OStatic

Why Google released Closure tools. The release of Closure Tools by Google under an open source license is about putting muscle behind Javascript.

Microsoft Linux: Why one free software advocate wants it. An ex-Microsoft employee says Windows is doomed, and FOSS will rule.

Vint Cerf plugs Android into the Interplanetary Net. He has added a software stack to the open source Android code.

Q&A: Ubuntu 9.10 security. What are the most notable security features introduced with Ubuntu 9.10, and how can you work with them?

Barnes & Noble, aided by Android, aims to disrupt the Kindle. The Nook has two capabilities that could expand the market for e-book readers beyond Amazon's.

Eucalyptus cloud platform updated. It now features multi-cluster support and enhanced concurrency management for improved scaling on almost any infrastructure.

Linux to own 32 percent of the netbook market? ABI Research predicts that Linux will get there, particularly because of sales in less developed countries.

What would make you trust Microsoft? Without the competition of open source, would Microsoft?s trend toward bureaucracy have ever been slowed?

Amazon's move mocks EU's fear of Oracle. Oracle hasn't even started with MySQL yet, and it already faces significant competition from forks like Amazon's.

Why Funambol acquired Zapatec. Fabrizio Capobianco explains how the move extends Funambol's mobile tech strategy.

Skype for Linux going (almost) open source. The UI will be open, but not the core.

Open source identity: Ruby on Rails creator David Heinemeier Hansson. In this Q&A, he discusses the history of Rails and where it's headed.

5 open source billing systems to watch. AgileBill and others take care of payment processing, invoicing, and more.

Web Open Font Format gets backing from Mozilla. It's an effort to bring advanced typography to the web in a much better way.

Setting up a MySQL cluster for your Linux desktop. It's not so complicated.

In a year that's been pretty rough on commercial conferences, community run events like FOSDEM, SCALE, SouthEast LinuxFest, LinuxFest Northwest and this past weekend's Ontario GNU Linux Fest are thriving. Why is that? Community conferences win out for a number of reasons.

Attending conferences is a big part of my job, and over the years I've started to take note of what events are worth attending and which events aren't. By and large, it's the smaller community events that are worth your time and money.

Although the 8th annual Southern California Linux Expo (SCALE) isn't until February, 2010, a Call for Papers has already been announced. If you've got something you want to discuss with the FOSS community, head over to the registration page and submit your idea for a talk. There are five speaker tracks to choose from including two specialized tracks -- one for beginners and one for developers.

I caught up with SCALE Publicity Chair Orv Beach, to get the inside scoop on what makes a successful presentation, what the review committee is looking for (hint: it's not Big Names in FOSS), and more.-- By Lisa Hoover

In a recent post I wrote called Linux has no marketing, but what if it did? I made the point that with Microsoft's Windows 7 OS coming out on October 22nd, there will be a blitz of marketing around it, and noted that there never is any such blitz promoting Linux. That post suggested that if Linux could have an equivalent marketing blitz, a very effective campaign might be built around how very much more secure and out of the line of fire of malware purveyors Linux is.

It's non-accidental that the spammers and crapware purveyors go after the top operating systems and applications on them in order of the OS installed bases: Windows (a lot), Mac OS (a little bit), Linux (hardly at all). Now, a Washington Post story is taking over where the Linux marketers never seem to tread and recommending Linux for online banking--for tighter security than Windows can provide.

The Software Freedom Law Center and Red Hat's CEO rag on the patent system. Nobody can write software without risking a lawsuit.

Ingres goes after Sun's customers. The company is promoting a migration path from the MySQL database.

Apple's iPhone now has one-third the market share of desktop Linux. NetApplications measured how much Linux and the iPhone are used to access the Internet.

FOSS sexism claims stir up the pot. Bruce Byfield's recent article on the topic has people talking.

ARMing desktop Linux. ARM-based netbooks are on their way and they can't run Windows.

Reading Sam Dean's piece on the absence of linux marketing brought back memories, many of them painful, of my involvement in Linux International, back in the day. For you kids today who only know your Linux Foundation, Linux International (LI) was founded by Jon 'maddog' Hall as a vendor-driven organization to, among other things, protect the Linux trademark. One of LI's initiatives that began in early 2000 was a marketing plan to be jointly funded by the vendors. You can read my call to action from that time begging and pleading for the members of LI to band together to do *something*.

Then, as now, the problem was the cacaphony of noise from various vendors, each with their own spin on Linux. Was it a desktop thing as Eazel and Ximian proclaimed at the time? Was it an enterprise dark horse as backed by IBM? Was it a really great web server, as VA Linux and Red Hat were promoting? All of the above? While multiple Linux markets have continued to grow since then, there does not appear to be a solution to the general problem.?

Mobile app developers, we have a problem. Some mobile apps are creating probems, ranging from distracted drivers to battery life and cell network compromises.

CEA developer contest aims to help the economic recovery. Apps for Innovation contest welcomes apps of all stripes, and first prize is $10,000 and a free trip to CES.

Will open source biology get anywhere? Sage Bionetworks aims to revolutionize collection of biological information and the treatment of disease.

Does the open source label still matter? How different are open source and proprietary software efforts?