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In the newest Halloween Document, I analyze Microsoft's "Get The Facts" road show. The anti-Linux arguments they are using now -- and, even more, the arguments they're *not* using -- reveal how desperate Microsoft is getting. I explain why I think we need to focus more on government adoptions, and predict serious ugliness during the next year.

Microsoft continued turning up the heat on Linux with its "Get The Facts" campaign last week. This time, Microsoft is claiming that Windows 2003 is faster at file and print serving tasks than a Red Hat Linux server, based on a test performed by Veritest.

In a move to try and curb its huge public sector budget deficit, the French government said that it would grant software firms the opportunity to win contracts until now given to Microsoft, according to a report from news agency Reuters.

MySQL AB, the company behind the popular open source database MySQL, is looking to ramp up its presence in the Australian market.

Skype Technologies made available a first test version of its Internet telephony application for Linux on Monday, 10 months and more than 14 million downloads after releasing the first version for Windows.

A newly discovered security hole in Linux, published on an open source website, has raised questions about how Linux security issues should be handled. The vulnerability could allow malicious users to bring down Linux machines with just 24 lines of code, which are available from several open source websites and internet news groups.

The Linux kernel and the open-source software components that surround it have progressed to a point where Linux on the desktop has become attractive for certain enterprise deployments. However, several challenges remain for desktop Linux, many of which relate to supporting the galaxy of hardware devices that exist for desktop and laptop computers.

Desktop Linux is good enough to supplant Windows in a number of enterprise desktop roles, and it has been for some time now. However, major enterprise Linux vendors—most notably Red Hat Inc.—have been too busy until recently with server-room Linux to produce desktop products with the sort of management frameworks and stable product road maps that enterprises require. That changed with the release last month of two desktop Linux variants from major enterprise players: Sun Microsystems Inc.'s Java Desktop System 2 and Red Hat's Red Hat Desktop.

Skype Technologies S.A. has launched the first beta version of its voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) program, Skype for Linux. The software can be downloaded for free and is available immediately.

The Eclipse open-source software foundation next week plans to release software that will offer developers an alternative to Windows for delivering desktop applications.

By using Linux you can say goodbye to hefty software costs, hidden pop-ups, and corporate tracking systems; all hallmarks of the much more common Microsoft system. The choice? 1) Pay tons of money to use a junk system that is designed to exploit you (to pad the wallet of Bill Gates); or 2) Pay nothing for a good system that you can even design yourself.

What do you do as an IT buyer when your technology vendor switches over to a new operating platform? Do you adapt accordingly or switch vendors? Eveready Industries Ltd has chosen the first option, based on its reading that at least compatibility will not be an issue in the future. Thus, as Oracle patronizes Linux, Eveready’s management has embraced Linux at the server-level too, since they have an Oracle Database.

It's no wonder Linux is awash in lawsuits. No sooner do I reveal the real truth about Linux – that I wrote it! -- than a bunch of Johnny-come-latelies try to horn in on the action. It's a good thing I didn't spill the beans about time-traveling back to invent the wheel.

A friend of mine wrote to me and asked me how he could go about switching to Linux*. I sent him an email back with some suggestions about how to approach it and he suggested that I should share this with others, so here it goes.

Last year I bought an IBM T30 Thinkpad, intending to install Linux on its hard drive sometime. Meanwhile, using a Knoppix LiveCD let me run Linux on the laptop while retaining the factory Windows XP installation. The notebook is my travel machine, so I also bought a Linksys WPC55AG PC Card wireless network adapter that supports 801.11a/b/g for the Thinkpad. For secure wireless Linux surfing, I was determined to find some configuration that would work with minimal intervention at boot time and that was easy enough that my wife could load it.

The US Courts' server migration project will put core applications and services on ProLiant servers running Linux.

Building on its contributions to the open source community and commitment to interoperability, Novell is sponsoring the Openswan project, a Linux* implementation of the IPsec (IP Security) standard that provides a common approach to securing Internet-based communications.

Microsoft is being accused of a plan to sink Linux using the US Patent system. So claims Eben Moglen, a Columbia University law professor, the general counsel for the Free Software Foundation and a board member of the Public Patent Foundation (PubPat).