Development

Open source identity: Bitcoin technical lead Gavin Andresen

Originally from Melbourne, Australia but now living in the US, Gavin Andresen is the technical lead of the Bitcoin virtual currency system. Started by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2009, Bitcoin is a digital currency system consisting of an open source client and P2P network. The aim of the Bitcoin project is a decentralised, secure peer-to-peer currency system that does not rely on banks or central transaction processing authorities. To generate “Bitcoins” people on the network use a cross-platform, open source client developed in C++. In addition to the open source aspect of Bitcoin, there is now an emerging market in services around the cryptocurrency such as exchange portals and virtual clearing houses. Previously, the Open Source Identity series has featured interviews with Ruby on Rails creator David Heinemeier Hansson, Linux’s Linus Torvalds, Jan Schneider of Horde, Mark Spencer of Asterisk fame, Spine CMS creator Hendrick van Belleghem, Free Telephony Project founder David Rowe, and PulseAudio creator Lennart Poettering. This time we talk to Gavin Andresen about the new, decentralised approach to money – Bitcoin.

By Rodney Gedda | 21 March, 2011 14:29

Tags: Bitcoin, currency, e-commerce, encryption, Gavin Andresen, internet banking, money, open source, open source identity, P2P

Q&A: Inverse CEO on building an open source Exchange alternative

Use of open source e-mail groupware systems in the enterprise has been lacklustre with most organisations opting for products from Microsoft, IBM or cloud providers like Google. The market is ripe for competition and Canadian company Inverse is set to provide another option by integrating the OpenChange project’s Microsoft Outlook compatibility software into the SOGo open source groupware suite. With a complete Exchange server replacement scheduled for release early next year, we spoke with Inverse president and CEO Ludovic Marcotte about open source groupware development, native Microsoft Exchange interoperability and data integration standards.

By Rodney Gedda | 26 October, 2010 14:13

Tags: groupware, Inverse, Microsoft, microsoft exchange, openchange, SOGo

Google: Concerns over Instant unwarranted

Google shook the search market last week with the launch of Instant, a new feature that lets the company's search engine refresh results on the fly as people type their queries.

By Juan Carlos Perez | 14 September, 2010 03:20

Tags: advertising, Google, Google Instant, internet, search engines

KDE innovation still brewing amid stable 4.5 release

With KDE Software Compilation (SC) 4.5 released this week, the open source project has made another stepping stone towards its goal of providing a modern, free desktop people can adapt to their needs. TechWorld caught up with KDE developer and spokesperson for the project, Sebastian Kugler, about what was achieved with this latest release and how KDE SC can be more innovative.

By Rodney Gedda | 11 August, 2010 05:50

Tags: desktop linux, innovation, kde, kde4, open source, software development

Google VP Mayer describes the perfect search engine

Last month, Google CEO Eric Schmidt said during the company's earnings call that Google had implemented about 120 search quality improvements during the third quarter as it moves toward its ultimate goal: "We want to get to the perfect search engine."

By Juan Carlos Perez | 11 November, 2009 08:44

Tags: Google, search engines

Interview: PayPal's developer network senior director, Naveed Anwar, and VP, platform and emerging technologies, Osama Bedier

PayPal’s developer network senior director, Naveed Anwar, and VP, platform and emerging technologies, Osama Bedier, who were in Sydney for this week's Web Directions conference, chat to Computerworld about PayPal's plans to open its payment platform to third-party developers.

By Kathryn Edwards | 09 October, 2009 13:01

Tags: paypal, software development

A-Z of Programming Languages: Scala

A Twitter developer has said that Scala could become the language of choice of the modern Web 2.0 startup. LinkedIn also uses the language. So do with many other big corporate names including Sony Pictures, EDF and SAP. Martin Odersky tells us about Scala’s history, its future and what makes it so interesting.

By Dahna McConnachie | 18 August, 2009 11:32

Tags: a-z of programming languages, LinkedIn, programming, scala, twitter

The A-Z of Programming Languages: Erlang

Our series on the most popular programming languages continues as we chat to Erlang creator Joe Armstrong

By Kathryn Edwards | 16 June, 2009 15:03

Tags: a-z of programming languages, erlang

KOffice on version 2.0, extensions, and being like Firefox

The idea of an application that supports third-party extensions and add-ons users can download and install in one click may be more applicable to Web browsers than office suites, but the developers at the open source KOffice project have developed such an architecture where all components are modular. TechWorld interviews the marketing coordinator for KOffice, Inge Wallin, to find out where this lesser-known of the open source office suites is headed now version 2.0.0 has arrived and what excites its developers. Building an easy, intuitive, cross-platform, and extensible platform like Firefox is high on the agenda.

By Rodney Gedda | 28 May, 2009 16:05

Tags: firefox, kde, kde4, KOffice, odf, ooxml, openoffice

The A-Z of Programming Languages: Tcl

Our series on the most popular programming languages continues as we chat to Tcl creator John Ousterhout.

By Kathryn Edwards | 08 May, 2009 13:22

Tags: a-z of programming languages, Java, mars lander, open source, python, software development, tcl

The A-Z of Programming Languages: Falcon

Computerworld's investigations into the most widely-used programming languages continues as we chat with Giancarlo Niccolai the creator of the Falcon programming language.

By Kathryn Edwards | 09 April, 2009 11:10

Tags: a-z of programming languages, C, Falcon, open source, programming, scripting language

The A-Z of Programming Languages: Bourne shell, or sh

On this occasion we speak to Steve Bourne, creator of the Bourne shell, or sh. In the early 1970s Bourne was at the Computer Laboratory in Cambridge, England working on a compiler for Algol68 as part of his PhD work in dynamical astronomy. This work paved the way for him to travel to IBM’s T.J. Watson Research Center in New York in 1973, in part to undertake research into compilers. Through this work, and a series of connections and circumstance, Bourne got to know people at Bell Labs who then offered him a job in the Unix group in 1975. It was during this time Bourne developed sh.

By Howard Dahdah | 05 March, 2009 08:45

Tags: a-z of programming languages

Open source identity: Spine CMS creator Hendrik Van Belleghem

Looking for a Web-based content management system that uses Perl instead of PHP? Want to serve dynamic and static content with PostgreSQL, not MySQL? What started out as a hobby project by Hendrik Van Belleghem, based in Bazel, Belgium, has grown into Spine – a Perl Web content system for Apache on Unix systems. With so many LAMP (Linux Apache MySQL PHP) content systems available, Spine offers a refreshing alternative with the tried and tested Perl language and is database independent. Open Source Identity interviews Van Belleghem about Spine, a lesser-known alternative to the popular Web CMSs.

By Rodney Gedda | 04 March, 2009 11:02

Tags: cms, lamp, mysql, open source identity, perl, postgresql

The A-Z of Programming Languages: Perl

Computerworld is undertaking a series of investigations into the most widely-used programming languages. This time we chat with Larry Wall, creator of the Perl programming language and regarded as the father of modern scripting languages.

By Rodney Gedda | 11 December, 2008 16:02

Tags: a-z of programming languages, perl, programming, programming language

ScrumMaster offers tips on how to play in a winning dev team

The original ScrumMaster, John Scumniotales, talks about the genesis of the popular agile software development methodology, the importance of incorporating stakeholder feedback and the “healthy tension” between developers and product managers.

By Lorraine Pauls Longhurst | 01 December, 2008 12:41

Tags: agile programming, scrum

Open source identity: Free Telephony Project founder David Rowe

Move over proprietary telephony systems. Australian engineer David Rowe started the Free Telephony Project three years ago to build an affordable IP-PABX system out of free hardware and software. That’s right, the design of the Free Telephony Project IP-PABX is open for any interested person to review and improve. With the first Free Telephony Project products now available and in use world-wide, Rowe hopes it will go along way to improving the availability of voice services in developing nations. In this edition of Open Source Identity, TechWorld interviews Rowe to uncover the burgeoning business of open product development.

By Rodney Gedda | 23 October, 2008 12:06

Tags: asterisk, codec, ip-pabx, opensource, open source identity, telephony, uclinux

The A-Z of Programming Languages: C#

In this interview Microsoft's leader of C# development, Anders Hejlsberg, took some time to tell Computerworld about the development of C#, his thoughts on future programming trends, and his experiences putting out fires. Hejlsberg is also responsible for writing the Turbo Pascal system, and was the lead architect on the team that developed Delphi.

By Naomi Hamilton | 01 October, 2008 13:00

Tags: C#, C, f#, a-z of programming languages

The A-Z of Programming Languages: Haskell

In this in-depth interview, we chat with Simon Peyton-Jones about the development of Haskell. Peyton-Jones is particularly interested in the design, implementation, and application of lazy functional languages, and speaks in detail of his desire to ‘do one thing well’, as well as his current research projects being undertaken at Microsoft Research in Cambridge, UK.

By Naomi Hamilton | 19 September, 2008 17:11

Tags: a-z of programming languages

The A-Z of Programming Languages: Lua

Computerworld is undertaking a series of investigations into the most widely-used programming languages. This time we chat to Prof. Roberto Ierusalimschy about the design and development of Lua.

By Naomi Hamilton | 11 September, 2008 20:29

Tags: lua, a-z of programming languages

Red Hat VP readies virtualisation roadmap

Paul Cormier is Red Hat's executive VP and head of Red Hat products and technologies divisions. His experienced thumb is firmly planted in many Red Hat pies; including engineering, product management and product marketing. The company credits the introduction of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) to Cormier's leadership and experience in enterprise technology. Cormier has returned Down Under on another visit to Red Hat's research and development team in Brisbane, and took some time out to chat with Computerworld about the anticipated boom in virtualisation, cloud computing, Microsoft's open source initiatives, CentOS, JBoss Application Server 5.0, how open source software can aid the current economic downturn, and of course, the growing role of Linux and RHEL in the enterprise.