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North Korea's Own OS, Red Star
klaasb writes "North Korea's self-developed computer operating system, named 'Red Star,' was brought to light for the first time by a Russian satellite broadcaster yesterday. North Korea's top IT experts began developing the Red Star in 2006, but its composition and operation mechanisms were unknown until the internet version of the Russia Today TV program featured the system, citing the blog of a Russian student who goes to the Kim Il-sung University in Pyongyang."
The year of the linux desktop has finally come, to North Korea.
Is that a 2-bit or 8-bit operating system?
I'm guessing said news program didn't consider the potential consequences for the student? (Especially if a) he's still there and b) If they consider this project to be some kind of 'national secret' which they probably do given security / the likelihood of 'cyber warfare')
In Democratic People's Republic of Korea, computer back door removes you!
Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
ICBM
Yet Another GNU Linux distro.
With a skin that resembles windows, and rebranded apps.
Here's an article with a bit more of information
http://techie-buzz.com/linux-news/red-star-os-linux-distro-north-korea.html
The "My Country" browser is just firefox.
Interesting is, they are in violation of the GPL. But then again, It's North Korea ...
WTF am I doing replying to an AC at 5 A.M on a Friday night?
The article in its entirety:
Russian student back from North Korea had purchased a $5 OS disc and a $10 application disc. Based on Linux, looks like Korean version of Windows.
Nothing else.
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crickets
Does it count as fulfilling the obligations required by the GPL if you make your source code freely available and downloadable but your entire country is behind a firewall and no one can access it? :)
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
Ironic how super-strict North Korea uses Free Software, while South Korea is totally in thrall to Microsoft.
I suffer from attention surplus disorder.
Does it count as fulfilling the obligations required by the GPL if you make your source code freely available and downloadable but your entire country is behind a firewall and no one can access it? :)
Most of North Korea doesn't even have electricity. I'm not sure they need a firewall.
Putting moderation advice in your
The Red Star is based on Linux
*ducks*
I'm surprised there isn't a press release telling us Kim Jong-Il programmed the majority of the OS himself in his spare time, it is the type of thing the Glorious Leader usually does.
mentions that the browser "my country" is actually a fork of FF
Personally I wonder if the Blue Screen of Death is replaced with a Red Screen of Dissention.
Moved to http://soylentnews.org/. You are invited to join us too!
Do they have the goofy M$ search assistant dog?
Just curious there...
--Stak
Holy happy hippy crap!
It is just the smart thing to do. I expect more nations to switch to Linux as their desktop operating system to save the dependency on "Red Mond". I mean, monoculture is dangerous for their national security. Linux is very strong in Latin nations for egovernment purposes. The nation to switch first is able to create a very sustainable Linux eco system and it is able to get the Microsoft political benefits as well. Win!
. . . but the only app is Duke Nukem Forever.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
can we start expecting contributions to the kernel?
Sorry comrade, it is now called "the Colonel".
You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
Falling from the heavens like a rainbow star, the operating system appeared as a spirit of the people, willing itself into being to fight the evil west and spread true communist freedom to all people.
and I cannot stop myself of thinking - this russian student in NK that revealed the secret to the evil world - what happens to this poor soul? I mean either he was f.g silly, the regime told him to do it or the regime is already falling apart and everybody (in NK) can see it. Well I personally opt for silliness.
After all, North Korea is not known for its high technology or modern infrastructure. Well, as I'm sure the Mozilla team can tell you, developing a high quality modern browser is not a trivial task. Takes a lot of work and a lot of expertise. They have that, and have many years of code to build on. NK doesn't. So, what do they do? Rip off someone else, of course! That way they can have their own high quality browser with a minimum of effort. There's also little risk of their citizens finding out it is a ripoff and not original work because of course they have almost no access to the outside world.
If any one was actually expecting a real, home grown, innovate OS the were kidding themselves.
I hear the patches will be real killers.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
http://pics.livejournal.com/ashen_rus/gallery/0000gyzd
North Korean standards of "new". It takes their engineers a decade to completely remove all of the NSA and Chinese backdoors from the hardware.
Does it count as fulfilling the obligations required by the GPL if you make your source code freely available and downloadable but your entire country is behind a firewall and no one can access it? :)
Since North Korea is a sovereign nation, I dont think that they have to abide by US copyright laws...
I doubt they're going to murder him for leaking information about their non-secret software if that's what you mean. Apparently North Korea still gets a fair number of Russian tourists and would probably like to not piss off the Russian government.
I ran across a bunch of pictures from a Russian tourist a while back with translated captions. I found them pretty interesting.
http://www.enlight.ru/camera/dprk/index_e.html
Does it count as fulfilling the obligations required by the GPL if you make your source code freely available and downloadable but your entire country is behind a firewall and no one can access it? :)
Isn't this kind of a modified version of one of the thought experiments from the Debian legal team? If you suppose dissidents in dictatorships should be allowed to improve and use the software without the need to put themselves in danger of exposing the fact that they have the software in their possession, then the licenses should only require sending source code and patches to people who specifically request them. (Incidentally, GPL doesn't require you to advertise your forked versions or send your modifications upstream. It just requires that if you distribute binaries, you should also make the source available upon request.)
Heck, the people who came up with this thought experiment probably never thought the same principle could be actually used by dictatorships to conceal the program from the outside world...
amerika has executions too y'all
Actually, it just looks like a default KDE desktop. I've seen the Chinese Linux that emulates the look of XP, and someone spent a lot of time on that copying the appearance down to the small details. This, on the other hand, isn't very customized.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law
Yeah, awesome, those Korean programmers! They can make Linux look almost identical to Windows ... by using the almost un-altered default theme of KDE3
They also aren't violating the GPL if the jurisdiction they are in does not require them to have the permission of the copyright holder to make a derivative work in the first place, since the GPL is merely a license by which the copyright holder grants someone else rights which would otherwise be exclusive under law to the copyright holder.
Since its the North Korean government operating within North Korea we're talking about, here, I'm pretty sure the local laws don't require them to have a license from anyone to do anything they want.
May I direct you here?
Judging by what the system looks like, he's under direct command of General Protection Fault.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
It has a nifty daemon that keeps system clocks set back by 50 years.
Personally I wonder if the Blue Screen of Death is replaced with a Red Screen of Dissention.
No, it's the Red Screen of Death. This is North Korea, after all. "Take that, Hans Brix!"
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
Rather that than the enterprise controlling government with an iron fist, like where I live.
Yes, like Germany for example
I'm Argentinian. born, raised and living in Argentina ... a big part of the US population consists mostly of racist, irrational, ego maniacal, selfish pricks
Perhaps you should leave Argentina once in a while and actually get to know a few more of the people you're describing.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
I tried clicking your link and all I got was this: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=whoosh
Kim Jong Il's 1st computer program: "Herro World".
Everybody knows that penguins are imperialists
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_Penguin