Page Last Updated And Links Checked: 29 June 2003 Page Last Updated And Links Checked: 29 June 2003 
Introduction
GNU/Linux is an independently-developed operating system designed to conform to the POSIX standard, which makes it a 'Unix-like' operating system (it is not, however, what ESR refers to as a 'trademark Unix', and so cannot be properly called UNIX).
Note Linux and the BSD's are variants of Unix while RedHat and Mandrake are distributions ('distros') of Linux for example and FreeBSD is a popular BSD distribution. My interest (or limitation) is the Desktop environment but the Server enviroment is what established open source as credible in the commercial world where trench hardened system administrators make decisions based on performance and cost relying on their own and their peers hard won experience.
Unix was created in AT&T's Bell Laboritories (like C), but as a government controlled monopoly they could not sell software but could licence it for a small fee. Universities took it up. Linux tendeded not to fork due to leadership qualities and inspiration of Linus T. and the nature of GPL licence. BSD (Berkly Software Design Inc.) was aimed at filling education role ..was intended to be free but at last moment the Uni management put limitations on access by others (probably just and ethics and credits issue that did not fit in with the extreme 'Free Software' philosophy) so others wanting to go down that track had to fork because that source code ceased to be open. There was a 2 year period where legal issues were being resolved which gave Linux a useful head start over the emerging BSD based open source operating systems.
Linux came into being because Linus Torvalds wanted to produce a freely available Unix equivalent (cf BSD which had strings at the time) and based it on 'Minix' (Professor Andrew S. Tanenbaum's famous UNIX clone supplied with full source code and free for education or research). RM Stallman's quite radical Free Software Foundation had accumulated some free software and Stallman had written a developers tool. Linus T. agreed to make his Linux work with the accumulated software and agreed to make it GPL. Opensource (GPL) licence goes to lengths to prevent anyone being able to close off development of a particular software development in an attempt to make short term financial gains. you can use it, make money out of it, sell what you make out of it but the source code remains open to others.
When discussing Linux and BSD keep in mind that BSD came first, there is BSD code in everything including Linux and Windows software (the TCP/IP software for example came from BSD). BSD has a different licence (to GPL) that some professionals are more comfortable with. The code is considered more professional, better written, more secure. It got open source software into the server space of commercial organisations. It has stong support if not the hype and publicity of Linux.
People who contribute to the source code and finding bugs do it for satisfaction and for the respect of their peers. For me the most convincing arguments for long term viability of opensouce software is the Halloween1 and Halloween2 leaked internal Microsoft memos (that read like white papers) analysing the strength and achievent of the opensource movement and the threat to Microsoft. These memos have been admitted by Microsoft to be genuine. Refer www.opensource.org/halloween
While Linus T. was doing his own thing with his Linus kernal -refer www.softpanorama.org/People/Torvalds/index.shtml, Richard Stallman -refer www.softpanorama.org/People/Stallman/index.shtml (other names are Eric Raymonds and Bruce Perrens, co-founders of the Open Source Initiative who promoted Linux as free software to business), one of the fathers of open source, defining the concept, GPL (GNU Public Licence) launches the Free Software Foundation (FSF). One of the first program he decided to write is a C compiler that became widely knows as gcc (also GNU Emacs editor took 15 with input from many over time ..not sure who the leader was). He was upset at the trend to try to commercialise and claim ownership of work and mechaniisms that had been freely provided by .edu types and internet enthuisiasts and wanted to ensure that future stuff put out was copywrite protected (against hijacking by unscrupulous commercial interests). The current Open Source license wording was one designed by some BSD types to protect their particular interest and just had BSD references crossed out.
Actually Stallman's GNU had accumulated the programs needed to make on operating system useful and Linus T adapted his Linux kernal (ported the kernal to the existing programs!) to run the suite of accumulated programs and the Linix system as we know it came into practical existance. In March 1994, the official Linux 1.0 appeared. The GUI was provided by the Xfree86 Project, a nonprofit group that provides free software for PC versions of the X Window System. Refer www.wired.com/wired/5.08/linux.html.
One point mentioned in the Microsoft Halloween documents was that the time of development of early opensource stuff had to allow for the effort to create the tools (themselves now opensource) needed by the development effort. These tools are now proven and are in place for further undertakings. Also while stating in one place that a lot of drive comes from universities, the Microsoft author asserted that opensource development can only modify existing work (in the case of Linux, Linus T's original work) and did not have the mechanism to start from scratch with original design ..they seemed genuinely not to be aware of, say, Python, Beowulf, and Squeak (to name just three of hundreds of innovative projects). Smacks a bit of telling the boss what he wants to hear.
www.oreilly.com/openbook Tim 0'Reilly's Open Book Project.
Includes facinating reads like Eric S. Raymond's 'The Cathedral and the Bazaar' and Richard M. Stallman's 'Free as in Freedom'. Once you start reading these it's hard to stop. There are also many Linux and Free/Opensource software technical books.
tuxedo.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar The Cathedral and the Bazaar.
Eric Steven Raymond's papers including:- How To Become A Hacker, A Brief History of Hackerdom, The Cathedral and the Bazaar, Homesteading the Noosphere, The Magic Cauldron and The Revenge of the Hackers (which brings events up to-date). All published together as 'The Cathedral and the Bazaar'.
In these readings the phenomenoa of what free/opensource is articulated and formalised in such away as to enable your your own better understanding and equip you to explain the mechanism to others. The learned way in which opensource is presented as a functional option to compete with closed source entrenched monoplies contributed to Netscape deciding to make their source code opensource which gave public credability and attracted mainstream financial and news media awareness of the opensource movement.
1. Operating Systems And Software
grabbag1.html#linux Linux And Open Source Software (section of Links1 page).
2. Technical Applications Software
grabbag2.html#linux Linux Related Technical Software (section of Links2 page).
3. Computer Programming
basic.html#linux For The Linux Operating System (section of QBasic page).
4. Open Source Graphics Software
psprotrng.html#open Emerging Open-Source Graphics (Some Free) (section of Paintshop Pro Graphics page).
The following two programs are included in SuSE Linux 7.2 (Personal or Professional) dia in the gra series and xfig in the tex series. See the www.linux-knowledge-portal.org review. "Dia trumps with features like platform and application independence thanks to its XML support, the custom diagram classes and downright clever functions like object merging and layer support. On the other hand, it is still suffering from teething troubles like as-yet unimplemented functions - I'm thinking of the tools menu here, which is accessible via the main menu (right mouse button) - and total crashes. dia is fine for getting started and the points mentioned above hold promise for the future. Anybody not prepared to put up with anything other than a stable working environment, however, had better think twice before installing Dia."
In my view, no clear winner emerges from the comparison of the two programs. Xfig meets my (modest) requirements fully and, apart from the unusual graphical interface which takes some getting used to, there are no signs of old age which might in any way hinder any useful work. All the functions it boasts are actually there and work as expected. In this sense, age does have its advantages
www.lysator.liu.se/~alla/dia/dia.html Dia (cf Visio).
www.xfig.org Xfig.
www.ldraw.org Lego building block software. Opensource (free). Various operating systems.
www.lugnet.com Lego User Group. See forum.
5. CAD
acadrhino.html#unixcad CAD for Unix (section of Rhino page).
appdb.codeweavers.com/appbrowse.php?catId=59 For complete list of CAD apps that run on Linux thru Wine. (**I'm sure I've got this listed somewhere ..test my new site search engine!).
www.msclinux.com MSC's Linux page. Download MSC.Linux 2002 for i686 (Linux distribution for Intel Itanium 2-based Systems).
freshmeat.net/projects/msclinux MSC.Linux is focused on high performance computing and comes with various kernel extensions, engineering tools, Beowulf tools, and desktop components that facilitate cluster computing.
www.mscsoftware.com MSC's main website. MSC make engineering simulation software.
www.tech.oru.se/cad/varkon Varkon homepage.
A parametric CAD-modelling package originally developed by Microform AB, Sweden.
www.varicad.com VariCad. For Mechanical Engineers
Windows and Most Linux distributions. Education version undifferentiated. From US$299
www.qcad.org QCad. For Linux, the Unices and Windows
Note QCad 1.4.7 for Windows is now available for free!
freeengineer.org/Freedraft Free GPL CAD system.
Being developed. Not a polished system. No community. Skill needed to install.
www.tech-edv.co.at/lunix/CADlinks.html Tech-EDV's CAD links.
www.tech-edv.co.at/lunix/MODlinks.html Tech-EDV's Modeller links.
www.tech-edv.co.at/lunix/UTILlinks.html Tech-EDV's CAD/3d Utilities links.
www.linuxcad.com Software Forge's LinuxCAD (also has FreeBSD version).
** I don't like the blurb below. Still not sure about pricing. Can't find any user community. **
'A complete replacement for AutoCAD. For any practical purpose, it implements all major features of AutoCAD in such a way that experienced AutoCAD users can start working immeadiately with LinuxCAD'.
'Linux users new to CAD will find the Users Manual an easy way to learn CAD. There is so much similarity between LinuxCAD and AutoCAD, that while learning LinuxCAD, you will simultaneously learn AutoCAD'.
'You will find yourself easily creating all kinds of technical illustrations, diagrams, sketches and industrial quality drawings'.
6. Distributions
Easy To Install
www.redhat.com Redhat. Dominant in US
www.caldera.com Caldera. Probably more big compay orientated. Bit outside the community.
www.suse.com S.u.S.E. (Germany) eg v7.2 is 5 CD's with more than you ever could want (applications duplicated).
www.linux-mandrake.com Mandrake. (France?) Most attractive desktop style interface to aid users who don't like keying commands but getting bigger as a consequence.
www.turbolinux.com TurboLinux. (Japan)
Moderately Difficult To Install
www.debian.org Debian. Considered pure. Difficulty is due to the available flexibility not product deficiency. Popular with enthuisiasts. Probably the most compatible with other Linux.
www.slackware.com Slackware. Perhaps comments apply as for Debian.
Note
UnitedLinux (Sep 02) is SCO Group (unix?), Conectiva (Brazil), SuSE (Germany) and Turbolinux (Japan).
Australian Sources
www.everythinglinux.com.au
Everything Linux -The Alternative Operating System Store. 40 East Street, Five Dock, NSW 2046.
www.lankum.com Australian Linux/BSD On-line Store. Asquith, Sydney.
www.lsl.com.au Linux System Labs Australia Pty. Ltd. Victoria.
7. Keeping Current OS
From the Linux Introduction page at www.linuxiso.org. "Most users new to Linux are running Windows. No surprise there, it's the ubiquitous desktop computer operating system. Linux can 'play nice' with Windows, meaning you don't have to erase your current version of Windows to use Linux. There must be some unused/free space on your hard drive to install Linux, just how much or how little depends on the particular distribution. At least 1 gigabyte should be enough for most, more will be better. Installation methods are as different as the distributions themselves. Fortunately, you will find documentation on the cd itself; reading it before you do an install is recommended."
'Some Linux distributions will install on unused disk space within your current Windows system, using as little as 300 megabytes of your drive'.
'A couple of distributions have the ability to run from the cd itself, creating only temporary files on your hard drive that are erased when you shut down your system, without making permanent changes to your hard drive.'
"If you decide to do an on-the-drive installation, you can still keep your current OS. Linux can set up a dual-boot system using a Boot Loader program, such as LILO, which allows you to select which installed operating system to run shortly after your computer boots up."
"If you want to try Linux but are concerned about installing another operating system to your computer, try one of the distributions that runs from cd, without installing permanent files to your hard drive. Two of these are the SuSE Live Evaluation version and DemoLinux." ** See links below **
(**Note The page by Carlie referring to SuSE and DemoLinux cd's says 'see the link below' on that web page but there are no links. He is working alone now. Send him an email**)
demolinux.org Referred to by Graeme Pabst. (Three frame screen with slide bars!)
This site is dedicated to the production of CD Roms (the DemoLinux CDs) that allow to run Linux without installation, disk partitioning and other hassles that usually prevent people from giving Linux a try. So someone can try Linux straight from the CD drive. (And a teacher can introduce students to Linux in High School or College without conflict with the established Windows installation or need administrator privileges.)
The ISO9660 image of the Demolinux CD takes up more than 600Mb (or 500 Mb compressed) and is located at ftp://www.demolinux.org/pub/demolinux/ (anonymous FTP server).
You must use an FTP client (not a Web browser) to download it from this site.
From a forum poster:-
"I highly suggest using DemoLinux [demolinux.org] to show people how easy Linux is to use. It has a lot of powerful features such as StarOffice, GIMP, etc. and requires no install to run. First download the .iso and burn it to a CD. Make a boot disk using the CD-ROM, insert both disks into the computer you want to demonstrate Linux on, and reboot. The computer will restart and load X Windows automatically. DemoLinux also gives the user the option to install Linux to the hard drive if the user likes it. This is a great way to demo Linux to anyone, a business or a home user".
www.suse.com/us/private/download (US)
www.suse.de/en/private/download (Germany)
SuSE free download pages. Go to SuSE Link, click on >>more, then scroll down to 'SuSE Linux for i386 Live-Eval' for the demo CD that operates from the CD drive.
Knoppix (k'nop-iks)
www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.html For Debian GNU/Linux based OS (arguably more than DemoLinux) on a CD to operate from the CD Drive. Uses on the fly decompression. Can install but not the intention. Klaus Knopper wanted a CD he could take into a school lab without having to install it.
KNOPPIX is a bootable CD with a collection of GNU/Linux software, automatic hardware detection, and support for many graphics cards, sound cards, SCSI and USB devices and other peripherals. KNOPPIX can be used as a Linux demo, educational CD, rescue system, or adapted and used as a platform for commercial software product demos. It is not necessary to install anything on a hard disk. Due to on-the-fly decompression, the CD can have up to 2 GB of executable software installed on it.
Burning: -Actually it's a 700MB ISO image, and you need to use 700MB/80 Minute CDR's. Make sure you are using the ISO as a filesystem image, and not just burning the file itself under a new ISO directory. (If you do a directory listing on the burned CD and only see 1 big file, you did it wrong.)
**Re:Deja-BSD - and more (Score:5, Interesting)
by vik on Saturday November 02, @01:21PM (#4584506)
(User #17857 Info | http://olliver.family.gen.nz)
Yeah, but it comes with 2GB of apps, boots into KDE, GNOME or WindowMaker, and even sets itself up as a PXE boot network server for diskless machines.
To be honest, it also impresses the pants off Windows users and is very likely to convert them to Open Source software. There they are used to Windows products and have been told Linux is too hard. Then along comes this CD, they insert it, boot, and a fully-fledged Linux app with OpenOffice, Mozilla, network, sound and lots of toys rises before them without them having to type or do *anything*.
That's why I put it on the NZ PC World cover disk (Nov 02?).
Vik :v)
Knoppix is just that good... (Score:5, Interesting)
by Lostman on Saturday November 02, @12:42PM (#4584334)
(User #172654 Info)
My fiancee was volunteered to teach a class in algorithm design and c++ programming at the highschool she teaches at (for honors credit) -- the problems, though, were numerous.
She had to deal with:
1) NO funds available for purchasing of any programming utilities
2) Computer ADMIN not allowing her to install ANY programming software
(borland freeware, DJGPP, etc) to disk
3) NOT allowing students to write (even temporary files) to the hard drive...
We looked at a LOT of different ways to handle these problems. Finally we decided that maybe using a linux livecd and having a disk with gcc/g++ for each student. Looked at a few different types that were mentioned on slashdot but NONE seemed to work well... until we saw a VERY old article that some user mentioned Knoppix.. went to it, d/l'ed it, burned to disk, popped it in and rebooted...
*WOW*
Knoppix comes fully loaded with office utilities, games (PLENTY of games), graphics software, but most importantly DEVELOPMENT software already on it. We were in love with it (in truth, my other box is still running it from cd just bc we liked it =) -- even more important was that it ran without the need for ANY files or ANY changes to the hard drive.
It discovered all devices hooked to my computer and actually had them working (AS WELL as the internet connection from 'straight to cable modem' or 'over network using ICS' setups we have at my house).
She took it to her school, popped it in, rebooted the computers (after fidgeting with bios to allow boot from cd, laugh) and QUICKLY came up with the Knoppix desktop. It certainly didnt take more than a min or so to bootup...
Most surprising thing was that for a 'ran from cd' linux it was REMARKEBLY fast. Lets just say I was VERY impressed with Knoppix and recommend it for ANY new person. Without the threat of 'ruining their computer,' they can just pop in knoppix to try out linux... if they hate it, pop it out and its finished.
So in the end, fiancee's school didnt have to shell out money, didnt 'screw up the computers' (sigh), have a setup for students to write and compile programs, and exposed students (and teachers) to Linux. I would say the entire situation was a big WIN =)
www.osnews.com/comment.php?news_id=2305 Interview with Klaus Knopper. Anong other things he points out he designed the CD to be able to take into class rooms so avoiding problems of having Linux installed. Comments by posters quite illuminating eg its an OS on a CD, now have a distro I can carry in my backpack and comparisons with DemoLinux (which is not listed as a distro at www.linuxiso.org).
www.linuxtag.org/../ LinuxTag's Knoppix forum. See English sections.
ftp://ftp.uni-kl.de/pub/linux/knoppix/packages.txt A 117kB text file listing all the packages on Knoppix.
8. ISO vs Distro
A Linux iso is a file containing a cdrom disk image of a Linux distribution. This cdrom disk image is an exact copy of a Linux distribution on a cdrom. Think of it as the equivalent of a screen capture, but instead of capturing the information on a screen, this image captures all of the information on a particular Linux distribution's cdrom. When burned as a disk image, the .iso file is turned into a duplicate cd of the original cd. If burned as a file, instead of a disk image, the cd becomes a copy of the downloaded .iso file, and not a bootable cd with accessible files and directories
Burning: (from Knoppix forum) -Actually it's a 700MB ISO image, and you need to use 700MB/80 Minute CDR's. Make sure you are using the ISO as a filesystem image, and not just burning the file itself under a new ISO directory. (If you do a directory listing on the burned CD and only see 1 big file, you did it wrong.)
9A. StarOffice and OpenOffice.
Sun's decision to supply Dell with Linux and Oracle (2002) is rattling Microsofts' cage as they can see loss of server position. Sun say they did it to rattle Microsoft.
Nov 02. According to Gartner, StarOffice could gain at least a 10 percent market share at the expense of Microsoft Office by the end of 2004. (To that you would have to add OpenOffice users -aj.) Gartner says their thinking is based on Microsoft maintaining it's current current policies, which took effect July 31st 2002.
Once users have migrated to OpenOffice, the reasoning goes, switching to Ximian Evolution, a free e-mail and group calendaring application, and Mozilla, an open source Web browser, becomes easier. And once those transitions are complete, removing Windows entirely and replacing it with Linux becomes less of an issue.
There are three main Open Source projects to develop office suites, Open Office,
Gnome Office and KOffice. Gnome Office and Koffice have grown out of the Gnome and
KDE desktop projects. Each of these has developed a desktop infrastructure, and a host
of more or less specialised applications49. Sun has released the source code to Open
Office, which is based on a product suite called Star Office. Open Office is a crossplatform
project, with downloads available for Windows, Linux and Solaris (Sun's own
Unix implementation).
MS Office Equivelent Components.
Refer
www.govtalk.gov.uk/documents/QinetiQ_OSS_rep.pdf ## 400 Object Not Found 6May03 ##
UK Cabinet Office Analysis of the Impact of Open Source Software (Oct 2001).
(Note The word Open implies OpenOffice, the prefix G implies Gnome and K implies KDE.)
MS Word:-
OpenWriter, Abiword (cross platform ie works on Windows and Mac as well) and Kword.
MS Excel:-
OpenCalc, Gnumeric and Kspread are all capable spread sheets.
MS PowerPoint
Impress (OpenOffice), Kpresenter, Achtung (Gnome -under development).
MS Internet Explorer
Mozilla, Galeon and Konqueror. The commercial Netscape browser is closely based on an Open Source browser
called Mozilla. Mozilla supports most modern standards; it is somewhat heavy weight.
Galeon uses the rendering core of Mozilla in a faster, lightweight Gnome shell; it is very
responsive but not yet as stable as Mozilla. Konqueror is also a very viable choice, and
is integrated into the KDE file manager.
MS Outlook
Evolution (Gnome -under advanced development), or if you want email only there is Balsa (Gnome) or Kmail.
(Note Outlook combines an e-mail client with a calendar, contact management and document management. This combination of functionality can easily be provided by several
separate Open Source tools but a single comparible product is only Evolution. Watch for Lotus 123 guy Mitch Kapor's Chandler project started in Aug 02 with 1st release in say 03 or 04.
MS Access Not referred to in the UK report but the following was posting was found on the net:-
There is little reason to add an Access-like database product to OpenOffice, as there are lots of free real full-featured databases available. e.g. PostgreSQL, SAPdb, Firebird. If you want an extremely fast database but can do without some advanced features you could go for MySQL.
PDF Format
Being addressed. Developer build 643 included native export to pdf.
Remember operating systems Lindows and Lycoris Desktop LX (five guys around the block from Redmond). Both really designed to go on boxes as the supplied (Windows like) OS but include some MS Office file compatable applications (Wal-Mart sells both on a box for US$199 which will do a lot to hasten acceptance of opensource at entry level).
StarOffice has separate native versions for Windows and Linux. Aust$65.
OpenOffice can be downloaded free (55Mb) or buy CD Aust$8
Sun Microsystems StarOffice 6.0 Australian education offer. Non-profit and educational institutions can buy the right copy and distribute the software to their members for vocational and personal use for AU$183. Prior to announcing the move a StarOffice 6.0 licence package for 500 users would have cost a university or school AU$71,000.
Note that in Xmas 2000 Sun released the source for StarOffice 5.2 -renamed OpenOffice 1.0. The source distribution is almost 80MB (370MB unpacked) -almost 35,000 files in over 2100 directories. Even so, it's not the full thing - some of StarOffice was built from third-party code and can not be redistributed under the GPL. These parts include little details like printing and spell checking.
It will be a daunting task to dig into. 'The source code is not as comprehensively commented as we'd like.' says the OpenOffice source overview page in a rather understated way. If you do find comments in the code, they may just turn out to be in German. The build instructions are hard to find (there's no README file), terse, and incorrect. But, more importantly, consider that the code is in rapid and massive development, and the plan is to make major changes (i.e. to turn it all into GNOME components). Sun has a large number of engineers working on the project, and they will likely be the bulk of the developer community for some time.
In other words, OpenOffice looks an awful lot like Mozilla. So it should not surprise anybody if this project takes a very long time to get to its first truly stable release.
(So what is OpenOffice situation now?? Well, it's free and I've read some user reports and OpenOffice seems very good. But I'd want to know how it reacts to MS Office if it is also installed somewhere and I'd want to know the uninstaller works. I also would expect to lose some formating of MS Office formats brought in and would stay with MS Office if I had a big investment in macros although with cross over products and emulators (eg Lindows and CodeWeavers) you could by the odd MS Office and install it over the top of particular machines in an all opensource server and desktop system. Could duel boot the odd machine but then you would need to buy a Windows licence. -AJ)
See also the May 2000 article
www.eweek.com/../
www.ximian.com A Linux based Outlook client ie email, calander, task list manager etc (but cost as high as Outlook!). To work with Star Office.
Ximian Desktop US$60 addresses two major deficiencies of Linux: the lack of a compelling personal information manager (PIM) and the labor-intensive work of installing and updating the Linux OS, desktop UI, and applications. The suite includes a customizable interface for Linux, a file manager (Nautilus), a Web browser (Mozilla), a PIM (Ximian Evolution), and control panels for customizing, managing, and tuning your system, plus other useful applications.
www.xandros.com A basic disto that works well with Crossover Office.
www.openoffice.org OpenOffice.Org
Creating, an office suite that will run on all major platforms and provide access to all functionality and data through open-component based APIs and an XML-based file format
www.desktoplinux.com Good links in right side navbar.
theopencd.org Opensource software on a CD that will run under Windows. Principally OpenOffice and selection of other good vetted software to help introduce people to opensource as a stepping stone to convincing them to go to Linux.
9B. .Net, Mono, DotGnu Portable .Net, Java.
Note: Also consider mode_perl and Sun's releasing J2EE (java) to OpenSource about Nov/Dec 2002.
'.NET' is a marketing term used by Microsoft. The actual platform is better referred to by neutral parties as CLI (Common Language Infrastructure
A quote going around is the Internet is becoming the computer.
'Webservices' is term used a lot and considering email it is a reality now but wether it will extend to become what commercial people want is another matter (will it have a hype lifecycle?).
dotgnu.org/pipermail/developers/2002-January/005586.html Good overview of DotGNU and Portable.Net and the neccesity by the founders.
www.perfectxml.com/Xanalysis/TSG/WebServices.asp Excellent definition of Web Services.
www.misweb.com/../ Comparing applications of J2EE and .Net in large Australian statutory organizations.
www.openp2p.com/lpt/a//p2p/2001/05/30/hailstorm.html Microsoft's Hailstorm, an important departure from the norm. May 2001 O'Reilly article. (Abandoned April 2002 but XBox on-line game users forced to go onto Passport while they where already on-line game players so it was not a necessary requirement. Was this part of detecting modded XBoxes?)
Points made include:-
The obvious question is 'Can a HailStorm transaction take place without talking to Microsoft owned or licensed servers?'
The answer seems to be no, for two, and possibly three, reasons.
First, you cannot use a non-Passport identity within HailStorm, and at least for now, that means that using HailStorm requires a Microsoft-hosted identity.
Second, you cannot use a non-Microsoft copyrighted schema to broker transactions within HailStorm, nor can you alter or build on existing schema without Microsoft's permission.
Third, developers might not be able to write HailStorm services or clients without using the Microsoft-extended version of Kerberos.
At three critical points in HailStorm, Microsoft is using an open standard (email address, Kerberos, SOAP) and putting it into a system it controls, not through software licensing but through copyright (Passport, Kerberos MS, HailStorm schema). By making the system transparent to developers but not freely extensible, Microsoft hopes to gain the growth that comes with openness, while avoiding the erosion of control that also comes with openness.
** Note Apr 2002. Due to lack of 3rd-party support for Microsoft's 'Persona' (originally codenamed 'Hailstorm'), the company has been forced to dump the project. It seems the companies didn't like having a middleman between them and the consumers. As a person worried about the future with .NET, this is a bit of a relief.
Where is MS taking .Net now?
Gartner sugessted that .Net and Java will each get 40% net business (for a total of 80%). Might even be 50%-30% Java's way. Java is higher cost with more flexibility (particularly cross-platform). .Net is lower cost with less flexibility (Microsoft VisualBasic, MS C# compiler?). Really Microsoft is getting into the net too late. Java got in in 1997 (say) and is well established. Also people are just wary of Microsoft now after the 2002 License 6 charges near blackmail. Java is both the name of the platform and the programming language used which causes confusion to some. Microsoft causes much more confusion by callinf everything .Net even unrelated products before the .Net was acrtally introduced. Microsoft now worried that >Net will compete with Windows for brand recognition which they don't want (Windows being the 4th most recognised brand name). Microsoft tried to use Java without Sun's Java platform and lost heavily in court and have discontinued use of Java.
www.go-mono.com Ximian's Mono project to create an open source implementation of the .NET Development Framework. They think that .Net is pretty good so they are going to produce an equivalent (not clone!)and they believe it's just a matter of putting bits together based on Gnome development experience. Sounds positive! There are several interesting links and comments to pursue relating to a decision to go from a GPL to a more BSD type licence to satisfy Intel and HP in order to get at the thousands of classes needed by Mono. Ximian has produced about 900. Ximian was co-founded by Miguel de Icaza of Gnome fame and Nat Friedman. It seems other companies are switching to other opensource licences from GPL because it has not woked for them. RedHat stands firm on GPL and implies you can't give much weight to the views of self-admitted losers.
Note elswhere Miguel said an advantage of producing the .Net equiv will be the ability to use it as a tool to get opensource products developed and debugged in one third the time it currently takes (and that Mono was pronounced mo-no after a Mexican monkey or is Spanish for monkey).
From Mono FAQ:
Question 99: Do you plan to port Rhino to C#?.
Answer:Eto Demerzal has started a Rhino port to C#.
www.southern-storm.com.au/portable_net.html DotGNU Portable.Net. Compare with Mono (and .Net).
Chaiman of the saudi Ararbia Computing Society said that Microsoft's .Net concept is a big trap for the country. .Net will make us hostage to Microsoft as a country. It is subscription based and people don't understand the dangers in .Net. Microsoft wants us to store all of our documents using their technology and gain access to them through their technology. This has the potential to really affect national security. It is important that decisions are not made simply on how much these systems and implementations will cost now. It is vital to take a long-term view.
10. Sites Of Interest
www.softpanorama.org Nikolai Bezroukov. Excellent read.
www.softpanorama.org/OSS/open_source.shtml Excellent learned history.
www.tuxedo.org Eric S. Raymond's personal domain. Excellent. Go to Site Map. Great readable narratives about critical periods in opensource history. Quotes on guns.
www.linuxmafia.com/~rick Rick Moen, Californian Linux/BSD advocate. See Fear Of Forking article that explains why forking tends not to occur and the advantages that being able to fork provide. See also other articles plus links and rants.
www.apocryphillia.com Merkac Dot. A slashdot summary. Leaves out the useless posts. See Afterslash.
www.oreillynet.com O'Reilly does a lot of good work (eg CSS and Open Source).
linuxtoday.com/../ A routine Linus Torvalds email listing patches for the latest 'build' of Linux. Note the list of contributers. No wonder Microsoft hates their guts. So many ..Linus says he's tired and needs more effort from everyone ..loyal liutenents, troopies ..anyone. I can see Mirosoft's problem. If they did neutalise him somehow, another would just take his place who might not be quite as easy going as Linus.
ms_ssi_danger.html A posting drawing attention to the danger to Open Source software if a contributer happens to be employed by a company with a 'Microsoft Shared Source Initiative' (SSI) agreement that is subjected to an IP violation civil action by Microsoft.
www.kde.org KDE is a network transparent desktop environment for UNIX workstations. Together with a free implementation of UNIX such as Linux, UNIX/KDE constitutes a completely free and open computing platform that we hope will finally bring the same open, reliable, stable and monopoly free computing to the average computer user that scientist and computing professionals world-wide have enjoyed for years.
www.lwn.net Linux Weekly News. Good.
www.linuxgazette.com Linux Gazette. Good.
pimientolinux.com/peru2ms ## 400 Not Found 6May03 to 29June03. Even pimientolinux.com did notcome up ##
Peruvian opensource activist site.
Details the efforts of the now quite famous Peruvian Congressman Dr Villanueva to introduce opensource in Peruvian Government. See his excellent letter responding to the Microsoft FUD directed at the opensource software initiative. It is a worth while read because it provides the most thoughtful and thorough rebuttal ever seen to Microsoft's standard attacks on open-source. Done with the surgical skill of a master swordsman without a hint of anger or even raising a sweat. Bill Gates responded by going to Peru personally to hand out freebies. Someone once said you can judge a man by his enemies.
www.zdnet.com.au/../ A Zednet article in which the author slices and dices a critics objections to the Australian Govt using opensource software (OSS) with wording that fairly rings of the words of Peruvian Congressman Dr Villanueva's reply to Microsoft's critism in the link above. I shall call it the 'Villanueva Response To Microsoft' or perhaps the 'Peruvian Attack'. The word defense does not come into it ..thats what Microsoft are doing.
www.google.com/press/zeitgeist.html Google's track of web searches. 20 Oct 02 2%Other 1%Linux 5%Mac 92%Win.
www.linux-knowledge-portal.org/en/index.php A portal run by one of the fathers of SuSE, Frank Rennemann, Ph.D. He has taken over a SuSE knowledge site and is making it an Independantl Linux site.
www.open4success.org Rex Ballard of IBM lets rip. Good. See his 'Linux was always a threat to Microsoft's Desktop' listing of Microsoft's manouvering to thwart competitors.
www.futurepower.net/microsoft.htm Michael Jennings: Windows XP Shows the Direction Microsoft is Going. Required reading. Spanish version available.
ms-bs.com Another what's Microsoft doing today watch site.
www.linuxwillprevail.com Don Soegaard. Advocating improving the Desktop and getting hackers and power users together. Interesting links.
www.distrowatch.comDistroWatch Stats on 104 odd current distributions of Linux. Excludes from operating from floppie or CD drive.
www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/27759.html Article on SuSE 8.1 approaching being an XP killer and an example of why MS execs Steve Ballmer and Brian Valentine are so bent out of shape about Linux. Some rough edges still to be smoothed out, look forward to 8.2, 8.3.
www.osafoundation.org Mitchell Kapor's (of Lotus 123 fame) website.
Links to all of his invovements in particular the Open Source Applications Foundation which commenced in Aug 2002 with US$5Million, 8 to 16 paid people and the open source community to build something better than MS Outlook (evidently he inspired to get back into software development and use the opensource approach after having lunch with Linus Torvalds). A link missing is to the Electronic Frontier Foundation he co-founded which is included below.
www.eff.org Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Co-founded by Mitchell Kapor (of Lotus 123 fame) and John Perry Barlow (a high priest type I admired who thought a lot and who once worked with cattle and was a songwriter for the Grateful Dead). Interestingly (Kapor defiitely and possibly Barlow was only interviewed) Kapor had been fingerprinted by the FBI following a outage at AT&T that was attributed to 'hackers' by the the FBI in 1990 (subsequently atributed to software error and response system failure). Set up in Washington to be able to lobby. Some impressive wins including getting to act as a consumer rep in Commitees that inially refused to include consumer reps after physical intervention at meetings and damming front step press interviews that exposed the arrangements to public scrutiny. Providing legal support where freedoms of the internet, freespeech or rights of consumers are brought to court.
www.li.org Linux International. Linux advocacy.
www.linex.org Refers to Vazquez de Miguel is the minister of education, science and technology in a western region of Spain called Extremadura. Linex is taken from Lin (of Linux and Ex (of Extremadura). Spanish company prepared andistro with necessary apps for public distribution. Should Spanish speaking countries of south America or and Mexico consider it? Many downloads from outside of Extremadura are occuring. A book is being written to support the initiative (CD in jacket?).
See article www.washingtonpost.com/../.
www.nsa.gov/selinux NSA who started SeLinux ('Secure Linux' to meet CC EAL4 certification for some US Federal Govt uses), worked with a contractor in California, then (supposedly) had to get out for whatever reasons eg Federal laws, contractor anguish over their propriety code going into a GPL product, Microsoft pressure or whatever. However they seem to be carrying on using 'surplus resources when avaliable'. Download SeLinux from here.
www.cpi.seas.gwu.edu Cyberspace Policy Institute, a group of academic researchers based at George Washington University advocating SeLinux. Click on the, hard to see, Activities -> SeLinux. Also visit the George Washington University link and search on 'SeLinux'.
www.osdgroup.com Open Source Development Group (OSDgroup), a Linux training firm who have taken up SeLinux and have released a version with Westcam some 2 years after NSA largely discontinued their effort. The package adds a graphical installer and new security settings.
See link on left nav bar for their SeLinux (beta) which is shipped by mail (3 CD's total 1300Mb).
www.worldtechtribune.com/../ Article deriding Linux claiming it does not meet CC EAL4. The submitted comments do a fair rebuttal. Linux is a kernel and no kernal could. Some distos might but not all distros. Costs lot of money. Apparently Win 2000 had just passed the day before (win 95/98/ME and XP do not) while no distro has ever been subjected to the test so it probably raises as many questions about Microsoft as it does about Linux considering Microsoft's resources and claimed superiority in the industry.
www.osopinion.com/../ Article: Is Linux Really More Secure Than Windows?
A poster says ...ActiveX IS a security flaw of the most incredible (infinite) proportions. ActiveX is a security disaster in its very concept, and the fact Microsoft CANNOT make ActiveX safe if EVER it is supported in any XHTML services attests to Microsoft's promotion of its ostensible effort (rather than its success at alleviating the threat ActiveX comprises) as little more than empty pretension. What serious engineer would pursue (much less retain) ActiveX in light of the fact it is an open door to insecurity?
Not mentioned is the fact that Microsoft now reserves the right to sue people who post vulnerabilities. This is not very encouraging.
Not to belabor a point, but here's a real-world example of Microsoft 'security'. Here's some ACTUAL source code from a KLEZ virus -- which 'technically' is an ActiveX object:
--E3524f8Qw3mbOk6Ma4g8333eS45V
Content-Type: audio/x-wav;
name=Ymhx.pif
Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64
Content-ID:
Engineers will recognize the extension indicates the attachment is a program information file -- which by Microsoft 'security' measures is EXECUTED. Even neophytes will note the attachment claims to be an audio/x-wav file.
Is there ANY means of determining the file is truly of the claimed type?
No.
Is there any system structure which will ONLY open the file with an audio player -- so it won't ruin our system?
Of course not. This is MICROSOFT 'security'.
There are thousands and thousands of VARIETIES of such exploits which can only attack Windows systems BECAUSE Microsoft 'security' is nothing but a facade.
In light of this, the concluding statement is particularly offensive. How this Hemmendinger is any kind of expert is beyond me:
'You're still not immune,' Hemmendinger said, 'but you can be reasonably sure that [a vulnerability] that was publicized a year ago won't bite you.'
NOT SO AT ALL. EVERY KLEZ and every other ActiveX exploit before it CAN STILL get you, and WILL still get you, because there isn't the slightest HINT Microsoft will close the door to ActiveX.
To further evaluate the security of Microsoft, consider this:
Windows users SHOULD be familiar with the 'security' option, 'Script ActiveX controls marked safe for scripting.'
What Microsoft doesn't dare tell you after spending so many millions 'training engineers to write 'safe' code is, what DOES mark an ActiveX control 'safe' for scripting?
The AUTHOR of the code does!
Every virus writer in the world can simply indicate his script is 'safe', AND THERE IS NO MECHANISM WHATSOEVER TO DETERMINE OTHERWISE!
Safe? Security? You have to be kidding! What could get us a year ago can't get us now? No way in the world, partner.
I'll 'finish' with this however:
Now, IF you were to trust a company to TRULY write secure software, WOULD you pick the company which for approximately A DECADE hasn't been able to write a 'work offline' routine that won't immediately RE-DIAL the modem as soon as you work offline?
Hah.
'Security'. Give us a break.
Virus writers are usually NOT expert developers, and the only reason they so readily exploit Windows systems is the door is wide open to the most basic, crude 'skills'.
www.cyber.com.au/../ Australian article. Referred to by a poster above.
www.ecommercetimes.com/../ Dated 15 Nov 92. Refers to FUD generated by Aberdeen based on Cert figures of 'security advisories' that proove Microsoft is more secure than opensource. Good rebuttal by qyv1723.
primates.ximian.com/~miguel/ Home page of Miguel deIcaza (Mexico), creator of Gnome. *Needs some fixing eg put a / in front of style.css ...unless that wsas done to disable the style sheet in which case the style sheet may need fixing also the header needs isolating in own table at top.
11. Some Quotes
Nikolai Bezroukov
High level programmers in industry can be dissatisfied with the corporate environment. For them a contribution to an open source project can be a way to supersede the limitations of a Dilbertesque atmosphere in some corporations by channeling part of their suppressed initiative in the corporate domain into a free/opensource software domain.
Torvalds
'Quite frankly, I don't want people using Linux for ideological reasons. I think ideology sucks. This world would be a better place if people had less ideology, and a whole lot more 'I do this because it's FUN and because others might find it useful', not because I got religion'.
Albert Einstein
Although I am a typical loner in my daily life, my consciousness of belonging to the invisible community of those who strive for truth, beauty, and justice has preserved me from feeling isolated.
Tim O'Reilly
The greatest opportunity for an open-source software business model may come from even less direct plays -companies that specialize in essential accessories like manuals stand to gain substantial profits from the demand for open-source software materials. O'Reilly & Associates, the leading publisher of technical resource books, has sold more than $94 million in open-source-related materials since it was founded, most of that since 1997.
Jonathan Kozol, On Being a Teacher, 1981
Pick battles big enough to matter, small enough to win.
Mahatma Gandhi
Almost everything you do will be insignificant, but it is important that you do it.
Moliere
It is not only for what we do that we are held responsible, but also for what we do not do.
Bruce Sterling (THE HACKER CRACKDOWN Law and Disorder on the Electronic Frontier)
Anything that really works is already obsolete.
12. Free Text/Html Editors for Linux
My editor of choice in Windows is Homesite but the free one I cart (900kb) around is Edit Pad Lite (Jan Goyvaerts) although MS Notepad is fine just to change something.
My editor of choice for AppleMac is BBEdit
My editor of choice for Linux is ..? That's what I need to find out (..Vi?).
www.linux.org/apps/all/System/Editors.html Linux.Org's listing of coding, text and html editors.
www.coffeecup.com/linux Coffee Cup's Linux Html Editor.
13. The BSD's
Note. FreeBSD is probably the most popular of the BSD's.
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/opensources/book/kirkmck.html Twenty Years of Berkeley Unix (A History). From AT&T-Owned to Freely Redistributable.
www.freebsd.org FreeBSD.
FreeBSD started as a patchkit to Bill Jolitz's 386BSD in 1993. John Hubbard, one of the founders is a manager in Apple's Darwin project (a 'Unix'). Bill Jolitz's lack of people skills probably (and a AT&T lawsuit) contributed to Linux early establishment (despite the clear head start). BSD (maybe) not as user installation friendly as some Linux 'distros'.
BSD was born in the University of California, Berkley (Berkly Software Design Inc.) aimed at education. BSD currently is not getting the publicity like Linux (they don't have a Torvalds or a penquin), it has a lot to offer and some (commercial people?) may prefer the licencing conditions to those of the GPL'd Linux.
www.freebsdportal.com FreeBSD Portal. Good FreeBSD Links. Wants good less known links.
www.bsd.net.au Pandaemonium. WA based BSD User Group (a 'Bug').
14. User/Community Groups
linux-bangalore.org Bangalore LUG. Where Eric S. Raymond's site above was described as essential reading.
www.wlug.org.nz Waikato Linux Users Group (WLUG) in NZ. A Wiki site!
www.linuxlinks.com Linux Links. Where I found the Waikato Wiki site. WSLUG was described as having a University of Western Sydney meeting location!
www.freelinuxcd.org Donate your old distos on CD and they will distribute them to people who don't have the resources. Promote Linux/BSD/opensource, counter Microsoft's tactics that complicate computers being donated to schools and third world countries and strike a blow for recycling.
www.cbnsw.org.au ComputerBank NSW.
Part of a national organisation installing opensource software on to donated computers for needy non-profit organisations or individuals. Use Debian as the base for the builds. (Note. Debian is probably the most pure, universal of the Linux system.)
www.debian.org/devel/debian-desktop Debian Org.
Refered to by ComputerBank NSW. Simplification of installation discussion. Use nav links to explore rest of site.
www.cat.org.au/pcan Paramatta Computer Access Group. Drop-in centre.
www.summit.net.au/../ Hawkesbury Seniors's Computer Group. Any type of computer.
www.wslug.org.au (WSLUG) Western Sydney Linux User Group at Richmond.
clug.org.au Canberra Linux User Group.
www.slug.org.au Sydney LUG.
www.woa.com.au/maclug MacLUG. (MacArthur) Campbelltown, Camden, Liverpool and Wollondilly areas. A SIG of SLUG.
www.goldcoastlinux.org Gold Coast Linux User Group. ## 400 Cant resolve 6May03 Does not come up ##.
glug.dyndns.org Goonellabah Linux User's Group (GLUG). Lismore, North Coast of NSW.
murlug.org Murray River Linux User Group. Meets at Lavington (Albury-Wodonga region of NSW-Victoria).
www.plug.org.au Perth LUG in Western Australia. Looks like a 'portal'. I did not see meeting details but users can post events into a calender. Interesting.
www.slpwa.asn.au Society of Linux Professionals Western Australia.
wlug.linuxorbit.com Wauchope Linux Users Group (WLUG). The intention is to advertise and hold a first meeting in early 2003. Note as at 6 Dec O2 the contact email on the page is wrong and should be drewbian@tsn.cc
Wauchope (pronounced 'war hope') is 20 km inland from Port Maquarie on the Hastings River on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales.
wlug.linuxorbit.com Where reference to Wauchope Linux Users Group was found.
hunter.apana.org.au/index.html APANA/Hunter. Providing free ISP to community and individuals (non-evil people) in Hunter Region. Use GNU/Linux exclusively. Five systems running 24/7. Been around 10 years.
www.ssc.com:8080/glue Linux Journal's Groups of Linux Users Everywhere. GLUE Coordinator: Christy Kyllo.
www.ssc.com:8080/glue/groups/nonus/australia GLUE'S Australian information page.
www.redhat.com/apps/community/LUG/australia_oceania/australia.html Red Hat Australian User Groups.
lugww.counter.li.org A 'World Wide' listing of Linux user groups. Actually listing of listings.
dir.yahoo.com/../ Yahoo's Linux User Groups page
www.users.bigpond.com/johncoom/linuxlinks.html A Melb User Group member. An AutoCad user with a duel boot machine. Website first with Windows NoteTab then edited with Linux html editors. Now it is being updated using non wysiwyg editors in which ever Opp/Sys is being used at the time. Posts on www.pclinuxonline.com, a popular user write-in site (comparable with a forum?).
linux.org.mt/index.jsp?lang=en Malta Linux User Group. Good content.
www.auug.org.au Australian UNIX and Open Systems User Group (AUUG), a professional association for end users, corporations, developers and vendors that promotes UNIX and related systems, including Linux and BSD. Chapters in each state.
www.linux.net.nz NZ Linux resource. ## 400 Did not come up 29June03 ##
www.linux.gen.nz NZ Linux: FAQ and Hardware Suppliers List .
www.nzoss.org.nz NZ Open Source Society.
www.symonds.net/~fsug-kochi Indian Linux user group that changred it's name to Free Software User Group. Their reasons for doing so. Good letter to education authorities rivaling the Peruvian memo for quality.
www.linuxworld.com.au LinuxWorld Australia. An IDG website that links to a further eight computing/IT related sites they have established in Australia. The editorial expresses the desire to be part of, or a link to the Australian Linux community.
www.osv.org.au Open Source Victoria. A marketing, advocacy and focus group, which aims to raise the profile of Open Source Software (OSS) in Victoria
15. Education (Primary/Secondary)
www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6349 Article on moving the Greater Houlton Christian Academy computer lab to Linux (USA). Refers to donated computers, Windows licensing costs and concern about software audits. Teacher driven. Although an earlier exposure to Linux was not positive, he felt obliged to have a fresh look and was impressed by being able to transfer over from Windows to Mandrake easily at home.
opensourceschools.org Informative. Enter Australia (or any country) in the search box. Note the article about Linux and StarOffice used in education in the Australian Northern Territory.
www.schoolforge.net Co-ordinating OSS use in Primary and High Schools.
www.seul.org Simple End User Linux. Linux use in Education.
www.k12ltsp.org K-12 Linux in Schools Project.
www.ca.asn.au Computer Angels -Western Australia.
Gives computers with OSS to kids (many with physical or mental disabilities) and show them how to use them.
Texinfo (GNU/Linux) is used to to write documentation.
cyberknights.com.au Small West Australian company supporting Linux transitions. Links with Perth LUG?
www.pcsforkids.org Pc's for Kids. Shut down by legal action supported by Microsoft for free supplying computers to disadvantaged children. Jesus! they were sending computers to Timor.
See www.cnn.com/../ CNN article.
www.the-ark.co.nz The Arc in NZ also forced to close its operation in 1997 after Microsoft pursued them for a $600 payment for each computer being given to a needy children. Reopened using initially using Free Dos and freeware. Now (apparently) using the the (MS) licences that come bundled with the recyled boxes (not real sure). See www.idg.net.nz/../ IDG article.
www.schoolnet.na/news/stories/msft20021111.html
A devestatingly effective reply by a Namibian educator/administrator to a Microsoft offer (dated Mar02). He quoted Peruian Dr Villanueva's open letter to Microsoft.
staff.harrisonburg.k12.va.us/~rlineweaver/#oss Cost savings of open source software in the server room -An informal case study in K-12 education.
16. Forums
groups.google.com/groups/../ Google Group's Aus.Comp.Linux.
groups.google.com/groups/../ Google Group's Comp.OS.Linux.
17. XBox Wars
The XBox is a Microsoft gaming console. It is powerful IBM-PC based hardware with a stripped-down version of the Windows 2000 kernel that allows only their games to run. It is relatively inexpensive (AUS$399 in Australia US199, in US and US193 in Japan). Microsoft's business plan is to sell it as a loss leader and make profits selling their games. People modifying it to use as a computer or play games they wrote themselves or purchased from other software companies does not fit Microsoft's business plan so they are deemed criminals. Of course they would not be criminals in any normal social circumstance except Microsoft can rely on cash-strapped Congressmen whose campaign funds always need toping up to support legislation that courts are then obliged to enforce.
www.smh.com.au/../ Account of Microsoft's failed court action in Australia to stop a man moding (ie re-chipping) game boxes including Microsoft executive ('opensouce is un-American') Steve Ballmer's threats.
www.lik-sang.com Lik-Sang in Hong Kong. Stopped by court injunction sought by Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo from selling chips for the XBox which would allow other games to be played (including those from, hobby game writers or start-up game writing companies. Now facing legal action. Note the court issued the injunction with permitting Lik-Sang to appear in court. So much for Hong Kong's 100 years of association with the British justice system.
www.lik-sang.com/news/../ Lik Sang's and user's responses.
xbox-linux.sourceforge.net XBox Linux Project.
Aims to provide a version of GNU/Linux for the XBox, so that it can be used as an ordinary computer. Linux should make use of all XBox hardware and allow to install and run software from standard i386 Linux distributions. An XBox running Linux is very useful as a desktop computer, as a (web) server or as a node in a Linux cluster. Achievements so far (as at 6 Dec 02) include:-
XBox Linux Mandrake 9. This is the first full Linux distribution for the XBox and is 100% compatible with Mandrake Linux 9. The 350 MB installation CD includes Gnome, KDE and OpenOffice.org and installs in 10 minutes. See also the Debian work. The XBox has to be modded for the Mandrake and Debian versions to run.
Windows 2000 has been run in inside Linux on the XBox with common PC virtualization software.
www.xboxhacker.net XBox Hacker Net. More people with a mission to modify what they have legally purchased to meet their specific (legitimate) needs.
www.red-mercury.com/mmceo/mmceo_current.html An article that quantifies the running cost of Microsoft's XBox situation. Suggests US$100 loss on each machine. Prospect of 5 to 10 dollars profit per game. Sony able to cut costs with integrated chip design (PlayStation2) while MS stuck with many off the shelf chips in oversize expensive box.
www.xodus-chip.com Some really bright Brits. Makers of the Matrix Mod Chip.
'If you can't afford the new Windows XP Media Center edition, why not grab yourself a modded XBOX, and check out the XBOX Media Player 2.0. The official site has some screen shots and previews. I am sure Gates will be real upset about this one. Somehow $300 for an x-box setup is cheaper than the $2000 XP boxes.'
18. Unallocated
www.nylxs.com New York Linux Scene. Activists.
www.windowsrefund.net Windows Refund Day. Second day -23 January 2003.
winxp.bink.nu Was www.windowsxp.nu until Microsoft demanded be it be handed over. MS Windows information.
www.disa.mil/pao/dodfoss.html ## Not Found 6May03 to 29June03 ##
Mitre's assessment of the role of Free and Opensource Software used in the US Department of Defence. A definative professional work that can be used to counter a lot of Microsoft fud. Single 504 kB html page.
mitredodfoss.html Local copy of key points in original format (for considering suggested changes for author).
mymitredodfoss.html Local copy of key points in altered format.
newsforge.com/newsforge/../ NewsForge (3 Jan 03) referring to Peter Gallagher and DevIS [www.devis.com] who sell solutions or applications based on an an OSS 'stack'. It's their skill and experience with the OSS they use which is their 'intellectual property'. Customers include US Federal Government. Gallagher muses about putting the OSS stuff on a CD and charging a dollar for it to get it onto the GSA schedule [the government's 'master' product purchasing catalog database] to meet requirements to use 'COTS'. They use OSS to help them meet the fixed price contract offered. Implication is that the purchaser does not (necessarilly) know they are using OSS.
www.aaxnet.com/editor/edit029.html Excellent article that covers a lot of where Microsoft is coming from and increasing disadvantages for dependant users. Longhorn is also discussed and it's MS Office legacy problems.
www.infoworld.com/../ Ernie Ball Inc. guitar makers was busted in 2000 by the Business Software Alliance (BSA) for running pirated copies of software from Adobe Systems, Autodesk, FileMaker and Microsoft. Raided by BSA an armed marshals who shut the IT system down. Found 8% unlicenced software. Now (2002) 'Microsoft free'. 'I couldn't have grown my business without Microsoft,' Stirling Ball said. 'Now I can't run my business with Microsoft.'
www.stepupcomputing.com For DocuNote, a lowcost Tablet with a Lindows 3.0 option. Does not have Microsoft's handwriting-recognition software.
lists.linux.org.au/archives/lias/2002-July/msg00000.html Linux at Granville TAFE.
lists.slug.org.au/archives/slug-chat/2001/10/msg00264.html Linux at Graville TAFE. 25 Oct 02 press release re Computerbank setting up a lab at Elec Eng Granville TAFE (02) 9682 0222 -Geoffrey Robertson (teacher). Talk of putting some together as a super computer.
www.progsoc.uts.edu.au/lists/cb-nsw/2000/November/msg00038.html 28 Nov 02. Discussion re- Linux Lab at Granville TAFE. Preparation for Term 1 2003 by Computerbank. One guy had Nth Ryde phone number.
www.slug.org.au/training.html SLUG'S Training page detailing Linux couses at Granville TAFE. The Electrical Engineering Department at Granville TAFE runs a course in Linux. The qualification is called 'A Statement of Attainment in Manufacturing and Engineering (Linux)---6752'. The cost is approximately $125 for the semester.
www.mandrakebizcases.com/geocases.php ## 400 not found 10Jan03
The Adelaide Institute of Technical and Further Education currently has 144 computers set up and using Mandrake Linux (ReiserFS) and 3 RedHat servers. The computers deliver network training and programming to students in the Diploma in Information Studies. See also North Coast Institute of TAFE using Mandrake 7.1 workstations to teach students Network Engineering as part of there Computer Engineering Advanced Certificate.
See also other Uni's and a High School using Mandrake.
www.smh.com.au/../ Australian UNIX and Open Systems User Group's inaugural Australian Open Source Awards. Lots of good Australian links to browse.
www.infoworld.com/../ Article about IBM spraying San Francisco's streets with the penquin tux logo. City charged them US$110,000.
www.dwheeler.com/oss_fs_why.html Why Open Source Software / Free Software (OSS/FS)? Look at the Numbers!
www.oswd.org Open Source Web Designs.
Maybe does not belong on this page. Need to look at the code (script) for the sites designs offered.
Concept looks interesting. (Think about a generic design for start up user groups that don't (apparently) have people available with those skills initially?)
www.telnetmedia.com Internet Sheriff. Australian Internet blocking (ie 'filtering') software.
www.efa.org.au Electronic Frontiers Australia Inc.
sethf.com Seth Finklestein. Failings of censorware eg search engines, language translaters, webpage validators and and others. Also see White Paper (good).
www.mit.edu/hacker/hacker.html The Hacker Crackdown, Law and Disorder on the Electronic Frontier by Bruce Sterling.
www.chriswaltrip.com/sterling Bruce Sterling's website.
www.peacefire.org Student level action against site censoring software. Getting printouts of blocked sites. Key word blocks vs url blocks.
www.livingwithoutmicrosoft.org Claims not to be a linux site.
www.watchingmicrosoftlikeahawk.com Watching Microsoft Like A Hawk.
www.wewantlinux.org Are these guys for real?. They don't identify themselves, display the US flag on the Linux symbol and appeal to the world for names and email addresses. They refer to British, Dutch, Australian, German and American computer sales outlets.
www.picosearch.com Pico Search. A free webpage search tool. Consider for use on the site.
Mandrake 9
a:, c: and d: drives implies /, /home, /usr
Note: Mandrake 9.1 has been released downsized to 1 CD (programs nominated by club users) 2 months since 9 came out. Hard to see build logic in 3 CDs to 1 CD.
www.mandrakelinux.com/en Mandrake Linux website.
www.tweakhound.com/mandrake9.htm A Windows user's description of getting to know Mandrake 9. Good.
Excerpts:
'Mandrake 9 comes with a handy little menu item in the Start Menu. It is called What To Do? It is a great idea for helping newbies find their way around. Want to listen to a CD? Go to What To Do? Enjoy music & video > Listen to a CD. The appropriate application will launch. This is a great tool for noobs. I can't tell you how impressed I was with it.'
Note: Konqueror is KDE's web browser and Nautilus is a Windows Explorer like file browser.
www.tweakhound.com Homepage of this good WindowsXP/Mandrake9 site.
www.extremetech.com/article2/1,3973,640388,00.asp Mandrake 9 review. Rated ahead of Redhat and SuSI due to both suitability for beginners (includes community) while also having the tools and options for experienced linux users.
www.techseekers.net/../ Good seven page Mandrake 9 review with some useful instruction and tips on how to use various features.
www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=1954 Mandrake 9 review by OS News. Not balanced but puts the finger on some specific sores.
Mandrake 9 comes with a handy little menu item in the Start Menu. It is called What To Do? It is a great idea for helping a noob find their way around. Want to listen to a CD? Go to What To Do? Enjoy music & video > Listen to a CD. The appropriate application will launch. This is a great tool for noobs. I can't tell you how impressed I was with it.
GNU Hurd
Microkernal (vs Linux is monolithic (more placed in kernal), 5 developers and 15 lesser people, no books and not taught anywhere so difficult yo find people who can join as developers. Linus Torvalds occaisionally rails against GNU Hurd (or some aspects of it). Same common POSIX Unix origins as Linux.
www.kerneltrap.org/node.php?id=5 Good interview with a developer, Neil Walfield.
www.gnu.org/software/hurd GNU/Hurd web site.
www.debian.org/ports/hurd Debian GNU/Hurd web site.
web.walfield.org/papers/hurd-installation-guide The Installation Guide.
www.gnu.org/software/hurd/faq.en.htmlThe FAQ.
Contact: Aussie John wpsmoke@yahoo.co.uk