Free Software Foundation

The concept of free software emerged in the year 1983 when Richard M. Stallman launched a project called as GNU, which stands for "GNU is not UNIX". The basic reason behind GNU was to provide the world with a brand new Operating System (OS) as a replacement for UNIX. The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a 201(c)3 donor supported charity founded in 1985 and is based in Boston, MA, USA. Check http://www.fsf.org for more information.

Recently FSF took a dig at Microsoft's initiative of opening a new research center at New England. If you go to the new research website you will find loads of stuff including pictures of new office and other attractive goodies offered by Microsoft (MS) to Cambridge students check http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/labs/newengland/ for more information. As expected Microsoft wants to attract world's best minds to continue their superiority in Information Technology. I must say MS is trying its level best to save itself from the competitors like Google, Linux and the list goes on & on. But we must remember that as MS products are getting more user friendly the level of abstraction is getting more complex. So if you are a programmer who always wanted to learn more about how the System works then you are at receiving end. The kind of flexibility provided to you by Open Source Softwares is really fantastic, you can change the Source Code and modify the entire piece of Software the way you want. I salute Mr. Stallman for the excellent work he has done in the field of Open Source. Please check this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman if you are really passionate about computers. FSF's campaign of working against Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) is aimed at targeting all the manufacturers that are trying to bring their DRM-enabled products in the market. I really like the name of the website dedicated to this Anti DRM campaign i.e http://www.defectivebydesign.org/ This website really keeps you updated on the DRM-enabled products.

Recently MS sued TomTom for using its FAT32 file system, this is the first time MS has directly targeted the product which is based on Linux. TomTom has responded by in turn filling a lawsuit against MS accusing MS of infringing on three of the company's in-car navigation system. TomTom decision to give back what it has got from MS is clearly a step further in escalating the tensions between the two. This clearly underlines the fact that MS is scared of the products which has any association with Linux. The recent news of IBM offering $6.4 billion to take over Sun Microsystems is an add-on to the success of Free Software. Well i must say IBM knows how to make money out of the Free Software by providing some additional features to the existing products. The take over will surely give sleepless nights to many in the industry including FSF, but till the time IBM agrees to provide NetBeans, Solaris and MySQL for free as usual we don't have any issues. To end this story i would request all readers of this blog to please visit http://ocw.mit.edu and check out what MIT has in store for the entire world & that too for free :)

gnuNify 2009

For all of you who must be wondering what gnuNify is? Please stop scratching your heads its a conference that was held in Pune at Symbiosis Institute of Computer Studies and Research (SICSR). Its Pune’s popular Free and open Source Software (FOSS) conference. I attended this conference accidentally this year and the overall experience was mindboggling. Check http://gnunify.in/ for more information.

As soon as entered the venue i was given a notepad, a pen & a special batch (gnuNify 09 crafted on it). I thought wow this was going to be an Out of box experience (OOBE) [I apologise for using MS Windows Keyword] for me. At the reception the first thing that i came to know was that the schedule has changed WTF (What the F*) i said. I still managed to get hold of the Ubuntu lab, where some novice users were trying to teach some other novice users about how to install Ubuntu (check http://www.ubuntu.com/ for more information). I have a habit of digging into the technology so i asked them few questions related to the boot loaders & the default page size, but the kind of response i got from them was pathetic. Its not easy to fool a skeptical person like me when it comes to technology but still those morons gave it a shot and that's where i caught them and made them taste the mud.

Now came the turn of presenters at the conference they tried hard to fool people around but as you know that i am habituated to asking tech questions, i asked them few but once again i was disappointed. The major reason for my disappointment was the response i got from them i.e please check the MAN (HELP as we say in Windows) pages. I then decided to move on to the next classroom where one presenter was explaining about the fedora project (check http://fedoraproject.org/ for more information). Within next 5 minutes the only audience left was the organisers and 3 more persons including me. I can explain the situation of presenters in one line "It was like acting in a movie without knowing whether you are playing the role of an actor or a villain (Gabbar to be more precise)". In the end i would just like to make one suggestion to the organisers that please give some respect to the Open Source Software (OSS) by calling the right people to speak in front of so many tech savvy enthusiasts.

Windows 7 or Windows Trouble

Microshit has made latest changes to its much hyped Operating System Windows 7 User Account Control (UAC). The fact that the changes done by MS has made UAC even less secure than it was in MS Windows Piss-ta or Vista (if you are the real fan of MS products) underlines the point that MS don't give the shit about what kind of products they are rolling in the market. Even in the financial turmoil that is surrounding the US economy MS is still undeterred to sell this piece of shity software to people at exorbitant prices. Anybody who has a bit of common sense will not buy this Operating System. For those of you who are really interested in taking a look at the latest vulnerabilities can check this link http://www.pretentiousname.com/misc/win7_uac_whitelist2.html

Its time for Microshit to realize the fact that the people are tired of buying the highly priced lame products & paying them hefty maintainence cost for those lame products. I worked for Microshit Windows XP Technical Support Group till 03\03\09 and believe me Windows XP is still better that MS Windows Piss-ta or 7. Hundereds of people i have talked to over the phone from US strongly believe that whosoever has created MS Windows Piss-ta should go to the hospital and get themselves treated by neuro surgeon (to be more specific). Its high time for MS to realize that people are getting cost conscious in today's scenario and will move to other available sources such as Open Source Software. In the end i would just like to say if MS does not make the requisite changes in UAC for Windows 7 it would be an add on to the existing failure of Windows Piss-ta.