Yes, computer geeks *do* have a sense of humor!

Date Sun, 4 Feb 2007 11:10:36 -0800 (PST) From Linus Torvalds <> Subject Super Kernel Sunday!

In a widely anticipated move, Linux “headcase” Torvalds today announced the immediate availability of the most advanced Linux kernel to date, version 2.6.20.

Before downloading the actual new kernel, most avid kernel hackers have been involved in a 2-hour pre-kernel-compilation count-down, with some even spending the preceding week doing typing exercises and reciting PI to a thousand decimal places.

I read a blog post a few days ago where someone who purported to be a Linux user (so as to not be accussed of trolling) claimed that although Linux and its freedoms were great and all - at the end of the day - the user had to return to Windows to get any serious stuff done. Well, I’m here to say, that I think that’s completely bogus. I haven’t had my Windows computer on since last Monday and I’m only turning it on today to work on my photography. All week long I’ve used Linux for everything, even helping to correct my younger brother’s paper by using Open Office.org Writer.

KDE.news has reported on part of the progress of KDE 4 specific to SVG graphcs. (I know that’s redundant) It’s redundant because SVG stands for Scalable Vector Graphics. Ever since about 2 years ago, Gnome and other projects began to move to SVG rather than PNG, JPG or other types of graphics. “What’s the advantage?” you may be asking yourself. Well, the advantage lies in how pictures are represented in SVG instead of, say, PNG and its ilk.

A few big things in Fedora News. First of all, the Fedora Summit happened recently. They are tackling a lot of things for Fedora Core 7 including blurring the line between Core and Extras (a point of contention for those moved from Core to Extras - they were less important they felt) and finally having a true LiveCD. You can read more about it at Linux.com’s review of the Fedora Summit.

In an interesting game of Russian dolls Techalign released Pioneer Linux, based on Ubuntu, which in turn is based upon the venerable Debian Linux. Technically, they’ve based it off of Kubuntu which is a KDE spinoff of Ubuntu; they aren’t even using Ubuntu proper. So when they send patches upstream, are they sending them to Ubuntu or Debian? Check out their free version, live CD, or pay version.

Red Hat is moving from the Nasdaq to the New York Stock Exchange. Great for the bean counters, probably won’t mean much for us.

As I read this article about how this guy’s kids love Linux and hate Windows, I had a couple of questions come to my mind. First of all, is this a testament to how easily kids learn things? Second, what does this mean for newbies to Linux who complain that it’s not as easy as Windows?

According to the article:

Here was a five year old, traversing the directories, finding applications and opening them without any hesitation. He had no issue figuring out how to open and close screens, move them around, or change their size. The tool bars, menus and icons were all intuitive to these kids.

I have to say that the first thing I noticed when I booted into gNewSense is that they have chosen a supremely ugly theme for their icons. I felt like plucking my eyes out rather than continue with this distro. I don’t know why I had such a against it. As you can see in the screenshot below, it’s just not aesthetically pleasing! I gues I’m just used to Fedora’s nice, smooth icons. Some people may say that Fedora’s icons are getting tired, but I like it.

Eben Moglen, a lawyer for the Free Software Foundation, remarks that the new deal may violate Section 7 of the GPL! So now you see that the stakes in the GPLv3 talks are very high! The GPLv2 may indeed be our saviour against Microsoft’s tyranies, but more on that momentarily! Mr. Moglen specifically comments:

“If you make an agreement which requires you to pay a royalty to anybody for the right to distribute GPL software, you may not distribute it under the GPL,” Moglen told CNET News.com Thursday. Section 7 of the GPL “requires that you have, and pass along to everybody, the right to distribute software freely and without additional permission.”

So, by now this is a little older news, but I wanted to wait for some more information before blogging. Novell has signed a deal with the devil, I mean Microsoft. When I first heard the story yesterday I thought, “OH sh$t! It’s embrace and extend and it’s with Linux!” Novell’s Press Release spun it as a positive thing for Linux. In reality, if you pay attention for the words, their point is that this partnership is good for Novell and Suse Linux, not all Linux users. I could have said, “Well, at least we have Red Hat in the business spaces to keep things going well.” But, no, Oracle had to botch that up last week. One of the biggest steps backwards this agreement takes, is that now Novell is support Microsoft’s Office XML format. NO NO NO! We were supposed to be going towards OPEN standards! You know, like the IEEE promotes! Why? Because we all know that proprietary standards can really cause things to get locked up when the proprietary vendor stops supporting it. But then again, maybe Novell doesn’t know this since it promoted Netware and other such proprietary produces before trading its stripes for Linux.

So you thought Debian was pretty anal about free software did you? Well you ain’t seen nothin’ yet! Love ’em or hate ’em, but the Free Software Foundation is very serious (and extreme) in their position of what constitutes free software. Although this has alienated some, I think that a certain amount of what they do is necessary because the forces of Evil in the World as pulling just as hard in the other direction. (eg Trusted Computing, DRM, etc) Well, RMS likes to get into quibbles with Linux distros over the fact that they don’t call them GNU/Linux systems when a large portion of important programs (GCC, for example!) come from the GNU project. So, they decided to play on Linux’s turf. (instead of finishing their own kernel, HERD) Using the power of the GPL (which the FSF is in charge of), they forked a Debian/Ubuntu mix of Linux which is 100% free! That’s right, forget the little fights over Firefox/IceWeasel. gNewSense (nuisance? the first part is creative pun on GNU, but the overall word may or may not be what they were looking for) is a Linux distribution where ALL of the software has the sources available. Anything available only in binaries (eg nVidia/ATI drivers) are nowhere to be found!