Title = Open News - Episode 28 - October 2, 2007 This is Open News for October second, 2007 ... Intro Hi. I'm Aaron Newcomb and this week on Open News Bundling Windows No Good In Europe, Monsoon Settles GPL Dispute, and the OSI Finds Fault With MS-PL. Before we get into the main stories I would like to thank all the volunteers who worked on Ohio Linux Fest. It was another stellar show this year and I would highly recommend it to all our listeners. Be watching our sister site thesourceshow.org to catch interviews with John "Maddog" Hall as well as Max Spevak of the Fedora Project and Joe Born of Neuros. Now here are some news briefs. News Briefs Brief 1 = Bundling Windows No Good In Europe = http://www.globalisation.eu/briefings/competition-policy/unbundling-microsoft-windows-200709231241/ A new report submitted to the European Commission says that bundling Microsoft Windows with new computers is a bad idea. Instead the Globalization Institute that wrote the report suggests that users should decide for themselves which operating system to install. “Competition would encourage open standards and interoperability as vendors would, for competitive reasons, want their products to interact with other vendors’ products,” the submission says. Brief 2 = UT3 Will Have Linux Binaries = http://www.linuxgames.com/news/feedback.php?identiferID=9593&action=flatview Good news for Linux gamers this week. Several sources have confirmed that Unreal Tournament 3 will have a linux version on the installer CD when the game ships. Unreal Tournament 2004, also included the Linux client and server binaries on the retail disc. Brief 3 = U.S. Department of Energy Powers Up Linux = http://www.linuxwins.com/us-department-of-energy-installing-redhat-linux/ The U.S. Department of Energy is beginning to see the light. The have hired DLT Solutions Inc. to provide $45 million dollars worth of Linux systems. Who says you can't make money with Linux? And now on to the main stories of the week. Stories Story 1 = Monsoon Settles GPL Dispute = http://www.linux-watch.com/news/NS3761924232.html In case you missed it last week the first GPL copyright violation suit was filed in Manhattan Federal District Court. Although now it seems that the case will be settled. According to Steven Vaughn Nicols on linux-watch.com ... "The first U.S. GPL-related lawsuit appears to be headed for a quick out-of-court settlement. Monsoon Multimedia admitted today that it had violated the GPLv2 (GNU General Public License version 2), and said it will release its modified BusyBox code in full compliance with the license. Monsoon Multimedia has stated that it is currently in settlement negotiations with the BusyBox project to resolve the matter without going to court. The company also said in a statement that it intends to fully comply with all open-source software license requirements. The company plans to make its modified BusyBox source code publicly available on on its website in the coming weeks, it said. The developers of BusyBox came to the SFLC after unsuccessfully trying to resolve the issue with Monsoon into on their own. One of the conditions of the GPL is that re-distributors of GPL-licensed software are required to ensure that each downstream recipient is provided access to the source code of the program. On the company's own website, Monsoon Multimedia had publicly acknowledged that its products and firmware contain BusyBox. However, the company has not provided access to the underlying source code." Monsoon also released a formal apology to the free software community on lwn.net last week. Story 2 = OSI Finds Fault With MS-PL = http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,2185919,00.asp?kc=EWRSS03129TX1K0000616 A few weeks ago we told you that Microsoft was going to submit their so called "open" licenses to the OSI for approval. Well, the first reports out of the OSI on the subject aren't too encouraging for Microsoft. According to an article on eweek.com ... "The Microsoft Permissive License, one of two licenses the software maker submitted to the Open Source Initiative for approval as open-source licenses in August, is unlikely to be approved in its current form. There have been two principle objections to the license from the open-source community, Michael Tiemann, the president of OSI, told eWEEK in an interview here at the annual Gartner Open Source Summit on Sept. 20. The first objection is that the use of the word "permissive" in the license title implies an expectation that the license does not meet. The second complaint is that the MS-PL (Microsoft Permissive License) is incompatible with a large number of other open-source licenses, he said. "Microsoft submitted their licenses to us and there was, of course, a certain amount of flak that went up about this. But we attempted to pre-empt some of that by saying this was not about militating for or against a given company, but rather looking objectively at the licenses and proactively at the Open Source Definition, and running the approval process in a fair way," he said. But the two primary criticisms of the MS-PL are valid, Tiemann said. "I, and others, would characterize the BSD license as a permissive license. The MS-PL, as drafted, does not have any of the properties of the combinability that BSD permits. So one of the complaints launched was that it should not be called a permissive license if it is not," he said. "My understanding is that the Microsoft guys are considering whether it is more appropriate to change the legal language to make it more permissive," he said. Microsoft could also change the name to something that was more faithful to the legal language, Tiemann said. "That is up to them and I think the community does not have a position one way or the other, except that they don't like the fact that something which is restrictive is called permissive," he said. " Story 3 = Gartner Calls Open Source The Biggest Disruptor = http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,2186932,00.asp?kc=EWRSS03129TX1K0000616 The effect that open source software is having on the software market is big and will only get bigger according to analyst firm Gartner. According to another eweek.com article ... "Gartner declared open-source software the biggest disruptor the software industry has ever seen and postulated it will eventually result in cheaper software and new business models. Open-source products accounted for a 13 percent share of the $92.7 billion software market in 2006, but should account for 27 percent of the market in 2011 when revenue is expected to be $169.2 billion, according to Gartner research. And, as open source adoption grows, expect its influence to grow, said Gartner research director Laurie Wurster in a presentation, "Measuring Open Source Market Influencers," at the Gartner Open Source Summit Sept. 21 here. "Open-source software is going to erode proprietary sales revenue by offering less-expensive or free alternatives, expanding the total market potential by meeting the demands of SMBs for affordable solutions, and creating a new business model for established and emerging service providers to provide selection, customization and management services for open-source solutions," Wurster said." Story 4 = Swedish State Pharmacy Chooses Linux = http://www.ad-hoc-news.de/Aktie/12717491/News/13319789/SOFTWARE.html Getting a prescription filled in Sweden will soon mean that you are using Linux. This according to an article found on ad-hoc-news.de. It states ... " Red Hat, the world's leading provider of open source solutions, today announced that Apoteket (The Swedish State Pharmacy), Sweden's largest state-owned pharmacy chain, has chosen to replace all of its servers at approximately 900 pharmacies with Red Hat Enterprise Linux running on Intel hardware. Apoteket's server infrastructure was slowly reaching end of life and experiencing Performance issues as a consequence of age. After careful evaluation, Apoteket made the decision to replace both the hardware platform and the server operating system with Red Hat Enterprise Linux running on Intel-based servers. Following the purchase, all servers at approximately 900 pharmacies will be replaced with Red Hat Enterprise Linux. "When you are dealing with people's health, you really do need an IT system that both the pharmacy and patients can rely on," said Anders Persson, IT manager at Apoteket. "We put high demands on the quality of applications, availability and cost efficiency. The switch to Red Hat Enterprise Linux is part of a strategy to offer our customers the best possible access and service, while cutting costs and modernizing our IT infrastructure." " Releases It's time to take a look at some releases that came out in the past week. Release 1 = Gnome 2.20 = http://www.gnome.org/ Gnome 2.20 was released recently. Improvements to the desktop manager include improved support for right-to-left languages; desktop search integrated into the file chooser dialog; convenient new features in the Evolution email and calendar client; enhanced browsing of image collections; simplified system preferences; efficient power management and incredibly accurate laptop battery monitoring. You should start to see this version of Gnome as the default desktop manager in upcoming versions of Ubuntu and Fedora. You can find out more at gnome.org. Tip Of The Week = Enabling Sudu Insults = http://ubuntu-unleashed.blogspot.com/2007/09/enable-sudo-insults-for-some-laughs.html Today's tip comes our way from ubuntu-unleashed.blogspot.com. Sometimes when you are busy at work in your systems terminal you just need to laugh to take your mind off things. If you fat finger your password as much as I do then you might want to turn on the insults option in your sudo program. To do this you run the application visudo as root and add the option "insults" to the end of the line that starts with "Defaults". The next time you log in with a default password you may not get the response you are used to. Maybe something like "I've seen penguins that can type better than that" or "Your mind just hasn't been the same since the electro-shock, has it?". Whatever the case if it breaks up the monotony it might just be worth a try. If you would like to send in your comments or share a tip with our listeners you can email us at opennewsshow@gmail.com or visit our website at opennewsshow.org where you can find links to all the news stories we comment on by clicking the link that says Latest Stories. Also remember to be watching our sister site at thesourceshow.org for our coverage of the recent Ohio LinuxFest. Until next time I'm Aaron Newcomb ... have a great week. Insert Ontario Linux Fest Promo ** Other peoples works that are cited on Open News can be referenced at http://www.opennewsshow.org/aggregator/categories/1