Two interesting articles from Doc Searls’ IT Garage: Doc has been banging the drum for a while on the theme of Do It Yourself Information Technology: DIY-IT. In Nonfriction, he ridicules the ‘Vendor Sports’ attitude of much of the information technology press: it’s not Novell vs. WordPerfect, MS vs. Sun, it’s ‘how do I get this stupid document to print’ out in the field. Andrew, you’ll like this piece, as he quotes Guy Kawasaki as well as others. His second piece, Non-Profit Use of Open Source is an interesting story of how FOSS can fit in the the non-profit segment. Some good references to look into here, too. If you’re not subscribed to Doc’s feed, I encourage it. There are some potent ideas brewing here.
Archive | 2005
Boston Windows UG announces a Malware UnloadFest
What a bizarre idea! The Boston Area Windows Server User Group has announced a Malware UnloadFest, an all-day lecture and lab, taking place on Saturday, April 9th at the Microsoft Offices in Waltham, Massachusetts. They are chargine $30.00 admission. I wonder if there’s a money-back guarantee. What’s Microsoft’s liability on this? I can’t believe the User Group members are going to try to “clean” (their word) compromised machines. How can you tell a compromised machine is cured? You can’t. Clean? Dust ’em out, fine. Then FDISK them. Boot them with Knoppix if you have to, to rescue files for which you haven’t a backup (tsk, tsk), but the OS is history and none of the files can be trusted. What a dangerous idea.
FireFox 1.0.2 released
The FoxProWiki notes that FireFox 1.0.2 is released
Tools | Options | Software Update | Check Now
should start the download. (It doesn’t appear that the Mac version is ready yet, but use FireFox | Preferences instead of Tools | Options ). If you don’t already have it installed, start at http://www.mozilla.org to check out all the cool products: FireFox, Thunderbird, the Mozilla Suite, Camino and more.
Note that you will need to restart FireFox to complete the re-install. This patch addresses a GIF buffer-overflow security problem, not yet exploited in the wild, supposedly.
Eric Sink: MSDN Universal isn’t, well, universal
Eric Sink, lead benevolent dictator at SourceGear maintains Eric.Weblog() and regularly posts interesting materials, including the draft chapters of a source code control book he’s writing. In Comments on the pricing of Team System, Eric writes:
“I observe that most MSDN Universal subscribers have an expectation which looks something like this:
As an MSDN Universal subscriber, I get everything Microsoft sells.
Given this expectation, it is easy to understand why people are upset. For these people, the world is about to change.”
Novell Brainshare PR stories
Novell/SuSE is running their BrainShare conference this week, and it looks like they have loaded up on announcments:
OSNews notes “A Bunch of Novell News. Why Novell’s internal migration to Linux desktops is a landmark story. Novell preps Linux Desktop 10: Desktop search, note taking features will surpass Windows, execs say. Novell buys N.H.’s Tally Systems to benefit ZenWorks.”
InfoWorld: Application development reports “Novell preps Linux Desktop 10. SALT LAKE CITY, Utah — Linux is ready for the corporate desktop, and the forthcoming version of Novell’s Linux Desktop offering will go head-to-head against Windows, Novell executives said here this week at the company’s annual BrainShare gathering.”
Slashdot also picks up on Novells internal migration storry, with “Brainshare Reports: NLD 10, Novell’s Linux Switch. An anonymous reader submits “Computer World has an article about Novell Linux Desktop 10, which was just announced at Brainshare, that it plans to compete directly with Windows. One of the biggest things about NLD 10 is that it will have the desktop search engine Beagle as a feature.” Also from Brainshare, Joe Barr writes on NewsForge about the significance of Novell’s ongoing (multi-year) transition to Linux for all of its 6,000 desktops. Consultants and software sellers of all stripes won’t soon run out of TCO arguments for the products they want to push, but Novell claims to have saved $900,000 last year in Microsoft license fees alone.”
Electronic Freedom Foundation appeals Apple – ThinkSecret ruling
EFF to appeal ruling in Apple freedom of the press case. “The EFF has filed an appeal in the lawsuit involving Apple and a handful of rumor sites. The EFF argues that the original ruling endangers journalistic integrity, while giving Apple an easy time. By caesar@arstechnica.com (Ken “Caesar” Fisher).” From Ars Technica.
Interesting arguments. Looking forward to seeing how this case is resolved.
Dabo 0.3.2 released in time for PyCon
Ed Leafe posts “Just in time for PyCon DC 2005, we’d like to announce the release of Dabo 0.3.2. A summary of what’s changed since the last release can be found at http://dabodev.com/announcements/changeLog-0.3.2. Source code is available for download at http://dabodev.com/download.”
dabo is an application framework for developing rich-client data-centric applications, released under the OSI-apprived MIT license. It runs (and is in use at customer sites) in Linux, Windows and OS X, and probably in other platforms supporting Python. While the primary focus has been compatibility with MySQL, support for PostgreSQL and Firebird are included in this version. Check out the links above for a wiki full of development information and to download source code and demos to play with.
— Ted Roche, dabo commercial licensee #1
Ted and Andrew contemplate Think Secret, Part IV
Andrew MacNeill follows up on my Ted’s full post(?) on Apple/Think secret. … “Either way, stolen property that provides a story spells bad news for anyone- journalist or not.”
If you have an apple and I take it, I have an apple and you don’t. You have been robbed of property. If you have an idea and I learn of it, then we both have an idea. You have not been robbed of your idea. Ideas should not be property to be protected by law from others. The practical, physical implementation of an idea – an invention – can be patented for a decade or two. An expression of an idea in writing – code or literature – can be copywritten for the (obscenely long, imho) period of seventy-five years or more. But an idea that you will do something or say something sometime is not an invention. It is not a copywritable expresssion. It may be a trade secret: some sort of confidential information that you can bind your employees and vendors under contract to keep confidential. Some secrets – the formula to Coke is often cited – are closely guarded for good reason. Other secrets – like a software project code name – is handed out like candy to try to get a buzz going about vaporware.
Rumor columnists occupy a funny niche. They don’t investigate as much as gather, they rarely verify. Calling them a journalist is a stretch at best. However, they do not steal. They don’t break into office buildings and crack safes and steal documents stamped SECRET. They answer the phone, they get email. Someone faxes them a tidbit or two.
Some of the people who send them rumors are making them up, lying about a new thing for the prestige or to start a buzz for their competing product or to quash a competitor. Some work for the company and are doing their jobs and some are undermining their employer. Some are probably violating the contracts they had with their companies, some with their supervisor’s approval and some with their oblivion.
The rumor monger hasn’t signed an NDA with Apple. They know enough to publish a rumor that the next iPod will be purple (remember, folks, you heard it here first!) and enough sense not to publish a secret schematic. These people aren’t competing for a Pulitzer. Most are likely low-paid flunkies at the magazines. (Just who is Buzz Hunter at Advisor, anyway? 🙂 But they’re just doing their jobs. They are not fencing stolen property, they are printing rumors.
Apple should not be able to waste court time and threaten rumormongers with bankrupcy through court procedings for publishing information they had no way of determining was or was not protected by some legal entanglement. Let Apple secure their leaky house themselves, not in the courts.
Acquisitions Right and Left…
Dan Gillmor on Grassroots Journalism, Etc. reports Flickr/Yahoo Make Deal. “Yahoo is buying Flickr, and Jerry Yang (at PC Forum) just said he hoped not to do anything that makes the Flickr community feel neglected in any way.”
Acquisitions Left and Right…
Alex Feldstein points to news that “Ask Jeeves (and Bloglines) sold. Ask Jeeves (which recently bought Bloglines) has been sold for $1.85 billion (an amazing sum). It has been bought by the owners of Expedia and TicketMaster… Will things improve? We’ll have to wait and see.”