Linux

Richard Stallman founder of the GNU project.





Linux is a generic term referring to Unix-like computer operating systems based on the Linux kernel. Their development is one of the most prominent examples of free and open source software collaboration; typically all the underlying source code can be used, freely modified, and redistributed, both commercially and non-commercially, by anyone under licenses such as the GNU General Public License.

Linux can be installed on a wide variety of computer hardware, ranging from embedded devices such as mobile phones, smartphones and wristwatches to mainframes and supercomputers. Linux is predominantly known for its use in servers; in 2007 Linux's overall share of the server market was estimated at 12.7%, while a 2008 estimate suggested that 60% of all web servers ran Linux. Most desktop computers run either Mac OS X or Microsoft Windows, with Linux having only 1–2% of the desktop market. However, desktop use of Linux has become increasingly popular in recent years, partly owing to the popular Ubuntu distribution and the emergence of netbooks and smartbooks.
Typically Linux is packaged in a format known as a Linux distribution for desktop and server use. Linux distributions include the Linux kernel and all of the supporting software required to run a complete system, such as utilities and libraries, the X Window System, the GNOME and KDE desktop environments, and the Apache HTTP Server. Commonly-used applications with desktop Linux systems include the Mozilla Firefox web-browser, the OpenOffice.org office application suite and the GIMP image editor.
The name "Linux" comes from the Linux kernel, originally written in 1991 by Linus Torvalds. The main supporting Userland in the form of system tools and libraries from the GNU Project (announced in 1983 by Richard Stallman) is the basis for the Free Software Foundation's preferred name GNU/Linux.

Linus Torvalds,  author of the Linux kernel.

New Application Could Make All Software 'open Source'

Imagine controlling Apple iTunes from inside Microsoft Word without having to switch applications. That could be possible, according to researchers at the University of Washington who are working on a project that could essentially make any proprietary software open source.

"Microsoft and Apple aren't going to open up all their stuff. But they all create programs that put pixels on the screen. And if we can modify those pixels, then we can change the programs' apparent behavior," said James Fogarty, a University of Washington assistant professor of computer science and engineering.

Almost everything seen on a display is made of prefabricated blocks of code, and the tool, called Prefab, looks for those blocks as often as 20 times per second and alters their behavior.

Fogarty likened the idea to HTML. "Everybody can see the HTML. But that hasn't been possible on the desktop," he said. A standard Web page can display a map from Google, an embedded YouTube video and a constantly updating RSS feed all at the same time, but achieving something similar with native PC programs is hard to do.

Fogarty has been working on Prefab for about two years, along with a University of Washington doctoral student in computer science and engineering, Morgan Dixon.

Dixon described Prefab's capabilities thus: "I'm using some program that I love, and I'm going to stick in some features from some other program that I love, so I have a more unified interface."

While the main part of the program is done, Dixon and Fogarty are still developing Prefab and exploring options for commercializing it.

Prefab doesn't actually reveal or manipulate the source code for programs, since it can't see it in proprietary software. It can only manipulate and combine what's visible on the computer screen. "Even if it's in a menu six layers down, if your eyes can see it, so can Prefab," Fogarty said.

He showed a few examples of how Prefab could work in a video using target-aware pointing techniques like a bubble cursor, which dynamically sizes the cursor so that it always captures the nearest target. Rather than needing to click directly on a button, the bubble cursor allows users to be in the vicinity of a button and still be able to click it. It can be particularly helpful for people with disabilities.

The bubble cursor could be added to any application by Prefab, which would start by copying the pixels from a source window. Prefab then interprets the pixels and adds enhancements -- in this case the bubble cursor. It then outputs the final product to a target window, including both the pixels from the source window and the enhancements.

Making changes to software from Microsoft, Apple and other companies could potentially lead to legal problems, but Fogarty argued that "there's a lot of value we can provide these companies."

He said he plans to use "crowd-sourcing" and create an online community for people to share ideas for Prefab. "We've seen the mashup culture flourish online, and this is not fundamentally contrary."

He plans to show the software on April 14 in Atlanta at the Computer Human Interface conference. One of the demonstrations will use Adobe Photoshop and involves creating multiple previews of a single image file. In the background, Prefab moves the controls to adjust color and contrast and so on, captures the resulting images and displays them all on a single screen. That could save time when editing images by displaying a range of possible results to users.

How to check and monitor cpu core temperatures in Ubuntu

Ok, so this weekend i decided to take the plunge and get myself a nice new box! I decided to go with Intel Core 2 Duo e5200 , and an Asus P5QL-E mother board, so anyways got everything mounted up and just installed Ubuntu Ibex 8.10 .. so now i wanna see what the temperature ratings are, and this is a snap with Ubuntu.

Open up a terminal and type
sudo apt-get install lm-sensors sensord

After installation of those packages we have to setup our sensors with our cpu
sudo sensors-detect

you’ll have to actually type Yes for all the next part, which is just asking about loading modules and drivers, for your cpu

So after all that we’ll have a little bit of editing to do, sensors will come up and tell you that you need to make some changes to /etc/modules, and will give you a snippet to paste into the file

sudo gedit /etc/modules

and then paste the code into the bottom of the file, for example this is what mine said

# Chip drivers
coretemp
#

Reboot and your all set, open up a terminal and type sensors to see your core temps! if you want to be real slick type watch sensors .. so you can watch the updates in the core temps every 2s .

Configuring Ubuntu Linux for BSNL Broadband.

BSNL Broadband

BSNL Broadband provides different types of ADSL modem/router:

1. Huawei ADSL modem/router with ethernet and USB port
2. DareGlobal ADSL modem/router with ethernet port.
3. Huawei ADSL modem/router with ethernet port, USB port and built-in wireless access point.

You should have a working ethernet card to connect the modem/router. No information is available about connecting using USB (PPPoA).

Instructions

Note: The router/modem would trigger the connection if configured this way.(Router on -> Connected)

1. Connect the modem/router to the ethernet card.

2. Assign an IP address for the ethernet card; the router has a fixed interface address of 192.168.1.1, so you can use 192.168.1.2 for your ethernet interface.

$ sudo ifconfig eth0 192.168.1.2

3. Add 192.168.1.1 as default gateway.

$ sudo route add default gw 192.168.1.1

4. Enter the address of some DNS servers in /etc/resolv.conf. These DNS adresses are provided on BSNL's instruction manual.

$ sudo vi /etc/resolv.conf

The entry will be of type nameserver 61.1.96.71, where the IP will be the one provided in your BSNL Broadband instruction manual.

5. Access the router's management interface via a browser by typing the address 192.168.1.1. The admin username/password is admin/admin

* Set the connection type to `PPPoE'. On my MT882 box, this comes under `WAN Settings'
* Enter your user name and password (username is of the form xyz@dataone)
* Reset the router. It will take 2-3 minutes for the box to come up again

Steps 2, 3, 4 can also be done from menu System->Administration->Network in GUI

Alternate Method:

1. Connect your ethernet wire to the port at the back of your computer.
2. Fire up the terminal and type in sudo pppoeconf
3. It should detect your modem.
4. Keep on pressing enter. Fill in your user name and password when indicated.
5. It should be easy to stick on to defaults.
6. You should be prompted back to your terminal when it would say pppoe loaded. Simple. That's the end of terminal.

Now go to System>Administration>Networking. Click on it. You would be asked for your password to carry out the administrative job as root. You should be prompted to enter the following details.

1. Activate the Wired connection.
2. Highlight the wired connection and click on properties.
3. Check the box "enable the connection"
4. Configuration as Static IP.
5. IP Address : 192.168.1.2
6. Subnet mask fills on it's own as 255.255.255.0
7. Gateway address :192.168.1.1

Blender 3D

Software for 3D modeling, animation, rendering, post-production, interactive creation and playback.

Features

Blender is the first and only fully integrated 3D graphics creation suite allowing modeling, animation, rendering, post-production, realtime interactive 3D and game creation and playback with cross-platform compatibility - all in one tidy, easily and free downloadable package!

"Blender is quickly being transformed from an impressive 3D creativity tool to a full-blown games and new media design application."

- Garrick Webster, Editor, Computer Arts Magazine

Modeling

* A range of 3D object types including polygon meshes, NURBS surfaces, bezier and B-spline curves, metaballs, vector fonts (TrueType, PostScript, OpenType)
* "Smooth proxy" style catmull-clark subdivision surfaces
* Boolean mesh functions
* Editing functions such as extrude, bevel, cut, spin, screw, warp, subdivide, noise, smooth Soft selection editing tools for organic modeling
* Python scripting access for custom tools

Animation

* Armature (skeleton) deformation with forward/inverse kinematics, auto skinning and interactive 3D paint for vertex weighting
* Non-linear animation mixer with automated walkcycles along paths
* Constraint system
* Vertex key framing for morphing, with controlling sliders
* Character animation pose editor
* Animatable lattice deformation
* "Ipo" system integrates both motion curve and traditional key-frame editing
* Audio playback, mixing and editing support for sound synchronisation
* Python scripting access for custom and procedural animation effects

Realtime 3D/game creation

* Graphical editor for defining interactive behavior without programming
* Collision detection and dynamics simulation
* Python scripting API for sophisticated control and AI, fully defined advanced game logic
* Supports all OpenGL™ lighting modes, including transparencies, Animated and reflection-mapped textures
* Playback of games and interactive 3D content without compiling or pre-processing
* Audio, using the fmod toolkit
* Multi-layering of Scenes for overlay interfaces

Rendering

* Very fast inbuilt raytracer
* Integral support for the famous Yafray render engine
* Oversampling, motion blur, post-production effects, fields, non-square pixels
* Environment maps, halos, lens flares, fog
* Various surface shaders such as Lambert, Phong, Oren-nayar, Blinn, Toon
* Edge rendering for toon shading
* Procedural Textures
* Ambient Occlusion
* Radiosity solver
* Export scripts available for external renderers such as Renderman (RIB), Povray, Virtualight
* UV texture editor with various mesh unwrap modes

Interface

* Flexible user configurable window layout
* Powerful object-oriented data system
* Anti-aliased fonts with international translation support
* Windows for animation curves/keys, schematic scene diagram, non-linear video sequence editing, character animation action editor, non-linear animation mixer, image/UV editing, file/image selection and file management
* Inbuilt text editor for annotations and editing Python scripts
* Consistent interface across multiple platforms

Files

* Save all scene data in a single .blend file
* .blend format supports compression, digital signatures, encryption, forwards/backwards compatibility and can be used as a library to link to from other .blend files
* Read / Write TGA, JPG, PNG, Iris, SGI Movie, IFF, AVI and Quicktime GIF, TIFF, PSD, MOV (Windows and Mac OS X)
* Native import and export for DXF, Inventor and VRML files, with python scripts available for many other 3D formats
* Create stand-alone executables containing interactive 3D content or play back with the 3d web browser plugin.

For more information : www.blender.org
Download Blender 3D

Shell Transparency with the help of Compiz.

Well Compiz offers you to make your entire shell transparent to whatever degree you want. There is one way using the options build under the Compiz (CCSM) Menu that han make your some apps. transparent including your windows, menus, tooltips, popup menus.......etc.

Method

1. Use the Alt + F2 key type ccsm and execute it.


2. This command executes the Compiz Config Settings Manager or the CCSM


3. In the manager look at the to most entry i.e. General Options Click on it.


4. After the General Options window is opened then scroll to the tab named "Opacity Settings". Open it.


5. In the Opacity Settings menu you can see a menu for Window Settings.


6. Click on "New" i.e. under it.



After you open it you will see two options one will ask for the name of the window i.e. Window Opacity (This refers to the window you want the opacity settings to work) the second is the Opacity Window Values (This sets the level of transparency you need - remember the lower the number the lower is the opacity or more transparent is the menu/window. A value of 0 will make the windows go completely invisible whereas a value of 100 removes every bit of transparency and makes it completely opaque. So be sure of giving it somewhat higher value.)

In the Window Opacity you can individually one by one write:

dropdownmenu
tooltip
popupmenu

And set the Opacity Window Value to: 84

Most popular Linux Software

Click On The Name of the Software to download it..


RealPlayer 10.0.5 GOLD
Play all the popular video datatypes.

Mandrake 10.1
Mandrakelinux is the branch of the operating systems.

NimbleX 2
NimbleX is a small but versatile operating system

LimeWire Basic (Linux) 4.12.6
LimeWire is a file sharing program running on the Gnutella Network.

Klinux 2.0
A Linux distribution that can be installed within MS-Windows, without partitioning or formatting.

NetBeans 4.1
This is an integrated JAVA development environment.

Advanced Bash Scripting Guide 5.3
Complete ebook tutorial and reference on shell scripting with Bash in Linux/UNIX

KOffice 1.6
This powerful office suite integrates into KDE 2.0.

AbiWord 2.2.9
AbiWord is a free word processing program similar to Microsoft® Word.

XEmacs 21.5.17
XEmacs is a highly customizable open source text editor.

OpenSolaris

OpenSolaris

OpenSolaris is an open source operating system based on Solaris created by Sun Microsystems, now a part of Oracle Corporation. It is also the name of the project initiated by Sun to build a developer and user community around it.

OpenSolaris is derived from the Unix System V Release 4 codebase, with significant modifications made by Sun since it bought the rights to that code in 1994. It is the only open source System V derivative available.Open sourced components are snapshots of the latest Solaris release under development.Sun has announced that future versions of its commercial Solaris operating system will be based on technology from the OpenSolaris project.

HISTORY

OpenSolaris is based on Solaris, which was originally released by Sun in 1991. Solaris is a version of SVR4 (System V Release 4) UNIX, co-developed by Sun and AT&T. It was licensed by Sun from Novell to replace SunOS.

Planning for OpenSolaris started in early 2004. A pilot program was formed in September 2004 with 18 non-Sun community members and ran for 9 months growing to 145 external participants.

The first part of the Solaris codebase to be open sourced was the Solaris Dynamic Tracing facility (commonly known as DTrace), a tracing tool for administrators and developers that aids in tuning a system for optimum performance and utilization. DTrace was released on January 25, 2005. At that time, Sun also launched the opensolaris.org web site, and announced that the OpenSolaris code base would be released under the CDDL (Common Development and Distribution License). The bulk of the Solaris system code was released on June 14, 2005. There remains some system code that is not open sourced, and is available only as pre-compiled binary files.

A Community Advisory Board was announced on April 4, 2005: two were elected by the pilot community, two were employees appointed by Sun, and one was appointed from the broader free software community by Sun. The members were Roy Fielding, Al Hopper, Rich Teer, Casper Dik, and Simon Phipps. On February 10, 2006 Sun reestablished this body as the independent OpenSolaris Governing Board.The task of creating a governance document or "constitution" for this organization was given to the OGB and three invited members: Stephen Hahn and Keith Wesolowski (developers in Sun's Solaris organization) and Ben Rockwood (a prominent OpenSolaris community member).

On March 19, 2007, Sun announced that it had hired Ian Murdock, founder of Debian, to head Project Indiana, an effort to produce a complete OpenSolaris distribution, with GNOME and userland tools from GNU, plus a network-based package management system.[8] Several independent distributions are also available.

On May 5, 2008, OpenSolaris 2008.05 was released, in a format that could be booted as a Live CD or installed directly. It uses the GNOME desktop environment as the primary user interface. The later OpenSolaris 2008.11 release included a GUI for ZFS' snapshotting capabilities, known as Time Slider, that provides functionality similar to Mac OS X's Time Machine.

In December 2008 Sun Microsystems and Toshiba America Information Systems announced plans to distribute Toshiba laptops pre-installed with OpenSolaris. On April 1, 2009, the Tecra M10 and Portégé R600 come preinstalled with OpenSolaris 2008.11 release and several supplemental software packages. On June 1, 2009, OpenSolaris 2009.06 was released, with support for the SPARC platform.

VERSION HISTORY

Version Release date End of support phase General Availability (GA) Post End of Version (EOV) SunSpectrum End of Service Life (SS-EOSL) 2008.05 13 May 2008 13 November 2008 13 May 2011 - 2008.11 25 November 2008 25 May 2009 25 November 2011 - 2009.06 1 June 2009 1 December 2009 1 June 2012 1 June 2014 2010.03 March 2010 - -

Colour	Meaning
Red	Release no longer supported
Green	Release still supported
Blue	Future release

Ubuntu

Ubuntu (pronounced /ʊˈbʊntu/), is a computer operating system based on the Debian GNU/Linux distribution. It is named after the Southern African ethical ideology Ubuntu ("humanity towards others") and is distributed as free and open source software with additional proprietary software available. Ubuntu provides an up-to-date, stable operating system for the average user, with a strong focus on usability and ease of installation. Web statistics from late 2009 suggest that Ubuntu's share of Linux desktop usage is between 40 and 50%.

Ubuntu is composed of multiple software packages, of which the vast majority are distributed under a free software license (also known as open source). The main license used is the GNU General Public License (GNU GPL) which, along with the GNU Lesser General Public License (GNU LGPL), explicitly declares that users are free to run, copy, distribute, study, change, develop and improve the software. Ubuntu is sponsored by the UK-based company Canonical Ltd., owned by South African entrepreneur Mark Shuttleworth. By keeping Ubuntu free and open source, Canonical is able to utilize the talents of community developers in Ubuntu's constituent components. Instead of selling Ubuntu for profit, Canonical creates revenue by selling technical support and from creating several services tied to Ubuntu.

Canonical endorses and provides support for three additional Ubuntu-derived operating systems: Kubuntu, Edubuntu and Ubuntu Server Edition. There are several other derivative operating systems including local language and hardware-specific versions.

Canonical releases new versions of Ubuntu every six months and supports Ubuntu for eighteen months by providing security fixes, patches to critical bugs and minor updates to programs. LTS (Long Term Support) versions, which are released every two years, are supported for three years on the desktop and five years for servers.The latest version of Ubuntu, 9.10 (Karmic Koala), was released on October 29, 2009.

HISTORY AND DEVELOPMENT PROCESS

Ubuntu is a fork of the Debian project's code base.The original aim was to release a new version of Ubuntu every six months, resulting in a more frequently updated system. Ubuntu's first release was on October 20, 2004.

Ubuntu releases are timed about one month after GNOME releases.In contrast to other forks of Debian, which extensively use proprietary and closed source add-ons, Ubuntu uses primarily free (libre) software, making an exception only for some proprietary hardware drivers.

Ubuntu packages are based on packages from Debian's unstable branch: both distributions use Debian's deb package format and package management tools (APT and Synaptic). Debian and Ubuntu packages are not necessarily binary compatible with each other, however, and sometimes .deb packages may need to be rebuilt from source to be used in Ubuntu. Many Ubuntu developers are also maintainers of key packages within Debian. Ubuntu cooperates with Debian by pushing changes back to Debian,although there has been criticism that this doesn't happen often enough. In the past, Ian Murdock, the founder of Debian, has expressed concern about Ubuntu packages potentially diverging too far from Debian Sarge to remain compatible. Before release, packages are imported from Debian Unstable continuously and merged with Ubuntu-specific modifications. A month before release, imports are frozen, and packagers then work to ensure that the frozen features interoperate well together.

Ubuntu is currently funded by Canonical Ltd. On July 8, 2005, Mark Shuttleworth and Canonical Ltd announced the creation of the Ubuntu Foundation and provided an initial funding of US$10 million. The purpose of the foundation is to ensure the support and development for all future versions of Ubuntu. Mark Shuttleworth describes the foundation as an "emergency fund" (in case Canonical's involvement ends).

Ubuntu 8.04, released on April 24, 2008, is the current Long Term Support (LTS) release. Canonical releases LTS versions every two years, with Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx (release number subject to change) scheduled as the next LTS version in 2010.The current regular release, Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic Koala), was released on October 29, 2009.

WHY IS UBUNTU POPULAR?

Ubuntu focuses on usability.The Ubiquity installer allows Ubuntu to be installed to the hard disk from within the Live CD environment, without the need for restarting the computer prior to installation. Ubuntu also emphasizes accessibility and internationalization to reach as many people as possible. Beginning with 5.04, UTF-8 became the default character encoding,which allows for support of a variety of non-Roman scripts. As a security feature, the sudo tool is used to assign temporary privileges for performing administrative tasks, allowing the root account to remain locked, and preventing inexperienced users from inadvertently making catastrophic system changes or opening security holes.PolicyKit is also being widely implemented into the desktop to further harden the system through the principle of least privilege.

Ubuntu comes installed with a wide range of software that includes OpenOffice, Firefox, Empathy (Pidgin in versions before 9.10), Transmission, GIMP (in versions prior to 10.04), and several lightweight games (such as Sudoku and chess). Additional software that is not installed by default can be downloaded using the package manager. Ubuntu allows networking ports to be closed using its firewall, with customized port selection available. End-users can install Gufw and keep it enabled. GNOME (the current default desktop) offers support for more than 46 languages.Ubuntu can also run many programs designed for Microsoft Windows (such as Microsoft Office), through Wine or using a Virtual Machine (such as VMware Workstation or VirtualBox).

VERSION HISTORY

Version	Code name	Release date
4.10	Warty Warthog	2004-10-20
5.04	Hoary Hedgehog	2005-04-08
5.10	Breezy Badger	2005-10-13
6.06 LTS	Dapper Drake	2006-06-01
6.10	Edgy Eft	2006-10-26
7.04	Feisty Fawn	2007-04-19
7.10	Gutsy Gibbon	2007-10-18
8.04 LTS	Hardy Heron	2008-04-24
8.10	Intrepid Ibex	2008-10-30
9.04	Jaunty Jackalope	2009-04-23
9.10	Karmic Koala	2009-10-29
10.04 LTS	Lucid Lynx	2010-04-29

Fedora

Fedora (pronounced /fəˈdɔrə/) is an RPM-based, general purpose operating system built on top of the Linux kernel, developed by the community-supported Fedora Project and sponsored by Red Hat. The Fedora Project's mission is to lead the advancement of free and open source software and content as a collaborative community.

One of Fedora's main objectives is not only to contain software distributed under a free and open source license, but also to be on the leading edge of such technologies.[3][4] Fedora developers prefer to make upstream changes instead of applying fixes specifically for Fedora—this ensures that their updates are available to all GNU/Linux distributions.[5]

Fedora has a comparatively short life cycle: version X is maintained until one month after version X+2 is released. With 6 months between releases, the maintenance period is about 13 months for each version.[6]

Linus Torvalds, author of the Linux kernel, says he uses Fedora because it had fairly good support for PowerPC when he used that processor architecture. He became accustomed to the operating system and continues to use it (as of 2008).[7]

According to Distrowatch, Fedora is the second most popular GNU/Linux-based operating system as of early 2010, behind Ubuntu.[8]

History

The Fedora Project was created in late 2003, when Red Hat Linux was discontinued.[9] Red Hat Enterprise Linux was to be Red Hat's only officially supported GNU/Linux distribution, while Fedora was to be a community distribution.[9] Red Hat Enterprise Linux branches its releases from versions of Fedora.

The name of Fedora derives from Fedora Linux, a volunteer project that provided extra software for the Red Hat Linux distribution, and from the characteristic fedora used in Red Hat's "Shadowman" logo. Fedora Linux was begun in 2002 by Warren Togami as an undergraduate project, intended to provide a single repository for well-tested third-party software packages so that non-Red Hat software would be easier to find, develop, and use. The key difference between the approaches of Fedora Linux and Red Hat Linux was that Fedora's repository development would be collaborative with the global volunteer community. Fedora Linux was eventually absorbed into the Fedora Project, carrying with it this collaborative approach. Fedora is a trademark of Red Hat. Although this had previously been disputed by the creators of the unrelated Fedora repository management software, the issue has now been resolved.

The Fedora Project is governed by a board whose majority is elected by the Fedora community.

Some websites report that the word FEDORA is an acronym: FEDORA-Flexible and Extensible Digital Object and Repository Architecture. (requires verification).

FEATURES

Distribution

PackageKit, the default package manager front-end on Fedora

The Fedora Project distributes Fedora in several different ways:

* Fedora DVD/CD set – a DVD or CD set of all major Fedora packages at time of shipping;

* Live images – CD or DVD sized images that can be used to create a Live CD or boot from a USB flash drive and optionally install to a hard disk;

* Minimal CD – used for installing over HTTP, FTP or NFS.

The Fedora Project also distributes custom variations of Fedora which are called Fedora spins. These are built from a specific set of software packages and have a combination of software to meet the requirements of a specific kind of end user. Fedora spins are developed by several Fedora special interest groups.It is also possible to create Live USB versions of Fedora using Fedora Live USB creator or UNetbootin.

Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux (EPEL) is a volunteer-based community effort from the Fedora project to create a repository of high-quality add-on packages that complement the Fedora-based Red Hat Enterprise Linux and its compatible spinoffs such as CentOS or Scientific Linux.

Software package management is primarily handled by the yum utility.Graphical interfaces, such as pirut and pup are provided, as well as puplet, which provides visual notifications in the panel when updates are available. apt-rpm is an alternative to yum, and may be more familiar to people used to Debian or Debian-based distributions, where Advanced Packaging Tool is used to manage packages. Additionally, extra repositories can be added to the system, so that packages not available in Fedora can be installed.

Software repositories

Before Fedora 7, there were two main repositories – Core and Extras. Fedora Core contained all the base packages that were required by the operating system, as well as other packages that were distributed along with the installation CD/DVDs, and was maintained only by Red Hat developers. Fedora Extras, the secondary repository that was included from Fedora Core 3, was community-maintained and not distributed along with the installation CD/DVDs. Since Fedora 7, the Core and Extras repositories have been merged, hence the distribution dropping Core from its name.That also allowed for community submissions of packages that were formerly allowed only by Red Hat developers.

Also prior to Fedora 7 being released, there was a third repository called Fedora Legacy. This repository was community-maintained and was mainly concerned with extending the life cycle of older Fedora Core distributions and selected Red Hat Linux releases that were no longer officially maintained. Fedora Legacy was shut down in December 2006.

Third party repositories exist that distribute more packages that are not included in Fedora either because it does not meet Fedora's definition of free software or because distribution of that software may violate US law. The primary third party repository and the only fully compatible ones are RPM Fusion and Livna. RPM Fusion is a joint effort by many third party repository maintainers. Livna is still maintained separately as an extension of RPM Fusion for legal reasons and only hosts the libdvdcss package for encrypted DVD playback support.

Security features

Security is one of the most important features in Fedora. One of the security features in Fedora is Security-Enhanced Linux, a Linux feature that implements a variety of security policies, including mandatory access controls, through the use of Linux Security Modules (LSM) in the Linux kernel. Fedora is one of the distributions leading the way with SELinux. SELinux was introduced in Fedora Core 2. It was disabled by default, as it radically altered how the operating system worked, but was enabled SPARC

Red Hat Enterprise Linux

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) is a Linux distribution produced by Red Hat and targeted toward the commercial market, including mainframes. Red Hat Enterprise Linux is released in server versions for x86, x86-64, Itanium, PowerPC and IBM System z, and desktop versions for x86 and x86-64. All of Red Hat's official support and training, and the Red Hat Certification Program center around the Red Hat Enterprise Linux platform.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux is often abbreviated to RHEL, although this is not an official designation.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 has been postponed for undisclosed reasons. Although Red Hat claims to supply major releases every 18 to 24 months, over 36 months (as of 14th March, 2010) have elapsed since the first release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5. Red Hat has not yet confirmed a release schedule.

When Red Hat releases a new version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, customers may upgrade to the new version at no additional charge as long as they are in possession of a current subscription (i.e. the subscription term has not yet lapsed).Red Hat's first Enterprise offering (Red Hat Linux 6.2E) essentially consisted of a version of Red Hat Linux 6.2 with different support levels, and without separate engineering.

The first version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux to bear the name originally came onto the market as "Red Hat Linux Advanced Server". In 2003 Red Hat rebranded Red Hat Linux Advanced Server to "Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS", and added two more variants, Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES and Red Hat Enterprise Linux WS.

Verbatim copying and redistribution of the entire Red Hat Enterprise Linux distribution is not permitted due to trademark restrictions. However, there are several redistributions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux—such as CentOS—with trademarked features (such as logos, and the Red Hat name) removed.

Version History

The various Red Hat Linux versions have little different Errata Support Policies. These are the versions:

Red Hat Linux 6.2E (Zoot), 27 March 2000

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 2.1 AS (Pensacola), 2002-03-26

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 2.1 ES (Panama), May 2003

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 (Taroon), 22 October 2003. Uses Linux kernel 2.4.21

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 (Nahant), 2005-02-15 (Beta released 2004-09-27). Uses Linux 2.6.9

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 (Tikanga), 2007-03-14 (Beta 1 released 2006-09-07, Beta 2 released 2006-11-16). Uses Linux 2.6.18

5.1, also known as Update 1, 2007-11-07 (Beta released 2007-10-10)

5.2, also known as Update 2, 2008-05-21 (Beta released (2008-03-13)

5.3, also known as Update 3, 2009-01-20 (Beta released 2008-10-29)

5.4, also known as Update 4, 2009-09-02 (Beta released 2009-07-01)

5.5, also known as Update 5, TBD (Beta released 2010-02-10)

Hello Everyone.....!!!

Hi...... This is the first post from the "Linux for You" Team...Stay Tuned for more updates.....:)

Battle For Wesnoth

David White who started Wesnoth back in 2003, had a vision of a free open source strategy game that had very simple rules, uses a strong artificial intelligence, challenging and fun. Wesnoth has already passed the 1 million mark for downloads. As of March 2007, the game is available in 35 different languages.

A normal Wesnoth player has

200+ unit types
16 different races
6 major factions
to choose from. Actually, you can even make your own custom units, design your own map, scenarios or even campaigns. It’s all up to your creativity. The most interesting part of any game is the ability to multiplay. You can challenge up to a total of 8 friends in multiplayer fantasy battles.

Nexuiz

Nexuiz is a free, cross platform, first person shooter distributed under GNU General Public License by Alientrap Software. It started back in May 31 2005 with version 1.0 using DarkPlaces, a significanlty modified quake engine. The current version, 2.2.3, was released on January 26, 2007. Nexuiz’s logo is based on the chinese character “力” which means strength.

Several notable features of the game include

ability to multiplay up to 64 players
ability to generate bots for practice sessions
dynamic lighting system similar to Doom 3

America’s Army

America’s Army is a tactical, multiplayer, first-person shooter owned by the United States Government and released as a global public relations initiative to help with U.S. Army recruitment. The first version, Recon, was released on 4th July 2002. The current version 2.8.1 was released on 22nd Mar 2007.

It’s the first well known computer game used for political aims. The game is used as a playable recruiting tool and critics have charged the game serves as a propaganda device. A counter on the homepage of the PC version shows over eight million registered accounts as of 2007. GameSpy tracked the game usage and reported an average of 4,500 players at any one time between 2002 and 2005. It is enough for America’s Army to rank in the Top 10 Online Games chart.