Dell, Google make things tougher for Sun, Apr 15, 2009

With an acquisition by IBM now out of the question, former Silicon Valley icon Sun Microsystems faces one challenge after another from competitors looking to eat into the Santa Clara company's market share.

First it was "the desktop". Now it's "the netbook" -- as in, what's the big proving ground for Linux vs. Windows going to be? And the latest hotly-debated bit of conventional wisdom is whether the Linux-based netbooks just don't cut it compared to their Windows cousins. The real problem seems to be who's willing to do more to bring regular users in.

As Windows 7, Ubuntu 9.04 and Fedora 11 all approach their launch dates, the author has been thinking about the differences in how they're created and released.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation reported over the last couple of days that a Boston College computer science student has been targeted by BC police largely on the basis of using Linux. Boston College police seized several items, citing his use of Linux as probable cause supporting their actions.

While security features are getting an update, the core of the company's networking OS could see a shift to Linux within months.

You have to wonder if Microsoft really knows what it’s doing. There’s a lot of hoo-hah around the Web about Windows 7, and how it’s going to fix Vista’s problems. Thing is, the signs are that it won’t -- and that Apple will be the biggest winner. Linux is a winner too.

Open source giant Red Hat has hinted that it might look to extend its new Open Source Channel Alliance scheme to Europe if the US launch proves successful.

Google has announced the availability of an Android 1.5 SDK preview release. It will give developers an early look at some of the features that are planned for the new version of Google's mobile operating system.

The Dutch ministries of Economic Affairs (EZ) and Education, Culture & Science (OCW) find it undesirable that students in the secondary vocational education system (MBO) are only being taught to use closed software systems from a few companies. Current ICT courses within the MBO schools have now started to pay attention to open source material. Heemskerk writes that they are negotiating with Novell on free support for the open source operating system Linux within the MBO schools.

Whenever the Conficker worm comes up there are always a number of people who point their fingers towards Redmond, stating that it's their fault Conifcker got out. What if a big security hole pops up in a Linux distribution - who will the Redmond-finger-pointing people hold responsible?

While the global recession may have many down in the dumps, it's apparently good news for Linux, with market research outfit IDC claiming it's going to come out of the crunch a winner.

With cost-cutting pressures expected to continue into the post-recessionary phase, ABI Research predicts that Linux will benefit from the entry into the market of lower-cost netbooks that run ARM-based processors.

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