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Linux In Robots, Windows in Handhelds
savuporo writes "Robots.net is reporting that Linux-based robots are far more common than Windows-based robotics. Especially various Asian robot builders are increasingly selecting Linux and other open-source software as a basis for robot products and research. Linux is also gaining ground in other embedded applications like PDAs and mobile phones." That said, prostoalex writes "50% of all the PDAs sold in 2003 had Palm OS, while Windows family accounted for 37.7% of PDA market. In 2004 Microsoft is the leader of handheld OS market with 43% market share, followed by Palm OS with 36.3%."
It seems to me that the robotics market is a growing one - more and more robots are going to be produced in the future. Linux has this growing market.
Windows has the shrinking market. Handhelds are on the way out, being pushed aside by smarter phones (running Linux or Symbian). Why have a phone and a handheld, when the phone will do both? So, the handheld market is shrinking, and that's the one Windows has.
Linux 1, Microsoft 0
This post will enter the public domain 70 years after my death, unless Disney buys another extension.
This might be a viewpoint that isn't shared by many, especially considering that it does everything that a PDA needs to do - then again a 5 year old Palm also did - but it has fallen behind, limited by the old architecture of PalmOS.
They really need to get version 6 out, the version that should be fully native on ARM hardware, using BeOS functionality and so on. They should concentrate on providing a wide range of easy to use software that looks good and performs well. Beat PocketPC where it is good.
The sad thing is that Palm Desktop is a good application for what it does, worth running even if you don't have a Palm!