SCO's lawsuit filed in Utah last week claims that IBM integrated computer code belonging to another company into the Linux operating system, touching off speculation that the lawsuit could hurt other Linux companies, including Red Hat, the country's largest distributor of the software. Red Hat isn't involved in the dispute, but some analysts say that the Raleigh-based company won't be able to escape the fallout. "It's kind of irrelevant who wins the lawsuit," said Victor Raisys, analyst with Soundview Technology Group in San Francisco. "You can't take back the fact that someone has tried to claim intellectual property on Linux. The genie is out of the bottle."

To play a bigger role in the development of computers — as well as software — Microsoft has formed a major new division to produce specialized versions of Windows and build prototypes of computers of the future. Called the Extended Platforms Division, the group has 900 employees assembled from the Windows, research and business-productivity divisions. It also includes industrial designers and evangelists who will pitch the concept computers to manufacturers.

Top Linux seller Red Hat will unveil today a new phase in its plan to profit from a premium product, introducing a new lower-priced version of its Advanced Server software, along with a new brand name.

From Ars Technica: "The present article outlines what AMD hopes is the next step in x86's evolution: x86-64. As we'll see, x86-64 is more than just a 64-bit extension to the 32-bit x86 ISA; it adds some new features, as well, while getting rid of some obsolete ones."

SuSE Linux today unveiled the latest version of its Linux package - introducing an easy to use, application rich desktop for home users. Available April 14, SuSE Linux 8.2, sets a new milestone for ease of use - incorporating the latest versions of KDE 3.1 and Gnome 2.2.

The industry gorilla seeks to replace widespread opinion that it is arrogant, unaccountable and monopolistic with a new perception as a softer, gentler giant following a subtle shift in the way it deals with clients and competitors. Additionally, the software giant has renamed its division responsible for software used to manage Windows servers, as the company prepares to update management tools at a conference next week.

This article is a followup to an article I wrote on 2-20-2003 about my experiences choosing a Linux distribution that would suit my needs and wants. My principal requirements for an OS are that it be powerful and up to date, easy to use and set up--I don't mind using the command line and I don't mind editing a file here and there, but I like doing this type of editing for fun, not because I have to. I also want an OS that is fast and looks nice on my PII 450 with about 350 MB of RAM.

"In eWeek Labs' tests of the second beta of Microsoft's Office 2003, we indeed found it more polished than Office XP in all the expected places, but what will really set Office 2003 apart when it ships this summer is its suitewide integration of XML. This should enable users and enterprises to work with their information in new, more efficient and creative ways." Read the review at eWeek.

Most of the savings from Linux desktops come from reduced administration costs--like rolling a custom RPM-based load that installs itself. Read the article online at LinuxJournal. On the printed version of the new issue of the LinuxJournal magazine, you will find "The Grand Unified Desktop" by Marco Fioretti: "Applications written for a variety of toolkits are coming together in a free best-of-breed desktop. To work together seamlessly, though, they need to follow important new standards."

MorphOS-news.de reports: "Emeric SH has pubished a review about his Pegasos with MorphOS. Although it's written completely in Hungarian it looks really nice. Also included are some screenshots of BirdieShoot and Knights&Merchants." If the article is translated to english, we will post a link to this story, as an update. Update: English translation here.

BeOSJournal features a short article about the presentation of YellowTAB's Zeta (BeOS-based Dano/R6) operating system at CeBIT. Also, click to view three shots from their new window manager design.

The Tcl programming language has been immensely successful in its almost 15 years of existence. Tcl, stands for 'Tool Command Language' and is pronounced 'tickle' by those in the know. It's probably most famous for the Tk graphical toolkit, which has for years set the standard for rapid, scriptable, cross-platform GUI development, but the language is used throughout a staggering variety of applications, from the open source web server that runs AOL's web site, to code for network testing, to code to run oil rigs.

This article we host here today is a must read for all Gnome and KDE users. We are happy to feature an exclusive interview with Waldo Bastian and Aaron J. Seigo from the KDE project and Havoc Pennington from the Gnome project. Waldo and Havoc are developers working on many "under the hood" places of their respective DEs, but they are also "sensitive" at UI and usability issues, so we could also call them "usability engineers". Aaron is the head of usability in the KDE project. All three of them were... brave enough to answer twelve hard questions about interoperability, standards, UI etc. between the two leading Unix DEs. Note that this is not a Gnome Vs KDE article, it is in fact exactly the opposite: 'KDE for Gnome' and 'Gnome for KDE'. The begining of a deeper collaboration and sharing that will bring the Unix desktop into a new era.

OSNews reader Jess Tipton was very kind to design really nice OSNews background images for various resolutions. Please download only the file that corresponds to your monitor's resolution (so we can save some bandwidth) from here. Also, please note that users who use older versions of Windows, will need to save these images as .bmp files before they can use them. Additionally, let's not forget that OSNews always is in search of people who would like to publish their articles on this site.