LINUX NEWS
RESOURCES & LINKS FROM BRAINBUZZ.COM
Thursday, September 27, 2001
Read By Over 7,000 Linux Enthusiasts Weekly!TABLE OF CONTENTS
1) Sean’s Notes
2) Linux News
Buy Two, Get One Free
Review of Rune
Gartner Group Reviews Red Hat
Use Linux, Save a Bundle3) Linux Resources
Tricking RPM
GNOME Autologin
Serving Java From Linux
Star Office Beta 6
Hackers Against Terrorism4) App o’ the week
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1) Sean’s Notes
It used to be that manufacturers of computer equipment didn’t care much about the Linux users. The XFree86 project had to beg and plead for specs that could be used to build accelerated X servers, and even then not all features could be used because of Non-Disclosure Agreements that limited what could be distributed in source form.
Perhaps that’s one reason I stuck with my Mach64 PCI card for so long. Between it and my Trident 9440, I could use X-Windows fairly effectively, though at a pretty pathetic 8 bit colour depth. Unfortunately, that gets tiresome, and after a monitor upgrade I was starting to wish I had the video hardware to drive my latest purchase.
So, when I decided it was time for an upgrade, I started looking at the options, and people’s experience with the card under Linux. One company that has hopped on the Linux bandwagon is NVIDIA. While XFree86 comes with an “nv” driver for NVIDIA chipsets, you can download newer drivers from NVIDIA directly:
http://www.nvidia.com/?page=LINUX
The drivers are distributed as a kernel module and an XFree86 driver called “nvidia”. From the looks of it, they are making periodic updates to the driver, so this wasn’t just a token gesture. Installation was as simple as changing
Driver "nv"in /etc/X11/XF86Config-4
to Driver “nvidia”
after installing the RPMs and re-running XConfigurator.
The drivers are still given in binary format, which is not ideal, but is a great deal more than other people give. They’ve thoughtfully provided a wrapper in source code format so that people with custom kernels can still use it. (Binary distributed drivers in a kernel are a nightmare; there are some products shipping with them that are effectively useless unless you are using the exact kernel that they were.)
After this Linux fan got the drivers installed and restarted X (no reboots – are you listening, Bill?) a huge increase in performance was noted. My first stop was over to Loki Software
http://www.lokigames.com/
to download the latest demos, and thus the entire weekend was lost.
Another company with the right mindset is Advansys, the makers of various SCSI cards. They write the driver, maintain it, and distribute it in source format. Furthermore, it’s packaged in the kernel source tree. Chances are, it’ll work on your system right out of the box. And to boot, it’s a good card, I have yet to have a complaint about mine.
Times have changed. There are now many companies that are supporting Linux, either by giving out specs without requiring NDAs, writing the drivers themselves, or supporting those that do. Make sure you do your research before you buy some new hardware – you no longer have to suffer poor performance with otherwise good hardware because you choose to run Linux. You’ll be supporting those companies, and sending a message to those that refuse to recognize Linux.
Long live the Penguin,
Sean mailto:swalberg@brainbuzz.com
Visit the Linux News Board at http://boards.brainbuzz.com/boards/vbt.asp?b2
2) Linux News
Buy Two, Get One Free
For the month of September (what’s left of it, at least), you can pick up three O’Reilly books for the price of two. If you’re in Canada, this offer lasts until mid-October, but only at certain stores.
http://www.oreilly.com/news/retailpromo_0901.html
Review of Rune
The porters of native Linux games, Loki Software, recently released Rune, a 3D adventure. This is the first review of it that I’ve seen, and it looks pretty good. There is a demo available from the Loki web site, being downloaded to my computer as I write this.
http://www.evil3d.net/reviews/software/rune/
Gartner Group Reviews Red Hat
Love ‘em or hate ‘em, groups like Gartner are part of the industry. One of their latest reports has to do with Red Hat Linux 7.1. Did they like it or not? You’ll have to read the article to find out!
http://techupdate.zdnet.com/techupdate/stories/main/0,14179,2814078 ,00.html
Use Linux, Save a Bundle
A consultant with little Linux experience was asked by a client about the merits of keeping existing hardware and moving to Linux, versus those of performing some upgrades and going to Win2k. After researching Linux and learning about it, he developed a business case and shared it with the world.
http://www.robval.com/linux/desktop/index.asp
3) Linux Resources
Tricking RPM
I found the need for a similar technique the other week. I had built perl from scratch, using 5.6.1, but the Red Carpet package management system insisted the RPM for 5.6.0 be present. Creating a dummy rpm by the same name wouldn’t work, so the solution was to use the ”–justdb” parameter to RPM, which forces the database updates but doesn’t touch the filesystem. This message explains it a bit better, and includes some more complete command lines.
http://www.geocrawler.com/lists/3/Red-Hat-Linux/87/0/6317855/
GNOME Autologin
One of the features of the GNOME autologin manager is that it can automatically log in a user. This may be desired for home use, kiosks, or anywhere else where you’d like to boot the machine straight to a logged in X-Session. The monkeys at Ximian have the steps to set this up in their knowledge base.
http://support.ximian.com/cgi-bin/ximian.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.ph p?p_refno0713-000001
Serving Java From Linux
Java may not have made it to every appliance we see yet, but it’s a great language for developing web applications. A friend who does Java servlet development expressed to me how difficult it is to get Apache to integrate with Java. Here’s an article that makes it simpler, not only walking you through the install, but providing tests to verify that it is working.
http://www.linux.com/enhance/newsitem.phtml?sid=1&aid532
Star Office Beta 6
I had passed along a link a while ago about Star Office 6, including a download of the current snapshot. While searching for more information about the product itself, I found this form, which will put you on Sun’s list of people to notify when the next release happens.
https://www.sun.com/staroffice/beta6.html
Hackers Against Terrorism
After the September 11 tragedy, crackers on both sides began defacing government sites. In an effort to channel their energy into more useful activities, such as intelligence gathering, the US Government is going to launch a series of TV Ads featuring none other than Vince Cerf, one of the people responsible for the creation of the core Internet Protocols.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,47099,00.html
4) App o’ the week
I don’t know how I didn’t notice this one earlier… This SourceForge project is the parent of several smaller ones, spearheaded by HP to develop Linux drivers for their printers under an Open Source licence. Besides drivers, they’re committing other resources to help other Linux projects integrate HP features into the codebase. I suppose it’s the next best thing to having vendors ship Linux drivers with the product themselves.
http://hp.sourceforge.net/
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