The paint has barely dried on Ubuntu 8.04 when Canonical announced at the Computex trade show in Taiwan on June 3rd that it will be releasing a new version of Ubuntu 8.04 just for Intel Atom-based netbooks and UMPCs (Ultra Mobile PCs).

I knew there was going to be big Linux netbook news coming out of the Computex trade show in Taipei, Taiwan, but I didn't know it was going to be this big. Sources at Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, tell me that Canonical will be announcing new partnerships with Intel, SanDisk, and RealNetworks.

In case there’s anyone left out there who doesn’t get that the UMPC (Ultra Mobile PC) is a big deal for the Linux desktop consider that arguably the most important business Linux desktop, Novell’s SLED (SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop) 10 SP2) is now available on MSI’s (Micro-Star International) new Wind Notebook.

Regardless of whether you think that the UMPC needs saving or not, it is clear that the ultra-mobile PC has not been the success that manufacturers had hoped it would be. These systems, which are now generally in or approaching their second generation, seemed great when they were announced, but were unable to hit reasonable price points.

Microsoft and Intel are fighting for the affections of hardware makers as the PC industry tries to answer Apple's iPad. The world's biggest software company used the annual Computex show in Taiwan to release a preview of Windows Embedded Compact 7 — the latest rebranded version of Windows CE, which has been promised on tablets from Asus, LG, and MSI.

Dutch integrator Van Der Led (VDL) Designs has announced a clone of the Asus Eee PC ultra-mini PC (UMPC) notebook. The WiFi-enabled "Jisus" UMPC is equipped with a Chinese-made 1GHz Loongson CPU, has an 8.9-inch display, and runs Ubuntu Linux.

Back in March, I tried to find as many Linux-based UMPCs as I could. At the time, I found 18, which was expanded to 20 with the help of commenters. After many more Linux-based UMPC releases, I decided to see how many more I could find. The first 20 on the list below are from the previous list.

Canonical isn’t wasting any time getting Ubuntu ready for UMPCs (Ultra Mobile PCs) and MIDs (Mobile Internet Devices). The company just announced on June 24 that the developer release of Ubuntu MID Edition 8.04 is ready for testing.

Reports of the Linux netbook's death at the hands of Microsoft have been greatly exaggerated. A flood of Linux netbook news will be made next week at the Computex trade show in Taiwan.