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Databases

Submission + - Will Widenius' "Fedora" Fork of MySQL Work (linuxjournal.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "Michael Widenius, founder and original developer of MySQL, says that most of the leading coders for that project have either left Sun or will be leaving in the wake of Oracle's takeover. To ensure MySQL's survival, he wants to fork from the official version — using his company Monty Program Ab to create what he calls a MySQL "Fedora" project. This raises the larger question of who really owns a commercial open software application: the corporate copyright holders, or the community?"
Programming

Submission + - The Professionalisation of Free Software (computerworlduk.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "Free software may begin as somebody scratching an itch, but one of its great strengths — its collaborative development approach — means that many others get involved. That requires some kind of organisation, for example through the use of "lieutenants", as with Linux. But there's a new approach that's gaining in popularity: to bring in professional, non-coding managers to handle day-to-day running. Examples include Mitchell Baker at Mozilla, Peter Brown at the FSF and more recently Stormy Peters at GNOME. Here's the latest: the Free Software Foundation Europe is now looking for a professional Executive Director too. Is this an inevitable development for large-scale, successful free software projects — and does it matter if the hackers are losing control?"
Patents

Submission + - Can an Open Source Licence Be Patent-Agnostic? (linuxjournal.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "Are there ever circumstances when software patents that require payment might be permitted by an open source licence? That's the question posed by a new licence that is being submitted to the Open Source Inititative (OSI) for review. The MPEG Working Group wants to release a reference implementation of the new MPEG eXtensible Middleware (MXM) standard as open source, but it also wants to be able to sell patent licences. If it can't, it might not make the implemention open source; but if it does, it might undermine the fight against software patent proliferation. So, what should be done?"
Mozilla

Submission + - Email is Dying: How Can We Save Thunderbird? (computerworlduk.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "More and more people seem to be giving up on email — no wonder, when 94% of emails are spam. That's probably one reason why Facebook and Twitter are becoming so popular: they give you far greater control over who can send you messages. So where does that leave open source email programs like Thunderbird? Are they doomed to become irrelevant, or can they re-invent themselves as general messaging clients displaying Facebook messages and tweets alongside emails? What would you like to see in Thunderbird 4.0 and beyond?"
Government

Submission + - Trick Used to Pass French "Three Strikes" (blogspot.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "France's "Loi Hadopi" — better known as "three strikes and you're out" — was passed by the National Assembly late last night when only 16 deputies were present (the voting was 12 in favour, 4 against). Most politicians had left because it was expected that the vote would take place next week. In this way, President Sarkozy has sneaked his controversial legislation through the French parliament — and shown his contempt for the democratic process. So now what?"
Programming

Submission + - Where are the Alpha *Female* Hackers? (blogspot.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "Today is Ada Lovelace Day, celebrating "women excelling in technology." There are plenty of women making great contributions to free software, but are there any high-profile ones that actually *code*, rather than run foundations — like Mozilla's Mitchell Baker or GNOME's Stormy Peters? And if there aren't any/many, how can we nurture more of them?"
Government

Submission + - DNA Biometrics Coming for UK ID Cards? (computerworlduk.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "After years of refusal, the UK government has finally released some internal reviews of its proposed ID cards. Here's the most chilling revelation: "There is general agreement that there should be a second biometric as well as the photograph (or digital photograph). On the assumption that DNA would be too expensive, however, should it be fingerprints or irises (or both)?" That is, in 2004, when the review was written, it was only the expense that prevented the use of DNA as a "second biometric" for ID cards. But since then, sequencing costs have decreased faster than Moore's Law, which means that cost will soon no longer be a barrier. Given the UK government's record on surveillance and DNA databases (which already include nearly one million innocent people), the Orwellian state in Britain is now only a breath — or saliva sample — away."
Programming

Submission + - It's *Not* The 15th Birthday of Linux (linuxjournal.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "There's been a spate of celebrations of Linux's 15th birthday recently. What they'are really marking is the 15th anniversary of version 1.0. But do version numbers matter for free software? The "release early, release often" approach means there's generally little difference between version 0.99.14z, say, and version 1.0. In fact, drawing attention to such anniversaries is misguided, because it gives the impression that free software is created in the same way as traditional proprietory code, working towards a predetermined end-point according to a top-down plan. So how should we be choosing and celebrating free software's past achievements?"
Sun Microsystems

Submission + - The First Truly Open Cloud Computing Solution? (computerworlduk.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "One of the big questions hanging over cloud computing is how to make it truly open. Basing it on open source is one aspect; allowing users to export data another. But open data on its own isn't enough: you need a *compatible* cloud computing service that you can plug it into. That's just what Sun's new cloud offering seems to enable with its API-based approach. As Sun's Tim Bray explains: "Maybe the single most interesting thing about this API is that the spec is published under a Creative Commons "Attribution" license, which means that pretty well anybody can do pretty well anything with it. I'm pretty convinced that if Cloud technology is going to take off, there'll have to be a competitive ecosystem; so that when you bet on a service provider, if the relationship doesn't work out there's a way to take your business to another provider with relatively little operational pain. Put another way: no lock-in." Is this the way forward for open cloud computing?"
Microsoft

Submission + - Is Microsoft Loving LAMP to Death? (blogspot.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "Microsoft recently organised a contest "to get competitive LAMP engineers to increase the volume of technical information around PHP/IIS and application compatibility." It seems to have been a big success: "A total of 71 applications out of the targeted 75 were ported onto IIS, of which 47 were newly ported to IIS." But surely the *real* result is that 47 more PHP/Perl applications now run on the Windows stack as well as on LAMP, weakening the appeal of the latter, and damaging the open source ecosystem. The only winner here seems to be Microsoft Windows: so should open source coders being taking part in these "competitions" at all?"
Operating Systems

Submission + - Russia to Roll Out Open Source for Government (blogspot.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "Russia is rapidly turning into open source's best-kept secret. First, it mandated open source for all public schools; more recently, there has been talk about creating a Russian operating system based on Fedora. And now a draft has been published of plans to roll out open source to all government departments. The document speaks of a phased introduction, including pilot schemes, training for civil servants and support for the development of free software in Russia."
The Internet

Submission + - South Korea Joins the Growing "Three Strikes&# 1

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "For years, the content industries having been trying to get laws passed that would stop people sharing files. For years they failed. Then they came up with the "three strikes and you're out" idea — and it is starting to be put into law around the world. First we had France, followed by countries like Italy, Ireland — and now South Korea: "On March 3, 2009, the National Assembly's Committee on Culture, Sports, Tourism, Broadcasting & Communications (CCSTB&C) passed a bill to revise the Copyright Law. The bill includes the so called, "three strikes out" or "graduated response" provision." Why has the "three strikes" idea caught on where others have failed? And what is the best way to stop it spreading further?"
The Internet

Submission + - UK Government Wants to Kill Net Neutrality in EU (iptegrity.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "Not content with snooping on all Internet activity, the UK government now wants to introduce changes to the contentious EU Telecoms Package, which will kill net neutrality there: "Amendments to the Telecoms Package circulated in Brussels by the UK government, seek to cross out users' rights to access and distribute Internet content and services. And they want to replace it with a 'principle' that users can be told not only the conditions for access, but also the conditions for the use of applications and services. The amendments, if carried, would reverse the principle of end-to-end connectivity which has underpinned not only the Internet, but also European telecommunications policy, to date." To add to the irony, an accompanying text cuts and pastes from Wikipedia — without attribution."
Microsoft

Submission + - The Real Reason for Microsoft's TomTom Lawsuit (computerworlduk.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "We now know that Microsoft's lawsuit isn't just against TomTom, but against Linux too: but what exactly is Microsoft hoping to achieve? Samba's Jeremy Allison has a fascinating theory: "What people are missing about this is the either/or choice that Microsoft is giving Tom Tom. It isn't a case of cross-license and everything is ok. If Tom Tom or any other company cross licenses patents then by section 7 of GPLv2 (for the Linux kernel) they lose the rights to redistribute the kernel *at all*. Make no mistake, this is intended to force Tom Tom to violate the GPL, or change to Microsoft embedded software." Maybe embedded Linux is starting to get too popular."
Businesses

Submission + - Linux's Next Frontier: "In-Vehicle Infotainmen (computerworlduk.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "Just because GNU/Linux hasn't conquered the desktop, doesn't mean it's not continuing to move out of its heartland, the datacentre, into new areas. Here's the latest: "In-vehicle Infotainment", thanks to the creation of the GENIVI Alliance, "a non-profit organization committed to driving the development and broad adoption of an open source In-Vehicle Infotainment (IVI) reference platform." What's really impressive about the organisation and the companies behind it is just how deeply they really understand why open source is perfect for their needs."

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