After years of conflict and strife, Microsoft and the computing and education project One Laptop Per Child, have worked out a deal that will see Windows XP on the OLPC.

According to the NYTimes,

Microsoft long resisted joining the ambitious project because its laptops used the Linux operating system, a freely distributed alternative to Windows.

“The people who buy the machines are not the children who use them, but government officials in most cases,” said Nicholas Negroponte, founder of the nonprofit group. “And those people are much more comfortable with Windows.”

The alliance between Microsoft and O.L.P.C. comes after long stretches of antagonism, punctuated by occasional talks, between the two sides. Mr. Negroponte, a former computer researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a new media pioneer, said he first talked to Bill Gates, Microsoft’s chairman, three years ago.

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The LiMo Foundation announced today the addition of Infineon Technologies, Kvaleberg AS, Mozilla Corporation, Red Bend Software, Sagem Mobiles, SFR, SK Telecom and Verizon Wireless as new member companies. Expanding LiMo’s membership to 40 since the foundation’s launch in January 2007, these companies join with existing LiMo members to collaborate on the LiMo Platform - the world’s first globally competitive, Linux-based software platform for mobile devices.

“This latest group of new members demonstrates the rapidly expanding reach of the LiMo ecosystem, and we are very excited by their commitment to further enrich the LiMo Platform and accelerate its adoption within all markets,” said Morgan Gillis, executive director of LiMo Foundation. “It is now clear that LiMo’s transparent and participative governance model and total focus on the handset operating system—which are designed to avoid value-chain distortion—are proving to be very attractive to the whole industry.”

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The Android Developer Challenge is a two-part contest whose goal is to encourage developers to build apps for the new Google mobile platform, code-named “Android.” In this first round, dubbed “Challenge I,” submissions were accepted up until April 14th. Yesterday, the top 50 entries were announced. Each of these application authors received $25,000 to fund further development of their app.

Read Write Web has a good post outlining some of the standouts, while the Android Developer Blog has the full list.

What do you want your cell phone to be able to do? Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Hal Abelson put that question to about 20 computer science students this semester when he gave them one assignment: Design a software program for cell phones that use Google Inc.’s upcoming Android mobile operating system.

In the process, they revealed the power of an open system like Android to shake up the mobile phone industry, where wireless companies are being pressured to loosen the control they have maintained over what devices do. If the brainstorms of these MIT students are an indication, phones will soon challenge the Internet as a source of innovation.

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Microsoft is launching a program to promote the use of its Windows OS in ultra low-cost PCs, one effect of which will be to limit the hardware capabilities of this type of device. Microsoft plans to offer PC makers steep discounts on Windows XP Home Edition to encourage them to use that OS instead of Linux on ultra low-cost PCs (ULPCs). To be eligible, however, the PC vendors that make ULPCs must limit screen sizes to 10.2 inches and hard drives to 80G bytes, and they cannot offer touch-screen PCs.

The programme is outlined in confidential documents that Microsoft sent to PC makers last month, and which were obtained by IDG News Service. The goal apparently is to limit the hardware capabilities of ULPCs so that they don’t eat into the market for mainstream PCs running Windows Vista, something both Microsoft and the PC vendors would want to avoid.

A virtual uprising that broke out among developers questioning One Laptop Per Child’s commitment to open-source software has prompted an official from the nonprofit effort to play peacemaker.

Doubts about OLPC’s commitment to open-source software surfaced after Chairman Nicholas Negroponte criticized Sugar, the user interface that currently works with the Linux-based XO laptops. Negroponte asked developers to extend Sugar’s development to Windows, which will make XO laptops more appealing to customers.

Without touching on the subject of Sugar for Windows, Kim Quirk, director of the technical team at OLPC, on Monday quelled any notion of OLPC abandoning open source.

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The open source Maemo platform, which is used on Nokia’s Internet Tablet devices, will soon support Trolltech’s Qt development toolkit. Nokia says that the GTK-based Hildon framework will continue to be used as the primary toolkit for Maemo’s user interface and core applications, but the Qt libraries will be distributed with Maemo so that third-party Qt developers can bring their applications to the platform.

Nokia is currently in the process of acquiring Trolltech and has some ambitious plans to bring Qt support to a multitude of mobile platforms. Nokia is particularly eager to enable development of applications that can target both Maemo and S60, a proprietary operating system used on Nokia phones.

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In an article by the Dow Jones Newswire, Joe Sims, vice president and general manager of T-Mobile’s broadband and new business division, said he had already seen prototypes of the company’s Android-based phone, which are scheduled to ship in this year’s final quarter. He goes on to state that T-Mobile may offer more than one product based on Android…

“I’m impressed,” Sims said. “We will have more than one product…(The move to an open platform) will be innovation across the board, not just one device.”

Linux is set to see strong growth as issues with framework fragmentation and silicon requirements are alleviated according to the latest report from ABI Research. The growing momentum behind the LiMo Foundation initiative, as well as the marketing boost that has been realized from the entry of Google’s Android solution has been further enhanced by Nokia’s support of the Maemo solution and its purchase of Trolltech. ABI believes that by 2013, nearly one out of every five mid- or high-end mobile devices will use a Linux operating system.

A new ABI Research study has found that Linux solutions will be at the center of the drive to bring more content-rich environments to users who currently utilize mid-tier devices. More importantly, it looks increasingly likely that mobile Linux solutions will be an important building block in enabling an application domain that embraces Web-based applications and blended Web/native applications.

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NTT DoCoMo, Inc. today announced that it will develop an operator pack for FOMA 3G handsets compatible with specifications established by the LiMo Foundation. DoCoMo expects to begin introducing handsets equipped with the operator pack in the second half of 2009.

The pack will contain a suite of Linux operating system-based software applications that implement i-mode, i-appli and other unique DoCoMo services. It will make use of existing assets developed by DoCoMo, including application software and MOAP (Mobile Oriented Application Platform) middleware now used in selected DoCoMo handsets. The new operator pack will incorporate elements of a Linux-version MOAP that DoCoMo has developed with NEC Corporation and Panasonic Mobile Communications Co., Ltd.

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