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Linux in the newsWe'll start this week with a few articles for recommended reading:
News from AbroadThe French newspaper Le Monde has several Linux articles out (obviously in French). Jean-Michel Collard has reviewed them and indicates that there is no "FUD" in any of them. He also indicated that he may be able to provide us with a translation for at least one of them in the near future. For those unwilling to wait, here is link to Babelfish where you can specify the URL of the piece you want translated.The Tide Turns for Linux is the title of this article from The Press, New Zealand. It focuses on a local company, Egressive, which is specializing in Debian GNU/Linux support and development. The changing tide has reached Christchurch, with the establishment of a company offering customised Linux systems and support for small to medium-sized businesses. The Jerusalem Post published an article on Star Office in their March 21, 1999 edition. They were apparently quite pleased. I downloaded the program and was able to successfully use the StarWriter component to open and save to MS Word files, and StarWriter was enough like MS Word to impress me. An on-line version of this article exists but requires payment in order to access. If you are interested, search the Jersalem Post archives for "User-Friendly", the title of the article. MiscellaneousDesktop alternatives to Windows are the focus of this brief article by Robert Lauriston. Using a MacIntosh is mentioned as an acceptable alternative, but Linux, BeOS, OS/2 and NextStep are all found to fall short. I estimate that it will be at least two more years before Linux is a practical alternative to Windows for the average user.USA Today has entered the legions of media providing coverage of Linux with two articles. The first is a fairly lighthearted look at a Linux Installfest. This isn't the '60s of placards and protests, but of be-ins and expanding consciousness. Or in the case of the Linux operating system, install-fests and the road trip called Bierwanderung. The second article takes a more serious approach, starting with a talk with Richard Stallman and the reasons behind the development of free software. "From Stallman you get the idea that any (software) contribution should be available to the general populace for the advancement of all humankind," says George Weiss, an analyst with the Gartner Group in Long Island, N.Y. Ben Elgin at Smart Reseller brings up a topic that has been known to start a few flames within newsgroups, "Is Red Hat becoming the Linux Microsoft?" He specifically addresses Red Hat's Certification Program and its luke-warm support for the LSB. ... some critics contend that Red Hat's business practices, under CEO Robert Young, are becoming heavy-handed and bad for the open-source industry. A couple more main-stream press articles came out this week about Apple's open source announcement, including:
Section Editor: Jon Corbet Guest Editor for the Week: Liz Coolbaugh |
March 25, 1999 |