Technologists Notes

In ‘93 or ‘94, a friend began trying to interest me in Linux. At the time, my direct needs for UNIX(-like) systems were still satisfied by Dell SVR4. However, late in 1996 I needed to host a web server, needed it to be Linux-based, and the same friend recommended I try either Debian or Red Hat. Based on his comparison, I started with Red Hat 4.0. I continued to stay up with almost all of the Red Hat releases through Red Hat 9, and have continued with Fedora releases since then, putting almost all of the Red Hat & Fedora releases into some production use. From habit, history, and curiosity, I’ve felt compelled to continue evaluating new Fedora releases and (mostly) putting them into production for web/mail/name service once some minimal comfort level has been achieved.

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Initially getting VMware Server to work with Fedora 11 and kernel 2.6.30 was challenging, and then the roughly bi-weekly kernel builds to keep up with Fedora updates got tedious. Trying the same approach with Fedora 12 and kernel 2.6.31 didn’t work at all for me. I kept getting duplicate definitions of init_mm that caused link failures. I tried various #ifdef kludges to overcome the duplicates, but nothing seemed to work. All this proved to me was that I really didn’t want to be trying to build the kernel at all.

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After years of skepticism about Avistar’s patent licensing and litigation pursuits, I feel obligated to express admiration for Avistar’s transitioning away from those pursuits, as announced last week: Avistar Communications Monetizes Its Patent Portfolio and Closes Transaction with Intellectual Ventures Management, LLC.

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Recent months have brought much promise about elephants dancing well with others, i.e., video calling interoperability with Cisco Telepresence and with Skype. So far, no signs that Cisco and Skype will dance with each other, but even that is conceivable now.

Along with the promise have been ambiguity, questions and controversy. This is a brief recap while still waiting for some of the partners to make their moves.

For example, when Cisco announced plans to purchase Tandberg, the largest of the companies committed to ITU-T and SIP interoperability, would Cisco become part of the interoperable crowd, or would Tandberg become less interoperable? It seemed inevitable that interoperability would prevail, but until it happened, who could be sure? Then the real controversy emerged: enough Tandberg shareholders want a higher bid from Cisco that the deal may not happen. A November 9 deadline has been extended to November 18.

The long anticipated sale of Skype by eBay was announced in September in the midst of controversy over intellectual property, and prior announcements of Asterisk interoperability and SIP interoperability. Naysayers widely predicted the demise of Skype. Others, notably LifeSize, joined the dance. With Friday’s announcements resolving the ominous litigation, Skype’s forward momentum seems impressive. Skype hiring of SIP pioneer Jonathan Rosenberg bodes very well for future Skype interoperability.

Assuming Skype overcomes current lack of multi-point video calling, Skype should be able to win a few dance contests.