Linux gaining steam in China, Jul 27, 2004

Linux, the open-source software programme, is gaining increasing momentum in Asia-Pacific, especially China, due to strong government backing and great demand for low-cost computing from enterprises, suggest industry executives.

"Linux is ready for prime time," said Derek Williams, executive vice-president of Oracle Asia-Pacific.

He made the remarks last week during the Oracle OpenWorld Shanghai 2004, a global conference held by Oracle Corp, which is the world's second-largest software maker.

Linux and open source software offers cost savings, flexibility and better security, according to ITV's director of operations and infrastructure, but is not always appropriate and needs to be assessed on a case-by-case basis.

Nick Leake explained that ITV had grappled with diverse systems, not least through the Carlton-Granada merger, and has recently been migrating several Unix server flavours to Linux.

So, how do you like the new kernel? You say you're not running it? Well, you should know that you are not in the minority. The vast majority of Linux users are still not running with 2.6. At LinuxWorld in San Francisco next week, you'll see that not every Linux distribution has embraced 2.6, either.

So what's the deal? Why aren't more companies using the latest and greatest? Who is shipping distributions with the new kernel, and who is holding back? What is the reaction of the Linux community to the 2.6 kernel? This article will try to answer some of these questions.

Targeting emerging markets where demand for its technologies is growing the fastest, IBM this month combined several initiatives, including Linux, grid computing and virtualization, to form a high-growth business group called Strategic Growth Initiatives.

"The opportunity here is that customers are asking for gridded Linux networks and virtualized servers that can run multiple operating systems," said Jim Stallings, general manager of the new group, in an interview. "The big news here is the customer thirst for this."

When the Mozilla Foundation recently announced its one-year anniversary, I thought, "Wait a minute! Hasn't Mozilla been around for many years?" I then realized that the anniversary referred not to the Mozilla browser but to when the browser was freed from its corporate entanglements with Netscape/AOL and the Mozilla Foundation itself was formed as an independent entity. As companies from Sun to even Microsoft think about open-sourcing some of their products, they would do well to remember Mozilla's history and learn from its successes and mistakes.

Recent weeks have seen some major advancements for the Mozilla browser, as the latest security hole in Microsoft's aging Internet Explorer became the straw that broke the camel's back for many users.

The menace of spam has pushed Lloyds Steel Industries to upgrade its mail server, for which the company has initiated a complete evaluation of both Microsoft and Linux based mailing solutions.

Detailing the proposed IT initiative to CXOtoday, Tanveer Ahmed, EDP officer, Lloyds Steel Industries Ltd., said, “Approximately 70 to 80% of our daily mails are spam that lead to considerable downtime. Thus the productive time of an employee is wasted in validating and deleting these mails. We therefore plan to get a comprehensive mailing solution for our enterprise.”

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