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This insider tip comes from Ryan Troy, co-author of Ubuntu Unleashed from Sams. Troy started with Ubuntu in October 2004, and started up the Ubuntu Forums Web site for the community. As a computer consultant, he regularly sees Ubuntu at customer sites. While desktop Ubuntu shines as the leader among Linux distributions, with analysts estimating their share up to 95 percent of the Linux desktop market, Ubuntu's server version lags. Expect huge advances in Ubuntu server installations during 2010 as a result of Ubuntu improvements, customer concern as SunOS comes under Oracle control, and restlessness among the Red Hat user base. Unlike Ubuntu server clients, Red Hat server clients must pay license fees, necessary because many applications remain Red Hat specific. Troy expects the Ubuntu server to make substantial advances attaining more application support and certifications.

I know how we'll know whether the iPad is a success or not. That's right. Somebody will port a version of Ubuntu to run on the iPad. For now, let's call it the Ubuntu iPad Edition Remix. If the iPad touches anyone in the open source community, iPadBuntu is right around the corner. You know how else we'll know. Google will release plans for its own Linux-based pad. Let's call it the gPad.

When Debian issues a point release, as it just did with the current Stable distribution Lenny going from 5.0.3 to 5.0.4, it's no big deal. They happen. But you don't need to throw out your Lenny install CDs or do any kind of reinstallation. The updates have been flowing to your Debian-running machine (assuming you have one) all along if you've been using the Update Manager that ships in the standard desktop, or regularly checking for updates with Aptitude or apt.

If you're fortunate enough to live near New York City, you can catch Eben Moglen at the NY Chapter of the Internet Society (ISOC-NY) on Friday, talking about "Freedom in the Cloud." Specifically, Moglen will be talking about the implications of "cloud computing" on software freedom, privacy, and security. Cloud computing does pose quite a few challenges for software freedom. In addition to software licensing, users have to worry about privacy, data portability, and more. Just having the source is no longer enough, when users do have the source.

After years of HTML standardization disarray, browser makers Apple, Opera, Mozilla, and most recently Google now are hammering out new directions for Web standards. Perhaps the most visible HTML5 aspect is built-in support for audio and video, but there are other HTML abilities under way: storing data on a computer for use by an application, Web Sockets for periodically pushing updates to a browser, Web Workers for letting Web programs perform multiple tasks at once, and Canvas for better two-dimensional graphics.... It's far from game-over for Flash, though.

The venerable GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP) is undergoing a significant transformation. The next major release, version 2.8, will introduce an improved user interface with an optional single-window mode. Although this update is still under heavy development, users can get an early look by compiling the latest source code of the development version from the GIMP's version control repository.

The Linux Foundation announced a call for papers and open registration for its second annual LinuxCon conference, scheduled for August 10-12 in Boston. The conference will feature several mini-summits prior to the show on topics including security and KVM, says the nonprofit Linux advocacy organization. LinuxCon, which debuted last September in Portland, Oregon, brings together technical and business leadership across the Linux spectrum, including desktop, enterprise, kernel, and embedded development.

Hot on the heels of digiKam 1.0, Gilles Caulier announced the 1.1.0 release of the popular open source photo management application. While the main focus in version 1.0 was on squashing bugs, the new release of digiKam does sport a couple of new nifty features and improvements.

I won't touch OOo Base with a poke anymore. It looks very nice, but it doesn't handle real world workloads. I have to try Kexi and Knoda. I sincerely hope it will be much better than my latest experiences, because I can't allow myself to lose valuable time over this. When I'm working at home, I simply don't have the time for experiments: I need things that just work. Like LyX. Like OOo Impress. OOo Base just falls short.

The European Union's Open Source Observatory and Repository (OSOR.eu) as of today is offering public administrations access to more than two thousand free and open source applications. The OSOR is a platform where public administrations can exchange information and experiences and collaborate in developing free and open source software. The platform has managed to bring together more than 2000 such open source software applications in just sixteen months after its launch. The most recent projects added to the OSOR repository include Zorb, an extension to the open source network monitoring tool Nagios, Comerzzia, meant to aid public administrations in providing services to SMEs and Genericoder, an open source converter for XML files.

Disclaimer: This post reflects my personal opinion and is in no way related to the company I work for. LWN tells us what is happening with the android kernel patches in upstream. The short version: They are gone

So, the XO-2 has moved from promise to hope to scrap, and has made way for a tablet-style, iPhoneiPad-like XO-3 (Read about the 3.0 model at Forbes and Engadget, with the now-in-production 1.5 and the in-planning 1.75 XOs, both using the current design but with faster processors. OLPC, and Nick Negroponte in particular, love to use conceptual designs to create excitement. This works great in normal, commercial development a few times. Once you miss a few targets, people react very negatively too it, even if you do finally release a product. Why do you think Apple pairs announcements with already-planned release schedules?

The mobile version of Firefox web browser has been finally released. But don't get too excited because as of the moment, it is only available for Nokia's Maemo5 platform. This means that the owners of Nokia N900 smartphone are the lucky few who can download, install, and experience Firefox for Mobile in action.

As Oracle digests Sun and OpenOffice, chatter has started about Oracle Cloud Office -- a forthcoming offering that may compete with Google Apps, Microsoft Office Web and Zoho. But where does OpenOffice fit into Oracle's plans? Here’s some perspective.

As the Android kernel code is now gone from the Linux kernel, as of the 2.6.33 kernel release, I'm starting to get a lot of questions about what happened, and what to do next with regards to Android. So here's my opinion on the whole matter...

F-Spot is an almost complete photo management application but has a problem (according to many people): it uses MONO. An advantage over similar tools like gThumb is the option to upload to PicasaWeb or Flickr. For the stable version of gThumb (2.10) that is, because the latest development version of gThumb (2.11.x) has already gained PicasaWeb support (not Flickr support for now though)!

China-based HiVision is readying an Android-based "PWS700CA" netbook with a 600MHz Rockchip ARM9 processor and a 7-inch, WVGA touchscreen, and according to one preview, it's likely to sell for under $100. HiVision also recently introduced a Linux-based "PWS700B" netbook, as well as an "EB-0600S" e-reader, says the company.

Fedora or Ubuntu? That is a question that Linux users are asking with increasing frequency. The question is not random -- the two distributions have consistently topped the downloads on Distrowatch for the last two years. Read Fedora and Ubuntu mail forums, and users who despair of one are constantly announcing their intention to try the other. Although other distributions, including Linux Mint, openSUSE, and Mandriva, offer comparable features, for better or worse Fedora and Ubuntu are widely viewed as the desktop distributions of choice. Unsurprisingly, you can find dozens of comparisons of the two on the Internet. However, except for one posted on PolishLinux.org, few answers are detailed enough to be of much use. And since the one on PolishLinux.org was made in 2006, it’s at least six versions behind the current releases (Fedora 12 and Ubuntu 9.10). So a new extended answer seems overdue.

Microsoft is being coy about when it will release version 7 of its Windows Mobile operating system as it focuses on other areas. It isn't the first time that Microsoft has missed the boat - it was also a late starter in the Internet game - but the company has all but dropped the ball with its Windows Mobile operating system.

Facebook's release of HipHop as open source underlines the fact that along with Google, Facebook has become one of the most powerful demonstrations that free software now scales way beyond proprietary offerings. In fact, HipHop handles over 10 billion PHP-based pages views every day, on average - a number that is likely to grow significantly.