Red Hat News Desk

Seven Predictions for Open Source in 2009

Tue, 06 Jan 2009 01:00:00 EST

2008 was an eventful, breakthrough year for many open source companies, and 2009 will hold even more promise for the open source market, especially in terms of business purchasing patterns, software business model shifts, and enterprise software stack evolution. The current economic conditions will certainly prompt businesses to look more closely at alternative IT solutions and open source technology will be one of the big winners next year. Here are a few predictions as to what will re-shape the open source software market in 2009:

AMD Releases Open-Source R600/700 3D Code for Linux

Mon, 05 Jan 2009 01:00:00 EST

AMD has released code on the ATI R600 series concerning 3D acceleration so that the open-source Linux drivers can begin to support the newer ATI graphics processors. This Linux code is needed to begin fostering the development of an open-source R600 3D driver. The microcode for the newest GPUs has also been released. Novell, AMD, and Red Hat developers have been doing a majority of the work taking advantage of the documentation, while internally at AMD they have been working to prepare the R600 documentation for release. Additionally, work has been performed to decide what code or documentation is needed for programming, sanitize it of any information not relevant to bringing up the 3D engine, remove any details concerning future ATI hardware, and then getting all of this work cleared by AMD's lead software and hardware architects so that it can be publicly released without any NDAs or other strings attached.

Case Study: Content Management System vs. Wiki for Community Websites

Tue, 30 Dec 2008 07:00:00 EST

Wikis are a great software tool for collaboratively creating and editing content. They seem to be an obvious choice for building a community Web infrastructure. Yet they have serious drawbacks that made JBoss.org choose a Content Management System (CMS) instead of a Wiki to build its new community website. JBoss.org's website currently serves 20 million page views per month and hosts over 40 community projects within that website.

JBoss to Support Google Web Toolkit

Wed, 17 Dec 2008 08:45:00 EST

Red Hat is on its way to supporting Google Web Toolkit (GWT) as part of its JBoss Enterprise Application Platform subscription. GWT is the open source project that helps Java developers build AJAX web applications for any browser, something traditional UI technologies for Java EE can't do. Anyway, Red Hat has signed a Google Contributor Agreement and has already done some preliminary integration between GWT and the JBoss Seam Framework.

Fedora 10 Out

Wed, 26 Nov 2008 15:45:00 EST

Fedora 10 is out and about. Fedora of course is Red Hat's freebie community OS and testbed for coming attractions in Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The new rev is supposed to have substantial virtualization improvements for remotely installing and managing storage provisioning and includes NetworkManager connection sharing so laptop users with Ethernet or mobile broadband connections can collaborate anywhere, anytime.

Fedora 10 Lays Out Roadmap for Future of Open Source Computing with Virtualization Enhancements

Wed, 26 Nov 2008 09:00:00 EST

The Fedora Project, a Red Hat sponsored and community-supported open source collaboration project, has announced the availability of Fedora 10, the latest version of its free open source operating system distribution. Fedora 10 features numerous leading-edge technologies and continues to lay the groundwork for derivative open source distributions throughout the enterprise.

SYS-CON's 1st International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo Attracts 40 Sponsors and 1,000 Delegates

Mon, 17 Nov 2008 11:00:00 EST

"More than a half dozen conferences and events targeting Virtualization and Cloud Computing canceled in the past two months," said Fuat Kircaali, CEO of SYS-CON Media. "We predicted that this would be the outcome for many competing shows due to the current economic conditions," he adds. "We will serve the Cloud Computing industry, our sponsors, advertising partners, and delegates as the leading global event around the globe for the next decade," said Carmen Gonzalez, Sr. VP of sales and advertising at SYS-CON Media.

AMD and Red Hat Demonstrate Live Migration of Virtual Machines

Mon, 10 Nov 2008 08:15:00 EST

AMD, in collaboration with Red Hat, have demonstrated the “live migration” of a virtual machine across vendor platforms. Live migration enables the movement of running virtual machines from one physical server to another without disrupting service to the end user, something that, till now, has only been demonstrated across systems based on one vendor’s platforms. The live migration demonstration moves a live VM from an dual socket Intel Xeon DP Quad Core E5420-based system to a system based on the forthcoming 45nm Quad-Core AMD Opteron processor, utilizing Red Hat’s high-performance open source virtualization software.

NetSuite Hurls Stone at German Goliath

Fri, 07 Nov 2008 12:43:00 EST

NetSuite, Larry Ellison’s other company, the on-demand one usually seen as a foil for Salesforce.com and its CEO, ex-Ellison lieutenant Marc Benioff, has started directing its attention to Larry’s great hereditary enemy, SAP. It’s got a new migration program called Business ByNetSuite – a name obviously inspired by SAP’s own bollixed contribution to cloudware, Business ByDesign.

Red Hat Named "Platinum Sponsor" of SYS-CON's Virtualization and Cloud Computing Conference & Expo

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 18:00:00 EDT

Red Hat is a trusted open source provider. Red Hat offers enterprise customers a long-term plan for building infrastructures on the quality and innovation of open source. Combining open source operating system platform, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, together with applications, management, and Services Oriented Architecture (SOA) solutions, including the JBoss Enterprise Middleware Suite.

RIA Conference Keynotes: Adobe & Microsoft

Wed, 15 Oct 2008 10:45:00 EDT

Join Scott Guthrie as he discusses Microsoft’s commitment to web standards development, Rich Internet Applications and how Microsoft is contributing to help move the web forward. Join Adobe’s Kevin Lynch as he demonstrates how Flash and HTML come together to make the most engaging, effective user experiences across operating systems and browsers.

Scalent Supports Red Hat with Virtualization

Tue, 14 Oct 2008 07:00:00 EDT

Red Hat says Scalent Systems is supporting Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 standalone and with Xen, extending virtualization and data center automation beyond hypervisors to bare metal servers, network and storage connectivity. Scalent V/OE provisions virtual or bare metal servers and associated storage and network topologies, reportedly yielding higher asset utilization and lower costs. It lets data centers react in real-time to changing business needs by shifting workloads and connectivity.

Red Hat and Tresys Partner to Deliver Enhanced Linux Security Services

Fri, 10 Oct 2008 15:00:00 EDT

Tresys Technology, a provider of technology and services for customers with high security requirements, and Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE: RHT), the world's leading provider of open source solutions, today announced an agreement to work together to deliver government and enterprise security services to customers. Under the terms of the agreement, Red Hat and Tresys will offer services that include security engineering, secure application development, virtualization security and compliance certification and accreditation support on the Red Hat Enterprise Linux platform.

Web 2.0 Is Dead and Web 3.0 Is Five Years Away

Thu, 02 Oct 2008 09:30:00 EDT

As far as the software industry goes, these tough economic days give the biggest business advantage to those companies who contribute directly to the solution of the big global problem and they will be the first to flourish as we dig ourselves from the ditch. Call that the new Y2K problem of our times, and it won’t go away on a predetermined date, as the clocks hit midnight. And on top of this list comes three recession curing technologies: SOA, Virtualization, and Cloud Computing.

IBM's Got Its Head in the Clouds

Mon, 29 Sep 2008 20:00:00 EDT

Reminding people of how its backing was the making of Linux, IBM, to no one's surprise, has thrown its support behind cloud computing, that delicious nexus of every chi-chi buzzword technology currently in vogue: Web 2.0, rich Internet applications, software-as-a-service, SOA, grid computing, Web Services, virtualization and utility computing. IBM calls its initiative Blue Cloud - like it could have another name - and claims it's a 'game-changing model for Internet-scale computing,' providing customer with just the right size computer power while at one and the same time being 'green' as well as 'self-healing and self-managing' based on open standards and Linux. Lordy, if this thing was a cute guy with money, it would be every mother's dream.

From Enterprise to Cloud, Virtualization Today on SYS-CON.TV

Fri, 12 Sep 2008 04:00:00 EDT

Virtualization has become a critical part of Enterprise IT strategy. Why and how has it become one of the most important change agents in our industry? To answer these questions I had the good fortune recently to be able to speak to a select group of top IT industry executives who joined me in the 4th Floor Reuters TV Studio overlooking Times Square in New York City for a special SYS-CON.TV "Virtualization Power Panel."

Red Hat Pits Itself Against VMware

Thu, 11 Sep 2008 23:00:00 EDT

Watching VMware stock and its market cap spike since it IPO'd must have had Red Hat positively pea green with envyWatching VMware stock and its market cap spike since it IPO'd must have had Red Hat positively pea green with envy - so green in fact that it's gonna try taking VMware on by pushing the Xen virtualization integrated in Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). Red Hat's new goal is to underpin 50% of the world's servers by 2015. And since virtualization is projected to take over the world by then that's a lot of Xen virtualization - and there's no extra cost in it like there is with VMware since it's bundled with RHEL. (Red Hat's telling people they'll save $20,000-$30,000 a server.) Red Hat claims it's got its first 18,000 virtualized servers - although it's a little fuzzy about whether those 18,000 are actually in production - anyway, it's confident they'll get there eventually after all the testing and evaluating is done.

German Home Savings and Loan Association Relies on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5

Mon, 04 Aug 2008 09:20:00 EDT

Red Hat announced that Vereinsbank Victoria Bauspar AG (VVB), a German private home savings and loan association, has implemented SEP sesam running on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 to maintain its backup and recovery solution for all database applications in its two parallel data centers. The high-performance solution enhances data transfer rates, speeding the resolution of backups while reducing maintenance and administration efforts.

Red Hat Solutions Deliver Flexibility and Reliability for InfoCamere

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 14:45:00 EDT

Red Hat announced that InfoCamere, an organization responsible for managing the IT systems that connect and secure over 100 Italian Chambers of Commerce, relies on Red Hat and JBoss solutions for flexibility, reliability and ease of use for its mission-critical systems.

Virtualization Conference Keynote Webcast Live on SYS-CON.TV

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 17:45:00 EDT

Brian Stevens, the Chief Technology Officer and Vice President of Engineering of Red Hat, delivered his Virtualization Keynote 'The Future of the Virtual Enterprise' at SYS-CON's Virtualization Conference & Expo 2007 West in San Francisco. 'Virtualization is the hottest subject today,' said Stevens, an industry luminary, who is credited with having pioneered new technologies that contributed to the rise of Linux as an industry-standard operating platform.

SYS-CON's Virtualization Conference & Expo: Themes & Topics

Tue, 10 Jun 2008 20:30:00 EDT

From Application Virtualization to Xen, a round-up of the virtualization themes & topics being discussed in NYC June 23-24, 2008 by the world-class speaker faculty at the 3rd International Virtualization Conference & Expo being held by SYS-CON Events in The Roosevelt Hotel, in midtown Manhattan.

Red Hat Named "Platinum Sponsor" of Virtualization Conference & Expo

Thu, 29 May 2008 14:30:00 EDT

SYS-CON's Virtualization Conference Keynote on SYS-CON.TV

Fri, 23 May 2008 15:00:00 EDT

International Virtualization Conference & Expo faculty alumni include such notable speakers as: Brian Stevens, CTO of Red Hat; Stephen Herrod, CTO of VMware; Vern Brownell, founder and CEO of Egenera; Simon Crosby, founder and CTO of Citrix XenSource; Hubert Yoshida, vice president and CTO of Hitachi Data Systems; Jeffrey Nick, CTO of EMC; David Greschler, director of Virtualization Strategy for Microsoft; Hal Stern, vice president and distinguished engineer for Sun Microsystems; Andrew Hillier, founder and CTO of CiRBA; Alex Vasilevsky, founder and CEO of Virtual Iron; Jack Zubarev, founder and COO of SWsoft; Stephen Pollack, founder and CEO of PlateSpin; Brett Adam, founder and CEO of rPath; Kevin Brown, founder and CEO of Kidaro; Bob Lozano, founder and CEO of Appistry; and Harry Ruda, founder and CEO of Desktone.

Red Hat Offers Enhanced Value to Customers with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.2

Fri, 23 May 2008 11:15:00 EDT

Red Hat announced the availability of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.2. With this latest update, subscribers can achieve greater return on their IT investment with new hardware support capabilities, selected new software technologies and numerous quality improvements. And, the certified application environment provided by every Red Hat Enterprise Linux version means that subscribers enjoy the new capabilities provided in release updates without the need to recertify their applications.

"Virtualization Journal" Debuts This Week at JavaOne

Thu, 08 May 2008 15:15:00 EDT

Founded in 2006, SYS-CON Media's 'Virtualization Journal' is the world's first magazine devoted exclusively to what Gartner has earmarked as the single highest-impact IT trend through 2012: virtualization. And now it will be available on newsstands worldwide, as SYS-CON Media seeks to support the world-beating 'International Virtualization Conference & Expo' series produced by SYS-CON Events with top-quality print collateral, available at newsstands wherever fine-quality technical journals are sold.

Red Hat Reupholsters the Chairs

Sat, 03 May 2008 05:00:00 EDT

Red Hat has been tinkering with senior management. Paul Cormier, executive VP of engineering, is now executive VP and president, product and technologies, responsible for product market, QA and support as well as engineering. CFO Charlie Peters is now also responsible operations and IT and Alex Pinchev, executive VP of sales, is now EVP and president, global sales, services and field marketing.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux Delivers Record-Setting Performance Results with Reuters Market Data System

Wed, 30 Apr 2008 09:00:00 EDT

Red Hat announced that Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.1, in combination with Reuters Market Data System (RMDS 6.0), IBM BladeCenter H and 10 Gigabit Ethernet technology from Blade Network Technologies and Chelsio Communications, delivers record-breaking performance results that meet key demands of the financial services industry. Together, the combination provides both the lowest mean latency and lowest standard deviation of latency reported with RMDS.

Open Source & Commercial Software: Both Are Crucial

Sun, 27 Apr 2008 08:45:00 EDT

Is software development a science or an art? The software industry treats it as a science. It uses processes like MRDs, PRDs, and functional specs to convert customer needs into software that solves their problems. Various roles like product managers, engineering managers, project managers, architects, and programmers work together to drive the process like an efficient machine.

Red Hat Wants Court To Limit Software Patents

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 14:15:00 EDT

Red Hat has filed a friend of the court brief with the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals complaining that the patent system is a hindrance to open source and asking it to bar software patents - or at least put a leash on them. The court is supposed to hear the so-called Bilski case - which doesn't have anything to do with software - but the judges are supposed to address the issue of the boundaries of what can be patented.

Red Hat Begs To Clarify Its Desktop Position

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 14:15:00 EDT

In the last 36 hours - thanks to a posting on one of its blogs - Red Hat has gotten itself in a pretty mess over whether it's in or out of the desktop market, with the influential Wall Street Journal, among others, reporting that 'Red Hat Abandons PC Plan.' Well, Red Hat CTO Brian Stevens says that's not exactly true. He's ready to concede that Red Hat, which has already canceled a couple of coming-out parties for its so-called Red Hat Global Desktop (RHGD), hasn't a clue when the widgetry will debut - or, in fact, if it ever will.

Moonwalk Extends Support for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.0

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 13:15:00 EDT

Moonwalk announced that its Moonwalk 6.0 software suite, which delivers an archive, backup and disaster recovery solution to heterogeneous networks, has become an approved application for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.0. As a Red Hat Ready Partner, Moonwalk has extended support for its software to allow Red Hat customers to use its technology for storage management.

Engelbart's Usability Dilemma: Efficiency vs Ease-of-Use

Thu, 10 Apr 2008 09:15:00 EDT

The mouse was the original idea of Doug Engelbart who was the head of the Augmentation Research Center (ARC) at Stanford Research Institute. Engelbart's philosophy is best embodied, in my opinion, in the design of another device that he invented, the five-finger keyboard - with keys like a piano, used by one hand. The problem was, Engelbart's five-finger keyboard and mouse combination was very difficult to learn.

Web 2.0 Is Fundamentally About Empowering People

Thu, 03 Apr 2008 05:00:00 EDT

'Unlocking content to be remixed into new business value' is the driver of Web 2.0 in the enterprise, says Rod Smith, IBM VP of Emerging Internet Technologies, in this Exclusive Q&A with Jeremy Geelan on the occasion of IBM's release of a new technology created by IBM researchers, codenamed 'SMash' - short for Secure Mashup.

Why Do 'Cool Kids' Choose Ruby or PHP to Build Websites Instead of Java?

Tue, 01 Apr 2008 17:30:00 EDT

Here is a question that I have been pondering on and off for quite a while: Why do 'cool kids' choose Ruby or PHP to build websites instead of Java? I have to admit that I do not have an answer. Why do I even care? Because I am a Java developer. Like many Java developers, I get along with Java well. Not only the language itself, but the development environments (Eclipse for example), step-by-step debugging helper, wide availability of libraries and code snippets, and the readily accessible information on almost any technical question I may have on Java via Google. Last but not least, I go to JavaOne and see 10,000 people that talk and walk just like me.

Red Hat Makes Its Numbers

Tue, 01 Apr 2008 15:00:00 EDT

In its fourth fiscal quarter closed February 29 Red Hat earned $22 million, a dime a share, up 7% or a million and a half more than a year ago, on revenues up 27% year-over-year to $141.5 million. Cost of sales and marketing, it said, up 31% to $52 million while R&D was up 32% to $26.3 million (hmmm, open source is getting expensive). Among other things it?s been opening offices and is now represented in 28 countries and will likely hit another 10 this year.

Presens IT Conducts Open Source Survey with Red Hat

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 13:00:00 EDT

Presens Technologies is conducting a survey in partnership with Red Hat. The mailing, which will be sent to CIOs and IT managers across North and South Carolina, aims toward mapping current use or intended plans to implement open source technologies in the corporate IT environment. The recipients of this survey will rate the importance of security, support and cost as well as training and exploration of server and storage virtualization technology. The responses will provide the scope of market need for new reliable and scalable products and services.

Red Hat Frees its Certificate System

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 06:15:00 EDT

Red Hat has open sourced its Certificate System - or rather those parts of it that weren't already open sourced. Certificate System, its identity management and security system, derives from the Netscape technology that Red Hat got from AOL three years ago and pieces of it like the Apache Web Server and Red Hat Directory Server were already open source.

Alcatel-Lucent Promises To Expand Red Hat's Business

Mon, 24 Mar 2008 20:30:00 EDT

Alcatel-Lucent, which owns Bell Labs, where Unix was created, says it's going to integrate Red Hat's Enterprise Linux and Realtime technologies into its communication products for SMEs with availability set for the first half of next year. No value was suggested but Alcatel pointed out that the alliance will 'help Red Hat expand its business' and called it an 'obvious choice' because of Red Hat's market leadership.

Russia Post To Go with Red Hat

Mon, 24 Mar 2008 16:00:00 EDT

Russia Post and US Linux market leader Red Hat have signed what the post calls a 'protocol' agreeing to work together to introduce the Linux operating system and other unnamed open source programs to the post's IT structure. The deal was signed by the deputy general director of Russia Post Andrey Pogodin and Red Hat's new CEO Jim Whitehurst.

iPhone Developer Summit

Thu, 20 Mar 2008 14:45:00 EDT

This session will provide attendees with an overview of the iPhone SDK, including discussion of the App Store, Apple's planned distribution channel for SDK applications. Keep in mind that the contents of the SDK and experiences while using it are covered under NDA, so be prepared for me to talk in generics and leave out specific details that might be covered by the NDA. I am planning on providing a quick introduction to Objective-C for those attendees who may have never seen it and might be worried that it will be difficult to code in (it isn't!).