Linux in the news
Recommended Reading
The Strange Case of the Disappearing Open Source Vendors (O'Reilly)
Publisher Tim O'Reilly writes about the current state of open-source software. "The dot-com boom has ended, the VCs and the stock market are in retreat, and of all the much-hyped open source companies, only a few are left. Red Hat is still flourishing, but VA Linux Systems has taken "Linux" out of its name; Caldera, SuSe, Turbolinux, and Connectiva are joining forces; Eazel, Great Bridge, and Lutris are out of business, among many others."
Start-up creates futuristic 3D display (ZDNet)
ZDNet examines a new 3D "crystal ball" computer display that startup company Actuality Systems is working on. "The 3D mechanism behind Perspecta goes back to the 1960s but had to wait for high-resolution processing and display technology to catch up. Perspecta uses a collection of proprietary algorithms to slice 3D data into a format that can be replicated in three spatial dimensions. A projector then displays the data at 5,000 frames per second onto a rotating screen within the transparent sphere, in such a way that the eye sees a 3D image. The image comprises 198 two-dimensional slices, with a 768-by-768-pixel resolution for each slice." The $40,000 price tag will probably keep this technology out of the hands of most developers for now.
Wi-Fi users take cue from hobos (News.com)
News.com looks into a new method that is being used to identify publicly accessible wireless networks. "Warchalking, as the practice has been coined by Matt Jones, entails simply drawing a chalk symbol on a wall or pavement to indicate the presence of a wireless networking node. If you see one of these symbols, you should--in theory at least--be able to whip out your notebook computer equipped with an 802.11 wireless networking card, and log on to the Net."
Companies
Struggling Linux company swaps CEOs (News.com)
News.com reports that Caldera International has replaced CEO Ransom Love with Darl McBride, formerly of Franklin Covey. "Linux seller Caldera International has replaced longtime Chief Executive Ransom Love and agreed to buy back shares held by two major investors."
Ransom Love out as Caldera CEO (Register)
The Register examines Caldera's CEO switchover. "The one thing Caldera has that no other Linux vendor has or has ever had is its 16,000 resellers. Yes, Caldera is attuned to Unix now, but if the company can be swung toward Linux, as both Love and McBride believe it can, it represents a potent marketing force that can get Linux into small and medium-sized businesses in a way no other Linux company can match."
Linux server maker's coffers growing (News.com)
News.com writes about a $44 million investment that Linux server company Egenera has received. "Sun Microsystems has been strong among financial services companies, but Egenera, Intel and IBM are using Linux as a way to grab some of that business. Linux is a clone of Unix products such as Sun's Solaris operating system, so it's a relatively easy step for customers to move their software to Linux."
IBM's utility computing push (Register)
The Register covers IBM's Linux Virtual Services. "At the core of Virtual Linux Services is an IBM technology which creates "virtual servers" from the computing capacity of IBM zSeries mainframes running Linux. By partitioning the processing, storage and network capacity for each customer, IBM isolates individual demand on the system and maps resources to that demand, while providing the equivalent separation between customers that a physical server would supply."
IBM to let customers plug in to Linux (News.com)
News.com covers IBM's Linux Virutal Service announcement. "The service is one of the clearest examples of the move toward "utility computing," a trend that IBM rivals Hewlett-Packard and Sun Microsystems are also advocating."
MandrakeSoft eyes up AMD's Opteron (ZDNet)
ZDNet looks at plans by MandrakeSoft to port its Linux distribution to AMD's x86-64 architecture. "..And MandrakeSoft hopes the move will also help drive its Linux operating system into the enterprise. "A version of Mandrake Linux dedicated to these powerful 64-bit processors can certainly accelerate MandrakeSoft's growing adoption in the Linux corporate market," said MandrakeSoft chief executive Jacques Le Marois in a statement."
Opera expands role in China (News.com)
News.com reports that Opera Software will partner with Redflag Software Technologies to sell the Opera browser. "Redflag plans to integrate Opera's browser software into its applications for PDAs (personal digital assistants) and set-top boxes. The deal with Redflag marks Opera's first arrangement with an Asian reseller."
Business
Linux Heavyweight Comes to Pacific Northwest National Lab (Genomeweb)
Genomeweb looks at a new supercomputer project that HP is building for Pacific Northwest National Lab (PNNL). "It may not be much more than a pipsqueak right now, but the computer system now being set up at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory is expected to grow into the world heavyweight of Linux supermachines."
IBM zips up Linux deal (News.com)
IBM will be supplying Linux servers to zipper manufacturer YKK America. "YKK America will use an iSeries server, a special-purpose machine typically sold in conjunction with software, to run a Web site where customers can place and check orders and monitor inventory. The company will use IBM's Linux-only iSeries product, the lower-end i820 that can accommodate one to four processors and can run as many as 15 instances of Linux simultaneously."
Biotech group opts for Linux (smh.com.au)
Smh.com.au covers an agreement between IBM and Medica Holdings LTD. "Biotech company Medica Holdings Ltd today said it had formed an agreement with IBM that will allow its subsidiary Cytopia to speed up discovery of drug candidates to treat immune disease and cancer. Medica said the Melbourne-based Cytopia would deploy IBM's latest generation Linux supercomputing technology, allowing it to increase 100 fold its speed and selectivity in screening drug candidates."
Opera signs with RedFlag in China embedded Linux deal (Register)
China's RedFlag Software will offer embedded versions of the Opera browser, according to this report in the Register. "The deal is Opera's first big one for the Asian embedded market, as until recently Opera didn't include support for non-Roman alphabets, and as embedded is a new area for RedFlag (historically it has dominated the Chinese desktop market), it's potentially a major coup for the Norwegian company."
Linux goes to Hollywood (IT-Director)
IT-Director reports on the use of Linux for rendering movie animation. "The cost of producing high quality animation is rising, primarily due to its high labour cost - a fact that is compounded by the viewers increasing expectation of high quality animation. Disney's newest films use computer rendered images to retain the look of the company's original movies. All of this takes computing power and over the last few years Disney has relied on Linux clusters to deliver the necessary power."
Feeling the Heat in Redmond (TechWeb)
Network Computing looks at Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) issues, and why they are causing Microsoft customers to consider Linux. "For the most part, Microsoft customers have done little more than grumble about such treatment. That's because alternatives from the likes of Apple, IBM, Novell and Sun have their own major drawbacks, and switching from Microsoft is a costly undertaking in itself. But enter Linux and the exploding number of applications that run on the open-source OS, and the competitive landscape looks more inviting. Linux is no silver bullet; its biggest downside remains the dearth of experts to support it. As the platform has matured, however, it has gained enterprise credibility."
King Larry Proclaims the Land His (Wired)
Wired reports on recent comments made by Oracle's Larry Ellison. "'Why Oracle's future is so good is because of a concentration of spending on the few surviving suppliers: Microsoft, Oracle, SAP and IBM,' Larry Ellison told reporters on the sidelines of an Oracle conference here. 'It will be killing fields. We will grow and prosper. Customers will have fewer choices,' he said." The article also mentions that Oracle's software will run on Linux clusters.
Interviews
Who says the browser war is over? (News.com)
News.com interviews Opera Software CEO Jon von Tetzchner. "We wanted to make effective software, and speed was a part of that. Size was another. It means a lot more work for our programmers because we don't use ready-made tools or modules. We do it all by ourselves from scratch. That benefits both customers and ourselves; because we don't rely on other people's code, if there's a fault, we can fix it ourselves."
Caldera VP bullish on UnitedLinux (ZDNet)
ZDNet features an interview with Benoy Tamang, Caldera's VP of strategic development, on the topic of UnitedLinux. "At the same time, when it came to discussions and being on initiatives and boards for LSB or for Linux community vendors and Linux internationalization standards group, the same parties would be there at the same time. So inevitably the technical people started talking to each other, and just said, "Why are we duplicating all of these efforts and creating our own versions?" And therefore we found, for number three, a possible area where the Linux companies themselves didn't have to duplicate the basic elements."
CEO: Corel's on the comeback (ZDNet)
ZDNet features an interview with Corel president Derek Burney.
"ZDNet: Since you've abandoned Corel Linux for the desktop--and in light of Mac OS X, which has a Unix core--what is Corel's current vision for Linux?
"
"Burney: We created a desktop version of Linux because we thought that Linux was very powerful but difficult to use. The product was a technological success, but the market wasn't interested at that time, so we stopped developing the operating system. But we do offer applications for Linux. Nowadays Linux is an operating system just like Mac or Windows, so if there is a business case to justify creating an application, then we'll do it.
"
Red Hat: Open source is our focus (ZDNet)
ZDNet interviews Red Hat CEO Matthew Szulik on UnitedLinux. "But my perspective on this whole UnitedLinux activity is that it takes an awful lot of capital to build a successful global franchise to support ISVs like Oracle and Veritas and TIBCO and the main enterprise ISVs. Certainly the Dell, the Compaq and HP announcement that we just made yesterday--it requires an awful lot of time and attention and capital. And so therefore it's hard for me to see how these four Linux vendors--the hybrid approach that they seem to be consolidating into--is going to be able to succeed with the demanding requirements of the customer and the support that's required to compete on a global basis."
It's time for ICANN to go (Salon)
Salon interviews EFF founder John Gilmore about ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. "The strings that were pulled before and during the Clinton administration's "Green Paper" and "White Paper" process, that ultimately resulted in the creation of NewCo, also known as ICANN, were pulled by SAIC. SAIC is a very interesting for-profit company with a multibillion-dollar annual revenue, most of which comes from classified contracts with the U.S. military. What's even more interesting about SAIC is that there is no external control on it: It is "employee-owned," i.e., there are no outside stockholders. If you leave the company, you have to sell your shares in it. SAIC's board of directors reads like a who's who of the military-industrial complex (former secretaries of defense, spy-agency heads, etc.). When you read about the government wasting billions on "homeland security," guess who gets it. SAIC's home page features their new brochure on "SAIC -- Securing the Homeland."" (Thanks to Joern Nettingsmeier)
Resources
Embedded Linux Newsletter for June 27, 2002
The June 27, 2002 edition of the Linux Devices Embedded Linux Newsletter has been published. Topics include Red Hat's embedded Linux strategy, Sharp's new Zaurus PDA, KORGANIZER/EMBEDDED 1.0, GNU BAYONNE 1.0, the Mira smart display device, and more.Setting Up an Old 386 on Your Home Network (Linux Journal)
Here's a Linux Journal article on how to turn an old 386 machine into a functioning Linux box. "New problem: when I told my wife that I had used MS software to get her system connected, she was not amused at all and demanded that I use open-source software only. It did not sway her when I explained that she was already running MS-DOS. Her reasoning was that MS-DOS was written before MS became the evil empire, so it was okay."
Reviews
Applications for the Sharp Zaurus (Linux Journal)
Linux Journal looks at fun things to do with a Sharp Zaurus PDA. "Pull up a Zaurus and make yourself comfortable. You just got your Zaurus and you are very proud of it. You tried every single application, then even typed some commands in the terminal, like uname -a, ping localhost and ifconfig to prove to yourself that it really is a GNU/Linux machine in the palm of your hand. You even know where most of the keys are but still may be looking for the pipe (hint: read more.sbc.co.jp/slj/doc/pdf/SL5000KeyAssign.pdf to find out that bar = Shift-Space)."
Why KDE applications have a bright desktop future (LinuxWorld)
Nicholas Petreley reviews KDE on LinuxWorld. "Put simply, the KDE class libraries and examples are a brilliant testimony to reusable objects done right. Features such as the sophisticated file dialog and toolbar functions are obviously a part of the standard KDE class library, which is why most KDE applications now include them. If you upgrade the file dialog, all applications that use it get upgraded automatically."
Sun and the new Office space (Arnnet)
Con Zymaris discusses OpenOffice in this Arnnet opinion column. "If your client has a mixed environment of Windows, Sun or Linux workstations, OpenOffice is perhaps your best choice. Finally, as a recent Gartner report suggests, many of the firms adopting OpenOffice are best served if they analyse which of their staff have a strong business case for the continued use of Microsoft Office (perhaps 20 per cent of them) with the remainder getting OpenOffice. As the documents and templates can generally be interchanged between these staff groups and the application operation is uncannily similar in most respects, this strategy makes sense."
Linux standard gets the go-ahead (ZDNet)
ZDNet examines the launch of the Linux Standards Base certification program. "The certification program is aimed at developers, software vendors and Linux distributions alike, and is designed to allow customers to easily identify software that has gone through the standardization process."
XML in Mozilla 1.0 (WebReference)
WebReference reviews the XML processing capabilities of Mozilla 1.0. "Mozilla offers a rich XML processing environment, where handling XML as a document format and exposing XML documents through DOM access functions is only the beginning."
Analysts examine UnitedLinux strategy (ZDNet)
ZDNet has published reviews by two industry pundits on the UnitedLinux strategy.theKompany's version of COBOL looks promising (NewsForge)
NewsForge reviews KOBOL, a commercial COBOL compiler that is being offered by TheKompany. "Speaking of classical batch, batch processing is about all you can do with KOBOL. Because other than displaying messages at the console, there isn't much interactivity available. At least not yet. But murmurings on the KOBOL mailing list indicate there may be a GUI in KOBOL's future." Thanks to Joe Klemmer.
Miscellaneous
$200k prize offered for getting Linux to run on Xbox (Register)
The Register reports that an anonymous donor has offered a cash prize for getting Linux to run on Microsoft's Xbox, legally, by the end of this year. "Is this for real? According to Michael Steil of the Project, the identity of the donor "is known to the project leaders and well-respected," so there seems at least a possibility that the money exists and will be paid up. And finding "a simple and completely legal way to run Linux on the Microsoft Xbox" before 1st January 2003 could be a tall order."
Want $200,000? Tweak Linux for Xbox (ZDNet)
ZDNet takes a look at the Xbox Linux project. "A software development project aimed at getting the Linux operating system to run on Xbox received a boost on Monday, when an unnamed donor agreed to pay successful contributors a total of $200,000."
Report: Brace for new wave of attacks (ZDNet)
ZDNet looks at the Apache worm and other network attacks. "The situation is made worse by a worm discovered over the weekend that makes use of the Apache flaw, a vulnerability in the mechanism for handling "Chunked Encoding". The worm is thought to be capable of spreading only to Web servers running the FreeBSD operating system--an open-source variant of Unix--and which have not had a patch applied for the recent flaw. Although few people have reported the worm, it is thought to be infecting vulnerable Web servers worldwide."
Apache worm barely squirms (News.com)
News.com reports that the Apache worm is not spreading or doing much damage. "However, there are indications that the flaw exploited by the worm appears in other platforms, which could mean the advent of more damaging worms."
How we could have prevented an Apache worm (ZDNet)
ZDNet gives a good history of the Apache worm. "On the one hand, ISS jumped the gun. It should have notified only Apache, then waited for its response before going public. But, on the other hand, ISS did a service by exposing a zero-day exploit--those that take advantage of vulnerabilities known only to malicious users, not the general public--and preventing a sneak attack."
IT Advances Research On Climate (TechWeb)
Information Week reports on the use of a cluster of Dell 2450 PowerEdge servers by researchers at Johns Hopkins University. "Researchers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore are breaking new ground with their study of the Atlantic Ocean's effect on the climate. The project began in earnest 18 months ago when the university chose to run its data collection and analysis on a cluster of Dell PowerEdge servers running Red Hat Linux 6.2."
Ballmer to China: 'Steal all the software you want, so long as it's ours' (Register)
The Register looks at Microsoft's $750 million investment in China. "Most interestingly, Ballmer claimed not to have extracted any promises from the Chinese government, according to Reuters. This of course means that MS is prepared to see its precious intellectual property defiled in every way imaginable just so it can get a toe-hold on the mainland."
Microsoft to pour $750 million into China (News.com)
News.com reports that Microsoft has pledged to donate $750 million to China over the next three years. "Ballmer told reporters that the deal with China covers a "wide variety of fronts: outsourcing, exports, local training, development--just to name a few." He said China had not made any specific pledges in return. "There's no real commitment that I would say is part of the agreement that we signed," Ballmer said during a news conference."
Life with Linux: What YOU think of the OS (ZDNet)
ZDNet looks at Linux from a Windows user's perspective, where virtual desktops are something new. "In his second "Life with Linux" column, Coursey raved about virtual desktops, a feature that lets you create multiple workspaces, each with its own set of programs and windows. "This may sound like switching between apps in Windows, but it isn't: Each desktop preserves its own arrangements of windows, so you don't have to do all that alt-tabbing, opening and closing of windows, or hunting around the task bar to find the apps you want," he wrote." We eagerly await their discovery of the X window system's remote display capabilities.
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