Security vendors have reported several new variants of the worm infecting PCs running Microsoft's Windows 2000 operating system. Groups of virus writers are competing to cause the most damage, according to one security company, although the worm appears less severe than some first feared.

Novell Inc. will open a Linux research and development center in Beijing by the end of this year, focusing on Linux on the desktop, international and localization issues and high-performance computing. Novell's expanded Chinese presence will apparently serve both as a development and support arm for Novell's current business, as well as an attempt to create new business opportunities within China.

One of the weaknesses of biometric security systems is that you can't just replace your finger or your eye if someone figures out how to compromise the system, like you can with a password. IBM researchers have applied more sophisticated cryptographic theory to the problem, providing a way to "construct a kind of technological screen separating a user's actual biological identification information from the records stored in profile databases."

The most recent Mac OS X security update from Apple Computer includes a glitch that prevents users from running 64-bit applications on the company's new Tiger operating system, AppleInsider has confirmed.

Creating a surprise twist in the portable music wars, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has denied Apple's application to patent its method of using hierarchical menus to navigate through the iPod's contents. The basis for the denial: a similar method outlined in a Microsoft researcher's patent application, filed after the iPod was introduced but before Apple sought its own patent.

The internet is full of hosts running unpatched versions of Windows. Should Microsoft release patching worms to fix every vulnerable system on the Internet in a matter of minutes? That's one of the hot questions that security researcher Jose Nazario, famous for his WormBlog, answered in this interview on SecurityFocus. It's a nice read, especially when they start comparing computer worms to nature phenomena.

O'Reilly's DevCenter continues its foray into all things Vista by investigating Aero Glass, presentation broadcast tools, UAP and RDP security, and more. Here's part 1 for those of you that missed it.

Intel, which next week is expected to announce plans to move to a new processor architecture, is switching to a new yardstick to measure processor performance: performance per watt. Intel's announcement will publicly signal an internal shift that's already taken place. After years of promoting clock speed, it's now emphasizing overall performance and power-efficiency.

Geronimo is one of the more complex projects undertaken by the open source community, comparable to Linux in its intricacy. One of Geronimo's principal goals is J2EE 1.4 certification - a time-consuming effort. Nevertheless, Geronimo has already issued several milestone releases and is moving steadily toward the magical 1.0 release. Peek behind the curtain and see how the Geronimo deployment model brings a number of different open source projects under one umbrella.

In Virginia, patrons waiting in line to buy county school surplus iBooks for $50 started a riot when the doors opened, with an old man getting trampled, people crushing a baby stroller, and someone trying to run people down with his car. One iBook hopeful admitted that he used his folding chair as a weapon to fight off people who were trying to cut in line. Take a lesson from Steve Jobs, Henrico County: make them a little more expensive, and prevent the bloodshed. (Editor's note for the humor-impaired: no, I don't really think Macs are too expensive. I'm making fun of people who do)

An OSX security update includes fixes for the following: AppKit, BlueTooth, CoreFoundation, cups, Directory Services, HIToolBox, Kerberos, loginwindow, Mail, OpenSSL, QuartzComposerScreenSaver, Security Interface, Safari, X11, and zlib.

This light hearted review is a look at how a girl who uses Windows (and is non-technical) deals with using Fedora Linux instead. In fact, she likes it so much, she uses it all the time now. If she can use Fedora Linux, anyone can.

O'Reilly's DevCenter is featuring an in-depth look at Windows Vista Beta 1. Their conclusion? "Surprisingly, this build of Windows Vista is pretty stable, and the performance is quite good."

Solaris Express Community Release build 20 is out. You can download it here. It should be available on the OpenSolaris page soon. In addition, Sun Cluster 3.1 8/05 has been released. More info here.