Announcements
Non-Commercial announcements
Crystal Space project accepting donations
The Crystal Space is producing a portable 3D Engine Framework. The project needs a financial boost to support development on the Linux platform. "This money will be used to get a new linux computer which is needed to better support Crystal Space on linux. At this moment Windows, Linux, and MacOS/X are supported by Crystal Space but most of the active developers are on Windows which means that that platform gets most attention. I have a linux computer but it is underpowered which makes it bad for testing the latest CS features on linux too."
Free Software Directory reaches 4,000 packages
The Free Software Foundation's software directory has reached 4,000 packages. "The Free Software Foundation (FSF) today announced that the FSF's Free Software Directory registered its 4,000th software package. The Directory, which accounts for more than 40% of the traffic on the FSF's Web site (receiving 2.25 million hits per month, an average of 321K per day), has grown and improved steadily in the past year: one year ago, the Directory had 3153 packages; it now has 4,029. The Web form, which lets developers enter packages themselves, has been refined and expanded."
GNOME Women (GnomeDesktop)
GnomeDesktop has an announcement about the launch of the GNOME Women project. "Hanna Wallach recently announced the formation of the GNOME Women project: "Concerned about the lack of female GNOME developers and inspired by the success of the Debian Women Project, Máirín Duffy and I have founded GNOME Women, a project to encourage more women to participate in GNOME development. At present, were starting smalljust an IRC channel and a forthcoming mailing listbut Im hopeful that the project will be as enourmously needed and successful as Debian Women."
GPL Version 3: Background to Adoption
The Free Software Foundation has released an article (click below) by Richard Stallman and Eben Moglen, discussing the forthcoming GPL Version 3.Open Country Joins OSDL
Open Country is a provider of IT systems management software for Linux servers, blades, desktops and appliances. The company is also the newest member of the Open Source Development Labs where it will participate, initially, in OSDL's Desktop Linux (DTL) working group to enable the Linux-powered enterprise.
Commercial announcements
IBM, Power.org Advance Chip Innovation for Linux
Power.org has announced eleven new members supporting the group's formation, demonstrated breakthrough products and detailed momentum on the European continent for Power Architecture(tm) technology.Intel Announces New Software Tool -- Compiler 9.0
Intel Corporation has announced new tools for software developers to help build threaded applications and extract the best performance from applications on multi-core platforms. The Intel Compilers version 9.0 for C++ and Fortran programming languages also help improve security protection in Linux* and Windows* applications.Mandriva acquires Lycoris
Mandriva has announced the acquisition of "several assets" from Lycoris. "The joint plan is now to develop a new product that will be the convergence between our Mandriva Discovery product and Lycoris Desktop/LX. Both teams have already started working on this product." Lycoris CEO Joseph Cheek is moving to Mandriva as well.
McAfee Entercept for Linux
McAfee, Inc. has announced the availability of its "Entercept" intrusion protection system for Linux (RHEL 3 in particular). Claimed features include buffer overflow prevention ("for all installed applications") and application shielding.Nokia uses open-source browser for Series 60 platform
Nokia has announced that it will use open-source web browser code in its Series 60 smartphone platform. "A key component of this development has been Nokia's cooperation with Apple, as the Series 60 browser will use the same open source components, WebCore and JavaScriptCore, that Apple uses in its popular Safari Internet browser. Based on KHTML and KJS from KDE's "Konqueror" open source project, this software has enabled Safari to achieve industry-leading features and performance. Nokia intends to continue its collaboration with Apple and actively participate in the open source community to further develop and enhance these components, contributing Nokia's expertise in mobility."
VariCAD 2005 for Linux Released
VariCAD has announced the release of the Linux version of VariCAD 2005. This new version of VariCAD with a new 3D kernel brings new enhancements, such as better 3D object displaying, more convenient 3D positioning and solid editing, easier creation of 2D drawing from 3D views, improved snapping and object selection in 3D, and more.REAL Software Announces Public Beta of REALbasic 2005 for Linux
REAL Software has announced that REALbasic 2005 for Linux is available for public beta and can be downloaded now from http://www.realsoftware.com/demo. REALbasic 2005 for Linux Standard Edition will be offered for free when it ships in August.TimeSys Secures $6 Million in Funding
TimeSys has announced the securing of $6M in funding. "TimeSys will use the funds to expand its reach among the rapidly growing number of developers choosing Linux as their embedded device development platform."
Zope Foundation to be created
Zope Corporation has announced that it will be creating an independent foundation to manage the continuing development of the Zope content management system. The foundation will own the copyrights to the code and the right to use the "Zope" trademark. A "question and answer" IRC session has been scheduled for June 21 for those who wish to learn more about this move.
New Books
"Digital Video Hacks" - O'Reilly's Latest Release
O'Reilly has published the book Digital Video Hacks by Joshua Paul.Mac OS X Tiger for Unix Geeks - O'Reilly's Latest Release
O'Reilly has published the book Mac OS X Tiger for Unix Geeks by Brian Jepson and Ernest E. Rothman.
Resources
The EFF's legal guide for bloggers
The EFF has posted a legal guide for bloggers with answers to questions on legal liability, intellectual property issues, and more. For publishers in the U.S., it would appear to be a highly useful document; it does not address the legal situation in any other country, however.
Education and Certification
PostgreSQL Certified Engineer program has started worldwide
Software Research Associates, Inc. has announced a PostgreSQL database certification program. "PostgreSQL CE, a PostgreSQL certification program, has started worldwide. PostgreSQL CE certifies skilled PostgreSQL engineers, and there are Silver and Gold qualifications for each skill level. The exam can be taken at local Pearson VUE testing centers, and it is available in English and Japanese."
Upcoming Events
Europython update
An update on the EuroPython 2005 conference has been sent out. The event takes place in Göteborg, Sweden on June 27-29, 2005. "The Europython schedule was publised on the Europython website today. With five parallel sessions for half of the conference and four for the rest, we think we have the largest selection of Python and Zope talks ever."
FUDCon2 at LinuxTag
FUDCon 2 has been announced. "FUDCon2, the second gathering of Fedora Users and Developers, will be held at LinuxTag in Karlsruhe, Germany on June 24-25, 2005. FUDCon 2 will feature presentations from prominent members of the Fedora Project, both from Red Hat and from the Fedora community. Attendance is free to anyone attending LinuxTag".
Libre Software Meeting, Operating Systems
The next Libre Software Meeting will be held from July 5-9, 2005 in Dijon, France. "The "Operating System Design and Implementation" topic this year will gather a wide range of developers and researchers in this area."
NDSS 2006 Call for Papers
A call for papers has gone out for the 2006 Network and Distributed System Security Symposium. The event takes place in San Diego, CA during February, 2006. Papers are due by August 22, 2005.OOoCon 2005 Call For Papers
A call for papers has gone out for OOoCon 2005. "The third international OpenOffice.org Conference, OOoCon 2005, will be held in Koper-Capodistria, Slovenia, this year, from 28-30 September, and you are invited! Promoted this year as a joint effort by the Slovenian and Italian OpenOffice.org language projects, the conference provides the opportunity for the community to meet the developers, contributors, marketers, and others who are making OpenOffice.org one of the most important open-source projects and products today."
Where 2.0 Conference: New Directions for Location Technology
O'Reilly has issued a press release about the upcoming Where 2.0 conference. ""Where 2.0 will make it obvious that web developers are the new market for geospatial tech," observes conference co-chair Nathan Torkington. "Map systems, satellite imagery, and yellow page information are all being made available to web hackers, with major corporate players in a race to offer the best platform to these developers. The GIS industry is watching very closely to see how this plays out.""
Events: June 16 - August 11, 2005
| Date | Event | Location |
|---|---|---|
| June 16 - 17, 2005 | AstriCon Europe 2005 | (Auditorium Madrid Hotel)Madrid, Spain |
| June 17 - 19, 2005 | RECON 2005 | Montreal, Quebec, Canada |
| June 18, 2005 | Perl Dag 2005 | Copenhagen, Denmark |
| June 19 - 22, 2005 | International Lisp Conference 2005(ILC 2005) | (Stanford University)Palo Alto, CA |
| June 20 - 21, 2005 | Linux Cluster Summit 2005 | Walldorf, Germany |
| June 22 - 25, 2005 | LinuxTag 2005 | (Kongresszentrum)Karlsruhe, Germany |
| June 23 - 24, 2005 | Italian Perl Workshop 2005 | (University of Pisa)Pisa, Italy |
| June 24 - 25, 2005 | Fedora Users and Developers meeting(FUDCon2) | Karlsruhe, Germany |
| June 25, 2005 | LugRadio Live 2005 | (Molyneux Stadium)Wolverhampton, UK |
| June 25, 2005 | XML Prague 2005 | Malá Strana, Prague, Czech Republic |
| June 27 - 29, 2005 | Yet Another Perl Conference(YAPC::NA 2005) | (University of Toronto)Toronto, Ontario, Canada |
| June 27 - 29, 2005 | EuroPython 2005 | Göteborg, Sweden |
| June 27 - 29, 2005 | Open Culture | (Via Festa del Perdono 7)Milan, Italy |
| June 29 - 30, 2005 | Where 2.0 Conference | (Westin St. Francis Hotel)San Francisco, CA |
| June 30 - July 3, 2005 | Linux Vacation/Eastern Europe(LVEE) | Hronda, Belarusia |
| July 1 - 6, 2005 | Linux Desktop Development and KDevelop Developers Conference 2005 | Kiev, Ukraine |
| July 5 - 9, 2005 | LSM 2005 Libre Software Meeting for Medicine | Dijon, France |
| July 6 - 9, 2005 | IV Jornades de Programari Lliure | Campus de Vilanova i la Geltrú, Spain |
| July 10 - 18, 2005 | Debconf 5 | Helsinki, Finland |
| July 11, 2005 | Evolution of Open-Source Code Bases(EVOSC05) | Genova, Italy |
| July 11 - 15, 2005 | First International Conference on Open Source Systems(OSS2005) | Genova, Italy |
| July 11 - 14, 2005 | GOTO10 workshop | (OKNO)Brussels, Belgium |
| July 11 - 15, 2005 | IEEE International Conference on Web Services(ICWS 2005) | Orlando, Florida |
| July 17 - 19, 2005 | Desktop Developer's Conference | (Ottawa Congress Centre)Ottawa, Ontario, Canada |
| July 18 - 22, 2005 | ApacheCon Europe 2005 | Stuttgart, Germany |
| July 18 - 22, 2005 | PostgreSQL Bootcamp | (Big Nerd Ranch)Atlanta, GA |
| July 20 - 23, 2005 | Ottawa Linux Symposium(OLS 2005) | Ottawa, Canada |
| July 20 - 22, 2005 | North American Plone Symposium | (The Astro Crowne Plaza)New Orleans, Louisiana |
| July 26, 2005 | 2nd European LISP and Scheme Workshop | Glasgow, Scotland |
| July 27 - 28, 2005 | Back Hat Briefings USA 2005 | Las Vegas, NV |
| July 31 - August 4, 2005 | 2005 SIGGRAPH Computer Animation Festival | Los Angeles, CA |
| August 1 - 5, 2005 | O'Reilly Open Source Convention | (Oregon Convention Center)Portland, Oregon |
| August 1 - 5, 2005 | CIFS 2005 Conference and Plugfest | (Doubletree Hotel)San Jose, CA |
| August 4, 2005 | Penguicon 2005 | Israel |
| August 4 - 7, 2005 | Linux 2005 | (University of Wales)Swansea, UK |
| August 8 - 11, 2005 | LinuxWorld Conference and Expo | (Moscone Center)San Francisco, CA |
Web sites
GnomeFiles.org One Year Old (GnomeDesktop)
GnomeFiles.org celebrates its one year anniversary. "GnomeFiles.org, the software repository for applications using the multi-platform toolkit GTK+, is now one year old. During that time 840 applications were posted and 240,000+ file downloads occured. The site now enjoys about 20,000 pageviews daily, on average. A big thanks to Eugenia for putting together and maintaining gnomefiles!"
Miscellaneous
Linux: ready for the seat back
Here's an amusing set of pictures from an air traveler who was able to photograph the reboot sequence for the computer driving the seat-back display. Turns out it runs Linux...
Page editor: Forrest Cook