OStatic

When Nokia announced that it was launching the Symbian Foundation to great fanfare, it had within its grasp that rarest of opportunities to move swiftly and become the dominant open source mobile platform. Alas, just one and a half years later, they have seemingly ceded that position to Android. Instead of recognizing the threat from Android and making strategic changes to counter, they instead criticized Google's closed-door development of Android before releasing a line of code themselves. When criticizing competitors, it helps to have your own house in order first.

?In October, the Symbian Foundation released the Symbian kernel sources to the world, and the rest of the world (read: developers) collectively responded, Great. Where's my Android phone? I've often lauded Google for its ability to fuse the marketing, PR and developer benefits of open source projects into one seemless operation. It would seem that Symbian could stand to learn a few things. The question is, is it too late?

Google has Chrome Frame plug-in for Firefox up its sleeve, says Mozilla. Source code is present for a possible 'browser-in-a-browser' plug-in for Firefox and Opera.

Waiting for Chrome OS. In China, there's a story of early devices running alpha Chrome OS and some Linux fans have made their own version.

Zimbra notches 100 percent growth. Its collaboration suite offering now sports more than 50 million paid mailboxes.

Garmin takes a new tack with Linux-based Nav phone. Is there a market for a $300 proprietary Linux-based navigation device?

Is Oracle getting ready to kill OpenSolaris? What does a Linux company, which Oracle is, want to do with its newly purchased Sun operating system?

Google releases open source NX server. Amid the fanfare of the Chrome OS announcement, Google quietly released an open source NX server, dubbed Neatx, for remote desktop display.

HP releases $500 Linux netbook onto Aussie market. This week sees the Australian launch of the Mini 110, which HP is offering with both Ubuntu and Windows XP.

Free operating systems that aren't Linux. There are other free options such BSD, OpenSolaris, HaikuOS, ReactOS, and PureDarwin.

Chrome, Android have different jobs, Google says. Android has features unique to running mobile devices, and one doesn't replace the other, a Google mobile executive says.

Doctor Who meets open source. Peter Murray-Rust explains how the open chemistry group known as the Blue Obelisk has evolved what he calls the Doctor Who Model of Open Source.

What is the best Linux distribution for beginners? Linux Mint has quite a lot going for it.

Recording music with Linux on an EEE PC. This tutorial will show you how to install and setup a linux recording environment on your EEE PC or other netbook.

Will Google Wave reshape enterprise IT? Within enterprise IT departments, starved for compelling ways to collaborate on application development, it could have a big impact.

How much do desktops matter? Jim Zemlin of the Linux Foundation insists they don?t.

Novell Linux revenue soars as global server revenue plummets. The company reported Thursday that its Linux Platform revenue climbed 25 percent year over year in one of the worst recessions in history.

Google expects 18 Android phones by year's end. Andy Rubin, senior director for Mobile Platforms for Google, said the number could be as high as 20.

A grab bag of Linux games. From first person shooters to racing games, here are some titles to try over the weekend.

Microsoft Update quietly installs Firefox extension. A routine security update for a Microsoft Windows component installs a .NET update extension.

Navigate the web faster with these Firefox hotkeys. Here are a whole lot of easy shortcuts.

As the Ubuntu Developer Summit (UDS) kicks into high gear, the hopes, dreams and plans for the upcoming Ubuntu 9.10 release are taking shape. Over at Ars Technica, Ryan Paul reports on Canonical developer Michael Casadevall's presentation highlighting some of the technical nuances of making Android applications run on Ubuntu Netbook Remix.

Ubuntu's popularity aside, it is still esoteric -- Google has the upperhand in non-open source enthusiast name recognition. This no doubt plays into netbook manufacturer's opting for Android on netbooks, even though (as Paul states) Android is still very much a smartphone platform. Android can be modified, of course, but Ubuntu (or any Linux distribution) are already lightweight desktops potentially requiring fewer modifications to work well on netbooks.

Will adding Android compatibility make Remix a more attractive platform option? Can it really hurt?