The Real Lenovo Laptop Deal

August 16, 2006 1 Comment

Contrary to the details in the original story, Lenovo will not be preloading Linux on a new Thinkpad. From the article:
The new “Linux-enabled” Lenovo laptop launched this week at LinuxWorld will not actually come “pre-loaded” with Novell SUSE Linux, a high-ranking Lenovo official said today, contradicting some industry reports stating otherwise.
Aggarwal maintained that Lenovo will be the first mobile PC maker to provide full phone support for a Linux laptop. Moreover, all Linux drivers needed for the T60p will be downloadable directly from Lenovo's Web site.
But he told LinuxPlanet that the T60p–an inch-thin, 4.7-pound laptop based on Intel's Centrino Duo processing technology–will be sold with a “blank hard disk.”
Not quite as exciting as the original speculation and certainly not the breakthrough deal for OEM Linux. That being said, it is a step in the right direction and it's good to see proper phone support and Linux drivers available directly from Lenovo. At over $3,000USD for a 14 inch screen though, I don't see this being a big seller in the end. This is another small iterative step in the evolution that will probably realistically take another couple years.
–jeremy
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Filed under Linux, Main Page, Open Source

First open source Java code promised for October

August 16, 2006 Leave a comment

Following up on an earlier promise, Sun will be publish the first parts of Open Source Java in October. More code will follow soon after, with the process being completed by 2007. The first bits to open will be Java C and the Hotspot VM, which isn't surprising since decent Open implementation already exist here. A license hasn't been decided yet, which was a bone of contention after the original Sun announcement. With the missing license info and details on exactly what Sun will be Open Sourcing extremely light (will it include the mobile stuff or the class libraries), the article doesn't give us much more than we knew on the direction of this initiative, but we do finally have a firm date. It's good to see Sun quickly following through on their promise and we're all anxiously anticipating watching this unfold. In the end, this could have far reaching implications, not only for OSS (especially projects like OOo), but mobile computing and really computing in general.
–jeremy
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HP offers Debian Linux support

August 14, 2006 1 Comment

Hewlett-Packard is throwing its support behind Debian, and is the first tier one hardware maker to align itself with the noncommercial community-based Linux offering. From the article:
“We've had a number of customers continuing to ask us to have broader support for Debian,” and HP decided to oblige, said Jeffrey Wade, worldwide marketing manager at HP's Open Source and Linux Organization. Red Hat and Novell will remain HP's main Linux partners globally, however.
According to the article, HP will offer technical support for installation and configuration during a server's warranty period and later this year, it will begin selling “care packs” to help customers with Debian problems (although no details on what a care pack constitutes was in the article). HP has had a long history with Debian, and many will likely find it surprising that there is no mention of Ubuntu. I think this is an interesting move, but you should take note of the following:
Debian won't be on the same level as Red Hat or Novell, though, Wade said. HP won't market it, and customers will have to download the software on their own. Software combinations with partners such as BEA Systems or Oracle won't be available with Debian. And HP won't formally certify Debian for its servers.
Despite those caveats, this should serve to further solidify Linux in the server market and it will be interesting to see how other OEM's react. I think HP could be a possibility as an OEM that jumps into the Linux on the desktop game. They're looking for any way they can to get a leg up on Dell at this point, and a good Linux strategy on both the server and the desktop may give them an extra boost.
–jeremy
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Filed under Linux, LinuxWorld, Main Page, Open Source

Open Source: Architecture or Goodwill?

August 10, 2006 Leave a comment

Sparked by a debate between Jeremy Zawodny and Matt Asay about whether companies like Yahoo! and Google are good Open Source citizens, Tim O'Reilly has posted an interesting Radar piece about the future of Open Source in a world that is increasingly web-based. From the post by Tim:
There are a lot of reasons why people make their code open source. I believe that one of the strongest original motivations has often been overlooked. Our hagiography tells the tale of how it all started with the quest for software freedom. But contemporaneous with Richard Stallman's story, other people were taking the same path (releasing source code) for a very different reason: the architecture of Unix.
The Software as a Service movement certainly has the potential to shake up what Open Source means to software. Tim makes some insightful points.
But in the world of Web 2.0, applications never need to be distributed. They are simply performed on the internet's global stage. What's more, they are global in scope, often running on hundreds or thousands or even hundreds of thousands of servers. They have vast databases, and complex business processes required to keep those databases up to date.
As a result, one of the motivations to share — the necessity of giving a copy of the source in order to let someone run your program — is truly gone. Not only is it no longer required, in the case of the largest applications, it's no longer possible.
That's why companies are having to think about new ways to “open source” their product. In the O'Reilly Radar Executive Briefing at OSCON, we looked at three of those ways:
The GPLv3 does make an attempt to address some of this issue, but the software world is rapidly changing and we could very well be at an inflection point. Open Source may very well have to go through an evolution to keep pace. Here's hoping our leaders and visionaries are listening. Indeed, as Tim says, the story has not been written.
–jeremy
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Filed under Google, Linux, Main Page, Open Source

Jono is the new Ubuntu Community Manager

August 10, 2006 Leave a comment

A quick congratulations to Jono, who will be the new Ubuntu Community Manager. I had a good number of beers with Jono at the last SCALE and he's a good guy who's well deserving of the position. He should have his work cut out for him trying to toe the line between Debian, Ubuntu and Canonical. Good luck Jono.
–jeremy
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Filed under Linux, Main Page, Open Source

Andrew Morton Moves To Google

August 9, 2006 Leave a comment

In a move I somehow missed a couple days ago, Andrew Morton is now employed by Google, where he'll continue to maintain the 2.6 Linux kernel. From the article:
The reason for this odd statement is explained by who was funding Morton's employment to begin with. Morton was named a full-time Open Source Development Labs Fellow in July 2003, and it is a common misperception that he was directly employed the OSDL. In actuality, Morton was employed by Palo Alto-based Digeo Interactive.
“My position there was funded by OSDL so that I could work on the kernel full-time,” Morton said in an interview with Linux Today.
Until recently, the arrangement worked very well for the developer, who is oft-times referred to as Linus Torvalds' right-hand man. But recently, changes began to take place.
“There were reorganizations at Digeo which would have changed my work situation in ways which were not attractive, and it was time to move on,” Morton explained.
The OSDL offered to directly employ Morton while he worked from home, but Morton indicated that he preferred to work in an office with other engineers. Thus a search for a new home was underway.
He also added his desire to work for a company that did not have a vested commercial interest in the kernel.org kernel. On the heels of the Google Code Project Hosting announcement, Google is clearly stepping up its Open Source support.
–jeremy
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Niall Kennedy is Leaving Microsoft

August 9, 2006 Leave a comment

That didn't take long. Niall Kennedy, who was seen as an ad hoc blogger evangelist replacement for Scoble at Microsoft, is already leaving. From his post:
The stock plummeted on the announcement Microsoft did not have its costs under control. Microsoft's market cap lost close to $59 billion in the six weeks after I joined and second quarter financials were released, more than the GDP of Ecuador and over half the market cap of Google. What do you do when the market responds to your 6 month-old online services strategy by reducing your valuation by 1.5 Yahoos? Windows Live is under some heavy change, reorganization, pullback, and general paralysis and unfortunately my ability to perform, hire, and execute was completely frozen as well.
Looks like Microsoft may be taking the short sighted approached and be letting the Street dictate a bit too much. Microsoft, in a bit of irony if you ask me, is in the middle of what Clayton Christensen calls the Innovator's Dilemma. A disruptive technology is upon us, but the sustaining technology for Microsoft (in the form of Windows and Office) is just too much of a cash cow. They can't move away too fast, lest they loss too much of their incoming cash, but at the same time they face a very real possibility of being left behind. Add to that attempting to placate Wall Street and you have one snarky situation on your hands. Now, Microsoft has a ton of cash to help them in this, but at the rate they are going to have to spend, that cash could go away faster than one might think. Now, I'm not one of those Open Source fanatics that will claim Microsoft will be irrelevant this time next year. They'll be relevant for a long time to come. But there is a strong possibility that a major snafu now will mark the beginning of the end. Keep in mind though, the “end” won't be a company that goes out of business, but one that looks like the railroads or Xerox does today. I continue to wonder how history will look back on Ballmer.
–jeremy
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Filed under Main Page, Microsoft, Open Source

Apple Opens Up: Kernel, Mac OS Forge, iCal Server, Bonjour, Launchd

August 9, 2006 Leave a comment

After taking a bit of heat for appearing to have closed the XNU source, Apple just announce that XNU and more are being released as Open Source. The projects will be hosted at Mac OS Forge, which will be replacing the OpenDarwin servers and may serve as a home for external (non-Apple) Open Source projects in the future. The one thing I found a bit odd while the previous story was making its rounds was how much heat Apple was taking. They aren't an Open Source company, and the don't really claim to be. They do, however, support Open Source where they feel it's advantageous or beneficial. That's more than can be said for most proprietary software companies. My guess is that the delay was a result of them not wanting the PPC->Intel news to leak too early, or simply that they didn't have sufficient time to cleanup the code for release. It could be something more nefarious though (such as them intending to really close that source and just now changing their mind). The former seems much more likely, but in the end we'll almost certainly never know.
The current list of what Apple is releasing is quite impressive from the brief look I gave it. Especially compelling is the Darwin Calendar Server (also known as iCal Server). This may have the best potential to serve as an Exchange replacement as anything I've seen to date (although it should be noted that Zimbra makes a really good product). Also interesting was the mention of “Apple Teams” on the list of supported clients, which also includes Mozilla Thunderbird. It looks like a wiki-based client that will support team collaboration and shared calendaring. On the topic of licensing, most releases are being done under the Apache license, and in fact some apps that were previous released under the Apple Public Source License have been converted. It's good to see Apple doing their part in cutting down on license proliferation.
–jeremy
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Filed under Linux, Main Page, Open Source

Jeremy Zawodny and Ubuntu Linux on his Thinkpad T43p

August 8, 2006 1 Comment

Jeremy Zawodny just tried Ubuntu 6.06 on a recently purchased Thinkpad T43p. His thoughts? WOW! A quote:
Given all that, I'm shocked and amazed. It works. It just works.
I think this is a very good sign that desktop Linux is well on its way. It's not there yet, but we've crossed an important barrier. I see Jeremy and users like him as the next wave of Linux adopters. They're technically savvy and have tried Linux before, only to give up for various reasons. For the most part, those “various reasons” are almost completely a thing of the past. That's significant. I've heard good things about SLED (Suse Linux Enterprise Desktop) as well. One of these days I'll have to try Ubuntu and SLED to see what I'm missing out on. In the meantime, it's encouraging to see users like Jeremy coming back to Linux and liking it.
–jeremy
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Couple Quick Followups

August 6, 2006 Leave a comment

I had a could quick followups to previous stories, so I'll lump them together in this post.
– On the topic of Ubuntu still being a fairly new offering in the server market, it looks like they now have a Ubuntu Billboard up in California. It's right near the exit for the Oracle offices, which has at least one Oracle employee wondering what Canonical is up to.
– Newsforge has posted Torvalds' comments on GPLv3 committees refuted which is a response to the piece I posted about here. The GPLv3 issue looks like one that is going to get really heated, which isn't going to be good for anyone (at least not anyone in the F/OSS world).
–jeremy
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Filed under Linux, Main Page, Open Source

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