Table of Contents

• Next General Meeting is August 8
  • Tutorial: Passwords (Part One) by Stan Reichardt
  • Presentation: Open Source Software: Ready for Prime Time? by Dr. Myles Bogner
• Next Linux Meeting is August 16
  • Presentation: Jabber - Instant Messaging and Beyond by Matthew Porter
• Book Specials
• Calendar of Events
• Meeting Directions
• Articles
• BBS Happenings
• Biotech Follow-up
• Annual Linux Showcase
• Life Markers
• Quotes
• Special Interest Groups (SIGs)
• St. Louis Linux Users Group
• Steering Committee
• Sponsors
• SLUUG on the World Wide Web
• SLUUG Administration is volunteer based.
• /usr/groups/other
• Contacts
• Submitting Articles to the SLUUG CRONicle
• SLUUG PO Box

Next Meeting Details

Tutorial

Abstract:
Passwords are the magic words that let authorized users work on computers while keeping others out. But, really, "Part One"!? Just how much can be said about this subject?

Well, Stan likes to make a lot of slides. He roughed out about 30 slides a few months back and took up two full hours defending them before the Hazelwood Linux Users Group meeting. It may have been that he had put something interesting together. Nobody fell asleep and everybody learned something that they didn't know before.

You can expect a somewhat structured ramble through the wonderful world surrounding the front door key to Unix security. Nothing highly complex, yet worth discussion. Too much to cover in one tutorial session but interesting enough to continue next month.

Bio:
We suspect that Stan Reichardt has some level of education, that he is licensed to drive his pickup truck, and that his employment has often been doing things other than his job title.

With a twinkle in his eye he recounts contract work with the US Post Office and Full Time active duty with the US Army Reserve. A life time member of the NRA that seldom shoots anymore, he is quite proud of a marksmanship trophy he got in 1990. The only other thing he is personally proud of from his military service is a bourne shell script application he wrote during his last two months with the US Army Reserve Command in Atlanta.

He is too cheap for the latest technical gadgets and his devotion to the VIM text editor (a "vi" emulation) is quite strong. For the last four years his personal choice of Operating Systems has been RedHat Linux.

His philosophy of life is that even though Y2K was a let down, similar opportunities happen all the time. Ask about his kitchen.

Stan was the volunteer SLUUG newsletter editor from Feb 1999 to Feb 2001. He has given various SLUUG tutorials and presentations. He acted as the "Beach Master" co-ordinator during the March 2001 St. Louis Linux Install-Fest. Currently he is the "Dictator for Life" heading up the Hazelwood Linux Users Group for "newbies" and he constantly attends our SLUUG Steering Committee meetings.

Check out Stan's personal web page at http://www.sluug.org/~stan for a glimpse of his subtle sense of humor about vacations and near death. Questions and comments are welcome. Contact Stan Reichardt via email to stan@mail.sluug.org or by phone at 314-298-1183.

Presentation

Abstract:
With the successes of the Linux operating system and Apache web server, many IT executives today are beginning to leverage Open Source software. A major question prevails: how far can open source software take my organization?

This talk gives a brief overview of the Open Source movement. It then describes how to build an e-commerce web application using entirely open source software. Technologies utilized include Linux, Java, and XML.

Bio:
Dr. Myles Bogner is Vice President of Research and Development for Asynchrony Solutions, Inc. He has extensive experience designing and realizing "smart" e-commerce and artificial intelligence software. Myles has developed leading edge solutions (primarily in Java) for venture-backed clients, medium and large sized corporations, and government agencies. He is an excellent leader in task management and has a refereed publications record. Myles is a vibrant instructor and continues to give invited talks. He has been a key team member of several interdisciplinary teams.

Myles received both his Master's and Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Memphis in a stellar three years after his B.S. in Computer Science from Rhodes College.

Ideas, questions and suggestions are welcome; please contact Christine Wanta (mailto:cfw1@mail.sluug.org).

Next St. Louis Linux Users Group Meeting Is August 16

Abstract:
Over the past few years, instant messaging (IM) has grown from a small niche market to the latest "must-have" technology. While IM competition between the big companies like Microsoft, Yahoo! and America Online has grown quite fierce, the open source community has remained strangely quiet. Without the open source community pushing for a standardization of IM protocol, the numerous competitors have kept their developments highly proprietary. While recent developments have prodded key players to pay lip service to standardization, the fruits of these efforts remain to be seen. Without a major open source project to uphold the standards and promote cooperation, users are left to the whims of large, faceless companies, interoperability flounders and outside development is non-existent.

Jabber is a completely open source, cross platform, feature rich, developer friendly, standards compliant IM platform. By upholding the standards of groups such as the IETF IMPP group, as well as creating a "translation" system between IM networks, Jabber promotes increased progress and frees users from negotiating which platform to use so they can focus on the point of IM: communication.

Bio:
Matthew Porter is a graduate of Saint Louis Univeristy - Parks College. He has a Bachelors of Science in Computer Science and is planning to return for a Masters in Computer Science in the near-term future. Matthew is currently a Java architect and software developer at Demand Management, Inc. where he is working with a talented team to build the company's next-generation product. When not coding, Matthew can be found driving his 1969 Ford Mustang Mach I.

Meetings of the St. Louis Linux User Group (LUG) are held from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM every THIRD THURSDAY of each month. Location: Indian Trails Branch - Saint Louis County Library. Meetings are free and open to everyone. Refer to http://www.stllinux.org for details and maps.

Comments, questions and ideas for the St. Louis Linux Users Group are welcome; please send email to linux@mail.sluug.org

Special Promotions

Special of the Month The August special will be: All Linux titles - 30% off All Microsoft titles - 70% off All other titles - 25% off

The O'Reilly and Associates line of books is available at each monthly general meeting as a convenience to our members. Most months we feature special offers on titles related to that month's presentation or tutorial topic. Discounts off retail prices are offered to all attendees.

Calendar of Events

Meeting Directions

Directions From Downtown

1. Take 40 West to the Hanley exit.
2. Turn left (south) onto Hanley.
3. Turn left (east) onto Manchester, then turn right ASAP into the Sunnen Products driveway.

(NOTE: A security guard from Sunnen is scheduled to be at the door from 6:20 PM to 7:20 PM to allow entry. After 7:20, the door will be unattended and attendees may not be able to enter.)

The SLUUG Steering Committee meets the Monday following the general meeting at 6:00 PM in the 2nd floor training room of Daugherty Systems, One City Place in Creve Coeur.

The St. Louis Linux Users Group meets the 3rd Thursday of every month at the Indian Trails Branch Library.

See map at http://www.stllinux.org/directions/

NOTE: These articles may express personal opinions and SLUUG exerts no more editorial control over such content than does a public library, bookstore, or newsstand. Any opinions, advice, statements, services, offers, or other information or content expressed herein are those of the respective authors and not necessarily supported by SLUUG. SLUUG does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any content, nor its merchantability or fitness for any particular purpose.

BBS Happenings

Several projects are in progress to improve SLUUG's computer systems, also known as the BBS. Work should be completed within a couple of months.

Configuration of a new mail server (i.e. a replacement for michelob) has started. Major new features include: 12GB of disk space vs. 3.5GB, 1GB memory vs. 64MB, a processor that is 3 times faster, and AIX 5L with many GNU utilities and Linux "application compatability".

A new Xyplex terminal server, for dial-up access, is now being tested. The main enhancement is a later release of the software which should further improve reliability. It will also provide the base for future security enhancements.

Account payments are now due for renewal. Emails will be sent out soon. Please make plans to pay as soon as you can. Payments may be made by mail, or at any regular meeting, and may be by check, credit card, or cash. Please contact Gary Meyer (gary@mail.sluug.org) for questions about BBS billing or to sign up for an account.

If you wish to help with the BBS or the upgrades, please contact Mike Knight.

Biotech Follow-up

At the July SLUUG general meeting, Robert Citek gave a presentation on genomic research and his work at Washington University maintaining their high-performance computing cluster. The presentation was well-received, and many people were eager to learn more about the topic. Robert posted these URLs, some of which he mentioned during his presentation, and some of which provide additional information.

Wash-U lab web site:

• Twinscan (http://genes.cs.wustl.edu)

  Genome Centers, data and software repositories:

• The National Center for Biotechnology Information (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov)
  • Home of GenBank and BLAST
• The Sanger Center (http://www.sanger.ac.uk)
  • Home of Acedb
• Genome Sequencing Center at Wash-U St. Louis (http://genome.wustl.edu/gsc)
  • Home of WU-BLAST and other software for licensing

  Journals/Magazines:

• Nature (http://www.nature.com)
• Science (http://www.sciencemag.org)
• Scientific American article (http://www.sciam.com/2000/0700issue/0700howard.html)

  OpenSources for bioinformatics:

• The Open Bioinformatics Foundation (http://open-bio.org)
  • Includes links to bioperl, biopython, biojava, bioxml, biocorba, biodas
• FreeBSD ports of lots of goodies (http://www.freebsd.org/ports/biology.html)

  Books to get started:

• Developing Bioinformatics Computer Skills (http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/bioskills)
• Genetic Switch: Phage Lambda and Higher Organisms
• Biological Sequence Analysis: Probabilistic Models of Proteins and Nucleic Acids

  Conferences:

• O'Reilly Bioinformatics Technology Conference (http://conferences.oreilly.com/biocon/cfp.html)
• Intelligent Systems for Molecular Biology (ISMB) (http://ismb01.cbs.dtu.dk)
• Bioinformatics Open Source Conference (BOSC) (http://open-bio.org/bosc2001)

Annual Linux Showcase

5th Annual Linux Showcase and Conference (http://www.linuxshowcase.org)

• November 5-10, 2001
• Oakland Convention Center, Oakland, CA

Each year, the best and the brightest in the Open Source and Linux community come together at one technical conference, the Annual Linux Showcase and Conference. Now in its fifth year, ALS continues its remarkable development as the premiere technical Linux conference for savvy system administrators, end users, enthusiasts, and developers.

• Enhance your already sophisticated technical skills
• Gain mastery of complex techniques and technologies from the experts
• Take home the solutions and knowledge to get immediate payoff within your organization.

The ALS conference starts out with a Tutorial Program, November 5-7, 2001. In the tutorials, you can gain mastery of complex techniques and technologies through in-depth instruction. The 12 tutorials deliver immediately useful information. Both full and half-day tutorials are offered.

The tutorial program will be followed by three days of technical sessions, an XFree86 technical conference and a free vendor exhibition showcasing the products and services of over 70 top Linux companies including Compaq, Hewlett-Packard Company, Red Hat, Inc., Sun Microsystems, Inc., SuSE Inc. and VA Linux Systems Inc.

For the complete conference schedule and to register visit http://www.linuxshowcase.org/.

Life Markers

O'Reilly And Associates editor-in-chief, Frank Willison, died Monday, July 30th. Over the years, you may have read his oreilly.com column, Frankly Speaking. Tim O'Reilly shares his thoughts on Frank and the impact he had as well as his famous wit, wisdom, humor, and humanity at http://www.oreilly.com/news/frank_0701.html. A memorial page has been set up at http://labs.oreilly.com/cgi-bin/frank.

In happier news, we'd like to wish Kara and Steven Pritchard congratulations on the birth of their first child. Emma Margaret Pritchard was born on Thursday, July 26. Mother and baby are doing great, and father is only slightly in shock. Given her lineage, Emma should be giving presentations at LUG meetings any day now. Pictures can be found at http://www.silug.org/~emma/ and http://www.growingfamily.com/webnursery/hospitals/template/babypage.asp?URLID=7L3C6W4K4W.

Quotes

Those who make peaceful change impossible make violent change inevitable.
 -- John F. Kennedy

It's kind of like a magazine subscription -- I get one every month.
 -- Dave Odevich, referring to Outlook viruses

Rich: Have you noticed the traffic out there?
Craig: No, I haven't checked my email since Friday.
Rich: No, the traffic on Olive.

I'd rather listen to [Sir Isaac] Newton than to [Microsoft's VP Craig] 
Mundie. He may have been dead for almost three hundred years, but 
despite that he stinks up the room less.
 -- Linus

What's weirder -- this haircut, or the fact that he has a razor with him?
 -- Buch Pyland

The government cannot take down Microsoft, 
but Microsoft can take down the government.
 -- devphil on Slashdot, in reference to the Code Red virus,
    which takes advantage of a hole in IIS to attack whitehouse.gov

Mike is mail police
He saves us from port two five
Mike could use procmail
 -- David Ulevich

Give a programmer a computer that runs twice as fast, he/she
will produce code that runs ten times slower.
 -- Unknown
 
EMACS: Eight Megs And Constantly Swapping
EMACS: Escape, Meta, Alt, Control, Shift
EMACS: EMACS Makes A Computer Slow
EMACS: Eventually malloc()'s All Computer Storage 
EMACS: Equine Mammals Are Considerably Smaller
EMACS: Excavating Mayan Architecture Comes Simpler

I use both Emacs and an IDE. If my left hand hurts, I've been using
Emacs for too long. If my right hand hurts, I've been using the IDE 
for too long.
 -- Michael Tiemann

It's hard enough to justify our own existence, much less that of a bacteria.
 -- Craig Buchek, in answer to the question "Why do bacteria exist?"

Special Interest Groups (SIGs)

St. Louis Linux Users Group

Indian Trails Library
8400 Delport Drive (at Midland)
(314) 428-5424

For more information on the St. Louis Linux Users Group, refer to the web page at http://www.stllinlux.org or contact Craig Buchek (linux@mail.sluug.org).

St. Louis UNIX Users Group Steering Committee

Sponsors

• Analysts International http://www.analysts.com/
• Accenture (formerly Andersen Consulting) http://www.accenture.com/
• Bradford & Galt http://www.bradfordandgalt.com/
• CIBER, Inc. http://www.ciber.com/
• Cybercon http://www.cybercon.com/
• Cypress Systems, Ltd. http://www.cypress-systems.com/
• Daugherty Systems http://www.daugherty.com/
• Informix Corporation http://www.informix.com/
• Maryville Data Systems, Inc. http://www.maryville.com/
• Maverick Tube Corporation http://www.mverick-tube.com/.
• O'Reilly & Associates http://www.ora.com/
• Renaissance Worldwide, Inc. http://www.rens.com/
• Sacerdoti Linux Machines http://www.slinuxmachines.com/ {link may be down}
• Sun Microsystems http://www.sun.com/
• Stopka & Associates http://www.stopka.com/
• Sunnen Products http://www.sunnen.com/
• Sykes Enterprises, Inc. http://www.sykes.com/
• Technisource Inc. http://www.tsrc.net/
• Triple-I Corporation http://www.triplei.com/
• Venmar Systems, Inc. http://www.venmar.com/
• The Law Offices of Rich McLennan, mclennan@mail.sluug.org

For more information about sponsoring the St. Louis UNIX Users Group, contact Ed Wehner, send mailto:wehner@mail.sluug.org.

SLUUG on the World Wide Web

SLUUG Administration is volunteer based.

/usr/groups/other

Contacts

Submitting Articles to the SLUUG CRONicle

SLUUG Mailing Address

        St. Louis UNIX Users Group
        P.O. Box 411302
        Creve Coeur Post Office
        St. Louis, MO  63141-9998