DebianPlanet: “ComputerBank NSW, a charitable give-PCs-loaded-with-Linux-away-for-free
organization based in NSW, Australia (there are other branches throughout .au),
recently performed an all-Debian install.”

LinuxPR: “Turbolinux, Inc., a worldwide leader in Linux operating environments and
multi-platform software deployment and management products, today
announced general availability of the PowerCockpit Software
Developers’ Toolkit (SDK), as well as a new release of its award-winning
PowerCockpit server provisioning and management software.”

Laurence writes: “The Linux 2.5.5 kernel’s been released, featuring a massive changelog. Included of course is that all-important addition of ALSA. Noticeable is the size. The source is now 31.1Mb for the .tar.gz (2Mb bigger than 2.5.4) and 25Mb for the .tar.bz2. Clearly, the kernel has come a long way since its 5.6Mb/4.5Mb, 2.0.0 size. And to think it all begun with an innocuous 71k/62k of code, in something called ”Linux 0.0.1”. 🙂 Download from a mirror near you.”

– By Robin ‘Roblimo’
Miller –
I have had a love/hate relationship with StarOffice 5.2 since it first came out. I’ve used it successfully to open, read, and modify files created with Microsoft Office, but for little else, because it was a bloated, often irritating program that tried to do too much and didn’t do it all well. OpenOffice does just about everything StarOffice ever did, but it has lost most of StarOffice’s irritating features. It is as usable an “Office” package as you’ll find in any operating system, and you sure can’t beat the $0.00 price.

As a writer, I am often forced to deal with publishers who are absolutely, irretrievably locked into Windows and MS Office for the foreseeable future. Even when their Windows computers have just been infected with viruses or have crashed for the umpteenth time in the last month, when I suggest switching to Linux and StarOffice, they act as if I am suggesting moving to Mars to get away from rush hour traffic or something similarly bizarre. For many in the publishing business, MS Office has become as much a part of life as breathing. And because their employers provide their software, they don’t worry about cost. MS Office is a fact of life for them, like breathing or car insurance, and the idea of giving it up is simply so far outside of their imaginations that anyone who suggests it is obviously a loon.

But even loons must eat. And this means we must be able to deal with “normal” people who do their work in MS proprietary formats despite the many reasons they shouldn’t do this. Hence, my dependance on StarOffice or a similar program may be co-dependance, but it is a fact of life nonetheless.

The accusations leveled against StarOffice 5.2 (and earlier versions) have always been correct. It was slow, bloated, and took over your entire desktop when you started it up. The menus were clunky and not very intuitive. But to balance the list of complaints, there was always the fact that StarOffice, and StarOffice alone, allowed me to work collaboratively with MS Office users on lengthy projects. AbiWord can’t do this. Believe me, I have tried, but its handling of embedded graphics in large .doc files is somewhere between “awful” and “horrid,” and it has balked or crashed every time I have tried to use it to mark up manuscript copy in Word/Office style. So, like it or not, we’re back to StarOffice — or now, the much nicer OpenOffice — once again.

Imagine a better, faster StarOffice
OpenOffice starts up fairly quickly. On the 800 MHz, 256 Mb RAM HP laptop I use for everyday work, it takes less then six seconds to get going. It uses a minimum of 170 MB of hard disk space, only slightly less than the 180 MD minimum required for StarOffice 5.2, and full installations of either one, including all available “cruft,” run closer to 250 MB. This is fairly reasonable for a program that does so much. To back up the “so much” claim, here is a list of tasks I have personally performed with OpenOffice:

• Opened .doc, .xls, .bmp, .rtf, ASCII, and .ppt files, altered them in their native formats, and sent them back to their originators, who then had no problems opening and using them.
• Written documents as long as 10,000 words, and inserted (quite large) print-quality TIFF and other graphics files in them without a burp, then saved those documents in OpenOffice’s native XML, in .doc, and in HTML without a burp.
• Created simple graphics, altered the size and characteristics of complicated ones (i.e. prepped them for WWW publication, my most common graphics task).
• Created letterheads and other common “small business” print materials, and printed them out cleanly on a common (HP) inkjet printer with one click.
• Made slide presentations, including animated graphics, in a few minutes, no problem, and showed them through a digital projector.
• Created and manipulated simple spreadsheets, then added them to text (.XML) documents.
• Made a rudimentary two-column newsletter, with a couple of photos in it — and used OpenOffice to convert the photos to greyscale for black and white printing.

There are other functions I did not test, including “mail merge” creation of personally-addressed form letters and addressed envelopes. But the ones I did try all worked without a hitch.

I’m using OpenOffice build 641, not the “next” stable release, now slated to be version 1.0.0. I look forward to testing this one when it comes out, although I am satisfied enough with build 641 that I see no urgent need to upgrade, and it will take some strong going on the part of the “soon to come out” commercial StarOffice 6.0 to get me to move away from Open Source OpenOffice.

Here are some specific improvements OpenOffice offers over StarOffice 5.2. Some may seem minor, but they are major usability factors for a busy worker:

• “One click” copying. StarOffice 5.2 required Windows-style Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V. I always hated this. One of the great Linux advantages for a hard-working writer or admin person is the ability to copy text by highlighting it, then either clicking the center button on a three-button mouse or both buttons simultaneously on a two-button mouse to paste it wherever. Now, with OpenOffice, I can do that — and not just within OpenOffice, but to and from other programs I use all day, notably Netscape or Mozilla. Yay!
• I get to control my desktop. MS Office and StarOffice 5.2 take over your entire monitor screen by default. I hate that. Yes, I need my word processor or whatever other “Office” program I’m using to be in a nice, big box, but I also tend to have IRC going in XChat, and a bunch of browser windows open most of the time, plus a terminal window or two, and maybe even XMMS or some other multimedia program playing a little music while I work. OpenOffice doesn’t suffer from the “I am everything you need” hubris problem shared by MS Office and StarOffice 5.2. It knows its place, you might say. And I like that in a program.
• Maybe this is just me, but I found it a lot easier to turn off the “autocorrect” and “autocomplete” features in OpenOffice than in StarOffice 5.2. I hate these things. Imagine trying to type the phrase, “Yahoo! is a Web directory,” and having some moron piece of software insist on capitalizing the word “is” because it comes after a punctuation mark commonly used to end a sentence. Well, this time, Mr. Office Program, it’s not the end of a sentence, okay? So quit trying to ram your opinion about correct punctuation usage down my throat! And if I want a word’s spelling checked or corrected, Mr. Office Program, I’ll let you know, thank you! I find it easier and faster to choose my own words. I don’t need “smart tags” from Microsoft Office, either. I need and like what OpenOffice gives me (now that I have disabled the “auto” features): a quiet, nonintrusive program that helps me do my work instead of telling me how to do it.

There are a few tiny flaws in the OpenOffice build I am using, but none of them have given me any grief. Compared to MS Office 97, this is a smoothie. There are plenty of OpenOffice features I still haven’t explored, and maybe they have some “showstopper” bugs in them. But then, hardly anyone uses all the features in a full-scale office program, and I use as many as most users are likely to in the course of my day’s work, and I have been totally satisfied with OpenOffice so far.

From Network World Fusion: “The second federal antitrust lawsuit against Microsoft to come from an industry competitor was filed Tuesday — this time from Be, a company that developed an operating system for personal computers and recently sold most of its assets to Palm.”

From The Register: “Danish local government is evaluating open source alternatives to Microsoft desktop software, in response to a proposed 30 per cent price hike for Window 2000 and Office 2000 licenses.”

It’s at ZOpe.org. Among the items: ” I for one had a great time at the Python conference. It was so great to meet up with the people I hang out with in the Zope community and talk face to face with them. Now I know they aren’t just bots hanging out on the #zope IRC channel 8^).

I think the main concern I heard from several people was that they thought that the Python conference had become too grandiose and would like to see a return to simpler (and cheaper) events. I can see their point, but I do think it is nice to have such a high-profile event to promote the use of Python and Zope and make it look like the “big deal” that we all think it is.
“

Meredith Derby writes: “Windows may be the dominant desktop platform, but Linux is actually better at running certain applications, according to Bob Yellin, CTO and vice president, technology at Tivoli Systems, Inc., Austin, Tex. E-mail systems and Web servers are where Linux has got it right, he said.”

What applications are best suited for Linux? Which run better on Windows? Yellin offered some insights on these questions, as well as virtualization and heterogeneous system management tactics in this interview with SearchWindowsManageability. He provided practical mixed platform management tips in Part two of this interview.

sWM:Are there any little known facts about managing a heterogeneous environment?Yellin:

There’s nothing in managing a mixed Windows and Linux environment that does not also exhibit itself in any mixed environment.

There are, of course, peculiarities associated with each discipline that make management challenging in a heterogeneous environment. The issues of security and software distribution versus the issues in performance monitoring could be very different. Obviously, doing things with universal, industry-adopted interfaces, like post office protocol, poses no problem. Once you get into using a proprietary interface, like the Windows management interface, you’re going to find a weak level of Linux support. So, if you try to manage only to the common features across all OSes, quite often you end up playing to the lowest common denominator. You could, of course, be dealing with a vendor who is going to enhance the capabilities and the functionalities.

sWM:What are the “peculiarities” in managing the performance of a Windows and Linux network?Yellin:

If Linux is not supplying something which is a Windows-only interface, it’s difficult for IT shops that expect to buy Linux, or get it off the shelf, to set it up and automatically plug it in. There’s work that has to be done to get it to communicate on proprietary protocol. Interoperability using Web-based interfaces is usually very safe because it tends to be self-defining. It will go over HTTP or use Web services as a model for invoking or communicating with heterogeneous platforms. Using an industry-standard method for interoperability will offer a lot flexibility and will neutralize a lot of these concerns.

sWM:What applications are best when run on Linux, and which are best when run on Windows?Yellin:

I don’t see Linux as a predominant desktop platform or replacing Windows 2000 Office applications. I do, however, see Linux as a viable server platform for running file systems, e-mail systems, and Web servers. I don’t think you’ll ever find the body of support and applications that exist for the Windows desktop on the Linux environment. There’s no real compelling reason to go to Linux in the desktop environment.

In the server environment, on the other hand, there are substantial economic advantages to running Linux. For one, it’s primarily Intel-based. Linux is also an ideal platform for server consolidation. So, running WebSphere on Linux, application servers, or HTTP servers within a Linux environment are some things it’s really ideal for. Then, you don’t have to deal with compatibility of the desktop paradigm. I imagine it’s only some of the real Linux extremists who would propose using Linux as a consumer desktop in lieu of Windows. You have to have another agenda to be jumping up and down about that one.

sWM:Are they any advantages to running Windows and Linux on the same server?Yellin:

I have not seen a lot of customers who are partitioning out, running Linux and NT alongside of each other. Logically, partitioning is two separate machines anyway. It’s just a matter of cosmetics as to whether both images on running on box.

sWM:Can organizations run Windows desktops and Linux for backend servers?Yellin:

I am sure there are issues around the way Microsoft put together the Active Directory. They have coupled and bundled some management functions that run between the Microsoft server and the Microsoft desktop that you don’t get in a mixed environment. You also don’t get the benefits of capabilities in Microsoft SMS, IntelliMirror, certain backup and recovery capabilities, and integration of the Active Directory when you’re running in the mixed mode Linux to desktop.
I don’t think people pick Linux to be their primary server. I think Linux is gaining wider acceptance as an application server, as opposed to an office system server. So, it wouldn’t be the owner of an organization’s local area network. If you’re running Linux to run an application, it’s nothing that is living behind the firewall or an unauthorized zone.

sWM:Could you explain virtualization in partitioning?Yellin:

Well, it’s always better to have fewer physical boxes. An example is of partitioning a large IBM zSeries computer into thousands of virtual Linux boxes. For large Web server applications, for large networks, I can see virtualization being very widely used because it gets the company out of the difficult problem of cabling. Also, the company does have the logistical management associated with managing thousands of separate boxes. It’s fairly easy to instantiate a new image in response to demands, for example.

FOR MORE INFORMATION

How to run your favorite Windows applications on Linux (From Searchwindowsmanageablility.techtarget.com)

Running Windows applications on Linux could lower TCO

Posted on LWN.net: “A set of buffer overflow problems have been found in hanterm, a Hangul
terminal for X11 derived from xterm, that will read and display Korean
characters in its terminal window. The font handling code in hanterm
uses hard limited string variables but didn’t check for boundaries.

This problem can be exploited by a malicious user to gain access to
the utmp group which is able to write the wtmp and utmp files. These
files record login and logout activities.
“

Jeff Gerhardt writes: Tuesday, February 19th, 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, PJ Hyett, Doc Searls(Linux Journal), Arne Flones and Russ Pavlicek; have another great show lined up tonight on The Linux Show!!

In Segment One – Hot News: We will be covering the hot Linux news of
the last few weeks. In particular we will discuss the BSD conference with Doc.

In Segment Two- MY BRAIN HURTS or Does Microsoft think we are a bunch of brainless “Gumby’s” or trying to sort out the newest phase of Microsoft vs. DOJ

We (us TLS folk) will all be reading the sample postings from the list posted at http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/ms-major.htm> and try to give you our opinions on the whole notion of this as well as comments on specific selections of the sample post.

Other opinions are welcome at GeekCast. This show in particular could use lots of opinions, so please join us on the show, check our IRC Chat(irc.thelinuxshow.com #linuxshow).

Remember tune in at 6pm pt, 7pm mt, 8pm ct, and 9pm et.
Catch the Linux show at www.thelinuxshow.com.