Many Linux users have experience with Wine, the application compatibility layer which allows some Windows programs to run on UNIX-like machines. During Ubuntu's Open Week event, Mark Shuttleworth was asked about Wine, and how important he believes it is for the success of Ubuntu.

This morning, the Itanium Solutions Alliance put out a statement with some vague numbers showing the strength of the Itanium server platform in 2008. By IDC's reckoning of the server space in the fourth quarter, shipments of Itanium-based machines rose by 18 per cent and it was the seventh straight quarter of sales that crested above $1bn for the Itanium server category. Data from Gartner's report covering 2008's server sales indicated that Itanium machines outgrew RISC-based alternatives in terms of sales and shipments, growing share in each category.

The Federal Trade Commission in the United States has started an inquiry into the close ties between the boards of Apple and Google. They are wondering if the close ties constitute a violation of antitrust laws now that the two companies are increasingly participating in the same markets.

A little earlier than expected, Microsoft has already released the Windows 7 release candidate to the general public. The Redmond company had already put the RC up for download on TechNet and MSDN, but from now on, everyone can download it. I've already updated all my Windows machines to the RC, so let's take a quick look at what I found. Note: The Windows XP Mode beta is also set to arrive today, but has not yet been made available. We'll update this item accordingly once it's released. Update: The Windows XP Mode beta is also available. Get it now!

This past weekend, Apple accused Psystar of withholding information in the ongoing lawsuit between the two companies. The letter made it onto the internet, and was widely reported on. Psystar has now replied to Apple's letter, and there's some serious venom in there.

"Alone in a room in his home in Bonn, Germany, Friedhelm Hillebrand sat at his typewriter, tapping out random sentences and questions on a sheet of paper. As he went along, Hillebrand counted the number of letters, numbers, punctuation marks and spaces on the page. Each blurb ran on for a line or two and nearly always clocked in under 160 characters. That became Hillebrand's magic number - and set the standard for one of today's most popular forms of digital communication: text messaging."

"Oracle's acquisition of Sun raised a lot of questions about the future of Sun's core technologies. Oracle says that it is committed to Solaris and Java, but some open source advocates are concerned about the implications for OpenOffice.org and MySQL. Ars looks at how Oracle and members of the open source software community have responded to the acquisition."

"At last year's Akademy the vision of the Social Desktop was born and first presented to a larger audience. The concept behind the Social Desktop is to bring the power of online communities and group collaboration to desktop applications and the desktop shell itself. One of the strongest assets of the Free Software community is its worldwide community of contributors and users who belief in free software and who work hard to bring the software and solutions to the mainstream."

A podcast without any Windows news this week; we focus on the alternatives with our discussion about RISC OS, Hackintoshes, and AROS. No GarageBand crashes this week, as Kroc downgraded to an earlier version without the bug that has been bugging us since the first podcast.

It's Sunday! Sunday! What does this mean! Yes! Another week has passed us by! We're all one week closer to inevitable death! This also means it's time for another week in review. This past week we saw a lot of Windows and Apple news, we had some items on various truly alternative operating systems, and Linux reached a milestone. I don't know what this week's My Take will be about. Maybe, once I'm done with the Week in Review, I'll have thought of something.

Reintji from Flickr was good enough to upload some photos of some of the popular gaming consoles throughout the years to his Flickr account. The catch? Not only is he an avid gamer, but he's also an x-ray technician. Combining his two fortes, he's provided these pictures in lovely black and white x-ray colors for us all to enjoy.

It's been relatively quiet around the whole Psystar case lately. The case is supposedly going to trial somewhere in November of this year, and the two opposing parties are probably preparing their cases. We've finally got some news on this front, as Apple is accusing Psystar of withholding financial information. Apple made its accusations in a partly censored letter to judge William Alsup.

Via Technologies may try to extend the use of its Nano processors from netbooks to servers in a potential challenge to Intel and Advanced Micro Devices. Via has introduced a new Nano-based motherboard for multimedia servers. It is Via's first server product based on the Nano chip, and some analysts said it could mark the start of an effort by Via to expand the chip's role in servers.

With a flood of ARM-based netbooks coming to the market starting somewhere end of this year, many hope it will be another opportunity for Linux to get some mainstream exposure. Since "normal" Windows doesn't run on ARM, Linux is the only obvious choice. Right? Well, Warren East, president and CEO of ARM Holdings plc, has been dropping hints that Windows might make its way to ARM after all. At least, that's what EETimes is concluding.