Good news? The EU declaration on eGovernment

2009-11-23 in OpenMisc | 3 comments

We all remember the discussions around the leaked EIFv2 draft. We know there is a lot of lobbying efforts in the background to make sure the principles of EIFv1 are kept and extended.

So today we see the Ministerial declaration on eGovernment policy. And it does contain some indications on what will likely happen. It’s good news combined with some vagueness.

Here is the part I do like (page 4):

21. Pay particular attention to the benefits resulting from the use of open specifications in order to deliver services in the most cost-effective manner. We will ensure that open specifications are promoted in our national interoperability frameworks in order to lower barriers to the market. We will work to align our national interoperability frameworks with applicable European frameworks. The Open Source model could be promoted for use in eGovernment projects. It is
important to create a level playing field where open competition can take place in order to ensure best value for money.

Now this IS good news. With some vagueness. The good news is that Open Source is recognized as a valid method of developing good solutions. The vagueness is “open specifications”. Why not call for open standards? We will have to wait what exactly is considered an “open specification”. I can tell you what I would like to see as a definition for this:

  1. Developed and maintained in an open process where anyone can particpate. So no membership fees, expensive travel requirements etc.
  2. The specification is available to anyone for free, eg by offering it for free as download on the web. Ideally at a central place, so anyone can see and get all open specifications at a one-stop-shop.
  3. Whatever patents or other so-called “intellectual property” is available on a royalty-free basis to all users and implementors by default and this “IP” is not limited to the specification. This is key. No lock-in based on patents or licenses.
  4. The implementation and usage must be unlimited. So no per-player or pay-per-view models.
  5. There must be at least two implementations available, ideally at least one of them Open Source. This to make sure that we have interoperability that can be verified. Single-vendor implementations with no competitive implementation are NOT allowed.
  6. There must be a validator and test-suite to garantuee conformance, validity, usability and correct interoperability. This test suite etc. must be available under open source license, so that anyone can not only use it but also examine it for correctness.

So now that we now what the ministers think, let’s help them in making EIFv2 the defining framework. It’s up to all of you to assist our politicians to not only talk the talk but also walk the walk.

The .NET Micro stuff – Where’s the beef? [updated]

2009-11-17 in OpenMisc | 2 comments

So I guess I was a bit too carried away in my previous post by assuming that the .NET Micro Framework is really something big. After doing my research, let me focus a bit more on the product itself and its importance to Microsoft.

Let’s read this article again. On may, 6th 2009 this journalist states that the .NET Micro framework is effectively obsolete stuff that Microsoft doesnt want to support anymore, so in an act of generosity, they will give it to the community:

Microsoft is turning the source code for its embedded .Net Micro Framework over to the community and slowly withdrawing from that
business, company officials are confirming.

(Update on May 7: Microsoft disagrees with my characterization of this
move as “withdrawing from the business.” But I’m standing by what I
said, while making it clear company officials didn’t say they are
withdrawing. To me, if you cut a bunch of a team and turn your source
code over to external parties, you are not signaling that you’re
continuing to stand firmly behind a product.

Today we see this plan taking shape (a bit delayed, isn’t it?).

I have great news to announce. Today, at the Microsoft Professional
Developer Conference (PDC) here in Los Angeles, we announced not only
the release of version 4.0 of the.NET Micro Framework, but also that we
are open sourcing the product and making it available under the Apache
2.0 license, which is already being used by the community within the
embedded space.

So no real news so far, in fact just an update. The only (possible) good news is that Apache 2.0 License forces MSFT to give the community a

perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free, irrevocable (except as stated in this section) patent license to make, have made, use, offer to sell, sell, import, and otherwise transfer the Work,

But I do not see a list of patents yet.

Now depending on what parts of .NET are implemented in the Micro
Framework this might be partly good news for MONO users. But that is about the only interesting thing I can see.

In closing, let’s take a look at what this stuff is all about on a
more technical level:

The .NET Micro Framework is currently supported on ARM architecture processors (including ARM7 and ARM9) and on Analog Devices Blackfin.

This means no support fro MMUs etc etc. So it is really a very basic thing.

The .NET Micro Framework has its roots in Microsoft’s SPOT initiative and was used in MSN Direct products such as smart watches before being made available to third-party developers early in 2007. It is a common platform for Windows SideShow devices and is beginning to see adoption in other markets, such as home automation and sensor networks.

Funny thing is however that the .NET Micro Framework comes without a
TCP/IP stack (third party stuff) and without a crypto library.

So what do we have here? A runtime environment for very basic stuff
(about 70 classes with about 420 methods), some presentation layer
loosely based on WPF but that’s about it.

It might help you in creating cool, non-connected gadgets with nice
bluescreens – but nothing more ;-)

So where’s the Beef in this announcement?

[UPDATE]

This is nice:

We do not include the source code for these libraries for several reasons – the TCP/IP stack is licensed from EBSNet(http://ebsnetinc.com/) and the Crypto libraries are used in other products besides the .NET Micro Framework.

So just because crypto is used also in other products, it cannot be opensourced? I guess we need to educate MSFT a bit on OS licensing …

The Microsoft engineers will continue to focus on some of the things that only they can do – deep coordination with the rest of the .NET team

So not THAT open, I guess …

Microsoft, .NET Micro Framework, Mono for iPhone – Ouch?

2009-11-17 in OpenMisc | 1 comment

So this will be a minor rant. And as always, this is my pure personal opinion and not related to my job.

So Microsoft broke the stunning news: They are going to open source the .NET Micro Framework under the Apache 2.0 license.

What does this mean? Well – at first glance it is all good news. All the patents covering the .NET Micro framework are nnow available

perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free, irrevocable (except as stated in this section)

where the exceptions are clearly defined and boil down to “sue me and you’ve lost the license rights”, typical covenant language.

So why don’t we all sing and praise Microsoft for this brave step in the right direction? First – there is always doubt when it comes to Microsoft and Open Source. For darn good reasons, I dare say. Think of TomTom and the FAT patent dispute.

Secondly – and IMHO more important – I am quite sure that Novell will not be totally happy – which they won’t admit in public, I dare also say ;-)

According to my sources, the MONO project was under pressure to finally make some revenue and one of the possibilities was to produce MONO for an important platform that Microsoft didn’t want to support – the iPhone.

So we now have MONOTouch for iPhone, and suprise, it has a price tag. Even better, it is not open source, accrding to the FAQ:

How is MonoTouch Licensed?

MonoTouch is a commercial product based on the open source Mono project and is licensed on a per-developer basis.

I guess you can see the problem here. Imagine that the .NET Micro Framework is “good enough” for the iPhone. Imagine that the community will soonish deliver a free implementation for the iPhone – who will need MONOTouch?

Now, the MONO people will claim that ofcourse the Micro Framework is incomplete, completely different and of no real use. But nevertheless – Microsoft did something that could become a pain for MONO. Is that what a partnership with Microsoft means? ;-)

Let’s wait and see.

Why TheSystem and bloggers have a problem

2009-08-31 in OpenMisc | 6 comments

Glyn Moody pointed me to this article:

‘Bloggers’ vs ‘Audience’ is over? or, Will the word ‘blogger’ disappear?

and it lead me to jot down why I think the term writer, author, reader in such discussions really miss the point.

TheSystem, which means the copyright system of publishers, news agencies etc. have a vested interest in keeping us in two worlds. Either you are a producer or a consumer. This makes the media world go round and has been their source of revenue. It all works because in the past it was costly to distribute your product. You had to print books, newspapers, transport them to book stores, little kiosks etc. And so it was natural that the consumer had to pay for it.

Fast forward to the Web Age. With distribution costs close to zero, this old value chain is struggling. And as if that isn’t enough, the consumer does stuff he is not allowed to do – he distributes his own content by using this new system of zero-cost distribution.

So we nowadays have not only a simple top-down market, from producer to consumer, we now have a system with three levels.

We still have producers, stuck in their old value chain, and we still have consumers – willing to pay for the work of the producers, but we now also have ProSumers, people that consume AND produce.

Bloggers are ProSumers. They live in networks of other ProSumers, and they also consume from producers. And this is where the problem starts for the old-.school producers.

As ProSumers remix content they gather, deem interesting, create themselves and distribute that under the same principles – knowing that other ProSumers will remix, the old value chain of Consumer-pays-Producer is under attack.

The old system defends itself with DRM (Digital Restriction Management), putting ProSumers in the same group as pirates and add to that that only real producers (journalists etc.) should be allowed to deliver content to consumers.

And slowly but surely the ProSumers distance themselves from this dying system. With Creative Commons, with Open Source and simply by ignoring the old value chain, they create a parallel system of content creation and distribution.

And this is the real problem. It is as simple as that. It is the value chain

Producer –> Consumer

versus

Producer <--> Prosumer <--> Consumer.

And as long as you try to defend the old chain while combining it with the new system you will fail. Funny thing is that quite some bloggers still see themselves more a producers where they effectively are prosumers.

And the so-called producers of the past have always been prosumers themselves. So as soon as TheSystem accepts the new flow, we will see more creativity and less restriction. If TheSystem fails to adapt, it will die.

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OOXML defect report – just the numbers

2009-08-07 in OpenMisc | 2 comments

So for all those people that still believe that OOXML is in good shape and might just need a few corrections. It might be a bit more complicated.

I am just reading the “IS 29500:2008 Defect Report Log [At Closure of the DCOR1 and FDAM1 Sets]“. This is a very interesting 809 pager. Note: The ODF Spec is around 700 pages. So the defect report for OOXML effectively outperforms ODF pagecountwise ;-)

ATM just the numbers, so you get a feeling for what is going on (or should I say wrong?).

Status Count
Open 7
Further Consideration Required 78
Last Call 0
Closed, to be incorparated in COR1 175
Closed, to be incorparated in AMD11 24
Closed without Action 9

Wow. Will now start to go through the details. Will take time. But with that amount of defects in place, how can anyone safely implement OOXML according to IS29500?

[Sarcasm] Microsofts 10-K – some comments

2009-07-31 in OpenMisc | No comments

Interesting stuff.

http://sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/789019/000119312509158735/d10k.htm#tx73014_3

“Open source commonly refers to software whose source code is subject to
a license allowing it to be modified, combined with other software and
redistributed, subject to restrictions set forth in the license. A
number of commercial firms compete with us using an open source business
model by modifying and then distributing open source software to end
users at nominal cost and earning revenue on complementary services and
products. These firms do not bear the full costs of research and
development for the software. Some of these firms may build upon
Microsoft ideas that we provide to them free or at low royalties in
connection with our interoperability initiatives.”

[Oh no. This interop thingy and the EU. They force M$ to open up stuff
that then gets implemented in Open Source. Interop steals their revenue!
How dare they!]

“We are devoting significant resources toward developing our own
competing software plus services strategies including the Windows Azure
Platform, our hosted computing platform designed to facilitate the
rapid, flexible and scalable development of cloud-based services. It is
uncertain whether these strategies will be successful. “

[Translated: We invest in the hype but we dunno if it will ever work.]

“Similarly, the absence of harmonized patent laws makes it more
difficult to ensure consistent respect for patent rights. Throughout the
world, we actively educate consumers about the benefits of licensing
genuine products and obtaining indemnification benefits for intellectual
property risks, and we educate lawmakers about the advantages of a
business climate where intellectual property rights are protected.”

[Translated: We lobby heavily for more patents and against open standards.]

“The [European] Commission’s impact on product design may limit our
ability to innovate in Windows or other products in the future, diminish
the developer appeal of the Windows platform, and increase our product
development costs. The availability of licenses related to protocols and
file formats may enable competitors to develop software products that
better mimic the functionality of our own products which could result in
decreased sales of our products.”

[Wow. So forcing M$ to respect the valid laws of competition is painted
as "impact on product design" and interoperability is painted as
competitors are now able to destroy M$ revenue? Remember - M$ was found
guilty of breaking laws.]

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Using KVM in the RHEL 5.4 Beta – fixing bridges

2009-07-18 in OpenKnowledge | 1 comment

When you use KVM in Rhel 5.4 Beta you will notice that there is no bridge setup to allow your virtual guests to directly connect to the local network.

However, it is easily fixed:

As we are using libvirt, we just need to do two steps, as outlined here:

Step 1: Create the bridge script at /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-br0

DEVICE=br0
BOOTPROTO=static
TYPE=Bridge
IPADDR=10.20.30.40
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
ONBOOT=yes
NM_CONTROLLED=no

As you can see, I use static IP config.

Step 2: hook up eth0 to the bridge and remove it’s IP config in /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0

DEVICE=eth0
BOOTPROTO=none
ONBOOT=yes
BRIDGE=br0
NM_CONTROLLED=no
TYPE=Ethernet

Now restart the network and done. When you now create a new virtual machine with virt-manager, you can select to have it directly hooked up to the physical network.

Spam protection on my blog

2009-05-23 in OpenMisc | 1 comment

I have activated Akismet and Yawasp for my WordPress blog here. It works. Here the current numbers:

Akismet has protected your site from 632 spam comments

Yawasp has stopped 614 birdbrained Spambots.

This really saves me some headaches ….

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Asking Switzerland for more neutrality …

2009-05-22 in OpenMisc | 3 comments

… sounds ironical, doesn’t it? However, it is true. So what is going on?

On the 23th of february 2009 the swiss BBL awarded Microsoft a contract for client/server licenses, applications and 3rd level support. This was published on the 1st of May here. The

The contract is worth 14 million Swiss Francs per year and as it is running for 3 years, the total amount is 42 million SFR. Now usually such investments are made after public tendering to make sure the most cost effective solution is chosen. In this case however, the BBL decided that they could use a specific article in the law to avoid the tendering process. You can look up here (in german) what the reasons are.

Let me translate that in a rough way for you:

What prerequisites are needed to call Art. 13, 1 lit.c Voeb (technical or artistic particularities of the order) into action?

It needs to be shown that due to technical or artistic particularities of this order or for reasons of protection of intellectual property only one supplier can be selected and due to this no sufficient alternative is available

(emphasis added by me)

These are the facts. BBL says there is absolutely no alternative to Microsoft, for servers, for clients, for applications. And due to this they can only select Microsoft. So no need for public tendering. Deal done. Microsoft happy.

And it doesn’t stop there. According to NZZ Ms. Lunau of BBL told NZZ that “due to the specifics of the Bundesverwaltung. competition between vendors will not exist short- and mid-term.”

Would you agree? Would you support sending 42 mio SFR to Microsoft without even evaluating alternatives? Especially when in the very same country, Switzerland, the government asks for equal treatment of Open Source? Knowing that the Kanton Solothurn and several courts are using exactly those alternatives that according to BBL simply do not exist?

Well – a lot of people in Switzerland and almost 20 companies are not really happy. Among these companies is Red Hat. So Red Hat is joining the official appeal that asks the court to stop this contract, force BBL to evaluate the alternatives that exist and are in active use, even in Switzerland in the offical way of public tendering.

Effectively the appeal asks the BBL to defend competition. In a vendor neutral way. Based on technical merits. I think it is fair to ask. Let the court decide.

And ofcourse the irony of asking Switzerland of all countries to act in a (vendor-) neutral way is quite funny.

[DISCLAIMER] This blog contains my personal opinion and does not reflect the opinion of Red Hat.

A short HOWTO to get laconi.ca running on Fedora 10

2009-05-14 in OpenMisc | No comments

Simple, if you know how to do it :-)

Prerequisites:

  • Up and running Fedora 10 with web server and mysql server installed (httpd, mysql-server RPM)

1. Get the tarball from http://www.laconi.ca

2. You need to install some RPMs, I ended up with adding these (you might already have most of them installed)

# yum install php-gd t1lib php-mbstring php-xml php-xmpphp \
php-oauth php-pear-Net-SMTP php-pear-Mail php-pear-DB-DataObject \
php-pear-Auth-SASL php-pear-MDB2 php-pear-DB \
php-pear-Net-Socket php-pear-Auth-OpenID php-pear-Net-Curl \
php-pear-Validate php-pear-Date php-pgsql php-bcmath php-pear \

3. You might also need markdown.php which unfortunately doesn’t yet exist as RPM. So get it from http://michelf.com/projects/php-markdown/ while it is hot ;-) The normal version is sufficient. Unzip the file and place markdown.php in your PHP search path (mine lives in /usr/share/php)

4. I placed my laconica installation in /var/www/html/laconica, so just untar the tarball in that directory, rename the directory if needed/wanted.

5. Create the database, database user and set the rights accordingly:

# mysql -uroot -p -e 'create database laconica';
# mysql -uroot -p -e "grant all privileges on laconica.* to laconica@localhost identified by 'PASSWORD'";

6. Now call http://localhost/laconica/install.php and finish the installation.

Done. Have fun with microblogging.

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