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

Linux in the news

Companies

VA Linux Misses Estimates, Cuts Staff (TechWeb). TechWeb reports on the VA Linux conference call. "The company will attempt to regain higher margins by focusing more on its SourceForge open-source services site, a turn-key collaboration system for open-source deployment where margins have been traditionally higher."

VA Linux pushes back profit goal by 9 months (Reuters). Here's a Reuters article on VA's quarterly results. The company evidently thinks that revenues could drop significantly (below $30 million, as compared to $42.5 million in the second quarter) and profitability in 2001 is no longer in the cards. "Chief Executive Larry Augustin said while the $30 million figure may be 'overly pessimistic,' VA Linux was readjusting its business to try to turn a profit on lower revenue levels. It said earlier it was cutting its work force by 25 percent, a move Augustin said will save $5 million a quarter."

IBM To Unveil New Linux Moves (TechWeb). Here is a TechWeb article about IBM's expected announcements at its PartnerWorld conference, going on this week. "To support its moves, IBM (stock: IBM) will introduce programs to make Linux available on its iSeries servers, formerly known as the AS/400 line, said Bill Zeitler, senior vice president for Big Blue's Server Group."

Business

Linux quietly finding its way into NZ business (Stuff). Stuff has put up an article on adoption of Linux in New Zealand. "Carl Klitscher, IBM New Zealand system specialist within the enterprise systems group, says about 15 per cent of IBM customers are loading Linux on to IBM machines." (Thanks to Rodger Donaldson).

Searching for a supermodel (ZDNet). What's the right Linux business model? asks this ZDNet column. "The Linux industry, as most people know it, has yet to really prove it can make a buck. Let's face it -- there's not a whole lot of money to be made selling boxes of Linux on store shelves for $30 or so."

P2P survival hinges on Napster's fate (News.com). News.com reports on a speech by Stanford University law professor Lawrence Lessig. "Speaking to an audience of peer-to-peer software developers, many of whose products are much closer to a Microsoft Outlook than to the industry-shaking file-swapping Napster service, he issued a pointed warning: The threat to Napster's survival is a threat to the developers' freedom, he said."

Court Hands Barnes & Noble.com a Legal Victory (InternetNews.com). According to this InternetNews.com story, a federal appeals court has overturned the injunction for Amazon's one-click shopping patent suit against Barnes and Noble. "'Because Amazon.com is not entitled to preliminary injunctive relief under these circumstances, we vacate the order of the district court that set the preliminary injunction in place and remand the case for further proceedings,' the Circuit Court wrote in an unusually harshly worded ruling." (Thanks to Jay R. Ashworth)

Products

PC Engines releases embedded-PC BIOS as open source (LinuxDevices.com). LinuxDevices.com reports on the open source release of tinyBIOS, a stripped down PC BIOS targeted at embedded devices.

ALICE Community Grows (BotSpot). ALICE, a chat bot which was awarded the 2000 Loebner Bronze Prize as the most human-like computer software, has a fast growing community, says this BotSpot article. "Where once we saw millions of independent bots linked to individual web sites, the developers now envision a single unified knowledge base, linked by a Napster-style file-sharing protocol." (Thanks to Dr. Richard Wallace, ALICE inventor)

DSPs and Embedded Linux: a great combination (LinuxDevices). LinuxDevices.com has published a white paper on the growing trend of combining Embedded Linux with digital signal processors. "Linux is particularly well suited to providing such simulators, by allowing a desktop Linux PC to run an embedded version of Linux as an application, including Internet connectivity and peripheral support through USB and Ethernet ports and common bus structures. Such environments makes it much easier to write applications and kernel-level code."

Alcatel says 'yes' to Linux USB ADSL support (Register). The Register reports that Alcatel will be providing a Linux driver for its SpeedTouch USB ADSL modem. "The driver will be ready next month, Alcatel said, along with full source code and the modem's firmware as a binary." (Thanks to James Taylor).

Adeos: a resource sharing multi-OS environment (LinuxDevices). Rick Lehrbaum interviews Karim Yaghmour, founder of Adeos, an open source project aimed at providing an alternative to the RTLinux patent problem, about that projects goal of sharing hardware resources between multiple operating systems.

Linux lookalike RTOS passes "Quake test" (LinuxDevices.com). LinuxDevices looks at LynuxWorks RTOS binary compatibility with Linux through the eyes of the new compatibility test bed: Quake. "The "Quake demo" consisted of running identical binary images of Quake on two side-by-side systems -- one running on top of Linux, and the other on the LynxOS RTOS. The intent of the demo, of course, is to raise the possibility that other Linux software might also run unmodified on LynxOS."

An introduction to Waba (LinuxDevices). Waba is an open source, Java-like programming platform for small devices. LinuxDevices.com has this look at Waba. "Waba was developed by Rick Wild of Wabasoft, initially for PalmOS -- principally to provide programmers with a layer hiding the instabilities of PalmOS (especially regarding low memory). Wild then ported Waba to Windows and PocketPC." A Linux port is in the works.

Interviews

The Story of Linus' Babies (Wired). Wired News talks with Glyn Moody, author of Rebel code. "Of all the people Moody interviewed, he said that open source guru Richard Stallman made the strongest impression on him -- 'not least because he had the novel habit of criticizing my questions as I asked them,' Moody said."

Intelligent devices: A new arena for Linux (OLinux). OLinux interviews LinuxDevices.com founder Rick Lehrbaum. "I consider LinuxDevices.com to be a community resource -- devoted to the Embedded Linux Community. My goal is to serve the needs of the community and make LinuxDevices.com the most useful resource on the web devoted to Embedded Linux and Linux-based 'devices'."

Miscellaneous

Why Linux kicks Windows all over the desktop (ZDNet). ZDNet columnist Henry Kingman describes his experience with Debian as his desktop system. "It has been inspiring to watch my Linux desktop improve. I enjoy sitting back with a cup of coffee watching my system update itself, occasionally asking me a question when it comes to a fork in the road or writes a config file with a new option. Despite this constant system activity and 'unstable' versions of everything, my system hummed along perfectly with nary a reboot."

Section Editor: Rebecca Sobol

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