Practical Technology

for practical people.

May 22, 2009
by sjvn01
4 Comments

Finding the right open-source savvy lawyer

Some days, like it or not, you need a lawyer. For most business purposes, picking the right law firm isn’t usually that big of a deal.

Chances are you already have at least an idea of how to find a contract lawyer, a tax law specialist or a real-estate attorney. But what if your programmers are using open-source code that’s licensed under two different licenses? What if you’re concerned with how a patent might affect open-source software your company is already using? Or let’s say a company based in Utah decides that you’ve put its proprietary code into Linux, who do you turn to then? Now, what should you be looking for in a law firm?

Darn good question. Here are some of the answers you’ll need if you find yourself in a spot where you need someone who knows both IP (intellectual property) law and FOSS (free and open source) licensing.
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May 22, 2009
by sjvn01
1 Comment

A+ for Dell’s new Ubuntu Linux netbook

I was lucky enough to have a friend at Dell who let me play with Dell’s new Latitude 2100-N for a few hours. After he chased me down, he pried it out of my fingers. I didn’t want to give it up. This is one nice Ubuntu Linux-powered netbook.

The Dell unit I looked at came with an Intel Atom N270 CPU running at 1.6GHz. This one had 1GB of DDR2 SDRAM, an 80GB, 5,400rpm hard drive, and integrated Mobile Intel 950 GMA graphics chip set. It also had a 6-cell battery. Like most new netbooks, it comes with a good-sized display: 10.1″. As equipped, this unit would sell for $444.

The base Ubuntu Linux 8.10 equipped unit comes with 512MBs of RAM, a 16GB SSD (solid state drive) and a 3-cell battery. This version of the netbook sells for $369. If you wanted to get the same netbook with XP Home SP3, it would cost you $399. It’s always nice to see a vendor offer you the Linux cost savings.

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May 21, 2009
by sjvn01
0 comments

Netbook Linux gets revved up

Scoffers have been dismissing the Linux netbook, but I’ve been saying all along that the Linux netbook was alive and well and that Google would make its desktop Linux move with Android this year. But, I sure didn’t see everyone this side of Microsoft jumping in the Linux netbook pool for the summer. Well, you know what? That’s exactly what they’re doing.

Let’s start with Dell. We knew that HP and many smaller computer manufacturers were playing with Android on the desktop. But, just recently we discovered that Dell is tinkering with Android on Dell’s new Mini 10 netbook. Dell has always been the most serious OEM (original equipment manufacturer) about desktop Linux. I can think we can safely expect to see Dell being one of the first vendors to ride the Android desktop wave when Google finally gives it the thumbs-up.

Oh, and on another note, Dell has also recently released a new set of laptops in Australia with Ubuntu Linux. Dell gets that desktop Linux is important.

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May 20, 2009
by sjvn01
2 Comments

Cisco makes peace with Free Software Foundation

Last December, the Free Software Foundation sued Cisco for copyright infringement. Some people saw this battle being like a moth tackling a light-bulb-a total no win situation for the moth. But, a few months later, what do we find? Cisco is making friends with the free software instead of burning it to a crisp.

According to today’s Free Software Foundation’s press release, “Cisco has agreed to appoint a Free Software Director for Linksys, a subsidiary of Cisco, to supervise Linksys’ compliance with the requirements of free software licenses such as the GPL (the GNU General Public License). The Free Software Director will report periodically to the FSF regarding Linksys’ compliance efforts”

In addition, “Cisco has further agreed to take certain steps to notify previous recipients of Linksys products containing FSF programs of their rights under the GPL and other applicable licenses, to publish a licensing notice on the Linksys website, and to provide additional notices in a separate publication. … Cisco will continue to make the complete and corresponding source code for versions of FSF programs used with current Linksys products freely available on its website. Cisco will also make a monetary contribution to the FSF.”

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May 19, 2009
by sjvn01
0 comments

Burying the truth? Boycott Novell hit by Denial of Service attack

Boycott Novell is one opinionated site. If you think I’m pro-Linux and hard on Microsoft, you haven’t been reading Roy Schestowitz, who makes me look as mild as a May day. Boycott Novell, which was founded in 2006 in reaction to Novell’s partnership with Microsoft, is very popular with about a million hits per month, but it’s also made enemies. Enemies who seem to have had enough of Boycott Novell recently launched a DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack, which has almost knocked the site out.

In an e-mail interview with Schestowitz, he wrote that he’s trying to make the best of a bad situation, “I guess the most reassuring way to look at it is as a sign of success. If they try to shut us up so miserably by resorting to crime, then it means our writings have great impact.”

As for the DDoS attack, Schestowitz wrote, the site “has been under DDoS attack for 3 days now. We’re still struggling to just stay online while hosts investigate where the attacks come from.” In the meantime, he has spoken to the British police about the matter.

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May 18, 2009
by sjvn01
0 comments

Managing Ubuntu Linux on the cloud

It’s actually pretty darn easy to run a virtual operating system on a server or on the cloud. The real trick is managing them. That’s why I’m excited that Canonical, Ubuntu’s Linux commercial backer, recently released Canonical Landscape 1.3, an Ubuntu network systems management and monitoring service that will let you control your Ubuntu servers no matter whether they’re on your desktop or a few thousand miles away on the Amazon EC2 (Amazon Compute Cloud).

You can get Landscape as either part of the Ubuntu commercial support package or as a standalone service. With it, you can manage multiple instances of Ubuntu on servers, desktops, or the cloud from a single Web interface. If you’re new to EC2, you can also use it to pick out a pre-configured Ubuntu server image and get it up and running in less time then it took me to write this blog posting.

In an e-mail interview, Ken Drachnik, Canonical’s Landscape business manager said “Landscape simplifies system management tasks for users who run Ubuntu on physical or virtual servers in-house or some or all of their Ubuntu servers on the Amazon EC2 cloud. It enables users to manage all instances from the same application.”

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