CNET has posted an article discussing ARM's business model, licensing practices, and near-monopoly share of some embedded processor markets. Despite its size and power, the company is not perceived as a monopoly, according to the article, because of its cooperative business practices and English origins. (more…)

Hitachi semiconductor spinoff Renesas and NTT DoCoMo, Japan's largest telecommunications company, will jointly develop a single-chip multiprocessor for mobile phones. The chip, expected in late 2006, will help save power in next-generation mobile phones — probably based on Linux — that will access the Internet at broadband speeds. (more…)

Fujitsu Siemens has launched a line of solid-state thin clients that use just 25 watts, or 80 percent less power than PCs. The Futro S clients run embedded Linux on Transmeta processors, are no larger than medium-sized books. (more…)

O'Reilly Developer Weblogs has published a brief article about using a USB “thumb” drive and a Knoppix Live CD to create a “ubiquitous computing” environment, a portable system the user can carry from computer to computer. The article also mentions several other ubiquitous computing projects. (more…)

The world's number two telecom RTOS vendor Enea has continued its adoption of Linux, adding a Linux port to the latest version of its real-time, fault-tolerant in-memory relational database management system (RDBMS). Polyhedra 5.1 also features an improved Java API. It targets data management applications such as process-control, telemetry, and remote monitoring, as well as telecommunications, data… (more…)

Access has revised its Java virtual machine (JVM), adding support for several current Java standards. “JV-Lite 2 CE Edition” runs on Linux and other embedded OSes, and targets PDAs, smartphones, set-top boxes, game consoles, and telematics applications. (more…)

Tom's Networking has published a thorough review of a small, inexpensive embedded Linux appliance from Linksys that could popularize network-attached storage (NAS). The $75 Network Storage Link for USB 2.0 Disk Drives (NSLU2) turns external USB drives into NAS devices with powerful automatic backup… (more…)

IBM has published the following technical articles, tutorials, and downloads on its developerWorks Website. They cover a range of interesting (though not necessarily embedded) technical topics. Some require free registration. Enjoy . . . (more…)

MontaVista has announced support for Freescale's latest mobile multimedia system-on-chip (SoC). MontaVista says that its Professional Edition (Pro) embedded Linux distribution supports the i.MX21 today, with Consumer Electronics Edition (CEE) support expected later this year. (more…)

Software development tools specialist Metrowerks announced a Linux board support package (BSP) for Freescale Semiconductor's soon-to-be-introduced i.MX21 multimedia applications processor. (more…)

Embedded Linux specialist TimeSys Corp. inaugurated a Systems Integrator Partner Program today, aimed at expanding the availability of custom Linux development services based on its TimeSys-certified Linux technology components and its TimeStorm suite of development and testing tools. (more…)

As the prices and complexity of home networking products have decreased and as consumers have begun to demand more enabled products to plug into their networks, the Internet enabled smart home is getting closer to a reality, according to In-Stat/MDR. However, the hi-tech research firm reports that the evolution of the smart home has not been happening as fast as most companies involved had predicted, and… (more…)

Bartlett Press has released a new book that introduces Assembly language programming under Linux. Programming from the Ground Up, by Jonathan Bartlett, aims to provide an understanding of “the language of the computer itself” that can help programmers improve, regardless of their… (more…)

MEN Micro has launched a PC/104-Plus SBC (single board computer) based on a telematics SoC (system-on-chip) from Freescale. The rugged, extended temperature range PP01 board features Freescale's low-power 384MHz MPC5200 PowerPC processor, supports Linux and VxWorks, and targets telematics, harsh environment, and… (more…)

Access has released a new version of its browser for Linux devices, along with a new SDK (software development kit) for UI (user interface) development. The SDK supports both the GTK+ and Qt/Embedded application environments under Linux, and targets mobile phones, PDAs, set-top boxes, digital television, and automobile telematics. (more…)