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Linux in the newsRecommended Reading How The Kernel Development Process Works (Groklaw)Groklaw is running an article by Greg Kroah-Hartman on how the kernel development process works. "People are claiming that code can just get "slipped into" the main kernel tree without realizing where it really came from, or without any sort of review process. Obviously they have never actually tried to get a major kernel patch accepted, otherwise they would not be making these kinds of claims :)"
Underground showdown (Register)The Register looks at an interesting phonomenon in the cracker world: web site defacers have are targeting phishing sites. "It's unlikely that many law enforcement officials will go after Web defacers who are posting warnings to potential victims of phishing fraud. Prosecutors can pick and choose the cases in which they want to invest time, and helping out bank fraudsters is not likely a high priority..."
Stallman: Nokia's announcement next to nothing (NewsForge)NewsForge has Richard Stallman's take on Nokia's limited patent grant. "We can honestly thank IBM for agreeing not to sue us with 500 of its patents, and we can thank Nokia too for agreeing not to attack one of our community's projects. But don't be distracted from the real issue at stake. Nokia most likely intends to use this announcement as a way to put us in more danger. Nokia, along with IBM and Microsoft, is lobbying hard for software patents in Europe. Nokia will surely point to its own small gesture as 'proof' that software patents will not be devastating to free software."
Trade Shows and Conferences India's Upcoming Free Software, Free Society Conference (Linux Journal)Linux Journal previews an upcoming Linux conference in India. ".. the Free Software Foundation of India is organising a four-country conference to be held May 28-29, 2005. The Free Software, Free Society conference brings together hackers from an unlikely set of nations, people who don't speak the same language but who do see much in the idea that knowledge is most powerful when it is shared freely."
Linux named "platform for the future" by PalmSource keynote speaker (DesktopLinux.com)Desktop Linux covers a keynote address by Dr. Dave Nagel at "Mobile Summit", PalmSource's annual developer event. ""Linux is our platform for the future," said Dr. Nagel, noting that CMS's (re-named PalmSource Asia) Linux-based products will make their way into PalmSource's offerings worldwide."
Big-business technologists talk up Linux (Computerworld Australia)Computerworld.au covers the LinuxWorld Summit. "Several IT executives at the LinuxWorld Summit last week reinforced the idea that Linux now has the technical brawn and industry support to accommodate the most demanding business applications in environments such as finance, airline reservations and stock trading."
IT giants accused of exploiting open source (News.com)News.com reports from the Holland Open Source Conference, where European Commission member Jesus Villasante made some comments about the community and business interests. "Villasante argued that open source is vital to the development of the European software industry, but that its progress has been inhibited by pressure from intellectual-property lobbyists and the traditional software industry, and by the fragmentation of the open-source community. 'Open source is a complete mess--many people do lots of different things. There's total confusion today,' Villasante said."
Companies Cyber fixers now at PC near you! (Hindustan Times)Hindustan Times reports that Bangalore-based DeepRoot Linux has come out with its 'DeepOfix' messaging server. ""It handles e-mail, fights spam and scans your mail. What most solutions take a week to do, our software does in 35 minutes. It has the ability to track e-mail, so that you know whether an e-mail you've sent has reached the receiver or not," Abhas Abhinav, who heads DeepRoot, said."
Novell reports loss as older business shrinks (News.com)News.com examines the latest financial report from Novell. "Revenue rose to $297 million from $294 million, but came in below Wall Street's average estimate of $302 million. Joe Tibbetts, Novell's chief financial officer, said revenue from the company's NetWare product line declined at a slightly faster pace than expected. "Revenue grew, but we'd like to see them grow more," Tibbetts said. "Even in our Linux business, we would have liked to do better there.""
Linux Adoption Detroit high school opens its desktops (NewsForge)NewsForge examines a switch to Linux and OpenOffice.org at the University of Detroit Jesuit High School and Academy. "The cost analysis was compelling -- the Linux option could be implemented for around $21,000, more than $100,000 less than the Microsoft Windows alternative. The key to enabling the move to Linux, however, was the ability to provide an acceptable office application suite that would run on both Windows XP and Linux. It was impractical for the school to support more than one office application suite, nor was it cost-effective nor beneficial to remove Windows XP from the newer systems."
Interviews The Meeks shall inherit the earth (GnomeDesktop)GnomeDesktop.org has announced the availability of Lug Radio Episode 28. "Lug Radio interviews Michael Meeks, Novell hacker and Busiest Man Alive, who talks about OpenOffice.org, Gnome, how you can get involved, and how to get lots of work done by not spending all day reading other people's weblogs..."
Interview with KDE-PIM Hacker Daniel Molkentin (KDE.News)KDE.News has an interview with Daniel Molkentin. "I am one of Kontact's maintainers, along with Don Sanders and Cornelius Schumacher. I mostly take care of the Kontact framework itself, the visible parts if you will. Other than that, I am the author or several fixes, features and hacks throughout KDE-PIM."
Interview with KDE PIM Hacker Cornelius Schumacher (KDE.News)KDE.News talks with Cornelius Schumacher, KDE-PIM module project leader. "We have seen several developers in interviews and blogs talk about the KDE PIM event in the Netherlands and what they are planning to work on during the meeting. Do you have any plans or ideas for this meeting? There are two big goals I would like to achieve at the meeting. First, creating a roadmap for KDE PIM 4. Second, relaunching the KDE-PIM web pages with some fresh and rejuvenated content. But I'm sure there will also come up some new ideas at the meeting."
An evening with the Guru of Python: Guido van Rossum (TuxJournal.net)Vincenzo Ciaglia interviews Guido Van Rossum on TuxJournal.net. "What's your role in the Python Developing Team? Are you still working on some projects or you just coordinate your guys? We're currently designing a new compound statement that lets you code resource acquisition and release pairs (such as acquiring and releasing a lock, or opening and closing a file) in a way that guarantees the release always happens without having to write a try-finally statement."
Resources The Daemon, the GNU and the Penguin - Ch. 10 (Groklaw)Groklaw has published chapter 10 of the book "The Daemon, the GNU and the Penguin," by Dr. Peter H. Salus. This chapter covers Sun and gcc.
Developing GNOME Applications with Java (Linux Journal)Linux Journal looks at the process of creating a GUI design in XML, writes Java code, and then plugs the whole thing in to the GNOME desktop. "With three existing Java GUI toolkits, one might ask why another alternative is necessary. GNOME's Java bindings are unique because they are tied directly to GNOME. An application written with GNOME's Java offerings looks and behaves exactly as if it had been written using GNOME's C libraries. It integrates seamlessly into the GNOME desktop and provides the same capabilities as any other GNOME application. The reason for this is GNOME's Java bindings use the Java Native Interface to delegate work directly to GNOME's C libraries."
Rexx: Power Through Simplicity (O'ReillyNet)O'ReillyNet covers Rexx. "Rexx was the first widely used scripting language. Though IBM invented it 25 years ago, it may come as a surprise that this language is more popular today than ever. There are now nine free and open source Rexx implementations. These run under virtually any operating system on any platform. All but one meet the Rexx language standard, and each has optimizations or extensions for a specific purpose."
Programming Tools: UML Tools (Linux Journal)The Linux Journal looks at tools (both free and proprietary) for creating UML diagrams. "At the moment, none of the open-source tools that I have tried match the richness of the commercial products. DIA is the most extensible, but it does not treat UML semantically, so logical connections and implications are not supported."
The Small Computer System Interface (SCSI) standard (IBM developerWorks)Peter Seebach profiles the history of SCSI on IBM developerWorks. "Alan Shugart, founder of Shugart Associates and Seagate, gets most of the credit for being the visionary who realized the world needed a standard like this one. The initial protocol was called the "Shugart Associates Systems Interface," or SASI. It had a fairly limited set of protocol commands, and performance peaked out at 1.5 MBps (which sounds pretty weak, but for 1979 this was incredible)."
Linux in Government: Optimizing Desktop Performance, Part III (Linux Journal)Linux Journal continues this series on optimizing the Linux desktop. "Some default features of Linux that seem slow to a new desktop user appear perfectly acceptable to long-time workstation users. When we begin to disable services that slow down the boot process, some Linux users might object. For instance, killing the mail transfer agent could mean that service messages meant for root or admin are not sent. Someone wanting to boot up her laptop quickly, however, might not care about that. For system administrators and developers, though, the missing chance to analyze a program flaw becomes a lost opportunity."
Miscellaneous EU puts funds toward global research on open source (News.com)News.com looks into a grant from the European Union for the support of open-source software around the world. "The newly approved funding--660,00 euros, or $825,594--is for the two-year FLOSSWorld project, Europe's first initiative to support international research and policy development on "free/libre/open source software." Previous FLOSS projects, starting as early as 2001, have concentrated on the use of open source in Europe alone."
Page editor: Forrest Cook |
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