Hi everyone, don't forget to come to FOSSCON 2003 tomorrow (Tuesday)
or Wednesday, even if you didn't pay for a ticket to the conference you
can still
attend the exhibition and pick up some cheap open source software - for
a list of
what's available see below.
For those that bought a ticket, don't forget to arrive by 9am! It's
not so early,
I have to be there at 7am to prepare!
I'm probably unavailable on email for a few days while I am at the
conference,
so hope to see you all there, and thanks to everybody who has helped us
with
the preparation.
Location - Sheraton Subang.
Map - http://opensource.mimos.my/fosscon2003/images/sheraton.jpg
More details - http://opensource.mimos.my/fosscon2003/
Imran
------------
What Open Source Software Should I Use?
Imran William Smith, MIMOS Berhad, 31 July 2003.
The aim of this brief document is to help you select the best open
source CD's for your needs. Save yourself some time later by
choosing the right software now!
Mozilla and OpenOffice CD
Currently offered versions : Mozilla 1.4, OpenOffice 1.1 RC3
We recommend these for almost all
computer users, whether Windows or
Linux. The single CD contains installers for both packages, for
Linux, Windows, Mac and Sun Solaris users.
Mozilla is a browser and
email application that runs on Windows, Linux and a number of other
platforms. You can easily switch from using Internet Explorer to
Mozilla for almost all uses. Mozilla also features some things
that Internet Explorer does not, such as 'tabbed browsing', ability to
block 'popup adverts' and an anti-spam filter in the email
application. If you are familiar with recent versions of Netscape,
then you will find that Mozilla is very similar, since they are related
products (Mozilla is the open source version of Netscape browser and
email). Also included on the CD is the new, faster and
smaller 'Firebird' browser, based on Mozilla.
For more information, see http://www.mozilla.org
OpenOffice is a fully
featured Office application, similar to Microsoft Office®. It runs on
Windows, Linux and several other platforms, and it can read and write
to Microsoft
Office® format files. If you want paid support for
OpenOffice, you could instead buy the 'StarOffice' package from Sun
Microsystems, which is the same software, but comes with commercial
support. Using OpenOffice in your home or office
environment allows you to save a huge amount of money that you would
otherwise need to spend on Microsoft Office® licenses.
For more information, see http://www.openoffice.org
Red Hat™ Linux
Currently offered version : 9.0
Red Hat™ is the most widely used and famous 'distribution' of
Linux. Linux (sometimes called GNU/Linux) is a complete operating
system with applications, i.e. you wouldn't need to use Windows,
Microsoft Office, Microsoft Internet Explorer etc if you installed
Linux. The 3 CD's will allow you to install Linux on your
computer. If you have a free hard disc 'partition', you may also be
able to leave any existing software such as Windows on the computer.
Red Hat™ is a 'corporate' distribution of Linux, known for its
stability and suitability for servers. It can also run on desktop
machines, with a full GUI (graphical user interface). Because Red
Hat™ is a profit-making corporate
organisation, they encourage you to buy (US$60 per year) a maintenance
license for Red
Hat™ (1 license per PC) that guarantees you priority access to security
updates.
Source or Binary?
The 3 binary discs are the 'program'
discs. They are all you need if you wish to just install and run
Red Hat on your PC, you only need
the binaries. If you want to study the 'insides' of Red
Hat, to learn how it works or to make improvements (for example, you
are a school or a University), you should get the source (software
source code) discs as well. The source discs alone are probably
not what you want.
For
more information, see http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/linux/
Red Hat™ 9 Linux Updates Disc
Currently offered version : 9.0, updates to 31 July 2003.
Usually when you install Red Hat, you have to spend many hours (if you
only
have a dialup internet) downloading security patches before your system
is secure. While you are doing that, your system is at risk. We have
the solution! This disc contains all
security updates released for Red Hat 9 (except source code) from its
release date up to 31 July 2003. Simply copy all
the files to your /var/spool/up2date folder and run the 'up2date'
command, to apply all the necessary security patches. After
updating, you can safely delete everything in /var/spool/up2date.
Mandrake Linux
Currently offered version : 9.1
Mandrake Linux is quite similar to Red Hat Linux. However,
Mandrake is more optimized to be a 'desktop' distribution of Linux,
rather than for servers. Again, Mandrake is written by a
corporate entity (called Mandrakesoft) who encourage you to buy support
services for things like security updates. The three Mandrake
CD's do not contain source code. However, you can download the
source code from the Mandrakesoft web site.
For more information, see http://www.mandrakelinux.com/en/fdoc.php3
Knoppix Linux
Currently offered version : 3.2, 2003-07-26
Knoppix is an innovative distribution of Linux, in what is called a
'Live CD'. Whatever operating system is currently installed
on your PC, you can still use Knoppix. The whole of Knoppix runs
from the CDROM drive, and does not install on your hard disc.
This makes Knoppix an excellent way to test Linux and the common
packages it contains (such as OpenOffice.org, Mozilla etc) without any
installation effort. After you finished testing Knoppix, just
remove the CDROM and reboot to your original system. Knoppix can
save files (such as your bookmarks or configuration data) to hard disc,
but setting this up is a slightly 'advanced' operation. We
suggest once you decided you like Knoppix, you may be ready to install
a full Linux distribution, such as Red Hat.
Knoppix is particularly well known for being able to detect a wide
range of hardware. If you have trouble getting Linux to work on your
PC, Knoppix may still work. Because Knoppix caches the (relatively
slow) CDROM in any available system memory, Knoppix works fastest if
you have a fast CDROM drive and lots of memory (best is 256Mb or more).
The Knoppix source code is not included on the Knoppix CD, but you can
download it from the Knoppix web site, or from the Debian web site
(Knoppix is based on a Linux distribution called Debian).
For more information, see http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.html
Knoppix-STD Linux
Currently offered version : 0.1b
This is based on Knoppix, but customized to be full of security and
networking related applications, such as firewalls, intrusion detection
software, forensic tools, honeypots, network utilities, vulnerability
scanning software etc.
For more information, see http://www.knoppix-std.org
Morphix Linux
Currently offered version : 0.4 (Light GUI, Heavy GUI, Games CD and
developers' collection).
Morphix is a similar concept to Knoppix, in that it's a 'Live CD'. See
Knoppix for more information. Morphix is intended to be more
'modular', and to make it easy to customize and create your own Live
CD, optimized with the Linux software and configuration you like or
wish to give to other people. Morphix also has an button to install
itself to the hard disc.
Morphix currently has several options, including a light GUI version
(fast and small, suitable for old PC's), a heavy GUI version (more
features, faster PC required), a CD full of open source games, and a
developer disc we have specially built containing many of the
sub-modules that can help you to create your own Live CD.
Debian GNU/Linux
Currently offered version : 3.0 r1
Debian is a non-commercial Linux distribution, meaning that it is
not run by a corporate entity. Debian tend to be a 'cautious'
distribution - the CD's contain fairly old but very stable versions of
the main
open source software.
It is possible to install Debian using just the first binary CD.
Alternatively, you can use all 7 binary CD's, which contain a huge
amount of open source packages that run on Debian.
Debian includes an advanced package management system (more advanced
than Red Hat etc). This allows you to add extra packages from the
internet easily, from a number of official and unofficial Debian
software 'mirror' sites.
Debian's installer is text based, and is said to be not the easiest
installer. However, when you have installed Debian, most people
report
that it is easy to use. Another of Debian's features is that you
should not need to do a complete 'reinstall' to get the latest version,
unlike Red Hat, Mandrake etc. Every single feature of the
operating
system can be updated over time without a reinstall.
Source or Binary?
See the 'Source or Binary' section under Red Hat.
For more information, see http://www.debian.org
Red Flag Linux
Currently offered version : 4.0 Desktop
Red Flag Linux is customized in China to be a version of Linux that
fully supports Chinese, from the installer onwards. The look and feel
is customized to be close to Microsoft
Windows®.
For more information, see http://www.redflag-linux.com/eindex.html
MoviX
Currently offered version : MoviX2 0.3.0
MoviX is a tiny Linux distribution that runs from CD. It's sole
purpose is to enable you to play media files, such as VCD's, DVD's and
any media files that may already be on your hard disc, such as MP3.
To use MoviX, simply boot using the MoviX CD (this is not particularly
fast, unfortunately). Then remove the MoviX CD and replace with the
media CD or DVD. Rightclick in MoviX to get the control menu, and
play. This allows an old PC, perhaps one without a hard disc, to be a
video player.
For more information, see http://movix.sourceforge.net/
FreeBSD
Currently offered version : both 4.8 and 5.1
Similar to Linux, FreeBSD is a full operating system with at least as
much power as proprietary operating systems like Microsoft
Windows®. Also like Linux, FreeBSD is based on the Unix operating
system. FreeBSD also has a graphical interface.
FreeBSD is not yet as popular as Linux, especially on desktop
PCs. It is increasingly popular for servers. Also, there
are a good number of FreeBSD enthusiasts in Malaysia willing to help
each other out. The FreeBSD installer is not a graphical
installer, therefore installing FreeBSD is not as easy as Mandrake or
Red Hat Linux.
FreeBSD 4.8 is the most stable, conservative version. FreeBSD 5.1
is the 'new technology' version which contains extra features but may
be less stable.
For more information, see http://www.freebsd.org/
OpenBSD
Currently offered version : 3.3
OpenBSD is probably the world's most secure mainstream operating
system. All features of OpenBSD are optimized towards high security.
This makes it well suited as a base operating system for things like
firewalls or web servers.
An official install disc of OpenBSD can only be purchased from OpenBSD
project in USA, for US$40. However, we are offering an 'unofficial'
install CD to promote OpenBSD throughout Malaysia. If you find
yourself using OpenBSD widely, please consider donating to the OpenBSD
project.
For more information, see http://www.openbsd.org
--
Imran William Smith
Project Manager, Open Source Development,
MIMOS Berhad, Malaysia
Asian Open Source Centre : http://www.asiaosc.org
MIMOS Open Source : http://opensource.mimos.my
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