Six degrees of freedom (6DOF) devices allow for movement in three axes, tilt in two axes, and rotation in the third. Some of these devices look like small joysticks -- for example, the SpaceNavigator. These devices are typically used for computer-aided design and manufacturing (CAD/CAM) and other 3-D applications. With a new programming library, you can now also use them with Linux applications.

Are you still using a web browser to access your favourite online applications? Why not do things the easy way, and make those applications part of your desktop with Prism.

...Essentially, we're trying to reorganize the desktop and optimize it for these kinds of applications. The Big Board is a part of the Online Desktop effort; it's a new panel type component that is intended to display more relevant things to your online life than the traditional panel.

Conversing (a.k.a. messaging) is a common online activity, and a number of desktop and web applications enable it. But with an increasing variety of protocols and providers, it’s getting harder and harder to keep track of all your conversations.

Could the web browser help you follow and participate in online discussions? Snowl is an experiment to answer that question..."

At last year's KDE Conference Akademy the vision of the Social Desktop was born and first presented to a larger audience. The concept behind the Social Desktop is to bring the power of online communities and group collaboration to desktop applications and the desktop shell itself.

This article contains a list of seven valuable--and best of all, free--applications for Windows Mobile devices. Most of 'em work on Windows Mobile Professional smartphones or Pocket PCs, some work on both and a couple are for Windows Mobile Standard. There's an uber RSS reader thingee, a free backup app and more.

Microsoft wishes it could charge for these...

I started using GNU/Linux and Free Software in 1992. In those days, while everything I needed for a working computer was generally available in software freedom, there were many components and applications that simply did not exist.

"...Two new technologies, which has been recently introduced, suggest an online direction for Eclipse. While it's possible that none of them is adequate, this is a strong indication on the future of the platform. I don't think that the desktop version will fade away in the near future, from the same reason that desktop office applications are still with us.

As I've mentioned in previous articles I currently have all the applications I need on my Ubuntu Linux desktop so I never need to use Windows. However, there are unfortunately still plenty of applications that some users need which are not available under Linux and have no equivalent. Adobe's Flash and Photoshop spring to mind, Turbotax is another that some miss, how about iTunes?