03.04.09

Contents

• GNU/Linux
  • Distributions
  • Devices/Embedded
• Free Software/Open Source
• Leftovers
• Digital Tipping Point: Clip of the Day

GNU/Linux

• VMWare’s filesystem clustering cracked open

  VMWare has also released the modifications to GPL/LGPL-licensed components used in their products, but has fallen short of actually open sourcing their ESX hypervisor, the crown jewel of the VMWare stack.

• Linux : The cool factor

  Compiz

  I know It’s like kicking in an open door. I think almost every Linux desktop user knows what compiz is and that’s because it’s one of the coolest things you’ll ever see when it comes to desktops.
  But not everybody does, and sometimes I still do impress a Linux user with my desktop. If your not a Linux user there’s a big change you want to become one when you see what you can do with it.

  Compiz provides you with Hardware-accelerated window management and desktop compositing through OpenGL.

  Impressive, aint it? No seriously, I understand if you’re not a technical person the previous sentence says about nothing. But you know youtube don’t you? Compiz is so cool, people even post video’s showing it off on youtube. So go there do a search for compiz and be stunned by the incredible desktop effects you can have when you run Linux. It’s actually the most advanced desktop environment available today. And it runs on Linux!

• Cedega 7.1 Released

  Cedega 7.1 is here and brings with it substantial improvements to your Linux gaming experience! Enhanced performance, stability and usability are at the core of the 7.1 update, plus Members can now enjoy the Cedega Certified game, Bioshock.

  Increased performance comes in the form of greatly improved VBO graphics and enhancements to take advantage of multi-core CPUs. Cedega 7.1 also offers you better handling of in-game resolution changes and removes a number of those slightly off-putting crashes on quit, thanks to broad changes to underlying reference counting methods.

• Portuguese open sourcers decry MS-only gov eProcurement

  Portuguese open sourcers are a bit miffed that a government “eProcurement” platform offers “conditioned access to bid at a public tender”, viz: If you’re not running Microsoft software you’re not tendering for anything.

• The Real Story on Oracle Unbreakable Linux

  · 79% of databases that run on Linux, run Oracle
  · Over 30% of Oracle Applications are deployed on the Linux platform
  · Over 50% of recent Oracle Fusion Middleware deployments are on the Linux platform

• CANopen Stack supports SocketCAN drivers for Linux

  IXXAT Automation GmbH is pleased to announce that the versatile CANopenRT protocol software now supports the most recent implementation of the SocketCAN drivers for Linux using the Sysfs virtual file system.

  SocketCAN is a set of open source drivers and a network stack that extends the Berkeley sockets API in Linux by introducing a new protocol family PF_CAN. Main components of SocketCAN are the network device drivers for different CAN controllers and the implementation of the CAN protocol family. The SocketCAN framework has become part of vanilla kernel starting with 2.6.25.

• Tell Them It’s Linux!!

  I found it amusing that most people thought KDE 4 was Windows 7 but hardly that surprising if I’m honest. I wouldn’t expect most people in the general public to know the difference and why should they? This was obviously meant just as a joke and that’s all very well but as I watched one thought screamed louder and louder inside my head, “for god’s sake tell them it’s Linux!!!”. I know this wasn’t a Linux advocacy project and I don’t even know if these guys care at all about open source, it’s up to them but they could have said just one word to these people after showing them the software. A little word beginning with “L” and ending in “x”. As I watched these people looking at Amarok and saying “oh wow, is this included?” I got more and more irate.

• Rule #3: Divide and conquer

  Deconstructing “GNU/Linux”

  When I tried to compare the size in “source lines of code” (SLOC) between “Debian GNU/Linux ‘Sarge’” and “Windows Vista”, the first problem to arise was that there really is no direct free software analog to the “Windows operating system”. Instead of one single monolithic development project, the free community produces a swarm of smaller projects. By choosing a popular selection of projects, it’s possible to build an “equivalent function” alternative to Windows.

  [...]

  One thing figure 1 does not show is the range of choice that is also possible. This particular stack (glibc + Linux + GNU utilities + X.org + KDE + Mozilla) is only one popular choice out of many. This choice is made possible by the fact that each layer in the stack adheres closely to published interface standards. With relatively few problems, any of the stack layers can be swapped out with alternative programs providing similar functionality. Figure 2 shows an assortment of the options available. Even considering that this not a complete list of objects, the number of possible combinations (over 2000) is staggering!

• Linux For Computer Science Majors

  I’ve had Linux installed as my primary OS for about 3 years, and as a computer science major, it’s certainly my environment of choice. Not only does Linux deliver a rich desktop environment, but also the command-line and its vast number of utilities are indespensible for any sort of development. It still suprises me, then, when I see other CS majors at my university who are so unfamiliar with Linux, and who cringe when any programming assignment requires Linux for one reason or another.

• Legacy

  • Breathing New Life into Old Servers

    For my purposes however I decided to download Ubuntu Linux 8.04 Sparc Edition, although which OS you decide to use is entirely up to you. My reasons for using Ubuntu were that the rest of my Linux platforms all run it, and I have a set of already-running monitoring scripts that work with them, making monitoring much easier.

  • Cleaning Out the Closet: What to Do With Those Worn-Out Legacy Systems

    Many large enterprises still run critical applications on legacy Linux and Unix platforms. Much like the fabled Energizer Bunny, these old computing OSes keep going and going and going. Some of these are not even in production any more.

• Kernel Space

  • Linux 2.6.29-rc7

    The bulk of the patch is a couple of new drivers (ATL1c network driver and firewire FireDTV DVB receiver). That’s due to the whole “new drivers can’t regress” thing, although obviously if you compile them in, they may give you problems whether you have the hardware or not, as we found with the FireDTV driver

    But apart from the new drivers, it should all be just small fixes. The shortlog (appended) tells the story.

  • Journey to the New Linux.com

    This distinction should be made clear: Linux.com will no longer be a “traditional” online media outlet. While we may offer our take on major news events from time to time, the main goal of the site will be providing information for all Linux users. Someone who wants to write a quick howto on how to get Skype running on a particular distro might not get the chance on a media site. But on Linux.com, we want it, because that’s what our readers will want.

• Desktop Environments

  • KDE 4.2.1 Release Announcement

    KDE Community Ships First Translation and Service Release of the 4.2 Free Desktop, Containing Numerous Bugfixes, Performance Improvements and Translation Updates

    March 4th, 2009. The KDE Community today announced the immediate availability of “Cream”, (a.k.a KDE 4.2.1), another bugfix and maintenance update for the latest generation of the most advanced and powerful free desktop. Cream is a monthly update to KDE 4.2. It ships with desktop workspace and many cross-platform applications such as administration programs, network tools, educational applications, utilities, multimedia software, games, artwork, web development tools and more. KDE’s award-winning tools and applications are available in more than 50 languages.

  • Quick look around XFCE 4.6

    Overall, I’m impressed. I haven’t hit a show-stopper yet. The icon thing is annoying and a bit amateur-ish (the part that’s due to XFCE’s default theme not being ready for 4.6), but it’s easily solved by installing another icon theme. Otherwise, nothing yet. Finger’s crossed.

• Distributions

  • HOW TO: choose the best version of Linux

    Linux Distribution Chooser – There are several websites that are designed to help you choose the best distribution. You just answer a few questions and then several distributions are recommended to you. Tuxs.org, Desktop Linux At Home, and Zegenie Studios all have helpful distributions choosers. These are some of the best starting points if you know nothing about Linux or if you just need some help narrowing down the list of possibilities.

  • 5 Minutes of SimplyMepis 8.0.00

  • Dream Linux 3.5 – An Excellent New Release

    There are lots of other packages included, of course, some you would expect and some you might not. Firefox, Thunderbird, OpenOffice (2.4), Adobe Reader, gThumb, Inkscape, Rhythmbox, Totem, CD/DVD burner… all installed and ready to go.

    In conclusion, though, I would say again, I am just amazed at how well, and how easily, Dream Linux installed on this Mini-Note, after all the struggles with the other distributions I’ve had. More to come.

  • Ubuntu

    • Memo to Mark Shuttleworth: Don’t Settle for Ubuntu Linux Desktops

      Dear Mark: You’ve made Ubuntu the most popular Linux distribution on desktops. You’ve established a footprint on notebooks and netbooks. But a lot of people wonder why you’re marching Canonical — and Ubuntu — in new directions like the server. Don’t listen to your critics. Keep marching upward.

    • Ubuntu 9.10 Release Schedule Is Now Available

      Ubuntu 9.04 will not even be out for another month and a half, but Ubuntu enthusiasts can already start getting excited for its successor, Ubuntu 9.10. Ubuntu 9.10 has been codenamed the Karmic Koala and this release from Canonical will integrate Plymouth to provide a rich kernel mode-setting experience, feature performance improvements, and contain enhancements for Ubuntu cloud computing. In time for Ubuntu 9.10 we may even see some Gallium3D drivers and the latest innovations in the Linux stack as of the Linux 2.6.31 kernel or thereabouts.

    • Ubuntu 9.10 Release Schedule

    • Hive Five Winner for Best Home Server Software: Ubuntu Server Edition

      It was certainly a neck and neck race to the finish line for last week’s Hive Five. Competing for the title of best home server software, Ubuntu Server Edition and Windows Home Server nearly tied with just a fraction of a percent giving Ubuntu the edge—only a 29 vote lead! Following in a distant third place was FreeNAS, a rock solid operating system for network attached storage but definitely underpowered in the broader spectrum of home server capabilities.

• Devices/Embedded

  • New Maemo UI framework arrives in Fremantle SDK alpha

    Several pre-alpha releases of the Fremantle SDK have already been made available for download. The second pre-alpha release included the new GObject-based Multimedia Application Framework (MAFW), which we examined in depth. As we noted in that article, the last major missing piece was the user interface framework.

  • Freescale re-purposes automotive chips

    Freescale is sampling a pair of new ARM11-based system-on-chip processors (SoCs) targeting industrial and consumer devices running Linux and other embedded OSes. The i.MX353 and i.MX357 omit the MLB (media local bus) and automotive focus of other i.MX35 parts, and with $12 pricing in volume, target a broader customer base.

  • Linux videophone does HD over WiFi

    Stavanger, Norway-based Pixavi has used embedded Linux to build what it claims is the first wireless videoconferencing camera capable of 720p HD conferencing. The ruggedized, battery-powered Xcaster offers CD-quality audio, 5Mpix stills, collaboration tools, Bluetooth, and 802.11n WiFi.

  • SOM format launches with Linux-ready x86 SoC

    SSV announced a 3.1 x 2.0-inch (80 x 50mm) processor module based on an x86-compatible VortexDX system-on-chip (SoC). The Debian Linux-ready eSOM/2586 is the first in a planned series of processor modules based on the form factor, which SSV is calling “eSOM-200.”

  • Intel and Wind River buddy up on multicore

    The partnership also appears to involve the Wind River Platform for Network Equipment. This Carrier Grade Linux (CGL) 4.0-registered networking version of Wind River Linux supports a variety of multicore processors, including the Intel Core 2.

  • Sub-notebooks

    • My bigger concern with Microsoft – netbooks

      I’ve already written about how difficult it was to find a good selection of Linux-based netbooks, and that discussion included some suspicions that Microsoft might be acting like its old self as it tries to stem manufacturer and distributor defections from Windows XP and Vista, particularly on netbooks. I believe CAOS commentator ObiWanKenobi summed up this sentiment well:

      This ‘not wanting to sell Linux’ may be the result of some ‘carrot or stick’ action from Microsoft. M$ (sic) can afford to offer some favorable conditions on Windows to sellers who agree ‘not to want to sell Linux.’ They sustain it for a while, until the competition is strangled. Then they raise the prices. This is a classical case of dumping. Waving a big stick may be even more effective. Intimidating in a subtle way does not cost them anything. Of course, nobody knows about this because it is all done secretly.

      ‘Not wanting to sell Linux’ manifests itself in many ways. Dell hides their Linux PCs on their web site so that you have to look for them by using Google. Netbook producers equip their creations with crippled versions of Linux which can perform only a few basic functions. Linux can be also put on a more expensive hardware version to make them look less attractive than their Windows-equipped cousins.

    • Clarion shows off what an Atom MID should be

      The UI is where the magic happens, and the Mind has an interface literally designed for it, with a lot of emphasis on ease-of-use and linking things together sanely. It starts out with Red Flag Linux, and builds on top of that. Clarion put Firefox in it for a browser, but most functions just work on their own, not in a browser window.

    • The BENQ netbook and EeeBuntu

      I’m really quite impressed with the little device, I can also run the compiz cube, unfortunately with the mouse pad it’s a regular pain to work with, so I don’t bother. As a highly portable laptop, I personally recommend it, or any other 10” net book with Linux.

    • Google boss backs subsidized Linuxbooks

      Google CEO Eric Schmidt has hinted that his company – or at least its partners – will one day subsidize the purchase of extra-low-cost Linux netbooks in an effort to promote the use of its myriad cloud online services.

    • Are retailers hijacking Linux for their own financial gain?

      With many retail outlets in South Africa now selling notebook and netbook computers with Linux pre-installed, I can’t really say that I am at all excited by the notion and find myself feeling very apprehensive about the way Linux is being introduced to the local market.

      My reason for feeling this way stems from the belief that most (if not all) people making the decision to buy these notebook or netbook computers do it based on the price tag, and not because the machine runs Fedora-based Linpus Linux. The salesperson selling this product has no comprehension of the Linux operating system or any of the programs available, and therefore is incapable of influencing the buyer to do it for any other reason.

    • 3MX RC2 Linux released for the Razorbook

      3MX is a very powerful & complete distribution for the Razorbook (or re-badged) netbooks. 3MX replaces the normal Little Linux Laptop OS & is a very user-friendly Operating System that comes with a lot of pre-installed software such as: Firefox 3 web browser, VLC Media Player, Transmission, Medit (HTML editor), Dillo web browser, Wifi Stumbler (for finding of wireless hotspots), Pidgin chat & Xchat.

Free Software/Open Source

• Software System’s Fans Gather to Talk Code

  Chris Ridder, a residential fellow at the Center for the Internet and Society at Stanford Law School, said that there was an ongoing debate about the pros and cons of free and open-source software, but added that such software has recently become more widely used, in part because of its flexibility.

• Is Open Source a Good Career Bet for Developers?

  With any article whose premise is ensuring the safety of your programming career, it’s tempting to try to hook your attention with fear, uncertainty, and doubt about the state of the economy. I could point at all those layoff statistics. Or I could frighten you by bringing up the spectre of your job going overseas.

  But that’s not the point, really. Our career choices affect us personally no matter what the economy looks like. We all have to find a balance between what we love to do and work that someone else will pay for. (This is why I cannot brag about my remarkable career from consuming chocolate; I’ve never found someone to pay the bills for it, alas.) To make the best career choices, you must become aware of where the market is going. And then you have to fine-tune your expertise so that your skills stay in-demand… or so that you can develop new skills that shortly will be in demand.

  [...]

  And the good news for open source developers is that comparing “programmer,” “programmer open source,” “programmer .net” and “programmer java” yields a happy chart for open source developers. The overall programmer salary averages $73,000 per year, and the Java and .NET developers earn just over that ($76,000). (Or, to be more rigorous, more jobs are advertised with those salaries.) In contrast, open source developers are offered $83,000–a nice raise.

• Finding Employment is a Gamble, Open Source Careers Aren’t a Bad Bet

• Open Source In Public K-12 Schools?

  I’m a computer science major who has been recently getting involved in local grassroots politics in my county and state. I’ve been discussing the idea with some of my state legislatures of submitting a couple of resolutions, opening up to the idea of switching to open source software in our state’s K-12 schools. I’m looking for more information/literature about this topic, open source solutions in public K-12 education, pros and cons, studies that prove or disprove many of the assumptions of open source and linux in public schools.

• Engineering Group and Ingres Agree to Business Partnership to Strengthen Open Source Offering in Italy

  Engineering Group, Italy’s leading IT services company, and Ingres Corporation, a leading provider of open source database management software and support services, announced today a new business partnership designed to strengthen its joint open source database and business intelligence offering in the region.

• Have Code, Will Travel – Sabre Chooses Open Source to Power its Business

  Whenever you buy an airline ticket or book a hotel room these days, chances are that a good part of that transaction will run through Sabre’s network. Sabre is one of the world’s largest suppliers of technology solutions for the airline and travel industry. What you may not be aware of, however, is that Sabre has made open-source software a cornerstone of its technology strategy. Sabre already relies on a number of open-source projects to handle thousands of transactions every second, and today, Sabre and Progress FUSE announced a new partnership that will make a number of FUSE’s open-source offerings a cornerstone of Sabre’s technology.

• Newham CIO sheds light on Microsoft relationship

  With the government promising to use open-source rather than proprietary alternatives (if there is no significant cost difference in products and services), I asked whether there will there be a Socitm/local government pushback against central government policy on open source, if Steel thinks open source is behind?

  However, Steel said that his personal opinions were not Socitm policy.

  “I will quite freely express my views, but they are in no way Socitm policy,” said Steel. “Socitm is interested in promoting and using open source.”

• Coders urged to take up open source in downturn

  The recession is a good opportunity for out-of-work developers to turn their hand to open-source software, a leader of a free software group suggested on Tuesday.

  In fact, all companies, programmers and other IT professionals would do well to look into free software, Georg Greve, president of the Free Software Foundation Europe, said in a speech at the CeBIT technology conference in Hanover, Germany. Predicting that the recession would probably end “sometime this year”, he said the downturn would serve as a “breather” and as an opportunity for companies and individuals to rethink their software strategies.

• Open Source Digital Music Library SW from IU

  Indiana University has released open source software, called Variations, that allows you to create a digital music library system. College and university libraries may digitize audio and musical scores to provide to their users in an interactive, online environment, including streaming audio and scanned score images.

• Auto alliance targets open-source platform development

  An automotive electronics industry alliance announced this week will seek to drive adoption of an open-source car infotainment platform by reducing development cost and time.

  The Genivi Alliance unveiled on Monday (March 2) includes auto makers BMW, General Motors and PSA Peugeot Citroen along with parts suppliers Magneti Marelli and Visteon Corp. along with Intel Corp. and Wind River. The founding members said they will collaborate to create the Genivi platform, which is billed as a common software architecture scalable across different product lines and versions.

• Volantis updates open-source mobile Web development tools

  Written in Java, Volantis Mobility Server combines a runtime framework, an expanding database of configuration information on thousands of mobile devices, and development tools. It supports other development languages including PHP and Ruby. A servlet container, such as the open source Apache Tomcat server, is needed for runtime support.

• CMSs

  • Open source identity: Spine CMS creator Hendrik Van Belleghem

    Looking for a Web-based content management system that uses Perl instead of PHP? Want to server dynamic and static content with PostrgeSQL, not MySQL? What started out as a hobby project by Hendrik Van Belleghem, based in Bazel, Belgium, has grown into Spine – a Perl Web content system for Apache on Unix systems. With so many LAMP (Linux Apache MySQL PHP) content systems available, Spine offers a refreshing alternative with the tried and tested Perl language and is database independent. Open Source Identity interviews Van Belleghem about Spine, a lesser-known alternative to the popular Web CMSs.

  • Open Source and usability: Joomla vs. WordPress

    Over the course of the last few years, I’ve been in charge of putting up a number of websites for various companies, often as favors for friends. In most cases, I’ve ended up using one out of two solutions: Joomla! and WordPress. While both of these projects have evolved greatly over the last few years, they are vastly different. Joomla! has always been intended as a ‘fit-all-your-possible-needs’-kind of CMS solution, while WordPress was developed as a blog with CMS capabilities. Recently WordPress has opened up to allow its users to set up a site with static-only material (with the option of a blog-page), without having to hack the code. Hence it’s one step closer to being a direct competitor to Joomla!.

• Audio

  • Open Sources Episode 6: Open source in the enterprise

  • Podcast Season 1 Episode 3

    In this episode: Debian 5 and Xfce 4.6 are released, Microsoft sues TomTom, are the Creative Commons licences working, are there too many Linux distributions and did Mike really play Captain ‘S’ – the remake?

  • Episode 0×08: Selecting a FLOSS License

    Bradley and Karen discuss the issues and considerations for a FLOSS project selecting a license.

  • Take Me Out to Ubuntu

    When I was a kid, sometimes on a hot summer day my grandfather — I called him “pops” — would jump up and ask, “Hey kid. You want to go out to Ubuntu?” When he asked me that, my eyes would light up. There’s nothing more I loved than spending time with pops and Ubuntu. As we walked over to his creaky Pentium III, we both broke out in that classic American song, “Take Me Out to Ubuntu.” (QuickTime version — Ogg version)

• Video

  • 15 years Linux: past and future

    Open source luminaries reminisce about the early days of Linux, its successes and how it should move forward. Featuring Larry Augustin (VA Software), Dirk Hohndel (Intel), Chris DiBona (Google) Eric Raymond and Jon maddog Hall

• Healthcare

  • DOHCS 2009 Conference a Hit! Wildly Exceeds Attendance Expectations

    The third appearance of the DOHCS (Demonstrating Open-Source Health Care Solutions) conference showed a stunning demand for open-source healthcare technologies. With the nation in the midst of a healthcare crisis, nearly 300 attendees learned how open-source alternatives to proprietary health technologies can offer the transparency and collaboration necessary for quality patient care.

  • CureTogether, a platform for open-source health research

  • CBO: Health IT Deficit of $17 billion over 10 Years

    Ten years in the ditch is a very long time. The only thing that could turn this around is a ban on federal spending for proprietary Electronic Medical Record software in which only Affero General Public License (AGPL) version 3 software can be purchased with federal funds. Current proprietary vendors can change their product licenses to AGPL to receive public money.

  • Midland Memorial Hospital Reduces Patient Deaths, Infection Rates Through Use of OpenVista Electronic Health Record

    Since the implementation of Medsphere’s OpenVista electronic health record (EHR), Midland Memorial Hospital (MMH) has realized a host of improved clinical results, including fewer patient deaths and medical errors and decreased infection rates, an independent case study confirms.

  • Your Money and Your Medical Privacy Gone

    The important exceptions are: The Veterans Affairs VistA software system which is in the public domain, successfully deployed in the private sector and is a remarkable example of a government success. Naturally the government has tried to kill it numerous times. Other Free/Open Source Software Electronic Medical Records that have achieved notable success like Webreach and ClearHealth. The recent ARRA of 2009 as written tips the playing field against FOSS software through hostile certification processes and marketing noise drowning out real solutions.

  • GNUmed 0.4.0 released

    Over last couple of months the GNUmed team has worked hard to bring you a brand new release. We are proud to announce version 0.4 of GNUmed.

  • A Generous, Virtuous Society

    A single sentence law enacted by Congress could change this. That sentence is: ‘All Electronic Medical Record software purchased with federal funds must be licensed under the Affero General Public License version 3.’ Such a sentence would change the picture dramatically for the better.

• Business

  • Zenoss Kicks Off 2009 with Multiple Industry Honors

    Zenoss Inc., the leading commercial open source network and systems management provider, today announced it has been named a finalist for three awards. Zenoss has been selected as a finalist in the Enterprise Tools category at the 19th Jolt Product Excellence Awards as well as the Software & Information Industry Association’s (SIIA) 24th Annual CODiE Awards in the Best Open Source Solution category. In addition, Zenoss is a finalist for the Innovator Award at the Chesapeake Regional Tech Council (CRTC) TechAwards 2009.

  • Obsidian adds Zmanda backup to portfolio

    South African Linux specialist Obsidian Systems has finalised a reseller agreement with open source backup specialists Zmanda. The deal adds Amanda Enterprise, Zmanda Recovery Manager for MySQL and Zmanda Internet Backup to Obsidian’s growing portfolio of products.

  • Is Open-Source CRM Right for Your Company?

    As the economic downturn lingers, businesses are looking for ways to move forward without making huge investments. One idea is to use open-source CRM software to save the cost of a license fee. But just because you save the money on that part of the application doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s cost-free. As with any software-implementation initiative, you need to go through the same process you do with commercial software. Nevertheless, open-source CRM could be a good choice if you’re looking for a more flexible development environment and you have the resources to implement it.

• Sun

  • Evidence-Based Open Source Adoption

    I mentioned to a friend of mine the other day how I was replacing Word with OpenOffice in the long run. He replied that they use OO exclusively at his place of work (mostly as a security measure, as it turns out). That provoked a question from another, skeptical friend: How do you know this is really going to help?

  • Visit the OpenOffice.org Planet

    The OpenOffice.org Planet is now collecting blogs around OpenOffice.org. This also includes announcements from the OpenOffice.org extensions and template repository, latest news from OpenOffice.org Issuetracker, notices about new features in OpenOffice.org and many blogs more.

• Programming

  • Hivelocity Announces SourceForge

    Hivelocity, a dedicated hosting provider, announced it will be providing the world’s largest open source software development and distribution environment, SourceForge, with download mirror services.

    [...]

    Hivelocity also provides mirrors to both Cpanel and CentOS.org.

  • about:mozilla – Thunderbird, Camino, Community Marketing Guide, Labs, Firefox, SUMO, TraceVis, and more…

    In this issue…

    * Thunderbird 3 beta 2 now available
    * Camino 2.0 beta 2 released
    * Mozilla Community Marketing Guide
    * Mozilla Labs February update
    * Firefox 3.1 beta 3 test week, March 2-6
    * Firefox Support: Make someone’s day in 10 minutes!
    * TraceVis: performance visualization for TraceMonkey

ODF

• Thirty years old and still no Tom-Tom…

  ODF 1.2 is well underway. The arrival of a flurry of new members inside the ODF Technical Committee who have illustrated themselves as proponents of OOXML is a bit fun to watch I must say. But I have to command the general serenity of the Committee and its chairs, Rob Weir and Michael Brauer for their quiet and effective management of the proceedings. I think the only thing that is to be hoped for is that we can finish the completion of this ODF sub-version. Also, and of some interest, I can only recommend the reading of the archives of the Committee’s discussions online where interesting concepts on extensions and conformance are being discussed.

• ODF Alliance offers recommendations to Obama administration

  Following on the heels of yesterday’s set of open standards recommendations to the Obama administration by the Information Society Project at Yale Law School, the Open Document Format Alliance has offered its own recommendations in the area of open standards for document formats.

• Teen winner of computer literacy contest

  Siti Nadia Radhuan, of Kolej Matrikulasi Pahang(KMP), won the Category IV of the 2008 Open Document Format Olympiad, a competition that tested the students’ proficiency in the use of computers.

• From the Statute of Frauds to WYSIWYS: Document Format Implications

  For editable formats like ODF, I think it points out the need to describe a formal content model that describes the semantic content of a document, aside from its formatting and layout. So text + lists + tables + headers + footers + footnotes + images + captions, etc. Visual appearance is nice to have as well, but it is less robust when rendered on different devices, different operating systems, and is less likely to be robust when rendered on OpenOffice 10.0 in 2015. But the equivalence of the semantic content of an unextended ODF document should provide the same ability to have an accurate and reliable record in an electronic document as we have had traditionally with paper and ink.

• Low-Fat ODF

  The proper pace to address these points is in the conformance clause of the ODF Standard. To that end, the current draft of ODF 1.2 defines two conformance classes, one for extended documents and one for unextended documents. The aim, in the end, is to give the consumer greater control and allow them to make a more intelligent choice. We can’t force vendors to implement one or the other conformance class. And we can’t force consumers to use one or the other. But we can formally define what an extended document is and let the free market operate based on the additional information made available.

Leftovers

• Tasty Tuesday Nuggets

  Penguin Pete echoes one of my favorite rants– we’re losing our freedoms by inches every day, and way too many people don’t care. In fact a sizable number of US citizens seem to favor the notion of a corporate police state, and don’t seem to mind suffering rampant corporate abuse of all kinds. I wouldn’t care, except their apathy impacts the people who do care.

• Did Belkin Really Need Fake User Reviews?

  PC World has written about fake user reviews before. But my question is, did Belkin really need to pay for positive reviews? Are its products so unworthy that without fake endorsements, few people would buy them? As someone who has written and edited PC World articles and reviews about a wide variety of Belkin products over the years, I knew the answer right away: No.

• Me [Lessig] @ Google RE: CHANGE CONGRESS

• Rights

  • Why Is The Government Asking Companies To Both Retain And Destroy Data?

    With Congress’ latest attempt to force data retention on anyone who operates a network (including home users), some are realizing that other parts of the government have been equally adamant about getting these same folks to destroy the very same information for the sake of keeping people’s data private

  • EFF creates anti-snooping site

    THE ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION has opened a web site designed to help you keep the government from get its grubby mitts on your hard-drive today.

• Copyrights

  • The Pirate Bay – Innocent or Guilty?

    After two weeks of live broadcasted hearings on the Internet, the ‘Spectrial’ is coming to an end. This week both parties presented their closing statements to the court. Time for us to weigh up developments so far and look forward to the verdict.

    king kong defenseYesterday the prosecutor called for jailtime, while the prosecution presented its closing statements. Today the defense had its say and the trial officially ended.

  • Neil Young (And Warner Music) Should Learn To Respect YouTube… And Music Fans

    After Warner Music got greedy and demanded money from YouTube that the company is under no legal obligation to pay (safe harbors, people), Google and YouTube demonstrated to Warner Music how little leverage the record label has by taking down all Warner Music videos. This is making plenty of Warner musicians quite angry with Warner Music for pissing off their fans and in some cases breaking the artists’ own websites.

  • Electronic Books and the Myth of Ownership

    Some details have leaked out about the impending Google book store. Richard Sarnoff, chairman of the Association of American Publishers identified some of the restrictions publishers are placing on electronic content. One is that all purchases will stay on Google’s servers with bits and pieces transmitted to the reader. Obviously the publishers are a paranoid bunch concerned about piracy. The lesson of the music industry is not lost on them. Access to books will exist as long as Google supports the book store. If Google abandons the market the purchases go bye-bye. That should be a real incentive for the masses to buy electronic books readable on cell phones and portable computers. Google gets something out of this as well. A Google ID is required to access the electronic library. That means opportunities to introduce people to Google Apps, Gmail, Chrome, and other Google services.