LLoyd Kvam of Venix Corporation will host a discussion and demonstration on Functional Programming at the next Python SIG meeting, held the fourth Thursday of each month at 7 PM at the Amoskeag Business Incubator.
Archive | September 15, 2005
MySQL announces Application and Partner of the Year
The Latest Updates from MySQL AB feed reports MySQL Announces Application and Partner of the Year Award Winners. “In his morning Keynote presentation at the MySQL Users Conference, company CEO Marten Mickos announced the winners of the 2005 Application of the Year and Partner of the Year awards.”
Impressive. This should continue to dispel the myth that MySQL is for “little” or “simple” applications. These are world-class high-performance sites.
Ed Foster: Value From Microsoft Licensing Remains a Distant Vista
From Ed Foster’s column today: “Microsoft’s Software Assurance licensing program has always stood out among software maintenance plans for the unique value proposition it offers customers. You pay nearly twice as much as other vendors charge for half of what other vendors give you, and that’s if you’re lucky.”
This is somewhere between “Would you like a service plan with that?” and your local mobster coming around to offer “insurance.” The quotes in the articles from irate IT customers, who paid 25% to 33% annually in licensing fees for essentially nothing, are priceless. Apparently, the “Vista Enterprise Version” will require an Assurance Plan, but that is something that only a few of the F500 should even be considering. If you’re that big, and really need 5-Nines reliability and want a 4-hour guaranteed response from their vendor, perhaps this is for you (note that is is a licensing payment plan, not a service contract). The rest of us would do better to hire a couple of qualified techs and keep them educated and up-to-date.
Off to MerriLUG
The Merrimack Valley Linux User Group, one of the five LUGs that makes up the Greater New Hampshire Linux User Group meets the third Thursday of each month at Martha’s Exchange in Nashua. Meetings commence at 7 PM, but members often gather for dinner before the meeting at 6 PM. The presenters tonight will be from WindRiver, manufacturers of VxWorks and a number of fascinating industrial products. Wind River will be presenting their build system, “which automates building the Linux kernel, and automatically generates the Linux filesystem from pristine source with needed patches applied automatically.” There ought to be good time for a Q&A as always on generally Linux topics, too. Hope to see you there.
Linux on desktops? Why not?
Over at OSNews, Thom Holwerda posts Getting serious about the Linux Desktop. “In his latest column, Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols argues that Microsoft Vista is going to be so expensive that it’s going to make users think hard about switching to Linux instead. [S.J.V-N says:] “Desktop Linux is never going to have a better chance than it will in the next eighteen months,” he says. [Thom says:] My take: He forgets two important factors: Vista can run with all the flashy graphics turned off, and seven editions of Vista? How many Linux distributions are there to choose from?”
Choice is Good, not bad, Thom. Many distributions serve many different audiences. We have choice in our appliances, in our automobiles, in our TV shows.
Vaughn-Nichols cites some interesting numbers about W2K being more popular than XP, despite not being officially “supported.” I have a lot of clients who have clerical staff who would be well-served with Linux as the OS, Thunderbird for mail, FireFox for browsing and OpenOffice.org for office documents. The Microsoft Vista launch could start the “Year of the Linux Desktop.”