Showing headlines posted by Scott_Ruecker

Access has licensed Bluestreak Technology's Flash player for mobile phones and set-top boxes, suggesting its Linux-based software stack for mobile phones could be used in phones that receive digital TV. The MachBlue player is said to implement a "large subset" of Adobe Flash 7 functionality.

SIL International, a nonprofit organization whose concerns include literacy and the study and preservation of minority languages, has announced the release of version 1.1 of the SIL Open Font License (OFL). The revision, which follows months of discussion and review on several mailing lists, including OFL-Discuss, clarifies the language of the license, especially about embedding fonts and allowing reserved font names.

Sys Admin Technical Conference on Security and Scripting in Baltimore May 7-8.

When Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 launched, it contained more than just new software. It also offered customers a substantially streamlined service-level agreement (SLA).

Mozilla developers are keeping up the pace on the development of their next-generation Firefox 3.0 browser with the Alpha 3 release, adding more under-the-hood improvements to security and its offline capabilities. Development began on Firefox 3.0, code-named Gran Paradiso, around October when Firefox 2.0 was released. Gran Paradiso hit its Alpha 2 release in early February.

Security researchers should make an effort to practice "responsible disclosure," according to Mozilla's security chief, Window Snyder. Her comments were made at a panel discussion during the ShmooCon hacker conference in Washington last week. "The researcher has all the power. They control when they disclose it, and they control the idea whether or not the vendor responds in time," she said during the panel, according to News.com.

Socat, netcat's "twin brother," is a utility that "establishes two bidirectional byte streams and transfers data between them." It handles sockets in various ways, allowing a wide range of actions, including file transfers, port forwarding, and serial line emulation.

Practically all Unix and Linux servers run an SSH service to let administrators connect securely from remote locations. Unfortunately for security administrators, attacks on SSH services are popular today. In this article I'll show you how can you protect machines running SSH services from brute force attacks using the pam_abl plugin for SSH pluggable authentication modules (PAM).

Earlier this month, Slashdot posted a piece asking whether the Gentoo project is in "crisis." The project has responded to the issues discussed in the posting, in part, by adopting a Code of Conduct (CoC), with "proctors" who will address breaches of the CoC. So far, that move seems of limited worth.

Linux laptops users have a wide variety of performance needs. If one is running basic productivity apps like e-mail, OpenOffice.org and Web browsing, one doesn't need a rip-roaring processor with 2 GB of memory. Predictably, hardware requirements -- while generally less than what is needed for Microsoft Vista -- are entirely dependent on the kind of use expected out of a Linux-based laptop.

Mandrivia is betting on an alternative 3D desktop approach, called Metisse, that eschews the 'traditional' cube approach to 3D desktops in favour of manipulating windows.

The Debian GNU/Linux project has come to some kind of crossroads - due to many factors, some of them artificial - and the man who takes over leadership next month will have to make some crucial decisions on the future direction of the project.

In this week's KDE Commit-Digest: Final stages of Freedesktop.org naming compliance performed on the Oxygen mimetype icons. IMAP-related crashes targeted in KMail. Many KFilePlugins ported to use Strigi. Better zoom and preview size interaction in Digikam. Optimisations in KSysGuard. Better integration with NEPOMUK-KDE interface elements in Dolphin, NEPOMUK-KDE components move to the kdereview module. Further Kst documentation work. Continued interface experiments and code progress towards Amarok 2.0. "Flame" window destruction effect in the KWin Composite branch. KBackup is renamed "Galmuri" due to naming conflicts.

Linux server provider Pogo Linux has just released its latest network attached storage (NAS) device, calling it the most versatile and advanced Linux-based device to date.

The ERP business is one that has long been dominated by giant enterprise software vendors like SAP and Oracle's PeopleSoft. Microsoft has entered the fray, too, with its Dynamics applications to further make the ERP marketplace even more competitive.

The dull looking toolbar at the bottom of any KDE installation is known officially as the Panel and, like most of Linux, has about a gazillion configuration options.

Digium, developer of the Asterisk open source IP PBX software, has launched the Asterisk Appliance, PBX hardware running Asterisk and able to serve up to 50 users.

I wrote ashort expose on Practice Fusion, over atFree Software Magazine. Practice Fusion is not"Googles EHR" it is company using AdSense to cover EHR costs. Further usingMirrorMed or the like, its trivial to set something like this up.

Don’t you wish you could talk, listen, watch — in other words, interact — with anyone, anywhere in the world, and not have to worry about cost? Step into the world of internet telephony software, that allows you to make telephone calls to other computers at minimum or no cost. One of the most famous and easy-to-use software is Skype, which offers Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) telephony that integrates smoothly into your computer.

As noted in Chapter 2 of this book, the release of the Altair microcomputer in 1975 heralded the beginning of the modern high-tech industry. But observers of the period also believe there was more to the Altair than just chips; the unit seemed to emit a mysterious elixir that entered the body of computer aficionados worldwide and sparked a strange war of the soul that has raged in the body of the computer geekdom for more than three decades. The war is between those who advocate for free software and open, patentless technology available to all and those who believe in making substantial sums of money from selling proprietary software and the vigorous protection of intellectual property. It’s the Kumbayahs vs. the Capitalists.