Mono for Android (.NET development for Android)

It was Netbeans and Eclipse tools to develop Android applications for those experienced in JAVA and C/C++. However other techies experience in .NET are now able to do so with new tool called Mono for Android.

Novell today announced the availability of Mono for Android, the first solution for developing Microsoft .NET applications for Google's Android platform. This essentially allows .NET and C# developers to use their existing skills to easily create Android apps.

Mono for Android consists of the core Mono runtime, bindings for native Android APIs, a Visual Studio 2010 plug-in, and an SDK that contains all the tools needed to build, debug, and deploy apps. Developers trained in Visual Studio can thus continue developing with their preferred IDE, while using their existing skills and .NET code, libraries, and tools, as well as C# programming knowledge. The Visual Studio 2010 plug-in lets engineers develop, debug, and deploy their apps to an Android simulator, an Android device, or the Android Market.

Mono for Android complements MonoTouch, Novell's solution for developing apps for Apple's iOS (iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch). Novell is thus pitching Mono for Android and MonoTouch to .NET developers as an option that will save them time and money because they will be able to share common code between iOS and Android on smartphones and tablets, as well as Windows Phone 7, Windows desktops, and Windows Server.

However the tool comes with the cost and there are four tiers of Mono for Android: Student ($99), Professional ($399), Enterprise ($999), and Enterprise 5 ($3,999). You can check out the differences between them at mono-android.net/store, but we recommend that you grab the trial either way first.

So for those thinking about developing applications for Android but having .NET skills sets are now able play and develop Android apps with an ease.

Happy 20th birthday Linux (Tux)

It seems time flies. You’ve come a long way, Tux the Penguin. I just can't believe it went so fast that I still vividly remember that day I logged online using back then called the (BB) bulletin Board at the Binghamton University Watson's computer center chatting with friends, mid of 1992, about new OS called MINIX then later on was called Linux. It was the earliest discussion about possibility of having FREE and OPEN operating system (it was talk of the campus at some universities- computer science students and teachers). Back then it was something. I was amazed and exited. I hooked on with the second and follow by many releases, but the first distro was of Slackware...

Yes it is time to celebrate the historical event. The Linux Foundation is celebrating 20 years of the famous FOSS operating system, Linux — or GNU-slash-Linux, depending on how hard-line a fossie you’re talking to — with a slew of special events, both online and IRL.

Today Linux is literally everywhere: in your phone, at your ATM, in your TV, on your desktop, at the movies, in your car, your house, and other gadgets.

The foundation marks the summer of 1991 as the time when Linus Torvalds made a bold decision to share his operating system with the world. Torvalds soon licensed that first Linux OS under the General Public License and indeed nothing in computing has been the same since. HAPPY Birthday, Tux, and many thanks to Linus Torvalds who started it all.

So I wish all happy computing and long live the Openness of Open Source software around the world.