The world's largest netbook manufacturer, Acer, has just presented its forecasts for its own second quarter, as well as the rest of the year, and it is very positive about the netbook market and its own part in that market. In line with IDC predictions, the company predicts a 100 growth in 2009 for the netbook market, and predicts its own notebook and netbook shipments to rise with 35-40% this quarter.

It's rare to see some truly interesting ideas in Linux distributions, as most seem content to just remaster Ubuntu with a different theme. Therefore, we at OSNews are always interested in fresh and interesting distributions that try to add something of value to the landscape. One such distribution is xPUD, a fast-booting, kiosk-like distribution that uses the Mozilla Gecko Runtime to display a simple user interface that allows you to launch normal desktop Linux applications.

Adobe has a promotion that states that if you will attest that you're unemployed, they'll give you a free license to Flex Builder 3 that you can use to burnish your skills.

We've been waiting a while to see NVIDIA's Ion-based computers, and now Acer is taking the lead in this race by debuting the first Ion "nettop" since the ones shown off at CES by NVIDIA: the Acer AspireRevo. This little 7.1- x 7.1- x 1.2-inch box sports an 1.6GHz Intel Atom, up to four gigabytes of RAM, a 250 GB hard drive, Four-in-one card reader, six USB sockets, Ethernet, and HDMI and VGA outputs while running Windows Vista Home Premium or Basic. It'll be able to play any of your 1080p content, of course. There isn't any word on when Acer will start rolling these out to consumers nor what the said consumers will be paying, but since it's likely that other Ion-based nettops will begin to appear at large come summer, the AspireRevo will most likely be up for grabs near the end of the second quarter. I suppose it's safe to say that the desktop equivalent to the netbook is coming.

At OSNews, we've talked about the possibility of Google's Android operating system moving to netbooks quite a few times already. It seems to make sense; it's designed for small displays, is probably light on resources, it's Free and open, and has the backing of a heavyweight company. Lately, the first actual signs of Android moving to netbooks have appeared.

"Microsoft Research was in the news not too long ago regarding the innovative, outside-the-box research being done by MSR scientists on display at the annual MSR TechFest event. One of the stars of the show was a new web browser project named Gazelle. This is a great conversation with Gazelle project lead Helen Wang and Alex Moshchuk, a PhD student intern developer working on the Gazelle project. We cover a lot of ground and Erik and I are unusually curious given the fascinating model Gazelle represents for a truly secure web browser."

The RC2 release of Mandriva Linux 2009 Spring (code name Estephe) is now available. This RC2 version provides some updates on major desktop components of the distribution, including KDE 4.2.2, GNOME 2.26, X.org server 1.6, and kernel 2.6.29. This RC2 version proposes also nearly all of the 2009 Spring design. This version will allow you also to dump in a very easy way All available One hybrid isos on a USB key and then install Mandriva Linux on netbooks.

Continuing the recently started trend at Microsoft to be a bit more aggressive towards the competition, Brandon LeBlanc wrote on the Windows Experience Weblog about why Windows is such a huge success on netbooks compared to Linux. Also, what is up with that story on AppleInsider about Microsoft offering Windows-7-to-XP downgrade rights? Is that really so special?

Robert Szeleny has given a short update on the status of SkyOS. "For the last weeks and as it looks like quite a few more weeks I'm in contact with a lot of people talking about their ideas to continue SkyOS development. Unfortunately many people completely underestimate the amount of work required to manage a development team for SkyOS, either an open or closed source version, or completely lack vision and or motivation and or seriousness. Anyway, I'm still reading through my inbox hoping to get in contact with people with real motives and knowledge being able to bring SkyOS to the next level."

"The Pip-Boy 3000 is by far one of the coolest gadgets I can imagine owning, and it's no surprise to me that some crafty guy with a little spare time on his hands might try to create the real thing. YouTube user larpcast uploaded a video of a fully functional Pip-Boy, created using the one that came with the Amazon.com exclusive version of the game and an iTouch . Mix throughly and tah-dah, your very own Pip-Boy!"

Two new architectures based on the FreeBSD-kernel have been added to the Debian Archive. This makes Debian the first distribution, and probably the first large OS, to support two completely different kernels at the same time. "The two new architectures (well, better named OS i think, as they use a different kernel) are available in unstable and experimental. We do start out empty, importing only what is needed to get a build running. For this reason you will not be able to directly use it immediately. Please wait until they catched up, which I expect to happen soon."

We almost had another small riot over the EULA Google uses for its Chrome web browser. On Slashdot, the editors posted an anonymous submission that questioned Google's policies as defined in the EULA used by Chrome. Slashdot readers quickly corrected the wrong assumptions by the anonymous poster, and Google jumped in on its corporate blog to clarify the "issue".

Take a look at some systems that enable you to trace the execution of applications and work out what they are doing without having to make any modifications to the source code, and even without having to stop and restart the application. See how with tracing alone, you can find and diagnose problems with just a few commands.

We've been following the recent news about IBM potentially buying Sun, and the internet had more or less accepted that big blue was going to be the new owners of Sun Microsystems. However, the omnipresent "people close to the matter" have told the New York Times that IBM has withdrawn its offer, and that the deal is now off.