Dougal Watt submitted this question "I have implemented a RedHat 5.1 based DNS server for an intranet, and want to install a mirrored drive array into it in case of drive failure. Does any one know a good controller/array solution?" Does someone have answers?

Nirvani writes "check here. Some other mirror have it to, ie: wcarchive. Have fun! " Ok, are we sure that this is the real one? I see files at least *grin*.

Several folks wrote in to tell the world that Red Hat Software has released v5.2 of their distribution. You can snag it from the mirror sites. For those of you on less then speedy connections, LinuxCentral is shipping the official version starting the 9th, and I'm sure the usual places will be carrying super cheap unofficial CDs just as soon as they can burn them.

An anonymous contributor wrote the following: "Intel has a private website for authorised dealers, on its "IPD" program. It also sends out by email some newsletters. They now provide "recipes" for setting up servers under Linux, as well as a few other OS types. Today in my inbox I got the following: It provides a series of PDF files showing how to set up your system, prepare disks, install Red Hat or Caldera Linux, configure LILO, XFree, and installing Apache. The PDF files have high revision numbers (1.5+), some cover Redhat 5.0, and were last changed in July, suggesting that Intel's official Linux involvement has been going on for some time." slashdot has seen proof that these documents exist and are well-written: nicely idiot proof. They'd probably be useful to the LDP if Intel were to make them generally available.

Tom Minchin writes "Red Hat 5.2 is about to be released. The directory has appeared on the mirror sites (locked down of course) and official RedHat dealers have pricing and are taking orders."

Edward C. Bailey wished to consult with you all on the following: "I've started to look at upgrading my home system (p166) to something a bit more up-to-date. However, I discovered that my current ATX case has so much stuff overhanging the motherboard there's no room for a PII, and a Xeon is just completely out of the question...;-> And I've yet to see a follow-up article from that earlier /. discussion on making cases from Legos; that might be worth considering, if I could see one first... :-) So does anyone out there have a favorite case supplier? URLs, please!" There's more! Click below...

Steve Blood, whom Nate and I have been talking to for quite some time now has officially opened the gate to thebazaar.org. New York City. Javits Hall. Many cool people (check out the list). March. Everyone must come. He also asked anyone who is interested in contributing, speaking, or just dropping a line to send some thing over here. This will be an interesting conference because it shows a different emphasis and new directions for Linux. update! Steve Blood has sent a response to the some of the comments below.

Microsoft is not going to wait for the outcome of its trial with the DOJ before attacking Linux. The battle scene is France, where Microsoft's new (expendable?) regional director Marc Chardon has just issued an open letter to his clients. Click below to read the translation of the Linux-section (it's in French) and some commentary.

Christian Selig writes "As this poll at Linux.de shows, SuSE is the preferred distribution in German-speaking countries" SuSE is the largest European commercial distribution, making it like RedHat in the US.

Oracle plans to distribute and support Linux, probably licensing an existing distribution to bundle with their database. However they will still support all 4 major distributions ( including I assume Redhat (US), Pacific HiTech (Japan) and SUSE (Europe)) wanting to be the people who are called if a user has a problem with Linux. Read more below.

Bob Young gave an interview to techweb in which he states that the Intel deal with Red Hat is not intended to give Red Hat a heads start over other Linux distributors. Ed: It would be great if Red Hat convinces Intel to make pre-announcement technology information available to the whole Linux development community. Rather like Cygnus, it appears that Red Hat does not depend on loans. This is good, and hopefully their prudent strategy will mean that if they IPO they'll keep 51% of their stock so that they cannot be bought out (and killed).

An anonymous read wrote in to say that Red Hat Software will no longer carry TriTeal CDE for Linux. They instead recommend either GNOME or CDE from XiGraphics

Donnie Barnes from Red Hat Software dropped us a line to let us know how things are going at ISPCON. Click on the link below to see the full report.

Microsoft's understanding of Intel and Netscape's recent investment in Redhat is atypically dumb. Ed Muth, enterprise marketing group manager for NT, believes that because there is no proprietary IP in Linux (GPL oblige) "there is no reason to stay in the market". Given that Microsoft is built on marketing and some level of support, I have difficulty believing this statement is anything but FUD or some smoke-screen. The article goes on to a legal-expert who seems to believe that applications use linux source code. Thanks to Dan Speers.

Bob Young, head of Redhat, gave an interview to news.com today. Apparently, Red Hat will now gain all Intel proprietary information at the same time as Microsoft does. It also believes that its new powerful friends will encourage MIS directors of large corporations to trust Linux. Moreover to further encourage this, it will be spending its newly won money on improving its support infrastructure. Ed: Given some other information I'm not at liberty to disclose, Redhat's support options may be on the verge of increasing vastly. However, there is no need for Redhat bashing since not only do they have a history of giving back, but moreover any improvements they make to Linux on the basis of proprietary information must be released with any product thanks to the GPL. Indeed, more support will only help establish Linux as a viable platform, as Marc Andresssen explains. Notice Linus' confidence in the availability of Linux apps in 3 to 5 years.

Redhat has now announced that Intel, Netscape, Greylock and Benchmark Partners have invested in it. Intel wants to target ISPs with their Linux strategy. Intel will also be joining Linux International. It will be interesting to see in which way Red Hat will react to UDI given the discussion about it on the kernel list, summarized by Linux Weekly News. (updated)

dave methvin from XIG, the guys who make Accelerated-X, Laptop-X, and a host of other X based products for x86 Unix machines wrote me recently about the XBF and related projects. I really meant to post this yesterday, but, well, higher powers had other things in mind. Anyway, click the link to read what he has to say about these projects.

Jamie writes "An article on ZdNet says that Intel and Netscape plan to Invest in Red Hat. The announcement will be made at ISPCon '98, and the money will most likely go towards creating an enterprise support group within RedHat. "

Well, RedHat and XBF project keeps coming up with new developemtns. This time is a full X server for the i740 based chipset cards.

Michael Wood writes in with a problem I myself have experienced from time to time. Here's it is: I've recently installed RedHat 5.1 on a pentium ii w/ 64 MB ram, S3 Virge/GX AGP video card, and SB AWE 64. X (or Linux or something) seems to be very unstable. If I start X, open an xterm and type "ls -lR /" (or various other commands) as a normal user the machine hangs solid after a small amount of output. I've done this a few times while trying to figure out what's going on, while running "while sync; do sleep 1; done" from a virtual console. While the while loop is running, the hard drive makes a noise every second as expected. When the machine hangs the hard drive is completely quiet, so it's not just X that's hung. Ctrl-Alt-Del does nothing. Keyboard leds do nothing. Can you help him out? Hit the link for more...