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Technical PerspectiveMunich Linux 'a reality' The City of Munich has insisted it is on track with its massive Linux migration in the face of claims in the German Senate that the project seemed to have failed before it ever got off the ground. Under the LiMux project which commenced in 2004 Munich is migrating 14 000 desktops from Windows to a custom Linux distribution running mostly open-source software. However two weeks ago a senior government IT official told the Senate that the migration had ground to a halt citing an inside source. more > Novell Offers Details on SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 Novell is betting that its upcoming SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 will be the release that drives widespread business adoption of its Linux desktop especially as it brings features like integrated desktop search which is not yet found in its largest competitor Microsoft's Windows.Executives from Novell based in Waltham Mass. are in Germany for the annual CeBIT trade show where they will be talking about the new desktop due out this summer. The desktop has also been renamed and rebranded from the current Novell Linux Desktop 10 moniker to SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 Greg Mancusi-Ungaro a director of Linux and open source at Novell told eWEEK. While he declined to give specific pricing details Mancusi-Ungaro said not to expect much movement from the current price of $50 per system a year for its Novell Linux Desktop 9 which is targeted at those customers with more contained workloads. Until now the biggest issues IT administrators faced around the Linux desktop were overall desktop usability connectivity to collaboration the productivity applications at its core and its ability to be deployed and managed by IT. more > Dell Opens Up About Desktop Linux Michael Dell chairman of Dell says he believes in offering Linux on the desktop server and workstation. What he doesn't believe in for now is giving Linux full support on the desktop. In an exclusive interview Dell explained his company's Linux desktop strategy to DesktopLinux.com's Steven J. Vaughan Nichols. People are always asking us to support Linux on the desktop but the question is 'Which Linux are you talking about?' Dell asked. If we say we like Ubuntu then people will say we picked the wrong one. If we say we like and support Ubuntu Novell Red Hat and Xandros then someone would ask us 'Why don't you support Mandriva?' The challenge we have with picking one is that we think we'd disenchant the other distributions' supporters. It's not that there are too many Linux desktop distributions Dell said it's that they're all different they all have supporters and none of them can claim a majority of the market. If you look at DistroWatch you'll see zillions of these distributions. Which one should we do? And everyone keeps telling us that they want different distributions. So our conclusion is to do them all and let the customer decide. more > Study: Linux Cheaper Easier Than Windows Stung by Microsoft's charges that the total cost of ownership (TCO) of Linux was higher than Windows open source software interests sought this week to refute the charges in a survey of IT organizations that lists various developments--many of them new--in which Linux undercuts Windows in price and management complexity. A report released Monday sponsored by Open Source Development Labs (OSDL) and member firm Levanta said earlier Linux management pains no longer exist and IT operations running Linux often spend less time and money running Linux than Windows. The study was prepared by Enterprise Management Associates which surveyed several thousand IT organizations by telephone and conducted interviews with CIOs and MIS directors at a wide variety of large Linux and mixed-software installations. The study wasn't intended to be a direct head-to-head comparison between Linux and Windows management said Levanta's director of marketing David Dennis in an email interview Tuesday. EMA's research determined that Linux management has come a very long way in a very short period of time. It now presents another set of data so a more even-handed debate can occur. more > Solaris and Linux: No Code Swapping While Sun Microsystems is open to licensing Solaris under Version 3.0 of the GNU General Public License it will not reconsider its decision not to license the operating system under GPL 2.0 the current version of the license. Sun's refusal to reconsider licensing Solaris under GPL 2.0 also appears to effectively remove any chance that code from that software can be co-mingled with that from the open-source Linux operating system which is currently licensed under GPL 2.0. That's because Linus Torvalds the Linux kernel project leader has said that he has no plans to relicense the Linux kernel under GPL 3.0 when it is released early next year. Thus if the Linux kernel code does not get licensed under GPL 3.0 even if Solaris does the current restrictions on the co-mingling of code from the two operating systems will essentially remain in force. more > Selling Linux and Open Source to Bean Counters Opinion: It's CFOs and dollars not CIOs and gigabytes that determine what technology companies buy. (Linux-Watch). I'm no bean-counter. I'm an IT guy. But I know that over the last few years it's CFOs and dollars not CIOs and gigabytes that determine what technology companies buy. But here's news you can use to get your CFO on board with a Linux and open-source makeover. ETrade Financial saved $13 million a year and they realized a boost in performance by switching to Linux from Solaris. Now $13 million isn't chicken feed even to a company like ETrade that reported $1.7 billion of revenue in 2005. It wasn't just Linux that made the difference though. It was also the Apache Web server and the Jakarta Tomcat JSP (Java Server Pages) servlet system. more > Windows vs. Linux: Think Patch Quality Not Quantity News Analysis: Tests at Microsoft's Linux lab show that counting the raw number of security updates required by the various operating system flavors is not as meaningful as examining the efficiency of the update process. Microsoft Corp. seems to be moving away from focusing on the actual number of security patches and updates that it and its software competitors release. Instead it is concentrating on making it easy and efficient for customers to obtain the security fixes and update their systems. Bill Hilf who is director of Platform Technology Strategy at Microsoft and heads its Linux and open-source lab told eWEEK in a recent interview that the differentiator for customers is not the number comparison but which vendor makes the patching and updating experience the least complex most efficient and easiest to manage. more > Mainsoft IBM Port .Net Apps to Linux J2EE Mainsoft Corp. and IBM Wednesday announced an effort to work together to extend the Linux ecosystem by helping Microsoft customers move to Linux. Mainsoft of San Jose Calif. said the new program enables Windows Web and server applications to run on Linux across IBM's line of eServer platforms supporting IBM WebSphere application servers. Mainsoft a cross-platform development company produces the Visual MainWin single source code development solution for .Net and J2EE (Java 2 Enterprise Edition). This is a teaming agreement with IBM for .Net ISVs to get into the Linux and J2EE markets said Yaacov Cohen president and CEO of Mainsoft. This gives ISVs the opportunity to double their market. With the announcement of its agreement with IBM Mainsoft also announced Version 1.7 of Visual MainWin for J2EE. Visual MainWin enables C# and Visual Basic .Net developers to develop and maintain Web and server applications on both platforms Cohen said. In addition Version 1.7 has been validated on IBM's ServerProven program he said. more > Microsoft Challenges Linux's Legacy Claims News Analysis: Tests run in Redmond's Linux lab seek to dispel the myth that Linux can run on anything especially older legacy hardware. Microsoft Corp.'s Linux and open-source lab on the Redmond Wash. campus has been running some interesting tests of late one of which looked at how well the latest Windows client software runs on legacy hardware in comparison to its Linux competitors. This may seem strange given Microsoft's desire to upgrade every possible customer to the latest version of Windows often resulting in a forced hardware upgrade as well. That strategy however is far more effective in the developed world than among developing nations Bill Hilf who is director of Platform Technology Strategy at Microsoft and runs the lab told eWEEK in a recent interview. The tests which found that Windows performed as well as Linux on legacy hardware when installed and run out-of-the-box were done in part to give Microsoft the data it needed to effectively put to rest the myth that Linux can run on anything. It also shows us what applications can run on those machines and software helping us better identify the needs and challenges of the public sector in those countries Hilf said. more > Linux Backers Form Patent-Sharing Firm Three of the world's biggest electronics companies—IBM Sony and Philips—have joined forces with the two largest Linux software distributors to create a company for sharing Linux patents royalty-free.The Open Invention Network (OIN) as the new firm unveiled on Thursday is known could mark a breakthrough in resolving how to protect vendors and customers from patent royalty disputes resulting from freely shared Linux code.If OIN's approach to managing intellectual property wins acceptance it could overcome a big stumbling block to wider corporate adoption of Linux and pose challenges for major opponent Microsoft Corp. which has argued that relying on open source software poses legal risks.OIN is funded by the world's largest computer company IBM two consumer electronics giants—Sony Corp. of Japan and Philips of the Netherlands—and Linux distributors Red Hat Inc. and Novell Inc. Market researcher IDC estimates that the worldwide Linux business will grow 25.9 percent annually doubling from $20 billion this year to more than $40 billion by 2008.If patent risk is lifted Linux use could accelerate at an even faster rate said Richard Doherty an industry consultant with Envisioneering Group of Seaford New York. more > The New Linux Kernel: Better Wi-Fi Better File Systems Better late than never the new Linux kernel version 2.6.14 became available late last week. Originally the latest kernel was to show up on Oct. 7. Linus Torvalds explained that the release been delayed twice due to some last-minute bug-reports some of which ended up being false alarms (hey I should be happy but it was a bit frustrating). Good things may come to those who wait. Compared with 2.6.13 the 2.6.14 kernel includes changes all over the place said Torvalds. The big change in the standard kernel is that it now includes Centrino Wi-Fi support. Many Linuxes such as SUSE 10 and Xandros 3 already support Centrino through the use of ipw2xxx drivers and Linux's hotplug infrastructure. This enables the Centrino cards or mini-adaptor's firmware to be switched out with a Linux-compatible interface. For further technical details with how this is done with the Intel PRO/Wireless 2100 Network Connection mini PCI adapter see the SourceForge site. more > Time to Standardize Mobile Linux: OSDL The Open Source Development Labs this week created the Mobile Linux Initiative a working group that it says is intended to “maximize the market opportunity for Linux-based devices” in the mobile market. OSDL develops specifications for use of Linux in servers and desktop computers. The MLI will address technical challenges associated with the use of Linux in devices define requirements and use-cases and promote application development through open-source projects and support. The organization in June told SD Times that it was in talks with France Telecom the CE Linux Forum and others and was fielding requests from its members regarding such a move at the time prompting speculation that it was working on a mobile Linux specification. Soon after it inherited the Platform Specification 1.0 intellectual property developed by the now-defunct Embedded Linux Consortium. It is unclear what role if any that specification will play in the initial work of the MLI which the OSDL said will gather for the first time this week in Beijing. MLI members currently include MontaVista Motorola PalmSource Trolltech and Wind River; all but PalmSource were ELC members. more > Linux Standard Base Takes on the Desktop The Free Standards Group and its Linux Standard Base work group Tuesday announced the formation of the Linux Standard Base Desktop Project with the support of Adobe Systems Inc. Intel Corp. IBM Hewlett-Packard Co. Linspire Inc. Mandriva SA Novell Inc. RealNetworks Inc. Red Hat Inc. Trolltech Xandros Inc. and others. The LSB (Linux Standard Base) Desktop Project's goal is to standardize common libraries and application behavior so as to make it easier for ISVs to write Linux desktop programs. The long-term goal is to help the Linux desktop achieve wide-spread adoption. In the past Linux ISVs while not anywhere near as constrained as they have been in writing applications for Unix have still faced complex and costly development and support issues. This in turn according to Jim Zemlin executive director of the Free Standards Group has lead to many ISVs choosing not to develop for Linux. In addition to long-time Linux supporter ISVs such as Trolltech and hardware vendors like HP and IBM the LSB Desktop Project is also being supported by companies that have not been well known for Linux support such as Adobe Intel and RealNetworks. more > OSDL Aims Multivendor Initiative at Linux Mobile Phones The OSDL on Monday launched the Mobile Linux Initiative an effort to accelerate adoption of Linux in mobile phones--one of the fastest growing consumer device segments. Linux is already among the top three OSes in converged mobile phones according to industry analysts and has shipped in Motorola handsets since 2003. The OSDL (Open Source Development Labs) which employs Linux creator Linus Torvalds and strives to be the center of gravity for Linux has long been rumored to have an embedded Linux project in the works. The organization last summer hired embedded expert Bill Weinberg and more recently took over stewardship of the Embedded Linux Platform Specification following the demise of the ELC (Embedded Linux Consortium). OSDL CEO Stuart Cohen said in April that the organization would get involved with embedded given enough member interest. And indeed Linux has turned out to be hugely interesting to mobile phone vendors many of whom already belong to the OSDL because of its Carrier Grade Linux initiative. more > SD Times For a community that was built byte by byte through the hard work of programmers it is surprising that Linux does not occupy a more central position in the world of development tools. For years Linux has made do with products that were sufficient but not exceptional. At the center of the development universe were tools like gcc and emacs which were the favorites of a vocal minority but did not represent the larger state of the art. And during the years of its emergence commercial tools vendors were greatly skeptical of stepping into the Linux market to provide the better products. more > Novell users eye Linux for kernel swap Two weeks after Novell Inc. released software that lets users run its stack of computing services on either the NetWare or Linux kernel members of the NetWare faithful cited widely varying plans for migrating their servers to Linux. Some attendees at the software vendor's BrainShare user conference here said they're in no rush to move to SUSE Linux the distribution of the open-source operating system that Novell acquired in January 2004. But others are starting to dabble with Linux and some are eager to take the plunge right away. Once Novell was behind [Linux] it was an easy decision said Roger Fenner infrastructure services manager at Comair Holdings Inc. in Erlanger Ky. I not only trust the Linux platform but I really trust Novell's handling of the Linux platform. more > Open source's open sore In a case which over the course of several years has spiralled to encompass some of the biggest names in computing a Utah federal court has finally ordered IBM to turn over the code-base of its AIX and Dynic operating systems for scrutiny by SCO a relative software minnow. The action against IBM is the latest step in a lengthy campaign by SCO to enforce intellectual property rights over code allegedly misappropriated and redistributed worldwide as part of the Linux open source operating system from which AIX and Dynic are derived. Although SCO's dogged pursuit has been controversial it does highlight the challenges which have appeared around open-source during its evolution from intellectual hobby-horse to global business phenomenon. Let there be no doubt that today open source - in particular Linux - is very big business. more > Novell unwraps new version of Linux Hoping to appeal to as broad a technical audience as possible Novell Inc. today released a new version of SUSE Linux Professional at CeBIT in Hanover Germany. Version 9.3 of the software includes the 2.611 version of the Linux kernel the 2.0 version of the OpenOffice.org productivity suite and the Firefox 1.0 browser. The software expected to be available through retail stories in the U.S. and online by mid-April contains about 1 000 open-source applications aimed at more technical users in both the business and home markets. It also contains previews of upcoming Linux-based server technologies including the Xen virtualization environment and a more intuitive search engine according to company officials. more > Penguin power is both cheap and costly Enterprises that are watching their wallets and longing to free themselves from being shackled to the products of established vendors are realizing the power of the penguin. It’s no secret that Linux is making inroads into corporate IT infrastructures at the expense of Unix products and Microsoft Windows Server. However recent research from Yankee Group finds that while Linux is a technological equal of its competitors it’s not superior to them. Yankee also found that a significant Linux deployment or complete switch from Windows in a large enterprise (at least 10 000 end users) would be three to four times more expensive and take three times as long to deploy as it would to upgrade to a new version of Windows. more > Selling Linux on IBM Sales is where the rubber meets the road. To that end IBM® has put together a Linux Sales Training Toolkit for IBM Business Partners with sales backgrounds interested in learning about Linux opportunities from an IBM eServer™ and middleware point of view. The kit is available to members of IBM PartnerWorld® a program that offers technical support education marketing campaigns sales tools and more to help independent software vendors grow their businesses. more > Linux Workstations Play Key Role in IBM-NYSE System IBM® is working with the New York Stock Exchange on a new order management and messaging system in support of the 1.6 billion shares traded daily. The system will be one of the world's most sophisticated examples of Extreme Availability relying on IBM computers infrastructure software and engineering expertise for a network designed to virtually eliminate downtime. Joint work on the new NYSE TradeWorks processing system is part of a long-standing and wide-ranging technology relationship between the world's largest equities market and the biggest information technology and services company. more > From the IBM White Paper Library--Linux and Storage Storage is a key component of a well-designed Linux-based e-business infrastructure. An effective storage strategy can help you cut costs consolidate your infrastructure and develop and position your organization for an on demand world. To register and receive a white paper on the role of IBM® TotalStorage® within a Linux environment go to www-1.ibm.com/linux and click on the button for the White Paper Library. more > Linux Servers Take on More Varied Workloads While Linux typically first won acceptance in the corporate IT infrastructure running Web servers and file and print servers the use of the open source operating system is slowly spreading to encompass additional applications according to a new study by the market research group IDC. In a report that looks at the spread of Linux in server applications IDC analysts predict that Linux will be increasingly used for enterprise applications and database operations. more > Linux Keeps Growing Fresh numbers in from IDC show that the annual growth rate of Linux server unit shipments has been increasing over the past three years from 15 percent in the second quarter of 2001 to 40 percent in the second quarter of 2004. Linux also represents about half of the worldwide server blade market in terms of unit shipments compared to 20 percent of all rack-optimized servers and 11 percent of all standalone servers. more > IBM and Red Hat launch Linex certification program IBM and Red Hat launched a jointly developed Linux certification and support program in Europe earlier this month in an effort to accelerate the migration of applications to Linux in that part of the world. The new program is designed to help independent software vendors (ISVs) who want to certify applications to run on Red Hat Enterprise Linux IBM hardware and IBM middleware. IBM Innovation Centers for Business Partners in Hursley England Moscow Paris and Stuttgart Germany will provide ISVs enrolled in the program with on-site and remote support (through VPNs) for the porting and enablement of software as well as a self-certification process for their applications. more > New set of Linux security flaws discovered A security researcher has uncovered a set of security flaws in an image component which could put Linux users at risk of system compromise if they view a maliciously crafted image. The bugs in the imlib image library found in most Linux systems haven't been patched by the library's developer but Linux vendors are currently rushing out patches. So far the Gentoo Foundation Novell Inc.'s Suse business unit and others have released fixes. more > Four Small Vendors Team Up on Standardized Linux Four small Linux vendors last week said they're joining together to create a common code base in an effort to attract more independent software vendors and hardware makers to support their versions of the open-source operating system. The four companies are Conectiva SA MandrakeSoft SA Progeny Linux Systems Inc. and Turbolinux Inc. Linux market leaders Red Hat Inc. and Novell Inc. both declined invitations to take part in the joint initiative. A Novell spokesman said company officials are supportive of the new group but at this point we're simply giving them moral support. more > Linux Unchained Customers of GAF3 Solutions tell the technology services provider that they want to use Linux because they hear it's reliable robust and relatively inexpensive. But a customer recently balked at the one-month delay to install a Linux server. Why such a long wait? GAF3's Linux expert was overextended says George A. Fitch III president and CEO of the Dover N.H.-based company. High demand has Fitch wondering if he should charge extra for Linux-related work. If he does he wouldn't be alone. more > Novell Kick-Starts Desktop Linux Push Novell on Monday took the wraps off its first desktop Linux operating system a product that brings to fruition the company's August 2003 acquisition of Ximian Inc. and January purchase of SuSE Linux. Although Novell claims its strategy is to patiently build up a market for desktop Linux in the face of Microsoft's dominance the company's Novell Desktop 9 includes several components that compete with head on with Windows. Desktop Linux has to cohabitate with Windows today says Ted Haeger Novell's director of project management. In fact the company projects it will take as long as five years before a desktop version of Linux is capable of displacing Windows in any significant way. more > In Search Of Open-Source Experts Applied Industrial Technologies Inc. a distributor of fluid-power and engineered products runs most of its infrastructure on Microsoft Windows. But two years ago Applied Industrial began running some Web file application and directory servers on the open-source operating system Red Hat Linux. Our technicians [were] saying 'we need to have Linux servers in place--we could pull down costs ' says IT director Bob Falkowski. We changed out hardware introduced new software components. But what we failed to realize is when you do this type of process there's some added burden. You have to fall back on yourself as being the ultimate solution provider when things don't work. Applied Industrial Technologies isn't the only company to be caught short by the effort and expertise required to support an increasing number of open-source projects. more > Novell counters Microsoft's Linux 'facts' with 'truth' Countering the latest salvo of Microsoft’s Get the Facts campaign against open-source software Novell Wednesday launched a Web site devoted to unbending the truth about Linux in the enterprise. Novell Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Jack Messman is also in the process of sending an e-mail to Novell customers. In that e-mail Messman debunked a memo that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer sent to customers last week. In his e-mail Ballmer wrote that Windows has economic and security advantages over open-source software and warned that Linux users are fair game for intellectual property lawsuits. more > IBM SGI win Linux supercomputer deals in Asia IBM and Silicon Graphics have won contracts to supply Linux-based supercomputers to a Korean national university and a Japanese nuclear research institute the two companies said Thursday. The IBM system will be provided to Seoul National University and consist of a 425-node cluster of the company's JS20 blade servers. The servers were launched by IBM earlier this year and are the company's first to be based on its Power PC processor. The South Korean system will also include IBM's Fast 7000 data storage system and will have a maximum performance of 5 teraflops said the company. more > UPS Unsure Open Source Can Deliver Despite the growing acceptance of open-source software not all companies are willing to entrust their operations to a community of strangers. Open-source software's collaborative model resonates with United Parcel Service Inc. as the company looks to build a services-oriented architecture where applications can be developed in one part of the company and deployed in multiple locations. But Nick Gray UPS's applications manager for architectural services sees the open-source developer community as a less-stable incarnation of the collaborative programming that IT departments have been doing for years. more > Value is King - New IBM eServer OpenPower server provides a Linux-tuned offering Although Linux* has enjoyed steady growth in the server realm particularly on IBM* eServer platforms the OS has never had the auspicious honor of having a server specifically tuned to natively run the open-source OS. Linux traditionally has had to content itself with running alongside other OSs. Linux can run on the pSeries* server for example but most clients today run it along with AIX*. The same holds true for the iSeries* server and OS/400* or i5/OS* and the zSeries* server and z/OS* where most clients choose to add Linux to their systems. And while Linux popularity with xSeries* businesses has grown dramatically Windows* is still the most popular environment for xSeries clients. Linux is supported on all these platforms but it never had the ability to show itself off on a server that was tuned for it until now. more > Business Technology: Microsoft And Its Blind Spot: Linux Steve Ballmer's letter to customers said nothing about the widespread reality of tens of thousands of Microsoft customers who are eager to deploy BOTH Windows and Linux. It's not so much what he did say; it's more a matter of what he didn't say. Steve Ballmer's letter to customers that was also artfully distributed to media across the world said that some analysts say a Windows enterprise solution is often less expensive than a comparable Linux enterprise solution. more > Ballmer's Linux Spin Which operating system Linux or Windows is cheaper more secure and lower risk? Countless hours have been spent debating the question and last week Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer sparked the argument again. In a letter E-mailed to customers Ballmer contended that a growing body of data proves that Windows beats its open-source competitor on all three fronts. It's pretty clear that the facts show that Windows provides a lower total cost of ownership than Linux the number of security vulnerabilities is lower on Windows and Windows' responsiveness on security is better than Linux Ballmer wrote. And Microsoft provides uncapped IP [intellectual-property] indem- nification of their products while no such comprehensive offering is available for Linux or open source. more > Dell to pre-install SuSE Linux on servers Dell will install Novell's SuSE Linux operating system on Dell PowerEdge servers as part of a worldwide agreement the companies announced at the LinuxWorld conference in Frankfurt. Novell's SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 will be available on PowerEdge 1850 2800 and 2850 servers for an annual subscription per single CPU (central processing unit) server for £110 while the price for a dual-CPU annual subscription will be £160 said Judy Chavis director of marketing for global alliances at Dell. The Novell agreement gives Dell Linux customers more platform choices with Dell's full customer support. We are offering a single point of service said Mathias Schadel vice-president and general manager of Dell Germany. more > Australian government inching towards desktop Linux The Australian government agency responsible for distributing social security payments is still moving towards near-universal use of desktop Linux but it's slow progress. Centrelink the Australian government agency responsible for distributing social security payments is expecting delivery of Novell's Open Enterprise Server technology early next year--another step on the organization's path that seems to lead to the ubiquitous deployment of Linux. Peter Gunning Centrelink's national manager for infrastructure architecture told ZDNet UK sister site ZDNet Australia that Centrelink is investigating various combinations of hardware and software to find the best possible solution in terms of manageability security and efficiency. more > Full Text of Microsoft Comparing Windows with Linux and UNIX Letter Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer this week sent a letter to customers outlining the reasons it believes Windows is superior to Linux. This is the full text of that letter. more > UK report says Linux is 'viable' UK government departments moved a step closer to using open-source operating systems such as Linux after a study found that they were viable products. The software could generate significant savings according to the Office of Government Commerce (OGC). The popularity of programs like Linux which are essentially free have grown as firms and countries look to limit their dependence on software producers. Companies such as Microsoft have the most to lose should Linux use spread. Challenge? Microsoft is the world's largest software maker and its Windows operating system is found on nine out of every 10 personal computers. more > Needed: Open-Source Education Understanding Much of the confusion and consternation over the use of open-source software can be alleviated simply by users understanding how such software may be licensed and software vendors taking greater care to research the intellectual property used in their products. That was the consensus of a Web-based panel of legal experts hosted Wednesday by JBoss Inc. a maker of open-source J2EE-based application-server software. more > Linux speared by trio of security holes A series of security holes in three common Linux components has led open-source suppliers to rush out several updates in just one day. Two of them rated highly critical by security company Secunia are in libpng a library used by a number of applications including the Mozilla browser to display png graphics files. more > From the IBM White Paper Library--Linux Requirements for Enterprise Deployments Linux is increasingly being viewed as an enterprise-wide platform. But what criteria must be met to ensure that Linux can meet the expectations of an enterprise-wide core solution? This white paper developed by the market research company IDC details how ready Linux is for the enterprise. To register for the IBM White Paper Library and download the report go here (http://www.dbta.com/cgi-bin/redir.cgi?id=ler1_20041020). more > Power to the People - The IBM eServer p5 servers - performance & functionality The revolutionary technology behind the new POWER5* microprocessor has given rise to a radically enhanced eServer platform line specifically as it applies to the new IBM* eServer p5 and IBM eServer i5 systems that leverage the functionality of POWER5 technology. UNIX* (pSeries*) customers now have at their disposal the powerful eServer p5 servers which drastically improve the performance of the AIX* OS and can better support additional OSs such as Linux*. Also customers can make use of such tools as the POWER Hypervisor* which supports many advanced functions including processor sharing virtual Ethernet connectivity between partitions system-level concurrent maintenance clustering and switchable towers. more > Cuts to Longhorn Don't Faze IT Managers Microsoft' weeping changes to its next major Windows release are drawing little surprise from enterprise IT departments many of whom were not counting on the most revolutionary changes promised in Longhorn. Late last week Microsoft announced that it was dropping a centerpiece of Longhorn called WinFS (Windows File System) in order to meet its schedule for releasing the desktop version in 2006 and the server version in 2007. more > Longhorn Delay Stirs Dismay Delight in Developers Developer reaction to Microsoft's decision to hold off on delivering planned parts of the next release of Windows Longhorn to meet the 2006 deadline has been mixed with many calling it a prudent move and others outright upset by the decision. Microsoft Corp. on Friday announced it would be making key elements of the Windows WinFX developer platform in Longhorn available for Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. Microsoft will deliver the WinFS Windows storage subsystem after the release of Longhorn the company said. more > Linux Performance When Running Under VM What follows are answers to some of the most common questions the VM performance team receives regarding running Linux* as a guest of VM. Some factors are more important to running hundreds of guests rather than a single guest. Many of the guidelines that exist for other guests (VSE and OS/390*) apply here as well. more > Free standard aims to keep Linux from ending up like Unix If I as a developer have to port my application to two different distributions of Linux that is one distribution too many says Jon Maddog Hall executive director of Linux International. Maddog's sentiments were shared by hardware and software vendors supporting the non-profit Free Standards Group release of Linux Standard Base (LSB) 2.0 which is designed to assure compatibility of applications running on the various flavors of Linux. He argues that without LSB we are no better than the proprietary Unix systems of old.” h more > IBM launches low-end Power5 Linux servers IBM has released a line of Linux-only servers aimed at the financial and retail sectors based on its 64-bit Power5 chip architecture. IBM will pre-install its new four-way 64-bit eServer Openpower servers with Red Hat's enterprise Linux operating system rather than AIX IBM's Unix-based operating system. IBM said it already has more than 650 certified applications for Linux on the Power platform which will make it a strong entry-level platform for Linux. more > Linux supporters rally around standard The Linux industry hit a standardization milestone last week that observers say will further bring open source technology into mainstream use. The release of Linux Standard Base (LSB) 2.0 could foster compatibility among Linux distributions and prevent code forking much like Unix did years ago. more > Analysis: Patent wars and the end of the software business ANALYSIS) Imagine a post-patent-apocalypse world where no new software can be written because even the most basic software patterns cannot be used without paying a massive fee. And even if you wanted to pay $1 million to incorporate a For ... Next loop in your program you can't transfer the money -- the banks are closed because the software and business processes they rely on belong to someone else more > IBM Puts Spotlight On Entry-Level Linux Servers A virtualization option will be available for the systems which are based on 1.5- or 1.6-GHz Power5 processors IBM on Monday introduced a new line of Linux servers intended to compete with entry-level Unix platforms from Sun Microsystems and Hewlett-Packard Corp. We have given users of Linux and those who have made the commitment to move to Linux a server of their own says Elaine Lack director of marketing and strategy for Linux on Power. This is a system designed to run Linux at entry-level prices while providing enterprise-level performance. more > Bridging the gaps from SQL Server to Java apps With demand for Microsoft SQL Server connectivity for Java applications growing steadily and with many companies migrating their production platform from the 32-bit SQL Server 200 Enterprise Edition to the 64-bit versions of SQL Server 2000 and SQL Server 2005 JNetDirect has added 64-bit support to two of its components. more > Pair of Linux Holes Put Users at Risk Linux users are at risk from serious security vulnerabilities in components used to view graphics and handle archives according to researchers. The security holes found in the imlib graphics library and the LHA archive tool can be exploited via a specially crafted bitmap image or an LHarc-format archive to take over a Linux system. more > Cheap Windows For New Markets Microsoft aims to take advantage of opportunities in countries where PC use remains low with Windows XP Starter Edition. On the lookout for new markets for Windows--and at the same time seeking an opportunity to stymie the growth of Linux--Microsoft will offer its cheaper version of Windows XP in more countries this year. more > HP Lines Up More Resources Behind Linux JBoss app server and MySQL database will work together on ProLiant blade servers. Hewlett-Packard has expanded its support for Linux by guaranteeing that the JBoss application server and the MySQL open-source database will work together on its ProLiant blade servers running that operating system. more > Feds Take Two Routes To Supercomputer Power Navy and NASA are doing ocean modeling but building separate supercomputers When it comes to supercomputing one size apparently doesn't fit all. As part of its efforts to solve advanced mathematically intense problems such as weather modeling NASA last week said it would deploy a supercomputer consisting of 20 Silicon Graphics Inc. servers containing hundreds of Intel processors. At the same time the Navy is turning to a system that incorporates hundreds of IBM servers each with just eight processors for its own high-end computing needs. more > LinuxWorld SAN FRANCISCO— Sun Microsystems Inc. will demonstrate a new version of its Sun Ray thin-client computing technology for Linux at this week's LinuxWorld conference here. The company is also announcing the release of its C C++ and Fortran development tools for Linux.http://www.eweek.com/article2/0 1759 1630171 00.aspOracle's Rocha: Linux Kernel Ready to Rock DatabasesEweek.comBy Lisa Vaas August 2 2004Categories: BQ&A: Noting that the company's Linux market share blossomed 361 percent in 2003 executive vice president Mike Rocha says it's extending its world-class Linux support and working hard to improve the 2.6 more > Oracle opens up (just a bit) Oracle’s JDeveloper 10g is an IDE in the broadest sense of the term. For the majority of Java application development projects the developer or architect will never have to leave the JDeveloper environment to get the job done. JDeveloper successfully integrates the tools needed to create not only Java apps but to develop (and in several cases to visually or declaratively develop) UML XML JSPs HTML EJBs and Swing interfaces. The IDE also provides connectivity to various Java app servers SQL databases via JDBC SOAP servers and a host of other data sources. Essentially any of the secondary tasks that one might find a need to perform during the phases of planning development testing deployment and maintenance of a J2EE J2SE or J2ME app are integrated in some fashion in JDeveloper. more > A modern face for a Progress engine Web services and related Service-Oriented Architectures (SOAs) are changing the face of corporate computing. They are also rocking the world of ISVs. The stories of enterprise users and ISVs are remarkably similar and the successes of ISVs -- whose software is so often part of the corporate mix -- have meaning for enterprise developers. Their embrace of Web services integration will come to simplify part of the IT department’s integration tasks over time. more > Silicon Graphics Wins Nod From NASA To Build Supercomputer The 500-terabyte machine will include more than 10 000 Intel Itanium chips. NASA has chosen Silicon Graphics Inc. to assemble a 500-terabyte supercomputer based on more than 10 000 Intel Itanium chips. The configuration for applications in space exploration global warming research and aerospace engineering will be one of the world's largest Linux-based supercomputers. more > Survey Says Linux Hacks Are Rare An Evans Data report says only 8% of Linux developers surveyed had ever seen a virus infect their systems.Adding more fuel to the Linux vs. Windows fire a research firm released a survey Wednesday that noted only 8% of Linux developers had ever seen a virus infect their systems. more > Specifix Offers Automated Linux Support Its new Linux distribution and software now available in test form can be used to track and define changes made to the operating system. more > IBM Unveils New Power5 Unix Servers IBM's debuting four systems incorporating its Power5 microprocessor that mark a major refresh of its Unix server lineup. more > IBM Poised To Unveil Server Enhancement The new servers will compete not only with Itanium-based configurations from Hewlett-Packard but also with servers from Sun Microsystems. more > Thought for the day: Linux access rights expose CIOs June was a big month for IT directors of companies listed on any of the US stock exchanges including UK firms or having a close business relationship with a company listed there. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 which covers the need to protect the integrity of information provided to investors set a deadline of last month for various criteria to be met. more > The Dominance of Linux on the Server Linux is not yet the dominant server OS in terms of units deployed or units shipped. Microsoft still has the lion's share of the market by all reasonable estimations. It is true that Linux market share figures are likely to be inaccurate because there is no easy way to count new Linux servers. The major problem is that it is possible to estimate those servers that come with Linux loaded but not possible to count servers that were running something else (Windows or SCO UNIX or whatever) that were repurposed. Even if one could get reasonable estimates for such replacement activities in the large enterprises it would not reflect the level of such activity in the SMB market or in geographical areas where Linux is proving very popular (China India South America and elsewhere) where the level of such activity is likely to be higher. more > Sun Unveils Tiger But It's Still A Youngster Sun execs debuted the upcoming version 5.0 of Java 2 Standard Edition known as Project Tiger at the company's annual JavaOne Conference--though general release isn't expected before fall. Sun Microsystems executives took the stage Monday to unveil a recent contribution to open-source code Project Looking Glass and the upcoming Java 2 Standard Edition version 5.0 known as Project Tiger. more > Gates: Microsoft To Explore Cheap Software With Asian Governments Bill Gates said Tuesday that Microsoft will hold talks with Asian governments to offer tailored cheaper versions of its Windows operating system geared toward bringing computer skills to millions of poorer people. more > BAM goes XML Business intelligence (BI) must be real-time as well as right time and that means business activity monitoring (BAM) and business process monitoring (BPM) need XML according to Anant Jhingran IBM's director of business intelligence. more > Trial Illuminates Ripple Effects Of Oracle's PeopleSoft Bid It's becoming increasingly clear that PeopleSoft Inc. isn't the only high-tech heavyweight worried about Oracle Corp.'s hostile takeover bid for the business software maker. more > Langa Letter: What's Behind The USB Drive Revolution These small drives can generate huge payoffs in convenience maintenance and security. Fred Langa examines the various types and their strengths and weaknesses. He finds there's much to like. Pen drives thumb drives jump drives keychain drives... they're called many things and they use surprisingly varied technologies but they all share a few features in common: They're compact removable drives that attach to your PC via a USB port and add anywhere from 16 Mbyte to more than 4 Gbyte of portable storage to your system more > Petaflop Imperative In the world of supercomputer engineers breaking the petaflop-barrier has all the symbolism of the four-minute mile. U.S. leaders are eager to claim that prize. But businesses want progress on a more-important supercomputing measurement than processing speed: Time to insight. more > PeopleSoft adds new version of former J.D. Edwards toolset PeopleSoft Inc. has unveiled a new version of its EnterpriseOne Tools which officials said adds features that can help mid-market companies with limited IT resources more easily deploy applications. The Pleasanton Calif.-based company claims the new version can reduce the time it takes to install its EnterpriseOne Rapid Start solutions by as much as three days. more > Review: Mono 1.0 www.mon-project.com Just in case you missed the memo Mono is a cross-platform (Windows/Linux/Sparc/Mac/etc) implementation of some of the core parts of .NET released under open-source licenses (GPL LGPL and MIT depending on which piece). Originally launched by independent developer Ximian the project is now under the auspices of Novell which purchased Ximian last year. Recently they reached a major milestone with the release of version 1.0 including source and binary downloads for all major platforms. more > KDE 3.3 Beta ships The KDE Project last week announced the availability of the first beta of the 3.3 version of its free graphical desktop environment for Linux and Unix workstations. KDE 3.3 Beta 1 code-named 'Klassroom ' (the alpha of 3.3 was called 'Kindergarten') was released in preparation for the upcoming KDE Community World Summit 2004 (August 21-29 2004 in Ludwigsburg Germany) an event known in the KDE community as the 'aKademy.' more > SmartAdvice: Consider Hardware First In Figuring Linux Ownership Costs Hardware considerations can muddle the seemingly lower cost of Linux ownership The Advisory Council says. Also aspect-oriented programming needs to mature before it's ready for prime time; and use compliance standards to make sure IT processes are in place and your IT organization is adequately staffed. more > IBM Takes Aim At Brazil It's targeting the country's enterprise IT market with services and PCs based on open-source software. IBM on Monday said it will target the Brazilian enterprise IT market with a range of new PC offerings based on open-source software. The company says it will target companies in Brazil with bundles of client devices--including desktops laptops and PDAs--running the Linux operating system. more > Fairfax County Schools Turn To Linux For Business Intelligence Fairfax County (Va.) Public Schools wants to give its teachers access to business-intelligence tools they can use to analyze their students' attendance data grades and test scores. The school district's plan for doing this involves moving its Oracle database and Business Objects Crystal Enterprise business-intelligence software from Windows to Linux. With the launch last week of Business Objects' Crystal Enterprise 10 for Linux Fairfax is a step closer to that goal. more > Wyse Adds Capabilities To Linux Desktops It introduced enhanced management security and Web-browser capabilities on two of its Winterm desktops as well as an updated version of its thin-client Linux operating system. Looking to seize a greater share of the growing Linux-based thin-client market Wyse Technology Inc. on Monday introduced enhanced management security and Web-browser capabilities on two of its Winterm desktops. Wyse also introduced version 3.2 of its thin-client Linux operating system. more > R&D Envy Amid today's cost-cutting obsession is there any room to experiment with new technologies? There is at these companies. Each year HIP Health Plan Of New York finds one or two of what chief technology officer Pedro Villalba calls golden nuggets in the company's IT sandbox. The first golden nugget extracted this year from the sandbox--as the company's research lab is known--is a tablet PC with customized software that's used by nurses to gather information about hospital patients so the health-insurance company's case managers can recommend the most cost-effective treatments more > Clusters of plenty Linux's maturing clustering and failover capabilities have quickly poised it as an attractive alternative to high-maintenance Unix systems be they monolithic or distributed. In fact Linux is shaking up the Unix world in a big way. But Windows too is affected. more > A few thoughts about coding standards Some disputes within the development community seem to be perennial popping up every so often like this year's crop of thistles (forgive the analogy; I live in farming country). I'm not talking about the big stuff like .NET vs. Java or even Linux vs. Windows. No the thing that has me ruminating this morning is the simple matter of coding standards. more > IT Confidential: Analyze This: The Microsoft Connection Remember the controversy kicked up last year by an analyst report paid for by Microsoft comparing the cost of ownership of Microsoft products favorably with that of Linux? A recent report by systems integrator BearingPoint concludes that the licensing and support costs of Windows Server 2003 were lower than Red Hat Linux or Novell/SuSE Linux in some usage scenarios. Guess who paid for the report? Co-author Christopher Jackson a senior manager of technology with BearingPoint downplays any conflict of interest insisting the findings are entirely objective--and suggesting the fee paid by Microsoft was small anyway. BearingPoint joins Giga Research (now part of Forrester Research) IDC and Meta Group as IT consulting firms commissioned by Microsoft to generate such reports which generally cast Windows in a favorable light. Following last year's controversy Forrester CEO George Colony established a policy against paid for publicized product comparisons. more > Microsoft's Patent Plans Worry Open-Source Supporters Microsoft's new policy for licensing its patents has supporters of open-source software worried that the company will use a broken government system for protecting intellectual property to beat back gains Linux and other competing software have made in the marketplace. more > Ballmer Memo Pushes Concept Of 'Information Work Scenarios' Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's annual E-mail to the troops highlights that concept and Integrated Innovation. more > Oracle unveils native BPEL engine Oracle Corp. last week unveiled what it called the industry's first and most complete Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) platform. Based on technology acquired with its recent purchase of Collaxa Inc. Oracle's new BPEL Process Manager features what the company claims is the first native BPEL engine or software that collects data from different applications to complete particular business processes. more > Testers start your engines! For months now I've been suggesting that most developers should not touch the early builds of Visual Studio 2005 with a stick. Microsoft has released a series of alpha and Community Technology Preview builds that while interesting were far too unstable to actually do anything useful with. But at Tech Ed Europe last week Microsoft unveiled the Beta 1 bits for Visual Studio 2005 and now it's time to put the stick away and start typing. more > Model Driven Architecture (MDA) moves onward ADT sat down for a Q&A interview with Mike Rosen at Cutter Consortium's recent Cutter Summit. Few people know more about Model-Driven Architecture (MDA) than analyst Rosen. As well few have considered more deeply the evolving role of MDA in Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) strategies. more > Taking Stock: Novell's Linux Focus Could Lead To Growth It's been some time since I touched on Novell a leader in PC networking in small and midsize businesses through its flagship product NetWare. Unfortunately NetWare has been a slowly declining cash-flow franchise. A new version NetWare 7.0 should be out by year's end and that might help stem the tide in the short term but does little to resolve the declining long-term fortunes for this once-dominant company. This is where Novell's new Linux strategy comes in. more > Linux Process Change Raises Questions Linux creator Linus Torvalds last week added a requirement to the process for submitting code for the operating system's kernel. While the change is subtle it raises new questions about the open-source development approach and the swarm of lawsuits involving Linux and intellectual-property rights more > CA Turns To Open Source A sweeping intellectual-property exchange sets the stage for future products. Computer Associates has expanded its relationship with the open-source development community with the release this week of its Ingres enterprise relational database for collaborative use. more > IBM Makes Storage Sing The Same Tune Company introduces virtualization software to let customers line up all the capacity on a storage-area network behind one application or process. Storage technology has evolved in recent years from individual storage systems trapped behind individual servers to networks that connect storage resources. But storage networks were limited by their inability to get multiple storage systems to work together to support an individual application. more > From CAWorld: Taking life-cycle tack As part of its kick-off at CAWorld 2004 in Las Vegas Computer Associates (CA) officials will describe a renewed effort to promote an application life-cycle software strategy with a wider collection of products now placed under the AllFusion umbrella. Like competitor IBM the company expects life-cycle approaches to gain traction as ''on-demand'' computing grows. more > Linux Going Mainstream When United Parcel Service Inc. first tried Linux three years ago the delivery company ran the open-source operating system for four months on a virtual machine within its mainframe. The test pitted CPU- and input/output-intensive applications on Linux against similar ones on a Unix server. Linux came up short on performance and added a layer of complexity that was discouraging. UPS decided the operating system wasn't ready for the demands of its data-center environment and IBM which had prodded UPS into doing the test agreed more > Big Blue's Mainframe Gathers No Rust Mainframe customers are taking a fresh look at the Big Iron that celebrated its 40th birthday last month. IBM is spurring things along with new pricing schemes; more powerful processors; support for non-proprietary technologies such as TCP/IP Linux and Java; and on-demand offerings that put the mainframe in the reach of even the smallest customers. more > Defection: Microsoft Proponent Moves To Linux 'Suppose I upgrade to Windows 2003 and Windows XP. What would I be able to do then that I can't do with my current boxes? Nothing. I don't need all of the collaborative features ' Hentzen says. Since its inception more than a decade ago Linux has held a special appeal for small businesses because of its low startup cost kernel stability and communal approach to problem solving. It was so attractive that Whil Hentzen an eight-time recipient of Microsoft's Most Valuable Programmer Award has for the past two years been converting most of his company's Windows systems to open source more > China Seeks To Develop Its Own High-Tech Standards DVD? China's trying to do it one better--with a technology called EVD. CDMA? The digital cell phone standard is so 2003 the Chinese say. Give TD-SCDMA a try instead. Intel Corp.'s Centrino and Microsoft Corp.'s Windows? If you're doing business with Beijing better bone up on WAPI and Red Flag Linux too. more > Network Associates Unveils Linux Anti-Virus The company is pitching LinuxShield as a necessary defense for Linux servers in heterogeneous environments. Network Associates Inc. on Monday shipped McAfee LinuxShield an anti-virus package expressly designed for Linux servers. Based on the company's McAfee virus-scanning engine LinuxShield scans for viruses worms and other malicious code that can threaten Linux systems. It features automatic signature updates can sniff out viruses within archived files and has a heuristic scanner that can pinpoint suspect worms and viruses before an updated signature is actually available. more > The BEA Buzz: Beehive Open Source Initiative BEA Systems is donating the application framework in its WebLogic Workshop Java development environment to the open source community the company disclosed last week. All future development of the newly re-branded Project Beehive will be done in the open-source community by BEA engineers and community participants said BEA’s CTO Scott Dietzen and the company plans to make the framework freely available under a BSD-style license. more > Timing is Everything Two online essays touching on software patents recently crossed my browser window. The first is Seth Nickell's Why Mono is Currently An Unacceptable Risk . Nickell is a Gnome developer (that's Gnome the open source software project not gnome who lives in the garden) and his essay discusses his reasons for not wanting to base any work on the Mono open-source .NET implementation. The second essay is Microsoft's Patents Pending part of their continuing Microsoft on the Issues series. Coming two days after Nickell's piece this will no doubt strike some folks as the official response from Redmond though a moment's thought will convince most reasonable observers that it must have been planned long before. In any case this particular bit of tub-thumping argues that software patents are A Good Thing and that it's good that the Bush administration is planning to spend some money to try to support the overtaxed patent office. more > Telelogic tool promises to extend requirements If you want your software development projects to succeed manage the requirements effectively say analysts at Meta Group. Meta surveys have found that approximately 60% to 70% of IT projects fail because of poor requirements gathering analysis and management (Research on Requirements Realization and Relevance 2003). The Standish Group came to a similar conclusion in a survey in which 50% of the reasons given for project success were related to well-managed requirements. more > Windows Linux Highlights From Around the Web Microsoft is accepting applications from organizations that want to beta its Live Communications Server 2005 a next-generation enterprise instant messaging and presence-awareness server previously code-named Vienna. It includes encryption and authentication as well as integration with Office. Interested companies should contact their Microsoft account manager or sales representative for instructions on how to nominate their organization according to a Microsoft announcement. more > IBM Puts New Spin On Client Computing IBM last week introduced technology that's designed to ease the manageability of business applications and increase the productivity of mobile workers. The company says its Workplace Client Technology--a set of downloadable middleware components that work with server-based applications--marries the power of local processing with the efficiencies of thin-client computing. more > Qantas Airways Hands Over IT Management To IBM The deal includes transitioning about 80% of Qantas' servers from Unix to Linux. Qantas Airways Ltd. has signed a 10-year $445 million outsourcing pact with IBM Global Services that will create a utility computing environment expected to help with the airline's effort to slash more than $1 billion in operating expenses over the next two years. more > Windows Linux Highlights From Around the Web IBM's Workplace bundle of application software could actually prove to be the biggest threat to Microsoft's hammerlock on PC software since IBM was pushing its own competing operating system OS/2 from 1987 through 1996 technology editor Alex Salkever writes in a Business Week Online commentary. more > IBM Unveils New Managed Clients Firing the latest shot in the battle to control client side deployment costs IBM is extending its middleware to run client side applications. IBM is releasing new versions of Lotus Workplace that will provide collaboration and lightweight productivity tools while using server-based portal and software distribution technology to manage client deployment. The embedded Micro Edition is currently available for download now while the PC-oriented Rich Client Edition will be available in Q3. more > Two Roads Ahead May 4 2004 Categories: Every few years it's time for developers to take stock and decide where to put their efforts for the future. For the last decade or so I've been following along as Microsoft releases new versions of Windows and the odds are that you have been doing the same. After all that's been the safe choice. But for the next round it looks like there are more than ever two paths to follow. more > IBM launches Power5-based iSeries server The eServer i5 formerly known as the iSeries comes bundled with the company's Virtualisation Engine a collection of embedded software technologies and services intended to help corporate users fine tune their infrastructure and wring more value out of their existing IT assets. more > Dell And SAP Team To Lower Customer Costs SAP needs to fulfill a promise it made to customers CEO Kagermann says SAP needs to lower the costs of software projects and Dell wants to work more closely with software vendors. Those mutual interests converged last week in the form of a partnership aimed at convincing more companies to run SAP applications on Dell servers. more > IBM Unveils Final Beta Version Of Flagship Database The updated DB2 Universal Database features new self-management capabilities and more support for Linux. IBM on Monday debuted the final beta version of the next major release of its DB2 Universal Database which sports self-managing capabilities extended Linux support and geospatial technology inherited through IBM's 2001 Informix Corp. acquisition. more > SOAPtest bubbles up Testing Web service apps can be tricky. Generally speaking a development team in a business-to-business environment is responsible for one end point in a Web services architecture. To verify that your portion of the service is functional you need the other end point which leaves you with a choice between waiting on the completion of the other end point or building your own in-house version of the opposite end point to your Web service architecture. Parasoft's SOAPtest provides an automated environment for emulating a SOAP server or client. more > Covering your assets For anyone following SCO's Linux litigation headlines that SCO's lawsuit against DaimlerChrysler was originally targeted at Bank of America may have provided a bit of comic relief. How do we know about this possible lawsuit? According to press accounts someone at SCO forgot to turn off the Microsoft Word change-tracking feature. more > Study: Small And Midsize Companies Will Lead IT Spending A new Forrester Research report says smaller businesses will increase their IT spending by 6.6% this year as opposed to 1.7% for larger companies. more > Zone Labs Updates Security Enforcer For Guest Access The update includes checks for spyware worms Trojan horses key loggers and other malicious code lurking on guest systems. Zone Labs on Monday rolled out an update to its Integrity Clientless Security solution that blocks non-IT controlled PCs--such as those owned by partners and used by mobile workers--from accessing a company network without having proper security provisions in place more > Open-Source Insurance Open Source Risk Management LLC last week launched the Open Source Legal Defense Center which will advise companies that find themselves accused of infringing on intellectual-property rights--whether or not the accuser is SCO Group Inc. more > Best Of Listening Post Linux stirs powerful emotions. On one side are those who say open source isn't perfect. On the other side are people who know a Microsoft conspiracy when they see one. more > IT Job Market Causes Concern A few years ago students entering college to study computer science had high hopes of landing secure well-paying jobs after graduation. Peter Rayson 21 a computer-science major and math minor had visions of earning $70 000 a year in a Java-related position when he entered Queens College in New York five years ago. But with graduation near Rayson is worried that the outsourcing trend will stand in the way of his long-term dream. more > Linux's Achilles' Heel New Linux distros still fail a task that Windows 95--yes 95!--easily handles namely working with mainstream sound cards Fred Langa says. That sends the cost of commercial paid versions of Linux dramatically higher. more > Linux vendors claim Forrester Report favored Microsoft A recent report from Forrester Research comparing security on Linux and Windows systems is being sharply criticized by four major Linux distributors as being biased against them. more > Enterprise inertia holds back open source Canadian IT managers have to get over their inertia if open source software is to make more headway in the corporate enterprise experts told the Real World Linux 2004 conference Wednesday. more > The call of MySQL Attention has focused of late on how open-source Linux is displacing Solaris Windows NT and other OSs. Effects are being felt in the database world as well as MySQL especially seems to be displacing other DBs and gaining open-source traction. more > Software Truce Will 'Grow The Market' First results of Sun-Microsoft pact due in June Sun's Schwartz says more > Linux vendors attack analyst report Linux vendors Debian Mandrake Red Hat and SuSE have hit back at research which claims that Linux and Microsoft products are both secure. In a report released late last month entitled Is Linux more Secure than Windows? analyst Forrester said: Microsoft gets a bad rap for security while many believe that Linux is relatively secure. more > Oracle And Dell Take Aim At Midsize Businesses After a couple of years working together to sell their combination of database software and commodity servers to large data centers Dell and Oracle are turning their attention to small and midsize companies. Oracle has granted Dell the exclusive right between now and year's end to deliver preinstalled versions of Oracle Standard Edition One on Dell's PowerEdge 2600 or 2650 servers running either Red Hat Linux or Windows. These pre-install licensing agreements are available in five 10 25 and unlimited user variations starting at $4 108. more > Macs discover new life in sciences Although the Apple Mac platform was long ago counted out by a lot of corporate IT managers it has morphed and continues to find adherents -- the graphic arts in particular have persisted as a major stronghold. And the Mac platform may even be thriving again in the science sector where it once held some dominance on the desktop. more > Langa Letter: Virtual Excellence: Microsoft's 'Virtual PC' Is Too Good Not To Check Out Late last year Microsoft quietly rolled out its entry into the virtual PC arena--Microsoft Virtual PC 2004--and delivered its offering at about half the price of competing commercial products. What's more Microsoft even offers a 100% free 45-day trial of the software. more > Utilities' Security Is Too Lax Report Says Gas and electric utilities are under attack for lax security that leaves their control systems vulnerable to cyber- and physical threats. A General Accounting Office report released last week cited a number of security problems and witnesses at a congressional hearing presented a mix of dire predictions and power-company defenses. Our systems have been designed to be open and don't have the needed level of security says Joe Weiss a power consultant at systems integrator Kema Inc. The entire industrial infrastructure was developed for efficiency and production not security issues. more > IBM To Open Its Microchip Technology IBM says microchip technology is reaching its physical limits so the company is shifting the focus of much of its processor-design strategy from the chips themselves to the creation of tightly integrated high-performance architectures for specific industries and applications. more > Survey: Moving From Windows To Linux Isn't Cheap For years Linux advocates have touted the open-source operating system as a less-expensive more-reliable alternative to Unix and Windows running on x86-based or industry-standard servers. Not so fast says the Yankee Group. more > Superpower: China's Choices Echo Around The World When the Chinese government makes technology decisions it impacts businesses around the world. China's always wondering 'Are we going to have our own standards or are we going to follow world standards?' says Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. And it's one of the few countries that's absolutely big enough to go through that kind of a process. more > Collection takes Web services route Meta data management is something of a new concept among financial service providers but it proved to be key to the success of a major IT innovation at CompuCredit. Last March the Atlanta-based specialty financial services and credit card company asked its IT organization to develop a way for its collection agents and customer service reps to use Web services to access and process data in real time. This January the group went into production with a solution: an information portal called the XML Business Gateway. more > IBM Opens Up Power Processor Design It's shifting the focus of much of its processor design strategy from the chips to the creation of tightly integrated high-performance architectures for specific industries and consumer applications. more > Windows Vs. Linux Security: Depends On Who You Ask A new Forrester Research study says the question of which operating system is more secure depends greatly on what aspects of security companies see as most important. more > Share Fixes NASA Asks Open-source agreement if approved would require developers to reveal code modifications. In a bid to make greater use of the open-source community the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration has submitted an open-source licensing agreement to the Open Source Initiative. If approved the NASA Open Source Agreement will require developers using NASA code to share modifications with NASA and the open-source community. more > Windows Linux Highlights From Around the Web A new survey purports to show that Linux total cost of ownership is higher than Microsoft's but skepticism abounds among Linux advocates after some other studies showing such results were found to have been funded by Microsoft. more > HP And Novell Join Forces To Put Linux On The Desktop Hewlett-Packard and Novell disclosed a partnership on Wednesday that will bring SuSE's open-source Linux operating system to select HP desktop and laptop systems in the second half of 2004. Touting the new effort as the first play by a major technology vendor to offer Linux from the desktop to the data center Martin Fink HP's VP for Linux said the move comes at the urging of its largest business customers who want to deploy a single operating system a single distribution of Linux from top to bottom. more > Open-source MySQL DBMS adds clustering tech Swedish open-source database maker MySQL AB plans to release a new clustered database product with high-availability support next month company officials disclosed. The new MySQL Cluster combines the company's flagship open-source database with a clustering architecture officials say is designed to deliver database applications with so-called five-nines availability (99.999% or less than five minutes of downtime per year). more > At SD West: Microsoft exec asks if for-profit software can survive At SD West: Microsoft exec asks i How will the for-profit software industry fair if the open-source model continues to proliferate? According to Microsoft Distinguished Engineer Jim Gray it might not survive. Commenting during a panel discussion at the Software Development Conference and Expo West (SD West) in Santa Clara Calif. last week Gray asked: How will there be a software industry if there's open source? more > Linux push breathes new life into Novell for some IT execs Attendees at Novell Inc.'s BrainShare conference this week will hear more product announcements related to the company's Linux strategy but the bigger news may be the smiling faces of Novell officials and many users. more > Lock-free ANTs Data Server updated ANTs Software Inc. a Burlingame Calif.-based developer of SQL database management systems recently announced availability of Version 2.2 of its ANTs Data Server. The product a standards-compliant relational database management system that includes some new design approaches now also includes support for Red Hat Enterprise Linux as well as replication with automatic failover stored procedures triggers and event mechanisms. more > Lock-free ANTs Data Server updated ANTs Software Inc. a Burlingame Calif.-based developer of SQL database management systems recently announced availability of Version 2.2 of its ANTs Data Server. The product a standards-compliant relational database management system that includes some new design approaches now also includes support for Red Hat Enterprise Linux as well as replication with automatic failover stored procedures triggers and event mechanisms. more > IBM aims for 40 000 Linux desktops in-house by 2005 IBM hopes to have 40 000 Linux desktop users within the company by year's end but that doesn't necessarily mean that the computer giant thinks everyone should move to the Linux desktop an IBM executive said today at the Open Source Business Conference in San Francisco. more > HP To Introduce Linux-Based PCs In Asia Hewlett-Packard Co. plans to become the first company to trumpet personal computers that run the freely distributed Linux operating system in Asia HP's Japanese unit said Tuesday. more > Start-up to sell open source insurance A New York company has spotted a new business opportunity in The SCO Group's legal battle with the Linux community: open source insurance. more > Popularity Growing For Open-Source Databases Database systems built from open-source code are gaining in capabilities and enjoying rapid adoption by early users of new technology on IT staffs. The trend indicates that open-source databases will move from the intellectual curiosity of 2003 to widespread mainstream use by 2006 a major analyst firm says in a recent report. more > SQL Server Delay May Complicate Microsoft's Software Assurance The delay of SQL Server 2005--the official name for what has long been called Yukon--may complicate Microsoft's efforts to keep businesses within its Software Assurance maintenance and upgrade program analysts said Thursday. more > The two-processor ProLiant BL30 lets users fit 16 blades in a 10-1/2-inch space. Hewlett-Packard on Monday unveiled a thinner two-processor blade server that lets users fit more of the high-powered computers in a rack. With the HP ProLiant BL30p businesses can fit 16 side-by-side blades in a 10.5-inch space. The server comes with dual Intel Xeon processors and is designed for running application servers E-commerce applications computation clusters grid computing and Web hosting. more > Longhorn roundup Longhorn like many things in the history of Microsoft is long-awaited. A release date has not been announced yet but it is still not too early to begin thinking seriously about Longhorn. The thing I worry about with IT managers is that if they're looking too far down the road in terms of Microsoft's next release they're going to take their eyes off what they should be doing now said Michael Silver vice president and research director at Gartner Inc. Stamford Conn. Don't sit around doing nothing waiting for Longhorn. Certainly understand what it's going to make you do where you want to be and how you're going to get there but don't ignore what's going on today either. more > Q&A: Sam Greenblatt Sam Greenblatt SVP and chief architect of CA's Linux Technology Group says open software and modeling will push app server progress; Linux is seen as the inevitable platform of choice to run the corporate enterprise. We asked about that in this Q&A interview. more > Coming Soon to Centrino Notebooks—Linux Lindows.com has announced a new version of its Linux operating system with support for portable computers based on the Intel Centrino platform. Although few observers see an immediate threat to Microsoft's operating system franchise according to Lindows.com officials making Linux available on cost-effective notebooks has been a big request from PC manufacturers. The first Centrino systems with LindowsOS Laptop Edition will begin shipping in the late-March to early-April time frame. more > Sabre Rebuilds on the Fly It was about 10 years ago when executives at Sabre Holdings Corp. decided they needed to start thinking about moving their online travel business off their existing proprietary mainframes and onto a new platform. more > What's next for Linux: desktop or data center? Depending on whom you spoke with at the recent LinuxWorld conference in New York City the next frontier of Linux is either at the data center or on the desktop. And as SCO ramped up litigation with a new copyright suit against Novell last month it's not surprising that licenses intellectual property and indemnification were also hot topics at the conference more > CA: It's Time to Join the Linux Generation First we had the PC generation. Then the Internet generation. And now we're in the midst of the Linux generation. And it's not too soon too join. That was the message of Computer Associates International Inc.'s Senior Vice President and Chief Architect Sam Greenblatt who delivered the LinuxWorld keynote here Thursday morning. more > Sun to IBM: Go Linux with us Sun Microsystems has offered IBM the benefit of its experience if Big Blue decides that it wants to implement a wholesale move to the Linux desktop. In a memo Sun issued Wednesday Executive VP Jonathan Schwartz said his company is firmly committed to a wholesale move from the Microsoft desktop--possibly in the next six months--and is prepared to help IBM do the same. We're not waiting for 2005 to migrate all of Sun to a non-Microsoft desktop. By the end of this calendar year--potentially by summer--we'll be there he said. more > Linux's 'center of gravity' When Stuart Cohen signed on as chief executive of Open Source Development Labs in April he didn't think so much of his time would be occupied with the actions of a small Utah-based company called the SCO Group. But after SCO's legal offensive expanded from IBM to include all Linux users Cohen--himself subpoenaed by SCO--decided to put the Linux consortium on the front lines. Last week the company announced a $10 million legal defense fund to protect Linux users. more > IBM to offer new point-of-sale OS from SUSE Linux SUSE Linux AG and IBM are now offering SUSE's first-ever point-of-sale (POS) Linux operating system combined with IBM's retail services and support. In a deal announced today the operating system called IBM Retail Environment for SUSE Linux will include an operating system based on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server along with other software needed by retailers. The POS operating system is designed to be compatible with IBM's SurePOS cash register machines eServers and middleware to allow retailers to create a scalable secure operating environment across their entire business according to IBM. more > Battle Between UNIX and Linux Heating Up With the holidays rushing toward us it should be a quiet time in the tech industry but a slew of recent developments in the battle over UNIX and Linux ensures that anyone with a stake in this conflict will have some unsettling news to mull over. This week computing giant Novell revealed that it has spent the past few months quietly registering for the UNIX copyrights the SCO Group claims to own copyrights SCO has used as a basis for its attack on Linux a UNIX clone. SCO meanwhile has sent a second threatening letter to Linux and IBM AIX customers warning them that they face lawsuits if they continue to use operating systems SCO says are based in part on UNIX code owned by SCO. more > Linux Creator Torvalds Details Code Differences The SCO Group Inc. recently made some specific claims about programs within Linux that it contends were stolen from the Lindon Utah company's Unix intellectual property. Linux founder Linus Torvalds on Monday offered eWEEK.com a number of specific code examples that countered SCO's assessment. more > MySQL Quashes Defects in Database Release MySQL AB on Monday released Version 4.0.17 of its MySQL open-source database software. The update features a number of cleaned up code defects that were recently sniffed out by an independent inspection company. Available in source code and binary form the MySQL 4.0.17 maintenance release for the current MySQL production version corrects all valid bugs discovered during an October poll conducted within the development community via an independent study by Mountain View Calif.-based Reasoning Inc. more > Red Hat releases Linux patches Red Hat has released a range of patches for its Linux 7.1 7.2 and 7.3 versions which previously allowed a local user to fire off denial-of-service attacks. The real issue comes with the Apache Web server. It was discovered that if someone gained access to the main configuration and access-restriction files used with Apache they could set up a denial-of-service attack. They could also gained increased system privileges making the possibility of other hacks larger. more > Sun looks to lead Linux onto desktop Sun Microsystems Inc. has just rolled out its first Linux-based desktop software and is working to secure deals with governments and businesses to deploy it but the company isn't targeting Microsoft Corp. a Sun executive said Thursday. First and foremost the objective of the Java Desktop System (JDS) isn't to go after Microsoft said Peder Ulander Sun's director of marketing for Desktop Solutions. Ulander was speaking at the SunNetwork Berlin conference the company's first major conference in Europe where the market for Linux-based desktop software is seen as much stronger than in the U.S. more > Gates: Blazing the Longhorn Trail The smoke having almost cleared from several years of antitrust proceedings Microsoft Corp. Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates is turning his attention to what he's calling seamless computing. The most influential figure in the software industry is confronting other challenges as well including following through on his company's Trustworthy Computing initiative to make Windows more secure. In addition Gates is shepherding a landmark Windows upgrade in Longhorn which is due in 2006 while fending off the Linux challenge and pushing Web services for application integration. Gates discussed these issues and more in an interview with eWEEK Editor in Chief Eric Lundquist at Comdex in Las Vegas last week. more > Conference speaker offers Linux reality check Here was a speaker at a Linux enterprise conference telling the audience that Linux isn't the best choice for every IT need. Linux and other open source software products in many cases may not offer the highest-quality choice available to enterprises and proprietary software isn't evil said Jonathan Eunice president and principal analyst at Illuminata Inc. an IT research and consultancy group based in Nashua New Hampshire. ************* more > Certifications a must for Linux admins Enterprise IT administrators holding a Linux certification are in possession of a coveted confirmation of their skills with the operating system. Experts say as more enterprises explore the potential cost savings and efficiencies promised with a switch to Linux admins holding a Linux cert will be higher on the list for new jobs promotions or pay raises. Bosses are telling managers to get their Linux hats on that they are going to be using it very soon said Ross Brunson director of Linux and Unix education with Philadelphia-based The Training Camp an outfit that trains and prepares administrators for certification exams. more > Linux inches up corporate IT priority list The chief information officers of some major U.S. companies say more businesses are choosing the Linux operating system as they face pressure to reduce costs. Speaking on a panel at a venture capital conference here Wednesday the CIO of clothing retailer Gap and a tech executive from Bank of America said they are among the Linux converts. Topping Gap's list of priority technology projects is anything touching Linux company CIO Ken Harris said. *********** more > Microsoft still rules server OS market Despite growing competition from Linux Microsoft continues to dominate the market for server operating systems software according to research from IDC. And the software potentate looks secure to retain its lead in the worldwide market for server operating systems through 2007 Framingham Mass.-based IDC reported Wednesday. During that period shipments of both Microsoft's Windows and the open-source Linux are projected to see higher annual shipments with the overall market for server operating systems expected to grow at a rate of 9.1 percent per year. In comparison the market for client operating systems is projected to grow 7.5 percent annually. *********** more > End-users driving reseller Linux interest Linux is becoming increasingly important for resellers because of pent-up end-user demand particularly among small and medium businesses (SMBs) according to IBM's Linux chief. Speaking to vnunet.com ahead of this week's Linux Expo event in London Adam Jollans IBM worldwide Linux software marketing strategy manager also said cost was not the only reason. Resellers tend to follow demand. They are interested in 'how do I make money and save money?' Demand is coming from end users he said. ************ more > SuSE readies desktop Linux update Small business does not mean small potatoes. That's the conclusion reached by an increasing number of technology companies. Both hardware makers such as Hewlett-Packard and software makers such as Oracle have been pledging devotion to the small- and midsize-business market. As large companies have clamped down on their tech spending smaller firms have started to spend more in part because the larger companies they deal with are demanding that they be more tech savvy. more > Update: HP to indemnify its corporate Linux users against SCO In a bold move aimed at reassuring its enterprise users that Linux is the right choice for their businesses Hewlett-Packard Co. today is announcing that it will indemnify its Linux customers against any future legal action from The SCO Group Inc. The company held a news teleconference earlier today to detail the move which is effective Oct. 1. more > HP to indemnify Linux clients against SCO Customers who buy Linux from Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP) can worry a little less about The SCO Group Inc.’s threats of lawsuits. Starting Oct. 1 customers who purchase Linux systems from HP will be indemnified against any legal action relating to SCO’s intellectual property claims against Linux the company announced in a conference call on Wednesday. “Today HP becomes the first major Linux hardware vendor to offer certain Linux customers indemnification ” said Martin Fink the general manager of HP’s Linux systems division. more > JBoss Joins Java Community Process Despite an ongoing battle over the licensing of the Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) with Sun Microsystems Inc. JBoss Group LLC has joined the Java Community Process (JCP) the organization that oversees all issues relating to the Java platform including J2EE. Marc Fleury president of JBoss told eWEEK that his Atlanta-based company which provides services around the open-source JBoss Java application server has joined the JCP to help take the Java standard forward. more > Linux clustering finding its way into enterprise Linux’s upsurge in popularity as a data center platform is a natural offshoot of its proven performance in clusters says Dean Hutchings chief operating officer of Linux Networx Inc. in Bluffdale Utah. His company is building one of the world’s largest Linux clusters named Lightning for Los Alamos National Laboratory. In this interview he explains how clusters increase application performance and why Linux and clusters are a good match. more > Sun JBoss Continue to Butt Heads Over Java The battle over open source and licensing Sun Microsystems Inc.'s software continues with both Sun and the JBoss Group LLC claiming the right to refuse or attain the proper licenses for Sun's Java technology based on open-source status. Palo Alto Calif.-based Sun and Atlanta-based JBoss remain at odds over whether JBoss an open-source application server provider should be able to waive the fee for licensing the Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) technology which JBoss sells its services around. more > Linux in the Enterprise: Now What? Linux the scarcely decade-old open-source operating system looks to have reached a sort of critical mass and has entered into an awfully busy period in its development. There's a major kernel update around the corner an audacious licensing challenge with which to contend and a rush by virtually every major enterprise IT vendor not located at 1 Microsoft Way to jump on the Linux bandwagon or help take up the reins and drive its development. more > Linux rules but won’t dominate z/OS says IBM exec Linux has done wonders for the mainframe’s image but don’t ever expect it to replace z/OS as the dominant force in supercomputing. At least that is the view from the office of Kyle Van Kleek IBM’s director of zSeries products. In part-one of this Search390.com interview Van Kleek the man responsible for the development and design of all zSeries servers talks about the effect Linux has had on the marketplace and how he believes Linux will stack up going forward. He also talked about why he feels the mainframe’s role in the data center won’t evolve much over the next several years. more > Is Linux Ready for the Database? As Oracle Corp. girds for the upcoming release of its Oracle 10G database next month the company is cranking up the G-for-grid part of the message for this major update. According to beta users the update will feature easier-to-configure grid capabilities. But a big part of Oracle’s RAC (Real Application Clusters) message for the past year has been about Linux which may shave the cost of the platform by up to five-sixths according to Wim Coekaerts director of Linux engineering for Oracle of Redwood Shores Calif. more > Microsoft Is Using Linux To Protect Its Own Web Site Microsoft has made a big deal out of asserting that Linux is not fit for the enterprise. But Microsoft itself is using Linux to help protect its servers against denial-of-service attacks. According to a post on the Netcraft Web site Microsoft changed its DNS settings on Friday so that requests for www.microsoft.com no longer resolve to machines on Microsoft’s own network but instead are handled by the Akamai caching system which runs Linux. more > Experts offer Linux migration pointers Experts are urging enterprise IT shops to develop strategies for moving back-end systems like databases to Linux while paying close attention to advances in Linux on the desktop. If an enterprise’s IT organization doesn’t have migration virtualization security and networking on its Linux to-do list today it will be eating a competitor’s dust tomorrow said experts polled by SearchEnterpriseLinux.com. Ken Milberg a SearchEnterpriseLinux.com site expert said companies should start focusing on migrating database servers from Unix or Windows to Linux in addition to considering how they can use Linux on the desktop. more > Linux ‘easily’ recompiled to dump SCO Vendors and users could easily recompile their Linux software to temporarily remove modules that may contain SCO copyrighted software according to tests conducted at vnunet.com’s sister title IT Week. By doing so users could avoid potential demands by SCO for royalty payments. Provided that support contracts allow it modules could be replaced by alternatives that do not infringe SCO’s copyrights ensuring that levels of functionality are maintained. more > Fujitsu may beat IBM with fastest Linux supercompu IBM has a challenger in the race to deliver the world’s fastest Linux-based supercomputer. A day after the U.S. company said it had received an order for what stands to be the fastest such machine Japan’s Fujitsu Ltd. announced an order for a faster machine that it expects to put into service at about the same time. The Fujitsu computing cluster will contain 2 048 as-yet-unidentified processors and stands to deliver a peak performance of 12.4 trillion floating point operations per second (TFLOPS) the company said in a statement today. Fujitsu received the order from Japan’s Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (Riken) a governmental research organization that will use the computer mainly in biotechnology research. Delivery is scheduled for March 2004. more > |
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