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Linux Distros & the ‘Except When We Don’t’ Syndrome

By Christine Hall on November 5, 2014 |

Community, Distros and Operating Systems

Linux Distros & the ‘Except When We Don’t’ Syndrome

When my colleague Ken Starks wrote on FOSS Force the other day about his gripe with Linux Mint’s handling of updates, I was a little amused because I had just dealt with this issue during the recent Bash crisis. I run Mint Maya with Xfce and I expected to find the Bash fix in Synaptic, but it wasn’t there. When I eventually found the update manager, I actually quite liked the set up. Having system updates easily available seemed to make sense and I liked the design. Like many things in tech, it turns out that the design was a little accidental, the result of a conflict necessitating the removal of the system update functions from Synaptic. But it works. I kind of like it.

Linux Mint logoIt also seems to fit with one of the underlying philosophies of the distro. Mint is famous for being a desktop that anybody can use. Updates on the dash is a concept which a new-to-Linux Windows’ user can understand, maybe even without having to go to the forums for help — and a piece of cake for experienced free software users. In my case, the only problem I had is that I misunderstood the severity numbering scheme, figuring one to be most severe instead of the least, but I easily managed to patch and update my system.

I was impressed — which is why I was amused by Ken’s consternation.

Continue readingLinux Distros & the ‘Except When We Don’t’ Syndrome
Video: Ken Starks’ & Ruth Suehle’s Keynotes at OLF

Video: Ken Starks’ & Ruth Suehle’s Keynotes at OLF

By FOSS Force on November 3, 2014 |

Community, Hardware, Operating Systems and Software

Here at FOSS Force we’re proud to be associated with Ken Starks. We’re proud because of the great articles he writes advocating Linux. We’re also extremely proud that he was chosen to be a keynote speaker at this year’s Ohio LinuxFest. But most of all, we’re proud because of his big heart, which he expresses through his work through Reglue, the nonprofit he founded in 2005 to give Linux computers, and training on how to use them, to financially disadvantaged school children in and around the Austin, Texas area where he lives.

Indeed, it’s this last aspect that was honored at Ohio LinuxFest, and the work Ken does with his “Reglue kids” was his focus during his time spent behind the podium. He called his presentation “Deleting The Digital Divide One Computer at a Time.”

Lucky for us, his friend Randy Noseworthy put together a video of the presentation, which we’re happy to be able to offer here. We’re certain you’ll find it as inspiring as we do.

Continue readingVideo: Ken Starks’ & Ruth Suehle’s Keynotes at OLF
The Wide World of Canonical

The Wide World of Canonical

By Larry Cafiero on October 31, 2014 |

Business, Distros and Operating Systems

Last week, I wrote an item that mentioned that the original Ars Technica article on 10 years of Ubuntu, since rightfully edited to delete the number of countries under the sphere of Ubuntu’s influence, briefly reflected the following irksome claim:

“Today, Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, estimates that there are 25 million Ubuntu users worldwide. Those users span 240 countries…”

Numbers: They may not be Canonical’s strongest suit.

I don’t blame Ars Technica for originally posting it because it’s a common claim by our friends from the Isle of Man. Also, I give Ars Technica all the credit in the world for going back and fixing it. But for the last week, it bothered me that Canonical might continue to make such a claim, knowing full well that they had erred.

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Drupal Hack & WordPress UsersWordPress logo

Drupal Hack & WordPress Users

By Christine Hall on October 30, 2014 |

Internet and Security

It’s not a good day for Drupal users, with the security folks at the CMS platform telling all users to consider themselves compromised if they didn’t install a security patch within seven hours of its release on October 15th.

Fixing the infected sites will require a bit of work. Sites will need to be taken offline, and the current install of Drupal blown-up and replaced with a backup from before October 15th. Any changes made made to a site since that date will have to be redone. Site owners will also need to notify their hosting companies of the situation, since the Drupal exploit could also be used to hack into other sites on a host’s server. Hosts will not be happy to hear this.

Users of other CMS platforms can give a sigh of relief — after all, they’ve dodged a bullet — but they’d be well advised to pay attention; a similar scenario could play out on any platform at any time.

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‘Hello World’s’ Indiegogo Campaign a Big SuccessHello World Nielson

‘Hello World’s’ Indiegogo Campaign a Big Success

By Christine Hall on October 29, 2014 |

Community and Media

It’s all over for Hello World’s fundraising campaign on Indiegogo — and what a success it was.

You may remember that the project, which makes short educational videos on Linux and other tech subjects, began a crowdsourcing campaign on September 10th, hoping to raise $2,048 needed to purchase new equipment. On October 9th we reported that the project had exceeded its goal, with a total at that time of $3,145. The campaign ended nine days ago, on October 20th, with the total raised at $3,705 or 181 percent of the target.

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Tux Machines DDOS Attack Mostly Contained

By FOSS Force on October 29, 2014 |

Community and News

For nearly a month now, we at FOSS Force have had no trouble reaching the popular FOSS sites Tux Machines and TechRights. Both sites are published by Roy Schestowitz and both sites, especially the former, had been offline during much of September due to a prolonged DDOS attack.

On October 4th, when we last reported on this, accessibility to both sites was greatly improved but still somewhat spotty. During most of this month, however, we’ve had no noticeable difficulty reaching either site.

According to Schestowitz, although the site continues to be under fire, he and his team have developed methods to deal with the attacks.

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Looking Ahead at Upcoming FOSS Events

Looking Ahead at Upcoming FOSS Events

By Larry Cafiero on October 29, 2014 |

Community, Distros and Operating Systems

Now that the mega-conference week that was is in the books — Ohio LinuxFest, All Things Open and Seattle GNU/Linux Conference are all history for this year — generally the Linux/FOSS world catches its collective breath and starts thinking about shows in 2015.

But wait. There’s one more event that deserves special mention before we close out the year. For those of you who are on the BSD side of the FOSS street, Meet BSD California 2014 takes place this weekend in San Jose at the offices of Western Digital.

Meet BSD LogoA biennial tradition in the San Francisco Bay Area, MeetBSD 2014 uses a mixed unConference format featuring both scheduled talks and community-driven events such as birds-of-a-feather meetings, lightning talks, and speed geeking sessions. MeetBSD can be traced back to a local workshop for BSD developers and users, hosted annually in Poland since 2004. Since then, MeetBSD’s popularity has spread, and it’s now widely recognized as its own conference with participants from all over the world.

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Synaptic Vs. Update Manager in Linux MintLinux Mint Update manager

Synaptic Vs. Update Manager in Linux Mint

By Ken Starks on October 28, 2014 |

Distros, Operating Systems and Software

I spent four days last week attending Ohio LinuxFest 2014, one of the busiest and most successful Linux shows in the country. It was my honor and privilege to deliver the closing keynote this year, and much of what I said either alluded to or squarely addressed our trust in free open source software.

That should be a no-brainer, right? I mean, GNU/Linux, or just “Linux”, is rooted in FOSS applications and principle.

Except when it’s not.

thinking about Linux MintHere’s what I want to know. Is replacing a well known application in Linux with a crippled version acceptable when it’s done in the name of stability? I’ll go ahead and place myself in front of you for scorn and castigation by admitting that I’ve been a member of the Slashdot community since 2002. Everyone has a sig line, right? Mine was thoroughly honed to be as concise a possible:

“Windows assumes you are an idiot…Linux demands proof.”

In other words, for the most part, Linux users are in complete control of everything in/on their system. Linux will allow you to completely bugger your installation, because as a user you have the responsibility to know what you are doing. Fools are not suffered gladly when using Linux. You wanna play with the rm command? Go ahead…it’s your computer.

Continue readingSynaptic Vs. Update Manager in Linux Mint
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