Ubuntu, another choice

During iPad’s announcement earlier this year Free Software Foundation hired a Steve Jobs look-alike (attempted) actor outside the event to express what they think about Apple’s closed platform model. At that time, most of us might have laughed it off. But in light of recent Apple announcement, rules putting more restrictions on an already heavily controlled platform, this seems very appropriate. Free Software Foundation was right | Geek Technica

Charlotte Observer Ubuntu 10.04, codenamed Lucid Lynx, is scheduled for release this month. The developers at Canonical, the company behind the Ubuntu Linux distribution, have already started the process of planning for the next major release. Founder Mark Shuttleworth revealed today in a blog entry that Ubuntu 10.10, which is scheduled to arrive in October, will be codenamed Moribund Moth Maverick Meerkat. Ubuntu 10.04 is a long-term support release, which means that the focus during the current development cycle has largely been on stabilization and refining the existing technology. Shuttleworth says that we can expect to see a return to experimentation in the 10.10 release, with the potential for some radical changes. Some of the most important goals include delivering a new Ubuntu Netbook ...

Why aren't the existing Linux viruses [1] anything more than a topic for conversation? Why don't they affect you in your daily computing in the way that MS viruses affect Windows users? There are several reasons for the non-issue of the Linux virus. Most of those reasons a Linux user would already be familiar with, but there is one, all important, reason that a student of evolution or zoology would also appreciate. First, let's take a look at the way Linux has stacked the deck against the virus. For a Linux binary virus to infect executables, those executables must be writable by the user activating the virus. That is not likely to be the case. Chances are, the programs are owned by root and the user is running from a non-privileged account. Further, the less experienced the user, the lower the likelihood that he actually owns any executable programs. Therefore, the users who are the least savvy about such hazards are also the ones with the least fertil...