"The Jack PC from Chip PC Technologies offers a neat and novel thin-client desktop computing solution where the computer doesn't just plug into the wall, it is the plug in the wall. Running on power provided by the ethernet cable that also connects it to the data center server, the computer-in-a-wall-socket supports wireless connectivity, has dual display capabilities and runs on the RISC processor architecture – which gives the solution the equivalent of 1.2GHz of x86 processing power."

"Under an initiative sponsored by the European Commission, the Symbian platform was this week endorsed by the Artemis Joint Technology Initiative and specifically identified as a unique technology that is a vital focus for European-centric mobile software development. As a result, a total investment of over EUR 22 million has been committed to the development of next generation technologies for the Symbian platform. This development project is being led by the Symbian Foundation as part of a consortium of major European technology organisations. The consortium is made up of 24 organisations from 8 European countries, comprising major mobile device manufacturers, hardware and service integration professional services, major consumer electronics companies, mobile network operators, application developers, universities and research institutions."

Every now and then, you get these news item that make you feel like something's wrong. The item doesn't make sense, shouldn't be possible, and yet it is. Despite Microsoft's newfound commitment to web standards, it's still incredibly unnerving to see things like this - the W3C's first HTML5 compliance test, in which Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview 6 outdoes all other browsers.

MIPS Technologies has said it will put its processor architecture in tablets and smartphones as it prepares to duel rivals Arm and Intel in those fast-growing markets. In September, MIPS released the MIPS32 1074K family of application processors, which it hopes to push into mobile devices. The 1074K is scalable up to 1.5GHz and is capable of multithreading, which the company claims will give it a leg up on Arm processors.

Do you like VLC on your iPhone or iPad? You don't yet have it installed, but want to? Well, then you'd better be quick about it, as some VLC contributors are unhappy with the fact that VLC is distributed through Apple's App Store, violating the GPL the video player is licensed under. At least, that's what some think.

Gutenprint has been ported to Haiku. "Michael Pfeiffer (wait, what?) intends on ironing out the configuration options and fixing any bugs that users experience. Please test out Gutenprint on Haiku with your supported printer and report back here, or file a bug report if you encounter problems. Anyone with a colour cartridge?"