Open source

Intel’s Nehalem chip and the Sun/IBM dynamic

Sun’s relationship with Intel on the new generation of processors may bear fruit with Solaris support for the Intel “Nehalem” chip family. In fact, Solaris may have the first and best support for the new processor.

Sun is hoping that better support for the new multi-core chips with special power management capability will give it an edge in the server space, but of course the question of an IBM Sun acquisition still hangs over the vendor. So does the fact that the Intel chip competes with Sun’s own Sparc line.

Users aren’t concerned about the IBM deal; they feel that Sun under IBM would be an even stronger partner. The Intel Nehalem affinity for Solaris and an IBM Sun acquisition might put Linux under more pressure. IBM has been a Linux backer but might be less active should it have its own open-source UNIX-compatible OS.

The Nehalem chip is one of the most advanced and fastest available, outperforming (says Intel) both IBM and Sun/Sparc by a large margin and providing unparalleled power management, I/O handling, and virtualization support. The new chip (Xeon 5500 is the current instantiation) is already launching a major flush of new servers from IBM, Dell, and HP.

ExperiaSphere Technical Primer ready for download

We have released the first public version of our PowerPoint presentation, ExperiaSphere Technical Primer. The document is available for downloading on our ExperiaSphere website. Please visit the Downloads menu tab.

We will be releasing further material through the next four months as we prepare for our release of beta code in late June.

Ecrisson, STMicroelectronics form mobile phone joint venture

In yet another move seemingly aimed at Google’s Open Handset Alliance, Ericsson and STMicroelectronics are forming a joint venture (JV) to create software and semiconductors for cellphones. The move comes after rival Nokia bought out Symbian and made it open source, and Google’s Android seems poised to enter the market.

There is a major push toward the creation of ecosystems around mobile devices, and we note that there is a similar drive to create vertical partnerships through APIs at the operator level. It seems clear that the industry has decided that developers are the key to their future.

Death of analog TV could benefit telecoms

The upcoming death of analog TV broadcasting may save the U.S. cellular providers from one of the risks of an open handset — the deployment of cellphones able to tune into analog TV. This type of phone is sold by ZTE in China, where analog service will continue for another six years.

There may be a link between the open handset programs and the death of analog, in fact, because the use of cellphones to tune free TV would likely hurt telecoms’ mobile TV plans. We’re hearing that a number of firms are now looking at two dodges to the “no-analog” problem; one is working on a tuner for digital TV small enough to carry in a handset, and the other is looking at using Wi-Fi or WiMAX to deliver DVB-H TV in broadcast mode only, selling advertising to pay the bills.

First Google Android handset due before year’s end

Google Android will be making its debut for the holiday season according to reports, with its first phone created by HTC and offered by T-Mobile. The new phone will have a touch screen, larger slide-based keyboard, and support an unknown number of Android applications from developers in the Open Handset Alliance program.

Android is the strongest of the open handset systems in our view; we have joined the programs and examined the material. There are other handset players and providers looking at announcements as well, but we do not believe that any more than one additional player has any chance of making an announcement by year-end.

We hear that HTC/T-Mobile will actually be ready likely in October but may delay a bit to insure pre-publicity is strong and that others don’t have time to capitalize on any holiday marketing successes.

Yahoo announces Fire Eagle developer platform

Yahoo is making its Fire Eagle geo-platform available to all developers today. The new platform is an example of the work that Yahoo in particular, but also other web giants, are doing to facilitate the development of applications through the release of useful tools that reduce developer effort.

Fire Eagle allows developers to build applications that can determine a user’s location, and also support the registration of location information in a secure way to other applications. This area will be closely watched by many because it presents some risk of being exploited by stalkers or online predators.

We note here that CIMI Corporation is working with Yahoo in the integration of Yahoo APIs with our ExperiaSphere effort. See our progress on the ExperiaSphere website (http://www.experiasphere.wikispaces.com).

Telcos look at open source

Telcos are apparently working harder to make their APIs suitable for a broader range of web developers, providing more Web 2.0-like or “RESTfull” interfaces (an acronym for the normal interaction between web clients and servers). We believe that the move is positive in that it shows the operators are aware they can’t make their developer programs work with complex event-based APIs. But we also believe that simple web interfaces are only suitable for the limited set of services that can be projected from a telco API direct to an end user. While we’re clearly biased, we believe this is a validation our open source ExperiaSphere (www.experiasphere.wikispaces.com) approach.

New open source initiative from CIMI Corporation

We have launched an open source project to develop service logic execution environments (SLEEs) and service management execution environments (SMEEs) for NGN services. The initiative is called “ExperiaSphere,” and we are now actively seeking contributors and partners in the process. We’ve established a website wiki  www.experiasphere.wikispaces.com) for this new venture, and we invite our clients and those who read this blog to review the material there from time to time as the concept develops. Some coding is already started for this activity, and we expect to be making media announcements in May.

Cisco Dips Toe into “New Media”?

Cisco made an exploratory foray into the new media space at its C-scape conference, with a short discussion of its architecture for social and entertainment portals, EOS. This open-source framework is expected to be available to developers in 2008. There were no real details of Cisco’s plans here, and it is widely believed that the step is so far more exploratory than a commitment to significant resources or efforts.