The latest version of the Firefox web browser has been released. If you haven’t already upgraded, you should go to Help->Check for Updates or use your package management software to download the latest version as soon as possible, because there are a number of security fixes included in the update. The full release notes can, as always, be found on the official Mozilla website.
There is an announcement on the official PHP website about PHP 4 reaching end of life at the end of this year, with no more development beyond the 31st December 2007. Security patches will continue for a further eight months after this date, but after August 2008 PHP 4 will be no more.
As one can imagine, this decision has caused a strong split of opinion within the PHP community. I suspect that many users will be extremely annoyed by the announcement, even though their applications should work under PHP 5 without any changes. If they don’t, chances are that it’s a problem with their script, although I doubt they will see it like that. On the other hand, GoPHP5 is waving the flag for the ‘move to PHP 5’ group, listing projects and hosts which have pledged to move to PHP 5 by February 2008—although this is something of a moot point now that we know that PHP 4 will be discontinued anyway.
My personal thought on all this is that both the PHP team and web hosting companies are to blame for the slow transition to PHP 5. The latest major version of the software has been out for three years now, yet the PHP team has done very little to push system administrators to upgrade, nor have they provided any major incentives for users to want to move to the latest version and put pressure on their providers to upgrade.. Web hosting companies have also failed to even offer PHP 5 in many instances, leaving users with no option but to continue developing for version 4.
Matt has also weighed in to the debate with his recent post, On PHP. I agree wholeheartedly with his point about the PHP core team killing off a popular product (for all its faults, PHP 4 has undeniably been a success) without thinking about why people haven’t upgraded to PHP 5. This could be laziness, in which case the PHP team needs to take steps to ensure that there are incentives to overcome this, e.g. new features, improved security model and smoother updates.
I think what amazes me the most about all this though is that we really should be looking towards PHP 6 by now, yet PHP 5 still isn’t adopted by the majority of hosting companies and end users. If it’s taken this long to move from 4 to 5, how long will moving from 5 to 6 (which has lots of useful improvements according to Jero) take?
BBC to hear open source concerns
The BBC Trust has offered to meet the Open Source Consortium over concerns that iPlayer, the upcoming software for watching past BBC shows online, will only be available to people using Microsoft Windows and Internet Explorer. This has been likened to the BBC launching a new channel which would only play on Panasonic televisions, and the failure to offer support for Linux and Macs has been widely criticised in those communities since the initial announcement.
The OSC has already threatened the BBC with a complaint to the European Commission, although at the time of writing no formal complaint has been lodged with the EC. Based on how long it usually takes the EC to take action, I doubt that the BBC Trust needed to worry about this, but the threat does seem to have achieved its desired effect.
Personally, I’m very glad to see some positive movement on this issue. I pay my licence fee every year and as such I expect to be able to use any service which is offered by the BBC, regardless of what operating system I choose to use (Linux most of the time, occasionally OS X and XP when I need to do certain things). The BBC is in a unique position in that it is not affected by commercial pressures in the same way as other broadcasters, and it must not be allowed to abuse that power by only allowing its services to work on certain platforms.
Despite announcing a cut in the price of the PlayStation 3 in the US, Sony has decided not to deliver a similar price cut in Europe. Instead gamers are being offered a ‘starter pack’, which will include two games and two controllers. So European consumers, who are already been charged a price which does not reflect the exchange rate between the dollar and the pound, will continue to be ripped off by console makers.
At the time of writing, a poll on the BBC News website indicates that, after 6078 votes had been cast, 84% of respondents would prefer to have a cheaper PS3 rather than ‘free’ games and controllers. Whether Sony will listen to gamers and change their policy has yet to be seen, but personally I think they need to do something if they want the PlayStation to remain the king of consoles and not be kicked off its pedestal by the Wii or the XBox.
Slackware release announcement: via Digg
The creaking Linux distribution known as Slackware has clocked over another major version number to make it to 12.0. Amazingly, Slackware is still largely maintained by one individual, Patrick Volkerding, although of course most of the software behind the distribution is maintained by hundreds of other open source developers. It’s finally managed to bring itself out of the dark ages with the 2.6 kernel being the only one officially supported (until fairly recently Slackware still used 2.4 by default). Most of the other software is up to date, such as KDE 3.5.x and gcc 4.1.x, so you can rest assured that you won’t be running a system several years behind anyone else’s.
What puzzles me though is why Slackware is still going. I can’t see anyone using it as a desktop distribution, when Ubuntu has pretty much wiped the floor with everyone else (although Fedora and SUSE are catching up fast and provide excellent alternatives), but neither can I see anyone using it on a server where the market is split between free (mostly Debian with the odd smattering of Gentoo) and enterprise distributions (RedHat and SUSE mostly). I suppose if Volkerding enjoys working on the project and there is still a large enough user base to justify it then that’s a good enough reason in itself, but I haven’t heard Slackware mentioned in any Linux-related conversations for a long time.
Edge magazine has released its list of the top 100 video games of all time today, covering more than ten years of gaming. Top of the list is ‘Legend of Zelda: Ocarina’, closely followed by Resident Evil 4 and Super Mario 64.
I’m a bit disappointed with the fact that only one PC game, Half Life 2, made it into the top 10. However, I suspect that ‘video game’ does not mean the same as ‘computer game’ in this context, even though they are often used interchangeably. This seems to be more about games which you would expect to see on the console, rather than real time strategy or turn-based games such as Civilization II (which should definitely be near the top, if only because of the amount of my life which has been taken up by that most addictive of games). In fact I have never played any of the games on the top 10 list, with the exception of Tetris and earlier versions of Resident Evil and Half Life.
The special edition of Edge magazine covering the top 100 list is available in newsagents today, priced £10. I feel that’s a little bit steep, but perhaps it will be of interest to serious gaming fans and possibly even become a collectors item in years to come.