02.13.09
Posted in Antitrust, Europe, Microsoft, Open XML, Samba, Steve Ballmer at 10:24 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
IN its top-secret presentations, Microsoft explains what "schmoozing" is. It’s a subversive and disingenuous strategy for causing harm to one’s rival. Here is a transcription of the Neelie Kroes press conference where she admitted Ballmer having schmoozed her in her hometown. It came up in a Q&A session whose transcript is the only source on the Net, the wire services (& tech publications that quoted them) which had paraphrased the fact.
Neelie Kroes: When the court ruling was published, we got in touch, and Mr. Ballmer and I found each other in a small restaurant, so to say, there it all started, nobody could find out where, or whatever, and there we were indeed promising each other that there should be a compliance of what has to be done much earlier.
18:13 (Antonio)
Q: I hope Microsoft paid the bill in the restaurant (laughter), but my question is on the fine. You may not have decided yet on the amount you may impose, if any, to Microsoft but please try to help us just avoid any present misinterpretation,miscalculation. What is, as of yesterday, the highest level of amount you can impose on Microsoft?
Neelie Kroes: I will be back with the news when we have taken that decision. Absolutely. I mentioned already today that anyhow — and that is a certainty, and there are not that many certainties in life, as you aware –that from today on, there is no reason to impose further penalties on Microsoft as of this Monday, the 22nd.
In 2006, Ballmer and Commissioner Kroes had been negotiating for some time and she had clearly thought there would be progress, until the day Ballmer suddenly published her e-mail correspondence on the Microsoft PressPass site without her consent, claiming “transparency”. She hit the ceiling and it was downhill for Microsoft from there.
“She hit the ceiling and it was downhill for Microsoft from there.”Ballmer had already annoyed her by making an unannounced visit and press conference around the corner from her office in Brussels in January (see coverage here and also here). He also held a secret meeting that day with Commissioner Viviane Reding, noted on her Web site agenda and picked up by one of the wire services, but no one connected those dots. That meeting was completely missed by the press, but Bloomberg may have had some coverage at the time.
The secret restaurant date with Commissioner Kroes in October 2007 was really damage control — she agreed to end the daily fines, but withheld what the actual daily fine amount would be. This was later announced in February 2008, the very day Microsoft was in Geneva helping to ram through OOXML [1, 2]. She was crystal clear that at least two other investigations of Microsoft were underway, a fact overlooked by the totality of the mainstream and tech press who generally reported the latest browser tying statement of objections as a “new” investigation. █
Related posts (2007):
- Articles About Microsoft Dropping a GPL/Samba Bomb on Europe
- The Free Software Community Warns the EU About the Microsoft Agreement
- More on Why the Agreement in Europe Simply Sucks!
- The Fourth ‘Patent Deal’ was with Europe… and the Sixth Deal That Won’t be
- A Victory in Europe for Microsoft’s Absurd Patents and So-called ‘Innovation’
- The Agreement in Europe Could Drive Free Software Projects to Other Countries
- Microsoft Separates Camps, Divides Open Source and Free Software Community, Breaks Linux Compatibility
- Is Europe Being Assimilated to America, Patent-wise?
- Antitrust Action to End in Europe, Begin in South Korea
- Quoteworthy Analysis: Acacia, Europe, the GPL, IBM, Microsoft, Red Hat, and Novell
- Novell-like Terms, Without the Deal… Now 93% Off RRP
- Microsoft Has Already Hijacked (to Kill) Open Source
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Posted in Microsoft, Novell, Patents, Red Hat, SCO at 9:40 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
NOVELL’S DEAL with Microsoft was not a success. Companies, like people, love to justify their own decision-making, but the reality of the matter is that Novell did not gain an edge over its main competitor, Red Hat.
Ron Hovsepian, Jeff Jaffe et al put more patent emphasis in Novell’s strategy, having arrived from IBM where software patents are seen as acceptable. Last year we wrote about the motives of the deal and there were shades of SCO in that one (SCO ended up going bankrupt, having gotten miserable and sold away its technical soul*).
Novell’s new strategy was to market itself with Microsoft, maybe even to fight GNU/Linux on its behalf. “Novell was great in the old times but it’s making very odd commercial money-grabbing moves,” says a source to us.
Despite the characteristic damage control, Novell's demise is near. Even the CEO admitted that more layoffs are coming, according to credible reports. █
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* Darl McBride, with his godfather-like mentality, may have actually made good money out of it.
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Posted in Free/Libre Software, Microsoft, Novell at 8:53 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Novell and Microsoft
MICROSOFT and Novell are growing closer all the time. The more they struggle, the more they huddle. Novell has just shown signs of more collaboration with Xenocode, which according to this new report is a “six-year-old, Seattle-based, lightweight application virtualization player full of Microsoft veterans.” The is not the first time that Novell collaborates with them [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] and this leaves room for more Microsoft influence.
Microsoft’s Poaching of Yahoo Executives
Yahoo! is still besieged by Microsoft [1, 2, 3], which wants to grab its market share and brains. It’s a lot cheaper than acquiring the company. According to reports from Microsoft watchers, Microsoft has just snatched another Yahoo executive who was focused on search.
Microsoft has hired Larry Heck, a Yahoo search executive, to join its online services division.
[...]
Most recently, Heck was vice president, search and advertising sciences at Yahoo Labs.
In a somewhat sarcastic essay, Cringley argues that “Yahoo should buy Microsoft”. Apart from an eye-catching headline, there is not much sustance, but Mark repeats his observation that Microsoft needs to lay off tens of thousands of employees.
My last column was all about the culture of Microsoft and how it makes real change difficult for the company. It’s not just at Microsoft that these things happen, by the way: nearly all mature organizations get into similar ruts. And if, like Microsoft, they are spectacularly profitable ruts, well then it isn’t surprising that things stay more or less permanently dysfunctional.
[...]
Next column we’ll deal with the rest of Microsoft, chopping those 20,000 to 50,000 heads.
Microsoft Ecosystem Smears Open Source
According to this from Slashdot, the Microsoft ecosystem is attacking Free/Open Source software behind closed doors. It’s like a whisper campaign.
Lately there has been a huge push by Certified Microsoft Professionals and their companies to call (potential) clients and warn them of the dangers of open source. This week I received calls from four different customers saying that they were warned that they are dangerously insecure because they run open source operating systems or software, because ‘anyone can read the code and hack you with ease.’
We have seen a lot of this recently. One just needs to follow the money in order to understand the credibility of the arguers.
In other related news, further to earlier reports, over 160 banks appear to have just been compromised due to “malware”.
Heartland data breach hit 160 banks (and rising)
[...]
Malware planted on servers was used to steal card data. It didn’t say how many records were exposed and how many financial institutions were affected by the breach. Heartland only said that it processed 100m transactions a month on behalf of 250,000 merchants, sparking concerns that the extent of the problem might rival that of the infamous TJX breach.
Was this “malware” installed on UNIX/Linux machines? Not likely. █
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Posted in Finance, Microsoft, Steve Ballmer at 8:12 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Good for him, not for the public
LESS than a week ago, Steve Ballmer was reportedly pressuring the new government to "invest in innovation" (typically meaning the investment of public funds in corporations under guises like “security”). Now we hear about Steve Ballmer promoting public looting, which is better known to many as “bailout” or “stimulus” (euphemisms). He takes his appeal right up to the congress.
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, who has been on quite a political tour as of late, sent a letter to all members of Congress Wednesday urging them to quickly pass the stimulus package.
The arguments he makes look familiar. Is he trying to 'pull an Abramoff'? Could it be true that Microsoft will require a bailout as it’s entering debt [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]? Here are some older articles of interest:
As a bit of historical background, the United States has a long and well proven tradition of funding technology projects using tax money or newly-issued debt, but it is usually marketed to the public as something in the interests of “security”, defending the value of capital(ism), keeping the country ahead in “innovation” and so on and so forth. Ultimately, however, the fruits of such works are not returned to the public that paid for it. Instead, the assets are handed over to private hands which not only possess what ought to have been public but also use it against the population. Examples include companies like Boeing and it’s no accident because that's just how the system is intended to work. █
Related and recent posts:
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Posted in Finance, Microsoft, Security, Windows at 7:14 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
THERE ARE many reports this week about Windows security problems, but one that really stood out is this one from yesterday:
Microsoft is offering a $250,000 reward for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of the virus writers behind the infamous Conficker (Downadup) worm.
This was also covered in:
So Microsoft plays sheriff and puts money on people’s heads rather than actually produce secure and robust systems. That’s the equivalent of jailing many people for possession of illegal drugs rather than looking for ways to prevent the trafficking of such drugs. It completely ignores the causes and instead addresses an outcome. The outcome is not just tens of millions of hijacked computers in this case; the ‘outcome’ is also teenage cyber-criminal who are empowered by badly engineered systems. Will there be a bounty presented to combat each and every Windows virus that exists (there are over a million, including variants)?
In other news, 8 “critical” vulnerabilities have just surfaced in Microsoft software.
Microsoft Patches 8 Critical Vulnerabilities
Microsoft Tuesday patched eight vulnerabilities — three of them marked “critical” — in the company’s Internet Explorer (IE), Office, Exchange and SQL Server software.
“Critical” is the highest degree of severity in Microsoft’s scale, so it’s only reasonable to expect larger botnets. Speaking of which, Microsoft is again addressing the wrong problem in the wrong way when it tries to take apart botnets rather consider the reasons for their creation in the first place.
Microsoft has beefed up the Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT) that ships with its Windows operating system so that it will detect and root out the notorious Srizbi botnet code.
“This month’s MSRT takes on one of the largest botnets currently active worldwide,” wrote Microsoft spokesman Vincent Tiu in a blog posting Tuesday, the day the update to the software removal tool was released. “Win32/Srizbi has been accused of being responsible for a huge chunk of spam e-mail messages sent in the years after its discovery,” he added. “We hope to make a positive impact with the addition of Win32/Srizbi into MSRT.”
This is also covered here.
In other security-related news:
i. Fake Infection Warnings Can Be Real Trouble
Michael Vana knew something was up when he saw the pop-up from “Antivirus 2009″ in the middle of his screen. The former Northwest Airlines avionics technician guessed that the dire warning of a system infection was fake, but when he clicked on the X to close the window, it expanded to fill his screen. To get rid of it, he had to shut down his PC.
ii. Fraudsters cream opposition in cybercrime wars
The celebration of Safer Internet Day on Tuesday was marked by warnings that cybercriminals are staying ahead of defenders in their attempts to defraud or otherwise abuse internet users.
iii. Germany deploys cybersoldiers
GERMANY HAS REVEALED that it has a team of 76 soldiers who are trained to defend the country from cyber attacks and software piracy.
Once again, Windows and the Web are unable to play nice with each other:
New Windows virus attacks PHP, HTML, and ASP scripts
Researchers have identified a new strain of malware that can spread rapidly from machine to machine using a variety of infection techniques, including the poisoning of webservers, which then go on to contaminate visitors.
The malware is a variation of a rapidly mutating virus alternately known as Virut and Virux. It has long proved adept at injecting itself into executable files, which are then able to attack uninfected machines through network drives and USB sticks.
A reader has just alerted us that a man is moving from the Ministry of Finance to Microsoft, hinting at possible government connections. Microsoft has already 'pulled an EDGI/MOU' around there.
Regarding news coverage like this one, wrote the reader, “the non-cached page has some nasty tricks to wipe out non-Javascripted browsers.” Further he added: “I have often wondered if the sudden push to web 2.0 is to compensate for loss of access that various interests have as people depart Microsoft Windows. The reasons for snubbing client-side javascript are still valid, perhaps more so than years past. Certainly there has been no value added. What does get added, aside from slowness and loss of functionality, is a whole slew of ways to remotely access content or activities on the client.”
Those who want a secure system ought to look at GNU/Linux. █
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02.12.09
Posted in News Roundup at 11:31 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
GNU/Linux
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Ars reviews the Neuros LINK, a set-top box that runs the Ubuntu Linux distribution. The LINK brings Web-based streaming media services like Hulu to your TV and can easily be repurposed to run Boxee and other popular Linux media software.
[...]
The Neuros.tv service is minimalistic, but it’s a convenient way to navigate to Internet content. It allows you to search for streaming media by typing in the name of a movie or television show, and then it will display available results from all of the supported services. The search box has a smart autocompletion feature that will offer suggestions.
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Since this funny project has already been reviewed by some other blogger, I thought I could drop some word as well.
Some time ago in the #rapache-devel channel Jason, which is the author of many of the nice features found in Rapache, came up with the idea of leveraging PulseAudio and do something with it.
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What are you going to use this summer? Ubuntu 9.04 will be released at the end of April and Windows 7 is rumored to be out at the end of July. With the release dates so close together, which would you prefer to run? To make the decision easier, I’ve tried to objectively compare Ubuntu 9.04 Alpha4 and Windows 7 Beta, both released at the end of January.
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Dell
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The EE Times reported earlier this week that the Dell E4200 and E4300 laptops are running both Linux and Windows on the same machine. Why both you ask? The Linux OS provides a quick boot for checking email and other “light” computing duties while the Windows side allows “heavier duty” computing like running Microsoft Office applications. It runs with two chips, one from ARM and one from Intel. The ARM chip, provides instant on booting and is much more power efficient, while the Intel chip provides the juice to run apps that require more computing power.
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Dell is offering Windows-Linux hybrid laptops that use both Intel and ARM processors. Though the user would never know it.
As pointed out in this EE Times report, entitled “Dell has dragged the Linux-ARM Trojan horse inside the Wintel PC,” Dell is offering a processor-plus-OS subsystem separate from the main Windows-Intel system.
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Applications
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I earlier wrote about Top 5 BitTorrent Clients for Ubuntu Linux, 7 Awesome 3D Graphic Design Applications for Linux , 23 Free Ubuntu Linux Login Screens and Top 10 Free Video Editors for Linux . It’s always great to have Linux Alternatives to popular applications so I’ve decided to write about some of the most useful System applications for Linux including Cd burners, Aniti Virus, FTP solutions and instant messengers that you can download today.
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Sweet Home 3D is powerful and easy to learn open source cross platform 3D software tool. It’s a free interior design application that helps you placing your furniture on a 2D house plan, with a 3D preview! Install it and be your own architect who can create the perfect house plan that will exactly fit all your needs and preferences.
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One of the reasons I haven’t been posting as many Linux reviews as usual so far in 2009 is because I have been spending a lot of what little free time I get learning how to use Inkscape.
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Slowly but steadily, Mozilla grew into more areas of interest than someone could have previously imagined. Firefox, Thunderbird, Instabird for instant messaging and… Songbird. The latter is a promising audio application some of you might have gotten yourselves accustomed to. The 1.0.0 release launched in the first days of December delivers an impressive arsenal ranging from themes to add-ons.
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International
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Reuters report today, 12th February 2009, that the government of Cuba aims to replace the, all pervasive Microsoft software, running on its administrative infrastructure, with its own Linux distribution. The Cuban distribution, called Nova and apparently a Gentoo variant of Linux, was introduce recently at the annual International Conference on Communication and Technologies in Havana.
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A Linux operating system variant called Nova, introduced in Cuba at a computer conference on technological sovereignty, is part of an effort to replace the Microsoft software running most of Cuba’s computers. The Cuban government views the use of Microsoft systems as a potential threat because it says U.S. security agencies have access to Microsoft codes.
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[Via Google Translate: Belarusian State University opens lab to study the freely distributed operating systems (open systems standards). It was established at the Faculty of Applied Mathematics and Informatics in cooperation with the Belarusian company "Clear Code" - a business partner of leading representatives of Linux-solutions.]
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Desktop Environments
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Have you ever dreamed of Compiz-like effects in Enlightenment 17 ?
After a good number of previous testing versions, reports, fixes, and features added, Elive finally releases the special version with E17 running over Compiz (ecomorph).
Do you want more details? Just watch the video and see what it looks like!
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Are you unhappy with the functionality of your desktop? Are the menus distracting, the system slow to start, etc? Would you rather have a minimal layout? A faster boot speed? In that case, you need to look at the window managers available for Linux users.
Window Managers are essentially the programs that control the way your menus and windows are arranged, moved, etc. They can completely change the feel of your computer, and be used to optimize your workspace for whatever you need it to do.
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I now use KDE 4.2 and haven’t looked back.
Why? Keep reading.
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Xfce 4.6 Release Candidate 1 is now in the Jaunty archive! I just upgraded to Jaunty (Hardy -> Intrepid -> Jaunty) the other day and am really digging the new version of Xfce4!
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Distributions
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We hope that you are all doing ok in these difficult times. Maybe Ulteo can help you in some ways to achieve your professional goals.
On our side we have been busy developing the Ulteo Open Virtual desktop beta for Windows applications or a mix Windows and Linux applications in the same desktop or from a web page. We are now looking for just 50 private beta users who commit to try and test it and send us feedback between Feb. 26 and March 7. 2009.
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New Releases
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Red Hat
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In this screenshot gallery we take you through the install process and basic desktop functionality of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3, which was released to customers in late January.
RHEL 5.3 includes support for Intel’s latest chip architecture, Core i7, codenamed Nehalem. It also includes the Open Java Development Kit, an open-source implementation of Java SE 6 supported by Sun Microsystems. This inclusion is intended to support Red Hat’s Java application server, JBoss.
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This month’s Linux Format Magazine includes Fedora 10. I upgraded to Fedora 10 a few months ago via a yum upgrade. I started by looking at Xfce as I’ve been using Xfce non-stop ever since starting “I’m Not Mad” in November. Xfce is much lighter than Gnome and I’m able to use Blender more effectively. Fedora 10 comes with Xfce 4.4.3. Overall, nothing major has changed on the surface although I know they’ve been doing a lot of work under the hood.
[...]
After writing this review I went in to read LXF’s review to see if I missed anything. The only other things they mentioned were that PackageKit and the Printer Adding dialog were much improved. I think PackageKit is a bit faster and a few tweaks make it a better experience vs Fedora 9, but it’s not THAT much of an improvement. LXF gave Fedora 10/10 and I think I’d probably give it a 9/10. So check it out – if you’ve been burned by unstable Fedora releases before, you’ll be pleasently surprised with Fedora 10. And now, I’m going back to Xfce….
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Debian
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With the release of ‘Lenny’ – the latest stable branch of Debian GNU/Linux – on Saturday (yes, that’s Valentine’s day – don’t forget!), Tom Callway speaks to the head of the Debian project, Steve MacIntyre.
Why is the imminent release of Lenny a good thing for the Debian community?
It’s the focus of lots of the work we’ve been doing for the last two years or so, with many new and updated versions of everybody’s favourite packages. We’ve translated more of our packages into more languages, and (as ever!) there are more packages available. That means we can cover more people’s needs, from home laptop or desktop system through to universities running massive scientific clusters and businesses depending on a very solid platform for their servers.
Many members of our community are happy to run from our testing and unstable branches, but the stable releases are very important to the rest where they trust us to just make things work and keep them working.
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Shortly before the release of Debian GNU/Linux 5.0 “Lenny” expected on Valentine’s Day, the Debian developers have released another update to Debian 4.0 “Etch”. The update comes only 7 weeks after the last update. Changes in Debian 4.0.r7 mainly include security updates and other bug fixes.
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Debian project leader (DPL) Steve Mcintyre said: “We will be dedicating the Lenny release to our long-term contributor and friend Thiemo Seufer, who was tragically killed in a car accident in Germany on December 26 last year.
“He was responsible for much of the work on the Debian MIPS ports and was always happy to help, sharing his technical excellence and good humour with many of us over the years. Thiemo’s tireless efforts in Debian and many other projects will be sorely missed.”
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Devices/Embedded
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RadicalCodex for Linux: eBook and Comic Book organizer includes exporting to Kindle and Sony eBook readers.
Radical Breeze is pleased to announce the immediate availability of RadicalCodex 1.0 Beta 3.
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Archos, the French manufacturer of multimedia tablets, has announced plans for a portable media device that will run Googles open source Android operating system. The Archos Internet Media Tablet (IMT) is to be a multimedia player with Smartphone capabilities.
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Just because Linutop is based on Linux, it doesn’t mean it’s difficult to configure. In fact, the little machine comes with a custom Linutop Setup applet which allows you to configure virtually every aspect of the system in a matter of minutes.
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Sometimes you kind of know a gadget is going to fail, simply because it launches at the wrong time. A great example would be the Microsoft SPOT watch which was essentially an expensive and ungainly data-casting wristwatch that could show very small amounts of news and weather data while you walked. Sounds OK, until you realise that it was launched at the same time as mobile phones were moving into data, as smartphones were appearing, as wifi was taking off.
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An open source hacker community has launched an online store to sell home-made gizmos, including a GPS-equipped baseboard (pictured) for the Linux-ready Gumstix Verdex processor module. GizmoForYou builds custom gadgets according to members suggestions, and sells the open-spec devices online, says the group.
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In an early test of the OLPC XO in Nigeria, the student users dropped every laptop several times a day. Despite the laptops’ rugged construction, they occasionally needed fixing, and a group of six-year-old girls opened up a “hospital” to reseat cables and do other simpler repairs. Mary Lou Jepson, One Laptop Per Child project’s CTO, had this response: “I put extra screws underneath the battery cover so that if they lost one, they could have an extra one. And kids trade them almost like marbles, when they want to try to get something fixed in their laptop.”
[...]
We eventually got her an Aspire One Linux version. And the question is it seems like there were a few minor tweaks like a 90 percent keyboard that would’ve made it something that could’ve still been used by kids, but would’ve given it a more general ability to be used?
[...]
MLJ: I think enormous things can be done. For example, right now in front of me, I have my laptop on. Not a single pixel is changing on the screen and I run Linux, pretty nice. I run Ubuntu.
[...]
JT: I was actually really amused that I got a big like a 50-inch last year and the last page of the manual has a GPL notice because it’s evidentially running a copy of Linux inside of it.
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The Open Source Automation Development Lab (OSADL) announced that the PREEMPT_RT patches have been stabilized with the mainline Linux 2.6.26 kernel. The newly available “latest stable” kernel is said to achieve latency as low as 39 microseconds, while inheriting several interesting new 2.6.26 kernel features.
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Enter DD-WRT (whose wiki is great, but the root page is less than useful), and I am a happy wireless camper again. This is still Linux-based firmware, but unlike the other firmware I tried, all configuration is intended to be performed via the web interface, meaning that you can leave your Linux knowledge at the door.
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Phones
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With deteriorating global economic conditions making their impact felt in the wireless industry, handset OEMs and mobile network operators are looking to Linux-based operating systems to cut costs and diversify their handset portfolios.
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The LiMo foundation welcomed lots of new members today, and according to recent research, it’s due in a large part to economic conditions favouring a license-free operating system.
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Sub-notebooks
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Just the existence of desktop Linux—a second source for the OS, as PC builders have a second source for everything else—means a shift of negotiating power. There’s still a lot of network value in a copy of Microsoft Windows because of all the compatible products out there. But, thanks to hard-working Linux driver writers, “driverless” USB class-compliant devices, and the rise of web-based applications to take the place of shrink-wrapped Win32 applications, the difference in network value is less and less at the low end of the market. There’s a higher difference in Windows and Linux network value when you move up from a basic web browsing, word processing machine to either content creation (where more of the leading applications aren’t out for Linux) or small business (where customers want Windows-only vertical apps and Intuit QuickBooks.)
So today, the negotiating power that PC builders get from the threat of desktop Linux is only at the low end. Jim Zemlin at the Linux Foundation goes straight to the source: a Microsoft earnings report. “Client revenue declined 8% as a result of PC market weakness and a continued shift to lower priced netbooks.” Even stuck at the low end, desktop Linux is making Microsoft’s product cheaper. Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols writes, “Well, I think Microsoft is offering some very sweet deals to the OEMs to make sure that XP gets a lot of play.”
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We recently had a look at games that run smoothly on Windows netbooks, proving that Atom powered machines pack enough punch to be handheld console killers, much to consternation of the laptop industry.
The myths persist, however, when it comes to their Linux-based brethren. The operating system is perceived as largely functional and, importantly, free rather than any fun at all, restricted purely to office tasks and web browsing.
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Linux has proved to be a very popular operating system choice on netbooks. Companies like Hewlett-Packard have even gone so far as to customize Linux on their systems in the hopes of a unique, distinctly un-Windows experience. The HP Mini 1000 Mi Edition computer, for example, actually runs on a modified version of Ubuntu Linux, but you would never know it.
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The operating-system choice is limited. Apple may surprise us any day, but so far haven’t entered the fray. Windows XP is most common on netbooks, though Acer, ASUS and HP have ones running on Linux. Windows Vista is sluggish on most laptops and would be useless on netbooks.
Free Software/Open Source
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Over the past decade open source software has become popular with technology users in India. The benefits of open source – affordability, availability of source code and freedom of choice – have made open source a preferred platform for many innovative Indian organizations and individuals who want to harness the power of high quality software which can be freely adapted to their own requirements.
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Developers soon will have a network to go to for developing principally open source projects and testing their software on multiple platforms.
The planned Snakebite network is intended to “provide developers of open source projects complete and unrestricted access to as many different platforms, operating systems, architectures, compilers, devices, databases, tools, and applications that they may need in order to optimally develop their software,” according to the Snakebite Web site, which also welcomes visitors to “the future of open source development.”
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In November 2008 the Buzztard project maintainers announced the public release of version 0.4.0 of their flagship application. This version of Buzztard brings new features and performance enhancements, including expanded support for original Buzz songs and machines and an impressive make-over of its GUI.
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Recently, we covered research showing that nearly half of open source developers are focused on applications for delivery in the cloud.
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Mozilla
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What is Mozilla’s involvement in the EC’s complaint against Microsoft?
We are following it closely and are obviously interested in the outcome. Mozilla has received “interested third party” status in the EC’s investigation. As a result, we may see the Statement of Objections confidentially. We may participate in a hearing if the EC concurs. Mozilla’s role as an interested third party best enables us to contribute our knowledge of the browser industry to the EC. Mozilla is not a complainant; we have not “joined the suit”, despite some reports to the contrary.
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Anyone can easily see the fallacious reasoning here. The truth of course is that Microsoft is not simply abusing its market position to stiffle innovation on the browser space[1] but it has been doing so aggressively and for a very long and well documented time.
Firefox managed to achieve market acceptance despite Microsoft’s monopoly on the space. When the new browser came out, it didn’t even register on the radar until the first major grass root advertising and word-of-mouth campaigns started. Even though it was vastly superior to any of MS’ offerings, its growth was slow and tortured, owning mostly to the fact that most webpages were “optimized” for IE and flat-out refused to work with Mozilla based browsers.
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Free Software Foundation Europe has been supporting the European Commission’s DG Competition in its antitrust work since 2001, when it first offered its expertise to the former Competition Commissioner Mario Monti. In 2003 it brought the Samba team to the table, and our cooperation was able to provide the Commission with substantial evidence for its final decision in 2004. We stood by the side of the Commission in the European Court of First Instance when most of the industry had meanwhile accepted out-of-court settlements with Microsoft, and saw the case through to the end.
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Business
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Is open source part of the answer to the financial crisis? Ingres thinks so.
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Hoping to bolster its position in the Web-based content management system market, Plain Black has rolled out a spruced-up version of its flagship product that makes it easier to maintain Web content and features a new point-of-sale cash register.
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Volantis Mobility Server was released under the GPLv3 almost one year ago, so I asked Mark Watson, Volantis Systems CEO, about how things are going, and how going open source helped.
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GroundWork Monitor has been updated to version 5.3 with improvements to key areas. The network management software from GroundWork is available as a free Community Edition, as well as two commercial versions, GroundWork Monitor Professional and GroundWork Monitor Enterprise. The new release includes version 3.06 of the Nagios monitoring tools. Updated components include MySQL, RRDTool, PHP and the reporting tool BRIT. Installation has been simplified for new Linux servers, as all prerequisites are now included in a single package.
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I asked David Dennis, senior director of product marketing at Groundwork, more about GroundWork’s customer base, how GroundWork keeps pace with open source innovation and how GroundWork benefits from using the BitRock Network Service.
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Licensing
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Under copyleft licensing, companies can modify and reproduce the software but must also make their own modified versions of the software available under the same copyleft licensing model.
If there is no copyleft provision, it is necessary to distinguish between modifications–or add-ons to the original OSS source codes–and derived codes, which are resultant source codes created using all or part of the original source codes.
Music
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FREE MUSIC DOWNLOAD COMPANY Qtrax has signed up the last major recording company to its service.
The company miffed some players in the music industry when it launched last year before any of them had signed up to the deal.
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Public health workers are increasingly looking at open source solutions to aid in gathering data, analyzing trends, and publicizing and launching new health care initiatives worldwide.
IntraHealth’s OPEN Initiative is taking a colorful approach to improving health services in developing nations — by bringing together health workers and (not at all health care specific) open source projects to train and support doctors and nurses using open source software in these areas. Because funding is always an issue (in public health and open source, alas) IntraHealth has gotten some help from some legends in the music industry, who have put together a charity album to raise awareness for the Initiative’s efforts, as well as offset program costs.
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The Government’s Digital Britain plan is a failure that gives favourable treatment to the music business and props up failed business models, a software trade body has said.
The Federation Against Software Theft and Investors in Software (FAST IiS), which promotes the legitimate use of software, has launched a stinging attack on the Digital Britain report and on the way the music industry has approached the threat of digital piracy.
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No longer working for EMI, in an interview with Joakim from Norway’s Dagbladet, Johansen – unrestrained from the shackles of a forced corporate line – speaks freely, noting that while he took a salary from EMI he felt obliged to defend their stance.
He now believes the music industry’s fight against piracy has been useless and says he disagrees with the assertion that illicit file-sharing is the same as theft. Referring to an earlier EMI anti-piracy initiative, Johansen noted, “The message of that campaign is that there is a reason why we have copyright, and I agree.”
Leftover
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Communications Minister Senator Stephen Conroy seems to be trying to increase the depth of the hole he’s digging with his much maligned Internet content filtering trial. The content filtering scheme and the trial are already widely unpopular but Senator Conroy is stretching the bounds of credibility by restricting the ISPs taking part to mostly bit players.
Digital Tipping Point: Clip of the Day
Bdale Garbee, Hewlett Packard computer wizard and Debian lead 08 (2004)
Digital Tipping Point is a Free software-like project where the raw videos are code. You can assist by participating.
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