Leading items and editorials:’Ramen Worm’ attacks Red Hat-based
systems, Signs of the times, VA Linux Systems puts out another
warning, There is still money for Linux businesses, at least
occasionally, Interview: Larry Wall and Hardware sales are getting,
well, hard.
“‘Ramen Worm’ attacks Red Hat-based systems. A new worm, dubbed
the “Ramen Worm”, was spotted on the Internet this week. For those
of you unfamiliar with the term, a “worm” is a self-propagating
attack, e.g., a script is written to attack a system, copy itself
to that system and then automatically go out to find new vulnerable
systems and attack them. This differs from the term “virus” in that
viruses are attached to or embedded in otherwise innocuous files or
programs. Linux is generally (though not theoretically) immune to
viruses; it is not immune to a worm, since a worm is simply a
specialized case of a successful, usually network-based,
attack….”
“Signs of the times. Should anybody still doubt that the Linux
business climate has changed dramatically over the last year, a
couple of events from the last week should help to clarify
things….”
“VA Linux Systems puts out another warning. In another sign of
the times, VA Linux Systems has put out another warning that
earnings will not be up to expectations. Revenue for the second
quarter (which ends on January 27) is expected to be $50 million at
best, for a loss of $0.24-0.28 per share. Among other things, VA
says that the usual January sales upturn has not happened this
year, and blames the state of the economy in general….”
“There is still money for Linux businesses, at least
occasionally. Consider these examples….”