The open source world opened up further this week with the announcement of Moblin, Intel's ambitious mobile Linux initiative targeted at accelerating software development for mobile Internet devices. Comprising a Linux kernel, UI framework, browser, multimedia framework and embedded Linux image creation tools as well as developer resources like documentation, mailing lists and an IRC channel, the Moblin project is touted by Intel as a point of integration for a series of existing sub-projects spotlighting mobile device power management, network profile management, Telepathy-based chat and related ventures. Â
While the sub-projects are presently focused on the Intel architecture, in particular the 600MHz A100 and 800MHz A110 processors (which combine Voltron-style with the 945GU Express chipset and ICH7 I/O controller hub to form Intel's Ultra Mobile Platform 2007), the computing giant said Moblin is open to contributions for support of competing platforms. Next week's Ubuntu Live conference should shed additional light on what Moblin is all about--for that matter, some digging into the Moblin website offers broad hints as to what the upcoming Ubuntu Mobile platform is all about, most notably a Mozilla-based browser complete with "finger-driven UI." Until then, it's good to see Intel inside the mobile open source ranks. -Jason