Linux in the news

Tarmle: The Bad Guys Win

Here's a speculative story describing our DRMed future. "You don't really own your home computer, or even the data you keep on it. Oh, you paid for it, just like you paid for the fibre-optic Internet connection that it can't function without, but now it squats under your TV using your electricity and does more work for the content industry than for you. The nightly security patches it downloads for itself don't secure your computer against attackers, they secure the system and software against you." (Seen on BoingBoing).

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The Linux pod people pocket $1500 (PCWorld)

PCWorld has this report about an Australian couple who create podcasts. "Not often thought of as radio stars, Linux developers are now able to steal the limelight thanks to Dapto couple James and Karin Purser who produce the Linux Australia Update and the LUG Roundup podcasts from their lounge room. Linux Australia has this week donated $1500 to the Purser's to help them upgrade their equipment."

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Covalent to support Apache Geronimo (ZDNet)

ZDNet reports that Covalent has added support for Apache Geronimo. "The company decided to extend support to Apache Geronimo because of signs of demand from its corporate customers, which number about 400, Covalent CEO Mark Brewer said. "Companies have been looking for ways to move off their closed-source application servers for some time. We've seen a huge number of people go off (BEA Systems') Weblogic or (IBM's) WebSphere and go to Tomcat," he said."

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MS Offers to License Some Code for a Fee in Lieu of Documentation (Groklaw)

Here's Groklaw's take on Microsoft's offer to license some of its Windows source. "It will be interesting to see if the EU Commission accepts the offer. All I can think of is whether there will be SCO-like infringement lawsuits down the road against folks who looked at the code and then write code Microsoft might claim they copied from their licensed code. Please, someone else cover those lawsuits, if they happen."

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Motorola Buys Maker of Linux-Based Set-Top Boxes (Linux Insider)

Linux Insider covers the acquisition of the Swedish IPTV company Kreatel by Motorola. "Motorola will purchase open-source technology vendor Kreatel Communications, which provides a combination of set-top boxes, software and professional services aimed at offering stable and future-proof solutions for television services, namely, IPTV. Terms of the deal have not been disclosed. Kreatel's Linux-based solution extends into the application and middleware Latest News about middleware layers, meaning the technology provides Motorola with flexibility to use it with a broad set of middleware solutions."

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Motorola acquires Linux-based IPTV STB vendor (LinuxDevices)

LinuxDevices reports that Motorola has agreed to acquire Kreatel Communications, a Swedish provider of Linux-based IPTV STBs (Internet protocol TV set-top boxes). "Motorola says demand for IPTV STBs is growing, and calls Kreatel's flexible STB platform a "natural complement" to its digital video solution. Motorola sells CPE (customer premises equipment) and infrastructure products for cable, xDSL, and FTTP (fiber-to-the-premise) networking environments, it says."

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Industry Readies For Round Two Of EU Patent Directive (IPW)

Intellectual Property Watch reports from a "Progress and Freedom Foundation" meeting where a renewed push for software patents in Europe was discussed. "'It's starting again,' said Guenther Schmalz, director of IP for Europe for software maker SAP. 'And I hope this time we will be better prepared.' Schmalz, who lobbied on the directive last year, said industry 'started very late' last time and will not let it happen again. He told Intellectual Property Watch that industry representatives developed informal networks last summer which are being revived." (Thanks to Florian Mueller).

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Industry joins in for new fight about software patents (Heise Online)

Heise Online provides some background on the latest push for software patents in the EU. "Meir Pugatch from the University of Haifa now gave the industry lobbyists reason to hope that their new attempt to exceed patent application rules might have more chances to succeed. The activists of the opposition, who argue for limitations in intellectual property rights, would only live for a tangible campaign, their movement would come undone afterwards. Contrary, large companies had long-lasting strategies and would see temporarily failures only as a minor step backwards in a long fight." (Thanks to Dirk Hillbrecht)

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Jeremy Allison on Samba 4 (Linux Format)

Linux Format has an interview with the Samba project's Jeremy Allison. "LF: For how long has development on Samba 4 been going on now? JA: I think it started about a year ago, maybe longer. And it's big, it's biting off a lot of stuff. Right now the Kerberos Domain Controller and the LDAP server are less well developed than other areas, and that's where a lot of the work is going on with now..."

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Interview: Dru Lavigne, BSD Certification Group (NewsForge)

NewsForge talks with Dru Lavigne about the BSD Certification Group. "The BSD Certification Group (BSDCG) is a non-profit organization established to create and maintain a global certification standard for system administration on BSD-based operating systems. After a year of work, the group behind the BSD Certification project plans to complete the process for the first certification (BSD Associate) in the first half of this year, with the first exam to be available by the second quarter."

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Defender of the GPL (ZDNet)

ZDNet interviews FSF attorney Eben Moglen. "Q: For openers, could you describe for us the magnitude of the changes in the GPL version 3 draft. Is this a revolutionary overhaul of the license or is this a course correction? Moglen: I would say that it is an evolution of the license, not a course correction. I believe there is no fundamental change to the course the license is on. This is an evolution representing catching up to 15 years of history because GPL version 2 lasted so long. Those 15 years of history saw a transformation of technology, a transformation of the social uses and environment of free software, and a transformation of the legal environment."

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Peter Quinn's First Interview (Groklaw)

Groklaw talks with Peter Quinn, former CIO of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. "Quinn: I believe that the ODF decision will stand. I believe MS will continue to do anything and everything it can to stop it. And I know my seat wasn't even empty and they (MS) took another shot at the title, to no avail. This horse is out of the barn and I see no way for it to go back in. Remember, all we are asking for was and is for Microsoft to commit to open and the standards process; so everyone looks really bad if the plug gets pulled at this juncture."

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An Introduction to DHCP (Linux Journal)

Linux Journal introduces DHCP in an article by Dean Wilson. "DHCP stands for dynamic host configuration protocol. What it does is dynamically assign network settings from a server. In other words, instead of having to configure the parameters related to how your computer communicates with a network, it happens automatically."

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CLI Magic: OpenSSH + Bash (Linux.com)

This CLI Magic article looks at OpenSSH and bash. "As a system administrator, I have used OpenSSH's piping abilities more times than I can remember. The typical ssh call gets me access to systems for administration with a proven identity, but ssh is capable of so much more. In combination with bash's subshell invocation, OpenSSH can distribute the heavy work, reduce trace interference on a system under test, and make other "impossible" tasks possible."

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Synchronizing your Palm PDA with Linux (Linux.com)

Linux.com explores several popular Linux applications that communicate with a PDA. "Ready to synchronize your Palm OS-based PDA with your Linux desktop? Here's a trio of GUI-based options and a command-line tool for you to try."

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My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com)

Javier de Miguel Rodríguez shares a list of his favorite tools, including netcat, IPTraf, mutt, ClamAV, nmap, LFTP, file, perl, subversion and tcpdump. "I work as a senior sysadmin for the University of Seville in Spain, where we use a myriad of operating systems. Here are the top 10 utilities I use in my daily basic admin activities."

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Add an extra layer of security with systrace (Linux.com)

Linux.com covers the systrace utility. "You can use Systrace to restrict a daemon's access to the system by defining which files it can access and how (such as read-only), and which port it can bind to. Also, if a daemon doesn't support privilege separation, you can avoid running it as root the whole time and keeping setuid and setgid binaries on the system. It's obvious how this can enhance the security of an untrusted daemon, or at least minimize the damage on a system if someone manages to exploit it."

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Creating and managing filesystems with Expert Partitioner (NewsForge)

NewsForge looks at the application Expert Partitioner in a book excerpt article. "The first, and perhaps only, time you have to create a new file system on your Linux computer is when you first install the operating system. If you add a second hard drive, or have set up a series of mount points that you decide to adjust in one way or another, you can use SUSE's YaST Expert Partitioner tool to handle this task for you."

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GStreamer framework eases development of media applications (NewsForge)

NewsForge looks at GStreamer. "The more than five-year-old gStreamer project is a library of plugins for a variety of audio and video formats, devices, and hardware. The library allows multimedia software developers to work on applications by creating "media pipelines" that connect files and resources to the hardware required to play them, said GStreamer developer Andy Wingo."

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Synfig 2D vector animation program opens source (NewsForge)

NewsForge takes a look at Synfig, a 2D animation tool. "In addition to basic motion, Synfig integrates some video-processing tools useful to the animator, including filter and transformation layers. Filter layers allow effects like shading, focusing and blurring, and color correction, so that the animator can add camera effects to the finished animation without redrawing the scene elements. Transformation layers enable distortion effects for reflections, rippling water, and other events. Synfig uses OpenEXR to store all projects in high dynamic-range format, and it can output to any resolution."

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Government agency dragging its heels on OpenSSL validation (NewsForge)

NewsForge covers an agency created by the US and Canadian governments to validate security software. The agency has spent about two years reviewing the OpenSSL project. "According to CMVP director Randy Easter, a typical testing cycle runs from several weeks to a few months, and the goal for NIST is to process reports generated by the labs after testing within six to nine weeks. Once processed, NIST either sends additional questions back to the testing lab or moves forward with granting validation. The process typically takes less than a year. Because testing on OpenSSL has now taken more than twice that long, some have begun questioning the review process and whether the open source toolkit is getting a fair shake by the agency."

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OpenSSL receives FIPS certification (NewsForge)

NewsForge reports that OpenSSL has received certification. "According to Chris Brych, FIPS-140 program manager at DOMUS, the OpenSSL validation posed new challenges in checking it for conformance to requirements because the testing process was not as simple as running the software. Since the source code is freely available, the validation was a proof-of-concept in the event that users decide to compile the toolkit themselves rather than opting for a precompiled version."

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