'Why Reiser4 is not merged' is a widespread question around forums, Slashdot, OSNews, and wherever else Linux-related new appears on the web. The flame-wars on this topic have gotten to the 'mine is bigger than yours' level. Hence, it's not easy to see where the real problem lies. This document tries to make clear the 'official' point of view of Linux developers on this matter.

"Right at this moment, big changes have or are about to occur in three well-known browsers: Internet Explorer is finally being updated, with version 7 in its third beta and almost ready to roll out the door; Firefox is also ripening an upgrade beta for its Version 2.0 - it's in beta 1; and finally Opera, which has a devoted but smaller following, has recently come out with Version 9.0. So, three new browsers in the same year, after no action for a half decade. How do they stack up?"

Intel launched its 'Montecito' Itanium, doubling performance compared with its predecessor. Each Montecito chip has two processor cores. Of the six Montecito models introduced, the top-end 9050 has 1.7 billion transistors and 24MB of high-speed cache memory. The models range in clock speed from 1.4GHz to 1.6GHz.

Object-oriented programming with imperative languages like C, C++ and Java has been the norm over the years. But some visionaries argue that other paradigms are more productive. In imperative languages, any method that can possibly return different values, given the same input, has side effects. This article explores the basics of functional programming using Haskell. You to can come to appreciate the raw productivity and power that a functional language can provide and how it eliminates programming side effects.

There is an update for the next Debian release plan. According to Marc Brockschmidt Etch will carry 4.0 as version number and should be released on December 4th, 2006. "Please note that as of now, RC bugs and problematic transitions are our main concern. There has been progress, but we still need to lower the number of release critical bugs further."

"Due to the recent media hype surrounding the new MacBooks and the lack of actual experimentation, I decided to take matters into my own hands. Since I work in the IT department of a factory that uses all Dell computers, I was able to borrow a brand new Dell Latitude D620 for a few hours. Also readily available to me was an Oakton InfraPro infrared thermometer and my very own MacBook. There has been a significant negative response to the amount of heat emitted from the MacBooks. Since I own a MacBook, why not put it to the test!"

SLED 10 is finally here, and so begins Novell's effort to get it onto as many business computers as possible. This event also comes shortly after the departure of Jack Messman as CEO, an event which has dramatically changed Novell's business strategy, especially as it relates to its SUSE Linux products. To find out more about SLED, its cousin SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, and the company's plans for the future, I got in touch with senior Novell executive John Dragoon.

OpenOffice.org has been increasing in both popularity and visibility over the past several months. Version 2.0 has added a number of new features to bring it closer to feature parity with Microsoft Office, and it also offers full support for the Open Document format. However, a report just released by the French Ministry of Defense says that it still falls short of Microsoft's office suite in one important area: security.

"Microsoft and XenSource today announced they will cooperate on the development of technology to provide interoperability between Xen-enabled Linux and the new Microsoft Windows hypervisor technology-based Windows Server virtualization. With the resulting technology, the next version of Windows Server, code-named 'Longhorn', will provide customers with a flexible and powerful virtualization solution across their hardware infrastructure and operating system environments for cost-saving consolidation of Windows, Linux and Xen-enabled Linux distributions."

Microsoft's effort to provide a little privacy for Windows users has instead turned into a very public black eye. There was a near-immediate outcry saying that, without proper safeguards, what was intended as a benefit could turn into a big headache for businesses. The software could make it harder for companies to meet compliance regulations as well as to handle users who forget their password, critics said.

"Microsoft has just released the latest installment of the Windows Vista pre-RC1 builds, with Vista Build 5472.5 making its way to TAP and Tech Beta tester today, and for once, MSDN Subscribers too. Build 5472.5 is a standard FRE Staged build, only available in English at the moment, though Arabic, Japanese, and German builds may follow. At this point all the builds we are seeing seem to undergoing severe stages of heavy optimization: although faster code normally comes at the expense of larger files as a rule of thumb, this build of Windows Vista packs a punch performance-wise, but is only a 100 MB larger than its predecessor. "

"After suffering through version 1.0 many years ago, I thought Xandros would be the least likely of the commercial desktop GNU/Linux distributions to succeed. Each subsequent release since 1.1 has changed my mind a little bit, and now with version 4.0 of its home desktop edition, I'm at last convinced that Xandros is positioned for success. This should be the desktop operating system that you recommend to your Windows-hating friends and family."

"Hopefully you never had to restore your own system from a compromise and you will not have to do this in the future. Working on several projects to restore a compromised Linux system for various clients, I have developed a set of rules that others might find useful in similar situations. The type of hacks encountered can be very variate and you might see very different ones than the one I will present, or I have seen live, but even so, this rules might be used as a starting point to develop your own recovery plan."

A company called Trustware, who has recently been nominated one of the 10 hot start-ups of 2006 by Microsoft, developed an application-level virtualization tool for Windows. This app, called BufferZone, promises to fight malware virtualizing I/O operations, so that the OS and user's data will be safe. Another cool advantage of this technology is that it doesn't require any user interaction. SecurityFocus published an interview with Eyal Dotan, creator of the tool, where he discusses the architecture, advantages of this design, performance, and how this method could be applied to servers running Windows or be ported to other OSs.