Mandrakelinux Community Newsletter #101

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                  Mandrake Linux Community Newsletter



                      Issue # 101   March 4, 2005



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Welcome to the Mandrakelinux Community Newsletter - dedicated to

keeping you up-to-date with the latest Mandrakelinux-related news and

info.

Inside this Issue:



   * Top Story -- Mandrakelinux and Conectiva announce merger

   * In the Cooker... -- Mandrakelinux 10.2 Beta 3 released

   * Mandrakelinux in the news -- The media on the merger

   * Mandrakesoft Interviews -- Mandrakeclub interviews Wobo

   * Mandrakesoft news -- New Country Manager in Italy

   * Software Update -- Protect your Mandrakelinux!

   * Mandrakelinux Goodies -- Get your retail therapy here!



Top Story

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Mandrakelinux and Conectiva announce merger



The biggest news this week is the merger of Mandrakesoft with the #1

South American Linux vendor, Conectiva. Mandrakesoft is buying all of

Conectiva's shares in a stock swap which will create a new, truly

international Linux vendor. Conectiva's enterprise connections and

know-how in South America and particularly Brazil will give a strong

boost to Mandrakesoft's enterprise development, and its research and

development abilities will combine with Mandrakesoft's to produce a

strong source of open source innovations. Decisions have not yet been

made on the form of the product line-up that the new company will

produce, nor on the name it will take, but we'll be sure to bring the

news to you as soon as it's available. You can read the announcement

of the merger here.

http://www.mandrakesoft.com/company/press/pr?n=/pr/corpor...




In the Cooker...

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Mandrakelinux 10.2 Beta 3 released



The development of the new Mandrakelinux continues with the release of

Mandrakelinux 10.2 beta 3. A third beta was not originally planned,

but has been added to further ensure the stability of the release.

Important things to test at this point include the automatic mounting

of USB devices, and Chinese and Japanese input. You can read the

announcement on the Mandrakeclub here and get downloading by FTP or

BitTorrent.

http://www.mandrakeclub.com/article.php?sid=3394&mode...
http://www.mandrakelinux.com/en/102beta.php3

http://qa.mandrakesoft.com/torrent/Mandrakelinux-10.2beta...


Mandrakelinux 10.2 Beta 1 for PPC



PowerPC users don't need to feel left out of the 10.2 development

process - thanks to the hardworking PowerPC contributors, beta 1 of

Mandrakelinux 10.2 for PowerPC is available too! Lots is new with

this release, most significantly support for the new G5 Macs. You can

read the release notes here and get downloading in the usual places.

And anyone out there who's been tempted to try out the new Mac Mini

but is worried about leaving their Mandrakelinux behind should be

happy to know that both 10.1 and 10.2 run well on the little machine!

http://qa.mandrakesoft.com/twiki/bin/view/Main/Mandrakeli...
http://www.mandrakelinux.com/en/102beta.php3





Mandrakelinux in the news

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The media on the merger



The Mandrakesoft / Conectiva merger has been widely and favourably

reported in the media. CNet says "the consolidation will help give

the combined company more heft". The UK magazine PC Pro remarked upon

Mandrakesoft's "Phoenix-like rise from the ashes" and said "The deal

also improves the company's standing in comparison with its bigger

brothers Red Hat and Novell's SUSE". The deal was reported on many

other high-profile sites including Linux Today and Slashdot.

http://news.com.com/Second-tier+Linux+sellers+agree+to+me...
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/69846/mandrakesoft-acquires-s...
http://linuxtoday.com/it_management/2005022401626NWBZMD

http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/02/24/1546209...


Linux Format picks Mandrakelinux 10.1 for best distribution



The UK magazine Linux Format rounded up fifteen distributions for its

January issue. The winner? Mandrakelinux 10.1! The article itself is

not online, but Distrowatch has a detailed write-up of the write-up

here. Mandrakelinux was picked out for having "the best installation

and configuration tools on the market" and because "we can breeze

through a Mandrakelinux install with our eyes closed". We can only

agree!

http://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20050117#1



Working on Mandrakelinux



The popular site NewsForge has been running a series called 'My

Workstation OS' encouraging people to write in and describe their

favourite operating system to work in. Gary Maxwell picked

Mandrakelinux, and his article is here. His reasons? "For ease of

use, excellent support, and up-to-date packaging, Mandrake is the

best desktop going."

http://os.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=05/02/07/1856202





Mandrakesoft Interviews

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Mandrakeclub interviews Wobo



Following its interview with Warly last week, this time the

Mandrakeclub interviewed Wobo - otherwise known as Wolfgang Bornath,

one of the longest standing Mandrakelinux contributors. Find out more

about his history with Mandrakesoft, his life, and his secret past

with OS/2 Warp over on the Club.

http://www.mandrakeclub.com/article.php?sid=3310&mode...


Perl.com interviews Rafael Garcia-Suarez



In case you didn't know, Rafael Garcia-Suarez maintains perl and the

urpmi tools for Mandrakelinux. As you can imagine, this makes him

something of a perl guru, and perl.com decided to pick his brains for

the benefit of its readers. Rafael has a sharp sense of humour, too -

when asked what tools Mandrakesoft uses to do automated testing of

graphical Perl applications, Rafael's answer revealed the secret of

Mandrakesoft's success: "Er, interns?" Read more shocking revelations

on the life of a perl hacker here!

http://www.perl.com/pub/a/2005/02/24/mandrakelinux.html





Mandrakesoft news

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New Country Manager in Italy

Hervé Jezequel has been appointed as Mandrakesoft's new Country
Manager for Italy. He brings with him more than twenty years of
professional experience in the IT sector, of which the last fourteen
have been with Prologue Software. Hervé has a strong background in
sales and international experience, including eight years of
experience as Italian affiliate manager and ten years of experience
in channel sales development. Mandrakesoft believes that Hervé's
experience in dealing with the Italian culture and developing channel
sales, along with his presence in Italy, will allow us to have a
better feel for the market and help us be more responsive to the
needs of Italian customers. Good news for Hervé, Italy and quite
possibly the world! Send any questions about Mandrakesoft products in
Italy right here.

Mandrakesoft at the Linux Days trade show in Germany

From March 10th to March 14th, the Linux Days trade show will be held
in Lörrach, Germany (near Basel on the French / Swiss / German
border), and Mandrakesoft will be there. Mandrakesoft's Till
Kamppeter will be at the Mandrakesoft booth on behalf of Linux
printing, and Wolfgang Bornath - alias wobo - will be at the booth
presenting Mandrakelinux and Move, including an early peek at
Mandrakelinux 10.2. Members of the Mandrakeuser.de community site
will be helping out with the booth and installing Mandrakelinux for
visitors, and many products including Mandrakelinux 10.1 Official and
Move will be on sale. Make sure to visit! You can read more about the
show on the official site, here.
http://www.it-linux-days.de/


Software Update
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Protect your Mandrakelinux!

As always, regular upgrading is essential to keep your Mandrakelinux
system healthy and happy. Since the last newsletter, packages
including KDE, squid and PostgreSQL have had important security
fixes, so make sure to run MandrakeUpdate regularly! And of course,
there's always Mandrakeonline for automated and scheduled updates.
Laziness and security - who could resist that combination?
http://www.mandrakesoft.com/mandrakeonline


Mandrakelinux Goodies
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Get your retail therapy here!

And finally, Christmas bonus still burning a hole in your pocket? Or
is your wallet full of little red envelopes from the Chinese New
Year? Whatever the source, where better to spend your money than the
Mandrakestore? Currently, the GlobeTrotter - a Lacie mobile hard
drive with Move preinstalled - is available at a special discount for
just 149.90EUR! Hurry over to the store now to find this and many other
bargains.
http://www.mandrakestore.com


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