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"As expected, today, December 11, 2016, Linus Torvalds unleashed the final release of the highly anticipated Linux 4.9 kernel," reports Softpedia. prisoninmate shares their article: Linux kernel 4.9 entered development in mid-October, on the 15th, when Linus Torvalds decided to cut the merge window short by a day just to keep people on their toes, but also to prevent them from sending last-minute pull requests that might cause issues like it happened with the release of Linux kernel 4.8, which landed just two weeks before first RC of Linux 4.9 hit the streets... There are many great new features implemented in Linux kernel 4.9, but by far the most exciting one is the experimental support for older AMD Radeon graphics cards from the Southern Islands/GCN 1.0 family, which was injected to the open-source AMDGPU graphics driver...

There are also various interesting improvements for modern AMD Radeon GPUs, such as virtual display support and better reset support, both of which are implemented in the AMDGPU driver. For Intel GPU users, there's DMA-BUF implicit fencing, and some Intel Atom processors got a P-State performance boost. Intel Skylake improvements are also present in Linux kernel 4.9.
There's also dynamic thread-tracing, according to Linux Today. (And hopefully they fixed the "buggy crap" that made it into Linux 4.8.) LWN.net calls this "by far the busiest cycle in the history of the kernel project."

An anonymous reader writes "FSF's John Sullivan launches the Defective by Design campaign and petition to rain on Steve's parade, barely minutes out of the starting gate. 'This is a huge step backward in the history of computing,' said FSF's Holmes Wilson, 'If the first personal computers required permission from the manufacturer for each new program or new feature, the history of computing would be as dismally totalitarian as the milieu in Apple's famous Super Bowl ad.' The iPad has DRM writ large: you can only install what Apple says you may, and 'computing' goes consumer mainstream — no more twiddling, just sit back, spend your money, and watch the show — while we allow you to." What is clear is that the rise of the App Store removes control of the computer from the user. It makes me wonder what the next generation of OS X will look like.

eldavojohn writes "A number of blog posts are surfacing that are calling out the helpful open source community on their documentation. No, not the documentation for the highly skilled technical people, but the documentation from beginner to apprentice. A two-part series by Carla Schroeder lists bad documentation as 'Linux Bug #1' and advises users to use Google as the documentation. We've discussed before some of open source's documentation being out of date. Is it really as bad as these blogs paint it? Has it come down to using Google before a man page?"

bpechter writes "Linux Today reports SCO has terminated Darl McBride and linked to the SCO 8K SEC report. The report found also at the SCO site and states: 'the Company has eliminated the Chief Executive Officer and President positions and consequently terminated Darl McBride.'"

theodp writes "Looks like Amazon's high-priced Silicon Valley attorneys will have to endure the 'undue hardship' of awakening early next Thursday morning to defend CEO Jeff Bezos' 1-Click patent in a Video Hearing before the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences. The attorneys' plea for a 1 p.m. ET start time drew a be-there-at-9-or-be-square response from the USPTO. The 1-Click patent has fallen into disfavor lately with USPTO Examiners, who no longer have the same boss who once sent a 1-Click love letter to the WSJ arguing that the merits of Amazon's patent were proven by a contest run by a Jeff Bezos-financed company, an argument that was later rejected by Congress."

An anonymous reader writes "Via Linuxtoday.com, a message from the OpenOffice Dev mailing list in which a new company is introducing the GravityZoo OpenOffice porting project. The unusually named group aims to bring OpenOffice to the Internet as a series of online apps. 'When OpenOffice.org is GravityZood, it will become a suite of productivity applications that are always available, online, via a broad range of devices. It will be possible to share and collaborate in real-time, to switch from one device (e.g. a PC) to another (Mobile) device. There will also be no need to save data, because everything you produce is saved automatically on the network. There is no need to download, install or update, the latest version is just available and accessible from any GravityZoo enabled client.'"

blackbearnh writes "At the Consumer Electronics Show on Monday, AMD hosted a presentation of the final Industrial Prototype (Beta 1) of the One Laptop Per Child XO Laptop. Linux Today has extensive reporting, including new photos and details about power consumption, networking, and the logistics of distributing and servicing what will be the largest rollout of any computing platform in history: 5 million units in the first year. This will represent nearly a 10% increase in the total worldwide laptop production for 2007."

blackbearnh writes "At the Consumer Electronics Show on Monday, AMD hosted a presentation of the final Industrial Prototype (Beta 1) of the One Laptop Per Child XO Laptop. Linux Today has extensive reporting, including new photos and details about power consumption, networking, and the logistics of distributing and servicing what will be the largest rollout of any computing platform in history: 5 million units in the first year. This will represent nearly a 10% increase in the total worldwide laptop production for 2007."

theodp writes "In seeking yet another patent related to 'single-action ordering of items,' Amazon asked the USPTO to consider a number of documents, including Doonesbury cartoons, which Amazon earlier claimed vindicated its 1-Click patent. Ironically, much of this material was collected and edited by BountyQuest, which reportedly received $1+ million from Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos in the name of patent reform. A USPTO examiner dutifully considered the material, and on Tuesday U.S. Patent No. 6,907,315 was issued to Amazon."

[vmlinuz] writes "Also picked up on The Register, The Inquirer and Linux Today - with the LUGRadio show getting more and more listeners and attracting guests such as Miguel de Icaza, Mark Shuttleworth, Alan Cox, Seth Nickell and more, the growing fanbase will be able to congregate at LUGRadio Live this summer. The day long event includes speakers such as Ian Bell (co-creator of Elite), Simon Willison, Bill Thompson, Christan Schaller and more. In addition to the speakers, an all day bar, multi-player gaming, mini expo and paintball are in the cards. LUGradio Live takes place on Sat 25th June 2005 in Wolverhampton, UK."

loser in front of a computer writes "ZDNet Australia reports that 'Australia's CSIRO research organisation has developed a Firefox plugin named Annodex that allows browsing through time-continuous media such as audio and video in the same way that HTML allows browsing through text.' I've just checked Annodex out and it's very cool. The sample video from the Perl conference is way funny too." The catch is, the media to be searched has to be prepped first.

Jem Berkes writes "In this current article about OpenOffice.org (also covered at Linux Today), I try to make a point about OpenOffice's commitment to open document formats and interchange as the strongest selling point - never mind cost. The OOo developers are putting a lot of effort into their XML format; will this pay off, and will users notice the significance of OpenDocument/OASIS document formats?" This can't be said enough: file formats are what determine whether and how easily data is portable, or whether the user is just stuck.

Voline writes "In the past few years the Venezuelan government has pursued a policy of 'Open source whenever possible, propietary software only when necesary.' This article from Venezuelanalysis.com provides a good overview of recent efforts on this front. Pres Chávez sees FOSS as a way to save money, develop the domestic software industry, and to reduce dependence on foreign (mostly US) suppliers. One of Chávez's advisors, José Luis Rey, is the former president of the Venezuela Linux Users Group."

superfebs writes "Some day ago Samba4 reached a pretty serious test stage. Promises are beautiful: full SMB protocol implementation, Active Directory Domain Controller facility, and more; here's a full roadmap."

kurtz_tan writes "This story on Linux World says the Singapore Ministry of Defence (Mindef) has installed the OpenOffice productivity suite on 5,000 new desktop computers. This move is aimed at giving employees in the ministry an additional choice in productivity software. It will also help Mindef make 'significant' savings in terms of capital costs. Singapore is acknowledged as the second best world wide for e-Government. Hope all other world wide government follow suit."

FlipmodePlaya writes "Linux Today reports the first release candidate for Gnome 2.8 has been released. A look at the new stuff can be found here. Notably, the possible inclusion of Evolution, and some networking goodies. My opinion: the GUI changes look too much like Windows/Internet Explorer for my tastes; I guess it's not just KDE."

ashmodai9 writes "According to this article on LinuxToday.com as well as this press release directly from their site, Novell announced that its "Connector for MS Exchange Server would be integrated into Evolution 2.0 and made available as open source, beginning today with the current Connector 1.4." Apparently, downloads will be available for the current version of Evolution starting May 14th." Thanks to reader crafterm, a snippet from Novell's Connector website: "With the Connector for Microsoft Exchange installed, Evolution functions as an Exchange client, enabling users to become full participants in company-wide group scheduling and other collaborative tasks. Linux and Solaris users can access public folders, Global Address Lists, email, calendar, task lists, and group scheduling information." Update: 05/11 17:58 GMT by T : In related news, ChiralSoftware writes "Codeweavers' long-awaited sequel to Crossover 2.1 is here. Just like the old version, the new version lets you install MS Office on Linux desktops. The new version adds support for Outlook XP, Lotus Notes and Microsoft Project."

MadChicken writes "This weekend, LinuxToday found that their link to an article was blocked by CMP Media LLC (publishers of Information Week). The editorial with full details is here. Could this have impact on other online news sites?"

Karma Sucks writes "LinuxToday is featuring a intriguing article on why Sun should open source Java, as a stronger followup to the recent ESR saga that was reported here. The writer notes: 'Sun needs to do some radical things to improve its chances of survival, and all of them involve Open Source in some form or the other.' One thing the article fails to mention is the threat of Mono, which should be of special interest to Sun, with its vested interest in GNOME."

CaptainT writes "According to this article in The Register Microsoft office was replaced by Open Office in the Israeli employment agency. MS scorns the defection... This follows current Israeli antitrust legislation and the recent release by IBM and Sun of Hebrew support in OpenOffice.org. Is the Israeli Defence Force going to follow?"

CaptainT writes "According to this article in The Register Microsoft office was replaced by Open Office in the Israeli employment agency. MS scorns the defection... This follows current Israeli antitrust legislation and the recent release by IBM and Sun of Hebrew support in OpenOffice.org. Is the Israeli Defence Force going to follow?"

theodp writes "With IE, IM and Linux all threatened by patent infringement lawsuits, it's worth noting that Saturday marks what would have been the third anniversary of BountyQuest. With $1+ million of Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos' money and an Amazon VP on its Board, BountyQuest vowed to reform the patent system through its prior art contests. While BountyQuest raised eyebrows when it found winning prior art right off the bat for a patent Amazon was sued for infringing on, it surprisingly drew little heat when it announced no winning prior art could be found for Bezos' own 1-Click patent. 'There was no Bounty winner, mainly because the 1-Click patent is specific to the Web,' explained BountyQuest. 'This was a tough one to win because the Amazon 1-Click patent is so specific to the Web,' added BountyQuest investor Tim O'Reilly. Amazon's claim that the contest outcome vindicated Bezos' 1-Click patent went unchallenged by the New York Times, who instead took contestants to task for submitting prior art that 'failed to mention the Internet.' But legal documents have surfaced revealing that a month before these arguments were made, Amazon was told by a Federal Court that 'This distinction is irrelevant, since none of the [Bezos 1-Click patent] claims mention either the Internet or the World Wide Web.' If it was 'in everyone's interest to get all relevant prior art out into the open,' as Bezos said, then what happened?"

Sit back, read Slashback. Tonight, (another) revision to the "Hidden Agenda" collegiate games contest, torrent files for the new Mandrake release, and the by turns heated-and-cool responses to Forbes' unfriendly description of the FSF -- for attempting to protect their copyrights -- as Linux's "hit men." Read on below for the details.

Hey, this approach works for the New York Post ... digidave writes "The fallout from Dan's Linux's Hit Men article on Forbes.com has pushed Forbes.com into putting up a discussion board, where Dan [Lyons] has posted his response"

And unmadindu writes "FSF's Bradley Kuhn has responded to the Forbes article ( reported earlier at Slashdot). Read the short, but to-the-point response at Linux Today." Kuhn's response is remarkable in its restraint.

Reader Waldo Jaquith sent the text of Lyon's first posting; an excerpt serves to illustrate its tone:

"Of course the Free Software Foundation is entitled to enforce its GNU General Public License (GPL), just as other organizations are entitled to enforce their copyrights and licenses. My article simply points out that the paradoxical effect of these "enforcement actions" (FSF's term) may be to impede the adoption of Linux. By demanding that licensees publish source code for their own "derivative work" code (in addition to the Linux they're using) the FSF is, in effect, charging a royalty that approaches 100% of the value of the licensee's product."

Some of the postings in response are very impressive; I especially like this one.

Dragonfly Forum Logs are scintillating reading. drdink writes "SlashNET would like to thank Matthew Dillon and everyone who attended the Dragonfly BSD Q&A forum session. Logs are available both in text and HTML formats."

You get to keep your base. Stealthgirl writes "The Hidden Agenda Game Development Contest, which received quite a bit of interest but also a lot of flak for its IP rules, has adapted the rules to appease those who were griping on sites like Slashdot. Check out this post for more info." Up to the entrants to decide if they like the rules of any contest, of course.

Leech friendly, with public Mandrake 9.2 torrents. An anonymous reader writes "Public torrents for the first two of the Mandrake 9.2 ISOs are up (I and II). Anybody cares to share the third?"

Sir? It's reality calling, on line two, from Anywhere. Marcelo Rodriguez (gardel on Slashdot), editor of Voxilla.com, writes: "We've posted the complete text of Federal Judge Mike Davis' ruling in Vonage v. Minnesota Public Utilities Commission on Voxilla.com. ... It's pretty much a slam dunk for Vonage and VoIP. Judge Davis wrote that Congress mandates that 'that information services such as those provided by Vonage must not be regulated by state law.' He also wrote that 'State regulation would effectively decimate Congress's mandate that the Internet remain unfettered by regulation.'"

Stargoat writes "CNet reports that China is looking into MS's source code for Windows. They are looking both to increase security as well as perhaps create a Chinese version of Linux. Or are they perhaps concerned with rumors of deliberate holes left in the software for the NSA to exploit?" Here's an earlier Slashdot post about the Microsoft-China agreement.

wampl3r writes " Eric Raymond and Bruce Perens deliver a great response to SCO's recent Letter to the Open Source Community. Their response does a good job of presenting many of the finer points we have been arguing about around here, but it's nice to see them in such a formal, well-thought-out letter." Munchola adds "Meanwhile, ComputerWire, from where McBride misquoted Perens in the first place, sets the record straight: 'In his statement McBride appears to have attributed a ComputerWire paraphrase as a quote from Perens.'" stefan points to this response to McBride's letter from Kevin Bedell, LinuxWorld Magazine's Editor. Below, find one reader's idea about the "stolen lines" SCO claims are in the Linux kernel, and one expert's claim that SCO might not know some of its own source code very well.

VikingBrad writes "The Sydney Morning Herald has an article on Dr Warwick Toomey of The Unix Heritage Society claiming that SCO may not know the origin of code in System V, including claims that there is a lot of BSD software in Sys V."

Alex writes "I wondered where the 100k+ lines of copied code in the linux kernel would come from in comparison to the SCO Unixware stuff. Then a thought popped up in my head: what if they just compared linewise? All those empty lines in the code would have the same content. But how many empty lines are in the Linux Kernel Code? This small shell script counts them for you:

emptylines=0; function parse_dir () { for file in $1/*; do if [ -d "$file" ]; then parse_dir $file; else while read line; do if [ "$line" = "" ]; then emptylines=$[$emptylines+1]; echo $emptylines; fi; done

Kernel 2.4.22, yet cleaned of the code which SCO claimed was stolen, has still 733140 empty lines, probably copied and pasted by the bad, bad kernel developers from the good, good SCO guys..."

An anonymous reader noted an article talking about the Samba Team's Statement to SCO. While Darl McBride blasts the GPL, his company simultaneously announces the use of Samba 3 in their OpenServer product. I'm not sure if it breaks my heart or boils my blood to read this stuff. Probably a little of both.

Anonymous writes "MWVLUG's coordinator, Cooper Stevenson, has asked Linux Today to post this detailed history of events surrounding the battle to get open source software legislation enacted in the Beaver State in an effort to raise public awareness for the campaign."

linuxwrangler writes "As noted in Ed Foster's InfoWorld Gripe Line blog, the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws committee on Uniform Computer Information Transaction Act (UCITA) has been disbanded. The UCITA proposal, a darling of the software industry, would have validated shrink-wrap and click-through licenses and legalized "self-help" or remote disabling of software by manufacturers. It's "developers are completely liable for defects...unless overridden by the shrink wrap license" provisions were of grave concern to open-source. The badly flawed proposed legislation was condemned by everyone from Librarians and InfoWorld editors to the American Bar Association, the Federal Trade Commission and Richard Stallman. Only two states (Virginia and Maryland) adopted it while twice that many passed Anti-UCITA laws. Although UCITA is not officially dead, at least it has been taken off life support which certainly qualifies as great news."

akahige writes "Forbes has a fairly detailed story about the sordid history of The Canopy Group and all the various companies they've sued -- Microsoft (who they beat) and CA (this case is still pending), among them. Before joining Caldera, Darl McBride sued IKON Office Solutions, for whom he worked -- and won. And it also seems that a bunch of Canopy power players also sit on SCO's board of directors. The short summary is, 'these guys are professional litigious bastards -- be exceptionally wary.'" A local user's group is planning a protest for tomorrow. Reader myst564 writes: "After reading all of this SCO press I remembered that SCO once offered up all of their 'Ancient UNIX' (their words, not mine) source to the world while retaining all copyrights (i.e, no OSS license). Interestingly enough it WAS located here but isn't any longer: SCO's Ancient Unix. What's more you can read about the original release here at: Linux Today. I downloaded the source myself way back then but never did anything but delete it! Anyway, check out this comment. It's interesting that this was predicted in 2000!"

akahige writes "Forbes has a fairly detailed story about the sordid history of The Canopy Group and all the various companies they've sued -- Microsoft (who they beat) and CA (this case is still pending), among them. Before joining Caldera, Darl McBride sued IKON Office Solutions, for whom he worked -- and won. And it also seems that a bunch of Canopy power players also sit on SCO's board of directors. The short summary is, 'these guys are professional litigious bastards -- be exceptionally wary.'" A local user's group is planning a protest for tomorrow. Reader myst564 writes: "After reading all of this SCO press I remembered that SCO once offered up all of their 'Ancient UNIX' (their words, not mine) source to the world while retaining all copyrights (i.e, no OSS license). Interestingly enough it WAS located here but isn't any longer: SCO's Ancient Unix. What's more you can read about the original release here at: Linux Today. I downloaded the source myself way back then but never did anything but delete it! Anyway, check out this comment. It's interesting that this was predicted in 2000!"

truthsearch writes "LinuxToday is reporting news and a response about Brazil making Open Source mandatory for 80% of all computers in state institutions and businesses, setting up a 'Chamber for the Implementation of Software Libre.'" This is a big win for Linux, but is making it mandatory going too far? It would seem wiser to support a solution that favors the best tool for the job, which may not always be an open source product.

truthsearch writes "LinuxToday is reporting news and a response about Brazil making Open Source mandatory for 80% of all computers in state institutions and businesses, setting up a 'Chamber for the Implementation of Software Libre.'" This is a big win for Linux, but is making it mandatory going too far? It would seem wiser to support a solution that favors the best tool for the job, which may not always be an open source product.

makapuf writes "According to linuxtoday, the X Consortium has published enhancement proposals to let X and IPV6 interoperate. This is surely a relief for the masses here that longed for X support for IPV6. Or the contrary? The proposal can be found here."

FyreWyr writes "Whether Microsoft is searching for new ideas, or supporting inventors outright is up for grabs, but they're stabbing at it with $300,000 for 12 spanking ideas (that's $25k each). But as with everything Microsoft, the devil's in the details, or rather, the fine print. At first, you'd swear it was "Brought to you by VISA" - the logo is ubiquitous - but the very last statement in the contest rules reads: "The sponsor...is Microsoft ... VISA...have not sponsored or offered this contest in any way". They also retain a spectrum of rights, and responsibily suggest that you go out and patent really good ideas first. Okay, how much does that cost again? (see end of this article)."

InodoroPereyra writes "Browsing Linux Today I found a link to an HispaLiNUX article stating that Andalucia goes OpenSource. More specifically, "All public educational centre necessities are intended to be fulfilled, first of all, with Free Software [...] It is compulsory to all hardware acquired by official educational centres to be fully compatible with Free Software operating systems. Furthermore, it must be preinstalled in all new bought computers". Andalucia is a region located to the South of Spain, with about 7.5 million inhabitants. This is an important follow-up to the many stories on Linux in Extremadura."

inode_buddha writes "We all know how RMS and Bill Gates toured India recently, with mostly mixed reviews. The reviews don't seem so mixed after reading this memo regarding the use of software in Indian schools... and it's interesting how quickly these people pick up on the business. IMHO, this letter ranks up there with the Peruvian Congressman's letter to Microsoft in clarity and impact. People worldwide are beginning to wake up, and this needs to be shouted from the (networked) hills... "

ggruschow writes "Linux Today reports 'The cost of running Linux is roughly 40% that of Microsoft Windows, and only 14% that of Sun Microsystem's Solaris, according to a new study which examined the actual costs of running various operating systems over three years.'"

Odinson sent in this news blurb from LinuxToday, reporting that Venezuela has adopted a policy for the use of Open Source software in government wherever possible. Apparently they have practical rather than philosophical motivations: keeping cash in the country and promoting local software development.

bwt asks: "With all the talk of DRM lately, it occurs to me that the entire concept depends on limiting the choice for computer hardware. OK, so the proper reaction to the copyright industry's attempts at PC market control is to be able to build a PC that they can't control. I know there have been some discussions on open hardware, but most if it was prior to the emergence of DRM as a real threat. In fact, Richard Stallman wrote an editorial in 1999 and said 'Because copying hardware is so hard, the question of whether we're allowed to do it is not vitally important.' DRM has perhaps changed that. Isn't the need for open hardware becoming critical? What is the status of the open hardware efforts?"

ezadro writes "I just spotted this article at LinuxToday about Redhat being directly involved in a new distribution that will be known as ReHMuDi, which stands for Red Hat Multimedia Distribution." The goal seems to be a system for professional audio composers and engineers. Don't expect it for awhile- they have 24 months scheduled to do it, although it looks like releases will start by the end of 02.

ezadro writes "I just spotted this article at LinuxToday about Redhat being directly involved in a new distribution that will be known as ReHMuDi, which stands for Red Hat Multimedia Distribution." The goal seems to be a system for professional audio composers and engineers. Don't expect it for awhile- they have 24 months scheduled to do it, although it looks like releases will start by the end of 02.

Abdul Nabi writes "I found this article on Linux Today which is a response from Turbolinux to the recent rumors of a shutdown. The responds contends that they are restructuring rather than shutting down." Ya know, I can't think of a single person that I know that runs Turbolinux. Maybe that has something to do with their problems.

joyoflinux writes: "Red Hat has released a beta version of its distribution, called LIMBO. It includes the latest desktop technology, gcc 3.1, Mozilla 1.0+, OpenOffice 1.0, and much more. You can download it here or use a mirror. Submit bugs here." Here's the announcement.

Earendil writes "Linux Today has a confirmed report that Microsoft is going to be an exhibitor at LinuxWorld Expo. One can only guess at what Microsoft's motives might be. It will be interesting to see the reaction to the appearance of a Microsoft booth." No doubt this means that the more childish among us will make us all look bad. Sigh.

Earendil writes "Linux Today has a confirmed report that Microsoft is going to be an exhibitor at LinuxWorld Expo. One can only guess at what Microsoft's motives might be. It will be interesting to see the reaction to the appearance of a Microsoft booth." No doubt this means that the more childish among us will make us all look bad. Sigh.

m0RpHeus writes "According to Linux Today, SuSE is denying per seat licensing for United Linux. `We really don't plan any per-seat licensing for UnitedLinux,' said SuSE's US Director of Sales Holger Dyroff. UnitedLinux, it seems is divided on this issue."

farrellj writes "In mining, geophysical data is the "source code" of the industry, and is usually guarded as closely as Microsoft guards their source code for their programs, sometimes even more so. But one Canadian mining company opened up their data, and reaped the rewards of Open Source in higher profits. Read all about it at: FastCompany. NOTE: Originally seen on Linux Today."

cigarky writes "I think many of us were very impressed by the recent letter of Peruvian Congressman Dr. Edgar David Villanueva Nuñez. Linux Today has a followup interview with more in-depth information."

cigarky writes "I think many of us were very impressed by the recent letter of Peruvian Congressman Dr. Edgar David Villanueva Nuñez. Linux Today has a followup interview with more in-depth information."

dipfan writes "The latest beta version of the Linux kernel 2.5.16 is out, with some comments by Linus here, who was kept 'personally somewhat busy' by 'the interesting Intel SMP-P4 TLB corruption bug, which ends up being due to some very funky asynchronous speculative TLB fill logic'. Woo hoo. Mirrors, etc." We haven't been keeping up with the 2.5.x series, but a slow Sunday is a good excuse to catch up.