Slashdot Mirror

Jon Hedley writes "While the perpetrator remains unknown, Lucasfilm's Star Wars Web site was the victim of its first crack today. The vandalism consisted of a list of names, presumably those of the hacker's friends, according to Lucasfilm. News.com reports that there are 20 - 30 crack attempts a day to the site. " Geez. I'd think anyone smart enough to do this would be smart enough not to...

Jordy writes "Well this report just came out today, a report that Microsoft has overcharged the computer industry $10 billion dollars for it's OS. Microsoft rebutted this and issued it's own press release stating that it's OS was comparable to other OS's. They list, amoung others, Sun Solaris as a comparable product to Windows98. You can read the highlights in an article at news.com." The report is rather interesting, actually, and has some fairly intriguing pricing data in it. Update C : The news.com link has been fixed.

Several folks wrote in to say that Hayes is dead. Remember the 'Hayes AT Command Set' that somehow became the standard? My first modem was a gigantic silver and black Hayes. It's strange that once again, a protocol they started has been extended, and outlived them. Update: 01/05 06:27 by CT : several folks wrote in with this story where the Hayes big shots deny the comments in the above News.com story.

cholko writes "There is a decent article on NEWS.COM about the availability of Linux based databases. It goes into the fact that there are available but real support does cost you." H: A tad bit of FUD here, methinks. What do you folks think? Click below for more comments. I don't think that the FUD is particularly bad in here-I think that they point some very valid issues. I also think that we shouldn't expect all of this to simply be free-that's being unrealistic. But I think the tone is over done.

Patrick Berry writes " Cool little story with lots of links telling how a number of Internet groups oppose the new limits to cryptography. But, will anyone listen to them? "

Mike McCune writes "It's called " Remote Explorer" and it attacks Windows NT machines in administrator mode. It compresses programs so that they don't execute and encrypts data files. Network Associates calls it "cyberterrorism"." There's a lot of media hype about this one judging by the large number of submissions about it. Is this one serious?

Quite frankly, upon seeing this headline, I couldn't resist. The article itself is about Frimage, the head of USWeb. Apparently, after having an "experience", he has become convinced that much of the world's technological advances and religious traditions are the result of extra-terrestrial influence. Oh, and in less esoteric news, his company merged with CKS yesterday.

Cassius wrote in to send us a link to News.com which has a front page story that talks about the recent Amazing Linux Growth. They say 212% in 1998. Shouldn't be a surprise to anyone in the know.

Roman Jurkech writes "Free version of WordPerfect for Linux is going to be available tomorrow according to this article. " I've seen it over at LWN as well. Looks like someone's FTP servers are going to be slow tomorrow.

Tim Funk wrote in to send us a link to a CNET article about someone selling a 35mm unviewed copy of the trailer on eBay. What is more interesting is the comment that a 4 minute trailer is due to be released on Jan 24.

phil reed writes "News.com is reporting that IBM will be releasing a secure replacement for Sendmail. It will be open source. "

el_nino wrote in to send us a link to a news.com article where you can read that NSI will invest in Centraal the Creators of RealNames- the cheesy keyword based net URL resolver thingee.

News about SGI's plans have come out. Essentially, beginning in January, SGI will, for the first time, be selling machines based on Wintel architecture. Their newest station, the Visual Workstation 320 will be selling for a little below 4000$ and will feature up to two PII 400s under the hood. This doesn't mean SGI is on the rebound yet-this is a radical shift for them, as this is pretty far away from their traditional playground.

So as many of you might already know, the whole Bay Area was without power for 6 hours. And as some others of you might know, San Francisco is where UPNetworks is. And many of you probably know that UPNetworks is where Slashdot is hosted from. But notice that we stayed up? I find it terribly amusing that they have 7 days of backup juice over there. Maybe I'm just slap happy from spending a day in a dark room with all those chemicals. Anyway, thanks to Jesse for the link, and the tails of woe from out there. And thanks to UPN for being cool and keeping juice & bandwidth to our beloved server throughout the outtage. On with the real stuff now.

Matt Singerman writes "NEWS.com is running a little story about how the NASDAQ stock market is "giving Windows NT a chance." Now is the time to sell. " H:For those of wondering, NASDAQ is going to try a NT system and test it to see if it can handle the enormous amount of transactions that it undergoes-stress testing, basically.

Well, some news comes out of the rumour mill today. The FCC which is already a month past its' one month deadline for decision, may be close to ruling that local calls to ISPs count as long-distance calls.

An interesting article is running, with comments from a MCI Vice President that pricing for Broadband access may have to come with long-distance style price tags. The VP points to the usage rates, the massive costs off laying bandwidth, coupled with the ever-increasing demands. However, another analyst points to the flat-rate US-style of pricing as a reason for the substantial growth of the Internet within the US. H: I personally hope they don't implement this-the consequences would be huge. What do you folks think?

Clive Turvey wrote in to point out a new News.com article touting Linux, and its strengths, specifically as it relates to Microsoft. Sort of good, here's why it matters article.

An anonymous reader wrote in to send us a link to a article about netscapesucks.com, which is owned by the same guy who owns whitehouse.com. The page is being used for (shock) anti netscape stuff. In this case, ranting against Smart Browsing. Netscape is less than pleased, and you can read a bit about their response.

Andy Tai writes "This news.com story reports on the new 600 mHz third-generation Alpha chip, 21264, from Samsung. It is twice as powerful as the previous generation."

AOL bought Netscape to gain an advantage by integrating the features of its portal with the browser, something that Netscape's been doing with its Netcenter portal. This would allow AOL to move back to being a proprietary, fee-based online service... something MSN tried and failed at. Interestingly, there will be little for Barksdale and Andressen to do, once AOL takes over... Time to set up a Mozilla based startup? In related news, Sun's McNealy disputed Microsoft's claim that the Sun-AOL-Netscape deal changes anything about the DOJ court case. Update I wonder what all this will do for newhoo, and Red Hat, both of whom have received Netscape investments.

diakka writes "Pacific HiTech believes that there is a large Linux market in China to be tapped. They plan on market their TurboLinux, which already has tools to handle the different character sets. Since Linux can run on low end hardware, and is easy to obtain a little or no cost, It seems likely that Chinese computer users may make up a much larger portion of the Linux community in the near future." What tools are available out there that allow the use of Chinese in Linux or X?

acb writes "Here's something interesting... apparently some researchers are working on a universal intermediary language for automatic translation between various native languages. Different organisations will create modules for translating between UNL and various national languages. If this works, it will open up information in smaller, lesser-known languages to non-speakers of those languages. "

Well, it's official. AOL is going to purchase Netscape for 4.2 billion dollars. You can read about it in ZDNet. You can also read about it in at C|Net as well. Update: Read Jamie's comments on the merger and make up your own mind.

Looks like This story will make the buzz of the week. AOL is in talks to buy Netscape (all stocks), and Sun Microsystems also could gain control of Netscape's business software operations in a 4 Billion dollars stocks deal. HNQ:I just wonder what will be with the Mozilla browser and Netscape's move in the Open Source issue. According to C|Net - "If completed, the deal would help both AOL and Sun compete against Microsoft." We'll see..

Thomas Charron writes "Looks like nice bright flatscreens will finally be available. A company in CA, USA has received a good deal of cash to set up manufacturing of monitors as bright as ordinary CRT's, but as thin as a flat-screen."

MSisEvil writes "According to CNet, Microsoft has dropped support for Java in IE for the Mac and Unix." So what do ya think folks? Is the DOJ thing gonna kill Java, Microsoft, or neither?

Steev wrote in to tell us that Microsoft's senior vice president for sales to PC manufacturers, Joachim Kempin suggested in December 1997 that Microsoft should charge an annual fee for Windows in a memo sent to Bill Gates. Other companies have been thinking similarly, to move from a one-shot sale industry to a service industry, using the Internet. Instead of buying an app, you'd get an executable for free which would require you to log into an account which provides you with large processing power (further reducing PC cost) while reducing piracy. You get charged by consumption rather than one-time only. However, with apps, you always have the option of moving to another service provider. With an OS, things get a little harder... In related news, Japan's FTC will issue a warning against Microsoft Japan. update! In other related news, Microsoft has at long last done the expected: claimed in court that Linux is a major competitor to Windows...

Steev wrote in to tell us that Microsoft's senior vice president for sales to PC manufacturers, Joachim Kempin suggested in December 1997 that Microsoft should charge an annual fee for Windows in a memo sent to Bill Gates. Other companies have been thinking similarly, to move from a one-shot sale industry to a service industry, using the Internet. Instead of buying an app, you'd get an executable for free which would require you to log into an account which provides you with large processing power (further reducing PC cost) while reducing piracy. You get charged by consumption rather than one-time only. However, with apps, you always have the option of moving to another service provider. With an OS, things get a little harder... In related news, Japan's FTC will issue a warning against Microsoft Japan. update! In other related news, Microsoft has at long last done the expected: claimed in court that Linux is a major competitor to Windows...

Jim Thompson writes "Today's edition of Project Heresy at CNET News covers a very interesting new (?) project called Squeak by, of all people, The Disney Co. This project, targetted at embedded devices, has a Smalltalk heritage and is based, to some extent, on code from Apple. Apple required that Disney not commercialize their product, so Disney has released it as Open Source. Squeak is not itself an OS, but the Heretics speculate that Squeak will soon be married to a scaled-down linux kernel an ported to all sorts of handheld devices. Squeak sounds reasonably cool in that it's based on Smalltalk-80 and has what sounds like a built-in "skins" feature for its UI. Do any Slashdotters have more info on Squeak, on where to go for more information? "

As usual, C|Net Radio with the Project Heresy. This week they talk about the Redhat & S.u.S.E support issue (24/7), Open source in other things like Squick (I really don't know what it is) and possibly combine it with Linux, BeOS 4.0 issue, MS vs Java, and finally - the Chrome program that MS dropped. Enjoy.

Microsoft is divesting from RealNetworks. One reason is that Real did not include the interoperability features Microsoft wanted. A more intersting reason was that Real and Microsoft did not see eye-to-eye on the future of streaming, and have been feuding over future standards. Chris le Tocq, an analyst at Dataquest in San Jose, Calif. said the rare move by Microsoft is Microsoft "saying that you are not one of us". Interestingly this move came after Microsoft offered to work with RealNetworks on an underwritten secondary offering of stock, but the two companies could not agree on terms... Although normally this would reduce investor confidence in RealNetworks, its stock bounced up while Microsoft's fell. In related news, Gartner reiterated its warning not to move to Windows 2000 until 2001 at the earliest.

Courtesy the uberinformed David Lesher. Sun has won their Java suit against Microsoft. The most obvious ramification is that Microsoft must stop shipping Windows 98 and IE immediatley. Hopefully, more information will come in later. H:For those of you who don't want to go to the NY Times, read about the victory over here. J: To clarify - my original post was very poorly worded.They did not win in the legal sense, but they did win in the sense they have succeeded in making MS either comply or lose. S: Hey you're all famous! we're mentionned on news.com.

Intel announced at Comdex that it will make integrated processors in 2000, following a trend initiated by Cyrix with its MediaGX processors. This is the first time Intel has discussed integrating peripheral functions onto the CPU die, although they have talked about integrating the i740 into a chipset.

Be has announced it has received $25 million from various sources including Intel. This and its recent design with Hitachi bode well for Be. Interestingly Be is pushing Windows compatibility in the guise of file system compatibility and shared keyboard shortcuts. Say GNOME and KDE become more theme-able: what would you think of the idea of providing multiple themes that train a Windows user starting from what (s)he knows and building up to using Linux more natively? Rather like children's books start with a few words on which they build.

Cyrix will be demonstrating a Wireless Net Device called a WebPad at Comdex. I've played with one already, and really like it. It's thought of as a web-browser that you can read anywhere in your house, but could easily be extended to capture notes, etc. It has a 10 inch really bright wide-viewing angle LCD panel, and runs on a MediaGX processor. Because it uses a standard x86 but is application specific, it can run any OS (currently QNX but could be Linux, WinCE, OpenDOS, whatever) without compatibility with legacy software being of great issue. It's got its own loudspeakers so I listened to the BBC world news over the internet on it. It's radio range is pretty good too (500 feet) and it worked outside. I really hope it takes off as I'd like to buy one. Hopefully it will be sufficiently open to enable a Linux port which means that someone out there needs to start working on a GNU handwriting recognition library: it uses a touch-screen with a pen. Any takers? Voice recognition would also be good.

Another EEE (extend, embrace, extinguish) effort from Microsoft has fallen flat on its face: their proprietary standard, Chromeffects, is shelved for an undetermined duration. News.com speculates that Chromeffects was targeted at Java.

Another EEE (extend, embrace, extinguish) effort from Microsoft has fallen flat on its face: their proprietary standard, Chromeffects, is shelved for an undetermined duration. News.com speculates that Chromeffects was targeted at Java.

No one of consequence writes "Intel invests in Be! Get the scoop here. The Wintel duopoly is splintering. Or, this is just a ploy to get the DOJ off Microsoft's back by showing "vigorous competition" exists. " Or maybe Intel just wants to make sure that it has a stake in all the major OSs just to make sure they all support upcoming intel hardware.

Linux World has a report from the Oracle OpenWorld panel. Linus said that he will be focussing on bringing Linux to normal users. Indeed, the competition is not high end Unixes, but Windows. He also mentioned that 2.2 should be out by Christmas. Intel also announced a Linux Community Program. Despite recent speculation, Larry Ellison did not discuss a Linux strategy, but an Oracle vice-president reaffirmed Oracle's commitment to Linux. Moreover, Oracle called upon Sun today to put Java into the Open Source community to accelerate its growth. Note that Netscape's vice president said that the emphasis should not be put on the OS but the apps it runs and the services around it: similar to this idea. Thanks to beg and ensor for their URLs. updated

Just in case you didn't listen to this ~30 minutes show here. You'll hear Dan Shafer & Brian Cooley explains regarding the Linux & GUI/commercial issue, the Beowolf project, and the "Halloween" documents (1&2)

Alan Cox wrote in to say "it is worth reminding all the Police State Of America citizens running ISPs that they need to register them with the US copyright office ASAP or be responsible for their users copyright violations." Proud to be an American yet? For those of you outside the US, where should I move after graduation? *grin*

Matt Perry writes Platinum Entertainment is going to release songs in MP3 format. What did I tell ya? Now we'll have something to put on those 50 gig HDs I posted an hour ago. And it'll even be legal.

There's a good story running at over news.com about a astrophysicist building his own supercomputer equivalent by using 140 Alpha boxes, and Linux. This has been mentioned-Avalon is the codename-but the price is so cheap (313,000$US) for this new verison of it that it warrants mentioning. The old cluster, 70 machines, was 315 on the supercomputer list. This might be in the top 100.

There's a good story running at over news.com about a astrophysicist building his own supercomputer equivalent by using 140 Alpha boxes, and Linux. This has been mentioned-Avalon is the codename-but the price is so cheap (313,000$US) for this new verison of it that it warrants mentioning. The old cluster, 70 machines, was 315 on the supercomputer list. This might be in the top 100.

ESR writes "The Wall Street Journal called me less than an hour ago to quiz me about the Halloween Document.

I gave them the sound bites they were looking for. In the process I found out that they've already talked with Microsoft -- and Microsoft has officially admitted that the memorandum is genuine!

This fact should become public knowledge no later than tomorrow evening (Nov 3) when the WSJ story runs.

As you peruse your WSJ tomorrow, the distant noise you hear will be me -- laughing my butt off at the people who leapt to accuse me of having been hoaxed, or even of perpetrating the hoax myself."

For those that can't wait, news.com is also confirming it. Thanks to David Fred for this link. Update! VNUNet believes Microsoft sanctioned the leak since it gives credibility to Microsoft's claim that Linux is competition for them. Microsoft's UK marketing manager also says Linux is not a threat. This reader's comment points out that the document focusses on License forking, not code forking. Links from LinuxToday.

WebTV, which is owned by Microsoft, has dropped support for Java within the product. This means that those on WebTV will /not/ have the ability to use Java over this. While WebTV hasn't exactly been a stellar success, this does hurt it even more with users. WebTV maintains that the drop is for cost reasons, and not part of the bad blood between Microsoft and Sun.

echo writes "On C-NET's Project Heresy yesterday Dan Shafer and Brian Cooley talked about where they think Linux needs to go in the future. In particular, they seem to think that the command line should be totally hidden, that the notion of multi-user should go away, and that programs shouldn't have "modes". At least for "regular" users. Here's the site. What do you think? " I agree that these things should be hidden from the novices, but making multi user go away? Yeah, right. update: (S) Apparently the guys at Project Heresy tried to contribute to the discussion but failed. This is what they had to say.

Dark Helmet (insert heavy breathing noises here) writes "Apparently, that new Digital Millennium Copyright Act law that was recently passed had a "little known provision" hidden within." The whole deal is at news.com. Its gonna be a bumpy ride.

Somewhere around 3 million of you submitted thatMicrosoft has officially renamed NT 5.0 to 'Windows 2000'. Probably the best link is over here, as it contains some other incredibly interesting (yes, that's is sarcasm) information about MS naming conventions. Now, stop submitting this, darn it. :)