Slashdot Mirror

This spanish web used P2P to distribute amateur videos of the "Campus Party" computer event.
Videos:
Conference Hispalinux.
Conference Windows vs Linux.
Video Frikis en el Chill out.
Video Computer Mods.

P2P: From People to People.

Spanish news site Barrapunto has a post about Teller. (Spanish)

Spanish news site Barrapunto has a post about Teller. (Spanish)

(Well, the subject line is anyway)

Spanish Slashdot: Barrapunto. It's been around for almost as long as Slashdot itself.

As pointed out in our Spanish-speaking counterpart barrapunto.com, OGo is the open-source release of SKYRiX. Current version is 4.1. Why would OGo not mention this?

For many administrations, the political point of Free Software is clear: no vendor lock-in, spurn local economy and so on. While this works quite well in places like Germany at all levels within the administration, in other areas, where the "Free Software Fever" has only caught partial areas of interest, M$ is doing just what it says in the memo. For example, in Peru.

Last week, Steve Ballmer was in Spain. which some of you might know spurned the Linex Linux distribution (in Spanish), proposed a small autonomous community (a bit like a state, for the benefit of American Slashdot readers :D), which is now being deployed in other autonomouse communities, as seen here.

Steve Ballmer was giving Free Software a bollocing, saying that it was a waste of time and so on. I didn't see the story in /., but it was covered in both Barrapunto (the Spanish-speaking /.), and in some other blogs. Ballmer offered the Spanish government 25 M EUR worth of software (by that, read Windows/Office licenses) for education.

Clearly, M$ is seeing that local efforts can be thwarted by giving 500000US$ (in the case of Peru), or 25M ? (in the case of Spain) worth of licenses. The aim is to stop the local movements spreading, as it is seen in Spain (where other regions are taking interest in Linex) to a national level. In Germany, as the push comes from the top (or so it seems), these techniques don't work.

We'll see where all this leds us to in a few years, tho'...

Me quedo callado sobre tu uso de "teh" en tus quejas sobre "proper modern Engl ^H^H^H^H American"....

RedIRIS (Network of Spanish Universities) reached an agreement with Sun a few days ago that makes possible the download of StarOffice 6.0 free of charge from the RedIRIS' ftps for every student.
Details here (in Spanish)

I don't remember when I registered, but I think it was this same year, or the previous O:-) Anyway, I knew /. since a few years ago, because of a friend of mine. I remember him sticking a Hemos and Taco picture in our LUG's HQ, and it was something like:

And a couple years after, IIRC, there it came Barrapunto, the spanish /. cousin. And then everyone started to put "weblogs" online, and we all were going to do great things with Linux, and it was going to rule the world, and ...

Sigh. I remember that those years I was hoping for the "good years" to come. And now I realize that those were the good years.

Anyway, congrats /. Keep up the good work.

...Barrapunto: Mono y... KDE (Spanish)

I submitted this earlier today, but it was rejected, it has some more interesting links, some of them in Spanish, feel free to post translations(I don't have the time to do it myself)

2002-07-16 12:59:06 Microsoft buys Peru (articles,news) (rejected)
---
The firts news, in Spanish, from Barrapunto, Advogato have another article about it in English, and another news item from Register, and more coverage in Spanish in a Peruvian news site.

Basically MS is "giving" 550$ million in software and consulting, including setting up an intranet for the congress, a "secure" web site for the government and giving away software for a few thousand schools.

I wonder how much is this really costing to MS? and how much will they get back from it? How much will Peru have to pay in the next "upgrade cycle"?

The proposed bill to mandate Free/Open software in the government have been put on hold, and will probably be dismissed, but some people(including Dr. Villanueva) will continue working on getting it accepted.

Well, we all knew that it was just matter of time until MS bought their own country...

At least we all have gained from this a great anti-FUD
---

How much buys you 550M $$? This days it seems yo buy you a full country... with president and all...

I submitted this earlier today, but it was rejected, it has some more interesting links, some of them in Spanish, feel free to post translations(I don't have the time to do it myself)

2002-07-16 12:59:06 Microsoft buys Peru (articles,news) (rejected)
---
The firts news, in Spanish, from Barrapunto, Advogato have another article about it in English, and another news item from Register, and more coverage in Spanish in a Peruvian news site.

Basically MS is "giving" 550$ million in software and consulting, including setting up an intranet for the congress, a "secure" web site for the government and giving away software for a few thousand schools.

I wonder how much is this really costing to MS? and how much will they get back from it? How much will Peru have to pay in the next "upgrade cycle"?

The proposed bill to mandate Free/Open software in the government have been put on hold, and will probably be dismissed, but some people(including Dr. Villanueva) will continue working on getting it accepted.

Well, we all knew that it was just matter of time until MS bought their own country...

At least we all have gained from this a great anti-FUD
---

How much buys you 550M $$? This days it seems yo buy you a full country... with president and all...

Appears that these guys actually have their own Linux distribution called Linex. I think this is actually the distribution that will be distributed to schools etc. I expect it is based on Debian.

If you can read Spanish, there's more discussion about this on the Spanish version of Slashdot, Barrapunto And here's the Extramadura LUG.

It's great they have their "own" version of Linux - people are more likely to use it because they are proud of their region. Of course because 95% of people are clueless when it comes to computers, they will probably think that it has been invented there, just as many people believe Bill Gates invented "Windows". But in this case it's a good thing if people use it out of pride and it boosts uptake of Linux.

By the way, Extramadura is I believe the poorest region of Europe, not just Spain. But they have great weather, wine and food there, and the people really know how to have a good time (which could be why it's one of the poorest regions...)

[a couple pages in a language that most Americans have never seen before]

Three things:

• Slashdot is an English board. There exist other Slashdot-like boards in other languages: for instance, this one speaks Spanish.
• What language was that anyway? Or was it generated with some sort of Scheme script like the one somebody else posted to the troll sid?
• That language looks too complex. You really should simplify.

Recently, these facts demonstrated us massive blacklists may be innacurate or under abuse. During a few weeks, a lot of Spanish free software projects, such as GNOME-DB, were blacklisted in MAPS because "they are dial-ups connections". Altough we told to MAPS administrators that we have fixed IPs in DSL connections, it was neccesary a message from Telefonica, the main spanish telephony and Internet provider.

I had an interesting discussion with Sourceforge administrators about the accuracy of MAPS lists (SF is using MAPS lists so we had blocked all emails with SF users during a few weeks).

Now, I recommend not supporting MAPS lists. I think they are abusing on them.

Actually, I sign all outgoing messages with this:

Note.- This message may or may not arrive to you. This is because a lot of non-spammer's Static IP addresses are being listed in MAPS antispam blacklists. So, please, do not use MAPS blacklists or a lot of mail for you would be lost.

I switched to Debian a while ago, so it's been some time since I used RedHat or SuSE, but from the point of view of a native speaker of Spanish, I'm quite happy with what they provide. Of course I have a pretty good command of English, so it's tough for me to judge how it would be for a monolingual speaker...

Personally, I'd burn CD images with all the Deian packages. You'd probably want to go with Woody, since it is almost frozen and Potato is quite outdated. Find pointers and instructions at http://cdimage.debian.org/. This way, you can make the install in English yourself and then install the appropriate packages. There is a very convenient "spanish" task package containing doc-linux-es, manpages-es, ispanish, wspanish and user-es. Then, run the "castellanizar" script found in user-es to have all the possible defaults in Spanish.

Another suggestion is for you to start to practice your Spanish now and make the same question on http://barrapunto.com, a Spanish-speaking slashdot copycat site. Best luck, anyway, I hope you make good converts...

There is discussion about the box on Barriopunto (Spain's version of Slashdot) here.

Comments on it vary. Some people say it's OK for Joe Public. Others say it sucks and hangs up. One says that the Mozilla and Linux distribution is very heavily modified and it is difficult to tell which versions they are using.

Someone points out that the box is basically the Intel Dot.Station Web Appliance. The spec. for the box is here.

The spec. says:

* Custom Intel browser based on Mozilla-- the world's most standards-compliant browser technology.

And later:

* Custom Linux operating system for increased flexibility and innovation.

More information about AOL avant from Intel's web site here.

damned spaniard, go trolling where you belong

Well, "slashdot" is Barrapunto when translated in to Spanish, so the verb would be "barrapuntar". E.g. ellos barrapuntaron el pagina (They slashdotted the page).

- Sam

This law project was mentioned already in Barrapunto, the spanish Slashdot. The comments was interesting (however, they are all in Spanish).

Barrapunto.com

It's not a transcription of Slashdot, but many of the same topics show up. I read it once in a blue moon, and this very topic is being hashed out over there.

Check this sotory at Barrapunto

You will need some Spanish and Portuguese, though.
__

Or perhaps we should start using Spanish, which has no such semantic limitations.
--

Where have you been? Jon Katz, interviews and numerous editorial pieces have appeared here over the years. That may not be the bulk of the stories, but still...

While I acknowledge that Slashdot creates some of its contents (and its not most of it, in your own words) it never gathers news per se, that is, it never collects and reports info on current events, it just merely echoes them. There's a subtle difference in there. Of course, that can be said of most printed media which are increasingly becoming a relay of filtered info gathered by Reuters, Associated Press et alii.

Uhm, no - that would be kuro5hin. With 200,000+ user accounts and hundreds of submissions in the bin at a time, I would hardly say that Joe reader has much influence. The editors filter the new items they think are worthy.

To be quite honest, I've been to kuro5hin a few times and I wasn't impressed. The looks are better than Slashdot's (but so are Barrapunto's) but its mostly "essays" (or rants, if one was feeling cynical) not news. And the name really sucks, but that's just MHO. The fact that the submissions are moderated by the audience is not that great, either: it's just Slashdot with a much larger staff (and a much more diminute audience). But the principle is still the same: echo news that may be relevant to nerds (and that is a filter in itself, which was my point), let nerds appraise them and then publish'em.

I don't agree with the original poster that /. will become a Microsoft lap-dog, but you can't discount the possibility of them being bought out by a bigger news source. It has already happened - twice - and the /. editors have no say on whom they get sold to any more.

Perhaps, but they have the proverbial right to vote with their feet, and any possible buyer would have to take into account the fact that Slashdot without the Slashdot crowd would most likely lose a lot of its appeal. Yes, that probably includes Katz too :-)

Anyone with a little perl knowledge can go a long way towards making a slashcode site into a customer support, file download, or of course a news and events website.

Anyways, here's the slashsites in case anyone is interested.

• Media-Mixer
• RadioTiki
• ipv6news.org
• PRIME Wrestling
• Knowledgerush
• High Performance Hunting
• marketseat.com
• ExtraCrispy.Net
• YourOfficeGeek
• ITCouncil
• Morrissey Solo
• The Cedar Valley Linux Users Group
• EastVan
• earthDot
• meepdot
• Love9
• MedMeta
• jazz-flute.com
• jazz-sax.com
• SigKill
• University of Utah College of Engineering Computing Facility
• Mr. Lego
• FuelCellTalk
• Portland Geekly News
• The Golden Horde Network
• use Perl;
• MacSlash
• bottomquark
• We Have No Product
• TQY3
• gildot
• Tar Heel State Online
• SlashHosting (Hosting for Slash sites)
• slashhost (Hosting for Slash sites)
• IDM Newsbase
• gosports.org
• Anime Station
• NetGAMES
• OnTopofIT
• Web Crush
• HairyPALM.com: The PDA InfoQuarters
• Myworkflow.com
• Techdirt.com
• Be Route (French)
• Yourtown CLN
• DNS Policy
• BarraPunto (Spanish)
• isrec.org
• AbsolutChaos
• Extreme XL Linux News
• Spam Roaster's Club

www.barrapunto.com offers stuff that matters in Spanish.

It's a great way to improve your Spanish reading ability, even if you're starting with none at all. Just grab a dictionary and start building your lexicon. You'd be surprised how quickly you can achieve 80 to 90 percent comprehension.

With the demographic changes expected in the US in the comming decades, being able to at least read Spanish is probably a good skill to pick up. And Barrapunto.com generally has a good set of stories which complement those on Slashdot. And instead of posting as an AC, you can post as a Pendejo Sin Nombre.

Could Slashdot have a section for these editorial errors, so that the comments that people posted won't go wasted?

It also shows that you acknowledge your mistakes.

The Spanish people at Barrapunto have a "Gazapos" section for this kind of articles.

IDKVB (I Don't Know Visual Basic ;), but it seems that it references Cmos.com when updating the registry.

And it definitely writes a binary file at the end of a sub called CopiarCmosAfichero (CopyCmosTofile). To me it seems it is creating Cmos.com so it can write the Cmos to a file, and thus doing what it states, but I would like confirmation on what it is doing.

Corrected from parent

You can
IDKVB (I Don't Know Visual Basic ;), but it seems that it references Cmos.com when updating the registry.

And it definitely writes a binary file at the end of a sub called CopiarCmosAfichero (CopyCmosTofile).

Is Barrapunto wrtten in English today, then?

--

• The press note from Microsoft España in Spanish.
  
• People paranoic about a Microsoft "Promote through piracy" plot at Barrapunto, the Spanish brother of Slashdot.
  
• The article at La Brújula.
  
• The related page at PC World

Well, if the sell-out aspect bothers you that much, go check out Barrapunto, a Slashdot clone. They're lame enough that you'll never have to worry about commercial interest. Or any interest. I'm sure they could use a few good trolls.

They had the "Embrace and extend" kerberos story 4 days before Slashdot

There's a site barrapunto.com which appears to be a spanish slashdot-esque thingy and uses the Slash code and has lots of people posting using the name "Pendejo Sin Nombre"... you get the idea.

Barrapunto (a Slashdot-inspired site in Spanish) ran a story on this too. They point out that Enrique Place, one of the LinuxTech guys, appears on UYLUG's official bylaws (or statutes, or whatever they are called in American English, of which I'm definitely not a native speaker --hint, hint--). These people knew each other before.

Their story also comments on the rambling nature of the UYLUG's communication. The letter signers claim that their first letter was not an official UYLUG statement, but merely some users' views. It, however, ends in two paragraphs declaring the steps the UYLUG is taking towards securing the LINUX trademark.

Also check out the comments for double postings, capitalized ALLEGATIONS (all of them signed AC) and general bad vibes.

My take: both groups hate the other group's member's guts. This trademark affair is the Free Software equivalent of mutual hair pulling, face scratching, and eye-gouging.

The reason I don't log in but choose to post as an AC is that these guys (both UYLUG and LinuxTech) make me ashamed to be part of the Spanish-speaking Linux community. But mind you, both of them would fit perfectly in any company but each other's. These people are really nice, they just aren't nice to each other.

At barrapunto we have a "patentes" topic. Check out the section logo. It plays on the simplicity of the device and on the Spanish phrase "The Law of the Funnel" (the mighty always do what they want, the meek always suffer the consequences of both the mighty's actions and their own).
-----------

There is a spanish site known as "Barrapunto" (spanish translation for /. ) which also posts news about Linux, computers and technology. You can check it out here.. Personally I think is a great idea to let some web site to have their foreign language counterparts.
As a Mexican, I can tell you is very dificult to find a really good web site (like ./ ) in Spanish.
Now it is a fact spanish is more spoken in the world than English, and most probably Chinese and Russian are more spoken than spanish. This is a great oportunity for web sites to reach more and more people around the world.

While it is true that the US is propably the world's biggest user of online services, the rest of the world is catching up really fast. More fiber optics, satellites, and high speed digital networks are been installed and/or in the process of been install as we speak (read?) and there will be one moment in the future where th Internet will be as common as a the phone network or as the public electrical infrastructure. Internet in the 90's has been like radio was in the 20's-30's .

The 90's where the decade the information era arrived to our homes and small offices, not as an isolated event, but as a global phenomenon that changed most of our activities of daily life. So it is totally acceptable that this translated web sites will keep "popping" up every time, because the Internet is a world wide communications network, not a US only priviledge.

And check it out -- they even have an article about this very issue. It's from the "ni-lo-pienses-CmdrTaco" department.

http://www.barrapunto.com

Hey, it's even got some things better than SlashDot: from here it's faster. It has no ads. On their FAQ page they tell you to send them an email if you spot a typo (imagine Hemos doing that?).

That same FAQ page gives credit to SlashDot, BTW.

No hay ladron que no sea lloron. Que suelten los abogados de andover.net, pa' ense~arles que quiere decir la propriedad! La tercer guerra mundial ya empieza, y se estalla en tu coco!

btw - they already have this story, and they say: "Si WhatsHappening.com gana, que se prepare noticias.com... y CmdrTaco podría pensar sobre barrapunto.com :-O ".. (if whatshappnin.com wins, lookout noticias.com [news.com].. and CmdrTaco could thing about barra [ / ] punto [ . ] :-0 = [ ai, chihuahua! ]

muerte a la bablefish! que vive el aprendizaje!

eMatter books should be cheaper. Lets Assume royalties stabilize at 50%. regular author can expect to receive between 7% and 12% of the cover price on a paper book, so expect to pay for eMatter between 14% and 24% of an equivalent paperback title. Assuming authors will not settle for the minimum, (and that they would much rather command a 15% royalty rate), that means eMatter books should cost between 1/4 and 1/3 of the price of an equivalent paperback. You pay for the reader, though (your computer? or one of those electronic book thingies?).

Well, if the system takes hold, we can foresee competition, and royalties for authors can escalate up to 80% *before* any special arrangements. Stephen King will probably get 100%. Or more :).

Candyman is not an Anonymous Coward. He just poses as one on Slashdot.
-----------