The Register is running a very interesting article by Dominic Connor, telling the insider story about OS/2 1.0/1.1 development in the old days. From the terrible management in IBM, to the hilarious coding practices of Microsoft, there's lots of stuff in here - and it's only part one. "The unholy alliance of IBM and Microsoft unleashed OS/2 25 years ago with a mission to replace Windows, Unix and DOS. Back then, I was a foot-soldier in that war: a contract bug hunter at Big Blue. Here's how I remember it."

Another patent fight is taking shape, this time between the two struggling smartphone makers RIM and Nokia. "Nokia has asked a California court to enforce an arbitration award that would prevent Research In Motion from selling products with wireless LAN capabilities until the companies can agree on patent royalty rates."

"Today, I want to share a bit more detail about the growing Surface family of products and Surface with Windows 8 Pro, specifically around pricing. In January, Surface with Windows 8 Pro will be available in two versions and pricing will start at $899." Stefan Constantine noted on Twitter: "For the price of a Surface Pro ($899), you could buy a Nexus 4 ($349), Nexus 7 ($299), and a Chromebook ($249). Do the math." No matter how hard people are going to shout the Surface Pro is an ultrabook competitor, people will compare it to an iPad.

With the just released version 12.11, the developers of the Genode OS Framework are celebrating the break-through to execute the entire build system based on GCC 4.7.2 within their genuine operating-system environment. The new release gets accompanied with new audio drivers from the Open Sound System project, extended support for OMAP4, and numerous stability and performance improvements concerning the underlying kernel platforms.

"As we pass the one month anniversary of the general availability of Windows 8, we are pleased to announce that to-date Microsoft has sold 40 million Windows 8 licenses. Tami Reller shared this news with industry and financial analysts, investors and media today at the Credit Suisse 2012 Annual Technology Conference. Windows 8 is outpacing Windows 7 in terms of upgrades." Not bad, but there are the usual asterisks, as Ars notes.

The clock is ticking for XP users, with Microsoft ending support with its final security update after 11 years on April 8, 2014. Netmarketshare's desktop browser statistics show 40% of users are still using XP, totalling about 500 million users (versus Windows 7 at 45% and Vista at 6%). Gartner and Forrester analysts predict that 10% to 20% of enterprise PCs will be running XP after April 2014. Options for companies include: speed up XP conversions, sign up for Microsoft's Custom Support Program for after-retirement support, and add a supported browser to XP to replace unsupported IE8.

Do you depend on your computer for your living? If so, I'm sure you've thought long and hard about which hardware and software to use. I'd like to explain why I use generic "white boxes" running open source software. These give me a platform I rely on for 100% availability. They also provide a low-cost solution with excellent security and privacy.

Software for the Raspberry Pi is quickly moving forward. Beyond the several core Linux distros, another couple dozen systems are available, with NetBSD, FreeBSD, and Chromium imminently stepping into the mix. (Ubuntu will not join them as it requires ARMv7 and the Pi is ARMv6). Two dozen programming languages are available, including Python, Perl, Java, Ruby 1.9.2, BASIC, and more. Since the Pi is a full fledged ARM computer, it should run nearly any ARM app within its system requirements. See the RPi Wiki or Foundation website for more info.

Since its 4.4.10 release way back in 2008, Damn Small Linux languished as an inactive project. But a month ago John Andrews announced 4.11 release candidate 2. It includes updated apps and bug fixes. Download from here (only 50m). More on what's in the release candidate here. DSL is popular for making older computers useful and also works well as a tiny live distro.

Levi Asher offers his free memoir of his rise and fall in the dot-com boom of the late 1990s and early 2000s. The autobiography covers Asher's twenty-five years in programming: his founding of the oldest ongoing literature website Literary Kicks in 1994, his success with the dot-com website iVillage in 1999 (and its subsequent collapse), and how all this insanity affected his personal life. It's a quick, entertaining read.

Haiku R1/Alpha 4 had a couple critical bugs that were immediately identified and resolved shortly after release. These issues affected a significant number of users, and Haiku developers felt it made sense to do an Alpha 4.1 point release to provide a better experience for subsequent user downloads. The new download links and torrents have been provided, and they encourage people to update.

On the day CyanogenMod moves CM10 to stable, their domain is hijacked by a community 'member'. "We don't like how this played out, and we are deeply hurt. Likewise, we are deeply saddened at the confusion this may have caused the community. We will continue to be open about the what, when, how, but unfortunately, we may never know the 'why' - though greed comes to mind. The team itself has not made a profit off of CM and that is not our goal. But to have one of our own betray the community like this is beyond our comprehension." This makes me so angry and sad. Slightly related: it's about damn time the Googles and Samsungs of this world invest some money and resources into CyanogenMod to give them a solid infrastructure to work with. It would be peanuts for them financially.

My new phone arrived today: a blue HTC 8X, running Windows Phone 8. As a huge Windows Phone fan put off by several persistent issues in Windows Phone 7.x, I'm basically giving this platform another shot, and in this day and age such a second chance doesn't come cheap: the 8X is 539 EUR, after all. Here's a few quick first impressions after less than a day of use.

"Advanced Micro Devices has hired JPMorgan Chase & Co to explore options, which could include a potential sale, as the chipmaker struggles to find a role in an industry increasingly focused on mobile and away from traditional PCs, according to three sources familiar with the situation." Woah. Bad news for competition in the x86 space.