Tag: Linux

Linux in Spain causes Microsoft pain

Posted on July 28, 2014 by - News

ValenciaIt has been a couple of bad weeks for Microsoft as more anti-Volish governments have been announcing successful open source operations.

Last week we had the British cabinet office moving away from Microsoft’s open document standard, and this week we have the Spanish praising Linux.

The government of the autonomous region of Valencia (Spain) has been waxing lyrical about Lliurex, a customisation of the Edubuntu Linux distribution.

Lliurex is used on more than 110,000 PCs in schools in the Valencia region, saving some 36 million euro over the past nine years, the government says.

The Lliurex distribution is managed through the Ministry of Finance and Public Administration. During installation, users can choose between several variants, tailored for example for use at home, in schools or by small and medium-sized enterprises.

Sofia Bellés, Director General of the region’s Information Technologies Department said that the new version will ease maintenance and management of PC equipment in schools in the region.

The software has also been optimised to save time in creating PC labs and is allowing better control over printing, reducing printing costs.

Liurex is one of several free software projects used by Valencia. It is using LibreOffice, a free and open source suite of office productivity applications, is used on all the 120,000 desktop PCs of the administration, including schools and courts. Using LibreOffice will help save the administration 1.5 million euro per year, the government said last year.

Last week, the administration of Extremadura, another Spanish region, revamped the website of its Linex distribution, also used in schools. Linex is installed on about 70,000 PCs and laptops in schools.

 

NSA dubs Linux forum a home for terrorists

Posted on July 4, 2014 by - News

National-Security-Agency--008US spooks have classed an open source Linux forum alongside Al-Qaeda and the Taliban and is targeting its visitors for special treatment.

The Linux Journal is a happy place where weirdy beardy types can get together to discuss the Linux operating system and slag off Microsoft.  IT is the go-to site for headlines like “How YARN Changed Hadoop Job Scheduling” and “rc.local, Cron Style”.

It turns out that NSA has a programme called XKEYSCORE which decides which traffic to keep indefinitely. XKEYSCORE uses specific selectors to flag traffic, and the article reveals that Web searches for Tor and Tails software.

It is something that the Linux Journal has run a number of articles on because it helps to protect a user’s anonymity and privacy on the Internet.

According to DasErste.de which found the XKEYSCORE source code, and if you look closely at the rule definitions, you will see linuxjournal.com/content/linux* listed alongside Tails and Tor. This means that the NSA considers Linux Journal an “extremist forum”,

This means that merely looking for any Linux content on Linux Journal, not just content about anonymizing software or encryption, is considered suspicious and means your Internet traffic may be stored indefinitely.

Ironically it means that the best way to peruse the Linux Journal is to use Tor, which actually does look jolly suspicious and might flag a response from a curious NSA.

IBM shows off zEnterprise BC12

Posted on July 23, 2013 by - News

ibm-officeIBM has announced the zEnterprise BC12 – the zBC12 mainframe, built with analytics, cloud, and mobile computing in mind.

Big Blue claims this server, priced at a cool $75,000, is one of the most secure and technologically advanced of its kind. It’s got a 4.2 GHz processor and twice the memory of its predecessor, the z114. IBM boasts it’s cheaper at the acquisition point than the closest competitor.

The zBC12 can handle 40 virtual servers per core or 520 in a single footprint, possibly for as little as $1 per day per server.

There will be a Linux-only version, too, called the Enterprise Linux Server. It includes hardware, a z/VM Hypervisor, three years of maintenance, and can be extended with ELS for Analytics and Cloud-Ready for Linux on System z. IBM says it can run a portfolio of more than 3,000 Linux applications.

IBM has included new hardware functions on the zBC12, such as providing CPU and storage savings by compressing data on the server. Management, IBM says, is simplified through z/OSMF.

The z/OS 2.1 operating system has improvements in performance and scalability. The OS now sports what IBM calls Crypto as a Service, meaning Linux applications can use z/OS to encrypt data.

General manager of IMB System z, Patrick Toole, said analytics, cloud and mobile are changing the way businesses operate.

“IBM’s zEnterprise technologies address these challenges by providing clients with a powerful and highly secure platform to manage new and emerging workloads,” Toole said, “helping speed time to market, reduce costs and stimulate business growth by making stronger connections with customers.”