Linux in the news

EC report advises open source for Europe (ZDNet)

ZDNet looks at the European Commission report recommending greater governmental use of open source software. "The study does not say that European governments should use off-the-shelf open-source software from companies such as Red Hat, but rather focuses on specialized software produced in-house by public authorities. Such software is typically used for the administration of roads, hospitals and public health, education, tax payment and recovery, justice, and territory management."

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Copyright fight comes to an end (News.com)

According to this News.com article, the parties involved have decided not to appeal the 2600 (New York) DVD case. "The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), which represents the magazine, said other cases in the future 'will provide a better foundation for the Supreme Court to act on the problems created by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.'"

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Tollbooths of the mind (Christian Science Monitor)

The Christian Science Monitor has an opinion column on the excesses of current copyright law. "These are mere annoyances, however, compared with what's coming next: the computer as informational Coke machine, on which we have to pay for every view. As publishers move increasingly to the Web, for example, they will be able to restrict not just access, but downloading and printing as well."

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Sites bow to Microsoft's browser king (News.com)

News.com is running an article that looks into the problem of sites that use broken web standards, and only support the Internet Explorer browser. "Non-agnostic Web sites "are saying, 'We're only interested in people if they use this browser,'" said Janet Daly, a representative for standards group the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). "That's a mistake on their part. The browser is a basic utility for people, and it's about having access to information regardless of who made that information or what authoring tool they used.""

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Want to Make a Living From Linux? (Linux Magazine)

Linux Magazine has some suggestions on making a living in the Linux world. "Can't stomach the idea of working on Microsoft software? Then consider picking up Web development, eXtensible Markup Language (XML), and the Web Services XML trifecta of Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP), Web Services Definition Language (WSDL), and Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration (UDDI). Trust me, with sufficient knowledge of those protocols, you won't have any trouble finding a job this year."

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Is Transparency the Killer Virtue? (Linux Journal)

Doc Searls points out transparency as, perhaps, the greatest virtue of free software in this Linux Journal article. "But most significantly, stockholders are finally--thanks to Enron and WorldCom--fed up with opaque accounting practices. How long will it take before they get equally as fed up with opaque infrastructural software?"

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Interview: John Cox (Easino)

The Easino site has an interview with John Cox, the lead developer of PostNuke. "As far as our relationship [with PHP-Nuke], quite frankly we have none. If we are aware of a security hole from the legacy code, we will forward it to Mr. Burzi, but seldom (if ever) get a reply."

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Embedded Linux Newsletter for July 4, 2002 (LinuxDevices.com)

The LinuxDevices Embedded Linux Newsletter for July 4, 2002 is available. See what's new in Embedded Linux.

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Tips and Tricks: Learn GNU/Linux in One Stanza (Linux Journal)

The Linux Journal looks at the Linux in One Stanza Project, which seeks to distribute Linux usage tips via short email signatures. "As time went, however, the team found that readership of e-mail signature tips was about 80%, much higher than any of the other information available on the server. So, more attention was paid to developing these short, info-containing signatures to disseminate Linux-related knowledge."

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FREESCO Review (LinuxOrbit)

LinuxOrbit reviews the FREESCO firewall distribution. "I gave it a shot and was very impressed. It seems ideal for someone who wants to get a quick and secure protected network up with some enhanced services behind it."

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Tabbed-Browsing Coming to KDE's Konqueror Browser (Mozillaquest)

Mozillaquest reviews the tabbed browsing capabilities of KDE's Konqueror browser. "The K Desktop Environment (KDE) certainly has done lots to narrow the gap between the Linux desktop and the Microsoft Windows desktop. And the addition of tabbed-browsing to KDE's Konqueror browser is one more large step in closing that gap. In our opinion, the K Desktop Environment already is just as good as, if not better than, the MS Windows desktop."

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KWord 1.2beta2 snapshots (TuxReports)

TuxReports reviews KWord 1.2beta2. "Many bug reports were sent to the development team because people didn't realize that the application was not meant to be WYSIWYG. Apparently the team changed it's mind and the latest 1.2beta2 offering is extremely good at matching the print preview with the document."

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The Simputer - Back again (TekCentral)

TekCentral takes a look at the Simputer. "A little fact that Cnet neglected to mention was that all the information required to manufacture the product is available under the Simputer Trust's own hardware license, the SGPL. As the name suggests, the license is inspired by the GNU GPL. The SGPL differs in many ways though, the main way is that if you use the information for a commercial product you must make a one-off payment to the Simputer Trust ($25,000 for devloping countries and $250,000 for developed countries)." (Thanks to Thesmelialichu)

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Quiet, Sad Death of Net Pioneer (Wired)

Wired News covers the recent death of Gnutella hacker Gene Kan. "Kan, peer-to-peer file-sharing programmer extraordinaire, died on June 29. His professional life revolved around developing new ways to share information easily and quickly. Thousands of people use Gnutella to swap files, a program Kan was instrumental in developing and promoting."

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Congressman vows Pigopolist legislation (Register)

The Register reports on Congressman Rick Boucher and his legislative efforts. "We don't know what holy light guides Rep. Boucher, but it's a holy light indeed: he's singular amongst public representatives in daring to reclaim the works of popular culture as something that belong to The Commons (that's us) ... rather than something that belongs in perpetuity to an industry that depends on its legitimacy on an antiquated distribution system."

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IT Surfs The Ocean's Waves (TechWeb)

Here's a TechWeb article on how Johns Hopkins University is using a Linux cluster for ocean modeling. "Johns Hopkins' staff considered systems from Silicon Graphics Inc. and Sun Microsystems but ultimately chose Dell and Linux because of price. An expensive supercomputer was out of the question."

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Companies pledge support for Itanium 2 (News.com)

News.com reports on the porting of various operating systems to the Itanium architecture. "MSC Software came out with its own version of Linux for Itanium 2 on Monday. The Department of Energy's (DOE) Pacific Northwest National Laboratory will incorporate HP Itanium 2 servers running MSC's Linux into a clustered supercomputer."

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