LWN Weekly Edition
Front pageSecurity
Kernel development
Distributions
Development
Announcements
->One big page
This page
Previous weekFollowing week
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
AnnouncementsNon-Commercial announcements FSF Advocates Free Software for U.S. IPEC Joint Strategic PlanThe Free Software Foundation (FSF) has responded to the United States executive Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator (IPEC) Joint Strategic Plan. "The FSF argues that the government should use free software to provide more freedom and transparency to its constituents and reduce the need to engage in costly copyright enforcement activities on behalf of proprietary software companies. The FSF states that "the most egregious harms to the public interest in the areas of copyright and patents come not from a lack of enforcement, but from extraordinarily excessive enforcement.""
Commercial announcements 2010 Google Summer of Code applications now being acceptedGoogle is now accepting applications for the 2010 Summer of Code program. "For our sixth Google Summer of Code, students can choose from 150 Free and Open Source software projects, in technical areas as diverse as gaming to humanitarian efforts to operating system design."
Sony Playstation to lose Linux installation capabilityAs described in this Playstation.com weblog entry, the upcoming Playstation v3.21 firmware update will remove the "install other OS" option from the system. "In addition, disabling the 'Other OS' feature will help ensure that PS3 owners will continue to have access to the broad range of gaming and entertainment content from SCE and its content partners on a more secure system." Incidentally, once the firmware update is made, anything on a Linux partition will be immediately lost forever, and not applying the update will cause the system to operate at reduced functionality. This move runs contrary to promises to PS3 owners made in the recent past.There is a press release in Japanese which can be turned into something resembling English with Google Translate.
Red Hat Reports Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2010 ResultsRed Hat has announced financial results for its fiscal fourth quarter and fiscal year ended February 28, 2010. "Total revenue for the quarter was $195.9 million, an increase of 18% from the year ago quarter. Subscription revenue for the quarter was $169.2 million, up 21% year-over-year. For the full year, total revenue was $748.2 million, an increase of 15% over the prior year, and subscription revenue was $638.7 million, up 18% year-over-year."
Legal Announcements Governmental free software preferences are legal in ItalyThe Italian constitutional court has ruled that the Piedmont region can legally maintain a preference for free software in its purchasing decisions. According to the court, this preference is for a caratteristica (characteristic) of the software, rather than for a specific product or technology. Click below for the press release (in Italian) from L'Associazione per il Software Libero, or see the English, French, or Spanish versions.
Decision in the SCO Group vs. Novell Jury trialNovell reports that the jury in the District Court of Utah trial between SCO Group and Novell issued a verdict in favor of Novell. "Novell is very pleased with the jury's decision confirming Novell's ownership of the Unix copyrights, which SCO had asserted to own in its attack on Linux. Novell remains committed to promoting Linux, including by defending Linux on the intellectual property front."
Elan Seeks to Block Apple Ipad Sales Over Patent (Bloomberg)The phone-related patent mess is getting deeper: Bloomberg reports that a company called Elan Microelectronics has sued Apple for patent infringement. It seems that Elan owns patent #5,825,352, which discloses the process of detecting two fingers on a touch pad - something nobody would have ever thought of otherwise. "That patent was affirmed after a California district court found Synaptics Inc. infringed that same technology in a 2008 ruling, Elan said." One assumes that Elan does not plan to stop here.
Articles of interest Villa: A community of FOSS lawyers?Luis Villa writes about the emerging FOSS legal community on opensource.com. "Despite all that, the FOSS law community is still growing- which is a testament to the power of the collaborative model. To me, the heart of the test for 'are people a community' is 'can I call on a known group of people for help in a pinch, and would they feel comfortable doing the same of me.' In this informal, unstructured way, there is definitely a growing FOSS legal community of shared interests and relationships."
Hacker vows to fight Sony PS3 update, restore Linux support (ars technica)Ars technica reports that hacker George Hotz aims to restore the Other OS option on the PlayStation3. "The wins Hotz has enjoyed in playing with the system were enough to make Sony nervous, and taking away Linux hasn't made many gamers happy. Catching the interest of someone who clearly has both the time and the knowledge to open the system wider isn't likely to end well for Sony; Hotz may not be interested in piracy, but the more capabilities put into the hands of the cracking community the more likely that outcome is going to be. Sony knows just how damaging piracy can be to a platform-the PSP has suffered from that problem almost since launch-but taking away features and claiming security concerns may have simply given the issue more attention than it deserved."
Resources Linux Foundation Newsletter: March 2010This issue of the Linux Foundation Newsletter covers Linux.com Store Opens, Design Contest Launches; 2010 Linux.com Gurus Announced; New Program Additions for Collaboration Summit; Call for Participation for LinuxCon Closes March 31; Call for Participation Opens for LinuxCon Japan; 2010 "We're Linux" Video Contest Enters Final Weeks; Linux Foundation in the News; and Upcoming Training Course from Linux Foundation.
Blog Postings O'Reilly: The state of the Internet operating systemTim O'Reilly has posted a lengthy article about the "Internet operating system." "This is the crux of my argument about the internet operating system. We are once again approaching the point at which the Faustian bargain will be made: simply use our facilities, and the complexity will go away. And much as happened during the 1980s, there is more than one company making that promise. We're entering a modern version of 'the Great Game', the rivalry to control the narrow passes to the promised future of computing. (John Battelle calls them 'points of control'.) This rivalry is seen most acutely in mobile applications that rely on internet services as back-ends."
Education and Certification Linux Training provided to drive growth of Open Source professionals in NigeriaThe Linux Professional Institute (LPI) has announced that its affiliate organization, LPI-Nigeria, has successfully completed a program of free Linux training for young people. "Lifeforte International High School (Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria), the LPI-Nigeria affiliate, has undertaken a two year program of training, Linux Professional Institute Certification (LPIC) exam lab events, and other special initiatives with the country's National Youth Service Corps and government agencies to promote this goal."
Meeting Minutes GNOME Foundation Meeting Minutes PublishedThe minutes for the March 18, 2010 meeting of the GNOME Foundation are available. Topics include GnuCash automation, Friends of GNOME sysadmin announcement, Annual Report Update, Brazilian GNOME events, The Idlelo Conference, Hackfests, and more.
Calls for Presentations Operating System Platform for Embedded Real-Time applications 2010Sixth International Workshop on Operating Systems Platforms for Embedded Real-Time Applications (OSPERT 2010) will take place July 6, 2010 in conjunction with the 22nd Euromicro Intl Conference on Real-Time Systems (ECRTS10) in Brussels, Belgium. The call for papers is open until April 4, 2010.
Upcoming Events Linux Users' Group of Davis, April 2010 eventsThe Linux Users' Group of Davis (LUGOD) will be holding three events this April in Davis, California. There will be a Linux Installfest Workshop April 3, 2010, a social gathering April 6, 2010, and a general meeting April 19, 2010.
Events: April 8, 2010 to June 7, 2010The following event listing is taken from the LWN.net Calendar.
If your event does not appear here, please tell us about it.
Page editor: Rebecca Sobol |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||