See also: last week's Commerce page.

Linux and Business

Let's Make a Deal. One way to get your software out to a wider audience is to bundle it with other packages. This week we saw a number of deals of this sort. For example, Loki Software announced that they are now shipping PowerPlant, a suite of developer tools and software for Linux from theKompany.com. Loki mostly sells computer games, ported to Linux. theKompany.com has tools that help game developers. It's a win-win situation for both companies and their customers.

Along the same lines, Corel has announced a deal which will get Corel Linux and Word Perfect Office 2000 bundled with systems sold by Andara Technologies.

Sun Microsystems is doing it too. They announced a long list of companies that have agreed to redistribute StarOffice 5.2. The list includes Caldera, Red Hat, TurboLinux, SuSE, MandrakeSoft, Conectiva, Definite Software, Stormix, MacMillan, and Easy Information Technology.

Lineo's product is its Embedix embeddable distribution and they are working with Hitachi Semiconductor to bring Embedix to Hitachi's SuperH processor.

This deal between VistaSource (part of Applix) and Comdisco offers Linux desktop systems, based on refurbished computers, with the intent of making a very low-cost system aimed at schools, non-profit organizations, and other budget-constrained customers.

Services can be shared too, as we see in this announcement from NCR, saying that it will be offering support services for Red Hat's distribution.

Also service-oriented is this press release announcing plans from Cendio Systems and Cell Network to offer new companies developing free software "a complete range of services to help them get their businesses up-and-running more quickly". Cendio will be offering a development platform while Cell Network offers business development services.

New Products. Terra Soft Solutions has announced a demo of an 8-node, Apple G4 cluster running Terra Soft's Black Lab Linux at MacWorld.

MSC Software has released MSC.Nastran DMP for Linux. Dubbed ''Supercomputing Without a Supercomputer'', MSC.Nastran is a package that has been used in the aerospace and automotive industries to distributing large simulation tasks amongst many PC computers.

SolSoft has announced the release of its "Solsoft NSM" proxy firewall code as open source. A quick look at the associated web site shows that the GPL has been used to license the code.

Popular Power, developers of commercial distributed computing software software package released in April, announced the availability of a Linux client for their software. "Once downloaded from www.popularpower.com, the Popular Power software operates in the background of Linux machines. When a PC is idle or has spare processing power, the program gets a small piece of a large computing task from the Popular Power server and returns results when complete. Popular Power's general-purpose commercial software differs from that of earlier, non-commercial efforts in its ability to execute different types of jobs, as opposed to single functions."

An open source release of the client is promised for early next year. The software is envisioned for use in donating time for research projects or even potentially selling unused time to commercial companies at some point in the future.

IBM has announced the availability of "WebSphere Homepage Builder" for Linux.

Napster Press Release. Napster has posted a press release with information from the legal brief they have filed. "First, the RIAA contends that Napster users are infringing. However, under the decision that protected the manufacturing of MP3 players, referred to as "the Diamond decision," and under the Federal statute called the "Audio Home Recording Act," (AHRA) consumers have an absolute right to create and transfer digital music for noncommercial purposes. And since its users are not directly infringing, Napster cannot be liable for contributory infringement."

Sourceforge growth rate 23 percent per month. VA Linux released this press release indicating that new free software projects have been added to the Sourceforge repository at a growth rate of 23 percent per month. Recent high-recognition additions to Sourceforge include MySQL and XFree86.

Press Releases:

Open Source Products.
Unless specified, license is unverified.

• Last week in this space we reported on SF Interactive, Inc. and its release of TagTemplate website building software to the worldwide open source community. We have since discovered that the module was released under the "GNU Lesser General Public License" The GNU LGPL.

• The Salutation Consortium (HIGHLAND, Utah), which provides open information exchange standard called service discovery for multi-platform handheld computers, will offer its reference model Salutation Lite code through an "open source arrangement".

Commercial Products for Linux.

• BigStorage Inc. (San Francisco) announced the unveiling of the tRAID, the first industrial-strength RAID for Linux.

• Inprise/Borland (SCOTTS VALLEY, Calif.) announced full support of native database driven Apache Server applications in its forthcoming Linux developer tool set code named "Kylix."

• Linux NetworX, Inc. (SANDY, UTAH) announced the release of ClusterWorX version 1.2, its cluster management software.

• Macmillan USA (INDIANAPOLIS) announced that Linux-Mandrake 7.1 Deluxe is now available in retail stores. The Deluxe edition includes 7 CDs of applications, utilities and tools.

• Macro 4 (PARSIPPANY, N.J.) launched UniQPrint for Linux, adding output management for printing, faxing and web site postings to the list of traditional enterprise applications available on Linux.

• Mele Systems, LLC (GREAT RIVER, NY) announced it will unveil Youseful-Linux, the Linux version of Youseful in both a Delphi and stand-alone version.

• Proven Accounting, Inc. announced that Proven CHOICE, its multi-user accounting system for Linux, will now be available only through qualified Linux installers and dealers.

• Quicknet Technologies, Inc. (SAN FRANCISCO) announced their new Linux Special Edition family of products. These products are the Internet LineJACK Linux Edition, Internet PhoneJACK Lite Linux Edition, Internet PhoneJACK-PCI Linux Edition, and Internet PhoneCARD Linux Edition, and Quicknet's "open-sourced" Linux drivers.

• Rackspace (SAN ANTONIO) introduced Unison, a proprietary load balancing solution.

• Xi Graphics Inc. (DENVER) released the DeXtop graphical user interface (GUI) is based on the Open Group's CDE or Common Desktop Environment.

• Xi Graphics Inc. (DENVER) announced 3D graphics support for Linux laptops.

Products with Linux Versions.

• Aestiva LLC (TORRANCE, Calif.) announced the release of Aestiva HTML/OS 1.8, the latest version of its Web operating system.

• Dataram Corporation (PRINCETON, N.J.) announced immediate availability of memory products for Silicon Graphics 230 and 330 workstations.

• Deneba Software (MIAMI) announced the release of Canvas 7.0.2, an integrated design application.

• Hypercosm, Inc. (SAN JOSE, Calif.) is offering $1,250 in cash for the best interactive 3D applet in one of five categories, use Hypercosm Studio.

• Lockheed Martin Global Telecommunications (BETHESDA, Md.) announced the launch of its Securedge(SM) VPN (Virtual Private Network) service.

• MAPICS, Inc. (ATLANTA) announced the global expansion of its Point.Man extended enterprise application (EEA), now available in the United Kingdom and Ireland.

• Net Talk (LOS ANGELES) announced its voice over IP technology is now available for Red Hat Linux.

• Opera Software (OSLO, Norway) released the full version of Opera 3.62 for EPOC.

• Rave Computer Association (Sterling Heights, Michigan) announced that they will integrate SPARC based platforms for customers building a Linux operating environment.

• SST (Silicon Storage Technology, Inc.) (BOSTON) announced that it has entered the embedded mass data storage market with the introduction of a flash memory-based ATA-Disk Chip (ADC) product family.

• Tech Soft America (TSA) (ALAMEDA, Calif.) announced the availability of the HOOPS Internet Tools for the creation of web-based visualization applications or publishing models to the web. The HOOPS Internet Tools consist of the HOOPS/Stream and HOOPS/ActiveX Toolkits.

• Tech Soft America (TSA) (ALAMEDA, Calif.) announced the immediate availability of the HOOPS 3D Application Framework (HOOPS/3dAF) version 5.0, with enhancements and extensions, including the HOOPS Internet Tools module. d

Java Products.

• Inprise/Borland (SAN DIEGO) announced its e-Commerce Framework Solution, an integrated software and consulting solution.

• Orbware (LONDON) announced the final release of OrCAS Enterprise Server v4.0 for EJB, a clean room implementation of the Enterprise JavaBeans 1.1 specification.

Books and Training.

• Advanced Open Source Solutions (AOSS) (Roseville, CA) is offering real-world training courses to high school and college students at the Roseville Linux Training Center.

• O'Reilly & Associates (Sebastopol, CA) announced "Linux Network Administrator's Guide", by Olaf Kirch. Originally part of the Linux Documentation Project, this book will "enable users to master all those day-to-day, practical issues that arise in Linux networking."

• O'Reilly (SEBASTOPOL, Calif.) announced a new edition of "Building Internet Firewalls".

Partnerships.

• Cybernet Systems (ANN ARBOR, Mich.) introduced an expanded Value-Added Reseller (VAR) partnership program for NetMAX, their Linux-based Internet appliance software.

• Lineo, Inc. (LINDON, Utah) announced they are teaming with National Semiconductor Corp. to co-develop Linux-based software development kits for the Information Appliance (IA) market.

• The Linux Insider (LOS ANGELES) is now offering a free Internet content service for webmasters, Web site owners, and developers of Linux-related sites.

• Mainsoft Corporation (ORLANDO, Fla.) announced its participation in the Microsoft Visual Studio Integration Program. Mainsoft's MainWin product is a Windows platform for UNIX and Linux, which allows developers to recompile and link Windows-based Visual Studio source code on UNIX and Linux.

• Sair Linux and GNU Certification (OXFORD, Miss.) signed on as a Sponsoring Corporate Member of Linux International, a non-profit organization of Linux activists.

• SteelEye Technology Inc. and Caldera Systems Inc. (MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. and OREM, Utah) announced that SteelEye's LifeKeeper reliability clustering product has been certified on Caldera OpenLinux eDesktop and eServer platforms.

Investments and Acquisitions.

• InterVideo Inc. (SANTA CLARA, Calif.) is getting help from intellectual capital exchange HelloBrain.com. Using that capital, InterVideo will be releasing a Linux version of its product in late summer 2000.

• Progeny Linux Systems, the startup created by Ian Murdock and Bruce Perens, has announced the completion of its first round of financing. Progeny's focus seems to be on the network management side - their products will be aimed at management of networks of workstations as single systems.

Linux At Work.

• Linux NetworX has announced that Lockheed Martin is using a 128-processor Linux cluster for aircraft analysis tasks.

• VA Linux Systems, Inc. (SUNNYVALE, Calif.) announced that Incanta, Inc. is rolling out hundreds of VA Linux servers across its broadband-edge network infrastructure.

Other.

• M-Systems Flash Disk Pioneers Ltd. (BOSTON) announced that leading Linux operating system developers are providing support for DiskOnChip in existing and upcoming Linux distributions.

• Vovida Networks, Inc. (SAN JOSE, Calif.) is sponsoring a position on the International Softswitch Consortium (ISC) for someone in the Linux development community.

Section Editor: Rebecca Sobol.

Next: Linux in the news