The Washington Post (via MSNBC) reviews Mac OS X, due on store shelves at 12:01AM Saturday: “ I’m going to keep OS X away from my everyday machines while Apple and its developers continue to compose this unfinished symphony. I recommend you do the same, unless you have a taste for adventure and a broadband connection to download all the bug fixes and updates.”

ZDNet UK says chip-maker Transmeta is promising major
manufacturing announcements this year.

” ‘Nearly every big name company is talking with us,’ says company founder Dave Ditzel. ‘In
2001 you can expect some big name players.’ In terms of server
hardware manufacturers, this means the like of IBM and Compaq,
altough Ditzel refused to be drawn on exact names.”

Chris Allegretta writes: “GNU nano 1.0 has been released. Check out the fluff press release, or download it from the homepage or from the GNU ftp site.”

From LWN.net: There are several weaknesses in various implementations of the SSH
(Secure Shell) protocols. When exploited, they let the attacker obtain
sensitive information by passively monitoring encrypted SSH sessions.
The information can later be used to speed up brute-force attacks on
passwords, including the initial login password and other passwords
appearing in interactive SSH sessions, such as those used with su.
Versions of OpenSSH 2.5.2 and later have been fixed to reduce the
impact of these traffic analysis problems, and as such all Linux-
Mandrake users are encouraged to upgrade their version of openssh
immediately.

From LWN.net: “One of the changes that is now in the 2.4.3 prepatch is
a new memory map locking scheme implemented by Rik van Riel. The memory map semaphore
controls access to the various virtual memory areas and page tables used by a process; it is
intended to keep concurrent activities, such as page faults, memory map changes, and
informational queries from stepping on each other. It is a fundamental part of how the virtual
memory system works.”

ZDNet UK reports that Web pad running Linux was
demonstrated for the first time by South Korean hardware
manufacturer LG at the CeBIT computer fair
this week. “The Linux operating system kernel, developed by volunteer
programmers and distributed for free over the internet, means that LG
will not be tied to a third part proprietary software maker, company
representatives said.”

CNet has more on Red Hat’s stock rally Friday, but warns that
analysts think its slowing sales growth is a sign of potential problems.

The BBC has a feature on the Ericsson Blip wireless device. “Ericsson says it is up to Blip users what they do with the device,
which can be programmed and updated from a conventional
computer using a serial or ethernet connection.

For that reason, the company based the Blip around the Linux
operating system, the free operating system put together by a
community of programmers across the internet.”

CNet reports that IBM has created a second-generation Linux
wristwatch, “this one smaller than the original and sporting a
gleaming golden display, but still just as impractical.

IBM is showing the new watch at the CeBit trade show. Though the watch
is a technology demonstration and isn’t for sale — its battery lasts only
two hours — it’s a lot closer to a commercial product than IBM’s bulky
first-generation model.”

Dan Dennedy writes: “Late last night, the SANS Institute (through its Global Incident
Analysis Center) uncovered a dangerous new worm that appears to be
spreading rapidly across the Internet. It scans the Internet looking
for Linux computers with a known vulnerability. It infects the
vulnerable machines, steals the password file (sending it to a
China.com site), installs other hacking tools, and forces the newly
infected machine to begin scanning the Internet looking for other
victims.
The SANS site has all of the information including a detection tool.“