A few months back Jag wrote this article on OSNews about my travails in my first encounter with Linux. Now, that Jag has been using it for a while, he has written a new article detailing steps required to convert an out-of-the-box Red Hat 9 system to a working and useful desktop system. Linux veterans will probably not find anything surprising here, but for someone trying Linux for the first time, this should save a significant amount of time and effort.

Hewlett Packard is the first major company to offer indemnification for its Linux-using customers from any legal action that SCO might take. Other companies, such as Lindows.com and Sun have offered protection, but based on agreements that they have with SCO. HP has not paid any Linux licensing fees to SCO.

Vasper released today BeOS Max Edition v3.0. The compressed file weighs about 280 MB and includes third party software in addition to the tweaked core of BeOS 5.0.3 PE. BeOS Max is patched and supports AthlonXPs/Pentium 4s and installs on its own partition. Burning the ISO is not as simple though, as it has to be burned as BFS ISO format. More info on how to properly burn it here and here.

Mac OS X 10.2.8 apparently pulled Mac OS X 10.2.8 has disappeared from Apple's Web Servers, and is no longer available via the automatic Software Update function. The update created a number of problems to some users.

Bertrand 'Frodon' Presles of ASUM has made two little videos (MPEG4 format, first, second) demonstrating GUI reactivity and solid moving/resizing on MorphOS.

PalmSource said the next version of the Palm operating system for handhelds will offer improved multitasking and graphics capabilities.

There is an interesting article on Gamespy about sales of console game units. This is relevant to an OS oriented forum because of the underlying struggle for real estate. Both Sony and Microsoft covet the space on top of your TV. The so-called "set top box" is seen by both as the key to dominating the converging worlds of entertainment, communication and computing.

The Darwin team announced the availability of the source code for Darwin 6.7 and Darwin 6.8. These sources correspond to Mac OS X 10.2.7 (for G5s) and Mac OS X 10.2.8 (for G3/G4s), respectively.

In a move to extend its business beyond the Linux operating system, Red Hat Inc. announced an initiative to deliver open source application server, clustering and systems management software that works seamlessly with Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

A recent assessment of Sun Microsystems Inc.'s enterprise Linux strategy by Boston-based analyst firm Aberdeen Inc., cautions IT managers and decision makers about Sun's internal bias toward Solaris and the perception that Sun isn't serious about Linux.

Pat Volkerding has announced the release of Slackware 9.1 Release Candidate 1. The changelog has all the details.

At the launch of AMD's Athlon 64 processor, the 2GHz 3200+ Athlon XP and the 2.2GHz Athlon 64 FX51, Microsoft is announcing a beta version of its Windows OS for 64 bit processors, called "Windows XP 64-Bit Edition for 64-Bit Extended Systems." It's expected to be available to MSDN subscribers in the first half of 2004.

Sun has awarded a scholarship worth several hundred thousand dollars to the ObjectWeb Consortium, a nonprofit organization based in France, so it can begin certification testing on its JOnAS (Java Open Application Server) J2EE implementation.

Grid computing represents a big step in the world of computing. The technology is still fairly nascent, but at the developerWorks Grid computing zone, they're publishing a steady stream of new articles, tutorials, resources, and tools. Many visitors interested in Grid computing are asking some very basic questions: What do we do with all of this stuff? Where do we start? How do the pieces fit together? What comes next? This page provides an overview for readers who want to learn about Grid computing but don't know where to start. It places the basics of Grid computing into their proper context and ties together relevant developerWorks articles, tutorials, and tips.