Welcome to . . .
the LinuxDevices.com Embedded Linux Weekly Newsletter
September 7, 2000
by Rick Lehrbaum -- Executive Editor, ZDNet's LinuxDevices.com
*** SPECIAL FEATURE ***
Java and Embedded Linux Team Up -- in this whitepaper, Randy Rorden discusses the advantages, benefits, issues, and tradeoffs of developing embedded systems based on a combined Java-Linux platform. story
*** THE KDE/GNOME "DEBATE" CONTINUES ***
KDE Core Team responds to GNOME hoopla -- The KDE development team issued an "official" response to the avalanche of attention generated by the recent launch of the GNOME Foundation. story Good news for KDE: Trolltech releases Qt under GPL -- Trolltech will offer a GPL license option with the upcoming version 2.2 of Qt/Unix. The lack of GPL, in the past, had been somewhat of an obstacle preventing widespread acceptance of KDE (which is based on Qt) among open source purists. story Trolltech clarifies decision to add GPL option to Qt -- Eirik Eng and Matthias Ettrich of Trolltech review the history of Qt's licensing, and provide insight into the thought process that led to Trolltech's decision to add an option of GPL licensing to Qt. story Stallman on Qt's licensing and its implications to KDE -- Richard Stallman issued a statement regarding Trolltech's addition of a GPL license option to Qt. Stallman discusses the implications of a GPL'd Qt to KDE. Stallman's statement is interesting in that it helps clarify the GPL license and the issues associated with using GPL libraries with non-GPL software. story
*** OTHER NEWS ***
BlueCat Linux support for DiskOnChip flash is announced -- M-Systems and LynuxWorks have announced support for DiskOnChip under BlueCat embedded Linux. story Internet-controlled home robot runs on embedded Linux -- iRobot announced a multi-purpose domestic robot that can be controlled through a web browser from anywhere in the world. Naturally, it's got Linux inside! story Lineo names Bob Waldie as COO -- Bob Waldie is the new Chief Operating Officer of Lineo. Waldie had been CEO of Moreton Bay (Brisbane, Australia), a company acquired by Lineo last May. story ESC to feature "hot debate" on merits of Open Source -- a debate on the pros and cons of "free" (open source) software and its role in the embedded industry will be an opening day highlight of the Embedded Systems Conference in San Jose, CA later this month. story Zilog "reinvents" Z180 with embedded Internet software suite -- Remember the Z80? Remember Zilog? No, Zilog hasn't announced embedded Linux for the Z80. But what the company has done, is "reinvent" the popular (Z80-derived) Z180 as an embedded Internet processor. story Embedded Linux Consortium (ELC) members to meet at ESC -- The ELC will hold its first membership meeting during the Embedded Systems Conference Wednesday, September 27. Future plans will be outlined and discussed. story IBM announces $200M Linux initiative in Asia Pacific -- This IBM announcement comes roughly six weeks after a similar announcement of a $200M IBM Linux initiative in Europe. That's nearly half a billion dollars of non-US Linux investment by IBM over the next four years! story Conoco geophysical supercomputer puts Linux cluster to work -- Conoco claims to have achieved a technological and competitive milestone in seismic exploration, through installing the petroleum industry's largest and most powerful Intel-based geophysical computer. story What are the most important software tools? -- This latest poll in LinuxDevices.com's ongoing embedded Linux market survey asks developers to rate the value of: the GNU toolset, test coverage, performance profiler, real-time debuggers, real-time tracing tools, source browsers, compilers, device driver tool-kits, GUI tool-kits, IDEs, and memory profiler. vote! RadiSys dons Hard Hat -- MontaVista will support RadiSys products and customers with Hard Hat Linux. story Lineo announces Linux/CPCI 99.999% availability solution -- Lineo's new High Availability Cluster solution, based on the Linux OS and CompactPCI hardware, grew out of the company's acquisition of INUP earlier this year. story National demo's dozens of apps based on Geode WebPAD reference platform -- National Semiconductor Japan showcased customer products at a Tokyo seminar. Many companies have taken advantage of National's ready-to-use web appliance reference design that includes schematics, BOM, enclosure design, . . . and Linux support. story Eazel's Nautilus (preview) is available for download -- Eazel, founded by several members of the core development team of Apple's Macintosh, is trying to make Linux easy to use. Their product, Nautilus, is now available for preview. story Linux Trace Toolkit supports real-time Linux -- Opersys and Lineo have added real-time capability to the open source Linux Trace Toolkit (LTT). It lets you trace real-time Linux tasks running in the kernel memory space and display the results graphically, . . . "just like the expensive tools from proprietary RTOS vendors." story Thirteen companies announce Open Source Development Lab -- The goal of the OSDL is to support existing industry open source software projects. The OSDL was founded by Hewlett-Packard, Intel, IBM, and NEC. story
*** LINKS OF THE WEEK ***
Geode-based WebPAD reference platform -- National Semiconductor freely distributes a ready-to-use design for a Geode-based portable web access device. All information required to manufacture the system -- including schematics, bills of materials, enclosure design, and Linux software drivers -- is included. story
The Linux Home Automation project -- The initial intent of the Linux Home Automation project is to create a standard daemon that interfaces between a plain command line interface and various Home Automation controllers. story The linux-wlan Project -- 802.11 wireless LAN -- The goal of the linux-wlan project is to develop a complete, standards based, wireless LAN system based on Linux. What differentiates this project from other Linux wireless projects is that everything is based on the IEEE 802.11 standard. story Linux Trace Toolkit -- GPL real-time trace support for Linux -- LTT provides all the information required to reconstruct a system's behavior during a certain period of time. Why do synchronization problems occur? What happens to an application when a packet is received for it? Where do applications spend their time? Where are the I/O latencies? story
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