Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

So, which really is better for the desktop: Vista or Linux? Ive been working with Vista since its beta days, and I started using Linux in the mid-90s. There may be other people who have worked with both more than I have, but there cant be many of them. Along the way, Ive formed a […]

Want a job working in Linux? Then one of your first steps should be to get an LPIC-1 (Linux Professional Institute first level) certification. In the past, getting this entry-level certification could be easier said than done, since classes arent available everywhere. Now, however, the SUNY (State University of New York) Linux Learning Collaborative, a […]

There was a time when the Open Source Initiative was one of the hotbeds of open-source activity. After the retirement of its co-founder and leader, Eric Raymond, in January 2005, the OSI lost much of its fire. That may be changing soon, though. An investigation by Linux-Watch has found that there is still heat in […]

ISVs have a problem with Linux. They want to be able to write, compile and ship one version of an application. They dont want to make one for SUSE, another for Red Hat and still another for Ubuntu. Novell has an answer. On Jan. 24, the company released the alpha version of the open-source OpenSUSE […]

How dumb is Microsoft? No, really: a few weeks ago, they decided to “give” bloggers a free—as in beer—$2,300 Acer Ferrari laptop. When some people—like me—suggested that this sounded like a bribe, Microsoft immediately back-peddled. They then told the bloggers that they had to “either give the PC away or send it back when you […]

One thing desktop Linux users, and prospective users, complain about most is the lack of hardware drivers and software. Often theres an answer to a users particular problem, but the driver isnt included in the users distribution, or the software is hard to find and harder to install. Desktop Linux distributor Linspire says it has […]

In a memo to their employees, the CEOs of two leading virtualization companies recently revealed that their companies have merged. Specifically, Serguei Beloussov, of SWsoft and Nick Dobrovolskiy of Parallels acknowledged that SWsoft now owns Parallels. According to a source close to the companies, SWsoft bought Parallels “about a year ago—but kept them very separate […]

Linux is growing by leaps and bounds, and it only makes sense that the organizations that track and guide its growth are finally getting together. So, if all goes well, sometime this February the Open Source Development Labs and the Free Standards Group will be merging to form the Linux Foundation. It really is the […]

Its no secret that many people in the Linux community dislike Novells recent Microsoft partnership. To some analysts, though, the deal is a feather in Novells market cap. Open-source activist Bruce Perens started an online petition to protest the deal. A group of people launched a Web site with a self-explanatory name, Boycott Novell. And, […]

The SCO Group on Jan. 17 reported financial results for its fourth quarter and fiscal year ended Oct. 31, 2006. Had Warren Zevon been a business reporter, he might have described SCOs latest fiscal year as “not that pretty at all.” He would have been right. SCOs revenue for the fourth quarter of fiscal year […]

Adobe Systems on Jan. 17 finally released the long-awaited Adobe Flash Player 9 for Linux. Although a binary-only release, its already proven quite popular within its first 24 hours of release. This version of Flash Player was meant to be feature-comparable to Adobes latest Windows and Mac OS versions, which were released in late June […]

In early January, rumors began spreading that The SCO Group—as a consequence of poor business, Novells demands for a share of SCOs Sun and Microsoft Unix deals, and the ever-mounting costs of SCOs IBM lawsuit—was nearing bankruptcy. In response to all this, SCO CEO Darl McBride has countered, “To paraphrase a line from Mr. Twain, […]