(InfoWorld) - The overseer of the Internet's addressing system rejected for the second time the creation of a ".xxx" top-level domain, supported by some as a way to isolate adult content on the Internet.

Nine board members for the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) voted against the proposal on Friday at ICANN's 28th International Public Meeting in Lisbon, Portugal. Five voted in favor, while one member abstained from voting, said Andrew Robertson, an ICANN spokesman. ICANN will hold a news conference on Friday afternoon to discuss the meeting's decisions.

Those rejecting a ".xxx" top-level domain said its creation could set ICANN up as a potential regulator of content on the Internet, which is not in its mandate. ICANN is responsible for the administration of the domain name system (DNS), the index that enables the translation of Web site URLS (uniform resource locators) into numerical IP addresses that can be called up into a browser.

In May 2006, ICANN also rejected creating the domain. Critics of the new domain said it could make adult content easier to find, but others argued that would also make it easier to filter out with software. The domain also raised concerned over free speech and how content on a Web site may be classified.

(InfoWorld) - Red Hat's latest financial results prove the company can withstand new competitive challenges, according to Matthew Szulik, the company's chairman and CEO.

On Thursday, Red Hat reported fourth-quarter sales of $111.1 million in sales, up 41 percent from sales of $78.7 million during the same period one year ago.

The sharp rise in sales came despite stepped up competition for Red Hat, including Oracle's introduction last October of a lower-cost version of Red Hat's subscription service for businesses using open source software. In addition, Microsoft started working to make features of Novell's Linux distribution work with Windows as part of a deal between the two companies.

These developments haven't slowed down Red Hat, which added 10,000 new customers during the fourth quarter, and 44,000 for the year, Szulik said during an interview with IDG News Service. What follows is an edited transcript of that interview:

IDG News Service: You said there was no impact in the fourth quarter from the Oracle and Microsoft-Novell deals, but Oracle is boasting that it won over 26 companies who were Red Hat customers to Oracle Unbreakable Linux, including Yahoo. Your response?

Szulik: Yahoo executives communicated to me that they consider Red Hat to be an important and strategic customer and that they plan to continue to build on their historical and successful relationship with Red Hat. They said they did not replace Red Hat across the enterprise, they implemented Oracle Linux on certain Oracle database servers.

IDGNS: But there were 25 other companies Oracle claims it won from Red Hat. Have you determined that they also replaced some Red Hat with Oracle but not across the enterprise?

Szulik: When we did our analysis, most of them, if not all, had very little to no Red Hat penetration. The facts speak for themselves: We generated 10,000 net new customers in the quarter.

IDGNS: Do you see that you'll have to continue to react to the Oracle and Microsoft-Novell deals going forward?

Szulik: Since 1998, the company has had to compete against the biggest and most successful operating system companies in the world. The culture has been trained to compete and sell value. And we will continue to focus on the customer as a way to compete successfully. [Red Hat], as a pure open source play, with the combination of the development model, the service capability and the economic model, will continue to produce superior results for our customers.

IDGNS: The Oracle strategy is markedly different from the Microsoft-Novell partnership in that Microsoft is improving interoperability of Novell and Microsoft. Do you see that, in particular, as something you have to address?

Szulik: As long as I have been in the business, which is almost 30 years, I have heard that Microsoft is trying to improve interoperability. So I'm wondering what kind of magic dust is going to get sprinkled over this relationship that is going to improve the satisfaction of the customer to operate and be successful in a heterogeneous environment. There's one answer and that is vendor-neutral standards. All the marketing money in the world will not distort the truth that customers will achieve a higher degree of interoperability when there are vendor-neutral standards.

(InfoWorld) - If you like cooking, you may have played the same game that I sometimes play while waiting in line at the grocery store: Checking out what other shoppers have in their baskets and trying to guess what meals they have in mind.

Silly? Perhaps, but it's better than reading the tabloids.

Watching storage vendors often triggers in me the same type of curiosity to figure out what’s cooking -- that is, in terms of their acquisitions.

The latest vendor to get me guessing is Cisco with its recent one-two punch of NeoPath and WebEx. Those two acquisitions both suggest an expansion of Cisco's menu beyond the traditional data transport focus.

I won't speculate on what Cisco plans to do with WebEx because Ephraim Schwartz has already posted some good thoughts on that, but looking at NeoPath, I see a more elaborate dish in the making than just file virtualization. The "secret ingredient" that NeoPath brings to the table is policy-driven file administration, a powerful feature that can save money and add superb flexibility to storage management.

Here's why: You may have millions of files parked on expensive first-tier storage that is getting full. Using policy-driven file migration, you can move those files to a less expensive storage tier using criteria based on, say, size, age, and content, and postpone (or avoid altogether) purchasing additional, more expensive arrays.

Will users be affected by that move? Not if you are using solutions such as NeoPath’s SMARTtouch, which provides seamless redirection from the old file location to the new one. Your users may not even notice that their files have been moved.

If you think that policy-driven file management is just nice to have but not a critical feature, consider that EMC made it a priority to add a similar capability to its newly acquired file virtualization technology from Rainfinity.

I'll wait to see how Cisco plays the NeoPath card, but to get the data migration features of EMC Rainfinity, you need to purchase that solution and comply with all its hardware requirements.

If buying more expensive hardware is not in your plans, be aware that an Australian startup, Moonwalk, made its U.S. debut this week with a software-only solution that enables policy-driven file management without adding more hardware to your datacenter.

In fact, Moonwalk 6.0 is based on lightweight, small-footprint agents that, driven by a centralized schedule and a set of rules, identify files that should be moved elsewhere using typical metadata attributes. 

Moonwalk uses an HTTP-based management console, where you define your source and target directories. From the same GUI, you create rules to select files according to criteria such as how old they are, how recently they were accessed, the filename, or the file type.

You can make a policy by applying one or more rules to selected source and destination directories. Moreover, by creating tasks, you can finally put those policies to work according to a schedule. After that, just sit back and watch your primary storage slim down as those files fly automatically to their new home.

Moving files from Novell Netware and Windows servers creates placeholders (also called "stubs") that make the change seamless to end-users. According to Moonwalk, a similar feature should shortly become available for Linux and Unix.

The purpose of leaving a stub when moving a file is twofold. First of all, it's a reminder that your file was once there and has moved elsewhere. Perhaps more important, the stub also acts as a teleport station: click it, and the system will immediately open the destination directory and provide access to the original file.

I also find it interesting that Moonwalk can use specialized connectors (called "plug-ins") to write files to nonconventional architectures, such as the EMC Centera, which creates an easy migration path for archiving files to more secure platforms.

Moonwalk starts at about $4,000 per node, a cost that can be easily justified with the savings you'll have from putting your storage on a diet. I'd say it's worth checking out this new startup (the company provides a free trial, too) before purchasing more storage.

Join me on The Storage Network with questions or comments.

(InfoWorld) - I'm having a strange moment of inner peace. I'm without a rant. Often my column is full of vinegar over some false security product claim, some incorrectly-held security belief, or some strange, insecure maneuver made by a recent client of mine. This week, it's all daisies and rainbows: I want to share a few cool security tidbits instead.

A few months ago, while giving a security presentation along with Symantec's senior vice president to a group of business leaders, I was approached by Pete Hernandez, a salesman from Emsec Systems. He told me about two cool products they are developing and selling for the wireless security world. These products recently started generating media buzz again and resparked my interest.

Emsec is headquartered in Hampton, VA, right down the street from Langley Air Force Base, the home base for spy planes, robotic warriors, and secret devices of all types. It's full of top-secret material and ripe for wireless spies.

Emsec's newest star product is an anti-EMI paint (really a polymer coating) that blocks most EMI and wireless emissions from entering or leaving a room, confined space, or box. You apply the coating, and you end up with an instant "cone of silence". Emsec originally developed the anti-EMI coating to shield small electronic avionic housing devices, radio control units, and transceivers, but it can now be applied to nearly any room for any anti-EMI or anti-wireless application.

What was once a military-only option has spread out to commercial companies. Robert Boyd, vice president and director of technology for Emsec says that "most of our commercial clients are DoD-related. But nonmilitary corporate espionage is becoming a bigger problem in our society, and CEOs are paying attention."

Emsec's coating blocks EMI and wireless transmissions in the 100 KHz to 18 GHz range up to 60 or more dBM (decibels per meter), including 802.11 transmissions, RF signatures, cell phones, Blackberries, monitors, cables, and printers. If your company is concerned about EMI or wireless transmissions, you might want to give Emsec a call. Prices run from $3-$4 per square foot, or about the same price you might pay for carpet.

An even cooler related product sold by Emsec's parent company, Unitech, is a "paint-on" antenna. It's the opposite of stopping EMI: Unitech can "paint" an antenna on nearly any material, including walls, fabrics, and double-curved surfaces. Unitech is experimenting with prototypes involving soldiers' ballistic helmets with the antenna fabricated in. In the future, soldiers may be wearing their transmitting and receiving antennas for battlefield transmissions, GPS device tracking, and live, real-time battle picture updates.

It kind of humbles me when I think about how I struggle to get 802.11i working at home with my open source firmware kit.

Another wonderful announcement is the fact that SANS has developed certification exams to test developers' understanding of security and secure code practices. The GIAC Secure Software Programmer has four different language platforms choices -- .NET/ASP, C/C++, Java/J2EE, and Perl/PHP.

This is wonderful news. Among the security world's biggest problems is that most programmers don't care about security, and security people usually don't program. That's one of the major reasons why most programs contain many security vulnerabilities.

While certification tests don't mean you're an expert in a particular subject, they do test your minimal knowledge. As the holder of more than 50 computer certifications, I know that every time I study for a new cert, I learn something I didn't know before. I applaud SANS for its leadership. Along with all the Secure Design Lifecycle courses being taught this year, I think there is finally a maturing set of education options for programmers. Find out more about the new SANS certification exams and learning material at http://www.sans-ssi.org.

Lastly, I often get asked what online security news sources I subscribe to. My favorites include:

*anything from www.securityfocus.com

*the Patch Management mailing list

*InfoWorld (of course)

*Bugtraq (bugtraq@securityfocus.com)

*Vulnerability Watch (vulnwatch@vulnwatch.org)

*Full Disclosure (full-disclosure@lists.netsys.com)

*Dshield (www.dshield.org)

*SANS (www.sans.org)

*Secunia (www.secunia.com)

*FRSIRT (www.frsirt.com)

Another favorite computer news source, not strictly security-related but always full of interesting stories, is The Register. It's got a British flair and slant to the news stories, and I don't always understand the jargon. But the reporting is topically informative, and it's only fair payback for all the stuff we Americans force on everyone else.

Well, that's all for now. I must get back to communing with nature.

(InfoWorld) - Tough competition appears to be driving profits down for Red Hat, but the company has hung onto one marquee customer, Yahoo, despite recent reports to the contrary.

Profits were down in Red Hat's fiscal fourth quarter, ended Feb. 28, to $20.5 million, from $27.3 million in the same quarter last year.

Red Hat is under increasing pressure from competitors like Oracle, which now offers a support program for users of Red Hat's Enterprise Linux, and Microsoft, which poses a new threat through its relationship with Novell.

Still, Red Hat's relationship with Yahoo at least is strong, despite comments recently made by Oracle's CEO.

"I spoke with Yahoo yesterday, and they were very quick to respond that they have had and continue to have a very successful relationship with Red Hat," said Matthew Szulik, chairman, CEO, and president of Red Hat, during a conference call on Thursday to discuss the company's earnings.

His assurances come after Oracle's earnings conference call last week when CEO Larry Ellison said that Oracle has replaced Red Hat at Yahoo as its Linux support supplier.

Ellison, well-known for his renegade behavior, may have been exaggerating. In fact, Yahoo's current infrastructure uses both Red Hat and Oracle products, Yahoo said in a statement. Yahoo may even be considering expanding its Red Hat Linux footprint, Szulik said.

Oracle did not respond immediately to requests for comment.