The company then assessed "Microsoft’s alleged Android portfolio and commercially scored the U.S. granted patents using M-Cam’s commercial asset underwriting systems. This assessment measured the commercial strength and transferability of each patent. Commercial patents are linked directly with cash flows and may have a basis for licensing."

Windows XP’s long run may have finally come to an end, but that doesn’t mean your XP-era hardware has to go too. No indeed: There are numerous options available in the Linux world, and one shining example is LXLE.

A brand-new LXLE 14.04 made its debut a few weeks ago, and it’s packed with new features while remaining lightweight and speedy. With an XP mode among several other desktop options, this zippy OS needs less than a minute to boot and get online. Don’t try that on your Windows machine.

Ready for a look? Read on, then, and see what your older PC hardware could be doing.

Usage of idiosyncratic software could push the Korean government away from Microsoft’s offerings and into open-source OSes like Linux

Also: S Korea to break away from Windows by 2020

The KDE Community introduced the concept of convergence way back in 2008 with the arrival of KDE 4.x (back then it was still KDE Desktop). If you ever tried KDE on your netbook you would have noticed that the desktop that got installed was different from that you would get when you install the same iso on your desktop.

Are you new to Linux, are you finding it hard to adjust to the Linux environment and are wondering where you can get an application for Linux that is similar to the XYZ program on Windows.

Robolinux uses a piece of technology called Stealth VM Software, which allows users to create a clone of a Windows Operating System with all the installed programs and updates. It should work, in theory, but there isn't enough feedback to see how good this particular solution really is.

Besides this important feature that is one of the most important ones implemented in this distribution, the developer has also made a few other major changes and he has added quite a few new packages.

There’s a lot that you can do with £5.5m. You could employ a couple of hundred people for a year for starters, or set up some small businesses. You could be sensible and invest in technologies, or you could pay for lots of operations. Alternatively, you could buy lots of sweets or several million copies of the Adam Sandler movie of your choice.

The British National Health Service, however, has handed over that amount of money to Microsoft. And in return, it’s getting an extra 15 months of support for a Microsoft product. It’s the kind of thing that doesn’t really take too long to sink in.

But the fact is, even if you think you are bound to Windows or some other proprietary operating system, you are probably already a Linux user too. When you visit a website, the chances are that it is using an Apache2 webserver. This is free and designed to integrate with the security and operating system features of Linux. Currently more than 60% of webservers are known to be hosting via Apache.

Linux may rule in most places — supercomputers, mobile, and Wall Street to name a few — but the Windows empire has still held on to the desktop, despite Windows 8.x's failure to grab marketshare quickly. Now there's new hope: At Google I/O, Sundar Pichai, Google's head of Chrome and Android, said during the opening keynote that Google will be giving Chrome OS the power to run Android apps.

There are quite a few Linux distributions that take direct aim at the Windows users, but not all of them are as appreciated as Zorin OS. The developers have managed to release a fresh take on the old desktop paradigm used by Windows. It somewhat resembles that well-known interface, but it manages to also feel new.

This latest edition is still in the development stages and it will take a while until it is ready, but, from the looks of it, Zorin OS 9 RC is already a winner. It's now based on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS (Trusty Tahr), which was released a couple of months ago, meaning that it will also come with extended support.

There is no love between Linux and Windows users, but that doesn't stop Linux users to transform their operating system until it looks like the latest Windows 8. In fact, the WinAte theme is actually perfect for this task.

SOCIAL NETWORK Facebook has introduced some of the fruits of its Open Compute project, revealing a networking switch and a supporting Linux operating system (OS).

Linux users need Wine to run applications from the Windows platform, but the bulk of apps accessed in this way is actually quite old. Sure enough, it's possible to run newer software as well, but most users need Wine for much older stuff.

One of the latest updates for Linux kernel 3.14.x brought some modifications and users found out that they couldn’t run Wine configured as Windows 9x, which is actually an important option.

Closed-source software products, mostly Microsoft’s, have been dominating Vietnam’s software market, despite the government’s encouragement to develop and use open-source software.

Some background: Microsoft in Vietnam

Windows XP is dead. Some people may not be aware of this fact but I'm telling you now "That parrot is dead".

Microsoft ended support for Windows XP on April 8th 2014 but what does end of support mean? Does it mean it doesn't work anymore?

Actually, Windows XP will continue to work perfectly well for quite some time but the trouble is that any remaining security holes will remain unplugged and that leaves a huge opportunity for the cyber criminals to exploit any individual or organisation that remains on that platform.

Also: Announcing Lubuntu Week

That system is Wine, a software “go-between” that lets users run Windows applications without a copy of Microsoft Windows. Wine isn’t an operating system in its own right, just a layer that sits on top of free systems like Linux. It doesn’t run every Windows program but offers seamless compatibility on many of the most recent and popular applications. Used in conjunction with a free graphical operating system like Ubuntu, it’s an option that could save you up to £80 on Microsoft’s current asking price.

My how the times have changed. At one point, HP and Microsoft were sharing friendship bracelets and having slumber parties. In fact, over the last decade, HP was a major player with Microsoft. Those days are gone. The juggernaut that was once Microsoft is slowly toppling and companies like HP are seeing the writing on the wall. That writing includes the likes of Android, Linux, iOS -- platforms perfect for mobile and embedded systems.

To that end, Hewlett Packard has decided to kick Microsoft to the curb and develop their own operating system that will power all of their future devices. In particular, HP is working on a device they call "The Machine." This new device will be made up of several new technologies -- including a new type of memory -- and will run a new operating system based on...

Wait for it...

Linux.

Looking around the BIOS let me set the Secure Boot to boot other OSes. It wouldn't let me just disable it completely. I set the boot order to boot the DVD drive first and tried to run those Linux live disks. Mageia 4 wasn't going to let me change the video driver from VESA no matter what. Cinnamon crashed once loading NVIDIA drivers in Mint 17. openSUSE behaved the best in giving me nice video support. I figured I'd install openSUSE and use it until Mint 17 came out in the KDE version.

Instead, the Chinese government is calling for the increased purchase and development of domestically developed operating systems, specifically those created on Linux. Although the ban of Windows 8 does not directly affect the general public, Sina News reports that the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology is pushing for domestic users to gravitate from Windows XP to domestic operating systems too. It's not too far fetched an idea, either–China has a long history of successfully developing domestic software. The messaging software QQ, for example, is more popular than the foreign-developed MSN, since it was specifically developed to cater to Chinese people's sensibilities.

Retail giant Woolworths has announced a massive IT transformation program, confirming it will phase out its huge collection of Microsoft Windows desktops in favour of 8000 Google Chrome OS machines.