Operating Systems

Is it me, or does the word "proprietary" pop-up in this press release a bit more than one might expect? Linspire, Inc., developer of the Linspire commercial and Freespire community desktop Linux operating systems and CNR.com, a free Linux software delivery service, today announced the immediate availability of Linspire 6.0, the latest commercial release of the desktop Linux operating system. Building on the best of open source software using Ubuntu as its base line, Linspire 6.0 adds licensed proprietary drivers, codecs, and software in its core distribution to provide a better user experience. The first commercial release from Linspire, Inc. in over two years, Linspire 6.0 continues its traditional focus on ease-of-use and bundles proprietary software where there are no viable open source alternatives, providing improved hardware, file type, and multimedia support, such as MP3, Real, Java, Flash, ATI, nVidia, WiFi, and many more. Linspire 6.0 is also the first commercial release to incorporate several technologies from Microsoft including Windows Media, True Type Fonts, as well as Open XML translators that allow OpenOffice to open and edit Microsoft Word .docx formatted documents."Today we continue the Linspire tradition by offering the choice of a better overall experience for users new to desktop Linux," said Larry Kettler, President and CEO of Linspire, Inc. "Linspire 6.0 further bridges the gap between open source and commercial software, combining the best from each into a single easy-to-use, familiar and productive operating system."Linspire 6.0 is the first desktop Linux operating system to bundle the CNR Client (beta), providing one-click access to thousands of open source and popular commercial applications such as Sun's StarOffice, Parallels Workstation, Win4Lin, CodeWeaver's Crossover Office, TransGaming's Cedega, commercial games and many more."If you are genuinely interested in finding an OS alternative, Linspire 6.0 will show you how far desktop Linu

byPaul Thurrott