LXer Weekly Roundup for 27-Jan-2008

LXer Feature: 27-Jan-2008 In this week's LXer Roundup we have an article on how to access Linux partitions from Windows, should your business choose KDE or Gnome when running Linux, Ken Starks Yanks The Window Shade, The Everex Cloudbook gets ripped apart by FCC, An open letter to Linus Torvalds, Apple cripples Sun's open source jewel and a field guide to free software supporters. Plus a humorous press conference, a couple of FUD articles and Linux For The Masses? Bet On This Winner.

In this week's LXer Roundup we have an article on how to access Linux partitions from Windows, should your business choose KDE or Gnome when running Linux, Ken Starks Yanks The Window Shade, The Everex Cloudbook gets ripped apart by FCC, An open letter to Linus Torvalds, Apple cripples Sun's open source jewel and a field guide to free software supporters. Plus a humorous press conference, a couple of FUD articles and Linux For The Masses? Bet On This Winner.

Three Ways To Access Linux Partitions (ext2/ext3) From Windows On Dual-Boot Systems: If you have a dual-boot Windows/Linux system, you probably know this problem: you can access files from your Windows installation while you are in Linux, but not the other way round. This tutorial shows three ways how you can access your Linux partitions (with ext2 or ext3 filesystem) from within Windows: Explore2fs, DiskInternals Linux Reader, and the Ext2 Installable File System For Windows.

For Your Business: GNOME or KDE?: I debated long and hard before deciding to take a stab at this article idea. Because KDE and GNOME users are so furiously loyal to their preferred desktop environment, I had to take into account that no matter how I stated my case, someone was going to come away feeling let down. Those concerns aside, I am writing this piece in hopes of sharing what each desktop offering has to provide and which of these options makes the most sense for your business.

The bug reporting culture: 10 things to avoid, 10 things you can do: Generally speaking it’s always nice if you can dedicate a few dozen minutes (around an hour I would say) to familiarize yourself with how bugs are reported in the project you’re participating with.

Yanking The Window Shade: I am loathe to offer real life suggestions based on Television and Movies...most often it indicates that one has less than a firm footing in their real world. In this case though, I am going to ask you to take the red pill. Together we will see how deep the Rabbit Hole goes.

EEE PC more than sold out: Asus obviously announced a shipping date like formerly only Apple did, together with the exact time. It will be this Friday, the 25th of January, at exactly 1700 (or 5pm).

Everex Cloudbook Ripped Apart by FCC: We’re only 5 days away from Walmart rolling out the Everex Cloudbook, but it looks like the FCC has beaten everyone to the dissecting punch by being the first to rip one apart for the internet to see.Technically, this is the Via Nanobook reference model that the Cloudbook is based upon but little is expected to change.

Asus Plans to Offer Windows on the Eee: Asus's Eee PC, an ultra-light notebook that runs Linux, will be available with Windows XP before the end of the quarter. Pricing has not yet been announced. It will be interesting to see which OS consumers choose.

Software emancipation: An open letter to Linus Torvalds: After years of watching the software industry twist itself in knots trying to differentiate “open” vs. “free” and having to re-invent code simply because it had the wrong comments at the top, I think it’s time to put an end to the madness. This promoted me to write the following letter to Linus Torvalds, creator of the Linux kernel.

Linux For The Masses? Bet On This Winner.: With Linux on the desktop going from a slow crawl to verging on an explosion, many have toiled with the question: How do we make this happen faster? A well-known Austin-based Linux Advocate thinks he has the answer.

Apple cripples Sun's open source jewel: It was all hookers and balloons at Sun Microsystems when the company first found out that Apple would pick up its well-regarded DTrace analysis tool for use with Mac OS X. Now, however, one of the lead DTrace developers has expressed some regrets after Apple "broke" his software in an apparent bid to protect big media and ISVs.

Debian Lenny doesn't fix my Nautilus problem, but a look at the bug report tells me why the issue is "resolved": I half-expected today's massive Debian Lenny update to solve my Nautilus-crashes-when-I-try-to-get-the-properties-of-a-file bug. It did not, but I'm not disappointed. I went back to the original bug report, which was filed with GNOME, not Debian, but is clearly a Debian-only bug. I saw the "solution," but didn't understand it until now. I still don't know how to actually "do" the solution, and for now I'm content to let it ride and see if Debian Testing catches up.

A Field Guide to Free Software Supporters: Hearing the terms "free software" or "open source," you might imagine that they referred to a single school of thought. Even "free and open source software" (FOSS) suggests only two different outlooks: Free software, which values political and philosophical freedom, and open source, whose main interest is enhanced software quality. Yet all these impressions would be misleading. When you look, there are at least seven different types of FOSS supporters.

How do I remember all these passwords?: If you are like me, you have a ton of passwords you have to remember. I have different login names and passwords for bank accounts, forums, blogs, email, and other stuff. How do you deal with it all? How can a person possibly remember them all, especially the ones that only get used once every month or two, or just a couple of times in a year? Thankfully, I found a cool program called Revelation Password Manager.

Open source under attack?: A nest of poisoned Web sites has been quietly attacking unsuspecting visitors using an arsenal of thirteen different exploits. If the site visitor has javascript enabled and is vulnerable to any of those exploits, then in no time at all their system will be compromised with a Trojan not yet recognised [sic] by many popular anti-virus packages.

Ubuntu chief decries interest rate cut: Canonical Chief Executive Mark Shuttleworth, founder of the Ubuntu version of Linux, called Tuesday's interest-rate cut the "most extraordinary failure of economic leadership in recent years."

KDE Sets its Sights on Windows, Mac OS X: KDE isn't just for Linux anymore. With the recent release of KDE 4, the K Desktop team has set their focus on porting the core libraries that power KDE applications over to both Windows and OS X. Although still in the early stages, there are already builds available for both platforms that will enable you to compile and run popular KDE application like the Amarok Jukebox or KOffice suite on either Windows or Mac, and KDE's goal is to have production-ready versions out later this year.

In our combined Humor and FUD section we have a 'fake' press conference and two FUD related articles for your enjoyment.

Bill Gates is NOT Satan, Says Satan: Sick and tired of hearing various "Bill Gates is Satan" jokes, the Prince of Darkness today issued an edict demanding an end to such friviolities. "How dare you compare Bill Gates to me!" Satan snarled during a fake press conference from the Fire & Brimstone Briefing Room broadcast live on CSPAN. "Yes, we all know Windows is an evil piece of crap -- and I applaud Bill Gates for his efforts -- but he doesn't even come close to the sheer vileness that I possess!"

Top 10 Linux FUD Patterns, Part 2: The #1 item on my Top 10 List of Linux FUD Patterns concerns its learning curve. This pattern is probably the most prevalent and primarily appeals to fear by attempting to convince you that Linux is too hard for the average person to use or that it is simply not user friendly. There are many variations of this pattern, from the straight-forward “Linux is for geeks” assault to more mature, logical arguments, such as “if Linux can do everything the fill-in-the-blank OS can do, why bother with the hassle of switching?”.

Cheap laptop price tags can mislead users: Personal computer (laptop and desktop) prices may have crashed. The low price tags, however, can be misleading - especially for first-time buyers. Consider this. All low-cost laptops and desktops come pre-loaded with a Linux OS or a DOS version (obsolete on desktops). The installation of a legal Microsoft operating system (OS) and office suite (for word, excel, etc) will increase the price of the desktop or laptop by 20 to 35 per cent.