【正文】 ude Marc Ewing, Rik Faith and Michael K. Johnson, among others. Linux Expo snowballs and bees the most popular and wellattended annual Linux show for the next several years (after three years Red Hat takes over anization and bees the major sponsor). The price for entry into the exhibit hall and a pass to the conferences? $4. January 1997 First ``Linux virus’’ discovered. Called Bliss, it actually works on any UNIXlike OS and offers a helpful``blissuninfectfilesplease’’ mandline option. Alan Cox points out that Bliss ``does not circumvent the security of the system, it relies on people with privilege to do something dumb’’ and reminds users to install digitally signed software from trustworthy sites only and to check signatures before installing. ``In fact it’s probably easier to write a virus for Linux because it’s open source and the code is available. So we will be seeing more Linux viruses as the OS bees more mon and popular.’’Wishful thinking from McAfee January 1998 Linux Weekly News begins publication with Jonathan Corbet and Elizabeth Coolbaugh as founders. The very first issue, dated January 22, was just a tiny hint of what LWN was to bee. Netscape announces that they will release the source to their browser under a free software license. This almost certainly remains one of the most important events of the year。 it also shows Linux to be the only system other than Microsoft Windows NT that is increasing its market share. IBM announces that it will distribute and support the Apache web server after working a deal with the Apache team. July 1998 The desktop wars rage as KDE and GNOME advocates hurl flames at each other. Linus gets in on the act, saying that KDE is okay with him. In this context, KDE is released. The first stable release of the K Desktop Environment proves to be popular, despite the plaints from those who do not like the licensing of the Qt library. Informix quietly releases software for Linux. Meanwhile, Oracle beats Informix to the punch PRwise and makes a Linuxfriendly announcement first, suggesting that they would soon be supporting Linux. Oracle promises to make a trial version available by the end of 1998, a deadline they beat by months. This, seemingly, was one of the acid tests for the potential of longterm success for Linux。 a lastminute repricing helps to create difficulties for people participating in the munity offering. The stock price immediately rises to $50。 Kaspar is one of the largest distribution channels. Red Hat wins InfoWorld’s ``Product of the Year’’ award for the fourth time in a row. March 20xx ``The law in open code means that no actor can gain ultimate control over opensource code. Even the kings can’t get ultimate control over the code. For example, if Linus Torvalds, father of the Linux kernel, tried to steer GNU/Linux in a way that others in the munity rejected, then others in the munity could always have removed the offending part and gone in a different way. This threat constrains the kings。 as such, it’s essentially a $199 (without monitor) X terminal. Reports first appear that SCO may be purchased by Caldera. Later in 20xx Caldera and SCO announce their intent for Caldera International to be formed from Caldera’s existing operation and two of SCO’s three divisions. Ted Ts’o steps forward to bee the new status list maintainer. Alan Cox was doing the job until he said that it was time to ``find someone else to maintain it’’. Ted Ts’o responded to Linus’ subsequent call for a new status list maintainer. August 20xx HP, Intel, IBM and NEC announce the ``Open Source Development Lab’’, which makes large hardware available to Linux developers for benchmarking and testing. September 20xx ``I’m a bastard. I have absolutely no clue why people can ever think otherwise. Yet they do. People think I’m a nice guy, and the fact is that I’m a scheming, conniving bastard who doesn’t care for any hurt feelings or lost hours of work if it just results in what I consider to be a better system.’’Linus Torvalds trying to change his image. The RSA patent expires, allowing for secure web transactions without proprietary software. Trolltech releases the Qt library under the GPL, putting a definitive end to a longrunning and unpleasant license flame war. The CueCat fiasco begins. Digital Convergence attempts to shut down programmers who have written Linux drivers for its CueCat bar code scanner. The pany has given out large numbers of these scanners for free, expecting people to use them with its proprietary software and web site. The threats cause the drivers to bee marginally harder to find for a short period, after which the pany declares victory and moves on. October 20xx Microsoft says that penguins can mutate in a European print ad that quickly bees famous. December 20xx ``I was dumbfounded to discover that installing Linux was easy. Why? Well, the world has changed. No more do you have to understand everything about Linux before you install it, downloading the many chunks of code necessary to run a plete system and getting them all to work together. That was BSWbefore shrinkwrap. With panies such as Red Hat and Corel putting all the software you need in a box, the pain is (nearly) gone.’’John Schwartz, Washington Post IBM announces plans to invest $1 billion in Linux in 20xx. January 20xx The longawaited kernel was released on January 4. The US National Security Agency (NSA) releases SELinux under the GPL. SELinux offers an additional layer of security checks in addition to the standard UNIXlike permissions system. March 20xx The Linux kernel summit is held in San Jose, California。 it includes hotswap capability and is available for the i386 and PowerPC architectures. The Embedded Linux Consortium is announced. Its goal is ``to amplify the depth, br