ACCESS Co., Ltd. and its subsidiary PalmSource, Inc. are announcing the ACCESS Linux Platform (ALP), the latest evolution of Palm OS for Linux. The ACCESS Linux Platform is designed to be an integrated, open and flexible Linux-based platform tailored for smartphones and mobile devices.
ACCESS' goal is to have ALP become the platform of choice for the development of high volume, feature rich smartphones and mobile devices for high performance networks, including 2.5G and 3G, worldwide.
ALP is designed to provide a complete, consistent and customizable solution for handset and mobile device manufacturers and mobile operators. ACCESS and PalmSource expect to make the ALP Software Developer Kit (SDK) available to its licensees by the end of 2006.
Major components of ALP include commercial-grade Linux kernel (version 2.6.12 and above), optimized implementation of GIMP ToolKit (GTK+), GStreamer and SQLite.
Where appropriate, open source components used in ALP are extended and certified by the Company. For example, ACCESS and PalmSource will enhance and certify the open source BlueZ libraries to provide ALP with a Bluetooth 2.0 technology compliant software stack.
A number of ACCESS and PalmSource technologies have been incorporated into ALP, including the ACCESS NetFront browser, PalmSource's messaging and telephony middleware and PalmSource's mobile applications including PIMs, multimedia, messaging, PalmSource HotSync and Palm Desktop.
ALP features MAX, an innovative application framework designed by ACCESS and PalmSource to deliver an easy-to-use user experience and user interface for smartphones and mobile devices. MAX will seamlessly support the concurrent operation of multiple applications and tasks. It will also provide easy access to background tasks.
In addition to the MAX application framework, ALP is designed to support the existing Palm Powered Economy, the J2ME developer community and the open source community.
In addition, ALP, because it includes open source components including GTK and GStreamer, can support a variety of third party Linux applications and services. ACCESS and PalmSource plan to provide the developer community with development tools and SDKs to enable them to port existing applications and develop new applications for ALP.
