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For about four months now, I have been using the Ubuntu Linux operating system full-time on both my desktop and notebook computer. A few weeks into this experience, I wrote an article sharing some of my findings about the Windows to Linux migration process.

This document describes how to install a Postfix mail server that is based on virtual users and domains, i.e. users and domains that are in a MySQL database. I'll also demonstrate the installation and configuration of Courier (Courier-POP3, Courier-IMAP), so that Courier can authenticate against the same MySQL database Postfix uses. The resulting Postfix server is capable of SMTP-AUTH and TLS and quota. Passwords are stored in encrypted form in the database. In addition to that, this tutorial covers the installation of Amavisd, SpamAssassin and ClamAV so that emails will be scanned for spam and viruses. I will also show how to install SquirrelMail as a webmail interface so that users can read and send emails and change their passwords.

Gareth Halfacree takes a look at the final release of Fedora 14, and sees if the Red Hat-based distro has what it takes to conquer the desktop market…

the success of OpenOffice, LibreOffice and of the only thing that really matters here, that is ODF depends (also) on handling three issues: make it possible to support users via email, explain fragmentation and never, ever mess with ODF.

One item on my shopping list this holiday season is a Linux-based tablet device. I decided to check the Sunday ad section and put together this list of Black Friday 2010 Linux Tablet Deals.

Google is playing coy over the future of Chrome OS, its still-gestating, browser-based operating system. When the project was first revealed in July 2009, Google said that systems based on the OS would arrive in the second half of 2010 — and through this past summer, it continued to make similar promises. But last week at the Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco, CEO Eric Schmidt said that a completed OS was still "a few months away," seeming to indicate a delay.

At last I can write this up for you, my fine readers. Today we're going to learn about using Wake-on-LAN to wake up a server remotely, and automatic shutdowns. My master plan for my backup server is to automate everything-- wake it up, run backups for all the computers in my house, and then everyone shuts down for the night. (You might want to review part 1 and part 2.)

In our last article on the BlackBerry ListField we learned how to display data in a vertically oriented list. We explored drawing text and even how to search for entries with a progressive text search. However, the UI was somewhat bland. This article extends the prior code to upgrade the UI a bit. Along the way we demonstrate a technique for subclassing the ListField to bring some more life to the application and importantly to move in the direction of building more custom functionality to help your applications stand apart from the crowd.

The release of Ubuntu 10.10 has insured that many derivative distros have also been updated. One of the less known but very useful ones is Pinguy OS 10.10. Pinguy OS takes generic Ubuntu 10.10 and adds quite a bit of additional software and value to it. If you are totally unfamiliar with Pinguy OS, you might want to peruse the full review of the 10.04 version I did on Desktop Linux Reviews. You can also get more background on the distro from its creator on the Pinguy OS site.

Nagios is both a powerful and flexible network monitoring tool for checking devices and applications. The power of Nagios is in the ability to monitor many different network devices at one time using various methods to monitor those devices. The flexibility of Nagios provides an administrator the tools to monitor just about anything that is connected to a network. In addition, Nagios allows the administrator to monitor both the external ports and internal application processes on those devices. Monitoring would not be complete without multiple methods for contacting administrators which Nagios also provides.

While we are still waiting on open-source support for the AMD Radeon HD 6000 series of graphics cards that were released last month, today AMD is releasing their initial open-source support for their Ontario hardware. AMD's Ontario is their low-powered Fusion processor designed for use in netbooks and other such devices. This dual-core chip with integrated Radeon HD 6250 graphics is only starting to ship now, but the open-source support for this first AMD Fusion chip is now available to Linux users, complete with 3D support.

OSADL, which has been overseeing real-time Linux (RTL) development patches to the Linux kernel, announced a "quality assurance testing farm" where manufacturers can test a variety of RTL systems under simulated production conditions. The multi-platform test center aims to prove RTL as a capable, and more flexible, alternative to real-time operating systems (RTOSes).

Network administrators have many tasks, and auditing the network is at the top of the heap. This isn't a problem if you have a small network. But what happens when that network outgrows your ability to simply walk around and manually make note of what is up/down, what OS a device is running, or what ports are open? When this happens you need to make use of one of the de facto standard open source network auditing tools — Zenmap.

CPTN Holdings LLC, a consortium of technology companies organized by Microsoft, is purchasing 882 Novell patents for $450 million cash, according to a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing submitted Monday by Novell. The deal is part of the Attachmate acquisition of Novell, also announced Monday, and expected to close in the first quarter of next year. In the original announcement, Novell stated only that CPTN would acquire "certain intellectual property assets."

It was announced this morning that Novell has sold off some portion of its intellectual properties to CPTN Holdings, (backed by Microsoft) for $450 million. The remainder of Novell assets will be acquired by Attachmate Corporation for about $2.2 billion. This should be of no surprise as Novell staked a For Sale sign in their front yard several months ago. But this has undoubtedly left users and developers wondering what will become of openSUSE.

The Linux world has been very talkative for the last few weeks with the news that Ubuntu plans on switching from the classic X server to Wayland for it's graphics environment. What is Wayland exactly and why the change?...

John Wilbanks, VP of Science Creative Commons, explains in a short interview why, exactly, Free SW and Creative Commons are a success worldwide and why it is much harder to replicate that success in other, material contexts, even when people want to be open

Nagios is a popular open source computer system and network monitoring software application. It watches hosts and services, alerting usersnagios_logo when things go wrong and again when they get better. This post shows you how to install Nagios in Fedora 14

Ubuntu Software Center is getting updates almost everyday. The latest one brings in more paid applications into Ubuntu Software Center. And it's good to see Canonical slowly waking up to one of its most important revenue making opportunity.

Earlier today we put out benchmarks of ZFS on Linux via a native kernel module that will be made publicly available to bring this Sun/Oracle file-system over to more Linux users. Now though as a bonus we happen to have new benchmarks of the latest OpenSolaris-based distributions, including OpenSolaris, OpenIndiana, and Augustiner-Schweinshaxe, compared to PC-BSD, Fedora, and Ubuntu.