right apps can make your device easier and more enjoyable to use. They can give it powers you didn't know were possible. They can make it feel like your own custom-tailored gadget -- whether you've been using it for two minutes or for two years.