According to this opinion column on Linuxworld, the Linux Development Platform Specification falls far short of its goals. “Does it meet that goal? Not at all. Although LDPS 1.0 falls short in nearly every aspect, I can illustrate the problem through one example: ncurses. The ncurses library provides programmers a common way to write sophisticated character-mode applications. In order to be LDPS 1.0 compliant, a distribution must include either ncurses version 4.2 or ncurses version 5.0. ”

TWiki, an open source WikiWeb implementation, is an enchanced version of the original WikiWeb. “The TWiki web is a web based collaboration tool. Imagine having a tool to create and maintain an Intranet instantly, not just by a webmaster, but by anybody using just a browser? That is what TWiki is, an instant Intranet (or an instant Internet web site if you would like). There is no need to learn a new HTML authoring tool, if you know how to fill in an HTML form, you already know how to create and change documents in TWiki.”

Info World explores the digital divide and whether the world’s poor need high technology, not having roads or electricity in many cases, based on a conference at MIT.

Linux PR is reporting on SuSE opening SuSE Korea and catapulting itself into the Asian market.

Slashdot is carrying a discussion of a German Yahoo news article saying that the developer responsible for MP3 has been honored in Germany.

NW Fusion reports that the European Union is preparing to adopt the “.eu” top level domain for European continental sites.

CNet has a story on Sun Microsystems’ new Full Moon server software to be released Dec. 5, including information on competitiors Red Hat and Compaq’s UnixWare.

OReillynet.com looks at how Stackless Python will fit into Python’s future. “Stackless’ fans argue that its inclusion is an easy choice. Stackless Python is
faster, more capable, and mature, because it’s been used for many months in
‘mission-critical’ applications already in production. A change to stacklessness is a
‘pure win,’ with no significant costs.”

LinuxDevices.com has a review of the Nokia Media Terminal: “Nokia describes its Media Terminal as a powerful ‘infotainment center’ for the home, which
allows consumers to gain the benefits of both Internet access and digital broadcasting.” It works on open technologies including Linux, Mozilla, and HTML.

LinuxWorld.com.au looks at Linux distributions
“targeted toward stand-alone, enterprise server installations to
assess whether companies selling this packaged open source
code are coupling it with the tools and services necessary for
enterprise server use.”