● 06.16.12

● Links 16/6/2012: Deploying Chromebooks, New Mandriva Foundation

Posted in News Roundup at 11:18 am by Dr. Roy SchestowitzContentsGNU/LinuxGNU/Linux

Desktop

• Cloud Sherpas, a Google Apps and Salesforce.com consulting firm, has deployed roughly 50 Google Chromebooks internally and is rolling out the cloud-centric notebooks to some customers. Is this the start of a larger trend for Google’s cloud desktop and mobile strategy? Here’s the update and speculation from The VAR Guy.

• Yesterday, we shared the story of Norma, whose new Thinkpad notebook computer from Newegg had a serious display glitch after only a few days of use. She sent the defective computer back, only to be told that they wouldn’t exchange it because she had installed Linux. “This voids Newegg warranty,” the RMA department told her in an e-mail. “Unit cannot be accepted or resold as received.” We reached out to Newegg for clarification, and they told us that this is not their policy, and they do accept computers back after the operating system has been upgraded or changed. Yay?

Server

• Recently it was announced that Microsoft is going to support Linux on its Azure cloud platform. At first glance, this sounds great, right? Microsoft supporting Linux with its own software. We’ve heard in recent times of Microsoft providing code to the Linux kernel, and this is what they have been preparing for: to support Linux on Azure. It hasn’t really been for the benefit of the open source community as some would like to think. In fact, there was some controversy regarding the code that Microsoft submitted to the Linux kernel, in that they were forced to do so after being caught using drivers that fall under the GPL (GNU General Public License). The code submitted for the kernel will ensure that Linux support is seamless on Azure.

• But, this offering by Microsoft for Linux support on Azure comes up short, as one of the largest players in the corporate GNU/Linux world has its distributions scratched from Microsoft’s list, and that is of Red Hat. If you look at the list of distributions that Microsoft is supporting, it includes…

Kernel Space

• Linus Torvalds is the father of the world’s most popular technology, the Linux kernel which is being used in every aspect of modern life. It powers ATM machines, supercomputers, spacecraft sent out to explore the universe, your Android phones and tablet, your wireless routers, printers, TVs, infotainment and much more. Linux is like a ‘good’ plastic of the modern world – it’s omnipresent.

• Linux creator Linus Torvalds has won the prestigious Millennium Technology Prize alongside stem cell researcher, Dr Shinya Yamanaka

Graphics Stack

• Besides releasing L4T version 15 this week, Linux engineers at NVIDIA responsible for their GeForce/Quadro binary graphics driver have released an update too. This latest update is the NVIDIA 295.59 stable release update.

Applications

Proprietary

• You could have knocked me over with a feather. The last thing I expected was to see a new version of Skype, the popular Voice-over-Internet Protocol (VoIP) program, arrive for Linux. But, just in time for Skype’s new in-your-face advertising program, Skype 4.0 for Linux has arrived.

Instructionals/Technical

Games

Desktop Environments

• “The world of IT is a better place when developers respect users instead of trying to enslave them,” said blogger Robert Pogson. “We need new user interfaces for new gadgets with tiny screens and no keyboards and no mice, but there’s absolutely no reason to radically change a user interface that has been used satisfactorily for decades.”

GNOME Desktop

• We are living in 2012 but so far Linux Desktop is nowhere. Even the “too big to fail” Canonical struggles to make partnerships with manufacturers and distribute Ubuntu in a broader market. Maybe Gnome could show the way?

Distributions

PCLinuxOS/Mageia/Mandrake/Mandriva Family

• Mandriva is in the process of building a foundation and creating a community to help develop future versions of their desktop Linux distribution. Today, Charles Schulz posted on the Mandriva blog to announce the first “milestone” of their journey.

Red Hat Family

• Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) this week ushered in the era of the cloud OS. But IBM, HP, Intel and other technology giants are set to rally around Red Hat Enterprise Linux (particularly for cloud computing) within the next two weeks. The VAR Guy isn’t picking favorites, but…

• … here’s the blow by blow.

• During TechEd North America 2012 this week in Orlando, Fla., Microsoft Server and Tools Business President Satya Nadella welcomed 10,000 attendees “to the era of the cloud operating system (OS) for infrastructure.” No doubt, Microsoft wants Windows Azure and Windows Server 2012 to emerge as preferred cloud OSes. Plus Microsoft recently said Windows Azure will support Linux — most notably CentOS, Ubuntu and SUSE, with RHEL noticeably missing from the list.

• Past Earnings Performance: The company met estimates last quarter after beating the forecasts in the prior two. In the fourth quarter of the last fiscal year, the company reported net income of 20 cents per share versus a mean estimate of profit of 20 cents per share. In the third quarter of the last fiscal year, the company beat estimates by 2 cents.

Debian Family

Derivatives

Canonical/Ubuntu

• Ubuntu’s Unity is far from the only desktop environment available for the distribution. For users who want to stay with Ubuntu 12.04 LTS but prefer another desktop environment, there are plenty of alternatives to try.Ubuntu’s Unity is far from the only desktop environment available for the distribution. For users who want to stay with Ubuntu 12.04 LTS but prefer another desktop environment, there are plenty of alternatives to try.

• Linux developers will soon have a chance to compete for prizes of laptops and smartphones, thanks to Canonical’s announcement today of the Ubuntu App Showdown contest.

• Canonical has finally taken the much needed step in order to create developer interest in the platform. The sponsor of Ubuntu, one of the popular operating systems, is organising a contest titled ‘the Ubuntu App Showdown’ to create an app from scratch for Ubuntu in three weeks, and delivered in the Ubuntu Software Centre.

Flavours and Variants

• The folks behind the ever more popular Linux distribution Linux Mint have announced that they’ve joined forces with an Israeli computer hardware provider, CompuLab, to sell Mint-branded computers with the operating system pre-installed and completely ready to go. “We’re passionate about what we do and for our very first Mint device, we wanted something unique, something special and extraordinary,” says the Linux Mint Blog. “The mintBox is Mint in a box. It’s tiny, it’s silent, it’s extremely versatile and it comes packed with connectivity.” Indeed, it does come with impressive connectivity options, and the two versions that are available (seen here) even look like Wi-Fi routers.

Devices/Embedded

Phones

• While we’re still waiting for Enyo 2.0 to come with the rest of the Open webOS kit, we’ll take an update to the beta framework when we can get one. In fact, this week we’re getting one with a bump to Beta 5. Included in this release are sliding and stacking panels, a ‘Bootplate’ starter template, an improved API viewer, and an expanded and reorganized developer documentation set.

Android

• Via Technologies, a designer of low-power and low-cost computing platforms, started to accept pre-orders onto its Android PC (APC) platform for $49 on Sunday and managed to sell the first batch of mainboards within several hours. Apparently, the demand towards the Google Android 2.3-based APC 8750 was somewhat higher than the company expected and many users complained about that fact.

• Google’s struggling Google TV platform took a big step last October with the Android 3.0-powered version 2.0. It got another push with a June 6 “2.1.1″ update that enables the viewing of movies rented through Google Play and extends YouTube movie viewing options.

• How to Get iOS 6’s Best New Features in Android Right Now iOS 6 is a big update for Apple fans, featuring several exciting updates—but those of us with Android devices don’t have to sit back and wait Google to deliver those same features to us; we can get the best of them right now. Here’s how.

Free Software/Open Source

• The open source cloud made waves in the news this week with the results of a RightScale study that claims widespread adoption among enterprises of open source cloud computing services. VMWare and IBM showed their agreement by announcing plans to expand their open source cloud investments. These positive stories offset the shocker that NASA has abandoned OpenStack entirely for Amazon Web Services.

Project Releases

Public Services/Government

• GNU/Linux may not have any pro-grade film editing software for the consumer market, but the film studios use Linux in every aspect of film production. Now Red Hat has added another feater in its hat as DreamWorks Animation SKG is using Red Hat Enterprise MRG as the grid infrastructure of DreamWorks Animation’s 30,000+ core render farm. The mega studio is also using Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization as the platform to run mission-critical services on Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

• Helsinki’s city council wants its IT department to continue to use open source software alternatives to help rid the city of IT vendor lock-in. Yesterday evening fifty of the city’s 85 council members supported a resolution instructing the IT department to keep supporting an open source office suite.

• Poland’s State Fire Services is excluding providers of open source solutions from responding to a call for tender. Asked to comment on the explicit ban, the Fire Services explains that the organisation is locked-in by proprietary office tools, ‘which likely make it impossible for open source to offer full compatibility’.

Leftovers

• In a blog post, company founder Ruslan Kogan said it was too hard and costly to make his website properly display on IE7, and suggested a list of newer browsers, which should be used instead. In an interesting move he chose to suggest Firefox, Opera, Safari and Chrome, but not the later Microsoft browser.

• If you’re shopping for electronics online at Australian retailer Kogan, an Oz equivalent of the U.S.’ Best Buy with the horribly out of date Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) 7 browser brace yourself for a nasty surprise. Kogan will charge you an extra 6.8% sales “tax” on your purchase.

• The Internet Archive has filed a federal challenge to a new Washington State law that intends to make online service providers criminally liable for providing access to third parties’ offensive materials.

• The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is representing the Internet Archive in order to block the enforcement of SB 6251, a law aimed at combatting advertisements for underage sex workers but with vague and overbroad language that is squarely in conflict with federal law. Procedurally, the Internet Archive lawsuit was filed as an intervention into a similar suit, Backpage.com v. McKenna, filed last week.

Hardware

• A group that includes AMD, ARM, and Texas Instruments is trying to tap into the graphics chip’s horsepower. Intel isn’t interested in the initiative, though.

Environment/Energy/Wildlife

• The 2012 BP Statistical Review, covering 2011 world energy data, has been released. With global oil production roughly flat for a seventh year, coal once again gained global share of total primary energy consumption. World consumption of coal rose 5.4% in 2011, as oil consumption eked out a very small, 0.7% gain. As for other sources, nuclear use fell notably by -4.3%. And world natural gas consumption was restrained to a 2.2% advance, owing to a large retreat in European demand. Finally, while starting from a small position, both hydropower and renewables (biofuels, solar, wind) once again made very strong gains.

Censorship

• We’ve mocked various newspapers for their ridiculous “social media policies” in the past — which often try to limit how reporters engage with the community. The whole notion seems backwards. But now one newspaper — the Colorado Gazette — has taken things to ridiculous extremes: putting reporter Barrett Tryon on administrative leave for posting a link to a news story about his own newspaper on Facebook. Apparently, the Colorado Gazette’s parent company, Freedom Communications, was purchased by a company called 2100 Trust. Soon after that happened, the LA Times reported that the company expected to spin off some of the smaller newspapers, including the Gazette. Given all of this, Tryon posted the following to his Facebook page:

Privacy

• Phil Zimmermann released PGP for free, but he’s planning to charge about $20 a month for his new Silent Circle encryption service. It’s unlikely to be applauded by encryption-wary law enforcement agencies.

Intellectual Monopolies

Copyrights

• The Supreme Court will soon hear a case that will affect whether you can sell your iPad — or almost anything else — without needing to get permission from a dozen “copyright holders.” Here are some things you might have recently done that will be rendered illegal if the Supreme Court upholds the lower court decision:

• 1. Sold your first-generation iPad on Craigslist to a willing buyer, even if you bought the iPad lawfully at the Apple Store.

ACTA

• On June 21st, the “International Trade” (INTA) committee of the EU Parliament will vote on whether to adopt its report on ACTA, which will mark the last procedural step before the Parliament’s final vote. Despite the fact that four committees recently voted against ACTA, heavy pressure from the pro-ACTA lobbies and the EU Commission might weigh on the INTA report. Citizens must mobilize to ensure that INTA Members recommend ACTA’s rejection, as this result will be decisive for the upcoming final vote of the EU Parliament, scheduled for the beginning of July (vote in plenary 3, 4 or 5th of July1).

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