osOpinion: “When asked whether Microsoft provided the ADTI with financial compensation, a Microsoft representative later admitted that the company did in fact offer funding.”

We are pleased to have Wendell Anderson back once more to speak to GNUbies
on “GNU/Linux Distributions: Which One for You?: An Update” this
Wednesday, June 12, 2002. Wendell’s past presentations on GNU/Linux
distributions have been very helpful and well-received, and there have
been many developments with both new and familiar distributions recently.
Whether you are about to try Linux for the first time, are considering
upgrading or trying a new distribution, or simply want to keep up with
what is happening with GNU/Linux distributions this talk should be of
interest.
Wendell is as a consultant to businesses in Information Technology,
primarily to the International Hospitality (Hotel) Industry in Bermuda and
the Caribbean. He has represented GTE Telenet Services for International
Data Network services in late 1980s, and as a full time user, reseller and
consultant for SuSE (linux), GmBH in the mid to late 1990s.

The meeting, as usual, will be held at the IBM building in Manhattan —
please see below for the procedures required for attending meetings at
IBM. We are grateful to IBM for continuing to provide us with space
for our meetings.

Wednesday, June 12, 2002

6:30 – 7:00pm General Questions and Answers

7:00 Wendell Anderson on
“GNU/Linux Distributions, which one for you: an update.”

The IBM Building,
590 Madison Ave. (New York City)
(57th Street and Madison Avenue)

As always, the meeting is free and open to the public.
As usual the most up-to-date information is on our web site at
http://www.gnubies.org (or http://www.eskimo.com/~lo/linux.)

We look forward to seeing you at this meeting.

Lyn
GNUbies
The GNU/Linux/FreeOS Beginners’ Group

~~~~~~~~Procedures required for attending meetings at IBM~~~~~~~~~~~

IBM has asked us to implement these security measures for our
meetings. In particular, it will be necessary to email us your
name in advance if you plan to attend, so that we can give them
a list of the people who will be attending. It will also be
necessary to bring photo ID in order to get in to the meeting.
We regret the need for these measures. Please send email listing your
full name as it appears on your ID to lo+0206@eskimo.com with the Subject
“June 2002 GNUbies” (note this is a “plus” not the letter “t”).
Sorry for the inconvenience.

People have requested that their names be kept on a cumulative list of
those who attend our meetings so that they will still be able to attend
if they don’t get a chance to respond some month. We started a cumulative
list last month and henceforth will assume, unless you indicate otherwise,
that when you submit your name you would like it to be added to this
cumulative list as well as the list for the current meeting.

Anonymous Reader writes: “Microsoft’s new licensing program, which goes into effect on August 1, 2002, has had the interesting side-effect of encouraging customers to consider non-Microsoft alternatives as a way to offset burgeoning software licensing and subscription fees, as well as to provide greater reliability and security.

In order to gauge responses and reactions to Microsoft’s new licensing strategy, DesktopLinux.com is conducting a survey of organizations and enterprises. Questions focus on alternatives to Microsoft’s products and the likelihood of using Linux and certain cross-platform productivity tools. Survey participants are offered the chance to win a copy of the Ximian Desktop Professional Edition by entering in a free drawing, as an inducement take part in the survey.”

http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS5745292165.html.

Jeff Gerhardt writes: Tuesday, June 11th, 2002, from the home of Wayne’s World, Aurora IL, tonight LIVE on
www.thelinuxshow.com.
At 6pm pt, 7pm mt, 8pm ct, and 9pm et…. Kevin Hill, Jeff Gerhardt, Doc
Searls (Linux Journal), Arne Flones and Russ Pavlicek; have another strange and wonderful show lined up tonight on The Linux Show!!

Segment One- The News. We will cover THE HOT NEWS of the last few weeks tonight. In particular, we will talk about the Caldera news and TLS plans for the summer (Road Trip any one).

Segment Two- Phat Linux 4.0 Phat Grows Up.

Tonight we are joined by Cameron Cooper the Wunderkind founder of Phat Linux. We first had Cameron on the show in the summer of 1999 when we first became aware of the product. At the time he was 15 years old, so at the age of 19 Cameron has done what the vast majority of companies were unable to do during the “dot com bust” and that is survive the washout. And, in our opinion he did it through innovation. Phat is a perfect product for getting the technically impared to experience Linux.

The partitioning demands of a ordinary Linux distributions make installing Linux very intimidating for many Windows users. Often times this can even defer experimenting. This is why Phat Linux was created.

Phat Linux doesn’t require a seperate hard drive partition, to be installed. It can be installed in a folder of a Windows FAT32 partition. This means Phat Linux can be installed on the same partition as Windows, without conflicting with Windows. Because of this ability, your run of the mill Windows
users are free to install Linux on their computer without the fear of losing valuable information. Phat Linux will install like a regular Windows application, but run as any other Linux installation would.

Phat is no longer the only product that will allow such a demonstration mode to be built on a Windows C drive, but it is the first to get it to work right, and in our opinion, is still the benchmark product for this niche.

Phat Linux also comes with a complete desktop environment. The packaged environment, XIMIAN GNOME, is a complete desktop environment built completely of free software.

Phat Linux was, in 2000, one of our winners for product of the Millenium.

Please join us on the show, and check our IRC Chat(irc.thelinuxshow.com
#linuxshow).
Remember tune in at 6pm pt, 7pm mt, 8pm ct, and 9pm et. NOTE: we are now on
Daylight Saving Time in the US.
Catch the Linux show at www.thelinuxshow.com.

From ITmanagement.com: While many major software vendors embrace a specific platform, Computer Associates, Inc. has focused on the middle ground — breaking down the barriers between different platforms …
In keeping with this tradition, CA is now getting behind Linux in a big way, adding 23 new Linux applications over the past three months.”

mhatch writes: Integrated Computer Solutions, Inc. (ICS), the leader in user interface development tools for
UNIX/Linux systems, announced today the general availability of Builder Xcessory PRO 6.0,
a major upgrade to its flagship product. Builder Xcessory PRO (BX PRO) is widely used by
enterprise software developers to speed the creation of graphical user interfaces for
mission critical applications that require high performance and high reliability.
ICS customers report 25%+ savings in development time through using BX PRO.
valuation copies of BX PRO are available free at www.ics.com/getbxpro.

New Features

Supports Motif 2.1 Provides access to the latest powerful features of
the industry standard GUI toolkit.

Includes ViewKit 2.1 – The latest version of an integrated C++ object
reuse framework with over 95 C++ components provides a jumpstart on your GUI development.

Extensive support for open source development tools Autoconf, CVS, and
Nedit support will speed your development without requiring the purchase of proprietary tools.

Redesigned user interface makes Builder Xcessory even easier to learn and use.
Compact footprint, tooltips everywhere, and greater consistency reduce learning curves and
maximize developer productivity.

For More Information
More information on Builder Xcessory 6.0, as well as other ICS products is available at
http://www.ics.com or call 1.617.621.0060. Developers interested in Motif 2.2, a new release of Motif, might also like to visit the
MotifZone, http://www.motifzone.net.

Reuters on ZDNet reports the European Union is looking at charges that Microsoft’s .NET Passport system breaks EU rules on data privacy.

Oreillynet.com has a rebuttal to a ZDNet column called “The very real limitations of open source.” From the rebuttal: ” I think the real problem with Carroll’s argument is that he bases it not on the real world application and adoption of open source software development by both big business, governments and individuals, but instead on the philosophy of the Free Software Foundation. In essence he ignores the fact that many in the open source community are not in total agreement with the outlook of the FSF, he assumes that the motivations of all open source developers are equal, and he ignores the business models that have been built around open source software.”

Henri Bergius writes: The R&D unit in Patient Monitoring Business
Area of Datex-Ohmeda, has chosen to pilot Nemein’s Nemein.Net solution
for project tracking and management.

Nemein.Net Projects is an advanced browser-based project tracking
solution for project managers, consultants, designers, researchers, HR
and business management. The main benefits of Nemein.Net include
ease-of-use, clarity of project status and fast rollout times.

The Nemein.Net Projects suite includes project scheduling, work hour
reporting, contacts management and document management. The
Internet-based architecture provides full web and WAP interfaces for
workstation and mobile users.

“For our project work it is very important to reduce management
overhead and enable real-time tracking of project status.
The Nemein.Net Projects suite provides a good match for these criteria,”
says Bror-Eric Granfelt, R&D Manager at Datex-Ohmeda.

Nemein.Net is built on the standard Open Source architecture of the
Linux operating system, Apache web server, MySQL database and Midgard
application server.

About Nemein

Nemein is a Finnish software company producing Open Source -based
applications for professional services organizations. Nemein’s
solutions enable companies to improve their web, sales, marketing,
project and customer service operations.

Nemein’s customers include Anttila, BNL Euro RSCG, City of Helsinki,
Datex-Ohmeda, Everscreen, Oplayo, Pharma Industry Finland, Publicis,
Stonesoft and Talent Partners. More information can be found from
http://www.nemein.com

About Datex-Ohmeda

Datex-Ohmeda is the world’s leading supplier of anesthesia equipment
and services and an emerging leader in critical care. Its range of
products includes networked patient monitoring systems, integrated
anesthesia systems, anesthesia machines and ventilators. Datex-Ohmeda
is the core business of Instrumentarium, a leading international
medical technology company headquartered in Finland. Instrumentarium
had sales in 2001 of EUR 1,025 million and employed 5,386
professionals worldwide.

Instrumentarium is listed on the Helsinki Exchanges (INS1V.HE) with
ADRs listed on the NASDAQ (INMRY). More information can be found from
http://www.datex-ohmeda.com

More information

Henri Bergius, Consultant Partner, Nemein
henri.bergius@nemein.com
+358-20-198 6032

Bror-Eric Granfelt, R&D Manager, Datex-Ohmeda
bror-eric.granfelt@datex-ohmeda.com
+358-10-394 3732

– By Robin “Roblimo” Miller –
This 63-page study was sponsored by the U.S. Army, presumably to help the Army make cost-effective software purchasing decisions. It has had plenty of lead-up publicity since it was written in July 2001, but is only now widely available for public viewing. It’s nothing like the study recently put out by the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution that seems to consist of warmed-over Microsoft marketing rhetoric. Read on for a brief synopsis and analysis, along with my personal take on what all this means.
The first thing to note here is that MITRE gets most of its funding from the Department of Defense and other government agencies, while the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution gets the bulk of its money from private sources, including Microsoft. In this case, you might say, MITRE is taking the customer’s view while AdTI is talking from the vendor’s viewpoint. It is as if MITRE is taking the car buyer’s side while AdTI is taking the car salesman’s, except that the stakes here are much greater than the purchase of a single automobile. Anyway, here are some of the primary points made in the MITRE study:

• Open Source is not new, but has been around since the 1960s; Emacs, the GNU toolset, Apache, Sendmail, Linux, and Perl are in wide use in the government already.

• Open Source software patches/bugfixes/updates happen “potentially an order of magnitude faster than those of commercial software,” and, “because the source code is publicly available, Program Managers can have their code tailored to meet their specific needs and tightly control system resources. This enables Program Managers to concentrate on developing the features unique to their current task, instead of spending their effort on re-thinking and re-writing code that has already been developed by others.”

• Cost comparisons are made between Commercial Off the Shelf Software (COTS) and unmodified Open Source Software (OSS), Modifiable COTS and lightly modified OSS, and between Custom Code (CC) and thoroughly modified, owner-maintained OSS. Open Source wins in some cases, but not in others.

• Linux desktop shortcomings are not glossed over. The study says, “Significant investments in areas such as ease of use and configuration are needed for Linux to achieve success on desktops.” [Remember, this was written in early and mid-2001; advances since then have been amazing … ed]

• Windows has advantages that include effective marketing, ease of use, and user familiarity across servers and desktops. Comparing Windows to Unix, the report says, “Organizations that do not plan for growth often choose Windows for its low initial cost of entry, while organizations that plan for aggressive growth upfront may choose Unix. Therefore, the optimal choice of Windows versus Unix depends on the number of users the system supports. As the number of users increases to over 1,000, Unix becomes the most effective platform, or optimal platform choice.” The next paragraph mentions the commercial world’s shift from Unix to Linux, and also notes, “If more Program Managers compared OSS to traditional COTS for their specific business case, it is likely that there would be many more users of OSS today.”

• “OSS provides more options than traditional COTS for life-cycle supportability, particularly for long-lived systems.”

• Big mention of and boost for Linux in embedded systems; the Abrams Tanks and Army Tactical Operations Centers are both mentioned as examples.

• Report conclusion: “… open source methods and products are well worth considering seriously in a wide range of government applications, particularly if they are applied with care and a solid understanding of the risks they entail. OSS encourages significant software development and code re-use, can provide important economic benefits, and has the potential for especially large direct and indirect cost savings for military systems that require large deployments of costly software products.”

A frightening series of thoughts

Put yourself in a proprietary developer’s shoes. Imagine running a software development house that concentrates on producing custom applications for government agencies. (There are lots of these around the Washington, D.C., area.) For many years, you have written software for one agency, then bid on projects for other agencies and you have been low bidder on most of the subsequent contracts because you reuse the proprietary code you developed for the first contract. Competitors must start from scratch, so you have a huge leg up by virtue of owning some unique and useful code. You live in the outer suburbs and drive a Mercedes. Your business is stable and looks like it is going to be profitable for the rest of your life. You are thinking about buying or building a vacation home in the Bahamas in addition to the ones you already own in Colorado and Maine.

Now someone is coming along and telling you that you should open all your source code to the rest of the world, in effect giving your competitors a chance to bid against you fairly, and possibly win contracts that would almost be yours by default if you didn’t have to share your source code. You are suddenly faced with the possibility that you are going to have to cut your profit margins significantly to stay in business.

Your immediate reaction is anger. The Bahamas house dream fades. Fear follows the anger. What if some bunch of developers with no overhead manage to underbid you on two or three contracts in a row? Good-bye, Colorado and Maine vacation retreats, and when you limit the Saks 5th Avenue credit card account, good-bye Trophy Wife, too. The future, once so rosy, is suddenly a frightening place, one where you may be forced to keep your Mercedes for three years instead of turning it in after one; where you will be forced to live in a 15-room house on a half-acre lot instead of adding on to your 30-room Horse Country manor on its 50 rolling acres.

So you fight. Of course you do. Hard.

Meanwhile, on the government side, the idea that a more humble programming group reusing Open Source code can bid as little as one tenth as much as the proprietary software magnate and do as good a job and a better long-term job of code maintenance looks great. Because others can freely use the original Open Source bidder’s code, subsequent bids will all be fully competitive, which will keep prices down. The programmers will still want to make decent livings, and will want their families to have 10- or 15-room houses on half acre lots in suburban communities with good schools, and that’s fine. They work hard and deserve to live well in return.

What gets wrung out of the system when government turns to Open Source is not code quality, and it certainly isn’t security (remember, the vast majority of government systems that get compromised run proprietary operating systems and software), but is the taxpayers’ contribution to proprietary software magnates’ personal wealth.

We can hardly blame the proprietary honchos for wanting to hang on to their lifestyles, and we should sympathize with their efforts to get government agencies to keep subsidizing them. These plutocrats are going to lobby, donate, create and distribute studies, hire PR firms, and use every other trick of modern American political marketing to fight off the Open Source hordes lapping at their mansion doors.

Against all this proprietary political power, you have the Open Source promise of more efficient, lower cost, more reliable, and more secure government software, which benefits both the people in the government agencies who must use and maintain that software, and the taxpayers whose money buys it.

Which side will win? Or is it necessary for one side to win and the other to lose? The proprietary powers are certainly painting all this as a battle where even the slightest bit of Open Source — or worse, GPL-licensed Free Software — infection will ruin the government’s entire code base and throw the virtual doors to every federal data center open to laptop-wielding robe-wearers who scream “Death to All USians” in Iraqi, Iranian or North Korean accents as they destroy our country’s IT infrastructure.

I’d like to think our government people are too sensible to believe this silly scenario, even if it is presented to them along with $10,000 campaign contribution checks while riding to “briefings” in Hawaii in so-and-so company’s jet, drinking corporate-bought 100-year-old Scotch and smoking corporate-supplied, illegally imported cigars hand-rolled by Fidel Castro himself.

But we’ll see how it all plays out. I personally expect slow but steady gains for Open Source in the U.S. government, but I also expect to see plenty of bones still thrown to the proprietary software plutocrats, if only because the current U.S. system of campaign finance and (shall we say) “lobbyist-aided decision making” might collapse without their involvement, and we wouldn’t want that.

Or would we? Hmmm…..