Several readers have submitted word (this one comes from n8twj) that "CNet News is reporting that AOL Time Warner apparently is NOT making a bid to buy Linux manufacturer Red Hat, said sources familiar with the matter."

fingerLess asks: "I recently got pushed over the edge in keyboard use. I use Linux and wanted to find a good voice-to-text solution I can use on Linux on my laptop. It seems the IBM ViaVoice I found was still at 1.0 and there was even some questions if it was still available. But if it isn't being worked on, is it worth it? Has anyone tried any voice products running on top of one of the win-virtual machines and had had any success? My experience with those indicate top much of a performance hit in the AV department (AV seems not to be a real high priority with such products aimed at business or 'Office' productivity). Ideas?" For a while there, it looked like speech recognition was progressing at a pretty good clip, especially with Big Blue leading the charge. However I haven't heard of anything revolutionary happening with this technology for the past 2 years. Did I miss something, or has voice recognition on the desktop lagged.

According to MartinG, Alan has posted to the LKML and said "Im insulted that anyone believes I would continue working for RH if aol/time warner owned them. " This of course refers to the Red Hat/AOL Buyout Rumors that we have been talking about all weekend.

qaseem asks: "I am looking for benchmark results of various applications (DB, WebAS, mail, etc.) on Linux on the S/390 mainframe. I am also looking for tools to stress test these applications when installed in the S/390 Linux partition. I was wondering if anyone has seen such information or tried such tools. On a side note I am also interested in finding a way to relate the MIPS speed of the S/390 to the world of MHz or GHz on other platforms."

Dante wrote in to say "I just read this on the Linux Kernel mailing list, it's from Peter Anvin, one of the ftp.kernel.org maintainers...

andyo from O'Reilly submitted linkage to a report he wrote over there where he urges Red Hat to think twice about letting AOL eat them. Talks about GNN, as well as Netscape. I'm sure this isn't the last word we'll hear on this subject either.

Over at Newsforge, Grant Gross has written an interesting overview of the options available for hosting multiple Linux installations on virtual machines; interestingly, it's not just for those with the big bucks for high-end IBM hardware, though that's surely nice.

bstadil sent in this rumor. The Washington Post isn't exactly a rumor site, so there's probably truth behind it. Wow. It would make a great deal of sense for AOL/Time-Warner to acquire an operating system for leverage against Microsoft - same reason they bought Netscape.

Tom F writes: "LinuxDevices did an interesting interview with Robert Love, the maintainer of the Linux preemptible kernel along with MontaVista. It is an exciting read and has Robert's usual wit and insight."

drwho writes "This just unveiled at the BAWUG meeting tonight: Linux firmware for Access Points. Check this URL for more info. I haven't tried it yet but it looks great!" The upshot is that certain Access Points can be flashed with a stripped-down Linux system, which makes them more flexible than they'd be under the included firmware. There are even some screenshots of a modded access point booting up.

ladislavb writes: "Sorcerer GNU Linux is not just another Linux distribution. It did not follow the tried and tested path of modifying a major Linux distribution and releasing it under a new name. Instead, the Sorcerer development team embarked on a completely unconventional way of putting together a unique distribution with features not found anywhere else. Once installed, it will be 100% optimised for your hardware, it will include the very latest Linux applications and it will provide an incredibly convenient way of keeping all software, even essential system libraries, up-to-date. The full review of Sorcerer GNU Linux, as written by DistroWatch.com."

diwolf writes "I've looked high and low, but haven't found a real Customer Relationship Manager for Linux. I used to use ACT! for Windows (bad word, blah, blah, blah), and loved it. But, I can't find anything similar on Linux. Does this mean I have to dust off my progamming skills and write my own? Or, is there an ACT! clone that's GPL'ed and just waiting for my download?" A ZDNet article from over a year ago also makes this point stating that Linux "still falls short when it comes to supporting workloads required by applications like ERP (enterprise resource planning), business intelligence, CRM (customer relationship management) and supply chain planning". Now it's a year later, and SourceForge has racked up an impressive array of CRM related projects. For those with experience with some of these Linux CRM solutions, how well do they stack up to other well known offerings in this arena?

DeadBugs writes: "Linux Weekly News is reporting on a new linux controversy. The inclusion of a Kernel Autoconfiguration program that would make it easy for almost anybody to build a custom Kernel on their computer. Eric Raymond supports this idea saying that this will bring Linux to a wider market. Those that oppose this idea mainly think that only those educated few should custom build their own Kernels. I for one hope this gets included if only to make standard installations and upgrades faster."

crow_t_robot asks: "In the past couple of months I have become increasingly interested in kernel programming and have finally decided to take the leap and 'get my hands dirty.' I have searched around the web and read a few docs and FAQs on getting started with the kernel but I was wondering what kind of personal experiences those in the Slashdot crowd have had that are so bold as to start goofing with the kernel code. For those that have become competent kernel programmers, how did you 'break in' and what advice would you give beginners?"

Kumar asks: "I'm trying to make a bootable Linux CD with nothing more than XFree86 4 and ogle to play DVDs. I'm trying to make it as simple as possible: boot the system, change the CD, hit 'play'. If anyone has attempted anything like this before I'd like to hear of their successes and/or any tips on achieving this goal." A Linux box set up like this might make a nice alternative to an expensive DVD player. Is anyone working on something like this?

Joshua Drake has written an article for LinuxWorld.com called The Kernel of Pain. He seems to think 2.4 is fine for desktop systems but is only now, after a year of release, approaching stability for high-end use. Slashdot has had its own issues with 2.4, so I know where he's coming from. What have your experiences been? Is it still too soon for 2.4?

CustomDesigned asks: "We are looking at the feasibility of mirroring all changes to selected filesystems to a hot backup over an internet or WAN link. This would provide a degree of protection for a business in the wake of a disaster like Sep 11. It seems that journaling filesystems have much of the work already done. All that is needed is a hook to copy log data into a message queueing system for delivery to the hot backup, and then running fsck for the unmounted file system to apply each log update. (This is more complex for ext3 where the log data is kept internally within the filesystem.) One problem is that JFS (and I presume ext3) only journal filesystem metadata. Has anyone seen a fully journaling filesystem? Is there any other work on remote hot backups for Linux? The toolset for any such capability should include a way to measure bandwidth required for a given filesystem without actually doing it. This would allow intelligent administrative decisions to balance bandwidth costs against traditional removable media backups."

ofels writes: "In the discussion of replacing the outdated Windows NT machines in the german Bundestag with open source based software, the german social democratic party (SPD), currently in charge of government, has opened up an online discussion channel for opinions on working with open source and Linux. Make sure you walk by and make your voice heard."

Jeremy writes "KernelTrap has spoken with Linux guru Alan Cox. He is perhaps the second most influental Linux kernel hacker, next only to Linus. In this interview he talks about himself, his history with computers and Linux, working for Red Hat, Marcello and the 2.4 kernel, the DMCA, the future of Linux and much more."

Andrea Scrimieri writes " An Interesting interview with Rik van Riel, the kernel developer, in which he talks about the Linux's VM, particurarly about his own implementation (which was recently adopted in Alan Cox's tree). With some controversy towards Linus Torvalds. "