Slashdot Mirror

g2g was among the people who noticed that Slashdot & OSDNs parent, VA Linux Systems has changed its name to VA Software. vasoftware.com is the new domain as I guess they are focusing on SourceForge and OSDN. On the upside, I guess newspapers will stop calling the company 'Linux' all the time.

Cassivs writes: "There's an article claiming that VA Linux is planning on selling a proprietary, closed-source version of SourceForge, SourceForge Enterprise Edition. See the letter to SourceForge members assuring them that VA Linux will continue to provide free hosting/etc. at SourceForge. They will also continue to maintain a GPL version of the code, SourceForge Open Edition." VA is Slashdot's corporate parent.

An anonymous reader noted that Slashdot's Parent Company VA Linux Systems has made an appearance on f'dcompany. I'm sure I'm not the only one who frequents the site, so I won't bother explaining it. The report says that VA is planning a lot of layoffs. Amusingly enough, it also mentions that VA hardware largely powers F'd company. Your guess is as good as mine wrt the truth in this rumor, and what it means if it is.

As a person who's owned no less then four GW machines, two Dells, and now have two VA, one DIYS, and one IBM Thinkpad, I found the SatireWire about the Dell-Gateway Amensty pretty amusing.

odoa4 asks: "What do you think will make a better 1u Apache Server? A Sun Netra X1 or a 1U Ontel box such as a Dell PowerApp.Web 120 or a VA 1220. This is a difficult question because the Intel boxes are about $1800 a piece and the Sun machine is only $1000. The Sun machine can only use 1 CPU and it runs at 400Mhz, where the Intel machines run at 800+Mhz with up to 2 cpus. Keep in mind that the web servers will be clustered, so the real question isn't so much about whether the Intel boxes are faster, but more along the lines of are they worth the $800 more when I could almost get another Netra for the cost. As far as OSs go, I would use Solaris 8 on the Sun machines and FreeBSD on the Intel boxes. Here are some links to various servers I've looked at: Sun Netra X1, VALinux 1220, and the PowerApp.web 120" Are there other alternatives for 1U servers, that the submittor might do well to look into?

Scott McNeil e-mailed me regarding Linux Standard Base releasing .9 - check out the full release of information below.

The Linux Standard Base is in the final stages of the LSB written specification for Linux. The workgroup has published the LSB v0.9 written specification, and is undergoing a 30 day Request For Comments from the public until Wednesday June 6th, 2001. Afterwards, this draft will be submitted to the Free Standards Group for adoption.

http://www.linuxbase.org/spec/lsbreview.html

The LSB is built on pieces of existing standards that are widely used by the industry and supported by the development community. These include:

• ELF & TIS 1.2
• FHS 2.1
• ISO C90 & C99
• LFS 1.5
• POSIX.1
• POSIX.2
• SUS (CURSES, XBD, XCU, XNS, XSH, XSH95)
• X base interface standards

Work is primarily being done by the development community and the major Linux distributions including Caldera/SCO, Debian, Mandrake, Red Hat, SuSE, and Trubolinux. Further contributions have come from IBM, Intel, Linuxcare, Metro Link, VA and others.

The goal of the LSB is to develop and promote a set of standards that will increase compatibility among Linux distributions and enable software applications to run on any compliant Linux system. In addition, the LSB will help coordinate efforts to recruit software vendors to port and write products for Linux.

http://www.linuxbase.org/

The LSB is but one of several open source standards efforts run by the Free Standards Group, a nonprofit organization founded by community developers to accelerate the use and acceptance of open source technologies through the application, development and promotion of standards.

http://www.freestandards.org/

prac_regex was the first to write with news of planned cuts announced today for VA Linux. "The title doesn't say it all, but it says a lot. Yahoo reports the cost cutting VA implemented today." VA reported higher-than expected per-share losses, and announced some big organizational changes as well. Guess "playing in the big leagues" means taking the occasional bean-ball. (Note: OSDN, of which Slashdot is a part, is itself part of VA, in case you hadn't heard;))

Cerlyn asks: "I am the network administrator of three server grade machines purchased from three separate companies. The recent power problems in California reminded me of the fact that none of these servers seem to support power management. The operating systems these systems run (Linux 2.2, 2.4, and FreeBSD 4.2) are compiled to support power management, but do not detect any power management capabilities at all. Granted, no one wants a server sleeping on the job. But the way things seem to be coded, processors can not even sleep while idle without known hardware support. Lightly loaded machines are often idle 75% of the time or more. Sleeping while idle could make them save a significant amount of power. For many companies, the extra ten seconds it would take to spin up a backup server's hard drive(s) likely would be a non-issue. So, why don't server grade computers support advanced power management (APM), APCI and the like?" And in the land of the rolling blackout, one has to wonder if the potential power saved could help the situation, assuming a good percentage of the big iron in Silicon Valley were configured to conserve what power it could (as opposed to adding on to the drain as it is now).

reptyle asks: "Over Xmas dinner, a friend of the family told us she was considering launching a partnership between her employer FNMA (colloquially known as Fannie Mae; they are a semi-private company that guarantees mortgages) and Microsoft to provide training and eventually, surplus hardware to private individuals and non-profit outfits. I lamented this choice and she suggested that I e-mail her names and URLs of companies as alternative recommendations. So far I have come up with: Debian, Red Hat (distributions), VA Linux, Penguin (hardware companies), and maybe a few non-profit advocacy groups, but I think the list is still a bit too short. I can't think of any other entities that might be appropriate so I figured I'd ask Slashdot readers for help in providing other organizations that I may have missed. I don't care whether the organization uses Linux or BSD, just as long as it's not a proprietary model."

We had an extremely interesting submission from Ted T'so,, Linux kernel developer, who also has an obvious interest in security, given his work with Kerberos ^[?] . He wrote in concerning the release by the NSA (Yes, that NSA) of a high security version of Linux. I've included his comments below.

tytso writes: "I recently attended a DARPA workshop which focused on high security open source operating systems. It turns out that parts of the U.S. government are really interested this topic; having an operating system with the necessary high-security features which they need, and for which source code is available, would be a really good thing for them. Among other things, for example, it would mean that they wouldn't have to live in terror about what might happen if Sun, IBM, SGI, et. al decided to pull the plug on Trusted Solaris, Trusted AIX, or Trusted IRIX. And they're serious enough that DARPA's willing to throw money at the problem.

While I was at this workshop, I met some folks from the NSA and they told me about a really neat project that they've been working on, called Security-enhanced Linux. One of the cool things about it is that it separates enforcement and policy. So selinux can easily support many different security policies, from the old (some would say outdated/silly) Multi-Level Secure/Bell-LaPadula model, to Domain-Type enforcement and Rule-Based Access Control models. So if you think that high-security features means the old silly, Secret / Top Secret / CMW bullshit, and needing to make sure that Secret windows don't get expose events from Top Secret windows, think again. A number of folks have found Domain Type Enforcement and Rule-Based Access Control systems very useful for securing Web servers and other real world systems.

The NSA folks just recently got permission to make their stuff available on the Web. It's just a proof of concept, and no doubt a lot of changes will need to made before people will accept integrating it into the kernel, but they have released a working system (both kernel and userspace patches --- RPM's aren't quite ready yet) based on Linux 2.2 and RedHat 6.1. So it's definitely worth a look, and in fact some folks with specialized needs might find it useful, even though it's a prototype.

Of course, the source code is all there, and we're encouraged to look at and audit the code. So paranoiacs who think that the NSA is trying to infiltrate trap doors into the Linux kernels needn't worry. (Besides, it's a different part of the government who's interested in spying on U.S. citizens, and it's much more efficient for them to break into your house, and insert a wiretapping device between your computer and your keyboard as part of a black bag job. :-)

The Web site is http://www.nsa.gov/selinux. I think it's really great that some folks at NSA's Information Assurance Research Office (IARO) have made this contribution to the Linux community. They're really nice folks (even if they can't talk about a lot of what they do at work :-).

P.S. Apparently it's not easy to get stuff published by the NSA, since their entire culture, not surprisingly, is based around not letting stuff out. This Web page went up a few days ago, and then some bureaucrats made the folks in the IARO take it down temporarily, much to their disappointment. At the moment it looks like they've finally crossed all of the bureaucratic t's and dotted all of the bureaucratic i's. But just in case, it might not be a bad idea if someone mirrored the entire tree just in case some flack in some other part of the agency tells them to take it down again....

"

We had an extremely interesting submission from Ted T'so,, Linux kernel developer, who also has an obvious interest in security, given his work with Kerberos ^[?] . He wrote in concerning the release by the NSA (Yes, that NSA) of a high security version of Linux. I've included his comments below.

tytso writes: "I recently attended a DARPA workshop which focused on high security open source operating systems. It turns out that parts of the U.S. government are really interested this topic; having an operating system with the necessary high-security features which they need, and for which source code is available, would be a really good thing for them. Among other things, for example, it would mean that they wouldn't have to live in terror about what might happen if Sun, IBM, SGI, et. al decided to pull the plug on Trusted Solaris, Trusted AIX, or Trusted IRIX. And they're serious enough that DARPA's willing to throw money at the problem.

While I was at this workshop, I met some folks from the NSA and they told me about a really neat project that they've been working on, called Security-enhanced Linux. One of the cool things about it is that it separates enforcement and policy. So selinux can easily support many different security policies, from the old (some would say outdated/silly) Multi-Level Secure/Bell-LaPadula model, to Domain-Type enforcement and Rule-Based Access Control models. So if you think that high-security features means the old silly, Secret / Top Secret / CMW bullshit, and needing to make sure that Secret windows don't get expose events from Top Secret windows, think again. A number of folks have found Domain Type Enforcement and Rule-Based Access Control systems very useful for securing Web servers and other real world systems.

The NSA folks just recently got permission to make their stuff available on the Web. It's just a proof of concept, and no doubt a lot of changes will need to made before people will accept integrating it into the kernel, but they have released a working system (both kernel and userspace patches --- RPM's aren't quite ready yet) based on Linux 2.2 and RedHat 6.1. So it's definitely worth a look, and in fact some folks with specialized needs might find it useful, even though it's a prototype.

Of course, the source code is all there, and we're encouraged to look at and audit the code. So paranoiacs who think that the NSA is trying to infiltrate trap doors into the Linux kernels needn't worry. (Besides, it's a different part of the government who's interested in spying on U.S. citizens, and it's much more efficient for them to break into your house, and insert a wiretapping device between your computer and your keyboard as part of a black bag job. :-)

The Web site is http://www.nsa.gov/selinux. I think it's really great that some folks at NSA's Information Assurance Research Office (IARO) have made this contribution to the Linux community. They're really nice folks (even if they can't talk about a lot of what they do at work :-).

P.S. Apparently it's not easy to get stuff published by the NSA, since their entire culture, not surprisingly, is based around not letting stuff out. This Web page went up a few days ago, and then some bureaucrats made the folks in the IARO take it down temporarily, much to their disappointment. At the moment it looks like they've finally crossed all of the bureaucratic t's and dotted all of the bureaucratic i's. But just in case, it might not be a bad idea if someone mirrored the entire tree just in case some flack in some other part of the agency tells them to take it down again....

"

The word is that the Florida recount will be completed later today (before 5 EST). In the meantime, a couple of interesting bits related to math (which seems much more appropriate to Slashdot ;) The big one is of course the 'Voting Irregularity' in Palm Beach where supposedly thousands of seniors voted for Buchanan due to a badly designed ballot. this report (unfortunately, its a PDF) breaks down the returns on various counties and pretty much proves that something was wrong. Any math folks out there interested in doing their own take on the numbers? bwoodard sent in a mathematical argument for the electoral college written by MIT Prof, Alan Natapof. Hopefully we'll have more word later today. Update: 11/09 01:55 PM EDT by C :For those of you interested in seeing why there is such controversy over the Palm Beach County ballot, you can take a look at the ballot to see for yourself if it might be a bit unintuitive. If you'd like more food for thought, you can check out this article which talks a bit about the usability issues behind the ballot's design.

Chris DiBona, a man of many titles (Linux Community Evangelist, VA Linux Systems; President, Silicon Valley Linux Users Group; Grant Chair, Linux International) passed to us this reminder that for all the (occasionally legitimate) claims of standards compliance out of Redmond, subtly breaking standards in the name of "improvement" can be far worse than more blatant attempts. Hint: supplanting ASCII is a bad idea. (More below.)

Chris writes: " So here's an interesting feature from our friends at MicroSoft. They've decided that Outlook 2000 users by default really don't want to communicate with the rest of the world, preferring to communicate only with other OL2000 users.

Now, while I don't have any problem with people extending the content of an e-mail with attachments, i.e. sending html-ized version and v.cards, it seems downright stupid to make the default behavior of ol2000 to send it's e-mail only in MS's proprietary TNEF format.

Now, It's clear that they've had some support calls on this, as proven by this KB Entry. So that means that they caught some flak for it. But they haven't changed it.

Fun Quotes from the KB entry:

• In addition to the receiving client, it is not uncommon for a mail server to strip out TNEF information from mail messages as it delivers them. If a server option to remove TNEF is turned on, clients will always receive a plain text version of the message. Microsoft Exchange Server is an example of a mail server application that has the option to remove TNEF from messages.

This means in essence that unless you are using a 'TNEF Aware' server -- like, say, hmm, MS Exchange -- you may not be able to read your mail. I may be reading a bit much into this paragraph, but it seems to me that this paragraph says 'if your friends can't get your email, it's their servers fault, not yours.'

And to take this the further, go join the EFF if you haven't already, step, suppose somone were to circumvent the protections on the TNEF format and write a program that could understand it, would you be liable under the DMCA section on anti-circumvention? Admittedly, I'd be surprised if MS took this route, but it's worth considering every single time you think about decoding proprietary formats. Does this mean strings is now a circumvention tool?

Anyhow, if there are any microsofties out there, do the right thing and cut down your support costs by making ascii the ol2000 default transmission behavior for text. And for anyone using Outlook 2000, you should switch to a program that your friends can actually recieve email from. Or at least shut off that option."

TheTomcat writes "Kuro5hin is back up and better than ever, with its new server from VA Linux. At 2pm(1pm EST) today, the site went live, after a month or so of downtime." Well, this was the first submission in the bin to actually say it was up. Congrats to the whole gang and welcome back. And everyone else stop submitting their return, 'k? *grin* Update: 09/19 01:53 PM by CN : SlashNET will be hosting a forum with Rusty and Inoshiro on Saturday at 5:00 PM PDT (0:00 GMT). Looks like a good opportunity to welcome k5 back, as well as learn how they've overcome the issues that kept them down.

bob|hm was one of the group of people who wrote to us with an update from Kuro5hin. The donated server from VA has been packaged and sent out - now it's a matter of hooking it back up and "kicking the tires."

wildag writes "I've recently come into a battle with a guy who owns this site. You might notice the 'similarities' between his web site and Linux.com. I'm going to doubt that Linux.com bought the interface from him. The acutal battle comes from a statment that is on his message board (posted by the admin - Leo). He says 'The layout of any website is "public domain" which is freely available to the public' (that is avaliable here: http://hobbes.resne t.tamu.edu/forums/showthread.php?threadid=25). What do you guys think? (BTW, Linux.com has been notified and he didn't ask permission)." There are countless websites that are direct ripoffs of others, but few as blatant as this one. My policy with Slashdot has always pretty much been take what you want, but give us credit for what ya lift. I've seen this done many times to many sites and it always bums me out: making a well designed website is hard work, and imitation is the sincerest form of flattery... but isn't saying thanks and crediting your source part of it too? (For those who don't know, Slashdot is owned by VA Linux now, which also owns Linux.com. This doesn't really have anything to do with this story, but I figured I'd mention it). I post this not to point fingers or cause a fight, but to open a discussion about this. Just because you can take something, should you? When are you stealing? Is is hypocritical to demand open source, but not be willing to share your design? And should "Sharing" mean "You can take it, and claim it as your own, and not give the original creator any credit?" Its an issue that spans genres: Web Pages? Source Code? Samples in Music? Fair Use?

With a planned move to San Francisco next summer, last week saw San Jose's last Linux World Expo, at least for now. The future as always is stubbornly uncertain, but it's impressive that the serendipitous combination of Free tools (from GNU) and a Free kernel (from Linus) has inspired enough interest and prosperity to excite a larger group of people each year. If you've not had the chance to attend one of these expositions, we hope this article will give you a flavor of what it's like. Note: Here are a few pictures from the floor (Day 1 & Day 2) contributed by Sensei^); do you have any cool shots to link to in comments?

First, the prelude: If you've worked on the pre-show aspects of anything from a high-school play to a LAN party, you know all those booths, displays, people and computers don't materialize by themselves. For several days before the show floor opened on Tuesday, forklift crews zipped cargos of wooden, fiberglass, plastic, aluminum and steel cases from moving trucks to exhibit spaces. These contained banners, snap-together modules, computers, lighted signs -- and Yes, more gratis logo-imprinted toys than you can wave a TuxTops LED light at.

Spiderwebs of CAT-5 and electric cord (run beneath the show floor) sprouted from the centerpoints of many booths, with strands for each computer to be connected to the Net during the show. Rolls of padding and carpet came next, then the slow assembly of display booths. These ranged from no-nonsense fabric partitions that housed companies like TuxTops and Sendmail (and legions of volunteers from PerlMonks, the Simple End User Linux project, Flightgear, and many others), to elaborate constructions with motorized signs, projected lasers and huge illuminated logos. Note: Slashdot (the site) was put together last week mostly from the comfy chairs of the PerlMonks booth.

The "C" (as in conference) part of LWCE got started on Monday, and for the days that followed, attendees got instruction -- on everything from Linux security to evangelizing Free software to their bosses-- in half-day doses. Meanwhile, the setup work continued into the wee hours, as exhibitors raced the clock to make sure that at least their signs, if not their networks, were up for the next day. And at the OSDN booth (home of the red-carpeted Slashdot stage and beanbags), prep work included stacking thousands of boxed distributions of Debian, and attempted to pawn a few copies off on every passer by.

Tuesday morning, at a shade before 10:00, visitors willing to miss Michael Dell's keynote began to stream into the halls, on a quest to find new distros, old friends, and swag. It's amazing what companies will give away in order to snag a little nook in your brain. Besides the usual trinkets (keychains, T-shirts, stickers) and the distributions that a Linux show would be empty without, booth visitors were handed everything from knives (Sendmail) to cute monkeys (Helixcode) to embarrassing pictures of themselves (BSDi), as well as too many toys with embedded LEDs to bother counting. Rather than a full swag accounting (which would only annoy those unable to attend), let me just say that you won't hurt for toys when the chance presents itself. (CT:I just wanted to note that VA gave away 2300 pounds of shrink-wrapped boxed Debian. Like 5000 copies. It was beautiful)

The things on display around the LWCE floor were more interesting than the toys, though. (And unlike a museum, most were available for hands-on demonstration, not hidden behind glass.) Indrema showed a prototype player (not in the sleek black box you see on their Web site, but still sporting that cool blue LED) hooked up to a HDTV display, playing a very fast game of Quake. (CT:Actually it was an HDTV demo, they promised the real deal will be less vaporous before I have children) In the Intel booth were server clusters populated with quad Itanium processors, demonstrating failover when one system was rudely but intentionally shut down. The amazing-like-emacs-is-amazing Flightgear project showed a really nice looking demo which is enough incentive by itself to invest in a better video card for my system so I can play with it.

Both Helixcode and Eazel made their first LWCE appearance this time around, exciting for those filling their anti-FUD cannon for the perpetual "Linux is tough to use" argument. The Eazel folks showing off Nautilus seemed to be all but cackling as they showed off the smoothness of the zooming information available for documents and the cool music-integration abilities it contains. It would have been cool if they'd had some sample CDs, but they promise a developers' release soon. (CT:They also promised .deb's, but I'll believe it when I see it. The UI was awesome, I just hope that someone hacks in something like the GUI command line in EFM)

Considering that Sun was showing off the GNOME desktop on Solaris (hinting at its inclusion in stock Solaris systems sometime very soon, too) and that the GNOME project itself was not only in one of the small booths against the wall but the subject of a big announcement -- about the advent of the GNOME Foundation -- it looks it's showing up everywhere. Happily, there seems to be no shortage of room for window managers right now: the KDE folks were also there not only in their own booth, but showing up in software demonstrations all over the floor, as SuSE, Caldera and others demonstrated the very slick KDE 2.0. (Can't we all just get along, anyhow?)

SuSE, by the way, was the only distributor I noticed showing off Linux on Apple hardware, and their current distro was sweet and fast on a G4. Beyond the curious lack of Apples, and the obvious ubiquity of x86 machines, there were machines based on everything from microcontrollers to StrongArm, MIPS, Alpha, Itanium ... even the IBM S/390s which have gotten attention for the ridiculous number of concurrent Linux systems they can support.

For all the cool hardware and cusp-of-reality, bleeding-edge distros, it's interesting that the announcement which seemed to generate the most buzz of the entire show was the long-awaited release of Debian's Potato. Considering the reputation that Debian has for intelligent upgrading, stability, and diligence in guarding the license of the software which makes it up, it's not as surprising as it might otherwise be that Debian's new release made people sit up a bit more than the newest offerings from the large commercial distros.

(CT: Also extremely impressive was the Pocket Linux booth, where they actually had iPaq's running Linux. The first dude that demoed the box to me was very nice, but what I really wanted to see was X11 running on it ... oddly enough, I encountered one of his cohorts in the bar later that night who showed it to me: X, xeyes, xterm, and twm running on an iPaq. When they get the wireless action going on these things I'm totally there ... I'll just need to hack minimalist interfaces onto pronto and my MP3 player software and use the thing as a portable X terminal on the local 802.11 wireless lan. Yum.)

Oh, and there were people on the floor as well -- close to 20,000, all told. I met some folks I've known previously only through IRC, and quite a few I might never have otherwise encountered.

It's interesting to see in the space of a few hours many of the smart people who you may experience vicariously through writings, speeches, code, art or IRC chatter -- and it also belies the idea that software celebrities of the Free software world are becoming celebrities of the traditional variety, since everyone from ESR to Jon "maddog" Hall (and Linus himself) are willing to talk to anyone who catches up with them long enough to say hello. The atmosphere (especially outside the mondo corporate-castle booths) is mellow and accomodating, and suprisingly so even within most of those castles. There were undoubtably personality conflicts at work, but it seems like most people have the good grace to deal nicely with each other for these few days at least.

At the close of each day, people shuffle out to drop laptops, T-shirts and bags of stuff at their hotels, then thousands of them show up to parties sponsored by companies from AMD to Red hat to VA, which are full-blown events in themselves. Mandrake's party, for instance, had go-go dancers in cages, which may be the most bacchanal thing I have ever witnessed. Ironically, though, many coders couldn't attend even events sponsored by their own companies, or thrown in the honor of their projects, because of strict carding policies. Wouldn't a chem-free party or two be a thoughtful way to include people?

(CT: This has been a consistent problem for several years. Although I know at "Someones" party (no names *grin*) they weren't carding, and I recieved many a happy note from fellow attendees proclaiming that they were able to get in. The parties themselves weren't bad: the OSDN/Potato release party was fun, with San & Zak spinning the tunes (next time we'll force CowboyNeal to scratch for us under threat of death). They had 2 buildings: one was a pool hall, where we tormented The Pope for nearly an hour, carefully distracting him, and then returning his balls to the table. He never noticed. We also met up with Nitrozac from After Y2k, and I snuck accross the street to the Eazel party for a bit, and got to meet Dave "You might remember me from cheat codes in some first person shooter" Taylor.) Attendeees mostly filed out for flights or drives home Thursday and Friday, but some are still in San Jose for the Intel Developers Conference, or otherwise enjoying the Northern California weather. It's a strange familiarity that many of them will feel when the next big conference rolls around, to see many of the same fellow attendees or workers -- of course, by the time the next big conference happens, perhaps we'll all be too excited by the release of 2.4 to notice.

Tonight at The Usual is our now traditional LWCE mega party. This time it's brought to us by OSDN, VA Linux, and all the assorted sites like Linux.com, Themes.org, SourceForge, ThinkGeek and what have you. The party is of course to celebrate the Debian 2.2 release. Music will be provided by San 'NeTTwerk' Mehat DJing and featuring Jon 'CowboyNeal' Pater scratching. The party starts at 8pm and continues well past my bed time.

On Sunday night, the popular geek news site Kuro5hin.org was the victim of a denial of service attack that involved the abuse of their news submission queue and comment system by an unknown cracker. While the identity of the cracker or crackers is still not known, the all-volunteer Kuro5hin team is busy going through access logs, portscan information and other information to find out who caused the problem. In light of the attack, Kuro5hin was shut down today with a message telling their fans why they needed to take the site down. I spoke to some of the Kuro5hin staff to get some answers: How did it happen, and is there a light at the end of the tunnel?

Dylan Griffiths, known to Kuro5hin users as Inoshiro, gives us the sysadmin play-by-play:

"This started on Sunday night. Basically, I had been over at a friend's place, there had been a storm watch, and he's a ham radio guy. He's a member of Canwatch, which is a volunteer ham radio thing you can do once you get a license. We were out driving around all afternoon. We got home, watched some TV, and dropped me off at home. At that point it was pretty late and I was about to go to bed. Normally, I would just go to bed, but I sat in front of the computer to check out Kuro5hin, and I noticed that there were about nine stories in the moderation queue. I thought that was a bit odd, because we normally get one or two stories at a time, and they get voted on, so they either show up or disappear quickly. I went to the submission queue, and I saw one or two stories posted by people with handles, and the rest were all Anonymous Hero. I initially thought that perhaps some fellow had decided to post a few things on Sunday night so it would be there for Monday morning, because weekend traffic is about half of our weekday traffic. I figured I would just delete the extras. The subject lines for the submissions were all just random strings of text. I didn't know why that would be, so I deleted a couple of them, and noticed that a couple came back. So, I logged into the server and I was going to see if I could block the garbage submissions. I also logged into the IRC channel to see if anyone knew what was going on. That's where people told me about a user named Kano, and how he was angry that his story was voted down so quickly. In the interest of getting the facts, I wanted to block what was going on, and get more of the story. I blocked it, fired off a couple of mails to [Kuro5hin creator] Rusty (Foster), and talked with some of the guys on IRC because on the whole, they're nice people. Kuro5hin has a great bunch of people that helped me and Rusty through this. We talked about it, and one of the channel members mentioned that the machine the attacks were coming from looked like it had a bunch of ports open. When I traced it through the whois database, it was a part of a server farm in a hosting company. So, you'd think they'd only have web, and maybe ssh and telnet open for admin purposes, and everything else would be centralized, because that's what you do when you have 400 machines."

The team leaps to action

Inoshiro continues, "Rusty joined the chat on Sunday night, and the IRC channel users banded together. We banned two subnets, and the channel people helped us clean up the submission queue. The box on one of the subnets we banned was obviously cracked. In addition to ftp ssh and http, they had sunrpc open, nfs, mysql and irc. So, besides the obvious fact that mysql should be open like that and the Sunrpc services, irc is something you don't see on a webhosting farm. I don't think the spammer expected us to block him quite so quickly. It took me about 40 minutes for me to block him because a router between me and k5 went mad and was giving me 3000ms latency. It was the first time I'd actually had to do it. Once it was blocked, that's when the channel helped us clean up. Then, within 20 minutes, it started coming in again. That one was blocked within about ten minutes, and that was a proxy server. Everything else since then has been cracked boxes.

"I got it down to the point where we would see five scroll by, and when we got to the end, I basically ignored everything else I was doing, and blocked submissions as they came in. It wasn't until Monday night that the router between myself and k5 stopped giving us incredibly high ping times.

"I went to bed, and I slept in a little bit. I got up, joined the channel. Since I finished school earlier this month, I talk to people in the channel in the morning because most of the people I know are asleep or have a job. I've been sort of looking for employment recently, but I've been spending a lot of time working on k5. I usually talk to them in the channel, because Rusty was gone for two weeks and I was the only admin around. I'd been spending more time just talking to people. We had a bit of a chat, a few people proposed ideas about who they thought might have done it. Nothing was really resolved. Then I noticed that there was more stuff coming in the queue. I contacted Rusty at work, and he joined the IRC chat, and we talked about it. We spent Monday getting some of the scoop developers to disable anonymous story submissions, then we added logging to a bunch of things. Basically, Monday was the day when we were babysitting k5. The poster would switch their submission to a new cracked box. I was watching the output of the log and ipchains the subnet, look up the person responsible, and cc: it to Rusty. The people Rusty used to work for, intes.net, offered legal support. They've been really great about it because even though Rusty doesn't work for them anymore, they were still hosting the box until we get it all moved."

On Tuesday, the system abuse continued not only in the submission queue, but also in the commenting system used by readers to share their feelings or concerns about news items that Kuro5hin posts throughout the day.

More from Inoshiro: "I mailed [Slashdot Founder] Rob (Malda) on Tuesday morning, and I wasn't sure how he'd take it. Usually his replies are given out with as few words as possible. After a couple of replies, we were sending 8 or 9 paragraphs back and forth all day. He suggested a few things, and Rusty said he didn't realize it could have gotten that bad so quickly. My buddy from Sunday came over, and I watching Kuro5hin and he was helping me set up networking booting with an OpenBSD box I have here. It was ten o'clock, and we went to watch The Simpsons. While we watched, the guy had just been spamming the server more. he started spamming about fifteen minutes after we went to watch The Simpsons. How could someone do this? This is like proving a windshield is made of glass by smashing it."

So, at three in the morning at the Villa Hotel in San Mateo, Rusty Foster, Kuro5hin's creator, replaced his website with a black page telling the story of the denial of service attacks. I got a chance to speak to Rusty today while he was in his office at OpenSales.

Rusty said, "Today I'm bitter and hopeful. Yesterday I was bitter and depressed. It bothers me a lot, is the best I can put it."

The fact that Kuro5hin is entirely volunteer-run, added to the fact that they've got an active IRC presence and die-hard fans, lends itself to community building. People read Kuro5hin, post comments, and share their feelings and criticisms with people around the world. In the end, the Kuro5hin staff is resolved to not let the misguided destruction of one incident destroy the community they have built from the ground up.

"I think that we will get the site back up," Rusty said. "It will not be entirely the same as it was before. Anonymous access is gonna go. That's all there is to it. There's a place for anonymous access and I'm all for free speech, but there's also got to be a place for real people who will stand up and identify themselves, more or less. We're not even asking for identities, we're asking people to create a pseudonym and use it. Slashdot pretty much has the market cornered on free and open access, and I'm a lot more impressed now with the crap you put up with."

I'm aiming for a month. I'm leaving in August to go to Italy, and then immediately after that, my sister's getting married. I won't be back here with reliable access until the middle off August. There are a bunch of great developers that work on the code, and I'm going to put together a list of things that need to be done. Knowing them, they'll probably do most of them. Whatever remains, I'll do when I get back, and then we will re-launch amid great fanfare. I got a lot of great E-mails from people supporting the site, and a lot of them supprting my decision to close it until we've taken care of the problem, and I would like to thank them collectively for all their support, making me feel better, and inspiring me to actually get the site back."

Update: 07/26 08:59 PM by CT : Just wanted to throw my 2 bits in... VA Linux Systems is gonna help with some hardware since the Kuro5hin system really was strugglign to keep up with their existing hardware. That doesn't address the spam attacks which we've also spent quite a bit of time discussing. I'm personally finding this really interesting since I've gone through it all with Slashdot over the years, and seeing it done to someone else with the benefit of hindsight and experience is quite interesting. The frusteration you feel when something you work so hard on is screwed with by troublemakers is hard to describe: especially when you're just a volunteer. Slashdot wouldn't have survived that stage without help from a lot of people... Best of luck to you guys, and I hope to see ya pull through this.

Bryan Mattern was the first of hundreds to note that MySQL is being released under the GPL, as well as forming a partnership with VA Linux (which of course now owns Andover). This means nice things like it can move out of non-free in debian, and that the postgress/MySQL debate can now be argued in terms of features instead of license. MySQL's license was definitely a hurdle for the FAISC ^[?] so I'm really glad to see this happen.

chrisd sent us the press release and says "Now, it is completely okay to blame every percieved failing of Slashdot on VA. I'd like to say that VA understands that Slashdot only has value so long as it is left free." My comment is the same as always: our editorial independance is legally guaranteed under no matter who owns us. Slashdot will suck just as much as always, and there's nothing anybody can do about it! Seriously, VA has a bunch of good guys, but the editorial staff is looking forward to not really having much to do with them *grin*.

At the request of countless users, we're happy to finally present a summary of the new setup over at Exodus. It's the result of over 6 months of work from a lot of people, so shadouts to Adam, Kurt, and Scoop, Team P:Pudge, PatG & Pater for the code, and Martin BSD-Pat and Liz for getting the hardware and co-loc taken care of. Now hit the link below and see what these guys did:

the original version of this document was written by Andover.Net Alpha Geek Kurt Grey. The funny jokes are his. The stupid jokes are mine.

The Backstory
We realized soon that our setup at Digital Nation was very flawed. We were having great difficulty administering the machines and making changes. But the real problem was that all the SQL traffic was flowing over the same switch. The decision was made to move to Exodus to solve these problems, as well as to go to a provider that would allow us to scatter multiple data centers around the world when we were ready to do so.

Meanwhile Slashcode kicked and screamed its way to v1.0 at the iron fists of Pudge (Chris Nandor) and CaptTofu (Patrick Galbraith). The list of bugfixes stretches many miles, and the world rejoiced, although Slashdot itself continued to run the old code until we made the move.

The Co-Loc
Slashdot's new co-location site is now at Andover.Net's own (pinky finger to the mouth) $1 million dedicated datacenter at the Exodus network facility in Waltham, Mass, which has the added advantage of being less than 30 minute drive for most of our network admins -- so they don't have to fly cross-country to install machines. We have some racks sitting at Exodus. All boxes are networked together through a Cisco 6509 w/ 2 MSFCs and a Cisco 3500 so we can rearrange our internal network topology just by reconfiguring the switch. Internet connectivity to/from the outside world all flows through an Arrowpoint CS-800 (which replaced the CS-100 that blew up last week) switch which acts as both a firewall load balancer for the front end Web servers. It also so happens that the Arrowpoint shares the same office building with Andover.Net in Acton so whenever we need Arrowpoint tech support we just walk upstairs and talk to the engineers. Like, say, last week when the 100 blew up ;)

The Hardware

• 5 load balanced Web servers dedicated to pages
• 3 load balanced Web servers dedicated to images
• 1 SQL server
• 1 NFS Server

All the boxes are VA Linux Systems FullOns running Debian (except for the SQL box). Each box (except for the SQL box) has LVD SCSI w/ 10,000 RPM drives. And they all have 2 Intel EtherExpress 100 LAN adapters.

The Software
Slashdot itself is finally running the latest release of Slashcode (it was pretty amusing being out of date with our own code: for nearly a year the code release lagged behind Slashdot, but my how the tables have turned).

Slashcode itself is based on Apache, mod_perl and MySQL. The MySQL and Apache configs are still being tweaked -- part of the trick is to keep the MaxClients setting in httpd.conf on each web server low enough to not overwhelm the connection limits of database, which in turn depends on the process limits of the kernel, which can all be tweaked until a state of perfect zen balance has been achieved ... this is one of the trickier parts. Run 'ab' (the apache bench tool) with a few different settings, then tweak SQL a bit. Repeat. Tweak httpd a bit. Repeat. Drink coffee. Repeat until dead. And every time you add or change hardware, you start over!

The Adfu ad system has been replaced with a small Apache module written in C for better performance, and that too will be open sourced When It's Ready (tm). This was done to make things consistant across all of Andover.Net (I personally prefer Adfu, but since I'm not the one who has to read the reports and maintain the list of ads, I don't really care what Slashdot runs).

Fault tolerance was a big issue. We've started by load balancing anything that could easily be balanced, but balancing MySQL is harder. We're funding development efforts with the MySQL team to add database replication and rollback capabilities to MySQL (these improvements will of course be rolled into the normal MySQL release as well).

We're also developing some in-house software (code named "Oddessey") that will keep each Slashdot box sychronized with a hot-spare box, so in case a box suddenly dies it will automatically be replaced with a hot-spare box -- kind of a RAID-for-servers solution (imagine... a Beuwolf cluster of these? *rimshot*) Yes, when it'll also be released as open source when its functional.

Security Measures
The Matrix sits behind a firewalling BSD box and an Arrowpoint Load balancer. Each filters certain kinds of attacks and frees up the httpd boxes to concentrate on just serving httpd and allows the dedicated hardware to do what it does best. All administrative access is made through a VPN (which is just another box).

Hardware Details

Type I (web server)
VA Full On 2x2 Debian Linux frozen
PIII/600 Mhz 512K cache
1 GB RAM
9.1GB LVD SCSI w/ hot swap backplane
Intel EtherExpress Pro (built-in on moboard)
Intel EtherExpress 100 adapter

Type II (kernel NFS w/ kernel locking)
VA Full On 2x2
Debian Linux frozen
Dual PIII/600 Mhz
2 GB RAM
(2) 9.1GB LVD SCSI w/ hot swap backplane
Intel EtherExpress Pro (built-in on moboard)
Intel EtherExpress 100 adapter

Type III (SQL)
VA Research 3500
Red Hat Linux 6.2 (final release + tweaks)
Quad Xeon 550 Mhz, 1MB cache
2 GB RAM
6 LVD disks, 10000 RPM (1 system disk, 5 disks for RAID5)
Mylex Extreme RAID controller 16 MB cache
Intel EtherExpress Pro (built-in on moboard)
Intel EtherExpress 100 adapter

Jeremy is a leading Samba maintainer, and therefore one of the world's leading experts on Samba, which is often held up (along with Apache and the Gimp) as a sterling example of efficient and useful Open Source development. In the interest of full disclosure, we must mention that Jeremy is now employed by VA Linux, but that his primary responsibility is still Samba, just as it was when he worked for SGI. Look for Jeremy's answers to your questions within the next week.

So Fred VanKampen (who has to hold the record for most money made by reselling two domain names) e-mailed us to say that the Domain Name for 'Linux.Net' has been sold. He won't say to whom, but it supposedly will be announced at LinuxWorld next week. Of course we have no idea what he got for the entry, but the rumors were that he made several million when he sold Linux.com to VA Linux. Hopefully he'll take me for a ride in his yacht. ;)

aaf writes "VA and HP are working together to improve printing under Linux and Samba. Everything is and will be Open Source and the initial focus will be on improving existing Open Source printing software and enabling advanced functionality for Laserjets. It's all being developed and managed through SourceForge." While this is all LaserJet specific, I can't help but think that open sourcing everything will enable the community to build stronger cross-platform printing solutions for Linux.

Precision writes "SourceForge, the opensource hosting service provided by VA Linux, has announced the initial code release. You can grab a copy here." SourceForge rocks my world.

We all heard about the extraordinarily successful VA Linux Systems IPO. And, of course, there was an SEC-mandated "quiet period" after that IPO during which VA executives and employees could hardly open their mouths. That quiet period is over. This is one of the first "post-IPO" interviews anywhere with CEO Larry M. Augustin and Linux Evangelist (his official title) Chris DiBona. Ask away!

I personally consider Steve Wozniak the biggest "star" we've ever interviewed on Slashdot. I was s-o-o happy when he agreed to do this interview that you wouldn't believe it. Many excellent questions for him were submitted Monday. Click below to read answers to the 11 questions we felt best represented the hundreds y'all sent in.

1) LinuxPPC?
by UM_Maverick

What's your take on the use of LinuxPPC vs. the MacOS? Many people say that Mac hardware is (and always has been) better than x86, but it's been held back by the OS. Do you think that LinuxPPC can change that?

Woz:

Many of the hardware advantages that Apple has is due to it's being more tightly controlled by Apple and in it's being more tightly integrated with the software. That allows Apple to make hardware changes and decisions that are more reliable than in the Wintel world. This has nothing to do with Linux and everything to do with MacOS. The basic plumbing is superior to Intel hardware in some ways (firewire on the motherboard for example) and a bit lacking in others (3D rendering hardware) but the basic performance advantage goes to the RISC architecture of the PowerPC processor. Intel's response to this is that even if RISC is 40% faster, that only amounts to a few months lead, according to Moore's Law.

If you consider attractiveness and other external qualities, you can't find any hardware that comes close to Apple's. That's because even companies like Sony, that truly care about the user experience, can't do much about the internal hardware (buying it from Intel like every other manufacturer). Also, companies like Sony are in competition with many very cutrate prices in a commodity market. The internal hardware supplier can't do much about the external quality either.

LinuxPPC certainly has the capability of improving the hardware efficiency and preventing some very bad things from happening and allowing software to behave in more expectable ways. It's hard to say that a great deal of the buyers are much influenced by these things or we wouldn't have so much successful crap around. The Macintosh market would probably be prime and ready for LinuxPPC but it probably needs more ease of setup. Also, other UNIX variants (Like Mach Ten) are available already and only marginally used by Macintosh owners. The performance of MacOS X Server is already quite incredible, and the [largely] Open Source MacOS X Client is coming in the summer.

2) Open-source and free software questions
by papo

Do you think open-source and free software is really a revolution or only a hype? How do you think things will become in the software industry in the future with open-source variable inserted in their middle? And do you think this model could lead to a more competitive and less monopolistic market?

Woz:

I definitely think that open-source is a revolution and not hype. I could have chosen to say that it's both.

There have always been people that believed strongly in free software. They are mostly people that have developed something rather good and even sellable, but small and of limited market potential. I support these people. It's little known, but the schematics of the Apple I were actually handed out at the Homebrew Computer Club before we started Apple.

But there are so many large bucks available just to companies that get people using their software because software is like a portal. It's hard to have a clear advantage in getting software widely accepted just because it's free. That's because Microsoft can distribute a lot of good software, like browsers and email clients, for free, making money in less direct ways. The main attraction to open source software may not be it's advantages (price, functionality) but the fact that some people don't want to support the big successful proprietary companies. There's good reason for fear of monopoly stagnation too. Look at ATT. When I was in school there was only one phone in one color. You couldn't buy an answering machine or any of the neat phone stuff that abounds today. ATT was the only phone company and didn't want any change to their guaranteed business due to competition.

3)Ease of Use vs Level of Control
by _J_

Apple has long been noted for having the most (or among the most) user friendly stuff around. What do you think of the trade off between ease of use and level of control? Is there a trade off?

Woz:

In a lot of cases there is a trade off here. In the case of applications, Apple primarily appeals to a market that wants things made easy. That means hiding functionality and control. It bothers people like ourselves. But Apple could say that programmers have as much control as they want, but that certainly isn't true of its hardware. The rule is "keep out" and "don't do it unless you are an expert." You won't find much at all in the way that individual techies can design and use their own boards with a Macintosh, the sort of thing that I always wanted to do.

Then again, Apple is the leader (for decades) in providing user interfaces and hardware interfaces that are easy, like plug and play (and install and pray) yet which can do as much anyway. This is the hardest thing to do in software and hardware and only the greatest artists can do it. It takes a mind that keeps searching for a better way that's unknown, and not stopping at the first few working results.

4) Did/do average people need a computer?
by Otter

In the days of the Apple ][, did you believe the average American household needed a personal computer? I remember being told that computers could balance your checkbook, keep your schedule and store your recipes and wondering if that was a cost-effective solution for people, or just an expensive, if fascinating toy. It's my impression that it's only now with consumer Internet access that a home computer provides value for most people.

What do you think?

Woz:

Even as a toy, I believed that every home needed a computer. This was even though I thought the computer would remain expensive and small, sans Moore's law. Also I believed it before the first killer app, Visicalc. I believed that people would become programmers and not need companies as much. You can see how laughable that was.

Although I never talked to Steve Jobs directly on this issue, I never heard him predict outright some things that are very obvious today in the internet days. But he was more forward looking and interested in making computers palatable for people and finding ways that computers could help them, not as computers but as tools to balance checkbooks, etc. The Apple ][ was just a start in gaining acceptance for computers in the home.

In Junior High School I assumed that transistors were being developed so that people could use them in transistor radios. But my father, who worked at Lockheed, corrected my by saying that they, and the early chips, were designed only for the military, and the consumer market just fell out. This bothered me. I was a person after all. I wanted consumer products to drive the chip market. Around 1969, when I could design any minicomputer made, I knew that I wanted one for myself. I told my father that someday I'd buy a 4K Nova computer and he said that it cost as much as a small house (in those days). I said I'd live in an apartment then.

By the way, the Data General brochures that I ordered came with one of two posters. One showed a commercial looking rack mounted computer. But the other showed a Nova in a sculpted shape on a glass table. It made a huge impression on me that even commercial looking computers with dozens of techie switches and lights, could go into a home. At least one other person believed this, since Data General had the poster.

Well, when we had the Homebrew Computer Club, we all talked of this revolution in the sense that it was empowering people without the companies owning the computers. A lot of people were planning to buy an Altair kit computer but a few started designing ones. The designs were a mixture of surplus store hobbiest and putting microprocessor into the existing commercial looking boxes, doing the same things, expecting the same plug in boards to do anything useful. I was in a perfect position to conceive of the computer in a different way, a personal (not commercial) way. First, I believed only in designing products for the average person. That's the exact phrase I always used. it was hard to stick to this thinking when everyone else, in 1975, was going a different way. I thought out what I wanted to do with my own computer and went for it.

I had an advantage in being good at reducing chips. I could conceive of an entire finished usable computer and design it in few enough chips to be practical. My philosophy of fewer chips led me to dynamic RAMs when all the other hobby computers were going with static RAMs. It just took a bit more design work.

But the biggest advantage of all was that I worked in Hewlett Packard's calculator division. Our calculators were basically computers, yet they were totally human and usable by normal people. They didn't have binary switches to toggle and boot up procedures from a teletype. The had a small amount of code in ROMS (under 1K 10-bit words in the HP 35) and a human keyboard. The ROM program merely watched the keys and responded to whatever key was depressed. So it was quite obvious for me to think of the keyboard and some ROM as integral parts of the computer. From there it's easy to see it in normal people's hands, whereas all the other commercial looking machines had no chance except in the hands of techies.

5) What would an Apple II 2000 look like?
by Croaker

The Apple II was the original "geek dream machine." I mean, the Apple ][+ we got back in 1982 or so came with schematics! Talk about an open system!

Pretend that Apple (or some other company) came to you and asked you to design a PC that would "fill the shoes" of the Apple II line. What do you think you'd put in it?

From reading your website, I know you're pretty pro-Macintosh... is that the ultimate in what you'd want to see in a personal computer, or would you do some things differently? Where, do you think, that current PC's (not meaning just WinTel machines) reflect the philosophy of the Apple II, and what do you think they have missed?

Woz:

First, my thoughts on what a modern computer would be can't be superior to anyone else's. But, in the light of the Apple ][, I'd choose the best processor that I could in terms of package size, performance, integrated I/O, number of leads, etc. I'd prefer unseen advantages under the hood, like RISC architecture. I'd design a board with very few chips that did a lot. The display would clearly be VGA and only standard ports would make sense. This is different than with the Apple ][. But the computer would have very few chips and would have high level languages and low level debugging and coding support too. I would try to offer high level GUI ability in the high level language. The schematics and all the code would come with the machine and would be open source (unless someone like Steve Jobs convinced me to sell it). I would treat the most important aspect of this machine as it's being an example to others of ways to design and code. There are a lot of people that want to learn in this way, on their own. Sometimes it's their desire, sometimes they can't find other sources easily. I'd also try to write some articles with small examples for others to learn from.

6) Teaching the children
by tweek

Do you feel that operating systems such as Linux/*BSD are a viable option for teaching those children who have no previous experience with a computer? Certainly the cost factor would be a great motivation for choosing these over other operating systems. It seems to me that it is more difficult to train those who are set in one GUI than those who have no previous experience whatsoever. I really have an interest in this kind of community service and felt that someone like you with experience (and albeit alot more money ;) could provide some insight and advice.

Woz: I think that the greatest need of children is to use computers to help do their homework and to make it look good. They are basically using apps and not an OS.

I personally think that our schools should change and teach real computer science from 5th grade on. You don't need higher level math or calculus or biology to start learning logic design. In this regard, Linux or BSD or even other UNIX variants, or simpler microprocessor Operating Systems, would be required in order to have a greater understanding of the machine and it's innards.

7) the Steves
by Skyshadow

What advice can you give the new innovators? As someone who would like to start a company, I can't help but notice that most truly innovative companies tend to boom then bust, either fading slowly into obscurity or being assimilated by some larger company.

Do you have any ideas for avoiding this fate? Is the only alternative to make some money and become a predatory company yourself? Or, alternatively, is this the eventual unavoidable fate of all idea-driven companies (Netscape, SGI, Apple, etc)? Or, to sum up the question: Can an Apple ever defeat a Microsoft?

Woz:

Apple made too many marketing mistakes early on. These were hard to see because we were extremely successful anyway. But we really went from first to second in the early 80's. It wasn't to Microsoft, it was to IBM PC's (and all the clones). Only recently did the world find out that Microsoft was a sleeper and was really in first place. Software made the bigger difference in computers and was what really changed the world more than hardware.

As a computer supplier, Apple is still huge. Our recent model computers still have the greatest market share of any manufacturer. So we must be doing something right. Apple is the only manufacture that is still in control of its future and changing computers and advancing the world and leaving the past behind. Every other one is a slave to Intel and Microsoft and competitive prices that don't allow for much R&D. They are the ones that have been assimilated. I'd rather be Apple. I believe that Apple's turn around is just starting. But it's not a matter of 'defeating' Microsoft. It's only a matter of building the best stuff we can. If Microsoft creates such good things they should be successful too. But there's always the luck of the right approach, even though no successful company will admit it.

8) Have you played with the BeOS?
by RavinDave

Have you ever had a chance to play around with the Be operating system? Since its developers were part of the Apple culture, I thought I might find a blurb or two on your page. What sort of advice would you offer Gassee? Is the proprietary aspect an albatross (should they opensource the OS and concentrate on apps)? Are they trying to get into the game too late?

Woz:

I have one and always wanted to play with it but just don't have the time yet. I like interesting people that can make your work fun, and Jean Louis is like that. But he had the same proprietary thinking that almost all key Apple execs shared, including the avoidance of licensing the software. BeOS would need something very special to rise above the noise, with Linux and open-source being so popular.

9) A question
by jd

Once upon a time, garage developers were considered the mainstay of the computer industry. Later, either you or S. Jobs said that the days of garage developers was over, forever. Later still, the Open Source model rewoke the Garage Developer philosophy with a jolt.(Or a Mountain Dew, depending on taste.)

Today, do you feel that garage development still has a place in Computing? And, if so, would it be in software, hardware or both?

Woz:

There were a couple of factors that helped a garage startup succeed in the late 70's. Before that time, computers were physically quite large and expensive and were developed by large teams. Now computer projects, even games, are worth so much $ that they are developed by large teams. Around 1975 and 1975 there was a window in which a person or two could develop a good complete computer.

Also, in the early days the computers weren't really personal computers, they were hobby computer kits. You would typically build them yourself and had to operate them at the binary switch level. It was more like ham radio than today's computers. Many big computer companies predicted no future for this hobby market. That's because all their market research was among existing computer customers, those buying the big $M machines. Those customers had no need for a 4K machine that could only run BASIC. But the market research didn't touch on non-computer users like dentists and schoolteachers and kids. So they missed the boat. Apple tried to rise above the hobby type machine and approach homes with a 'personal' computer. Only then did analysts and computer companies start to see things in a different light.

Today, look how many successful startups there are. These often come from a couple of young people with good ideas and not a huge amount of money. I'm on the Board of one such company now. So it must be happening all over the place, just one step above a garage. It's hard to happen in the garage, because the Apple story is not forgotten. A lot of investors missed out and want to jump at anything having to do with computers that looks like it might succeed. So a couple of people like myself and Steve Jobs would be consumed very quickly today, unless we almost deliberately remained hidden or found a perfect investor like Mike Markkula.

Now that I think about it, we had to grow out of the garage to build more than a couple of hundred computers. So today, many that get funded for a startup really developed something in their homes, in their garages to speak, anyway.

10) Idealism today
by Ledge Kindred

You seem to be one of the most "purely" idealistic people in this industry. (i.e. RMS is idealistic in the sense he wants to push GNU, you are idealistic in that you just want to help kids get a leg up and generally be An All-Around Good Guy.)

Do you ever look at the industry and get depressed over what's it's become with companies with virtually no product and running deep in the red but who have "e-" or "dot-com" in their names pulling off ridiculously huge IPOs, companies patenting obviously unpatentable concepts and ideas apparently for the express purpose of suing the pants off of competitors instead of competing with the quality of their products, companies like Microsoft going beyond the boundaries of the law and way, way beyond the boundaries of ethical behaviour to get a step up on the competition, the industry lobbying government to pass laws that would create an entirely unregulated industry, including things like legislation that would legally disavow software companies of any responsibility for creating shoddy products that don't even do what the box says they will do, employees floating with a company just long enough to vest and then bailing out without a backwards glance so they can go to The Next Big IPO, etc, etc, etc.

What do you look at in this industry to remind yourself that computers and the computer industry can actually help make the world a better place?

Woz:

That's a lot of questions. I don't get depressed at all over anything. I do happen to think that companies that look like the big dot-coms of the future deserve their successful IPO's. I guess that they sort of sell out early to finance their guaranteed dominance. Investors take advantage of this too, knowing that the IPO financing will guarantee that these startups don't lose their early lead. Many see this as a situation where the great wealth being made is being lost somewhere else but I don't. I see it as truly new wealth that's being created due mainly to an accelerated economic system. Regardless, this wealth gets trickled down to all of us to some extent. Eventually, it all gets distributed. As the wealthy approach death, estate taxes will be due. Any large amounts of funds have to be transferred into foundations whose purpose is to distribute them to tax free organizations. Otherwise the government gets half the money. It's just the only efficient way to go. It's in the tax laws.

Some patents are for truly clever things but some are for simple things that every single person would think of if there was a need for it. Wealthy companies patent such things early, when these things are not yet viable, when they are too expensive to market. For example, I used a chip in the Apple ][ called a character generator to convert characters to dots that could be displayed on a CRT or TV. It turned out that RCA had patented it back when almost nobody could have afforded to put characters on a CRT. Such a simple concept does not help us respect the patent system.

I truly wish that companies would be liable to consumers for products that don't do what the consumer reasonably expected, or that don't include the sort of service that the consumers reasonable expected. I'd like more truth in advertising. I'd like speedy remedies for people that are injured. We need regulation in a lot of technological industries, including cellular phones. Not in order to keep prices low, but to assure that powerless people have recourse and can get things corrected. Most of all, companies should be required to give straight answers. Too many ISP's and phone companies and computer companies and software companies and hardware companies dodge helping in order to save costs. Only a few are very good, and they don't always remain that way. I'd much rather that another person be honest with me than that they sell me something at a good price. This industry will provide service as cheaply as possible due to competitive factors that can only be overcome by regulation.

11) The Future of Education
by moonboy

From what I've read, you are very involved with children and their education and technology seems to play a major role in the basis of that education. Personally, I think that next to being loved adaquately, education is the most important factor in a developing child's life. In America we seem to take education for granted and are very far behind other countries in regard to the quality of the education that our children receive. Technology in general and more specifically, computers and the Internet, are fantastic tools with a great potential for drastically improving education.

My question: How do you see education making better use of technology and technology making education better?

Woz:

Personal love is certainly the most important thing. To some extent, a teacher offers this, but only to each student 1/30 of the time. 30 computers could become like 30 teachers, but they have to become as personal as possible. They need realistic graphics like games have. They need realistic sounds. They should be voice operated, especially since very early elementary students can't type well. Every time a computer program gets more human-like, it attracts better student attention. But the software needs to be many times as deep as it is today in terms of a personality. It needs to be more like a real person, with many ways to present the same subject, backtracking intelligently, even to the far past, following a student through years of education. The programs should tell lots of jokes as well, and play occasional games too. Today the class presentation is fixed. Each student hears the same presentation in the same time frame. Then a test is given and the varable is the grade. But with 30 teachers, the presentation can be variable, with students going at different speeds in different courses. The student can pick their grade in advance, with the grade now being fixed.

It's too hard to predict that schools will disappear as rapidly as many stores and newspapers and other things of the physical world. Schools currently serve as a parking place for the kids during the day and, even when everything is available at home on the web, parents will still want their kids in a socially healthier environment during the day.

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Next week: Larry Augustin and Chris DiBona of VA Linux Systems. AND, at the same time, another,very special interview guest: Leon M. Lederman, Nobel Prize Winner, internationally known specialist in high energy physics and director emeritus of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Illinois.

As head of Linux International, Jon Hall is one of the highest-profile people in the Linux community. He's also one of the nicest. He's wanted to do this interview for a long time, and we've wanted to have him as a guest for just as long. Finally we got the schedules to match. Yay! Suggested interview theme: "The next 100 years of Linux," but what you actually ask is up to you. One note to clear up a name misunderstanding that has been causing problems for Jon "maddog" Hall lately: Please do not confuse him with VA Linux Vice Presedent (and recent "on paper" mega-millionaire) John T. Hall. (Note the spelling difference!) They are not, repeat not, the same person! Anyway, usual interview rules - with one difference: we're going to post Jon's answers Saturday instead of Friday. Who could be better (and what topic could be better) to kick off the New Year?

Everyone at this point has heard and seen about VA Linux Systems succesful IPO. Lesser known is the fact that ESR ^[?] is on the Board of VA. Yesterday seems to have been a time of personal reflection on the his new situation. Click below to read ERSR's musings on sudden wealth.

A few hours ago, I learned that I am now (at least in theory) absurdly rich.

I was at my machine, hacking, when I got email congratulating me on the success of the VA Linux Systems IPO. I was working on my latest small project -- a compiler for a special-purpose language I've designed called Scriptable Network Graphics, or SNG. SNG is an editable representation of the chunk data in a PNG. What I'm writing is a compiler/decompiler pair, so you can dump PNGs in SNG, edit the SNG, then recompile to a PNG image.

"Congratulations? That's interesting," said I to myself. "I didn't think we were going out till tomorrow." And I oughtta know; I'm on VA's Board of Directors, recruited by Larry Augustin himself to be VA's official corporate conscience, and it's a matter of public record that I hold a substantial share in the company. I tooled on over to Linux Today, chased a link -- and discovered that Larry Augustin had taken the fast option we discussed during the last Board conference call. VA had indeed gone out on NASDAQ -- and I had become worth approximately forty-one million dollars while I wasn't looking.

Well, that didn't last long. In the next two hours, VA dropped from $274 a share to close at $239, leaving me with a stake of only thirty-six million dollars. Which is still a preposterously large amount of money.

You may wonder why I am talking about this in public. The first piece of advice your friends and family will give you, if it looks like you're about to become really wealthy, is: keep it quiet. It's nobody else's business -- you don't want to look like you're gloating, and you don't want to be deluged with an endless succession of charity appeals, business propositions, long-lost best friends, and plain bald-faced mooching.

Trouble with the "keep it quiet" theory is that I've made my bucks in a very public way. When you're already a media figure, and your name is on the S-1 of a hot IPO, and email from friends and journalists starts coming in like crazy as the stock breaks first-day-gainplaying it coy swiftly ceases to look like a viable option.

Besides, it wouldn't be fair to dissemble. I serve a community. I'm wealthy today because my efforts to spread the idea of open source on behalf of that community helped galvanize the business world, and earned the respect and the trust of a lot of hackers. Larry thought that respect was an asset worth shelling out 150,000 shares of VA for. Fairness to the hackers who made me bankable demands that I publicly acknowledge this result -- and publicly face the question of how it's going to affect my life and what I'll do with the money.

This is a question that a lot of us will be facing as open source sweeps the technology landscape. Money follows where value leads, and the mainstream business and finance world is seeing increasing value in our tribe of scruffy hackers. Red Hat and VA have created a precedent now, with their directed-shares programs designed to reward as many individual contributors as they can identify; future players aiming for community backing and a seat at the high table will have to follow suit. In this and other ways (including, for example, task markets) the wealth is going to be shared.

So while there aren't likely to be a lot more multimillion-dollar bonanzas like mine, lots of hackers are going to have to evolve answers to this question for smaller amounts that will nevertheless make a big difference to individuals; tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars, enough to change your life -- or wreck it.

(Gee. Remember when the big question was "How do we make money at this?")

The first part of my answer is "I'll do nothing, until next June". Because I'm a VA board member, under SEC regulations there's a six-month lockout on the shares (a regulation designed to keep people from floating bogus offerings, cashing out, and skipping to Argentina before the share price crashes). So it's not strictly true that I'm wealthy right now. I will be wealthy in six months, unless VA or the U.S. economy craters before then. I'll bet on VA; I'm not so sure about the U.S. economy :-).

Assuming the economy does not in fact crater, how is wealth going to affect my life in six months? Honestly, I think the answer is "not much". I haven't spent the last fifteen years doing the open-sourcefor the money. I'm already living pretty much exactly the way I want to, doing the work that matters to me. The biggest difference the money will make to me personally is that now I should be able to keep doing what I love for the rest of my life without worrying about money ever again.

So I expect I'll just keep on as I've been doing. Hacking code. Thinking and spreading subversive thoughts. Traveling and giving talks. Writing papers. Poking various evil empires a good one in the eye whenever I get a chance. Working for freedom.

I expect most other hackers confronted with sudden wealth will make similar choices. Reporters often ask me these days if I think the open-source community will be corrupted by the influx of big money. I tell them what I believe, which is this: commercial demand for programmers has been so intense for so long that anyone who can be seriously distracted by money is already gone. Our community has been self-selected for caring about other things -- accomplishment, pride, artistic passion, and each other.

OK, so maybe I'll break down and finally get a cell phone. And cable broadband so I can surf at smokin' speed. And a new flute. And maybe a nice hotrodded match-grade .45 semi for tactical shooting. But really, I don't want or need a lot of stuff. I'm kind of Buddhist that way; I like to minimize my material attachments. (My family gripes that this makes me hell to buy Christmas presents for.)

I'm not going to minimize my attachments by giving it all away, though, so you evangelists for a zillion worthy causes can just calm down out there and forget about hitting me up for megabucks. I am *not* going to be a soft touch, and will rudely refuse all importunities.

I'm not copping this harsh attitude to protect my money, but rather to protect the far more precious asset of my time. Because I don't want to have to become a full-time specialist in deciding whose urgent pitch to buy, I'm going to turn everybody down flat in advance. Anyone who bugs me for a handout, no matter how noble the cause and how much I agree with it, will go on my permanent shit list. If I want to give or lend or invest money, *I'll* call *you*. (Sigh...)And yes, there are causes I'll give money to. Worthy hacker projects. Free-speech activism. Firearms-rights campaigns. Tibet, maybe. I might buy a hunk of rainforest for conservation somewhere. Megabucks are power, and with power comes an obligation to use it wisely. I'll give carefully, and in my own time, and only after doing my homework -- too much charity often kills what it means to nurture. And enough about that.

Ironically enough, one result of my getting rich is that I will probably start charging for speaking appearances, now that nobody can plausibly accuse me of doing it for the money. I won't charge open-source user groups or schools, but I will cheerfully extract a per diem from all the business conferences that keep wanting me to to boost their box office. Charging a price for my time will separate the expensive conferences that attract powerful people from the marginal events where the hacker community would get less leverage from my presence.

For the same reason, I'm still going to insist that anybody who wants me to give a talk has to cover my expenses and eliminate hassles. But I also expect I'll still carry my own luggage. And I'll never get too proud to crash on somebody's daybed when the local user group is too broke to cover a hotel.

But enough trivialities; I'm going to get back to work. I've got the SNG compiler stage almost done. Next up, I need to refactor the pngcheck code so I can give it a report-format option that generates SNG syntax. Then, I need to think about supporting MNG...
--
Eric S. Raymond

Well, I'm going to drown in submissions if I don't post the news that VA Linux Systems opened at 299$ a share, which is some sort of record, I'm sure. You can check it's current trading level as well, albeit with a twenty-minute delay. Congrats to all involved.

Quite a number of people have written in with the news that VA Linux Systems has re-priced, this time setting their range at $28-30 per share. People have been submitting e-mail reports from E*Trade, so if you are getting anything through there, you must re-confirm. For the friends and family program, remember that you will also be contacted to confirm as well.If you are part of the friends and family program, you can pre-emptively re-confirm by calling the phone number in the initial packet. Otherwise, phone calls will begin 8AM-4PM EST on Friday.

Well VA Linux Systems has been popping up all over the news, from a story in MSNBC to a commentary from news.com. The latest word is that they have repriced their offering, putting the shares' range at $21-23 per share. As soon as the SEC approves this, the people on the friends and family list should expect to be contacted to confirm their position. Update: 12/07 05:40 by H :Thanks to readers for the latest update on pricing - it is $21-23.

synaptic was the first of several to note that "The Letter" offering Linux developers in on the VA Linux Systems IPO. Its a hefty 600k PDF file containing a prospectus, and a form to return to show interest. No word on how many people are getting the letter, but the rumors are that there will be quite a few.

DaveM writes "The Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory is working with IBM and VA Linux Systems to build "Chiba City" -- the largest supercomputing cluster dedicated to highly scalable open source software development. The 512-CPU Linux cluster will be opened to the U.S. research community, including universities, laboratories and industry. "

hpa writes "The Linux Kernel Archives, kernel.org, has gotten a major facelift! After suffering with insufficient bandwidth for far too long, we are now operating with a dedicated 100 Mbit/s connection from Globix. VA Linux gave us a really nice new box to run it on, too; so it is really a wonderful setup we have gotten. Not only should this resolve the bandwidth shortage, but hopefully we'll be adding new services soon. We have already added anonymous rsync services for the benefit of unofficial mirror sites. I'd appreciate hearing requests for new services on kernel.org, just email me. "

Anonymous Coward writes "According to this News.com article. VA Linux Systems, O'Reilly and Associates, and SGI. Will be co-sponsoring a retail box version of Debian GNU/Linux. In addition VA will be helping to setup toll free technical support for Debian."

Dredd13 writes "This time, it's really official. According to this story on Yahoo! News, VA Linux Systems is filing for its IPO. Wonder how they'll handle the IPO "Friends and Family" shares considering how the Red Hat fiasco went..."

Thanks to John Mark Walker for sending over a great spoof video performed by Jon "mad dog" Hall -and given the recent "myth debunking by Microsoft, the linux4u project seems timely. The project is intended to educate the corporate setting about the benefits of Linux. Grab the Mad Dog videos (high bandwidth) here and (low bandwith) here and see what I mean about mad dog going underground. RealPlayer is required.

Long ago and far away, I started writing a series called "Road To Linux," in which I set out to learn Linux in a few weeks. Talk about clueless. Nearly one year, two wasted computers, a ticked-off spouse, (and a Yellow Lab who ate a motherboard) 30-plus books and manuals and much assorted debris later, I've more or less made it. I have no illusions about the technical accomplishments I've achieved here, but these are the first proud words I've ever written online without any assistance from Bill Gates or Steve Jobs or any big fat corporation. Small stuff to most of you, Computer Everest to me.

My PPP daemon keeps cutting out, and I'm puzzling over swap partitions, random seeds and generators bin/appfinders, so I'll keep this brief. In the next few weeks, I'll write more about my personal, somewhat hellish road to Linux. It was a hummer, accompanied every step away by the jeers and cheers of geeks and nerds on and off of Slashdot.

The big lesson was that I approached Linux in the wrong way, from every conceivable perspective. It needn't be that hard.

Rather than wading into manuals and books and programming (if you do it, believe me, O'Reilly is the best), I finally figured out that there are people like Joe Volodarsky out there, and companies like Amnet, people who live and breathe computers and Linux and who actually pick up the phone and help Every-Single-Time-You Call! The truth is, I never did figure this out. Somebody figured it out for me, but I finally got it. If you're not a geek, that's the big news.

And I am not a computer geek, and don't aspire to be one. I'm a writer, and happy with that title. Posting a column on a Linux laptop somebody else designed and preloaded for me hardly makes me any sort of nerd or techno-whiz. This is, in fact, the level of the classic breathless newbie, a mantle I expect to take to the grave.

Disagreement and criticism is a healthy, integral part of Web-writing, but the minor yet persistent controversy surrounding my writing for Slashdot has always surprised me. Some are passionately into defining who belongs or doesn't, an unfortunately common and increasingly difficult impulse in electric (and off-line) communities.

The term "geek" is broadening and evolving daily, and is coming to mean different, complex and increasingly positive things to people.

The real geeks and hackers, it seems to me, aren't into chest-thumping about who deserves the title. Like Joe, their real kick comes from getting people where they want to go. They're almost invariably welcoming and helpful. They're pretty secure about themselves, and their techno-manhood. From the first, they've been trying to help move me along, to the best degree of my limited ability. But if I recognize my limitations in writing on a Linux Box, I'm still pretty happy about it.

Real programmers are different from mortals, certainly from writers. They are a separate species. Programmers are precise, confident and look ahead. They have no doubt they can make technology come out right for them. Writers are imprecise, uncertain and backwards-looking. Their relationship with technology is uncertain, a means, never an end.

But here's what the fight about me being on Slashdot has always really been about: You don't need to be - and shouldn't have to be - a programmer to use and appreciate Linux, which is, to my amazement, every bit as easy and logical as my beloved Macs, once you get past the installation.

Linux is fun. Knowledge is, in fact, empowering, and learning and seeing how a computer actually works, especially in the context of a powerful idea like Open Source, is worth the grief and trouble. And for non-geeks heading for Linux, there will be plenty of both.

Joe Volodarsky was savvy in puttng together this computer for me, to a degree I wouldn't have thought possible. He used KDE and set up folders for Netscape, WordPerfect, documents,the printer, Templates, News, Updates, the Gimp, CD-ROM and floppy disks. I can't stay off of the KAPP Finder, which scrolls through an exotic list of programs and apps I'm reading about one by one, using my O'Reilly and other Linux guides. My laptop was designed with me in mind, even down to a Mac OS logo on the start-up menu. I've spent a dozen happy but nerve wracking hours puzzling over random seeds and bizarre commands, but I've learned more about computing in the last few weeks than in the decade I've been online.

For somebody who loves to write about technology, this is definitely a humbling gift and an opportunity. Open Source is one of the most powerful ideas I've come across in media, even as I'm just beginning to grasp how complicated an idea it is. Linux is a huge part of it. I'd like to go as far as I can get, taking small steps, one day at a time.

Playing around with my new laptop, I'm fascinated by how accessible the workings of this system are, (and how hidden the processes of my other computers have been) and have even moved a few things around, killed a few programs, and relished checking the Term windows to see my computing life and history passing before my eyes. I was up till 2 a.m., and had more fun than at any point in my life aside from walking into Joe DiMaggio on a New York City street when I was a kid.

Since this is the third time I've tried to post this message, I'm not going to prolong it.

Thanks to Joe of Amnet, which makes Linux boxes, laptops and servers. For getting me up and running, he deserves a place in the Geek Hall of Fame. Rare in our world, he is both technologically skilled and empathetic. He only lost it with me two or three times, and then briefly ("Katz, you don't have to Re-Boot. Don't turn it off!"). Thanks also to VA Linux Systems for hooking up the Slashdot crowd with Sony Vaios.

For those of you who sneered and jeered, thanks. You gave me the iron will to persevere. It was the Penguin or Death. And nuts to you, too.

For those of you who supported me in a hundred ways - especially Rob, Jeff, Robin, Jesse, Joe, Karl, Tom, Sandy, and scores of others who offered help every single day for nearly a year - thanks even more.

I might never be a Linux Geek. But I am my own particular kind of geek now.

Seems to me that's the idea.

Paul Carlstrom wrote to let us know that Idealab! has unveiled its first Linux venture: an open source e-commerce engine, called OpenSales. Runs on Linux, Solaris, UNIX and WinNT, and VA Linux Systems will be bundling it with some servers later this year. This will be interesting to see how they and Magic-SW, the makers of a Linux e-commerce engine will make out - and creds to Magic for donating 10k to save penguins. They have also vowed to not use live penguins anymore in promotion of their products.

Quite a number of people have written in with the news that Dell is going to be expanding their Linux support. Beginning in October, they will be offering installation of Linux on their hugely popular Dimension Line of PCs-before this, it had only been offered on servers. Will this mean more competition for the VAs and Penguins?

tweek writes "Over at news.com , you can read a story about VA Linux Systems deciding to open offices in 10 other cities. " The story also talks about great revenue growth, and the potential for an up-coming IPO.

An anonymous bastard writes "I'll be covering LWCE next week, and so I'm on a list of e-mail addresses for "the press" who get invited to interview "Linux People" for their publications. One of the e-mails was from the PR firm for VA Linux Systems (formerly VA Research) asking if I'd want to interview Larry Augustin. Interesting to note was this phrase: "Larry is one of the keynote speakers at the show, and has a lot of VA-related news and annct's to brief you on before VA goes into its quiet period." Apparently they've got a quiet period coming up, which means Linux IPO Number Two is coming. " Well, I've had a nice conversation with the press person at VA-they wanted to assure me that they are not headed directly into the quiet period post-LWCE. It'll be sometime soon, but don't hold your breath waiting for it-at least for the next couple weeks. *grin* Bottom line: Still waiting.

WebMaven writes "Well, acording to his page, Raster will soon join Mandrake as an employee of VA Linux. Congratulations, Raster, we can't wait to see what you'll code next! "

VA Linux Systems has been selected as a Fortune Magazine "Cool Company". You can get the whole scoop on the Fortune site. The article talks about some of the people that have been been hired in by VA recently for the Linux Labs as well - with Jon "Mad Dog" Hall being one of them.