The company maintains that it has built a version of its Authentium ESP Enterprise Platform that can bypass PatchGuard without setting off the desktop alarms produced by the security feature when the Vista kernel is compromised. ESP Enterprise, an SDK sold by Authentium to telecommunications carriers and so-called managed services providers, offers virus protection, anti-spyware, data recovery, firewall and transaction security capabilities.

Two reviews of the recently released Fedora Core 6. "FC 6 certainly is one of the best looking distro’s I have seen, especially for a default installation. but several smaller issue bugs that crept into FC 6 made me wonder how organized they really are. The problems I encountered with Fedora Core 6 were not huge issues, but there were enough smaller bugs that made me wonder if this release was rushed." And secondly, "FC6 is here, at last, and we've been busy putting it through its paces to let you see what's new. You're probably most interested in the following questions: Is Yum still slow? (yes). How good is AIGLX? (excellent). Does it still lack many configuration tools (yes)."

This week the Mozilla Foundation released Firefox 2.0, and that occasion did not go by unnoticed at Microsoft's Internet Explorer team. "The Microsoft Internet Explorer Team sent us a cake for the upcoming release of Firefox 2! A big thanks to Redmond, Washington!" What's next, Stallman on a dinner date with Ballmer?

The Xen team writes: "We're pleased to announce the official release of xen 3.0.3! This release includes many new features as well as enhanced stability and performance." TheCodingStudio has a screenshot walkthrough of this new release.

Microsoft's Sender ID e-mail authentication technology can now be used without fear of the software giant's intellectual property lawyers. The company said Monday it is making the 'Sender ID Framework' available under its Open Specification Promise program. That means Microsoft will not sue anyone who creates products or services based on the e-mail technology.

A few months ago we ran a poll about the most important non-free Linux apps. We had over 8,000 votes in that poll and we consider the results pretty interesting. Interesting enough to push Linux's market share if a distro capitalized on them?

"Apple computers have long been prized for being relatively virus-free. But as more people use Apple products, experts say the company is increasingly becoming a target for cyber pranksters and criminals writing viruses and other forms of malware. Oliver Friedrichs, director of security response at Symantec, a leading anti-virus software vendor, said 72 vulnerabilities were discovered in the Mac's OS X operating system in 2006, up from 19 in 2004." Please consider the source, though.

"Novell today announced the availability of SUSE Linux Enterprise Real Time, enabling customers to realize the benefits of Linux for real-time applications. SUSE Linux Enterprise Real Time from Novell adds real-time technology from Concurrent Computer Corporation to the flexible and scalable SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 platform."

"When eWEEK Labs first reviewed Sun Microsystems' Solaris 10 early last year, we were impressed by the new facilities the operating system offered for better serving up applications and making the most of the SPARC and x86 hardware on which it runs. With this summer's Solaris 10 update, labeled 6/06, Sun has significantly improved on its already excellent operating system with the addition of the much-heralded Zettabyte File System."

"Nvidia is making a CPU, but the only questions are what kind of CPU, and how the heck is it going to do it. Making an X86 based CPU is not a trivial venture, and there are enough problems to make even a company with the engineering bandwidth of Nvidia cringe. Those problems are mainly called lawyers."

"When I wrote about the wrangling over the GNU GPLv3 licence a month back, it provoked a lively conversation in the comments. Given this evident passion among readers, I thought it would be interesting to ask the top hackers - the ones actually involved in the discussions - for their thoughts on the matter. So I contacted Richard Stallman for the FSF angle, and a bunch of the top kernel hackers - Linus, Alan Cox, Greg Kroah-Hartman, Andrew Morton and Dave Miller - for their view."

"Mandriva Linux, once the most popular desktop GNU/Linux distribution, still enjoys an enthusiastic following and a positive cashflow, and has settled into the niche it established in 1999: a technologically advanced operating system that's easy to install, configure, and use without dumbing everything down. Last year's merger with Conectiva and Lycoris more than doubled the size of the company, bringing together hundreds of dedicated and experienced employees to further challenge the Red Hat and Novell desktop GNU/Linux stalwarts. Below are interviews with three of those everyday people."

"This whitepaper, fourth in our series leading up to the Nov. 1 official launch of Windows XP Embedded SP2 Feature Pack 2007, describes a new set of components that bring desktop capabilities to Windows XP Embedded. This allows applications to work identically in both desktop and embedded environments and makes the same management, monitoring, and deployment infrastructure available to manage embedded systems."

In the midst of the busy semester here at school, my fiancee's laptop, running Windows XP SP2, picked up some friends - adware, trojans, etc. It was a pretty nasty sight. I worked on it for at least two hours every couple of days, wiping it clean, doing my best to lock it down, and so on. Avast! and Ad-Aware had their limits it seemed, for only a day or so after I cleaned it, pop-ups and weird stuff would show up again. She was getting sick of it. I was getting sick of cleaning it, so I suggested, offhand, installing a different operating system that is a bit more impervious to those nasties. To my surprise, she agreed.