Linux News for Aug 29, 2001

• dot.kde.org: KDE wins the 'Best Open Source Project' award at LinuxWorld Expo (Aug 29, 2001, 23:40)
  "...at LinuxWorld Expo being hosted in San Francisco, CA, the KDE Project was honored as the winner in the 'Best Open Source Project' category."


• Enterprise Linux Today: SuSE Linux Presents Enhanced DB Solutuion for Enterprise Applications (Aug 29, 2001, 23:30)
  "Apart from SuSE Linux Enterprise Server, the "Workgroup Edition" of SuSE Linux Database Server comes with a multiple-workstation version of the DB2 database for applications and data that are jointly used by a workgroup or department over a PC-based LAN. The "Internet Edition" delivers stored information available to an unlimited number of users over the Internet. The respective Open Source and Linux program packages were specifically adapted and optimized for operation with IBM's DB2."


• Kernel Cousin Debian Hurd #105 by Paul Emsley (Aug 29, 2001, 22:45)
  Highlights from the Debian-Hurd development mailing lists for the previous week.


• TechTarget.com: Managing the Windows-Linux enterprise (Aug 29, 2001, 22:03)
  "As IT budgets contract, many Windows administrators are being asked to manage mixed-mode environments. Often, they have to make antagonistic operating systems, such as Linux and Windows, play well together. In search of tips that would help administrators avoid common heterogeneous infrastructure and standards administration blunders, searchWindowsManageability recently interviewed Mike Wilkinson, director of product management for Orem, UT-based Caldera's Volution management software suite."


• LinuxPR: Kohan: Immortal Sovereigns Now Available for Linux (Aug 29, 2001, 21:24)
  "TimeGate Studios, Inc. and Loki Software, Inc. announce that the hit fantasy and strategy game, Kohan: Immortal Sovereigns, shipped for the Linux platform on Saturday, August 25."


• eWeek: Banking on Linux: Financial services companies slowly opening their doors to open source (Aug 29, 2001, 19:13)
  "The decision certainly has paid off in nitty-gritty cost savings: Prast said that using the existing equipment and Linux software, RoTech has cut the cost of running its network down to one-third of what it would have been using new hardware and a typical commercial operating system."


• Mandrake 8.1 Beta 2 Released (Aug 29, 2001, 18:02)
  "DiskDrake reworked, new Mandrake Wizards, Prelude 0.4.2... There are a lot of new features and bug fixes to test in Mandrake 8.1 Beta 2." Package highlights and download links within.


• ServerWatch: Sendmail Releases IBM Mainframe Offering (Aug 29, 2001, 17:49)
  "Performance tests conducted by Sendmail and IBM found that a single IBM eServer z900 mainframe could support more than 2 million users, making it the largest single-server e-mail system on Linux currently available, according to Sendmail."


• ZDNet/Yahoo!: Nations uniting for open source (Aug 29, 2001, 16:21)
  "But behind the obvious reasons for the move to open-source and free software are more subtle issues. One of the overriding drivers behind legislation, experts said, appears to be a desire to break free of the United States' lock on the global software market."


• Xandros Announces Strategic Licensing Agreement with Corel Corporation (Aug 29, 2001, 15:06)
  "Xandros Corporation today announced that it has signed a strategic licensing agreement with Corel Corporation, giving it access to Corel's Linux desktop OS and related technologies. The newly formed company will focus on developing the desktop and server markets with assistance from its founding parent, Linux Global Partners." The distribution Xandros releases will be based on Corel Linux 3, and will continue to be Debian-based, according to the company.


• NetSlaves.com: The Failure of Tech Journalism (Aug 29, 2001, 14:18)
  Read initially for personal curiosity, the article gets around to (and aims a few barbs at) advocacy sites before moving on to broadsides against just about every other facet of tech journalism, including fawning Windows reviews and the cursory consideration given the worst abuses of the dot-coms: "Try and find an agnostic view of Linux or MacOS. The sites which cover them are in the business of preaching to the converted. While Mac evangelism is as silly as worshiping a dead Sci-fi writer, Linux evangelism seems to expect everyone to rely on the belief of miracles with no further evidence needed. To read Slashdot, only the lack of intellectual fervor is standing between you and the nirvana of Linux. The fact that you need a million work arounds and training sessions to get it to function on the desktop is always downplayed. Mention this and you're a 'luser who uses Windoze.'"


• LinuxPlanet: .comment: A Dead End and a Milestone, or "What's Up, .doc?" (Aug 29, 2001, 13:03)
  If one of the unhappier realities of the Linux publishing industry is that the vast majority of Linux books are likely being written in Microsoft Word to satisfy the need editors and publishers have for rainbow-colored revision copies, one of the more pleasant facts of the Linux world is that just when you're cursing the lack of a feature in your almost-favorite app, it pops up. Or not. As he battles the forces of .doc, Dennis Powell considers KDE's pending jump to Qt-3.0 and all the happy confusion (and progress) that might entail.


• Infoworld: Open source takes hold [Results of a CTO survey] (Aug 29, 2001, 10:44)
  "About half of the CTOs we polled trust their business to open-source application development tools and application servers. Almost all respondents reported that open-source projects save their companies time and not just a little money. They report savings ranging from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars, which is money being siphoned away from the pockets of commercial software vendors."


• LinuxPR: Astaro Security Linux version 2.0. with expanded functionality (Aug 29, 2001, 10:06)
  "Astaro Security Linux is a complete, powerful security solution for the efficient and secure protection of networks against hackers, virus attacks and other dangers originating from the use of the Internet. Astaro's flagship software which has demonstrated it's value many times over by protecting customers valuable data and network resources, in many different projects, contains the following key features..."


• Cryptome: Press Release: Department of Justice on Sklyarov/Elcom Indictment (Aug 29, 2001, 09:35)
  "This is the first indictment under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA"), enacted by Congress in 1998. The DMCA requires that the government prove a defendant offered to the public, provided, or trafficked in technology that was primarily designed to circumvent copyright protections, or was marketed for use in circumventing copyright protections. The statute provides criminal penalties where the copyright violations are perpetrated for purposes of commercial advantage or private financial gain. The DMCA also contains certain exemptions for nonprofit libraries, archives, and educational institutions, as well as for reverse engineering and encryption research."


• LinuxPR: Easy Software Products Releases ESP Print Pro v4.2 (Aug 29, 2001, 09:08)
  "Easy Software Products today announced the release of ESP Print Pro v4.2, a complete printing solution for UNIX. The product is based on the company's Common UNIX Printing System technology and supports AIX, HP-UX, IRIX, Linux, Solaris, and Tru64 UNIX."


• AllLinuxDevices: Century Software Delivers Fully Integrated PDA Solution (Aug 29, 2001, 07:50)
  "PIXIL provides a complete suite of embedded software for advanced Internet appliances that are proven across multiple form factors and includes full support for wireless communications, networking, web browsing, power management and GUIs. PIXIL's modular framework offers fully optimized, pre-defined components for ready-to-use and easily customized applications, while eliminating the costly and time-consuming need to combine individual components into one integrated solution."


• Conectiva Linux Security Announcement - xloadimage (Aug 29, 2001, 07:22)
  "`xloadimage` is a program used to display images. This program contains a buffer overflow in the code handling FACE type images. In conjunction with plugger and netscape, this could be used by remote attackers to execute arbitrary code on the user's machine when this user visited a site containing a specially crafted image."


• Mandrake Linux Security Update Advisory: kernel 2.4 update (Aug 29, 2001, 07:20)
  "A security hole was found in the earlier Linux 2.4 kernels dealing with iptables RELATED connection tracking. The iptables ip_conntrack_ftp module, which is used for stateful inspection of FTP traffic, does not validate parameters passed to it in an FTP PORT command. Due to this flaw, carefully constructed PORT commands could open arbitrary holes in the firewall. This hole has been fixed, as well as a number of other bugs for the 2.4 kernel shipped with Mandrake Linux 8.0"


• KOffice 1.1 Released (Aug 29, 2001, 06:20)
  KOffice 1.1 is out. The project's press release, with change information and download links available within.


• Making GNOME Accessible -- Opening New Doors At the Workplace for Users with Disabilities (Aug 29, 2001, 06:01)
  "GNOME Foundation today announced the early access release of the Gnome 2.0 Accessibility Framework. This framework paves the way for a new generation of applications that integrate with assistive technologies -- enabling all users to access the GNOME desktop."


• ZDNet: Windows and Linux: in perfect harmony (Aug 29, 2001, 04:57)
  "We called on five Windows-on-Linux solutions--VMware GSX Server, VMware Workstation, Win4Lin, Wine, and WinToNet--to strut their stuff for us. With an emulator (or, in the case of Wine, a Windows compatibility layer), you can maintain the Linux foundation while being able to call up Windows applications as needed. And WinToNet takes a different tack; it's a Windows NT/2000-based product that can serve up Windows applications to any client with a browser--including Linux. Although each of these packages has its own set of quirks, none is terribly difficult to use, and all tend to work to varying degrees, depending on what you're looking for."


• Yahoo!/Reuters: Russian Programmer Indicted in Copyright Case (Aug 29, 2001, 03:53)
  "Dmitry Sklyarov, 26, and ElcomSoft Co. Ltd. were named in the five-count indictment filed in San Jose federal district court, prosecutors said. They are charged with selling and conspiracy to sell technology designed to circumvent the new U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which bans the sale of technology that can allow people to thwart copyright protections in computer and electronic programs."


• Shawn Gordon of theKompany.com Named as HancomLinux USA CEO (Aug 29, 2001, 02:30)
  "Gordon's appointment, announced today at Linux World in San Francisco, is part of an effort to gain popularity in the United States. That effort includes porting the word processor, HancomWord, to QT, as well as inclusion of applications from theKompany.com aimed at the enterprise and groupware market."


• OSNews.com: Interview With the People Behind JFS, ReiserFS & XFS (Aug 29, 2001, 01:30)
  OSNews.com interviews the project leads for three of the journaling file systems available for Linux regarding the differences between each, inclusion in the Linux kernel, and how production-ready each is.


• Colorado State University, IBM in $21.6M National Technology Hub Partnership (Aug 29, 2001, 00:18)
  "IBM will provide Colorado State's College of Business students and faculty with the use of a powerful mainframe... Developers can even re-boot or recompile programs without interfering with others on the system. This technology will allow faculty and students of the Department of Computer Information Systems, along with other departments on campus, to be able to work on their own virtual Linux server, the fastest growing operating system in the industry."