The H Roundup - Linux Mint 15 RC, WebM patents, Google drops XMPP

Welcome to The H Roundup, your rapid review of the week with the most read news on The H, the security alerts and open source releases, and the essential feature articles – all in one quick-to-scan news item. This week: Continuous database migration, Google chat drops Jabber compatibility, possible VP8/WebM patent licensing problems, development plans for Ubuntu 13.10, Debian GNU/Hurd 2013 and a ready-to-roll robotics kit from Arduino.

Features

Why not store the data within a database in a version-controlled way in a similar way to how developers store their source code? The H's developer feature this week explains how to do this.

• Continuous database migration with Liquibase and Flyway

Many readers are still finding out about last week's discovery of what looks like routine surveillance of Skype users' IM conversations by Microsoft.

• Skype's ominous link checking: Facts and speculation

Top News

With the revamp of its Google+ social network and associated applications, Google's chat software is leaving interoperability with the XMPP standard (also known as Jabber) behind. In security news, Bitdefender's Clueful application helps Android users to discover applications that might put their privacy at risk and, at a conference for African activists, researchers discovered malware for the Mac that tries to send screenshots to a server.

• Google's chat client drops Jabber compatibility
• Mac spyware takes screenshots
• Bitdefender Clueful exposes Android spies

Simon Phipps warned that Google's WebM licensing could be incompatible with free software development, a release candidate for Linux Mint was released, and the Handbrake developers announced version 0.9.9 of their media file conversion tool. Meanwhile, the Ubuntu developers have been planning what goes into the next release of their Linux distribution.

• VP8/WebM cross-licence incompatible with open source
• Linux Mint 15 "Olivia" gets release candidate
• Handbrake turns 0.9.9
• Development plans for Ubuntu 13.10

Microsoft's Skype division has released a new version of Skype for Linux that polishes the application's user interface, the Debian developers have released an unofficial version of their distribution based on the GNU Hurd kernel, and Arduino has announced a new family of Wi-Fi-enabled boards and a ready-to-roll robotics kit.

• Skype for Linux 4.2 brings interface improvements
• Debian GNU/Hurd 2013 rounded up
• Arduino launches Wi-Fi board and ready-to-roll robotics platform

Open Source Releases

Open source releases this week included the latest release of the Mageia Linux distribution, a new release of NetBSD, a Perl release, a new version of Google's Chrome browser, and a new Fedora remix targeted at the Raspberry Pi mini-computer.

• Mageia 3 arrives "all grown up" after two months' delay
• NetBSD 6.1 and 6.0.2 released
• Perl 5.18 goes stable
• QEMU 1.5: GPU pass-through and ARM support
• HeidiSQL 8.0 arrives with polished user interface
• Tails 0.18 can install packages on the fly
• SQLite gets memory-mapped I/O
• Chrome 27 comes with better load speeds and security fixes
• Fedora Raspberry Pi remix reborn as Pidora

Development releases include the beta of Chrome 28 and the Tizen developers working on a desktop version of the mobile operating system under the stewardship of the Linux Foundation.

• Chrome 28 Beta gets faster, brings fullscreen mode to Android
• Tizen with GNOME 3 shell shown by Intel

Security Alerts

QuickTime users on Windows should update their version of the media framework as soon as possible to close several vulnerabilities.

• Apple closes QuickTime vulnerabilities on Windows
  

For everything The H has published in the last week, check out the last seven days of news. To keep up with The H, subscribe to the RSS feed, or follow honlinenews on Twitter. You can follow The H's own tweeting on Twitter as honline.

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