– by Tina Gasperson –
MSNBC regularly publishes a “bug of the day” blurb, warning about actions that tend to provoke a BSOD for Windows users. Today, however, the warning is for Linux people.The report says “it is possible to corrupt the data in a Red Hat Package Manager (RPM) file so code is executed on a Linux system,” but admits that it would be a difficult thing because “the memory location of the hacker shellcode would need to be known.”

RPMs can be dangerous because they have to be run as root, and they have permission to execute all kinds of commands automatically – installing, deleting files, adding users, and other things. The MSNBC report is true: be careful where you get your RPMs from.

ZDNET: “Software packages that allow clients to share printers over a network may be leaving enterprises open to attack.”

CNet reports that “an unfinished novel by science fiction writer Douglas Adams will be published next year and released on the anniversary of his death, according to published reports.”

From CNet: “It is not surprising that IBM is increasingly its lead in the server market. The company has been reinventing its server business, and the results are quite positive.”

Kelly McNeill writes “Recently published reports have stirred up a hornet’s nest after implying that the open alternative to GIF may be in trouble because Apple Computer is the owner of a patent on key component technologies used in the PNG image format. The concern is over Apple’s U.S. patent No. 5,379,129, filed in May of 1992 and granted to Apple in January 1995. The patent describes a “method for compositing a source and destination image using a mask image. In response to the concern, Greg Roelofs — a member of the PNG group and author of “PNG: The Definitive Guide” — debunked the incorrect implications in a forum discussion.”

CNet reports that “Firing an employee accused of sabotaging tests at Hewlett-Packard’s top-end Superdome Unix server helped the company improve a key performance measurement, an executive said Monday.”

Kelly McNeill writes “While skimming through my TOEFL (test of English as a foreign language) book, I came across a passage about music. It says that all music consists of two elements — expression and design. Expression is subjective, while design is objective. I believe that software is, in some ways, like music, because it is all about expression and design.”

Martin (a.k.a Mayhem) writes “Download the tarball (gz) from here or any of the mirrors. Changelog follows:

pre7:

– Jeff Garzik: network driver updates

– Christoph Hellwig: UFS filesystem byteorder cleanups

– me: modified Andrea VM page allocator tuning

“Communications chipmaker Broadcom said Monday it had filed a lawsuit charging that certain Intel semiconductors infringe on patents held by Broadcom,” according to ZDNet.

ZDNet reports “Complaints about anti-copying technology have forced a record label to issue CD replacements for angry consumers–another setback for the music industry’s stuttering campaign against record piracy.”