LXer Weekly Roundup for 21-Oct-2007

LXer Feature: 21-Oct-2007 Some of the big stories this week include Linux vs. Windows Power Usage, Microsoft gets two licences approved by the OSI, Kevin Carmony switches to Ubuntu and on top of all that we have a slew of LXer features including a couple of reports from T-DOSE, Carla Schroder continues her series on Digital Photography and a reader submitted article with some advice for those trying to decide between Windows or Linux.

Some of the big stories this week include Linux vs. Windows Power Usage, Microsoft gets two licences approved by the OSI, Kevin Carmony switches to Ubuntu and on top of all that we have a slew of LXer features including a couple of reports from T-DOSE, Carla Schroder continues her series on Digital Photography and a reader submitted article with some advice for those trying to decide between Windows or Linux.

Day one at T-DOSE and Day two at T-DOSE: In its second year, T-Dose, the Dutch Open Source event aimed at developers takes place in Eindhoven. Your two LXer editors went there to find out what's happening and what's new in open-source land. Todays topics include QTopia for PDA's and smartphones, open source software in the iLiad digital paper device, KDE4 application programming, the Lodel publishing tool, efficient data structures and how to overtake proprietary software without writing code.

Our Present-Day Frankenstein: The parallels are there. At least enough of them to bring forward a comparison and force us to ask the tough questions. Questions not only between us, but questions that should be posed to the world....a world by the way that really doesn't see what we do. We've created a creature that now rules the Master. How do we stop it? And even if we decide we should...how do you fight a monster of this stature and strength?

The GNU Hurd: Most Linux users out there, think that their whole system is named just “Linux” (or perhaps the distribution name). For a large number of reasons, which I do not intend to analyze in this post, this is not, and should not be the case. The actual name is GNU/Linux since only the Linux Kernel is “Linux” and the rest of the system (including some vital parts such as glibc or GCC) are parts of the GNU Operating System. Linux was chosen as the kernel for the GNU system at a time when the GNU project had a nearly working operating system, which however lacked a working kernel (although an initial implementation of the Hurd existed).

Adventures in Digital Photography With Linux, part 4: Fundamentals: Carla Schroder continues her series on Digital Photography "So far in this randomly-appearing series I haven't talked all that much about Linux, but mostly camera gear. Today I'm going to talk about photography fundamentals. Because a skilled person can use an image editor to doctor any photo to look like anything, but for me that is not the point."

Choosing Windows vs. Linux - Which One & Why & What Lies Ahead!: An article submitted by one of our readers, they explain "With the arrival of Windows Vista , lots of people are looking for alternatives. And Linux has emerged as the best contender. As I have used Windows XP and Linux for last 5 years, and Vista since its release. I thought why not write an article for the people who may want to know/use/switch to Linux from Windows."

Document Format Standards Committee "Grinds to a Halt" after OOXML: As you may recall, Microsoft's OOXML did not get enough votes to be approved the first time around in ISO/IEC - notwithstanding the fact that many countries joined the Document Format and Languages committee in the months before voting closed, almost all of whom voted to approve OOXML. Unfortunately, many of these countries also traded up to "P" level membership at the last minute to get more influence. And that's turning out to be a real problem.

Linux vs. Windows Power Usage: It seems the the Phoronix guys have been getting a ton of requests to do a power consumption comparison between Linux and Windows. Here they compare the power consumption of Microsoft Windows XP, Windows Vista, Fedora 7, and Ubuntu 7.10.

13 reasons why Linux should be on your desktop: Technology marketing consultant Kim Brebach, who last month published an essay titled "13 Reasons why Linux won't make it to a desktop near you," discovers why desktop Linux has thrived despite what he terms its "troubled childhood."

Microsoft licenses get open source nod: In a surprising announcement, which will no doubt stir up the open source community, the Open Source Initiative said that it had approved two of Microsoft's licences as being fit for open source software.

Ex-Linspire chief defects to Ubuntu: Former Linspire CEO Kevin Carmony has shown all the loyalty of a free agent athlete. Just a few months after resigning from Linspire, Carmony has traded in his old company's Linux operating system for Ubuntu.

Ubuntu vs. Debian on the $0 Laptop: So far, Ubuntu is outpacing Debian on the $0 Laptop, a Gateway Solo 1450 that I resurrected from the dead by replacing its shattered power plug. While both Debian Etch 4.0 and Ubuntu 7.04 are doing fine in the power-management department, Ubuntu is pulling ahead when it comes to touchpad and mouse configuration.

Fallout from Office Open XML vote continues: The fallout from the events leading up to the recent vote on whether or not to approve Microsoft's Office Open XML documents format as an ISO standard continues unabated, more than a month after the software maker conceded it had lost that vote.

(Mis)understandings of the words “intellectual property”: The author, Ruth Suehle Recently had a bad experience using her camera "Last month I was threatened with police intervention after taking pictures of my two-year-old. Why? We were in what you might think of as analogous to an outdoor mall. It’s a former industrial complex that’s listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Today the area has been revitalized with restaurants and office space, a large greenspace in the middle, and an attractive manmade river and waterfall."

Where does Linux go from here?: Linux is now mainstream -- so mainstream, in fact, that two of the top three Linux distributions are commercially successful operations, and the third aims to be. Every day, more and more old-school IT firms shake off their initial doubts, get in line behind their customers, and try Linux and other free software projects. In the face of such success, will Linux remain true to its free software ideals and to the community which created it? Or will it morph into a corporate byproduct, driven by the bottom line, and complacent with all forms of predatory intellectual property (IP), including software patents and closed, proprietary standards which are standard fare in the IT industry.