Amiga Inc has revealed more details on the new Amiga Operating System: "Amiga is pleased to publish this first version of the feature set of the up and coming AmigaOS4.0. The document will undergo revision in subsequent issues but because of the massive demand for information made by the public, we have decided to release it in its current state." The official launch of the PPC based AmigaOne platform together with AmigaOS4.0 is sheduled for March at the upcoming CeBit tradeshow in Germany.

A couple of months ago, at the Lightweight Languages Workshop 2002, Matthew Flat made a premise in his talk: Operating system and programming language are the same thing (at least "mathematically speaking"). I find this interesting and has a lot of truth in it. Both OS and PL are platforms on which other programs run. Both are virtualizing machines. Both make it easier for people to write applications (by providing API, abtractions, frameworks, etc.)

"As some Apple defenders have noted (and I implied with my Bang & Olufsen comparison), there are lots of niche players who make loads of money selling higher priced, but high quality products. The problem, however, is that software lacks the natural levels of compatibility found in other markets. Bang & Olufsen stereos can play the same radio stations and CDs as the lower-priced offerings from Aiwa. That isn't the case with operating systems, and really can't be so long as developers have different ideas about API design." Read the editorial at ZDNews.

"Could we be constantly tracked through our clothes, shoes or even our cash in the future? I'm not talking about having a microchip surgically implanted beneath your skin, which is what Applied Digital Systems of Palm Beach, Fla., would like to do. Nor am I talking about John Poindexter's creepy Total Information Awareness spy-veillance system, which I wrote about last week. Instead, in the future, we could be tracked because we'll be wearing, eating and carrying objects that are carefully designed to do so." Read the interesting editorial at ZDNews.

The next update to Microsoft's Windows CE .Net OS, which has been given the code name McKendric, will ship before the middle of 2003 and include several new features, a company executive said at the Microsoft Embedded DevCon 2003 conference.

John Mahala writes "Over the weekend, Sun released Solaris 9 for x86. You can check it out here. The cost is $20 to download, and there is no offering (yet) to purchase a Media Kit."

Carlos Perez has posted 25 reasons why he thinks Java is a better platform than .NET while Jason Whittington has an opposite article counteracting Carlos' arguments.

"Visual Studio .NET 2003 just came out as a "final beta." I’ve been developing on it for a while now, and I want to point out some of the signature features and tools in this product.2 Read the article at 3Leaf.com.

From the GNOME Desktop 2.2 Release Candidate 1 (2.1.90): "1.21 Jigawatts", is ready for your bug-busting and testing pleasure! It is available for immediate download on ftp.gnome.org and mirrors."

From MacNN: Rob Galbraith has posted an article on digital file transfers, comparing an Alienware Laptop, a discontinued Dell Desktop and a MDD Dual 1.25GHz PowerMac in RAW photo and Photoshop batch processing. The article concludes that the Windows machines beat the Mac in virtually all of the benchmarks:

Lycoris interview with Jason Spisak the Marketing Director, at Lycoris. Lycoris provides operating systems such as Desktop LX and Productivity suites for office use. "We provide an alternative to Microsoft's core products at a much greater value."

Frank alerted us to the new cartoons IBM presents on their website. Though generally out of character for OSNews.com, here's a little weekend humor. Linux Animations (requires Flash or Realplayer).

Terminus wrote in to tell us that FreeBSD 5.0 RC3 is now available on the FreeBSD FTP servers. He also reminds us "The final release is scheduled for January 17th 2003."

Timothy R. Butler writes "Former Red Hat employee Bernhard "Bero" Rosenkraenzer has resurfaced, after leaving Red Hat last fall, with a brand new GNU/Linux distribution meant for the average user. According to the distribution's web site, "The Ark Linux distribution is based primarily upon a Red Hat Linux 7.3 / 8.0 foundation. On top of this, we have added a new easy-to-use installer (an Ark Linux installation is only four mouse clicks away!) and extensively tailored the software applications and utilities included - all in an effort to ensure that Ark Linux provides superior ease-of-use and the features and functionality end users have told us they want." Read more here." The ArkLinux home page.