Day 3 of this year's Ottawa Linux Symposium featured a number of sessions, most notably a keynote address by Ubuntu founder and space tourist Mark Shuttleworth, who called for the greater Linux community to start thinking about discussing syncronicity, his term for having major software releases synchronised.

Some people seem to challenge the idea that most (if not all) free software projects need a benevolent dictator—that is, somebody who has the last say on every decision. They are quick to point out Linus Torvalds’ past “mistakes” (see the speech marks): using BitKeeper to manage the kernel, not allowing “pluggable” schedulers in Linux, etc.

To continue my look at how non-profits and the free software community can engage, I’ve decided to look at some popular free software products and see how well they fit the need of an average charity—namely my employer. I’ll start with OpenOffice.org.

"...As part of the FSCONS the Free Software Foundation Europe created and handed out the first Free Software Scandinavian Award. Since I was on the award committee I know first hand how interesting reviewing and discussing Free Software projects and initiatives can be. Here is the press release about the award which went to the excellent Norwegian project Skolelinux..."

Running a free software project can be a rewarding experience if you begin with your eyes open. In my personal experience, starting a free software project with only a head-on view of a few existing free software projects is not really enough. Some basic background information can really help get you started in the right direction.

I’ll be presenting on Thursday, 16:00 UTC. I’ll be presenting on using Ubuntu on the EeePC. If you have an EeePC still running Xandros, if you have an EeePC running Ubuntu (or derivative), or if you’re just thinking about getting one I think it’d be a great presentation for you to join.

"The Free Software Foundation will host a mini-summit on Freedom for Web Services to discuss how the free software community can ensure that software, and its users, stay free in this new technological environment..."

"A common misconception is that only programmers can contribute to free software. The first significant reference I recall to this was in a presentation by Pia Waugh [1] where she mentioned that she felt that the way words such as “coder” and “hacker” are used in the community as synonyms for “contributor” are denigrating to people such as herself who aren’t coders..."

Some GNU/Linux desktop deployments require secure authentication from a Windows Active Directory server. Gerald Carter, a long-time member of the Samba team and an enthusiastic free software developer, now works for Likewise.