Jason Brooks

Theres very little legal, high-quality digital content available over the Internet today, and according to Sen. Fritz Hollings, its the failure of entertainment and technology industries to come up with a rigorous anti-copying scheme thats to blame. Hes right. While the popularity of peer-to-peer file sharing software and of the MP3 music format has demonstrated […]

In the past 10 years, handheld computers have developed from overpriced, underpowered electronic oddities to become legitimate business tools. And thats not surprising—the history of computing has been marked by a trend toward increasingly convenient and widely distributed terminals. In this installment of IT Agenda, eWeek Labs examines the state of enterprise handheld computing and […]

The Microsoft antitrust saga stretches onward, and in our latest thrilling installment, the attorneys general from the states rejecting the settlement proposed by the Department of Justice and Microsoft are demanding that Microsoft produce a modular version of Windows—free of applications deemed (by whom Im not sure) as extraneous to the operation of the OS. […]

As the ordained gadget guru here at eWEEK Labs, I get a lot of questions about which cool new device to buy, and almost everyone defines “cool new device” along the same lines—small, cheap and wireless. Of course, “small, cheap and wireless” has often been too tall an order for mobile device makers. Palm will […]

One of the first ways I tested Windows XPs remote desktop feature was by connecting to my desktop with my aged IBM z50 Windows CE device, using a terminal services client from Microsoft. Even though Ive since ditched Windows CE on the z50 for NetBSD, Ive been able to continue connecting to my XP box […]

On Feb. 14 the Federal Communications Commission gave the green light to a new generation of wireless communications, imaging and radar systems by approving the commercial use of Ultra Wideband wireless technology. I was telepresent at the proceedings, courtesy of an FCC streaming media feed. UWB transmissions consist of low power, short duration signals sent […]

Its now been more than two years since the now-defunct Be Inc. released Version 5 of its innovative desktop operating system, BeOS. Unfortunately, Be shifted its focus to the Internet appliance operating system market around the same time—a gamble that succeeded in sealing Bes doom, ensuring that BeOS would never see another release. However, BeOS […]

I finally got around last week to installing NetBSD on my IBM z50 Workpad—a subnotebook-sized unit that teamed excellent design and capable hardware with the extremely poor-performing Windows CE 2.11 operating system. Id picked up the z50 a year or so back when IBM pulled the plug on it and the devices could be had […]

Central to the success of Linux on the desktop is the continued improvement of the GNOME and KDE environments. The first alpha release of GNOME 2.0 (source code is freely downloadable from www.gnome.org) provides a look at what users of this open-source desktop environment can expect in GNOME 2.0, slated for release late next month. […]

Facing slowed sales in the handheld computer space, Handspring Inc. is staking its future on the Treo 180, the first in a new line of products that sport cell phone capabilities in lieu of the Springboard expansion slots that define the companys Visor handheld devices. In eWEEK Labs tests, we were impressed with the Treos […]

Palm recently announced that it had finished forming a separate, mobile operating system entity called Palm Solutions Group. And although the corporate structure intended to market and develop Palm OS is complete, its not clear how this venture will fare. Im sure Palm will welcome a change from the ever-shrinking margins of the hardware business […]

Everyone seems to agree that itll take an infusion of Bluetooth-bearing mobile phones to shift the young cable replacement technology into high gear. So where are they? The Ericsson Inc. T39m that we tested came from Europe. Configuring and using Bluetooth can be a complex task, but the T39m does a good job of shepherding […]