Dell announced first to market availability of Version 7 of the Red Hat Linux operating system on Dell PowerEdge servers and Dell Precision Workstations worldwide. The new operating system is also available on select configurations of Dell

desktop and notebook PC products.

Graphics and security are two areas that were improved in Red Hat 7.0. The new release is based on the 2.2.16 Linux kernel; it includes XFree 4.0, Mesa. In a major change of philosophy, most network services will now be turned off by default at installation instead of being turned on.

Corel has a new management and new owners, there's a rescue plan in place and there will be some product rationalisation. Linux is likely to feature strongly in these changes.

Not only does Linux have two distinct GUI environments from which to choose and customize, it also has at least a dozen window managers that sit on top of those environments, and each has its own unique themes. It's enough to make decorating your desktop space a Major Project.

Linux continues to make inroads into the Far East, with contributions ranging from embedded devices and wireless services in Korea to hosting the number one Olympic Web site in China. The OS's Asian enthusiasts seem eager to put Linux's muscle behind big business operations.

Despite all the glitzy announcements and high expectations, there is still a lot of hard, serious groundwork to be done to ensure that Linux systems are successful players in the enterprise computing arena.

Open-source guru and accidental revolutionary Eric S. Raymond wants the code to be open, the bits to be free and the government to butt out.

SGI and IBM have been making major announcements all year about giving proprietary high-end Unix code to Linux. The only thing missing is the official vendor announcements that their proprietary Unices are on the way out.

Githogori, a former software researcher at the Xerox Research Center, is preaching the gospel of Linux. He's convinced that the free software model is the only way for Africa to ever leapfrog its status as an underdeveloped continent.

Lineo's uClinux is a micro version of Linux that can be used in devices that use processors without a memory management unit.