The next release of the popular Ubuntu GNU/Linux distribution is unlikely to include Mono.

Under its new owner, Attachmate, Novell has begun sacking staff, with reports saying that 700 to 800 are being given pink slips.

A bid by Canonical to profit from the inclusion of the Mono-dependent music player Banshee in its next Ubuntu release has failed.

Much has been written about the fact that the next version of Ubuntu, Natty Narwhal, will switch its interface from GNOME to Canonical's own Unity interface.

The next version of the Ubuntu GNU/Linux distribution will jettison the current default Mono-dependent image management and photo editing application, F-Spot, in favour of Shotwell.

When Hubert Figuiere, a developer who had lost his job with Novell in the first quarter of 2009, released the note-taking application Gnote on April 1 last year, one doubts that he had any idea about the kind of attacks which would be launched on him by Mono advocates and apologists.

Miguel de Icaza, a vice-president at Novell and the founder of the Mono project, made a number of statements recently that were diametrically opposed to all that he has said earlier about Microsoft's .NET development environment.

He's the man with a conscience in the computer industry. Not too many of them around these days, an era when people attach the name "open source" to anything in a bid to attract funding.

Patents are the only threat that Microsoft can brandish against free and open source software and that is exactly why people should be wary of the Mono project, free software advocate and Samba hacker Jeremy Allison told a packed auditorium at the 11th LCA today.

As the year ends, it is fair to say there have been many free and open source software organisations that have made rapid strides, not merely in 2009 but right through the noughties. But one organisation badly needs to get its act together.