• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

Four Siblings Prove Age Is Just A Number

Nuruddin Hadii said that the e-School system is based on Linux platform since it is cheaper and secure compared to other operating systems.

Nadzirun Hazim, the Solution Developer, said the solution he is using in this e-School system is based on Linux platform.

Khairunnisaa Saaniah added that the idea of publishing “My PSR Puzzle” books sprang when they were struggling in completing the e-School system.

The Onverse Virtual World Adds Cross-Platform Patcher, Power-Up System

The update also officially launches its Linux client alpha test.

Turns Out There’s A Linux Car Too

In response to this morning’s Google Car post, tipster George sent through a pic of this Mercedes with Linux licence plates. Considering the Merc would cost a lot more than the Holden, does that mean that Linux is better than Google?

Softpedia Linux Weekly, Issue 86

North Korea’s “secret cyber-weapon”: brand new Red Star OS

Not only does North Korea have “its own Internet” – a national information network independent from the US-based Internet regulator – it also has an operating system, developed under by order of Kim Jong-il.

Russian student Mikhail, who studies in the Kim Il-sung University and writes a blog from the Russian embassy in Pyongyang, has recently purchased the Red Star Operating System (OS) and tested it. Courtesy of Mikhail, RT gives you an opportunity to take glimpse at IT life of world’s most closed country.

Red Star OS: Linux distro from North Korea

North Korea has had its own internet from a long time now. Their internet is free of any American influence and now, they have their own operating system to power that internet. The Red Star OS is a Linux based OS, developed by orders from Kim Jong-il.

Storagepipe Now Offers Rapid Recovery with Linux Support and Deduplication Capability

In response to the recent success of their Rapid Recovery offering, Storagepipe Solutions (http://storagepipe.com) has issued several important new updates that allow support for Linux systems and data deduplication for minimized storage costs and improved recovery speeds.

Bioinformatics and Biologists

The more ambitious new users can find plenty of challenges (and rewards) by creating Linux one-liners involving pipes or commands like awk or sed. These appear quite complex, but they are manageable when started with cookbook-style cheat sheets. Keeping a project’s set of commands in a file makes it very easy to document and tweak the pipeline, and to remember recently learned tricks. This expertise in basic Linux command-line use is all that separates many biologists from a ton of great, publicly available bioinformatics tools.

Selftestengine Introduces All about Linux+ certification

Are you looking to make a great career in the field of Linux then here is a certification that would help you in that. In this article you would come to now about the Linux+ certification course and its requirements. Here is a chance to certify your knowledge.

Meet the laptop for PC phobics!

“If the company succeeds it will be a huge boost for the cause of Linux computing.”

Alex laptop aimed at technophobes

The Alex uses an operating system that was based on the Ubuntu Linux system and includes applications that have been designed by Broadband Computer designers.

Fast Boot

• Linux OS – A Rose By Any Other Name

  Q: Are you working with a Linux distribution partner? Who is it?
  A: Yes Thundersoft. Lenovo recognized the value of running Linux as a base platform for the Skylight User Interface for everything from performance to extensive customization. This allowed us to pick the best and most appropriate elements to solve the SmartBook equation. An extensive team of partners along with internal development teams from Lenovo and Qualcomm worked together to pick, customize and create what we needed to provide a world-class solution.

  Yes my friend. It is still a Linux OS.

• HP Touches the 2740p Tablet PC

  Day Starter is a Linux application that comes on within five seconds of hitting the Power button and provides a look at the day’s schedule, along with battery status. The system continues to boot in the background while Day Starter is displayed, allowing the user to see Outlook (only) schedule information without affecting system boot time. HP Day Starter is for information only, no interaction with the information displayed is possible.

Server

• Parallel programming tool offered for Cell processor

  The Offload parallel programming tool suite from Codeplay Software Ltd. is now available for all programmers developing software to run under Linux on the Cell Broadband Engine processor.

• IBM Launches New POWER7 System

  The POWER7, like other IBM power systems which run on the AIX, Linux and IBM i operating systems, is aimed to help clients manage their current applications and services at less cost, more energy savings, and with cost-efficient use of memory and better performance, IBM said.

• Fixstars Launches Linux for CUDA

  Multicore software specialist Fixstars Corporation has released Yellow Dog Enterprise Linux (YDEL) for CUDA, the first commercial Linux distribution for GPU computing. The OS is aimed at HPC customers using NVIDIA GPU hardware to accelerate their vanilla Linux clusters, and is designed to lower the overall cost of system deployment, the idea being to bring these still-exotic systems into the mainstream.

• Russia invests in supercomputers

  Russia launched its fastest supercomputer, Lomonosov, at the Moscow State University’s Research Computing Center in 2004. With the peak speed of 420TFLOPS, it is still ranked 12th in the Top500 list of the world’s fastest computers.

Kernel Space

• Intel readies Sandy Bridge Linux support

  Intel is well known for its open source love, so it’s no surprise the firm has started to roll out its Sandy Bridge GPU support on Linux.

• Download Nvidia 195.36.08 Linux Display Driver

  Nvidia is making quite a lot of Linux gamers happy with the latest update to its display drivers for *NIX platforms (Linux, FreeBSD and Solaris). Nvidia 195.36.08 adds support for a few of the latest graphics adapters from the chip maker, specifically Quadro FX 880M, GeForce GTS 350M and GeForce GTS 360M. On Linux, the latest Nvidia 195.36.08 driver also adds support for NVIDIA 3D Vision Stereo with Quadro GPUs. It also comes with a lot of updates and changes for the VDPAU API Nvidia developed to offload video processing and decoding to the graphics unit.

Applications

• CAD freeware for Windows® and Linux® now used commercially

• gFTP: The No-Hassle Way to Transfer Files

  gFTP is typical of most Linux-based software. It does not have to suffer code bloat to be a powerful program. Much like a file management tool, gFTP makes it easy to manage files at either end of the connection. Sure, there are other file transfer apps available to Linux users, but I found that gFTP is among the smallest and easiest packages to use.

• Instructionals

  • Tech Break – SSH Tunneling: Like a VPN, only cooler

  • “Setup Unmanaged VPS 4 Linux Noobs!” – VPS Bible’s New Tutorial Website Launch

    “vpsBible offers Linux noobs and seasoned webmasters alike the easy-read copy-paste guides they need to build a first rate web server at minimal cost.”

• Games

  • CANADA VENTURE: TransGaming Bringing Video Games To TV

    TransGaming makes software that allows video games to be deployed across different operating systems without the need for redevelopment. For instance, using the company’s software, games developed for the Windows operating system can be used on Mac and Linux operating systems.

Distributions

• New Releases

  • SystemRescueCd 1.4 released

    The SystemRescueCd developers have announced the availability of version 1.4.0 of their recovery tool for administering or repairing an operating system and recovering data after a system crash. The SystemRescueCd is based on the Gentoo LiveCD and supports a wide variety of file systems including Ext2, Ext3 and Ext4, ReiserFS, XFS, JFS, VFAT, NTFS, ISO9660 and Btrfs.

  • Tiny Core Linux 2.9 Available for Download

    Tiny Core 2.9, the latest update to the frugal Linux distribution, has now been made available to all users in its final form. The distro comes with a number of upgraded packages and components under the hood, but also fixes several bugs and adds a few new features. Some of the changes to the very light Linux distribution also make Tiny Core 2.9 compatible with more hardware platforms.

• Ubuntu

  • Ubuntu dumps the brown, introduces new theme and branding

    Canonical has revealed the style of the new default theme that will be used in Ubuntu 10.04, the next major version of the popular Linux distribution. In a significant departure from tradition, Ubuntu is shedding its signature brown color scheme and is adopting a new look with a palette that includes orange and an aubergine shade of purple

  • Ubuntu 10.04 to support iPhones and iPod touches

Devices/Embedded

• ARM processors run native Linux and Android applications

  ARM will showcase this week at the Embedded World conference in Germany a software development tool for Linux and Android native applications running on ARM processor-based systems.

• iGala Linux powered WiFi Photo Frame does more than displaying Photos

  Gala WiFi Linux Based Photo Frame available at ThinkGeek for $239.99.

• Netgear Unveils NAS For SMBs

  The 3100 is a 1U, four-bay, rack-mount device that can come equipped with 4 TB or 8 TB of storage. The 4200 is a 2U, 12-bay, rack-mount product that’s available with either 12 TB or 24 TB of storage and two redundant drives. Both products are VMware-ready and are unified storage systems powered by the Linux-based ReadyNAS RAIDiator operating system.

• Netgear expands ReadyNAS offerings for virtualised environments

• AE Linux Is Available on Cinnamon Bay SBC Featuring Intel(R) Atom(TM) Processors

  Embedded World (Germany) — Arium (Tustin, CA) and ADI Engineering (Charlottesville, VA) today announced at the Embedded World Conference that Arium’s AE Linux has been ported onto ADI Engineering’s Intel Atom-based Cinnamon Bay Single Board Computer (SBC) platform. Arium’s AE Linux distribution is targeted for headless designs requiring a small file system and kernel footprint. The Cinnamon Bay platform is targeted at OEMs and embedded device developers who desire high-performance, highly-integrated computing platforms where they can directly boot AE Linux from a microSD card, making for a very compact and low-cost solution.

• Enea Simplifies Multicore Development with Hypervisor

  The Enea Hypervisor is based on OSE micro kernel technology and runs Enea OSE applications at native processor speeds without compromising any real-time critical properties, and takes as guests Linux Operating System and optionally semiconductor specific executive environments for bare-metal speed packet processing.

• How to Learn Embedded Linux (For Free Again)

  In the past few years, the use of Linux in embedded devices has skyrocketed. Televisions, phones, cars, ATMs: you name it, it probably has Linux running in it. At the recent Mobile World Congress, Linux dominated virtually every product announcement: Samsung’s Bada, many new Android phones, the Linux Foundation’s MeeGo project, Palm, and many more. Embedded Linux today has been nearly as disruptive as Linux was in the data center in the 90s and 2000s as it displaced proprietary Unix OSes.

• Korenix JetOS95 Embedded Linux Platform Now Approved for IPv6 Ready Silver Mark

  Korenix is proud to announce that its JetOS95 Embedded Linux Based operating system has been approved for IPv6 Ready Silver Mark – a certification led by China Telecom Group. This indicates that Korenix JetBox 9500 / 9400 and 5400 series Embedded Networking and Computing Platforms, which are running on JetOS95 software, include the IPv6 mandatory core protocols and can interoperate with other IPv6 equipments.

• MontaVista Selected as a Finalist in Two Categories in EDN’s 20th Annual Innovation Awards Competition

  MontaVista(R) Software, LLC, the leader in embedded Linux(R) commercialization, announced today they have been selected from hundreds of nominations as a finalist in two categories for this year’s EDN Innovation Awards. Instituted in 1990, the Innovation Awards honor the people, products, and technologies that have shaped the semiconductor industry over the past year. MontaVista is a finalist for Innovator of the Year and the Embedded/Software Tools categories. EDN’s worldwide audience of electronic engineers and engineering managers select the ultimate winners from among the finalists along with EDN’s editorial staff. Visit www.EDN.com/innovation20 to review each of the nominees and cast your vote.

• 0 to Linux in 1 second

  Impressed by the 7 second boot time of Chrome OS? Then this will blow you away!

  The great thing about Linux is that due to its open source nature, it can be pushed to further limits than a closed source OS. It can be designed to work with extremely constrained resources, and its modular nature means that you can get away with removing a lot of features without affecting its working. It can be pushed to work in mere kilobytes of RAM, or on computers of a mere 20MHz, and now it has been shown to boot in under a second.

• Phones

  • Telco software groups line up facing Google, Apple

    The two consortiums, wireless Linux group LiMo and application alliance WAC, offer operators alternatives to the software and services of Apple, Google or Nokia as they can brand and customize their software.

  • Organisations join forces to combat Apple

    The Wholesale Applications Community (WAC), a telco-led organisation announced at the recent Mobile World Congress (MWC) event in Barcelona, is to co-operate more closely with mobile Linux group LiMo, according to a Reuters report released today.

  • Orange/Meego

    • Orange backs Intel-Nokia Linux drive

      Orange has given its thumbs-up to the Intel-Nokia Linux venture Meego, the OS formerly known as Maemo and Moblin.

    • Orange backs Intel, Nokia Linux platform

      Mobile operator Orange got behind the Nokia-Intel founded Linux initiative MeeGo on Wednesday, anticipating the creation of a new channel for the delivery of consumer multimedia services.

    • Intel And Orange Tout Nokia Linux Platform

  • Nokia

    • Nokia N900 review

      Perfect for Linux developers with deep pockets, but despite great performance and an intuitive OS, it’s not suitable for consumers who want a wide selection of apps and easy updates.

    • Nokia N900 coming to retailers in April

      Nokia has announced its Linux-based smartphone, the N900, will be available in Australia through retailers in April, but stopped short of announcing any agreements with carriers.

    • MVTec embedded software runs on Nokia mobile phone

      MVTec claims that tests have proven that image-processing applications based on HALCON can be successfully built for the Nokia N900. Applications are first developed with HALCON running on a PC. The exported code is then compiled for the Nokia N900 to allow the application to run on this mobile platform and access the full functionality of HALCON.

  • Android

    • Where Android beats the iPhone

      Can Google Android phones compete with the Apple iPhone? A few weeks ago, Google loaned me a Nexus One smartphone for experimentation, and I’ve spent the time since downloading applications and writing my own code. The good news is that the platform is not only competitive but is often a better choice than the iPhone for many programmers and the enterprises that employ them.

    • Carphone Warehouse flogs Motorola’s Milestone

      We reviewed Motorola’s and Europe’s first Android 2.0 smartphone back in January. At the time Motorola had an exclusive deal with the online retailer Expansys but the company has now signed a deal with Carphone Warehouse to flog its handset to the UK.

• Sub-notebooks

  • CeBIT 2010: Linpus Linux Lite 1.3 for netbooks

    At this year’s CeBIT in Hannover, Linpus Technologies has announced version 1.3 of their Linpus Linux Lite distribution specifically aimed at Original Equipment and Original Design manufacturers of low-cost hardware, such as netbooks. Linpus Lite is based on the Fedora operating system and supports resolutions as low as 640 by 480 (VGA).

  • Intel’s New Convertible Classmate PC Doubles as E-Reader

    It is available with either Microsoft Windows or Linux operating system.

SCALE 8x: Color management for everyone

On Sunday at SCALE 8x, Inkscape developer Jon Cruz presented a talk entitled “Why Color Management matters to Open Source and to You,” putting the need for color management into real-world terms for the average Linux user, outlining current development work on the subject at the application and toolkit levels, and giving example color-managed workflows for print and web production. Color management is sometimes unfairly characterized as a topic of interest only to print shops and video editors, but as Cruz explained at the top of his talk, anyone who shares digital content wants it to look correct, and everyone who uses more than one device knows how tricky that can be.

The alternatives to iTunes

However, if you want to manage your iPod, look no further than Floola. Both Songbird and Floola run on Windows, Macs and the open-source Linux operating system. It will sync your music, your podcasts, your photos and your calendar, just as iTunes does. Although Floola has a basic interface, it does have some bells and whistles that you won’t find in iTunes. iTunes can sync with iCal, the built-in calendar app on the Mac, but Floola can sync with your Google calendar too. It can also copy web videos to your iPod just by adding the web address of the video, repair your iPod and download missing artwork.

Openness

• FCC to Call for Government Data Overhaul

  The Federal Communications Commission outlined more details of the comprehensive broadband plan it plans to deliver to Congress later this month, laying out a series of recommendations for using Web-based technology to drive civic engagement with the government.

  The commission will call on all branches of government to continue the early efforts underway in the executive branch to bring more data online, and urge government officials to accelerate the use of social media tools to engage the public, Eugene Huang, the director of government operations at the FCC’s broadband task force said on Monday.

US might turn to WTO to pressure China

SEARCH GIANT Google wants the US to take its Chinese battles through the World Trade Organisation (WTO), according to a Business Week report.

This will no doubt further fuel the antagonistic relations between Google, the US and China.

Security

• Slouching toward justice for Terry Childs

  The Terry Childs trial has dragged on for eight weeks now, and the defense hasn’t even started presenting its case. I’m nowhere near the courtroom — I’m on the other side of the country, in fact — but I’ve talked to several folks who were there. Each one volunteered that jurors seemed bored to tears; some in the jury box may even have been sleeping. Seems my comments last year about the potential problems of seating a jury for this trial [1] had some foundation after all.

• Nose scanning techniques could sniff out criminals

  We already have iris and fingerprint scanning but noses could be an even better method of identification, says a study from the University of Bath, UK.

  The researchers scanned noses in 3D and characterised them by tip, ridge profile and the nasion, or area between the eyes.

  Since they are hard to conceal, the study says, noses would work well for identification in covert surveillance.

  The researchers say noses have been overlooked in the growing field of biometrics, studies into ways of identifying distinguishing traits in people.

• Think the ID card’s gone away? Think again

  I have been a resident of the UK since 2005, having emigrated here from the USA – my home country. At first I was a graduate student, then -according to the Home Office – a highly-skilled migrant worker. Recently I married a UK citizen and I had to renew my visa for the fourth time in 4 years. This time, the situation is different. No longer do I have a ‘vignette’ sticker in my passport. Instead, I have been compelled to have a UK ID card which holds my biometrics and visa. I have to carry both my passport and my ID when I travel in and out of the country.

• What not to do when you retire…

  An old man who has chosen to spend his retirement presiding over the most intrusive and expensive system allowing our government to control its population ever conceived in Britain.

• Vulnerabilities in sudo closed

Environment

• Organized Campaigns to Cyber-Bully Climate Scientists?

  Climate scientists increasingly report that they have become targets of cyber-bullying, saying threats and hatred pour into their email inboxes whenever they appear in the press or media. The emailers call the scientists cheaters, frauds, scumbags and worse. Australian academic Clive Hamilton speculated in a news column that purpose of this cyber-bullying is to upset and intimidate the targets, making them reluctant to participate further in the climate change debate. Most of the e-mails seem to be the work of frustrated individuals who simply want to rant, but some appears to be coming from coordinated campaigns. Scientists say people appear to be taking cues from influential anti-climate change advocates like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and the Web site ClimateDepot.com.

Finance

• Take Action on Bank Reform!

  The reckless behavior of big Wall Street banks, credit card companies, and mortgage lenders caused a financial crisis that cost us millions of lost homes and jobs, billions in tax-payer funded bailouts and trillions in lost college and retirement savings.

  This week, the Senate will take up financial reform legislation that will set the shape of economy for the next 50 years. This is a critical time to call or email your Senator and tell them American families can no longer afford a “boom and bail” economy and it’s past time that they cracked down on the abuses that caused the financial crisis.

• Court Upholds Release of Corporate Jets List Sought by ProPublica

  A federal district judge ruled [1] Friday that a list of private planes whose flights are blocked from the public view should be released under the Freedom of Information Act.

  We at ProPublica have been seeking [2] the list since December 2008 after the CEOs of the Big 3 automakers flew to Washington, D.C., on corporate jets to ask Congress for financial help.

• JP Morgan Ramps Up Greedwashing

  JP Morgan Chase is one of the largest banks in America, and played a critical role in the 2008 financial crisis. It received $25 billion in bailout funds in 2008, enabling the company to get back on its feet and pay eye-popping bonuses to top executives in 2009.

• Goldman’s Golden Fleece

  Sound familiar? In 2002, the same firm created a similar index that allowed investors to bet on the likelihood of defaults in the subprime bond market. The “savvy” investors at Goldman made a fortune off the collapse of the market. It’s a sure bet that they will do so again if Greece goes down.

• “Markets” and the National Interest

  Markets are wonderful mechanisms, but only up to a point. Greed is not self-correcting. The lessons of corruption never seem to be learned beyond a generation or two. After a cycle of manipulation and corruption, reforms and regulations are enacted. But then everyday Americans forget the lessons, vote for politicians preaching “free markets” and “deregulation” and the cycle repeats itself. Deregulation was the watchword during the Clinton and Bush years. And see what it gave us. Bernie Madoff. Who stole billions while the Securities and Exchange Commission turned a blind, deregulated eye?

PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

• Conventions tie state officials to drug makers, raise conflict concerns

  Three California officials who oversee billions of dollars in Medi-Cal prescription drug spending have failed to disclose free flights, hotel rooms and meals paid for by nonprofit groups funded by drug makers, records and interviews show.

• The Latest Obama-Islam Conspiracy Theory

  The conservative blogosphere is busy charging that the United States Missile Defense Agency’s (MDA) new logo looks suspicious … like a combination of the Muslim crescent moon and Barack Obama’s campaign logo. Some even say they detect a similarity to the logo of Iran’s Space Agency. Right wing blogger Frank Gaffney, a former senior official at the Pentagon during the Reagan administration, says something “nefarious is afoot” about the new logo.

• Progress Energy abandons dirty coal front group ACCCE.

  Utility giant Progress Energy is the latest in a stream of companies to abandon the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE), the scandal-ridden coal-industry front group that has dirtied the debate on climate legislation.

• Progress Energy Dumps Pro-Coal Front Group

  Progress Energy is the latest in a growing number of energy companies abandoning the pro-coal industry front group, the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE). ACCCE opposes President Obama’s clean energy reform agenda, and was the group that ran ads at Christmas time, 2008 featuring animated lumps of coal called the “Clean Coal Carolers” cheerfully singing Christmas Carols like “Frosty the Snowman” with the lyrics changed to deliver pro-coal propaganda (“Frosty the Coalman is a jolly happy soul. He’s abundant here in America, and he helps our economy roll. Frosty the Coalman’s getting cleaner every day. He’s affordable and adorable and helps workers keep their pay.”)

• Rep. Conyers Compares Lack Of A Performance Right Tax To Slavery

  Of course, Conyers knows all about Payola. Back in 2002, he was the one who called for payola hearings on Capitol Hill. So how is it that he suddenly thinks that money not going the other way is somehow “no avenue for compensation”? He’s being blatantly intellectually dishonest here. Is it worth mentioning that in the last election the two largest contributors to his campaign were lawyers and the Music/Movie/TV industry?

Censorship/Privacy/Civil Rights

• Utah A.G. may gain broader power to demand Internet, cell-phone records

  A proposal that would broaden the power of the Attorney General’s Office to demand Internet and cell phone companies turn over information about customers won broad approval Tuesday from a Utah House committee.

• Lib Dems seek web blocking: ask them to stop

  Lib Dem peers are seeking to amend the Digital Economy Bill to allow site blocking for copyright infringement. This could lead to unwanted blocking of sites accused of copyright infringement, including sites like Youtube, and a massive chilling effect as any site with user generated content could easily fall foul of provisions like this.

• Court rules anti-terror data storage illegal

  In a victory for privacy advocates, Germany’s highest court on Tuesday knocked down an anti-terrorism law that allows authorities to store all phone and internet records of private citizens.

• When American and European Ideas of Privacy Collide

  “On the Internet, the First Amendment is a local ordinance,” said Fred H. Cate, a law professor at Indiana University. He was talking about last week’s ruling from an Italian court that Google executives had violated Italian privacy law by allowing users to post a video on one of its services.

Internet/Net Neutrality/DRM

• Senator Asks NBC to Explain Internet Restrictions

  Senator Herb Kohl, Democrat of Wisconsin, called on NBC Universal on Friday to explain why it has limited access to some Internet video from the Vancouver Games to subscribers of the cable, satellite and telephone companies that have Olympic deals with NBC.

Intellectual Monopolies/Copyrights

• Free Is Not An Aberration; It’s Basic Economics

  First, this is hogwash. Most newspapers and magazines make the majority of their money from advertisements anyway, so putting their content out there for free is hardly taking away serious revenue. Newspaper subscription fees don’t even cover the printing and delivery costs. Magazine subscriptions are just as cheap. You know all those “deals” that give you magazine subscriptions for next to nothing? That’s because subscription revenue is meaningless. Ad revenue is what matters.

• Once Again: People Want To Share The News

  Lots of folks have been sending in the “news” about news consumption from a new Pew study. A lot of the attention being paid to the study focuses on how more people are using the internet for news than newspapers, but that was an obvious trend. What I find a bit surprising is how few people seem to be talking about one of the other findings: that so many people are actively involved in “shared news.” That is, they either share news links or get news links from others on a regular basis.

• Supreme Court Says Courts Still Have Jurisdiction Over Unregistered Copyrights

  In appealing the settlement, it was noted that many of the freelancers had not registered their copyrights. Now, as you hopefully know, you automatically get copyright on any new content as soon as it’s set in tangible form, but if you decide to register it, it gives you additional privileges and remedies against infringement.

• Spanish Indie Labels To Sue The Gov’t For Not Stopping File Sharing

  This is pretty disappointing. Last year, I actually bought a bunch of CDs (yes, physical CDs) from an indie label in Spain that I only heard about after a friend sent me some MP3s suggesting I might like a couple of the bands on the label. After checking out their websites (and being able to listen to some of the songs) I ended up ordering a bunch of CDs from the label. Just last week, I bought two more albums (downloads, via CDBaby) from the same label. Yet, according to these labels (and I can’t tell if the label whose CDs I purchased is part of the lawsuit), they would have been better off suing my friend. Indie labels should be leading the way here: focusing on giving fans real reasons to buy, rather than suing the government for not putting up more protectionist barriers to pretend it can hold back what the technology allows.

• Music without copyright

  Hmmm…think it would make a lot of difference to the world if they lost the $1.6 million from the albums? Without copyright they’d only make $22.8 million from touring…You might almost think it would be worth it to them to give the recorded music away for free to promote their concerts…

• ACTA

  • Lambrinidis or how to stay credible when it’s outrageous

    Here the article again. The quote from Lambrinidis sounds rather harsh and shrill to me but it is all true. Yes, the misuse of FTA for policy laundry is a problem for our emerging European democracy. David pointed that out. I wrote an article a while ago to try out the Salon.com blog titled What laws and bananas have in common about the same issue.

  • The ACTA Conspiracy

    What is often not understood, the planned ACTA is negotiated among a coalition of the willing. It is not primarily targeted at the nations which sit at the negotiations table but it aims at third nations, in particular emerging nations and BRIC. TRIPS included IPR ‘minimum standards’ under the premise of their misuse as a barrier to trade. The current ACTA negotiations leave that premise totally out of sight, negotiators are not aware of the difference or argue that is was just enforcement, not substantive provisions. The actual usefulness of ACTA lies in its applications beyond its original members.

  • EU member states: Making ACTA fit the acquis

• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

Nouveau, Pulseaudio and a critique of modern GNU/Linux distros

A common critique I have of GNU/Linux distributions is the direction of core software packages that are seemingly replaced every few years for no other reason other than they are new. We only have to look at Pulseaudio and the mess that it has caused a what was once stable landscape of working soundcards to notice this trend. Back when Alsa ‘just worked’ for everyone, along came an over-engineered audio subsystem that acted as a network-capable sound server, a wrapper for Alsa, OSS and Esd and as a package that completely broke usable sound on a lot of people’s workstations.

Gentoo Optimizations Benchmarked – Part 2

Gentoo is a source based distribution which lets the user decide how to optimize their system in many ways and includes building for a specific CPU architecture. Linux Magazine benchmarks four such options; i486, i686, pentium3, core2, and throws in Ubuntu for good measure.

Kernel Space

• Finally, Reiser4 Benchmarks Against EXT4 & Btrfs

  There is no shortage of EXT4 benchmarks from comparing this evolutionary file-system’s performance on netbooks to how it battles the Btrfs file-system to its performance recession. We have even benchmarked it on USB flash drives and on high-end SSDs. We have also delivered numerous Btrfs benchmarks. In this article though we are finally delivering something that has long been requested and that is Reiser4 file-system benchmarks running directly against EXT4 and Btrfs. We have also thrown in the original ReiserFS file-system for comparison too.

• The kernel column

  Last month saw the opening (and then closing) of the 2.6.33 merge window (the time during which Linus takes potentially ‘intrusive’ patches to the kernel, followed by a period of stabilisation) and with it a flood of patches intended for the 2.6.33 kernel release. There were the usual kinds of driver updates, but also a large amount of work on Big Kernel Lock (BKL) removal – more on that in a moment – and some controversy over graphics drivers. As usual, almost nothing is truly off limits in the kernel and even the venerable sysctl support had a sprucing up this time around. Meanwhile, outside of the merge process, there were a number of features proposed for the longer term – asynchronous page faults and power capping amongst them – and poetic verse in changelogs.

• The Linux Foundation Launches Free Webinar Series With Big Names

  Starting this month, The Linux Foundation is offering free Linux Training webinars taught by well-known Linux developers and personalities.

• Major Linux 2.6.34 Kernel GPU DRM Updates

  There’s already quite a bit of code that has been merged into the Linus 2.6 Git tree for the Linux 2.6.34 kernel tree, but the first pull request for the DRM (Direct Rendering Manager) code has went in this morning.

Applications

• Win32

  • CodeWeavers Releases Crossover Office 9.0 for MAC and Linux

    CodeWeavers, Inc., a leading developer of software products that turn Mac OS X and Linux into Windows-compatible operating systems, today announced the release of CrossOver 9.0 for both Mac and Linux. CrossOver allows Windows software to be used on Mac and Linux PCs without the need for a Windows operating system license.

  • CrossOver 9.0 Improves Windows Application Support on Linux

    CodeWeavers, supporter of the open source Wine project, have released their latest version of CrossOver for Linux and Mac. CrossOver 9.0 (codenamed “Snow Mallard”) is a commercial product that makes installing Windows applications via Wine extremely easy for Linux users. We’ve been waiting for this new release for several months, and it seems it was worth the wait. So far, we’ve tested it with Office 2007 and IE 7 with great results. Look for a full review at a later time. For now, here is an overview of the new features and some screenshots.

• Instructionals

  • tar.gz, tgz and tar.bz2

  • How to monitor the network activity on Mandriva 2010

  • How to install Opera 10.50 Alpha in Linux

  • Connecting to a Microsoft VPN with Linux

  • In case you love Amarok 1.4 more than Amarok 2.x

  • How to Migrate a Mysql Database with a simple method

  • Revitalise your desktop with Compiz

  • Running awstats on Gentoo

  • Configure Microsoft Outlook Express

  • Install Songbird Latest Version in Ubuntu(Lucid, Karmic, Jaunty)

  • Set Up a VNC Linux Server in 5 Easy Steps

  • How to create LXC system containers to isolate services

    Last week I introduced you to LXC, or Linux Resource Containers. We looked at the requirements to get LXC up and running and looked at isolating individual processes using application containers. In this tip, we go one step further, from isolating a single application to creating a fully separate container that runs a full service or set of services. This tip assumes that LXC has been previously configured, as discussed last week.

  • Build a Netbook NAS With Linux

    Is your netbook nearing the end of its usefulness as a portable? Are you desperate for some network storage? Kill two birds with one stone.

K Desktop Environment (KDE SC)

• KDE Software Compilation 4.4.1 Out Now

  KDE has released an update to the 4.4 series of our Software Compilation. Among other improvements, this update includes a fix for KMail hanging when sending emails that just missed the deadline for 4.4.0 and a number of fixes in many gearheads’ favorite terminal emulator, Konsole.

• KDE Software Compilation 4.4.1 Release Announcement

  KDE Community Ships First Translation and Service Release of the 4.4 Free Desktop, Containing Numerous Bugfixes, Performance Improvements and Translation Updates

• The difficult choice of removing features

  Where does that leave photography ? Well clearly, it is out. And honestly, between Gimp (especially with their work on 2.8) and Digikam, there is not really much room for an other linux photography application to prosper. Since Krita was always more oriented toward drawing and painting, and photographic features were available mostly because “we can”, and there is no high-end application for drawing and painting on linux, the logical conclusion, for us, was to focus on where we can be the best, and the most useful.

GNOME Desktop

• Thoughts about the current Zeitgeist situation (GNOME 3 and beyond)

  I would love to see Zeitgeist growing to be something like Telepathy in terms of providing a standard for event logging (even if its in python), and I hope we get there soon. And I hope Nokia and Intel could also make use of what we have and not reinvent the wheel if they like what we do….

Distributions

• Live Hacking CD a Huge Success; Initial Download Figures for Ethical Hacking Linux Distribution Released

  Dr. Ali Jahangiri, the widely acclaimed security expert and author of Live Hacking: The Ultimate Guide to Hacking Techniques & Countermeasures for Ethical Hackers & IT Security Experts, is pleased to announce the initial download figures for the Live Hacking CD, a new Linux distribution designed for ethical hacking. In the first two weeks since its release the Live Hacking CD has been downloaded over 2400 times.

• New Releases

  • Linux from Scratch 6.6 has arrived

    The Linux from Scratch (LFS) project has released version 6.6 of its building instructions for Linux. The project’s manual contains about 300 pages of instructions on how to compile a custom Linux system from the Linux sources. The LFS project aims to help people understand how Linux works internally and to enable them to build compact, flexible and secure Linux distributions of their own.

• Fedora

  • Zarafa Open Source Collaboration Feature in Fedora 13

    Zarafa is available in the regular Fedora and EPEL repositories. You can install Zarafa after installation using the command line or the package manager of your choice.

• Debian Family

  • CeBIT 2010: Knoppix 6.3 CeBIT Edition released

    At this year’s CeBIT Open Source Forum, Knoppix creator Klaus Knopper has announced the release of version 6.3 of his popular Live Linux distribution. Knoppix is a bootable CD, DVD or USB Flash drive distribution of Linux, incorporating automatic hardware detection. It can be used to demo Linux, as an educational CD, a rescue system, etc. Knoppix uses on-the-fly decompression, so it can have up to 2 GB of data and software installed on a distribution CD or up to 10 GB of data on a single layer DVD.

  • Ubuntu

    • Ubuntu for Beginners

      If I you decide to go with Ubuntu you need to pick which variation you want, There’s Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Edubuntu. Ubuntu is probably the most common; it uses the GNOME graphical user interface. Kubuntu uses the KDE environment, Xubuntu uses Xfce (it’s great for older computers), and Edubuntu designed to be used in classrooms or other education environments. They all basically do the same thing, just look at some screenshots and pick the one you think you would enjoy using more.

      [...]

      Here is a video comparing the Windows Vista Aero desktop to the Ubuntu desktop with Compiz enabled. Loading up your system with a lot of Compiz effects can cause it to slow you down if you don’t have a powerful machine. However, some people like to make things pretty so if that’s you then take a look at this video: Windows Vista Aero vs Ubuntu Compiz
      Besides the stuff you see in that video you can also draw on your screen with fire, you add rain drops to the screen, and much more.

    • Good for the goose but not for the gander.

      So some people like windows. So what! I personally think that it is a badly designed pain in the rear end which only serves as a monetary black hole for a company who is trying its best to be a financial singularity. I like Linux. I think it is the best thing since sliced bread. What was that? So what if I use Gentoo. I don’t care that it is not Ubuntu or Redhat. Whatever floats your boat.

    • Ubuntu One Music Store is Coming to Rock Your World

      The news has been confirmed. Ubuntu One Music Store is how it is going to be called. And it will be there by default in Rythmbox Music Player in Ubuntu Lucid 10.04. And that is NOT welcome because most of us don’t use Rythmbox at all. But hold on, Ubuntu One Music Store is going to have a plug-in support as well. That is sweet!

    • An open letter to Dell regarding Ubuntu, or “go big or go home”

      Well let’s see here. You bury it on your site. You offer nothing but garbage for computers available with Ubuntu — as compared to ones available with Windows.

      I guess I can’t say I’m surprised if your Ubuntu sales are slow. In fact, I’d be surprised if you sell anything at all, the way you’re going about it.

    • Advene – Annotate Digital Video, Exchange on the net

    • Panel power in Ubuntu

    • Call for Artist: Lucid Lynx

      Would you like to see your Lucid Lynx illustration in the pages of Ubuntu User magazine? To have your art considered for Ubuntu User issue #5, submit two sample drawings of a “Lucid Lynx” by March 22, 2010, 5pm CST (GMT -6).

      In one illustration, the Lucid Lynx critter should illustrate the theme “Networking,” and in the other it should illustrate “Security.”

    • Linux Mint

      • Minting the Girlfriend

        Is Vista gone from her laptop? Not yet, but maybe someday (Move Media Player not installing on Linux or through Wine is the last hangup). She is booted in Mint more often than not and has found her way around the Ubuntu Software Center to install Frostwire (among other things). She also used the Linux answer machine to hunt down the driver for her Cannon MP190 printer when it was not auto-found by the printer installer on Mint.

        All in all I must say though, the best part about installing Mint on her laptop is that now when I use it to check my email I no longer have to use Vista

Devices/Embedded

• Phones

  • LiMo Foundation Seeks Alliance With WAC

    The LiMo Foundation wants to partner with the Wholesale Applications Community, as both mobile trade associations try to cut into Apple’s overwhelming dominance of the mobile applications world.

  • WebOS 1.4 adds video capture

    Sprint and Verizon Wireless have released Palm’s upgraded 1.4 version of the Linux-based WebOS for Palm Pre and Palm Pixi smartphones. Ofering much-anticipated video capture and editing functionality plus improved messaging features, WebOS 1.4 arrives shortly after Palm announced lowered investment guidance due to disappointing smartphone sales.

  • Nokia to launch Linux-powered N900 tomorrow

    The N900 will be Nokia’s first and last Maemo 5 smartphone, with the next version due to run the new MeeGo Linux mobile OS created as a joint venture between Nokia and Intel.

• Android

  • Android 2.1 to be available everywhere?

    All Android phones sold in the U.S. will be eligible for an Android 2.1 update, although some older phones may need to be wiped first, says an industry report. Meanwhile another report says Google’s Nexus One is heading to Verizon on Mar. 23, and an AdMob study explores Android users.

• Tablets

  • Sub $200 Android tablets arrives: is the iPad doomed?

    The $179 Archos 7 vs the $ 499 iPad

    The Archos 5 inch tablet has never really been a competitor to the iPad, as the screen size did put it more in the MID / media player category than the tablet category. The new 7 Inch Archos tablet running Android on the other hand is clearly aiming at the iPad crowd. Its major selling point: the price, with some models going for as low as $179 (for the 2GB version), less than half the price of the iPad. Spec-wize the Archos tablet is somewhat inferior to the iPad: it uses an older ARM 9 processor (but then the iPad A4 processor is not very fast either), has less storage (but allows for an SD card to be used), has a lower resolution screen and a more limited choice of application, but on the other hand it has a better media player (more formats are supported), do offer a browsing experience on par with the iPad and may support flash lite (flash 10.1 won’t be possible however). You probably will not get an integration as good as between the iPad and iTunes, but then you won’t have to deal with Apple censorship (you can install ANY working application just by downloading the apk file) and Linux is officially supported as your desktop OS.

    [...]

    When you add to that the recent shenanigans concerning “sexy apps” (not so much a problem in the US, but much more here in Europe where we are not used to that kind of censorship) I can see Android tablets winning the tablet war on the long term.

VLC is used in Formula One

I read a blog post of Jean-Paul Saman, a VLC developer, about the use of VLC in the most popular motorsport of the World, Formula One. According to the blog, a big VLC fan, Dan Dectis, posted a message on the vlc mailing list mentioning this picture from the Formula One Photography. This is indeed one of the examples showing the power and extent of VLC media player.

CeBIT Open Source Forum 2010

For the second time in a row, CeBIT will be devoting an entire section to the topic of open source. The event will be supported by international industry associations and representative bodies such as the Linux Foundation, Linux International, the Free Software Foundation Europe and the LIVE Linux Association. The Open Source Forum will serve as the lively hub of the exhibition, which in turn features a diverse range of open source companies and independent projects.

Anti-FOSS Lobby

• An Open Letter to The United States Trade Representative

  Recently it was reported in the Guardian, an on-line newspaper, that the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA) is requesting that the United States Trade Representative put Indonesia, Brazil and India on the “Special 301 Watchlist” specifically because those countries advocate the use of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) in their economies.

  I have been in the software industry for over forty years, as a programmer, businessman, educator, author and entrepreneur. I have worked in some of the largest companies, both as a supplier of software and a customer of software.

  I have traveled to two of these three countries, and while I have not been to Indonesia, I helped formulate the FOSS policies of Malaysia, have worked with the government of Brazil, and presented many times in India. I know their cultures and their way of doing business.

• Open-Source Software: Bad, Evil and Un-American

  That’s the view of the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA), a group of trade bodies that includes such notables as the Business Software Alliance, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). The IIPA recently submitted its Orwellian-sounding “2010 Special 301 Report on Copyright Protection & Enforcement,” an annual review of intellectual property protection and market access practices in foreign countries, to the U.S. Trade Representative. Ten countries make the “priority watch list” of naughty boys this year (down from 13 last year), including Indonesia.

Samba

• Samba 3.5 release includes experimental SMB2 support

  The Samba project has released version 3.5 of its open source SMB protocol implementation. Major changes include implementation of SMB2 (used in Windows Vista and Windows 7) and support for Windows’ 100 ns resolution timestamps, where supported by the kernel and system libraries. The 100ns resolution timestamps will therefore work with Linux kernels later than 2.6.22 using glibc 2.6 or later.

• Watching the Sun Set

  I joined Sun in 1989, fresh from a System Administration job at Manchester University. I was so excited. Finally, I was going to get the chance to see the inside of “real” UNIX ! No more Minix hacking for me, I was finally going to get the chance to see and work on the source code for a real UNIX operating system. I wasn’t disappointed. It was incredibly sophisticated, with a virtual memory system, a working network file system (NFS) and a state of the art graphical user interface (SunView). It was one of the most advanced systems available at the time.

Government

• Vermont Adopts Open Source Software Policy

  The policy says the Vermont Department of Information and Innovation and other departments should look at open source solutions as part of the procurement process, and are directed to calculate the total cost of ownership for an open source system, including “fixed costs (direct purchases and licensing) and operational costs for support, testing, upgrades, maintenance and training,” as part of the procurement process.

  Tucker told Government Technology that the idea for a policy began last summer, when as deputy CIO he originated a process for examining open source because there weren’t any existing guidelines. So when Tucker became CIO late last year, he convened a council that met several times and gave input on the new policy.

• Are we about to lose?

  I don’t have the expertise to fully comprehend these NPRMs that were recently issued, but did spend the last few hours reading large chunks of all three. The area they cover is huge, and I fear open source and small EHRs are about to lose big, and big corporate EHRs are about to get total lock-in courtesy of our government.

Keep Your Cloud, I’m a Customer Not a Consumer

The cloud hype is getting thicker and smellier every day. All the cloud excitement is coming from those who hope to profit from it, the vendors and breathless tech journalists who can’t think of anything worthwhile to write about. They’re working very hard to make it sound like a wonderful thing, a miracle of rare device that will transform life as we know it.

In related news, Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, Sasquatch, Yeti, and Elvis are all throwing a fabulous party at Graceland and everyone is invited. If you don’t live in Memphis they’ll send a private jet to pick you up.

The Cloud is Nonsense

The problem with all this cloud nonsense is it’s exactly that–nonsense. Hosted services are nothing new. What would be new and radical and transformative are attractive products reasonably-priced, and good customer service. Those are the missing pieces, and I predict they will always be the missing pieces. Because it seems that among the big players in tech, research and development are devoted entirely to inventing new buzzwords. If it weren’t for the small independents we would have nowhere to turn.

Security

• Kid Controller Controversy: Boy Directs JFK Air Traffic

  JFK airport is one of the largest airports in the country, handling a thousand takeoffs and landings a day. Yet on Feb. 17 a child was caught on tape in the control tower directing air traffic and giving instructions to pilots.

• New $1B U.S. embassy in London will feature a moat to prevent terrorist attacks

  Local residents had complained about the security barriers outside the current embassy in the Mayfair district, so the new building will include a 100-foot wide reflecting pond that also serves as a barricade.

Finance

• Linux Fund Brings Spend-and-Support Model to the UK

Intellectual Monopolies/Copyrights

• US Trade Rep serves drug companies, publishers and pushes anti-consumer agenda

  Today the Senate Finance Committee will hold a hearing on the 2010 Trade Agenda. The single witness is Ambassador Ron Kirk, the United States Trade Representative. (The agency Kirk runs is known by the same name — USTR for short.) This is a busy week. A few blocks away, at the International Trade Commission (ITC), USTR is holding a day long hearing on something called the Special 301 list — which is a program to pressure trading partners on intellectual property rights. On Monday, in Geneva, the USTR blocked a request by developing countries to hold a workshop at the World Trade Organization (WTO) on access to patented medicine. The USTR is also doing damage control to defend a controversial new trade agreement on the enforcement of intellectual property rights that is being negotiated in secret, and trying to block a new treaty at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) for persons who are blind or have other disabilities.

• ACTA

  • New ACTA leak shows major resistance to US-style DRM rules

    The leaks keep coming for the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA). A new leak from Europe has revealed the inner workings of the negotiating process through a 40+ page document showing each country’s positions on key provisions of the treaty.

    While most of the negotiating is quite technical, what stands out most sharply is the international resistance to the US-drafted proposals on DRM “anticircumvention” rules. Let’s take a look at some of the key differences among parties.

  • Updated: New Zealand seeks to restrain ACTA

    New Zealand appears to be at odds with the US in the secret international Anti Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) talks.

    According to Canadian internet law specialist Michael Geist a new leak from the negotiations has revealed a “significant disagreement on a range of issues” among the countries involved.

    “For example, on the issue of anti-circumvention legislation and access controls, the US wants it included per the DMCA [Digital Millenium Copyright Act], but many other countries, including the EU, Japan, and New Zealand do not, noting that the WIPO [World Intellectual Property Organisation] internet treaties do not require it.”