“The use of Java to build application servers is gaining in popularity and
is in fact dominating that market. Two leading vendors in this realm, BEA
Systems and iPlanet, have been certified for the Java 2 Enterprise Edition
(J2EE) platform specification from Sun Microsystems. IBM is likely to follow
suit.

Driving the greater acceptance of J2EE-based application servers is the
promise that they can be interchangeable, no matter the vendor.” Full story at InfoWorld.

Reuters via InfoWorld reports on the FCC’s recently-concluded wireless spectrum action. Sales were a record $16.86 billion, with Verizon Wireless scooping up over 100 of the 422 licenses available.

MSNBC reports: “Much to the chagrin of an army of skeptics and
ill-wishers, the Secure Digital Music Initiative lives.
Though executive director Leonardo Chiariglione
announced on Tuesday that he would step down to
focus on the expanded duties of his day job at Telecom
Italia, SDMI will continue pressing forward with its
unpopular mission: establishing a framework for record
labels to market online music that cannot be freely
copied and distributed over the Internet. There is even
talk that the famously deliberative body will start picking
up the pace.”

Version 1.1.6 of the Common UNIX Printing System (CUPS) is now available. CUPS provides a portable printing layer for UNIX-based operating systems. This version includes new security enhancements and bug fixes. More information and download at cups.org.

“Former versions of the exmh program used /tmp for storing temporary
files. No checks were made to ensure that nobody placed a symlink
with the same name in /tmp in the meantime and thus was vulnerable to
a symlink attack. This could lead to a malicious local user being
able to overwrite any file writable by the user executing exmh.” Full details at LWN.net.

LWN.net posts: “Versions older than 3.23.31 have a buffer overflow vulnerability that
could be exploited remotely depending on how the database access is
configured (via web, for example).”

CNN reports that the Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act (UCITA) is slated for debate and votes in four US states year. UCITA is a controversial bill that gives the software industry unprecedented power in defining the terms of product sales.

ZDNet reports that sources close to Palm say a new version of the popular handheld device could be released soon. The new unit will feature a hardware upgrade and expansion slot, similar to the one offered by Palm clone Handspring.

From LinuxPlanet: “I was talking to a colleague recently who wanted to know what it’s like to write about Linux. He’d read discussions on a few Linux sites
and come across one where a writer had gotten himself fairly mauled for drawing the wrong conclusion and getting linked by the wrong
site for his troubles.

“I don’t know,” my colleague said, “but you guys are sorta out there. No one else cares about stuff like this and you guys are all like
‘GPL this’ and ‘Microsoft sucks that’ and you all just rip on anybody who doesn’t see it that way. No one takes you guys seriously.””

“The discovery of the first Linux worm to go feral has sent a stark message to the Linux community not to be complacent about protecting their computer systems.” Full report at NewScientist