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Ken Brown's forthcoming book, published by the Alexis de Tocqueville Institute, is embarrassingly mistitled Samizdat: And Other Issues Regarding the 'Source' Of Open Source Code. No doubt you've heard of it by now, although more than likely you've only heard Andy Tanenbaum and others respond to it more than anything else. It's basically the world's largest troll, seasoned with more than a hint of flamebait. In the history of publishing there has never been a less scrupulous work than this book. It's a stinging insult to real books and genuine authors everywhere, harming the credibility of all of us who write for a living.

chief executive John Thompson said Wednesday his company is considering whether to use Linux operating system software to run its desktop computers instead of

SCO Group, a Utah company, sued IBM in March 2003, claiming that IBM illegally contributed Unix code to Linux and seeking $1 billion in damages.

Security is a perennial concern for IT administrators. Managers need a framework to evaluate operating system security that includes an assessment of base security, network security and protocols, application security, deployment and operations, assurance, trusted computing, and open standards. In this study, we compare Microsoft Windows and Linux security across these seven categories. The overall findings of this qualitative assessment are that Linux provides superior to comparable security capabilities in comparison to Windows, except in the category of assurance -- for now.

PeopleSoft and International Business Machines say they will develop Linux-based programs as part of a campaign to sell software and hardware to small and mid

Open Source Development Labs, which promotes adoption of Linux, said Monday it is putting in place a new system to better track and document changes to the operating system's kernel.

Since their 14 May announcement of a forthcoming book purporting to show that Linus Torvalds did not write Linux, the Alexis de Tocqueville Institute has come in for enraged attack not just fom Linux fans but from Andy Tanenbaum, one of the people they cite as a major evidentiary source and the wronged party in their narrative. For some unaccountable reason ADTI just sent me 92 pages of the book. As one who both lived through and has studied the history of Unix and open source, I can report that this thing is probably the worst case of fraud and ax-grinding I've seen since "Arming America".

Code submissions for inclusion in the Linux kernel will in future be accepted only from those who acknowledge the right to make a contribution under an

Critics of open source software have argued that, from an economic standpoint, "giving the product away" makes no sense. As a new business model, open source has been the victim of many misconceptions and mischaracterizations: that it's the equivalent of communism, that's it's like a virus, and that it's economically dangerous to society, for example. In such a hostile atmosphere, it's not easy to objectively assess a new paradigm that differs greatly from the status quo. However, though a comparable model may not exist in the IT sector, a parallel working model for open source already exists in at least one other field, biomedical research, and this model has been proven to be of great benefit to society.

Mandrakesoft is very pleased to announce the download availability of Mandrakelinux 10.0 Official.