Linux users have been salivating over Trolltech's promised Greenphone for the better part of a year. The "open" Linux phone platform, powered by Trolltech's Qtopia 4 embedded software stack, is bundled with a Qtopia software development kit (SDK) designed to kick-start mobile Linux application development. The first batch of devices has now shipped, and I spent a couple of weeks with a review unit. While it's an interesting package, it's only a first step and in no way a finished product.

"DirectX 10 is probably the most important revolution in games development, at least since the introduction of the programmable shader in DirectX 8.0. Because of the way that Microsoft has designed the new driver model, DirectX 10 will only be available for Windows Vista users and there will not be a version released for Windows XP. Along with DirectX 10, Windows Vista will come with DirectX 9.0Ex - this is because pre-DirectX 10 hardware will not work under the new API due to the complete overhaul."

On December 28th, 2005 - a day which will live in anonymity - OSNews published an editorial of mine urging hobby and research operating system developers to implement Project UDI, because otherwise we (the small/ non-mainstream/ hobby/research OS community) would always wind up stuck with mutually incompatible sets of drivers for doing the same exact things. I also proclaimed that I would implement UDI for my own operating system kernel. Bad decision.

"The ImageIO framework, introduced in Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, allows applications to read and write popular image file formats. ImageIO works in conjunction with Quartz and is designed for maximum performance, convienient metadata access, and color management. As the definitive way to access image data on Mac OS X, you should consider using ImageIO in your application as a high-performance substitute for Image Importers or other image handling libraries. This article gets you started working with ImageIO, shows how to read and write data to and from Quartz, and points to some of the capabilities in working with Core Image that you can explore further on your own."

El Reg has reviewed the Shuttle x100. "The Shuttle X100 is an unusual Windows PC that stands out thanks to its tiny size and stylish looks. It thoroughly deserves to reclaim the many receptionists' desks that are currently occupied by iMacs across the nation and it's ideal for duties in your living room where a noisy beige tower simply won't be tolerated."

Not necessarily what you expect from the top managers: Halamka judged three operating systems according to a variety of criteria including their performance, user interfaces and enterprise management capabilities, such as the ability to configure applications, easily organize file systems, and establish granular security control. CIO.org followed Halamka's progress, and now they have his conclusions.