Chris Cheney writes: "Linux 2.4.0-test1 is out with a note from Linus for more details. Why does all the cool stuff come out after potato is frozen? " With Linus being gone for three weeks, Alan is likely to maintain a 2.4.0-ac series. It's getting closer...

Anton asks: "This is a question about Linux failover in business situations. We are a growing B2B company; our product runs on Apache/Linux. We contracted professional services to properly set up our network. After all the hellishly expensive CISCO hardware had been set up it turns out that for our servers to be configured for failover, each one needs two dual-port NICs configured for one IP connected to two different switches, furthermore the driver needs to intelligently switch the ports when the active port fails ... We've never heard of such beasts for Linux and a net search revealed nothing. Our consultant however claims that 'Linux is biting itself in the foot' for not supporting that, and that other industrial strength OS's like solaris in fact do support this. Has anyone run into this before or have other ideas? " [nik suggests]: Take a look at Polyserve Understudy, which might be an alternative. FreeBSD and Linux versions are available (and bundled with FreeBSD 4.0).

petard writes: "CNet is holding an OS death match between Corel GNU/Linux and Mac OS 9. An advocate of each is invited to answer the question of which is better on the desktop in the areas of Installation, Interface, Applications, Hardware Compatiblility and Internet Support. At first I thought it was flamebait, but the article is reasonably well done and highlights genuine strengths and weakness of each OS." It's really easy to say, 'Yeah, well, wait for Eazel,' but this comparison is a hard reminder that people think about the here and now, not just the soon.

starvo pointed us to a ZD Net story about the recent trouble at LinuxCare. It's got a fair amount of details about all the problems that led to both the CEO & CIO jumping. Linuxcare has been pretty mysterious about the whole thing, so it's nice to finally get some meat to chew on... the article is relatively fair.

Matthew Miller recently went through the RH300 training course, as well as the RHCE Certification Exam. He was kind enough to write an overview and give us his opinions on both of them, as well as his opinions on the relevance and quality of the training and the exam. Certification has been discussed extensively with regards to Linux, and here's a big scoop of food for thought.

DAldredge sent us linkage to a ZD Net article that talks about Red Hat announcing that it would be sending the EFF ^[?] $70k to help with the defense in fair use and reverse engineering cases, specifically like the recent DeCSS hoopla. Update: 05/22 12:30 by CT : Marc Ewing wrote in to tell us that this $ actually came from the Red Hat Center, started by him and Bob Young.

A reader writes: "According to the following Cnet news article, it looks like Lineo is planning to go public, despite the recent downturn in Linux stocks. I wish them luck."

DayTrader Dreaming of Penguins asks: "For the past few weeks, I've been on an avid search for something I would have thought would be easy to find. I visited chat rooms, Web sites, and news groups. But I'm still left empty handed. I'm looking for the tools and indicators for DayTrading that could be used under Linux. Things like real-time charts, and NASDAQ Level 2 windows are virtually unavailable in one software package for the Linux Community. Due to lack of option I had to give up my Linux machine for one with a window. With software like DTNIQ, WindowOnWallStreet, and countless other services available for Windows, why is it Linux has yet to capitalize? Maybe I'm just looking in the wrong places?" How difficult would it be for a new project to break into this market? It would seem that such tools are based on incredibly proprietary (read: expensive) protocols and hence Free Software un-Friendly.

nicktook writes: "ZDNet has this story that RedHat has released a full alpha distribution for the 64-bit Itanium processor. Can Itanium hardware even be bought yet?" Not by jes folks, that's for sure. cnoe also sent a link to the official announcement from Red Hat as well. Coupled with SGI's release of Pro64 compilers for Itanium, it seems like Intel's Next Big Chip keeps whispering "penguins." Stunning news from MS on this front is long overdue.

mister_nate sent us a really cool interview with Jon "Maddog" Hall. I've said this before, but Maddog is the perfect Linux advocate. A lot of Slashdot readers (and I definitely include myself in this statement) can learn a lot by watching the way Jon handles Linux Advocacy. It's amazing.

Make no mistake. Andy Hertzfeld, Eazel developer and Macintosh forefather, is an Open Source zealot. Forged in the fires of Steve Jobs and Bandley 3, Andy's leading the team to build a kinder, gentler interface for our favorite operating system. I got the opportunity to speak to Andy last week, and I learned a lot about the challenges and victories of thinking different with Linux.

Dave Sifry writes: "I wanted to let you guys know that my response to Tim O'Reilly's recent column about Linuxcare. Things really aren't as bad as some in the press have made it appear. I feel it is important to get a dose of facts into the conversation -- now that we're out of our quiet period and we can talk about what's going on, and all of the neat stuff we've been working on." After all that's been said about LinuxCare, it's good to hear info straight from the top, and that Tim O'Reilly is an active listener. Just remember who's speaking.

nodvin writes: "CNN is reporting Linux users unscathed by ILOVEYOU. It is interesting that none of the multiple e-mail accounts on my Linux IMAP-POP servers seems to have encountered the virus. The mail server that I use is Communigate Pro from Stalker Software running under either Red Hat 6.2 or Linux-Mandrake 7.0. Perhaps the fact that I have Communigate Pro enabled for the MAPS Realtime Blackhole List (RBL) helped prevent ILOVEYOU from getting through. " It's a Petreley piece from LinuxWorld, but kinda cool seeing it on CNN.

~-zman-~ asks: "How should Linux User Groups advocate Linux/free software in their community. Obviously, meetings and 'installfests' are good ideas, but my group has been pondering public service announcements and LUG radio. What do you guys think?" Interesting thought. If Microsoft can have TV commercials, why can't LUGs make radio announcements. Click below and share your thoughts, and suggestions.

joel_archer writes "According to this article on C|Net Red Hat Ventures division will take $500,000 to $2 million stakes in new companies specializing in open-source software and Internet infrastructure technology. Red Hat said it hopes to identify new business opportunities through the funding of start-ups. "

chromatic returns with a book tuned for anyone whose answer to heterogeneous networks is SAMBA, and wants 500 pages of practical advice (and answers to common problems) distilled from the fountain of SAMBA knowlege.

Leo Comitale writes "According to this press release the Linux Standard Base and the Linux Internationalization (I18N) project have merged and are calling themselves the Free Standards Group. I think it is really important for Linux to have a basic, low level standard for file system layout and support for international languages. These areas are critical to keeping Linux from splintering into a bunch of incompatible variants, and it seems these efforts are not getting as much support as they probably should be."

dmelomed asks: "I would like to Ask Slashdot about Linux's PHYSICAL limits of partition and FS size on i386 and 64 bit chips. What are the maximum real-life possible partition sizes on big RAIDs (several TB) that the kernel can work with reliably? What are better filesystems to use that handle LARGE RAIDS?"

Eupolis writes "Reuters reports that Linuxcare has withdrawn its IPO filings, and is now cutting staff to try to keep from running out of money. " As well as the report from Reuters, News.com has an analysis of the situation as well.

Fluid Donkey was the first of many to let us know that kernel 2.2.15 has come down the wire. It's a fairly large patch (just over a meg), but it contains many updates, including support for Intelligent Input/Output (I20) devices. You can find it in the usual places. (ftp.<two-letter-country-code>.kernel.org if you forgot)