IBM have rolled out a 33.8 million dollar Linux network for a Spanish healthcare provider. The roll-out is said to be the largest Linux deployment in Spain to date and will provide 14,000 medical professionals with information to improve patient care. The biggest single roll-out of Linux in Europe thus far is the German National Rail, which has swapped to Linux on 55,000 of it’s machines. IBM is making great strides towards getting Linux accepted by enterprise and government and is behind both of these deployments.

When I speak, it appears Microsoft listens! Just a few short weeks ago I criticized MS for the failure to include RSS feeds on the company’s press releases. Unless I was mistaken, they did not exist then — and they do now. I could be wrong, but it appears they added them about February 7, 2005, meaning that even with the savvy they have, it took them a week after I suggested they do it. Not too bad still.

Perhaps they will offer me a job next given that they hold me in such high regard. Could happen!
[ed: Yes, but would you accept such a job?]

RSS Link for Microsoft Corporations Press Releases

RSS Link for Microsoft Corporations Latest Headline Stories

Today Microsoft launched Microsoft® Office real-time collaboration solutions with a dog and pony show led by Bill Gate’s himself. In a connection featuring Mark Burnett, creator of “The Apprentice” reality show hosted by Donald Trump, Gates demonstrated his software. They expect to roll out three primary products in the coming months:

Microsoft Office Communicator 2005 (previously code-named “Istanbul”) that is claimed to “unif[y] real-time communications modes — such as IM, voice, video and access to voiceconferencing and Web conferencing — into a single application. It also enables PC-to-phone integration”,

Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2005 Service Pack, an update to the existing communications platform, and

Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2005, touted as a major update to the existing net meeting software.

Linuxense has issued a hacking challenge. For the first 48 hours, if it gets that far, no shell accounts will be available. The server is at: 202.88.234.250 After that time, shell accounts will be available during the remainder of the 96 hour challenge.

If you can get to root you can either:
leave your mark, or
take down the server

There are some specific rules about how to do it — be sure to read them. Should be fun.

Two new worms that effect Microsoft MSN messenger have surfaced. The two worms are called Kelvir.a and Kelvir.b and both of them include links in instant messages which if clicked will download and install a Trojan horse program. MSN messenger is a good target for cracker activity because it’s embedded into Windows, just like Internet Explorer, presumably this was done so that Microsoft could defend potential anti-competitive lawsuits by claiming they can’t remove it because it’s “part of Windows”. The advice is the same though, make sure you are running an up to date anti-virus application, (see here if you want a freebie.) and make sure you have all of Microsoft’s critical updates installed. (Open IE, go to “tools” and select “Windows update”, the only reason anyone with any sense would run IE nowadays). TheInq have more on the Virus issue.

In other MS news, apparently Microsoft have created their own version of Mrs Weasley’s family clock (from the Harry Potter series). This has incensed many Harry Potter fans, some of whom have been suggesting legal action. This brings up something I’ve been thinking about lately, the Star Trek series came up with many ideas that in the fullness of time have come to fruition, like the communicator or voice interaction with computers for a couple of examples. Can a company that actually creates working models of these ideas patent them as their own? Does fiction count as prior art? The idea is a fascinating one, because if it doesn’t count as prior art, should authors start patenting the devices created in their fiction?

Cnet have a very interesting FAQ list on blogging with respect to the workplace. Since there have already been a few cases where employee’s have been sacked for their online activities, this should be of interest to anyone with their own Blog. So folks, if you work, and you blog, you need to read this if you plan to continue both.

This article is funny. The guy goes to great lengths to get a PDF document. It is easy, just download a copy of OpenOffice.org and export as PDF, (OpenOffice.org is a free Open Source office suite for Windows and Linux and performs and looks much like other office suites including a Word processor, spreadsheet, drawing program and presentation software that is compatible with Microsoft Office file formats).

Speaking of OpenOffice.org, they have just released the 2.0 Beta which we will be reviewing shortly.