Linux News for Nov 30, 2009

• Dealing With Records in Perl (Nov 30, 2009, 23:34)
  ServerWatch: "One thing Perl does really well is read in information from a file. There are a couple of useful special variables you can use to neaten up your code when doing this or to alter the default behavior when reading in records."


• Last Call: ZaReason's Ubuntu PC Cyber Monday Sale (Nov 30, 2009, 23:14)
  WorksWithU: "One good sale deserves another. That’s one way to think of the Ubuntu PC market, where ZaReason is the latest company to offer special Cyber Monday sales to Ubuntu desktop and notebook shoppers"


• Introducing Lernid (Nov 30, 2009, 23:04)
  Jono Bacon@Home: "Last week, while at the Ubuntu Developer Summit in Dallas I mentioned in one of the roundtables about how wicked-cool it would be to have a desktop client for Ubuntu Open Week, Ubuntu Developer Week and other online tuition events that we run."


• Power to the People (Nov 30, 2009, 22:34)
  Linux Pro Magazine: " In today’s world, we have a “digital divide,” wherein some people have the means and tools to exploit technology and others do not. In most developing countries, people still pirate software because they cannot afford to pay for it."


• rPath Expands to Datacenter Automation (Nov 30, 2009, 22:04)
  InternetNews: "What does building and maintaining Linux-based software appliances have to do with datacenter automation? A whole lot, according to appliance vendor rPath."


• KDE Plasma desktop: A failure that just won't go away (Nov 30, 2009, 21:34)
  TechRepublic: "I want to like KDE 4.3. I really do. But I don’t. I want to keep an open mind about where “Plasma” is heading. But I can’t. Hear me out, before you log me off."


• Dell Offers Custom Chromium OS Download For Mini 10V (Nov 30, 2009, 21:04)
  PC World: "Dell has made available a customized download of Google's Chromium OS (the open-source version of Chrome OS), specifically for its popular Mini 10V netbook."


• DNSSEC under attack? (Nov 30, 2009, 20:34)
  Netstat -vat: "A new vulnerability is now out that attacks DNS servers WITH DNSSSEC installed."


• Ubuntu, Google, and the Future of Linux. And rsync too. (Nov 30, 2009, 20:04)
  Ubuntu User: "There's a provocatively titled article by Robert Strohmeyer over at PC World that professes "The Future of Linux is Google". It waxes prophetically about how Google will eventually dominate all that is Linux and Open Source, and that "it's time for the Linux world to rally"."


• 5 of the Best Free and Open Source CD/DVD Writing Software for Linux (Nov 30, 2009, 19:34)
  Tech Source From Bohol: "If you are using Linux, there are plenty of optical disc-authoring programs to choose from. Here are some of those that I like:"


• First look at Kubuntu Netbook Edition 9.10 Technology Preview and the KDE Plasma (Nov 30, 2009, 19:04)
  Distrowatch: "By the time Ubuntu 10.04 "Lucid Lynx" is released next April netbook users will have three Ubuntu variants customized for their smaller systems."


• Google chart shows which netbooks run Chrome OS best (Nov 30, 2009, 18:34)
  Lilliputing: "The chart details which systems have been “officially” tested by developers and reveals what hardware works and what doesn’t."


• DRM Change Continues To Cause Debate (Nov 30, 2009, 18:04)
  Phoronix: "With this message, Kristian created a new DRM repository that dropped all of the linux-core, bsd-core, and shared-core code. Seems simple and straightforward, right? Well, three weeks later with dozens of replies, this change is continuing to cause debate."


• GNOME's Guadec 2010 Hosted at The Hague (Nov 30, 2009, 17:34)
  GNOME Foundation Press Release: GUADEC, the annual GNOME conference, will be held in The Hague, Netherlands from the 24th through the 30th of July 2010. The conference is expected to draw more than 500 attendees to discuss and direct the future of the GNOME Project.


• Linux: Freedom or Freakdom? (Nov 30, 2009, 17:17)
  Daniweb: "What is it about free software that makes you crazy?"


• Linux Mint 8 final released (Nov 30, 2009, 17:04)
  ItRunsOnLinux: "Just 2 weeks after Release Candidate 1 was released, Linux Mint 8 final dubbed Helena version is available. This release comes with a lot of improvements & numerous bug fixes."


• Photo Compositing with The GIMP: Part 1 (Nov 30, 2009, 16:34)
  Packt: "In line with that, I'm following it with a new article very much related to the concepts discussed therein but we'll raise the bar a bit by having a glimpse on compositing, where we'll use an existing image or photograph and later add in our 2-dimensional element seamlessly with the said picture."


• FreeBSD 8.0 Benchmarked Against Linux, OpenSolaris (Nov 30, 2009, 16:04)
  Phoronix: "With the stable release of FreeBSD 8.0 arriving last week we finally were able to put it up on the test bench and give it a thorough look over with the Phoronix Test Suite. We compared the FreeBSD 8.0 performance between it and the earlier FreeBSD 7.2 release along with Fedora 12 and Ubuntu 9.10 on the Linux side and then the OpenSolaris 2010.02 b127 snapshot on the Sun OS side."


• System76 Ubuntu PCs: Cyber Monday Sale (Nov 30, 2009, 15:34)
  WorksWithU: "System76, the Ubuntu PC maker, continues to offer special holiday pricing on selected systems through Monday evening, November 30. Here's a look at System76's Ubuntu PC and notebook discounts, which are part of an ongoing Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales promotion."


• Open Source as a Model for Business Is Elusive (Nov 30, 2009, 15:04)
  New York Times: "In many ways, MySQL embodies the ideals of the populist software movement known as open source, in which a program's creator releases it to the world free of charge, and legions of volunteers contribute improvements that are also freely shared."


• And Now for Something Completely Different � The N900 and its Killer Feature (Nov 30, 2009, 14:34)
  The Maemo: "Nokia has created a huge amount of anticipation with the N900, although they refuse to call it a "Smart Phone", preferring instead the term "mobile computer". It is important for prospective buyers to understand why. Otherwise, some users may purchase it expecting it to be something it is not."


• Kernel Log: Coming in 2.6.32 (Part 6): Infrastructure (Nov 30, 2009, 14:04)
  The H Open: "Devtmpfs, aka 'devfs 2.0' to its detractors, should allow the Linux kernel to start faster and run without udev."


• Remix Linux: how to customise your install (Nov 30, 2009, 13:34)
  TechRadar: "Why should you have to live with community decisions when you can make Linux work your way?"


• A lighter OpenOffice for all kids... and their parents (Nov 30, 2009, 13:04)
  Stop!: "OOo4Kids is a special version of OpenOffice.org (the popular, free and easy to use alternative to Microsoft Office) which is very interesting and useful not only for schools, but also for many adult users."


• Lenovo IdeaPad S12 (Nov 30, 2009, 12:34)
  Linux User: "Lenovo is cranking out the netbooks so fast, it's hard to keep pace. Recently, this major manufacturer (the fourth biggest PC maker in the world) released the IdeaPad S10 netbook, and now the company has birthed the updated S12."


• Will the Adult Industry Drive Android Adoption? (Nov 30, 2009, 12:04)
  Tech Broiler: "The Adult Entertainment industry drove the adoption of DVD and the streaming media technologies that everyone now enjoys and takes for granted on the Internet. Will pioneering in mobile porn also accelerate adoption of Google's Android mobile OS?"


• Ubuntu X.org Guru Calls for Desktop Help (Nov 30, 2009, 11:04)
  Linux Pro Magazine: "Bryce Harrington is agonizing over the nontrivial task of delivering a working X server for Ubuntu. On the Ubuntu desktop mailing list he speaks of a flood of bug reports and appeals to improving the situation."


• GlusterFS performance tuning for small files, replication, distributed, NUFA (Nov 30, 2009, 07:04)
  Linux Blog: "Small files performance is still the Achiles heel of GlusterFS. Tuning for replication (AFR, mirroring), distributed and NUFA setups is a non-trivial task, and you must know your application behaviour, your hardware and network infrastructure"


• Interstellar overdrive - Linux and astronomy (Nov 30, 2009, 03:04)
  The H Open: "At a more prosaic level, anyone with an appropriately enabled smart phone can sit beneath the stars and view a labelled Google Sky Map that uses Android, GPS, compass data, date and time to fix your place on earth, and learn the names of the stars. "