SCO & Linux: 'OS Agnostic' Anderer Comes In From the Cold, Mar 15, 2004

S2's CEO, strategic consultant Mike Andererer - author of the infamous memo of October 12, 2003 to Chris Sontag, Vice-President and GM of SCOsource, copied to SCO Group CFO Bob Bench - has emerged from the shadows to share with readers of NewsForge his thoughts on the whole episode.

The open-source database firm has updated a licensing provision that forbade a common software combination

MySQL, an open-source database company, has taken a step to mend a rift in the open-source world by updating a controversial licensing provision that had broken a close tie between the MySQL database and another software package. The rift divided MySQL and PHP, software that lets computers construct customised Web pages on the fly. The two packages are found alongside each other so often, along with the Linux operating system and the Apache Web server, that there's an acronym, LAMP, to label the software combination.

Open source may have flown under the radar at many government agencies, but that could soon change, says Tony Stanco, organizer of the Open Source in Government conference series at the Center for Open Source and Government at George Washington University. Stanco anticipates major discussions among government agencies about large-scale open source implementations at the conference this week in Washington. Public agencies have long used Linux and Apache to power Web servers, and he foresees announcements of more open source usage in the coming months. Stanco also expects open source Web services tools, such as Zope, and content management systems to catch on.

The success of the Linux computer operating system has fuelled a rush by venture capitalists to invest in a new wave of open source software companies, creating the sort of land-grab mentality last seen during the 1990s technology boom.

"Smart, savvy people are begging to put a lot of money into open source - the venture capital spigot is back on," said Mike Olson, chief executive of Sleepcat, an open source company. Although the company did not need cash, he said it received "multiple solicitations" a week from would-be investors.

HP has supposedly been selling MandrakeSoft Linux on the desktop for a while but it's been so quiet about it that for all intents and purposes it's been a stealth operation.

But now that the desktop Linux hype meter is registering new highs, HP has decided to raise the decibel level.

It says it's got two new Linux desktops for the North American SMB market. One is the first of a new basic 2000 series, the HP Compaq Business Desktop dx2000. The company figures the street price of a Celeron model will be $389 to start. The Hyper-Threaded Pentium 4 unita will be pricier.

Linux is powering the infrastructure behind a distributed global network hosting images of the current Mars Rover and the European Space Agency's recent Rosetta comet chaser mission.

Web content delivery company Speedera Networks is using Linux running on Hewlett Packard ProLiant DL360 servers to host content from Nasa, the European Space Agency and websites including Fox Broadcasting, Sony Music Entertainment, Network Associates and Macromedia.

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