Microsoft Corporation has opened an Open Source Interop Technology Center near Munich, Germany that should promote open source software on Windows and improve the relationship of its products with the free software community.

Along with its ongoing work on Lenny, the Debian project is still attending to its version 4.0 called Etch. Its now fifth update includes bug fixes and security patches.

The pending release of Ubuntu 8.10 was announced by Steve Langasek last night. The Ubuntu team is confident the latest candidate, codenamed Intrepid Ibex, is stable enough to be used without risk.

Kyocera Wireless Corporation (KWC) uses Android software for its own mobile platform. The embedded Linux firm Wind River has engaged itself as an integrator.

In a recent report of the European Union's IDABC agency, numerous software tenders in Europe run against regulations in that they favor proprietary software. If it were up to the IDABC, the tendering organizations would be liable for these practices.

After the glut of netbooks on the market, Imovio, an offshoot of U.S. company Comsciences, presents the iKit Multimedia Messenger, a palm-sized netbook with Linux.

The upcoming version 5.0 of Debian GNU/Linux, codenamed Lenny, provides for the first time not only image downloads for CD and DVD, but also for Blu-ray disks, along with live images.

International Data Corporation (IDC) has analyzed PC sales figures for EMEA in the third quarter of 2008 and discovered that netbooks are responsible for more than half the nearly 30% sales growth. Linux is to ride along on the wave, which is to remain at its current level.