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So you want to be a Debian developer? You're not the only one. Preparing software packages for the distribution, writing documentation, and testing a release are all endless, thankless tasks. Yet, at any given time, hundreds have applied to do them. However, before candidates are trusted with such tasks, they have to prove not only their programming skills, but also their understanding of Debian processes and philosophy. The process takes months, and there are few exceptions.

Opponents of software patents are delighted that the EC will be asked to rewrite the Computer Implemented Inventions Directive.

BURLINGAME, Cal. -- What was posed as an issue or a weakness of Linux and open source software and development -- the lack of a single entity in charge of it -- was presented yesterday as a unique strength in the industry by top Linux and open source developers Linus Torvalds, Andrew Morton, and Brian Behlendorf.

Of all the distros that I have used, Beatrix has got to be one of the most interesting. The title of this article is derived from something I read in the Beatrix Design Goals.

Linux comes with several good utilities for getting detailed information on what's inside the box. Here are three recipes for getting information from lspci, dmesg, and /proc.

Torvalds, Morton, Behlendorf and Kapor call for "well-defined standards and interfaces," including on the desktop front, as they discuss common challenges at the OSDL Enterprise Summit.

An open source access system should ease teachers' password woes.

...we are all deeply deeply ashamed for the delay and we throw ourselves on the mercy of the community and ask for forgiveness

A scalable, stable, secure software stack for small and medium-sized business network services is hard to develop in-house or integrate from piecemeal components. To integrate it all with a single sign-on for users requires even more work. Enter Novell's new SUSE Linux-based OpenExchange, a packaged, full-featured, secure, all-encompassing operating environment.

Two open-source leaders joined Linux founder Linus Torvalds in disparaging software patents Tuesday, the newest volley in a battle that pits the cooperative programming philosophy against Microsoft.

Experts in Linux Systems Management to Join OSDL Data Center Linux and Desktop Linux Working Groups

International Business Machines Corp. has requested documents from Intel Corp., the world's largest chip maker, as it prepares its defense in a billion-dollar dispute with SCO Group Inc. over the Linux operating system.

It's been 14 years since major changes have been made to the GNU General Public License, and there is a need for a new version; however, there will be significant challenges, claims FSF's Eben Moglen.

Sun Microsystems President Jonathon Schwartz recently joined the weblog community (http://blogs.sun.com/roller/page/jonathan/) to regularly dish out his thoughts on Sun's business and the computer industry at-large. Sure, Schwartz's blog is part propaganda, but he's also provided some interesting insights into how Sun looks at Linux and -- reading between the lines -- how they plan to compete with it.

As I mentioned last month, having persistent Perl code means that some steps of your application can be reused rather than repeated. One very easy optimization is keeping your database handles open between web hits, rather than reopening them on each new hit. The Apache::DBI module (found in the CPAN) does the work for you by altering the way normal DBI connections are processed.

If you want to make money with your web site, running advertisements is a good, first approach. Running ads requires little or no capital expense, and there are several options to sell ad space: you can sell it directly; you can hire a salesperson or consultant to sell it; or you can sign up with an ad network, which matches advertisers with your site. Implementing and managing ads is also quite easy, thanks to phpAdsNew, the LAMP ad management software of choice of many webmasters. In this article, let's look at ad networks and learn how to use phpAdsNew.

If you've used Linux for a long time, you're probably quite familiar with file permissions. Indeed, managing permissions is a critical part of managing a Linux system.

Linux offers several excellent music players, including (but not limited to) XMMS, Zinf, noatun, amaroK, Juk, Rhythmbox, and Kaffeine. Most of these can play streaming Internet audio, compact discs, and best of all, digital audio files. With music stored as digital audio files, you can enjoy your music wherever and whenever you want to. If you don't know how to convert CDs into audio files on Linux, this column is for you.

Last month, we looked at MySQL's new storage engine, NDB (also known as NDBCluster or MySQL Cluster). Now it's time to look at the compilation, installation, and configuration process.

In this installment, I'd like to touch on an oft-forgotten but increasingly important component of the Linux desktop: Java applications. Since Java is largely distribution neutral, what Java code works on Fedora Core works for Debian, Red Hat, SuSE, Mandrake, and any number of other distributions. And, yes, Java applications really do exist, and some are actually good.