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Ready to try Linux but want some hand-holding when you do? Here are three videos that walk you through the process of installing Kubuntu, the KDE-based version of Ubuntu. The first video shows how Kubuntu looks running directly from live CD, and gives you a brief look at the software included on the CD. Video number two steps you through the process of installing Kubuntu to your hard drive, and video number shows you how to install and remove software in Kubuntu. This Kubuntu video tour is the first of a series. In coming weeks and months we'll do similar...

Linux for Consumers in the U.K. France, and Germany; Dell/Red Hat Solutions & More I hinted at this before, but today, it's official: Dell announced that consumers in the United Kingdom, France and Germany can order an Inspiron E1505N 6400 notebook or an Inspiron 530N desktop with Ubuntu 7.04 pre-installed. Since we began offering Ubuntu in the United States back in May, it's no secret that we've received many requests from customers all over the world to offer Linux there. This represents another step in broadening that offering. Before Ubuntu, we've offered Red Hat Linux as an option for Dell...

The Mozilla Foundation is thinking about creating a separate organization to take control of its Thunderbird e-mail application, allowing it to concentrate on development of the Firefox Web browser. In a blog posting Wednesday, Mitchell Baker, CEO of Mozilla Corp., a subsidiary of the Mozilla Foundation, called for a new structure to allow "the Thunderbird community to determine its own destiny" and asked the open-source community for input. Baker said Mozilla's Thunderbird effort "is dwarfed" by the energy it spends on the Firebox browser and the ecosystem around it. "Mozilla doesn't focus on Thunderbird as much as we do... on...

Skype has been found guilty of violating the GNU General Public License (GPL) by a Munich, Germany regional court, a decision likely to influence the way companies approach GPL compliance in the future. The decision found that Skype had violated the GPL by the way it distributed a voice over IP (VoIP) handset, the SMCWSKP100, which incorporates the GPL-covered Linux kernel in its firmware. The phone is manufactured by SMC, the target of a separate case that hasn't yet been decided, but the court noted that Skype was liable to fulfill the conditions of the GPL because it sold the...

San Francisco (IDGNS) - Popular open-source software development site SourceForge.net hosted the equivalent of the open-source Oscars on Thursday evening, billing the event as a big party, not a painfully long and formal awards ceremony. File archiver 7-Zip won the top award as all-over best project and also picked up the prize for best technical design. The Firebird relational database was another double winner, being voted both best project for the enterprise and the project providing the best user support. It was the second time SourceForge.net has asked its community to vote for their favorite open-source projects after debuting its...

Microsoft wants more open source software to run on Windows. Microsoft also wants its own Open Source Initiative (OSI) approved license. Perhaps they really can get along. On the software side, Microsoft today announced a partnership with open source solution vendor SpikeSource to eventually certify all of SpikeSource's SpikeIgnited solutions on the Microsoft Windows platform. The move could make dozens of popular open source solutions available to Windows users in a fully supported manner. SpikeSource solutions include the gambit of content management, CRM and collaboration solutions. The first SpikeIgnited solution being made Windows-certified is the Drupal content management solution. Throughout...

Dell knows it won't happen overnight, but along side wanting to ship audio/video codecs, Intel Wireless 80.211N support for Linux, Broadcom Wireless for Linux, and being able to ship notebooks and desktops with Compiz Fusion enabled, Dell would like to see improved ATI Linux drivers. At Ubuntu Live 2007, Amit Bhutani had a session on Ubuntu Linux for Dell Consumer Systems, where he had shared a slide with Dell's "area of investigation", which Amit had said is essentially their Linux road-map. Amit had also stated that the NVIDIA 2D and 3D video drivers were "challenges in platform enablement". Dell wants...

Apple Inc. isn't just a user of the CUPS, or Common UNIX Printing System, now the company is the owner, too. Michael Sweet, creator of CUPS, revealed on Wednesday that Apple purchased the printing system source code and brought him onboard as an employee in February 2007. Apple uses CUPS for part of the printing system in Mac OS X, and with the purchase of the source code, that isn't likely to change. CUPS was developed by Mr. Sweet under the GPL2/LGPL2 license, commonly used for free and open source software. He claims that Apple will continue to offer CUPS...

Looking to get a jump on the lucrative back-to-school shopping season, Wal-Mart has begun selling a sub-$300 PC. The Everex IMPACT GC3502 comes with Windows Vista Home Basic and OpenOffice.org 2.2 installed on a system that includes a 1.5GHz VIA C7 CPU, 1GB of DDR-2 SDRAM, an 80GB hard drive, a DVD burner, and integrated graphics, as well as a keyboard, mouse, and speakers. The Everex machine will be competing for Wal-Mart shelf space with the low-cost Dells recently introduced to the world of brick-and-mortar sales. The retail giant currently sells the Dell Dimension E521 for $498 alone or bundled...

This is one case study, out of a three-part series, where OpenOffice expert and instructor Solveig Haugland examines the successes and failures of a school, city government and corporate migration from proprietary office suites like Microsoft Office to OpenOffice. More from this migration series: Migrating a city government to OpenOffice Migrating a corporation to OpenOfficeSteps for a successful migration Pete Poggione is an IT director for a school district. The school district just switched last year and is still in the process of working out some kinks. Pete took a big risk switching to open source, presenting it in the...

Today HP execs wrote to tell us that their company has been awarded a top international Linux security certification. The certification, called the Evaluation Assurance Level 4 (EAL4+) Common Criteria security certification for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5, applies to HP servers, workstations and notebooks. In June, if you’ll remember, IBM was awarded the same EAL4+ certification for RHEL5 running on IBM System x, System p, System z, and BladeCenter servers. This cert is part of the Common Criteria Evaluation and Validation Scheme (CCEVS), an internationally recognized standard used by governments and businesses worldwide to determine the level of security...

When Dell first announced that it would be releasing Ubuntu Linux-powered consumer desktops and laptops, some people saw it as more of a stunt than a serious business move. They were wrong. Dell has already expanded its consumer Linux line, and now it has announced that it will soon be offering Ubuntu Linux systems outside of the United States and for new businesses. On Dell’s Direct2Dell site, Lionel Menchaca, Dell’s digital media manager, said, "Wanted to be clear that Dell does have plans to offer Linux to more consumers in additional locations outside the United States. More details to come...

Excerpt - Big UNIX news this morning. Apple has bought out CUPS, the common UNIX printing system. The name may not sound familiar, but it's part of every Mac OS X installation. CUPS implements a cross-platform printing system based on the Internet Printing Protocol and is, according to its web page, the defacto standard printing system for Linux. Until now, CUPS has been distributed by Easy Software Products under the GNU general public license. Although the purchase was announced today, it seems the actual deal went down this past February. In addition to acquiring the CUPS source code ownership, Apple...

Ubuntu Linux founder Mark Shuttleworth has declared more publicity would be generated for open source software if the three large desktop projects of KDE, GNOME, and OpenOffice.org agreed on a common and regular release cycle. During his keynote address at this year's aKademy KDE conference in Glasgow, Scotland, Shuttleworth suggested that KDE move to a more predictable, preferably six-month, release schedule. The rhythm and beat of publicity, according to Shuttleworth, would be a frightening prospect for proprietary competition. KDE's blog editors said the comments "certainly prompted heated discussion, which is still going on". With a significant release coming in the...

Google Inc. launched a Linux version of Google Desktop on Wednesday, almost three years after the product's launch for the Windows operating system. The application, designed for indexing and finding data in PCs, as well as for searching the Web, also comes in a Mac OS X version, introduced in April of this year. Like the Mac OS X version, Google Desktop for Linux is a beta, or test, product. The Windows version shed its beta tag already, meaning Google considers it a more stable and mature product. At this point, Google Desktop for Linux does not feature the Sidebar...

San Francisco (InfoWorld) - JBoss is introducing an upgrade to its open-source portal software on Monday that features integration with Google Gadgets, ADVERTISEMENT With Google Gadgets, developers can drop Google Gadget components onto a portal. These are mini-applications that work with the Google homepage, Google Desktop, or any page on the Web. Examples of Gadgets include a calendar, a weather globe, or a media player. JBoss Portal 2.6 also adds improvements in personalization, identity management, and workflow, JBoss said. The software will serve as the foundation of the JBoss Enterprise Portal Platform. Advanced personalization in version 2.6 enables users to...

In the latest word in a peculiarly public interchange, Linux leader Linus Torvalds appears inclined to take up Sun Microsystems Chief Executive Jonathan Schwartz on his offer for dinner. Last weekend, Torvalds expressed some "cynical" thoughts about Sun's intentions regarding its open-source Solaris operating system, which in turn led Schwartz to invite Torvalds to dinner to demonstrate Sun's intention of being a team player in the open-source realm, not a parasite. In an interview Wednesday, Torvalds indicated he was interested in the dinner date, even given the condition Schwartz attached. "I'm a fervent (believer and founding member) of the Free...

[Updated June 14] -- Linspire Inc. has announced an agreement to license voice-enabled instant messaging, Windows Media 10 CODECs, and TrueType font technologies from Microsoft for its Linux distribution. Additionally, Microsoft will offer protection to Linspire customers against possible violations of Microsoft patents by Linux. Spread the word: digg this story In his June 14 weekly Linspire Letter, Linspire CEO Kevin Carmony stated, "This agreement will offer several advantages to Linspire Linux users not found anywhere else, such as Windows Media 10 support, genuine Microsoft TrueType fonts, Microsoft patent coverage, improved interoperability with Microsoft Windows computers, and so on." Linspire...

John Weathersby, executive director of the Open Source Software Institute, told Linux.com today that, effective immediately, the Department of the Navy has adopted a new policy which requires that open source software must be considered in every software acquisition the Navy makes. Department of the Navy CIO Robert J. Carey signed a memorandum (pdf download) today entitled "DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE GUIDANCE" which first notes that misconceptions about whether or not open source software qualifies as COTS (commercial off-the-shelf) or GOTS (government off-the-shelf) software has hindered the Navy's ability to fully utilize open source software. The new...

Firefox Takes 25% of Browser Market May 29, 2007: According to the latest statistics from w3counter.com, Firefox’s market share is going gangbusters with the open source browser capturing over 25 percent of the browser market. Based 31,612,302 unique visits to 4,362 websites, the May 20 report from W3Counter will no doubt be a feather in the Mozilla Foundation’s cap as its browser goes from strength to strength. While it has a long way to go to capture a similar user base as Microsoft’s internet Explorer, the figures show both significant gains for Firefox, and significant losses for IE. W3Counter found...