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Chinese tech institute backs Linux standard

Martin LaMonica Former Staff writer, CNET News
Martin LaMonica is a senior writer covering green tech and cutting-edge technologies. He joined CNET in 2002 to cover enterprise IT and Web development and was previously executive editor of IT publication InfoWorld.
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Martin LaMonica

The Free Standards Group, a non-profit group promoting Linux standards, said that a Chinese government agency has opened a lab that will use the Free Standards Group's Linux Standards Base certification process.

The Linux Standards Base (LSB) is a specification designed to allow software companies to verify that Linux distributions and applications can run on different versions of Linux. It standardizes several software interfaces and includes test suites and documentation.

Large ISVs, including Linux distributors Red Hat and Novell's SuSE Linux, have voiced support for the LSB.

The China Electronics Standardization Institute (CESI) will establish a lab and use LSB to certify Chinese Linux software products.

"LSB certification will help ensure that Linux systems in the PRC conform to the ISO/IEC standard. The LSB lab provides an environment where Chinese companies can study and master the core technologies in the global standards system," said Mo Wei, executive director of CESI, in a statement.

Jim Zemlin, the executive director of the Free Standards Group, said that the Chinese government's endorsement of LSB will help prevent a fragmentation of Linux which could lead to incompatibilities among different versions.