Linux News: Standards

Motherboard Madness and Mayhem
February 04, 2010

Misery loves company, as the saying goes, and nowhere is that more evident than on the Linux blogs. Case in point: Linux Planet's Carla Schroder recently told a woeful tale about her attempt to upgrade the CPU on her ECS motherboard, and it has inspired a vast outpouring of sympathy from geeks far and wide.

Life After Microsoft: IT Utopia or 'Apocalyptic Tailspin'?
February 01, 2010

Well, the snow continues to fall here in the Linux blogosphere, and Linux Girl is beginning to wonder if it will ever end. Bread and milk are still in short supply at the local FOSS-y-Mart; children are getting cabin fever; and the snow drifts are getting taller than many netizens.

IT Needs Its Darth Vaders
November 17, 2009

If there were a psychiatrist seated across the room from us, and we were to present to her our feelings about information technology as a force in our lives, her diagnosis would be simple and immediate: We have an obsession. Maybe having nothing to do with technology itself at all, we're obsessed with the notion of a nemesis with an unfair advantage influencing the decisions we make.

VMware Laps Up SpringSource
August 11, 2009

VMware is acquiring SpringSource, an enterprise and Web application development and management company, to eventually build out a Platform as a Service offering. Under the terms of the agreement, VMware will pay approximately $362 million in cash and equity, and it will assume approximately $58 million of unvested stock and options.

Speculation Sizzles Over Google's On2 Buy
August 06, 2009

Google will be acquiring video compression technology provider On2 Technologies in a stock deal valued at $106.5 million. The deal, which requires On2 shareholder and regulatory approval, is expected to close in Q4. Speculation over Google's plans for the On2 technology is rampant.

On Patents, Promises and 'Ugly' Patches
July 16, 2009

It was once written that promises are most given when the least is said. Lately, however, a great deal has been said about Redmond's latest round of promises. For those who haven't been following the story, it all began when Microsoft's Peter Galli announced last week that his company had applied its "Community Promise" to the C# and CLI programming languages.

Is Linux Suffering From Mono?
June 22, 2009

In the general population, "Mono" may be best known for infecting teenagers with the "kissing disease." On the Linux blogs, it's recently caused a different kind of anguish as geeks far and wide have debated whether it's infected Linux too. It's a different Mono, of course, but its effects -- or, at least, the discussion of them -- have been no less agonizing.

Openness, Linux and Mobile Innovation
June 03, 2009

As the most dynamic and commercial industry on Earth -- which has grown its annual revenues from zero to US$1 trillion in less than 25 years and today manages 4 billion consumer relationships -- mobile has propelled itself forward with a highly discriminating attitude toward openness within device technology.

Facebook Knocks Down Another Single Sign-On Hurdle With OpenID Adoption
May 19, 2009

Facebook is adding support for OpenID to its Web site, allowing users access to the social media sign-on platform. Facebook is the standard's largest relaying party -- that is, the largest Web site accepting log-ins from OpenID. The move is beneficial to Facebook because a great many of its users are likely active on other social media sites, said Greg Sterling of Sterling Market Intelligence.

Is the Open Cloud Manifesto an Open Book?
March 30, 2009

A group of large and small IT companies and institutions have signed the Open Cloud Manifesto, pledging to work together to establish and promote open standards in cloud computing. Officially, there are now 38 signatories -- a group that includes IBM, AT&T, Sun Microsystems, Novell, Rackspace and SAP.

FOSS Debates, Part 2: Standard Deviations
March 13, 2009

When Microsoft won its bid to make Office Open XML an international standard last year, it was a pivotal moment for many in the FOSS community and beyond. The process had been a highly contentious one, with protests from nations and corporations around the globe, and the International Organization for Standardization's final decision was met with considerable shock, disbelief and even outrage on the part of some.

Microsoft Takes a Beating, Gmail Takes a Nap
February 28, 2009

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer told a gathering of analysts that the company won't be making any further layoffs, and once word got out, Wall Street proceeded to pummel the company mercilessly, sending its stock to an 11-year low. Analyst Rob Enderle told us the no-more-layoffs decision made sense because there just aren't a lot of unnecessary people on Redmond's payroll, but Wall Street was having none of it.

Obama and the Open Sourcing of the US Government
January 26, 2009

Those of us in the Linux community have long appreciated the many virtues of open source technology, but a rash of new interest suggests that governments are starting to wake up to the idea as well. For example: Earlier this month, as faithful readers will remember, we noted the new mandate in Vietnam that all government computers move to Linux.

Open Standards + Community Support = Healthy Wireless Networks
January 24, 2009

You may be thinking "who needs another open source High Availability project?" Or, in fact, "why do we need any open source HA project?" For those who do not know, OpenSAF is the latest in a line of open source HA projects that is specifically designed to address high availability and clustering.

Video's Route to the Mainstream: Open Standards
December 11, 2008

Adoption of online video is finally moving into the mainstream. Once constrained to companies for whom the production and distribution of video was their primary business, online video is now entering a stage of broad adoption by companies of all sizes who see video as a way to broaden their marketing reach, deepen interaction and increase engagement through the integration of video assets.

MySpaceID Gives Web Wanderers Longer Leash
December 09, 2008

MySpace has introduced its own version of single sign-on functionality, a move that follows on the heels of a handful of announcements last week from competing social networks. MySpace Open Platform is a suite of products that includes the MySpace Application Platform, MySpaceID -- formerly called "Data Availability" -- and Post-To MySpace.