Your next phone could run Linux, Feb 13, 2008

Linux seems to have chosen the 2008 Mobile World Congress to quietly make its way onto the new consumer devices so in abundance at the annual mobile Mecca.

The next version of the popular Ubuntu Linux distribution was released today. As the name suggests, Edgy Eft will include bleeding-edge Linux technologies, with many of the packages expected in Edgy to be beta themselves.

I was certainly a happy and enthusiastic Ubuntu supporter ... until Dapper Drake was released.

IBM is not going to replace Windows with Linux on its 300 000-odd desktops, but it has ported its groupware suite, Workplace, to the Linux operating system, according to Joe Ruthvern, IBM SA's Linux and OSS business development manager.

The South African Revenue Service (SARS) issued a tender (RFT 37/2005) for a proof of concept Linux desktop solution for the tax-collecting government department on 17 February

It's been a long, bad year for politicians, petrol prices and proprietary software. But 2005 was an exceptional year for open source software. It really found its feet this year, and I think it also started to cement a new façade that will serve it well for years to come.

For all the arguments against Microsoft and its anti-competitive practices, the one thing that really holds Linux back is the complete, embarrassing and possibly negligent support for it by vendors. Microsoft really has nothing to do with it.

Ubuntu Linux has signed Obsidian up as the first certified support partner in South Africa. Obisidian expects to certify 15 engineers for Ubuntu -- the same number of certified Red Hat engineers it has in its stable.

In yesterday's keynote speech at the LinuxWorld conference, Mark Shuttleworth announced that the Ubuntu Linux distribution will be naming its local support partner today.

A plethora of partners, led by IBM, launched Africa's first Linux competency centre 15 March in Johannesburg, South Africa.