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LWN.net Weekly Edition for February 10, 2005Judge Kimball rules at lastSCO v. IBM has been absent from the LWN front page for some time - and there has been a striking lack of letters from readers protesting that. An important ruling has been issued, however, and so it's time for an update.IBM's tenth counterclaim ("CC10") in this case requests a ruling from the court that IBM's Linux activities do not violate any of SCO's copyrights. IBM filed a motion requesting a summary judgment on this counterclaim, stating that there were no disputed facts that might argue against that judgment. A victory on this motion would take much of the wind from SCO's sails. The SCO Group knows this, and so filed a motion of its own requesting that the tenth counterclaim be dismissed, or at least stayed. These motions were argued before Judge Kimball back in September. The ruling was long in coming, but it is now available (in PDF format). The ruling is not a clear victory for either side, but it suggests that SCO is facing a rough road unless it turns up something truly incriminating in the discovery process. The first order of business was SCO's motion to dismiss or stay CC10. The Judge notes that SCO's arguments have shifted over time, ending up with the statement that CC10 is moot because SCO is not actually alleging copyright infringements on IBM's part. The Judge didn't buy it:
Notwithstanding SCO's puzzling denial in its briefing that it has
not alleged a claim against IBM for copyright infringement arising
out of its use, reproduction, or improvement of Linux, it clearly
has alleged such a claim.
The Judge makes note of SCO's public statements on the matter, and the AutoZone suit as well. In conclusion:
The court assumes that SCO was prepared to prosecute its claim in
the AutoZone case or it would not have filed suit. Indeed,
in light of SCO's lawsuit against AutoZone and SCO's public
statements during the last two years, which have essentially
invited this claim, it is incomprehensible that SCO seeks to
postpone resolution of this claim.
The motion was denied flat out, with prejudice. In other words, SCO will have to face this counterclaim, which is clearly a problem of its own making. The Judge then moved on to IBM's request for a summary judgment, which would have resolved CC10 (in IBM's favor) immediately. Judge Kimball reviewed a number of SCO's more blatant public statements, along with IBM's claim that no evidence to back up those statements has been presented. The Judge clearly sees some merit in IBM's arguments, but is not willing to grant the judgment at this time:
Viewed against the backdrop of SCO's plethora of public statements
concerning IBM's and others' infringement of SCO's purported
copyrights to the UNIX software, it is astonishing that SCO has not
offered any competent evidence to create a disputed fact regarding
whether IBM has infringed SCO's alleged copyrights through IBM's
Linux activities.
Nevertheless, despite the vast disparity between SCO's public accusations and its actual evidence-or complete lack thereof-and the resulting temptation to grant IBM's motion, the court has determined that it would be premature to grant summary judgment on IBM's Tenth Counterclaim. The Judge reasons that SCO's contract claims could play into the final determination of the copyright issues, and that ongoing discovery could yet yield the evidence that SCO seeks. The ruling, in passing, notes that Judge Kimball is "in general agreement" with the discovery order forcing IBM to provide all of its Unix/Dynix code to SCO. The Judge also states:
Simply put, regardless of the merits, the granting of summary
judgment would be very unlikely to survive an appeal when a Rule
56(f) motion has been filed and a motion to compel production of
arguably relevant information remains pending.
Judges hate being reversed on appeal, for obvious reasons. So Judge Kimball is, as he should, playing the game in such a way as to come to conclusions which will stand. So the court declined to rule in favor of IBM's motion now, but states that the motion can be refiled after discovery is complete. IBM had also argued that the summary judgment on CC10 should be granted as a sanction for SCO's misbehavior in the case. Judge Kimball didn't buy it, though, and rejected that motion out of hand. Then, IBM had filed a motion trying to strike a number of declarations filed by SCO. These declarations, by Sandeep Gupta, Chris Sontag, and John Harrop, were said (by IBM) to be inadmissible because the people who wrote them didn't know what they were talking about. The Judge accepted SCO's argument, though, that the real purpose of the declarations was to argue that more discovery was needed; he then said, however, that he made no use of the declarations in any case. So this motion, moot to begin with, was denied. IBM has two other summary judgment motions on the table. One seeks to dispose of SCO's contract claims, while the other seeks a ruling on IBM's eighth counterclaim - the GPL violation claim. The filings on these motions are not complete, and arguments have not taken place. Judge Kimball has denied them (without prejudice) anyway, stating that they cannot be resolved until discovery is complete. In fact, no such motions can be resolved, so there is now a ban on any further dispositive motions during the discovery period. What all this seems to mean is that there will be no shortcuts in this case. SCO does not get to squirm out of CC10, but neither does IBM get a quick resolution to its claims. SCO, it seems, will be able to conduct its fishing expedition through IBM's source repositories, though there may yet be more arguments on that point. Your editor, attempting to read between the lines of the ruling, senses a fair amount of hostility to SCO's claims and tactics. But, regardless of how the Judge sees the case now, he seems determined not to make any premature or careless decisions. This case will have to play out according to the calendar - at least, until the discovery phase is over.
The first public Sunbird releaseThe latest addition to the Mozilla Project's offerings is Mozilla Sunbird, a calendar application based on the iCal standard. Actually, Sunbird has been in the works for some time, but the recent 0.2 release from the Sunbird team is the first "official" release. We're not really sure what makes this "official," but we thought this might be a good time to look at Sunbird to see how it's maturing.Sunbird is far from complete, but it's much more stable than one might expect from an application at version 0.2. We used Sunbird for a couple of days without experiencing any crashes or "show stopper" bugs. There are a few glitches in Sunbird 0.2, which is to be expected. For example, copying and pasting an event from Thursday to Friday changed the start and end times of the event. There are also a few minor interface glitches, but nothing that would prevent a user from getting work done with Sunbird.
To test Sunbird's calendar import feature and handling of iCal files, we
grabbed the U.S. holiday calendar from the Mozilla's holiday
files page,
The Sunbird roadmap shows how far Sunbird has progressed so far. Sunbird lacks the ability to export to HTML, edit remote calendars, accept invitations from Outlook users, and a number of other features. Still, the list of features that are complete is larger than the list of incomplete features. The list is not entirely up to date, either. For example, the "work week view" feature is available, though the roadmap doesn't show this feature as complete. This is, in fact, one of this writer's favorite features in Sunbird. The user can specify the days of their work week, and display only those days in the calendar view. Since this writer works a decidedly non-standard work week (Thursday through Sunday) this can come in quite handy. As a standalone calendar application, Sunbird is already on its way to being a useful project. However, many users are going to want a calendar application that integrates with a mailer and browser. To that end, there's Project Lightning. Lightning is still in the early development phase, so there's very little concrete information about it, but the general gist of the project is to provide tighter integration between Thunderbird and Sunbird. The first general-user release of Lightning is tentatively scheduled for mid-2005. Another area where Sunbird needs help is device synchronization. Right now, the application doesn't offer any automatic method of synchronizing with a PDA, which is a feature that many users will want from a calendaring application. Why should users care about Sunbird when we already have Evolution and KDE PIM, which are much further along than Sunbird? The primary reason is multi-platform support. While Evolution and KDE PIM have much to recommend them, wide cross-platform availability is something that neither project can offer at this time. Companies that are looking to standardize on an application will want something that runs on Windows, and possibly Mac OS X as well. Sunbird is a promising application. Given the quality of Firefox and Thunderbird, not to mention the original Mozilla suite, we're optimistic that Sunbird will be an excellent calendaring application when it grows up.
Looking forward to LinuxWorldThe LinuxWorld Conference & Expo happens February 14 through 17 in Boston. LWN editor Jonathan Corbet will be wandering by the event for the first time in a few years. Among other things, he will be giving a talk in the O'Reilly booth on Wednesday at 1:30; one can only hope that there will be no rap bands or accordion players in the neighboring booth at that time. Such problems are not unheard of at LinuxWorld.It would, of course, be a disservice to our readers if we failed to point out that Linux Device Drivers, Third Edition, by Jonathan Corbet, Alessandro Rubini, and Greg Kroah-Hartman, will be released (and available) at the show. The first LinuxWorld event was almost six years ago now. LWN was published that week only because the kind folks at Linuxcare let us stay in the exhibit hall past closing and plug the laptop into their network hub. That conference was an eye-opener. Even for those of us who had been convinced for years that Linux World Domination was inevitable, the level of interest - and the amount of money - to be seen at LinuxWorld was shocking. The wave was clearly building, and it didn't seem that anybody had any real control over it. The memories of the Red Hat party - or the disturbing lack thereof - will be with us forever. Six years later, LinuxWorld is a different experience. It's all executive keynotes and expensive exhibits; the conference program almost seems like an afterthought. The more development-oriented conferences, such as OLS or Linux.conf.au (where your editor will also be speaking), are much more fun. LinuxWorld remains the preeminent commercial Linux show, however, at least in the U.S. As a place to get a sense for what the business of Linux is doing, it is hard to beat. Your editor, masochist that he is, is looking forward to having his nose rubbed in the hype for a few days, seeing where people think the money is in Linux, and meeting some LWN readers. See you there.
European software patents may be adopted on Feb. 17The FFII site has a translated article from the Polish press agency stating that Poland will no longer resist the adoption of the software patent directive in the European Council. If Poland backs down - and no other country steps up in its place - the Council could adopt its version of the patent directive without regard to the restart motion which passed the legal affairs committee on February 2. And that would mean US-style software patents in Europe.
Security Attacks on FirefoxLinux detractors often say that, if and when Linux becomes as popular as Windows, it will attract just as many attacks - and prove just as vulnerable. The popularity of Linux exceeds that of Windows in some areas, but, so far, these attacks have not materialized. It is now beginning to look like this upsurge in attacks may not target Linux directly. Instead, the Firefox browser may become the target of choice.Eric Johanson recently put out an advisory demonstrating how "homograph attacks" can work against Firefox (and Konqueror). These attacks take advantage of international domain names, which can be written in non-ASCII character sets. The problem is that many non-ASCII characters are rendered just like (or very nearly like) characters in the ASCII set; as a result, a visually identical domain name can actually point somewhere unexpected. An example provided by Mr. Johanson is www.pаypal.com, which your browser renders as www.pаypal.com. This technique, clearly, could be used for phishing attacks - especially when one considers that SSL certificates can contain non-ASCII characters too. It is said that a short-term workaround for this problem is to turn off the network.enableIDN parameter in the about:config screen, but this workaround does not work for all users, and it does not persist across sessions. Meanwhile, "mikx" has posted a set of three different Firefox vulnerabilities. "Fireflashing" is a trick that, in conjunction with the Flash plugin, can be used to trick a Firefox user into changing configuration parameters. The "firedragging" vulnerability gets around some restrictions to possibly allow a (Windows) user to put a web-supplied executable file onto the desktop. And "firetabbing" circumvents the isolation between sites when links are dragged to different tabs. All of these vulnerabilities have been acknowledge by the Mozilla Project and fixes have been committed. These attacks are not truly devastating. They make certain kinds of phishing and social engineering attacks easier, but, hopefully, should not fool suitably careful users. But they do show that the level of interest in Firefox vulnerabilities is on the increase. Attacking many parts of a Linux system is hard. Security is generally reasonably good, one hopes, and techniques like privilege minimization, privilege separation and sandboxing help to contain any vulnerabilities which do exist. The sheer variety of deployed Linux systems also works against attackers; an exploit which works on one system may be useless against the next. The role of diversity in ensuring the security of Linux systems should not be underestimated. Firefox, however, is widely deployed and quite similar on all systems. If nothing else, the project's trademark policies tend to ensure that Firefox deployments will not vary much. Firefox contains interpreters which will certainly contain exploits of the "write once, run anywhere" variety. Firefox is directly controlled by users who may have little interest in - or knowledge of - security policies. And, in many (perhaps most) cases, it talks directly to random sites all over the net. So of course Firefox is being eyed as a possible entry point to otherwise secure systems. The Firefox browser is popular for a reason: it is a solid, highly featureful, highly useful program. It is also a huge and complex program. Regardless of the skill of the Mozilla hackers, verifying and maintaining the security of a code base that large is going to be a major challenge. Expect some interesting times over the next few years as the security claims made by the Mozilla Project - and by the free software community in general - are put to the test.
New vulnerabilities emacs21: format string vulnerability in "movemail"
mailman: path traversal
newspost: buffer overflow vulnerability
postfix: error in IPv6 handling
python: illegal function internals access
squid: multiple vulnerabilities
xview: buffer overflows
Updated vulnerabilities a2ps: input validation error
AWStats: remote code execution
bind: validator function denial of service
cdrecord: failure to drop privilege
chbg: buffer overflow
ClamAV: multiple issues
cpio - file permissions error
cups: multiple vulnerabilities
cyrus-sasl: remote buffer overflow
dhcp: format string vulnerability
enscript: arbitrary code execution
ethereal: multiple vulnerabilites
evolution: arbitrary code execution
exim: buffer overflows
f2c: insecure temp files
FireHOL: insecure temporary file creation
Foomatic: Arbitrary command execution in foomatic-rip
FreeRADIUS: denial of service
gaim: buffer overflow in MSN protocol
Gallery: cross-site scripting vulnerability
gtk2, gdk-pixbuf: buffer overflows
gettext: Insecure temporary file handling
ghostscript: symlink vulnerabilities
glibc: Information leak with LD_DEBUG
glibc: tempfile vulnerability in catchsegv script
gnome-vfs: backend script vulnerabilities
groff: insecure temporary directory
gtkhtml: malformed messages cause crash
imagemagick: .psd image file decode vulnerability
imlib2: buffer overflows
iptables: missing initialization
kdelibs: unsanitzied input
kerberos5: execution of arbitrary code by authenticated user
kernel: i386 SMP page fault handler privilege escalation
libdbi-perl: insecure temporary file
libgd2: buffer overflows in PNG handling
libpng: multiple vulnerabilities
libtiff: buffer overflow
libxml2 - arbitrary code execution
libxml2: multiple buffer overflows
libxpm4: stack and integer overflows
lvm10: creates insecure temporary directory
mailman: cross-site scripting
mikmod: buffer overflow
mpg321: format string vulnerability
mysql: several vulnerabilities
mysql-dfsg: insecure temporary files
nasm: Buffer overflow vulnerability
ncpfs: multiple vulnerabilities
netkit-telnet: invalid free pointer
nfs-utils: denial of service
nfs-utils: arbitrary code execution
ngIRCd: buffer overflow
openssl: der_chop script temp file vulnerability
OpenSSL: denial of service vulnerabilities
openswan: stack based buffer overflow
perl: setuid vulnerabilities
php: remotely exploitable memory errors
php: multiple vulnerabilities
postgresql: privilege escalation via LOAD
qt3: BMP image parser heap overflow
rp-pppoe, pppoe: missing privilege dropping
ruby: infinite loop
samba: integer overflow vulnerability
sharutils: arbitrary code execution
sox: buffer overflow
SpamAssassin: Denial of Service vulnerability
Squid: multiple vulnerabilities
SquirrelMail: multiple vulnerabilities
Subversion: Remote heap overflow
sudo: environment variable sanitizing
File overwrite vulnerability in tar and unzip
tiff: buffer overflows
unarj: buffer overflow vulnerability
uw-imap: authentication bypass
vim: modeline problems
vim: symbolic link attack
wv: buffer overflow
XChat 2.0.x SOCKS5 Vulnerability
xine-lib: buffer overflows
xine-ui - insecure temporary file creation
xorg-x11: integer overflows
xpdf: buffer overflow
xpdf: buffer overflow
xpdf: integer overflows
zip: arbitrary code execution
zlib: denial of service
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Events [ISN] NSPW 2005 Call For PapersThe New Security Paradigms Workshop will be held September 20 to 23 in Lake Arrowhead, California. The call for papers has gone out; the submission deadline is March 28.
Page editor: Jonathan Corbet Kernel development Brief items Kernel release statusThe current 2.6 prepatch is 2.6.11-rc3, released by Linus on February 2. This prepatch adds an XFS update, a set of out-of-memory killer fixes, a generic transport class mechanism (which replaces the SCSI transport code), some architecture updates, the removal of bcopy(), a fix for writable module parameters in sysfs (it never actually worked before), and various fixes. See the long-format changelog for the details.Linus's BitKeeper repository contains a small number of patches, including some IDE updates, some additional checking in read() and write() (see below), a DMA blacklist for problematic serial ATA drives, and a handful of fixes. The current -mm tree is 2.6.11-rc3-mm1. Recent changes to -mm include a firewire update, the address space randomization patches (covered on last week's security page), the "BIO pool" mechanism, the removal of the realtime rlimit patch (see below), and more fixes. There still have been no 2.4.30 prepatches.
Kernel development news Quotes of the week
A large part of kernel history is currently practically locked into
bk. bk isn't doing what I need, so naturally I'm looking for
alternatives, but I don't have the freedom to take my data and try
it with some other tool. Was that really part of the deal when bk
was introduced that I'm denied of this freedom?
-- Roman Zippel
It's exactly the same as a file system. If you put some files into
a file system does the file system creator owe you the knowledge of
how those files are maintained in the file system? Since when is
that part of the deal?
-- Larry McVoy
If you must follow this conversation, the thread can be found over here.
Audio latency goes full circleTwo weeks ago, it appeared that a solution to the problem of low-latency scheduling for audio applications had been found. Ingo Molnar's approach, which allowed unprivileged processes to use the realtime scheduling modes as long as they did not use more than an administrator-specified portion of the available CPU time, seemed like a reasonably straightforward way to go. Ingo's patch had gone into the -mm tree for further testing.The rlimit approach keeps a rogue process from taking over the system entirely. It does not, however, prevent abuse by poorly-behaved software. If even limited access to realtime scheduling became widely available on Linux systems, it would only be a matter of time until developers figured out that they could make their programs seem faster by using the realtime mode. Proprietary applications could be particularly problematic in this regard; distributors would likely rip out unwarranted realtime scheduling calls in free software that they ship, but that cannot be done with proprietary code. Other concerns with the rlimit approach include the need for some audio applications to get fast access to the CPU even if they require 100% of the available time, and general unease with tweaking the scheduler for this use. The end result is that the rlimit patch has come back out of -mm, and Ingo has said:
i'm not opposed to the LSM solution per se, especially given that
none of the other solutions in existence are fully satisfactory
(and thus acceptable for the scheduler currently). The LSM patch is
clearly the least intrusive solution.
Those who have been following the discussion will remember that the whole long thing began because certain kernel developers did not feel that the realtime security module (which gives members of an administrator-specified group access to realtime scheduling) was acceptable for inclusion. So the discussion has come back to where it started, and it appears that the realtime security module will be merged (though that had not happened as of this writing). Ingo apologized for the whole thing, explaining it this way:
it is just an unfortunate situation that the issue here is _not_
clear-cut at all. It is a longstanding habit on lkml to try to
solve things as cleanly and generally as possible, but there are
occasional cases where this is just not possible.
One remaining problem with the realtime security module is that it gives audio users the right to monopolize the processor with any program they run, not just audio utilities. Making the audio programs run in a setgid mode might seem like a way around that issue, except for the fact that the GTK+ toolkit actively prevents things from working that way. The unfortunate result is that users must be given more privilege than they actually need. Most of the time, that should be acceptable; multi-user audio workstations are likely to be relatively rare.
read() and write() access checkingLong ago, when the 2.0 kernel was the state of the art, the implementation of the read() and write() system calls (and readv() and writev() too) behaved a little differently than now. Then, as now, the main purpose of the core implementation of those system calls was to pass the call on to the appropriate function in the filesystem code or device driver handling the file of interest after dealing with any relevant file locking details. In many ways, sys_read() and friends in 2.6 look very much like they did in 2.0.The 2.0 implementation differed, however, in that it checked whether the calling process had the ability to read or write the buffer it passed into the kernel. The semantics of a read() call, say, should be the same regardless of where the data is being read from. So it made sense to check, before invoking the VFS or device driver, that the buffer passed to read() was writable by the calling process. In 2.2, that check went away, possibly as part of the big changes made to how user-space access checks were implemented. Performing those checks became entirely the responsibility of the lower-level code. Linus recently merged a patch which restores the upper-level checks for 2.6.11. The reason given with the patch is that checks performed in lower-level code only verify the range of memory which will actually be read from or written to. If that range is smaller than the application requested (because the file is not that long, say), part of the range requested by the application will not be checked. The operation of the system is entirely correct in this case, but an opportunity to flag a bug in the calling program will have been missed. It also doesn't hurt that placing the check at the entry point to the kernel ensures that it will be done in all situations. One less opportunity for security problems resulting from forgotten checks in lower-level code can only be a good thing. It seems almost certain that at least one such vulnerability must exist somewhere in the 2.6 kernel. One might conclude that low-level code, such as device drivers, need no longer perform the access_ok() check, since it is now being handled at a higher level. A prudent developer, however, would probably leave that check in place. It is quite cheap on most architectures (it generally just ensures that the given buffer is not located in kernel space), and the higher-level checks went away once before. Safe is better than sorry, especially when being safe is so easy. (For completeness, it's worth noting that Linus merged another patch which ensures that a read or write operation does not overflow the file offset).
More hooks for kernel eventsThe kernel has, for a while now, been accumulating hooks for informing user space when things happen. Some of the current mechanisms include:
One might think that, at this point, the kernel is sufficiently well instrumented that more hooks would be unnecessary. But more are on the way. One of those is the relay fork module, proposed by Guillaume Thouvenin. Its sole purpose is to inform interested user-space processes when a process forks; the intended user is the enhanced Linux system accounting project. Rather than use one of the existing mechanisms for conveying information to user space, the relay fork patch works by sending a signal to the interested process(es) whenever a fork occurs. The patch works by adding a new sysfs directory (/sys/relayfork) with a couple of control attributes. The attribute signal controls which signal is sent; by default, signal 33 (which is in the realtime signal range on most architectures) is used. The other attribute (processes) contains a list of the processes receiving these signals. Registering a process for receipt of "relay fork" signals is simply a matter of writing its process ID to the processes attribute. This patch may eventually go in, but probably not with the signal mechanism. Guillaume was encouraged to use the kernel events mechanism instead, and he has agreed that it is a workable solution. Meanwhile, the vSecurity project is working to put together a number of hardening technologies in a form suitable for merging into the mainline. To that end, a couple of new LSM hooks have been proposed. This one adds a hook for invocations of the chroot() call, which, interestingly, has no such hook now. The purpose is not so much to control the use of chroot() as to note that it has happened and take steps, in other security hooks, to ensure that the process does not break out of its restricted subtree. The other patch adds a hook to chmod(). This one is unlikely to be merged, since a separate hook, which is called for inode attribute changes, already exists. The vSecurity hacker (Lorenzo Hernández García-Hierro) has indicated that he has other hooks he wishes to place, but those have not yet been posted for review.
Patches and updates Kernel trees
Core kernel code
Development tools
Device drivers
Filesystems and block I/O
Memory management
Networking
Architecture-specific
Security-related
Miscellaneous
Page editor: Jonathan Corbet Distributions News and Editorials A look at Slackware 10.1You can't keep a good distribution, or maintainer, down. Despite Patrick Volkerding's "medical vacation" Slackware 10.1 has been released.Slackware 10.1 continues the tradition of shipping well-tested and solid software rather than focusing on the cutting edge. Though the 2.6 kernel has been out for more than a year, Volkerding decided that the 2.4 kernel was more appropriate for this release of Slackware. The default is the 2.4.29 kernel, though a 2.6.10 kernel is available for those who want to use the 2.6 tree. We installed Slackware 10.1 on a Pentium III 500 MHz system with 384 MB of RAM. We chose a full install, which took about 30 minutes. Slackware can still be installed from a single CD, but to install GNOME and other packages requires the second CD. The "full" install consumes about 3 GB of disk space. There are few surprises with Slackware 10.1. The installer is essentially the same as 10 - a plain-text menu-based installer that offers few frills, but works well on lower-end machines. Despite the fact that Slackware doesn't offer a mouse-driven GUI installer, it's still user-friendly and easy to use.
There is plenty of desktop and server software included with 10.1. The
latest release comes with several desktop options including GNOME 2.6.1 and
KDE 3.3.2. This writer's favorite desktop, Xfce (version 4.2.0) is included
as well. (It's interesting to note that Xfce is billed "above" GNOME in the
release announcement.)
Koffice, Abiword and Gnumeric are included, but OpenOffice.org and Evolution are not. The exclusion of OpenOffice.org makes some sense, since OO.org takes up quite a bit of space, and would cut into space available on the install discs. It's easily found on the OpenOffice.org website, and shouldn't be that difficult to install for the average Slack user. Evolution, on the other hand, is a bit less fun to install from scratch. On the server side, Slackware 10.1 comes with Apache 1.3.33, MySQL 4.0.23, PHP 4.3.10, Bind 9.3.0 and Sendmail 8.13.3. Slackware is one of the few Linux distributions to still ship with Apache 1.3.x as the default, rather than the Apache 2.0 series. Slackware's package management has been much maligned by users of RPM and Debian-based systems, but Slack's package management has a few add-on tools that make it competitive with Yum or APT. Slackware still uses pkgtool but Slackware 10.1 includes slackpkg, a tool similar to APT or Yum, that allows Slackware users to easily update and install Slackware packages from remote repositories. This tool actually made its debut some time ago, but it's still not part of the core distribution. Users who want to try Debian-style package management will need to hunt it down in the Slackware extras. For users who want or need RPM, it is included as well. Slackware continues to live up to its reputation as a solid, "Unix-like" Linux distribution. The only real disappointment, at least for this writer, is that Slackware doesn't have a native X86-64 port available. However, for x86 users, Slackware makes a great distribution. We wish Pat the best of health in 2005, and are looking forward to Slackware 11.
Distribution News Slackware 10.1 releasedSlackware 10.1 has been released. Features in 10.1 include a 2.6.10 kernel (though 2.4.29 remains the default), X.Org X11R6.8.1, new package management tools, and much more; see the announcement for the details.
Mandrakelinux Corporate Server 3.0 now LSB 2.0 certifiedMandrakesoft has announced that Mandrakelinux Corporate Server 3.0 has received LSB 2.0 certification. "This certification is in line with Mandrakesoft's earlier announcement about its participation in the Linux Core Consortium (LCC): going forward, the Corporate Server line of products will be based on the LSB-compliant LCC operating system architecture." Click below for the full press release.
Yellow Dog Linux v4.0.1 Supports Mac mini & iMac G5Terra Soft Solutions has announced (click below) Yellow Dog Linux v4.0.1 with lots of updates, including the return of sleep and audio for pre-G5s; thermal support for G5s; and support for the iMac G5 and Mac mini.
New Ubuntu 'Array' ReleaseUbuntu Linux has announced another Ubuntu Array release, featuring the new LiveCD. This and future releases will have synchronized LiveCD and installer CDs available.
Guadalinex and UbuntuGuadalinex has announced (click below) that its 2005 release will be based on Ubuntu.
Unofficial Fedora FAQ UpdateThe Unofficial Fedora FAQ has been updated. You'll find all new information on the new ATI drivers, an updated yum.conf to work with Fedora Extras, and more. Click below for the announcement.
Debian Project Leader ElectionsNominations for Debian Project Leader are now open. All nominations should be cryptographically signed and sent to debian-vote. Nominations will be open until February 28th, after which will be a period for campaigning and an IRC debate between candidates. "Speaking of the debate, I would like to invite people to be panelists for the IRC debate (to be held on irc.oftc.net). The debate should be held on IRC after the rebuttals are posted, and before the voting starts, at the convenience of the candidates, and the panelists (which kinda puts it roughly in the ides of March, I think)."
Call For Papers for DebConf5 in HelsinkiThe annual Debconf conference is the technical and social forum for Debian developers, sponsors, affiliates, and friends. It allows various groups within Debian a chance to come together and network. This is the time to submit a proposal to present a technical paper or tutorial, or to host a meeting (BoFS, or Birds of a Feather Session). Click below to find out more.
Distribution Newsletters Ubuntu Traffic #20Benjamin Mako Hill is still getting caught up on IRC and mailing list activity. This Ubuntu Traffic covers the last week in of 2004. Threads covered in issue include Ars Technica Awards, Supporting Different Pythons, Documenting the Ubuntu Documentation Project, Ubuntu Minimum Specifications, LSB and Ubuntu, Beagle!, Security "Hardened" Kernels, Ubuntu on Servers, Encrypted Swap, Documentation Team Happenings, and Ubuntu Security Notifications.
Gentoo Weekly NewsletterThe Gentoo Weekly Newsletter for February 7, 2005 is out with a look at Gentoo booth at LinuxWorld, the 2,000,000th post since the creation of Gentoo's phpBB user support forum, two new support platforms for audio/video discussions, and more.
Debian Weekly NewsThe Debian Weekly News for February 9, 2005 is out. This week's news includes Elizabeth Garbee's talk at LinuxConf.au, a Debian kernel IRC meeting, uploading packages without ftp, a report from the Debian booth at Solutions Linux, Paris, running Debian on the Mac Mini, a discussion on valid file names, and more.
DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 86The DistroWatch Weekly for February 7, 2005 is available. "Welcome to this year's 6th issue of DistroWatch Weekly! In this issue we'll talk about Ubuntu's rapid surge in popularity, cover the release of Slackware Linux 10.1, reveal a much-requested page for Sun Microsystem's Solaris operating system, and bring you news about several new distributions developed in various corners around the world. Happy reading!"
Minor distribution updates Devil-Linux v1.2.3 releasedDevil-Linux v1.2.3 has been released. "The changes include Kernel 2.4.29, addition of a tftp server, serial console support for install-on-usb, many program updates and many other changes."
GNUstep LiveThe GNUstep Live CD v0.9.4 has been released. "Software using GNUstep (Addresses, Agenda, AClock, Affiche, BioCocoa, Camaelon, CamelBones, Camera, Charmap, Cenon, Connect, Cynthiune, DisplayCalibrator, EasyDiff, EdenMath, Fortunate, Gridlock, Gorm, Gomoku, GNUMail, GNUstep-icons, GNUstepWrapper, GNUWash, GWorkspace, GTAMS, HelpViewer, InnerSpace, ImageViewer, LapisPuzzle, LaTeX Service, LuserNET, Mines, MPDCon, Paje, ProjectCenter, PRICE, Poe, Preferences, PlopFolio, Preview, Renaissance, RSS Reader, Scheme, Shisen, Stepulator, StepTalk, StepBill, TalkSoup, TimeMon, Terminal, TextEdit, ViewPDF, VolumeControl, Waiho, WildMenus, Zillion, Zipper)"
Specifix LinuxSpecifix Linux has announced the release of Specifix 0.21 Alpha. "Every package in the entire distribution has been rebuilt. We had to rebuild everything anyway because we changed to storing all our sources in the repository (a move long planned but only recently implemented, for various trivial reasons). In addition, rebuilding means that the packages all have "trove info", including size, the source trove from which they are built, time they were built, and the version of Conary that built them (view this information with conary rq --info). Lastly, this rebuild incorporates the new LSB /srv directory for things that used to be in /var but are local information that is permanent in character."
Package updates Fedora Core updatesFC3 updates: kernel-2.6.10.1.760_FC3 (disable longhaul driver, fix NFSv3 oops), xpdf-3.00-10.3 (fix handling CID font encodings in freetype), kdepim-3.3.1-1.FC3.1 (apply patch to fix buffer overflow), system-config-printer-0.6.116.1.1-1 (bug fixes), hwbrowser-0.19-0.fc3.2 (fix pygtk2-libglade requirement), python-2.3.4-13.1 (fix object traversal bug).FC2 updates: kernel-2.6.10-1-12_FC2 (disable longhaul driver, fix NFSv3 oops), hotplug-2004_04_01-1.1 (fixes updfstab in the presence of multiple USB plug/unplug events).
Newsletters and articles of interest Becoming a Debian developer (NewsForge)In this NewsForge article Bruce Byfield looks at the process of becoming a Debian developer. "Martin Michlmayr, Debian Project Leader and a member of the New Maintainer Committee, strongly advises anyone interested in becoming a developer to make other contributions to Debian first. That way, they can learn what they need to know beforehand. They can also decide whether they are willing to commit the necessary time. Inactive developers are a continual problem, especially with package maintenance, and candidates who know what to expect are less likely to drop out after being accepted."
Distribution reviews My workstation OS: Libranet (NewsForge)NewsForge has a brief review of Libranet. "Long-time Libranet users know that what makes Libranet unique and powerful is its Adminmenu tool. Adminmenu has a large number of utilities that not only include the basics and the required, but also the downright handy. For primary needs, there are setup utilities for sound, video, users, networking, and packages. For handiness' sake, there are utilities for configuring the time and APT sources, and scanning for SCSI and SCSI emulation devices and Zip drives. There are all kinds of shortcut applications for installing browser plug-ins and RealPlayer, changing the monitor resolution and mouse cursors, and more."
Page editor: Rebecca Sobol Development The GRASS Geographical Information SystemGRASS GIS is one of the most under-hyped open-source applications currently in existence. GRASS stands for "Geographic Resources Analysis Support System"; it represents the most complete Geographical Information System available under the GPL.
The history of GRASSGRASS has been in existence since 1982, according to the history document. It started life as a so-called environmental planning and land management system, its function was to enable the US Army Corps of Engineers' Construction Engineering Research Laboratory (USA-CERL) to manage the Pentagon's considerable landholdings.GRASS originated on a VAX Unix environment and was ported to various Unix flavors during the 1980s. The project leader Bill Goran and the software architect L. Van Warren initially assumed that other commercial GIS systems would be easily accessible, and that they would be able to adapt such systems to the Pentagon's needs. After some analysis, they realized that no existing GIS system would meet the Pentagon's standards; they decided to create GRASS mostly from scratch, although existing Unix libraries were used wherever possible. GRASS was released as public domain software in 1985. The project received feedback from other development groups working at federal and institutions and universities. In 1996, version 5 was in the making, but USA-CERL decided to withdraw support from the public domain version of GRASS, and collaborated with several commercial entities to create the non-free GRASSLANDS and other derivatives. In 1999 GRASS was released under the GPL while under the leadership of the University of Baylor and Markus Neteler, then at the University of Hanover. Various ports to a number of Linux flavors and non-Intel architectures have come into existence since. These days the stable 5.4 version is available for Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows NT/2000/XP under Cygwin. It is possible to run GRASS on a number of Unix systems, but one would be well advised to compile from source, since, despite assurances to the contrary, binaries are not always available. The same advice applies to version 6.0.0, so far there are only beta and development versions available.
The GRASS ArchitectureGRASS is currently undergoing a major version change, from 5.4 to 6.0.0. GRASS consists of more than 350 programs and scripts and most can be accessed from the command line. The project is almost completely GUI-accessible now. It has been running with a Tcl/Tk interface since version 5.4, that was initially coded by Jacques Bouchard. The Tcl/Tk version of GRASS is known as tcltkgrass, although from version 6.0.0 and forward, the interface has been changed considerably. The reliance on Tcl/Tk is set to grow less and less pronounced. All modules included in the GRASS tool chain that require user interaction use a new display manager to create GUIs every time they are instantiated.The internationalization framework for GRASS is has been fully implemented, and character sets which are part of the Unicode standard can be used to implement new localization projects. The display routines now support the multi-byte character sets used in East Asian languages. GRASS is huge, there are currently more than 1 million lines of C code. Binary versions weigh in between 30 and 150 MB, depending on the options enabled at compile time and the operating system target. C++ support is being added, although it is not clear to what extent future modules should be written in C++. All GIS tool chains rely on databases to handle their spatial data. Internally, GRASS relies on dBase, although interfaces to external databases engines like MySQL, PostgreSQL and ODBC-based database engines exist, and are well supported. Anyone writing new modules for GRASS database access will not have to pay attention to the specifics of the database engine. For users and programmers, a basic Unix-type sub-directory structure with pre-configured directory names has to be created first, since it is hard coded into the GRASS installation and configuration files. Multiple GRASS sessions can now be started from the same installation. This is particularly useful for instances where users might want to work on different versions of the same dataset. It is even possible to start 5.4 sessions and 6.0 sessions concurrently without having to worry about version conflicts. GRASS supports both raster-based and vector-based data management; but unlike many other GIS systems, it supports a large variety of image processing modules, the creation of maps using the PROJ.4 cartographic projections library, and data visualization. Grass can process 2D and 3D raster data in 40 different formats including the bmp and jpeg formats as well as the less common JDEM format. The GDAL library supports many formats, although many of the more obscure formats can only be read, not created. 3D raster (voxel) volumes have been folded into GRASS quite recently with the 5.7 development version. Routines from the scriptable NVIZ package make it easy to visualize the same 3D raster data, since it includes new 3D display routines. Vector data handling has been the subject of a complete rewrite. GRASS 6.0.0 is now able to handle topological vector data fully, and the vector geometry engine uses a data format that can live on 32 and 64-bit processors. Internal data structures have been rewritten in such a way that vector data can be accessed much more quickly. Vector data include non-spatial attributes that are best processed by traditional SQL-driven database management systems, a factor in the decision to include external database support. GRASS can also handle PostGIS geographical objects stored on PostgreSQL. PostGIS objects are accessed as a vector file format. They are made available through the OGR Simple Features Library, which is a part of the GDAL package.
GRASS ApplicationsGRASS has been used in many contexts, from academic environments to soil erosion modeling and social science simulations. Vector network analysis is a well-established technique that adds another data modeling layer to the range of information evaluation tools already available. Statistical routines are accessible via the R interface, this makes it possible to produce geostatistics.The number of interfaces, scripting routines, visualization packages as well as its stability and scalability make GRASS a truly unique addition to the stable of Linux applications. GRASS has also become the focus around which several Linux distributions have been built, including GIS Knoppix and Quantian. Enjoy!
System Applications Audio Projects Planet CCRMA ChangesThe latest changes from the Planet CCRMA audio utility packaging project include the addition of Qjackctl 0.2.15-1, the 2.6.10 kernel for Fedora Core 2 and 3, ZynAddSubFX 2.1.1-2, and Pd externals for Fedora Core 3.
Database Software PostgreSQL Security Release for versions 8.0, 7.4, 7.3, and 7.2A security release of the PostgreSQL database has been announced. "In order to address a potential security hole recently identified with the "LOAD" option, the PostgreSQL Global Development Group is announcing the release of new versions of PostgreSQL going back to the 7.2.x version."
PostgreSQL Weekly NewsThe February 4 2005 edition of the PostgreSQL Weekly News is online with the week's summary of PostgreSQL database information.
Object-Relational Mapping with SQLMaps (O'ReillyNet)Sunil Patil looks at SQLMaps on O'Reilly. "Hibernate is great--if your DBA will let you run generated database queries on his or her system. Sometimes you need to keep the option of hand-optimized queries open. Sunil Patil introduces SQLMaps, a framework that allows you to do just that."
MySQL-python 1.1.10Version 1.1.10 of MySQL-python, the Python interface to the MySQL database, is out. "MySQL-3.22 through 4.1 and Python-2.3 through 2.4 are currently supported."
MySQL Triggers Tryout (O'Reilly)Peter Gulutzan explores MySQL triggers on O'Reilly. "MySQL 5.0, the alpha version of MySQL that's available for testing new features, has trigger support. This is no surprise, as triggers were promised in the MySQL Development Roadmap, but it's a novel experience to work with one of the big "MySQL can't do that" features and watch MySQL doing it."
Interoperability Samba 3.0.11 Available for DownloadStable version 3.0.11 of Samba is available for download. "This is the latest stable release of Samba. This is the version that production Samba servers should run for all current bug-fixes."
Networking Tools Nagios Plugins 1.4 released (SourceForge)Version 1.4 of Nagios Plugins, an open source monitoring system, is available. "This release includes major enhancements. With the growth of internet enabled devices, the IPv4 addressing range will be used up soon. Jeremy T Bouse has integrated IPv6 support into our networking utilities, so you can now monitor your next generation network."
Peer to Peer WASTE v1.5 beta 3 Now Available (SourceForge)WASTE "is an anonymous, secure, and encrypted collaboration tool which allows users to both share ideas through the chat interface and share data through the download system." Version 1.5 beta 3 of WASTE has been announced. "This new release features a brand new installer, a mini version for those with a low bandwidth connection (excludes documentation), and the first release of WASTE in other languages."
Web Site Development ATutor 1.4.3 Released (SourceForge)Version 1.4.3 of ATutor, a Web-based Learning Content Management System (LCMS), is available. "Current ATutor users are encouraged to upgrade their systems to take advantage of the many new features that have been added to this release."
UnCommon Web 0.3.5 releasedVersion 0.3.5 of UnCommon Web, a Common Lisp-based web application development framework, is out. "This version features several changes related to components and component rendering, the TAL/YACLML template and formatting languages, backends, documentation, and more."
Desktop Applications Accessibility The Silent Soundtrack (O'Reilly)John E. Simpson applies XML to captioning on O'Reilly. "It's taken a while for movie producers and distributors to catch up to the closed-captioning capabilities of the hardware, but they're almost there. Yet in one important area, content is still all too often obscured from my earnest attention: computerized multimedia. From games to Flash and Shockwave animations to Quicktime and Windows Media clips, what's going on on my PC is frequently just flat-out lost on me. Computers... text... hmmm. You'd think XML might come to the rescue here. And so it does."
Business Applications Compiere R2.5.2 with Database Independence (SourceForge)Version 2.5.2 of Compiere, an ERP + CRM business application, has been announced. "Compiere to date, has been available on Oracle. We are pleased to announce that it is now also available on Sybase. Several independent open source projects have ported Compiere to different databases."
Data Visualization Gmsh 1.59 is availableVersion 1.59 of Gmsh, a three-dimensional finite element mesh generator, has been announced. "In addition to the usual bug fixes, Gmsh 1.59 adds support for discrete surfaces, introduces several new default plugins, and improves the solver interface."
Desktop Environments The Equinox Desktop EnvironmentEquinox Desktop Environment is a new lightweight desktop system that is based on FLTK, the Fast, Light ToolKit.
Equinox Desktop Environment (shortly EDE) is small desktop environment, builted to be simple and fast.
It is based on modified FLTK library (called extended FLTK or just eFLTK). Comparing to other desktop environments, EDE is
much faster and smaller in memory space (EDE's window manager use less memory than xterm). By the way, it is for now, little bit buggy :(
EDE Version 1.0.2 was announced this week, it promises stability improvements and new features.
GNOME 2.10 Beta 1 Public Testing Release (GnomeDesktop)GnomeDesktop has an announcement for the new GNOME 2.10 Beta 1 Public Testing Release. "Also known as 2.9.90, GNOME 2.10 Beta 1 is the first pre-release intended for wide public scrutiny before the final release in March. It is packed full of tasty GNOME goodness, so if you're itching to find out what we've been doing, and can't wait to finish building it, take a look at Davyd's Sneak Peek this release".
GNOME Software AnnouncementsThe following new GNOME software has been announced in the last week:
KDE Software AnnouncementsThe following new KDE software has been announced in the last week:
KDE CVS-Digest (KDE.News)The February 4, 2005 edition of the KDE CVS-Digest is online with the following content summary: "Digikam does black and white tonal conversion. KPDF implements history and KTTSD (screen reader) support. KMail adds graphical emoticons. KNotes implements read-only support. Konqueror shows document title and favicon in location bar autocomplete. amaroK supports the Akode engine"
The Big Kolab Kontact Interview - Part II (KDE.News)KDE.News continues its interview with the Kontact and Kolab developers. "KMail is the best Open Source e-mail program existing today and with KOrganizer and KAddressBook we already had two other important parts of a PIM solution. So why should we start from scratch? With KParts, XML-GUI and DCOP, KDE offers an incredibly cool framework which made it quite easy to integrate these applications without throwing away existing and well tested code, so it was clearly the way to go."
Electronics Open Collector ReleasesThe latest new electronics applications on Open Collector include QOscC 0.1.6 (software oscilloscope), SC2V 0.3 (SystemC to Verilog synthesizable subset translator), and Confluence 0.10.2 (declarative functional programming language for the design and verification of synchronous reactive systems).
XCircuit 3.3.8 releasedVersion 3.3.8 of XCircuit, an electronic schematic drawing package, is available. This version features fixes for several bugs.
Financial Applications Eclipse Trader 0.12 Released (SourceForge)Version 0.12 of Eclipse Trader is out. "Eclipse Trader is a set of plugins for the Eclipse RCP (Rich Client Platform) dedicated to the building of an online stock trading system. This release adds a simple alerts system that may be used to receive notifications when a stock item reaches a predefined price level, and a new plugin for the Directa Trading (Italy) service. This plugin provides realtime data and trading feature for Directa customers."
Games Ember 0.2.0 ReleasedThe WorldForge game project has announced version 0.2.0 of Ember. "Ember is a 3d client for the WorldForge project. It uses the Ogre 3d graphics library for presentation and CEGUI for it's GUI system. This is the first release of Ember since it's fork from the Dime codebase. The focus has been on getting a working client out of the door. Games such as Mason are fully playable."
Reviving PygameThe PyGame site has been mysteriously quiet for a few months, now there's an explanation: "As you might have noticed, Pete has been MIA recently. A group of Pygame users (Bob Ippolito, Rene "illume" Dudfield, Joe "piman" Wreschnig, and others in #pygame) are trying to organize the 1.7 release in his absence. If you know of any bugs in Pygame 1.6.2 that haven't been fixed in CVS (if you don't know and don't know how to check, assume they aren't), please stop by #pygame on irc.freenode.net".
Graphics G3D 6.05 Beta 2 Released (SourceForge)Version 6.05 beta 2 of G3D, a cross-platform 3D engine for games and other applications, has been announced. "The 6.05 beta 2 release includes new support for the 3DS file format, 2D and video rendering, optional wxWidgets integration, workarounds for bugs in old graphics cards, and major performance improvements in the networking API. It is also the first release to support the new g++ 3.4 on Linux and has a Win32 installer for easy setup."
Instant Messaging IRC Text to Speech with Java (O'Reilly)Paul Mutton applies a speech synthesizer to IRC on O'Reilly. "This article will show you how to create a multi-platform IRC bot (an automated client) that uses the FreeTTS Java speech synthesizer library to convert IRC messages into audible speech."
Interoperability Wine TrafficThe February 4, 2005 edition of Wine Traffic is online, take a look for the latest developments in the Wine project.
Music Applications blepvco 0.1.0 - LADSPA minBLEP hard-syncable VCOsVersion 0.1.0 of blepvco is out. "blepvco is a LADSPA plugin library containing three anti-aliased, minBLEP-based, hard-sync-capable oscillator plugins. The oscillators are intended to be used with modular synthesis systems, such as Alsa Modular Synth (a couple example AMS patches are included)."
Science Mathomatic 12.0 releasedStable version 12.0 of Mathomatic is out. "Mathomatic is a highly portable, general purpose CAS (Computer Algebra System) written entirely in C. It is totally free software (GNU LGPL license). This is a console mode application that compiles and runs under any operating system with a C compiler. It has been under development since 1986 and now stands at 15,000 lines of code."
Web Browsers Mozilla 1.8 Roadmap Updates (MozillaZine)MozillaZine covers the latest Mozilla Development Roadmap announcement. "Following on from the recent Mozilla Firefox Roadmap update, the main Mozilla Development Roadmap has also been revised. The big news is that there will be a second Mozilla 1.8 Beta release in March."
Minutes of the mozilla.org Staff Meeting (MozillaZine)The minutes from the January 24, 2005 mozilla.org staff meeting are online. The MozillaZine summary says: "Issues discussed include Mozilla 1.8 Alpha 6, Mozilla Firefox 1.0.1, Mozilla Firefox 1.1, deploying Hendrix and the broken website tool."
Independent Status Reports (MozillaZine)MozillaZine has announced the February 7, 2005 edition of the Mozilla independent status reports. "The latest set of independent status reports includes updates from Journal, Link Visitor, Spurlbar, biobar, cuneAform, Figaro, Research Buddy, Abacus MathML Editor, IE View, ConQuery, Launchy, viewbgplus, Searchsidebar and Flashblock."
XForms 1.0 Beta Plugin Available for Gecko (MozillaZine)MozillaZine reports on the availability of version 1.0 of the XForms plugin for Mozilla and Firefox. "The Mozilla Foundation today released a beta version of its XForms plugin for Gecko-based browsers. XForms 1.0 is a W3C recommendation that allows web page authors to take advantage of structured data and client-side validation when designing forms. XForms is designed to be embedded in XML documents, such as XHTML 1.0. Mozilla XForms support has been developed over the last several months by IBM, Novell, and independent contributors."
Miscellaneous Sunbird 0.2 Released (MozillaZine)MozillaZine carries the announcement of the first official release of the Sunbird calendaring program from the Mozilla Project. For the curious, screenshots can be found on the Sunbird page.
Languages and Tools Caml Caml Weekly NewsThe February 8, 2005 edition of the Caml Weekly News is online with the week's Caml language news.
Java Bitwise Optimization in Java: Bitfields, Bitboards, and Beyond (O'ReillyNet)Glen Pepicelli manipulates bits with Java in an O'Reilly article. "Flipping bits on and off is the lowest level of computing, and most Java developers are totally isolated from it. But maybe they shouldn't be. In this article, Glen Pepicelli introduces the idea of bitsets--ints and longs whose bitwise representation are the data you're interested in--and how they can be used with mathematical and logical operators to write faster code."
An Introduction to TMAPI (O'Reilly)Robert Barta and Oliver Leimig introduceTMAPI on O'Reilly. "There are several software packages for Java developers when they need to develop applications using XML Topic Maps. There are some proprietary software vendors and also open source packages like TM4j, tinyTIM, and a few others. In the Java tradition to standardize interfaces, the TMAPI project has proposed a set of Java interfaces which particular Topic Map implementations may choose to adhere to. The obvious advantage for the application developer is to use only that single set of interfaces and to choose a particular implementation on other merits."
AOP tools comparison, Part 1 (IBM developerWorks)Mik Kersten discusses tools for Aspect-oriented programming on IBM developerWorks. "AOP is a technology whose time has come, but how do you choose the right tool for your projects? In this first article in the new AOP@Work series, aspect-oriented programming expert Mik Kersten compares the four leading AOP tools (AspectJ, AspectWerkz, JBoss AOP, and Spring AOP) to help you decide which one is for you. In Part 1 of this two-part discussion, the author focuses on the tools' language mechanisms and the trade-offs imposed by the different approaches."Part two of the series is also available.
Cover your code with Hansel and Gretel (IBM developerWorks)Dennis M. Sosnoski writes about the Hansel and Gretel code coverage tools on IBM developerWorks. "Unit tests provide a great technique for making sure that code performs to specifications. But the quality of unit tests is up to the test writer, and the results from unit tests are only as good as the quality of the tests. How can you make sure your unit tests deliver the quality you need? In the first article of this new series dedicated to classworking tools, regular developerWorks contributor Dennis Sosnoski discusses how code coverage tools provide one important quality check for your tests."
Lisp Parallel Computing in LispA series of web log entries about parallel computing in Lisp are available. "Bill Clementson has written a new weblog entry in a series about parallel computing in Lisp. The latest entry, posted on 25 January 2005, deals with the feedback he got on the previous ones. Bill started posting weblog entries in this series in April 2004. They discuss the various approaches, dialects and tools for parallel computing in Lisp."
Perl This Fortnight in Perl 6The January 19-31, 2005 edition of This Fortnight in Perl 6 is online with another collection of Perl 6 topics.
Throwing Shapes (O'Reilly)Vladi Belperchinov-Shabanski discusses the Remote Procedure Call under Perl. "In the Perl world there are several modules that offer different kinds of RPC, including RPC::Simple, RPC::XML, DCE::RPC, and more. In this article I'll explain how to use Perl-specific features to develop a compact RPC implementation that I will name Perl-centric Remote Call (PerlRC). As the name suggests, it will run only with Perl clients and servers."
Python Python 2.3.5 releasedPython 2.3.5 - a bugfix release - is now available. Included therein is the fix for the SimpleXMLRPCServer vulnerability. This is the last planned update for Python 2.3.
python-dev SummaryThe python-dev Summary for December 16-31, 2004 is out with another summary of traffic from the python-dev mailing list.
python-dev SummaryThe python-dev Summary for January 1-15, 2005 is out with another summary of activity on the python-dev mailing list.
Dr. Dobb's Python-URL!The February 9, 2005 edition of Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! is online with the latest Python language articles and resources.
More Test-Driven Development in Python (O'ReillyNet)Jason Diamond continues his O'Reilly series on Test-Driven Development in Python with part two. "The goal of test-driven development is not to produce tests; they're merely a helpful by-product. The real goal is to produce elegant, working code. Jason Diamond demonstrates how test-driven development can improve the design of code."
Ruby Ruby Weekly NewsThe February 6, 2005 edition of the Ruby Weekly News is available with the latest news and discussion from the ruby-talk mailing list.
Tcl/Tk Dr. Dobb's Tcl-URL!The February 8, 2005 edition of Dr. Dobb's Tcl-URL! has been published. Take a look for the latest Tcl/Tk news.
XML The XPath 2.0 Data Model (O'Reilly)Bob DuCharme discusses the XPath 2.0 data model on O'Reilly. "As XSLT 2.0 and its companion specification XQuery 1.0 approach Recommendation status, it's time to step back and look at a more fundamental difference between 2.0 and 1.0: the underlying data models. A better understanding of the differences gives you a better understanding of what you can get out of XSLT 2.0 besides a wider selection of function calls."
Generate SQL with XSLT 2.0 (IBM developerWorks)Jack Herrington shows how to Generate SQL with XSLT on IBM developerWorks. "Learn to use the cutting-edge features of XSLT 2.0 and generate PHP code from an abstract data model. In Part 1 of this two-part series, Jack Herrington uses a robust multilevel transform technique to show you how to take a simple model of a target database and generate the SQL for the database server."
Version Control Aegis 4.20 releasedVersion 4.20 of the Aegis version control system is available. See the change log file for details.
Page editor: Forrest Cook Linux in the news Recommended Reading Part I: Corporate Desktop Linux - The Hard Truth (OSDir.com)W. McDonald Buck, retired CTO of World Bank, looks at what it will take to put Linux on the corporate desktop, on OSDir. "I'm a Linux devotee. I'm offended by the rigged analyses that Microsoft has purchased in its "Get the Facts" campaign. But I think it is important that the open source community demonstrate fairly that open source software presents a better cost/benefit case than Windows. This case is not helped by resorting to the same kind of trickery and distortion of which Microsoft is guilty. I don't like to see obviously skewed analysis on Linux's behalf any more than I like to see it on Microsoft's behalf. No that's wrong. I have a greater dislike of pro-Linux trickery, because I expect better of us."
Experts Predict Spyware for Mozilla Firefox in 2005 (NewsForge)NewsForge reports that experts are predicting that spyware creators will soon target Mozilla Firefox. "For his part, Stu Sjouwerman -- founder and COO of Counterspy maker Sunbelt Software -- agreed that Firefox spyware is likely in 2005. "I'm pretty sure you can expect one or two Firefox (spyware) exploits before the end of the year," Sjouwerman said. "The more popular a platform gets, the more likely it is to come under attack. Firefox -- which I use myself -- I don't think is going to be immune from that. If you go wide like this, you have to expect that your product will be exposed to a trial by fire.""
Trade Shows and Conferences Linux leaders at open-source summit (ADT Magazine)ADT Magazine reports on the Open Source Development Labs (OSDL) Linux Summit. "On the corollary subject of the lawsuit filed back in 2003 by The SCO Group against IBM for illegally contributing its proprietary Unix code to Linux, panel moderator Stuart Cohen saw a bright side to the legal rangles over patent infringement in the open-source community. "The SCO lawsuit was probably the greatest thing that every happened to acceleration of Linux and open source," he said. "If the press hadn't covered it to the extent they did, and the due diligence hadn't then been done by all of the attorneys, Linux and open source probably never would have had the rapid success that it's had over the past 18 months. Because it came through all of that with such flying colors, it became a real phenomenon.""
License issues lining up for Linux, open source (NewsForge)NewsForge covers license discussions at the recent OSDL Enterprise Linux Summit. "In a presentation on open source software licensing issues, noted open source legal mind and license author Larry Rosen gave attendees a sampling of the new license applications he received via email while working for the Open Source Initiative (OSI) last year."
The SCO Problem How SCO's Threats Rallied Linux (Business Week)Business Week is running a column by Stuart Cohen (CEO of OSDL) on how the SCO Group has helped Linux. "The SCO litigation and surrounding media hoopla actually helped accelerate Linux's popularity -- and its legal foundation. SCO's legal offensive was effectively a wake-up call for a community, mobilizing and uniting a large but disparate group of customers and developers around a single cause. It spurred the Linux community to get its house in order. Its response revealed to the world how large that house had become and gave Linux newfound credibility."
SCO's Opposition to IBM's Motion for Reconsideration/Clarification of Wells' Discovery Order (Groklaw)For those following the details of the SCO/IBM trench warfare, Groklaw has SCO's opposition to IBM's attempt to get reconsideration of the latest discovery order. There is also a detailed discussion of why the parties are behaving as they are. "The Nazgul are also implicitly telling Judge Kimball that it is so likely Magistrate Judge Wells will reconsider or clarify her discovery ruling that the matter is not ripe for his consideration, and the effort required to come up to speed on a small mountain of briefs and evidence. By doing so, they actually compliment the magistrate judge, in effect signaling that she has overlooked dispositive factors on an important issue but they regard her as an honest, competent judge who will make the correct decision if she takes a fresh look at the issues in light of the brief that will accompany the motion for reconsideration or clarification."
Ray's Return (ComputerWorld)ComputerWorld looks at the trouble at the Canopy Group. "So when [Ray Noorda] takes control of SCO's Linux litigation, we can be pretty sure one set of lawsuits will go away almost immediately: the ones aimed at corporate Linux users. At 80, Noorda may have lost a step. But he'll never be so far gone that he'll think it's a good idea to sue his own customers."
The Yarro Complaint (Groklaw)For those of you following along with the self-destruction of the Canopy Group: Groklaw has Mr. Yarro's complaint in the suit. "In a nutshell, Yarro and the others who 'resigned' from Canopy say Noorda meant to give them millions and millions (and in some cases part ownership of the company) instead of to his children. You see, it was like this: Yarro was such a valuable employee that Noorda wished to keep him there, and apparently it required millions in perks to retain his services."
Companies MP3.com founder returns to music biz (News.com)News.com looks at Linspire executive and MP3.com founder Michael Robertson's MP3Tunes downloadable music service. "Robertson says he will open the service next week, with "hundreds of thousands" of songs from independent and unsigned artists already available at 88 cents apiece. He'll approach the major labels for access to their music, too--but it will be a tough sell. The big labels have adamantly opposed selling any songs online that are not wrapped in digital rights management technology." A Linux-based music player appliance is also in the works.
Sun Responds to Criticism of CDDL (Groklaw)Groklaw takes a look at Sun's response to criticism of the CDDL. "If Sun prefers to carve out a smaller community for itself, it is free to build its own little island, with its own big fence. The result will be, though, that Linux will continue to develop more quickly and it will bury Sun's license and its code, because the open, GPL method works better, and the GPL requirement of giving back all modifications results in rapid improvement. Sun is free to cut itself off from that, if it so chooses, but it will reap what it sows. If they imagined that the world would drop the GPL and adopt the CDDL instead, I trust by now they realize that isn't going to happen."
Trolltech to Extend Dual Licensing to Qt for Windows (KDE.News)KDE.News reports that Trolltech will be offering the Windows version of Qt under a dual license. "Trolltech, maker of the Qt toolkit which forms the basis for KDE, announced today that the Qt version for Microsoft Windows will be available under the GPL in addition to its current commercial license offerings for that platform. This change will take place with the release of Qt 4."
It's Windows vs. Windows as Microsoft battles piracy (News.com)News.com covers a new heavy-handed approach to operating system piracy coming from Microsoft. "In its most serious bid yet to reap revenue from those who've been getting Windows without payment to Microsoft, the company plans to require computer owners to verify that their copy of Windows is properly licensed before allowing them to download software from Microsoft's site. By mid-year, the once voluntary Windows Genuine Advantage program will become mandatory." The article hints at a possible increase in Linux adoption in emerging markets as a result of the change.
Legal Eiffel Tower: Repossessed (Fast Company)It's not directly Linux-related, but this Fast Company article does show that the U.S. has no monopoly on copyright excesses. The company which maintains the Eiffel Tower, it seems, has copyrighted it. "As a result, it's no longer legal to publish current photographs of the Eiffel Tower at night without permission. Technically, this applies even to amateurs."
Warming up to open source (News.com)Here's a News.com article on a change in patent policy at the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards. "But the overture to open-source developers only goes so far, making royalty-free (RF) licensing of patents in standards an option next to the existing status quo, Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory (RAND) licensing of those patents."
Interviews Linux kernel maintainer joins patent celebrations (ZDNet)ZDNet UK talks with some free software developers about the (hopefully) restarted European software patent discussion. "But there is a dark cloud already looming over the celebrations of anti-patent campaigners, as the EC has not yet decided whether to agree to the EP's request for a restart. Linux developer [Alan] Cox said he is worried that the EC may ignore the EP's request. 'Unfortunately, however, it seems the Commission will not treat this as a chance to drop the entire issue but will continue pursuing software patents for the sole benefit of a tiny number of large, mostly American, companies,' said Cox. 'The battle is far from over.'"
FOSDEM 2005: KOffice Interview (KDE.News)KDE.News interviews Raphael Langerhorst, who will be giving a talk at FOSDEM on "KOffice - Desktop Integration and Workflow Automation". "A big advantage of KOffice is its KDE base, which makes it more lightweight and integrated. OOo brings its own framework which makes the codebase bigger and harder to maintain, but it is necessary to be cross platform. And this is what makes OOo more suitable in mixed environments - OOo builds the bridge between Windows and Linux/Unix whereas KOffice might be a better choice in pure KDE environments. OOo is also a suitable bridge between many legacy file formats and the OASIS Open Document format."
Resources Cygwin: Changing the Face of Windows (Linux Journal)Machtelt Garrels gives an overview of Cygwin in a Linux Journal article. "Cygwin does not convert your Windows machine into a UNIX-compatible one, however. Cygwin does not enable your computer to understand UNIX signals, pseudo-terminals (PTYs) and such; it only provides mappings of UNIX actions to the Windows platform. It is not a way to make native Linux applications run on Windows. If you want an application to run on your Windows workstation, and it is not yet a part of the Cygwin suite, you will have to compile the source. If the application is a graphical one, another solution is to run the application remotely by using X functionality."
Coasterless DVD burning (Troubleshooters)Troubleshooters.com has put up a tutorial on DVD burning. "This document is written for a person just getting started with DVD burning. It details the pitfalls and how to avoid them. The reason is simple enough -- I'm just now learning DVD burning, and have recently fallen into those pitfalls."
HA-OSCAR: Five Steps to a High-Availability Linux Cluster (O'ReillyNet)O'ReillyNet uses HA-OSCAR to set up a high availability Linux cluster. "The HA-OSCAR project's primary goal is to improve the existing OSCAR, Beowulf architecture, and cluster management technology systems (including OSCAR, ROCKS, and Scyld) while providing high-availability and scalability capabilities for Linux clusters. The OCG recognized the project as an official working group, along with the current OSCAR and Thin-OSCAR working groups. HA-OSCAR introduces several enhancements and new features to OSCAR, mainly in the areas of availability, scalability, and security. The new features in the initial release are head node redundancy and self-recovery for hardware, service, and application outages."
Comparing MySQL performance (NewsForge)NewsForge runs a set of MySQL benchmarks on various Linux and BSD systems. "Both Linux 2.4 and 2.6 had the strongest showing overall for these tests, dominating just about every benchmark no matter the workload. Scalability for both kernels was also excellent with addition of an extra processor. In fact, I was surprised how well 2.4 had done, as I had somewhat expected 2.6 to show at least a noticeable, if slight, increase over 2.4. Instead, they took turns besting each other from test to test -- and in scalability -- for a fairly even overall showing."
A Temporary Internet Lounge Revisited (Linux Journal)Linux Journal shows how to set up an Internet lounge using Knoppix 3.7. "By default Knoppix never touches the hard drive--you don't have to install it, you simply have to tell a PC to boot from the CD-ROM drive. Because of Knoppix's excellent hardware detection system, one could, in theory at least, put together a dozen different makes and models of PCs with a dozen identical Knoppix disks, and in five minutes have all of them up, running and browsing the Internet. With Knoppix, there are in essence two filesystems on the disk--a conventional ISO 9660 system that is used while Knoppix boots and a compressed filesystem that is used after the system boots. This complicates things, but it also allows Knoppix to store significantly more than 700MB of software on a conventional 700MB CD-ROM."
Top 15 Firefox Extensions (PC Magazine)PC Magazine takes a look at some ways to extend your Mozilla Firefox browser. "Extensions can do loads of tasks, from blocking pop-up ads to playing card games -- and even viewing a Web page as if it were in IE -- so they can make Firefox a versatile and customizable platform for your browsing activities. But where to start? Which extensions are worth downloading and installing? We evaluated dozens of extensions and present the best 15 for your perusal. It's easy to add them; just go to the Tools | Extensions | Get More Extensions menu to get started."
Reviews Linare Releases Sub-$500 Notebook (ExtremeTech)ExtremeTech takes a look at some new Linare notebooks. "Linare's notebook includes an AMD Athlon 1800+ processor, a 40-GB hard drive, a 14.1-inch XGA TFT-LCD, 128 Mbytes of RAM, a CD-ROM, Fast Ethernet, and the Linare Linux OS. It also ships with OpenOffice, a full office suite compatible with Microsoft Office documents."
Miscellaneous New site to group Aussie open source bloggers (ZDNet.au)ZDNet Australia covers an announcement by Linux Australia about a new Planet Linux Australia site devoted to aggregating the blogs of prominent Australian Linux and open source developers. "According to the organisation, the site "is not just about aggregating feeds, it's about recognising and appreciating all the cool stuff people are doing around the country". Using RSS aggregation software popular within the blogging community, so far the the site has linked 62 Australians associated with open source development, from many different fields and from around the nation."
Zombie trick expected to send spam sky-high (News.com)Just when you thought you couldn't get enough of that yummy spam, News.com reports that a new surge of bogus email is soon to arrive. "According to the SpamHaus Project--a U.K.-based antispam compiler of blacklists that block 8 billion messages a day--a new piece of malicious software has been created that takes over a PC. This "zombie" computer is then used to send spam via the mail server of that PC's Internet service provider. This means the junk mail appears to come from the ISP, making it very hard for an antispam blacklist to block it."
Page editor: Forrest Cook Announcements Non-Commercial announcements FSFE writes Open Letter to International Bank of SettlementsThe FSFE has sent an open letter to the International Bank of Settlements regarding software patents in Europe. "Once Basel II becomes widely used, a dramatic increase in software patent infringement lawsuits for this area is likely to occur on a global basis. Any bank or any of its customers for Basel II based software may become target of such legal action -- the risk is incalculable and can bring about multi-billion Euro lawsuits."
Commercial announcements Command Prompt Unveils Around the Clock PostgreSQL SupportCommand Prompt has announced a 24/7 support program for PostgreSQL database customers. "The program, which is an extension of the successful line of Managed Services offered by Command Prompt, allows any user of PostgreSQL to call Command Prompt, Inc. any time, any day and receive the support they need."
Guardian Digital Releases Advanced Spam and Phishing ProtectionGuardian Digital has announced the release of their Secure Mail Suite version 3.2. "Incorporating advanced technologies for enterprise spam and phishing protection, Secure Mail Suite v. 3.2 is the first solution of its kind to include distributed protection from these types of attacks including the latest blended threats."
JBoss and Sun Microsystems Expand Collaboration on StandardsJBoss and Sun Microsystems, Inc. have announced that they have expanded their collaboration on standards through a new multi-year agreement for JBoss to support the Java 2, Enterprise Edition platform.
JetBrains Provides Free IntelliJ IDEA LicensesJetBrains, Inc. has announced availability of free licenses of its IntelliJ IDEA to the open-source community. "JetBrains, Inc., creators of intelligent, productivity-enhancing tools, announced today it is formalizing and expanding its practice of supporting Open Source development projects and invites developers of qualifying Open Source projects to apply for no-cost user licenses for its widely acclaimed IntelliJ IDEA integrated development environment for Java."
Mandrakesoft to participate in IGGI supercomputer projetMandrakesoft has announced their participation in the IGGI supercomputer project. "Mandrakesoft and partners are starting a research project in grid computing: IGGI. The consortium will develop a solution that can turn any network of desktop machines into a cluster. This project is supported by governemental funding."
New specifications from OSDLThe Open Source Development Labs has announced that version 3.0 of the Carrier Grade Linux Requirements Definition is available "as a technology release for evaluation by developers." The CGL document is "a public reference blueprint for Linux distributions, major end users or Linux kernel developers to build Linux kernel features and associated libraries that are required by telecommunication carriers in their next-generation network infrastructure."Also available is version 1.1 of the OSDL Data Center Linux Capabilities document. "The new document expands priorities published last year by the Lab around Data Center Linux in four main areas: security, hot-plug, clustering, and storage networking."
PalmSource Completes Acquisition of China MobileSoftPalmSource, Inc. has announced the completion of its acquisition of China MobileSoft (CMS), a Chinese mobile phone software company. "The combination of Palm OS and CMS's software products is expected to enable PalmSource to provide one of the broadest lines of mobile software in the industry, powering mobile phones at all price points in all regions of the world. Over time, PalmSource expects to leverage the work CMS has done with Linux to provide a new version of Palm OS based on Linux. The Company will continue to support the Palm OS(R) Garnet and Palm OS(R) Cobalt operating system software lines."
Sealevel Systems Announces First Internal USB to RS-232 Serial AdaptersSealevel Systems, Inc. has announced a series of internal USB to RS-232 serial adapter with Linux support. "These devices are intended for mounting directly to a PC's chassis, eliminating the need for external converters and providing a clean, professional installation. All models are USB bus powered, capable of data rates to 460K bps, and install inside the computer in a spare bracket location."
SKY MobileMedia Announces SKY-MAP Support for MontaVista LinuxSKY MobileMedia, Inc. has announced their SKY-MAP mobile applications software platform on the MontaVista Linux platform. "In collaboration with MontaVista Software, the combination of SKY's fully integrated and standards-compliant SKY-MAP platform paired with MontaVista(R) Linux Consumer Electronics Edition provides phone manufacturers with a complete applications software platform for multimedia handsets and smartphones."
Unisys ES7000 Servers Now Certified On SUSE LINUX Enterprise Server 9Unisys has announced that its ES7000 server line is now certified on SUSE LINUX Enterprise Server 9. "Unisys is the only vendor to achieve SLES 9 certification for both 32-bit and 64-bit servers with up to 32 processors."
Virtual Iron Software Joins Open Source Development LabsOpen Source Development Labs has announced that Virtual Iron has joined OSDL and will participate in the Lab's Data Center Linux (DCL) working group.Virtual Iron Software, Inc. has announced it has established an advisory board founded with industry leaders for the datacenter virtualization company and named Steve Beckhardt, Dr. John Carter, Dr. Charles E. Leiserson, Billy Marshall, Richard Napolitano and Christopher M. Stone as founding members.
New Books GNU/Linux Application Programming publishedCharles River Media has published the book GNU/Linux Application Programming by M. Tim Jones.
"Home Networking Annoyances" Released by O'ReillyO'Reilly has published the book Home Networking Annoyances by Kathy Ivens.
"Internet Annoyances" Released by O'ReillyO'Reilly has published the book Internet Annoyances by Preston Gralla.
Zope 3 Developer's Handbook publishedSams has published the book Zope 3 Developer's Handbook by Stephan Richter. An online version of the book is also available.
Resources FSF Europe NewsletterThe February 7, 2005 edition of the FSF Europe Newsletter is online with the latest from the Free Software Foundation Europe.
Linux Gazette #111The February 2005 issue of Linux Gazette is out. Articles include Are Your Servers Secure???, by Blessen Cherian, Free as in Freedom: Part Two: Linux for the "Rest of Us", by Adam Engel, Compiling the Linux Kernel, by R. Krishnakumar, Introduction to Shell Scripting - The Basics, by Ben Okopnik, Songs in the Key of Tux: Recording with Audacity, by Jimmy O'Regan, and more.
Contests and Awards 2004 LinuxQuestions.org Members Choice Award WinnersLinuxQuestions.org has announced the Members Choice Award winners for 2004. Firefox was named Browser of the Year, Slackware is the Distribution of the Year and Knoppix is the LiveCD Distribution of the Year. A full list of nominees along with detailed results can be found here.
LinuxWorld Conference & Expo Names Finalists for Product Excellence AwardsLinuxWorld Conference & Expo has announced the finalists for the LinuxWorld Product Excellence Awards, to be presented at LinuxWorld Conference & Expo next week. Finalists include KDE 3.3, Mambo 4.5.1a and Novell Linux Desktop 9.
Upcoming Events ApacheCon Europe 2005 CFPA Call for Participation has gone out for ApacheCon Europe 2005. The event will be held from July 18-22, 2005 in Stuttgart, Germany. Submissions are due by March 4.
CodeCon ReminderA reminder has been sent out fo the CodeCon event. "CodeCon will be held February 11-13, noon-6pm, at Club NV (525 Howard Street) in San Francisco."
New Products, Services and Software to Be Featured at Desktop Linux SummitLinspire has sent out a preview of the upcoming San Diego Desktop Summit. "The Desktop Summit today announced a preview of new products, services and software to be featured at the event, February 9-11 at the Del Mar Fairgrounds in San Diego. Several new products and services will debut at the Summit, which will also feature exhibitors from some of the most innovative open source and desktop Linux companies."
Fedora User and Developer Conference (FUDCon)The first FUDCon has been announced. "The Fedora Project, a Red-Hat-sponsored and community-supported open source project, today announced a packed program for their first international conference, the Fedora Users and Developers Conference. Known as "FUDcon" for short, this conference is the first to bring together Fedora users and developers. It will be held at Boston University in Boston, Massachusetts, USA on Friday, February 18th, 2005."
FOSDEM 2005 Press-releaseA press release has gone out for FOSDEM 2005. "FOSDEM announced the preliminary program for its upcoming conference, to be held February 26-27, 2005 in Brussels, Belgium. Now in its fifth year, FOSDEM provides a forum for programmers across a wide spectrum of free and open source technologies to share ideas, and to foster collaboration between different projects. A wide range of developers gather at the annual conference to advance the adoption of open source and free software throughout Europe and the world."
Sun Regional Delegate Program for linux.conf.au 2005Sun has announced its Regional Delegate Program for the linux.conf.au 2005 conference. "As with previous LCAs, Sun Microsystems has kindly offered to sponsor the Regional Delegates Program (RDP) for LCA 2005. For the LCA 2005 RDP, there will be ten winners: one from each of the Australian states and territories; a national winner; and a winner representing New Zealand." The conference will be held in Canberra on April 18-23 2005.
Google, HP, Novell, and Red Hat Execs to Keynote 2005 MySQL Users ConfThe keynote speakers for the 2005 MySQL Users Conference have been announced. The event will be held in Santa Clara, California on April 18-21, 2005.
PGP keysigning at LinuxWorld in BostonA PGP keysigning session will be held on February 15 at the Boston LinuxWorld conference.
NSPW 2005 Call For PapersA Call For Papers has gone out for the 2005 New Security Paradigms Workshop. The event will be held in Lake Arrowhead, California on September 20-23, 2005.
PalmSource Worldwide Mobile Summit and DevConPalmSource, Inc. has announced its Worldwide Mobile Summit and DevCon. The event will take place in San Jose, California on May 23 -26, 2005. "PalmSource will also highlight its product roadmap for feature phones and Linux, leveraging its recent acquisition of China MobileSoft (CMS), a leading Chinese mobile phone software company."
Call For Papers - August Penguin 2005A Call For Papers has gone out for the Penguicon 2005 conference. The event will be held in Israel on August 4, 2005, papers are due by March 4, 2005.
FlightGear to Demo Linux Based 747 Cockpit Simulator at SCALE 3xFlightGear will demonstrate their open-source 757 flight simulator at the SCALE conference in Los Angeles. "The FlightGear team will use their open-source flight simulator to drive a full scale 747-400 simulator cockpit. The FlightGear demonstration will take place at SCALE 3x on Feb 12-13, 2005."
OpenEMR at Southern California Linux Exposition (LinuxMedNews)LinuxMedNews has announced a presentation of the OpenEMR project on February 13 at the Third Annual Southern California Linux Exposition. "Walt Pennington will discuss OpenEMR, an open source medical practice management and electronic medical record application."
YAPC::Taipei 2005 Registration Opens (use Perl)Use Perl has announced registration for the YAPC::Taipei 2005 Perl conference. The event will be held on March 26 and 27, 2005 in Taipei, Taiwan.
Events: February 10 - April 7, 2005
Mailing Lists VOIPSEC mailing list formedA new mailing list has been formed by the Voice over IP Security Alliance (VOIPSA). "The Voice over IP Security Alliance (VOIPSA) is a unique collaboration of VoIP and Information Security vendors, providers, and researchers. VOIPSA aims to help organizations understand and mitigate VoIP security risks through discussion lists, white papers, sponsorship of VoIP security research projects, and the development of tools and methodologies for public use."
Web sites CPAN::Forum (use Perl)use Perl has an announcement for the newly created CPAN::Forum site. "Graham integrated links to the individual subforums in the search.cpan results and Randy in the Kobes' search. I hope people who are searching for modules will find it a good place to discuss them."
Page editor: Forrest Cook
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