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Leading items


Eric Raymond has updated his latest paper, The Magic Cauldron, adding an appendix to specifically address why closing the source for a device driver loses money for the vendor. "If you stay closed you will usually get the worst of all worlds -- your secrets will get exposed, you won't get free development help, and you won't have wasted your stupider competition's time on cloning."

We actually think Eric has missed many of the best reasons why closing the source for a driver is economic bad judgement. Losing free development help is certainly one of the best reasons, which he does mention. However, he forgot to mention no longer having to pay your internal staff to rewrite, test and distribute new binaries for each new kernel as it comes out. In fact, open source drivers are a whole lot less likely to break with new kernel releases, partially because of Linus' well-known dislike of closed source drivers.

The best reason, though, is because selling hardware is what makes money for you. If your drivers are hard to find, have to be updated frequently, or worst, run poorly, it reflects badly on your hardware and you will sell less of it. Fewer sales, less revenue. Period.

Continuing our discussion of open source in vertical markets, Tim Cook from the FreePM project sent in an editorial to us, entitled "Open Source: Going Vertical. It sums up some of his thoughts and planning that went into the June 28th announcement of the FreePM project, concerning the promise of vertical open source software and some of the potential difficulties of managing such projects. "Many open source vertical market applications are actually started as either in-house or hobby projects. In these cases, one of the most difficult things to do is create the required emotional detachment."

Comdex Canada is underway and Dan York has sent in a report from Day 1 of the event. "Packed in the back corner of the large North Hall of the Toronto Convention Center, the Linux Pavilion proved once again that Linux will draw a crowd. During much of the first day, the aisles were filled, almost all of the presentations in the Linux Theatre were standing-room only, and the questions were coming fast and furious." Expect pictures from the event tomorrow and compliments to the members of the Canadian Linux Users' Exchange (CLUE), the group that organized the Linux Pavilion.

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July 15, 1999

   

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See also: last week's Security page.

Security


News

This year marked the first time that the annual DefCon hacker convention became a mainstream media focus instead of an obscure event ignored in more "professional" circles.. The number of articles produced in reaction to the conference were prodigious. Clearly the congressional testimony of several well-known hackers earlier this year changed the tone of the media, always in search of a story people will actually read. Here are a few of the articles:
  • ZDNN, software companies should be held liable for insecure software
  • ComputerWorld, Bruce Schneier's Defcon talk on cryptography
  • Techweb, Anti-Sniff 1.0 from L0pht Heavy Industries
  • ZDNN, Two new projects from the Cult of the Dead Cow
  • Wired News, Defcon wrap-up

U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno testified against efforts to remove encryption export controls. Some comments and the full text of her testimony are available. Her concerns echo the standard concerns put forward by law enforcement professionals, but fail to understand that export controls are not actually limiting access to encryption. "The widespread use of encryption, however, will effectively eliminate these exceptions and prevent law enforcement, even with an order obtained from a court under procedures established by Congress, from obtaining information which may be critical to protecting public safety."

Last week, we mentioned new legislation in Britain intended to give police and intelligence agencies more power, but implied that the legislation had already passed. Bruce Stephens pointed out that this is incorrect; the legislation has been proposed, but not passed. In fact, it is unlikely to pass in the current session. Here is a followup article which talks about why the Opposition Party is currently blocking the legislation. "Alan Duncan, Conservative Party IT spokesman, said on Thursday night his party would not agree to the legislation in its current form. It's "too long and too heavy for its purpose," he said, with 30 pages of complex text where there should be three."

SecurityPortal has a nice overview article on internation encryption policies. "Most crypto friendly region in the world? Latin America".

Security Reports

Netscape 4.6-0 does not correctly enforce "originating server" cookies when Javascript enabled, according to this note, posted to Bugtraq. This can cause a privacy violation when a user has chosen the setting "Only accept cookies originating from the same server as the page being viewed". In this case, third party ads not originating from the original HTML page should be automatically rejected, but instead are silently accepted. This can allow a third party to track your web movements through completely unrelated web sites. Netscape has not yet responded to this report.

This report generated a couple of other postings, including this mention of a bug Netscape acknowledged, claimed was fixed in 4.51, but actually chose not to fix because of repercussions for Yahoo Mail.

A patch to fix a problem with "Custom" memory configurations and the 2.0.37 kernel has been made available by Solar Designer.

Updates

No security reports have been released by Caldera, Debian, Red Hat, Slackware or SuSE in the past week.

Events

SANE 2000, the 2nd International SANE (System Administration and Networking) conference, has been announced. It will be held May 22nd through the 25th in Maastricht, The Netherlands.

ToorCon, "San Diego, California's ONLY Comprehensive Computer Security Conference", has been announced. It will take place September 3rd-4th, 1999, in La Jolla, CA.

Section Editor: Liz Coolbaugh


July 15, 1999


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See also: last week's Kernel page.

Kernel development


The current development kernel version is 2.3.10. Pre-patches for 2.3.11 continue to fly around.

The current stable kernel is 2.2.10. Meanwhile, Alan Cox's release of 2.2.10ac10 is believed to have fixed the file corruption problem. The fact that 2.2.11 still has not been released, though, is probably a measure of how confident they want to be that the problems are fixed, before they move on.

For those that want to catch up on the messages related to file corruption with 2.2.9 and 2.2.10, all related articles (with hardware-related problems deleted) can be downloaded in a single file from this site.

Resource management issues started annoying Linus, so he took some time out of his schedule to rewrite the resource management package (kernel/resource.c).

"I got tired of the problems with the resource management - lack of hierarchy, and the stupid and utterly horrible static allocation.

So I rewrote it. The new one can generate resource trees: you can claim a piece of the pie, and then within that piece you can continue to do resource management. And the new one doesn't have any arbitrary limits or magic constants (0 is IO, 1 is MEM is gone, gone, gone)."

Instructions and patches for getting NFSv3 working on Linux are provided at this web-site, maintained by Michael Kaminsky. Michael also pointed out a couple of problems with the current NFS code.

The source code for NwFs 1.4.5, the Netware Filesystem (FENRIS), is now available for download. Of course, to play with NwFs, you'll need to be able to create a Netware partition ... NWDISK is the tool needed, but it has not yet been released.

Tomasz Motylewski released mbuff-0.5 for 2.2 and 2.0, announced in this note. Mbuff is a character device that implements the mmap method on any size of vmalloc'ed kernel memory. It is heavily dependent on the bttv.c driver, though, which Alan Cox pointed out was changed heavily in 2.3.10pre5 in order to support the Ultrasparc. Mbuff patch author Tomasz Motylewski commented that the new bttv does not work with the Intel architecture as a module, so he stuck with the older version to maintain portability.

Patches/Releases over the past week

Section Editor: Jon Corbet


July 15, 1999

For other kernel news, see:

   

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See also: last week's Distributions page.

Distributions


Users of any RPM-based distribution might want to note that, with the release of RPM 2.5 and later, the -F option can be used to conditionally upgrade an rpm file, that is, install the upgrade only if the package is already installed, unlike the behavior of the -U option. This option is undocumented in 2.5, but documented in the latest release, 3.0. [Thanks to George Sexton]

Back to new distributions, we promised a couple of weeks ago to give some brief descriptions of some of the distributions we added to our list but did not cover at the time. So here's a sprinkling for your pleasure this week!

DLite, also known as Debian Lite for ISPs, is a mini-Linux distribution. Not floppy-based, DLite contains around 200 Debian packages to make up the core of an Internet-based server, such as might be used by an ISP.

Eonova Linux is based on the "pkg" package manager, a variant of RPM. Pkg packages are the same format as rpm packages. It is intended to be a highly stable distribution, with a stated goal of "Lag-Behind" releases, estimated to be about six months behind the current Linux leading edge. Thus, Eonova 0.90, the current stable release, is based on 2.0.36 and libc5, while 0.92, currently in development, will be glibc-based and yet still run the 2.0.36 kernel.

Eurielec Linux is a Spanish distribution, based on Red Hat, and maintained by a student club (the best, they say proudly) at he ETSI of Telecomunicaciones (UPM). Their current version is 3.0 and CDs are available. They created the distribution so that new students coming to the University would have an easy-to-install Linux system available for their use. To cut down on the costs of downloads, they included a wide variety of packages, so the distribution is now quite complete. The installation is in Castilian, as well as many of the programs and much of the documentation.

Debian

The July 13th issue of the Debian Weekly News is out. Freeze and release plans are starting to be discussed. Given past history, that would pinpoint the actual release date in six to nine months. However, the intention is to release more frequently, so the opportunity exists to prove that estimate wrong. Other topics this month include the internationalization of the Debian init scripts, generating package diffs to reduce downloads and news from the Debian-JP project.

A test install of Storm Linux was described by DWN Editor Joey Hess. Storm Linux is based on Debian.

Mandrake

Internationalization of Mandrake is an upcoming focus, mentioned by Gael Duval in this note. "We want to make Linux-Mandrake available in as many languages as possible, with as many keyboards flavors as possible..."

Mandrake is the preferred version of Linux recommended by this article in Christian Computing Magazine.

The Duke of URL reviews Linux Mandrake 6.0.

Red Hat

New packages released in the last week include updated NetKit-base and traceroute packages. These were updated due a problem on the Alpha, so installation of the updates on non-Alpha architectures is not required. For more information, check the Red Hat Errata.

In addition, new rpm and rpm-devel packages have been released. These upgrade Red Hat's distribution from rpm-2.5 to rpm-3.0.2, which provides more functionality. Note that upgrading these packages will require that users of the rpmfind, rpm2html, gnorpm and kpackage will need to upgrade these packages as well, to ones that have been linked against rpm 3.0.X. For more information, check the Red Hat Errata.

Last, the rdist package has actually been downgraded, not upgraded, from 6.1.5 to 6.1.0 due to a change in the license that prevents commercial distribution and use of rdist 6.1.5.

SuSE

SuSE released version 6.1 of its Linux distribution for Alpha processors. This version uses kernel 2.2.9 and comes with glibc 2.1, XFree86 3.3.3.1, KDE 1.1.1, and GNOME 1.0, and other software packages.

An English version of the announcement of the creation of the SuSE Linux Labs is now available.

Section Editor: Liz Coolbaugh


July 15, 1999

Please note that not every distribution will show up every week. Only distributions with recent news to report will be listed.

Lists of Distributions
Kernelnotes
Woven Goods
Known Distributions:
Apokalypse
Bad Penguin Linux
Bastille Linux
Best Linux (Finnish/Swedish)
Black Cat Linux (Ukrainian/Russian)
Caldera OpenLinux
CCLinux
Chinese Linux Extension
Complete Linux
Conectiva Linux (Brazilian)
Debian GNU/Linux
Definite Linux
DLD
DLite
DLX
DragonLinux
easyLinux
Easylinux-kr
Enoch
Eonova Linux
e-smith server and gateway
Eurielec Linux (Spanish)
eXecutive Linux
floppyfw
Floppix
Green Frog Linux
hal91
Hard Hat Linux
Independence
Jurix
Kha0s Linux
KRUD
KSI-Linux
Laetos
LEM
LinuxGT
Linux-Kheops (French)
Linux MLD (Japanese)
LinuxPPC
LinuxPPP (Mexican)
Linux Pro Plus
Linux Router Project
LOAF
LSD
Mandrake
Mastodon
MicroLinux
MkLinux
muLinux
nanoLinux II
NoMad Linux
Open Kernel (Russian)
Plamo Linux
PLD
Project Ballantain
PROSA Debian GNU/Linux
QuadLinux
Red Hat
Rock Linux
ShareTheNet
Skygate
Slackware
Small Linux
Stampede
Stataboware
Storm Linux
SuSE
Tomsrtbt
Trinux
TurboLinux
uClinux
UltraPenguin
Vine Linux
Xdenu
XTeamLinux
Yellow Dog Linux

   

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See also: last week's Development page.

Development tools


"Due Diligence: Do it on your Linux box first", is the title of one section from Troubleshooting Magazine's July issue, which focuses on CGI.

Guile

Version 0.2.0 of guile-fltk has been announced. "guile-fltk is a Guile binding to the C++ Fltk widget set. It is still a work in progress but it is already very useable and I have re-written many of Fltk's test suite applications in scheme." Comments are requested and additional information can be found at this site.

Java

Creating an open-source presentation program is the goal of this new project, which plans to develop it in Java. They're early in the design stages, so now is the time to put in your two cents.

The Known Bugs with the JDK 1.2_pre-release-v2 webpage was updated on July 9th. None of the other JDK 1.2 Status pages have been updated recently.

Perl

The third edition of Perlmonth is now available. Eight new articles are included, ranging across topics from embperl, pod and perl sets, to Apache and XML.

A mailing list for MIDI-perl has been created. For more information, send a note to midiperl-request@maths.ex.ac.uk .

Python

A Python implementation of the SEMI Equipment Control Standard protocol for equipment used in semiconductor fabrication has been announced.

Alfajor, a configurable cookie filter, was recently announced.

gimp-python 0.4, a set of python modules for writing plug-ins for the Gimp, was announced. The new version now supports gimp 1.1 (as well as gimp 1.0).

The third alpha release of PIDDLE (Plug-In Drawing, Does Little Else) is now available. The new version adds a unified testing framework as well as bug fixes.

And our favorite "unusual" project, Stackless Python, is now up to version 0.3.

Smalltalk

Release 2.3.11 of the POC (Portable Object Compiler) is now available. POC is an Objective-C preprocessor that translates Objective-C to C. The new version has Objective-C class names that correspond better to Smalltalk.

Tcl/tk

Tcl-URL! is back! This week's edition covers several bug reports and some HOW-TO questions. Comments on Tcl/Tk 8.2 are due in by July 23rd, they remind.

The TkGS project now has a mailing list. TkGS will define a new graphics subsystem for Tk with device-independence in mind.

Section Editor: Liz Coolbaugh


July 15, 1999

   

 

Development projects


Why would a screensaver for Windows 95/98/NT be of interest to you? Maybe because it shows a nice collection of screenshots from Linux ... just the thing to introduce your friends, family and co-workers to Linux! This is from Marco Iannacone, best known as the author of the Italian Linux FAQ.

No, there is no version of Front Page for Linux. Tight on time for publication last week, we mentioned that a file called fp40.linux.tar.Z was available for download from ftp.microsoft.com. However, we didn't have the opportunity to download and examine the file before we published. Many people have written in to verify that the file just contains the Front Page extensions for Linux that have been around for a while. Sorry for the confusion.

FreePM

The FreePM project has moved its home page to http://www.freepm.org.

Ganymede

Ganymede 0.99.4 has been released. "Ganymede is a GPL'ed network directory management system written in Java, providing support for team management of NIS, DNS, etc."

Gnome

The Gnome Summary, July 4-11, is now available. Coding has begun for GScript, the GTK+ framework for Unicode text. Check here for information on the Gnome API documentation, in case you want to sign up to produce some yourself. Gnumeric now supports printing, one of the remaining major features that it was lacking. Most importantly, for anyone that missed it, http://developer.gnome.org is on-line with lots of documentation, white papers, etc.

ht://Dig

Geoff Hutchison wrote in with some status on the ht://Dig project. He reports that major architectural changes of the version 3.2 development should be nearing completion in the next week or two. Database support for phrase searching and support for multiple transport protocols will be finished as of this week. He also reports that they're looking for people interested or knowledgeable helping out with Unicode/UTF-8 support. Anyone interested should e-mail the htdig3-dev@htdig.org developer's list.

icecast

Icecast 1.3, the "next-generation audio streaming server" has been announced. Multiple streams can now be supported from a single server, new administration tools have been added, and meta-data streaming, "a new, robust method for displaying information about a stream without corrupting or interfering with the actual music data" is now supported. It is mentioned that meta-data streaming is a new standard, just emerging, developed in cooperation with the makers of the Sonique, K-Jofol, FreeAmp, MacAmp and XMMS MP3 players.

KDE

The July 8th issue of the KDE Development News from Navindra Umanee is now available. It seems in general KDE is within its schedule for the next release, though with some caveats in regard to the high-colour icons, which are not yet ready.

Mozilla/Netscape

A few weeks back, we mentioned a news.com article which seemed to imply that Netscape's licensing future was unclear. From MozillaZine comes a clarification. Apparently the original article was a masterpiece of journalistic ineptitude. AOL, not Sun, has jurisdiction over Netscape still and has expressed complete support for Mozilla.

Midgard

A new major release of Midgard, version 1.1 (also dubbed "Iron River"), has been released. Midgard is a PHP-based, freely-available Web application development and publishing platform. The new release features enhanced URI mapping, PHP 3.0.11, and renamed functions to make Midgard "play" better with PHP.

VirtuaLaw

VirtuaLaw is another open-source project in a vertical field, this one focusing on legal case management. Note that, although a Linux version is also planned (according to this page, VirtuaLaw was originally built with Microsoft Access and Visual Basic and therefore runs only on Microsoft systems (or under VMWare) for now.

Wine

The Wine Weekly News for July 13th is available.

Quotes from Wine Headquarters webmaster Douglas Ridgway are featured in this article about a planned competitor to Windows NT (not Linux!). "'Microsoft has known about us for a long time, so surely they would've said something by now if they had a problem with our project,' said Douglas Ridgway, webmaster for Wine Headquarters".

Zope

The Zope Weekly News, July 15th edition, is now available. It mentions that another Zope alpha release is out and Zope 2.0 beta is getting close.

Section Editor: Liz Coolbaugh

 
   

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See also: last week's Commerce page.

Linux and business


More software goes open-source:

Boulder Software Foundry announced that it is embracing the Open Source model of software distribution and will extend the capabilities of its Flashpoint Application Server Technology to the Open Source community. Flashpoint is currently available for Linux.

Lamar Owen sent in a nice summary covering the July 9th announcement that AOL had released the source code for AOLserver under an open source license. The summary covers the development history of AOLserver, its functionality, and, of course, the license under which it has been released. "AOL ammended the Mozilla Public License (MPL) and called the result the AOLserver Public License (APL). One of the clauses states that derived works can be released either under the APL or under the GPL -- programmer's discretion."

Linux in embedded systems and other small devices:

Linux as a great prototyping tool for embedded-hardware designs is the subject of an article in the June issue of Electronic Design. "This article describes how MCG plans to use Linux as a proof-of-concept tool on our new high-availability (HA) CompactPCI-based systems. (HA systems are defined as systems that are running 99.999% of the time.)"

The new Pia (Personal Internet Appliance) will be unveiled before a live national (USA) network television audience on Good Morning America, Thursday, July 15, 1999. Here's where you can find the press release about the EBIZ Enterprises' Linux-based PIA.

Rebel.com is set to unveil the first server computer based on the diminutive NetWinder line the company acquired from Corel. NetWinder computers use Red Hat Linux and are based on Intel's StrongARM chip, lauded for being powerful without requiring a lot of electricity. The NetWinders themselves are 9.5 inches tall and 2 inches wide, though rack-mountable versions also are available.

More support, service, and training:

Penguin Computing, manufacturer of reliable Linux systems, announced that it will begin offering sales and technical support in Spanish, French, Japanese, Vietnamese, Turkish, Italian, Hebrew, Chiuchow, Arabic, Mandarin, Cantonese, Thai, Cambodian, German and Russian as well as English.

Linux vendor Red Hat Software announced a partnership with training specialist Global Knowledge that is aimed at establishing Linux credentials for developers. The training will be available in 15 cities across the U.S. and Canada starting in September.

Other stuff:

  • We have the Linux Professional Institute News for 14 July 1999.

    Borland has created a Linux developer survey, intended to help them shape future Borland Linux development tools. The survey will only cover Linux development. You can get more information, and find a link to the survey from here.

    Amiga chooses the Linux kernel for the core of their new Amiga Operating Environment (OE). Apparently the concept didn't fit too well with many in the Amiga community. Here's an example of the feedback. And here's Amiga's respnse. "I simply don't believe we can gain enough momentum without tapping into the Linux momentum. Linux will give us continuous access to new technology and components as they are released. " [Thanks to Robert Knop]

    IDC Japan's prediction of continued growth in market share for Linux was described by the Andover News Network. "On an estimated 2,200 machines in 1998, IDC predicts the Linux user-base will expand to 10,000 servers in the current year, 22,000 in 2000, 34,000 in 2001, 50,000 in 2002 and 65,000 in 2003. The predictions represent a compound annual growth rate over the next five years of 97 percent."

    Press Releases:

    • Adaptec, Inc.'s Ultra160/m SCSI drivers are now embedded in Red Hat Linux 6.0.

    • Compatible Systems Corporation announced that it has signed an agreement with Data General Corporation of Westboro, Mass. under which Data General will perform on-site installation and maintenance of Compatible Systems' IntraPort family of VPN Access Servers.

    • HELIOS Software GmbH announced its network and prepress server software now fully supports multiple processors running the Linux operating system on Pentium-based computers.

    • IBM provided fans with the best seats in the house at Wimbledon via a web site. IBM's DB2 Univeral Database for Linux, was one of many products used in the creation of this web site.

    • Kasten Chase Applied Research announced that its VersaPath Web-to-host product will support the Linux operating system and Java client technology.

    • The MERIT Project is conducting a survey at CA-World 1999 on the manageability of Linux platforms.

    • Metrowerks, Inc. and SuSE, Inc. announced their partnership to provide CodeWarrior software development tools for the SuSE Linux operating system.

    • OnChannel, Inc. developer of operating system software for sub-$199 set-top PCs, announced the introduction of the OS 2000 Beta Test Program for PC manufacturers. OnChannel OS 2000 is derived from Linux.

    • Pericom presents a wide range of X windows based emulations now available for the Linux operating system.

    • Phobos Corporation announced shipment of its P1000 Gigabit Ethernet Network Interface Card with support for PhobosLink Trunking Software on UNIX, Linux and NT servers.

    • Quantified Systems announced the release of Urchin ASAP 2.0 for Apple's new Mac OS X Server. Urchin is the first web statistics system to be developed for the new OS and Urchin ASAP is free. It will run on most systems, including Linux.

    • TechRepublic announced the addition of Mark Hall's UNIX RIOT Column to its site. UNIX RIOT is a weekly "insider" column that covers the UNIX and Linux market.

    • TechRepublic announced the addition to its site of two in-depth information products for IT professionals considering implementation of two of today's hottest software packages -- Linux and Office 2000.

    • Ultera Systems introduced its most advanced product, LibraryMaster, a SCSI-based automated tape library. It works with all tape technologies, including DLTtape, AIT, Mammoth and SLR, as well as the forthcoming LTO and it operates transparently with the leading backup software on a variety of operating systems, including the major UNIX platforms, NetWare, Windows NT and Linux.

    • VSI (V-Systems Inc.) announced that it has entered into a strategic partnership with Red Hat Inc. to provide Red Hat Linux users with the reliable network fax capabilities of the VSI-FAX Gold Series.

    • X10 (USA) Inc. providers of solutions for home automation, security, and entertainment, has teamed with freshmeat.net to offer its loyal members the chance to receive one free Firecracker Kit.

    Section Editor: Rebecca Sobol.


  • July 15, 1999

       

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    See also: last week's Linux in the news page.

    Linux in the news


    Here's this week's picks:
    • The Press in New Zealand has a post-benchmark article. "'The media is doing exactly what Microsoft wants them to do -- presenting a damning result of a set of contrived benchmarking tests that are unrelated to how computers would be used in practice,' says Dave Lane of Egressive, a Linux supplier in Christchurch."

    • 'This Column Is Free', by Jason Levitt is a review of Eric S. Raymond's essay 'The Magic Cauldron'. "The Magic Cauldron is a must-read for Internet entrepreneurs-if only to understand the possibilities of open-source business models. Raymond analyzes the 'economic substrate of the open-source phenomenon', and his conclusions are compelling."

    • This is an installation nightmare story with a twist. In the first half the author, an admitted newbie, attempts to install Microsoft's BackOffice Small Business Server 4.0. and regrets it. In the second half the author installs Red Hat 6.0, qmail, Samba, Apache, PHP3, MySQL, and Phorum for several virtual domains. "I'm sick of hearing people whine that "Linux isn't easy to use". No server software is as easy to use as a consumer OS like Apple -- anyone who can't figure out why this is true has no business around electronic equipment. Half the problem with Linux is that all the hard stuff comes right at the beginning -- disk partitioning, configuring X for your graphics card and monitor, etc. -- and scares people off." (OS Opinion)

    • The Latest and Greatest talks about how the Open Source movement can cure the compatibility hassles of staying on the bleeding edge. " I submit that an Open Source OS will watch the rise and fall of the BeOS. It oversee the death of Windows 2000 and the death of the next rabbit Microsoft pulls out it's hat. And it will watch the end of the Mac. "

    From Federal Computer Week - Linux reviews:

    • FCW did a product comparison on SuSE 6.0, Red Hat 6.0, Caldera 2.2 and TurboLinux Workstation 3.6. "As we tested the products in this comparison, we saw something we hadn't seen in quite a while: an operating system market not dominated by one vendor. The benefits are staggering. "

    • They also reviewed the Linux kernel, version 2.2. "The 2.2 kernel includes support for many different Intel Corp. processors as well as support for chips from Advanced Micro Devices Inc. and Cyrix Corp. This makes it easier for the kernel to deal with the quirks (and bugs) found in the various Pentium or Pentium clone chips."

    From ISPs to SMPs:

    • This New Zealand Press article talks about a new trend where various ISPs offer cheap or free PCs with an internet service contract. Most offer a simplified version of Linux. "Internet phones add to voice calls the ability to read and write e-mail and access websites through a small screen and slide-out keyboard. Set-top boxes provide these functions on the TV set. And not a Windows screen in sight."

    • This CPU Review article delves deeply into the benefits, the how-tos and also the tribulations of putting together a Symmetric Multi-Processing system. "This [Red Hat 6.0] seemed like a match made in heaven... low cost SMP motherboard, low cost CPU's and a free (if I had downloaded it) operating system!" (Thanks to Bill Henning)

    and the rest:

    • In an exclusive interview with Daemon News, Kevin Lawton says: "I'd like to see Windows running at a comfortable speed on a reasonably powered Linux workstation, using dynamic translation." Kevin also explained about his latest project: freemware...

    • Earlier this week Apple announced that they updated QuickTime Streaming Server and added support for Linux on Intel. That's how this OS Opinion article begins. "Initially upon hearing this wonderful news brief, I became overjoyed when I misunderstood this to mean that Linux users could now join the ranks of Macintosh and Windows desktops by playing QuickTime streaming content from their preferred platform."

    • Several alternative operating systems are covered in this San Francisco Chronicle article. " By Christmas, shoppers in the market for a cheap PC will be able to choose among products that run the BeOS, a modern multimedia-oriented system developed by Menlo Park's Be Inc.; Linux, the cooperatively developed, freely distributed operating system that's recently made a splash in corporate and technical markets; and even a new version of GEOS, a decade-old graphical software environment that appeared to have succumbed to the Windows tide years ago."

    • Also from the San Francisco Chronicle a column that very briefly gives some information about PGP and Linux. "The best thing about Linux is that it works on older PCs, so if you have a 386 or 486 system gathering dust in the basement, Linux could give it new life."

    • Here is an introductory article comparing Windows and Linux. Linux gets generally favorable treatment. "But I thought it would be years before Linux was ready for ordinary folks, since it was way too difficult to install and use.
      Boy, was I wrong. Linux' cheery Penguin logo isn't about to drive the Windows flag off of millions of desktops. But if it progresses as fast as it has in the past few months, Linux could soon be a contender, especially in business. It faces many challenges, but Linux is more secure and less crash-prone than Windows 95 or 98, and will run well on much less powerful hardware than Windows NT.
      " (Thanks to Marty Leisner)

    • Here's the news from DaveNet. "Earlier this week we announced a strategic partnership with Digital Creations, the company behind Zope, the deep and open source web content management software on Linux."

    • Linux hits the mainstream press in Chile with this introductory article (in Spanish). [Thanks to Alvaro Herrera]

    • The author of this OS Opinion article is a self-proclaimed student of the arcane Unix arts and an evangelist for the open source movement. The general focus is Microsoft Bad - Linux/open source Good. "Employ Unix/Linux. Learn the command line. Be privy to power. Interact with the kernel from a hair's breadth. Experience real power! Learn to program or write shell scripts. If you do, good for you! If you don't, start now. Broaden your horizons. You are a computer professional after all, not a Saturday morning cartoon junkie."

    Section Editor: Rebecca Sobol


    July 15, 1999

       

    Sections:
     Main page
     Linux in the news
     Security
     Kernel
     Distributions
     Development
     Commerce
     Announcements
     Back page

    See also: last week's Announcements page.

    Announcements


    Resources

    LANshark Systems, Inc has announced their fall training class schedule.

    Events

    There will be a Linux Users Party during the "Fiestorro" in Benaguasil (Valencia/Spain), formerly : Benaguasil-P@rty. July 23 - 25. Click here to get more information.

    Volunteers wanted

    Triumph PC ONLINE is looking for volunteer writers for their webzine.

    July 15, 1999

       

     

    Software Announcements


    Package Version Description
    AbiWord 0.7.3 Fully featured word processor
    ac3dec 0.5.3 A free Dolby Digital (AC-3) decoder for unix
    Aegis 3.18 Transaction-based software configuration management system
    aewm 0.9.1 A minimalistic window manager for X
    Alfajor 1.2 Cookie Filter (Python)
    Alien 6.44 Converts between the rpm, dpkg, stampede slp, andslackware tgz file formats
    AlsaPlayer 0.99.23 PCM (audio) player for Linux/ALSA
    AOLserver 3.0 beta 1 America Online's own web application development platform
    Appindex browser 0.3 Simple ncurses-based Freshmeat appindex.txt browser
    Artistic Style 1.10.0 Indentation and reformatting filters for C, C++, Java
    auto-upload 1.0.2 program that uploads files to an FTP account non-interactively
    Bandmin 0.62 Bandmin is a package that monitors and logs ip accounting data
    BetaFTPD 0.0.8pre1 Single-threaded, small FTP daemon
    Big Brother 1.2b Highly efficient network monitor
    bk2site 0.7.2 Transforms Netscape bookmark file into yahoo-like website.
    Bluefish 0.3.2 Gtk based HTML editor
    BlueLava v0.2 A CGI-based x10 interface for home automation, etc
    Bomb 1.24 automatic interactive visual stimulation
    bookmarker 1.5 WWW based bookmark manager
    BottleRocket 0.04 command-line X10 FireCracker control software
    BRICO Knowledge Base 1.0 Large semantic network of concepts and words referring to them
    Build Your Linux Disk BYLD - 0.9 A package that helps you to build a Linux distribution on a single floppy.
    Cd Backup PERL 1.1 Backups files onto multipule CDs.
    cdlabelgen 1.5.0 Generates frontcards and traycards for CDs
    cdplayer.app 1.1 CD player with CDDB support.
    CDR-Toaster 1.01 Tk frontend for cd-burning. Uses mkisofs and cdrecord
    cgi-util 2.0 A C library for developing web CGI programs.
    CGI-x10 0.2 Perl/CGI interface to Bottlerocket x10 firecracker software
    cgvg 1.3 Tools for convenient grepping through code.
    Columns 1.0 A columns game using SDL
    Common UNIX Printing System (CUPS) 1.0b5 Internet Printing System for UNIX
    CompuPic 4.6 build 1006 CompuPic Graphical Digital Content and File Manager for Linux
    Condor 6.0.3 A distributed batch system that takes advantage of idle cycles of computer
    Cookiecutter 0.1.1 Utility for removing unwanted cookies from Netscape cookie files
    COSA 1.06 Linux driver and tools for the COSA and SRP synchronous serial boards
    crocodiles 0.11-patch1 An ISP packet accounting management package
    Dante 1.1.0-pre2 Free socks v4/5 implementation
    Darxite 0.3 Controllable daemon that downloads via FTP in the background
    Data::Address::Standardize Perl Module 0.001 A Perl module for standardizing U.S. postal addresses
    DB_Browser 1.2 Web-based utility to browse and modify a postgres database
    Debian Intelligent Backup System 0.2.0 The intelligent backup system for Debian GNU/Linux.
    Dejafilter 0.02 Content-filtering CGI-based proxy script for Deja.com queries
    DejaSearch 1.63 DejaSearch is a frontend to DejaNews, the leading Usenet archive
    DGen/SDL 1.16 DGen Sega Genesis emulator, ported to SDL
    Diary.py 0.8 Diary is a simple journal program to record daily events, etc.
    Doubly Linked List 1.1.0 Doubly Linked List API with indexing
    Downloader for X 0.99 Downloads files from the Internet via both FTP and HTTP
    Downtime 2.2.1 Network monitor, watches your connection, and logs downtime.
    EasyGTK 1.1.3 Wrapper library for GTK
    ecasound 1.2.1r3 Sound processing, multitrack recording and mixing
    Edcom Pre1.2.1 An easy to administer, multiuser, story posting system, written in perl5.
    EHD (encrypted-home-directory) 0.6 patch for login to allow encrypted home directories under linux
    EiC 4.1.1 A bytecode C interpreter/compiler
    Elvis 2.1_3 A clone of vi/ex, the standard UNIX editor.
    encrypt 0.7 turns plaintext words into encrypted strings in a variety of ways.
    Ensemble 0.61 A toolkit for constructing reliable distributed applications.
    Epeios 19990627 Collection of general purposes C++ libraries working under UNIX and Windows.
    Etherboot 4.2.4 Source code for making TCP/IP boot ROMs to boot Linux and other OSes
    eXtace 1.1.4 ESD FFT visual plugin, eye-candy
    fbgetty 0.1.3 An extended mingetty for Linux
    fbview 0.3.0 An image viewer for Linux consoles, using the oFBis library. It uses libjpeg and
    Fcheck 2.06.27 Baseline filesystem and administration policy monitor.
    Free Trek 0.16 Star Trek type space battle simulator
    Freeciv 1.8.1 Implementation of Civilization II for UNIX/X released under the GPL
    freemed 19990709 Free medical management software in a web browser
    fwdl-yam4416s 0.0.1 Yamaha 4416S CDRW firmware upgrade utility
    Galway 0.8.0 Guile-gtk HTML Editor
    Ganymede 0.99.4 GPL'ed Network Directory Management System
    gchbkgrd 0.8.0 Program to constantly change the desktop's background
    getAlias 1.1 returns email aliases or list of aliases user belongs to.
    GF1 1.01 Play GIPF against your computer
    GFingerPoken 0.20 BlackBox-type GTK-based game
    gFTP 2.0.3 A multithreaded ftp client for X Windows
    gimp-python 0.5 A package that allows you to write gimp plugins in python
    glFtpD 1.16.7 FTP Daemon for Linux. Great program for an ISP or anyone!
    GnoMail 0.0.2 GnoMail is a yet another GNOME email client.
    GNU Pilot Logbook Pro 0.91 A logbook program for pilots.
    GNU Pth 1.0b7 GNU Portable Threads
    GNU shtool 1.4.3 Shell Script Collection
    GNU xhippo 1.05 Gtk-based playlist manager for various UNIX sound players
    GOB (GTK+ Object Builder) 0.0.1 Preprocessor for building GTK+ Object
    GPeriodic 1.2.1 Periodic Table Reference and Browser
    Gqcam 0.3 GTK based QuickPict clone
    grep-dctrl 1.0 grep Debian control files
    GTC 0.1 Game Programming Library
    GTetrinet 0.3 A clone of the game Tetrinet.
    GTK File Browser pre-0.20 Small, fast, lightweight, GTK File Browser
    GTK xset 0.1 GTK xset is a graphical frontend to xset(1), based on GTK+
    GTK+XFce 3.0.0 (final) Easy-to-use and easy-to-configure environment for X11
    Gtk::Dialogs 1.0-1 Simple Perl interface to create dialog boxes with Gtk
    GtKali 0.9.1 Gtk+ interface to Kali.
    GTKdiff 0.9.5 GTK+ diff frontend
    GTKeyboard 0.96 Graphical Keyboard for the physically disabled
    gtkpool 0.2 Simple GTK+ pool game
    gtk_pizza 2.0 Pizza Delivery System for Pizza Services and Bistros
    gtml 3.34 An HTML pre-processor specially designed for maintaining web sites.
    Guppi 0.11.0 GNOME application for plotting and analyzing data
    Hevea 1.04 HEVEA is a quite complete and fast LATEX to HTML translator.
    HTML PLAIN 1.0.7 A revolutionary HTML precompiler
    HTMLPerlSETI 0.4 Display SETI@home client statistics in an HTML table.
    Humanoid 0.3.3.3 a pure Java arcade video game clone of the classic
    icecast 1.3.0 MP3 Audio Broadcasting System
    icoutils 0.9.0 A set of programs that deal with MS Windows icons and cursors
    iGecko 0.99 Financial Media Player
    ILD 0.1.2 Throughput logging for the Traverse Technologies NetJet ISDN router
    IMHO 0.96.2 IMAP4 Mail Host for Roxen
    IMP 2.0.9 IMAP and PHP3 based webmail system
    indent 2.1.0 GNU indenting program
    InfoPrism pre0.0.7 A General Document Processing System
    InfraRed-HOWTO 2.7 How to use the software provided by the Linux/IrDA project.
    inpowerd 1.0 UPS power event notification server.
    intimed 2.00 A time server for synchronizing networked machines' clocks.
    ircu 2.10.06.24 Undernet's IRC daemon
    IRMP3 0.3.1 MP3 jukebox daemon, controllable by IR remote control, optional LCDisplay output
    isp-watcher 1.06.1 A perl script which monitors lines at an ISP for disconnects.
    jdrinfo 0.1 Implements a hypothetical machine-information retreival protocol
    jed 0.99-8 Powerful editor, terminal and X11 interface
    jEdit 1.7pre5 Powerful text editor
    Kalendar 0.5d Simple, easy to use calendar and to-do list manager
    Keystone 0.60.01 Web-based problem tracking system, rewrite of an older system called PTS
    KHexEdit 0.8.1 Versatile binary file editor for KDE
    kISDN 1.0 ISDN configuration and monitoring GUI
    KPackage 1.3.6 GUI interface to the RPM and the Debianpackage manager
    Krabber 0.4.2 Pre 4 KDE audio cd grabber and mp3 encoder front-end
    Krio 0.19990708 A graphical interface to your Diamond Rio
    KRunning 0.1.9 A database manager for your private running events
    KVIrc 1.0.0 beta 1 Enhanced visual IRC client for X11/KDE
    leak 1.0 Simple sysadm shell script for finding which process is leaking memory.
    Lesstif 0.88.9 LGPL'd re-implementation of Motif
    liboop 0.1 Low-level event loop dispatcher.
    LiCe4 4.0.7 Fully functional script for EPIC4, with excellent userlist functions.
    LilyPond 1.1.54 The GNU Project music typesetter
    LinKT 0.6.1 Packet-Radio terminal for radio amateurs
    Linux Backup 1.0 A small utility to backup files
    Linux Virtual Server 0.7 for Kernel 2.2.10 Linux Load Balancing and NAT
    Linuxconf 1.16r1.1 Sophisticated administrative tool
    Lithium 0.3.0 Suite of Network/System Admin Tools with a GTK+ GUI
    Logresolve.pl 0.3 Replaces the standard logresolve application that comes bundled with Apache
    Lothar project 0.2 Tools for hardware configuration
    Lua 3.2 An extensible extension language
    lwm 0.8
    Lynx 2.8.3.dev4 fully-featured, text-based World Wide Web browser
    MachineInfo 1.1 author
    mailblink 0.3 Blinks LEDs when new mail arrives.
    Majik 3D 0.00/M1 An online role-playing world
    maketool 0.3 GTK front end for GNU make
    MathMap 0.10 A very generic GIMP plug-in
    mbx2mbox 0.2 Converts Outlook Express .mbx files into standard RFC822 mail files.
    mGSTEP 0.144 An attempt at creating a small lite derivative of GNUstep
    mg^2 0.1.12 Truespace work/look alike 3D modeler using Gtk and OpenGL
    mhash 0.5.2 Provides an easy to use C interface for several hashalgorithms
    Midgard 1.1 A PHP Application Server Suite - Web building with Web-based tools
    Midnight Commander 4.5.37 Unix file manager and shell
    MindTerm 0.98-4 SSH-client in pure Java, includes stand-alone ssh- and terminal(vt100)-packages
    MiniMate 3.14.0.3 Administration tool for MiniVend
    minordomo 0.7 A minimalistic mailing list manager
    mkdnstab 0.3 DNS Table generator in Perl
    monitor.c 1.0.0 power off after prolonged inactivity
    MP3c 0.17 Audio-CD to MP3-Converter, with use of CDDB. Included GUI and cmdline-support
    MPEG Movie Tools 1.0.0 Complete set of tools for encoding MPEG-I movies with picture and sound
    mpstat 0.0.9 Helps monitoring SMP machines
    mtools 3.9.6
    Multi-vendor UPS Monitoring Project 0.41.1 Multiple vendor (APC, Powercom) UPS monitoring software
    MyGuestbook 0.7.0 A simple Guestbook using PHP3 and MySQL, several languages supported
    MySQL 3.23.1-alpha SQL (Structured Query Language) database server
    NAMG 0.0.7 Downloads mail from a NetAddress account and forwards it locally
    NetLeds applet 0.9.0 A gnome applet that displays lights (RX, TX and COL) from a network device.
    NetSaint 0.0.4b1 A relatively simple active network monitor
    news2html 0.2 converts news articles into HTML formatted files.
    nget 0.7 auto-resuming command line nntp file grabber
    ngrep 1.33 network grep
    nis-utils 1.1 Linux NIS+ Tools
    ntop 1.2a2 Network usage monitor
    oFBis 0.0.9 Framebuffer graphical library for Linux.
    OfflineMailer 0.2 Offline mail handler
    ojstools 0.3 Tools to simplify JavaScript programming
    OpenNaken 0.20 Tcl/Tk client for Naken Chat
    ORBit 0.4.92 Thin/fast CORBA ORB
    Paloma 0.82a Relational music/mp3 database system
    passwdd 0.03 Password synchronization server/client
    PCCS NRM 0.8c Network Resource Manager (PC, NW Printers, and Software)
    PCI Utilities 2.1-pre4 Utilities for diagnostics and cofiguration of PCI devices
    PDAddUser 1.1 Tool for administering large amounts of users easily from simple text lists
    ped 0.1.2 A text editor with an emacs/vi-like user interface written in perl.
    Perl App Server 19990712 Object Oriented Application Server written in Perl
    PHPLIB 7 Web Application Development Package for the PHP 3 language
    phpop 0.2 Simple PHP Web based POP e-mail reader
    phpPolls 1.0.2 PHP Voting Booth
    popexec 0.0 Runs any arbitrary command when new e-mail arrives at a POP mailbox
    Popol 0.2 ID3v1.1 tagger, doesn't append tags to already tagged file...
    PoPToP 0.9.5 PPTP Server for Linux
    PortSentry 0.98 Detects and responds to port scans against a target host inreal-time.
    PPP_Install 0.1.2 Easy way to install PPP internet scripts for use on Console or Xwindow
    privtool 0.90 Beta GT009 Sun mailtool replacement with PGP support
    psiconv 0.3.0 Psion 5 file conversion utilities and file format documentation
    ptkfonted 0.11 Perl/Tk BDF Font Editor
    PURP 0.9.0 An ncurses-based RPM-manager
    PyGCS 1.3.2 A very stripped down MUD-like chat-server written entirely in Python.
    Q10 0.20 A basic Qt GUI for manipulating X10's Firecracker devices
    QScheme 0.2 Really fast, small and easy to interface Scheme interpreter
    QuickList 0.6.0 MS Works like database application
    QuIRC 0.9.79 X IRC client written in C++ with full Tcl/Tk scripting.
    Quotable Homer quotes 19990711 Homer Simpson quotes for `fortune`
    RadioActive 0.6 patch 1 Radio tuner for X11 and Video4Linux
    radkill 1.21 BASH script for ISP's that wish to guarantee no busy signals
    REalizer 0.3 Python regular expression tester
    RearSite 0.81 Tool for updating personal www pages
    Remembrance Agent 2.04 Remembrance Agents are an augmented, associative memory.
    ripperX 0.98 A graphical interface to cdparanoia and 8hz-mp3
    RPM 3.0.2 Red Hat's package management system
    sblive (EMU10K1) v0.3b Linux Driver for SoundBlaster Live! and Live! Value.
    sci 0.5.4 A data entry screen builder which works from ASCII templates
    ScryMUD 1.9.11 Original MUD Server and Java Client
    sherpa 0.1.1 A system security configuration and maintenance tool
    sitecopy 0.7.0 Maintain remote copies of locally stored web sites
    slang 1.3.8 A powerful interpreted language
    SMS Client 2.0.8h Command line based utility which allows you to send SMS messages
    spec-gen 0.0.6 simple spec file generator
    Spruce 0.4.8a Simple email client coded for X with the Gtk widget set
    sqlbind8 0.9.0 SQL backend to Bind 8
    sqrmimport 1.0 Import util for the Squirm redirector
    Squid 2.2.STABLE4 High performance Web proxy cache
    Squirm 1.0B A fast & configurable redirector for the Squid Internet Object Cache.
    strace 4.0 System call tracing utility (like trace, truss, etc)
    sudo 1.6b6 Provides limited super user priviledges to specific users
    Sula Primerix II 0.09.1 Extensible multi-server IRC Client for X
    susi 071399 An easy user-interface management
    SWplayer 1.1 Plays Simon Jansen's Star Wars ASCIImation on a Unix text terminal. With source.
    syslog-ng 1.1.27 A portable syslogd replacement with enhanced, flexible configuration scheme.
    tar 1.13.1 utility used to store, backup, and transport files.
    TCE/Java 1.0.1 Java class library - minsize, maxperf - BigDecimal, string conversions, more
    TCL Developer Studio 1.0 small
    tcpdstats 1.2 tcpd log analyzer
    The Loci Project (alpha) A network-distributed system of clients and servers for computational biology
    The Newsroom 1.01c The Newsroom for the Falken BBS Software.
    The SCOOBS Context Based Search Engine 1.0.1 A Java Based XML Search Engine that allows searching with context.
    TkFM 1.0.2 Tcl/Tk File Manager
    tkFTP 1.0.2 tkFTP is an FTP client completely written with the Tcl/Tk scripting language.
    TKnetbus 0.2.1 Tcl/tk-client for the cracking-tool netbus
    tkWorld 1.3.0 Wes's Own Really Lazy Desktop
    tpctl 0.1.9 a ThinkPad configuration tool for Linux
    Traveller's Linux 1.1.8 Minimal floppy Linux distribution
    twonz 0.1 secure hash calculator for password management
    uri 2.3 URI manipulation library
    util-linux 2.9u Miscellaneous system utilities
    Venezia 0.9 C++/GTK++ based client for the c-mserver (masqdialing)
    Vim 5.4o Popular vi clone that features syntax highlighting and an X11 interface
    ViperDB 0.8 A smaller and faster option to Tripwire
    Wacom Driver for XFree86 alpha 8 Wacom driver for XFree86
    WaveForge 0.0.2 A Sound Forge Wave Editor Clone for Linux.
    webbase 5.1 Internet crawler C library and program
    Webinterface for Unix Listproc 0.1 A Webinterface for Unix Listproc; user functions only; no admin stuff (yet?)
    Webmin 0.73 Web-based interface for system administration for Unix
    WebRFM 0.2a CGI file manager supporting WebDAV and other HTTP extensions
    which 2.7 Show full path of commands
    WMmhcheck 1.0 Window Maker applet to display number of messages in your mailboxes
    WMmnt 2.5 a mount.app-like dockapp, that uses LEDs and big icons
    WMNetMon 0.2 A WindowMaker dockable network host monitoring tool using ICMP pings.
    wmRecord 1.0.0 wmRecord is a general purpose audio recording utility
    wmx10 0.01 A WindowMaker/Afterstep applet to control X10's Firecracker kit
    wmy2k 2.0 beta1 Countdown to y2k for your Window Maker dock
    X-Chat 1.1.2 GTK+ Based IRC Client. Alot like AmIRC (Amiga).
    XEmacs 21.1.4 (Arches) Internationalized text editor
    xmemo 1.00 XWindow desktop memo.
    XML::Parser 2.24 XML Parser module for perl based on James Clark's expat lib
    XMMS-Solaris 0.2.1 Output plugin for XMMS to play on Solaris audio
    Xplanet 0.30 An Xearth wannabe
    xps 3.14 X/Motif dynamic display the Unix processes tree/forest
    XRacer 0.52 Clone of Psygnosis WipeOut
    XSane 0.28 A GTK-based X11 frontend for SANE, also a GIMP plugin
    xterm Patch #111 A terminal emulator for the X Window System
    Yacas 1.0.3 Yet Another Computer Algebra System
    Zircon 1.18.220 An IRC client written in tcl/tk
     

    Our software announcements are provided courtesy of FreshMeat

       

    Sections:
     Main page
     Linux in the news
     Security
     Kernel
     Distributions
     Development
     Commerce
     Announcements
     Back page

    See also: last week's Back page page.

    Linux links of the week


    A security resource site that has been the source of good information we've used over the past year is Rootshell.com. It was surprising to review our links of the week for the past year and note that we had not yet mentioned them.

    Reviewing past Links of the Week has been amusing, to say the least. Checking out our editions from last March, no wonder that links were easier to find, when we were busy introducing Slashdot and FreshMeat. Both of these sites, of course, predate our first edition by several months, but we mentioned them for anyone who happened to run across our site before hearing about theirs.

    Section Editor: Jon Corbet


    July 15, 1999

       

     

    Letters to the editor


    Letters to the editor should be sent to letters@lwn.net. Preference will be given to letters which are short, to the point, and well written. If you want your email address "anti-spammed" in some way please be sure to let us know. We do not have a policy against anonymous letters, but we will be reluctant to include them.
     
       
    From: Mike Richardson <mike@quaking.demon.co.uk>
    To: letters@lwn.net
    Subject: MS Buys RedHat
    Date: Thu, 8 Jul 1999 09:03:55 +0100
    
    There has been some speculation that M$oft might buy up all the RedHat
    stock. It has been pointed out that this would not give them any useful
    control over RedHat, so presumably there is no immediate threat.
    
    But what if they could. Suppose that RedHat offered anough stock that
    M$oft could buy control, and suppose that M$oft forgot their "Linux is
    a viable competitor" arguments to the DOJ. What would they gain? I
    suggest that the answer is pretty well zero.
    
    IPR? Hardly, everything is available under the GPL, they can obtain it
    anyway if they want, just as I can. People? I think that you wouldn't
    be able to see for all the dust as the people who make RedHat distinct
    bolt. Income? RedHat sales would go down like a lead brick.
    
    I think we can ignore this one.
    
    Mike Richardson
    Series 1 Software
    England
    
       
    Date: Fri, 09 Jul 1999 03:50:53 -0500
    From: Tom Adelstein <tadelstein@earthlink.net>
    To: letters@lwn.net
    Subject: Lotus Notes on Linux
    
    In your article you say:
    It seems Lotus will only come kicking and screaming into the fold after
    all...it ends with the comment, "What Lotus won't be doing, however, is
    bringing the Lotus Notes client or SmartSuite Millennium Edition 9.5
    office suite to Linux...
    
    In a press release published at LinuxToday we stated
    (http://linuxpr.com/releases/124.html)
    
    "We're beginning to source some important breakthroughs for Linux. One
    of our consultants has a Lotus Notes client running on Linux and we'll
    post the how-to very soon. That's a milestone for moving the Linux
    desktop into the enterprise." 
    
    Also, several references within IBM internal forums exist discussing
    Lotus Notes running on Linux desktops in production environments.
    
    What is IBM going to do, deport companies and their own personnel who
    want to run the Client on Linux? In our call center we're running Notes
    server on an OS/2 in a token ring environment with Linux clients. How
    about that!
    
       
    Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 19:35:25 +0200
    From: Bernhard Weiss <Bernhard.Weiss@KryptoKom.de>
    To: letters@lwn.net
    Subject: CORBA - IIOP/GIOP
    
    Hello dear reader,
    
    to expand our Linux based "High level firewall" we look for someone who is
    capable and interested to give a one or two day inhouse introduction on
    CORBA.  The focus should be IIOP/GIOP and the implications in their use
    through firewalls in Intranet, Extranet and Internet.  An additional topic
    might be interoperability between different implementations.  The CORBA
    basics should be included, to help understanding the whole concept.
    
    The presentation language may be english or german and it should be given
    at our main location in Aachen/Germany.
    
    Financial terms are to be negotiated.
    
    Please refer to our homepage for informations about
    KryptoKom:
    
    Homepage in english http://www.kryptokom.de/english/index.html
    Homepage in german http://www.kryptokom.de/
    
    Thanks and regards
                    Bernhard Weiss
    -- 
    Bernhard Weiss                   KryptoKom GmbH
    Technology Service               Dennewartstr. 27
                                     D-52068 Aachen
    bernhard.weiss@kryptokom.de      http://www.kryptokom.de
    
           Office Marburg            Central Office Aachen
    Phone: +49 (0)6424 / 964497      +49 (0)241 / 963 - 1380
    FAX:   +49 (0)6424 / 964495      +49 (0)241 / 963 - 1390
    
       
    Date: Wed, 14 Jul 1999 13:53:08 -0700
    From: Anand Srivastava <anand@nmi.stpn.soft.net>
    To: tburgess@netcom.ca, letters@lwn.net
    Subject: Designing the Linux for the Masses
    
    Hi,
    
    If you look from the programmers point of view Linux fulfills all the seven
    criterias that you have outlined. But then the system is made by
    programmers for programmers. I guess if general users can't think the way
    programmers think they will have to live with Windows ;-). Why do
    programmers care. They are not making Linux for altruistic motives. They
    just want to have the best systems for themselves. We will and are getting
    GUIs but they will also fulfill those criterias only for
    programmers. Unless users take it upon themselves to write an operating
    system for themselves, or they can continue to use Windows and live with
    its stability (or rather the lack of it).
    
    Of course there will be a time when Linux will have GUIs for normal users
    too.  Because programmers are making our GUIs very very configurable. It
    melds with their idea of choice in everything. They will also make it
    easier to make those configurations. That will be the time when some
    intelligent (we are not oriented towards normal users, they don't pay us,
    they don't make any additions, if they can't even use the interfaces made
    by us, so we can call them stupid, for our purposes, and as Scott Adams
    says everybody is an induhvidual in some field), normal users will be able
    to dumb down the GUI to normal users tastes.
    
    I don't know why anybody would like less freedom. But maybe normal users
    need chains around them to prevent them from poking around where they don't
    have any business. But this is what Orwell predicted. So maybe we are
    entering a time when they will need chains. But I would rather be free. My
    advice would be to have the freedom, but just don't go around messing with
    things that you don't understand.  That is what freedom is, if you screw up
    you go to jail, rather being in jail from the beginning.
    
    I hope you won't lull yourself into thinking that programmers want to make
    Linux the best system for everybody. They care too much about
    themselves. If you want to do that start a company and hire designers and
    programmers to do that, of course you will be charging money for what you
    produce. We will see what eventually becomes more used the free stuff or
    the more dumb user friendly. I believe the masses don't want to spend money
    on GUIs, and they will take whatever is free.  As long as their favourite
    browser, or app runs on it ;-).
    
    -anand
    
    
       
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