● 04.21.09

● Links 21/04/2009: Sun Bought by Oracle, Kubuntu Beats PC-BSD in Benchmarks

Posted in News Roundup at 4:37 am by Dr. Roy SchestowitzContentsGNU/LinuxGNU/Linux

• So it’s no surprise that Intel, which has a very close relationship with notebook and netbook manufacturers, is really on the side of Linux rather than Microsoft Windows 7 Starter Edition. It rights an imbalance where Widnows software gobbled up much more of the PC pie than rest of the component manufacturers. And, of course, Windows is a component too.

• As a whole, Kubuntu 9.04 performed much better than PC-BSD 7.1 in these tests. Some of these performance differences may be attributed to PC-BSD 7.1 / FreeBSD 7.1 using the slightly older GCC 4.2.2 release compared to GCC 4.3.3 in the Jaunty Jackalope release for Ubuntu and Kubuntu. In a few benchmarks, PC-BSD had the upperhand over Kubuntu. PC-BSD was better with Dhrystone 2 and complex ray-tracing using POV-Ray.

• The last time I looked at PC-BSD was way back in 2007. PC-BSD is another option for those who want an alternative to Windows but who might not be interested in Linux or Mac OS X. PC-BSD is an operating system that is based on FreeBSD and uses the KDE desktop. My last experience with it was quite positive so I was pleased to see that there’s a new version available.

• If configured with an operating system, did you go for a Linux variant or XP?

• Welcome to this year’s 16th issue of DistroWatch Weekly! It’s the Ubuntu release week (or Ubuntu “circus”, as some prefer to call it), a major event in the calendar of many open source software enthusiasts. What will the distribution’s 10th official release be like? And will the download servers cope with the expected heavy demand? We’ll have to wait until Thursday to find out; in the meantime, read below for a quick tip on reverting to an older kernel under Ubuntu and visit Canonical’s ShipIt service to order your free CDs. In the news section, Mandriva gains support for hardware database known as Smolt, Easy Peasy ponders a few ideas concerning the distro’s default user interface, and Fedora’s Ricky Zhou points out the importance of innovation in Red Hat’s community distribution. Finally, don’t miss our feature article which calls for an implementation of a centralised bug-tracking database for all open source software projects.

Kernel Space

• This code will allow open-source 3D acceleration on the Radeon HD 2000, 3000, and 4000 series of graphics cards. Those using the Radeon X1000 series (R500) or earlier have already had open-source ATI 3D support for a while.

Desktop Environments

• Qt Software and the KDE e.V. are happy to report that they are sponsoring a developer sprint for all North American students accepted into Google Summer of Code 2009 to work on KDE. The event will be completely free for all accepted students, with round-trip flights, lodging, and some meals fully reimbursed; all students that applied for GSoC 2009 are welcome to attend, although those not accepted into the program will not be reimbursed for travel and lodging expenses.

Distributions (Ubuntu)

• Canonical, the sponsor of Ubuntu, announced today that Ubuntu 9.04 Server Edition is available to download from Thursday 23 April. Canonical offers assessment, deployment, migration, training and support services to ensure that companies can make the most of the cost-effective, powerful and reliable Ubuntu Server Edition platform.

• Inching closer to the final release of Ubuntu 9.04, codenamed as “Jaunty Jackalope”, the Ubuntu development team has come up with the release candidate (RC) for the upcoming operating system.

• RightScale®, Inc., the leader in cloud computing management, today announced that the popular RightScale Cloud Management Platform will support the global debut of the Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud (powered by Eucalyptus) to help enterprises deploy and manage “private” clouds in their own data centers.

• Canonical this afternoon debuted its Ubuntu 9.04 release of Linux, the tenth release since the company founded the Ubuntu project in October 2004. This iteration of Ubuntu, code-named “Jaunty Jackalope,” comes with mixes designed specifically for three platforms: netbooks, desktops, and servers.

Devices/Embedded

• Some developers who’ve gotten a head-start working on applications for Palm’s webOS have indicated that they like what they see. A lot. Pandora’s CTO noted, “Everything about the Pre feels like it’s ‘future-oriented,’ not an iPhone-inspired knockoff.”

• MontaVista® Software, Inc., the leader in embedded Linux® commercialization, today announced that MontaVista Linux has been deployed by Spanish network equipment provider (NEP) Teltronic in its next-generation private radio network base stations. Teltronic, a manufacturer of mobile terminals, in-car terminals and infrastructure for TETRA-based radio networks used by emergency services, security services, the police and public transportation systems, selected MontaVista Linux for use in forthcoming products due to the commercial-grade quality, integration and support provided by MontaVista.

Sub-notebooks

• Windows 7 Starter edition is designed to run no more than three applications simultaneously — purchasing an upgrade allows users to run, presumably, as many apps as their netbooks can handle at one time. Now, three concurrent applications at a shot might be sufficient for a number of users; it might be all that some netbooks can handle, depending on the applications and system resources running in the background. Microsoft isn’t hiding the fact it is experimenting with a limited Starter, and hopefully netbook manufacturers will also make buyers aware of this. But awareness and being almost sufficient in even most cases is irrelevant. It’s the concept that there is a limit, and purchasing an upgrade for functionality that most won’t need every day (but when it’s needed, it’s really needed) that will make netbooks running alternative operating systems increasingly attractive. It’s an advantage not only for Android, but any Linux distribution netbook builders optimize for their hardware.

• But these features are still there, installed on the netbook but not enabled until you pay for an upgrade.

• Now this has a number of things wrong with it in my mind, if the netbook can run more than 3 applications why not allow it? If the features are installed why not enabling them?

Free Software/Open Source

• To be successful and to stay competitive in the ever changing business world, a business should be able to adapt modern changes that should be applied. E Commerce has been proven to be an effective way to help your business to achieve these goals. With proper marketing strategy and building a solid E Commerce application, these can be all possible.

• Web site plays a vital role in business. However, website should be meeting the business need. There are many ways to manage your web site. From simple Web log (blog) engine system that allows limited publishing content to a full content management system framework to application framework, on which you can build your own custom content management system.

• Vienna’s city council has been using GNU/Linux and open source for years and has developed its own Ubuntu-based software distribution called Wienux. Yet no binding political decision in favour of open source has been made and the city relies on voluntary use of the free software. Councils are free to change to open source or stick with Microsoft and other proprietary software.

• I’ve attended my share of Linux installation festivals (installfests), where open source volunteers typically take donated Windows PCs and revive them as Linux systems. Now, the installfest craze seems to have found a new calling: The Asterisk IP PBX market, where open source meets telephony.

• Home education is all very well, especially if the parent is a polymath, but this is not usually the case. More often input from subject-specialists is required. Even the best online ‘teach yourself spanish’ is a big ask for the home learner. Independent learning is something that is mastered by few and in any case takes a long time to acquire the skills to do so.

• DISA CUSTOMER PARTNER CONFERENCE 2009 — CollabNet, the leader in distributed application lifecycle management (ALM) solutions, today announced that the Defense Information System Agency (DISA), the information systems group for the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), has promoted its Forge.mil initiative from limited operational availability (LOA) to Initial Operational Capability (IOC), making it generally available for unclassified use. Forge.mil enables collaborative software development and cross-program sharing of software, system components, and services in support of net-centric operations and warfare. Forge.mil is powered by CollabNet TeamForge, the leading application lifecycle management platform for distributed software development teams, and CollabNet Subversion, the best version control and software configuration management (SCM) solution for distributed teams.

• Infobright’s quest began in September o2008 when the company open-sourced its commercial column-oriented data warehouse. At the time it had eight customers but today has more than 50, including Royal Bank of Canada and Xerox, Davis added. Those customers reside largely in the telecom, mid-tier financial services, and marketing firm spaces. “We’re really going into the area where MySQL is,” Davis explained.

• Network Solutions has expanded its Open Source Application offerings, it was announced recently. The company has broadened its range of open source hosted application offerings through the Application Packaging Standard (APS), which was developed to enable companies to make applications available in the software-as-a-service model quickly and simply. Network Solutions is a leading global hosting provider that manages more than 7 million domains, over 1.5 million e-mailboxes, and more than 350,000 websites. The APS applications have been added to the Network Solutions Open Source Library to enable web hosting customers to create new revenue streams by offering value-added services and better engage and interact with their own customers. The newly added services include blogging software WordPress, content management service Joomla! and photo organizer Gallery2.

• ONE/Northwest is a US non-profit supporting the environment and grass roots organizations through the use of technology. For over a decade, ONE/Northwest has helped over 800 environmental organizations fuse technology with new ways of doing their work. The organization relies intensively on open source software, for example, offering websites powered by the Content Management System Plone in order to help environmental NGOs make the leap to the Internet age.

Cloud

• Does using open source software pay off in a total cost sense when compared to commercial offerings today? Is it worth the usually lower cost, or will an enterprise that casts its lot with FOSS be trapped in a high-risk situation where they can’t get support and innovation?

Mozilla

• One of Firefox’s greatest strengths is that it can be extended to provide additional functionality to the end user. However, the vast number of extensions available for Firefox can be a bit overwhelming. We look at that top 10 Firefox add-ons that can improve your productivity on Linux.

• The document below is a proposed high-level strategy for Mozilla accessibility-related activities, both those funded by grants to third parties and those engaged in by Mozilla personnel.

• Note that this covers accessibility work proposed for the future; it is not meant as an exhaustive description of past Mozilla and Mozilla-related accessibility projects, and also does not constitute a commitment to fund or perform future projects.

Business

• Coming out of a record first quarter and feeling bullish, SugarCRM has its sights trained on the IPO market. “An IPO is also good news for the CRM industry, which has had about 20 IPOs in the last 20 years,” according to CEO John Roberts. “We represent the latest generation.”

Sun

• Moreover, this development would fit nicely with the increasing number of Android developments in new contexts – netbooks, consumer devices etc. As a result of all this interest from across the computing spectrum, Android is going to become much hotter, and that will drive even faster innovation, development and uptake in this area. Bad news for the other Linux-based mobile platforms perhaps, and certainly bad news for people like Symbian and Microsoft.

• Here’s the press release. So they own Java and Solaris and MySQL, not to mention all the patents Sun pledged to use to defend Red Hat and Ubuntu when Microsoft began patent saber rattling, plus whatever patents Sun had that made Jonathan Schwartz say he had been approached to sue Linux but decided not to:

• So whatever he was talking about now belongs to Oracle.

• I’m talking Linux partitions on mainframes. Eventually the sheer number of x86 boxes involved will mean it makes monetary sense to consolidate.

Open Access

• Enrico Francesconi and Ginevra Peruginelli, The Florentine Debate on Free Access to Law, VoxPopuLII, April 9, 2009. (Thanks to Joe Hodnicki.) A report on Law via the Internet: Free Access, Quality of Information, Effectiveness of Rights (Florence, October 30-31, 2008).

• The Internet Archive is seeking leave to file a motion before the Southern District of New York U.S. District Court to intervene in the matter of The Authors Guild Inc. et al. v. Google Inc. as a party defendant.

• A globe-spanning U.N. digital library seeking to display and explain the relics of all human cultures has gone into operation on the Internet for the first time, serving up mankind’s accumulated knowledge in seven languages for students around the world.

Standards/Consortia

• The appointment of Aneesh Chopra as the U.S. federal government’s first Chief Technology Officer (CTO), together with the earlier appointment of Vivek Kundra as the Federal Chief Information Officer (CIO), is a signal of the importance of information technology to the Obama Administration. We expect Chopra to play a vital role in achieving the policy goals set out in the Administration’s IT platform.

• New federal CTO Aneesh Chopra is not an open source executive. He’s not a programmer, either. And he has no political fingerprints on the open source-proprietary divide.

Leftovers

• An AP win could kill “fair use” and change the Internet as we know it.

• The Election Technology Council (ETC), a trade group comprised of the most prominent electronic voting machine vendors, has published a paper that argues against mandating source disclosure for electronic voting machine systems. The paper (PDF), which broadly conflates source disclosure and open source software licensing, dubiously contends that enabling public scrutiny of voting technology would lead to compromised security.

Censorship/Web Abuse

• The Rapporteur of a European Parliament directive plays a crucial role at the second reading: he must forge a compromise with the Council of Ministers between the opinion expressed by the Parliament at the first reading and the common position adopted by the Council. If he succeeds, this compromise stands an excellent chance of becoming the report that comes to a vote in parliamentary committee, then reach a vote in plenary session by all Members of the European Parliament (MEPs). So the directive, the outcome of a consensus between the two legislative bodies, will become European law. If not, the Council and Parliament must reach an agreement for a third reading: the conciliation phase.

• Amendment 138, which protects Internet users rights against blocking and 3-strikes measures, has been scrapped in a back-room EU deal. The European Parliament has sacrificed users rights, in order to appease the French and UK government demands, so that they can move ahead with plans for 3-strikes and protocol blocking.

Copyrights

• A California Senate candidate is using a Don Henley song in a campaign video on YouTube, and when Henley sued for copyright violation, the candidate fired back that it was his first amendment rights to use the song. It seems he failed to understand the nuances of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Maybe he should be complaining to the RIAA instead.

• The “liberal” CNN has filed a DMCA notice to have video taken down that was being used by a conservative blog for commentary purposes — again, almost certainly fair use. Also, it sounds like some of the video footage that CNN demanded be taken down wasn’t even filmed by CNN, suggesting they don’t hold the copyright on it.

• A pair of consumer groups have surveyed 16 copyright regimes around the world. The worst one they found was the United Kingdom, a “blessed plot” which makes it illegal to rip CDs, doesn’t protect parody and satire, and puts a copyright on government documents.

• Given the way in which copyright law was transplanted into China without a fulsome cultural understanding of the values that informed the system, it seems the power of copyright can be easily usurped for means that infringe on political and civil rights. And yet, the United States, through the WTO process, is seeking stronger copyright protection in China.

• This seeming inconsistency may not currently be a large issue because of the more explicit means of control available to the Chinese government. However, as political pressure mounts on the human rights front, it is possible that the Chinese government may have to be more covert in their attempts to suppress political speech. If that happens, copyright law may begin to look appealing to the Chinese government as a means of control.

TPB

• Set up a torrent tracker, get fined, go to jail.

• Join a bank, destroy the economy, profit.

• Hacktivists have launched denial of service attacks against music industry association ifpi.org and lawyers involved in the prosecution of the four Pirate Bay defendants in the wake of a guilty verdict against the quartet last Friday.

• To hear some tell it, file sharing gutted the music industry by encouraging people to gorge themselves on free, illegal content. Indeed, unless Friday’s landmark verdict against The Pirate Bay is overturned, four Swedes will spend a year in jail and owe millions of dollars to entertainment companies for operating a file sharing network.

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