Mandrake Linux Community Newsletter -- Issue #57

[ Thanks to Phil Lavigna for this link. ]

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             Issue #57    Thursday,   29 August 2002

Welcome to the Mandrake Linux Community Newsletter -- dedicated to 
keeping you up-to-date with the latest Mandrake-related news & info.

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This Week's Summary: 9.0 Beta 4 Has Been Released; 9.0 Commercial RPMs 
Ready for Testing; Marketing Survey Needs Your Input; Mandrake PPC 
Pre-loaded on Macs; The Latest MandrakeClub Activities; Mandrake in the 
News; Business Case of the Week; MandrakeSecure.net: "Making the most 
of OpenSSH"; Headlines from MandrakeForum; Correction to Newsletter #56


Top Stories
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Time to debug 9.0 Beta 4!
The fourth Beta of the upcoming Mandrake Linux 9.0 for x86 is now 
available for download & testing. Our thanks go to everyone who 
submitted valuable input during the previous Betas. OpenOffice 1.0.1 is 
the star feature of Beta 4, other highlights include:

* Drakconf: memory leak has been fixed. Additionally Drakconf offers an
  improved look and feel.
* "tinyfirewall" is now active
* RpmDrake: Several improvements have been added including the ability
  to perform search in descriptions and the availability of
  "noclearcache" option.

Read the official Beta announcement, plus the complete changelog.

--

9.0 Commercial RPMs ready for testing.
The first Commercial applications built for 9.0 have been uploaded to 
the MandrakeClub download area so that Club members can test them 
before the final release of 9.0. The QA team has tested these new apps, 
but we could use your input and observations. Please report any 
problems with the packages to the webmaster (Denis), and he'll forward 
them to MandrakeSoft QA.

Some of the available applications include:
 * Cameleo -- for image acquisition (scanners or digital cameras),
   processing, retouching, composing, RIPping, layout, output, etc.
 * Codeweavers-wine -- for running MS-Windows programs in Unix
 * FlashPlayer, Realplayer & Acrobat Reader 5.0
 * VMware Workstation
 * Plus games, anti-virus programs, hardware drivers, developer's
   tools, configuration utilities, and lots more. 84 packages total.


Marketing Survey
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To help determine and satisfy the special needs of Mandrake Linux 
users, MandrakeSoft's Marketing team is conducting a brief survey that 
requires your assistance.

Please help us improve our products by taking two minutes out of your 
busy day to answer this brief questionnaire.

Your input is highly valued and greatly appreciated.


Mandrake PPC available pre-loaded on Macs.
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QliTech, an Authorized Apple Reseller (VAR) located in Illinois, has 
announced that they now offer Mandrake Linux PPC pre-installed on Apple 
computers. QliTech's Apple page lists iBook, PowerBook and PowerMac 
systems, as well as a Rackmount server.


MandrakeClub
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Denis has returned from vacation and he's back in action again.

The latest headlines from MandrakeClub:
 * Club discounts for 8.2 update CD, and for 8.2/PPC
 * You can test commercial 9.0 applications NOW!
 * Mandrake Linux 9.0 is coming!

Not yet a Mandrake Club member? To learn more, please visit:
http://mandrakelinux.com/en/club/


Mandrake in the News
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NewsForge.com -- MandrakeSoft to warrant holders: Show us the money.
MandrakeSoft CEO Jacques Le Marois explains why the company is giving 
investors a little more time to participate in its initiative to 
increase capital. "Even with MandrakeSoft's recent positive financial 
results and an attractive valuation, most people are difficult to 
convince. Just two years ago, we could have raised all the necessary 
funds in only four days with a similar operation."

HWExtreme.com -- AMD Hammer Review.
The popular hardware website 'HWExtreme.com' benchmarks Mandrake Linux 
(with kernel 2.4.18-24mdk) running on AMD's Opteron platform, 
previously codenamed Hammer.


Business Case of the Week
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Internet/E-commerce: Mandrake delivers the goods at Nigerian CyberCafe.
When "iDaystar" launched a new cybercafe in Akure, Nigeria, they needed
a server to provide a local web server, a mail server with webmail 
capabilities, a caching DNS & proxy server, and a Windows 2000 domain 
controller.

"Creating a mail server was an especially challenging task, because we 
needed to fetch email from a common maildrop, sort it into recipients 
mailboxes, and serve it to them over web mail. So we set up a box with 
Mandrake Linux 8.2, and put it to work."

For many more examples of Mandrake in the workplace, see MandrakeBizcases.com.


What's New at MandrakeSecure.net?
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MandrakeSecure.net: Making the most of OpenSSH.
"Ever wanted to know more about using OpenSSH? Like maybe how to use it 
properly, or how to use it more securely? Want to know how you can 
configure outgoing SSH connections to suit your needs, as well as 
configure how incoming connections to your account are treated? This 
and more is described in the latest MandrakeSecure paper, entitled 
'Making the most of OpenSSH.'"


Software Updates
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Security-related software updates have been released for:

xinetd -- fixes remote DoS (denial of service)

View the complete list at MandrakeSecure.net.


Headlines from MandrakeForum
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Mandrake Linux 9.0 - fourth try!
Read about Deno's first impressions of the latest Beta, and many 
reader comments as well.

Sigma Designs, MPEG4 codec, and GPL
"Anonymous" discusses what might become an interesting test case of the 
GPL license: "Shortly after the fact that Sigma Designs "borrowed" GPL 
code from xvid.org in its proprietary MPEG-4 video codec has been made 
public (thus infringing the XVID license), Sigma design realized the 
difference between "GPLed" and "public domain" software."

Read these and other stories at MandrakeForum.


Newsletter Correction
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Last week's newsletter (Issue #56) contained an incorrect date for the 
"Summertime Special" at MandrakeStore. It should have said: "From 
August 22 through September 22, all purchases for the USA, Canada and 
the European Union receive FREE shipping. Customers in other countries 
receive 50% off shipping."

We regret the error and any inconvenience it may have caused.

Stop by MandrakeStore today.

Related Stories:

• Mandrake Linux Community Newsletter -- Issue #56(Aug 23, 2002)
• Mandrake Linux Community Newsletter -- Issue #55(Aug 16, 2002)
• Mandrake Linux Community Newsletter -- Issue #54(Aug 12, 2002)
• Mandrake Linux Community Newsletter -- Issue #53(Aug 03, 2002)