Showing headlines posted by dcparris

Tens of thousands of users are deploying open-source storage software in an effort to avoid pricey proprietary products such as array clustering and disk eraser applications and to get some long-term protection through the availability of source code.

Woburn, MA – Strategic Test has announced the release of new Linux® drivers for kernel 2.6 versions of RedHat, SuSe and Fedora distributions. The kernel 2.4 drivers have also been updated. Linux kernel 2.6 gives increased stability and near to real-time operating system performance, useful for measurement and signal generation applications.

Open-source software developers in China should invest in Linux and similar software, senior industry executives said at a Beijing conference Wednesday. Though current Chinese investment in open-source software manufacturing is relatively small, the numbers are rising. Sales of Linux in the country rose 20 percent between 2003 and 2004, and analysts predict that figure will grow 24 percent annually by 2009, with revenue topping $27 million.

A weeklong conference of open source developers ended Friday in Portland with a battle cry. Eben Moglen, legal counsel to Free Software Foundation, declared that the war against closed, proprietary software controlled by Microsoft and others is far from won.

Commentary: By definition, members of the free and open source software (FOSS) communities have shown themselves to be more than software and hardware experts. They've also proved themselves people willing to take a stand on behalf of their ethics and the quality of their work. Contrary to the stereotype of the geek, many apply this same commitment to politics and social events. Now, when many companies are hovering around the question of how they should support FOSS, and some are considering implementing restrictive technologies like digital rights management (DRM), maybe it's time for the next logical step. Maybe it's time for FOSS supporters to become consumer advocates. In other words, perhaps they should start officially endorsing or condemning companies and organizations according to how well products and policies fit with FOSS ethics.

[So glad you could join us, Bruce! We've been arguing that in our forums since at least last October. - dcparris]

Ten Days After Its Official Launch, Over 165,000 Downloads of SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 Products

The Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) Technology Group has positioned Linux as a medium term technology bet, which means one to three years to mass adoption.

The Advanced Packaging Tool (APT) is a distinguishing feature of Debian-based systems. APT was the first major alternative in GNU/Linux to boast automatic dependency resolution. Most GNU/Linux users know it through the apt-get command, a utility that calls on the lower-level dpkg command. However, other APT-based utilities remain largely unknown to desktop users. Some of these utilities offer a range of functionality far beyond those of the basic tools.

The third African VoIP Forum to be held in Nigeria during August has attracted a number of international and regional organisations including the ITU and senior African government regulators ministers.

There's a lot more to the Linux operating system than just the kernel itself. Each Linux distribution ships with compilers, utilities, small tools, and even full-blown desktop applications. Some of that software is essential; no Linux system could run without it. In other cases, however, it's superfluous. Sometimes it's even a hindrance.

Linux leader maintains his objections to provisions against digital rights managment.

[At least Stallman is fighting DRM. I don't see too many others doing that. - dcparris]

South Korean Linux developer Haansoft Inc. has joined Open Source Development Labs Inc. (OSDL), a nonprofit industry group that promotes the use of the Linux operating system in enterprises, and will participate in OSDL's Carrier-Grade Linux working group, the group said Thursday.

PORTLAND, Oregon -- When Narayan Newton, an Oregon State computer science student, received an e-mail from a prominent developer of Linux desktop applications, he expected it to be a complaint. "I'd submitted some bug reports," he says. Instead, Newton was surprised to learn that the programmer, Duncan Mac-Vicar, would be his personal mentor for three months, courtesy of Google's "Summer of Code" program.

Even the most mission-critical Unix-based central business systems are being replaced by Linux running on commodity hardware, according to delegates at the Linuxworld 2006 Conference and Expo in Sydney Tuesday.

Free and open source software will be punted at the Southern African Youth Festival organised by the Zimbabwe Youth Council and organisers are already using open source tools to promote the event.

Freespire is the free offshoot of the proprietary Linspire Linux distribution, formerly an outside effort, but now produced by the company itself. The first beta release is available through the Freespire Web site, both as a CD-sized burnable ISO image and as a VMware Virtual Appliance. Despite its youth and inexperience, it already exhibits considerable polish.

Note that Linspire is offering a means to use non-free multi-media codecs, and hasn't really done much to provide or support free codecs that everyone can use.

Has Redmond finally accepted that open source should be embraced, or are the company's recent partnerships with community-developed software providers simply another way to crack the competition?

[O.k., the article opens with a blatent lie from Microsoft's UK Technology Officer. The only 'interoperability they ever cared about is between different versions of Microsoft software. - dcparris]

The Free Software Foundation yesterday released the second draft of the GNU General Public Licence version 3 which incorporates many of the 1000 community-suggested changes received since the first draft in January. The FSF says it is still on track to release the final version early in 2007.

With its acquisition of Suse Linux in 2003, Novell set itself up as the chief commercial competitor to Red Hat Linux for the enterprise Linux market. Last week Red Hat struck back, this time bringing the competition to Novell's home court.

[I like this author's question - where do you draw the line? If these vendors were willing to acknowledge the moral aspect of software licensing, they would know where to draw the line - dcparris]

Mozilla Corp. on July 26 started urging Firefox users to install a newly released version of the browser, v1.5.0.5, which includes some essential security fixes.