News, news and some news

Here is a large news post for the weekend...

Warp2Search
Fake DirectX 9
According to the German website dialerschutz there is a spam mail currently being sent out that masks itself as a Microsoft news flash reporting the release of DirectX 9. Translated, the mail reads "Yesterday, 19.04.2002, we completed our DirectX 9.0. In your own interest, you should update your system with this new version as soon as possible. Our free update is available for all operating systems." Of course, this is all a lie. Whoever follows the download link provided is, in reality, downloading a 0190 (pay-per-call) dialer of the company Interfun. Note - When checking the link, I noticed the webmaster account being closed due to spam.

STABLE Mozilla 1.0 Release Candidate 1 - Completed April 18, 2002
Anonymous writes "Previous article was the nightly build:

Created most weekdays from the previous day's work, these will probably work, but maybe not. Use them to verify whether a bug you're tracking has been fixed.

The new one is more stable.

Windows XP Patch: Direct3D-Based Screen Saver Hibernate/Standby Error
If the 3D Flowerbox, 3D Flying Objects, 3D Pipes, 3D Text, or another Direct3D-based screen saver is running in Windows XP, the computer may be unable to enter standby or hibernation by using the timer in Power Management properties. Download now to avoid this issue.

Lindows Screenshots I really want to get my hands on this operating system...
MaltiBRD over @ Planet-Xp.de let me know that he has some nice screenshots from the Lindows Operating System online.

Rage3D
ATI3DUAG.DLL - R300 Direct X functions
Daemonarch noted in this thread that a new file, called ATI3DUAG.DLL, included with the 9026 drivers, contains R300 Direct X functions. Here is a list of functions he found:

R300FFVSCacheDebug
R300FFVSCacheSizeLog2
R300FFVSCache
R300VSConstMgmt
R300VSConstGranularity
R300OptimizePVSCode
ForcePrefetch
128BitVectorWrites
ForceFPUs
LocalTextureTiling
LocalTextureMicroTiling
UserScissorEnable
AllowDitherWhileBlending
ColorCompression
CMaskEnable
TCLEnable

Rage3d Tweak v3.1e Released
Well, this version is primarily all of the fixes released yesterday wrapped up with a new help file and some other minor additions.

What's New and Download sites on the Rage3D Tweak Page.

And something else I spotted somewhere... Niscenus will enjoy this one.
Why Open Source Software / Free Software (OSS/FS)? Look at the Numbers!
OSS/FS has significant market share, is often the most reliable software, and in many cases has the best performance. OSS/FS scales, both in problem size and project size. OSS/FS software generally has far better security, particularly when compared to Windows. Total cost of ownership for OSS/FS is often far less than proprietary software, particularly as the number of platforms increases. These statements are not merely opinions; these effects can be shown quantitatively, using a wide variety of measures. This doesn't even consider other issues that are hard to measure, such as freedom from control by a single source, freedom from licensing management (with its accompanying litigation), and increased flexibility. I believe OSS/FS options should be carefully considered any time software or computer hardware is needed.