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While the Linux world still ponders the implications of Oracle's footprint on Red Hat, Inc., other projects--which are demonstratively more important to the future of Red Hat Enterprise Linux than whatever plans Larry Ellison might have--are continuing to progress.

Building a community is at the core of any free and open source software (FOSS) project, but few projects have faced challenges equal to Fedora's and openSUSE's efforts to create FOSS communities around formerly commercial projects, or Ubuntu's efforts to manage growth in a widely popular distribution. How to define communities, how to encourage participation from non-programmers, what community values to foster -- these are questions that community leaders from these projects have had to struggle with. Their attempts to answer the questions provide guidance to others trying to build communities within FOSS.

The folks at Slashgear recently posted an interview with Benjami Zores, one of the core developers of the embedded Linux distribution knows as GeeXboX. In summary, GeeXboX, which incidentally has no affiliation or tie in with the Microsoft console, is a fully operational Media Center solution available on what's known as a LiveCD. It works on both x86 and PowerPC based computers and is as easy to use as dropping a CD in a PC since no installation is required.

German software vendor SoftMaker announced earlier this week that it has ported its office suite to Linux and FreeBSD. SoftMaker Office 2006 includes updates to both TextMaker and PlanMaker, two popular stand-alone applications that are combined into one office suite, according to the company.

Trolltech reports that its developer-friendly, Linux-based "Greenphone" was named "best embedded Linux product or initiative" at LinuxWorld, London. Additionally, the company's Qtopia Phone Edition (QPE) stack won a mobile phone tools award presented by a Chinese trade magazine devoted to mobile phone multimedia.

The first "dynamic coalition" resulting from the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) has vowed to get governments interested in adopting open standards for both hardware and software. A panel, which included academics, business, and standards bodies argued its case in Athens, where one of the aims of open discussions between different groups has been to get like-minded people together.

linux.conf.au 2007 has announced its programme and registrations are now open. Check out the plethora of awesome talks, tutorials, miniconfs and events happening January 15-19th in Sydney, Australia.

With the release of Krita 1.6, it seems like a good time to compare the two big raster image editors for Linux. Coming as they do from the divergent GTK+ and KDE programming camps, it can be hard to assess the differences between the GIMP and Krita without being swayed by politics and emotion. Let's take a cold, hard look at the two, and compare the features side by side.

This tutorial provides step-by-step instructions on how to install the free VMware Server (version 1.0.1) on a Debian Sarge system. With VMware Server you can create and run guest operating systems (virtual machines) such as Linux, Windows, FreeBSD, etc. under a host operating system. In this article we use Debian Sarge (3.1) as the host operating system.

The powers that be at Free Software Magazine decided to be a media sponsor of LinuxWorld Expo UK at Olympia, London held on the 25th and 26th of October. As I make a habit of going to that expo, and I also write for the magazine when I remember to hand articles in, I was contacted and discovered I was to be handed a “press” badge for the event. So, on the day, I set off early from Cambridge to enjoy the privileges of my new super-status.

Red Hat users should carry out compatibility tests of Oracle’s Linux set-up because it offers a “more complete” support package, analyst firm Gartner has urged. The call follows Oracle’s launch of its Unbreakable Linux support package for the Red Hat Linux distribution, in direct competition with Red Hat’s own support.

The os-cillation team is happy to announce the release of Xfld 0.3. Xfld is a live demo of the Xfce desktop environment, version 4.4. Xfld boots from a CD-ROM drive and provides a complete GNU/Linux operating environment without the need to install anything. The new release features applications and tools like Xfce 4.4rc1 with Thunar, OpenOffice.org 2.0.4, GIMP 2.2.13, Firefox 2.0, Thunderbird 1.5, AbiWord 2.4.5, Wireshark 0.99.3a, Ruby, Python and Perl... Xfld 0.3 is now based on Ubuntu 6.10 (Edgy)

Sun Microsystems is backing a "milestone" release of NetBeans by expanding a year-old partner program to drive uptake for its tools environment and IDE.

Siemens of Switzerland is shipping three hardware/software reference designs for Internet protocol set-top boxes (IP-STBs). The STB-7100-series designs run Linux 2.6 on a SuperH-based STMicroelectronics (ST) SoC, and support standard- and high-definition content, along with multiple access technologies, including DSL, cable, and DVB-T (digital video broadcast -- terrestrial).

New Linux Links Directory @ ReviewLinux.Com

Applications for graphical visualization of data on Linux are varied. Explore a variety of open source data visualization tools such as gnuplot, GNU Octave, Scilab, MayaVi, and Maxima to better decide which is best for your application. Each has its advantages and disadvantages and targets different applications.

Security-conscious BSD fans will be pleased to hear that the OpenBSD team this morning released OpenBSD 4.0 with a long list of hardware and feature improvements and a still-as-strong-as-ever security focus.

With sponsorship from MIPS Technologies, GNU tools specialist CodeSourcery has added support for the MIPS architecture to the GNU/Linux prelinker, with the goal of helping MIPS-based embedded designs enjoy faster application start-up times. Additionally, the consulting and services company has joined MIPS Technologies's MIPS Alliance Program.

You know, the barrier that used to divide operating systems is almost a distant memory now. It’s no longer this or that, but it’s this and that. Thanks to virtualization solutions and Boot Camp, Intel Macs can now run any PC operating system, and the ability to have one machine that does it all is definitely something that appeals to many reasonable consumers.

Paul Shapiro likes PBS talk show host Charlie Rose. He also likes the level playing field of the Internet, and has a passion for giving a voice to the "community." Shapiro has come up with a way to emulate his favorite television interviewer using webcams, voice over IP, and "free as in beer" digital video editing software, and he has big plans for his invention.