EmilEifrem writes: "Seems like everybody's getting more and more frustrated by Linus' (in-) ability to handle patches. Rob Landley just wrote an "RFC on Penguin Patch Management" wherein he proposes a "Penguin Patch Lieutenant" system that he believes would scale better. The full discussion can be found on the Linux kernel mailing list. Linus seems to dislike it, as usual, source code maintenance tools/organization are for wimps!, but a lot of others find it a good idea. Anyway, it's a very good read."

joestar writes: "As seen at Mandrake's website, Mandrake Linux 8.2 Beta seems to be available for download at different places. The new features include the ability to install a Mandrake as small as 65Mb on the HD, and encrypted file-system support. I guess it's the good time to report all bugs we don't want to see in the final version. Very promising release, worth a look at!"

Cameron asks: "Has anyone tried to make a Linux cluster on a typical company/school network? I am trying to make a Linux cluster by taking bootable CDs and putting them in computers on an existing network. Red Hat (or another distro if it's better suited) would boot and run off the CD without needing any (or much) HD space. This way the computers aren't changed and I can have a virtual supercomputer for a while. Mmm 18Ghz. Anyway has anyone tried this before? Also I'd appreciate any suggestions on which distro to use and what cluster software/daemons I'd need. i.e. Beowolf or something like it." While an interesting approach to clustering, unless each node has quite a bit of RAM, I would think that you might need a marginal swap partition. What problems do you see with this idea, and would they be surmountable? Might such an idea be useful for quickly converting a computer lab to a cluster when it's not being used for other things?

jlttb writes "LinuxWorld gets under way this week in New York City, and CRN has some extensive preview coverage this morning, including a look at Raptor, IBM's first Linux mainframe, and other IBM and Compaq Linux servers to be announced at the show. A second feature takes a look at the growth of the Linux services channel, from industry heavyweights like IBM, Compaq, Red Hat and Caldera, to smaller 'mom and pop' Microsoft and Novell shops that are re-focusing on Linux. Finally, the magazine looks at how Microsoft and Sun are each fighting back against the gains made by Linux in corporate America." I still haven't packed yet, but I'm looking forward to the show.

Outland Traveller writes: "A few months ago I sent some feedback to RedHat concerning their then $30/month RHN subscription service. I asked them to consider offering a $5/month low end version more suitable for home users with multiple computers. I'm sure that a plenty of other people offered the same suggestion, but I was still surprised when I opened my email this morning and found that the exact service I asked for is not only being offered, but that fast access to iso images has been added as well, among other improvements. I guess I now have to put my money where my mouth is :) Seriously though, this should be good news for people who download RedHat's .iso images but want to financially support RedHat in a way that makes sense."

borgquite asks: "At the school that I work for students waste a lot of paper and toner because they print without thinking. I've been looking at printer quota / charging software, but unfortunately I can't seem to find any for Linux, and the Windows based software is all priced far too high. What I need to do is to say that students can print a certain amount per day/week/month/year, and provide a system where they can pay to increase their quota. I've looked for Linux / BSD based solutions, but all I could find is lots of references to a tool called lpquota, but no information on how I can obtain and implement this on my network. Does anyone know of such a system?"

Well, the wait is finally over. Lindows, the system that promises to bring Windows software to Linux, has finally been released in sneak-preview form. You can catch a first hand review of the system on NewsForge.

shawarma asks: "Due to a recent power outage, I've had to shut down a server running a process that had been running for ages calculating something. The job it was doing would have been done in a few days, I think, but I had to shut it down before the UPS ran out of juice. This got me thinking: Why can't I freeze down the process and thaw it back up at a later time? It ought to be possible to take all the connected memory pages and save them in some way, preserve file handles and pointers, and everything. Maybe net-connections would die, but that's understandable. Has any work been done in this field? If not, shouldn't there be? I'd like to contribute in some way, but I think it's a bit over my head.." Laptops have been doing this in some form for years: most laptops, when they run out of power, or when told by the user will go into "suspend" mode which is similar to what the poster is describing, however outside of laptops, I haven't seen this done. Sleeping processes also do something similar, sending their memory pages into swap so other running processes can use the memory. What, if anything, is preventing someone from taking this a step further?

Ulwarth writes: "Desktop Linux is running a feature documenting a mid-sized company switching to Linux on the desktop, like the City of Largo but this time in a corporate environment. Proof that it can be done - at least for businesses which need only the 'standard' office apps."

$hy_guy asks: "I have been totally striking out finding some info on how to do port forwarding in Linux. I am currently running Mandrake 8.1 as my router and i would like to forward a particular port to another machine on my LAN. I'm pretty sure I have to use iptables but I have been very unsuccesful at the proper syntax. I have scoured through Google and I have not really found any useful info. I would appreciate just a link or something to point me the correct direction. Thanks for the help" I know many of you may think this is an FAQ, but it seems that IPTables confuses many people as this is not the first time this question has hit the bin. If someone has a good general reference on the use of IPTables, please share.

Several readers have submitted word (this one comes from n8twj) that "CNet News is reporting that AOL Time Warner apparently is NOT making a bid to buy Linux manufacturer Red Hat, said sources familiar with the matter."

fingerLess asks: "I recently got pushed over the edge in keyboard use. I use Linux and wanted to find a good voice-to-text solution I can use on Linux on my laptop. It seems the IBM ViaVoice I found was still at 1.0 and there was even some questions if it was still available. But if it isn't being worked on, is it worth it? Has anyone tried any voice products running on top of one of the win-virtual machines and had had any success? My experience with those indicate top much of a performance hit in the AV department (AV seems not to be a real high priority with such products aimed at business or 'Office' productivity). Ideas?" For a while there, it looked like speech recognition was progressing at a pretty good clip, especially with Big Blue leading the charge. However I haven't heard of anything revolutionary happening with this technology for the past 2 years. Did I miss something, or has voice recognition on the desktop lagged.

According to MartinG, Alan has posted to the LKML and said "Im insulted that anyone believes I would continue working for RH if aol/time warner owned them. " This of course refers to the Red Hat/AOL Buyout Rumors that we have been talking about all weekend.

qaseem asks: "I am looking for benchmark results of various applications (DB, WebAS, mail, etc.) on Linux on the S/390 mainframe. I am also looking for tools to stress test these applications when installed in the S/390 Linux partition. I was wondering if anyone has seen such information or tried such tools. On a side note I am also interested in finding a way to relate the MIPS speed of the S/390 to the world of MHz or GHz on other platforms."

Dante wrote in to say "I just read this on the Linux Kernel mailing list, it's from Peter Anvin, one of the ftp.kernel.org maintainers...

andyo from O'Reilly submitted linkage to a report he wrote over there where he urges Red Hat to think twice about letting AOL eat them. Talks about GNN, as well as Netscape. I'm sure this isn't the last word we'll hear on this subject either.

Over at Newsforge, Grant Gross has written an interesting overview of the options available for hosting multiple Linux installations on virtual machines; interestingly, it's not just for those with the big bucks for high-end IBM hardware, though that's surely nice.

bstadil sent in this rumor. The Washington Post isn't exactly a rumor site, so there's probably truth behind it. Wow. It would make a great deal of sense for AOL/Time-Warner to acquire an operating system for leverage against Microsoft - same reason they bought Netscape.

Tom F writes: "LinuxDevices did an interesting interview with Robert Love, the maintainer of the Linux preemptible kernel along with MontaVista. It is an exciting read and has Robert's usual wit and insight."

drwho writes "This just unveiled at the BAWUG meeting tonight: Linux firmware for Access Points. Check this URL for more info. I haven't tried it yet but it looks great!" The upshot is that certain Access Points can be flashed with a stripped-down Linux system, which makes them more flexible than they'd be under the included firmware. There are even some screenshots of a modded access point booting up.