Computerworld - The North Korean government appears to have developed a graphical Linux-based operating system, though its people still prefer that symbol of Yankee high-tech imperialism, Microsoft Windows.
That's according to the blog of a Russian college student identified as Mikhail, who studies at a university in North Korea's capital city, Pyongyang.
According to translations of the blog by Russian satellite news channel Russia Today and Google's Translate tool, installation DVDs of the operating system, known as Red Star, can be freely purchased in Pyongyang for $5 and the operating system is available in both client and server versions.
Red Star requires, at minimum, a Pentium III 800-MHz CPU (which was state of the art in developed countries about 10 years ago), 256MB of RAM and 3GB of hard disk space.
Installation takes 15 minutes, and users may only choose to run it in the Korean language. The clock on the bottom right shows the year in both the standard international Gregorian calendar and the North Korean "Juche Idea," in which 2010 is the year 99.
Mikhail said that North Koreans have told him that Red Star is not stable, and that they still prefer Windows XP, Vista or 7.
Mikhail did not comment on what version of Linux Red Star might be built upon. Last year, Cuba released its own version of Linux, called Nova; it is based on Gentoo, a Linux variant that is run by a foundation based in New Mexico.
Red Star's roster of applications includes a thinly disguised version of the Mozilla Firefox browser, an OpenOffice.org-like productivity suite, an e-mail client called Pigeon and a number of other utilities.
Two programs that were apparently developed by North Korea include a firewall application called Pyongyang Fortress and an antivirus application called Woodpecker.
The browser's search engine defaults to the North Korean government's official Web site, Naenara.
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