Torvalds Only Cares about the Kernel
Linus Torvalds is back in the news today after his keynote speech at Linux.conf.au. ArsTechnica.com covered the Q&A session with some of Torvalds most notable quotes. In other news, Phoronix.com previews GNOME 3.16 and Clement Lefebvre today announced new tiny PC "MintBox Mini." Lastly, Nick Heath covers Munich's Linux trials and travails.
After speaking at the Linux.conf.au Conference in New Zealand today, Torvalds took questions from the audience. ArsTechnica.com quoted Torvalds saying, "Some people think I'm nice and are shocked when they find out different. I'm not a nice person, and I don't care about you. I care about the technology and the kernel—that's what's important to me." On the subject of diversity Torvalds said, "The most important part of open source is that people are allowed to do what they are good at. All that [diversity] stuff is just details and not really important."
Michael Larabel recently compiled a list of features to look out for in upcoming GNOME 3.16. Larabel said 3.16 is due in March 2015 and developmental versions have been release for those wishing a sneak peek. Those trying the betas might find that GTK+ now supports OpenGL which will lead to a more feature-rich and prettier Nautilus, Mutter, and themes. Other improvements are less flashy but welcome.
Clem Lefebvre today blogged of the new Mint mini PC dubbed "MintBox Mini." The silent mini is less than an inch thick and is completely silent. It will feature an AMD A4 6400T, Radeon R3 GPU, 4GB RAM, 64 GB SSD, Wifi and wired, lots of USB ports, and two HDMI sockets. It will likely cost $295 and will be available in Spring 2015.
Nick Heath today said, "The mayor of a German city that swapped Windows for Linux must stop publicly criticising the way IT is run at the council or risk worsening an ongoing staffing crisis." The IT department is running at about 80% currently and spokesmen say they'll continue trying to fill the vacancies. Beyond that a survey is planned for workers to gauge adoption issues and satisfaction. The results will be "used to draw up a definitive list of issues users have with IT at the council and potential ways to resolve them." But all in all, the Microsoft loving mayor is making things harder than they have to be.