Category: Computers, Science & Technology

Microsoft is now saying that only Novell SUSE Linux customers are free from infringing on their intellectual property. Riiiight!

Novell disputes claim by Microsoft on patents

“In a twist that underscored the unlikely nature of their alliance, Novell Chief Executive Ron Hovsepian publicly distanced his company Monday from Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer’s statement last week that the open-source Linux operating system contains patented Microsoft technology. ‘Importantly, our agreement with Microsoft is in no way an acknowledgment that Linux infringes upon any Microsoft intellectual property,’ Hovsepian wrote in a letter to the open-source community, posted on Novell’s Web site. He added, ‘When we entered the patent-cooperation agreement with Microsoft, Novell did not agree or admit that Linux or any other Novell offering violates Microsoft patents.’ Responding to a question about the Novell deal at a conference in Seattle last week, Ballmer said that Linux ‘uses our patented intellectual property’ and that one result of the pact was to be ‘appropriately compensated’ for that intellectual property. Novell’s Suse Linux is one of many varieties of the open-source operating system, created by worldwide communities of programmers. In his remarks, Ballmer said that, because of the Novell deal, ‘only a customer who has Suse Linux actually has paid properly for the use of intellectual property from Microsoft.'”

FUD, or “Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt” is what Microsoft wants to spread about Linux, because they know it is their biggest true competitor. They are evil. Don’t be swayed.

The most famous “wiki” is probably Wikipedia. In case you don’t know, “wikis” are web sites that can be updated, essentially by anyone, to share collaborative information. Now, there is beginning to be a demand made on Enterprises (large businesses) to bring Wikis into the corporate world. And, there is resistance. Why? Can you say, “Lack of control?”

Wikis Are Alive and Kicking in the Enterprise

“If you haven’t heard that cry already, chances are you will soon, as the use of wikis in enterprise environments spreads like wildfire. Proliferating virally, wiki usage has grown exponentially in recent months, along with other consumer-centric technologies—including blogs, podcasts and RSS—that have made their way into the workplace thanks in part to the influx of the tech-savvy entry-level employees of so-called Generation Y. A wiki, which means ‘quick’ in Hawaiian, is a Web site that enables users to easily edit and update shared content. Computer programmer Ward Cunningham originated the wiki concept and gave it its name more than a decade ago. After slow growth initially, wiki use has exploded in the past couple of years. Wiki technology, which has been popularized by the widely used Web encyclopedia Wikipedia, took a big leap in mind share when Google purchased wiki software maker JotSpot for an undisclosed amount on Oct. 31.”

Have you noticed more spam lately? Well, it is real. Some Russians running a botnet network are pumping out way more spam than normal!

‘Pump-and-Dump’ Spam Surge Linked to Russian Bot Herders

“The recent surge in e-mail spam hawking penny stocks and penis enlargement pills is the handiwork of Russian hackers running a botnet powered by tens of thousands of hijacked computers. Internet security researchers and law enforcement authorities have traced the operation to a well-organized hacking gang controlling a 70,000-strong peer-to-peer botnet seeded with the SpamThru Trojan. According to Joe Stewart, senior security researcher at SecureWorks, in Atlanta, the gang functions with a level of sophistication rarely seen in the hacking underworld. For starters, the Trojan comes with its own anti-virus scanner—a pirated copy of Kaspersky’s security software—that removes competing malware files from the hijacked machine. Once a Windows machine is infected, it becomes a peer in a peer-to-peer botnet controlled by a central server. If the control server is disabled by botnet hunters, the spammer simply has to control a single peer to retain control of all the bots and send instructions on the location of a new control server.”

Please help eradicate spam! How? Never buy ANYTHING you get from an unsolicited message. Go out of your way not to. Once they can’t make money, they will stop. Do your part!

You HAVE to be kidding! You would think Microsoft would have “talked among themselves” and made sure that this embarrassing issue would not have happened!

It’s true: The Zune is incompatible with Vista

“I had heard the Windows Media Player DRM and the Zune DRM were not going to be compatible. (According to this Knowledge Base article, Zune supports Windows Media Player 10’s DRM, but not WMP 11’s. And ‘Zune software and devices only play protected music files from Zune Marketplace.’) That was bad enough. But there is absolutely no way Microsoft would allow the Zune to work only with Windows XP SP2 and Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 Update Rollup 2, I said. It is going to have to support Vista — or at least have a clear-cut upgrade path and timetable as to when Vista support will be provided. But on November 14, Microsoft rolled out the Zune player, which doesn’t work with Vista. And so far, the Softies haven’t provided any public info (that I’ve heard/seen) about when the company will introduce a patch or update enabling the Zune to work with Vista. I already know Microsoft’s justification: Vista only RTM’d on November 8. So there was no way that the Zune team could have made sure the final Vista bits would work with Zunes. All I can say is Microsoft really needs to have a Vista update — or at least a public Vista support strategy — for Zune by the time the company does the business launch of Vista on November 30.”

This is one of those, “I gotta get one” things! A T-Shirt that you can wear that actually allows your “air guitar” playing to generate sound. Whoa!

Australian air guitar T-shirt actually rocks

Australian scientists have invented a T-shirt that allows air guitarists to play actual music as they strum the air. The T-shirt, created by scientists from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), is called a ‘wearable instrument shirt.’ The shirt has censors in each elbow and sleeves to detect and interpret the air guitarist’s arm movements — one arm chooses chords and the other strums imaginary strings. The gestures are then connected wirelessly to guitar audio samples to generate the music. ‘It’s an easy to use, virtual instrument that allows real time music making, even by players without significant musical or computing skills,’ said CSIRO engineer Richard Helmer. ‘It allows you to jump around and the sound generated is just like an original mp3,’ Helmer said in a statement on Monday.”

Well, it has happened! Sun Microsystems announced that it is releasing all of Java under the GPL! Wow!

Sun Pours Out Java Cup

“Sun on Nov. 13 released at www.sun.com/java all versions of Java—Standard, Enterprise and Micro Edition—under GNU GPL (General Public License) Version 2.0. Sun will maintain its commercial license and its CDDL (Common Development and Distribution License) in a multiple-license menu for certain customers that have already built systems based on previous contracts. ‘This undoubtedly is the largest single open-source contribution in the history of IT,’ Rich Green, executive vice president of software for Sun, said in an interview here. ‘It’s the mental final step for Sun and Java.'”

The next release of Ubuntu is already under development. And, this time they are concentrating on user experience more than “back end” development.

Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn) Release Dates

Mark Shuttleworth says of “Feisty”: “The main themes for development in this release will be improvements to hardware support in the laptop, desktop and high-end server market, and an aggressive adoption of emerging desktop technologies. Ubuntu’s Feisty release will put the spotlight on multimedia enablement and desktop effects. We expect this to be a very gratifying release for both users and developers. Edgy has been a wild ride, with some remarkable achievements (nothing like re-inventing and substantially improving on init!) Feisty will be a little more focused on features that are very visible to end-users.”

OK, OK, I know, the podcast normally comes out on Saturday… but I am out of town… and hope to get it done this evening… hang in there! I should be back in town later this evening. And, I have some good stuff!

Well, first it was Office, now Vista. Microsoft has released the product to manufacture. Will YOU use it?

Microsoft Releases Windows Vista To Manufacturing

“Microsoft on Wednesday released Windows Vista to manufacturing, marking the end of the operating system’s five-year, and often difficult, development cycle. ‘This is a good day,’ said Jim Allchin, the co-president of the company’s Windows division, in a press conference Wednesday morning. ‘An hour ago we signed off [on the RTM build]. We’re ready to ship.’ The announcement, which was presaged in leaks from several Windows tipsters and analysts beginning last weekend, means that Microsoft has wrapped up its work on the Vista code, or at least the core code. Work can continue, for instance, on add-ons, including drivers, which will be delivered at launch or after via the Windows Update automatic update service. ‘RTM [release to manufacturing] signifies the next step and the next phase for Vista,’ said Allchin, who added that the torch had been passed to computer makers, which will install the OS on new PCs, and third-party software developers. Allchin also confirmed that Vista would release to corporate customers with volume license agreements before the end of November and that the next-generation OS would meet the previously-set deadline of January 2007. ‘January 30, in fact,’ said Allchin.”

An IBM sponsored study shows: At least in the server world, Linux has won. Web servers and database servers remain the dominant applications, but development environments are now among the most popular systems in production, meaning the trend toward Linux and Open Source applications should accelerate, according to a Blog by Dana Blankenhorn on ZDNet.

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