Blenderlover writes: "The full Blender 3D animation & game creation/playback suite runs on a Compaq iPaq now! Here's what Not a Number (the creators of Blender) write on their website : One of the biggest suprises at the GDC was the demonstration of Blender running on a Win CE PDA (personal digital assistant). Prepared as a demonstration of the portability of the Blender code, the full creation suite was shown running on the 200 Mhz, 32 Mb iPAQ system. With a textured game demo playback of 3-4 frames per second, without CPU optimization, it was another confirmation of the power of NaN technology to shape next generation digital media. Mobile and PDA 3D gaming is arriving! There's a wicked video showing Blender on the iPaq" Why not the Linux version on an iPaq properly equipped? ;) This strikes me as a less-than-ideal development tool for Blender (which screams out for a 36" monitor just to hold the widgets!), but a cool accomplishment anyhow.

ILikeRed writes "Well, you mentioned this story more than once, and even gave advice on fighting it. But now the UCITA has come to Texas, my home state, so I am hoping you will send out the word, so we can show that people do not want this legislation, even if it is in Compaq's back yard. And here I thought they were supposed to be a company that got it - can anyone submit a full list of companies supporting this thing? Might be a good cause for a boycott...."

Simon writes "Check out these new iPaqs" Apparently some information leaked about the next generation: 64 megs of memory on board, expansion slots (and word of a wireless card too). I'm still hearing good word about Compaq continuing the fine Linux work they've been doing on these devices, (stretching back to the now-legendary Itsy, first mentioned on Slashdot way back in May of 98.) Having now used one for a few weeks I have to say its a solid little handheld (I don't like the WinCE GUI as much as the PalmOS GUI, but I like the apps better).

Fire In the Valley is not about the computer or software industry in toto -- this book is about the evolution of the PC, including well before it was called the PC. Forget being able to pick up the phone and order a speedy machine with plenty of RAM (for overnight delivery, no less!) from any of several vendors, for less than a month of the minimum wage: this was a time when the very idea of a machine for casual or home use, or even have a full-featured computer on one's work desktop was radical, even laughable. A personal computer? There was no such animal, until the people in this book invented it. (Read more below.)

sparcv9 writes "The NetBSD Team announced today the offical start of the NetBSD/hpcarm port of their multi-platform OS. This port runs on StrongARM-based handheld PCs. So far, the HP Jornada 720 and the Compaq iPAQ H3600 are supported. With this port hot on the heels of the SH3/4-based hpcsh port and last year's MIPS-based hpcmips port, it looks like NetBSD could give Linux a run for its money in the handheld arena."

Some of you may find it odd to see your own experiences and memories presented as social history. But according to a meticulously reported (but somewhat dry) new book Rebel Code: Inside Linux and the Open Source Revolution, Open Source has changed the world and isn't done yet. If you want to read a top-to-bottom account of how it happened, author Glyn Moody offers a good one. (Read more)

I recieved this press release at some point in the night (which I've included below). We've talked about it for a while now but the deal has been...consumated. Art Tyde, co-founder and current CEO of LinuxCare will be CTO, while T. Paul Thomas, president and CEO of TurboLinux will remain as CEO. As for the name - they are staying with TurboLinux. My hopes for LinuxLinux as the company name have been dashed.

mach-5 asks: "I am currently in the process of starting my own business, building custom computers. Our business model is to offer friendly customer support without the big corporation BS, waiting in the phone que, etc. My big fear is that most people will be turned off by the higher prices we are forced to have because we don't have the buying power of big brother corporation. Basically, I'm worried that Joe Consumer will see a Compaq priced for $500 (after $500 MSN rebate) and would rather pay that than the $1000 that we are initially charging. I'm also worried that Joe Consumer will not be able to grok the quality of computer they will be getting as compared to a mass produced machine, with proprietary drivers, etc. What can I do to market my machines so that the public knows they are getting a quality machine, and friendly service? What niche can I position myself in to attract business? Also, what qualities would you Slashdotters like to see in a computer hardware vendor that would make you purchase from them, rather than Dell or Gateway?"

Veidit writes: "The Compaq Cambridge Research Laboratory seems to have a cool project named "Mercury". They are integrating an IPAQ running Linux with many diffrent types of wireless alternatives like 802.11b, Bluetooth, GSM, CDMA via PCMCIA. The linux version seems to be the one that Handhelds.org has. " We also had an e-mail from Dan Sparks who writes: " The free Compaq TestDrive Program has added two new features allowing iPAQ handheld development online. In the Test Drive Program, we have four DEC Sharks (DNARD) SA-110 based network computers running Linux allowing development on Linux based StrongArm systems. In addition, Alpha2Arm cross-compiler tool chain has been added to every single one of our Alpha Linux machines, including our Brickwall Beowulf cluster. This means that you can compile programs for your iPAQ handheld on our blazingly fast Alpha computers. The Toolchain includes support for C and C++, and is available on all the Alpha-based Linux distributions we have, including RedHat Linux, SuSE Linux, TurboLinux, Kondara Linux, and Debian GNU/Linux."

sumdumgai noted that Compaq is now selling preconfigured Linux Clusters if you happen to have any weather patterns sitting around needing to be analyzed or something. But this is a pretty substantial bit of heft behind Linux as a valid Clustering platform, as well as an easier way to get one.

Fact-o-matic writes: " Compaq, government weapons facility Sandia National Laboratories and genetics researcher Celera Genomics are teaming up to build a petaflop computer -- one that will process 1,000 trillion operations per second. To listen to an audio playback of today's press conference announcing the project, Celera has set up a phone-in recording: call (800) 642-1687, and enter the conference ID: 818790 You can read the joint press release or the Compaq press release"

thefin asks: "My research group has finally received funding (~$200K) for a single SMP box. I've looked over the offerings from SUN, IBM and Compaq. I was wondering what others think of the SMP offerings and in particular, opinions of Linux as a SMP OS. What should we know before purchasing such a machine? What should we look for and what should we avoid? We will be using the box for large, individual based ecological modeling efforts. These models are CPU intensive, and make heavy use of inter-node communications. In particular, inter-node communication can be a serious bottle-neck in our models."

Dean Kent writes "Simultaneous MultiThreading is a method of getting greater throughput from a processor by essentially implementing multi-tasking within a single CPU. Information on Compaq's plans for SMT in the EV8 can be found in thisan an article and thisand this article. Also, there is some speculation that Intel's Foster CPU (based upon the Willamette core) will also have SMT and that the P4 may even have the circuitry already included, as discussed briefly in forums."

Way back in October we solicited ideas for Christmas presents for geeks. This was done with Wired, and the results appear in the current issue (the lime-green colored one: unless you're blind, you can't miss it. You'll only be able to find the first copy, tho). The authors' money will be a nice Christmas present to the EFF. Thanks go to Paul, who did all the really hard work compiling the final list from all your ideas. Now read on to see the list.

If the iPAQ looks nice, the Yopy looks sexy, the Agenda intrigues you, and a V-Tech Helio running Pocket Linux looks interesting to you ... then you may enjoy this sweep of the available Palmtop GUIs with an emphasis on Free ones, written by reader 1010011010.

Russell Pavlicek, Linux and Open Source evangelist, has written an impassioned little book that purports to explain to the non-geek world in particular why they should care about the Open Source movement and the success of OS systems like Linux and FreeBSD. Know what? He delivers.

The ongoing Slashback assault on previous stories here reveals that (among other things) 1) Maybe Compaq's Transmeta plans are at least slightly more up in the air than previously claimed; 2) Hasbro has again been unable to nab a clue(.com); 3) Hope still springs eternal that you won't have to give your address and DNA sample to RadioShack in order to use some nice (but high-ping) satellite bandwidth. Read on.

scott1853 writes "Accroding to this article on ZDNet, based on this article at G2News, Compaq has decided to put off use of Crusoe in favor of Intel's P3. Unlike IBM, Compaq isn't claiming to put the processor on hold, they appear to have made their final decision not to use it. Could this be Intel flexing it's influential muscles, or is Transmeta not being competitive enough price-wise?"

Raleel writes: "IBM has released the source code to AFS for AIX 4.2, Digital/Compaq UNIX 4.0, Red Hat Linux 6.2, Solaris 2.6 and 2.7, and Windows NT 4.0. You can download it from here. It is under IBM's Open Source license." This was supposed to be released a while ago, but it's good to see IBM following-thru. For more information, see our article regarding the open sourcing of AFS and the article from 1998 regarding the porting effort.

An Anonymous Coward asks: "Why haven't Compaq, HP and others provide an option in BIOS to boot from from a Compact Flash card in order to speed Linux acceptance and development for handhelds like the IPAQ 3600 series? Are there technical reasons? I some of you have to be drooling over the possibility of Linux on these babies - and yes I know about the great work at handhelds.org - but a worrisome thing is that currently, once you burn flash in the unit, there is no going back. If these companies would provide that option, the development of alternative OS's to winCE would speed up! Want to try a new kernel? Replace the CompactFlash card."