Open Recall: FreedomBox, SANE, Stellarium and Audacity

Open Recall is a space on The H for those things that are too small to package as news but are worth the linkage. This edition is about some of the latest open source software releases.

• FreedomBox 0.1 - The FreedomBox Foundation has announced the availability of its first FreedomBox software release since being successfully funded on Kickstarter in March of last year. FreedomBox is a Debian Linux-based software system for inexpensive, low-power, plug-top computers that is intended to allow users to setup their own web services, such as secure email and telecommunications, anonymous publishing, social networking and media sharing. Described as "long overdue" by its developers, the first version 0.1 release focuses on architecture and infrastructure and is aimed primarily at developers. The team say that they hope the 0.1 milestone will make it easier to progress towards a 1.0 release.

• SANE 1.0.23 - More than 18 months after version 1.0.22 arrived, the SANE project has published a new version of its API for controlling scanner hardware, improving overall hardware support. Version 1.0.23 of SANE – short for "Scanner Access Now Easy" – adds support for 30 new scanner models and includes new backends for Panasonic and Kodak hardware; existing backends have also received updates. Support for the Video for Linux (V4L), which provides generic access to video cameras under Linux, has been improved and the software deskew algorithm was updated. Source code for the new version is available from the project's site.
  

• Stellarium 0.11.4 - While the developers have yet to announce its release on the Stellarium homepage, version 0.11.4 of the open source planetarium application is now available for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. The latest release of the astronomy software improves the Night Vision mode, and introduces two new plug-ins: Exoplanets and Observability. According to the release notes, the update also improves support for BSD-based systems and adds new unspecified scripts. Stellarium 0.11.4 is also available from The H's Downloads section.
  

• Audacity 2.0.2 released - The new version of Audacity improves several of the open source audio editor's toolbars and updates some of the Nyquist effects. Audacity 2.0.2 also corrects a significant bug that caused clicks on split lines. A full list of changes, including known issues, can be found in the release notes.

(crve)