LXer Weekly Roundup for 08-Jul-2007

LXer Feature: 08-Jul-2007 The big stories this week include Microsoft's attempts to distance itself from the effects of the GPLv3, Part 2 of Carla Schroder's Adventures in Digital Photography, using Live Linux distro's for online banking, Massachusetts decides that XML is ok and the BSA ups the ante on getting people to "Blow The Whistle". All this and more await you in this weeks LXer Roundup.

The big stories this week include Microsoft's attempts to distance itself from the effects of the GPLv3, Part 2 of Carla Schroder's Adventures in Digital Photography, using Live Linux distro's for online banking, Massachusetts decides that XML is ok and the BSA ups the ante on getting people to "Blow The Whistle". All this and more await you in this weeks LXer Roundup.

Linspire Joins Microsoft in Developing and Deploying Open Source Translators between Document Formats: In the deal that came as no surprise to anyone, Linspire announced that they would be working with Microsoft on providing translators for ODF and XML. What amazed me was that this didn't happen a lot sooner. Linspire has always been at the forefront of providing the necessary codecs and such in their distributions. I wonder what took them so long?

Permission for home!: In an article contributed to LXer, the author describes how he somehow got locked out of, and his ordeal in fixing the permissions to be able to enter his home directory on his computer again.

Adventures in Digital Photography With Linux, part 2: In the second part of her series, Carla Schroder covers why DSLR cameras may be good or bad depending on your needs and wants, Lenses, Focal Length, Sun Filters and much more. If your into Digital photography this is a must read.

Mass. Embraces MS' Open XML Document Format: In what we all saw coming, Massachusetts has reversed its policy and will support both Microsoft's Office Open XML format and the OASIS Open Document Format. After "helping" to remove one Director and biding their time patiently, Microsoft finally got what they wanted.

BSA Raise Reward Up to $1 Million for Qualified Reports of Software Piracy: The Business Software Alliance, otherwise known as Microsoft's "Piracy Police" have raised the reward for reports of software piracy up to $1 Million dollars. They have also launched the "Blow the Whistle" campaign that encourages employees to report software piracy to the BSA. That kind of money almost makes it worth screwing the company you work for, losing your job and ruining your reputation. It will take most of that money to move to another state and change your name just to get another job and do it all over again.

French Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries Choose Mandriva: The French Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries chose to migrate its local servers (about 400 machines) from Windows NT Server to Mandriva Corporate Server 4.0, within the next two years.

The ticking time bomb of old file formats.: The National Archive in the UK has issued a statement expressing concern over the amount of data locked up in proprietary file formats. Microsoft have stepped up to the plate to take advantage of the situation, created largely by their own policy.

Joint releases to jolt open source: Shuttleworth: Ubuntu Linux founder Mark Shuttleworth has declared more publicity would be generated for open source software if the three large desktop projects of KDE, GNOME, and OpenOffice.org agreed on a common and regular release cycle. Now if only Ubuntu could just stick to their own regular release cycles Mark might be able to convince others to do the same.

KDE 4.0 Alpha 2 is out: In this LXer Press Release we announced that KDE Alpha 2 is out. There is a lot of info and screenshots available for you to check out.

The politics of open source: The author responds to Rob Enderle's article in which he suggested that Cuba's adoption of Linux would make it a political issue and that no US politician could now dare be associated with open source software. Why is it that when Rob says things, everyone doesn't just take him on his word?

Secure web browsing through Live Linux distros: In this article the author expounds on the virtues of using a Live Linux distribution to keep ones online banking experience as safe as possible.

Microsoft Says It Is Not Bound by GPLv3: Microsoft attempted to "clear the air" July 5 concerning its obligations to GNU General Public License Version 3 support, declaring it will not provide support or updates for GPLv3 under the deal it penned in November with Novell to administer certificates for the Linux distribution. Whew! I'm sure glad they cleared that up for me.

Microsoft Tries to Spit Out the GPLv3 Hook: SJVN states "Microsoft wants everyone to understand that GPLv3 has nothing to do with the company, its Linux partnerships or anything else Redmond-based. In other words, Microsoft is doing its best not be caught on the hook of GPLv3. Ah, Microsoft you'd love to be able to do that, wouldn't you?"

Microsoft's Plot To Kill Linux Busted: A great spoof cartoon that speaks to the ever increasing war of operating systems between Microsoft and Linux.

Bill Gates creates perfect accessory for Linux tablets: In this very amusing article by Fernando Cassia, he shows how Bill Gates came to the rescue in providing him with the perfect accessory for his Nokia N800.

Linux Less Secure Than Vista: In our "its got some FUD in it" article of the week Matt Hartley successfully propagates some old Linux security myths and chastises Microsoft a little, but not too much.