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Sam Dean (8)
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Symbian Releases Microkernel As Open Source, Finally

It was well over a year ago now that news of the Symbian operating system--found on approximately half of global smartphones--going open source broke. The news was interpreted as particularly important to Nokia's forward-looking Symbian strategy, but after all this time, an open source version of Symbian's platform is still only in beta testing.

Today, though, as EETimes notes, Symbian has released its platform microkernel, and software development kit (SDK), as open source under the Eclipse Public License. The Symbian Foundation claims that it is moving quickly toward an open source model, which is questionable, but the release of the EKA2 kernel is a signal that Symbian still means business about adopting an open source model.



Palm's App Catalog Should Embrace Open Source, Not Reject It

It's no news to anyone that Palm is desperate to make a success of its Palm Pre phone. It was met with very solid reviews initially, and AdMob's latest wireless traffic metrics show it gaining market share. Nevertheless, Palm's recent revenue forecast missed Wall Street applications by a long shot, and that's heading into the important holiday season, when the iPhone and many new Android handsets are likely to go on a tear.

Apple's success with the iPhone, of course, has a lot to do with its App Store, which has now moved over 2 billion applications. To put that 2 billion number in perspective, that's not far behind the total number of songs sold on iTunes since its inception years ago. Palm would very wise to try to compete with Apple's App Store through openness in its Palm App Catalog, along the lines of how Android Market pursues openness. That's why it's disturbing news that a Netscape veteran is reporting that his apps were rejected from the App Catalog because the source code was available elsewhere.



Android Gains Ground in Wireless Traffic War

Admob is out with its latest roundup of traffic metrics on the wireless web (PDF), and although the iPhone still rules, Android is gaining significant ground. The iPhone accounted for 40 percent of wireless web usage in August, up from 33 percent in February, but Android more than tripled its share of traffic, jumping from 2 percent to 7 percent over the past six months. The really notable thing about Android's performance is that numerous upcoming handsets based on the open source OS haven't even arrived yet, including ones from LG, Motorola, Samsung, and INQ. Check out more in GigaOm's story.


What Lies Ahead As Android Phones and the iPhone Square Off in China?

Slowly but surely, Apple has been trying to crack the Chinese market with the iPhone. There have been many obstructions, and China Mobile has already expressed its desire to push Android-based phones, such as Dell's, throughout the country. As MacNewsWorld reported late last week, though, the iPhone's slow boat to China has finally arrived. China Unicom, the second largest wireless provider in China, announced on Friday that it will start carrying iPhones in this year's third quarter. Is there likely to be a smackdown between Android-based phones and the iPhone in China, and how free and open will China's government allow cutting-edge smartphones to be?


Dell Shows Off an Android Smartphone Aimed for China

Could the open source Android operating system possibly find its biggest momentum yet in China? Last week, Telecomasia.net reported on China Mobile's intent to introduce its Ophone smartphone concept this month. The Ophone hardware is made by China-based Lenovo, and runs a version of Android. China Unicom is also preparing to release Apple's iPhone in China in September, but many people believe that Chines users will favor phones based on open source operating systems. Now, as Engadget reports, Dell is ramping up to enter the Chinese smartphone market with its Mini 3i smartphone, running the Android-based Open Mobile System (OMS).


Fashionistas, Design and Early Open Source Smartphones

Today, JKOnTheRun notes that HTC--the first hardware maker to back the open source Android operating system--may be putting Android on over 50 percent of its future phones. If true this is a big blow to Windows Mobile, the platform on the major portion of HTC?s lineup for some time, they conclude. I have to agree, and this is yet another example of Android's pronounced momentum in the smartphone market, where we're going to see large waves of Android handsets arrive this year and next. Android is shaping up to be a hugely influential open source platform.? For Android phones to really get competitive with the iPhone, though, the cool factor matters. This is much more important than it may seem at first glance.


Report: Android Now Has 6 Percent of the U.S. Smartphone Market

In spite of rumblings that the Android operating system isn't spreading out to more handsets, consider this finding from researchers at AdMob: The Android OS now has 6 percent of the U.S. smartphone market and is tied with Palm as the fourth-largest OS. AdMob's latest research on the smartphone market also found that growth in requests [to AdMob's network] from devices running the Android and iPhone operating systems continued to outpace other platforms in March, despite the relatively limited number of devices in market. The growth in requests from devices is largely being driven by very healthy growth in usage of the app stores for both Android and the iPhone. Here are some of the other key points from AdMob's report.



Smartphone Sales Predicted to Stay Strong, to Become Led By Open Source

Two new market research reports are predicting strong smartphone sales growth going forward, and some researchers are predicting that open source-based smartphones will soon start to trump Apple's iPhone. In-Stat is predicting that the number of mobile application users will quadruple in five years, and that sales of open source-based smartphones will double iPhone sales over the same time period. In-Stat's latest report on the trend, foresees applications moving briskly from mobile application stores such as Apple's and the Android Marketplace.?