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News in General

71% of iPhone and Android Apps Violate Open Source Licenses

At the March AnDevCon Conference, OpenLogic, Inc., a provider of open source governance solutions. announced the results of a scan and license compliance assessment of 635 leading mobile applications. Among other findings, the results show that 71% of Android, iPhone and iPad apps containing open source failed to comply with basic open source license requirements.

OpenLogic found several apps with extensive EULAs that claimed all of the software included was under their copyright and owned by them - when in fact some of the code in the app was open source.

Using its scanner, OSS Deep Discovery, OpenLogic scanned compiled binaries and source code where available for 635 mobile applications to identify open source under GPL, LGPL and Apache licenses. For the 66 applications scanned that contained Apache or GPL/LPGL licenses, 71% failed to comply with four key obligations that OpenLogic analyzed. These included:

GPL/LGPL license requirements to:

• provide source code or an offer to get the source code
• provide a copy of the license

Apache license requires to:

• provide a copy of the licenses
• provide notices/attributions

"Many mobile and tablet developers may not have a complete picture of the open source they are using and the requirements of the open source licenses. This has real-world implications. For example, the Free Software Foundation has stated that the GPL and iTunes license are not compatible, and Apple has already pulled several apps from the store that were determined to be under the GPL," said Kim Weins, senior vice president of products and marketing at OpenLogic. "Google has also received takedown requests for Android market apps that violated the GPL. App developers need to pay attention to open source license compliance to ensure their apps are not impacted by legal actions."

Out of the 635 apps scanned, OpenLogic identified 52 applications that use the Apache license and 16 that use the GPL/LGPL license.

OpenLogic found that among the applications that use the Apache or GPL/LGPL licenses, the compliance rate was only 29%. Android compliance was 27% and iPhone/iOS compliance was 32%. Overall compliance of Android applications using the GPL/LGPL was 0%.

Although the research did not specifically analyze conflicts between different licenses, OpenLogic noted that 13 of the applications came from the Apple App Store, used GPL/LGPL. The App Store has already removed other applications that included GPL/LGPL licenses. In addition, two of the applications on Android contained LGPLv2.1. This license could have potential conflicts with Apache 2.0 - which is the major license of the Android operating system. OpenLogic provides enterprises with a certified library of open source software that encompasses hundreds of the most popular open source packages via OpenLogic Exchange (OLEX), a free web site where companies can find, research, and download certified, enterprise-ready open source packages on demand. For more information, visit: https://https://olex.openlogic.com/.

IronKey finds UK Organisations Fear Organised Cyber-crime

IronKey, a leader in securing data and online access, released a survey of IT security professionals working at UK-based organisations including, Lloyds Banking Group, HP, Fujitsu, Siemens, Worcester County Council and Cleveland Police. The study showed that 31 per cent suffered one or more organised attacks in the last 12 months resulting in theft of data or money.

Besides suffering at least one cyber attack in the last 12 months, 45 per cent believed their organisation is a target of organised cyber-crime which could result in the theft or sabotage.

"Unfortunately the results of our research don't really come as a shock, as the past 12 months have seen some of the biggest and most successful cyber-attacks our industry has ever witnessed," said Dave Jevans, founder of IronKey and the Anti-Phishing Working Group.

When asked about the significant information security threat facing their organisation today, 54 per cent of respondents highlighted accidental data leakage by staff, contractors or vendors as the biggest threat. The past five years of highly publicised data breaches and the power of the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) to levy £500,000 have gained the attention of organisations. In contrast, only 10 per cent fear external attack on networks and systems and only 13 per cent see Trojans that steal data, money, or sabotage systems as a significant threat to their organisation.

While 44 per cent of respondents believed an untrusted desktop or laptop is the most vulnerable location for an advance persistent threat (APT) attack, it appears respondents prefer traditional methods, such as end user education (44 per cent) or anti-virus (29 per cent), as opposed to technology that isolates user and data from threats (19 per cent), as the most effective tool to prevent APT attacks.

"Unfortunately, end user education and anti-virus were all in place at organisations that suffered painful losses as a result of APT attacks. Doing the same thing over and over won't make the problem go away - criminals are only more encouraged," commented Jevans. "As an industry, we need to shift away from trying to be all knowing and detecting threats we can't know about until they happen. Instead, we need to isolate users of sensitive data and transactions away from the problem."

As a result of cyber-crime, British business is estimated to be losing £20bn a year. Targeted attacks on the global energy industry as part of the Night Dragon attacks, the breach of infrastructure at RSA, compromise of digital certificate issuance at Comodo, and theft of millions of customer records from Epsilon all show that any organisation is a potential target.

IronKey also announced the availability of IronKey Trusted Access for Banking 2.7 which addresses the continuing needs of banks to isolate customers from the growing threat of crimeware and online account takeovers. The new update includes IronKey's keylogging protection that blocks the capture of user credentials, one-time passcodes (OTP), challenge questions, and other sensitive data criminals can otherwise easily steal.

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Conferences and Events

ESC Silicon Valley 2011 - Enbedded Systems

May 2-5, McEnery Center, San Jose.
https://schedule-siliconvalley.esc.eetimes.com/.

Lean Software and Systems Conference 2011

May 3-6, 2011, Long Beach California.
https://lssc11.leanssc.org/.

Red Hat Summit and JBoss World

May 3-6, 2011, Boston, MA.
https://www.redhat.com/promo/summit/2010/.

USENIX/IEEE HotOS XIII - Hot Topics in Operating Systems

May 8-10, Napa, CA.
https://www.usenix.org/events/hotos11/.

OSBC 2011 - Open Source Business Conference

May 16-17, Hilton Union Square, San Francisco, CA.
https://www.osbc.com.

Scrum Gathering Seattle 2011

May 16-18, Grand Hyatt, Seattle, WA.
https://www.scrumalliance.org/events/285-seattle.

RailsConf 2011

May 16-19, Baltimore, MD.
https://en.oreilly.com/rails2011.

FOSE 2011

May 19-21, Washington, DC.
https://fose.com/events/fose-2010/home.aspx.

MeeGo 2011

May 23-25, Hyatt Regency, San Francisco.
https://sf2011.meego.com/.

Citrix Synergy 2011

May 25-27, Convention Center, San Francisco, CA.
https://www.citrixsynergy.com/sanfrancisco/.

USENIX HotPar '11- Hot Topics in Parallelism

May 26-27, Berkeley, CA.
https://www.usenix.org/events/hotpar11/.

LinuxCon Japan 2011

June 1-3, Pacifico Yokohama, Japan.
https://events.linuxfoundation.org/events/linuxcon-japan.

Semantic Technology Conference

June 5-9, 2011, San Francisco, CA.
https://www.semanticweb.com.

Ottawa Linux Symposium (OLS)

June 13 - 15 2011, Ottawa, Canada.
https://www.linuxsymposium.org/2011/.

USENIX Annual Technical Conference '11

Don't miss the 3-day conference program filled with cutting-edge systems research, including invited talks by Stefan Savage on "An Agenda for Empirical Cyber Crime Research," Finn Brunton on "Dead Media: What the Obsolete, Unsuccessful, Experimental, and Avant-Garde Can Teach Us About the Future of Media," and Mark Woodward on "Linux PC Robot." Gain insight into a variety of must-know topics in the paper presentations and poster session. Since USENIX ATC '11 is part of USENIX Federated Conferences Week, you'll also have increased opportunities to mingle with colleagues and leading experts across multiple disciplines.

Register by May 23, and save! Additional discounts are available.
https://www.usenix.org/atc11/lg

June 15-17, Portland, OR.
https://www.usenix.org/atc11/lg.

USENIX Conference on Web Application Development

Back for 2011, WebApps '11 features cutting-edge research that advances the state of the art, not only on novel Web applications but also on infrastructure, tools, and techniques that support the development, analysis/testing, operation, or deployment of those applications. The diverse 2-day conference program will include invited talks by industry leaders including Finn Brunton, NYU, on "A Tour of the Ruins: 40 Years of Spam Online," a panel on "The Future of Client-side Web Apps," a variety of topics and new techniques in the paper presentations, and a poster session. Since WebApps '11 is part of USENIX Federated Conferences Week, you'll also have increased opportunities for interaction and synergy across multiple disciplines.

Register by May 23, and save! Additional discounts are available.
https://www.usenix.org/atc11/lg

June 15-17, Portland, OR.
https://www.usenix.org/webapps11/lg.

Creative Storage Conference

June 28, 2011, Culver City, CA.
https://www.creativestorage.org.

Mobile Computing Summit 2011

June 28-30, Burlingame, California.
https://www.netbooksummit.com/.

Cisco Live, U.S.

July 10 - 14, 2011.
https://www.ciscolive.com/us/.

Cloud Identity Summit

July 18-21, Keystone, Colo.
https://www.cloudidentitysummit.com/index.cfm.

ApacheCon NA 2011

7-11 November 2011, Vancouver, Canada

ApacheCon 2011: Open Source Enterprise Solutions, Cloud Computing, Community Leadership

Apache technologies power more than 190 million Websites and countless mission-critical applications worldwide; over a dozen Apache projects form the foundation of today’s Cloud computing. There’s a reason that five of the top 10 Open Source software downloads are Apache, and understanding their breadth and capabilities has never been more important. ApacheCon is the official conference, trainings, and expo of The Apache Software Foundation, created to promote innovation and explore core issues in using and developing Open Source solutions "The Apache Way". Highly-relevant sessions demonstrate specific professional problems and real-world solutions focusing on “Apache and”: Enterprise Solutions, Cloud Computing, Emerging Technologies + Innovation, Community Leadership, Data Handling, Search + Analytics, Pervasive Computing, and Servers, Infrastructure + Tools. Join the global Apache community of users, developers, educators, administrators, evangelists, students, and enthusiasts 7-11 November 2011 in Vancouver, Canada. Register today https://apachecon.com/

ApacheCon NA 2011 Vancouver

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Distro News

Ubuntu 11.04 Goes Gold

The newest release of Ubuntu Linux was released at the end of April and features the new Unity user interface - a source of some controversy among beta testers - and added support for Cloud deployments and DevOps automation.

Ubuntu 11.04 Server, while not a release with Long Term Support (LTS) , will include will upgrades for the core cloud solution, Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud. The release includes the latest stable version of technology from Eucalyptus for those looking to build private clouds. Also included is OpenStack's latest release, 'Cactus.

For those working on public clouds, Ubuntu Server 11.04 will be available from Amazon Web Services (AWS). In addition, Canonical is announcing Ubuntu CloudGuest later in May, allowing individuals and businesses to test and develop on the cloud with support and systems management from Canonical. For the first time, potential users can test-drive Ubuntu online using only a web browser. Visitors to Ubuntu.com will be able to access a complete version of the latest product without having to download anything.

In part, the CloudGuest program replaces the free CD program that Canonical has discontinued.

With the Unity UI, Ubuntu has better support for touch screens and multi-touch gesture controls. There also better support for Sandy Bridge and Radeon graphics chip sets and drivers. Also Ubuntu Software Center, used to download free applications, has been integrated with the Unity program launcher and shows users reviews of potentially useful software.

Ubuntu 11.04 includes Cobbler and MCollective to help automate system administration tasks and orchestrate operations, with policy-based configurations and RPC calls.

Check here the Ubuntu Downloads Page.

Slackware 13.37 released

Here comes Slackware Linux 13.37, a new version of the world's oldest surviving Linux-based operating system.

Slackware 13.37 has been released with enhanced performance and stability from a year of rigorous testing. Slackware 13.37 uses the 2.6.37.6 Linux kernel and also ships with 2.6.38.4 kernels for those want to be at the bleeding edge. Firefox 4.0 is the default web browser, the X Window System has been upgraded (and includes the open source nouveau driver for NVIDIA cards) and the desktop is and KDE 4.5.5.. Even the Slackware installer has been improvedl with support for installing to btrfs, a one-package-per-line display mode option, and is an easy to set-up PXE install server that runs off the Slackware DVD.

The Speakup driver, used to support speech synthesizers providing access to Linux for the visually impaired community, has now been merged into all of the provided kernels.

See the complete list of core packages in Slackware 13.37.
See the list of official mirror sites.

Yocto 1.0 and Carrier Grade Linux 5.0 Released

Two Linux Foundation Working Groups released major updates of their collaborative work in April.

vThe Yocto 1.0 Project Release became availabile and includes major improvements to its developer interface and build system, providing developers with even greater consistency in the software and tools they're using across multiple architectures for embedded Linux development. For more information, Click here.

Carrier Grade Linux 5.0 covers several specification categories that include Availability, Clustering, Serviceability, Performance, Standards, Hardware, and Security. Also, a number of requirements have been dropped from the specification due to the mass adoption and ubiquity of CGL and its inclusion in the mainline Linux kernel, which allows these specifications to become more consistent fixtures across different distributions. For more information and to review the CGL 5.0 specification, please visit Carrier Grade Linux' Page.

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Software and Product News

VMware Delivers Cloud Foundry as an Open PaaS

This next generation open application platform provides a broad choice of developer frameworks and cloud deployment options.

VMware delivered Cloud Foundry in April, an open Platform as a Service (PaaS) architected specifically for cloud computing environments and delivered as a service from both enterprise datacenters and public cloud service providers. Cloud Foundry enhances the ability of developers to deploy, run and scale their applications in cloud environments while allowing wide choice of public and private clouds, developer frameworks and application infrastructure services.

VMware is introducing a new VMware-operated developer cloud service, a new open source PaaS project and the first ever "Micro Cloud" PaaS solution. VMware introduced Cloud Foundry at an event where developer community leaders highlighted the value of an open PaaS in advancing highly productive development frameworks for the cloud. Speakers include: Dion Almaer and Ben Galbraith, co-founders of FunctionSource, Ryan Dahl, creator of Node.JS from Joyent, Ian McFarland, VP, Technology, Pivotal Labs, Roger Bodamer, 10Gen, steward of MongoDB, and Michael Crandell, CEO and co-founder of RightScale. Further industry support and blogs are available from 10Gen and RightScale.

Modern application development faces a growing set of challenges such as diverse application development frameworks, choices in new data, messaging, and web service application building blocks, heterogeneous cloud deployment options, and the customer imperative to deploy and migrate applications flexibly across enterprise private clouds and multiple cloud service providers.

PaaS offerings have emerged as the modern solution to the changing nature of applications, increasing developer efficiency, while promising to let developers focus exclusively on writing applications, rather than configuring and patching systems, maintaining middleware and physical machines and worrying about network topologies.

Early PaaS offerings, however, restricted developers to a specific or non-standard development frameworks, a limited set of application services or a single, vendor-operated cloud service. "For all of the developer interest in the potential benefits to PaaS solutions, actual adoption has been slowed by their employment of non-standard components and frameworks which raise the threat of lock-in," said Stephen O'Grady, Principal Analyst at RedMonk." With Cloud Foundry, VMware is providing developers a PaaS platform with the liberal licensing and versatility to accommodate the demand for choice in developer programming languages."

Cloud Foundry is a modern application platform built specifically to simplify the end-to-end development, deployment and operation of cloud era applications. Cloud Foundry orchestrates heterogeneous application services and applications built in multiple frameworks and automates deployment of applications and their underlying infrastructure across diverse cloud infrastructures.

Cloud Foundry supports popular, high productivity programming frameworks, including Spring for Java, Ruby on Rails, Sinatra for Ruby and Node.js, as well as support for other JVM-based frameworks including Grails. The open architecture will enable additional programming frameworks to be rapidly supported in the future. For application services, Cloud Foundry will initially support the MongoDB, MySQL and Redis databases with planned support for VMware vFabric services.

Cloud Foundry is not tied to any single cloud environment, nor does it require a VMware infrastructure to operate. Rather, Cloud Foundry supports deployment to any public and private cloud environment, including those built on VMware vSphere those offered by VMware vCloud partners, non-VMware public clouds and demonstrated support for Amazon Web Services by cloud management provider RightScale.

Cloud Foundry will be offered in multiple delivery models:

• New VMware-Operated Developer Service - Available now in beta release, https://www.cloudfoundry.com is a full function public cloud PaaS service, operated by VMware, enabling developers to access Cloud Foundry and providing a test bed for new services and operational optimization. Via this multi-tenant PaaS environment, developers can deploy and cloud-scale their applications in seconds. Developers can sign up for invitations today to use this service.
• Open Source, Community PaaS Project - Available now at https://www.cloudfoundry.org, this open source project and community under Apache 2 license enables developers to inspect, evaluate and modify Cloud Foundry software based on their own needs, while also minimizing the risk of lock-in. This model provides the highest degree of extensibility, allowing the community to extend and integrate Cloud Foundry with any framework, application service or infrastructure cloud.
• New Cloud Foundry Micro Cloud - Available later in Q2 2011, Cloud Foundry Micro Cloud will be a complete, downloadable instance of Cloud Foundry contained within a Linux virtual machine that can run on a developer's desktop, enabling simplified development and testing. Then developers can build and test applications on their own machines and ensure that applications running locally will also run in production, without modification, on any Cloud Foundry-based private or public cloud.
• Cloud Foundry for the Enterprise and Service Providers - In the future, VMware will also offer a commercial version of Cloud Foundry for enterprises who want to offer PaaS capabilities within their own private clouds and for service providers who want to offer Cloud Foundry via their public cloud services. This commercial solution will enable enterprises to integrate the PaaS environment with their application infrastructure services portfolio. Service provider solutions will further deliver on the promise of portability across a hybrid cloud environment, enabling freedom to deploy internally or migrate to one of VMware's nearly 3,500 vCloud partners.

New Version of Intel Atom CPU aimed at NetBooks and Tablets

In April, Intel released the Intel Atom chip formerly codenamed "Oak Trail," which will be available in devices starting in May. In addition, at the Intel Developer Forum in Beijing, the company gave a sneak peak of its next-generation, 32nm Intel Atom platform, currently codenamed "Cedar Trail." This solution will help to enable a new wave of fanless, cool and quiet netbooks, entry-level desktops and all-in-one designs.

The new Intel Atom processor Z670, part of the "Oak Trail" platform, delivers improved video playback, fast Internet browsing and longer battery life. The rich media experience available with "Oak Trail" includes support for 1080p video decode, as well as HDMI. The platform also supports Adobe Flash, enabling rich content and Flash-based gaming.

The platform also helps deliver smaller, thinner and more efficient devices by packing integrated graphics and the memory controller directly onto the processor die. The processor is 60 percent smaller than previous generations with a lower-power design for fanless devices as well as up to all-day battery life. Additional features include Intel Enhanced Deeper Sleep that saves more power during periods of inactivity. An integrated HD decode engine enables smooth 1080p HD video playback with less power used.

The Intel Atom processor Z670 allows applications to run on various operating systems, including Google Android, MeeGo and Windows. This flexibility aides hybrid designs that combine the best features of the netbook and tablet together.

SPLUNK 4.2 Features real-time alerting

Splunk has released version 4.2 of its software that collects, indexes and harnesses any machine data logs generated by an organization's IT systems and infrastructure - physical, virtual and in the cloud.

Splunk 4.2 builds on the innovation of previous releases, adding real-time alerting, a new Universal Forwarder, improved usability and performance, and centralized management capabilities for distributed Splunk deployments.

Machine data holds a wealth of information that can be used to obtain operational intelligence and provide valuable insights for IT and the business. Splunk is the engine for machine data that helps enterprises improve service levels, reduce operations costs, mitigate security risks, enable compliance and create new product and service offerings.

Splunk 4.2 new features include:

Real-time alerting. Provides immediate notification and response for events, patterns, incidents and attacks as they occur. Universal Forwarder. New dedicated lightweight forwarder delivers secure, distributed, real-time data collection from thousands of endpoints with a significantly reduced footprint. Easier and faster. New ways to visualize data, quick start guides for new users, integrated workflows for common tasks and up to 10 times faster search experience in large-scale distributed deployments. Better management of Splunk. New centralized monitoring and license management facilitate the management of multiple Splunk instances from one location.

For more on the Splunk 4.2 release, download a free copy here..

Watch the Splunk 4.2 video .

Copyright © 2011, Deividson Luiz Okopnik and Howard Dyckoff. Released under the Open Publication License unless otherwise noted in the body of the article.

Published in Issue 186 of Linux Gazette, June 2011

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