Colin Charles Agenda

Its great to see that the Obama campaign in America are after folk that dig open source. They’re after folk that can write software for nation-wide voter contact and mobilisation (something like Twitter?), fund-raising, and social networking and online organising at My.BarackObama.

They’re a LAMP shop. They’re after:

• Experience scaling large LAMP applications
• Posses deep knowledge of MySQL performance and query optimisation

I once wrote:

If they can waste your ringgit on buying proprietary software licenses, when there are clearly open source alternatives, can you trust them with spending and budgeting for a country?

It may seem extremely naive to correlate the use of open source software to creating a better budget or spending wisely, but I think its a start.

Recently, I had to futz with an Ubuntu server that was to run mail, web, and database services.

You slowly learn that Ubuntu as a desktop is easy to use, but as a server, its “different”, if you come from a Red Hat based background (especially if you’ve been using Red Hat-based distributions for the last thirteen years or so).

From example, while service httpd start works (well, the equivalent is service apache start), enabling things on boot using chkconfig (I wrote about it a while back) is replaced with update-rc.d.

In fact, if you’re an rpm aficionado, dpkg is a little different. I applaud the Ubuntu folk for creating an article such as Switching to Ubuntu from Red Hat Enterprise Linux or Fedora. Impressive. Switcher guides :)

OpenSolaris needs switcher guides. svcadm/smf is different for someone who’s coming from Linux-land.

MySQL Lists are available via NNTP, so you can use your newsreader! If only all lists were like this.

Now for the real motivations…

After all acquisitions, things tend to change. We’ve been mostly nudged to migrate to using Sun’s email systems, and you can imagine its fun moving about three years worth of mail from one server to another. Especially, while you’re at the developer’s meeting, with lots of people sucking bandwidth.

The recommended method is to Ctrl+drag (OK, Command+Drag for me on the Mac) folders. This is called pain. My Sieve filters are also not importing without pain.

As a consequence, I’ve unsubscribed from all MySQL Lists. But that’s the point of this post – you can read all MySQL Lists using NNTP (with a newsreader of course – Thunderbird is a good one, as is Pan or slrn).

Point yourself to news://lists.mysql.com/ in your newsreader and have a good time. Less email. Still the same great lists.

A few weeks ago, I attended a fiduciary bootcamp. I didn’t even know what it meant.

“involving trust, esp. with regard to the relationship between a trustee and a beneficiary : the company has a fiduciary duty to shareholders.”

It was generally not a productive use of my time, but a choice quote through it all, caught my attention.

We need to recognize corruption for what it is. Officials who take bribes are stealing from their own people — not just money but governmental legitimacy and the hope of a better future. Their actions distort government decisions, waste scarce resources, and undermine public trust in political leaders and institutions. What’s more, corruption makes it more difficult for governments to implement laws and policies, and to attract and hold essential foreign investment.

This was presented at his keynote address at Rice University, in a talk titled “Taking a corporate stand against public corruption“. Choice reading (and I don’t normally consider reading stuff from a lawyer, choice reading).

Tomorrow (Saturday, September 20 2008) is Software Freedom Day, and we’re taking Latvia by storm! We’re hosting it at the University of Latvia, and we have an awesome schedule.

Why awesome? Because we have exciting speakers like you wouldn’t believe.

• MÃ¥rten Mickos, former CEO MySQL AB, current SVP Database Group, Sun Microsystems
• Kaj Arno, VP Community, Database Group, Sun Microsystems
• Mark Callaghan, Google Inc – he’ll be talking about running a database when your business depends on it – very cool stuff
• Domas Mituzas, Wikimedia Foundation and Sun Database Group Support Engineer

There are many, many more, but just the list above is pretty impressive if you ask me.

There is to be free lunch at the university, and in the evening at 7.30pm, there is to be free buffet dinner and beer at the Radisson SAS Daugava Hotel. Come unwind with the rest of the Sun Database Group!

So, if you’re currently not in Riga, Latvia, consider coming. Take a flight in, or if you’re in Finland, there’s a ferry; if you’re in Estonia, there’s a train; and if you’re in Lithuania, there’s a bus!

As an aside, I find it funny, that I have traditionally never been in my own country when there has been a Software Freedom Day. Last year I was in Beijing, China delivering a speech on MySQL. This year, I’m in Riga, Latvia, with the rest of the Sun Database Group for our yearly developer’s meeting.

Are you a user of Microsoft Windows? Are you a user of a non-licensed copy of Microsoft Windows? Does it happen to be Windows XP Professional? Have you seen “blackouts“?

Apparently, from about the end of last month (August 27 2008, to be precise), users of pirated copies of Microsoft Windows XP Professional that also happen to be connected to the Internet will see their screens go black, and have no icons visible.

The esteemed folk at Microsoft Malaysia seem to think that there are 8.6 million users of Windows XP Professional in Malaysia (seems like a huge number, considering the population), and about three million will suffer from these “blackouts”. Only 35% of Windows XP Professional users are pirates?

Its a most interesting tactic. Annoy the user by allowing them to change their background, and 60 minutes later, give them grief again. After all, an original copy of Windows XP Professional only costs RM580. That’s about 227 litres of unleaded petrol, at the current rate of RM2.55/L. Or nearly 6 tanks of petrol, in a more fuel efficient car. No wonder, people prefer paying RM5 for pirated media.

I don’t see why anyone in their right minds will be paying for last generation software, that already reached its end-of-life. Even industry pundits seem to think its a tactic to get people to upgrade to Windows Vista, which amongst corporations seems to have a slow uptake (read: massive failure for Microsoft’s coffers).

Software Freedom Day is this weekend (September 20 2008). Why not tell Microsoft to keep their software (and their “Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA)”), and go the open source route? There’s an alternative to almost everything they provide. I think the open source world might only be deficient for hardcore gamers (but even that’s being looked into, thanks to CodeWeavers).

That pretty much covers desktop productivity, I think. There are alternatives to IIS (Apache), MS SQL Server (MySQL), Visual Studio .NET (NetBeans, Eclipse), and the list just goes longer and longer. There is really no excuse in today’s world to be bogged down by Microsoft’s “Genuine Advantage”. Don’t even let me get started on open standards (which Microsoft flouts or doesn’t practice, period).

Don’t worry about piracy. Don’t bow down to another corporations silly moves. Think open standards. Think freedom. Just go open source.