Showing all newswire headlines

Osaka, Japan – (NYSE: MC) Matsushita Electric has said that one of its subsidiaries, Panasonic Mobile Communications (Panasonic Mobile), will phase out overseas 2.5G GSM mobile terminal operations due to severe global competition. By concentrating resources into next-generation mobile terminal technologies, as well as unifying platforms and core technologies for the Japanese and overseas markets, Panasonic Mobile aims to improve development efficiency and product competitiveness. Sales and service activities for the current GSM products will continue.

SyncML Technology Enables Smooth Interface With Most Mobile Devices; Major Swiss Hospital Chooses Open-Xchange Server for Latest Innovation

Given that Firefox has already entered double-digit market share territory in just one year, grabbing users from Microsoft's Internet Explorer, is it logical that hackers will increasingly target Firefox with a whole host of exploits?

"Dig into the details of existing Firefox issues and you'll find threats that allow remote users to access and control your system, launch denial-of-service attacks, leave you vulnerable to phishing, and even spoof dialog boxes to trick you into performing unintended actions. These are similar to the issues that have put IE users at risk for years," writer Dan Dinicolo asserts in a new PC Magazine article.

Matt Asay, the founder of the Open Source Business Conference, discusses his views on the conference and open source businesses and products. Matt works at Novell as director, Open Source Strategy. Prior to Novell, he worked with Lawrence Lessig at Stanford and subsequently at Lineo.

The OpenOffice project vividly illustrates the limitations of open source as a way of producing software

Linux is often thought to be inferior to Windows and Mac OS when it comes to multimedia applications. However, by using open source software and a few simple tips, one can easily turn a simple Linux box into a multimedia powerhouse, according to Kyle Rankin, author of the newly published Linux Multimedia Hacks.

Mandriva Linux, known as Mandrakesoft eight months ago, has had quite a year. The Paris-based company believes it's ready to bounce back into the race to capture international market share from competitors such as Red Hat and Novell. Only 18 months ago, the company was in the throes of bankruptcy.

There's no chance of the Sony BMG rootkit DM spyware debacle going away. It will echo loudly down many corridors and the University of Calgary's Greg Hagen believes its existence should make anyone thinking about supporting Canada's Bill C-60 copyright act, think again.

[Ed: Canadians in particular may want to pay attention to this one - dcparris]

TARRYTOWN, NY, December - Open-Xchange Inc., the maker of the world's leading open-source alternative to Microsoft Exchange, announced today that Germany's Green Party has selected Open-Xchange Server 5 for e-mail, contacts and calendaring for its Berlin headquarters.

What new economy does syndication suggest? And does Linux point the way?

Don't believe Christmas greetings-by-email is huge business? Google it. Every sleazebag outfit on the web offers them. Some even throw-in spyware and rootkits or links to phishing sites, free of charge. That's why so many network managers do everything they can to block the traffic. Email Battles invents a way to make everybody happy. Sadly, nobody's using it.

[Ed: And don't you just love those greeting card e-mails from some anonymous person? Frankly, I like the idea thes folks suggest. It's sooooo simple! - dcparris]

As further evidence of the expanding role of open source applications in enterprise data centers, Pentaho, a start-up that builds open-source business intelligence software, announced this week that it has received $5 million in series A funding.

[Ed: If business intelligence is anything like military intelligence, I'm scared! - dcparris]

Peppercom and Comodo will launch an aggressive communications campaign to raise awareness of Identity and Trust Assurance as the cornerstone for creating trust online

Into the Valley Don't take the biscuit

[Ed: Apparently folks attempted to recreate the "open source" model in the baking industry. Vance is wrong about one thing though.

"The business types don't understand how open source software really works and when they try and fail to apply it elsewhere, it makes the FOSS crowd look inept."

Actually, it makes the folks who tried this look inept, although the mad scientists may not see it quite that way. - dcparris]

Red Hat and Novell have become de facto standards in the commercial world. Yet one longtime Linux distributor is betting that corporate customers won’t settle for a two-horse race. Paris-based Mandriva, formerly known as Mandrakesoft, last week unveiled global partnerships with Intel and Hewlett-Packard and plans for a major corporate push based on its Mandriva 2006 product line, complete with corporate server and a new SMB bundle.

[Ed: Ummm, isn't that the point of a competitive marketplace? - dcparris]

Mozilla Firefox is a great Internet browser, applauded by users and critics alike for its features, performance, usability, customisation and security. Firefox 1.5 builds on Firefox 1.x by adding an integrated auto-update system, improved pop-up blocker and improved standards support, not to mention thousands of bug fixes. This updated guide will take you through all that Firefox 1.5 has to offer covering the options menu, about:config preferences, CSS, extensions and more.

[ED: Nice guide for new users with pictures, watched a friend fighting his way through reconfiguing his Firefox on XP, this would have helped - HC]

Gmail just added a nifty RSS feed directly into your Gmail account. It is easy to do but LXer is not yet one of the default tech sites so you need to do it manually.

Go to Settings in your Gmail account and click on the new Web Clips tab. Then take this URL http://lxer.com/module/newswire/headlines.rss

and paste it into the search box. Google will acknowledge this as a valid feed and the add button will appear. Hit it and presto your are done

You probably need to edit the initial feeds. I had all kind of gunk suggested by Google.

Digg

Free software advocates focus on the ability to share, develop, and improve software as a community effort. But how do these freedoms affect the business community? David Chisnall takes a look.

Broadband access in Africa has grown significantly over the past four years with at least 20 fixed-line operators introducing ADSL services, according to a report published this week by Balancing Act. The reports says, however, that at current prices broadband access in Africa is still the domain of the privileged classes.

Geronimo, an open source Java application server under the Apache umbrella, has come a long way