Pundits are already calling it the "desktop kernel" and it may be coming to a computer near you soon: Linux 2.4.

Since heading up the Open Source Initiative, Eric Raymond has become one of the most prominent advocates of open source software.

If installing Linux on a desktop system is getting to be old hat, perhaps you're ready for the next challenge: Running Linux on your laptop.

One of the most important skills for any Linux newbie to develop is the ability to know when and where to look for help. While Linux is much easier to operate than it used to be, chances are that some day you're going to run into a situation where you will need advice from someone who has been there, done that, and received the proverbial T-shirt.

It is easy to question a company's commitment to a new technology, especially when there is much confusion and competition. But anyone sniping at IBM's motives when it comes to Linux is way off the mark. Sure, I've heard the criticisms. Some say IBM is backing Linux as a last-gasp attempt to fight Microsoft, and others claim that our Linux programs are just a ploy to sell AIX as a follow-on product. Then there's the perennial gripe, "IBM is going to throw its weight around and completely botch up Linux."

I recently installed the shipping version of Red Hat 6.1 onto a bare hard drive. The installation went very well, and I told Linux to install KDE, my preferred desktop, but not GNOME. When I logged in and ran the infamous command to launch into my graphical (X) environment, what greeted me was something I'd never seen before -- KDE running with Enlightenment and using the GNOME panel across the bottom of the screen.

Winston sat in the darkened room. All around him lights blinked and flashed. Regardless of what he did, Big Brother knew. There was nothing he could do without Big Brother being aware. When Winston did something that Big Brother did not particularly like, alarms would sound, and people would come storming into the room.

The Linux 2.4 kernel is just around the corner and, in theory, is supposed to be coming to a computer near you around the time you read this article. So in the interest of shamelessly tapping into the 2.4 hype and excitement, this month's column is about the extensions to packet filtering you will have at your fingertips when you finally get your hands on the Linux 2.4 kernel. (See pg. 30 for the complete story on Linux 2.4. -Ed.)

Last month I talked about how to write a device driver for radio-tuner cards. This month, I'll cover video-capture devices, which share the same interfaces as radio devices.

Let me start off with a correction (sigh). Last month I described the difference between slow and fast system calls and then described select() as a slow system call. That was incorrect. Since select() takes a timeout value, it always returns in a predictable amount of time, so it's considered a fast system call.

My Web server for http://perltraining.stonehenge.com is on a nicely configured shared Linux box at a 24x7-manned co-location facility. While I'm not really system administrator for this box, I still want to be sure that my Web things aren't bogging the system down unnecessarily. (If that happens, the other e-commerce users will start rallying to kick me off.) This is especially true as I experiment more with dynamically generated pages and toys for columns like this one.

Corel spiffs up the Debian distribution in hopes of taking Linux to the masses.

The date on the cover of this magazine is January 2000. Welcome to the 21st century. I'm writing this in November, but the events of this fall point to a very interesting beginning for the next millennium -- not only for Linux, but for the entire technology industry.