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Mounting and unmounting filesystems used to be straightforward in GNU/Linux. A basic knowledge of the mount command or some editing of /etc/fstab in a text editor and you were done. However, with the addition of udev in the 2.6 kernel for autoplugging, and the demand for hotswapping USB devices, along with the increased use of logical volume managers and other complications, the process is now more complicated -- perhaps too complicated for many among the growing number of desktop users. That is where graphical mount managers such as Forelex Mount Manager, PySDM, and MountManager find their niche.

Vtonf is a free web-based control panel (released under the GPL license) for managing virtual private servers (VPS) based on OpenVZ. It makes it very easy to create and manage OpenVZ VMs even for people with little technical knowledge. Right now, Vtonf is available only for RedHat, Fedora, and CentOS (support for Debian is planned), therefore I describe its installation and usage on a CentOS 5.2 server.

Sometimes porting a bit of code to another platform or piece of hardware isn't about the ported code delivering new features to the device. Sure, sometimes it's about opening the device to a specific application, and sometimes it's just about opening the device up to a new development approach. Sometimes the idea is to push the code (and the device) further, to learn -- because you can.

The team studied Debian Linux, a free operating system continuously being developed by more than 1,000 volunteers from around the world. Developers create software packages, such as text editors or music players, that are added to the system. Beginning with 474 packages in 1996, Debian Linux has expanded to include more than 18,000 packages today. The packages form an intricate network, with some packages having greater connectivity than others, as defined by how many other packages depend on a given package. "Open source offers a unique opportunity provided by the high completeness of data concerning open source (thanks to the disclosure policy of the open source terms of license)," lead author Thomas Maillart of ETH Z?rich told PhysOrg.com. "Debian Linux allowed us to retrieve exhaustive information from several years ago. Many other complex systems are not so well 'documented.'"

To date this year, we have built and placed 315 Linux computers with kids that normally would not have been able to afford a computer for their school work. Add this effort to our Linux Labs and you have a well-rounded effort that benefits everyone. Our HeliOS Project has inspired others to do the same thing in other communities and we're proud to help them any way we can. So, what are the goodies for this year's drawing? Let's take a look.

Ever notice how Microsoft plasters the Windows name on everything it can reach? Splash screens, stickers on computers, and advertising everywhere. There is no escaping it. Except when it's yet another malware outbreak-- then all the news organizations go inexplicably deaf, dumb, and blind, as this latest story demonstrates:

Virus hits nearly 75% of systems on Afghanistan military base.

Is it serious? Well....

"...the intrusion was severe enough to raise the INFOCON status, the information security equivalent of the DEFCON alert, and also necessitate the briefing of the president."

Red Hat's open source Network application project evolves with a plan to get rid of Oracle on the back end. "The application code for Spacewalk is open source, but we are using a proprietary back end for the database," Todd Warner Product Manager, RHN Satellite and Project Spacewalk told InternetNews.com. "For an open source project that's a problem since we have all these open source bits and it requires a proprietary database. It's a big Achilles heal that we'll be focusing a tremendous amount of effort to rectify."

Hi All, Here's the 15th tip in the "OpenLDAP Quick Tips" series: "You want to change your OpenLDAP loglevel to get more information, but can't take your directory server offline":..

You don't need to fork over big bucks – or even any bucks – to keep your online activities and identity secret. The open source community has dozens of privacy-related projects in development, and some of them have already proven themselves to be among the best privacy protection tools available. These tools are targeted at three broad groups of people. First are products aimed at the general public. Everyone with a computer needs applications like firewalls, anti-spyware, intrusion prevention, and password management. But there are also email encryption, anonymous file sharing, anonymous surfing, and other apps for those with more pressing privacy needs.

The PasTmon passive traffic monitor keeps an eye on your network, recording which clients are interacting with which services, when and how long things took. You can then use the application's PHP Web interface to investigate these figures to see if any host is connecting to Web services that it shouldn't, or is contacting services suspiciously more frequently than you would expect for normal operation, or when response times become excessively long. The Ubuntu, openSUSE, and Fedora repositories do not include packages for PasTmon. Although the version number is still low, the project has had releases available for three years.

Ease of use is one of the main interests in the Ubuntu 8.10 server so administrators tend to look at Ubuntu not only because it's a staple of the Ubuntu Desktop but the server version has been known...

The economy may be a shambles, but Brian Gentile's software company, JasperSoft, is doing better than ever. JasperSoft posted record revenue for the quarter that ended in October, and its customer tally rose 63 percent over the previous period. The gain is all the more notable considering the record cutbacks in corporate software spending.

Below Mac user numbers, we're talking much smaller shares of internet traffic. Linux had a bump to 0.82 per cent from 0.71 per cent of web browsers. The iPhone grabbed 0.37 per cent of traffic, which also was a small increase. Obviously, Microsoft's 89.69 per cent isn't something to sneeze at (as made clear by El Reg's super scientific graph below) — but hey, it's a big symbolic loss in our deca-based number system.

[They better lookout, we're almost to 1% lol!- Scott]

Solaris 10 packet sequence numbers. Are they still bullet-proof? Were they ever? Does It Matter Anymore? A study in gross oversimplification. Today, we're going to look at a subject that gets plenty of attention (but, maybe not as much publicity) in the world of Unix and Linux network computing: TCP packet sequence number prediction, how it's used to protect network transmissions and whether or not, with the advent of packet checksumming, etc, it's even a factor in basic network security anymore.

The global economic crisis is taking its toll on many technology companies and Mandriva, the Linux company based in France, has now taken a hit. Last week, the company announced that it would be terminating the services of all its external contractors, that is those who work from remote locations.

For the first time, Apple is recommending the use of anti-virus tools to protect Mac systems. Long something of a phantom menace, strains of malware capable of infecting Mac machines have gradually been increasing in prevalence over recent months. In addition, VXers are making more use of web-based attack and applications specific vulnerabilities to infect PCs whatever their underlying operating system might be. Windows-specific malware attacks are still orders of magnitude greater than assaults on Mac machines, but the risk to Apple fans is now enough for the Church of Jobs to admit a risk exists.

[Steve says the vaunted Apple OS needs an anti-virus, but I thought it was secure? Sorry, couldn't stop myself..;-)- Scott]

Earlier this month we saw the military ban the use of USB drives and other removable media. Apparently the virus outbreak that lead to this measure affected 75% of all systems at the largest U.S. military base in Afghanistan....... This is really quite frightening.

This is WFTL Bytes!, your occasiodaily FOSS and Linux news show for Wednesday, December 1, 2008, with your host, Marcel Gagné. Today's stories include a list of what's wrong with Linux (and how to fix it), a kinder, gentler, more open, Microsoft, a kinder, more open, Atheros, Linux on the iPhone, Intel didn't know netbooks would go like this, and more.

Valve Software was in the market a little over a year ago for a software engineer who would, among other duties, work with porting Windows-based games to Linux. No word on who got the job, or how that engineer's first anniversary review went, but evidently, this year was productive. It seems, according to Phoronix, the "Left 4 Dead" demo (Windows client version) shipped with some very suspicious sounding Linux libraries. The file names (such as steamclient_linux.so) lend some weight to the theory that these files have little to do with the Linux server build.

Last year a new Linux distribution came about and immediately began appearing on some budget PCs within retail establishments. Good OS, the company behind the gOS Linux distribution, that launched the conceptual Google OS last year has had a quite successful 2008.