Showing headlines posted by Scott_Ruecker

Every major web browser has been updated this week, mostly to deliver security patches. It isn't every week that sees the delivery of an update for or affecting each of the major browsers. Those of us who like or need to use multiple browsers have plenty of downloading and installing to do, so thank goodness the process is largely automated.

Six-year-old BlueStar Energy Services Inc. doesn't have the kind of systems-baggage that saddles many older organizations. Still, the Chicago-based company found itself hindered by the rigidity of its core systems, which constrained its efforts to expand its customer base and offer new services. Those barriers to growth led the company to embark on a bold effort to replace the bulk of its IT infrastructure -- including voice, e-mail and financial systems -- with open-source software. The initiative has been so successful that CEO Guy Morgan attributes much of the company's recent growth to it.

What's the crowd up to these days? Solving the world's problems -- and saving corporations a lot of money in the process. A few individuals are managing to eke out some personal gain in return for their contributions, but for the most part, the crowd is beginning to look like an incredibly large, wise, cheap labor pool. Fortunately, it's also unwieldy, which may be the crowd's saving grace.

The largest trend in Solaris deployment these days is to wait for end-of-life and then replace the server with Linux, where possible. But now that OpenSolaris exists, should this trend continue? Perhaps we should look at OpenSolaris instead of Linux? Last week I took the stance that OpenSolaris could in fact replace Linux. In theory—in the future, if Sun plays its cards properly—this is possible. Asking if I’d deploy OpenSolaris at work, however, is a very different question.

For many years Spamhaus has been top dog in the anti-spam world of DNSBL (Domain Name System Block List; also known as Realtime Blackhole Lists or RBLs). But Spamhaus is no longer a 100% free service. Even small nonprofits are now expected to pay at least $250 per year for a subscription to the Spamhaus DNSBL Datafeed Service. Now a new, free alternative to Spamhaus has arrived: the Barracuda Reputation Block List (BRBL), provided by well-known, open source-based Barracuda Networks. And Barracuda CEO Dean Drako says the company has no plans to charge for the service in the future. He says that BRBL (pronounced "barbell") "does cost us a little bit of money to run, but we think that the goodwill, the reputation and the understanding that Barracuda is providing the service will do us well in the long run."

The sysrq key sits quietly at the top of your keyboard, usually sharing space with PrntScrn. sysrq is a direct hotline to the kernel and gets you out of trouble when your system is getting tangled up in itself; Juliet Kemp shows how.

Low-level optimization of performance-critical code can be a challenging task. At this point, one assumes, the potential for algorithmic improvements in the targeted code has been realized; what is left is trying to locate and address problems like cache misses, mis-predicted branches, and so on. Such problems can be impossible to find by just looking at the code; one needs support from the hardware. The good news is that contemporary hardware provides that support; most processors can collect a wide range of performance data for analysis. The bad news is that, despite the fact that processors have been able to collect that data for many years, there has never been support for this kind of performance monitoring in the mainline kernel. That situation may be about to change, but, first, the development community will have to make a choice between a venerable out-of-tree implementation and an unexpected competitor.

Novell Inc.'s openSUSE project is becoming more open, as a new release due out Thursday includes licensing changes that make it easier to redistribute the Linux operating system, as well as a build service that will encourage more contributions from open-source developers. OpenSUSE previously used a standard user license agreement and contained some proprietary software -- namely Adobe Acrobat and Sun Java -- that made it difficult to redistribute the open-source software, says Joe Brockmeier, Novell's openSUSE community manager. OpenSUSE 11.1, the release that will be announced Thursday, modifies the license to eliminate some of the legal headaches and removes the proprietary software, which now must be downloaded separately.

eRacks Open Source Systems has introduced a new desktop model that uses the recently-released Intel (News - Alert) Core i7 processor. The Core i7 processor from Intel is the first member of a new family of Nehalem processor designs and is equipped with new technologies that boost performance on demand and maximize data throughput. The Core i7 processor speeds video editing, immersive games and other popular Internet and computer activities by up to 40 percent without increasing power consumption.

Debian developer Josselin Mouette has had his privileges of posting to the announcement mailing list for developers withdrawn, following an offensive post to the list in November. Debian Project Leader Steve McIntyre told iTWire that after Mouette's "abuse of the ability to post to the d-d-a mailing list, I asked our mailing list administrators to remove that privilege for in future." Following the post on November 23, at least two Debian women developers indicated they were reconsidering their participation in GNU/Linux project.

[Looks like it finally got the attention of the brass at Debian. - Scott]

We are pleased to announce you the launch, by January ‘09, of a world wide Mandriva Community Steering Committee whose main targets will be to: Unify and leverage the Mandriva Community and Ecosystem, thus aligning joint efforts towards clear goals. Provide a better visibility on products releases. And last but not least, establishing a key milestone on the road to success.

This week's feature article shows keen Linux users how to make the most of their computer by performing a custom install for a leaner and faster system - in this case we build a custom Ubuntu 8.10. In the news section, openSUSE prepares for the imminent release of version 11.1, Debian announces the upcoming second and final release candidate of the Debian installer, the Unofficial Fedora FAQ updates its HOWTOs for the recently released Fedora 10, the University of Glasgow settles on Slackware Linux for its log-in server, Spain's Trisquel is added to GNU's free distribution list, and Chile's Educalibre gets Tuquito Linux running on Intel Classmate netbooks. We also have links to two interesting interviews - one with Timothy Cramer from OpenSolaris and the other with Warren Woodford of MEPIS Linux. Finally, if you are still searching for that elusive minimalist Linux system that would run smoothly on any old computer, take a look at Tiny Core Linux - a desktop distro in 11 MB.

Sun has updated its "open source" desktop virtualization software. xVM VirtualBox 2.1 reportedly features improved 64-bit support, 3D acceleration, easier Windows and Linux networking, hardware virtualization on Macs, and "full" VMDK/VHD support, including snapshots, although many new features are "experimental."

Another year gone, and Blizzard's World of Warcraft remains the unrivaled champion of the massive multiplayer online (MMO) genre, and - in many ways - PC gaming in general. At its feet lay 2008's pile of would-be "WoW-killers" left charred, battered, and wondering what Blizzard's four-year-old creation has that they lack.

If Parkinson's Law for computers holds true, then no matter how much disk space you have, it will get used up. If you're already feeling a pinch, consider using a disk space analyzer tool to see what's eating your space.

Contrary to some recent reports, senior managers at Acer and other leading vendors have confirmed that Microsoft Windows XP now dominates the emerging sub-notebook market with more than 90% of new sales. Meanwhile, Linux, which had the netbooks market to itself until April this year, has seen its share of the space eroded to less than 10% in a breath-taking decline.

Microsoft plans to open Office to other file formats, a move the company hopes will placate government and business concerns about document interoperability. Describing this as a step to foster greater transparency, Microsoft intends to document how it incorporated Open Document Format (ODF) support into Office 2007 Service Pack 2, which is still in beta. That product is expected to ship sometime in the first half of 2009.

In a mature IT market, it becomes hard to make any significant changes in hardware architecture or software design without upsetting the installed base of legacy users. This, of course, makes the evolution of a product somewhat troublesome. Change must fit within the strict confines of compatibility, ensuring both hardware and software vendors do something useful without upsetting the entire apple cart in the data center - or on our desks and in our laps.

Laziness, impatience, and hubris: the three qualities that make a programmer, according to Larry Wall, the creator of Perl. Perl earned its fame years ago by being the major language driving web programming, and distinguished itself from the rest of the pack by allowing developers to write full-featured programs using nothing but punctuation. Perl 6, which has been in development for the better part of a decade, has shown Larry to be at least one third correct. Which third, however, depends on who you ask.

I was celebrating Leap Day (February 29) at a London pub with Mark Antony Kent, Head of Technology Strategy at British Telecom, hoping also to pump his brain for insights to follow up on a contentious FCC hearing at Harvard earlier that week???one convened to visit issues around Comcast's valving of BitTorrent traffic.