Fritz Hollings (D-Disney) is fairly well known for his work to create and try to pass a bill that would allow the government complete access to all our personal actions on the computer – so it seems odd that he’d be sponsoring a privacy bill as well. We should all read that pretty closely to make sure there are no hidden “gotchas.” Another senator apparently has some problems with the privacy bill and is working to stall it. Read more at IDG.net.

theregister.co.uk: “Leading lights from the software libre community were sounded out about support for
the project, but discovered that any innovations would be owned by CMU. Which
meant that the University owned the code, leaving it in prime position to exploit it
commercially

Er, no – this is isn’t how we work exactly, was the rejoinder from the community.
Which prompted the University to offer a twin-track license late last week. “

– By Robin ‘Roblimo’ Miller –

Once again, I agreed to speak at a regional computer expo, not one dedicated to Linux but a general one full of ISPs and training companies and telecommunications vendors hawking their wares to local small and medium sized businesses. There were Certified Microsoft Partner signs all over the place. My speech was titled Building Online Profits with Free Software. It drew more than 100 people, only a handful of whom were Linux users.

I enjoy this kind of advocacy. It’s more satisfying than speaking to a room full of the converted, and does more good in the long run. The guy in the third row aisle seat who ran the golf magazine and golf Web site would never have come to hear a presentation about Linux per se, but when you talk about making his site more profitable he’s all ears, asks lots of questions, and later goes to the booth in a back corner of the exhibit hall run by the local Linux User Group.

The difference between this presentation and past ones I’ve done is that I didn’t talk about the wonders of Linux very much. I talked about making attractive Web sites at minimal cost, and mentioned Linux, Apache and some other software as tools. For this audience, composed primarily of local non-computer business owners and managers, software is not a primary concern. To them software is like a telephone system or a pickup truck: a tool. If they find a new software tool that’ll do what needs to be done better, faster or cheaper than the one they’re already using, they’ll switch brands as fast as they’ll buy a Ford pickup instead of a Chevy (or vice versa).

I did not detect any particular Microsoft loyalty. Rather, I sensed acceptance that Microsoft was something one was stuck with; that it was all there was. At the end of my presentation, when I mentioned the slide show they had all seen was produced with StarOffice, not PowerPoint, and that my laptop was running Linux, not Windows, at least 20 people gathered around the podium to ask more questions about Linux on the desktop. Several in this small group had read about StarOffice, but none of them had ever seen it in action before. They were impressed when I showed off the programs’ features, and with the simple, clean look of my basic KDE desktop (the default in Mandrake 8.2), and how I had loaded buttons for almost all my everyday software into the panel at the bottom of the screen so I could call up any of these programs with a single click, even if the rest of my desktop was covered with open windows. (The fact that I could keep dozens of windows open at one time without anything crashing seemed to impress some of them, too.)

Servers are still the main thrust

Most of my audience was more interested in servers than in desktop applications, because a crashed desktop or laptop is an inconvenience, but a crashed server brings their business to a halt. Free in cost was not a big issue to this audience; these are people who are willing to pay money (and often do) for security services and consultants who can keep their computer running. If they decide a $500 piece of software will save them $2000 worth of time and trouble, they have no problem buying it. When I described Linux — in the Web site and server context — I mentioned briefly that it was free, but didn’t really dwell on that aspect. I talked more about stability, how the Linux/Apache combination is far more hacker-resistant than Windows 2K/IIS when properly installed and administered, and how Linux was impervious to the many Windows viruses currrently wandering around the Internet.

One thing hardly any of the people in this audience seemed to know was that many managed hosting services charge less to maintain servers running Linux or BSD than for servers running Windows, and that only part of this saving comes from eliminating software license costs.

This was not an audience filled with FUD, just one that hadn’t heard much about Linux before, except in offhand way. I detected no hostility, just eagerness to learn. These people needed to be taught, and taught on a level that made sense to them in a business context. They were not interested in getting involved in the “religious” aspects of software licensing. They were happy to leave that to the software developers.

Explaining Linux to business people

One of the big perception hurdles to overcome about Linux is the hobby OS or upstart operating system image. So here (slightly paraphrased) is how I moved from talk about Web page design into my little Linux spiel:

Imagine an operating system under continuous development by top-end sofware engineers from IBM, Hewlett Packard, Red Hat, Sun, Transmeta, and dozens of other leading-edge computer companies, all working together instead of competing, in partnership with some of the brightest minds at NASA, NSA, theNational Institutes of Health, NOAA and other science-oriented government agencies, along with thousands of academic researchers at institutions ranging from MIT to Florida State University.

This operating system exists. It’s called Linux.

I mentioned Florida State because I was speaking in Florida. In Michigan I might have said University of Michigan. You can pick almost any large university with a strong computer science department: there are Linux and Open Source developers at virtually all of them.

The reality of Linux and Open Source development today is that the majority of it is being done by skilled, professional programmers, either on company (or university) time or as an after work (or school) labor of love. There is still plenty of room in the Linux and Open Source development world for talented youngsters, and I know some brilliant ones, but I think we all agree that a 45-year-old business owner is a little more comfortable with the idea of software developed with the aid of well-known companies and government bodies than with the idea of a bunch of 19-year-old hobbyists cranking out code after midnight while scarfing junk food and sucking down liter after liter of some caffeine-laden carbonated beverage.

(Don’t forget: Linus Torvalds, himself, is no longer a 19-year-old student. He’s a respected — even famous — professional computer guru; a married man with children and responsibilities, and well over 10 years of experience with Linux development.)

At no point, speaking to this business-oriented audience, did I use the words new or exciting when talking about Linux. It is no longer new, and it is certainly not as exciting as Windows’ never-ending parade of viruses and worms and software lcense audits. Not only that, to a business person, the new and exciting label, applied to a car or other piece of mechanical equipment, means it probably breaks down a lot, parts are hard to get, and hardly anyone knows how to fix it.

Now and then I still see a mainstream press article that calls Linux an upstart operating system. This is no longer true. Linux is now an operating system, period, mature enough, with wide enough acceptance, that it isn’t revolutionary anymore, but is a standard part of the commercial computing landscape. This, at least, is the Linux I find myself presenting to non-geek audiences: a mature, useful, cost-effective tool, with a licensing scheme that makes it more flexible than proprietary operating systems.

All this certainly makes Linux sound boring, doesn’t it?

But boring is what business people want from their software, especially server software. They want to install it (or pay someone else to install it), then have it run all the time without paying any attention to it beyond minor maintenance.

Linux is now mainstream, and mainstream advocacy is what is going to keep it growing. That is a simple fact of life, one that some old line Linux users may not want to hear, but will make others — especially those trying to make a living helping businesses deploy Linux — stand up and cheer.

From ZDNet:
“America Online has dropped Internet Explorer from a test version of its software for Mac OS X, the latest sign that the Internet giant wants a rematch
in the browser wars with Microsoft.”

From Linux PR:

“CodeWeavers, Inc. today released CrossOver Plugin version 1.1.1, the company’s Windows(R)-To-Linux(R) adapter for
Windows browser plugins and document viewers.”

From ZDNet UK:
“The battle to cut costs in the semiconductor manufacturing industry is hotting up, with both Intel and AMD claiming the edge

Both AMD and Intel proudly claim they can make chips cheaper than the other guy, but after going through the math and examining the two companies’
divergent strategies, analysts conclude it’s a dead heat.”

From ZDNet UK:
“The open-source Ximian project has released a new version of Evolution, the Microsoft Outlook clone for Linux, fixing a glitch that can crash the
software. Evolution 1.0.5 also fixes a list of less serious bugs.”

Anonymous Reader writes “In March 2002 at the Embedded Systems Conference held in San Francisco, CA, the Embedded Linux Consortium (ELC) rolled out the requisite organizational infrastructure to allow it to begin developing embedded Linux standards. The ELC’s primary effort will be to create what is being called the “ELC Platform Specification”, which will formally define a standardized core embedded Linux platform. Additional efforts are expected to focus on specific areas of system functionality, such as graphical interface, real-time functions, system boot processes, etc. In
this interview, Mark Brown, Chair of the ELC’s Core Platform Working Group, answers questions posed by LinuxDevices.com founder Rick Lehrbaum about the ELC’s standardization process, and comments on the significance of the ELC’s Core Platform spec.”

“Reuters will announce plans Thursday to bring its financial information software to Linux in conjunction with Red Hat, Intel and Hewlett-Packard, sources said, a major achievement for the comparatively young open-source operating system,” says News.com.

(Click “Read More” for full text of original press release.)

San Francisco – Reuters, the global information, news and technology group, has formed an alliance with HP, Intel Corporation and Red Hat to make Reuters Market Data System (RMDS) available on Intel-based servers with Linux, the open source operating system. The move supports financial institutions using Intel® Architecture (IA) and Linux to reduce the cost and improve the flexibility and performance of their market data platforms.

Reuters decision to run RMDS on Linux comes in response to a growing interest and deployment of the operating system within the financial services industry. Tom McDonald, Executive Director at Morgan Stanley said, “Linux on Intel is an important evolutionary platform for Morgan Stanley. Support for this platform from Reuters is important to our efforts and is strategic to Morgan Stanley.”

The four companies will jointly participate in the porting, testing and optimization of RMDS on IA with Red Hat Linux. The service will run on Intel® Xeon processor and Intel® Itanium® processor family-based servers from HP. A version of RMDS on this platform is due to begin testing in the third quarter of this year.

Reuters Consulting, working with HP Services, will assist customers to ensure its migration to Linux on Intel-based servers delivers maximum benefit. Services will cover a range of areas including initial review and application audit, development of Linux application architecture and migration, through to ongoing support.

RMDS integrates the crucial real-time data and news that a financial institution uses to make its trading decisions and interact with the markets. The system delivers information to thousands of users and applications throughout the financial institution and across the Internet. RMDS combines the best elements of the most widely installed market data systems, Reuters Triarch and the TIB Market Data Distribution System, while enhancing them with components that improve cost of ownership, scalability, and business flexibility.

Mike Sayers, Reuters Chief Technology Officer said, “Our customers see RMDS on Intel-based servers and Linux as an important way to reduce their costs of operation and improve their service, so it was quite natural that we should bring the two together. The support Linux enjoys from a broad range of hardware vendors also makes it an excellent fit with Reuters policy of open systems. We are pleased to bring the Linux version of RMDS to market first on the HP, Intel and Red Hat platform. Working with these industry leaders will ensure that RMDS on Linux provides the stability, performance, and integrity that our customers have come to expect from us.”

“As a premier provider of market data delivery systems, Reuters understands the critical role that leading information technology plays in today’s competitive and constantly evolving business environment. Reuters is focused on providing its clients competitive edge with global technology solutions that can evolve and adapt while managing costs,” said Peter Blackmore, Executive Vice President, HP Enterprise Systems Group. “HP is pleased to extend our long-standing relationship with Reuters to help them achieve these goals. By choosing HP ProLiant servers, the world’s market leader in Linux server unit shipments for 16 quarters running, Reuters can confidently introduce mission critical Linux solutions with the economic benefits of industry-standard computing.”

“Red Hat has technology and service relationships with eight out of the ten top financial companies in the world,” said Michael Tiemann, Chief Technology Officer at Red Hat. “Red Hat solutions provide customers a dramatic increase in the capacity and performance of their pricing and trading systems. This in turn has led to substantial increases in the need for financial data and analysis to fuel these systems. Through this partnership, Reuters has the opportunity to meet these increased demands while retaining the rock-solid quality that customers expect when using RMDS.”

Reuters
Reuters (www.about.reuters.com) is the leading global provider of financial information, news and technology solutions to financial institutions, the media, corporates and individuals. Reuters strength is our unique ability to offer customers a combination of content, technology and connectivity. Our premier position is founded on continuous technological innovation and a reputation for speed, accuracy, integrity and impartiality. Reuters has over 19,000 staff in 97 countries, including some 2,500 editorial staff in 230 bureaux serving approximately 150 countries, making Reuters the world’s largest international multimedia news agency. In 2001, Reuters had revenues of £3.9 billion.

Reuters and the sphere logo are the trade marks of the Reuters group of companies.

HP
HP is a leading global provider of technology products, solutions and services to consumers and businesses. The company’s offerings span IT infrastructure, personal computing and access devices, global services and imaging and printing. The merged company had combined revenue of approximately $81.7 billion in fiscal 2001 and operations in more than 160 countries. Information about HP and its products can be found at http://www.hp.com.

Intel

Intel, the world’s largest chip maker, is also a leading manufacturer of computer, networking and communications products. Additional information about Intel is available at www.intel.com/pressroom.

Red Hat

Red Hat (Nasdaq:RHAT) is the world’s premier open source and Linux provider. Red Hat is headquartered in Raleigh, N.C. and has offices worldwide. Please visit Red Hat on the Web at www.redhat.com. For investor inquiries, contact Gabriel Szulik at Red Hat, (919) 754-3700.

LINUX is a trademark of Linus Torvalds. RED HAT is a registered trademark of Red Hat, Inc.”

ZDNet reports that “considering the backlash to Microsoft’s new software licensing policies, Sun just might have hit the suite spot with StarOffice. According to a recent Tech Update poll, 59 percent of the respondents said they’re considering ditching Microsoft Office (12 percent had already done so), and less than a third–29 percent–said they were sticking to their Microsoft Office guns.” This page contains three links to ZDNet stories on the new offerings, plus a link to download OpenOffice.org 1.0.