Linus Torvalds announced the release of Linux 2.6.34, which is notable for adding two filesystems: Ceph for distributed and cloud-based applications, and LogFS, which is optimized for flash-memory based devices. Other new features include a faster KVM virtualization driver based on Vhost.net technology, says LinuxPlanet.com.

Many users of open source software point to the fact that their applications and platforms are more secure than proprietary alternatives simply because they aren't such obvious targets for malware distribution. As just one example, the Standish Group recently completed a survey in which 70 percent of respondents said Red Hat Linux is less vulnerable to security threats than Windows.

The RC2 release of Mandriva Linux 2009 Spring (code name Estephe) is now available. This RC2 version provides some updates on major desktop components of the distribution, including KDE 4.2.2, GNOME 2.26,X.org server 1.6, kernel 2.6.29.

Brian Proffitt recently tackled the topic of distro-hopping over on LinuxPlanet. Proffitt wonders whether the practice might be passe or something to be discouraged, but it's here to stay and should be encouraged rather than looked at askew. Distro-hopping, if you're not familiar with the term, is the practice of switching Linux distributions.

It has been more than two years since the Yin and Yang article was published on LinuxPlanet, a long time in the information and communications technology world. The purpose of that article was to highlight the opportunity for greater entrepreneurial focus to gain broad, fast adoption of Linux and open source computing solutions.

I recently read the discussion on the GCC development mailing list related to GCC's transition to GPLv3. Despite generating 172 emails, the transition was quite smooth actually.

The OLPC project has begun production and everyone wants to have a say. The articles I found all had slightly different slants or information, but not different enough to warrant posting each story as a separate entry. Of course, some opinions are far more positive than others!

Here are the links to the stories I found. If you want to add other links in the comments, feel free.

$100 laptop' production begins (the BBC News)
Linux powered OLPC unable to hit $100 target price (DaniWeb)
Getting to know the OLPC's 'XO' (desktoplinux.com)

"Dion Almaer is a name you will find 80,700 results for when searching on Google, so it is clear that people know how Dion Almaer is however, let's kick this interview of with, like the shower scene in a slasher movie, the obligatory first question, who is Dion Almaer? ..." --