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

Linux in the news

Recommended Reading

IPOs will feel the chill in 2001 (Upside). Will the IPO market rebound enough to impact Linux? Upside took a look at IPOs in 2001. "High-tech's best picks in 2001 probably will be all about bandwidth, mobility, infrastructure, software and services that enhance e-commerce, Internet security, privacy protection and the like, says Manuel Fernandez, head of SI Ventures in Fort Myers, Fla., and chairman of the Gartner Group." Linux and Free Software will certainly be part of that mix.

Linux gaining with mission-critical systems (CNN). CNN carried a story this past week from CIO Magazine on the gains Linux has made in mission critical systems. "Within a week and a half, VA Linux had rewritten the kernel, and the data center has worked flawlessly since. And because Linux is open source, the improvement was made available to all Linux distributions. As such, it can benefit every Linux user, present and future. Of course, startup Netledger had the luxury of building from scratch -- not always an option for large brick-and-mortar companies. And while Durkee knows he took a risk with an unproven technology, he thinks his success has served as a proof of concept for established companies that are reluctant to take a chance with Linux on their mission-critical systems."

Pirates Beware: We're Watching (Wired). At midweek, Wired examined what movie and music companies are up against in trying to prevent file sharing ala Napster. "If you flip every bit in the MP3 (just invert it), then they wouldn't be able to recognize it. On the other end, just flip 'em back. Piece of cake to do; they'd have to update their software to check for the flipped bits," [spoke software programmer David Weekly.]

While the system might sound difficult, Weekly said that public key cryptography applications like Napster and Gnutella could build the encryption into upgraded versions. So users would have a seamless experience of file-trading, while the network tracking systems wouldn't know that infringing files had crossed the network."

Companies

Slackware.com compromised. After more than a week of silence, Slackware announced on Wednesday that their main web site - slackware.com - was compromised on December 25th, forcing a shutdown of that site to do a complete audit. That audit was completed on Wednesday prior to the announcement and backup files were restored. The break in appeared to have been due to an older version of imapd, which had known security holes that have since been fixed. Slackware neglected to upgrade imapd on that system. The site was up and running again at the time of their announcement.

Business

Transmeta to help AMD push into servers (News.com). According to C|Net's News.com, AMD is looking to Transmeta's Crusoe chip and a special version of their code morphing software to give software developers a jump start in porting applications to AMD's upcoming SledgeHammer chip. "The Sledgehammer simulator is crucial to AMD's plans to break into the lucrative server market. With a software simulation of the chip, developers can tweak their programs so they can release products when Sledgehammer emerges commercially in the first half of 2002. AMD will also come out with a version for desktop computers called ClawHammer, the company has said."

Resources

Linux fans still waiting for new kernel (News.com). C|Net recounted the planned releases for 2.4 over the past 2 years. "Torvalds said in June 1999 that Linux 2.4 would be done by last fall. In May 2000, Torvalds acknowledged that likely it would be October 2000 before 2.4 saw the light of day, since developers were attempting to cram more new, high-end features into the final release. On Oct. 6, at Frankfurt's LinuxWorld, Torvalds was quoted as saying Linux 2.4 wouldn't be launched until December at the earliest."

Reviews

Y2K and the Desktop Experience (Linux Orbit). This Linux Orbit piece looked at the Linux Desktop, how it changed in 2000 and how it might change in 2001. "As I stare into my GPL'd crystal ball, I see the new market of less-tech savvy, but more spend-happy, Linux converts driving the shape of desktop Linux to come. Basic economics will tell you that supply and demand are what drives an industry, and the new blood of the Linux community will drive development toward a more end-user friendly, less technical Linux. End users want ease, and are willing to pay for it. The companies that will have the most success will be the ones catering to that market."

Linuxiso.org reviews "The Process of Network Security". The book The Process of Network Security : Designing and Managing a Safe Network by Thomas A. Wadlow was reviewed by Linuxiso.org. "This book is written for network managers and administrators. Readers should also be familiar with computing and network processes and terminology. Divided into 16 chapters, this book has a good flow about it. The focus is on helping the reader to understand just what security is, what to do when a system is compromised, and how to protect these systems in the future."

The Linux Internet Dream (OS Opinion). This OS Opinion article discussed the widespread acceptance of Linux on the desktop. "Linux is currently going through the same stages the Internet did. It started off as a geeks-only area, but some very smart companies -- IBM and so forth -- saw the potential for the OS, just like very smart companies -- Netscape -- saw the potential for the Internet. These companies are the ones that are going to bring Linux to the home user. This business method has much in common with those early adopters that brought the Internet to the home user."

Abit KT7-RAID MotherBoard Review (LinuxLookup). Here's a review from LinuxLookup that ran this past week on the Abit KT7-RAID MotherBoard running Linux. "With Socket A motherboards now being almost a dime a dozen, Abit steps in with its contender, the KT7-RAID. This board packs a killer punch, and there is no question it is one of the top boards for Socket A processors. In the past, Abit has been quite innovative with its products, and the KT7-RAID continues this tradition. Lets see how this baby shapes up under Linux."

Socket A Boards Revisited: AOpen's AK73 Pro and Soyo's 7VTA-B (Signal Ground). Signal Ground posted an article on using Socket A motherboards with Linux. "It's unfortunate that UDMA66 and UDMA100 don't work "out of the box" on these boards yet, but that's hardly the fault of the Linux developers. It'd certainly be helpful if the specs were available to the general public (Vojtech told us that if they were, he'd have updated his driver already), but sometimes you can't have it all."

People

Reader's Digest European of the Year. Linus Torvalds was named the Reader's Digest European of the Year for 2000. "Torvalds had done something remarkable: he had created the kernel of a new computer operating system-the brains of a computer which controls the hardware and organizes the programs. Not only that, he had then given it away free, a decision akin to the Coca-Cola company publishing the formula for Coke, or MI5 releasing its top-secret files." (Thanks to Richard Storey)

Miscellaneous

The year of predicting dangerously? (ZDNet). ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley searched for a good prediction for Linux in 2001. "When I asked Stacey Quandt, Linux analyst at Giga Information Group, for her two cents, she proposed that 2001 be designated the "Year of Managed Services" for Linux. Hmmmm. It's plausible, although hardly sexy. Kind of like calling 1984 (and 1985, 1986, 1987... who's counting?) the 'Year of the LAN.'".

So Many Predict So Much (Wired). Here's a set of New Year's predictions which came from Wired News this past week. "Larry Sanger, editor-in-chief of Nupedia:
I believe the 'open content' concept is going to enter the public consciousness more fully this year. Currently, the concept is understood by only a handful of people online; by the end of the year, 'open content' could be nearly as much a common buzzword as 'open source' is now."

Linux Gazette #61 (Jaunary 2001) available. The January 2001 issue of the Linux Gazette was published earlier this week. Featured articles for January include

• Linux On Your Desktop: Setting Up GNOME
• Using the Wireless Modem Ricochet
• Setting Up a Linux Laptop With No CD-ROM Drive
• Plus other articles, the MailBag and News Bytes.

Servers: When I'm 64 (bit) (ZDNet). AMD will be looking to Linux for support of its 64-bit family, according to this ZDNet article. AMD is promising to debut its x86-64 platform, with four and eight way multi-processing, in the first half of 2002. "Microsoft isn't likely to build an operating system for these chips, so AMD is looking elsewhere -- namely to the Linux community for a 64-bit version of that operating system".

Section Editor: Michael J. Hammel

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