If you want to know what kind of history OQO has at Ars, just check out this Google search, which will cough up coverage that goes back to at least 2002. We’ve covered the launches of the various OQO products over the years, as the company’s handheld PCs always seemed like they were on the verge of becoming the Next Big Thing… once someone figured out a killer app for them.
Microsoft and HP this week announced plans to deliver an end-to-end unified communications and collaboration (UCC) solution. The Frontline Partnership, which was set up by the two companies over 20 years ago to make sure their products worked seamlessly together, will soon be getting up to an additional $180 million boost over the next four years. This new finance will be invested in product development and integration, professional services, as well as joint marketing and sales, with the aim to help organizations lower costs (telecom, IT, travel, and operating) as well as improve productivity and business output. The duo believes that demand for UCC technologies is growing rapidly and so their end-to-end solution is supposed to span software, hardware, networking, and services.
An iPhone app that can download and format free texts from Project Gutenberg has been rejected from the App Store on the basis of “objectionable content.” Why? Because a translation of a respected, ancient Indian text that deals with matters of human sexual behavior can be downloaded and read using the app. The developer’s attempts to solve the problem highlight the mysterious black box developers continue to face when trying to contact Apple for assistance.
One of these days, I swear the Window Mobile/Zune rumor mill is going to collapse under the pressure of pumping out such enormous amounts of speculation. The first time I can remember the mention of Zune Mobile was over a year ago in April 2008. Zune Mobile doesn’t refer to a Zune phone, which I still believe is unlikely (at least in its pure form), nor does it refer to the all-but-confirmed touch-enabled Zune HD, with its rumored specifications and upcoming September release date.
Those hoping and praying for an “iTablet”—the mythical chimera begotten from an overzealous iPhone and a lonely MacBook—may have to wait six months or more for their dreams to be realized. Recent analysis from Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster suggests such a device might be coming, but not until sometime in the first half of next year.
Despite an overall decline in mobile phone sales in the first quarter of 2009, a 13 percent increase in smartphone sales has helped Apple double its share of the smartphone market according to the latest figures from market research firm Gartner. While the overall market for mobile phones decreased 9.4 percent year-over-year for Q1—from 294.3 million to 269.1 million units worldwide—smartphone sales increased from 32.3 million to 36.4 million units. Smartphones now account for 13.5 percent of all mobile sales.
InkSeine is a prototype inking application for Tablet PC and UMPC devices developed for Microsoft Research. A new version of the software is now available: 1.1.1714.0. You can download it straight from Microsoft Research (18.6MB). Remember that since this is still a prototype, Microsoft is trying to figure out whether or not this technology is worth developing and won’t necessarily be turning it into an actual product. Here’s the changelog (thanks to the The AlpineInker blog):
Intel renewed its netbook push Tuesday with the formal announcement of its next-generation Atom platform, codenamed Pine Trail. The details of Pine Trail, including the late 2009 launch date, had already been widely leaked, and today’s disclosure provided little new information. But for those who haven’t followed the Pineview leaks, I’ll break down the details of what was announced.
When Web Scouts, Inc. wrote its tank warfare game iCombat for the iPhone, the company put a few extra lines of code into the application. The code checked the size of the application’s .plist and, if the files size differed from what it was when the company packaged the application, it would phone home.
Intel has announced the availability of the first Moblin 2 beta release. This version introduces the platform’s innovative new user interface. Although there are still some rough edges, it delivers impressive usability and aesthetic sophistication. I tested the beta on my Dell Mini 9 netbook so that I could get a real hands-on look at the new version.
