Michael J. Hammel’s The Artist’s Guide to GIMP,
2nd ed. (No Starch Press)
Michael J. Hammel is one of the ur-names associated with the
GIMP graphic design and photo manipulation application. Back
in the 1990s, the producers of Linux Journal published the first
edition of Hammel’s book The Artist’s Guide to GIMP, which
No Starch Press recently released in a fully updated 2nd edition.
The new edition, which carries the subtitle “Creative Techniques
for Photographers, Artists, and Designers”, illustrates how to
put the GIMP’s powerful tools to work to produce professional-looking advertisements, apply
impressive photographic effects, and design cool logos and text effects. Hammel demystifies
the notoriously challenging elements of the GIMP not with a boring list of menu paths
and options but with step-by-step tutorials that help to accomplish important tasks. After
a crash course in GIMP’s core tools like brushes, patterns, selections, layers, modes and
masks, the reader will learn photographic and Web-design techniques, as well as type and
advertising effects. Readers of all levels will be inspired by the art that they can create.
http://www.nostarch.com
BeyondTrust’s PowerBroker Servers Enterprise
The new PowerBroker Servers Enterprise solution from BeyondTrust was created
to confront the challenges related to managing Linux and UNIX user accounts
in heterogeneous networks. BeyondTrust describes PowerBroker as “a cost-effective approach to allow organizations to seamlessly manage privileged
access on Linux and UNIX systems across dynamic physical, virtual and cloud
environments through Microsoft Active Directory”. The result is a reduction in
costs, complexity and susceptibility to security breaches, especially inside jobs.
PowerBroker provides an intuitive GUI to implement privileged access policy
and the ability to log, monitor and report on all user access and activities. This
approach empowers IT organizations with the ability to delegate root tasks and
authorization on Linux, UNIX and Mac OS X platforms without ever disclosing
the highly sensitive root password. Furthermore, businesses of every size and
industry are better able to satisfy critical internal and external compliance
requirements and regulations, including SOX, HIPAA, GLBA, PCI DSS and FISMA.
http://www.beyondtrust.com
