When it comes to video playback on Linux, the premiere choice for video acceleration is currently using VDPAU with its CPU-efficient, GPU-accelerated capabilities that even has no problems playing 1080p video files with extremely low-end hardware.

One month ago Nvidia released their 180.22 video drivers for Linux OSes, which brought initial support for Linux kernel 2.6.28. Last night (February 11th) Nvidia proudly presented yet another improved version of their proprietary video driver for the Linux, FreeBSD and Solaris open source operating systems.

Fluendo S.A., the popular software company that offers audio and video codecs for various Linux distributions, such as Mandriva, proudly announced yesterday evening (July 2nd) the immediate availability of a new solution to legally play DVD-Video discs.

Areas of important development in the overall Free Desktop ecosystem can be broken down into several main areas: multimedia, hardware support, infrastructural enhancements, and usability work, and I intend to cover each of these broad categories in the next couple of days.

That fancy row of icons at the bottom of the Mac OS X desktop is pretty good, you have to admit. Hence the multitude of copy-cats that followed on other OS’s, none of which really matching the quality of the OS X dock. However, with advances in 3D desktop support, Avant Window Navigator (AWN) has stepped up, and is beginning to mark its territory, all over the OS X dock.

Video editing is the process of editing motion video footage. In the new age of personal video, video editing is becoming a central function of the desktop, with the popularity of video editing software ever increasing.

Desktop use of GNU/Linux is on the rise, and one of the factors leading people towards its use is videos such as these, showing off the newest effects. However, to get these effects on a KDE or Gnome desktop, you must* use a 3D-accelerating hardware driver for your video card.

There were a few areas where desktop Linux needs some improvement. I may have been lucky as a lot of these problems I have not personally experienced, some of them I have and some of them I remember from years back but are no longer relevant.

MPEG-4 AVC (H.264), the efficient, open industry standard for video encoding, has made huge strides to become the industry leader in all areas – it plays on mobiles and MP3 players, it's used by HDTV and Blu-ray Discs, and cameras and HD camcorders record in it.