The same technology used in Nintendo’s popular Wii video game console that lets you bowl strikes and hit tennis volleys like you’re Venus Williams is also making its way into mobile handsets.

Responding to a flick of the wrist or sweep of the arm, tiny sensors called accelerometers, which measure linear acceleration in the Wiimote game controller, translate motion into action on the screen. When the technology is added to a cell phone, the handset’s utility changes in several intriguing ways. It can, for example, function as a motion-sensing mouse that lets you browse the mobile Internet by tilting the device left, right, up or down. It even can allow you to monitor a fitness workout by measuring the number of steps you take, your speed and the calories burned.

Experts say this is just the beginning. As accelerometers advanced from one-axis to two-axis to three-axis measurement capabilities, their accuracy has improved dramatically. And some companies, such as the 3-year-old start-up Invensense, are taking the technology a step further by combining three-axis accelerometers with gyroscopes, which measure rotation speed, to create even-more accurate sensors that could be used to improve photo stabilization and location and navigation services.

Source: ZDNet

Oh great! Just what we need! People driving and playing tennis on their cell phones!!

~LC

SAM Linux 2007, a light-weight PCLinuxOS-based live/installation CD featuring the Xfce 4.4 desktop and a 2.6.18.6 kernel, was released for free download today. SAM 2007 is positioned as a complete desktop environment that is suitable for older hardware.

According to the project team, “To run SAM all you need is at least 128MB of RAM and a 300MHz CPU. Lesser is possible (down to 64MB RAM with a existing swap partition), but not recommended.”

SAM Linux 2007 comes with support for more than 20 languages, includes Beryl and Xgl support, and contains a complete home desktop with office, Internet, games, multimedia, graphics, system, security, and rescue software, the team said. It also sports “nice additions, like WINE, Flash 9, Java, and RealPlayer,” the team said.

It is possible to boot SAM Linux 2007 from a USB thumb drive in conjunction with using the CD as start medium, according to the project’s website. The user’s “home” folder gets stored on the USB flash device.

Key new features, according to the team, include:

* OpenOffice.org 2.2 RC1; also supports GNOME Office
* Added Gparted, root-kit-hunter, redo-mbr, Dayplanner, Glabels, Chestnut Dialer, PyNeighbourhood, Streamtuner, RealPlayer, and FLPhoto
* Added LiveUSB mode and mkusbhome
* GAIM 2.0.0beta6 instant messenger
* GIMP 2.3.10 graphics editor
* Mplayer 1.0 RC1 music player
* Firefox 2.0.0.2 browser

Thunderbird 1.5.0.4 email client was removed from this new edition.

You can download the 699 MB CD iso from one of the project mirrors here. Alternatively, you can link directly to the ISO image file here.

You can view some screen shots here, at LinuxQuestions.com.

Source: Desktop Linux

~LC

Personally I love those Mac vs PC advertisements, but throw in Linux and they’re even better. Here’s a couple YouTube videos from Novell that made me giggle! And of course I love the fact that Linux is a woman!!

Source: Reverend Ted

~LC

VideoLAN’s VLC is a cross-platform media player with a simple interface that doesn’t require a degree in rocket science to operate. That doesn’t mean, however, that VLC is a simplistic application: it has a few tricks up its sleeve that can…

VLC is a program that comes in handy a lot for a lot of those strange video formats at you run into on the net, Baldy

Source: VLC beyond the basics