NewsFactor Network writes” “Recent news articles celebrated the fact that the first Web page went online approximately 10 years ago. I remember what it was like being involved with software development at that time. My initial feeling was that using markup in a browser was less than optimal because it leaves too much of the presentation details up to the browser. Thankfully, new technologies are around to make my life easier.”

InternetWeek, by way of YahooDailyNews: “Bored with initiating traffic-flooding attacks that take down Web
servers, hackers are focusing on router vulnerabilities that could let
them divert large amounts of traffic to Internet wastelands, security
experts warn.”

Lori Pike writes: “VANCOUVER, BC – Dec. 18, 2001 – ActiveState, the leader in open source programming tools, announces the release of ASPN Tcl, comprehensive Tcl tools and resources in a single value package. ASPN
Tcl provides the latest quality TclPro builds and information with access to the ActiveState Programmer Network’s Tcl cookbook; mailing lists and archives; and technical references. ASPN Tcl includes licenses for TclPro, a toolkit for rapid development of Tcl applications; and Komodo, ActiveState?s cross-platform, multi-language IDE, with special TclPro integration.

ActiveState?s quality assured TclPro toolkit for Linux, Solaris and Windows enables programmers to remotely and visually debug Tcl; deploy Tcl programs as ready to run executables; obfuscate code; and check syntax to spot errors.

“ActiveState?s delighted to step in where Scriptics/Ajuba left off. ASPN Tcl fills the need for productive and secure editing, debugging and deploying of Tcl in the enterprise,? said Dick Hardt, Founder & CEO, ActiveState. ?ActiveState?s extensive Tcl tools, resources and support we provide make Tcl programming safe and easy, which is key for customers of ours like Cisco with thousands of Tcl developers.?

Key ASPN Tcl features:

• TclPro toolkit – quality-assured checker, debugger, wrapper and
  compiler
• Komodo IDE – editor, graphical debugger, tutorials, and
  dynamic help for Tcl, Perl, Python, PHP, and XSLT on Linux and Windows
• Tcl cookbook – a collaborative website, built by ActiveState, which
  hosts community contributions to the art of Tcl programming
• ActiveTcl – free binary Tcl distribution, available for Linux,
  Solaris, and Windows;
• ASPN – technical references, FAQs, mailings
  lists and archives

“Tcl has proven to be the best scripting language for our automated testing environment for over a decade now. The number of Tcl users has grown from a few engineers to over thousands within our organization,? Hemang Lavana, Software Engineer, Cisco Systems. ?ActiveState has successfully managed to fill Scriptics/Ajuba?s spot of providing Tcl support. I?ve been very impressed with the current distribution of ActiveTcl and look forward to your future Tcl-based products.”

“I’m excited to be reviving the popular TclPro toolset, which along with
the advanced Komodo IDE is the most extensive Tcl development environment available,” said Jeff Hobbs, Tcl Tech Lead, ActiveState. “These tools greatly enhanced Tcl programmer’s productivity, whether in the enterprise space or in a one person shop.”

Other ActiveState Tcl initiatives comprise hosting of the primary Tcl community website. ActiveState also provides support for Tcl applications and internals on a wide range of platforms with the TclClinic on a per-incident basis, as a prepaid support contract, or through ActiveState’s TclDirect. Future plans include Visual Tcl, a Tcl plugin to Microsoft?s Visual Studio .NET.

ASPN Tcl is being offered at a special introductory price of $50 off for the first year for $445 until January 15, 2002. The regular price is $495. It is an annual service that includes all updates for one year, plus online, searchable access to cookbooks, technical references, sample code, and more.

About ActiveState:
ActiveState is the leading provider of open source based programming products and services for cross-platform development. ActiveState’s key technologies are Perl, the Internet’s most popular programming language; Python and Tcl, user-friendly scripting languages; PHP, the dynamic Web programming language; and XSLT, the XML transformation language. The ActiveState Programmer Network (ASPN) offers these technologies with the latest information and productivity tools, empowering programmers with the freedom to work with their preferred language and development environment.

Media & Analyst Contacts:
Lori Pike, ActiveState
604.808.6655

ActiveState, ASPN, Komodo, and Visual Tcl are trademarks of ActiveState
Corp. All other company names herein may be trademarks of their
respective owners.

© ActiveState Corporation 2001.”

DebianPlanet: “As you might now, Sony released in Japan a hardware kit to run the port of GNU/Linux on a
Playstation 2 some time ago.

They’re now questioning wether the kit should be released in other places. They have set a poll site for
Europe and US. Please send your vote if you find it interesting.

There’s also a project to port Debian GNU/Linux to the PS2 platform. What would you think of a cheap
PS2 box running a complete Debian system?”

NewsFactor Network writes: “The way we handle information on our computers is called the “desktop metaphor.” But there is nothing metaphorical about the way we point-and-click our way through icons, folders and files. A number of companies are experimenting with software and services that allow users to better navigate around, through and over the mountain of data that comes pouring through our home and work computers every day, in the shape of e-mail, faxes, Web pages and spreadsheets. If the new systems ever catch on — and some skeptics say our old system is too ingrained to make way for the new — it could change the whole concept of how we relate to our machines.”

– By Jack Bryar –

Why is Red Hat Software picking on a bunch of low-rent CD salesmen
about their use of the term “Red Hat” on the disks they are peddling?
It is Red Hat’s collection of code, although UnixCD and CheapBytes may have every right to peddle it. However, Red Hat has a good reason for complaining. It’s the same
reason that the company has made a business of selling something you supposedly
can get for free. Here’s a hint: Red Hat’s success has almost nothing
to do with the software.

A few years ago, I said a lot of mean things about Red Hat. I suggested
that commercializing Open Source software was an inherently silly idea,
and its investors were very silly people. That may have been true
about nearly all the other vendors in the Linux environment, but it is
time to recognize that Red Hat has made a real business out of the
platform. The way the company has done it shows how good management can build a brand.

Let’s be frank. There’s nothing all that special about Red Hat’s
technology. It’s Linux, the same powerful, clunky, indestructible code base
you can find on the Web in a lot of places if you’re patient and willing
to look. While the company has done a tremendous amount of work
extending that code to such an unlikely system as an IBM mainframe, there are
plenty of other developers who have done the same thing. It isn’t Red Hat
software that makes the company and its product so valuable.

It is Red Hat’s brand that sets the company apart.

Branding is what the Red Hat business is all about. It may be
about the purest example of just how far a brand can take you. It is
certainly the best example of brand building in the Open Source community — if not in the entire software marketplace. Branding may be the one reason that Red Hat continues to keep its head
above water financially, even while the rest of the industry is drowning.

How much is a brand worth? Sony will tell you it is nearly the entire
worth of their company. So will Philips
Electronics, as will Coca
Cola (.pdf file).

But how do you build a brand and make into a key asset?

Building a brand isn’t easy to do, and most “formulas”
for creating a brand are nonsense. Buying a brand doesn’t work either.
Ask the
investors in Pets.com.

The only way you can build a brand is to earn it, and that’s what Red
Hat has done. The company’s process is simplicity itself. It’s also hard.

First rule of brand-building: Be true to your vision.

Nearly every would-be Open Source company announced that it was
going to make money by selling services associated with Open Source. As far
as I can tell, the only firm that has really executed this plan
has been Red Hat. It put together a services
and training program that isn’t embarrassing.

Red Hat has a systems
integration and consulting team that can talk to the CTO or the suits without
embarrassing themselves, and the company has built a credible contract engineering team.

And Red Hat still sells software.

Had you looked, you would have found something similar in the business
plan of every Linux corporate wannabe that rode a wave of
irrational exuberance in the late ’90s. However, what other company
stuck with their plan and waited for the market to mature?

Second rule: Do your job.

Most software companies do a pretty poor job of developing products.
Many match that poor product with levels of support that are downright
infuriating. While Red Hat gets mixed marks from the user community, it beats
poor support (Microsoft) or no support (the average Open Source
project). When the company first began to bully some small distributors, it
said, “We want users to understand what they are entitled to [when they deal
with Red Hat] — a difference of service and support levels.” That
doesn’t sound unfair.”

Third rule: Pick your friends well.

Of all the happy circumstances Red Hat has encountered, few are as
happy as Big Blue’s loud public embrace of Open Source. Not only has IBM
given credibility to the Linux platform, judicious positioning by Red
Hat made it seem as if Red Hat was IBM’s preferred vendor.

Fourth rule: Make your name synonymous with the product.

This can be a risky strategy as anyone familiar with the story of Thomas Crapper can
tell you. However, Red Hat has to be happy that so many software
developers have specified Red Hat Linux as opposed to “POSIX-compliant Linux”
as their preferred platform.

Fifth rule: Pick your enemies well.

Microsoft’s inability to refrain from the most infantile corporate
behavior imaginable has allowed Red Hat to position itself as the alternate
voice of reason. It’s a role that Sun’s Scott MacNealy can’t play. Larry
Ellison doesn’t look the part. But whenever Matt Szulik takes the
stand at a federal hearing, it re-enforces the perception that his
company is the primary alternative to the bullies of Redmond.

Sixth rule: Make yourself the alternate choice.

That has been the principal success of Red Hat as 2001 draws to a
close. Red Hat, more than Apple, or AOL — or any other vendor — has become the
alternate choice, a safe choice for corporate buyers and a recognized
name in the marketplace. And for a firm that I thought would disappear
a long time ago, that’s a pretty good place to be.

Slashdot is discussing a Linux Journal article about the perception of Linux held by IT undergraduate students.

From ZDNet: “Red Hat edged a penny ahead of analyst expectations Tuesday, as the leading Linux seller posted a $1.3 million profit before charges for its fiscal third quarter, ended Nov. 30.”

NewsFactor Network writes “Ben Anixter, AMD’s vice president of external affairs, points to new data from Gartner Dataquest showing that 27 percent of desktop PCs sold in the United States in the third quarter contained Athlon chips. Meanwhile, AMD is preparing a new line of chips, the Hammer series, to challenge Intel’s nascent Itanium processors. Both Hammer and Itanium are designed to process data 64 bits at a time, compared to today’s 32-bit processors. The result is an ability to handle vastly larger databases. But the Itanium won’t be able to run today’s 32-bit software without special emulation programs that slow down performance. Hammer will run 32-bit programs directly, as well as 64-bit software.”

MobYle Freak writes “Here is a review of an interesting web pad device from FIC. The AquaPAD runs Midori Linux and comes with 802.11b support thanks to a PCMCIA slot. It weighs only 2.5 pounds and has an 8.4 inch screen similar to the Iopener in size, but it is totally mobile.”