– by Tina Gasperson –

My boss got a press release from IBM recently, touting the new and improved IBM.com Web site. First thing I did was go test it out with my version of Konqueror — it still doesn’t work, but they tell me that this time it is Konqueror’s fault. The latest version of KDE’s browser is completely compatible with IBM.com. I guess I should upgrade. Tomorrow.Then my other boss (are we detecting an unpleasant trend here?) noticed a freaky, swirly, psychedelic kind of ad on the front page of NewsForge. Being the curious cat that I am, I clicked on it, and guess what? It was an ad for IBM.com. Big Blue sure is getting funky these days. If you were anywhere near the party IBM threw for LinuxWorld attendees back in February, then you know what I mean.

Yes, it’s a far cry from the old days of no facial hair, white button-down shirts, and blue ties. IBM is catering to Linux developers now, and it’s a brave GNU world.

But what about the Web site? Is IBM.com useful? Or is it yet another slick corporate brochure? When I pull up the main page, I notice that some things never change. It’s big and there’s a lot of blue. Menu on the left side with several choices. I pick “developers” and then “linux.” (No, I’m not a developer, but I play one on … uh, I write stuff for them.)

The page comes up. Looks full of things at least worth investigating. One cool graphic — an oyster shell with a glowing blue pearl inside. It highlights a feature article entitled, “A Programmer’s Environment.” As I click through, a subtitle tells me more: “Optimizing your machine for your needs.” Let’s see: written by Teodor Zlatanov in March of 2001! It’s current. This is good.

One of the beginning paragraphs explains:

“This article is intended for the intermediate to advanced Linux user. Perl 5.6.0, or at least 5.005, should be installed in order to do some of the examples. The Emacs editor is
mentioned and may need to be installed if you want to try the Emacs examples. The Enlightenment window manager is mentioned and may need to be installed together with the
Eterm terminal emulator, but most recent window managers and terminal emulators have features similar to what Enlightenment and Eterm provide in the context of this article.”

It turns out to be a nice, long article that is packed chock full of usable knowledge. It’s a keeper. OK, back to the main Linux developers’ page. What else? I see something called “Zone Highlights” and a list of articles and summaries underneath: hardware diagnosis techniques, security-enhanced Linux, learn to use CVS, write GUI apps in minutes, and the story behind the new K desktop environment. All very much on topic. I am particularly interested in the CVS tutorial.

Wow. Big surprise. This is no mere article. It’s a two hour tutorial that requires (free) registration. Somehow, I already have a user ID and password for IBM.com, so I jump right in.

The tutorial gives step by step instructions for compiling and installing CVS from sources. Then it talks about basics like CVSROOT, the remote password, interacting with CVS, and for developers, there’s info about how to modify files, deal with merging conflicts, the CVS commit, and the .cvsrc file.

I don’t have time to absorb the tutorial right now, so I back out and find that there is a long list of these tutorials: compiling the Linux kernel, advanced Linuxconf, Java courses, and hey, even “Brave GNU World” tutorials. There are too many to list here.

I go back to the main page because I noticed a few columns earlier. We have “Charming Python,” “Common Threads,” and “Cultured Perl,” the latest issue of which is one and the same as the featured article I mentioned earlier.

All of this is only the information linked to in the center column of the page. I haven’t even mentioned anything off to the sides, like “favorite links,” “latest developerWorks Open Source projects,” (there are several), and other things you will find interesting if you are interested in Linux.

No kidding, they don’t call it Big Blue just for the heck of it. There is almost too much information here — definitely more than you can consume in one sitting. It’s the Disney World of developer’s sites — but it won’t set you back a week’s salary to check it out.

Let me know what you think of IBM’s developerWorks site for Linux. And if you know of a site worthy of the NewsForge spotlight, pass that along, too.

NewsForge editors read and respond to comments
posted on our discussion
page.

LinuxJournal.com: “The main advantage of Fibre Channel is to have several computers share the same storage device. This is to a certain degree possible with a regular SCSI bus is but not
done too often. Trying to connect more than two computers may not be easy, involving problems like setting host-IDs and termination problems when a computer is
powered on or off. Using Fibre Channel to connect several computers to the same storage devices is trivial. However, this raises some new and challenging questions. If the
shared devices contain shared files, system problems may occur.”

IBM DeveloperWorks: “In this article, Daniel introduces you to the concepts behind Linux LVM (Logical Volume Management) and shows you how to get the latest kernel patches and
tools installed on your system. LVM allows you to create logical volumes out of the physical storage resources on your machine. However, unlike physical volumes, the
logical volumes can be expanded and shrunk while the system is still running, providing Linux system administrators with the storage flexibility that they’ve until now
only dreamed of.”

Debian.org has posted a schedule for their involvement at CeBIT.

Slashdotters are talking about an eeTimes article about the military’s plans to use embedded Linux in voice/data units.

The highlight of Thursdays: a fresh copy of LWN.

Mikael Pawlo writes “Stanford professor Larry Lessig says that code is law. According to Lessig, the architectures of cyberspace are as important as the law in defining and defeating the liberties of the Net. If code is law, then Linus Torvalds must be the legislator. Is Linus Torvalds too powerful?

Read more at Kuro5hin.“

Network World Fusion reports that the inventor of SSH (Secure Shell) has been denied a trademark request for ‘SSH’, intended to protect his company from several other versions of the same software.

CNet reports that Nintendo has asked retailers to stop marketing Microsoft’s not yet released Xbox, warning that marketing the product could hurt their sales and those of Nintendo.

silver writes “As I have done for the last two year with my i-mode phone I log into my web server using SSL and check if the server is running correctly and if there are any email’s, answer them and close all while I sit on the toilet. Only problem is that I can only do it in from my PC or my NTT DoCoMo phone, but this is all about to change. NTT DoCoMo plans to open its i-mode Internet communication service network for cellular phones to other telecommunication operators by the spring of 2003, just in time for Christmas and a US launch. What does that mean? Well imagine i-mode as an operating layer or protocal for ever other application out there, i-mode in the toaster, i-mode in fridge. It seems i-mode and NTT plan i-mode to be the next generation of internet operating systems for embeded hardware and with already 20 million subscribers I think of it as a standard soon :)”
The story is at www.yomiuri.co.jp.