2015 LQ Awards and Linuxmint.com Returns, 17.3 Delayed
The 2015 LinuxQuestions.org Members Choice Awards categories are being updated this year. Discussion are ongoing. Slackware Live got Cinnamon and MATE flavors and Linuxmint.com is back saying 17.3 "isn't out yet." Elsewhere, Italo Vignoli suggested six LibreOffice extensions to "add new functionality or make existing functionality easier to use" and Doc Searls examined how "The Regulatorium" is ruining Linux wireless.
The LinuxQuestions.org Member Choice Awards have been taking place for at least a decade, which is why Jeremy is leading a discussion of the categories for this year. Technology has changed and some categories aren't relevant anymore and new categories need to be added. Proposed for the chopping block are FTP Client of the Year, Game Distribution Service of the Year, Revision Control, Messaging Application, VoIP, and Graphics Applications of the Year. Some of the proposed additions might be Shell of the Year, IRC Client of the Year, Package Manager, and Linux Filesystem of the Year. Suggestions are flying at the famous forum and one suggested adding a category for Open Hardware of Year. Visit the thread if you'd like more information or to participate in the discussion.
Linuxmint.com returned to the Netwaves early Thursday morning with a post from Clement Lefebvre saying, "I would like to apologize for keeping you in the dark. You probably noticed our website and forums were down." He then added, "Linux Mint 17.3 isn't officially out yet." It seems the project suffered some hardware failure and was a bit neglectful with the backups. Clem reassured users the team was working "day and night" to try and recover as much data as possible, of which Clem is sure will be most. "Only files were lost," Clem said, databases were fully backed up and thus restored. He also warned regulars to expect performance issues until they get the new system all "tuned" up and properly configured. "On the website it means 404 errors, missing screenshots and release notes, outdated pages..etc." 17.3 has been delayed because Clem said they "can't afford to announce it in these conditions." No estimate was given when to expect the 17.3 announcement, but other sites are still reporting its release. Distrowatch has a link to the download. 17.2 is still receiving updates.
Document Foundation founder Italio Vignoli posted a piece at OpenSource.com today listing six useful extensions for LibreOffice to make it more productive and fun. One is MultiFormatSave that "lets users save a document in the OpenDocument, Microsoft Office (old and new), and/or PDF formats simultaneously, according to user settings." Export as Images "adds a File menu entry export as Images... in Impress and Draw, to export all slides or pages as images in JPG, PNG, GIF, BMP, and TIFF." Both of those sound really handy. See the rest of Vignoli's suggestions at OpenSource.com.
In other news:
* Can We Save Wireless from Regulators? (spoiler: No).