Why server downtimes and flame wars seem to start always on Friday afternoon? As you probably know, this time the well-intentioned Ari Jaaksi got slashdotted and a new wave of discussion around Nokia and its open source involvement began.

I'm on the go all the time, and sometimes that makes it hard to stay connected. I could carry my laptop with me everywhere, but that can be a pain, especially when I am on my bike. To meet the demands of my daily life I have constructed a lightweight, ultra-portable, Linux-based computing solution.

"... 'The new Nokia is a company that wants to sell you a mobile device that you’ll use to purchase lots of music and other forthcoming content (N-Gage games) and lock you into their portals and services (navigation subscriptions). The device is only a means to an end, and giving customers choices by making the devices open limits Nokia’s future revenue.' ..."

It has been years since we have seen a full scale operating system war. Today’s announcement by Nokia that they will be open sourcing Symbian and making it available royalty free is the opening of yet another front in the blossoming mobile OS conflagration.

Nokia announced it plans to acquire all of Symbian, a UK-based mobile phone operating system developer, for £208 million, and will open the software in a move seen as a response to new rival new, Google's Android.

The easy, obvious answer is yes. Nokia’s agreement to buy Trolltech for $155 million has to be a big win for mobile Linux.

Interesting things are happening in the world of mobile embedded devices where GNU/Linux was already making significant strides as its being used on such popular mobile devices as is Nokia Nseries.

TechCrunch IT are reporting that Nokia has bought Symbian Ltd, the software development company famous for creating the proprietary operating system for mobile devices, Symbian OS.

The second annual "Open Source in Mobile" (OSiM) conference has announced its sponsors and program of events. Set for Sep. 18-19 in Madrid, Spain, the event features keynotes from representatives of Nokia, Access, Red Hat, Motorola, Telecom Italia, and HP.