When asked what he thought of IBM's huge investment in Linux, Ballmer said, "It will have an impact, but Linux is a toy." By IBM supporting Linux well then it is not a toy. But does that mean IBM and Linux will carry the day? No way.

AGENDA VR3 PORTABLE PC Agenda Computing Inc, a California-based company has launched a full function PDA, codenamed VR3, running on embedded Linux. The Developer Edition, priced at $249, measures 4.5"x3.0"x0.8" and weighs 4 oz. It comes equipped with a 66MHz 32 Bit NEC VR4181 MIPS processor, 8 MB of RAM and 16 MB of flash storage. It has a 240x160 pixel monochrome LCD touch screen display with 16-level gray scale and a viewable area of 2" x 2¼".

"The second-generation HP Print Server Appliance 4200 features a point and print function that automates the installation of printers. It off-loads spooling and printing services from general purpose file servers to improve IT management, installation, administration and optimization of network printing services. It supports Microsoft Windows 95, 98, NT, 2000, Millennium and UNIX clients."

With the range of Linux applications available, Linux is becoming increasingly popular for use in e-com front-ends running DNS servers, mail servers, proxy servers, caching servers and even server appliances like Cobalt's RaQ and Qube servers. As Linux benefits most enterprises, it will not fade away, much to Microsoft's chargin.

By building AIX-based clustering capabilities into Linux, IBM hopes to eventually make it easier for its larger customers to seamlessly mix and match Unix and Linux clusters. This ability, will give corporate IT shops more confidence to deploy Linux for mission-critical applications.

Boeing on Wednesday bought a 96-processor supercomputer based on the Linux operating system and Advanced Micro Devices processors for use in designing the new Delta IV rocket that launches satellites into space.

IBM's strategy to push Linux across all four of the main server lines has helped unify it's server groups. More important, Linux has changed IBM's popularity among programmers and has raised the company's profile in a very similar way to what Sun accomplished with its Java software.

Although Linux has made tremendous inroads into the corporate-computing world, barriers to its widespread adoption still exist. They include ease of upgrades, vendor support, a general lack of software that can run on the platform (especially enterprise and e-com applications), lack of a strong robust file system, proper backup support, etc.

Alongside the changes in registration requirements, users will have a slightly different experience in obtaining updates, with a web-based interface that allows them to review changelogs, queue packages for delivery to their systems, and receive zip files of fix collections.

Under terms of the letter of understanding Linux NetworX will maintain their current research and development operation and sales team in Salt Lake City and will broaden their manufacturing and corporate functions with resources available in the EBIZ Technology Center in Houston.