LWN.net Weekly Edition for September 4, 2003
A quick look at Conglomerate 0.70
The DocBook format is often promoted as the format of choice for free (and non-free) documentation. DocBook, as an SGML and XML standard, is compliant with as many buzzwords as anybody could wish for. The standard is well developed and highly expressive. And DocBook, of course, is all about structure. More, perhaps, than any other markup language, DocBook forces the author to concentrate on the structure of the language without thinking about how a document will be rendered in any particular medium.Anybody who has had to create a serious work in full frontal DocBook knows the rest of the story, however. DocBook is complex and verbose. Like PostScript, DocBook requires that the author maintain a deep stack in mind to track the current state of the document. And, like PostScript, DocBook is best used as the output of a higher-level tool, rather than created directly by the author.
Unfortunately, given the current state of the tools available, manipulating DocBook directly with a text editor is often the only option available. So your editor, who is currently in the process of updating a substantial book which is, of course, in DocBook format, was more than usually interested in the recent announcement that Conglomerate 0.70 had been released. As stated in the announcement:
For authors working in DocBook, a nice editor would be worth a great deal. So Conglomerate seemed worth checking out.
The first challenge with bleeding-edge software, of course, is getting it installed and running. For Conglomerate, an attempted install on Debian sid proved doomed to failure; the maze of dependencies proved too twisted, and the packaged version in experimental had not been updated. On the other hand, version 0.70 configured, built, and installed on a Red Hat Linux 9 system without trouble. There are advantages to having a variety of distributions sitting around.
What resulted was a tool that shows some serious promise, but which is not
yet ready for production use. The sample text used (Chapter Two of
Linux Device Drivers, Third Edition) required significant editing
(with a text editor) before Conglomerate would accept it. Conglomerate
does not recognize common entities (e.g. –), and there
are differences of opinion on how certain types of tag (such as
<indexterm>) should be terminated in some situations. The
tool spews out an unending series of Gtk warnings, crashes occasionally,
![[Screenshot]](https://static.lwn.net/images/ns/conglomerate/current-sm.gif)
and is generally slow. It is missing fundamental features, such as an
"undo" operation. It does, however, work well enough to give a good
idea of where the developers are going.
True to the basic premise of DocBook, Conglomerate is all about structure. Looking at a document in DocBook will not tell you much about how it will appear in printed (or web) form, but it is full of information on how the document goes together. To that end, the window (see the screen shot on the right) is divided into two panes. The left side shows the overall structure of the document, in the usual tree presentation. The main window, on the right, shows the text. But this is no WYSIWYG presentation; instead, the document is presented as a set of nested boxes showing, once again, how things are structured. Subtrees of the document can be expanded or hidden at will, providing a sort of zoom feature.
![[menu entry]](https://static.lwn.net/images/ns/conglomerate/menu-entry.gif)
At the structural element level, the right mouse button yields an
impressive array of new elements (86 of them) which can be added as
subelement or sibling elements. Once you get below the paragraph level,
however, a whole new menu with various types of low-level markup
(e.g. <emphasis>) appears instead. Conglomerate does not, of
course, change the presentation of the text to reflect this sort of
![[literal]](https://static.lwn.net/images/ns/conglomerate/literal.gif){kind=small}
markup. So, for example, rather than italicizing text marked
<literal>, it simply indicates that the tag is present.
The tool displays internal comments in a highlighted form, but does not
appear to provide a way to add or edit comments.
There is no shortage of features that this tool still needs: undo, an easy way to join paragraphs, the ability to read and fix not-quite-perfect files, entity definitions, and some sort of way to quickly see what formatted output would look like. The performance and stability issues need some work. But none of this should detract from the fact that the Conglomerate developers have made substantial progress toward the creation of a desperately needed tool. Conglomerate is headed in the right direction; we're looking forward to the next release.
European software patent vote delayed
Last week we reported on the impending software patent vote in the European Parliament. That vote, set for September 1, did not happen as scheduled. Thanks, at least in part, to protests in various forms, the vote has been pushed back to the September 22 Strasbourg session.What remains unclear is what will be voted on at that time. By some reports, the entire software patent proposal has been pushed back for a rewrite before the vote. By others, it is a simple delay, and the same proposal will be voted upon in Strasbourg. Real information, however, seems hard to come by.
Either way, now is not the time to let up the pressure on software patents. The next few weeks should be used, by Europeans, to make sure their MEPs understand how they feel about software patents and the threats patents pose to European businesses. The "software patent factsheet" being distributed by MEP Arlene McCarthy should be challenged. It is also necessary to provide a counter to the pro-patent forces, which are evidently pressing for a removal of the interoperability exemption in the proposed law. This battle, perhaps, can be won - but it is not over yet.
Software Customer Bill of Rights
[This article was contributed by Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier]
In the last week or so, Cem Kaner's Software Customer Bill of Rights has been making the rounds of the "blogosphere" and getting quite a bit of attention. Essentially, Kaner proposes ten basic rights that should be enjoyed by any user of commericial software. As End User License Agreements (EULAs) have become increasingly onerous over the last few years, Kaner's bill of rights has struck a chord with users.
For the most part, the rights proposed by Kaner are already enjoyed by users of open source software. They already have the right to transfer free software to other users. They don't need to reverse engineer the software to check for security holes or to fix bugs and security glitches -- they already have the source code. (Nothing in any open source license would prevent a user from choosing to do it the hard way, however.) Kaner proposes that users should have the "right to see and approve all transfers of information from her computer." While "spyware" is a constant danger posed by proprietary software, with access to source code, users can make sure that a program isn't secretly sending data off of their computer to another machine.
However, there are a few rights that would benefit users of open source software. Firstly, the unfettered right to reverse-engineer proprietary software would be a major boon to the open source software community. As Kaner points out, courts have been willing to enforce clauses against reverse-engineering in software licenses. This poses a problem for open source developers looking to achieve interoperability with commercial software, operate embedded devices with open source software or simply a way to access data saved in a proprietary format.
Another right that Kaner proposes is "mass-market software should be transferrable." As mentioned previously, users already enjoy the right to transfer software that is licensed under a FOSS license. However, most users of open source software still end up dealing with proprietary software. How many open source users have purchased a laptop or desktop computer with software preinstalled that will never be use by the purchaser? The cost of a Windows XP license is built into the price of a brand-new machine. The user should have the right to transfer that software to another user who will make use of the software, if we so choose.
The first item on Kaner's list, however, is "let the customer see the contract before the sale." This is particularly timely in light of Dell's hidden license policy. Even some of the Linux vendors have started using the "clickthrough" mechanism, with some of the Linux installers requiring the user to agree to the terms of the open source licenses, without allowing the user to read them first. This is probably done because of the number of licenses involved -- most distributions include software under the GNU General Public License (GPL), Lesser GPL, Artistic License, Apache License, Mozilla License, BSD License and so on.
One potentially dangerous clause in Kaner's bill of rights is number ten, "When software is embedded in a product, the law governing the product should govern the software." Generally, this would be a good thing. A hardware manufacturer should not be able to use licensing terms to forbid the transfer of a router or network appliance by forbidding the transfer of embedded software. Car manufacturers shouldn't be able to exclude embedded software from warranties.
However, one wonders if this might make open source developers liable in some way if their software is "embedded" in a product. Most, if not all, FOSS licenses disclaim any warranty because the software is being given away. What happens, however, if a court decides that embedded software qualifies as "goods" and that developers can be held liable for defects -- even if they have not charged for the software in the first place? This may seem like a stretch, but we do live in a very litigious society.
Kaner's proposed rights would be a dramatic improvement for users of proprietary software, but they leave out many rights that FOSS users take for granted. For example, users of FOSS software expect to have access to source code. They also expect to be able to modify the software, to add or remove features that they deem necessary or desirable, and to be able to distribute the changes.
Despite the fact that the Software Customer Bill of Rights doesn't quite match the average FOSS license in terms of customer rights, it would be good to see it become reality. It's time to start reversing the current legislative trends that have given far too much power, and too little accountability, to vendors of proprietary software.
Security
Brief items
Advisories and relative security
A recent CNN article asks why the Linux community hasn't used the Blaster and SoBig worms for marketing purposes. The author concludes:
This seems like a good time to go and look at what these advisories really covered. CERT's 2002 advisories were:
Interestingly, we count 37 advisories for last year, not 29. There is no contesting the fact that the Linux-related column is significantly longer than the others. One could quibble a bit: the mod_ssl worm advisory covers the same vulnerability as the OpenSSL advisory, and the three trojan advisories are individual site compromises rather than widespread vulnerabilities. But that sort of quibbling wouldn't really change the situation.
On the other hand, it is a legimate question to ask why the mod_ssl worm (which affected very few systems) merits a CERT advisory, when worms like Klez, Bugbear, Badtrans, Nimda, and Sircam do not. The costs imposed by any one of those worms is likely to exceed that of all the Linux vulnerabilities put together.
The real point is that anybody who tries to make a security point by counting advisories is building a weak argument. A more honest look at the situation would ask how many vulnerabilities have been actively exploited, and how quickly they have been fixed.
That said, we couldn't resist putting together a 2003 table while we were at it:
This table suggests that the record for Linux-related software is nothing to be all that proud of, but certain other operating systems are currently in the lead in the "advisory count" race. On the other hand, in the fast-changing free software world, it is somehow comforting to see that sendmail continues to give advisory writers something to do - as long as you're running a different MTA...
New vulnerabilities
gkrellm: buffer overflow
| Package(s): | gkrellm | CVE #(s): | |||||
| Created: | August 29, 2003 | Updated: | September 3, 2003 | ||||
| Description: | A buffer overflow was discovered in gkrellmd, the server component of the gkrellm monitor package, in versions of gkrellm 2.1.x prior to 2.1.14. This buffer overflow occurs while reading data from connected gkrellm clients and can lead to possible arbitrary code execution as the user running the gkrellmd server. | ||||||
| Alerts: |
| ||||||
horde: session hijacking
| Package(s): | horde | CVE #(s): | |||||||||
| Created: | September 1, 2003 | Updated: | September 3, 2003 | ||||||||
| Description: | According to this advisory an attacker could send an email to a victim who used HORDE MTA, to get the victim to visit a website, which then logs all available information about the victim's system. | ||||||||||
| Alerts: |
| ||||||||||
mindi: insecure file creations
| Package(s): | mindi | CVE #(s): | CAN-2003-0617 | ||||||||
| Created: | September 2, 2003 | Updated: | October 1, 2003 | ||||||||
| Description: | Mindi versions prior to 0.86 creates files in /tmp which could allow local user to overwrite arbitrary files. | ||||||||||
| Alerts: |
| ||||||||||
node: buffer overflow, format string
| Package(s): | node | CVE #(s): | |||||
| Created: | September 1, 2003 | Updated: | September 3, 2003 | ||||
| Description: | Morgan alias SM6TKY discovered and fixed several security related problems in LinuxNode, an Amateur Packet Radio Node program. The buffer overflow he discovered can be used to gain unauthorised root access and can be remotely triggered. | ||||||
| Alerts: |
| ||||||
pam_ldap: non-functioning host restrictions
| Package(s): | pam_ldap | CVE #(s): | |||||
| Created: | September 3, 2003 | Updated: | September 3, 2003 | ||||
| Description: | pam_ldap 161 contains a bug in the pam_filter module which prevents host-based restrictions from working as advertised; version 1.62 fixes the problem. | ||||||
| Alerts: |
| ||||||
phpwebsite: SQL Injection, DoS and XSS Vulnerabilities
| Package(s): | phpwebsite | CVE #(s): | |||||
| Created: | September 2, 2003 | Updated: | September 3, 2003 | ||||
| Description: | phpwebsite contains an sql injection vulnerability in the calendar module which allows the attacker to execute sql queries. In addition phpwebsite is also vulnerable to XSS. More information can be found in the full advisory. | ||||||
| Alerts: |
| ||||||
Resources
Open Source Security Testing Methodology Manual version 2.1 released
The Open Source Security Testing Methodology Manual (OSSTMM) is an open standard method for performing security tests, focusing on the items that need to be tested, what to do during a security test, and when different types of security tests should be performed.
Page editor: Jonathan Corbet
Kernel development
Brief items
Kernel release status
The current development kernel is 2.6.0-test4; Linus has not released any kernels since August 22.That situation may have changed by the time you read this, however; Linus is back from his vacation and has merged a great many changes into his BitKeeper tree. Patches there include a reworked de4x5 driver, "very basic" VIA 8237 serial ATA controller support, a set of MODULE_ALIAS() calls (see below), support for a software-implemented hard disk activity LED, Intel High Precision Event Timers support, Al Viro's first set of large dev_t support patches (covered here last week), some IDE work, a large USB update, lots of network driver fixes, a new set of iptables modules, and many other fixes.
The current stable kernel is 2.4.22. Marcelo released the second 2.4.23 prepatch on August 30; it contains a set of IDE patches, some USB and networking fixes, and a number of other updates. 2.4.23-pre3 followed on September 3, with a fair amount of networking work, a backport of the 2.6 request_firmware() interface, a DRI/DRM update, gcc-3.3 support, and various other fixes.
Marcelo also notes that he has left Conectiva; his kernel work is now being supported by Cyclades.
Kernel development news
Class-based Kernel Resource Management
The Class-based Kernel Resource Management (CKRM) project is an effort at IBM to provide the hooks for better control over resource consumption by processes. The CKRM project sees the existing resource management tools (nice, ulimit) as not being up to the task. So the CKRM hackers have set out to provide a whole new infrastructure for process control. The ideas were presented at the Ottawa Linux Symposium last July; now, the first set of patches has been posted. The overview posting describes the other patches in the set and gives some pointers to further information.The core concept behind CKRM is the division of processes into distinct classes, each of which has a separate set of policies applied to it. A kernel API has been provided which enables the loading of classifier modules, enabling different sites to have entirely different ways of classifying processes. Most would likely stick with the rule-based classifier, which is provided with the CKRM patch set; it allows classification based on various task structure fields. So, for example, processes can be classified based on their UID, which program they are running, etc.
Tasks can be reclassified any number of times over their lifetime. The CKRM core patch places hooks in the logical spots where a process could change classification: when a user or group ID is changed, when a program calls exec(), when a new process is forked, etc. There is also a plan for a system call allowing a process to request reclassification at any time, but that call does not appear to be present in the current patches.
Once a task is classified, the system can apply policies to that task. So, for example, the CPU control patch enforces CPU usage policies on processes. Essentially, each class (as a whole) can be restricted to (and guaranteed) access to a administrator-specified percentage of the available processor time. To implement this policy, the patch modifies the scheduler by creating a new run queue for each class. Before the scheduler picks a new process to run, it first decides which class has the highest-priority claim on the CPU. The process to run can then be chosen from that class's queue in the usual way.
The memory control patch, instead, implements policies stating how much physical memory each class can use. The patch hooks into the page reclamation code, making that code rather more selective in how it choses pages to kick out of main memory. Whenever possible, the page reclaimer only choses pages from classes which are going over their maximum allowed share of physical memory. As memory gets tighter, each class will be trimmed down to its minimum share, as set up by the administrator. If there is no real pressure on memory, however, processes are allowed to grow beyond the bounds set for their class.
The memory control problem is complicated by shared pages: what happens when pages are shared between processes in different classes? The documentation on the CKRM web site describes an elaborate mechanism where classes are set up in a hierarchy and shared pages are divided across the appropriate parts of that hierarchy. What the current code appears to do, however, is to simply assign shared pages to the class with the largest share of physical memory.
The CKRM team also describes mechanisms which allow control over the disk I/O bandwidth used by each class and the number of incoming network connections each class can be handling at a given time. The I/O limitations are implemented by adding per-class queues to the disk I/O scheduler and merging requests into a single dispatch queue with the bandwidth policies taken into account. The networking policies involve the creation of yet another set of class-specific queues; in this case, incoming connections are divided into classes through the use of iptables rules. Patches for I/O bandwidth and incoming network connection control have not been released at this time, however.
CKRM is clearly a work in progress; much of the structure is in place, but not everything has been implemented and the code is full of "this needs to be cleaned up" comments. The CKRM hackers hope to get their work into 2.7, however, so they have some time yet to work things into shape.
Power management arrives
One of the surprises in 2.6.0-test4 was the merge of a pile of power management patches from Patrick Mochel. The patches themselves were not a surprise; their arrival has been expected for some time. In fact, at the Ottawa Linux Symposium, Patrick had promised to try to get them in by August 20. The surprising part is that they went straight to Linus, with no prior appearance on linux-kernel.The -test4 patches made a number of changes. Perhaps the most significant were the move of the device suspend() and resume() methods out of the device structure and into the bus_type structure. Bus-level code now is explicitly responsible for handling power management operations on devices attached to the bus.
Also changed in -test4 was the software suspend code; this code has been massively reworked and cleaned up. A number of panic() calls have been removed, requirements have been made explicit, the underlying mechanisms are more flexible, and the code is somewhat easier to read. The only problem is that, in -test4, software suspend also no longer works. The various problems which were introduced are being fixed, but one kernel developer in particular - the 2.6 software suspend maintainer - has been very loud in his criticisms and complaints. As a result, Patrick has stated that he will no longer go anywhere near the software suspend code. He evidently has his own implementation which he has chosen not to merge so far; it may put in an appearance in the near future.
Patrick also took some grief for the removal of /proc/acpi/sleep, which no longer fits well into the power management structure. It is, however, an interface which has been present for a while, and can thus break user-space programs.
Given all that, it is perhaps not surprising that Patrick announced his next set of changes on linux-kernel before sending them off to Linus. With these changes, the various suspend states all work with ACPI - at least, on a system without much going on. There is still a lot of work to do, especially with regard to adding driver support. But things appear to be heading in the right direction.
The new set of patches restores /proc/acpi/sleep, and the older software_suspend() function (as a wrapper for the current pm_suspend() function) as well. A number of software suspend improvements have been added. And various other aspects of the code have been cleaned up. With one exception, the developers are not complaining about the new power management code. With luck, one of the remaining 2.6 rough edges will soon be smoothed out.
MODULE_ALIAS
The Linux kernel has long had the capability to load modules on demand when external events make their presence necessary. In many cases, the kernel knows exactly which module is required, and can simply ask for it by name. So, for example, the IDE subsystem can call:
request_module("ide-cd");
should it encounter a CD needing a driver. In many cases, however, the kernel does not know exactly which module should be loaded; in these cases it punts the question into user space. So, for example, if a user program tries to open a block device node with major number 100, and no driver has registered that number, the kernel will try to load a module called block-major-100. The job of finding a module then falls on modprobe, which will expect to find an alias line in /etc/modules.conf telling it what module should really be loaded.
The only problem with this scheme is that device drivers usually already know which device numbers they are prepared to support. Adding configuration information to /etc/modules.conf is, at best, redundant. It can also be misleading; the poor administrator who tries to connect a driver to a different device number via modules.conf is unlikely to experience much joy.
When the new module loader was added - almost one year ago, now - it included a new MODULE_ALIAS macro. The purpose of this macro is to allow driver authors to specify directly which aliases the module should be responsible for. It is an idea that makes sense, but uptake has been slow; a quick grep of the 2.6.0-test4 source shows that there is not a single use of MODULE_ALIAS in the kernel tree.
That situation appears to be about to change, now that Rusty Russell has released a set of patches which insert actual MODULE_ALIAS calls into the kernel source. The actual variants used depend on the subsystem; block drivers use MODULE_ALIAS_BLOCKDEV, for example, while char devices use MODULE_ALIAS_CHARDEV or MODULE_ALIAS_MISCDEV and network protocols use MODULE_ALIAS_NETPROTO.
There are still situations which require alias commands in the modules.conf file: there is no way for a driver author to know which module should be loaded to implement eth0, for example. But many of the boilerplate aliases can be, eventually, removed. Internal alias support has been present in module-init-tools for some time, so all that's needed before the alias commands can be cleaned up is to get rid of all those legacy 2.4 (and prior) kernels.
Patches and updates
Kernel trees
Architecture-specific
Build system
Core kernel code
Development tools
Device drivers
Filesystems and block I/O
Janitorial
Memory management
Networking
Benchmarks and bugs
Miscellaneous
Page editor: Jonathan Corbet
Distributions
News and Editorials
Interview with Knut Yrvin, Project Leader of Skolelinux
[This article was contributed by Ladislav Bodnar]
September traditionally means back to school in many parts of the Northern Hemisphere and this year is no different. What will be different, however, is the operating system that many Norwegian pupils will find on their school's computers once they return to the classrooms. That's because despite the excruciating heat wave that hit much of Europe this summer, the Skolelinux developers did not take a break. Skolelinux? Yes, Skolelinux, a project to create a Linux distribution with the goal of replacing the proprietary operating systems in schools throughout Norway. The project's two primary objectives are the ability to run on low-end computer systems as well as a complete support for all Norwegian languages, including the minority ones.Knut Yrvin, the Project Leader at Skolelinux kindly agreed to answer a few questions for LWN.
Knut, thank you very much for your time. Firstly, can you tell us about the beginnings of Skolelinux? What motivated the initiation of the project?
As the name suggests, Skolelinux is specifically designed for deployment in schools. How do you go about convincing schools to switch to Skolelinux?
We have also written a considerable amount of tailor-made documentation for teachers. We provide a day-to-day Operation Handbook, a Getting Started guide, a Get-to-know Skolelinux course, and other documents. Everything is written in Norwegian in a simple, non-technical language.
IBM Norway is helping as well. They started promoting Skolelinux in December 2002 and soon afterwards many more hardware vendors jumped on the bandwagon. Suddenly there seems to a be a lot of momentum behind the Skolelinux project!
How many schools are using Skolelinux at present?
What kind of response have you been getting from schools? Would you say that there is a lot of enthusiasm for Linux? Have you met with any resistance?
In Spain, there are several provinces the governments of which have mandated exclusive use of Linux in all levels of schools. Is there a similar situation in Norway? Do you get any support from the Norwegian government?
The development, translation, deployment, maintenance and support of Skolelinux costs money. How do you go about raising funds for your work?
Every successful deployment of Skolelinux in a Norwegian school means a lost sale for Microsoft. Has there been any reaction from Microsoft Norway?
You have chosen Debian GNU/Linux as a base for your distribution. Any particular reasons?
From the technical point of view, what exactly is the main focus of your development work?
Knut, thank you very much for your time and good luck with your project!
Distribution News
Debian GNU/Linux
The Debian Weekly News for September 2, 2003 is out. This week's edition looks at software patents in Europe; a talk on Debian GNU/Linux as a Japanese language teaching platform; Opteron support; for Debian Developers; and much more.Branden Robinson reports on the results of a survey which followed a lengthy debate on the debian-legal mailing list concerning whether the GNU Free Documentation License satifies the Debian Free Software Guidelines. Meanwhile, the debate continues.
Last October, Bdale Garbee arranged a group subscription to LWN.net for Debian developers, sponsored by HP. In response to questions, Bdale has recently noted that the Debian group subscription is still available. For those of you who have opted to keep your own subscription to help out LWN, you have our thanks. However, if you are a Debian developer and not currently subscribed to LWN you might want to take advantage of Debian's group subscription.
Gentoo Weekly Newsletter
The September 1 Gentoo Weekly Newsletter is out; it looks at the availability of portage tarballs for OpenBSD and FreeBSD and the second Gentoo BugDay. The project is also looking for a new lead French translator.LinuxQuestions.org adds a Red Hat Forum
LinuxQuestions.org has announced the addition of a Red Hat forum that is officially recognized by Red Hat.Slackware Linux
At Slackware Linux the slackware-current changelog shows lots of activity. Lots of packages have been upgraded, including the Linux kernel (to 2.4.22). Bugs have been created and squashed in the process.Interview: Morphix founder Alex de Landgraaf (NewsForge)
NewsForge interviews Alex de Landgraaf, founder of Morphix. "When did you start Morphix and why? I actually started playing around with Knoppix, was pretty active on knoppix.net, in December 2002. I had a remastered version called KnopNL, because I was planning to make a light-weight Dutch distribution. There was (and still is) a lively community working on making specific distributions using Knoppix, but I saw time and time again that people had to "put Knoppix on a diet" and merge new changes from Knoppix before they could do anything useful."
FreeBSD portupgrade (O'ReillyNet)
O'ReillyNet looks at FreeBSD's portupgrade utility. "The ports collection is constantly being updated. New ports are added regularly, usually on a daily basis. If you're the curious type and like to see a layout of which ports were added when, you'll find FreshPorts an invaluable resource."
Beehive Linux
Beehive Linux is dead. From the obituary:
Minor distribution updates
Astaro Security Linux
Astaro Security Linux has released v4.011 with minor security fixes and v4.012 with minor bugfixes. "Changes: This Up2Date added LOGACCEPT to packet filtering and year support for log files. It also fixed the WebAdmin port after importing a backup, the Autofilter bug with PSK authentication, an iptables rules/DNSproxy settings conflict when the proxy was disabled, and a PPTP daemon connection limitation. The POP3 proxy was fixed for clients that didn't terminate connections properly." Version 4.012 fixes a small issue with SMTP domain routing which occurs in very rare cases.
BG-Rescue Linux
BG-Rescue Linux has released v0.2.0 with major feature enhancements. "Changes: This release updates uClibc to 0.9.20, e2fsprogs to 1.3.4, reiserfsprogs to 3.6.11, LILO to 22.5.7.2, and mdadm to 1.3.0. It adds cmdftp 0.62 and a new Linux kernel 2.4.22 (bzip2) with additional support for USB 2.0 EHCI, PCMCIA serial devices, and the following ethernet adaptors: 3c590/3c900, eepro100, VIA Rhine, TI ThunderLAN, USB-Realtek RTL8150, and USB-ASIX AX88172."
bootE Linux
bootE Linux has released v0.20-r2 with minor feature enhancements. "Changes: In addition to a few minor adjustments, support for MS-DOS and VFAT file systems were compiled back into the kernel. Furthermore support for ReiserFS was added."
Damn Small Linux
Damn Small Linux has released v0.4.5 with minor feature enhancements. "Changes: This version adds generic printer support. Fluxbox and most X applications are now running under user instead of root. sudo and Microcom were added. Oneko was added for the kids. The swap partition should now be properly recognized which makes DSL more compatible with low RAM systems. A tabs- and frames-enabled, patched version of Dillo was added. The icons were remapped so that they fit in the smallest resolution setting. The enhance feature is now smarter, so that it will not launch duplicate applications, but will bring bbpager into theme compliance."
floppyfw
floppyfw has released stable v2.0.7 with minor bugfixes and the 2.4.22 kernel was included.Local Area Security Linux
L.A.S. Linux has released 0.4b MAIN of its 'live CD' distribution. "Changes in this latest version of L.A.S. include the addition of Ettercap-GTK, Clam Anti-Virus, MiniCOM, SpikeProxy, MRTG, and many of the Cisco-centric Open Source Exchange tools."
MoviX
MoviX has released v0.8.0 with minor feature enhancements. "Changes: Support for remotes has been improved, the size of initrd has been reduced, and Italian translations have been added."
Onebase Linux
Onebase Linux has released version 1.0 for x86 systems. Also Onebase is now set to form a Developer base for this project and everyone is invited to join.Recovery Is Possible! (RIP)
Recovery Is Possible! (RIP) has released v6.0 with major feature enhancements. "Changes: The kernel has been updated to 2.4.22. There are a lot of changes, and new floppy versions (1.44 MB and 1.68 MB)."
Rock Linux
Rock Linux has released v2.0.0-rc1 with minor bugfixes. "Changes: In this release, more help text was added, a major cleanup of Emerge-Pkg was made, some new packages were added forming a total package count of nearly 900 packages, there were boot CD improvements, some init scripts were corrected for LSB conformance, and a better optimization selection for PowerPC resulting in better optimization settings, as well as many more cleanups and bugfixes."
dRock v2.0.0-rc1 is
also out. "Changes: This release is based on ROCK Linux
2.0.0-rc1. It includes minor bugfixes and feature additions, including
better optimization settings for PowerPC.
"
Distribution reviews
A Galaxy of Possibility Part 1: Mandrake 9.1 ProSuite (OfB.biz)
Open for Business reviews Mandrake Linux 9.1 ProSuite. "For our evaluation of Mandrake Linux 9.1, we received a copy of Mandrake Linux ProSuite 9.1. ProSuite is Mandrake's high-end package that offers a number of useful features for enterprise deployment on both desktops and servers. Of particular interest is the DVD-ROM that is included, something that makes deploying Mandrake much more of a joy. Like SuSE's Professional Edition DVD (actually the latest SuSE includes two DVD's, but we only needed the one), Mandrake ProSuite's DVD allows you to use just one disc to install pretty much everything you could ever want on a GNU/Linux system."
Page editor: Rebecca Sobol
Development
Coming soon: GNOME 2.4
The second beta release of the GNOME 2.4 desktop is now available; see the announcement on FootNotes for download information. Given that the real 2.4 release is intended to happen in early September, it seems like a good idea to have a look at what this release will bring. It would appear, however, that the GNOME folks have been too busy hacking to put together a comprehensive document on what's been done in the 2.3 development series. So the best place to look is this writeup by Sayamindu Dasgupta, who played around with the 2.3.5 release for a bit.One enhancement in 2.4 will be a new set of system administration tools. There have been a number of attempts at graphical adminstration tools for Linux over the years; with mixed success. Combining the numerous utilities, configuration files, and setup schemes into a unified interface is a hard problem. It is good to see that work is continuing in this area, however. Eventually somebody will get it right.
A good step in that direction is the new "change screen resolution" dialog. Linux doesn't require constant tweaking of the display settings the way certain other desktop operating systems seem to, but it's still a good idea to make it easy when the need arises.
On the browser front, Galeon is gone. Epiphany is now the browser bundled with GNOME. Some quick tests here in LWN labs (where Galeon has long ruled supreme) show that Epiphany pretty much works as expected; it is a reasonable, functioning browser. But we'll probably keep Galeon around for a while yet.
Accessibility is an important theme with 2.4; the "gnopernicus" screen reader has been improved and fixed up. There's a new set of "assistive technology" preferences which control which accessibility tools are started up at the beginning of a session. And, to help keep people from needing assistance in the future, GNOME now includes the obnoxious "time to take a typing break" nagging utility.
There's many other additions, of course; gedit has syntax highlighting, nautilus is improved, etc. See the writeup for more information. Or, better, download the beta and help shake out the last bugs so that 2.4 can be a truly stable release.
System Applications
Audio Projects
JACK 0.80.0 released
Version 0.80.0 of the JACK Audio Connection Kit is available. Changes include improved portability, a new transport API, support for asymmetric sound cards, and more.
Database Software
PostgreSQL Weekly News
The August 28, 2003 edition of the PostgreSQL Weekly News has been published. Take a look for the latest PostgreSQL database news.
Education
Moodle 1.1 is now available! (SourceForge)
Version 1.1 of Moodle has been released. "Moodle 1.1, the best system for managing and conducting online courses, is now available. Highlights include: A completely new packaging system for backup, transfer and restore of courses."
Printing
Ghostscript releases
AFPL Ghostscript (i.e. the one with a "not quite entirely free" license) 8.11 has been released; this is the first stable release since 8.00. Improved font rendering is the most significant new feature this time around.The second release candidate of ESP Ghostscript 7.07.1 is available. ESP Ghostscript is the "Easy Software Products" version, which has been patched to work well with the CUPS print system.
Desktop Applications
Audio Applications
KGuitar Release 0.4.9 (SourceForge)
Version 0.4.9 of KGuitar is available. "KGuitar aims to develop a free, full-featured guitarist helper program, focusing on tabulature editing and MIDI synthesizers support." This version adds support for KDE 3.0.
Ecasound 2.3.0
Ecasound 2.3.0 has been released. It includes a number of important bug fixes, JACK 0.80 support, and numerous other enhancements; see the announcement for details.
Desktop Environments
KDE Traffic #62
Issue #62 of KDE Traffic is online. The KDE.News summary says: "A whole lot of news in this one, including some discussion on the new KPrefs, GConf2, quick tab access in Konqueror, a lot of KOffice news (beta 3 feature freeze, better support for Word 6 and Word 95), and mention of the new pim.kde.org design. Thanks Russell!"
August 29 KDE-CVS-Digest
The August 29 KDE-CVS-Digest is available. "Some new applications: Knot, a service location server, Kickme, a lightweight dcop messenger and event viewer, kio-ldap kioslave, KWifiManager, for monitoring wireless cards, the new Plastik widget style, an snmp plugin for Ksim. ARts adds Media Application Server output support."
GNOME Network 1.99.1 released (GnomeDesktop)
As seen on FootNotes: version 1.99.1 of the GNOME Network package - a set of network-oriented tools - has been released. This is a development release, and thus may not be for everybody.
Graphics
GIMP 1.3.19 Released (GnomeDesktop)
Version 1.3.19 of the Gimp has been announced. "GIMP is now very close to a 2.0 prerelease, so your testing efforts are particularly appreciated." The announcement lists the changes in detail.
Interoperability
Samba-3.0.0 RC2 available for download
The second release candidate of Samba 3.0.0 is available. See the release notes for change information.
Mail Clients
Balsa 2.0.14 released (GnomeDesktop)
Version 2.0.14 of Balsa, and email client for GNOME, is available. New features include message wrapping improvements, delsp draft support, experimental LDAP write support, and bug fixes.Mahogany 0.65 released (SourceForge)
Version 0.65 of Mahogany, an email client, has been released. "All existing users should upgrade to this version, it adds many new features (real Drafts folder with automatic messages saving in case of crash; TLS and PGP/GPG support; many, many UI enhancements) and fixes tons of bugs."
Multimedia
GStreamer ''Mother Theresa'' 0.6.3 (GnomeDesktop)
Version 0.6.3 of GStreamer, an open-source extendable multimedia framework, has been announced. "This, along with the merge of netRhythmbox into Rhythmbox is excellent news for the open-source community. With the development of Totem, sound-juicer, and gnome multimedia support GStreamer is getting to be nearing a point where it can be used for everyday media playing. The Pipeline Editor is also becoming quite stable."
Office Applications
AbiWord Weekly News #159
The August 31 edition of the AbiWord Weekly News is out; it includes a call for assistance with the Windows port along with the usual summary of AbiWord development themes and activities.
Web Browsers
Linky 2.0.0 Released (MozillaZine)
Version 2.0.0 of Linky has been announced. "Linky is an add-on for the Mozilla Application Suite and Mozilla Firebird that adds extra link-related items to the standard page context menu. It allows users to perform tasks such as opening all links on a page in new tabs or copying selected links to the clipboard."
Mozilla 1.5 beta released
Mozilla 1.5 beta is out. A number of fixes and enhancements have gone in since the 1.5 alpha release; see the release notes for details.
Miscellaneous
A new gDesklets site
gDesklets is a GNOME architecture for desktop applets. A new site has popped up at gdesklets.gnomedesktop.org to support desklet development. Have a look for the latest release from the desklet hackers.
Languages and Tools
C++
QuantLib 0.3.3 released (SourceForge)
QuantLib 0.3.3 (a financial modeling library) has been released. "Major additions of this release are an extensive test suite, a partial port to the new Pricing Engine framework, and the support of low-discrepancy Monte Carlo simulation."
Java
JGraph 3.0 released
Version 3.0 of the JGraph "powerful, lightweight, feature-rich, and thoroughly documented open-source graph component" for Java has been released. It is accompanied by the JGraphPad diagram editor.
Lisp
SBCL 0.8.3 released
Steel Bank Common Lisp version 0.8.3 is out. "This version, which now also builds on MacOS X, features new optimizations, improved compiler validation, support for automatic dowload and installation of code from CCLAN, the SB-THREAD:INTERRUPT-THREAD function and the usual bug fixes."
CL-GD 0.14 released
Version 0.14 of CL-GD - a Common Lisp library for dynamic image creation - has been released. This is the first public release of CL-GD, which is built on top of the classic "GD" graphics library.Macho 0.2 released
Macho is a web archiving system for electronic mail, written in Lisp. Version 0.2 has just been released, with new support for better quoting highlighting, an improved message parser, and improved performance.
Perl
This Week on perl5-porters
This week on perl5-porters for August 31 is out, with looks at the Cwd module, base.pm, next and dynamic labels, Spambench, and more.Code Review Ladder Mailing List (use Perl)
use Perl has an announcement from Simon Cozens on the creation of the Perl code ladder review mailing list. The idea is to create a forum where Perl code can be reviewed by interested hackers before being submitted to CPAN or whatever else may be its eventual destination. With luck, the list will lead to a higher-quality CPAN in the future.Esperanto Translation Mailing List Created (use Perl)
usePerl notes the creation of a mailing list to support the Esperanto translation, which, it seems, beat out Swedish_Chef to be the official YAPC::Europe language.
PHP
PHP Weekly Summary for September 1, 2003
The PHP Weekly Summary for September 1, 2003 is out. Topics include: 4.3.3 ships, Servlet SAPI, phpize broken, libxml2, and Zend Engine optimizations.PHP Security, Part 2 (O'ReillyNet)
John Coggeshall continues his O'Reilly series on PHP security with part two. "Welcome back to PHP Foundations. In my previous article, I continued my mini-series on best practices in PHP by introducing you to some of the ways that security can be compromised in your PHP scripts. This article continues that discussion with more examples of potential security holes and the tools and methods you can use to help plug them. Today I'll start by talking about one of the more critical potential security holes in PHP development writing scripts that make calls to the underlying operating system."
Python
This week's Python-URL
Dr. Dobb's Python-URL for September 1 is out with the latest from the Python development community.Cleese - an operating system in Python
"And now for something completely different..." Cleese is a project to write a new operating system entirely in Python - or, at least, as much as possible. The project is young, but it has recently released "HalfPy," a stripped-down version of the Python interpreter, and a bootloader setup that works within Bochs.
Tcl/Tk
This week's Tcl-URL
Dr. Dobb's Tcl-URL for September 1 is available, with the usual summary of happenings in the Tcl/Tk development community.
Debuggers
Learning the JavaScript debugger Venkman (st.com)
Svend Tofte has put together a tutorial on Venkman, a JavaScript Debugger that is integrated into the Mozilla browser. "Realizing that most people who program JavaScript are not programmers, and thus might not be familiar with debuggers in general, I wanted to make a visual guide, that together with a bunch of screenshots and files, would explain how to use Venkman. For while a debugger is usually an arcana piece of software, most webdevelopers couldn't care less about, using Venkman can improve your productivity, by finding the bugs faster."
Page editor: Jonathan Corbet
Linux in the news
Recommended Reading
Linux gains ground on aging Unix (Globe and Mail)
The Globe and Mail reports that Linux is gaining ground on proprietary UNIX. "A major factor in Linux adoption is support from application software vendors. For instance, Ms. Day says Red Hat Linux is widely used to run Oracle Corp.'s popular database software. One reason, Mr. Dean says, is that Oracle has promoted the fact that its software supports Linux. More and more application vendors are doing so." (Thanks to Jim Gallacher)
Ian Clarke on Freenet and his Decision to Leave the USA (GrepLaw)
GrepLaw interviews Ian Clarke. "Freenet is in active use in countries such as China to permit the free distribution of information there despite government censorship. A group, Freenet-China has taken Freenet and translated it to Chinese for this very purpose. Freenet is also actively used in other countries, including the United States, to distribute censored information such as the Church of Scientology 'Operating Thetan' documents." (Thanks to Joe "Zonker" Brockmeier).
Interview: Andrew Tridgell, the heart beat of Samba (LinuxWorld.com.au)
LinuxWorld.com.au interviews Samba creator Andrew Tridgell. "Andrew Tridgell: Over the last seven months I have been building the basic infrastructure for Samba version 4. As you know, Samba version 3 is only now nearing its final release, but while that is an important release its scope is much narrower than what we are aiming for in Samba4." (Thanks to Sydney King)
The SCO Problem
Of monkeys and penguins (Economist)
The Economist catches up with the SCO case. "Indeed 'the SCO case' of 2003 sounds increasingly like the famous Scopes Monkey Trial of 1925, which pitted religious fundamentalists against progressives wanting to teach Darwin alongside the Bible in American classrooms. The SCO case plays the same role in a culture war now consuming the software industry. On one side are the equivalents of the fundamentalists -- buttoned-down types clinging to proprietary and closed computer systems. Facing them are today's evolutionists -- the pony-tailed set championing collaboration and openness in the form of Linux, an operating system that anybody can download and customise for nothing."
SCO fined in Germany (Heise)
There is a brief article (in German) on Heise Online stating that SCO has been found to be in violation of a court order prohibiting the company from stating (without proof) that Linux contains stolen SCO property. SCO has been fined EUR 10,000. English text is available via Babelfish. (Thanks to Florian Kuhnke).Dell: No shelter against SCO suits (News.com)
News.com reports on a speech by Michael Dell in which he states that Dell will not be offering indemnification for its Linux customers. He also talks about other directions being taken by the company: "'Eight-way (servers) are less than 1 percent of the market and shrinking pretty dramatically,' Dell said. 'If our competitors want to claim they're No. 1 in eight-ways, that's fine. We want to lead the market with two-way and four-way (processor machines).'" This comment has already rekindled the "how far should we scale" debate on linux-kernel.
Companies
Brunswick Integrates Code Expertise (TechWeb)
TechWeb covers an open source project from an unlikely source. "Brunswick Corp., maker of billiard tables, boats, and bowling balls, has produced an open-source code engine to exchange business data over the Internet, and the Securities and Exchange Commission is an early adopter. The SEC will use the engine to feed a system that analyzes stock trades as part of its regulation of insider trading."
IBM to release new Eclipse to run on Jikes VM (NewsForge)
NewsForge covers an IBM announcment that the latest version of the open source Eclipse development platform will now run on the Java-based, open-source Jikes Research Virtual Machine.Motorola picks Linux for phone of the future (Register)
The Register looks inside Motorola phone software. "The fact that Motorola is selling its stake in Symbian (the corporation) doesn't mean that Motorola is stopping selling Symbian (the software) in its phones. But it does mean that Motorola thinks the future in phone software is elsewhere. Linux, to be precise."
HP waves Red Flag for corporate Linux (ZDNet)
ZDNet has a brief report on a new partnership between HP and Chinese distributor Red Flag. "HP will support the Red Flag Server 4 series operating system and its subsequent products on the HP Integrity and ProLiant server lines. Red Flag will work with HP on product quality control, market sales, applications research, management training and applications support services."
Eclipse revamp to forge path for Sun (News.com)
News.com reports that the Eclipse project is separating from IBM. "Given the organizational changes under way at Eclipse, Sun is considering joining the open-source project, according to a company representative. Sun wants a number of issues to be addressed before it joins, however. The company may push for a change in the organization's name, along with a resolution of technical problems over how Java applications present information, the representative said."
Business
Linux Set to Break Through in Consumer Electronics (NYTimes)
The NYTimes has picked up a Reuters article about Linux in consummer electronics. "Linux's key advantage over other operating systems is that the core software is freely available and widely embraced. In the cut-throat electronics business where profit margins are one or two percent at the best of times, every saving is welcome." (Registration required)
Linux Adoption
Linux: Is free really cheaper? (InfoWorld)
InfoWorld is running a lengthy report on the costs and benefits of switching to Linux. "The more fully an enterprise adopts Linux across its infrastructure, the more financial leverage it is likely to get out of up-front investments in the OS. Those investments, which can be considerable, include Linux training and tools, and the costs of migrating from a Unix or Windows environment. And that financial leverage is improving steadily as better management tools, more third-party vendor support, and more skilled Linux system administrators arrive on the market." (Thanks to Max Hyre).
Open Asia: Open source in Burma, Cambodia, and China (NewsForge)
NewsForge looks into the availability of open source software in Burma (also known as Myanmar), Cambodia, and China. "The PeguNC-Linux distribution, aimed at Myanmar, is intended to encourage native data processing. According to a message in the Myanmar Linux Users Club Yahoo! group, Myanmar has just a font, but no language support with sorting and searching. Byteklay, a member of the project, says, "(We) started with a so-called PeguNC-linux project at mmlinux.org . When I couldn't continue mmlinux, friends from mm carried that project on myanmarlug.org, a site developed and maintained by Ko Wiston [Compunut].""
Legal
Controversy over software patents (Heise)
Heise Online is running an article (in German) on the delay of the vote on software patents in Europe. Among other things, it notes that pro-patent forces are still hard at work trying to get an interoperability exemption removed from the proposed law. English text of a sort is available via Babelfish. (Thanks to Dirk Hillbrecht). Dirk has also supplied this translation.
Interviews
Interview with Bjarne Stroustrup (Linux Journal)
Linux Journal interviews Bjarne Stroustrup, the creator of the C++ programming language. "LJ: Did you have a computer at home when you were growing up?"
BS: No, it was too early for that. Computers were very expensive and lived in university departments and large companies. The first computer I saw was my university's Math department's GIER. It was an old Danish computer that filled a room and was fed programs on paper tape. I learned to program in Algol 60 on that one.
New Gnumeric
GnomeDesktop points to two articles about Gnumeric, which plans to release version 1.2.0 soon.Here is a review of Gnumeric beta 1.1.19 is available from ILUG-Cal. (Found here)
LinMagAu has an interview with Jody Goldberg and Andreas L. Guelzow. (Found here)
Resources
Five Lessons Open Source Developers Should Learn from Extreme Programming (O'ReillyNet)
This O'ReillyNet article looks at how Extreme Programming lessons can benefit open source programmers. "Open source projects usually don't have the time or budget constraints to require hard and fast release dates, but getting frequent feedback from users and customers is vital to the survival of the project. Since "customers" are often potential developers, having a good feedback loop can increase the resources at your disposal. Keeping the source code public with regular snapshots or anonymous CVS or Subversion access helps, but if features take a long time to land or to stabilize, it can be difficult to know when the code is worth using."
Reviews
Mozilla's New Focus: The End User (eWeek)
eWeek reviews Mozilla 1.5 beta. "With the Mozilla 1.5 Beta, the project is promising improvements in performance, stability, standards support and Web compatibility. But new features are not the primary focus. The beta release marks the beginning of the project's journey to focus more energy on end users and promotion of its efforts now that it is an independent organization, Mozilla President Mitchell Baker said."
Page editor: Rebecca Sobol
Announcements
Non-Commercial announcements
Test Environment Toolkit, TET3.6 now available
The Open Group has announced that the latest update to the Test Environment Toolkit, TET3.6, is now available. TET is used to drive the LSB Certification tests for Linux distributions.LinuxFocus.org September/October 2003 issue
The September/October issue of LinuxFocus is available. This month you can learn how to model a 3D train in Blender, explore the MySQL C API, see why older people love Linux, enhance photos with Gimp, and much more.LPI-Newsletter August 2003
The Linux Professional Institute's newsletter for the month of August is available. Look for LPI at TechXNY New York, Linux Expo UK, and Wow-Gao Canada; LPI-Brazil becomes an official affiliate; Update on Linux World San Francisco; LPI in Vietnam and Australia; and much more.Linux Gazette issue #94, September 2003
The September 2003 edition of Linux Gazette is out. Articles include From C To Assembly Language by Hiran Ramankutty; Linux based Radio Timeshifting by Yan-Fa Li; Python Weather Station by Phil Hughes; SCO Interview by Anonymous; and more.ibiblio designates September as "Linux Month"
ibiblio.org has announced the designation of September as "Linux Month", in celebration of the twelfth anniversary of the birth of the Linux software created by developer Linus Torvalds.
Commercial announcements
Linux in the Library of Congress
IBM has sent out a press release announcing that the Library of Congress Moving Images Collection - a project of three university libraries - will be hosted on IBM servers and, of course, Linux.Wing IDE for Python 1.1.10 Released
Version 1.1.10 of Wing, a commercial IDE for Python has been announced. This is a maintenance release.Opera delivers triplets for *nix
Opera Software has released Opera 7.20 Beta versions for the Unix variances Linux, Solaris and FreeBSD. These three beta releases all add support for bidirectional languages such as Arabic and Hebrew.
New Books
The Linux Web Server CD Bookshelf
O'Reilly has released The Linux Web Server CD Bookshelf, Version 2.0, a bookshelf of LAMP technology on a single CD."Perl Cookbook, Second Edition" Released by O'Reilly
O'Reilly has released the second edition of the Perl Cookbook.
Contests and Awards
Perl Programming Contest (use Perl)
Use Perl reports on a perl programming contest for the WebGUI content management system. The contest lasts for 3 months and ends on December 1.
Upcoming Events
Linux.Conf.Au 2004 Registration Opens
Registration is now open for linux.conf.au. IBM has signed on as the event's Penguin Sponsor. The conference will be held at the University of Adelaide in South Australia, January 14 - 17, 2004. Click below for more information.Linux Users Group of Davis: 'Uber TiVo' - hacking & upgrades
The September 15 LUGOD meeting will feature a talk on TiVo hacking.Events: September 4 - October 30, 2003
| Date | Event | Location |
|---|---|---|
| September 8, 2003 | Boundaryless Information Flow: Open Source in the Enterprise | (Hilton London Paddington)London, UK |
| September 11 - 12, 2003 | Python for Scientific Computing Workshop(SciPy'03) | (CalTech)Pasadena, CA |
| September 15 - 18, 2003 October 7 - 8, 2003 | LogOn Web Days | Across Europe |
| September 15 - 18, 2003 | Embedded Systems Conference(ESC) | (Hynes Convention Center)Boston, Mass |
| September 26 - 27, 2003 | Third DZUG-Conference | Paderborn, Germany |
| October 12 - 15, 2003 | International Lisp Conference 2003(ILC 2003) | New York, NY |
| October 15 - 17, 2003 | The First Plone Conference | (Tulane University)New Orleans, Louisiana |
| October 26, 2003 October 27 - 31, 2003 | Large Installation Systems Administration Conference(LISA) | (Town & Country Resort Hotel)San Diego, CA |
Event Reports
GNOME-ms at fosscon 2003 (GnomeDesktop)
GnomeDesktop has a report from the GNOME-ms booth at the Free and Open Source Conference 2003 (Fosscon 2003) that was held last week in Subang Malaysia.
Web sites
Server Central Sponsors PHP.net Open Source Site
Server Central, a provider of managed hosting, announced it will sponsor PHP by hosting a server for PHP.net.New Mozilla Links Newsletter Launching Tuesday (MozillaZine)
The new Mozilla Links Newsletter has been launched. It is a bi-weekly publication, spawned from the nascent Mozilla marketing effort, featuring headlines, tips and information about third-party projects.MozillaZine is Five: 1998-2003
MozillaZine celebrates five years online, with a special fifth anniversary section.
Software announcements
This week's software announcements
Here are the software announcements, courtesy of Freshmeat.net. They are available in two formats:
- Sorted alphabetically,
- Sorted by license.
Miscellaneous
'Perl' Added to Oxford English Dictionary (use Perl)
Use Perl reports that Perl has been added to the Oxford Dictionary of English. "Perl. noun [mass noun]. Computing. a high-level programming language used especially for applications running on the World Wide Web.
Page editor: Rebecca Sobol
Letters to the editor
Of monkeys and penguins
| From: | Pete Flugstad <peteflugstad@mchsi.com> | |
| To: | letters@economist.com, letters@lwn.net | |
| Subject: | Of monkeys and penguins | |
| Date: | Fri, 29 Aug 2003 09:31:51 -0500 |
Dear Editors of Economist:
Your article (author UNKNOWN - how about some attribution for this
article):
http://economist.com/printedition/displayStory.cfm?Story_ID=2020889
about SCO and attempting to compare it to something as fundamental as
the Scopes monkey trial is about as off base as it could possibly be.
The SCO trial is about one thing and one thing only: money. SCO is
using the PR and buzz they themselves are stiring up by kicking the
hornets nest that is the Open Source movement. They're doing this
purely in order to pump up their stock price, which they are
proceeding to sell as fast as possible. Numerous news and web sites
have pointed this out and highlighted the sales SCO execs and share
holders have been making, but apparently the oldest motive on the
books is too opaque for some magazine called the "Economist".
Everything SCO is doing, from refusing to actually disclose what
code may or may not have infringed, to sending letters to 1500 large
corporate Linux users, to calling the open source movement
"communist", is designed to generate buzz (good or bad) and that
results in increasing stock price. The whole "open source is
communist" line is sold old and defunct now, I'm stunned your editors
let you print it. Don't you know the new bogeyman is called a
"terrorist" now? I'm surprised SCO didn't try and label the open
source movement with that one (they probably did and I just missed it
in the avalance of press releases they send out).
Please, make an attempt to actually do a little research on stories
before you snap off a silly puff piece like this about it. You've
just contributed to the SCO cause: your uncritical piece, attempting
to "glorify" the SCO case, is *exactly* what they want.
Pete Flugstad
Iowa City
[Editor's note: The Economist, as a matter of policy, does not put bylines on its articles]
Page editor: Jonathan Corbet