China is one of the countries that have suffered the most when Microsoft decided to pull the plug on Windows XP. The Chinese government is now looking towards Linux to fill that gap, and it intends to use its resources to make that happen.

In today's open source roundup: Plant seeds to open source for farmers, gardeners and plant breeders. Plus: The Linux Foundation launches the Core Infrastructure Initiative, and why Linux is a great replacement for Windows XP.

"Sometimes it takes a crisis to do the right thing," Jim Zemlin, executive director of the Linux Foundation, told eWEEK. "There is nothing broken in the open-source model, but we wanted to see what lessons could be learned from Heartbleed and how we could make something good come out of it."

As a pre-release build of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 RC offers a near-final look at the only operating system crafted for the open hybrid cloud, building upon the feedback collected during the beta program for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7. Also, Red Hat plans to introduce Red Hat Enterprise Linux Atomic Host as a new addition to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux family.

Calibre is an ebook collection manager with support for many services, including Amazon, Android or Barnes & Noble. Calibre makes it easy to organize ebooks, as well as search various services for new ebooks. The latest version is 1.33 and brings several improvements, like a tool to check the spelling and a number of bug fixes.

The Perfect Server - Ubuntu 14.04 (Apache2, PHP, MySQL, PureFTPD, BIND, Dovecot, ISPConfig 3) This tutorial shows how to prepare an Ubuntu 14.04 (Trusty Tahr) server (with Apache2, BIND, Dovecot) for the installation of ISPConfig 3, and how to install ISPConfig 3. ISPConfig 3 is a webhosting control panel that allows you to configure the following services through a web browser: Apache or nginx web server, Postfix mail server, Courier or Dovecot IMAP/POP3 server, MySQL, BIND or MyDNS nameserver, PureFTPd, SpamAssassin, ClamAV, and many more. This setup covers Apache (instead of nginx), BIND (instead of MyDNS), and Dovecot (instead of Courier).

The cloud is having a huge impact on the enterprise, so much so that it's actually altering the roles of IT and end users alike --and not surprising each party sees the cloud through a different lens.

The Linux Foundation has launched the Core Infrastructure Initiative with a slew of prominent corporate supporters including Amazon, Cisco and others.

Kid3 is a powerful audio tag editor for KDE with support for formats like MP3, Ogg/Vorbis, FLAC, MPC, MP4/AAC, MP2, Speex, TrueAudio and WAV. Kid3 allows you to edit common tags over multiple files as well.

For you extreme Baseball fans (is baseball mostly American?) Out of the Park Baseball 15 has been released on Steam for Linux promising you the ability to manage your dream team.

First, a brief rant about Ubuntu, then a few hints to make the latest version less annoying.

In the wake of the Heartbleed OpenSSL security disaster, The Linux Foundation has brought together both open-source supporters and companies better known for proprietary software to fund mission-critical open-source projects.

Scratch is a great tool for teaching programming to young children, but what happens when kids outgrow Scratch? Among Raspberry Pi aficionados, the typical answer is to advance to using Python, which is an excellent choice. However, in honor of the 50th birthday of BASIC, I would like to suggest another programming environment: Gambas.

Open source software, hardware, and methods are gaining popularity and access to them couldn't be more prolific. If you're thinking about starting a new open source project, there are five common pitfalls you should be aware of before you begin. Don't despair if you've already started your project and are just now reading this! These pointers can be helpful at any stage if things are still running smoothly. Fail faster and succeed with open source. 5 common pitfalls of a new open source project

The DNS server that we have created in the previous tutorial is an open DNS resolver. An open resolver does not filter any incoming requests, and accepts queries from any source IP address. Unfortunately, an open resolver can become an easy target to attackers. For example, attackers can initiate a Denial of Service (DoS) or […]Continue reading... The post How to close an open DNS resolver appeared first on Xmodulo. Related FAQs: How to run iptables automatically after reboot on Debian What are available iptables management tools with GUI? How to set up a transparent proxy on Linux How to count the number of open network connections on Linux How to set up a transparent HTTPS filtering proxy on CentOS

EFF is evaluating the feasibility of offering a prize for the first usable, secure, and private end-to-end encrypted communication tool. We believe a prize based on objective usability metrics (such as the percentage of users who were able to install and start using the tool within a few minutes, and the percentage who survived simulated impersonation or man-in-the-middle attacks) might be an effective way to determine which project or projects are best delivering communication security to vulnerable user communities; to promote and energize those tools; and to encourage interaction between developers, interaction designers and academics interested in this space.

I had a chance to catch up with David A. Wheeler, a long-time leader in advising and working with the US government on issues related to open source software. As early as the late 1990s, David was demonstrating why open source software was integral to the US goverment IT architecture, and his personal webpage is a frequently cited source on open standards, open source software, and computer security. In this interview, we explore the current state of use of open source software by the US government, the challenges of the Federal acquisition system, and what he's excited about as he looks ahead for open source and government.

Team Tiny Core is pleased to announce the release of Tiny Core Linux 5.3: Changelog: BusyBox - updated nosuid to 1.22.1, added ntpd, corrected dc failure, modified wget timeout to 10s; tce-load - don't show an error when extension contains multiple modules; tc-config - change owner /tmp/tce/optional to support tftplist; tce-load - use sudo when unmounting meta-extensions; added full path to sudo commands; tc-config - introduce ntpserver boot option; switch getTime.sh to ntpd; replace aliases with functions in useBusyBox.

Canonical pushed out Ubuntu 14.04 last week. This release is the first Ubuntu Long Term Support release in two years and will be supported for the next five years.

It feels like, for Canonical at least, this Long Term Support release couldn't have come at a worse time. The company is caught in a transitional phase as it moves from a desktop operating system to a platform that spans devices.

Audacious is an advanced, feature-complete music player for GNOME using GTK 3 that bundles many features, a clean interface, support for real-time audio effects, visualization, equalizer, lyrics and other plugins, themes (including Winamp Classic style with installable skins), powerful configuration options and multiple playlists organized in tabs.

The Linux Foundation has announced the keynote schedule for the LinuxCon and CloudOpen North America event in August, which will highlight open source's role in virtualization, MOOCs, 3D printing and more.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler confirmed today that proposed rules to replace the net neutrality regulations struck down by a court decision are on track for an FCC vote on May 15.

Wheeler didn't detail exactly what those rules would be, but The Wall Street Journal says it has a source who knows. "The Federal Communications Commission plans to propose new open Internet rules on Thursday that would allow content companies to pay Internet service providers for special access to consumers, according to a person familiar with the proposal," the Journal reported.

Tubecore’s “Duo” wireless media-streaming speaker embeds a Raspberry Pi or Udoo SBC, and features Bluetooth and WiFi, plus a 48v Class A analog-tube preamp. At $649, discounted to $479 in the current pre-order phase, the Duo costs more than typical $50 to $200 wireless speakers. However, it’s also a full media player that can stream […]

IBM today formally announced its Power8 silicon and server lineup in a bid to help improve Big Blue's hardware fortunes. A key part of the Power8 launch is a renewed focus on Linux for data center workloads.

Today the Black Lab Linux team is pleased to announce the release of its Enterprise edition 5.0.1 to current and prospective customers. With this release we have fixed a myriad of problems experienced with release 4.2.5. The fastest growing alternative to Red Hat Enterprise Linux has just gotten better.

In a post on his personal blog Mark Shuttleworth expressed his willing to do something unified and upright, something about which we can be universally proud in the next Ubuntu release, but he also gave us a hint about the codename which 14.10 will have: Utopic Unicorn.

SolidRun revealed a Raspberry Pi-like “HummingBoard” boardset for its Linux-ready CuBox mini-PCs, based on a Freescale i.MX6 SoC located on a tiny COM. SolidRun created the community-backed “HummingBoard” to serve as a modular motherboard for use in its Linux- and Android-ready CuBox mini-PCs, including the recent CuBox-i models. Like the recently announced, Allwinner A20-based Banana […]

InfoWorld thinks it's a bad idea to replace Windows XP with Linux. They're wrong, of course, and I'll tell you why in this column.

Puppy Arcade 11 uses the power of Puppy Linux and fuses it with every games console emulator imaginable. The ROM Loader is a great tool for loading games into each emulator but there are a few rough edges.

The new rules, according to the people briefed on them, will allow a company like Comcast or Verizon to negotiate separately with each content company – like Netflix, Amazon, Disney or Google – and charge different companies different amounts for priority service.