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NewsVac: News from around the Web
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Shred and secure-delete: tools for wiping files, partitions and disks in GNU/Linux
2 hours, 39 minutes ago
I carry a small, laminated card indicating my subscription to the IUSP (International Union of the Super Paranoid, tin hat division). Well, you can’t be too careful. After all, we live in a dangerous world and computers are just an extension of that. After you’ve installed the right operating system—GNU/Linux, of course—secure browsers, rootkit and virus scanners, you might just start to feel secure—and smug. Don’t be. Until you have understood and mastered some of these GNU core utilities to securely delete, shred and wipe files, directories, partitions and whole disks you’re not in the clear. Why not? -
40 Open Source Tools for Protecting Your Privacy
3 hours, 9 minutes ago
You don't need to fork over big bucks – or even any bucks – to keep your online activities and identity secret. The open source community has dozens of privacy-related projects in development, and some of them have already proven themselves to be among the best privacy protection tools available. -
10 ways to reduce removable media headaches in Linux
3 hours, 39 minutes ago
For many new Linux users, removable media can be a deal-breaker. Anyone coming over from Windows knows you simply insert the CD, use it, and eject it. With Linux, it isn’t always that simple. In fact, with Linux, removable media has always held a completely different philosophy. -
Red Hat Spacewalk Expands Linux Management
4 hours, 9 minutes ago
Red Hat's open source Network application project evolves with a plan to get rid of Oracle on the backend. -
Red Hat: Moving beyond 'rip and replace'
4 hours, 39 minutes ago
Microsoft offers a full ecosystem of software to would-be buyers, but its greatest success may actually result from its strategy to present customers with an "and" decision when initially purchasing Microsoft technology, rather than a difficult "or" decision. -
EFF, Bush administration spar over telecom immunity
5 hours, 9 minutes ago
A federal judge on Tuesday heard arguments in a case that centers on an important constitutional principle: can the Feds immunize any telecommunications company that violated the law by opening its network to government snoops? -
Real World Benchmarks Of The EXT4 File-System
5 hours, 39 minutes ago
With the EXT4 file-system being marked as stable in the forthcoming Linux 2.6.28 kernel, and some Linux distributions potentially switching to it as an interim step until the btrfs file-system is ready, we decided it was time to benchmark this journaled file-system for ourselves. We ran a number of disk-centric Linux benchmarks along with several of our real-world tests from the Phoronix Test Suite to gauge how well the EXT4 file-system performance will be noticed by desktop users and computer gamers. We have compared these EXT4 results to the EXT3, XFS, and ReiserFS file-systems. -
Growth in Internet crime calls for growth in punishment
6 hours, 9 minutes ago
Internet crime is now more prevalent and more professional than ever before. F-Secure believes that against a background of steeply increasing Internet crime, the obvious inefficiency of the international and national authorities in catching, prosecuting and sentencing Internet criminals is a problem that needs to be solved. -
The Pros and Cons of Using Joomla!
6 hours, 39 minutes ago
For those of you who have not heard of Joomla!, it is a content management system that allows one to build a complex web portal without the need of advanced web programming knowledge. You download it, install it, add a template then enrich the CMS with extensions. This way you can transform your site into a webshop, link directory, photo gallery and pretty much anything you set your mind to. But like any other CMS, Joomla! is not perfect. -
TIP: Switching Soundcards In Ubuntu
7 hours, 9 minutes ago
If you have multiple soundcards in your system and have to switch between them regularly you would definitely be under-whelmed by the less-than-stellar performance of ubuntu in switching between the sound cards. -
Gran Canaria Desktop Summit 2009: GUADEC and Akademy Dates Announced
7 hours, 39 minutes ago
The GNOME and KDE projects recently decided that their upcoming developer events -- GUADEC and Akademy, respectively -- will be held simultaneously in the same location. Both projects hope this will foster communication and collaboration between their developer pools, and ultimately strengthen open source desktops. -
Interview: Anthony Gold Takes Over as President of Open Solutions Alliance
8 hours, 9 minutes ago
Since forming in 2007, the vendor-neutral nonprofit consortium Open Solutions Alliance (OSA) has been working toward raising the awareness of open source in enterprise through a combination of education and marketing. As the group prepares to enter the new year, the OSA announced today that a new leadership team is poised to take over. Anthony Gold, vice president and general manager of open source business at Unisys, will replace former OSA president Dominic Sartorio as president of the organization. -
Fedora Project Taking Ideas For Next Release Name
8 hours, 39 minutes ago
Distribution naming schemes are one of the more humorous aspects of the open source community. Ubuntu uses an adjective followed by an animal name (Intrepid Ibex, Jaunty Jackalope), while Debian names releases after characters in the movie "Toy Story" (Sarge, Etch, Lenny). Fedora's method is a bit more obscure, but no less clever. -
Windows Drops Below 90% Market Share--Firefox Above 20%
9 hours, 9 minutes ago
NetApplications is out with a couple of new metrics of market share for operating systems and browsers, and the news is good for open source. Topping their findings, Microsoft Windows' market share has dropped below 90 percent for the first time in its measurements. The share erosion is largely attributed to increased interest in the Mac platform, but Linux is cited as on the rise as well. In addition, for the first time since it launched its metrics, NetApplications' data shows Firefox's market share topping 20 percent. -
Our Linux Dream 2008
9 hours, 39 minutes ago
Every year, the Linux landscape changes dramatically. These changes are very hard to predict, but it is easy to think of what you would like to see happen. Regardless of the reality of your dream for Linux in 2009, come share it. - More News
Linux.com : Features
Indian GNU/Linux advocate and independent FOSS consultant Raj Mathur (video)
New Delhi resident Raj Mathur is living proof that a Free and Open Source Software advocate can earn a decent living working with clients who are using or planning to use FOSS. Raj has also been a member of the Open Source Initiative board of directors and is a leading member of his local Linux users group. He's also contributed to more than a few Free Software projects over the years. Raj is a "heartbeat of GNU/Linux" kind of guy -- not famous, but a stalwart soldier in the worldwide FOSS army. (And a nice person, too.)
KNDISwrapper is half-done, but far from half-baked
If any process ever cried out for a graphical interface, it is using NDISwrapper to enable wireless devices to run on GNU/Linux using Windows drivers. The process is often torturous, especially for first-time users, who are unsure whether any problems are due to NDISwrapper's limitations or their own inexperience. By organizing and explaining the process, KNDISwrapper promises to remove much of the labor. But, so far, it only partly delivers on that promise by neglecting the hardest part of working with NDISwrapper -- finding the right Windows driver.
Bidirectional filesystem syncing - DirSync Pro vs. Unison
Everyone knows and loves rsync, the command that lets you clone a directory tree to another disk or system with the ability to keep the clone fresh in an incremental and bandwidth-efficient manner. Sometimes, however, you want to sync in the reverse direction. With bidirectional filesystem syncing tools, there is no primary filesystem -- you just tell the tool to make sure both target directories, or clones, are identical. Here's a hands-on look at two tools designed to accomplish that task: DirSync Pro and Unison.
Browse all your source code revisions with ViewVC
For programmers on big projects, a version control system for managing source code is vital, but working on files in a large project from one of these programs' command-line interfaces is cumbersome. Worse, the results of the commands lack highlighting to show the differences between files and revisions. ViewVC is a handy browser-based code viewer that allows users to browse a source code tree managed by either CVS or Subversion, look at changes, compare revisions at the file or line level, and perform other operations -- just about anything except allow users to check out or commit files.
Three graphical mount managers
Mounting and unmounting filesystems used to be straightforward in GNU/Linux. A basic knowledge of the mount command or some editing of /etc/fstab in a text editor and you were done. However, with the addition of udev in the 2.6 kernel for autoplugging, and the demand for hotswapping USB devices, along with the increased use of logical volume managers and other complications, the process is now more complicated -- perhaps too complicated for many among the growing number of desktop users. That is where graphical mount managers such as Forelex Mount Manager, PySDM, and MountManager find their niche.
Keeping an eye on your network with PasTmon
The PasTmon passive traffic monitor keeps an eye on your network, recording which clients are interacting with which services, when and how long things took. You can then use the application's PHP Web interface to investigate these figures to see if any host is connecting to Web services that it shouldn't, or is contacting services suspiciously more frequently than you would expect for normal operation, or when response times become excessively long.
Keeping tabs on your network traffic
One of the first things I do upon installing a Linux distribution is put the Network Monitor applet on my GNOME panel. Watching the blue lights twinkle on and off makes me aware of network traffic. But if you want more details about what's happening on your network, such as which application is hogging bandwidth or what each network interface is up to, you can turn to specialty tools like NetHogs and IPTraf. While NetHogs is a unique tool altogether, IPTraf can be used on a server as well as by a home user.
Managing your MP3s with Zina
Large collections of MP3 files can be hard to manage. Organizing your music into directories helps some, but when you want to play just those tracks in a certain genre or from a certain year, no amount of directory organization will help -- but Zina, a powerful Web application, can.
Recent Firefox extensions for tab addicts
The number of Firefox extensions continues to grow. For example, when I last wrote about tab extensions just over a year ago, about 110 existed. Now, despite the need to rewrite many extensions to make them compatible with Firefox 3.0, the number is over 190, and the choice is greater than ever. Basic functionality, coloring options, positioning of the tab bar, automatic opening of tabs at startup -- whatever your need, you can probably find it on the Firefox add-ons site.
openDesktop.org provides super-portal to free software sites
When users want the latest in free and open source software (FOSS), they are likely to think first of sites like freshmeat, or perhaps Softpedia or GnomeFiles. However, as the FOSS community has divided into specialized communities, sites for new releases have proliferated, to the point where it is difficult to keep track of them all. Since 2007, openDesktop.org has provided a portal for many of these specialized sites. Under the slogan "Let's build the desktop of the future," openDesktop.org provides a quick overview of new software that is independent of desktop or distribution.
Giving thanks for a long weekend
Gmail notifiers let you know "you've got mail"
If you are into email like Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan were in the movie You've Got Mail, you probably want to be warned as soon as any message enters your mailbox. If you use Gmail, you can try one of several Gmail-specific applications that let you know when new messages arrive.
Run your NFS server in the user address space with NFS-GANESHA
NFS-GANESHA is an NFS version 2-4 server that runs in the user address space instead of as part of the operating system kernel. Filesystem in Userspace (FUSE) lets you run a filesystem in the user address space instead of as part of the Linux kernel, but the FUSE support in the Linux kernel from many Linux distributions does not allow you to export FUSE through NFS. NFS-GANESHA lets you expose FUSE through NFS without patching your kernel.
Fedora 10 proves infrastructure matter
Glancing at the features list for Fedora 10, at first you might be unimpressed. Many of the features are basically infrastructure improvements, fixing known problems and enhancing performance while laying the groundwork for future developments. However, infrastructure affects almost everything you do with your computer, and the more you use Fedora 10, the more you are likely to conclude that -- one or two minor problems aside -- this may be the strongest Fedora release yet, as well as the first glimpse of its future.
Three applications for making disc labels
Making labels for DVDs and their cases is an often overlooked task. Many discs are lucky to have some terse information quickly scrawled on them after burning. But there are some fine open source applications available for creating labels for CD-ROM and DVD disks and printing jewel case inserts, including gLabels, kover, and cdlabelgen.
TiddlyWiki derivatives help you get things done
TiddlyWiki excels at managing notes and text snippets, but can you tweak it for other uses? If you take a look at some applications based on TiddlyWiki, the answer appears to be a resounding yes. With TiddlyWiki derivatives, you can manage tasks, track projects, keep tabs on contacts, and organize book collections. Like the original TiddlyWiki, each derivative consists of a single HTML file which you have to download to your local hard disk. Open the downloaded file in a browser, and the TiddlyWiki-based tool is ready to go.
Upgrading to the newest Fedora release
With Fedora 10 scheduled for release today, many users are thinking about how they are going to upgrade. A complete upgrade is something you do no more than twice a year, so the details are easy to forget. Also, the Fedora upgrade process, which centers on pointing to a new repository, is more complex than, say, the equivalent Debian process, in which repositories remain constant and only their contents change with a new release. But an even stronger reason for the uncertainty is that a Fedora system can be upgraded in at least four ways, each of which has its advantages and disadvantages.
Open source Untangle guard union's privacy
When Maine State Employees Association SEIU Local 1989 needed software to safeguard confidential information and ward off online threats, it found an open source solution. The labor union, which represents more than 15,000 public and private sector workers throughout the State of Maine, chose Untangle's open source Gateway platform, a solution that not only helps keep confidential data away from prying eyes, but also protects against spam, spyware, phishing, and viruses.
Debug your shell scripts with bashdb
The Bash Debugger Project (bashdb) lets you set breakpoints, inspect variables, perform a backtrace, and step through a bash script line by line. In other words, it provides the features you expect in a C/C++ debugger to anyone programming a bash script.
DataForm adds efficient input to OpenOffice.org Calc
Spreadsheets might be called databases for the timid, since they're more user-friendly than databases and do a good job working with limited amounts of data. Some tools for databases can work well with spreadsheets too. Take for instance DataForm, a new OpenOffice.org Calc extension that provides a form-like interface designed to make entering and finding spreadsheet data easier.
