OOo-La-La!

An interesting report from the French Ministry of Defence, that OpenOffice.org may have neglected some security issues in its headlong rush to achieve parity with Microsoft Office. The problem seems to lie with macros, and frankly, I'm not surprised. I never use them, and I really think that anyone who does is asking for trouble. A word processor is for, you know, processing words; it does not need to pass the Turing Test.

Still, this is the kind of stuff that's easily fixed with the odd huge window marked "Danger: do not run this macro" every five seconds. (Via in Ars Technica.)

Open Source is Better - Ask a Virus Writer

Virus writers are not known for their morals - or for being fanboys: they will use whatever means necessary to achieve their dubious ends. So when MacAfee warns that

Malicious-software writers are increasingly using open-source methodologies when developing their code

you can be pretty sure that this follows an extremely objective evaluation of the various competing development methods.

Maybe not quite the testimonial most free software enthusiasts were looking for, but a testimonial nonetheless.

Shock! Horror! Macro Viruses for OSS

This explains why macros are generally a bad thing to use in word processors or spreadsheets (yes, I know they can be useful, too). It is also a warning to OSS activists not to hit the "OSS is immune to viruses" button: it may be true now, but it sure won't be in the future as OSS enters the mainstream. (Via LWN.net).