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Ever wonder why Red Hat spends so much time focused on the JBoss middleware market and so little time trying to make Linux a desktop standard? The answer involves some simple but startling open source math. Check out this little piece of Red Hat financial info, uncovered by The VAR Guy.

Got visions of saving the world? Every now and then it takes spending some time in someone else's world to realize you don't always have all the answers. To some of us, that isn't just a blow to our egos...it's a sea change in the way we perceive ourselves and our role in the little world we've created.

Wikis are sprouting up everywhere, so it's not surprising that the world of investing, finance, business and money management is getting in on the act. If you're looking for stock tips, industry analysis, information about how to start a home business, or advice about paying off credit card debt, you might turn to one of these money-related wikis to benefit from the wisdom of the digital crowd.

This series began with the idea of showing a form that could be used by an external user(s) as a means of adding content to a remote site. The idea of the use of a password form was there from the onset. It made sense to limit access to a select set of users. The password form enhances security, which became an issue with the data input form. Nonetheless, until very recently, I intended to skip any real discussion of password forms. I was going to cite a book's discussion. At most, I might have mentioned a few potential problems. I was certain that would have sufficed. I changed my mind when I saw the ease simple minded SQL injection breached this barrier. Therefore, more than a few words are warranted.

Although we all remember that everything started with legendary Norton Commander, somehow lots of TC users religiously believe that every other, two pane file manager, is a not worthy clone. They all share the same roots, but TC with its rich Plugin library managed to capture the largest user base. In this article I will try to cover the most popular alternatives for both TC and NC. It is not a review though, so you won’t find any particular recommendation at the end. Everyone chooses the set of features that is relevant for his or her needs.

Gmail, Google's popular Web mail application, is already full of useful features all on its own. But Firefox users can further customize Gmail with a variety of add-ons. Some only change the appearance, while others add functionality that makes Gmail more like a personal planner than just a plain old email application. Let's take a look at three Firefox add-ons for Gmail.

Microsoft products have always presented a paradox for organizations. On one hand they seem to be universally derided. On the other, they remain the corporate standard. Open source, SaaS/online and other alternatives have had a hard time gaining widespread traction in large organizations. That's partly because companies would likely rather deal with the devil they know, a de facto standard, rather than something else, and partly due to institutional inertia.

Open source software has long been accepted as a legitimate software license by tech-savvy crowds. It's become recognised by business. And even the courts are taking seriously open source software authors rights despite the fact no money has changed hands. This month an Artistic License was tested in court in the case of Robert Jacobsen vs KAM Industries, and upheld as enforceable copyright conditions. It was a landmark decision ratifying the philosophical basis behind FOSS.

A guide to the kernel development process aims to encourage participation by new programmers by explaining what is involved. Some developers and businesses attempting to submit changes to the Linux kernel find themselves tangled up with the processes used, according to the guide, which was written by Jonathan Corbet, executive editor of lwn.net and himself a Linux developer.

A Unix and Linux Command Line Dictionary For Those Of Us Who Love The CLI :)

Linux Gazette...making Linux just a little more fun!

SCO keeps changing its story of "infringement", and so over the years, we've tried to track all the twists and turns, comparing their allegations with evidence available on the Internet or in our collections. SCO made it harder when it removed its collection of press releases from its site and from the Internet Archive. I had forgotten all about it, but years ago, before they did that, I had saved their list of older press releases, meaning for us to eventually look at all of them. Then, they disappeared, and I just stumbled across the information again now, and I'd like to share it with you. Even the names of the press releases could be useful. If anyone gets sued at any point, at least they'll know what to ask for in discovery.

A couple of innocuous words that have insidious consequences. A simple marketing tagline, yet it appears to be seriously undermining a vast segment of the computer sector. What is it? The phrase, "industry standard." It comes from the same warped (but ingenious) minds that coined the term "legacy" back in the 1990s. That harmless word served to forward the Windows NT - Intel processor gravy train at the expense of so-called inferior technologies like mainframe, OpenVMS and even Unix. Yet many would argue that despite all the genuine improvement to Windows in recent years to make it much more enterprise friendly, it still can't hold a candle to many of these legacy systems.

Free software advocates are praising a federal appeals ruling that allows greater protection for open source software against copyright infringement. The case concerns a company, Kam Industries, which downloaded open source code for use in a product that programs the chips that control model trains. The code used was written by Robert Jacobsen, who released it under an Artistic License, which requires other people who use it to give credit to the author, identify the original source of the files and describe how the new code has been changed, among other conditions.

Most often, Microsoft Corp.'s biggest rivals in the Chinese market have been black-market versions of its own products. That could change for the company's Office software suite, a key product that includes its word processing and spreadsheet tools. Wuxi, China-based Evermore Software is expected to release its latest Office competitor in late August. And while EIOffice 2009 is based on a file format standard promoted by the Chinese government and costs a fraction of Microsoft's offering, it also comes with a new legal threat.

Ten years ago, the then CEO of Ericsson in Sweden wrote an internal article about digital convergence. He stated that within a very short time, all data produced in an analog way such as books, music, photographs, newspapers and so forth would cease to exist. Instead all content would become digital and we would render, view and listen to digital formats. I believe he had a vision for the future, but his timing was off about eight to ten years.

CodeWeavers' CrossOver Linux is a software framework that emulates the Microsoft Windows 98, 2000 and XP application programming interfaces (APIs) on GNU/Linux. This allows Windows programs to run on GNU/Linux without having to run a virtual instance of the operating system e.g. a virtual machine.

LXer Feature: 17-Aug-2008

This week we have Akademy 2008 reviews, Windows gives a BSOD during the Olympics opening ceremonies, Linus doesn't like monkeys, Derek Knowlton journeys to Sin City to experience DefCon 16, Lawyers who should stay away from Linux and 10 of this, 5 of those, 11% of that..its numbers numbers everywhere!

In the nextPeople Behind KDE interview, we stay in the United States of America (but leave in an underwater craft!) to meet a KDE developer who could be a JuKebox in another life, someone who helps you build development versions of KDE (staying on the bleeding edge without the pain!) - tonight's star of People Behind KDE is Michael Pyne.

Yesterday marked a big step in copyright protection of open source licensed software, as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled that an open source software developer can claim copyright infringement, even if the work is released under a free software license.