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Sony, Toshiba And IBM To Develop New OS

Posted by timothy on from the more-the-merrier dept.

gaijin writes: "According to this article in the English version of the Japanese newspaper 'Daily Yomirui', Sony will use its experience developing the PS2 OS (hey, wasn't it Linux based?) and work with Toshiba and IBM at the hardware side to create a new OS that 'would allow personal computers and home appliances to exchange huge volumes of data, including the high-resolution graphics of a television screen, through a broadband connection.'"

6 of 198 comments (clear)

  1. Why? by Ami+Ganguli · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It looks to me like they want something with Digital Rights Management, but don't want to work with Microsoft (and Linux is too open). Evil.

    It's also worth noting that 2005 is about the time the next Playstation should emerge. That's not a coincidence.

    --
    It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail. - Abraham Maslow
  2. Huh?? by hyrdra · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What does this new OS provide that we don't already have and are not already capable of doing? You can already watch TV on your computer and view your computer's monitor on your TV. Regular NTSC resolution isn't that high anyway and is easily handled by a computer. You can already store television programs on your computer -- in fact, we even have things like TiVo which are consumer devices just for that purpose.

    Also via X-10 hardware we can control just about anything from our PCs -- including air conditioners. The problem isn't availability, it's just that most people don't really need to control their microwave or other hosehold devices/appliances from their computer.

    The new OS sounds cool, and the companies developing it are respectful and would no doubt produce a quality product, but there is much more information needed besides the media-PR blurb given in that article. I get the sense that this paper didn't have anything else to write about so it made something up, because throughout the article not one department or source is mentioned besides "industry sources". I would also think the three huge companies mentioned -- IBM, Toshiba, and Sony wouldn't work together anyway. Each one would be more than capable of developing and operating system on their own, and IMO there would be too much departmental overlay to justify cooperation with two other huge firms.

    Work on the OS project has not yet begun, but the three companies have begun joint development of next-generation semiconductors that will be hundreds of times faster than current integrated chips and feature networking functions.

    Yeah, and the're also working on a way to colonize Mars, too.

    --


    "I'll just chip in a bit for RedHat: I actually have that installed on my university machine." - Linus, '95
  3. Huge tuners !!?? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    "TVs with the OS installed will be much smaller as they will not need a tuner, the sources said."

    And we all know how huge TV-tuner-modules are.
    At least several cubic centimeters !

  4. A multitude of OS:s by adadun · · Score: 5, Insightful
    2005: I get to use Microsoft at work, Linux on my web server, Simbian on my phone and some other random Sony OS on my television... joy.
    Most people unknowingly use a multitude of operating systems in their daily lives, even today. They use OSE on their cellphone, RTXC on their microwave oven, pSOS in their car's control system, RTEMS in their stereo system, vxWorks in their dishwasher and perhaps even Linux in their VCR. Almost every device we use today is equipped with embedded small computers and they all run different operating systems.

    We shouldn't be striving for a "standard" OS in all those appliences. (Who would want to run Windows in their embedded systems anyway? Yes, Microsoft would probably succeed in making Windows the standard OS in such a case...) We should be setting standards for exchanging data between those systems instead.

    TCP/IP is a good carrier of the information exchange - the global Internet has proven that. But service discovery, naming and security are issues that needs to be delt with. Hopefully, this will be developed out in the open just like the Internet protocols once were developed and not beind closed doors, patents and intelectual property lock-ins.
  5. Doomed from the start? by Phil+Wherry · · Score: 5, Informative
    While nothing's 100% certain, history suggests that efforts like this might have difficulty achieving success.

    There have been a number of fairly spectacular failures in this arena. Consider, for example:
    • Taligent. This was an Apple-HP-IBM joint venture aimed at developing operating system software. Four years passed, and much money was spent. Much hype was produced, but I don't think they ever shipped a product.
    • Kaleida. This was an Apple-IBM joint venture aimed at developing (yep!) operating system software. No product resulted.
    • OS/2. This one's a little different since a product (and, for that matter, a pretty good one) resulted. But pride-of-ownership and internal competition issues killed the product anyway.

    Software development successes seem to start with a small team who understand the position and purpose of the product. Once that's achieved, then the team can scale up. I'd be concerned that the three companies behind this announcement are likely to have difficulty assembling an appropriately small and well-focused core team.
  6. There will be no such thing! by MadMirko · · Score: 5, Informative

    Check Gamefront Magazine (German). Sony denied the claims of that Japanese newspaper, calling them a misunderstanding. Sony, IBM and Toshiba are developing a shared broadband network, no OS.