OpenOffice 2.0 is out, and generating good news: Google throws bodies at OpenOffice and OpenDocument format gathers steam (IBM, others host conference to build on Mass.' statement of direction.)

Tim Coyle over at eHomeUpgrade has some excellent points about why Firefox extensions are a better place than Google to integrate all your Web resources. (Why Firefox is Web 2.0, Google Doesn't Get It and Microsoft Is Back in the Game) But even if that's true for now, I'd still like to keep the configuration data for my Firefox stack on the web, so that when I move from machine to machine I get the same consistent experience.

Lockergnome claims to be "Your Top Technology Information Resource!" and it certainly looks like they have a good list of tutorials. Also sections on Search technology and techniques, Internet Marketing, RSS, Hot downloads, Tech Newswatch, plus Linux, Windows and general IT posts. For instance here's a an Oct.2005 intro to Keyword Suggestion Tools for SEO (Search Engine Optimization) including the Google Suggest beta.

Serendipity strikes -- Librarian Blogs
While poking around the Forbes RSS feeds and trying to get a custom feed to work, I found this list at the host pubsub site: PubSub Community Lists: The Librarian List, which lead me to this top-ranked tech-librarian: The LibrarianInBlack, which is my kind of space. That in turn lead me to a neat intro on Web 2.0, with a fine list of citations. And now it turns out that the PubSub Community Lists are really new, witness this Nov.7th announcement from Steven Cohen, over at Information Today.

Microsoft will wipe Sony's 'rootkit' | CNET News.com: Microsoft is following the other big anti-virus security vendors in deciding to zap the unwelcome bits added by recent Sony BMG CDs -- "To protect Windows users, Microsoft plans to update Windows AntiSpyware and the Malicious Software Removal Tool as well as the online scanner on Windows Live Safety Center to detect and remove the Sony BMG software, the software maker said in its anti-malware team blog."

Trillian Discussion Forums - SUPPORT: MSN Err 0:0 looks like good advice for 2 out of my 3 machines that have stopped working with MSN.

Lockergnome's Problem Solvers -> Is Rdxie.dll malware, as Spybot 1.3 says: "The experts here will know much better, but i believe it is spyware in a sense: it's from Real Networks and deals with the transmission of ads & usage statistics re Real Player... btw: there's a spy-free version of it here(make sure to totally uninstall the old version first, of all will be for naught): http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/audiohelp_install.shtml"

FlexWiki: Microsoft's latest Open Source project has some very cool features including... "Federation and namespaces - When there are many somewhat related Wiki sites, it's often hard to get them to link together smoothly. FlexWiki has some very cool features to support this scenario. Specifically, a single installation of FlexWiki (called a WikiFederation) can bind together multiple WikiBases. All topics in a WikiBase live in a TopicNamespace. See WikiFederationOverview. "

Home PCs not as protected as owners think: "While 77% of the survey respondents believed they were safe from online threats, two-thirds lacked current anti-virus software and did not use any firewall protection. More than half said they did not understand the difference between the two.
Yet 84% stored personal data on their home PCs, and 72% routinely used the Internet for sensitive transactions, such as banking and medical data exchanges.
When technicians examined their PCs, they found 80% loaded with dozens of spyware programs that track the user's Web-browsing habits. Cybercrooks also have begun spreading a more invasive kind of spyware, called keystroke loggers, that steal logins and passwords as the user types them in. " [USATODAY.com]

Tabbed Browsers Can Disclose Confidential Info: "Among the affected browsers are Mozilla 1.7.2 and 1.7.3, Firefox 0.10.1, Opera 6.x and Opera 7.x, Safari 1.x, Netscape 7.x, and Konqueror 3.x.
Some of the flawed browsers have already been repaired or will be fixed shortly. Konqueror, for instance, closed the vulnerability in the version shipped with KDE 3.3.1, while the newest versions of the Mozilla/Firefox browsers have been patched against the second of the vulnerabilities. Opera said it will correct the issue in the upcoming version 7.60 (the current version of Opera is 7.54).
According to Secunia, users should either disable JavaScript within their browsers, or not visit trusted Web sites--such as financial institutions or retail sites--when tabs showing untrusted sites are also open. "

Yahoo! News - New IE Bugs Open Up XP SP2 To Attack: "As is its usual practice when it touts critical problems in IE, Secunia recommended that users either disable Active Scripting in the browser, or switch to an alternate, such as Mozilla's Firefox."

XStandard Lite XHTML WYSIWYG Editor: "IE/Mozilla/Firefox/ActiveX control -- The Lite version of XStandard is freeware and can be used in commercial applications. Features not supported in the Lite version include the ability to customize the toolbar, Word clean-up, and features dependent on Web Services (ex: spell checker, communication with third-party content, file drag & drop). "

InformationWeek > Sun Microsystems > Sun's Extreme Makeover > October 18, 2004: "Sun has been standing its business model on its head--transforming its most-important commercial software into open source, embracing standard chipsets, converting rivals into partners, and tailoring subscription-style services.. Next month, Sun is bringing out Solaris 10, an upgrade to its flagship Unix operating system that's more finely tuned for x86 microprocessors. This week, it's unveiling more pay-by-the-drink pricing options for grid computing. By year's end, it plans to finalize a sweeping plan to make its software available as open source, including a version of Solaris. And around the first of the year, it promises interoperability with Microsoft's identity-management and directory-services products.

Sun is betting it can make money from service and support agreements, not unlike Red Hat Inc.'s approach to Linux. "'f you want it fully supported or want input into new features, then you might have to pay for that,' Loiacono says.

It's part of a broader push into a software-as-services model. Sun provides hosted storage on an as-needed basis, and, in January, it established a $100-per-seat model for its Java Enterprise development platform, which has attracted more than 345,000 customers. Sun also introduced in September hosted grid computing for $1 per processor per hour and this week will disclose details of a plan for third-party hosting.

November's Solaris 10 launch comes after much work to optimize the operating system to run on x86 microprocessors from Intel and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. Sun finally hopes to smash the perception that Solaris' quality and performance come at a steep premium. Solaris is 'cheaper than Windows and less expensive than any of the major Linux distributions,' Loiacono contends.

In addition, Sun is almost ready to play its Microsoft card. Having reached earlier this year a $2 billion legal settlement that included cross-licensing of technology and a joint-development agreement, Sun and Microsoft have identified up to 20 areas of potential collaboration. Within the next 90 days, they'll deliver the first fruits of that work.

The companies will provide single-sign-on capability for Microsoft's Active Directory and the Java Enterprise LDAP Directory. Sun's CTO, Greg Papadopoulos, and Microsoft's chairman and chief software architect, Bill Gates, have been working closely the past few months on a road map to bridge the Sun and Microsoft environments. The companies say they'll unveil integration products a few times a year over the next 10 years, concentrating initially on interoperability among their messaging services, applications, and systems management. 'I don't anticipate that Microsoft is going to do any kind of similar deal with any of our major competitors,' Loiacono says. 'We have the inroad into technology and interoperability with them. Red Hat's not going to have this capability.'"

Web Application Performance Management Software: ProactiveNet: "ProactiveNet provides real-time application, SLA and infrastructure performance analytics software. Based on patented analytical technologies, ProactiveNet is an essential and cost-effective addition to traditional systems management and performance monitoring tools. By leveraging existing data collection methods, ProactiveNet provides end-to-end visibility into the source of application performance issues."

Software disasters are often people problems

Big software projects -- whether to manage supply chains, handle payroll, track inventory, prepare finances -- tend to begin with high expectations and the best intentions. They're all about efficiency, reliability, cost-savings, competitiveness.

Companies might develop their own programs internally, outsource the job or buy from a company such as SAP AG, Oracle Corp. or PeopleSoft Inc. Regardless of the route, it's usually a major undertaking to get things right. Often, however, the first step toward total disaster is taken before the first line of code is drawn up. Organizations must map out exactly how they do business, refining procedures along the way. All this must be clearly explained to a project's technical team.

"The risk associated with these projects is not around software but is around the actual business process redesign that takes place," said Bill Wohl, an SAP spokesman. "These projects require very strong executive leadership, very talented consulting resources and a very focused effort if the project is to be successful and not disruptive."

A 2002 study commissioned by the National Institute of Standards and Technology found software bugs cost the U.S. economy about $59.5 billion (euro48.35 billion) annually. The same study found that more than a third of that cost -- about $22.2 billion (euro18.04 billion) -- could be eliminated by improving testing.

Style Guide for Online Hypertext: This w3c piece by Tim Berners-Lee goes back to 1992, but has been maintained over the years. It is still a seminal introduction to things a new webmaster needs to remember. When you need an introduction to specific web site technologies, the w3c Tutorials are a good place to look.

What is a URI? It looks like the usage of this term has evolved. Around 1999, an article on URx said that "Uniform Resource Indicators (URI) are in development. URIs are defined as ASCII-based character string network protocols that represent communications streams... Identifiers are proxies for resources. A human being (resource) is labeled by a name (identifier), books are known by ISBN codes."

However the HTML 4.0 Recommendation and Terena's Guide to Network Resource Tools describe URI's as simply the protocol + host + path-within-host. Which leaves me wondering Is a URL any different from a URI? "URLs form a subset of the more general URI naming scheme."

The definitive clarification would be the w3C report URIs, URLs, and URNs: Clarifications and Recommendations 1.0 which "addresses how URI space is partitioned and the relationship between URIs, URLs, and URNs.... URL is a useful but informal concept: a URL is a type of URI that identifies a resource via a representation of its primary access mechanism (e.g., its network "location"), rather than by some other [identifying] attributes it may have. " By adding that "an http URI is a URL, " this puts our minds at rest -- we do not need to look for a distinction in http-space. "urn:isbn:n-nn-nnnnnn-n" is also a URI, but one based on an identifier (ISBN) rather than a location, and hence is not commonly referred to as a URL.

So we may as well just use the term URI universally, but there's nothing wrong with using URL in the context of location-oriented mechanisms like http. Some useful historical context is outlined at the http://www.w3.org/Addressing/.

Content Management Systems (CMS) Directory: Browse: Products:Free systems

Open-source CMS: On the rise - TechUpdate - ZDNet: "Here's a look at some of the issues enterprises need to evaluate when looking at open-source CMS products, and how four of the main open-source contenders--Zope, Midgard, OpenCms, and Red Hat CCM--stack up"

Tomcat Links
Jakarta Tomcat Wiki
Tomcat 5 Documentation

Google Search: hosting jsp linux

Google Search: open source content management hosting united states

General information about Drupal | drupal.org: "A dynamic web site platform which allows an individual or community of users to publish, manage and organize a variety of content, Drupal integrates many popular features of content management systems, weblogs, collaborative tools and discussion-based community software "

Web Hosting Industry News | OSI Expands Open Source Hosting: "September 16, 2004 -- (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) -- Colocation, dedicated server and Web hosting provider OSI Hosting (osihosting.com) announced on Wednesday that it has signed a deal to acquire facilities in seven locations across the United States. ... its dedicated server offerings will exclusively run open source software."

BlackboardBlog: Ocotillo: blogs, wikis, discussion boards are standing by: "Each group publishes their activities, findings, ideas on a weblog. Each group also has a wiki of its own to build collaborative resources, and a discussion board to have 'conversations' ... The weblog is where groups publish updates, information, commentary. Ideas are exchanged in the discussion area while the wiki is the place where anyone can collaboratively build resource collections. ... So four groups times a blog, wiki, and board = 12 information sources plus a blog for the General faculty Ocotillo chair and we have it all tied together with RSS or RSS-like feeds to present a dashboard view of all the activity... we call Ocotillo Central"

OpenPortal CMF for any host with PHP: "Installing OpenPortal CMF simply requires you to have access to a server running PHP. You don't need MySQL, but can use it if you like. Once you are all setup with PHP, you simply have to download the OpenPortal CMF installation package, unzip it, upload it to your server, and follow the on-screen instructions." See the downloads page for some more Open Source / free tools.

Authena Open Source CMS & DRM :: Marrying Open Source Digital Rights Management (DRM) to Open Source Content Management Systems (CMS)

StuffIt Expander: When some files are delivered via email, they're encoded in a standard Internet format known as 'MIME.' Most email programs support this standard, and will transparently decode the 'MIME' file for you. A few email programs, and any web-based email systems (like Yahoo Mail, Juno.com, and others) have trouble with the MIME files. StuffIt Expander can decode these files for you when your email program can't. It's available for free in both Macintosh and Windows versions.

Why the JDK 1.4 Release Is Faster
• Reflection: More than 20 times faster
• Java Native Interface (JNI)
– 78% faster to call native code
– 38% for C code to call Java code
• Serialization: 30–300% faster
• Better GC sizing out of the box
• JIT Improvements
– Array bounds check eliminations, more loop optimization, better inlining

ZSearch has an intriguing "Librarian's Toolbox", including a SpyRemover.