• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

Mosaic Completes Nation-Wide Linux Migration Successfully with NoMachine NX

Mosaic, a non-profit charity organization serving more than 3,500 adults and children with intellectual disabilities, has completed a four year project of converting their Windows network to a fully supported Linux environment with the deployment of NoMachine’s NX technology, the world-renowned hosted desktop and application delivery software. NX is a critical part of this project and provides Mosaic employees across the country access to Linux server farms at Mosaic’s headquarters.

Linux users talk GlustersFS, Drupal

Linux users of Victoria will hosts its monthly meeting on 2 March, featuring presentations on file system, GlustersFS, and the use of open source software in humanities.

The meeting is one of several among Linux user groups around the country. IT consultant and developer, Dave Hall, will discuss his experience testing GlustersFS, a distributed file system for storage, as an alternative to network file system (NFS) for replicating files across multiple web servers.

Sandy Bridge GPU Linux support commences

While Clarkdale and Arrandale CPUs with on-die integrated graphics apparently work just fine under Linux, give or take a bug here and there, it’s now Sandy Bridge time.

Say, this is almost as easy as Linux!

This pilot fish works as a Linux sysadmin at a small software-as-a-service company. “I come in early in the mornings, while the tech that does most of our Windows and desktop work comes in later and stays later,” fish says.

“One night, she does a scheduled migration of one of our accounting personnel to a new desktop and sends the user an e-mail that the switch was complete and everything looks good.”

Linux users, the coolest cats in town

Column: The Linux Desktop Expansion

What we really want is a significant upgrade, something you’d normally pay for. Perhaps we should focus on value. Recent analysis of the kernel by Jon Corbet showed that 75 per cent of the 2.8 million lines of code in recent contributions were written by paid-for developers. That puts Linux freedom in context.

Cassidy: Geek girls make a point at Linux Expo

Mirano Cafiero and Saskia and Malakai Wade really do believe that in the future women will play a more prominent role in the world of high tech and computing.

No, the record to date hasn’t been good. But you can afford to be optimistic when you’re 8, as Saskia is, or 12, as Mirano and Malakai are. Still, the girls aren’t leaving anything to chance.

Which is how they found themselves last week standing before a crowd of people giving a presentation during the Women in Open Source segment at the Southern California Linux Expo, one of the biggest open-source software conventions on the West Coast. They were there to be seen and heard, never mind the old admonition concerning children.

Canadian tax software and Linux

Well, it’s tax time again!

This used to be the part of the year I would dread. Not because I feared how much income tax I would need to pay, but because I knew I would have to get Windows running in a VM or on a spare computer in order to use tax preparation software.

I would get heartburn from wondering if the new flavour-of-the-day copy-protection mechanism the software used would actually work in a VM, and if it would let me open up my files again after reinstalling it if something went wrong. Top that off with the fact that trusting your important data to Windows is like locking your safe with duct tape, and I’d be popping Rolaids like candy.

Server

• Cray inks $45m super pact with DoD

  This Army lab also has a bunch of different Linux Networx clusters with several thousands cores across all of the machines (SGI ate the carcass of Linux Networx in February 2008). The ARL also has two Cray XT5 machines, one for production called MRAP, with 10,400 cores rated at 95.7 teraflops) and a baby machine for development. (MRAP is short for Mine Resistant Ambush Protected, and refers to Humvee and other vehicles used by the Army).

• Proxmox VE 1.5: combining KVM and OpenVZ

  Users can launch two sorts of virtual machines. First, one can use KVM for full virtualization. This allows the user to run a lot of operating systems, such as Windows, Linux, the BSDs, etc., because the operating system in the virtual machine runs on virtualized hardware that looks like real hardware. Proxmox VE also supports KVM with paravirtualization for device drivers to improve I/O performance, e.g. with paravirtualized network drivers for Windows guests.

• PIKA Technologies Makes First Appearance at CeBIT – Introduces Telephony Boards and Linux Appliances

• TeraMedica Launches Evercore® – Clinical Enterprise Suite 5.0 Now on Linux

  TeraMedica Healthcare Technology, a leading medical informatics company, has launched a new enterprise platform for its revolutionary Evercore® – Enterprise Clinical Suite software system, now available on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 systems.

Kernel Space

• Kolivas Pushes New Kernel Responsiveness Patches

  Con Kolivas had stopped working on the Linux kernel for two years after he became fed up with the kernel development community, but last year he made a return by introducing the BFS scheduler. The BFS scheduler for the Linux kernel is quite simple in design compared to other schedulers, but it performed fairly well on desktop systems. Due to Con’s past frustrations, he has no intentions of mainlining the Brain Fuck Scheduler, but he has now offered up another batch of patches.

Applications

• Free Trial Download: Build Professional Linux Installers with InstallAnywhere

  Linux® developers, are you tired of building RPM and DEB packages that don’t install properly? Try InstallAnywhere®, the Linux and multiplatform installer solution trusted by the world’s top software companies.

• Review: Linux Browsers, Part 1

  I’ve been a giant fan of Firefox since it emerged on the browser scene and I was able to kiss Internet Explorer 6 goodbye. Recently, though, I’ve started to notice some cracks appear in the FF facade. For the first time, I had a valuable add-on (Ghostery) systematically misbehave and prevent the program from closing smoothly. And I noticed that I was having severe slowdowns in Javascript on some websites, including one that I use regularly. Doing even routine tasks was bringing FF to a crawl and making using it unbelievably painful. At the same time, I started seeing more mention of emerging browsers, as well as competitors who had been around – sometimes for years – but who for whatever reason had never seemed to get much traction. Combined with my FF problems, I got the itch to start trying out alternatives.

• Review: Linux Browsers, Part 2

  HV3 started up in about 8 seconds. YouTube displayed but noted that Javascript was off or the browser was using an old version of Flash. Similarly, the base elements of the Pandora homepage rendered, but not the login dialog. CNN rendered fine, although multimedia elements were rough. The browser includes a neat debugging tool “Polipo” that provided a log of errors.

• Two Open Source Tools for Photographers

  digiKam is a truly versatile and powerful application for managing and tweaking photos, but it’s not the only photographic tool around. In fact, there are a few other nifty open source utilities that can make great additions to your photographic toolbox. Here are a couple of such tools worth considering.

  [...]

  Tonido is not a dedicated photographic tool per se, but this server solution includes the nifty Photos application which lets you share your photos with other users easily and securely. You might wonder why you’d want to use Tonido to share photos when there are dozens of Web-based photo sharing services out there. For starters, you can use Tonido to share photos without uploading them to a third-party service. This means that you remain in complete control of your images. More importantly, Tonido lets you share your photos securely and only with people you explicitly give access to your photo collection.

• Miro – Slick open source video player for Linux, Mac and Windows

  What makes Miro so nice is the look and feel of it. The guys did go out of their way to make it easy to use and visually appealing as well.

• Instructionals

  • The Perils of Sudo With User Passwords

  • Setting Up Hibernation on Linux SSD Netbooks Without Swap, Part 1

  • Installing Drupal

  • Change font and font size in Fluxbox

  • Useful command line little tricks (part 3)

  • CentOS – update / install PHP 5.2

• Games

  • Steam could be coming to Mac

    But rumours are also doing the rounds that Valve is hiring Linux and Mac developers so there could be something in it.

  • A Linux Rubik’s Cube

GNOME Desktop

• Early peak into Gnome 3’s potential

  The Gnome 2010 UX Hackfest has been such fun! Today is the last day, reckon we’ll be riotous. It was a wonderful, familiar memory. I know not everyone reciprocates (hi hatemail, bye hatemail), but I missed you Gnome.

• “Task Pooper” could revolutionize GNOME desktop

  The GNOME community’s design and usability experts gathered for a week-long hackfest hosted by Canonical in the UK to shape the next major iteration of the GNOME desktop environment. GNOME 3, which is tentatively scheduled for release in September, will introduce new user interface paradigms and include an upgraded desktop shell environment.

  The participants at the hackfest are aiming to improve the usability of existing applications, enhance the look and feel of the desktop with new theming concepts, and brainstorm ideas for extending the functionality of the new shell. They are actively publishing mockups, design documentation, usability notes, and other materials that provide insight into their vision for the future of GNOME. By reading all of this material, I was able to get an understanding of their goals and plans.

Distributions

• FOSDEM’10: distributions and downstream-upstream collaboration

  For the first time in its ten-year history, FOSDEM didn’t organize individual developer rooms per distribution, but it opted for a joint ‘mini-conference’ in two distribution developer rooms, with talks that specifically target interoperability between distributions, governance, common issues that distributions are facing, and working with upstream projects. A couple of them piqued your author’s interest.

• PTS Desktop Live 2010.1: Phoronix Test Suite 2.4.1 in a Live CD

  PTS Desktop Live 2010.1, codenamed “Anzhofen,” a live DVD distribution designed solely to run the Phoronix Testing Suite, has now been released, bringing the comprehensive benchmarking and testing software suite to those that want the most accurate results. Like previous releases, it’s based on the popular Ubuntu Linux distribution and PTS Desktop Live 2010.1 comes with the latest Phoronix Test Suite 2.4.1. The idea is to give users a standard software stack to run the testing suite ensuring that the underlying operating system doesn’t interfere with the validity of the results.

• In Defense of Distro-hopping

  It’s doubly important for contributors who participate in FLOSS projects, especially distro development, to have a good hop now and again. Cross-pollination is one of the things that make open source great. Without frequent and repeated exposure to other distros and software, it’s too easy to get locked into the idea that there’s One True Way.

• [Mandriva:] We will be present at the Solutions Linux 2010 exhibition

  We will participate to the Linux 2010 Solutions Exhibition, which will take place from the 16th March to the 18th March at Paris – Porte de Versailles in Hall 1.

• [testing] ArchBang 2.00-RC1

  Care to test the latest and the finest and the smoothest release yet?

  ArchBang now has an installer! That’s right! Besides copy2ram, we are introducing an installer with which you can install it on your hard disks! Did we n00bify it? Are we trying to re-invent the wheel? Are we making Arch “easier for the masses” like most graphical distributions? Heck no! We are keeping Arch as it is! K.I.S.S all the way! That old and familiar ncurses based installer,we can’t live without it!

• Sabayon 5.2? Pulseaudio %$#* Flash amd64?

• Debian Family

  • Why GNU/Linux for academics and why Debian in particular?

    While this is not exhaustive these are some of the reasons why I choose GNU/Linux and Debian. So why not Ubuntu you ask? Well in my opinion, it’s buggier, because they release too often and I don’t really trust Canonical and Mark Shuttleworth. I see Mark as a little bit of a leech on Debian and while I think Ubuntu has contributed to Debian and upstream projects, it still seems meager compared to how much they’ve benefited. Debian’s slow release cycle also means you don’t have to update as often and you get a release that is more stable. All Ubuntu does is add some frosting on the cake and that frosting looks more and more like Mac OS X.

  • Ubuntu

    • Product Spotlight: Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud

      If you are not sure about deploying a cloud, and want to give it a try without breaking your IT budget, Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud is the way to go. Although the installation of both controller and nodes can be quite a challenge, the reward is that you will not have spent a single penny on software in the process of discovery. And once you have your UEC up and running, you will find it performs as well as the competition.

    • Ubuntu to report archive status via Twitter and identi.ca

    • Ubuntu Software Centre updates for 10.04

      In Ubuntu 10.04 LTS – Lucid Lynx – due for release in April 2010, the Ubuntu Software Centre moves to version 1.1 and gains at least two new choices – Featured and System Packages. Ubuntu introduced the Software Centre (currently at version 1.0.3) with Ubuntu 9.10 ‘Karmic Koala’, released in October 2009, to provide a simple method for managing applications and utilities on the desktop.

    • Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Alpha 3 Brings Nouveau and Thunderbird 3

      A few minutes ago, the Ubuntu development team unleashed the third and last alpha version of the upcoming Ubuntu 10.04 LTS (Lucid Lynx) operating system, due for release in late April this year. As usual, we’ve downloaded a copy of it in order to keep you up-to-date with the latest changes in the Ubuntu 10.04 LTS development.

    • Analysis: Ubuntu 10.04 Keeping Pace, Or More, With Windows 7

      The Ubuntu community released Alpha 3 of the next-generation Lucid Lynx version of its desktop OS, and it’s becoming increasingly clear thatMicrosoft (NSDQ: MSFT) will have difficulty putting any daylight between Windows 7 and the free operating system.

    • Beautify your Ubuntu desktop using the software center

      There is nothing wrong with wanting to spruce up your computing environment. Sure there are those who live and breathe more than comfortably in a console environment but if you function in a GUI then appearances can matter and if it does there are more than enough options for you to do so in Ubuntu. In fact any Linux desktop can be beautified in this or a similar fashion. I have found two important programs for you to install from the Ubuntu Software Center that will allow you to drastically change the appearance of your Ubuntu desktop and app windows.

    • Ubuntu One Music Store FAQ

    • 20 Breathtaking Ubuntu Studio Wallpaper Collection

      For starters, Ubuntu Studio is a multimedia enhanced version of your favorite linux distribution, Ubuntu. And I must say, the basic artwork in Ubuntu Studio that include themes, wallpapers and iconsets, are way better than that in the original Ubuntu itself. Here is a nice collection of 20 Ubuntu Studio Wallpapers you might want to check out.

    • Ubuntu 10.04 to Include Chromium Web Browser

      While Firefox will remain Ubuntu’s default web browser, the Ubuntu community has added the Chromium browser to Lucid Lynx’s repositories. Chromium is the open source version of Google’s Chrome web browser. In Lucid Lynx Alpha 3, the Chromium browser is super easy to install right form the Ubuntu Software Center. The current version of Chromium is from the 5.0 branch and seems to be very stable. Hopefully, this package will be kept up-to-date as Google seems to be upgrading Chrome at an amazing pace.

    • Variants

      • Mint Enlightenment

        More importantly, it was fast. It wasn’t up to Fluxbox’s level of performance, but it was enough to make me seriously rethink whether I wanted to stick with LXDE. I’m not going to go into a full-bore review of MoonOS here. Suffice to say, that little foray gave me some incentive to revisit my window management strategy. I broke out one of the old laptops and proceeded to install Linux Mint Fluxbox Community Edition. With that as my starting point, it was time to install Enlightenment.

      • Lubuntu (w/ LXDE) 10.04 Lucid Lynx Alpha 3 Released With 4 New Default Apps And New Artwork (Screenshots)

        The most important changes in Lubuntu Alpha 3 are 4 new default applications: Chromium for the browser, gnome-mplayer as the default media player, Wicd has been replaced with the Network Manager and Pcmanfm2 as the default file manager but we’ve already told you about that about a week ago.

      • Lubuntu looks familiar! – Hint: Xandros

        Folks at Ubuntu have rolled-out Alpha 3 of Lubuntu. To us, the most exiting feature this version brings with it is the Lubuntu Netbook session which has a striking resemblance to the Xandros interface that was made popular by the first gen-Eee PCs by Asus.

      • Kubuntu is awesome!

        Why do many people use Gnome as their window manager for Linux? It seems Ubuntu.com markets the distribution which contains Gnome pre-installed. For example, the live CD contains Gnome and for this reason many new users seem to think this is their limitation as far desktop interface goes.

Devices/Embedded

• Cortus – Is this the smallest ever CPU core running Linux?

  Availability of uCLinux for the APS3 family of processors has been announced by Cortus. This version of Linux is ideally suited to low-power, high-performance, embedded systems. The APS3 family of processors comprises modern, powerful processors, specifically designed for embedded systems, featuring a tiny silicon footprint, says the company.

• Phones

  • Nokia

    • Ubuntu Mobile 9.04 Installed on Nokia N900

    • Nokia N900: First looks

      Nokia is taking bold strides in revamping their phone line-up with the latest N900 smartphone and In.Tech got a sneak peek at the upcoming Maemo-powered device last week at the Nokia Malaysia office.

      First off, some background information on the N900 — it is Nokia’s game-changing phone that it hopes will reshape the way its smartphones work. The N900 sets itself apart from Nokia’s past efforts by running on a brand new Linux operating system called Maemo 5.

  • Android

    • Google and Apple: Giants of the Mobile Industry

      The Google Android on the other hand, is a mobile platform made by Google based on the concept of open source technology established by Linux. There are many apps and features in the Android that are not possible in the iPhone (until recently) that makes use of a majority of major device functions. Last January, Google launched a self branded smart phone named the Nexus One. While the device itself was not a commercial success, it galvanized Google’s place as a major player in the mobile phone industry

• Sub-notebooks

  • ABI: 163 million Smartbook shipments in 2015

    Qualcomm, Freescale, NVIDIA, Texas Instruments, and other chip-makers are pushing the smartbook concept pretty heavily. Lenovo and HP are expected to launch some of the first smartbooks in the US in the next few months. And if you don’t get hung up on the “book” side of things, I suppose you could make the case that iPad is a smartbook without a keyboard.

  • Canonical Taps Enlightenment for Ubuntu ARM Devices

    The UI won’t look a great deal different to end users familiar with the Ubuntu Netbook Remix. Bennett says that it’s a “direct clone of the UI found in the 9.10 Karmic release on i386.” Users testing Ubuntu 10.4 alphas can test the launcher now by installing the netbook-launcher-efl package. The most recent Ubuntu 10.4 alpha release came out on Thursday, February 24.

  • A Prism for Jolicloud: Web-Centric Desktop Apps

    I recently bought a netbook and installed Jolicloud, a Linux/Ubuntu distro designed as a replacement for, or companion to, Windows. Jolicloud was a revelation, something fresh and new in the seemingly snail-paced world of desktop computing. The bold idea of Jolicloud is that the browser is the operating system. It’s all you need and you don’t need to even think about it. The browser is a core service that supports all applications but it can recede into the background and let applications take the foreground.

• Tablets

  • How Dual-OS Open Source Tablets Could Slay Apple’s iPad

    If Android has been such a success competing with the iPhone OS on smartphone handsets, why can’t it compete with the same OS on tablets? For that matter, why can’t it ship on tablets that have more than one free, open source operating system for users to choose from? This proposition gets even more interesting when you throw into the mix the fact that an abundance of applications usually ensures the success of a hardware platform. Could a tablet that, say, runs a version of Ubuntu as well as Android give me a pallette of applications that would make my iPad’s applications look puny in comparison? Why not?

Open-source software can have a catch

Benjamin says open-source software is more a project than a product. “Everyone with an interest works together to protect, preserve and improve the eco-system that produces it,” she says.

“Let’s look at Linux [a free operating system]. Linux is one of the most successful open-source projects in existence. Some of the world’s top vendors are working together by employing developers to work on the Linux kernel [the software that runs the operating system]. IBM, HP, Novell, Red Hat, Canonical, Oracle and now even Microsoft make contributions to the Linux kernel that supports their own products.”

The research and development also takes place in community organised events, Benjamin says. “They’re like the secret R&D lab brought out into the open marketplace. Developers mingle and socialise, all the while sharing their experiences, explaining their challenges and working together to find solutions to common problems.

“This is where the seeds are sown for new features, where problems are solved and the technology is improved. It’s the technologists that drive these events, not the marketing department. There is no marketing department.”

Guest Post: Si Chen on Cloud Computing and Open Source

Open Source and the Cloud Together

Ultimately, open source and the cloud are not mutually exclusive; they can work together.

I started my blog at opensourcestrategies.blogspot.com five years ago, but then moved it to WordPress last year. So here’s a case where I’ve moved off the cloud and back to open source. But I also use Google’s Feedburner to syndicate my blog, and I’m thinking about adding Facebook wigdets, MicroPoll, and Disqus as well.

FLOSS Weekly 110: Webmin

Webmin, the web based administration tool to keep your system simple.

Jamie Camron for Webmin.

Fog Computing

• hSenid Mobile Unveils revolutionary Open Source App Store and Community VAS platform

  The open source Telco apps store mChoiceTM Vishma, provides the necessary platform to build an application eco system in which application developers can publish and market their various applications. The users can perform reviews, ratings, trials and visualizations of available content. mChoiceTM Vishma provides a seamless integration to mChoiceTM Soltura helping users to create an application using mChoice Soltura, and directly publishing it on mChoice Vishma. Moreover, since mChoice Vishma is an open source apps store, it can be customized and integrated to the Service Delivery Platforms provided by any vendor.

• The Open Source Innovation Backbone is SaaSy

  Facebook and Twitter both represent good examples of this. They are busy these days trying to show their open source bonafides. They are sharing code and encouraging contributions to make their services better, hoping to ride the wave of open source innovation.

Mozilla

• Mozilla begins browser education campaign

  There’s a box to put in your email address, and when the ballot screen is rolled out you’ll get a note in your inbox explaining the strengths of different browsers. To some of you, that’ll seem a little ridiculous – surely no-one’s still using Internet Explorer 6 out of ignorance, right? Well, there’s still plenty of people out there who think Yahoo is a browser…

CMS

• London.gov.uk switches to Drupal open source CMS

  London.gov.uk, the official website for the Mayor of London and the Greater London Authority (GLA), has switched to the Drupal open source content management system (CMS).

• Alert: What’s Coming for Open Source CMS in March 2010

Business

• Vyatta: Open Source Networking Meets MSPs

  Vyatta, which positions itself as an open source alternative to Cisco Systems, has launched a service provider partner licensing (VSPL) program. The subscription-based model targets ISPs, MSPs, hosting businesses and cloud providers. The big question: Will MSPs trust their infrastructure to open source routing and firewall services? For at least one MSP, the answer is a resounding yes. Here are the details.

• Open source helps Facebook achieve massive app scalability

  People all over the world spend a total of eight billion minutes a day on Facebook. Some 400 billion Web pages are viewed every month, 3.5 billion pieces of content are shared every week and the site logs a staggering 25TB of data every day. David Recordon, senior open programs manager at Facebook, talks about how the social networking giant uses open source tools to achieve its massive app scalablilty.

• CollabNet Acquiring ScrumWorks Maker Danube

  CollabNet, supplier of the Subversion open source change management system, has acquired Danube Technologies, a supplier of a key management piece of software for Agile development, ScrumWorks.

• Jaspersoft’s open source BI gains traction

  The open-core business intelligence vendor has amassed more than 10 million downloads, raising questions about potential acquisitions

Richard Stallman

• ‘Free software’ proponent to speak at UB

  Well-known computer programmer Richard Stallman will visit the University at Buffalo Monday evening to discuss copyright laws in the age of the Internet.

• Richard Stallman, President of Free Software Foundation Presents: Copyright vs. Community in the Age of Computer Networks

  Who: Richard Stallman launched the development of the GNU operating systems in 1984. GNU is free software where everyone has the freedom to copy it and redistribute it, as well as to make changes either large or small. The GNU/Linux system is used on tens of millions of computers today.

• The downside of hiking out-of-state tuition

  Richard Stallman must have a crystal ball underneath his bed. When it comes to the world of computing, he’s seen the future so many times that one of his ideas would be enough on which to base a career.

  Way back in the Texas Instruments’ “Hunt the Wumpus” days of computers (the early 1980s for those of you too young or too old to remember the early computer game), Stallman envisioned the GNU operating system.

  A variant, the GNU/Linux operating system, is now used in hundreds of millions of computers worldwide. His announcement of that system in 1983 sparked the free software movement.

  Now you’ll have two opportunities to hear him talk about “Copyright vs. Community in the Age of Computer Networks.” Stallman will speak at 4 p.m. today at Union College’s Olin Auditorium. He’s at the University at Albany at 4 p.m. Friday in the Recital Hall of the Performing Arts Center on the uptown campus.

• Free software, free society

  Richard Stallman spoke to an eager crowd of UB students Monday night, bringing to them his message about free software and explaining what he feels are the evils of copyright law.

  Stallman is well known for his position as the founder of the GNU Project and the Free Software Foundation. He is a long-term activist for free software and advocates against corporations who, he believes, stretch the copyright laws and software patents. He presented in Norton Hall on Monday about his first passion – free software.

• Stallman and Free Software Foundation launch Day Against DRM

  DRM is a technology used with digital files that are copyrighted to ensure than can not be copied to other devices.

  Richard Stallman said the day was designed to “raise public awareness to the danger of technology that restricts users’ access to movies, music, literature and software; indeed, all forms of digital data”.

Releases

• Abiquo announces formal release of abiCloud 1.0

  Abiquo announced today that abiCloud 1.0.0 has been formally released under the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL) Version 3.

Government

• UK.gov IT minister makes open source gaffe over browsers

  The UK government’s current minister in charge of the IT brief has got her knickers in a twist over web browsers by wrongly stating that Opera is based on open source technology.

Open Data/Access

• ‘Cloud in the sky’ idea brings Haiti relief efforts into focus for geography students

  Such has been the experience for a group of University of Nevada, Reno geography students and their instructor. They have spent the early days of the spring semester participating in a worldwide effort using the open digital technology source OpenStreetMap to help Haiti in its effort to rebuild.

• Open-source alternatives bring flexibility to textbooks

  Students can access open-source textbooks online for free or purchase a printed version through Web sites of open-source textbook providers.

Programming

• Qt + Box2D is easy!

  Integrating Box2D into your Qt application is quite easy, and this blog shows you how to get started. First of all:

  * Step 1: Download Box2D from Google Code: http://code.google.com/p/box2d/
  * Step 2: Build it (I had to insert a few #include <cstring> to get it to build)
  * Step 3: Build and try the test bed application: Box2D/Examples/TestBed/
  * Step 4: Read the manual: http://www.box2d.org/manual.html
  * Step 5: Continue reading this blog to hook up the two frameworks…

Standards/Consortia

• How Sir Tim Berners-Lee cut the Gordian Knot of HTML5

  Simon St Laurent wrote, over at O’Reilly, about “the widening HTML5 chasm”. (He’s a former worker on the World Wide Web Consortium (aka W3C), where Berners-Lee has of course toiled for longer than one would have thought humanly possible.) He reckoned that discordant interests would leave HTML5 damaged and its credibility weakened.

  And then the Free Software Foundation urged Google to kill Flash by open-sourcing its video codecs and pushing them out to YouTube users – meaning “The world would have a new free format unencumbered by software patents.”

What Google Really Wants From On2 Deal

Internet apps are delivering a new class of functionality to HDTVs, and there’s a lucrative new market for that functionality. Google might score some points with Web browser fans by giving away VP8, but giving it to the Web would mean giving it away everywhere — and that’s something that looks less and less likely.

Science

• Scientist eyes 39-day voyage to Mars

  A journey from Earth to Mars could soon take just 39 days — cutting current travel time nearly six times — according to a rocket scientist who has the ear of the US space agency.

  Franklin Chang-Diaz, a former astronaut and a physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), says reaching the Red Planet could be dramatically quicker using his high-tech VASIMR rocket, now on track for lift-off after decades of development.

Security

• Poland admits role in CIA rendition programme

  After years of stonewalling, Warsaw’s air control service confirmed that at least six CIA flights had landed at a disused military air base in northern Poland in 2003.

Environment

• Must-see site: Global Warming Art

  In the spirit of free content, this site strives to incorporate and develop materials that may be widely reused by the public at large. All text is licensed under the GNU Free Document License and most images are released under some similar form of generous use license, though individual terms vary. Also in the spirit of free content, this site will seek to build upon free resources from NASA, NOAA, Wikipedia and others. In particular, many terms and important concepts will be green-linked back to Wikipedia in order to provide the reader with more detailed information than is available here. Despite this close integration, Global Warming Art is not part of the Wikimedia family of sites.

• Academic attempts to take the hot air out of climate science debate

  I, too, think it would be a grave mistake not to make better use of the obvious open-source and crowd-source advantages enabled by blogs such as Climate Audit. Just as the SETI@Home project has made use of thousands of otherwise idle computers to scan radio telescope data for signs of extraterrestrial life, if people are willing and able to interrogate climate datasets in their spare time it would be strange in my view not to try and make use of this collective resource.

• Giant iceberg breaks off from Antarctic glacier

  An iceberg the size of Luxembourg has broken off from a glacier in Antarctica after being rammed by another giant iceberg, scientists said on Friday, in an event that could affect ocean circulation patterns.

Censorship/Privacy/Civil Rights

• Epic Fail in Congress: USA PATRIOT Act Renewed Without Any New Civil Liberties Protections

  Yesterday evening, the U.S. House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to renew three expiring provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act, after the Senate abandoned the PATRIOT reform effort and approved the extension by a voice vote on Wednesday night.

• Chinese factory worker jailed for joining political party

  A 20-year-old factory worker who joined a banned political party because he was unhappy with one-party rule in China was sentenced to jail for 18 months yesterday, his mother said.

  A court in southern China’s boomtown city of Shenzhen found Xue Mingkai guilty of subversion of state power because he joined the US-based China Democracy party last April, Xue’s mother Wang Shuqing said.

Intellectual Monopolies/Copyrights

• Rare Ruling on Damages for Sending Bogus Copyright Takedown Notice–Lenz v. Universal

  In the lawsuit over the allegedly bogus takedown of a YouTube video of a baby dancing to Prince’s “Let’s Go Crazy” (previous blog coverage), Judge Fogel has defined some standards for computing damages in a 17 USC 512(f) case, which creates a cause of action for sending certain types of bogus copyright takedown notices. I can’t recall another case discussing the damages requirements of a 512(f) claim–the only other definitive 512(f) plaintiff’s win was Online Policy Group v. Diebold (also before Judge Fogel), which settled for $125k before Judge Fogel reached damages. As a result, I believe this is a novel ruling which could have significant implications for future 512(f) cases.

  512(f) says that the sender of an impermissible takedown notice “shall be liable for any damages, including costs and attorneys’ fees, incurred [by the 512(f) plaintiff] as the result of the service provider relying upon such misrepresentation…” Judge Fogel interprets the language to mean that “a §512(f) plaintiff’s damages must be proximately caused by the misrepresentation to the service provider and the service provider’s reliance on the misrepresentation.” Accordingly, 512(f) does not require plaintiffs to show that they suffered economic losses.

• US government rescinds ‘leave internet alone’ policy

  Instead, an “Internet Policy 3.0” approach will see policy discussions between government agencies, foreign governments, and key Internet constituencies, according to Assistant Secretary Larry Strickling, with those discussions covering issues such as privacy, child protection, cybersecurity, copyright protection, and Internet governance.

• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

The Move to Linux – “Daddy’s a penguin!”

With each new convert, Linux joins the mainstream, but even that statement is not fair. Linux is mainstream. It is viable and it is used in hundreds, if not thousands of businesses, schools and governmental agencies every day. Yet we keep talking about the day the desktop will take over, or the day…

Maybe, instead of plotting the overthrow of Redmond, we should just be focusing on our own systems, one at a time. And let the nine year-olds tell us they want the penguin.

Intel Atom/Nvidia system that runs Ubuntu from ZaReason … why you should consider buying from a Linux-loading vendor … and why I’m looking at FreeBSD

Buntfu.com – Linux PC Computer Systems

I am hoping that the community will soon discover and become a part of our site which we tout as a “Community based PC Vendor.” We believe anyone with a computer for sale loaded with Linux is a vendor and supporter of open-source software and should have a unified place that focuses on selling their Linux or BSD computer while promoting the use of open-source software.

Audiocasts

• The Linux Link Tech Show #342 2/24/10 [Ogg]

• Linux Outlaws 137 – Bing!

  This week on the show: The Ubuntu One Music Store, big GPL case settled, Ubuntu soon powered by Bing, Google sued over Buzz, Apple hates naked people and much more…

Events

• SCALE 8x Attracts Largest Crowd In Its History

  SCALE attracts largest crowd in its history, 30 percent increase in registration bodes well for show, FOSS in general. Observers looking to take the pulse of the Free/Open Source Software movement looked to the Southern California Linux Expo SCALE 8x, the first-of-the-year Linux event in the U.S., and found that this year, and the immediate future, may be at its brightest.

Desktop

• A return to Linux: a review of Ubuntu Linux

  Linux, specifically Ubuntu linux is Grandma and Mom ready. for two simple reasons… It will NOT get full of viruses and spyware for you to clean out every visit, AND via VNC or even log-me-in you can easily help them remotely if you need to. Not having to fix and clean a PC every week because the user is not a computer expert is a holy grail for any tech person. It’s easier to use than a Windows PC, Far FAR cheaper as there are no licensing costs, and most software someone would want at home is available free for it with a single click. But the big test is a real world non-techie. can they use it? My wife will be the test subject. Yes that will do nicely, use family as guinea pigs!

• Forget Linux for Dummies: now it’s Linux for Grannies

  In the case of Alex, it’s not clear what role Linux is meant to play. The way the deal is set up appears to offer few of the benefits of open source, but has the high cost more commonly associated with Windows.

Kernel Space

• Stable kernel 2.6.32.9

  The 2.6.32.9 stable kernel update is available. There are over 90 fixes in this update, quite a few of which are security-related. Subscribers can refer to our detailed summary for more information on the changes in this release.

• Linux 2.6.33 Boosts Graphics, Dumps Android

  The Linux 2.6.33 kernel is the first new kernel release of 2010 and follows the 2.6.32 kernel release by nearly three months. Key to the new update are enhancements in graphics and storage capabilities.

• Graphics Stack

  • XGI Working On Big Linux Patch For Big Feature

    This is what XGI’s Jong Lin wrote today to the xorg-devel mailing list. It looks like Jonh is getting ready to send a batch of patches to the list, but apparently the patches are big because of “big features” (hopefully more than just EXA) so Jong is concerned about the length. We’ll see what patches end up getting submitted.

Applications

• BitTorrent Client for Linux

  In this article, I didn’t mention about softwares which don’t have gui like rtorrent. In Linux there are more alternatives than following softwares’. I didn’t use some of the softwares’ last versions. I’ve also mentioned the versions which I used, near the titles.

• Bordeaux Group Announces License Agreement With StormOS to Develop Bordeaux 2.2 User Interface

  Under the terms of the agreement, the developers at StormOS will develop the future Bordeaux (UI) User Interface and StormOS will receive an exclusive license to distribute all related intellectual property.

• Instructionals

  • Creating An NFS-Like Standalone Storage Server With GlusterFS On Fedora 12

  • Command line calculator for Linux, calculate big with bc

  • Safari 4: Installing and Running it on Ubuntu Linux

  • Add medibuntu sources to install more useful softwares in Ubuntu

  • How To Run Ubuntu in Windows 7 with VMware Player

  • remap Control to Caps_Lock Key

  • Switching Between Absolute and Relative Cell References in OpenOffice.org Calc Spreadsheets

  • OpenOffice.org: The Need for Style

  • How To: Change Timezone in Linux/Unix From

  • Gentoo, awesome and themes

  • How to Control the CPU Usage of a Process in Ubuntu / Debian Linux with cpulimit

  • OpenOffice Keyboard Shortcuts

  • How to create a Gentoo USB installation medium (from Ubuntu, as well)

  • How to install Sodipodi SVG Vector Editor in Ubuntu

  • How to Turn Your Linux Box into a Home Theater with Boxee

  • Linux Howto: Cleaning up Your GRUB 2 Menu (part 2)

  • Creating An NFS-Like Standalone Storage Server With GlusterFS On Fedora 12

  • How do I run a remote Linux desktop in Windows?

  • Hg Init: a Mercurial tutorial

  • Meet Git, the Version Control System for Developers Who Like Ease

  • How To Enforce YouTube Safety Mode To Block Objectionable Content With SafeSquid Content Filtering Proxy

  • GNU/Linux: Server Upgrade Problem Solving

  • Drupal 6: Attachment Views, Page Views, and Theming

  • 5 SSH Tricks You Must Know

  • Build a NIS Client

  • Policy Banks with Postfix

  • How to Change Password and Profile Picture from Gnome – Ubuntu Tricks

  • Kerberos Server Set Up

• Games

  • Galcon Fusion – Review

    I was late to write news about Galcon Fusion release so I’ve decided to write a review…
    When Galcon Fusion was released for GNU/Linux I thought it was another of those simple games that I will play for 10 minutes and lose interest very quickly – but I was so wrong…
    This is one of the most addictive games I have ever played !
    After 10 minutes of playing I just had to buy it (and it’s very cheap, just $8.99 this week, original price $9.99).

  • The Quake III Test

    So my test is Quake III. If I’m talking to someone and trying to make the point that they’ve got a computer, I’ll point out that if you can run Quake III on the device, it must qualify as a computer. Not just that specific device, or the specific game, but all devices in that class.

    And Quake III has the added bonus of being open source. So it’s a great study in what’s possible as long as devices are open and allow modification.

Desktop Environments

• K Desktop Environment (KDE SC)

  • Applications to make your KDE more powerful and smarter

    KDE is a nice desktop manager for linux operating systems. KDE usually comes with almost everything you might need. But have you ever dreamed if you could make your kde better, smarter and powerful with more amazing applications . Here are a few wonderful applications for kde which are not included in kde by default. If you have any suggestions , please do comment .

• GNOME Desktop

  • Missing Menu Icons: What are GNOME playing at?

    Martin Owens points out in his blog post deriding this decision that removing the icons and the ability to easily re-enable them, stating that it makes it harder for people with dyslexia (he himself is dyslexic) to use Ubuntu. I can equally imagine that users with visual disabilities also find their removal a hindrance.

    I often use my sister as an example of non-tech users using Ubuntu on this blog (she can’t tell an OS from a browser). What was one of the first grumbles I heard after installing Ubuntu Karmic on her notebook? Missing icons. She had become used to them, she knew what they stood for and allowed her to quickly navigate around menus – menus of which she is continual fearful of in case of screwing something up! Their removal only served to worry her that something was wrong.

Distributions

• 5 Linux distros I normally recommend to newbies.

  If you have friends or colleagues who you would like to have try the Linux OS, an important decision would be the distro you choose. There are over 500 out there and whatever distro you choose will be a great factor in shaping your friends view of Linux. The following 5 Linux distros are my personal favorites when it comes with giving people a feel of what Linux is and is not.

• Ubuntu

  • Ubuntu Linux Now Available to Fed Customers on GSA Advantage

    Canonical’s Ubuntu has become third Linux operating system approved by the General Services Administration for use by federal purchasers. It joins Linux distributions from Red Hat and Novell, already available through the GSA Advantage purchasing program.

  • Ubuntu goin’ gray, like the Mac OS way?

    A source from inside the Ubuntu team has informed a blogger that there will be an important announcement coming from Canonical regarding a possible rebranding of Ubuntu. A lot of enthusiasts are quick to speculate that the changes will be all about the color schemes used by Ubuntu and that it may go from brown to gray.

  • Ubuntu 10.04 Alpha 3 Released – What’s new?

    The third and final Alpha of the Lucid development cycle has been released this evening – but what can you expect to find inside?

  • An Update On The Boot & Power Performance In Ubuntu 10.04

    In December we wrote that Ubuntu 10.04 already shortened the boot time, which has been a great focus amongst Canonical and Ubuntu developers as they strive for a ten second boot. A lot has changed since that article was published last year, including the introduction of Plymouth and many kernel mode-setting improvements along with the introduction of Nouveau for NVIDIA KMS support. We’ve ran a new boot performance comparison on two laptops and a netbook as we see how the boot times are looking with Ubuntu 10.04 LTS when compared to Ubuntu 9.10. We have also looked at how the power consumption has changed in the Lucid Lynx for these mobile devices.

  • Ubuntu Music Store may feature automatic cloud and desktop sync

    As Canonical continues work on Ubuntu 10.04, it’s becoming more and more apparent that they’re serious about delivering an OS with some serious consumer appeal. Ubuntu One — Canonical’s cloud sync service — and the U1 Music Store will no doubt contribute to that appeal.

  • New Graphical Interface for Ubuntu on ARM

    Linux is the operating system of choice for devices with ARM processors. Unfortunately problems with graphics appear in most cases. Ubuntu wants to fix this with a new GUI.

    No matter if a smartphone, smart netbook or embedded device, most hardware with an ARM CPU is currently running Linux. It’s natural that Ubuntu therefore wants a large slice of the ARM pie, but, like many GUIs, is running into resistance from graphics drivers that in many cases don’t support direct rendering

  • Variants

    • From Mandriva to Mint

      I have liked Mandriva since Mandrake Linux 9.1. Its been an amazing distribution ever since. Pure visual delight and ease of use. I like KDE for the look and feel, GNOME is mostly a no no for me. Mandriva being a KDE centric distro fits the bill perfectly. Mandriva is the default king of our two year old Family Desktop. We all loved the latest version and despite KDE being a little buggy, find it convenient to use.
      I gave this info to emphasize that it was not easy for me to think about moving from Mandriva to any other distro, specially a GNOME centric Mint. Here goes the story :

      My wife’s vaio completed 1 year and ran out of official warranty. Hence she allowed me to dual boot it with Mandriva and Vista. She was already comfortable with Mandriva, so it was supposed to be a smooth move. The problem started right after the first install.

Devices/Embedded

• Things I’ve Learned about eReaders

• Imaging boards tap 720p-ready DaVinci chips

  Leopard Imaging is shipping two Texas Instruments DaVinci-based vision/imaging development boards supported by the company’s Designsomething.org development community. The $84 Leopard Board 355 and $129 Leopard Board 365 tap TI’s TMS320DM355 and TMS320DM365 processors, respectively, support 720 video, and ship with a Linux SDK from RidgeRun, says the company.

• Android

  • Philips to launch Android-based GoGear Connect

    Philips has given journalists some info, at the company’s Winter Media 2010 event, of an Android-based media player that will be hitting the markets in July 2010.

  • Latest AdMob Shows Android Users are Mostly Dudes

    The January AdMob report (PDF) is out today and it shines a little bit of light on who the typical Android users are. We already know that Android growth is steady, but just are the people using these phones? As it turns out, we’re mostly Android Guys. See what we did there?

  • Android tablet runs simultaneous 720p sessions

    Broadcom demonstrated an Android-ready tablet design that offers video-conferencing and DLNA streaming to IP set-top boxes and HDTVs. The Persona Tablet is equipped with a BCM11211 VoIP processor, coprocessors including one or two BCM11181 chips, and can process simultaneous 720p video streams, says the company.

  • Android Phone Prices Declining Quicker Than Expected

    it’s expected to sell for about £100 (US$155) unlocked. That’s over 54% less than the price tag that came on the original Pulse only a few months ago. Granted the screen size does factor in for most heavy users, the general public will likely fall in love with the price.

  • Best Android apps

• Sub-notebooks

  • OLPC breaks 1,000 machine barrier

    The One Laptop Per Child project has so far deployed 1,000 of its XO laptops in Australia and taken the first delivery of the next generation devices which it will unveil in coming weeks.

9 Free, Open Source Tools for Video and Media Playback and Encoding

It wasn’t that long ago that it was impossible to find good, free open source tools for working with and viewing video. Now that video runs rampant on the web, though, there are a whole lot of applications worth getting, even if you’re currently happy with your video and encoding apps. Here is an update to our ongoing collection of open source tools, with nine good choices here–all free.

7 of the Best Free Linux Configuration Management Tools

System administrators are responsible for the maintenance and operation of a computer system and network. This is a major task with a huge number of decisions to be made regarding the configuration of the system.

Ogg Theora vs. H.264: head to head comparisons

Streaming video websites like YouTube face growing pressure from consumers to provide support for native standards-based Web video playback. The HTML5 video element provides the necessary functionality to build robust Web media players without having to depend on proprietary plugins, but the browser vendors have not been able to build a consensus around a video codec.

Although the h264 codec has gained dominance due to its excellent compression and broad support in the consumer electronics ecosystem, it is covered by patents that preclude broad royalty-free usage. Several browser vendors, including Opera and Mozilla, favor the Ogg Theora media codec, which is believed to be unencumbered by patents. Ogg may offer advantages from a licensing standpoint, but there are still many unanswered questions about its quality and suitability for Internet video streaming services.

[...]

Some streaming video experts, including Ozer, are not convinced that royalty-free VP8 will solve all of the problems that the industry is facing with standards-based video. He contends that the cost of reencoding existing content will make it difficult for streaming content providers to adopt alternatives to h264 at this stage regardless of whether the alternative is royalty-free.

DtO: Geekette’s Syndrome

Boxee Beta Newer Version Released

Boxee has always surprised everyone with its lightning fast and unique interface. Boxee is like the Google Chrome of Multimedia apps. It is truly a revolutionary application. Only a month has been passed since the official release of Boxee Beta and you have a newer version of Boxee Beta up for grabs.

SEP open sources parts of its backup solution

Backup and data recovery specialist SEP AG has announced that it has released several components of its SEP Sesam backup software to the open source community. The SEP Sesam Storage Server consists of two modules; the Sesam Multiplex Stream-Server (SMS) module and the Sesam Transfer Protocol Server (STPD) module.

Open Source E learning Stack

The answer is to manage raw resources using the features of a Document Management package such as the Open Source product Alfresco. Alfresco’s Smart Space concept allows rules to be set on shared folders (say a public folder allocated for the VLE ‘drop off’ point) which in effect converts most of the mess into some kind of order.

Sun/OpenSolaris

• Oracle Explains Unclear Message About OpenSolaris

  To be sure, some people could read the page and ascertain that OpenSolaris is not long for the enterprise world. Oracle, a famously proprietary software company, already does plenty of business with Windows, Solaris, AIX, Red Hat Linux, Ubuntu and other operating systems.

  OpenSolaris, however, appears to be safe for the time being.

• Oracle Still To Make OpenSolaris Changes

  As one former Sun customer points out, the subscription link for OpenSolaris has been removed. George Shepard formerly of Sun and now with Oracle has iterated that Oracle is indeed planning on changing the support model for OpenSolaris, but no announcements are yet available.

• Oracle kills OpenSSO Express – ForgeRock steps in

Events

• The 6th International Conference on Open Source Systems, May 30 to June 2

  OSS 2010, the 6th International Conference on Open Source Systems, will take place on the campus of the University of Notre Dame, South Bend, Indiana, USA, from May 30 to June 2.

• OOoCon 2010

Web

• British Library unveils web archive

  IBM Big Sheets is based on the Apache Hadoop Java framework, and promises to process large amounts of data “quickly and efficiently”.

• IBM BigSheets to preserve fleeting Web data

  Boloker explained that BigSheets is a private cloud service running parallel MapReduce jobs on all of the library’s machines. And while it’s a private cloud (take note–private cloud spotted in the wild), the British Library will make the data and services available for people to access.

• Steam UI Update Beta Drops IE Rendering For WebKit

  Tracking games and achievements have both gotten simpler, and Valve has dropped the Internet Explorer rendering engine in favor of WebKit.

Releases

• Brand New Lernid Released

  Ready for the awesomeness that is Ubuntu Opportunistic Developer Week, we have a shiny new Lernid for you all to rock the week with. Lernid is the online learning tool for getting the most out of our learning weeks. It makes connecting a doddle and provides interactive features such as showing slides, web pages and more.

Government

• Spanish government’s adds software development site to OSOR’s list

  The Spanish government’s Technology Transfer Centre (CTT) is the newest name on the list of federated open source software sites in the European Union.

  As of Thursday this week searches for open source applications on OSOR.eu will also provide links to the more than 130 software projects that are hosted on CTT’s software development website.

Openness

• Hungry? How About An Open Source Restaurant

  Imagine just finishing a great dish at a restaurant and wishing you could make that at home. Well at the Instructables Restaurant you can do just that. In fact not only can you get the “source code” of the dish you ate, but you can download the plans to the furniture and fixtures as well.

Programming

• Zend Server monitors PHP scripts

  Zend Logo Zend Technologies, a major contributor to the development of PHP, has announced the release of version 5.0 of its Zend PHP Web application server. Zend Server is a complete package for implementing web applications via PHP. In addition to the web and application server, the company also offers the Zend Studio development environment for Eclipse and Zend’s PHP framework. Zend released version 1.10.2 of the framework at the same time as the new server release.

• The Nature and Importance of Source Code and Learning Programming with Python

  In conclusion, if you or anyone you know wants to learn how to program computers, I recommend starting with Python using MIT’s on-line course materials supplemented with the other on-line resources mentioned above (and summarized in the table below). I’ve now watched more than half of the videos from the MIT 6.00 course and I’ve worked through several of their assignments: this is a great course! Even with nearly three decades experience programming including a couple of college-level courses in the 1980s, I’m finding the class is more than just good review for me: I’ve learned a few new things (in particular, dynamic programming and the knapsack problem). Python’s clean syntax and elegant design will help as one delves into writing code for the first time. Its extensive libraries and repositories will support the application of one’s newly acquired computing skills to solve problems in the area of the student’s special interests whatever they may be … and that’s the way we learn best: by doing something that we personally care about!

ODF

• ODP View

  Web based Open Office Presentation Viewer -v0.0000 – A effort to make a pure Javascript ODP Viewer

• Relevant link of today: OOXML not suitable for Norwegian government

  A study published by the Norwegian “Direktoratet for forvaltning og IKT” (Agency for public adminstration and ICT) comes to the result that OOXML is not suitable for being used by the Norwegian government. The study is available online in Norwegian.

• WP-United User Manual: Help Needed!

  You can download the manual from SVN, here. It is in ODF, and it would be great if it could stay that way — if you are using software by The Man, you can download an ODF add-in to open and save the format. (For downloads, I will convert it to PDF, and probably many other formats. The key is keeping the source in ODF).

• odtPHP

• Danish Open Source Vendors declares victory in open standards war

  Many years ago (10 December 2003), I helped to cofound an organisation with the aim of uniting all the good forces to promote the commercial use of open source in Denmark. The result was The Danish Open Source Vendors’ Association (aka OSL – an acronym from the Danish name Foreningen af Open Source Leverandører). Yesterday, OSL held another general meeting where among other more important things I was reelected to its board of directors for another 2 year period.

GoDaddy store your passwords in clear-text and may try to SSH to your VPS without permission

Heros

In 1997, the EFF awarded George Antheil (who was long dead) and my hero (who by that time was retired in Florida) a “Pioneer Award”, fifty-six years after they had submitted their patent.

If you look at the patent, you still might not recognize the name of my hero, Hedy Kiesler Markey, nor might you know her by her birth name of Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler, but most of you probably have at least heard of her stage name, Hedy Lamarr, once called “The most beautiful woman in the World”.

MacGyver of the Day: Electronics Hacker Jeri Ellsworth

Science

• Senators blast NASA for lacking vision

  A Senate science subcommittee clashed with NASA’s chief on Wednesday, saying the firm and the White House lacked a clear vision and goal for the program.

• Saturn moon could be hospitable to life

  NASA said on Tuesday that a flyby of planet’s Enceladus moon showed small jets of water spewing from the southern hemisphere, while infrared mapping of the surface revealed temperatures warmer than previously expected.

  “The huge amount of heat pouring out of the tiger stripe fractures may be enough to melt the ice underground,” said John Spencer, a composite infrared spectrometer team member based at Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colo.

• Gemfields discovers 6,225-carat ‘elephant’ emerald in Zambia

  Gemstone producer Gemfields today announced the discovery of an “exceptional” 6,225 carat rough emerald in its Kagem mine in Zambia.

• Large Hadron Collider in multi-magnet quench hiccup

  A technical hiccup has delayed the planned restart of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the titanic subterranean magno-doughnut particle smasher situated deep beneath the Franco-Swiss border.

Security

• Good neighbours tidy up their village… then get a ticking off from the council

  They thought they were being helpful by collecting litter around their village.

  But despite leaving the pavements and verges spotless not everyone was pleased with their efforts.

  For it seems the volunteers of North Stifford, Essex, who filled 43 bags of rubbish during three hours of hard work, turned out to be a little too good at their job for the likes of the local council.

• Laptop surveillance kid was disciplined when spying authorities mistook candies for pills

  According to the lawyer for the family of the boy whose school spied on him at home through a covert webcam application on his laptop, the boy was disciplined for eating candies that bear a passing resemblance to pills.

  The Lower Merion School District has admitted that the laptops it distributed to students were configured so that administrators could activate their webcams without alerting the user, but insists that the spying capability was only used to help find stolen laptops.

Environment

• Don’t let commercial fleets fish the Atlantic bluefin to extinction

  No fish represents the growing crisis in our oceans better than the Atlantic bluefin tuna. Thanks to relentless overfishing by large commercial fleets in the last 40 years, the bluefin population has crashed by over 80%. Marine biologists worldwide are warning that unless the Atlantic bluefin is declared endangered and international trade in the fish is banned, the fish will go extinct in a matter of years.

• Geothermal Gardens and the Hot Zones of the City

  The climate of the city is altered, in other words, literally from the ground up; using the functional equivalent of terrestrially powered ovens, otherwise botanically impossible species can healthily take root.

• Imagining a Carbon Neutral Seattle: A Collection of Ideas

  Let’s imagine 10 moments of an average day that might be different in a carbon neutral city. The following are a collection of ideas, from my point of view. They are a thought explorations in how I think carbon neutrality will benefit cities and the people who live there. Even if your city has not announced carbon neutrality as a goal, you too can think about just how different your city would be in a bright green future.

• Silicon Sweatshops: Another black eye for Apple supplier

  A Taiwanese manufacturer that makes LCD screens and components for tech giants like Apple confirmed Thursday that more of its workers in China were sickened by chemical exposure than it previously reported.

• 5 Reasons You Should Be Scared of Apple

Finance

• citibank is so not fabulis

  In a bit of strange and disturbing news, fabulis discovered today that someone(s) at Citibank had decided arbitrarily to block fabulis’ bank account due to what was described to us on the phone as “objectionable content” on our blog. In fact, the account — it turns out — was blocked a few days ago without anyone letting us know about it by phone or email.

  Huh?

• Fed chief: We’re looking into firms betting on Greek default

  Bernanke said the Fed is examining companies’ use of credit default swaps, a form of insurance against bond defaults. Bernanke made the comments at the start of a Senate Banking Committee hearing. It marked the second day where the Fed chief testified on Capitol Hill about the state of the economy.

• Bernanke wants answers on Goldman role in Greece

  U.S. regulators are looking into how Wall Street firms like Goldman Sachs (GS.N) helped debt-stricken Greece arrange derivatives deals that critics say were used to disguise the size of its budget deficits.

• Goldman Sachs, the WSJ, and Consumer Protection

  It’s almost worth accepting the bad idea of a new government bureaucracy just to see how it would handle the Goldman Sachs-Wall Street Journal claim that buyers of Goldman Sachs mutual funds and individual customers of its asset management business somehow don’t qualify as retail customers or consumers. It’s really a preposterous claim by both Mr. Blankfein and by the Journal.

• Goldman Sachs Is ‘Morally Culpable’ for Greek Debt (Video)

  Video: Feb. 18 (Bloomberg) — Stefano Harney, a professor at the University of London, talks with Bloomberg’s Andrea Catherwood about Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s involvement in $15 billion of bond sales for Greece after arranging a currency swap that allowed the government to hide the extent of its deficit.

• In Taibbi’s Latest, More Shots at Goldman

  In a signature polemic, Matt Taibbi, columnist for Rolling Stone, takes on his favorite target, Goldman Sachs, accusing Wall Street’s most profitable investment bank of setting the stage for the country’s next crisis hardly more than a year after it was on the brink of collapse.

  Though difficult to quote at length in this publication, Mr. Taibbi tries to explain how the bank made the gains it did given the pitiful state of the American economy.

• Billionaire Singh Eschews Goldman Model for His India Brokerage

  Malvinder Singh, the 37-year-old Indian billionaire trying to build a global financial-services company, says there’s one rival whose playbook he won’t copy: Goldman Sachs Group Inc., the most profitable securities firm in Wall Street history.

PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

• Lobbying run amok: Eight health care lobbyists for every member of Congress

  That’s about 4,525 total lobbyists from 1,750 companies that include 207 hospitals, 105 insurance companies and 85 manufacturing companies.

Censorship/Privacy/Civil Rights

• Blogger evicted from court whilst print journalist remains

  Many people now obtain their news from the internet. This method of communication has allowed a remarkable explosion of free speech, of providers of information (usually providing content which can be obtained for free) and a muliplicity of choice in what one reads. It is to be applauded.

• BT could face criminal case over Phorm trials

  The Crown Prosecution Service has revealed that it is working with a top barrister on a potential criminal case against BT over its secret trials of Phorm’s targeted advertising system.

• Colbert Takes On Ridiculous Restrictions Over Talking About The Olympics

  On last night’s Colbert Report, Stephen brought on his brother, Ed Colbert, an international copyright lawyer to discuss the totally ridiculous restrictions on what he can and cannot say concerning his Olympics coverage, to avoid getting sued by either NBC or the Olympics, leading Colbert to dub his reports the “Vancouverage of the quadrennial cold weather competition” to avoid saying things like Vancouver, Olympics or even winter games, as those are all on the forbidden list.

Internet/Net Neutrality/DRM

• The Decade in DRM (and announcing Day Against DRM, 2010)

  Since the late 1990s, a handful of media and technology companies has waged war against the public, imposing digital restrictions on the technology we use. Here’s a rundown of this decade’s most important moments in the fight against DRM, and an important announcement: Day Against DRM 2010 is happening on May 4th!

  Since the late 1990s, a handful of media and technology companies has waged war against the public. Their goal? To seize total control of our use of our copies of published works. Their method? Building restrictions into our technology — Digital Restrictions Management, or DRM.

Intellectual Monopolies/Copyrights

• About author rights

  Authors are always very happy when their paper is accepted for publication in a journal, as this shows that their work was deemed important but editors and referees. But they also want to make sure that their work gets read and does not disappear behind a subscription wall. There are several steps an author can take here.

• Sexy textbook innovation?

  But if it takes off, it will benefit the student with lower prices–which have been a scandal. And it could benefit publishers by lowering their costs and get around the monopoly power of the patented ebook readers. This could also have differential impact on small publishers, if the software to update material is readily available. Authors may even end up liking it.

• Men at Work appeal Down Under plagiarism ruling

  EMI Music has lodged an appeal against the ruling that the flute riff in Down Under by Oz band Men at Work was plagiarised from Lucky Country kids’ favourite Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree.

• Film industry appeals in iiTrial case

  AFACT has lodged a last minute appeal against a Federal Court judgement earlier this month which exonerated ISP iiNet for the copyright infringing activities of its subscribers.

• Hollywood lawyers have another go at Aussie ISP

  Hollywood copyright lawyers are having another go at the Aussie ISP iiNet which recently won a case brought by the Australian Federation against Copyright Theft.

• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

Sell Linux on its merits

I believe we should tell Linux as it is: not a clone of Windows, nor was it created to replace it. Sure it’s nice telling people they are not likely to suffer security breaches on Linux as they would on Windows, but that should not be the norm of promoting Linux.

Guide For Switching To Linux At Your Church

My earlier post on how we migrated to using Linux raised some questions. Some wondered why other churches, schools and Christian ministries did not do this (though there are many that have). Others wondered how they could do it themselves.

DIY

maddog troubleshoots a broken Windows system and saves his niece some money in the process.

My niece was having problems with her system, which because of her work must run Microsoft, and she decided to take it to a repair depot to have the hardware checked to see if anything was wrong. Nothing wrong could be found by running hardware diagnostics.

Nine Linux projects in 90 minutes

Southern California Linux Expo(SCaLE 8x) Recap

If you are an open source fan or vendor and can make the trip, I highly recommend attending to SCale 9x next February.

The Five Stages of Benchmark Loss

This weekend at the Southern California Linux Expo in Los Angeles, Matthew Tippett and I presented a talk entitled Five Stages of Benchmark Loss: PTS and You. In this hour-long talk, we covered Linux benchmarking, what has been learned over the years of benchmarking at Phoronix, the Phoronix Test Suite, and the five stages that users and developers generally go through when they lose out on benchmarking results. For those that were unable to attend this event, here are the slides and recordings.

Desktop

• Corporate IT won’t run Linux desktops because of the ‘Skype attitude’

  76% of issues in the JIRA database are new. Compare this with the Windows client, where 21% of issues are new. It seems that Skype is truly uninterested in their Linux user base, expending minimal or no resources on it. Even if you take into account that the Linux client is several steps back from the Windows version and the development team is apparently working on a new version, the number of open issues is still worrying (they claim to be in a late Beta stage, but audio does not work with a large proportion of modern OS versions and there is no timeline to fix it). So, Lesson #1, DON’T INSTALL A BETA VERSION OF SKYPE IF YOU WANT TO CALL PEOPLE!

  [...]

  It appears that in Skype’s mind, all Linux users are potential Beta testers of their software. We all want to suffer software failures and issues. We also apparently want no way to ever recover from them, unless we follow Skype’s unknown and unpublished roadmap. This is the attitude to the Linux desktop of a large commercial software provider. Maybe this helps us understand why corporate IT is so reluctant about installing Linux desktops – even if they don’t want Skype on their networks, they can’t trust a highly visible commercial company to write Linux software that works and manage it professionally, so what hope is there of trusting free, open source organizations from doing the right thing?

• ASUS’ Xonar STX Gains Even More Functionality Under Linux

  Ever since ASUS first released its Xonar line-up of cards, I knew I had to have one. But, being that I use Linux as a primary OS, I knew that the chance of me finding good support was slim. Well, that support may have taken a couple of months in the beginning to come to fruition, but since then, the open-sourced ALSA drivers have come to support every Xonar model available, along with many of their specific features.

• The best way to reduce software ‘piracy’

  Some years ago, while I was in a small computer shop in a suburb of Melbourne, trying to convince the owner to put a few machines running GNU/Linux on display, a lady arrived with a laptop in hand.

  [...]

  The point of this tale? It just underlines the fact that the entire IT industry is built on overpriced products and services. People working in the business get away with it because IT is a complex business – and they are very good at making it seem even more complex than it is.

Kernel Space

• Linux 2.6.33 released

  The shortlog below is (obviously) just the things since the last -rc8, for a fuller log you can either download the full ChangeLog, or preferably do the git thing and look at whatever area you are interested in. Or wait for the kernelnewbies report.

• What’s new in Linux 2.6.33

  A promising open source driver for NVIDIA graphics hardware, a replication solution to prevent server down times, “ATA Trim” support and a host of new and improved drivers are some of the most prominent improvements in Linux 2.6.33.

• Community Filtering and Disagreeableness

  In a practical regard I’m very impressed with the shear scale of development that the Linux kernel project manages to organise. It does have a very effective set of mechanisms for filtering contributions that intend to reduce noise and promote useful contribution over general chatter.

• Built to last

  It has now been almost exactly five years since kernel development community tentatively started using the git source code management system with the 2.6.12-rc2 commit. That was an uncertain time; nobody really knew how long it would take the development process to get back up to speed after an abrupt core-tool change. As it turned out, git was almost immediately useful, and has only become more so since. Making the development process work is git’s main claim to fame, but, as a side benefit, git also makes it possible to learn a lot about how our kernel is developed. And that, as it turns out, includes taking a look at the code which is not changed.

  [...]

  It turns out that, of the approximately 12 million lines of code and documentation that make up the 2.6.33 kernel, about 31% dates back to that 2.6.12-rc2 commit. A third of our current kernel has not been touched in the last five years.

• Linux kernel R&D worth over 1bn euros

  The development costs would reach over a billion euros (or about £900m, or $1.4bn USD), according to researchers from the University of Oviendo, Spain. Jesús García-García and Mª Isabel Alonso de Magdaleno are set to present this open source thought experiment at the European Union’s Conference on Corporate R&D next month.

• Kernel Log: Linux and hard disks with 4-KByte sectors

  In future, fdisk will arrange partitions in such a way that the new hard disks with 4-KByte sectors can achieve optimum performance – although, for now, users will still need to select fdisk’s appropriate mode of operation manually. The developers of Realtime Linux have released new kernel versions, and the completion of 2.6.32.9 and 2.6.33 is also approaching.

Applications

• Kate Puts Other Text Editors to Shame

  Kate is a multi-document editor that grew from a rewritten version of the KWrite editing widget of the KDE desktop. It’s runnable on both Gnome and KDE desktops. Kate’s feature set goes above and beyond that of most text editors. It can display an index of files on a sidebar, check a document’s spelling, and perform robust search-and-find tasks.

• Why Not Mplayer?

• Emesene Docky Integration Coming Soon

  Docky integration with Emesene is just around the corner thanks to the work of the awesome Tom Cowell (who has already given us a plug-in for Emesene Messaging Menu integration)

• Arista, a Multimedia transcoder for GNOME Desktop

  Today a friend of mine asked me to suggest him some good video converters in Linux. As of now, I am only aware of the King of all, ffmpeg, but when I searched in the repos for some more video convertors I came across Arista Transcoder, a pretty cool application which makes encoding media content for various popular devices really easy for you.

• Instructionals

  • When X decides to crash

  • How to Setup Static IP Address in Ubuntu Linux from command line

  • The differences between useradd and adduser commands

  • Project: Building An All-Text Linux Workstation – Part 11

  • On Ubuntu 9.10 and SATA

  • LPIC 101 tutorial part 1 hardware

  • Virtual Hosting With Proftpd And MySQL (Incl. Quota) On Ubuntu 9.10

  • Caught In the Loop? Awk While, Do While, For Loop, Break, Continue, Exit Examples

  • Disable Annoying Beep on Mandriva 2010

  • bash: read a specific line or/and a column from a file

  • How to setup Hauppauge-HVR-950Q in ubuntu 9.10

  • Install and Run Alliance P2P Software in Linux

  • Quick and easy pop or imap server with Dovecot

  • Animated-Desktop-GUI- Use your favorite video as an animated Desktop or screensaver|Nautilus Script

  • On Backups

  • 10 Ways to Prevent or Mitigate SQL Injection Attacks

  • Gaupol – Subtitle editor for text-based subtitle files

  • MyHDL on Ubuntu

  • How to get direct downloads of Ogg Vorbis from Jamendo

  • Getting to Gno GNU Utilities

    The GNU Project has provided dozens of useful utilities that you can find on almost every major Linux system, but many new Linux users have no idea where to start to learn these handy utilities. In this tutorial, I’ll cover a few of the utilities that you can use to measure file system usage, verify the size of files, and take a peek into larger text files like Apache logs.

• Games

  • Yo Frankie! to be available for the masses in Ubuntu Lucid

    Now, thanks to the attention we’ve raised to get Yo Frankie packaged, all the legalities (sorting out the licensing) have been dealt with and we managed to get it in Lucid just in the nick of time. This time i’m excited to let you know that the availability of this game has increased once again.

  • Codeweavers Crossover Games Rules

    After being a computer game fiend for almost all of my childhood up until early college, since moving exclusively to using a Macbook, I have been absent from the gaming world for quite some time. A combination of not having enough time (not that I have enough time now…) and just lack of interest had me disregarding computer gaming in favor of console games when I lived with a roommate who decked our apartment out with a huge flatscreen TV and an XBOX 360 and.. Call of Duty 4 and Soul Calibur 4.

  • Gbrainy – Brain Teaser Game for Linux

  • OpenArena 0.8.5 Is Out With Small Changes

    While the ioquake3-powered OpenArena game is not as advanced or popular as say Nexuiz, it is a fairly popular free software game amongst those using an open-source Mesa3D driver stack.

Desktop Environments

• K Desktop Environment (KDE SC)

  • Test driving some new features of KDE 4.4

    Qt 4.6 passes a collection of new functionalities to KDE 4.4. We’ll show you the animation framework and KDE’s new multi-touch feature.

  • KDE Sub-Project for Real Time Communication

    Chat, instant messaging and video communication: the KDE Real Time Communication and Collaboration (RTCC) project wants to improve the integration of real time communication into the desktop environment.

• GNOME Desktop

  • GNOME UX Hackfest Photos

  • GNOME 2.29.91 Beta Available

  • GNOME Shell 2.29.0 with new notification system

    Version 2.29.0 of the GNOME Shell is now available for testing. The developers have integrated a new notification system into this version. An information bar at the bottom edge of the screen informs users, for instance, about newly connected devices or about which track the audio player has just changed to. Previous notifications are saved and can be accessed via an info icon in the bottom right corner of the screen.

  • Gnome 3 Will Be Amazing

    I am excited. I am really, really excited. This should scare you. It scares me. But I hope you’ll bear with us; and by bear I mean “help us carry the load”. Help us make this real! Help us refine the bad parts! Help us eliminate the bad sub-designs! Help us shoot flames from our eyes and launch dragons from our missile tubes. Help us break granite with our faces. Descend with us, little lambs, into the labyrinth of chasomagic.

Distributions

• Raster to be the default Qt4 graphics engine @ Gentoo Linux

• The number of Linux distros – A strength or weakness?

  So to sum it up, I don’t agree per se that the number of Linux distros is either a good thing or a bad one. It is just a matter of available choices to satisfy different needs of different people from different parts of the globe.

• too much choice can sometimes be a bad thing

  Well, to sum it up, some advice, if you’re thinking of switching to something other than Windows, and other than mac, and all you want is a decent desktop system, I would suggest you go with Ubuntu, it’s the distro I had the least problems with, and that you can get up and running even if you’re neither a programmer nor a system administrator.

• Red Hat Family

  • RHT Poised To Benefit From Shift To Cloud Computing

    Analysts at JMP Securities believe that Red Hat (NASDAQ: RHT) appears well positioned to benefit from the shift to cloud computing, especially at the OS level with RHEL.

  • CloudLinux OS: Standing Out in the Linux Crowd?

    In the meantime, Seletskiy says CloudLinux OS can run applications designed for Red Hat Enterprise Linux and CentOS (the community version of Red Hat).

  • RHEL 5.5 – extra lube for your KVMs

    So what did I make of the RHEL 5.5 beta? I found it to be, well, quite nice. It was my first exposure to RHEL directly, though I’m familiar with CentOS, and indeed, aside from the prominent Red Hat branding, things looked and behaved much like CentOS.

    [...]

    Ahead of that release, I’d say the beta provides a solid update for RHEL. The new KVM tools and additional device support will make RHEL 5.5 well worth the upgrade when the final release does arrive later this year.

• Debian Family

  • SimplyMEPIS 8.5 Reaches RC1

    MEPIS has announced SimplyMEPIS 8.4.98, RC1 of MEPIS 8.5, now available from MEPIS and public mirrors. The ISO files for 32 and 64 bit processors are SimplyMEPIS-CD_8.4.98-rc1_32.iso and SimplyMEPIS-CD_8.4.98-rc1_64.iso respectively. Deltas are also available.

  • Knoppix 6.3 highlights

    Knoppix creator (and Q&A mastermind) Klaus Knopper shares some insights on the latest release.

  • Ubuntu

    • Why I Switched from Ubuntu One back to Dropbox

      As many of you surely know, Dropbox and Ubuntu One are applications to keep files on your desktop in sync across multiple computers, and backed up in the cloud. After using Dropbox for a year or so on Ubuntu, the Ubuntu One project came out and I thought I’d move over to it. I assumed it would be easier to set up, being pre-installed, and could integrate better with the file manager and other applications, being made specifically for Ubuntu.

    • A preview of Ubuntu 10.04

      These are just the first few things I discovered after installing Ubuntu 10.04 – Lucid Lynx. You can learn more about Lucid Lynx and download the latest test build from Ubuntu’s website. I would not recommend upgrading your system to this alpha release because it still contains a lot of bugs at this stage. If you have never used Ubuntu and would like to give it a try you can obtain a copy of Ubuntu 9.10 (the most current release) here. If you have limited bandwidth, slow internet, or you just don’t want to download it then you can also request a copy of it to be mailed to you for free.

    • Ubuntu To Make Big Announcement Tomorrow?

      Word has reached my ears that tomorrow, 25th February, at around 18:00 UTC, a big announcement concerning the branding of Ubuntu will be made.

      Branding

      Whilst my source wishes to remain anonymous he did divulge that the announcement has “something to do with…” the branding of Ubuntu and/or Canonical, the colour scheme used for them and “possibly the logo”.

    • Full Circle Podcast #1: Stop Wine-ing and Go Native!

      That’s right, the Full Circle Podcast is back and better than ever!he podcast is in MP3 and OGG formats. You can either play the podcast in-browser if you have Flash and/or Java, or you can download the podcast with the link underneath the player.

    • Ubuntu founder stops by Round Rock

      My favorite cosmonaut-coder Mark Shuttleworth stopped by our offices this morning for a visit. Mark is the founder of both the Linux distribution Ubuntu and its commercial sponsor Canonical. Mark and I sat down in the lobby and caught up. Here is a short interview we recorded.

Devices/Embedded

• Pogoplug Linux-powered file server appliance

  In Short
  It makes a pleasant change when something does exactly what it’s supposed to, so well done to Pogoplug for taking the hard work out of sharing files. µ

  The Good
  Easy setup, loads of sharing options, decent web interface, no fees.

  The Bad
  Limited video formats supported for web preview.

  The Ugly
  Did we mention it’s shocking pink?

  Bartender’s Score
  9/10

• Phones

  • Better lucky than smart

    Last week in Barcelona at the Mobile World Congress, I felt exactly the same way. I felt I got even too lucky. This time, in my work life.

    [...]

    At the Mobile World Congress, the talk of the show was Android. There were Android phones everywhere. It is mobile open source. The big announcement on Monday? Intel and Nokia, two of the largest players in mobile (who is bigger than Intel on chips or Nokia on devices?), announced MeeGo. A mobile open source initiative (and you can tell by the weird name, right amigo?). Then Symbian rushed out Symbian^3… Guess what? Mobile open source.

  • Android

    • Mobile Roadie Now Creates Apps For Android Ecosystem

      We’re big fans of Mobile Roadie, a startup that helps develop iPhone apps. But the one gripe we had was that Mobile Roadie was limited to the iPhone platform. Today, our wish came true as Mobile Roadie is launching functionality for Android phones.

    • Google snubs Chinese Android developers

      But in January Google did postpone the Chinese launch of two Android handsets – one Samsung and one Motorola – saying that it would be “irresponsible” to launch them when the search giant’s own future in China was so uncertain.

      With no Android handsets launched it would have been a strange developer conference in Beijing, and cancelling the appearance will put more pressure on the Chinese government while making Google look good at home.

    • Quake 3 Comes To Google’s Android Platform

      Almost exactly one month ago we reported that Roderick Colenbrander was working on a new open-source project after his once-popular NVClock program has since largely faded away. Details were scarce on the project originally, but we knew it was to do with Linux gaming. Today we now know that this project is called “Kwaak3″ and it’s a port of Quake 3 to Google’s Android platform.

    • HTC Hero Review

      In conclusion, this is a good phone for most people, since it provides everything that they need, however it has some lag, especially if there are many apps running, and it provides some limitations. Still, android+sense makes this phone really shine, and the lag has been reduced since the original phone with one update, and the new android 2 OS seems to bring some performance improvements which could further improve on this. However, this phone, to be great, deserved much better hardware (something like an AMOLED screen, snapdragon and 512MB ram), a decent camera, a sync app for Linux and only a few more pollishing made to the android OS (full bluetooth support and paid apps in market more specifically).

• ARM

  • Mandriva Joins ARM Connected Community

    Mandriva, Europe’s leading Linux publisher, today announced it is a new member in the ARM® Connected Community, the industry’s largest ecosystem of ARM technology-based products and services. As part of the ARM Connected Community, Mandriva will gain access to a full range of resources to help it market and deploy innovative solutions that will enable developers to get their ARM Powered® products to market faster.

  • ARM Launches a Smarter Brain for The Internet of Things

    So ARM added some digital signal processing capabilities to the chip. Think of it as sending the silicon to school so it can learn algebra–after realizing that basic math doesn’t cut it anymore. Already NXP, Texas Instruments and ST Microelectronics have licensed the cores and expect products containing the chip to hit the market in 2011. Some areas we’ll see it are in smart appliances for “talking to” to the smart grid (GigaOM Pro sub. req’d), and as a way to add better audio quality to everything from headsets to Mp3 players without adding a lot of cost.

  • Saving the World, One Laptop at a Time

    Negroponte believes that, in addition to educating children, the computers enable both girls and boys to become agents for social change. “We find in Peru that as many as 50 percent of the kids, because they are in remote villages, are teaching their parents how to read and write.”

Please talk while gaming, with VoiceChatter

Playing a game with friends over the Internet is great, but typing conversations lacks the immediacy of a real conversation. That’s the filled by VoiceChatter, a free voice communication application primarily designed to be used during games, though it can be used for all sorts of purposes. It allows you to vocally talk to groups of other people over the Internet.

Nginx, the little Russian web server taking on the giants

According to Netcraft, 7% of all websites on the internet are now using nginx. This is all the more amazing when you consider that nginx was developed by just one person.

Introducing hands-on computing in secondary education

Teachers work long hours and are underpaid for the work they do. Between 7AM and 3PM they’re responsible for their students, with (possibly) an hour of time during the day where they might be free to “prep”. The truth is that “preparation time” for many educators comes either early in the morning or after work. Many teachers spend one, two, or more hours after work (either at school or at home) preparing their lessons for the next day. Weekends, likewise, are often time spent catching up, grading, or doing other work that (in theory) should be doable during their “preparation time.” Put simply, educators work hard.

Graphics lesson

Open Source 101: Paying for Free Software

Though most Linux binaries are indeed free, there are a few out there that do come at a cost. Like, for instance, Red Hat Enterprise Linux. But, if I wanted to, I am more than able to go out and download the source RPMs and compile the code myself to make a full-blown instance of RHEL.

Even though I have the skill set to do this, the question then becomes, why would I? My time is worth way more then the fee Red Hat charges for putting this all together, so even if it hits my wallet right up front, it’s well worth it in the long run.

This is the core advantage of open source software for most users like me: it’s not that we can get the source code ourselves, but rather that other people with more time on their hands (and ideally a paycheck to do it) can take the code and make it into a form we can use.

Thinking about open source: There are three types of software

Let me break down software into three categories:

1. Open source software, where every single byte of the programming source code is covered by some license sanctioned by the Open Source Initiative (OSI).
2. Proprietary software, where none of the code making up the whole is covered by an OSI-sanctioned license or is otherwise made available for free reuse and distribution.
3. Hybrid software, where some of the code is covered by an open source licence and some of it is not.

Whoa!, you might say, it is ethically and ideologically wrong to do anything but #1!

Whoa!, you might say, capitalists abhor “free” when it comes to anything they are trying to sell, so #2 wins!

Whoa!, you might say, you’re allowed to mix open source and non-open source code to create software, as in #3?

Open Source vs. the White Supremacists

The open source connection is indirect, but essential—Facebook is built on open source technologies, and the Internet itself is one of the biggest open source success stories of all: open software, and open standards and protocols.

[...]

Once again I give my heartfelt thanks to all the great Linux and FOSS people who made all this possible. It’s making a big difference to my little community.

Diffusion of Open Source Innovation

The open source innovation backbone for startups mentions Google, FaceBook and Twitter sustaining innovations, reporting that are all heavily based on open source software. Beyond standing on giants’ shoulders, companies like Google are engaged at tactical and strategic level with open source communities, and they are not alone.

Many Happy Returns, Apache

First, it ensured that the back-end of the Web was not locked into proprietary standards. Had Microsoft established its Internet Information Server (IIS) there, as might well have happened in the absence of Apache, it would have been able to control vast swathes of Web development through the tight linking between IIS and Internet Explorer on the client side.

[...]

Apache has moved far beyond its roots to become a key player in the open source world in many areas. On the occasion of its 15th birthday, it’s good to remember just how much it has done in that time, and to look forward to all the things it will do in the future. Many happy returns, indeed….

Free Software, Private Property

The main thrust of the article is that Open Source companies could exclude people from using Free Software. The specific hypothetical being Red Hat increasing the inconvenience of downloading an .iso – technically they are meeting the obligation of providing the source, but they are adding “hurdles” to make it not worth the effort.

The basic point holds – a company could ostensibly pretend to be Open Source-friendly but take all sorts of “extra-license” measures to work around “the spirit of Open Source”.

Why would a company do that?

Consider a company like Red Hat, well-respected and considered genuine in its commitment to Open Source. Imagine, what would happen if Red Hat did try to fiddle with download access: not only would the community nerd-rage with the intensity of a million exploding blue LEDs, not only would Red Hat suffer a credibility hit of biblical proportions, but someone would just put up a torrent and work around the problem.

Will open source ever be completely free?

So, will open source drive prices to $0.00? Yes, for some workloads and in some scenarios, like infrastructure that will be expected to be free. But expect the smart open-source companies to make plenty of money in this service-enabled, cloud-hungry world.

OpenOffice.org

• OpenOffice4Kids – Educating kids the right way

  Office suites are mainly intended for adults. But sometimes, kids write too. And when they do, they work with tools intended for their parents, functionality and looks wise. This makes the chance of a child liking big, complex word processors and spreadsheet software less likely. But what if you helped them a bit?

• Head to Head: Office 2010 vs Open Office 3.1

  It’s a battle of the office productivity suites as we look at how Office 2010 shapes up against its main open alternative. We find out which is best in this head to head review.

  In this head to head we are focusing on the two most popular suites of office software on the market today. While some people consider the comparison a little one sided, we thought it was time to give Open Office a chance to stand up to the heavyweight that is Microsoft’s 20-year old Office, in its latest beta incarnation.

  We have chosen these two big-hitters because of the wealth of support and features available but we’d like to offer a nod to Google Docs, a suite which we see as a potential contender for the future, when it makes up part of the upcoming Chrome OS.

Mozilla

• Top 5 Mozilla Firefox YouTube Add-Ons

  If you are both a Firefox user and a YouTube fan (or fanatic), there are number of Firefox add-ons that can integrate YouTube directly into your Firefox browser in ways that make watching videos more enjoyable. Each one of these add-ons comes with certain features: some allow you to download the video, some are able to create complex playlists, some make it easier to search for a video and so on.

Databases

• Recently in MariaDB #1

  The aims of this kind of blog post is simple – I want to help keep the masses informed as to what’s happening with MariaDB, as a whole. There is a community growing, and MariaDB is a community project, not necessarily a Monty Program Ab baby (and we’re clear on this distinction: think of it like Canonical/Ubuntu). So, think of it as such that I’m sharing the good news, and summarising what’s been happening, to save you time.

Drupal

• Drupal 7.0 Alpha 2 released

  Our first Drupal 7 alpha version was released just over a month ago. Today, we’re proud to announce the release of the second alpha version of Drupal 7.x for your further testing and feedback. The first alpha announcement provided a comprehensive list of improvements made since Drupal 6.x, so in this announcement we’ll concentrate on how you can help ensure that Drupal 7 is released as soon as possible and is as rock solid as the previous Drupal releases that you’ve grown to love!

• How To Learn Drupal

• Need a job? Learn Drupal

  I recently learned that there are more jobs available working with Drupal than there are employees to fill them. According to John Faber, COO at AF83, a Drupal development shop, they’re so busy with projects that they’ve had to turn away business. And it’s the same for many other Drupal specialists in San Francisco. There’s a clear need for bodies skilled in Drupal and other open-source software, including Linux.

• Archdiocese of Saint Louis Migrates to Drupal

  In early 2009, the Archdiocese of Saint Louis determined that it needed to upgrade its website, mostly for security concerns. After investigating a move from Joomla! 1.0.x to Joomla! 1.5.x, the Archdiocese determined it would be more cost effective and a more future-proof decision to migrate the over 49 individual Joomla! sites that comprised www.archstl.org into a single Drupal installation.

• Drupal goes to Mars

  Drupal goes to Mars, or rather, Drupal helps us go to Mars … eventually. NASA’s Mars Space Flight Facility at Arizona State University is doing a lot of advanced work with Drupal. They have a number of Drupal sites, each with a different purpose, but all used to share information about Mars as discovered by ASU’s THEMIS camera on the Mars Odyssey orbiter. All of the sites have some interesting integrations with other software, including LDAP, legacy authentication systems, Java Servlet based web services, Flash, Java desktop clients, map servers or Google Earth.

• London.gov.uk using Drupal

  The official website for the Mayor of London and the Greater London Authority is using Drupal.

BSD

• PC-BSD 8 installation guide

• PC-BSD 8.0 Released For A Polished, Friendlier FreeBSD Desktop

  FreeBSD 8.0 was released in November with a number of improvements and various performance enhancements as our FreeBSD benchmarks have shown, but if the text-based installation process has put you off from installing this popular BSD distribution or other usability challenges, there’s no reason to fear any longer. The PC-BSD project has finally come out with their stable PC-BSD 8.0 release that is derived from FreeBSD 8.0 but with much desktop-oriented love and its friendlier installer and package management system.

FSF/FSFE/GNU

• The Toyota Recall and the Case for Open, Auditable Source Code

  Finally, in response to the controversy, Sequoia Voting Systems announced last October that their new voting machines would be based on publicly available source code and open architectures, noting that “[s]ecurity through obfuscation and secrecy is not security” and that “[f]ully disclosed source code is the path to true transparency and confidence in the voting process for all involved.”

Government

• Free Software and Italian Elections 2010

  Italian free software association asks again Italian candidates for Municipal and Regional elections to sign a pact where they agree to promote the use of free software.

Licensing

• Second Life Tries To Backpedal On the GPL

  GigsVT writes “The Second Life viewer has been available under the GPL for three years. Linden Lab, the maker of Second Life, recently released a ‘third party viewer’ policy that all but erases the freedoms granted under the GPL. It includes such draconian measures as ‘You agree to update or delete at our request any data that you have received from Second Life or our servers and systems using a Third-Party Viewer,’ ‘You must not mask IP or MAC addresses’ (reported to the server), ‘you must have a published privacy policy explaining your practices regarding user data,’ and ‘You acknowledge and agree that we may require you to stop using or distributing a Third-Party Viewer for accessing Second Life if we determine that there is a violation.’”

Openness

• Flat World Knowledge: Open College Textbooks

  Aside from the invention of the alphabet, Gutenberg’s press and moveable type, and the Internet — all major disruptors of establishment enterprise in their time — Open Licensing is surely the most profound development yet to enable the transparent spread of intellectual capital. “Open” innovations include Linux and its various flavors; Apache servers; Moodle, a powerful open learning platform; the Open Library, providing unprecedented universal ccess to the world’s literature; open pharma offering the promise of widely shared and cheaply available pharmaceutical formulae to save lives; and Firefox, the world’s most popular web browser. Literally, billions of pieces of intellectual capital — writing, imagery, research, art, scientific formulae, designs, art, multimedia, and so on are licensed as Open — with open licensing growing at exponential rates, enabling a new world of creation and discovery — and now, Open licensing has entered the world of textbook publishing, to become a solution to the high textbook cost problems mentioned above.

• What does information really want?

  “Information wants to be free” was, for better or worse, a powerful slogan, but 25 years later its work is done. The crowd has gathered, the rallying cry, however flawed, worked. But now we have to create some actual policies and change some real laws.

  If overly restrictive copyright, patent, and IP rules are to be replaced with something better, the free culture movement has to supply people with good, solid reasons why they should want to protect these very important and threatened freedoms.

• Arduino – the hardware revolution

  Enter, the Arduino: a low-cost, open source, tiny hardware board for connecting the real world to your computer, and/or to the whole internet. What can be done with it? Everything. The limit is the imagination, and as you’ll see from a few of the example creations we review here, imaginative use is the norm.

Open Access

• Adventures of an Amateur Cartographer

  While striding manfully across the streets of suburbia this week I’ve been listened to some back issues of FLOSS Weekly that I’d previously missed. This excellent podcast by Randal Schwartz covers all aspects of Free Libre Open Source Software, occasionally straying into open source hardware and, in the case of the podcast I was listening to, open source data.

• Textbooks That Professors Can Rewrite Digitally

  In a kind of Wikipedia of textbooks, Macmillan, one of the five largest publishers of trade books and textbooks, is introducing software called DynamicBooks, which will allow college instructors to edit digital editions of textbooks and customize them for their individual classes.

  Professors will be able to reorganize or delete chapters; upload course syllabuses, notes, videos, pictures and graphs; and perhaps most notably, rewrite or delete individual paragraphs, equations or illustrations.

• Meedan Releases the World’s First Open Access Arabic/English Translation Memory

  The MeedanMemory is released under the Open Database License, which permits the use, copy and distribution of the translation memory, produce work using it, and to modify, transform and build upon the translation memory.

• Open Access to Research Is Inevitable, Libraries Are Told

  Public access to research is “inevitable,” but it will be a slog to get to it. That was the takeaway message of a panel on the role libraries can play in supporting current and future public-access moves. The panel was part of the program at the membership meeting of the Association of Research Libraries, held here yesterday and today.

• Introducing Datapkg: A Tool for Distributing, Discovering and Installing Data “Packages”

  Datapkg 0.5 has been released! This is the first release deemed suitable for public consumption (though we are still in alpha)! This announce therefore serves as both introduction and release announcement.

• Uncovering the truth

  Briefing papers for the meeting include a handsome discussion paper from the Audit Commission. Page 13 sports a revealing table of users and uses of public-sector data. It identifies as users: professional and frontline staff; service managers; corporate managers, directors and members; national government and regulators – and citizens. An impressive array of uses is tabulated for the users – except citizens. Apparently we use it for “choices about services” and “democracy”. Where are the innovators who pounced on data.gov.uk and mapped bicycle accident black spots?

• Open Data in Archaeology

  In addition to opening up access to journal articles for print, new digital technologies allow archaeologists to go beyond traditional ways of disseminating scholarly research. This includes new ways of collaborating and publishing findings in ‘real time’ on the web using blogs, wikis and the like. Also researchers can go beyond PDF files of articles for print, towards machine readable texts and the raw data and other materials underlying research.

Programming

• Glade 3 + GtkBuilder + Anjuta Example.

  Today I whipped up a simple GTK application using the Anjuta IDE, Glade 3, and the new GtkBuilder system. As some of you know, Glade 3 and GTK changed things up. First Glade stopped using generated code which required you to use libglade. Now the GTK developers created their own interface interpretor called GtkBuilder. Your whole entire Gtk+ application is now done using mainly signals, making it fairly easy to develop Gnome type applications.

Kevin Rose’s 10 Tips for Entrepreneurs

Kevin Rose, Digg’s founder, spoke this week at Webstock in Wellington, New Zealand and covered 10 amazing tips for entrepreneurs. They were truly insightful

Health

• Hospital left patients ‘sobbing and humiliated’

  Hospital patients were left “sobbing and humiliated” by uncaring staff, an investigation into one of the worst NHS scandals in history has found.

• Americans die from hospital infections

  According to an antibiotic-resistance study from the Extending the Cure investigation, about 48,000 Americans die each year from hospital-acquired infections (“superbugs”). The medical costs to treat these infections are also staggering.

Security

• Mall security guard accuses shopper of being a paedophile for photographing his own son

  Outside of the mall, Kevin was stopped by a police constable who had received a complaint from mall security that a suspicious potential paedophile had been taking pictures on its premises. The PC threatened to arrest Kevin “for creating a public disturbance” and ordered him to delete the photo of his son. The PC also averred that the Bridges Shopping Centre is a hotbed of paedophile assaults.

• Latvian ‘Robin Hood’ hacker leaks bank details to TV

  An alleged hacker has been hailed as a latter-day Robin Hood for leaking data about the finances of banks and state-owned firms to Latvian TV.

  Using the alias “Neo” – a reference to The Matrix films – the hacker claims he wants to expose those cashing in on the recession in Latvia.

• 3 Bulgarians charged in 44-day ATM hacking spree

  Three Bulgarian men were charged Wednesday with defrauding banks of more than $137,000 in a scheme that attached electronic skimming devices to numerous automatic teller machines in Massachusetts.

• Call for CCTV volunteers

  Minehead CCTV partnership is looking for volunteers to operate the town’s CCTV cameras in a bid to reduce crime and disorder.

  The partnership, which includes Minehead Town Council, West Somerset Council and Avon and Somerset Police, is looking for local people to become police volunteers at the CCTV office, based in the town’s police station.

• ICO concerned that DNA retention law neuters four data protection principles

  The Information Commissioner has criticised the Government’s proposals in relation to the retention of DNA personal data as removing the protection of the First, Third, Fifth and Sixth Data Protection Principles from data subjects. Although his measured memorandum to Parliament does not couch his concerns in this way, anyone how has knowledge of how data protection works will arrive at a very stark conclusion.

• Citizens rail against government data sharing

  The poll found that 61% of those surveyed believe police should not be allowed to keep a person’s DNA profile if they have not been charged with an offence, compared to 45% in a similar survey by the trust in 2006.

• Australia to require biometric visas

  Australia will spend $69 million building the technology infrastructure for biometric checks of visa applicants from countries considered a high risk of producing potential terrorists as part of Government’s long-awaited Counter-Terrorism White Paper.

• Supreme Court sets aside strict ruling on Miranda ‘right to remain silent’

  Reporting from Washington — A crime suspect who invokes his “right to remain silent” under the famous Miranda decision can be questioned again after 14 days, the Supreme Court ruled Wednesday. And if he freely agrees to talk then, his incriminatory statements can be used against him.

Environment

• Monkeys, butterflies, turtles… how the pet trade’s greed is emptying south-east Asia’s forests

  Countries across south-east Asia are being systematically drained of wildlife to meet a booming demand for exotic pets in Europe and Japan and traditional medicine in China – posing a greater threat to many species than habitat loss or global warming.

• Global warming could hurt some poor populations and lift others from poverty, Stanford study finds

  The impact of global warming on food prices and hunger could be large over the next 20 years, according to a new Stanford University study. Researchers say that higher temperatures could significantly reduce yields of wheat, rice and maize – dietary staples for tens of millions of poor people who subsist on less than $1 a day. The resulting crop shortages would likely cause food prices to rise and drive many into poverty.

• Have you no shame, Sen. Inhofe?

  Finally, if you’re wondering how to keep up with the non-stop barrage of pseudo science and abysmal ignorance — latest example: widespread misinterpretation of the significance of a retraction of a paper about rising sea levels — well, there’s an app for that.

  At this point, you just to have to choose your reality. I will choose Steven Chu and endlessly self-checking , self-correcting science over James Inhofe every single day.

• A tour of climate data at CKAN

  The following guest post is by David Jones who is, among other things, a curator of the climate data group on CKAN (the OKF’s open source registry of open data) and co-founder of Clear Climate Code

Finance

• Wall Street shifting political contributions to Republicans

  Commercial banks and high-flying investment firms have shifted their political contributions toward Republicans in recent months amid harsh rhetoric from Democrats about fat bank profits, generous bonuses and stingy lending policies on Wall Street.

• The Future of Money: It’s Flexible, Frictionless and (Almost) Free

  A simple typo gave Michael Ivey the idea for his company. One day in the fall of 2008, Ivey’s wife, using her pink RAZR phone, sent him a note via Twitter. But instead of typing the letter d at the beginning of the tweet — which would have sent the note as a direct message, a private note just for Ivey — she hit p. It could have been an embarrassing snafu, but instead it sparked a brainstorm. That’s how you should pay people, Ivey publicly replied. Ivey’s friends quickly jumped into the conversation, enthusiastically endorsing the idea. Ivey, a computer programmer based in Alabama, began wondering if he and his wife hadn’t hit on something: What if people could transfer money over Twitter for next to nothing, simply by typing a username and a dollar amount?

• IndyMac Sale To One West and The Mod/Short Sale Scam

  We linked this video once before but think it important enough to repost. This is actually a follow up to the original. Hear how the FDIC encourages One West NOT TO modify or work out lonas. They need to lose a set amount of money and when they do the FDIC will subsidize losses.

• Wall Street’s Bailout Hustle

  On January 21st, Lloyd Blankfein left a peculiar voicemail message on the work phones of his employees at Goldman Sachs. Fast becoming America’s pre-eminent Marvel Comics supervillain, the CEO used the call to deploy his secret weapon: a pair of giant, nuclear-powered testicles. In his message, Blankfein addressed his plan to pay out gigantic year-end bonuses amid widespread controversy over Goldman’s role in precipitating the global financial crisis.

  The bank had already set aside a tidy $16.2 billion for salaries and bonuses — meaning that Goldman employees were each set to take home an average of $498,246, a number roughly commensurate with what they received during the bubble years. Still, the troops were worried: There were rumors that Dr. Ballsachs, bowing to political pressure, might be forced to scale the number back. After all, the country was broke, 14.8 million Americans were stranded on the unemployment line, and Barack Obama and the Democrats were trying to recover the populist high ground after their bitch-whipping in Massachusetts by calling for a “bailout tax” on banks. Maybe this wasn’t the right time for Goldman to be throwing its annual Roman bonus orgy.

  Not to worry, Blankfein reassured employees. “In a year that proved to have no shortage of story lines,” he said, “I believe very strongly that performance is the ultimate narrative.”

Intellectual Monopolies/Copyrights

• Why I Will Not Sign the Public Domain Manifesto Why I Will Not Sign the Public Domain Manifesto

  It would be difficult to stand aside from a campaign for the right goals merely because it was written with unclear words. However, the manifesto falls far short in its specific goals too. It is not that I oppose them. Any one of its demands, individually, would be a step forward, even though the wording of some of them discourages me from signing my name to them.

  Rather the problem is that it fails to ask for the most important points. I cannot say, “This manifesto is what I stand for.” I cannot say, “I support what’s in this manifesto,” unless I can add, equally visibly, “But it fails to mention the most important points of all.”

  [...]

  I ask the authors of the Public Domain Manifesto, and the public, to please join me in demanding the freedom to noncommercially share copies of all published works.

• Administration Asks For Public Input On Intellectual Property Enforcement

  As part of the mis-named ProIP act, the newly created IP Enforcement Coordinator (generally called the IP Czar) is supposed to help figure out what an effective “intellectual property enforcement strategy” would be. While we have questions about why this position or this plan is really needed in the first place, here’s a bit of good news: rather than just doing the typical consult with industry lobbyists, the administration is, again, asking for public comment…

• Watch Lawrence Lessig on copyright, fair use etc: live on video

  Video streaming software company Flumotion and the Open Video Alliance will stream live on the net a speech on copyright, fair use, politics and online video being delivered on Friday morning (Australian Eastern time) by Lawrence Lessig at the Harvard Law School.

• Criminalise Exotic Pets, not File Sharing

  But of course, since we’re talking about mere ecosystems here, not something sacred like intellectual monopolies, it’s pretty low on governments’s priorities….

• Make 3 strikes bill law, says Simon Cowell

  The Three strikes law is a corporate music industry scheme and an element of the ACTA project.

  It’s being introduced as locally proposed legislation by governments in countries such as the UK and France. Under it, governments would act as entertainment industry copyright agents, and ISPs would become industry enforcers against their own customers.

• ACTA: why will the EU Commission not answer?

  Questions on ACTA in the European Parliament today revealed a distinctly shady Commission, which is giving out conflicting information publicly and privately. The key issue for MEPs is why the Commission is being so economical with the truth?

• Help the European Parliament oppose ACTA

  Four Members of the European Parliament – Zuzana Roithova (CZ, EPP), Stavros Lambrinidis (GR, S&D), Alexander Alvaro (DE, ALDE) and Françoise Castex (FR, S&D)- have submitted a written declaration opposing ACTA.

• Consumers ‘confused by copyright’

  The current state of the law means that it is illegal for somebody to copy a CD or DVD onto a computer or an Ipod for their own use. This copying to a different device is known as format shifting.

  In a poll of 2,026 people, some 73% said that they did not know what they could copy or record.

• New Zealand Introduces File-Sharing Amendment Bill

  Following widespread objections, New Zealand’s Section92A ‘guilty upon accusation’ anti-piracy law was scrapped last year. Today, The Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Amendment Bill will be introduced, which repeals Section 92A and replaces it with a “three-notice” regime, backed up by $15,000 fines and 6 month Internet suspensions.

• New Zealand tries again with anti-piracy copyright laws

  The New Zealand Government has tabled in Parliament its second attempt at amending its copyright laws to counter illegal downloading.

• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

7 wonders of the Linux world!

6.Free support: Linux is open source and it has a real community of users and developers who really are out there to help you. If you run into a problem you can head over to the forums or even talk to the developers who will be glad to help you.

7.More customization options: In windows or Mac if you change the wallpaper you will still end up with pretty much the same desktop. In Linux it’s you choice. There are several customization options. You even choose different desktop environments such as Gnome and KDE on a single system. You just have to install it them.

Linux Support?

This isn’t a perfect solution for my particular need – I’m still looking for something more like media hive but with transcoding-on-the-fly, and a little cleaner client UI – but that’s not the point here.

The point is so many times I’ve seen Linux users express interest in a port only to be dismissed out of hand. I was very glad to see a developer make the effort.

I also found it funny that the Linux users and the developer quickly agreed that a CLI-only version was just fine and dandy!

Chuck Norris is not a Linux virus

While Chuck Norris runs on Linux-based DSL modems and routers, it doesn’t actually attack Linux at all. Instead, it runs as a normal Linux application. So how does it get there if it doesn’t try to crack Linux? It infects routers by trying common and default passwords. That’s it. That’s all there is to it.

Chuck Norris botnet doesn’t infect routers…

According to ComputerWorld, the botnet spreads by malware that installs itself on routers and modems by guessing the default administrative password and seizing control due to many devices being configured to allow remote access.

Desktop

• A Linux Story

  I was about five years old when my father showed me my first computer. It was an old 8086, and it had 5.25 floppy drive, a shiny new 3.5 floppy drive, and a 10MB hard drive. When he gave it to me, it ran nothing but MSDOS. As a starter machine, I didn’t really care. I was just stoked to have a computer, and when my father showed me how to get to video games, and how to type a text document, I was thrilled. In 1993, my father got himself a Pentium machine, and I received his 486. The 486 also had DOS on it, but when I tried to play my old games everything went by too quickly. I asked my dad what was wrong, and he said that the games I had been playing relied on the CPUs clockspeed. At this point, he gave me a thin orange book, Understanding Microprocessors, which was published by Motorola. He also showed me a book on his shelf that taught me a bit about electricity. A month after this encounter, I went back and asked him if there were any operating systems that would run in protected mode. He told me, yes.

  [...]

  In 2005, I graduated High School, got myself a 64bit machine, installed Slackware on it, and joined the Marine Corps. I was injured and discharged ’07. I came home went to college, graduated, and built a new machine. Guess what. I still use Slackware. Everyone tells me that I’m stuck in the past, but at least I installed the 64bit version

• Refusing to Treat Self-Inflicted Wounds

  I started at the beginning. I told her why Linux was put on the computer and how these problems were non-existent on that system. I spoke to her for 3 minutes without her saying anything. I kind of figured it out.

  “Is he standing right there.”

  she answered simply.

  “Yes”.

  They were frightened of him.

  This Thursday, I am going back there to fix this problem. I am going to set up the old Optiplex in the bedroom for him to use and I’ve told her that the computer we gave her is HER property. He is not to touch it. Linux will be installed on that computer.

• Habey’s BIS-6620: Tiny Computer with Plenty of Connectivity, No OS

  The Habey BIS-6620 is petite, and it certainly does offer options for connectivity and integration, but is it ready to compete with the big boys as a digital entertainment center?

• Virtualized USB Key: The Future of Online Banking?

  Aimed at companies that want to protect corporate bank accounts, Trusted Access for Banking is actually a standard IronKey USB drive that runs a walled or ‘hardened’ Linux virtual environment inside the PC’s OS. It comes complete with its own browser hardwired to access only a particular bank service, and incorporates RSA Secure ID tokens for authentication.

• Microsoft Plays Catch-up — Sub-$70 Linux Virtual Desktop

  Userful Corporation, the world leader in multiseat Linux desktop virtualization, today announced that 30,000 schools worldwide have chosen Userful virtual desktops to reduce computing costs and improve computer-to-student ratios. Microsoft recently announced its own multi-seat solution, Microsoft Windows MultiPoint Server 2010, seven years after Userful pioneered the technology on Linux back in 2002. Another classic case of Linux vs. Windows, only this time Linux has the upper hand with Userful having already sold 750,000 seats.

Kernel Space

• Latest real-time Linux kernel to demo at German embedded conference

  The Open Source Automation Development Lab (OSADL) announced the release of the “Latest Stable” Linux mainline real-time kernel, based on Linux 2.6.31. The “PREEMPT RT”-based release will be demonstrated on Mar. 2-4 at Embedded World 2010 in Nuremberg, Germany, which offers a number of sessions on Linux and Android development.

Applications

• Better Linux Package Management with Checkinstall

  If you use Linux in any depth, you’re eventually have to install a program from source code. Normally the process is pretty quick and painless, but it still has some drawbacks, especially when it comes to upgrading or uninstalling that program. To help resolve this, we’ve got checkinstall, a useful tool that adds some cleverness to the process by keeping track of file changes and generating binary packages from your tarballs. With checkinstall, you can generate a RPM, deb, or Slackware package that can be ported between systems for easy install and removal.

• 3 Linux Console File Managers You Should Try: Midnight Commander (MC), Last File Manager (LFM) And VIFM

  GNU Midnight Commander (MC), Vifm and Last File Manager (Lfm) are 3 visual file manager applications for the Linux console. All of these 3 applications will remind you of Norton Commander – with the main interface consisting of two panels which display the file system -, but each has something special. Read about these 3 great console file managers for Linux and let us know your favourite in the comments!

• Instructionals

  • Installing and Running Safari 4 on Ubuntu Linux

  • Update on Controlling Konsole via DBUS

  • MySQL Multi-Aggregated Rows in Crosstab Queries

  • How-To: Partitioning Hard Drive using FDisk utility in Linux

  • Gentoo: tcpdump -i any = tcpdump: SIOCGIFHWADDR: No such device

  • How to install GNOME desktop environment theme in OpenSuse 11.1

  • GDM2 Setup 0.3.6 released! Help you get back the older GDM setup utility’s functionality in karmic koala|Gnome

  • Install and configure Tomcat webservices in LinuxMint 8 Helena

  • Tile windows vertically/horizontally in Ubuntu easily with X-Tile

  • How To Set $PATH Variable in Linux

  • VBoxHeadless – Running Virtual Machines With VirtualBox 3.1.x On A Headless Debian Lenny Server

  • Pino: Install twitter and Identi.ca Client for ubuntu Linux

  • Easy folder sharing in GNOME

  • Two open-source data deduplication tools

  • Easy LAMP Server Installation

    You will have to answer a single question when you get to the MySQL portion of the install (what you want to use for the admin password). That’s it.

    Your LAMP server is ready for you. Of course all you have is a bare-bones LAMP server. Since this article does not dive deep into the trenches of any of the packages, you will want to familiarize yourself with these tools before you really start playing around with them. But – even with what you have, you can now overlay a tool like Drupal, Joomla, or Xoops! on top of your LAMP server.

  • Introducing Linux virtual containers with LXC

    In the past we have looked at using OpenVZ for container virtualization on Linux. OpenVZ is great as it allows you to run compartmentalized “servers” within an operating system so you can separate systems, much like running virtual machines on a host system. With OpenVZ, you can get the benefits of virtualization without the overhead.

Desktop Environments

• K Desktop Environment (KDE SC)

  • Fresh Faces, Universal Access, and Really Plain Text

    The 4.4 release will be come with Kubuntu 10.04, that old Lucid Lynx, but it was backported to 9.10 for those of us who prefer to run a stable release over alpha code. I’ll tell you how to add those repositories to your system in a moment, but let me start by telling you about KDE 4.4.

    It’s so beautiful, I think I’m going to cry (see Figure 1 — click for a full sized image).

  • tokamak tuesday

    Today Tokamakers have been flying in all directions getting probably more done than we’ve ever achieved at Tokamak. There was a great meeting about animation extensibility (including the ability to change them, ala SVG themes, at runtime), a conference call with the company behind gitorious.org get the next steps in the git migration process sorted, huge strides forward on the mobilizing of kdelibs, the first runs of the Plasma Mobile proof of concept using QML and Plasma together on the N900, more bugs fixed in netbook as well as Javascript, the start of work on the new activities switcher, integration of context with Nepomuk and much more.

• GNOME Desktop

  • Gnome Shell 2.29.0 Released [What's New And Screenshots Inside]

    Gnome Shell is the new core user interface for Gnome 3 which provides switching windows and applications but you’ve probably already heard of it by now so I’ll skip the introduction. However, I would like to mention that this is still a VERY EARLY version of GNOME Shell and should not be taken of indicative of the final user interface or performance.

  • GNOME Shell 2.29 Brings A Lot Of Improvements

    A few days back we reported on a new Mutter release, which is the window and compositing manager for GNOME 3.0, and now with the GNOME 2.29.91 beta release coming up on Wednesday there is also the release of another new GNOME 3.0 component. Perhaps the single biggest new component for the GNOME 3.x stack is the GNOME Shell and this is the package that just reached version 2.29.0. GNOME 2.29.0 brings a lot of improvements.

  • Painless accessibility tips for GNOME designers and developers

    This morning at the GNOME 3 UX Hackfest in London, Willie Walker gave us some tips for ‘painless’ accessibility.

    [...]

    Calum asked Willie a really good question – how do assistive technologies handle dynamic UI elements? As Willie explained, we handle it okay but we could do better. Some common dynamic UI elements are progress bars, or monitoring graphs (eg the CPU usage monitor), or checkboxes that disable based on selections elsewhere on the screen. For the latter case – dynamically-disabled elements – when they are disabled, they are not accessible until the selections on the screen enable it again, so this case is handled okay. For progress bars and graphics, one thing we can do is announce every time it changes, or we can put some time constraints in there for announcement – announce every 3-5 seconds, for example. For progress bars in particular, we have a progress bar setting for orca: announce updates (yes or no.) This enables orca to announce every so many seconds the current status of the progress bar. For example, for a download progress bar: “10 percent. 25 percent. 73 percent.” We could handle these better, though.

  • Gloobus Provides Snappy, Sleek File Previews in Linux

    Ubuntu and other GNOME-based Linux distributions have their own built-in file preview tool, sure. But that previewer doesn’t act on every file type, leaving you sometimes regretting a double-click as GIMP or another heavy tool loads up with your file. And thumbnail icon previews aren’t available for every file you can create or download. Gloobus aims to provide universal file previews inside its dark, stylish interface.

• LXDE

  • LXDE: Smaller, Faster than KDE or GNOME

    Three years ago, the Lightweight X11 Desktop Environment (LXDE) was a faltering project — so much so that, when I wrote about it, one commenter questioned whether the project was still alive. However, since then, accounts of LXDE’s death have proved greatly exaggerated, and the project is once again flourishing.

    [...]

    In many ways, LXDE is where Xfce was a couple of release ago: polished in some places and rough in a couple of obvious ones. It could use another few months of development before it is as user-friendly as it could be.

    Meanwhile, LXDE is ideal for intermediate users who prefer a graphical interface, but do not object to some simple one-time configuration at the command line. Appealing to both old-time users and the users of modern hardware alike, it provides a unique bridge between free software’s past and present — and possibly its future as well.

Distributions

• 10 Best Minimal / Low-Footprint Linux distros

  10. Devil Linux

  It is a small, customizable, secure Linux distribution that runs with 32MB RAM. Devil Linux’s is small and customizable Linux distribution. Traditionally, Devil-Linux was used as a Router/Firewall. However, now it is used as a server for many applications. By adding an optional hard drive many network services can be included in the distribution.
  The system can be installed without a hard drive. It can be installed using a CDROM and a write-protected floppy. The system can be fully configured, but the running system has no writable device.

• New Releases

  • Clonezilla Live 1.2.4-3

  • GParted LiveCD 0.5.1-3

  • PC-BSD 8.0 Released

    The PC-BSD Team is pleased to announce the availability of PC-BSD 8.0 (Hubble Edition), running FreeBSD 8.0-RELEASE-P2, and KDE 4.3.5

  • PAIPIX 9.10

    The new PAIPIX 9.10 uses Debian Lenny development, xwindows and kde with kernel (2.6.30), openoffice 3.1.1 and many more applications. New scientific applications were included but a special emphasys was put on including a set of videoconference tools. With very fast networks available everywhere and a planet acking ion all possible ways, we should not travel anymore just to convey information by meeting. A set of tools including updated versions of sipproxd, opensips, ekiga, linphone, ffmpeg, palantir, and teamspeak, may be hepfull to come up with a strategy to bring virtual conferencing ta a convenience replacement of travel.

  • Webconverger 6.1

  • SliTaz GNU/Linux 20100221

  • Epidemic GNU/Linux 3.1 now avaliable

    Team Development Epidemic is pleased to announce the launch of Epidemic GNU / Linux 3.1 (Codiname Freedom).

  • The second stable LiveCD and LiveUSB with KDE4 is out!

    Hi! Without further explanation I present the second stable PLD-LiveCD and LiveUSB with K Desktop Environment… For more details visit http://kde4.livecd.pld-linux.org/

  • Igelle DSV 1.0.0

  • Igelle DSV 1.0.0 Introduces the Esther Desktop

    Igelle has announced that its Linux flavor for desktops, laptops and the likes, Igelle DSV 1.0.0, is now complete and available for anyone wanting to give it a spin. The developers say the Linux distribution is production-ready and have granted it the 1.0 label. The main feature of the release is the new Esther Desktop, a customized desktop environment, which Igelle states it’s lightweight enough to work on underpowered machines without compromising in the looks department.

  • PapugLinux release 10.1

    PapugLinux-10.1 is finally available for download, this is a major release in term of package update.

• Red Hat Family

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux: A Decade-Shaping Technology

    Last week, eWEEK Labs published their picks for the top 25 technologies that changed the decade. They judged their selections on the impact the technologies had on the past 10 years, while also considering the affect that these technologies will have on the future of IT. Among the winners – which included innovative technologies such as the iPhone, the Blackberry, Blade Servers and Bluetooth – was our leading operating platform, Red Hat Enterprise Linux. eWeek noted,

    Coming into the decade, Linux was already a hot commodity, but it wasn’t until Red Hat launched the buttoned-down and subscription-priced Enterprise variant of its Linux distribution that Linux was truly ready — both in terms of roadmap stability and of business model — to truly storm the enterprise.

  • VMware vs. Red Hat: The Next Virtual Machine Management Battleground

    Red Hat is making plans to beef up its virtualization management software so it can compete with VMware on a more equal footing in the future.

    The Raleigh, N.C. based Linux vendor launched its Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for Servers (RHEV) bare-metal hypervisor solution in November last year, two months after the launch of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 5.4 — with-KVM-based virtualization built-in. RHEV is made up of two components: the KVM-based hypervisor itself, which is essentially a stripped down RHEL kernel, and RHEV Manager for Servers, a Windows Server 2003-based virtualization management system that gives administrators control of virtual machines running on the RHEV hypervisor or RHEL-with-KVM hosts, and the hosts themselves.

  • Fedora

    • Fedora Splits and Goes Faster

      The bleeding edge of Red Hat’s Fedora Linux community has long been the branch of Fedora code known as Rawhide. New contributions land in Rawhide first, marking the tip of new Linux development for Fedora, though activity there slows down during Fedora release cycles.

• Debian Family

  • Turning off kernel mode setting is the key to Intel 830m video not just in Ubuntu Karmic and Lucid but in Sidux 2009-04 – and more importantly that should mean Debian Squeeze will work, too

  • Ubuntu

    • Top 15 Wallpapers for Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid from Ubuntu Artwork Pool

      Ubuntu Artwork pool in flickr is busy with contributions from everyone in and around the community. There is simply a lot to choose from. This is a collection of 15 beautiful wallpapers for Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx from Ubuntu Artwork Pool. You may also want to give a shot at wallpapers that you could download via ubuntu repositories.

    • Mark Shuttleworth at PyCon: Cadence, Quality and Design

      Mark Shuttleworth, Founder of Canonical (maker of the Ubuntu Linux Distribution) spoke with me at the PyCon 2010 Python conference in Atlanta, GA. We discussed Python, PyCon, and also about effective software design and development.

Devices/Embedded

• Ultra-compact PC targets digital signage

  Habey USA announced an ultra-compact PC with a choice of Intel Atom processors. The BIS-6620 has a 4.7 x 4.7-inch footprint, runs at 1.1 or 1.6GHz, comes with CompactFlash and SD expansion slots, and uses just nine Watts, the company says.

  Habey’s little BIS-6620 has a heatsink and case design strongly resembling Icop’s similarly tiny eBox PCs (variously based on CPUs from Via and DMP Electronics), but we’re unaware of any actual relationship between the products. According to Habey, the PC has a footprint of just 4.7 x 4.7 inches, targets digital signage and media playback applications, and comes with Intel’s original Z5xx Atoms — either the 1.1GHz Z510 or the 1.6GHz Z530.

• Cortus Announces uCLinux for the APS3 Family of Processors

  Cortus is pleased to announce uCLinux for the APS3 family of processors. This version of Linux is ideally suited to low power, high performance, embedded systems. The APS3 family of processors are modern, powerful processors, specifically designed for embedded systems, featuring a tiny silicon footprint.

  The APS3 architecture is ideally suited for uCLinux. The clean, uniform, architecture means that the ported kernel code is straightforward, easily implemented and understood. There are no hidden pitfalls due to inconsistencies in the architecture which could reduce performance or trip up unwary programmers. Developing application programs is uncomplicated and creating drivers for new peripherals and hardware is simple.

• TomTom Go 550 Live

  With turn-by-turn navigation rapidly becoming the favoured give-away on smartphones, it’s reasonable to ask what the future holds for the dedicated in-car satnav makers.

• Libelium to demonstrate wireless sensor products at CeBIT

  Complementing Waspmote, the Meshlium multi-protocol, Linux-based, outdoor router enables mesh networks to be deployed in buildings, arenas, transport hubs (such as railway stations and airports), open spaces and by emergency services.

• Icecrypt S4000 review

  This well-specified box of Linux-powered tricks sells for £340 (with a 320GB hard disc or £300 without). Other welcome features include hardware blind search, two CI slots, full DiSEqC compatibility for multi-satellite flexibility, the potential that networkability brings and multimedia playback.

• Phones

  • Nokia to have Snapdragon and Intel devices this summer

    Nokia’s first Maemo (now MeeGo) device, the N900, uses OMAP, but the OS will presumably be heavily geared to Atom in the wake of the Intel deal announced last week. This convergence of the two Linux-based OSs will take the OS formerly known as Maemo beyond Nokia – LG has already said its GW990, the first Atom-based smartphone, will evolve to run MeeGo.

  • Android

    • Hack Shows How to Get Android 2.1 On Some Windows Mobile Phones

      As a long-time Windows Mobile user who finally gave up on it and switched to an Android phone, I’ve been thrilled with the new operating system. Now, it looks like others who are fed up with WinMo might be able to switch a little more easily.

      Over at XDA-developers, a forum where developers post hacks, tips, and software, a developer has released a beta ROM of Android 2.1 for four Windows Mobile phones, all by HTC: the Tilt for AT&T (AKA the HTC Kaiser), Vogue, Niki, and Polaris. That means that four phones that aren’t built with Android at all have Android 2.1 before some native Android phones, like the Hero and the Droid Eris.

    • AT&T picking up HTC Desire, Sprint grabbing HTC Hero2

    • Acer Liquid e to reach North America through Rogers

      Telus’ version of the Motorola Milestone currenly runs Android 2.0 and is upgradeable to 2.1.

    • Android Gets Mobile Application for Video Ads

      Companies and ad agencies looking to get more of their message in front of mobile users just got a new tool.

      Following its debut on Apple’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone, iVdopia, a mobile-video ad platform, has now released its software development kit (SDK) for Google’s (NASDAQ: GOOG) Android operating system.

    • The Android – What Makes It Special?

      Android, officially became the “darling of the masses” – the mobile phone operating system was made open source with Google releasing most of the Android code under the open source license. The ANDROID Software development kit – aimed at making applications for ANDROID was released complete with a debugger, emulator, documentation, a tutorial handbook and code samples. It is adaptable to handset models of various sizes, support for graphics libraries. It makes use of SQLite, a sql engine for data storage purposes, provides java support, Bluetooth/WiFi/GSM connectivity, threaded messaging services and multimedia support.

    • Virtualization technology rev’d for Android

      VirtualLogix announced an Android-optimized version of its virtualization software for handsets, plus related design wins with ST Ericsson and Infineon. VLX MH 4.0 makes it easier for mobile silicon vendors and OEMs to design smartphone functionality into lower-cost, single-core, ARM-based phones, says the company.

• Sub-notebooks

  • UNE on my Desktop, I likes

    I’ve been running UNE on my desktop with a largish monitor since yesterday morning. Because the Desktop Team now also manages the UNE distro, I figured I should get in the habit of using UNE daily, but I don’t use my netbook as much as my desktop during the course of a normal week. Above is the launcher ready for me to get started.

  • HP Experiments with Google Android Netbook

    Hewlett-Packard is launching a Google Android-based netbook. Shipping under the Compaq brand, HP calls it the AirLife 100. It will debut in the United Arab Emirates (no word on a U.S. launch). The big question: Is Android for netbooks a good computing solution?

  • Smartbooks to reach 165 million units in 2015, says study

    ABI Research is projecting that 165 million “smartbooks” will ship in 2015. The secret for success for these non-x86-based, “always on” netbooks and MIDs is to keep the price under $200, says the research group.

    [...]

    Indeed, in ABI’s research, smartbooks appear to be subsets of netbooks and MIDs. In an ABI report from last year, the rise of low-cost ARM-based netbooks (i.e. smartbooks) sold in developing countries was considered to be a chief reason why the research firm projects that Linux will take the lead from Windows in the netbook market by 2013.

  • ARM strengthens low power hand, targets smart grid

    As Intel moves into its heartland territory in smartphones, processor firm ARM is extending its reach in turn. With Intel’s efforts to reduce power consumption dramatically in Atom as yet unproven, ARM hangs on to its power advantage, and is moving more aggressively into embedded wireless and the ‘internet of things’.

50 Open Source Tools: Desktop Downloads

The universe of open source tools is large and rapidly expanding. If your desktop doesn’t look and perform exactly like you want it to, you really have no excuse.

We found dozens of great open source tools that let you customize your desktop environment, whether you’re ready to try out a whole new operating system or just a new screen saver.

While many of these tools add new features to software you probably already have on your system, others offer brand new functionality, like the Florence virtual keyboard and the PNotes sticky notes. You might even find a open source tool or two that you just can’t live without.

OpenOffice.org 3.2 Offers Modest Update, Better Startup Speed

Version 3.2 of the open-source OpenOffice.org productivity suite delivers a handful of file format compatibility enhancements alongside feature tweaks for the suite’s Calc spreadsheet application and continued gains in startup speed for the suite as a whole.

Open Source Infrastructure Management tool helps JSL reduce downtime by over 50 percent

Dhir decided that he would go in for an open source IT infrastructure management tool, after making all the necessary tests. “We were treading on a new path where few organizations in India had walked on.

Meedan puts machine translation into practice

One of the leading open source statistical machine translation systems is Moses, whch is funded partly by the European Commission. The project is being led by Philipp Koehn at the University of Edinburgh, and he’s just written a book about the topic.

Will an algorithm pick you for your next coding job?

The former CTO of Dopplr has hacked together an algorithm to find the best (open source and public) coders in whatever location he’s in. A taste of the future?

[...]

And, inevitably, he’s put the source code on Github.

Your task: see how you would rate against that system. And consider: is the future going to be about doing more in “social programming”, where what you’ve contributed becomes key to your hiring?

Do It Yourself! It works

How has your experience been with open source?

There is a big misconception that open source is cheap and free. I would rather say its virtues are flexibility, robustness and its capability to address any kind of business challenge, which is what, is often missing in other options. For one, security loopholes are less of a concern with open source. Many applications and the email platforms have now been virtualized and powered with open source at the company. And that has interestingly been with purely in-house efforts. That has helped us save a lot of capex and operational costs.

Hearst Expands Local Sports Coverage With Open-Source ‘Bleacher Report’

From the vantage of Bleacher Report’s partners, the open-source model seems to be something of a hit.

Events

• Applications Are Invited For The Erasmus IP Funded GIS OPENSOURCE Summer School At Girona, Spain

  The Summer School in Open Source GIS is organized jointly by the Geographical Information Systems and Remote Sensing Centre of the University of Girona, the Lahti Centre of Aalto University School of Science and Technology of the Aalto University, the Centre for Geospatial Science of the University of Nottingham and the Institute for Research on Urban Sciences and Techniques from the Ecole Centrale de Nantes.

• SCaLE 8x Report

  After a long weekend at SCaLE 8x with some of my favorite people, Linux Journal’s Kyle Rankin, Bill Childers and Shawn Powers, I have officially become a huge fan of the annual Southern California Linux Expo. Shawn, Kyle and I had the opportunity to give talks at the conference, and were able to talk with many readers and meet lots of fellow open source enthusiasts. It is always gratifying to hear positive feedback from so many readers in person, and it is fun to see people all over the conference kicking back with a Linux Journal in hand.

Health

• Get smarter about open source

  Open source has come a long way in the past few years, and great stories of open source’s success are abound.

  For example, OpenMRS has been utilised in Haiti, addressing the need to rethink medical records. In the mobile industry ‘open’ is a common theme used to help combat a highly tilted competitive landscape. And the desktop space, although not champion, is still brewing with a very large community of enthusiastic users.

• How Open Source maps helped Haiti

  This effort has proven that Open Source is all about passion. This time, it was the passion of helping. As for other times, it is always the passion of free and open thinking.

• FOSS for health care

  The site allows users to comment on and discuss each specific project and each of the projects is published under one of the popular open source licenses, such as the GPL, LGPL, MPL or the Apache license.

• OpenEMR Project Releases version 3.2

  The OpenEMR Project releases their newest version of the popular FOSS software, 3.2.

• MISYS Open Source Solutions Enters Strategic Partnership with Markit

  Misys Open Source Solutions (“MOSS”), a division of Misys Plc (FTSE:MSY.L), today announced a partnership with Markit, a leading, global financial information services company, to promote the Misys Environmental Registry System (“MERS”), the new carbon management emissions reporting solution that will be released March 31, 2010.

• Axial Exchange Presents Open Source Innovations at 2010 HIMSS Health IT Venture Fair

  Axial Exchange, Inc. — the open source solution to sharing health care information for hospitals and doctors, payers, pharma and researchers — has been invited to present at this year’s HIMSS Health IT Venture Capital Fair in Atlanta on February 28th.

• Thayer County Health Services and Redwood MedNet Demonstrate “Network of Networks” Using Mirth Corporation’s Meaningful Use Exchange

  Mirth Corporation, the leader in commercial open source healthcare information technology, working with partners at regional Health Information Exchanges and Hospital Systems, announced a successful demonstration of “the Health Internet” — a network of networks through which patient data can be safely and rapidly exchanged to place critical information at clinician fingertips where and when it’s needed.

• The state of Dicom viewers for GNU/Linux

  In summary: As a physician running a GNU/Linux only shop such as e.g. cardiologists who constantly receive or send CDs there is no good option to view the data.

Apache

• Cassandra Database accepted as a Apache Top-Level Project

  Apache Software Foundation (ASF) member Matthieu Riou has announced that the open source Cassandra database has been accepted as an Apache Top-Level Project (TLP). The move marks the end of Cassandra’s time in the Apache Software Foundation’s Incubator.

• The Apache Software Foundation Announces the 15th Anniversary of the Apache HTTP Web Server

  ASF Flagship Project is World’s Most Popular Web Server, Powering More than 112 Million Websites

Databases

• Ingres Makes Rain for Partners by Powering Application Development in the Cloud

CMS

• Optimation signs with SilverStripe

  Optimation has joined open source content management system (CMS) provider SilverStripe’s global partner programme to provide web and intranet sites for its customers.

Mobile

• Open Source WordPress client for Symbian and Maemo under development

  WordPress bloggers will be interested in the Open Sourced blogging client being developed for Maemo and Symbian using Qt. The blog for the client can be found here, along with the relevant downloads for the latest version. The software is still being developed, but you can get the latest builds and contribute to the project at dev.nokia.wordpress.org.

• Keeping the Web open and mobile

  Not only are the libraries available to any developer; Galbraith says Palm will open source the Facebook app, so that other developers can see how they did and build on top of it. (There are very few open source Facebook apps even for the desktop and Palm’s Facebook app appears to be the first open source mobile Facebook app of any kind).

Business

• Community grows for open-source enterprise apps

  Importantly, these communities are highly additive to the companies associated with them. Zimbra, for example, has more than 50 million paid mailboxes and counting. Alfresco, for its part, has grown every quarter since its formation in early 2005, with its last quarter seeing a 30-percent quarter-over-quarter increase on an already large base.

• Will open source ever be completely free?

  While there’s still plenty of room for Red Hat and other commercial Linux vendors to grow, especially as the overall Linux market’s growth outpaces the 1 percent decline in paid adoption, this trend toward self-support (which trend is also evident in other mature open-source markets) could imply that charging for open-source bits (and packaging it as a subscription) may not be the ideal model in the long term.

• nacamar and Kaltura Form Strategic Partnership to Deliver Online Video Solution

  nacamar GmbH, one of the leading streaming and media hosting providers in Germany, and Kaltura Inc., developer of the first open source online video platform, have joined forces to offer Kaltura’s video management solution to broadcasters, publishers, content providers, multimedia agencies, enterprises and educational institutions in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Luxembourg. Hosted in nacamar’s Frankfurt-based data center, the Kaltura solution serves as the basis for nacamar’s online video service medianac® 2.0. The combined service will be presented at CeBIT 2010 for the first time.

• Open Source ECM Vendor Nuxeo Expands Document Intake Capabilities With ReadSoft Partnership

  Nuxeo, the Open Source Enterprise Content Management (ECM) company, and ReadSoft, a leading provider of global document process automation solutions, today announced an international partnership to develop a new connector to seamlessly integrate hard copy data with Nuxeo open source document management solutions. Integration of ReadSoft and the Nuxeo ECM platform is expected to be available in the second quarter of 2010.

• Jaspersoft’s Open Source Community Drives BI Innovation, Represents the World’s Largest BI Ecosystem

  Jaspersoft passes 10 million downloads, contributes to 350 open source BI projects and attracts nearly 120,000 registered members globally

• Facebook still pitching itself to open-source crowd

  A company like Facebook obviously wants to be there, and at past FOWA events it’s used the soapbox opportunity to market developer initiatives like its application platform and Facebook Connect log-in tool. But this year the focus was instead on open source, with relatively recent hire David Recordon taking the stage rather than a platform evangelist. Recordon, who spearheaded the launch of the Open Web Foundation, is Facebook’s first really prominent open-source guru, and when it comes to Facebook’s marketing pitches, the open-source guys have taken a little more coaxing than the iPhone developers or widget-builders.

BSD

• Opera launches open source project Dragonfly for business

  Opera has announced that Opera Dragonfly a fully open source project, is now hosted on BitBucket. Since the inception of Opera Dragonfly, Opera had planned for it to become an open source project. It has always been released under an open source BSD licence, but the source repositories were on Opera servers.

Government

• US government to revamp acquisition and procurement systems

  The US General Services Administration (GSA) has unveiled details of a $74m programme to modernise the system that federal agencies and their suppliers use to source equipment, supplies, information technology (IT) and telecommunications services.

• Tories’ cash incentives for localised planning

  Their policy paper Open Source Planning said the proposals would restore democracy to planning while the incentives would prevent it being captured by ‘nimbys’, the party said.

• Tories unveil planning green paper

• Tories would let councils set their own design standards

  Proposals to fast track schemes that do not attract objection from local people are also included in the party’s long-awaited planning green paper, Open Source, published today (Monday).

Openness

• As Cars Get More Complicated, Maybe Open Source Is The Way

  This is a intriguing proposition for a number of reasons. By releasing its software to the open source community, they could become key participants in the growing open source car ecosystem. By doing so, they could potentially benefit from the collective intelligence of that community looking at their code. Sure, Toyota may scoff at sharing what they consider to be proprietary IP with potential competitors, but in this case, Toyota could stand to gain more than it would potentially be giving away. After all, while software definitely is playing a critical part in automotive systems, by itself, it is not the selling point of a car. Even the e-voting industry is coming around to open source, after balking at the idea for years. For a variety of reasons, the automobile industry seems ripe for the exploration of new models right now. Programs like CityCarShare and ZipCar could be seen as “Automobiles As A Service” — so maybe we’ll start to see a Red Hat-like automobile company emerge in the near future.

• Open source

  Champ Schuyler Towne, 26, can pick a lock in two seconds. Next month, he’ll launch a series of locksport workshops at sprout in Somerville.

• Macmillan Debuts Interactive Digital Textbook Platform

  “We think it’s a fresh approach to the publishing model; its the best of the open source approach and it will enable teachers, protect the author’s version and the teacher’s edits,” said Marshall.

• How to make your own e-books

  None of the software I have will convert files to this e-book format: Apple should add this to Pages and Text Edit. Instead I looked at Open Source software, focusing on three applications: Sigil, Stanza Desktop and Calibre.

Ruby

• ThoughtWorks organizies first ‘RubyConf India’

  Ruby is an open source, dynamic programming language that runs natively on Linux, Windows and Mac OS. It runs on the Java and .Net platforms as JRuby and IronRuby respectively. It offers an ideal development environment for Agile practitioners with one of the most active open source communities worldwide which produce and support tools and projects like “Ruby on Rails” – a powerful web application development framework that significantly reduces time-to-market and is used by top web companies like Twitter and Shopify.

• Puppet: Ruby-based Server Management Automation Suite

  The team at Reductive Labs recently announced the release of version 0.25.2 of Puppet, the open source Ruby-based configuration management and automation tool for Linux and Unix servers. In this software bug-fix release, 123 open tickets were closed, and the developers claim a reduced memory footprint, improved error reporting, threading, and lock contention (the latter apparently a source of reported system hangs).

• Rhodes 1.4 mobile framework released

  Rhomobile has announced the release of version 1.4 of its open source Ruby-based framework called Rhodes. Rhodes allows developers to create platform independent applications using HTML code that can be translated into device-optimised native mobile application for a number of smartphone operating systems, including Google’s Android OS, Apple’s iPhone OS, Windows Mobile, Symbian and RIM’s BlackBerry.

• Working with Ruby and Amazon Web Services: Ruby/AWS 0.8 Released

  After a long pause in releases, a new version of Ruby/AWS is available for developers looking to work with Ruby and Amazon’s product advertising API. Ruby/AWS makes it possible to access carts and catalogs on Amazon.com, and a number of the regional sites as well. This release supports most of the AWS v4 API, though some operations are not entirely implemented.

• Travel Rails in Style with Hobo 1.0

  The Hobo team has popped the cork on Hobo 1.0, a mere three years after its original beta release. Hobo is a collection of extensions for Ruby on Rails to greatly simplify Web application development using Ruby on Rails.

Americas bloc excluding US and Canada is proposed

Latin American and Caribbean nations have agreed to set up a new regional body without the US and Canada, Mexican President Felipe Calderon has said.

The new bloc would be an alternative to the Organisation of American States (OAS), the main forum for regional affairs in the past 50 years.

Blanket HIV testing ‘could see Aids dying out in 40 years’

Health officials are considering a radical shift in the war against HIV and Aids that would see everyone tested for the virus and put on a lifetime course of drugs if they are found to be positive.

Science

• Stop funding homeopathy, say British MPs

  Homeopathic remedies work no better than placebos, and so should no longer be paid for by the UK National Health Service, a committee of British members of parliament has concluded.

  The House of Commons Science and Technology Committee, which released its report on homeopathy on Monday, also urges governments in other European countries where homeopathy is popular – notably Germany, France and Austria – to be equally wary of funding homeopathy. “We feel there’s a real message, not just in the UK,” says committee chairman and Liberal Democrat MP Phil Willis.

Security

• Police called in over SMH leak

  Police are investigating if the New South Wales Government fell victim to hackers in the lead-up to releasing its $50 billion transport blueprint.

  On Saturday, one day ahead of the blueprint’s launch, the Sydney Morning Herald reported it had obtained key Government announcements that it said had been uploaded accidentally to a new website.

• Minister, a monkey could have ‘hacked’ secret transport site

  You know a government is in trouble when it starts accusing aging Sydney Morning Herald hacks like me and my colleague Andrew West of engaging in high level cyber crime.

• London councils sue themselves for parking offences

  London councils routinely take themselves to court over disputed parking tickets their wardens issue to their own vehicles, it has emerged.

• Martha Giraldo at the gates of Fort Benning

  I’ve posted on my blog before about Martha Giraldo and her family’s very brave struggle to tell the truth about how the Colombian army killed her father, a campesino, and dressed him up to look like a “combat kill” (a so called false positive, a fake guerilla killed in combat death). As my previous posts recount, they have used video to tell their story in a powerful way that is an inspiring example for others to follow.

• Reeling in the hackers

  A new study reveals that the popular film portrayal of computer hackers is actually quite accurate, writes KARLIN LILLINGTON

  IF YOU don’t like the idea of a scholarly paper on the trail of hackers in films, then take it up with Damian Gordon’s parents. “I have to blame my parents – the only films we were ever taken to were science fiction and futuristic kinds of films,” says Gordon, a lecturer in computer science at the Dublin Institute of Technology.

• Hackers Leverage Global Authority Void

• Suit possible over baby DNA sent to military lab for national database

  An Austin lawyer threatened to pursue a new federal lawsuit Monday after learning that some newborn blood samples in Texas went to the U.S. military for potential use in a database for law enforcement purposes.

• Airport scammers

  Despite a marked absence of thoughtful analysis of either the technology’s safety or effectiveness, full body scanners are coming to an airport near you. With 19 already in place, the Department of Homeland Security intends to have 300 scanners installed by the end of the year and President Obama’s budget request for nearly a billion more for 1,000 additional scanners is a slam dunk. No one in Congress wants to be accused of standing in the way of America’s security, particularly in an election year. (It matters not that they voted overwhelming against full body scanners just last year.)

• Judge calls radio phone-in to say CCTV is useless waste of money

  A judge telephoned a radio phone-in programme from his chambers to say that film from CCTV cameras was often “completely useless” as evidence.

  Listeners to a BBC Radio Cleveland debate on security systems were told by Judge Peter Fox, QC, that the images produced by such cameras were almost invariably poor and a waste of money.

• No CCTV footage of alleged Grangetown assault

  A “COMPREHENSIVE” CCTV system failed to capture the vital moments a Teesside engineer was struck, crushed and crippled in a car crash.

  Teesside Crown Court heard that cameras were broken or facing the wrong way at the time of an alleged murderous attack on Kevin Harland.

Environment

• Congress to Investigate Safety of Natural Gas Drilling Practice Known as Hydraulic Fracturing

  The top Democrats on the House Committee on Energy and Commerce have asked eight oil-field companies to disclose the chemicals they’ve used and the wells they’ve drilled in over the past four years. Last week, Waxman also revealed two of the largest gas drilling companies have pumped hundreds of thousands of gallons of diesel-based fluids into the ground in violation of a voluntary agreement with the Environmental Protection Agency.

• Preparing for 2014-15 “Oil Crunch” Forecast by UK Industry Group

  A new report by a United Kingdom industry taskforce predicts steep oil price rises and gasoline supply shortages by 2014-2015, which will put the global economy at similar risk to the 2007-2008 rapid rise in oil prices that helped trigger the Great Recession.

Finance

• Wall Street bonuses jumped 17% after bailouts

  Employment in the securities industry in New York City declined by 31,500 jobs between November 2007 and August 2009, a decline of 16.7 percent. Since then, the industry has added 3,900 jobs through December.

• Moral Hazard? — Or Ten Commandments?

  It’s Sunday, so here’s today’s sermon. Young firebrand Matt Taibbi has written another installment in his all encompassing indictment of bailed-out banks. Wall Street’s Bailout Hustle, published in Rolling Stone last week, uses con artist terms to explain how Goldman Sachs and other banks pocketed trillions of dollars from one government “rescue” program after another. Taibbi concludes by showing how Wall Street is re-creating the conditions for another big crash in the not-so-distant future.

• The Chairman Of Goldman Sachs Bank, And Former FRBNY President, Says Many European Countries Used Comparable Debt-Hiding Swap Transactions

  In a speech before the UK Treasury Select Committee the Chairman of Goldman Sachs Bank, Gerald Corrigan, who also happens to be a former New York Fed President (and people still wonder where Tim Geithner will end up) noted that it is not Goldman who is at fault in the whole Greek swap fiasco but Eurostat, “which was consulted on the transaction at the time it was entered into and which offered no objection.” What is troubling is Corrigan’s revelation that “Goldman Sachs was by no means the only bank involved with countries in these types of transactions…These transactions were not limited to Goldman Sachs and Greece.” Just whose debt numbers will be put under the microscope next?

• A Historical View of Culture Change at Goldman Sachs

  Yes, GS has come along way since the days of Sydney Weinberg. In fact, many of our large corporations have succumbed to greed and left morailty in their gold lined trash cans. I doubt that we will ever see a return to business even the way it was in the latter part of the Twentieth Century. Back in those days even the banking industry served the public and their customers. Rmember when you knew your banker and your banker knew you? Of course, technology and the internet have changed and removed a lot of the personal aspect but it has not changed morality. Only greed and the ever growing greed amongst large corporations has changed the changed and often eliminated the moral boundaries they operate within.

• AIG Plane Unit Seeks $750 Million Loan Through BofA, Goldman

  American International Group Inc.’s plane unit is seeking a $750 million loan arranged by Bank of America Corp. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in the subsidiary’s first debt issuance through capital markets since AIG’s 2008 bailout, said a person with knowledge of the matter.

  [...]

  “We anticipate selling some ILFC assets in the future,” Robert Benmosche, AIG’s chief executive officer, said in a statement this month when the company announced the departure of Steven Udvar-Hazy as leader of the Los Angeles-based plane unit. “We continue to review other options, including accessing the capital markets through secured debt financing.”

• Secret AIG Document Shows Goldman Sachs Minted Most Toxic CDOs

  When a congressional panel convened a hearing on the government rescue of American International Group Inc. in January, the public scolding of Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner got the most attention.

  Lawmakers said the former head of the New York Federal Reserve Bank had presided over a backdoor bailout of Wall Street firms and a coverup. Geithner countered that he had acted properly to avert the collapse of the financial system.

• Part IV: The Financial Coup d’Etat — The Economic Elite Vs. The People of the United States of America

  Just look at how they have already done this in many other countries, and then look at the “bailout.”

  The success of the coup is clear by the control of the US Treasury by Goldman Sachs criminal masterminds Hank Paulson and Tim Geithner, and the continued control of the Federal Reserve by Ben Bernanke.

• Goldman, Greece — It’s All One Big Conspiracy, Man

  European leaders have not shied away from directly criticizing the market’s behavior, when they don’t like it. This has been especially true while the Greek fiscal crisis has wound on. There’s been a lot of talk, for instance, of a “speculative attack” on Greece, and thinly veiled warnings directed at market participants. After the Eurozone Finance Ministers’ meeting last Friday, French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde went so far as to warn off speculators. They “had better be careful,” she said, “There is clearly a statement of solidarity—we are closing ranks. Whether we are big member states or small member states we are all in this together and we are not going to let any of us down.” She even followed this with an implicit regulatory threat. “What we are going to take away from this crisis,” she added, “is certainly a second look at the validity, the solidity of [Credit default swaps] on sovereign debt.”

• The Woman Behind Greece’s Debt Deal

  Colleagues say 46-year-old Antigone Loudiadis, who has a given name from classical mythology but goes by the nickname “Addy,” was the woman behind the deal.

PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

• Goldman’s rehab

  The 55-year-old chief executive of Goldman Sachs — three-plus years into his tenure — recently turned to a Texas corporate p.r. firm to buff the image of the tarnished Wall Street powerhouse.

• Report: Goldman Sachs Looks to Outside Public-Relations Gurus

  According to the New York Post, Goldman is using Public Strategies, a firm headed by former George W. Bush and Karl Rove confidant Dan Bartlett, to gauge the bank’s “perception in the marketplace.”

• Goldman Sachs Hires Crisis PR Firm Run by Bush Aide

  So Blankfein brought in Public Strategies, a Texas-based PR firm that’s run by Dan Bartlett. Bartlett was President Bush’s longest-serving aide and, more importantly, the press’s official “Senior Administration Official speaking on the condition of anonymity” of 2001-2007.

  What kind of work does Public Strategies (most recently in the news when MSNBC decided not to inform its viewers that Richard Wolfe was a “strategist” there) specialize in? According to their website, they’re a good friend to have when your natural gas company is responsible for killing old people in an explosion.

Censorship/Privacy/Civil Rights

• Simon Singh in court to appeal against ruling over Guardian article

  The science writer Simon Singh is in court today to appeal against a preliminary libel ruling over a Guardian article in which he criticised the British Chiropractic Association (BCA).

• MagicJack dials wrong number in legal attack on Boing Boing

  Gadget maker MagicJack recently lost a defamation lawsuit that it filed against Boing Boing. The judge dismissed its case and ordered it to pay us more than $50,000 in legal costs.

  The Florida-based VOIP company promotes a USB dongle that allows subscribers to make free or inexpensive phone calls over the internet. I posted in April 2008 about its terms of service—which include the right to analyze customers’ calls—and various iffy characteristics of its website.

  We had no idea that it would file a baseless lawsuit to try and shut me up, that CEO Dan Borislow would offer to buy our silence after disparaging his own lawyers, or that MagicJack would ultimately face legal consequences for trying to intimidate critics.

• Red Bull, Verizon Tweets Run Afoul of Olympics Rules

  Neither Red Bull nor Verizon Communications is an Olympic sponsor, but both have posted items about the Vancouver Games on Twitter and Facebook.

• Serious threat to the web in Italy

  In late 2006, students at a school in Turin, Italy filmed and then uploaded a video to Google Video that showed them bullying an autistic schoolmate. The video was totally reprehensible and we took it down within hours of being notified by the Italian police. We also worked with the local police to help identify the person responsible for uploading it and she was subsequently sentenced to 10 months community service by a court in Turin, as were several other classmates who were also involved. In these rare but unpleasant cases, that’s where our involvement would normally end.

  But in this instance, a public prosecutor in Milan decided to indict four Google employees —David Drummond, Arvind Desikan, Peter Fleischer and George Reyes (who left the company in 2008). The charges brought against them were criminal defamation and a failure to comply with the Italian privacy code. To be clear, none of the four Googlers charged had anything to do with this video. They did not appear in it, film it, upload it or review it. None of them know the people involved or were even aware of the video’s existence until after it was removed.

Internet/Net Neutrality/DRM

• Broadband tax condemned as ‘unfair’ by MPs

  A government proposal to charge people with fixed phone lines 50p per month to help fund ultra-fast broadband has been condemned as “unfair” by MPs.

Intellectual Monopolies/Copyrights

• Piracy Isn’t Killing The Movie Industry, Greed Is

  At the box-office the major movie studios are raking in record profits, but their continuing refusal to widely adopt online business opportunities are hindering progress. According to the head of the Blockbuster video chain, the movie industry’s greed is to blame for holding back innovation.

• 88-Year Old Avatar Pirate Caught in Theater

  An 88-year old man, carrying a walking stick and a camcorder, has been caught by movie theater personnel when he tried to make a private copy of the movie Avatar. The man was planning to show the film to his wife who could not make her way to the theater.

• 88-Year Old Man Caught Taping Avatar With A Camcorder

  Now, for any compassionate human being, this is a tale of sweetness. What a thoughtful thing this guy wanted to do for his wife.

  But the industry doesn’t see it that way. To them, it’s still “piracy” and a problem. To be honest, if the movie industry stopped with its silly “windowing” concept, this wouldn’t have been a problem at all.

• Russian Collecting Society Sues Over Beyonce Concert

  Russian collecting society RAO is suing a company it identified as the promoter of Beyonce’s November 2009 Moscow show for allegedly violating public performance rights by not obtaining a license from RAO.

• From Mash-up Novels to Crowdsourced Films

  The global film festival circuit has been buzzing about RiP! A Remix Manifesto — a documentary that resists the traditional definition of copyright by chronicling the success of Girl Talk (Gregg Gillis), a mash-up artist who rearranges a myriad of pop, indie, and hip-hop tracks to create infectious and dance-worthy remixes.

  “Remix culture is a return to folk culture, where everyday people are involved in creative practice,” said the film’s director, Brett Gaylor, by email. “Having a generation that knows how the media sells them things, attracts their votes, changes their minds is going to be a vital part of 21st century democracy.”

• Mandybill petition puts hacks in a spin

  The Open Rights Group and TalkTalk, who have jointly campaigned against the measure, have both issued press releases today to point this out the Downing Street petition response makes no difference to the substance of the Bill. They correctly point out that by denying it will do something it never planned to do, the government has spun the press into believing whatever it wants to believe.

• EU Data Protection Supervisor Warns Against ACTA, Calls 3 Strikes Disproportionate

  Peter Hustinx, the European Data Protection Supervisor, has issued a 20-page opinion expressing concern about ACTA. The opinion is a must-read and points to the prospect of other privacy commissioners speaking out. Moreover, with the French HADOPI three strikes law currently held up by its data protection commissioner, it raises questions about whether that law will pass muster under French privacy rules.

  Given the secrecy associated with the process, the opinion addresses possible outcomes based on the information currently available. The opinion focuses on three key issues: three strikes legislation, cross-border data sharing as part of enforcement initiatives, and transparency.

• ACTA: No time for internet chapter in Mexico

  Here is the meat:

  The civil enforcement chapter was discussed very thoroughly. It was possible to agree additional language, but when entering into the detail of the different mechanisms (provisional measures, injunctions, calculation of damages) progress became slow due to the different technical concepts of each legal system.

  “Due to lack of time, internet discussions could not be concluded.”

• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

Softpedia Linux Weekly, Issue 85

The following Linux-based operating systems were announced last week: Calculate Linux 10.2, SimplyMEPIS 8.5 Beta 5, openSUSE 11.3 Milestone 2 and PC/OS 10.1 Beta 2. In other news: Canonical launches the Ubuntu Single Sign On service, and Phoronix Media releases Phoronix Test Suite 2.4.1. The weekly ends with the video clip of the week, the latest Linux distributions released/updated and the development releases.

Virtualised USB key beats keyloggers

Aimed at companies that want to protect corporate bank accounts, Trusted Access for Banking is actually a standard IronKey USB drive that runs a walled or ‘hardened’ Linux virtual environment inside the PC’s OS. It comes complete with its own browser hardwired to access only a particular bank service, and incorporates RSA Secure ID tokens for authentication.

PGP security gets Linux and Win7 support, plus more encryption

After rolling out the first Linux edition of its desktop encryption security software last month — together with new support for the latest versions of Windows and Mac — PGP Corp. on Monday announced major server updates that will let PGP be managed alongside myriad other approaches to encryption.

Opinion: “Confessions of an Ubuntu Fanboy” Response

Linux is just as easy to use as Windows or Mac OS X especially from the point of view of anyone who has no computer experience. The problem is that so many people do come from other environments and they have spent a lot of time learning those environments… and that knowledge is often a stumbling block to learning something new… in this case Linux. People who have been using Microsoft Windows XP for years seem to forget the learning curve they had to go through at the beginning of that relationship. The truth of the matter is that Windows is NOT intuitive and you actually have to learn your way trial and error… but as with anything, learning pays off and you are rewarded for it.

Applications

• The Five Best Linux Video Players

  Have some downtime and want to watch a movie or two on your Linux laptop? Linux has plenty of options when it comes to video players. In fact, there might be a few too many to chhose from.

• My top 10 Gedit plugins

  Gedit can be a really awesome editor if you give it a few plugins and an open mind. Here are a few of my favorites.

• Jupiter – Awesome Netbook Power/Config Applet

  Jupiter is a hardware and power management applet that, whilst targeted at netbooks, works on all laptops, netbooks and desktops.

• Trivial but appreciated: new pause/unpause display in Totem

  I will freely, happily and knowingly admit that the following new feature in Totem is quite possibly irrelevant to most people, but i thought I’d mention it anyway.

• Instructionals

  • Controlling your Linux system processes

  • MYSQL_PS1: 6 Examples to make your mysql prompt like Angelina Jolie

  • How to reset forgotten user/boot password in Ubuntu

  • Compiling Ada with gcc

  • Let’s Learn LaTex: Part 2

  • LiVES – Mixes real-time video performance and non-linear editing

  • A simple security script

  • IMAP: cannot create subfolders in mail-client

  • Changing Wallpapers and Themes in KDE 4.4

    If you’re new to KDE4 or KDE for that matter, you might be a little bit lost in trying to customize it, especially when it comes to themes and wallpapers. Here’s how you can change them.

  • Skin your Opera

  • Managing ANDs and ORs in the OpenOffice Calc Standard Filter

  • Episode 134: Dynamic Range Therrory

  • Playing Encrypted DVDs in Ubuntu: The Complete Guide

  • Byzanz-record, Record your Desktop Session to a GIF image

  • 8 tips for passing the Linux Professional Institute Certification exam

  • Installing PHP-Nuke

Distributions

• Linux Training Week: Which Distribution To Choose?

  Another favourite of mine is Fedora Linux, used by none other than Linus Torvalds himself… It’s second only to Ubuntu, which hopefully you’ll be more familiar with after our week of features on it!

• DeLi Linux: A Linux distro for old computers, from 486 to Pentium III

  DeLi Linux stands for “Desktop Light” Linux. It is a Linux Distribution for old computers, from 486 to Pentium III or so. It’s focused on desktop usage. It includes email clients, graphical web browser, an office programs with word processor and spreadsheet, and so on. A full install, including XOrg and development tools, needs not more than 750 MB of harddisk space.

• Takeover of Kongoni Linux…

  When this is gonna happen, the next release, at the moment is unknown, as this is my first time of taking over the development of a Linux distribution and plus I need to understand the overall idea of Kongoni.

• Red Hat Family

  • CentOS Clone OpenNode Aims to Simplify KVM and OpenVZ

    Active Systems has released the first public beta of OpenNode, a CentOS based distro that is designed to make it easier to run virtual machines using KVM or OpenVZ.

• Debian Family

  • Debian Project at CeBIT 2010

    The Debian Project is happy to announce that it will again be represented at the CeBIT IT fair in Hanover, Germany, this year. At the booth of Univention GmbH in hall 2 stand B36, members of the project will be available for questions and discussions and will give a preview of the new version Debian 6.0 “Squeeze”, which is expected to be released this year.

    In addition the new port to the FreeBSD Kernel “Debian GNU/kFreeBSD” will be presented at the booth as well as in a introductory lecture. The lecture will take place on Tuesday, March 2nd 2010 at 5:15 pm at the CeBIT Open Source Forum (hall 2, stand F38).

  • Ubuntu

    • Ubuntu for the US authorities

      Autonomic Resources offers the ARC-P dedicated Infrastructure-as-a-Service platform (IaaS) for US government agencies and recommends using the Ubuntu Linux distribution and the Landscape management solution to manage virtual and physical servers, especially when establishing cloud infrastructures.

    • Awesome Ubuntu Software Center Updates

      You should all hunt down mvo on Freenode IRC and tell him he is awesome.

    • My Artwork Landing A Ubuntu 10.04

      As I mentioned earlier, I’ve been working with Scott Ritchie to create a “branding-ubuntu” package. During the Lucid cycle Scott have been working on getting the artwork into the actual Ubuntu 10.04 release (rather than just a separate package). If you play Mahjongg or Klondike (also known as Solitaire and Aisleriot) in Ubuntu 10.04, you will notice the new artwork.

    • Sorbet- Another proposed theme for Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid

Devices/Embedded

• Talking Devices Anywhere for Pennies – RoweBots Releases DSPnano Operating System V3

  The DSPnano Operating System offers an ultra tiny embedded POSIX environment for 8 and 16 bit microcontroller (MCU) based development that is also Linux compatible.

• WiebeTech ToughTech XE Mini review

  The WiebeTech ToughTech XE Mini works with Linux operating systems, as well as Windows and Mac OS and is available with a prefitted drive, as here, or as a bare enclosure so you can fit the drive you wish.

• Reference Virtual Platform of ARM Model Running Linux Under SystemC/TLM-2.0 Released by Open Virtual Platforms (OVP)

  The Open Virtual Platforms (OVP) initiative (www.OVPworld.org) has announced the release of a reference virtual platform of the ARM Integrator development board using OSCI SystemC TLM-2.0 C++.

• Talking Devices Anywhere for Pennies – RoweBots Releases DSPnano(TM) Operating System V3

  RoweBots Research Inc. announces and releases the DSPnano Operating System Version 3, achieving a significant milestone in shrinking intelligence into small and powerful microcontrollers and digital signal controllers. Motor control, ADPCM and color graphics along with other advanced networking applications and a Linux™ or POSIX compatible application are cost effective in any device.

  The DSPnano Operating System offers an ultra tiny embedded POSIX environment for 8 and 16 bit microcontroller (MCU) based development that is also Linux compatible.

• Phones

  • 3D mobiles are the future, says Nokia

    One interesting thing would be more details on Nokia’s Intel deal to create Linux-based MeeGo, but in spite of a question on the subject, Harlow refused to be drawn into more detail, leaving us still speculating as to the scope and impact of the deal.

  • First ELSE Still On Track for Mid-2010 Release

    To remind you, the First Else is, obviously, the first ELSE phone and the OS has been designed for one-handed use. The Linux-based OS has gone through several revisions with new parts added since the last time we saw it, with some honeycomb-style effects and a fish-eye magnifying lens both on display.

  • Marvell to Introduce Wide Array of OPhones Built for the China Market

    OPhone OS is a mobile operating system that runs on the Linux kernel. OPhone OS is linux-based smartphone software based on open source software and mobile internet technologies.

  • Android

    • Qseven module runs Linux and Android on i.MX515

      iWave Systems announced a COM (computer module) based on Freescale’s i.MX51 SoC (system-on-chip). The iW-i.MX51 includes up to 512MB of RAM and 2GB of flash storage, runs Linux and Android, and works with an available iW-Rainbow-G8D development baseboard, the company says.

    • Three short stories, all about Android

      Clearly, free applications exist for Android. But finding them takes work, which is silly; this is a perfect job for a computer. An ideal solution would be for Google to add a “freely-licensed” option to its (proprietary) market application. Failing that, it should be possible (for somebody with a bit more Android application-level programming experience than your editor) to put together an alternative market application which would focus on the growing body of free software for the Android system. It is an area worthy of encouragement; free software doesn’t become less important just because it’s running on a machine that fits into a shirt pocket.

• Sub-notebooks

  • New Millenium Learners Conference 2010 – Day 1

    The third and last session of the day was “The policy expectations: why countries are investing on 1-to-1?” and included presentations about projects in Maine (probably the most famous 1:1 computing in education project), Uruguay, Portugal and Canada. Additionally Rodrigo Arboleda from the Miami based OLPC Association presented his view of things.

  • Life with Linux: Adapting to the smaller screen on a netbook

    After a few days on Remix I decided I wanted to go back to the regular Ubuntu Gnome desktop and so when I got home I downloaded and installed Ubuntu 9.10 “Karmic Koala.” There’s nothing wrong with Remix, it’s just that I’m used to the regular desktop and I decided the screen was large enough to support it.

• Tablets

  • More touchscreen tablets on the way

    The folks at Slashgear spotted this Android-powered tablet from Mastone at Mobile World Congress last week. It’s powered by a Freescale iMX515 processor and features 3G and WiFi wireless networking.

Local users and analysts upbeat about Sun’s future

After months of uncertainty, Oracle has achieved its goal of buying one of the world’s most iconic IT companies, providing in the process a roadmap for Sun technologies and products, and increased certainty for New Zealand Sun users.

John Askew, group operations IT architect at the University of Auckland, which is ranked as New Zealand’s biggest user of IT systems and services by CIO magazine’s MIS100 survey, is optimistic about the buy.

Open Source Open World

Open source is a concept of free sharing of technical information that has been around for much longer than most of us would imagine. When we think of open source today, we usually think of software. As wonderful and widely used as open source software is, according to Linus Torvalds, “the future is open source everything.” From foods and beverages to scientific and health research studies and advanced technological innovations, the world has turned to open source.

Web Browsers

• Brace for Another Skirmish in the Browser Wars

  My main browser is Firefox. 3.5.7 for Linux, to be exact.

  [...]

  It was down to the Ogg Theora video format, but late in 2007, the spec was updated to allow for other formats, and currently the H.264/MPEG-4 AVC is the big contender.

  It should be noted that as of this writing, H.264 is not yet supported by Firefox, nor can it be run in IE without the Google Chrome Frame. Guess which big hardware vendor names after a fruit is among the big H.264 supporters?

  In the past, this kind of standards contention was at worse a nuisance. If you ran across an IE-only site, you would just fire up (shudder!) IE. But with cloud-based computing putting so much emphasis on the browser-interface-as-app-platform, any kind of standards fight could likely cause big problems for cloud users.

• OSnews Podcast Now Available in OGG

  The Flash audio player has been replaced by an HTML5 audio element. Please report any problems you experience.

  Doing the actual transcoding to OGG and uploading has taken over 20 hours to do, all I can say is that I hope it all goes to good use, I’m knackered.

• Slideshow – Awesome Image/Photo Viewing Google Chrome Extension

  Google Chrome is growing and so is it’s arsenal of extensions. Google Chrome recently stole the limelight from Safari browser and became the third most popular web browser in the world. With its recent emphasis on teaching people about web browser in general through innovative Google Chrome advertisements, it is genuinely going places. Slideshow is a beautiful yet functional image viewing extension for Google Chrome.

• Microsoft Browser Ballot arrives this week – 77% of UK don’t know it’s coming

  Mozilla has launched opentochoice.org, a site to explain the browser choice screen and to encourage people to discuss browser choice. Mozilla’s CEO, Mitchell Baker, said “Whether or not you decide to keep your current Web browser, we encourage you to learn more about your browser and the impact it has on the way you see the world, and to make your own choice.” The site at the moment appears to only consist of a blog, with a posting plus a comment, and an option to sign up for future information by email.

Databases

• Protocols, The GPL, Influences from MySQL

  I spent my Saturday at the SCALE conference down in LA. Most conferences I find have a meme and for this conference that was “MySQL’s longterm influence on the GPL”.

  MySQL was the company that had the most influence on how companies and investors viewed the GPL.

  When MySQL said “we will only take contributions via a contributor agreement”, this translated into investors expecting everyone to do this (though requiring contributor agreements destroyed outside MySQL development to the kernel, and left MySQL in a position where no substantial, or many, contributions ever occurred).

Drupal

• Kofi Annan Foundation using Drupal

  The Kofi Annan Foundation is using Drupal. Kofi Annan was the Secretary-General of the United Nations. In 2001 Kofi Annan and the United Nations were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace. Since leaving the United Nations, the Kofi Annan Foundation supports Kofi Annan in his current work to press for better policies to meet the needs of the poorest and most vulnerable in the world.

• Le Figaro using Drupal

  Le Figaro, the oldest and second-largest national newspaper in France, started using Drupal for its social features on http://www.lefigaro.fr. It is still using its old web content management system to serve its main content, but all of the social features such as comments on articles are now provided by Drupal.

• 5 modules that should come by default in Drupal.

  Drupal is a great CMS no doubt. I have gone round and tried lots of them, but I still come back to Drupal. However, the more I use it, the more I feel that the following five modules should actually come by default with every Drupal installation.

Releases

• Blender 2.5 Alpha 1 arrives

  The Blender developers have announced the availability of the first alpha for what will become version 2.6 of their open source 3D content creation suite. The second official development release includes several changes, new features and more than 100 fixes compared to the previous Alpha 0 release.

• PC/OS 10.1 Beta 2 Is Here

  There’s no shortage of Ubuntu-based Linux distros but that hasn’t been stopping anyone from coming up with another one so far. PC/OS is based on Xubuntu rather than the vanilla Ubuntu distro and, while it comes with quite a few customizations, it doesn’t stray too far from its source. The distro is getting close to the launch of its latest update and there’s now a new beta, PC/OS 10.1 Beta 2.

• MediaInfo 0.7.28

  MediaInfo 0.7.28 is released. This tool supplies technical & tag info about a video or audio file.

Programming

• Perl 5, Version Numbers, and Binary Compatibility

  As mentioned in What Perl 5′s Version Numbers Mean, the written Perl 5 support policy must explain several guidelines and their implications.

  If you’ve ever upgraded between major versions of Perl 5 on the same machine, you’ve likely noticed that you have to install new versions of modules. Various resources spread across the Internet suggest the use of CPAN autobundles, but even that’s likely enough to make you curse a little bit as you babysit a CPAN shell for an hour or two to get back to where you started.

• Making Linux Server Directories More Readable, Add to Perl’s @INC Array

• Learning Python, 4th Edition

Devotion to Duty

Oompah Loompah Google-y Do!

A perfect primer for bloggers.

Sorry, English major, the engineers have triumphed

Science

• New Approach to Generating Truly Random Numbers May Improve Internet Security, Weather Forecasts

  A new approach to generating truly random numbers could lead to improved Internet security and better weather forecasts, according to researchers writing in the International Journal of Critical Computer-Based Systems.

• In reality, simulation is key to math education, says Stanford mathematician

  Devlin thinks the role-playing approach has tremendous potential, but based on his experience, he said, it may take a national initiative to make it happen. He explained his views, and exhorted his peers to work to promote such a project, on Feb. 19 at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting in San Diego.

Surveillance

• School Spying Scandal Gets Even More Bizarre: Student In Question Was Disciplined For Eating Candy

  The story of the school district that supposedly spied on some students keeps getting odder and odder. While the school district claims that it used the secret remote webcam activation technology 42 times — and only to track down stolen or lost laptops — it still hasn’t explained why this particular student was punished.

• More Details Emerging About School Laptop Spying, And It Doesn’t Look Good

  Apparently, in various forums, blog posts and videos, one of the school’s techies talked about the technology they were using and how to set it up so that the user would not realize they were being spied on. He also discussed how to prevent a laptop using this software from being “jailbroken,” so users couldn’t discover that their computers were being used in this manner. Other forum posts from students at the school show that they were told they could not use other computers, could not disable the cameras and could not jailbreak their laptops on the risk of expulsion.

• The Snitch in Your Pocket

  The prosecutors said they needed the records to trace the movements of suspected drug traffickers, human smugglers, even corrupt public officials. But many federal magistrates—whose job is to sign off on search warrants and handle other routine court duties—were spooked by the requests. Some in New York, Pennsylvania, and Texas balked. Prosecutors “were using the cell phone as a surreptitious tracking device,” said Stephen W. Smith, a federal magistrate in Houston.

• Here’s Looking at You, Kids

  The feature was originally designed to help police and emergency personnel follow up on 911 calls, but the FBI and other law enforcement agencies have been obtaining more and more cell phone location records, without notifying the target or obtaining judicial warrants that establish probable cause.

Security

• Pope Benedict XVI criticises airport body scanners

  The Pope made his comments during an audience with airport workers held at the Vatican.

  Although the Pontiff did not mention the words body scanner it was clear what he meant as he told the 1,200 strong crowd: “Every action, it is above all essential to protect and value the human person in their integrity.

• Judge criticises ‘waste of money’ case after pensioner threatens boys with hammer

  She was arrested after the four scouts, from the 1st Newton Longville Scout Group, claimed she had swung the hammer at them twice, missing one of them by inches.

  The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) charged her following the incident on February 21 last year and bought the case before Northampton Crown Court this week.

  But following a two-day trial, a jury of six men and six women cleared Mrs Welch of affray and found her guilty of the lesser charge of threatening behaviour.

• Unmanned drones set to give defence a lift

  But a government-funded European group is pushing ahead with work aimed at showing that drones, known as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), can safely be used in civil airspace. Drones cannot be flown outside regulated areas at present because they are controlled remotely and do not have the ability to “see”.

• Sussex CCTV scuppered by street lights

  Glare from lamps is causing such poor picture quality that individuals filmed committing a crime cannot be identified.

• Despair of the DNA ‘sisters’: In a terrible mistake that casts new doubt on DNA profiling, it turns out they weren’t related at all

  It was the perfect, joyous advert for a Government-backed scheme linking the children of sperm donors – two daughters of the same man meeting for the first time.

• ContactPoint: £224m national children’s database ‘is not stable’, officials admit

  Contactpoint, the £224 million computer system designed to protect young people, is a “frustrating” database and not “user friendly” for local authorities, internal documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show.

• Photographer films his own ‘anti-terror’ arrest

  Bob Patefield used his video camera to record the moment police stopped him from taking photographs of Accrington town centre. He shows how the police claims he was engaging in anti-social behaviour led to his arrest

Environment

• Book Review: The Lomborg Deception

  The Danish political scientist won fame and fans by arguing that many of the alarms sounded by environmental activists and scientists—that species are going extinct at a dangerous rate, that forests are disappearing, that climate change could be catastrophic—are bogus. A big reason Lomborg was taken seriously is that both of his books, The Skeptical Environmentalist (in 2001) and Cool It(in 2007), have extensive references, giving a seemingly authoritative source for every one of his controversial assertions. So in a display of altruistic masochism that we should all be grateful for (just as we’re grateful that some people are willing to be dairy farmers), author Howard Friel has checked every single citation in Cool It. The result is The Lomborg Deception, which is being published by Yale University Press next month. It reveals that Lomborg’s work is “a mirage,” writes biologist Thomas Lovejoy in the foreword. “[I]t is a house of cards…Friel has used real scholarship to reveal the flimsy nature” of Lomborg’s work.

• Saudi Prince, Now Part Owner of Murdoch’s News Corp., Influences Fox News

  Investigative journalist Joseph Trento also reported that a comment he recently made on a Fox Network morning news show, Fox and Friends, about Saudi Arabian money still financing Al Qaeda, was edited out of the show. Trento also reports that Alwaleed “has personally donated huge amounts of money to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers.” In a rare interview with Fox News’ Neil Cavuto in January, AlWaleed explained his personal reasons for seeking influence in American politics: the U.S. buys Saudi Arabia’s oil, and the bulk of his country’s gross domestic product (GDP) comes from oil. Fox News reliably broadcasts misinformation on clean energy, and aggressively fights efforts to move America away from being dependent on a fossil fuels.

• Conservative Activists Rebel Against Fox News: Saudi Ownership Is ‘Really Dangerous For America’

  Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal owns a 7 percent stake in News Corp — the parent company of Fox News — making him the largest shareholder outside the family of News Corp CEO Rupert Murdoch. Alwaleed has grown close with the Murdoch enterprise, recently endorsing James Murdoch to succeed his father and creating a content-sharing agreement with Fox News for his own media conglomerate, Rotana.

Finance

• Deceptive Big Bank Ads Will be Key to Election 2010

  Groups for and against the current financial reform bills have already conducted their polls, polished their messages and are starting to engage in ad-war skirmishes that foreshadow the deluge of big bank spending to come, as Wall Street fights to elect candidates who will protect their interests and privileges.

PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

• New Monsanto and GMO Propaganda

  Multinationals like Monsanto are facing real grassroots opposition in the world, especially over agro-chemicals and GMOs. Monsanto has led the big corporations towards diversionary tactics: they have issued codes of conduct and ethical charters to conceal their real objective of creating value for their shareholders. They are promoting their products as cures for third world hunger and disease, and as an alternative to the dangers of pesticides. They hope to win over a hostile public with advertising.

• Soda Industry Using Tobacco Industry PR Strategies

  Manufacturers of sugar-laden drinks are adopting Big Tobacco’s public relations strategies in response to government proposals to tax soda and sugary drinks. They are claiming their products are wholesome or harmless at worst, sowing doubt about whether their products are really related to the problem (even when there is no longer doubt that they are), marketing heavily to children, funding front groups to oppose the taxes, and trying to take attention away from their products by focusing arguments on other topics, like individual responsibility and the totality of the diet.

• Soda: A Sin We Sip Instead of Smoke?

  Still, the idea of a special tax on soda, similar to those on tobacco, gasoline and alcoholic beverages, is attracting more interest. Advocates of a tax note that sugared beverages are the No. 1 source of calories in the American diet, representing 7 percent of the average person’s caloric intake, according to government surveys, and up to 10 percent for children and teenagers. These calories, they point out, are worse than useless — they’re empty, and contribute to a daily total that is already too high.

• It’s the New, Improved Iraq War!

  The Pentagon is formally rebranding the Iraq war by changing its name from “Operation Iraqi Freedom” to the sunnier “Operation New Dawn,” to reflect the reduced role the American military is supposed to have in that country over the next year.

• Obama’s Pentagon Rebrands Iraq War, Rolls Out PR Offensive in Afghanistan

  This week, the same week that saw the U.S. military launch a major new assault in Afghanistan — a much ballyhooed effort that is as much a PR offensive as a military one — the Pentagon decided to formally rebrand the Iraq War.

Censorship/Privacy/Civil Rights

• IOC orders blogger to take down video

  The International Olympic Committee has ordered a blogger to remove a video showing the death of Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili from his website.

• Did NewTeeVee/GigaOm Violate Copyright Laws By Telling You How To View The 2010 Olympics Online?

  It’s no secret that tons of people are pretty damn upset with NBC’s decisions to tape delay pretty much everything at the Olympics, in an era when everyone is used to real-time info. On top of that, most people recognize that it’s not hard to simply go online to unauthorized sources to watch streams of the Olympics live. GigaOm’s NewTeeVee put up a post over the weekend that explains how to view such unauthorized streams, and the site even titled the post: “Pirating the 2010 Winter Olympics.” Given that this is all rather obvious, it shouldn’t be a problem, right?

• Next up for France: police keyloggers and Web censorship

  Having just passed its super-controversial Création et Internet “graduated response” law, you might think the French government would take at least a brief break from riling up the “internautes.” Instead, the government is prepping a new crime bill that will, among other things, mandate Internet censorship at the ISP level, legalize government spyware, and create a massive meta-database of citizen information called “Pericles.”

• Facebook Restores Accounts Of 3 Critics It Mysteriously Deleted

  Apparently, three Argentines who worked on a book that mocks Facebook mysteriously had their Facebook accounts deleted in January.

• Facebook critics’ profiles restored after press uproar

  After an uproar in Latin American media, three Argentines involved in a book that portrays the social network in a cynical and satirical light had their Facebook profiles restored today.

Internet/Net Neutrality/DRM

• Is AT&T Shutting Down Metered Billing Trials?

  We reached out to AT&T for confirmation, and while AT&T confirmed to Broadband Reports that they were no longer signing up users to the trial, they wouldn’t technically confirm that the trials had been scrapped. “We are no longer adding new customers to the trial,” says AT&T’s Seth Bloom. “We are still reviewing the lessons and feedback we’ve gained from the trial so far to guide our next steps,” he says. “We don’t have any other plans to share at this time, but we’ll communicate with our customers once we’ve decided how we’ll move forward.”

• Plans to cut off internet connections of illegal filesharers dumped

  The government has backed away from its proposals in the Digital Economy Bill to cut off people who have illegally shared files online.

• Has the government changed its position on Disconnection? No

  Please do not be confused by the government’s semantics. BIS and DCMS decided in the summer that they would not refer to ‘disconnecting’ users, because that sounds harsh and over the top. ‘Temporary account suspension’ sounds much more reasonable.

  Language matters. What journalist is going to run a story on ‘temporary account suspension’ (yawn)? This is why the government has chosen these disingenuous terms: it‘s just more spin.

  What we still don’t know is how long a family’s internet might be disconnected for.

  A month? Three? A year? There is nothing in the Bill or any of the notes that we are aware of that might give us a clue.

Intellectual Monopolies/Copyrights

• WhoseTube?

  MY band is famous for music videos. We direct them ourselves or with the help of friends, we shoot them on shoestring budgets and, like our songs, albums and concerts, we see them as creative works and not as our record company’s marketing tool.

  In 2006 we made a video of us dancing on treadmills for our song “Here It Goes Again.” We shot it at my sister’s house without telling EMI, our record company, and posted it on the fledgling YouTube without EMI’s permission. Technically, this put us afoul of our contract, since we need our record company’s approval to distribute copies of the songs that they finance. It also exposed YouTube to all sorts of liability for streaming an EMI recording across the globe. But back then record companies saw videos as advertisements, so if my band wanted to produce them, and if YouTube wanted to help people watch them, EMI wasn’t going to get in the way.

  [...]

  Embedded videos — those hosted by YouTube but streamed on blogs and other Web sites — don’t generate any revenue for record companies, so EMI disabled the embedding feature. Now we can’t post the YouTube versions of our videos on our own site, nor can our fans post them on theirs. If you want to watch them, you have to do so on YouTube.

• EMI Gets State Farm To Sponsor Embedding Ok Go Video — But Should You Need A Sponsor To Embed?

  Now comes the news of a “resolution” to the issue, as EMI will allow an Ok Go video to be embedded thanks to an as-yet-unexplained “sponsorship” by State Farm. While this shows, in some way, how different business models can step in and help pay for content, it worries me that EMI now seems to think a video needs to be directly sponsored to allow for embedding.

• The Irreducible Complexity of Copyright

  Current intellectual property law frowns on “copying” as opposed to mere “influence.” If I write and record a song that is manifestly influenced by the sound of the Beatles, that’s just how culture works; if I remix or reperform a medley of their songs, that’s infringing. One way to think about the distinction is to ask how much mutation of the original work has occurred in my head before I send it out into the world. We can imagine my sitting with a guitar playing “Taxman,” beginning by improvising new lyrics, and gradually altering the melody until I’ve produced a song that is sufficiently transformed to count as an original work, though perhaps still a recognizably Beatlesesque one. I’m free and clear under copyright law just so long as I only record and distribute the final product, which consists of enough of my own contribution that it no longer counts as a “copy.”

  Implicit in this model is the premise that creativity is fundamentally an individual enterprise–an act of intelligent design. Yet so much of our culture, historically, has not been produced in this way, but by a collective process of mutation and evolution, by the selection of many small tweaks that (whether by chance or owing to some stroke of insight) improve the work, at least in the eyes of the next person to take it up. Perhaps ironically, this is the kind of evolutionary process by which myths evolve–myths of life breathed into mud, or of Athena springing full-grown from the head of Zeus. Our legal system now takes these evolved myths as its paradigm of creation.

• Tech Company Lobbying Group Explains The Importance Of Letting Countries Make Their Own Policy Decisions On Copyright

  So it’s great — if not surprising — to see that the CCIA’s filing to the USTR for the Special 301 report (pdf) actually matches much of my own filing, though from a more legalistic perspective (and focuses on Canada). The key points are the same, however: the Constitutional basis for copyright has never been that “more is better,” but that we should be seeking the most effective ways to “promote the progress.” Second, it notes that countries should be free to make their own policy decisions on copyright law, rather than being pressured into them by the US. It further notes that the USTR Special 301 process shouldn’t be focused on legislative and policy issues, but merely enforcement of the law. Unfortunately, it’s gotten far away from that.

• ACTA’s Internet Chapter Leaks; And, Now We See How Sneaky The Negotiators Have Been

  Reports spread this weekend that the ACTA’s all-important internet enforcement chapter had leaked. You can download the PDF from that link, or check it out below:
  From here, you can see why this is still quite a dangerous document — and why there’s been so much misinformation from its supporters, insisting that it “can’t change US law,” or even (as stated by the USTR) that it won’t include three strikes. It doesn’t. Sort of. But it does make it very very difficult for any online service provider to get safe harbors without doing something along those lines. Let’s explore deeper…

• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

There’s a way to get new wallpaper images every day on a GNU/Linux system

One of the apps I loved when I was a Windows user was Webshots, a great app for not only rotating wallpaper images but also for finding new wallpapers. Of course it’s only available for Windows so GNU/Linux users have to manually look for new wallpapers and use another app for changing walls on a regular basis. I’ve used Desktop Drapes, which is a really nice app for managing and changing your desktop wallpaper, but for the longest time I kept going back to WallpaperTray. The big plus for WallpaperTray is that you can not only look for specific wallpapers but the icon is a thumbnail of the wallpaper image itself and if you hover your cursor over the icon it tells you the path and filename for the active wallpaper. This is a big plus if you have a lot of wallpapers across a number of directories.

LB – Episode 50 – Milestone Debauchery by Linux Basement

Who is Linux, really?

While Linus developed the first Linux kernel he is not Linux. Linus is the father of Linux and Linux is his creation so Linus cannot be Linux. Richard is the founder of the GNU revolution and most of the key programs in a typical Linux distribution are from the GNU umbrella but they are only a part and not the whole of Linux. Mark has single handedly done more for Linux popularity than just about anyone else. He is the one who I would say that put glamour in the Linux name. Who can put any higher praise on Linux than someone who has been to space I ask you? Tux has been around almost as long as the Linux kernel has when a guy called Larry Ewing was inspired to draw a penguin relaxing after gorging on bountiful fish. Since then Tux has been the Linux mascot and one of the most famous computing mascots of all time, so much so that many businesses not even related to computing are using his image. If you want to see just exactly who Linux is then follow these directions.

The Last Act of Courage…

Bruno spent years teaching thousands of people how to use Linux. Brunolinux is a website devoted to do just that and the lion’s share of my knowledge of Linux grew from that tree. From bash scripting to my feeble attempts at learning C…

Advanced Technologies Selects Ada for U.S. DOT Traffic Signal Control Program

ATI used the Ada language, the GNAT Ada development environment for GNU Linux, and the GNAT Programming Studio (GPS) Integrated Development Environment to build the prototype system. ATI utilized AdaCore’s GTKAda toolkit along with the GLADE 2.0 GUI Builder to implement the graphical user interface (GUI) and display for the prototype.

Desktop

• Distrowatch.com Stats

  If a newbie reads about 5 distros before choosing one, that could mean that 7000 newbies switched to GNU/Linux each day for the last year. That’s 2.5 million converts in a year. These are mostly geeks, of course. Ordinary folk just take their software pre-installed. Assuming there are 20 ordinary folk adopting GNU/Linux per geek, that is 50 million converts. Of course geeks might lead a few to GNU/Linux or they might help them buy a PC pre-loaded with GNU/Linux.

  The world is becoming a better place, one convert at a time.

Graphics Stack

• Hook for catching X.org freezes

  X.org freezes are perhaps one of the most frustrating bugs in Ubuntu. These were such a pain during Hardy that special debugging procedures were developed to enable users to gather the data upstream needed. But these procedures are pretty technically involved to do, and had to be done while ssh’d into the frozen system – not always an easy task!

• AMD Gets A Seat With The X.Org Foundation

  The new X.Org Foundation board members include Alex Deucher, Keith Packard, Matthieu Herrb, Matthias Hopf, and Eric Anholt. Alex Deucher had the most votes to be seated and this his first time sitting on the board and now provides some AMD representation where he works on their open-source driver stack and documentation.

Applications

• LTSP 5.2 is out !

  As we wanted this release to be some kind of a reference point in LTSP’s history, we also released LDM (LTSP Display Manager) 2.1 and LTSPfs 0.6 on the same day.

  Packages for LTSP 5.2, LDM 2.1 and LTSPfs 0.6 are already in Ubuntu Lucid and a backport for Karmic is available in my PPA.

• File compressors in Linux | gzip zip tar

• Marave 0.6 is out

  Version 0.6 of Marave, my peaceful, fullscreen text editor is now available at the usual place: http://marave.googlecode.com

• Pino Twitter Client Goes Experimental: Adds multi-account, Indenti.ca & a Xmas Tree

• Ubuntu MeMenu to Encourage Social Media Broadcasting

  It seems that a huge segment of the world’s population has gone Twitter and Facebook crazy. People are busy updating their statuses, sending each other links, and trying to see how many “friends” and “followers” they can get. We are becoming social “broadcasters”, constantly bombarding our “friends” with 140 character chunks of information. In reality, these social networks are all about making “ME” feel good about myself, tricking us into thinking that people care about what we say … or maybe they really do care?

• fun with irc clients

  So, after having a pretty productive Fedora day yesterday (I cleaned up EPEL buildroot override tags/closed tickets, caught up on all my mailing lists and such, started in on some package reviews, helped people on IRC, etc) I decided to play around with some new IRC clients today.

• Instructionals

  • GUI GRUB Editor using Startup Manager in Ubuntu

  • Network Analysis With Wireshark On Ubuntu 9.10

  • How to install skype on Ubuntu 9.10

  • Debian Console, Framebuffer, Grub2

  • Pure EFI Linux Boot on Macbooks

  • Installing Debian via USB

  • Install Perl modules using CPAN

  • BleachBit- Quickly frees disk space, removes hidden junk, and easily guards your privacy

  • CentOS / Redhat Linux: Install Keepalived To Provide IP Failover For Web Cluster

  • Zattoo – Watch Online TV for free

  • Getting list of referers out of Apache logs

  • How to install Angry IP Scanner on Ubuntu

  • Linux Installation Methods: Timing & Performance

  • Resize multiple pictures with a too high resolution

  • How to Get Mac’s QuickLook Function In Ubuntu

    In Mac, the QuickLook feature allows you to preview your files without opening them. For Linux users, particularly for those with Gnome desktop, you can also get a similar QuickLook functionality in your desktop with Gloobus-Preview.

  • How to configure multipath for high availability and performance on Debian and CentOS for storage at IBM DS8300 SAN

  • Set up Ubuntu Karmic Server (Grub2) PV Guest at Xen 4.0-rc4 Dom0 (2.6.32 pvops) on top of Fedora12

Games

• Quake Live Tips

  Quake Live is a free, manly game to play. QL is a version of Quake 3 that runs as a browser plugin for Firefox, Safari, and IE. It features a skill-matched game finder, a friend’s system, and other modern features. Think a Lite, browser-based version of Steam. Quake 3 came out in 1999, and people have been playing it on a regular basis since. That’s about 11 years ahead of you if you’re new (doesn’t mean you can’t become excellent fast.)

• Chocolate Doom 1.3.0

Desktop Environments

• K Desktop Environment (KDE SC)

  • Interview With Netbook Master Marco Martin From the KDE Plasma Team

    What part of KDE development are you involved in?

    I mostly work in the Plasma team, on the library and on the main workspaces: Plasma Desktop and Plasma Netbook.

  • day 2 of tokamak 4 (and a bit about day 1, too)

    Yesterday was the first full day for Tokamak 4 with most of us having arrived from near (e.g. right here in town) and far (Brazil, Canada) the day before. We had a great series of presentations to catch each other up on where we are right now and where we are going. I opened the proceedings with the usual “state of the plasma” presentation where, after recapping the motivations and core design values we had defined together over the past couple of years, I likened our efforts to those of a sculptor. We had before us just raw materials, a rough-hewn stone if you will: Qt4 with QGraphicsView in it’s earliest infancy, KDE 4′s libraries and a simple vision.

• GNOME Desktop

  • GNOME Activity Journal 0.3.3 is out!

    The next release will allow more interactions and make use of Zeitgeist’s “Most used With” and “A priori Sets”. Zeitgeist 0.3.3 will be out soon…

  • GNOME Activity Journal 0.3.3 Video

Distributions

• My typical archlinux desktop

  The more distrohopping I do, the more I realize I’ll never feel as comfortable as on arch. I don’t like being forced to use applications or settings that other people think are the best, I have my own best, and I can only do that if I build a system from the ground up.

• Do we really need all these different Linux distributions?

  One very good example which I can think of is Knoppix. Before Knoppix arrived on the scene hardware configuration of Linux hardware was a manual affair requiring intimate knowledge of your hardware details. With Knoppix came a great advancement in automatic hardware detection and configuration. Nowadays just about all Linux distributions have the same ease in hardware detection and configuration.

• New Releases

  • Tin Hat: High security Linux

    Tin Hat is a Linux distribution derived from hardened Gentoo which aims to provide a very secure, stable and fast Desktop environment that lives purely in RAM.

    Tin Hat boots from CD, or optionally a pen drive, but it is not a LiveCD. It does not mount any file system from CD via unionfs or otherwise. Rather, Tin Hat is a massive image (approx. 2.3GB) which loads into tmpfs upon booting.

  • CloudLinux OS Set to Surface At Parallels Summit

    During a Feb. 23 keynote, Seletskiy is expected to describe how hosting service providers can leverage CloudLinux to maintain balance between number of users per server and the load the server can carry. The Parallels event is expected to mark the first time Seletskiy takes the stage to talk about the CloudLinux OS.

• Ubuntu

  • There’s an antivirus called ubuntu

    Ubuntu will be the best choice for him. It’s very good that he chose ubuntu forums. Just to know that you have a whole community to help you when in trouble, that’s lovely!

    We meet lots of people having similar problems – who don’t know what an operating system is, who just want to know how to get their surfing and wordprocessing done hazzle-free. All we people need to do is to carefully guide them in their transition to Ubuntu, without burdening them with technical stuff. Just make their life in ubuntu wonderful and exciting!

  • Wubi does the job

  • Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter Issue 181

    Welcome to the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter, Issue #181 for the week February 14th – February 20th, 2010. In this issue we cover: Debian Import Freeze in effect, Feature Freeze in place – Alpha 3 freeze ahead, New MOTU, Ubuntu single sign on service launched, Meet Jelmer Vernooij, Sikuli — scripting your use of GUIs, Global Bug Jam, Taking Lucid for a test spin, Opportunistic Developer Update, Ubuntu One Music Store, One Hundred Paper Cuts, Mark Shuttleworth to give keynote at PyCon 2010, Ubuntu UK Podcast returns, Ubuntu torrents are now IPv6 enabled, and much, much more!

  • Making Myself Clear About Ubuntu Development

  • Element is designed to be run as a dedicated media PC in the lounge room, connected to a high definition television.

    Element is an Ubuntu-based distribution for home theatre or media-centre personal computers featuring a ten-foot user interface and designed to be connected to a HDTV for a digital media and Internet experience within the comforts of a living room or entertainment area.

  • Customizing the Ubuntu Application Stack Before Installation

    Ubuntu is way easier to install than certain other operating systems. But it would be even greater if I could select which applications I wanted on my new system before the Ubiquity installer goes about its business–an idea that was proposed recently on Ubuntu Brainstorm. Here’s why it should go through.

  • Ubuntu Linux is not suitable for you if…

    * You cannot understand the simple differences between the two main software development models called Open Source and closed source or proprietary.
    * You expect to see the yellow, green, blue and purple ( is it purple???) colors made into flag when you boot Ubuntu.
    * You find it difficult to shed your 1997 notion of a typical Linux OS: command line and again CLI driven.

  • Confessions of an Ubuntu Fanboy

    Ubuntu is easy to learn

    In the past, I’ve been guilty of installing Ubuntu on a new computer and leaving the poor user with words like “don’t worry, Ubuntu easy to learn, it’s really not that different from Windows.” While this is true for geeks and people who love experimenting with computers, I’ve learned that it’s simply not true for most users. Computers are difficult!

  • Edubuntu is Ubuntu for the Classroom

    Ubuntu by Canonical, one of the most popular Linux distributions, provides a few different variants. One of them is Edubuntu. It is the same operating system as Ubuntu but comes loaded with many educational applications and games. In this article, we’ll install Edubuntu and discover exactly which applications come preinstalled. Now lets get started!

  • Mint

    • Taking a look at Linux Mint 8 “Helena”

      DW: What’s new in Mint 8? What are some of the new features people will enjoy in Helena?

      CL: We answered many of the requests we received after the release of Linux Mint 7 and some of the changes we made were quite popular among our users. The Update Manager now allows you to ignore updates for certain packages. The level associated with each package is something we maintain so this addition gives a lot more power to the user. We also improved many aspects of the Software Manager and we implemented numerous little things to make the system more comfortable to use.

    • Linux Mint 8 Fluxbox CE review: Lightweight, fast, surprisingly cohesive

      Linux Mint 8 Fluxbox Community Edition is based on Linux Mint 8 Main Edition, the 2.6.31 Linux kernel, and Fluxbox 1.1.1. As a longtime Fluxbox user and a recent enthusiast of Linux Mint, I was pretty excited that there was going to be a Fluxbox Community Edition based on the most recent Mint release, because to me it seemed like the best of both worlds — the streamlined, clean “cohesiveness” I’ve come to enjoy in Linux Mint, plus the fast, highly customizable Fluxbox that I tend to install on my own anyway, regardless of what default desktop or window manager is included in any distro I’m using.

• Devices/Embedded

  • Android

    • Archos to launch Two New Android Tablets at CeBIT.

      We’ve just had word from Archos’ German PR company that Archos will announce two new Android Tablets at CeBIT.

    • Two Archos Android home-use tablets at CeBIT 2010

      The Archos 7 looks pretty much to be locked-in for CeBIT in around a week’s time, but according to Archos’ German PR team the company have a second Android-based internet tablet to bring to the show. CarryPad have heard that two new devices are in the works for the Germany-based show, both described as “good value Android Tablets that are specially designed for use in the home”.

  • Sub-notebooks

    • ARM at 28 nm This Year

      Did I mention these things are small? At 28 nm the cores will be half the size of their 40 nm devices which are very competitive with Atom. Running GNU/Linux instead of that other OS, these new ARM CPUs will kick Atom with that other OS out of the park.

Of the powers we choose to lose

It is the fact that the market will reflect the mentality and culture of the people. If the people are so easy to convince into giving up their power then they will do it in a multitude of ways. Perhaps buying an iPhone isn’t as immediately harmful as voting for a law that creates a yet another victimless crime, but it is the reflection of the same mentality. They have gotten you so easily convinced that convenience must come at the expense of your personal power just as the government has gotten you convinced that security comes at the expense of liberty.

Tips to help users migrate to OpenOffice

The migration from other office suites to OpenOffice really isn’t that difficult. In fact, many users might hardly notice the difference. But there are users that might wind up in a panic when they see their old friend MSO was replaced with OO. With these tips it shouldn’t be all that difficult to ease their worries. What about you? Have you found a tip or two to help ease the migration? If so, share.

Open-Xchange: Another Big SaaS Partner Win

Open-Xchange, an open source alternative to Microsoft Exchange, continues to gain momentum in Europe and North America. The latest example: Bull, a €1,110 million solutions provider headquartered in Paris, is offering SaaS and on-premises Open-Xchange to its end customers in Germany.

[...]

As you may recall, Open-Xchange claimed 2009 was a banner year for the company; more than 15 million people worldwide were running Open-Xchange at the end of 2009, an 80 percent increase from 2008. CEO Rafael Laguna is expected to provide another business update (and potentially more news…) during this week’s Parallels Summit 2010 in Miami; the event is attracting cloud and SaaS experts from across the globe.

A handbook for the open source way, written the open source way

The book is entitled The Open Source Way: Creating and nurturing communities of contributors and you can access the current text here and the wiki for contributors here.

SCALE 8x: Day 1 – WIOS Talks

My review of the first day of SCALE 8x and the WIOS talks I attended.

New medical FOSS listing/platform online

Medfoss.apfelkraut.org should provide a comprehensive and structured overview of Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FOSS) projects for the health care domain.

Mozilla

• Hands-on and under the hood: Ars tests Firefox on Android

  I really want to emphasize the fact that what we tested in this article is NOT a release, a prerelease, or an official build from Mozilla. I copied the code directly from the active working branch of a Mozilla developer and poked it with a sharp stick until I got it to compile. The purpose of this article is to shed some light on the development process and provide a helping hand to other enthusiasts who want to get it to compile. The bugs, performance issues, and other limitations that I’ve discovered are not indicative of what the final product will be like.

Databases

• Zmanda hooks Tivoli cop into MySQL

  Open source vendor Zmanda is adding hooks into its MySQL database backup software for shops using IBM’s Tivoli Storage Manager to mastermind the policies.

  The company on Monday unfurled a new feature for Zmanda Recovery Manager called — get ready for some unwieldily precision here —Tivoli Storage Manager Option for Zmanda Recovery Manager for MySQL.

CMS

• QuickStudy: Drupal

  Drupal is free content-management software designed to let an individual or user group publish, manage and organize Web sites that feature a wide variety of content. Drupal is currently being used to power community Web portals, discussion sites, corporate Web sites, intranet applications, personal Web sites and blogs, fan sites, e-commerce applications, resource directories and social networking sites. Recently, the Obama administration adopted Drupal as the foundation for the WhiteHouse.gov Web site.

FSF/FSFE/GNU

• Media Advisory: Controversial Free-Software Activist to Speak at UB

  Richard Stallman, founder of the GNU Project and the Free Software Foundation and one of the most controversial figures in the history of the Internet, will discuss “Copyright and Community in the Age of Computer Networks” on Feb. 22 at 6 p.m. in 112 Norton Hall on the University at Buffalo’s North Campus.

Licensing

• FOSS Legal Strategy Session Silicon Valley: Success!

• Bruce Perens: Inside Open Source’s Historic Victory

  Jacobsen v. Katzer is closed, after five years. Open Source won, and big. A manufacturer who attempted to collect royalties from an Open Source developer has lost two patents. As terms of his settlement with the developer, the manufacturer is paying $100,000 to the Open Source developer, has agreed to place himself under a permanent injunction, and has signed a release of any liability to all members of the Open Source project. The case was not “sealed” like so many settled cases, so its documents are available to the public now.

• FOSS devs can collect damages from license violators

  Although the ruling won’t set a broad precedent due to the fact that it emerged from a district court, it’s still a significant victory for open source software licensing enforcement. The threat of having to pay monetary damages will give software companies a big incentive to refrain from abusing or misappropriating open source software code. In response to the ruling, Katzer finally agreed to settle with Jacobson last week. The conflict, which originally started five years ago, has reached an end.

Programming

• New Python shell is a DreamPie

  DreamPie, a new interactive shell for Python developers, has been released with support for Python 2.5, 2.6 and 3.1, Jython 2.5 and IronPython 2.6. DreamPie is described as a “new concept for an interactive shell”, with the display divided into a history box for commands and a code box for “in work” Python code. The shell provides automatic completion of attributes, displays function arguments and documentation, can save session history as a HTML file and allows for interactive plotting with matpotlib.

Applications

• pyLoad, lightweight and powerful one-click hoster download manager

  This tiny tool will definitely catch your eye of interest if you’re downloading a lot of files from Rapidshare, Megaupload or hotfiles: pyLoad, entirely written in Python, is a download manager available for GNU/Linux, Windows, Mac OS X and most interestingly for routers!

• iPFaces – Mobile Application Framework

  If you can program Java, you can now program also mobile applications. iPFaces is distributed under GNU/GPL for community usage.

• Pidgin update fixes security vulnerabilities

  The Pidgin developers have released version 2.6.6 of their open source instant messenger application. In addition to the usual changes and bug fixes, the maintenance and security update addresses a total of three vulnerabilities in the the multi-platform instant messaging client.

Standards/Consortia

• Open letter to Google: free VP8, and use it on YouTube

  With its purchase of the On2 video compression technology company having been completed on Wednesday February 16, 2010, Google now has the opportunity to make free video formats the standard, freeing the web from both Flash and the proprietary H.264 codec.

• Older blog entries for dwmw2

  To me, HTML5 looks less like a standard and more like a set of broken hackish kludges to work around the fact that people out there aren’t actually capable of following a standard.

• Risks in Google killing Adobe Flash

  My son loves The Daily Show, but for some reason he can’t load Adobe Flash 10 on his Windows PC. It claims to load, but then Windows tells him it’s not there. (I tried “switch to Linux.” It just re-opened the Generation Gap.)

  [..]

  Google could solve his problem in a flash, the Free Software Foundation says. Just switch from supporting Flash to the VP8 codec recently acquired with ON Technologies on YouTube.

• Let My Codecs Go: Will Google Free VP8?

  The good news is that if anyone has the resources to sort out the legal and technical problems, Google has. The reason why it might want to go to all that trouble is to free itself from any dependence on the patent-encumbered codecs of others, and to promote a flourishing open video ecosystem, and with it lots of lovely content that it can sell ads against.

• Free Software Foundation urges Google to open On2 codec

  We question whether yet another plug-in is the best of ideas, but the post has other ideas. “You could interest users with HD videos in free formats, for example, or aggressively invite users to upgrade their browsers (instead of upgrading Flash). Steps like these on YouTube would quickly push browser support for free formats to 50% and beyond, and they would slowly increase the number of people who never bother installing Flash.”

Science

• Space shuttle Endeavour lands in Florida

  The space shuttle Endeavour has landed at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, following its latest visit to the International Space Station (ISS).

Security

• FBI launches probe into schools accused of spying on kids through webcams

  The FBI has launched an investigation into a Pennsylvania school district that has been accused of spying on students through webcams on laptops it issued to those students.

• Feds open school spycam probe

  The school offers pupils MacBooks as part of its “21st Century Learning Initiative”. On Friday the school said it had appointed lawyers to look at its past and present laptop policies.

• McKinnon gets a date for ‘final’ appeal

  Pentagon hacker Gary McKinnon and his legal team have been given three months to prepare for a judicial hearing on whether the Home Secretary proceeded correctly in allowing extradition proceedings to proceed in spite of dire medical warnings.

• Twitter bomb threat joke man faces possible jail sentence

  The message was reported to the authorities, who treated it as a threat and called in the police. Officers from South Yorkshire police arrested and later charged Chambers “with sending… a message that was grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character”. Police confiscated his iPhone, laptop and home computer.

Environment

• ‘Mountains’ of e-waste threaten developing world

  Urgent action is needed to tackle the “mountains” of e-waste building up in developing nations, says a UN report.

  Huge amounts of old computers and discarded electronic goods are piling up in countries such as China, India and some Africa nations, it said.

  India could see a 500% rise in the number of old computers dumped by 2020, found the survey of 11 nations.

PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

• Goldman Hires Outside PR Firm to Help With Image Problem

  Goldman Sachs has decided the time to hire an outside public-relations firm to help polish their tarnished image has come, the Post tells us today.

Intellectual Monopolies/Copyrights

• Herald ends payments for online content

  In December 2009, the media company began providing a link for voluntary payment at the end of each online story. “After evaluating two months of response, we’ve decided to end the program,” said Elissa Vanaver, a company vice president and assistant to the publisher. She would not say how much money the effort had raised.

• Author Who Claimed $9.99 Not A Real Price For Books Admits Comments Were A Mistake

  Of course, it looks like the backlash got even stronger following that quote in the NY Times. Robert Ring alerts us to io9′s coverage, saying that after the NYT’s piece came out, Preston’s book started getting one-star reviews on Amazon, with many people mentioning the NY Times quote as a reason not to buy the book.

• Tenenbaum: $675,000 is absurd when I caused $21 in losses

  Joel Tenenbaum, the second P2P defendant to take his case all the way through trial, is on the hook for $675,000 in damages. But according to his lawyer, Tenenbaum only caused the record labels $21 in damages.

  The disparity between these two figures is, in the words of Harvard Law’s Charles Nesson, “monstrous and shocking.”

• ACTA

  • ACTA “internet enforcement” chapter leaks

    Someone has uploaded a PDF to a Google Group that is claimed to be the proposal for Internet copyright enforcement that the USA has put forward for ACTA, the secret copyright treaty whose seventh round of negotiations just concluded in Guadalajara, Mexico. This reads like it probably is genuine treaty language, and if it is the real US proposal, it is the first time that this material has ever been visible to the public. According to my source, the US proposal is the current version of the treaty as of the conclusion of the Mexico round.

    I’ve read it through a few times and it reads a lot like DMCA-plus. It contains, for example, a duty to technology firms to shut down infringement where they have “actual knowledge” that such is taking place. This argument was put forward in the Grokster case, and as Fred von Lohmann argued then, this is a potentially deadly burden to place on technology companies: in the offline world Xerox has “actual knowledge” that its technology is routinely used to infringe copyright at Kinko’s outlets around the world — should that create a duty to stop providing sales and service to Kinko’s?

    [...]

    Also buried in a footnote is a provision for forcing ISPs to terminate customers who’ve been accused — but not convicted — of copyright infringement (along with their families and anyone else who happens to share their net connection).

  • World going barmy over copyright enforcement

    IT IS NOT CLEAR how accurate it is yet but someone has posted a copy of what appears to be the crucial enforcement section of the secret copyright treaty that the publishing cartels want the world to accept.

  • ACTA leak shows US Trade Rep lied about “3-strikes”

  • ACTA Internet Chapter Leaks: Renegotiates WIPO, Sets 3 Strikes as Model

    Several months after a European Union memo discussing the ACTA Internet chapter leaked, the actual chapter itself has now leaked. First covered by PC World, the new leak fully confirms the earlier reports and mirrors the language found in the EU memo. This is the chapter that required non-disclosure agreements last fall.

• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

The World Is Mourning The Loss Of Bruno Knaapen – Linux Advocate

I knew little about the man called Bruno. I knew he was a Linux advocate and he knew Linux inside out. He was patient with those who were trying to learn the OS and he always had the answer to any question that was posted in the forum. Looking over in the Scot’s Newsletter Forum, All Things Linux, Bruno has posted over 37,000 replies to questions or information for Linux users. He also had an excellent site called Tips For Linux Users in which he posted everything you needed to know about Linux.

Dearest Friends, Students, Admirers of Bruno Knaapen…

In Amsterdam, where Bruno lives, they have the option of “dignified death” (euthanasia by choice). Bruno has reached that point. He will be surrounded by his family as he takes his final journey beyond this existence. The time is set for this Saturday morning (Amsterdam time).

Security Alert: They Should Have Used Linux

I’ve seen a collection of articles about computer security breaches originating from China and would like to give a report from the ITYS Foundation. ITYS, for the unaware, is “I Told You So.” I’ve discussed the use of Linux on the desktop for years, touting its security, stability, thousands of free software applications and feature-rich interfaces. I’m constantly told that Linux on the desktop is dead. I’ve even said it myself after taking too many verbal lashings when touting Linux as a prospective desktop operating system. Novell and RedHat have both put the Linux Desktop out mind.

[...]

It’s my sincere hope that companies will soon discover that their reluctance to embrace Linux on the desktop is foolish. It’s also my hope that virus and malware writers will face the maximum penalties available for costing innocent people millions of dollars in lost time and data. I know how China will deal with them. Perhaps the rest of the world should take note. You’d think under penalty of death that these individuals and groups would find some way of using their programming skills for good.

How the Internet makes us stupid – or not

But he’s wrong about Linux. When Helsinki-born Linus Torvalds first posted a fledgling version of Linux on an obscure software bulletin board, no one – apart from the most diehard open source evangelists – would have predicted that open-source software would be much more than a short-lived hackers’ experiment. And yet, within a few short years Linux became the largest software engineering project on the planet and spawned a multibillion-dollar ecosystem that upset the balance of power in the software industry.

Today, Linux is used in everything from the smallest consumer electronics to the largest super computers. It helps run Germany’s air-traffic-control systems. It also runs a number of nuclear power plants (whose names cannot be disclosed for reasons of national security). If you drive a BMW, chances are it is running Linux. And, at the time of writing, more than 500 million users of set-top cable boxes, TiVos, Android phones and other home appliances use Linux, and more than 1.5 billion people use it indirectly every day whenever they access Google, Yahoo or myriad other websites.

Linux Fund To Introduce UK Business Credit Card

Pioneering Open Source funding organization Linux Fund and MBNA UK today announced Europe’s first credit card that supports Open Source projects and events with every purchase.

Desktop

• Broadband Computer Co Alex review

  You know how it goes: you help a relative buy a PC for their simplistic needs and then you spend the rest of your life giving out free technical support. If that’s a familiar story, Broadband Computer Co’s Alex could well be of interest.

  [...]

  Once into the main computer, Alex has been designed to keep things as simple as possible. As such, there’s not the usual desktop layout; so, there’s no start menu or task bar, windows can’t be resized or moved and there’s only the choice of applications that come preinstalled. While most operating systems have bright, large icons, but Alex is back to basics using buttons with clear text labels.

• Linux laptop takes the strain for technophobes

  A Newcastle-based company has launched a Linux-based laptop and support package designed to encourage technophobes online.

• Suddenly a Vista-phonic Moment

  I dumped Vista and put Ubuntu 9.04 and later 9.1 on the exact same DELL with NO hardware changes and it has never even hiccuped once. It has run without ANY failures and only has required one reboot (outside of new kernel installs)in the year since I installed Ubuntu 9.04.

Thin Clients

• NEC

  NEC, sadly, tries to discourage potential customers from using GNU/Linux instead of welcoming them to twice the benefit from using GNU/Linux and thin clients instead of that other OS.

• Acceptance of Thin Clients

  For the most part, I have replaced old thick PCs with new servers and thin clients. There is no clinging to the old ways from that perspective. It is just unreasonable to assume any non-profit organization has the ability to replace old PCs with the state-of-the-art new PC periodically to stay up to speed while they can upgrade a few servers for much lower cost. My cost of server per user is about $25 these days, not the $100-$500 cost of some PCs. For that I get the advantage of huge RAID, RAM, multiple cores and gigabit/s networking. I will give up sluggish USB to get those more frequently needed resources. If there are some users for whom faster USB is important they can use thick clients. It should be a minority in most schools.

• Userful upgrades multi-seat Linux desktop virtualization solution

  Calgary AB-based Userful Corporation has announced the release of Userful Multiplier V.3.7, the latest version of their multi-seat Linux software which turns a single PC into 10 virtual machines.

• Don’t You Just Hate Some Analysts?

  A server for AD/file/print with 2 gB RAM can handle 20 users with GNU/Linux, so the “extra” cost of using GNU/Linux terminal services is -$1800 . Seems like a good deal to me. Sizing the server reasonably scales out a long way. I budget about $25 per user on the server as I save more than $100 on the client hardware because of smaller case, CPU, memory, power-supply and case. I can run gigabit/s on CAT-5 if needed so the cost of network upgrading is minimal on any system wired in the last ten years. Take that, Sloan.

Server

• Linux is now Oracle’s low-end offering

  Oracle Corp. has rekindled its Solaris love. Sun’s Solaris operating system will underlie new high-end data center appliances running the Oracle software stack. And Oracle EnterpriseLinux now becomes the preferred OS for lower-end commodity hardware.

  By making the Sparc/Solaris tandem the foundation of big-iron SMP appliances, the company is going back to its roots when Oracle and Sun were joined at the hip. Pre-Linux, Solaris was the de facto development platform for new Oracle software. New Oracle databases came out first on Solaris and later on everything else.

• Piper Jaffray: 3 Firms To Grow Big In The Cloud

  Still, I wasn’t sure Red Hat had emerged as the overwhelming, dominant supplier of Linux to the cloud computing vendors. The report’s authors note that all examples of the next generation, cloud computing data centers are running Linux, and more often than not, Red Hat Enterprise Linux. That would include Salesforce.com, Google and Amazon.com. In effect, cloud computing “leverages the compelling economics of open source components,” Murphy and Schwartz wrote.

• Oracle in no hurry to clarify OpenSolaris’ future

  When Oracle Corporation announced its plans for the various products it had inherited as part of its purchase of Sun Microsystems, one open source project was prominently absent – OpenSolaris.

Kernel Space

• Installing Linux Kernel Source

Applications

• The state of (high definition) video editing on Linux

  In short, PiTiVi’s development has a strong focus on doing everything “the right way” before adding extra features, and using the GStreamer framework is an important choice. The result is better integration with the Ubuntu, GNOME-based desktop, a consistent user interface, and clean, modular code that will help development progress faster as we enter the stage of expanding the feature list. It’s an exciting time for open source video editing on Linux, and hopefully more developers can hop on board to bring these advancements sooner.

• Gloobus is a sexy file previewer for your Gnome desktop

• Midori 0.2.3 Released

  It’s a GTK+ based Webkit browser that is extremely fast and extremely awesome.

• Findwild

• Instructionals

  • SHMMAX share Linux memory

  • Linux Training Week: Customisation

  • Fix DSL pppoe connection problem with Network Manager in Ubuntu 9.10

  • Linux/UNIX: Move File Starting With A Dash

  • ImageMagick: add text to many images

  • Quick note to users installing ~arch KDE4

  • SHMMAX share Linux memory

• Games

  • Plants Vs. Zombies for Linux

    Have you heard of the famous Plants Vs. Zombies game? If not, it is an awesome game which takes you through varied levels of adventures to protect your home from Zombies who are trying to “eat your brains”. The primary defense mechanism for your home is implemented through plants who protect the house with their powers.

  • Match, run, collect and put all the pieces together

    phime studio has announced the release of Dale Hardshovel and the Bloomstone Mystery, a puzzle game now available for PC Windows, Linux and Apple Mac OS X platforms.

K Desktop Environment (KDE SC)

• the limits of virtual desktops

  so… we’re going to be talking about activity stuff at tokamak this week. there’s a lot of things that aren’t final yet… but… one thing that’s pretty much settled is that the activity/context stuff is going to be separate from virtual desktops. regardless of whether we *should* do such a thing, it’s not possible to do it properly anyways. I’ve been asked about this a few times so I’m going to explain the whole thing in excruciating detail so that I never have to explain it again.

• On the menubar

  KDE developers are currently discussing whether Rekonq could replace Konqi as KDE’s default web browser. I’m glad that this discussion has not (yet) turned into a flamewar like we saw in the days when Dolphin replaced Konqi as the default file manager. Instead, people are mostly discussing whether Rekonq is up to the task it is supposed to fulfil, and many people are arguing against that (including the Rekonq developers themselves!).

• Configure and use the KDE 4.4 pager

Distributions

• Think you’ve mastered Linux? Prove it, with Suicide Linux

  Linux gurus who pride themselves on their skills with the command line would finally have a way to prove it if one guy’s wacky idea came to fruition. Yes, it’s Suicide Linux, where any unrecognized command is parsed as “rm -rf /” … that’s Linux for “your hard drive’s content go boom.”

• Red Hat Family

  • Savvytek lands Red-Hat Linux Virtualization implementation project

    In partnership with Red Hat and Oracle; and in their endeavor to lead the market towards a more proficient, secure and better performing infrastructural solutions; Savvytek was chosen by Middle East Payment Services (MEPS) to implement their new core application – RS2 – based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Oracle technologies. This technology migration project comes to support MEPS direction in building a Highly Available, Cost-Effective–Ready Data center that hosts and supports their mission-critical, dynamic operation.

  • Lenovo promotes ThinkServer brand with Tech Data, Red Hat rebates

    Lenovo has announced a rebate program with Red Hat and Tech Data that will give resellers rebates when they purchase select Lenovo ThinkServers and Red Hat Enterprise Linux or Red Hat Enterprise Linux Advanced. The rebates are designed to give Red Hat resellers an incentive to try out Lenovo’s ThinkServer brand.

• Debian Family

  • Element OS- Your ultimate entertainment Linux OS.

    It is based on the Debian Packaging System (.deb), same one that Ubuntu uses. Unlike other Debian/Ubuntu based systems, Element OS utilizes its own online app center for software installations, where many of the most popular Linux applications that are compatible with our interface standards have been ported.

  • Debian Installer

    A few weeks ago, I noticed some really good e-Bay deals on used, Opteron-based servers. I mean, they were going for less money than I had to pay for old Pentium III-based servers just three years ago. So, I decided that maybe it was time to upgrade.

  • Ubuntu

    • Debian & Ubuntu on my Acer Aspire One D150

      A few weeks ago, I won an Acer Aspire One D150 on Ebay. For anyone not in the know, it is a netbook with a 10.1 inch screen. Apparently, the machine was an unwanted Christmas present and the owner had not used it very much, if at all.

    • Little Things That Matter: Ubuntu 10.04′s MessagingMenu

      I’ll round off this little personal love-fest for awesome user-design with a picture of the latest addition to the Lucid MeMenu. We’ve already seen it get Gwibber integration and now but the latest updates have given it a personal touch, knocking it ¾ of the way into the proposed design ballpark.

    • U1 Music Store – Store Music in U1?

      After the post I made about the Ubuntu One Music Store, I’ve noticed a couple of things which might indicate what’s coming.

      Firstly as we know Rhythmbox is the music player of choice in Ubuntu and we can already see the placeholder for the music store in the app.

    • Kubuntu Lucid Review

      I am an early adopter of KDE 4 and I welcome the radical changes it has made from earlier versions. I have been using KDE 4 from 4.0 release and has been following its growth from simple & buggy to feature-rich and mature. The fifth installment of KDE 4, KDE SC 4.4, released on February 9th caused a lot of excitement among KDE fans like me. I could not wait for the shiny new packages arrive in a distro near me.

      Kubuntu seemed to be the winning choice because I have seen early KDE 4.4 reviews state that Kubuntu was the easiest and less buggy path to 4.4. In this article, I will be reviewing both Kubuntu Lucid Lynx the new KDE SC 4.4. I chose the 32 bit version of Kubuntu Lucid Lynx alpha 2. The test machine was Compaq Presario V3000 series (V3624AU) with AMD Turion 64 X2 @1.8GHz cpu, 3 GB RAM, Nvidia GeForce Go 7150 integrated display card and Broadcom wifi card.

Devices/Embedded

• Marvel Reveals ARM-Powered Notebook at MWC

  Even though ARM processors are generally dominant as far as the mobile market is concerned, the CPUs have not been able to make an incursion into the mobile PC front so far because of the chip architecture’s lack of support for the Windows operating system. However, the Linux platform is gaining momentum and its support for ARM has opened up a series of possibilities for the processors, with the most recent development being an ARM-based notebook.

• Pogoplug Safely, Seamlessly Shares Your Personal Cloud with Others

  The Pogoplug is a small device, basically a custom designed Linux computer with four USB ports (for your drives) and an Ethernet connection. You plug drives with shared files into the USB ports and then connect the Pogoplug to your home router (or switch) directly.

• SYSGO ELinOS supports TI’s OMAP35x evaluation module

  SYSGO has launched ELinOS 5.0, a Linux operating system that supports the Texas Instruments OMAP35x Evaluation Module. The new SYSGO support package combines high performance and minimal power levels with industrial grade Linux in a single chip. The package enables rapid development of reliable long-lived applications.

• Android

  • Wipro to offer commercialisation services on TI’s OMAP processors

    Wipro said that these services, which include Linux baseport, Android operating system (OS) porting on hardware platforms, middleware, third-party component integration, application development, and operator customisation, addresses commercialisation requirements of OEMs designing on Android.

  • TI’s OMAP gets Android development support from Wipro

    Wipro Technologies is offering range of design services for Texas Instrument’s OMAP processors such as Linux baseport, Android operating system (OS) porting on hardware platforms, middleware, third-party component integration, application development, and operator customization. These services are aimed at helping OEMs in commercializing Android based products quickly.

  • AdWhirl Android SDK Now Available

    AdWhirl, a growing leader in mobile advertisement, as just announced the Android SDK for their ads. Could this mean that Ad companies are loosing interest in the iPhone? The Press Release is below. Find out for yourself.

• Tablets

  • Nvidia tablets could use Intel’s Meego

    Asked whether Nvidia would consider bunging Intel and Nokia’s new open source Operating System on its tablets and other Tegra powered devices, Neil Trevett, the firm’s vice president of embedded content said it would take the lead from its OEM partners.

The Competitive Advantages of Free Software [PDF]

What is freedom anyway?

Late last year Steve, the co-founder of Shimmer Project, wrote a longish blog entry about freedom. I wholeheartedly recommend that you read the article thorough. Today I’d like to raise up some points from Steve’s blog entry and go even further, pondering what freedom means for me and how I feel it actualizing. Things aren’t going to be easy to say, probably harder to read and even harder, almost heartbreaking, to admit.

[...]

Good communication means people can throw suggestions around and give constructive criticism without anybody feeling they are not valued. We should trust our developers work according to the responsibility they got when they were appointed as team leaders and became part of the Xubuntu team.

Now that all this is said, it’s time to start taking actions. Let’s continue the discussions about new governance, start communicating more efficiently and attract new developers. If we can do that, it’s very likely that the Xubuntu community will be more powerful than ever.

Metasploit Gains Further Commercial Adoption

Learner’s Edge Selects rSmart Sakai Collaboration and Learning Environment to Enhance and Expand Its Services

We chose the open source rSmart Sakai CLE over the leading commercial course management systems because it meets all of our technical requirements for functionality, scalability, and stability, and because of rSmart’s excellent reputation and track record for support services.”

Imonggo Free POS Software Possible with Open Source Technology and Cloud Computing

The Imonggo team revealed today the technology behind the award-winning Imonggo POS software that has attracted thousands of small business retailers. Imonggo is the first software-as-service (SaaS) company to offer the global market a web-based point of sale software, which is easy to use, scalable, and affordable.

Events

• SCALE 8x – Wish you were here

  Greetings from sunny L.A.! I’m scurrying around before we finish setting up our Linux Pro and Ubuntu User booth, but I thought I’d post a quick update on the first day at SCALE 8x. It looks like attendance is up quite a bit over last year, which bodes well for both the event and the economy. Several old friends are noticeably absent and missed this year, while there are also a lot of new faces – I met several first-time SCALE attendees yesterday and a couple of first-time open source event attendees, too. SCALE is a great ‘gateway’ event for first-timers because if its relaxed atmosphere, affordability, and jam-packed schedule with options for everyone.

• Atlantic.Net to sponsor California Linux Expo 2010

  Orlando, FL (February 19, 2010) – Atlantic.Net (www.atlantic.net) a privately–held high performance data center services company, today announced its participation as a sponsor for the California Linux Show 2010.

• Eclipse Foundation at CeBIT

• Pentaho Open Source BI vs. Proprietary Heavyweights at Caesars Palace

Training

• LinuxCertified Announces its next “Linux Fundamentals” Course

• Marakana Offering Special Open Source Training Deals

  Marakana is a privately-held company based in San Francisco, CA. Since 2001, Marakana has been helping IT professionals get better at what they do by providing an extensive range of training services on open source software solutions and agile practices. The Around Dublin Blog is teaming up with our friends at Marakana to offer our readers a 10% discount on any course from their extensive training catalog. To qualify for this discount, simply type “Around-Dublin-Blog” when prompted for the coupon code during the course registration process.

Mozilla

• Google’s microsoft takedown helped by rivals

  Personally, I prefer Mozilla Firefox, a descendant of the Netscape browser that Microsoft vanquished in Browser War I. Maintained by an open-source community, Firefox is available for PCs, Macs and Linux computers, and is the second-most-used browser after Internet Explorer. The program benefits from a well-developed ecosystem that includes thousands of add-ons for everything from speeding up YouTube downloads to StumbleUpon, which adds a button that helps you discover and share websites that match your interests.

Databases

• Slingshot Software Announces Added Support for Linux OS and PostgresSQL Database Management System

  Slingshot Software, a leading provider of web-based enterprise software solutions to mid to large sized companies, today announces added support for the Linux operating system and PostgresSQL database management system.

• “Open Source Databases: One Size Does Not Fit All”

  •How specific database use cases are addressed (or not) by select open source databases.

• EnterpriseDB to Host Three Complimentary Webinars Focused on Increased Use of Open Source Databases in the Enterprise

Business

• SugarCRM Targeting 100 Indian Customers for 2010

  The Cupertino-based commercial free and open source CRM software company has been driving on its free downloadable software — Sugar Community Edition, the offering previously known as Sugar Open Source for the last six years. The users could freely redistribute Sugar Open Source and the license allowed for the inspection and modification of the source code and for the creation of derived works.

• Investment firm manages business rules with open source

  Aiming to improve the flexibility of its compliance system to improve user efficiency and reduce mounting system queries, investment company Millennium Global Investments (MGI) recently deployed JBoss Enterprise BRMS (Business Rules Management System), an open-source business rules solution developed by Red Hat, Inc.

Releases

• Telemedicine in the making: Moca source code released

  Moca, an MIT student organization, today announced the release of the Moca source code, a set of foundational building blocks for telemedicine and mHealth applications that use wireless networks to connect rural healthcare workers to urban-area specialists.

• Google

  • Google News Living Stories scheme goes open source

    Google News has announced that it is open sourcing the code for its Living Stories project to allow more online news publishers to make use of the platform.

    Launched two months ago, Living Stories offers a new way for users to browse web news articles by detailing different developments in a story as they occur on a single page.

  • Google Open-Source Living Stories, Its Experimental Approach to News Reporting

  • Google’s Living Stories to become open source

  • What it means when open source is no longer the underdog

    I predict these anti-Google rumblings are going to start hitting open source, too, and soon. There are always dual motives in open source — it’s part of the business world after all. There is an assumption that open source steals jobs, and drives down tech wages, which is growing.

Government

• The Future Growth of Russian Open Source Market Ensured: Key 2009 Partnerships, Milestones and Resources

  The head of the Ministry Igor Shchegolev and Vice President – General Manager EMEA of Red Hat Corporation Werner Knoblich met on the 4th February 2010 at the Ministry of Communications and Mass Communications. They discussed both global and Russian open source market trends and Russian achievements in 2009.

  [...]

  A number of Russian universities implemented open source software educational programs.

  The Russian Association for Open Source Software was established.

• Open Source In Government: What’s the Problem?

  Tiemann’s argument was that the U.S. government has settled into a procurement system that locks contracts in for longer than they should. By having the long lock-in he noted that it prevents faster user driven innovation.

  Makes a whole lot of sense to me. If government agencies are restricted by master agreements that have the goal of locking in software it makes it harder for anyone new – open source or otherwise to get access.

• MPs live in dark ages with their software choice

  We have to be realistic here: it was never likely that MPs would opt for an open-source operating system for the House of Commons’ own machines – much as the idea of them searching round for an open-source package to keep track of their expenses has a certain appeal – the choice of Vista is frankly bizarre.

Openness

• (Video) When Open Source Works In The Offline World

  The introduction of open source processes continues to re-invent innovation as far as software culture is concerned, but can we see this seeping into the analogue world? Cesar Harada’s research centers on this process. His most recent project Open Sailing explores developing a sustainable architecture for research and eventually future living conditions in the oceans.

• Open Source Maps Are Helping the World Bank Save Lives in Haiti

  The humanitarian relief effort underway in Haiti is proving the true potential of open source map building. Don’t take my word for it, follow the Tweets and blogs of my friend Schuyler Erle. He’s on the ground in Port-au-Prince along with Tom Buckley, a developer of mapmaking program GeoCommons Maker. The pair are advising the World Bank on the use of crowd-sourced mapping, primarily through the open-source program OpenStreetMap, in the relief and recovery effort in Haiti. They are also dealing with rain, illness, PowerBar meals, World Bank contacts snowbound back in DC, and bureaucratic alphabet soup.

Programming

• After Learning Java Syntax, What Next?

Security

• Obama Boosts Nukes

  On February 1, the Obama administration delivered a budget request calling for a full 10 percent increase in nuclear weapons spending next year, to be followed by further increases in subsequent years.

• Obama’s atomic blunder

  As Vermont seethes with radioactive contamination and the Democratic Party crumbles, Barack Obama has plunged into the atomic abyss.

  In the face of fierce green opposition and withering scorn from both liberal and conservative budget hawks, Obama has done what George W. Bush could not: pledge billions of taxpayer dollars for a relapse of the 20th Century’s most expensive technological failure.

  Obama has announced some $8.3 billion in loan guarantees for two new reactors planned for Georgia. Their Westinghouse AP-1000 designs have been rejected by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission as being unable to withstand natural cataclysms like hurricanes, tornadoes and earthquakes.

Environment

• A surreal argument for biofuels

  A leaked paper has set out the idea that palm oil plantations can be considered ‘forests’ – and the EU seems to be buying it

• Deep-sea trawling is destroying coral reefs and pristine marine habitats

  Deep-sea trawling is devastating corals and pristine marine habitats that have gone untouched since the last ice age, a leading marine biologist has warned.

  A survey of the world’s reefs and seamounts – giant submerged mountains that rise more than a kilometre above the seabed – has revealed widespread damage to the ecosystems, many of which are home to species unknown to science, said Jason Hall-Spencer at Plymouth University in the UK.

Censorship/Privacy/Civil Rights

• Facebook Hit With Class Action Over Privacy Changes

  A class action lawsuit has been filed against Facebook over changes that the social networking site made to its privacy settings last November and December.

• Tasmanian electoral law threatens privacy

  A law requiring all electoral matter posted on the Internet to be accompanied by the poster’s name and address conflicts with the need for users of social networking sites to maintain their privacy.

Scandals

• Wipro Investigates Alleged US$4 Million Fraud by Employee

  Indian outsourcer Wipro said Wednesday it is investigating the embezzlement of US$4 million [m] from the company after an employee allegedly obtained a colleague’s online password.

  The fraud, which was detected in December, had been going on for about a year, although the company has been able to recover half of the money, a Wipro spokeswoman said.

• BBC Trust blows £3m on new HQ

  The BBC Trust signed a £2.2m, eight-year lease for the first floor of a converted Edwardian mansion in central London last month to house its 60 staff. It spent a further £1m on refurbishment, including £250,000 on interior designers, project management and removals, and £400,000 on fitting out the building.

Intellectual Monopolies/Copyrights

• Leaked ACTA Draft Treaty Reveals Plans for Net Clampdown

  In a separate leak that first appeared on blogs last week, the European Commission updated members of the European Parliament on the most recent face-to-face meeting between the signatory countries, which took place in Mexico at the end of last month.

  According to that leak, the Internet chapter of the treaty was discussed, but no changes to the position suggested by the U.S. last fall were agreed.

  “The internet chapter was discussed for the first time on the basis of comments provided by most parties to US proposal. The second half of the text (technological protection measures) was not discussed due to lack of time,” the memo said, adding:

  “Discussions still focus on clarification of different technical concepts, therefore, there was not much progress in terms of common text. The U.S. and the E.U. agreed to make presentations of their own systems at the next round, to clarify issues.”

• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

Resource Hogs

My people are running XP in 256MB with a serious over-commit to virtual memory. I can run 12 users at once and services in 1024 MB with GNU/Linux. That would explain a lot of the speed difference. My terminal server is not swapping.

We’re All Makers

Fortunately, nobody is making us fall under the spell of fancier, shinier, ever-more-closed toys, and we still have a wealth of great choices open to us. Like Linux and Free/Open Source Software, for starters. All you need is a PC, an Internet connection, some time, and the creative possibilities are legion.

Intelligence Slideshow: 40 Fast Facts on Linux

Which Linux For Non-Techie Windows Users?

obarthelemy writes “Having at last gotten Linux to run satisfactorily on my own PCs, I’d now like to start transitioning friends and family from XP to Linux instead of Windows 7. The catch is that these guys don’t understand or care much about computers, so the transition has to be as seamless and painless as possible. Actually, they won’t care for new things; even the upcoming upgrade to Windows 7 would be a pain and a bother, which is a great opportunity for Linux. I’m not too concerned about software (most of them only need browser, IM, VLC, mail and a Powerpoint viewer for all those fascinating attachments). What I’m concerned about is OS look-and-feel and interface — system bar on the bottom with clock, trash, info on the right, menu on the left, menu items similar to those of Windows. Is it better to shoot for a very targeted distro? Which would you recommend? Are there themes/skins for mainstream distributions instead? I’ve been looking around the web, and it’s hard to gauge which distros are well-done and reasonably active.”

LemonPOS: Your Open Source Point of Sale

If your small business is looking for a solid point of sale system, without so many bells and whistles as to increase the learning curve, LemonPOS might be just what you are looking for. It’s not Quickbooks POS, but it will help you to get your business up and running quickly and inexpensively. And, since it’s running on top of the Linux operating system, you know it’s running on top of a proven, reliable system.

The Evolution that is Linux

Not only is Linux and FreeBSD holding on to the server markets but also under the hood of iPhones and ARM processors. Spreading its seeds across all continents be it the PC Market or Laptop or Mini-Laptop Market, the species continues to awe its original developers.

Desktop

• Matt Asay Sees the Light

  Oh well, better late than never. The year of GNU/Linux on the desktop has come and gone, he agrees, and we will go forward to much greater accomplishments.

• From OS X to Ubuntu: 2 Years Later

  I have to say that over the last couple of years, I’ve really come to love Ubuntu. Until recently, I rarely felt the need to go back to Windows or OS X (I’ll tell you more about that in another blog post). I’ve been generally pleased with each new release of Ubuntu and enjoy seeing the incremental improvements. Ubuntu has come an unbelievable way since I first tried it almost 5 years ago.

• Alex laptop to bring Linux to the masses

  A new laptop aims to make it easier for anyone to get online, surf the net, send emails and keep in touch with friends and family.

  The Linux based 15.4-inch Alex laptop comes with a suite of programs for everyday tasks including office and image editing tools.

• When Vendors Go Bad

  That’s right: I installed Linux on the laptop, and therefore Newegg is not going to honor my refund.

  Need I say more? Newegg is now on record as a vendor from whom you purchase at your own risk. They have demonstrated that they will knowingly sell defective hardware, and not honor refund requests on same.

• Activating Virgin Media Broadband on Linux

  When I plugged in the router and went to view a website on my computer, I was redirected to an activation page, where I had to enter my name and postcode and stuff like that. Except that the first page you go to checks to make sure you’re running Windows or using a Mac. Thankfully, Konqueror and Opera both let me change my browser identification string so that Virgin’s servers think I am using Windows.

• Staples Launches Online Backup, Security Service

  Help desk support is provided along with systems and network monitoring. For larger, more sophisticated businesses, Staples provides cross-platform and open source support for Windows, Linux, and Apple operating systems.

• [Sarcasm] Linux frustrates!

  I have heard of my geeky friends talking about this Linux stuff. I wasn’t sure what it was so I asked them about it. Honestly, I thought they were trying to sell me some religion the way they jumped all over me trying to explain what Linux is. They did make some very good points though. I have always felt uncomfortable with using a pirated version of windows but I can’t justify the expense of buying an original version. I am also tired of all the problems I have been having because of virus and spyware infestations. These Linux guys tell me that they don’t have any problems with that stuff.

Server

• Linux and Open Source Software at the center of security

  If Linux is recommended by the Department of Defense, then I consider it good for me as well. I no longer trust Internet Explorer or Windows for that matter, with any valuable information online. Too often I hear about rootkits and malware running silently in Windows, allowing critical information to be gathered through a backdoor. Even the most recent activity regarding the TDL3 rootkit which was installed on a huge amount of Windows computers. Users never even knew it was there until the Microsoft patch for the 17 year old bug was released. I’ve seen malicious programs get downloaded and launched by simply visiting a website with Internet Explorer. With all things considered, Linux proves to be the most solid platform in the long run, which to me should make it the #1 choice for servers and desktops, or whatever application you choose.

• VM

  • Linux and the Power of Virtual Mega-Machines

    Currently, the vast majority of workloads requiring a large number of processing cores or large memory have already moved or are in the process of moving to Linux.

    These once-proprietary Unix applications have been relatively easy to migrate or are increasingly being written for a Linux or open source operating system alternative. This makes it inherently easier for these workloads to move to x86 infrastructure, providing more flexibility in their deployment models and giving customers the ability to take advantage of higher-performance and lower-cost commoditized systems.

  • Virtual Appliances Offer Fast Sandboxes, Production Environments

    One of the most obvious benefits of free and open source software is the ability to download world-class software and implement it gratis on your system. But, sometimes, there is a big difference between theory and action.

    I’m not talking about installing desktop applications like Firefox, OpenOffice.org, or GIMP. Most of the Linux distributions have by now made this process newbie-simple, and Windows and Mac systems have never had a problem with installation. Rather, I am talking about complex server systems, like Ruby on Rails, Tomcat, Joomla!, or Drupal. Regardless of platform, getting one of these instances running can range from a bit tricky to downright hair-pulling.

  • TestDrive – Test Drive an Ubuntu ISO in a Virtual Machine

Kernel Space

• Herding the Meta-Cats

  In the famous online argument between Linus and Minix creator Andrew Tanenbaum during the very early days of Linux, one of the more memorable statements from the latter was the following:

  I think co-ordinating 1000 prima donnas living all over the world will be as easy as herding cats

  The “prima donnas” that he was referring to were hackers, rather than opera singers, and his point was that it’s hard to get technically very able people with strong opinions to agree to the point where they can move a software project forward. And that, indeed, is part of the amazing achievement of Linux and all the free software projects that have adopted its methodology: without formal lines of command or management structures being imposed on them, those same prima donnas often *do* manage to agree on enough to make projects successful well beyond what traditional development techniques can produce.

  So, it turned out that Tanenbaum was wrong as far as herding those particular cats was concerned, but what about at the next level: how easy is it to herd *meta*-cats – that is, to get the various projects working together in a more coordinated fashion?

• New attempt to integrate AppArmor into Linux

  John Johansen, a developer with commercial Ubuntu sponsor Canonical, has submitted an updated version of the AppArmor security framework to the Linux kernel developers for inspection. Johansen writes that, like the SELinux and Tomoyo solutions already integrated into the kernel, this fourth general posting of AppArmor uses Linux Security Modules (LSM) to hook into the kernel. Some, but not all of the characteristics criticised by the kernel developers when AppArmor was posted last have reportedly been corrected in the new posting – known for his rather direct comments, however, the maintainer of the Virtual File System (VFS) of Linux soon also found various inconsistencies in the newly posted code.

• Invoking user-space applications from the kernel

  Invoking specific kernel functions (system calls) is a natural part of application development on GNU/Linux. But what about going in the other direction, kernel space calling user space? It turns out that there are a number of applications for this feature that you likely use every day. For example, when the kernel finds a device for which a module needs to be loaded, how does this process occur? Dynamic module loading occurs from the kernel through the usermode-helper process.

• Graphics Stack

  • Wayland Is Indeed Moving Off Eagle For Mesa

    Last month we reported that the Wayland Display Server was losing its Eagle-specific bits and today this dependence migration from Eagle to Mesa’s EGL stack has been confirmed.

  • Nouveau Now Switched On In Ubuntu 10.04

    For those interested in proper OpenGL support for gaming or other situations, the NVIDIA binary driver can still be installed in Ubuntu 10.04.

Applications

• How To Install Nautilus CoverFlow In Ubuntu

• Simple Scan – A simple scanning application

• Simple Lightweight Graphical Latex Editor Ubuntu Linux : Gummi

• 6 of the Best Free Linux Disk Cloning Software

  One of the key responsibilities of a system administrator is to ensure the safety of an organisation’s computer data. This is a critical task for any organisation, given that the loss of important data could have profound implications on its future prosperity.

• Instructionals

  • How to get started with Linux

  • How to add/remove User accounts in Linux?

  • Linux Installation Choices

  • Remove Duplicates with fdupes

  • Making a videoloop with Kino and Audacity

  • How to change the default Opera download directory on Linux.

  • Creating MySQL Backups With AutoMySQLBackup On Ubuntu 9.10

  • HOWTO: Customized Live DVDs with Reconstructor’s Web UI.

  • Ars Technica Guide to Virtualization: Part II

  • Bash to Basics: The For Loop

  • Simplest bare metal program for ARM

  • How to install GOsa on RHEL/CentOS 5

  • Howto enable password protection in Burg

  • Create Your Own Avatar for Free on Linux

• Games

  • Enterprise Edition… Space Invaders?

    What do you get when you cross business logic and 80s arcade video games? An open source Space Invaders clone that’s being used to illustrate the power of a business logic integration platform for game design.

  • 7 reasons to play retro titles – Puppy Arcade 7 is released!

    So here are my 7 reasons why you should use Puppy Arcade:

    1. There is a wealth of games/systems that you are able to relive your childhood/youth with.

    2. Scott Jarvis is dedicated to this distro and updates are regular.

    3. Spec requirements are low.

    4. It puts the best of the emulation scene in one distro.

    5. Puppy Arcade runs from a modified Puppy Linux which is as fast as hell

    6. It has a really groovy backdrop!

    7. It really is that damn good.

  • Linux Gaming With Sabayon Gaming Edition DVD

    One of the most common complaints I hear about Linux is that it’s just no good for gaming. Some complain about hardware support, others the lack of titles, others that it’s just too complicated. It’s true that Linux probably isn’t the first platform that comes to mind when I think about PC gaming, but some parts of that reputation are inaccurate or outdated. Sabayon Gaming DVD takes on that myth to see just what a Linux gaming system can do. It’s got a fast Gentoo base, built-in codecs and 3D driver support, Compiz, and many of the best games available for Linux. On top of the usual Gnome games, you get such titles as Neverball, Battle for Wesnoth, OpenArena, Tremulous, Warsow, Nexuiz, and Warzone 2100, all playable from the live DVD.

  • Amnesia: The Dark Descent – Teaser, Web Site & Pre-order

  • Amnesia: The Dark Descent – Teaser, Web Site & Pre-order

    From the makers of the Penumbra series comes a brand new survival horror game, Amnesia: The Dark Descent.

K Desktop Environment (KDE SC)

• Easy folder sharing in KDE 4.4

• Window-specific options in KDE 4.4

• How to install KDE Software Compilation 4.4 from PPA in ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic)

  KDE announces the immediate availability of the KDE Software Compilation 4.4 on 9th feb 2010, “Caikaku”, bringing an innovative collection of applications to Free Software users. Major new technologies have been introduced, including social networking and online collaboration features, a new netbook-oriented interface and infrastructural innovations such as the KAuth authentication framework. According to KDE’s bug-tracking system, 7293 bugs have been fixed and 1433 new feature requests were implemented. The KDE community would like to thank everybody who has helped to make this release possible.

• Arch Linux + Kdevelop + Irrlicht 3D + Blender

  Kdevelop was another application that I noticed was much quicker. Under Ubuntu I could barley use KDE as it was but now I can use KDE and the KDevelopment system and I have no lag issues at all. I’m really starting to wonder what the Ubuntu team is adding to their distribution to make it such a hog.

• Getting Google Calendar to work with KDE’s KOrganizer, Kontact and KMail (on Kubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala)

• KDE or Openbox

  I love KDE, and the latest release is better than ever. It’s easy, fast, beautiful, all that.

  So when I installed Arch on another partition in another attempt to to find the cause behind those pesky network problems, and I slapped Openbox on it because I didn’t want to waste my bandwidth on a KDE install I’d never use, I certainly didn’t think I would consider using it full time.

Distributions

• Mandriva Family

  • Mandriva 2010 – A Review

  • 15 Awesome Mandriva Linux Wallpapers

    15 Awesome Mandriva Linux Wallpapers: We’ve featured several distro-specific wallpapers before, like our awesome Slackware wallpapers collection and a number of cool Ubuntu wallpapers. This time, I’ll be giving tribute to one of the best Linux distributions (currently topping our “Best Linux Distro of the Decade” poll) around, by sharing with you yet another set of beautiful desktop wallpapers.

• Gentoo Family

  • using gentoo

    My point is that, it shouldn’t matter what Linux distribution you are going to use — you need someone to keep it up and running. I think Gentoo is great because it removes the veil from saying, “just run these versions of the software and you’ll be totally fine.” Bugs creep in all the time. Binary distributions stick you with a set of packages, that if, you want to break out of that pigeon hole, it may be completely impossible to do. With Gentoo, the definition of “stable” is left up to the user, the maintainer, the systems administrator. I love it.

    Go Gentoo.

  • Pulseaudio and Kmix 4.4 in Sabayon 5

• Fedora

  • Fedora 13 and rawhide diverge

    The much-anticipated split between the Fedora “Rawhide” development repository and the stabilizing Fedora 13 repository has happened at last. That means that people continuing to follow Rawhide should fasten their seat belts and update their backups in anticipation of a flood of packages intended for Fedora 14.

• Debian Family

  • Dual booting Debian and KolibriOS

    KolibriOS is very impressive stuff, and after finding a brief set of instructions for installing it to a hard drive, I had a “dual-boot” system of both Debian and Kolibri running on the old Thinkpad 560e that’s still floating around the house.

  • Ubuntu

    • Eeebuntu 4 Beta 1 Overview And Screenshots

      Eeebuntu, the Linux distribution for netbooks which won the Sourceforge Choice Awards: BEST NEW PROJECT in 2009 has released the first beta of the new version 4. For now only the i386 version is available.

    • Ubuntu Netbook Remix enlightens ARM support

      Canonical is developing a 2D ARM interface based on Enlightenment Foundation Libraries for the upcoming Ubuntu 10.04 (“Lucid Lynx”) version of Ubuntu Netbook Remix. In other Ubuntu news, Ubuntu Live CDs in Lucid Lynx will boot 33 percent faster, and The Linux Box will market Ubuntu.

    • Ubuntu Optimizes its OS for ARM CPUs

    • Ubuntu live CDs now boot 33% faster!

      How to convince a Mac OS X or Windows user to try GNU/Linux? Installing the desired distribution in a Virtual Machine? Read them all those FAQs about partitioning your hard drive for a dual-boot system? No, no – there’s an easier way: live CDs or DVDs! Almost every distribution (like Ubuntu, Knoppix or Fedora) are capable of booting into a fully functional desktop right from a burned disc. Simply download the .iso image file, burn it to a CD or DVD with your favorite disc burning application, and reboot your machine!

      [...]

      According to Bennett, tweaks to the debconf database have boosted the live CD startup time nearly 33%!

    • Ubuntu 10.04 May Backport More Kernel DRM

      The decision to stick with the Linux 2.6.32 kernel rather than the soon to be released Linux 2.6.33 kernel for Ubuntu 10.04 LTS that will be released in April is leading to a few more headaches for those involved with packing X.Org and the graphics components for the Lucid Lynx release.

    • Ubuntu Finally Getting A New Default Theme Starting With Lucid

      In a recent interview (as of yesterday, 19 February) for DellVlog, Mark Shuttleworth says Ubuntu will finally change the default theme from Human to a “light theme”.

    • No Human Theme In Ubuntu 10.04

      In an interview recorded on February 19 2010, Mark Shuttleworth revealed that a new light theme will replace the Human theme in Ubuntu 10.04. The Human theme has been the default theme in Ubuntu since the first release.

    • New Theme For Ubuntu 10.04 – Human Theme Dropped

    • Ubuntu One Music Store Sneak Peek

Devices/Embedded

• OSS big in mobile world

  The annual Mobile World Congress was dominated by open source operating systems

  The annual Mobile World Congress (MWC) is always a highlight of the year for the mobile sector but this year’s show was also a big one for open source software. Traditionally in a market dominated by proprietary operating systems there has been a significant shift towards open source software by mobile phone makers over the past year.

• Linux Wall Wart Works Wonderfully

  It’s no secret that Linux runs behind many consumer devices, and embedded Linux fits in the tiniest of places. One of the latest ways to get your Linux fix comes in what looks like power wall wart from TonidoPlug. Under the cover you’ll find essentially a Marvell SheevaPlug with a 1.2 GHz CPU, 512MB of DDR2 memory and a 512MB flash disk. On the outside you’ll see a single USB port and an Ethernet jack.

• Projectors

  • Android phone sports pico projector

    Samsung unveiled an Android 2.1 phone equipped with a built-in pico projector. The “I8250″ Android phone offers a 3.7-inch WVGA “Super AMOLED” display, an eight-megapixel camera, and up to 16GB of internal memory, says Samsung.

  • Pico Projectors Marry Mobile Phones

    Mobile phones are incorporating pico projectors for on-the-spot presentations, or for just sharing photos with friends, projected up to 100 inches wide. Four phones showcased that feature at Mobile World Congress.

• MeeGo

  • Under the Hood with MeeGo

    Some may be surprised by the merger, announced this week, of the open source Maemo and Moblin projects, given their architectural differences. Maemo targets ARM, while Moblin aims to enable devices with Intel Architecture (commonly “x86″) processors.

  • Tablet runs on Moorestown processor

    OpenPeak announced an Intel Moorestown-based tablet device, which may well end up running the new Nokia/Intel MeeGo operating system. The OpenTablet 7 features a 7-inch multi-touch display, 802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth 2.1, cellular, HDMI output and dual cameras, says the company.

  • The open source mobile ’super-platform’ cometh

    As you may be aware by now Nokia and Intel have announced that they will merge their respective Maemo and Moblin software platforms to create a combined Linux-based operating system targeting a new broader range of fixed and mobile devices. MeeGo is aimed at creating a unified Linux-based environment that will run across smartphones, mobile computers, netbooks, tablets, digital TVs and in-vehicle infotainment systems.

  • What does MeeGo mean for Mobile Linux?

    After years of hearing about it, I’m only aware of one phone the N900 that runs Maemo -and that’s from Nokia a company with hundreds of devices and handsets. Moblin on the other hand is the benchmark standard that Linux distros have been aiming for when it comes to netbooks – Intel Atom powered netbooks to be precise.

  • Maemo + Moblin = MeeGo: The Q&A

    Q: What about the decision to host it with the Linux Foundation?
    A: That’s a positive. It will get more visibility than it would directly managed by the vendors, it will abstract the project from certain institutional political interference (think ARM enemies at Intel, and the pro-Symbian crowd at Nokia), and it gives the project a more open image.

• Phones

  • Linux, open source driving smartphone revolution

    Google’s Linux-based Android operating system powers the industry’s latest must have, the Motorola Droid. Many more Android phones are making their debut, such as Motorola’s Backflip, which will be sold by AT&T it was announced at the Mobile World Congress this week. Apple must be thrilled.

  • Google gains the most, Palm loses the most, in smartphone market share

    Google’s significant gains can likely be attributed to the release of the Motorola Droid and Droid Eris phones on Verizon, along with the ingenious marketing campaign that introduced those phones to the public.

  • Biz Break: AT&T joins Google’s Android army; plus: Intuit profit rises

    AT&T will sell its first smartphone with Mountain View Internet juggernaut Google’s adroit Android operating system next month: Motorola’s Backflip.

  • Android

    • SK Telecom crams Android, processor inside a SIM card

      The SIM cards in cellular telephones might be smaller than a postage stamp and less than a millimeter thick but that hasn’t stopped South Korea’s SK Telecom from cramming all the major components needed to run Google’s Android OS inside one of them.

      The carrier’s Android SIM, a prototype of which is on show at this week’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, includes an ARM-based processor, companion memory and 1GB of flash memory to store the OS and other data.

    • Android phone boasts 14Mbps HSPA+

      Huawei announced the U8800, which it calls the first Android smartphone to run the 14Mbps HSPA+ cellular technology, and also tipped three lower-end Android phones — the U8300, U8100, and U8110 — plus a 7-inch “SmaKit S7″ Android tablet. Meanwhile AT&T confirmed that it will launch the Motorola Backflip on Mar. 7.

    • Saving the Gadget? The Dilemma of an Android Fanatic.

    • Multi-touch displays support all ten fingers at once

      The French company Stantum is demonstrating multi-touch displays that can react to as many as ten fingers simultaneously. The Android-ready “PMatrix” technology permits the use of gloves or styli, responding to varying levels of pressure, according to the company.

      According to Stantum, its PMatrix IP core and firmware watches every grid intersection of a touch-panel’s matrix and reports any change of electrical characteristics, “delivering an exact image of what’s happening on the touchscreen surface.” As a result, the company claims, there’s essentially no limit to the number of simultaneous touches a device can respond to.

    • Apple, Google gain in phone market

      The iPhone’s share of the smartphone grew to 25.3 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009–up more than a point–while Research In Motion (RIMM) fell to 41.6 percent, down a point, according to a comScore report. Microsoft (MSFT) and Palm (PALM) also lost ground while Google’s (GOOG) Android gained nearly 3 points to reach 5.2 percent.

    • HTC Android phones sport AMOLED, new UI layer

      Both the high-end HTC Desire and the more modest HTC Legend offer Android 2.1 along with a new version of HTC’s Sense UI layer. Most notably, the new HTC Sense offers an application called HTC Friend Stream, which is said to aggregate social communications, including Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr, into one “organized flow of updates.”

    • Multi-touch displays support all ten fingers at once

      The French company Stantum is demonstrating multi-touch displays that can react to as many as ten fingers simultaneously. The Android-ready “PMatrix” technology permits the use of gloves or styli, responding to varying levels of pressure, according to the company.

• Sub-notebooks

  • The New UI for ARM Based Ubuntu Devices

    ARM based platforms traditionally have a problem with graphics drivers and free software. Encumbered by licensing issues, many platforms only ship with 2D based drivers whilst the 3D driver-enabled offerings only frequent the poshest of circles such as Nokia’s N900. There are exceptions, but its a painful reality at the moment.

    Vendors are trying to work around it, especially as there is the expectation of a ramp-up in the availability of ARM based hardware. Super long-life netbooks, low powered touch based computers, and even a flurry of smaller embedded devices are forecast to hit the market this year, many of which will be based on the Linux operating system. Ubuntu would be a great match for this.

Google Declares “Living Stories” Experiment Success, Offers as Open Source

It’s been just over two months since Google, the New York Times and the Washington Post joined together to experiment with a new way to provide news with Google’s Living Stories. Today, Google has declared the experiment a success and has said that it will offer the project’s functionality to the general public.

Events

• Free/Open Source Software 2010 Workshop

  The Workshop on the Future of Research on Free/Open Source Software (FOSS) was recently held in Newport Beach, California.

  FOSS 2010 was an invitation-only workshop aimed at identifying the key research projects and challenges for free and open source software. FOSS is funded by the Computing Research Association and the National Science Foundation, and hosted by the Institute for Software Research at UC Irvine.

• SCALE ready for launch – Pre-registration for SCALE spikes, WIOS/OSSIE and more on Friday

  To get a sense of how the health of the Free/Open Source Software (FOSS) community is in general and to monitor the interest in FOSS and Linux in the region in particular, the Southern California Linux Expo staff watches pre-registration closely leading up to SCALE 8X.

• SCALE: 5 Key Takeaways for Open Source VARs

  SCALE, the Southern California Linux Expo, kicks off today in Los Angeles. More than a Linux geek fest, there are signs that SCALE is starting to attract solutions providers that work with Red Hat, Novell, Canonical and other open source partner programs. Here’s a look at five key trends solutions providers should be watching at SCALE.

Audiocasts

• The Linux Link Tech Show Episode 341 [Ogg]

Fog Computing

• Eucalyptus Completes Amazon Web Services Specs with Latest Release

  The Eucalyptus Project has reached a major milestone this week with the 1.6.2 release. While it mostly consists of minor improvements for performance and stability, the point release also marks the implementation of Amazon’s EC2 and S3 specifications. Your private cloud is now ready!

• Carnegie Mellon joins Open Cirrus, continues to grow cloud research expertise

  Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Computer Science announced this week that it is has joined the Open Cirrus project, adding one of its clusters to resources available on the open-source test bed for cloud computing research.

• Open sourcers fortify Ubuntu’s Koala food

  With Eucalyptus – the open source platform that put the Koala in Ubuntu’s Karmic Koala – you can mimic Amazon’s so-called infrastructure cloud inside your very own data center. At least up to a point.

  At the moment, Eucalyptus duplicates the APIs for Amazon’s three primary Web Services: Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2), Simple Storage Service (S3), and Elastic Block Store (EBS). But it’s yet to provide things like elastic load balancing or an Amazon-esque browser front-end – something that lets users tap your so-called private cloud through a reasonably intuitive GUI.

Twitter

• All A-Twitter about Open Source

  Twitter loves open source.

  [...]

  In a sense, this is a non-story: after all, does *anyone* these days not use open source for these kind of massive, rapidly-growing sites?

• It’s not just Twitter

  A recent Washington Post story observed that Twitter loves open source. Twitter’s not the only ones. Most, if not all, social networks are built on top of Linux and open-source software.

  When the writer wrote that Twitter loves open source he wasn’t exaggerating. He was quoting from Twitter’s About Open-Source page. There, Twitter states that, “Twitter is built on open-source software-here are the projects we have released or contribute to.”

• Twitter Loves Open Source: Just Not as Much as Status.net

  News is making the rounds that Twitter has put up a directory showing all the open source projects it loves, which in real terms means the projects that Twitter contributes to. It’s an impressive list of projects, including cachet, its Java-based text-processing software for handling Tweets, contributions to several Ruby tools, and other major contributions. Of course, notably absent is the actual platform that runs Twitter itself — so the love only runs so deep, apparently.

Mozilla

• Firefox running on a Nexus One

• Jetpack Gearing Up for Production: Look Out Chrome?

  Jetpack has been iterating pretty rapidly. The 0.8 release brings a few new APIs to work with. Namely, a toolbar API and the Places API to work with history and bookmarks in Firefox.

BSD

• FreeBSD and the GPL

  Linus Torvalds has said Linux wouldn’t have happened if 386BSD had been around when he started up. We trace the history of FreeBSD and how it’s affected the open source world.

Releases

• Announcing project OsmocomBB: Open Source GSM Stack

  I am hereby publicly announcing project OsmocomBB: A Free and Open Source software project to create a Free Software GSM baseband firmware.

  The baseband chipset is the part of a mobile phone that actuall communicates directly with the GSM network. It typically includes a DSP and a microprocessor running some RTOS, drivers for the baseband chipset, the GSM protocol stack and some kind of user interface.

• HAST Project is Complete!

  I’m very happy to report to FreeBSD users that the HAST project I was working on for the last three months is ready for testing and already committed to the HEAD branch.

  I’ll describe what HAST does in few words. HAST allows for synchronous block-level replication of any storage media (called GEOM providers, using FreeBSD nomenclature) over a TCP/IP network for fast failure recovery. HAST provides storage using the GEOM infrastructure, meaning it is file system and application independent and can be combined with any existing GEOM class. In case of a primary node failure, the cluster will automatically switch to the secondary node, check and mount the UFS file system or import the ZFS pool, and continue to work without missing a single bit of data.

• NetworkManager 0.8 Is Ready For Release

  NetworkManager, the free software project that’s backed by Red Hat and used by many distributions for easily managing network connections from the Linux desktop, is ready for its version 0.8 milestone. NetworkManager 0.7 is getting old and while NetworkManager 0.7.1 brought some improvements last year, the 0.8 release is rather exciting.

• Wine Announcement [1.1.39 Released]

  The Wine development release 1.1.39 is now available.

  What’s new in this release (see below for details):
  – Support for registry symbolic links.
  – Many MSI fixes.
  – Build process improvements.
  – MSXML cleanups and fixes.
  – A number of MSHTML improvements.
  – Various bug fixes.

Government

• The arsehattery of restrictions upon open and free political discourse in Tasmania

• Open Source, UK Gov. & Institutional Profligacy

  As you will probably know, I have a vested interest in seeing the Cabinet Office’s Open Source, Open Standards and Re-Use Action Plan[pdf] implemented in full and as quickly as possible. The comment above however, coming from deep within the halls of power, is a clear indication that there seems to be little appetite to drive this Action Plan into, ahem, action.

Licensing

• Major legal victory for open source in US

  The long running case of Jacobsen v. Katzer has been settled on terms favourable to Jacobsen, a developer of the Java Model Railroad Interface project. The case came about when Katzer incorporated Jacobsen’s code into it’s proprietary model trail software, after deleting the copyright notices that existed in the code.

• A Big Victory for F/OSS: Jacobsen v. Katzer is Settled

  A long running case of great significance to the legal underpinnings of free and open source/open source software (F/OSS) has just settled on terms favorable to the F/OSS developer. The settlement follows a recent ruling by a U.S. Federal District Court judge that affirmed several key rights of F/OSS developers under existing law.

  That case is Jacobsen v. Katzer, and the settlement documents were filed in court just after 9:00 AM this morning. Links to each of them can be found later in this blog entry. The brief background of the case, the legal issues at stake, and the settlement details are as follows.

  The software underlying such an important legal dispute is almost charmingly inconsequential from a commercial point of view – model railroad software. But to the litigants, the stakes were high relative to their resources and their commitment to that niche. The plaintiff, Robert Jacobsen, is a software developer member of the Java Model Railroad Interface (JMRI) Project, and the defendant, Matthew Katzer, is the owner of a proprietary vendor of model train software called KAMIND associates, d/b/a KAM Industries.

• Jacobsen and FOSS Community Win Big in Jacobsen v. Katzer Settlement

  The lawsuit is dismissed with prejudice (i.e. the case cannot be refiled by either party). This case is an excellent resolution for the FOSS community and the lawyers for Jacobsen should be congratulated for their hard work and success.

Openness

• Open-source sets trend for broader transparency

  Moody jokingly told the LCA2010 audience that the genome book is essentially the same text as Rebel Code, his 2002 book on Linux and the open source movement, with just a few terms changed.

  There is, he suggests, a more direct connection between the two endeavours. A public programme to piece together into a complete genome the fragmentary sequences of genetic materiel that came out of analysis in the early years of the decade was competing with a parallel programme run by private company Celera Genomics, which could have patented crucial parts of the discovery.

• Open Data: A Question of (Panton) Principles

  They form the basis of the newly-formalised Panton Principles for open data in science, and are followed by the four short principles themselves – essentially that there should be an explicit statement of what may be done with the data, and that ideally that data should bein the public domain.

• Victorians To Win $100,000 To App The State

  Victoria’s IT innovators will be invited to take part in a $100,000 online competition to create new applications to be formally launched later this month, as mentioned in the statement of government intentions released this week.

  Minister for Information and Communications Technology, John Lenders, said the ‘App My State’ competition would give Victorians the motivation to turn their creative ideas into applications used by other Victorians every day.

• How MakerCulture Is Reinventing Politics

Programming

• Subversion accepted as a Apache Top-Level Project

  According to a post on the Subversion Community website, Subversion, the popular open source version control and configuration management tool has been accepted as an Apache Top-Level Project (TLP). The news marks the end of Subversion’s time in the Apache Software Foundation’s (ASF) Incubator which is the first step to becoming an ASF Top-Level Project. It also means that it will now be governed under the Foundation’s meritocratic process and principles.

• Oracle is working on a combined Java Virtual Machine

  The engineers responsible for the development of the JRockit and HotSpot Java Virtual Machines (JVMs) are “spending lots of quality time together” to work out how to combine the Oracle JVM and what was Sun’s virtual machine.

Standards/Consortia

• File formats, alphabets and public money: did you know that…

  This said, the situation in Italy can be summarized as follows: file formats are alphabets, open file formats were officially declared necessary at least five years ago, an official organization of the Italian Government says the formats of Microsoft Office are not open ones, but those formats are still ignored, when not actually refused, in most Italian Public Administrations. Why? Very often, it’s just out of inertia and because citizens themselves never complain. So don’t follow this example, check what your national laws say about open file formats, demand that they are applied and to know more keep reading Stop!/Zona-M.

• AI based software, a new challenge to Open Standard. A case of Quillpad typing hindi

  I am a big fan of Open Standards, but the nature of development do not take care about open standards. Recently my brother asked me why do not I use Quillpad ( http://www.quillpad.in/hindi/ ) for writing hindi.

[Linus Torvalds:] Demons? Really?

And that’s when it gets strange. One of them starts to seriously talk about praying demons away, and then after the prayer has driven the demon out of the person, you have to support the person so that the demon doesn’t come back. And nobody laughs at him.

Seriously? What year is it again? I’m pretty sure they didn’t have Costco foodcourts in the middle ages, but maybe there was some time warping going on.

What the hell is wrong with people?

What we can learn from Nepali orphans

In many ways, Nepali culture of today closely resembles pre-tech revolution Japan. The way the aunties at Ama Ghar prepared food in the kitchen or washed clothes in buckets of cold water reminded me of the way my Japanese grandmother went about her daily chores — it’s something about the pacing and the commitment to what may seem like the most menial tasks that made me nostalgic for my childhood. I see many similarities between Japanese and Nepali culture. They’re both traditionally patriarchal societies, with heavy Buddhist influences; children are taught to respect and care for elders, and society as a whole values community over individualism. But an unfortunate side effect of economic growth was that some of these cultural values have been compromised — if not ignored outright, they have at the very least become marginalized.

Health Insurance Death Spiral

The most startling implication of Anthem/Blue Cross of California’s announcement last week that it is going to raise individual health insurance rates by up to 39 percent this year is not that insurance companies are arrogant and untouchable. That was already well known.

What has to be more alarming for the 800,000 Californians who are covered by Blue Cross individual health insurance policies is that their insurance rates appear to have entered what insurance industry underwriters call a death spiral.

Security

• Firm uses typing cadence to finger unauthorized users

  Though most users feel anonymous when browsing the Web, their browsers constantly turn over unique information such as a list of installed plugins, screen resolution, and the user agent string. Taken together, such bits of information can uniquely identify many users even without cookies.

• Mother ‘fined £50 for dropping banana’

  A mother claims she was issued with a £50 fine when her toddler dropped the end of a banana out of his pram.

• Leys crime rises despite CCTV cameras launch

  CRIME outside shops on a road on an Oxford estate has risen since long-awaited CCTV cameras were switched on two months ago.

• Plans to extend town’s CCTV system

  FELIXSTOWE: Moves are under way to extend the town centre’s crime-busting CCTV system as part of work to revamp the shopping area.

• Car nabbed under CCTV

  LONG-TIME Murwillumbah resident Ken Ward thought it would be safe to park his Landcruiser ute under the CCTV security cameras in central Murwillumbah

• Bob Barr At CPAC: ‘How Would You Like To Be Waterboarded?’

  One-time Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr riled the conservative CPAC crowd on Friday, when he declared that civilian courts were appropriate for handling terrorists and insisted that — if a trial was what they wanted — those who used waterboarding should be brought before a judge.

• Pennsylvania School Accused of Cyberspying

  “I don’t feel that school has the right to put cameras inside the kids’ home, inside their bedrooms and spy on children,” Holly said.

• Government drops jail for data thieves… again

  The government has quietly dropped plans to jail personal data thieves, frustrating the Information Commissioner and arousing criticism of the Data Protection Act as toothless.

• Support workers to spot terrorists

  Staff sources say that the sessions have included being told how to spot anything suspicious, and being asked to report anything – no matter how trivial – to police, such as quantities of empty bottles of bleach.

  Support workers who visit a range of clients in their own home including vulnerable groups, people with addictions and elderly people, have been among the first to get the training.

  Concierges, community safety teams and other front-line staff across the council are also to be sent on the sessions, which are hosted by police as part of the Home Office’s counter-terrorism strategy.

• Air security a matter for all

  The federal government should ground plans to charge air travellers for the privilege of subjecting themselves to full-body scanners while going through security.

• Interested in campaigning against body scanners? Click here

• Body scanners are to be compulsory

• Insult to injury – charging passengers for the privilege of going through body scanners..?

• Tracy Residents Now Have To Pay For 911 Calls

  Tracy residents will now have to pay every time they call 9-1-1 for a medical emergency.

• Could Looking At London’s 2012 Olympics Logo Land People In Prison?

  That is the logo for the 2012 Olympics in London. My first reaction to it was that it’s just hideous from a design standpoint, but others quickly noticed something worse. You can look at that logo and… um… see what appears to be Lisa Simpson… doing something she shouldn’t be doing. Yeah. Once you see it, it never goes away. So, as CHT notes, given that ruling of child porn for having an image of a Simpsons cartoon child performing sex acts… is looking at the 2012 Olympic logo going to be classified as viewing child porn now?

• Official: FBI probing Pa. school webcam spy case

  The FBI is investigating a Pennsylvania school district accused of secretly activating webcams inside students’ homes, a law enforcement official with knowledge of the case told The Associated Press on Friday.

  [...]

  Days after a student filed suit over the practice, Lower Merion officials acknowledged Friday that they remotely activated webcams 42 times in the past 14 months, but only to find missing student laptops. They insist they never did so to spy on students, as the student’s family claimed in the federal lawsuit.

• Calling 911? That’ll Be $300

  This has to be one of the more ridiculous things I’ve heard in a while. Does the town really want to discourage people from calling in the event of an emergency? In my life, I think I’ve called 911 four times — and three of those were after witnessing car crashes by other people. With this rule in place, I would have much less incentive to call to get the police if I witness something bad happening, whether it’s a car crash, or someone getting mugged. 911 is a public service. You shouldn’t have to pay for a 911 call.

• Mother’s fury as nanny state brands her healthy daughter, 5, ‘fat and at risk of heart disease’

  Sports mad, always full of energy and certainly not fat, five-year-old Lucy Davies’ parents had no concern about her health.

• Now council issues elf ‘n’ safety alert over swimming goggles

  They are perfect for encouraging children to swim by keeping the stinging chlorine out of their eyes.

  But health and safety officials today revealed a darker side to swimming goggles.

• Misha Glenny on the Mafia [TED]

• Move over China, here comes Russia

  In late January, NetWitness security research were able to gain visibility into a large scale ZeuS-based botnet, taking user credentials and confidential information from thousands of organizations around the world (See The Wall Street Journal article). Some of the information collected has been synthesized in the Kneber Bot whitepaper that you can dowload from the NetWitness website.

Environment

• World’s top firms cause $2.2tn of environmental damage, report estimates

  Report for the UN into the activities of the world’s 3,000 biggest companies estimates one-third of profits would be lost if firms were forced to pay for use, loss and damage of environment

• Distinguishing Climate “Deniers” From “Skeptics”

  A fair number of people have written in response to my previous posting – The Real Struggle Behind Climate Change – A War on Expertise – griping that I do not get a crucial distinction between climate-change “Skeptics” and “Deniers.”

  Several claimed to be rational, educated fellows who regret the shrill anti-intellectualism of Fox News. Yet, they still defend the core notion underlying the anti-HGCC (human generated Climate change) movement — the premise that virtually 100% of the thousands of scientists in a given field can be suborned, corrupted, or intimidated simultaneously into supporting a nonsensical, baseless theory.

  [...]

  Skeptics first admit that they are non-experts, in the topic at hand. And that experts know more than they do.

  Sound obvious? Especially regarding complex realms like atmospheric studies, or radiative transfer, or microcell computer modeling. But this simple admission parts company from…

  … Deniers, who wallow in the modern notion that a vociferous opinion is equivalent to spending twenty years studying atmospheric data and models from eight planets.

• An addendum on “The Fall of Civilizations”

  One is the trail of stupidity, leading to a cliff. Almost 100 years ago, in The Decline of the West, Ozwald Spengler transfixed the public with his certain-sounding explanations for why Europo-American society would soon dissolve into pain and despair, decadence and dust.

• The Real Struggle Behind Climate Change – A War on Expertise

  The schism over global climate change (GCC) has become an intellectual chasm, across which everyone perceives the other side as Koolaid-drinkers. Although I have mixed views of my own about the science of GCC, and have closely grilled a number of colleagues who are front-line atmospheric scientists (some at JPL), I’m afraid all the anecdotes and politics-drenched “questions” flying about right now aren’t shedding light. They are, in fact, quite beside the point.

  That is because science itself is the main issue: its relevance and utility as a decision-making tool.

• Open-source environmental protection

  As part of the Agency’s Open Government plan, they’re soliciting input from the public through March 19th. Not only can you offer ideas, you can vote, and comment, on other people’s.

Finance

• 95% Of Americans Got Tax Cuts; 12% Know It; Tea Partiers Least Informed

  A CBS poll reveals that when asked whether the Obama administration, raised, lowered, or kept taxes the same for most Americans, only 12% get the answer correct: taxes were decreased.

  • 24 percent of respondents said they INCREASED taxes.

  • 53 percent said they kept taxes the same

  • And 12 percent said taxes were decreased.

• Bank of America forecloses on house that couple had paid cash for

  Charlie and Maria Cardoso are among the millions of Americans who have experienced the misery and embarrassment that come with home foreclosure.

• Who needs banks if you have a mobile phone?

  WITH smartphones taking the world by storm, a phone that can only send and receive voice calls and text messages may seem like a relic from a bygone age. Yet in East Africa, simple phones like these are changing the face of the economy, thanks to the “mobile money” services that are spreading across the region.

• Most of the big banks are insolvent

  The steady drip of details about the financial crisis continues. PBS News Hour has Paul Solman interviewing an ex-bank regulator, William Black who now teaches at the University of Missouri link here. Points Black makes that are worth thinking about:

  *Following the S & L collapse, more than 1000 executive insiders were convicted and jailed for fraud. No one has been charged in the current mess, much less convicted or jailed.

• The Great Goldman Sachs Fire Sale of 2008

  In an interview last week, President Obama said he didn’t begrudge Jamie Dimon, the chief executive of JPMorganChase, and Lloyd Blankfein, the head man at Goldman Sachs, their 2009 bonuses of $17 million and $9 million, respectively. He said that while $17 million was “an extraordinary amount of money,” there are “some baseball players who are making more than that and don’t get to the World Series either, so I’m shocked by that as well.”

• Wall Street’s Bailout Hustle

  Goldman Sachs and other big banks aren’t just pocketing the trillions we gave them to rescue the economy – they’re re-creating the conditions for another crash

• Goldman Sachs: No Longer Shocking, But Still Wrong

  We can’t help but share the “shocking” news we came across in the Sunday Times that former US Treasury Secretary (and former Goldman Sachs (GS) CEO) Hank Paulson does not believe that banning proprietary trading at large banks (i.e. Goldman Sachs) insured by tax payer dollars is a good idea. Since most of those in Washington with the power to formulate financial reform have spent most of their careers on Wall Street, and maintain close ties with their former pals, this “shocking” news should not come as a surprise. But it still makes us sick to our stomach.

• Greece Is Far From The EU’s Only Joker

  First there was Enron; then, subprime. Now it turns out that some governments have been just as adept at using financial alchemy to hide debts. Take Greece, a country with a $350 billion national debt that is now under investigation by the European Commission (EC) for underreporting its deficit by as much as 9 percent of GDP in 2009. It used derivatives devised by Goldman Sachs to give itself an off-the-book loan, sold future EU subsidies and lottery earnings to investment banks for upfront cash, and raised money by mortgaging its highways and airports.

• Why the fate of Greece matters to the world

  OVER the past few weeks, financial headlines have been hijacked by Greece. A number of commentators have almost buried the euro, pointing to the failure of Greece as the first domino to fall and to be followed by Italy, Spain, Ireland and Portugal. All those who had predicted in the 1990s that the euro was a stillborn project are at it again.

• Greece Hires Former Goldman Banker as Debt Chief

  Greece replaced its debt management chief with a former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. investment banker, as declines in the country’s bonds roil European markets.

• The euro’s Greek tragedy

  The Greek crisis has thrown another detour into the euro’s march to world currency domination.

  The rise of the European common currency has been a market theme for years. At its peak early in the financial crisis, the euro had gained 59% against the dollar since its inception in 2000, thanks to the European Central Bank’s inflation-fighting mandate and years of lax policy in the United States.

• Greek Crisis Fallout: Could the Euro’s Days Be Numbered?

  The rest of the euro-zone countries can come to the rescue. Indeed, these countries — led by France and Germany — have pledged twice this month to do what’s necessary to see Greece through its deficit crisis and defend the common currency. If need be, officials say, that will include a financial bailout of Greece, providing the funds to allow Athens to make its debt payments as the government slashes spending and raises taxes, no matter how unpopular this may be with its taxpayers.

• A Prisoner’s Dilemma: AIG and Goldman Sachs Game Each Other And PwC

Censorship/Privacy/Civil Rights

• US drug firm drops libel action against scientist

  A US corporation, GE Healthcare, has dropped the controversial British libel action it brought against a scientist who criticised one of its drugs, saying the firm did not mean to stifle academic debate.

  Lawyers for leading Danish radiologist Henrik Thomsen said today: “He will be obviously relieved. Now he won’t have to worry about his future financial position, and won’t have to keep looking over his shoulder before he says anything.”

  At a 2007 Oxford medical conference, Thomsen criticised use of Omniscan, GE’s best-selling contrast agent injected into patients so their tissues show up better during MRI scans.

• Europe to the rescue – again

  I for one despair of us being dependent on a Court and a Parliament which have grown from a very different jurisprudential and cultural tradition to protect our rights, and for those with a sense of British liberty and freedom it feels rather shameful, doesn’t it?

• Full footage from the Livingstone interview – “The Assault on Liberty”

• PIC: Zuma cops lock up jogger

  A UCT student has been arrested, had his house searched and been questioned about his political affiliations after gesturing at President Jacob Zuma’s convoy of vehicles.

  Police officers have claimed he pointed his middle finger at vehicles in the convoy and tried to resist arrest.

• Switzerland pursues violent games ban

  Possibility of stricter measures after resolution passed restricting sale to minors

  With violent games currently causing a stir in Australia, closer to home it has emerged that Switzerland is now considering banning violent video games outright in the territory.

Internet/Net Neutrality/DRM

• Filtering round up: French filtering, Ireland backs off, UK sidesteps?

  Meanwhile in a surprising twist, Eirecom have apparently pulled out of the negotiated settlement they reached in January 2009 to disconnect subscribers “repeatedly” using P2P for (alleged) illicit downloading. This was the result of the Irish court case brought against them by various parts of the music industry for hosting illegal downloads, and appeared to open up a route to “voluntary” notice and disconnection schemes on the part of the ISP industry; a worrying trend both for advocates of free speech, privacy, due process, ISP immunity and net neutrality.

• UK Music complains to BBC over report on Digital Economy Bill

  UK Music has filed a formal complaint to the BBC over what it believes is a breach of the corporation’s editorial guidelines on accuracy and impartiality. The complaint relates to an an edition of The Culture Show broadcast on BBC2 on 4 February, 2010, which featured a segment on the Digital Economy Bill (DEB), which includes measures on clamping down on illegal filesharing.

  The umbrella organisation that promotes the interests of Britain’s music industry claimed the programme-makers misrepresented certain facts relating to the bill that had been presented to them in advance. In a letter to the editor of the show, UK Music stated that this resulted in a broadcast it believes was not only grossly misleading and inaccurate, but also misinformed the audience in a biased and prejudicial manner.

• BBC iplayer DRM raises its head again: now for the iphone

  But with iplayer, and other DRM systems, you are point blank breaking the law if you take that speech and use it – even though you wish to exercise your right to free speech, supposedly guaranteed in copyright law. This is because it is also illegal to get round copy restriction systems.

  That’s right. You must break the law to use your legal rights. That’s very wrong. In a world full of bloggers, where free speech is genuinely being exercised publicly by thousands of individuals, these rights really matter.

• [BBC presenter] Ray Gosling had already told friends about killing his former lover

• Newspaper publishers lean on the BBC Trust

  THE NEWSPAPER PUBLISHERS ASSOCIATION (NPA), which is adopting a King Canute strategy against new technology, is trying to stop the BBC from making its content available on mobile phones.

Intellectual Monopolies/Copyrights

• Not wrong, just illegal

  From a practical point of view, trying to regulate the distribution of these materials over the Internet is an unachievable goal. No matter what laws are put in place, technological advances by ingenious young computer geeks mean that youth will always be one step ahead of the authorities. The industry may successfully prosecute and punish a few people but their success will be short lived. Almost no one will be deterred by legal prosecutions because the chances of being caught are minimal.

• The Creative Class War

  Awhile back an author and thinker named Richard Florida wrote articles and penned a book about the “rise of the creative class,” a demographic of young urban professionals who would be ferociously attractive to dying cities that have lost their industrial/manufacturing base, and what these cities would have to do in order to attract them. While there’s been some impressive debate about whether or not Florida’s thesis has proven true, and what cities are really benefiting from this push, one thing that’s clear to me is that the “creative class” — journalists, writers, programmers, Web designers, graphic artists, traditional artists, musicians, and so on — need all the help they can get.

• Are People Resentful Of Content Creators?

  Coming at the same question from the other direction, again, I have trouble seeing “resentment” as the issue at all. When we look at the success stories, the one thing that comes through loud and clear is that respecting fans results in those fans becoming incredibly loyal. They’re loyal to a fault, in fact. There’s no resentment there at all. If anything, at times, it seems to border on hero worship.

• Time To Change (Or Ditch) The USTR Special 301 Process That Pressures Other Countries To Adapt US IP Laws

  In the meantime, EFF and Public Knowledge have teamed up to ask the USTR to change the process and, at the very least, stop taking the word of industry lobbyists as if it were gospel. They also suggested that the USTR be more flexible in allowing countries to set their own IP policy — noting, amusingly, that the US itself famously didn’t implement its “international obligations” in the Berne Treaty for decades, because the country felt differently about certain aspects of copyright law. Hell, even today we’re not in full compliance with Berne. But for some reason the USTR acts as if other countries need to fall in line with US IP policy, even as we’ve chosen to go in a different direction when we felt it was warranted.

• Illicit File-Sharing and Streaming of TV Shows Increases

  A new report by a consultancy firm specializing in analyzing consumer consumption of digital media reveals that during the last quarter of 2009, increasing numbers of Swedes accessed unauthorized movies and TV shows online. The research indicates that the downward trend provoked by the introduction of the IPRED legislation is over.

• Infographic: buying DVDs vs pirating them

  I rip all my kid’s DVDs (not least because she has a tendency to scratch them to hell), and the difference between firing up a movie on a laptop and it just starting versus trying to explain to a toddler why Daddy has to spend five minutes pressing next-next-next menu-menu-menu is enormous.

• Olympic bullying drives goggle-maker to verse

• IOC Claims Olympian Lindsey Vonn’s Name As Intellectual Property

• Blonde we like wins Downhill (Last name rhymes with “Bonn”)

  There once was a lawyer from the IOC,
  who called us to protect “intellectual property.”

  “During the Olympics”, she said with a sneer
  “your site can’t use an Olympian’s name even if they use your gear.”

  “No pictures, no video, no blog posts can be used…”
  Even if they are old? “No!”, she enthused.

  While Olympians chase gold the IOC pursues green.
  Cough up millions, or your logo cannot be seen.

• Disney Decides To Kick A Dying Man Over Copyright Issues

• The Real Purpose of ACTA

  So it is obvious that whatever ACTA is, it isn’t a trade agreement. I came to this conclusion before Christmas 2009, but didn’t publish anything at the time, because I had no conclusive proof that it wasn’t a trade agreement. It’s obvious that something was being negotiated, but what?

  The situation reminded me of the World War 2 Allied deception plans that were put in place to fool the Germans into thinking that the invasion of Europe would be anywhere other than Normandy.

  So if ACTA is a deception plan, what is it hiding?

  [...]

  The main points I got from her recording were:

  1. ACTA would not require any changes to IP laws. Note that this is impossible if the Treaty actually had anything to do with IP, but he was adamant on this point.
  2. He kept mentioning Prince William. He seemed to thing that Prince William would become King of the United States, as well as England, Canada, Australia, and Mexico.
  3. He was under the impression that no one would accept Prince Charles as King, due to his marriage to a divorced woman, an exceptionally archaic viewpoint as far as I am concerned.
  4. He then confirmed that ACTA would require changes to laws. When she questioned him on this, as he had said earlier that it wouldn’t require changes, he said ‘I said it wouldn’t require changes to IP laws, I didn’t say it wouldn’t require changes to other laws’.
  5. He then proceeded to mumble about how paranoid the Americans were, and how wrong they were about the ‘New World Order.’

• Book Publishers Circulating ‘Talking Points’ To Counter Arguments That Ebook Prices Need To Go Lower

  For a while now, we’ve been discussing how the pricing on ebooks doesn’t make much sense, and almost certainly needs to fall. Like many industries, the book business could learn a lot from other businesses that have realized that drastically lowering the price on digital goods can massively increase sales, and better maximize profits. But, instead, book publishers seem to be pushing in the opposite direction, and trying to push the price of digital books up. We recently wrote about a NY Times article that suggested consumers might revolt if the publishers keep moving in this direction, which is actually supported by reports of how consumers are reacting to publishers’ anti-consumer activities with regards to ebooks.