ibm Archive

  • Is IBM splitting hairs with open source?

    Is IBM splitting hairs with open source?

    Posted on April 8, 2010 | No Comments
    It's no secret that I'm a big Free Software fan. It's no secret that IBM is a giant company with more money than I can possibly imagine. So I was pretty happy in 2005 when IBM, in an obvious PR stunt to get buddy-buddy with the open source community, made its Statement of Non-Assertion of Named Patents Against OSS, ostensibly saying that it would permit open source projects to use any of the items covered by those patents without risk of penalty or lawsuit. Yay! Finally, a BigCo getting it and doing the right thing! But five years is a long time, people come and go, and promises can be forgotten. IBM has lately threatened to sue someone for infringement of a lot of IBM patents, including at least two that were included in the Non-Assertion statement.

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  • Remember the Linux wristwatch?

    Remember the Linux wristwatch?

    Posted on April 5, 2010 | No Comments
    With all the hype about the iPad, and indeed, the hype about smaller and smaller mobile computing devices, I thought I would remind you all that there was at one point a Linux-powered wristwatch! This marvelous curiosity was discussed back in 2001, when it ran kernel version 2.2.1, had 8 megabytes of flash memory, and had IrDA (remember that?!). It even had a touchscreen display, and had a PIM suite that "consists of an organizer, WML browser, to-do list and a calculator" all in 51K of code!

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  • IBM researching ways to help the aged, illiterate

    IBM researching ways to help the aged, illiterate

    Posted on March 9, 2010 | No Comments
    IBM's. Open Collaborative Research is working on ways to get mobile Internet to the aged and illiterate all over the world. The initial research is happening in Japan and India and will be used to plan future endeavors including open source platforms for information sharing. Japan was chosen because of its high number of older folks and India chosen because, despite recent impressive advances, many citizens are still illiterate.

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  • Fujifilm and IBM develop magnetic tape that stores 35TB

    Fujifilm and IBM develop magnetic tape that stores 35TB

    Posted on January 22, 2010 | No Comments
    Fujifilm and IBM today announced they jointly developed a technology that makes it possible to store 35TB of data on a single magnetic tape. The companies say the tape can store the "text of 35 million books, which would require 248 miles (399 km) of bookshelves". 35TB is about 44 times as much as previously possible.

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  • IBM developing zero-emission data center technology

    IBM developing zero-emission data center technology

    Posted on November 9, 2009 | No Comments
    We've already established that your favorite tech company, from Apple to HP to Nintendo, and everyone in between, is being pressured to go green. While some of the tactics may be a bit silly, I think it's safe to say that you'd rather see these companies green than not green, right? It makes us feel good about ourselves, that even though we're buying hunks of plastic and metal—Lord knows what chemicals are in these things—the company in question is trying to make everything as environmentally friendly as possible. In the spotlight today is IBM, which continues to develop technology that could, one day, lead to zero-emission data centers.

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  • Graphene makes a gra-fine photodetector

    Graphene makes a gra-fine photodetector

    Posted on October 13, 2009 | No Comments
    Graphene, as everyone knows, "is a one-atom-thick planar sheet of sp2-bonded carbon atoms that are densely packed in a honeycomb crystal lattice." (Seriously, I didn't just check Wikipedia for that.) Scientists have been using the material for lots of different applications for some time now. Recent work at IBM's T. J. Watson Research Center has focused on using graphene as a photodetector, and it turns out that it does a pretty good job in that role.

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