The folks over at younevercall.com have put together a handy guide for Linux users looking to create their own ringtones. With cellphone companies charging as much as $3 for a twenty second ringtone, the guide should help Linux users save a little cash. As an added bonus all the software tools involved in the process, Audacity, LAME and BitPim, are free and open source.

via Wired Blog

The enterprising Palm hardware hackers at Hack&Dev have recently had some sucess in getting a current build of OpenMoko to run on a Palm TX and have posted a series of pictures and some instructions.

I managed to run and adapt OpenMoko on PalmTX. It is built using the good-old OpenEmbedded, so using a Palm kernel (and modules, of course) and a root image from http://buildhost.openmoko.org/ , you can run OpenMoko on Palm.

OpenMoko isn’t going to replace the Palm OS on the TX anytime soon as there are a number of issues and incompatibilities. It is primarily designed for a 640×480 screen, so a lot of work had to be done to scale it down to the TX’s 480×320 resolution and some elements do not make the transition well. The other main issue is that the OpenMoko software is still in its very early stages and much of it is not even functional yet.

via Palm Infocenter

Shipments of the XO notebook PC for the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project will likely be delayed until the third quarter, the manufacturer said Friday.

Quanta Computer Inc., the world’s largest contract laptop PC manufacturer, had earlier predicted shipments could start as early as July, but software adjustments by the OLPC group have pushed the schedule back to the third quarter.

“The hardware is pretty much in place,” a company representative said.

Read

The GNOME Foundation announced today the creation of the GNOME Mobile & Embedded Initiative (GMAE), and a software platform for user experience development across a wide range of device profiles.

The GNOME Mobile & Embedded Initiative will advance the use, development and commercialization of GNOME components as a mobile and embedded user experience platform. It brings together industry leaders, expert consultants, key developers and the community and industry organizations they represent. The initiative aims to:

Read the rest of this entry »

ACCESS has released a Garnet VM Compatibility Kit. The kit includes a Garnet VM emulator that will run Garnet OS applications within the ACCESS Linux Platform. The kit is intended to help current Palm OS Garnet developers check how their current applications will run in ACCESS Linux Platform, and adjust them if necessary.

The kit supports testing on Windows and Linux. For Windows, it includes an ARM emulator running the Garnet VM environment. For Linux, it includes the Garnet VM simulator. Both platforms will run 68k and ARM PNO application code. Both Release and Debug (with extra parameter checking and error messages) versions are included.

ACCESS says this standalone version of the GVM is a subset of the application that runs within ACCESS Linux Platform. The full version provides additional gateways to the host system such as PIM data sharing and will be provided as part of the ACCESS Linux Platform SDK in the future.

via Palm Infocenter

Unicon Systems, a Linux handheld software and hardware technology developer from Menlo Park, California, will start shipping its Mobile Linux Development Kit (MKitTM) this week. The product was first introduced last year at LinuxWorld Expo, where it generated a lot of interest from Linux professionals and hobbyists.

Unicon System’s MKitTM development kit is the first and only unique mobile Linux development kit on the market. It gives professional developers and manufacturers the ability to create new handheld devices for industrial, security, educational and medical applications, as well as for various consumer electronics products.

Unicon has two development kit models: MKit – consumer (available now) and MKit – industrial (coming soon).

Read the rest of this entry »

At its developer forum in Beijing today, Intel unveiled its first SoC (system-on-chip) specifically targeting digital set-top boxes (STBs) and media recorders. The Intel CE 2110 is based on a 1GHz XScale core, and is shipping to early customers now, along with Linux-based development and reference design kits.

Link

Intel on Wednesday unveiled its Ultra Mobile platform, also known as McCaslin, designed for ultramobile PCs and other handheld devices, and outlined plans for increased Linux support and a new chip for ultramobile PCs due in 2008.

Link

Mozilla Corp. unveiled the final version of its open-source Thunderbird 2 e-mail client on Thursday, improving how users can organize and label their messages.

Link

Looks like Intel is shedding the Origami gorilla (read: Microsoft) as they prep a Linux-based platform to compete with Vista and XP-based UMPCs. Intel will unveil their new MID (Mobile Internet Device) platform at the Intel Developer Forum in Beijing later this week. Unfortunately for their marketing department, they’ve already posted the slides. Unlike UMPCs which target mobile professionals, MIDs will target “consumers and prosumers” and feature a range of screen sizes from 4.5 to 6-inches with resolutions from 800 x 480 to 1024 x 600.

Read more at Engadget.