Samsung has shipped a new Linux-based smartphone in China. The SCH-i819 targets Chinese business travelers, and is the first Linux phone to support dual-band cellular operation with both CDMA 1x (800MHz) and dual-band GSM (900/1800MHz) networks, according to Mizi Research, which supplied the phone's Linux stack. (more…)

Mizi Research is shipping a new version of its Linux software stack for mobile phones. Prizm 2.5 adds support for one-handed operation, support for new streaming media formats, and the option of a Flash-based dynamic user interface. (more…)

Production Linux kernel maintainer Andrew Morton says Linux may be getting “buggier,” and if he can prove it, he'll decree a “bug fix-only kernel cycle,” according to an article at ZDNet UK. However, Morton's definition of “bug” is quite broad, observes Linux-Watch columnist Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols. (more…)

FPGA (field programmable gate array) vendor Altera is shipping a new version of its FGPA design tool that runs on Linux hosts. Quartus II 6.0 includes new features aimed at high-density designs, including today's 90-nm designs as well as forthcoming 65-nm designs, the company says. (more…)

Intel will ship its second-generation dual-core processors for desktop and mobile applications in Q3, 2006. Both desktop and mobile versions will be known as “Core 2 Duo” chips, and both will share a common microarchitecture, to simplify software optimization across a variety of target hardware platforms, Intel says. (more…)

Applications are due today for Google's “Summer of Code” 2006, a program in which selected student developers will earn stipends and receive mentoring in exchange for contributing to open source software projects. Mentors are available from 102 projects, including several related to embedded Linux. (more…)

Ezurio is shipping a USB Bluetooth adapter suitable for embedded and industrial applications. The “High Speed USB Adapter” uses less power, has greater range and interference resistance, and a wider operating temperature range than consumer-grade Bluetooth radios, the company says. (more…)

An industrial control system vendor that has used embedded Linux in commercial products for more than 10 years will ship in July a new Debian-based system based on a 3.5-inch single-board computer (SBC) with a Pentium-class processor. (more…)

A detailed, highly technical introduction to Flash memory, focusing on NAND flash, has been published by CommsDesign. The article was excerpted from a paper presented at this year's Embedded Systems Conference by Jim Cooke, a principal applications engineer at Micron. (more…)

The Nokia 770 “does little, and not very well,” writes Washington Post Personal Technology Columnist Rob Pegoraro, in a scathing review. Pegoraro lambastes the 770 on all fronts, while grudgingly admitting that some of the time, it works okay for surfing the Web. (more…)

“Devicescape's GPLed driver does promise to make Linux WiFi support easier, [but] don't think for a moment that it will quickly make adding WiFi support to Linux a snap,” writes Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, in a thoughtful Linux-Watch column outlining challenges facing Linux WiFi subsystem developers. (more…)

TimeSys will present a series of free, hour-long, technical webinars on cross-development this month. Each session will explore cross-compilation and build challenges, highlight TimeSys tools for addressing these challenges, and enable live interaction with technical experts from TimeSys, according to the company. (more…)

EnFlex used embedded Linux in an industrial control and monitoring system targeting facilities management. The Site Control Server (SCS) G100 is based on a 586-class processor and runs Debian Linux. (more…)

Trolltech reportedly foresees Linux shipping in more than a billion phones. Additionally, the company believes Linux is well-positioned to play a leading role in handsets with BOM (bill-of-materials) costs from $60-$70 dollars and down, according to an interview with founders Eirek Chambe-Eng and Havaard Nord published by TheRegister. (more…)

Kontron has unveiled an upgrade to the ETX specification for the computer-on-module (COM) category of single-board computers (SBCs). ETX 3.0 adds two serial ATA ports without changing any of the ETX board-to-board pins, keeping new modules 100 percent pin-compatible with previous versions, according to the company. (more…)