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Linux in the news
Recommended Reading
Factory of the Future? (Newsweek)
Newsweek has published a look at Nathan Myhrvold's patent shakedown startup. "Sources familiar with Myhrvold's strategy say that he has raised $350 million from some of the largest companies in high tech: Microsoft, Intel, Sony, Nokia and Apple. Google and eBay also recently invested. With this large bankroll, the company is out buying existing patents in droves. (Myhrvold won't comment on these activities, but sources say he has already purchased about 1,000 patents.) The strategy is to set up a sort of patent marketplace. Patent owners get money upfront for the dusty ideas sitting on their shelves, the investors get the rights to use the ideas without being sued and Myhrvold gets to rent those same ideas to other companies that need them to continue creating products."
Dear IE, I'm leaving you for good (ZDNet)
A ZDNet columnist breaks up with his browser. "With Mozilla Firefox, at least I know where I stand. The code is open source, built from the ground up, clean--not recycled. No more hidden agendas. At least when there's a flaw in Firefox, this browser alerts me on its toolbar. It doesn't try to hide its mistakes, waiting until the second Tuesday of the month to offer me a patch for some flaw that's been out there for six months already."
Prelude to MS-Linux (CBS)
CBS MarketWatch is carrying a Dvorak column on Microsoft's investment in Vintela. "When these two purchases are analyzed along with other recent Microsoft actions, you have to conclude that it is about to bring out a version of Linux under its own brand name. I suspect it will simply be termed Microsoft Linux or MS-Linux."
The SCO Problem
Fact and fiction in the Microsoft-SCO relationship (News.com)
News.com has posted a lengthy article claiming to lay down the truth behind Microsoft's involvement in the SCO case. There is some decent research there, but some things are missing: the name "Mike Anderer" never appears, for example. "But it was Microsoft that helped ensure that SCO could mount the fight, by providing major financial help at least twice in 2003. (SCO's finances are currently being tallied for the quarter ended Oct. 31, with the results to be reported in late December.) Though it doesn't appear that Microsoft was in the driver's seat when it came to SCO's legal attack on Linux, Microsoft's financial assistance was unusual and crucial."
Companies
CollabNet: Bringing open source to the rest of us (Silicon.com)
Silicon.com covers CollabNet. "Five-year-old CollabNet doesn't feel ashamed to get more deeply involved in open source than just providing the tools for development. When it saw the need for an open-source version control tool to succeed the industry standard CVS (Concurrent Versions System), it spearheaded the creation of the Subversion project by hiring four employees to get the process started and build a community around it."
Red Hat opens office in China (News.com)
Red Hat has opened a new office in China, according to this article on ZDNet. "The company said it will work with industry partners such as Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Intel and Oracle, as well as with Chinese business partners, to serve the rapidly growing Chinese software market. Red Hat's office will be located in the nation's capital, Beijing."
Sun deputizes Versora for Microsoft attack (the Register)
The Register reports that Sun will be working with Versora in an effort to move customers off of Microsoft web servers. "Versora, a small company based in Santa Barbara, California, is the newest member of Sun's iForce partner program. The firm makes products that automatically move code from Windows IIS servers to Apache servers. Sun will be looking to shift customers onto both Apache and its own Java System Web Server."
Sun to set Solaris free, after a fashion (News.com)
News.com sees Open Solaris as Sun's attack on Red Hat. "The pricing strategy, to be announced at a quarterly product launch event in San Jose, Calif., is the first half of an ambitious effort to retrieve relevance that Solaris lost to Linux. The second half will arrive in 60 to 90 days as Sun releases the source code of Solaris under an open-source license, Loiacono said."
Business
Firefox fortune hunters (News.com)
News.com looks at businesses built around Mozilla. "One result of these and other efforts is that Mozilla developers who cut their teeth as volunteers are now finding paid work in the Mozilla-based marketplace--a trend reflected in the open-source ecosystem as a whole."
Linux Adoption
Norway reports additional benefits from move to Linux (Desktop Linux)
Desktop Linux looks at Linux adoption in Norway. "In the midst of a migration to Linux, the city of Bergen, Norway has reportedly expanded its estimates of the cost savings and other benefits it expects to achieve in switching from Microsoft Windows technologies. In a report at ZDNet published last week, Bergen CTO Ole-Bjorn Tuftedal says he expects to save 30 percent on hardware costs alone thanks to the efficiency of Linux -- this, in addition to cost savings associated with licensing fees and other economic benefits he had expected prior to testing open source for city-wide deployment."
Venezuelan government institutions may adopt GNU/Linux (VHeadline.com)
VHeadline.com reports that Venezuela is looking at Linux. "Venezuela's National Assembly (AN) has started a debate on a bill to implement "free software" in government institutions ... the proposal was introduced October 21 by AN deputy Luis Tascon and urges the five independent branches of Government: Executive, Legislative, Judiciary, Moral and Electoral including all official entities to adopt free software as an exclusive working platform via the GNU/Linux operative system."
Legal
Senate May Ram Copyright Bill (Wired)
Wired examines the latest silliness before the U.S. Congress. "The bill would also permit people to use technology to skip objectionable content -- like a gory or sexually explicit scene -- in films, a right that consumers already have. However, under the proposed law, skipping any commercials or promotional announcements would be prohibited. The proposed law also includes language from the Pirate Act (S2237), which would permit the Justice Department to file civil lawsuits against alleged copyright infringers."
Monopolies of the mind (Economist)
The Economist has run a leader on patent problems. "Europe has not, so far, made the same blunder, but the European Parliament is considering the easing of rules for innovations incorporated in software. This might have a similarly deleterious effect as business-method patents, because many of these have been simply the application of computers to long-established practices."There is also a (subscribers only) article on fixing the patent system. "Later this month, the European Council of Ministers will discuss draft legislation on harmonising policy on computer-implemented innovations. Many small software companies in Europe, as well as 'open-source' software developers that make non-proprietary software, oppose the initiative. They fear that it is a first step towards adopting controversial software patents, already awarded in America, which could block different implementations of the same features. Were further proof needed that this may not be an entirely positive development, look no further than the mighty software monopolist, Microsoft, whose chairman, Bill Gates, has called on employees to increase the number of patents that the company files."
MS and Indemnification (Groklaw)
Groklaw has taken a detailed look at Microsoft's indemnification offer. "Refund the full amount they paid for the software? How can you resist a generous offer like that? Maybe we need to look at the fine print here."
Interviews
Interview: OSDL chief Stuart Cohen - Part 2 (vnunet)
Vnunet is running part two of an interview with OSDL's Stuart Cohen: "There are people who think Linux is going to run Microsoft into the ground. I don't believe it for a minute. It's too smart, too well managed, too well run. [But] it'll listen to its customers. When it gets to some market share number, or some customer sets, or some customer rating, then some [Windows] applications will run on Linux. It'll try different things, probably in different geographies, to see what works."
Novell CTO on hot Linux apps and closing gaps (Enterpriselinux)
Enterpriselinux interviews Novell CTO Alan Nugent. "Some corporate IT pros say they have a hard time finding the applications that they need for Linux. Do you think this is still valid, or do they just need to do more research?""Nugent: I think it is still valid in some areas. If I am at a Fortune 500 insurance company, I can't find a great claims management system that runs on Linux just yet. But, if I am in the electrical CAD business or mechanical CAD business, I can. So, it depends on the market. A year ago, that question would have been valid for a much broader segment of the market. They really couldn't find applications that would run on Linux; but it is getting better every day. Companies can now begin to use Linux much more broadly than for Web servers or firewalls. We work with dozens and dozens of companies which have either completed ports or are in the process of doing ports to Linux. Many of them are household names."
Interview with NVIDIA Engineers (LinuxQuestions)
LinuxQuestions.org interviews some unnamed NVIDIA engineers. "Demand has continues to grow for high quality Linux drivers with each new generation of GPUs. Around 15-20% of our workstation users ship with Linux. Some industries in the workstation business are 100% Linux. We have users using our Linux OpenGL drivers for things like designing automobiles, operating medical equipment, broadcasting television, and creating the latest special effects in movies."
Interview with Red Hat Vice President of Open Source Affairs Michael Tiemann (LinuxQuestions.org)
LinuxQuestions.org talks with Michael Tiemann. "As a Linux distribution, Fedora shines, pure and simple. But it's hard not to: the work that the GNOME team, the Open Office team, the Evolution team, the Firefox team, the kernel team, I could go on..., are doing is simply amazing. And the Fedora community is blessed with a large number of people seriously committed to making it great. I think that Fedora does a fantastic job of showing people "the best of what works today in 100% free and open source software". I think that Fedora is the perfect balance of leading edge technologies, yet robust enough that I can give my dad 4 CDs, he can install them, and then tell me "everything worked, as expected.""
Resources
Securing Linux, Part 2: Planning the installation (IBM developerWorks)
IBM developerWorks helps build a secure Linux system. "The first step -- before inserting your distribution's CDs and launching the installer -- is to develop a security plan: determine what services the system will provide, which hardware will be used, what software is necessary, and how the installation will be organized. By making the effort to develop such a plan before the actual installation, lots of possible security issues can be identified and eliminated at a very early stage. This is beneficial as it helps to minimize the risk of a system intrusion or outage. Furthermore, it provides a sound basis for quickly reacting in case of attack or publication of software vulnerabilities and patches."
FreeBSD for Linux Users (O'Reilly)
Dru Lavigne presents part one of an O'Reilly introductory article on FreeBSD. "In today's article, I'll cover some of the big-picture differences from the perspective of a Linux user being introduced to FreeBSD. In Part 2, I'll discuss command equivalents between Linux and FreeBSD."
Reviews
What's New in Fedora Core 3 SE Linux (Linux Journal)
Linux Journal examines Security Enhanced Linux in Fedora Core 3. "The default SE Linux policy in FC3 is the targeted policy. Two types of policies are offered--targeted and strict. Targeted policy is new in FC3. Under the targeted policy, only some of the more commonly used daemons run with SE Linux restricting what they can do. These daemons include named, httpd, dhcpd, portmap, squid, nscd, syslogd, snmpd and ntpd. These daemons run in their own domains; httpd, for instance, runs in the httpd_t domain."
Miscellaneous
TiVo hacks flourish (ZDNet)
ZDNet looks at some of the interesting modifications that are being done to the Linux-based TiVo video recorders. "TiVo hacks available for download do everything from adding a Web interface to the TiVo unit, converting programs to DVD and other formats, altering TiVo native features, expanding the unit's hard drive, transferring files back and forth from the unit to the PC, and archiving shows at smaller file sizes. "TiVo is missing some tremendous opportunities," said Riley Cassel, a programmer who last year released a popular, unauthorized extension called MFS_FTP. "There's no technical reason you couldn't watch TV across the Net...Of course, the problem is that the same software can be used to broadcast HBO or Discovery HD, so Hollywood would go nuts.""
Page editor: Forrest Cook
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