With the availability of RTM builds of Windows 8 this past week, it's become clear that at least for the initial release, they won't be providing a way to disable the controversial new "Windows 8 style UI," formerly known as "Metro." While I think this issue is a long way from being fully resolved one way or the other, it will be something that will hound both the release and adoption of Windows 8. Read on for my thoughts.

adeelarshad82 writes "Research in Motion announced the company's first slider-style BlackBerry, the Torch 9800, which is also the first BlackBerry with both a touch screen and hard keyboard, and the first device to run the new OS 6. The Torch feels and looks very much like a BlackBerry, with the proper BlackBerry Bold-style arrangements of plastic, metal, and glass; there are also BlackBerry fonts on the keys and the now-standard BlackBerry trackpad. The Torch's 3.2-inch, 360-by-480 screen is a standard capacitive LCD touch screen. The screen is bright and sharp, but it's obviously behind the competition in terms of resolution. The Torch has a 5-megapixel camera with VGA video recording, Bluetooth 2.1, 512 MB of program memory, 4 GB of built-in storage, and 802.11n Wi-Fi. The Torch has the same 624-MHz Marvell processor as the existing BlackBerry Bold. The new BlackBerry 6 OS adds touch to the interface mix. RIM appears to have totally rewritten its media apps. There's a new Desktop Manager coming with BlackBerry 6, and a Social Feeds app that combines Twitter, Facebook, and various instant messaging conversations."

adeelarshad82 writes "Dell Streak, the Android-based 5-inch tablet (which has also been called out as a smartphone) is set to ship starting in July, both from a US carrier and direct on Dell.com for $500. Even though Dell has not disclosed the name of the carrier, some experts believe that it will be AT&T because the Streak is a 3G GSM 850/1900 device and AT&T is the only major US carrier that supports those frequency bands. According to a hands-on, Streak is a sharp-looking device with a black front and candy-apple red back that unfortunately shows fingerprints easily. On the upside, Streak's curved body is comfortable to hold. Streak runs a customized version of Android 1.6, but Android aficionados will have to get used to the unusual button layout. Its 800x480-pixel screen makes images look tight, and web pages will benefit from the horizontal resolution. The 1 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, the same as in the HTC Incredible and Sprint EVO 4G, functions snappily. There's a 5-megapixel camera on the back, a VGA camera for video calling on the front, and a MicroSD memory card slot under the back cover."

Robaato writes "Stephen Levy writes in the Guardian about the perception of randomness, or the lack thereof, on an iPod set to shuffle." From the article: "My first iPod loved Steely Dan. So do I. But not as much as my iPod did.... I didn't keep track of every song that played every time I shuffled my tunes, but after a while I would keep a sharp ear out for what I came to call the LTBSD (Length of Time Before Steely Dan) Factor. The LTBSD Factor was always perplexingly short." My first iPod shuffle refused to let me delete (sigh) Weird Al's Polkamon off of the flash memory.

Bruce Lawson submits the review below of Stuart Langridge's Excellent guide to creating dynamic web pages; scalable and sensible., writing "Don't be put off by the title: the DHTML here bears no resemblance to the stupid Web tricks of the late 90s that allowed animated unicorns to follow your cursor or silly Powerpoint-like transitions between Web pages." Read on for the rest.

michaelpapet.com writes "IBM has ported/developed their Javacard smart card operating system for Sharp's 1MB smart card. Read Sharp's announcement here. Interesting features include: AES encryption; elliptical curve encryption; and 1MB of storage. Sharp's smart card package claims to be almost as small as a normal smart card package. In an industry that can considers 64K of memory a luxury, 1MB is staggering. Read Sharp's original 1MB smart card announcement here. Is this a 'Build it and they will come...' kind of solution? How small is an 'almost as small' smart card IC package?"

We've reviewed Wall Street Meat, by Andy Kessler. Andy's recently released Running Money. Below is an excerpt from the book, which we'll be reviewing soon; I've read it already and whole-heartedly enjoyed it.

Anonymous Writer writes "EmperorLinux is distributing the Sharp Actius RD3D autostereo laptop with Linux pre-installed, dubbing it the 'Molecule'. Almost all the hardware features can be utilised under Linux; the autostereo 3D display (most importantly), CD-RW/DVD-RW combo drive, Ethernet port, audio hardware, PC Card slot, 4 USB 2.0 ports, FireWire port, Sony Memory Stick slot, Compact Flash slot, SD slot, and internal floppy dive. The only built-in feature unsupported is the internal 56 Kbps modem, however a supported 56 kbps PC Card modem is available as well as a WiFi PC Card."

An anonymous reader writes "LinuxDevices.com reports that Sharp will introduce a new member in its Linux-based Zaurus PDA family in the Japanese market on Nov. 27, 2003. The SL-C860 appears to be a more powerful and feature-rich version of the much-reviewed SL-C750/760. The device boasts a 400MHz Intel PXA255 processor equipped with 128MB of Flash memory (65MB available for user programs) along with 64MB of SDRAM memory, has a 640x480 resolution full-VGA color display, and runs an embedded Linux operating system based on Metrowerks's OpenPDA handheld device software stack."

He says, "Sorry about how long this took to do. Blame it on a European Tour that took much more of my time than I have ever imagined..." No problem, Neil. We love you, and your answers to our questions were certainly worth the wait.

i4u writes "Sharp announces new models of their Zaurus PDA line. The new models are the SL-C760 (launch date: June 21, 2003) and the SL-C750 (launch date: May 24, 2003). The new PDAs have a faster CPU, more memory and feature a bigger Screen (VGA 640x480) than the former SLC-700 model. The start speed of applications improved to about twice (compared to the SL-C700) by adopting the Intel XScaleTM PXA255 400MHz CPU. Connectivty is possible via Wireless Lan and FOMA broadband wireless phones. The installed software contains also an MP4 Player for Movies. Nice for business users is the ability to connect the Zaurus to a projector (800x600) and present MS PowerPoint Slides. Photos and English translation of Press-Release available on I4U.com"

Slashback tonight with a quartet of updates. So, read on for more information on portable video viewing (and instant recording!), United Linux and one analysts view of What it All Means, Microsoft's answer to a Gopher hole, and why easily guessed passwords sometimes save the day.

Nat Friedman often seems to live in the shadow of his famous coworker, Miguel de Icaza, but today it's his turn to shine. You asked Nat questions last week. This week he answers, in detail, with lots of links, touching on subjects ranging from Gnome's future directions to how Microsoft is dealing with Linux as a competitor to Windows.

Phillip M. Torrone writes: "Gosh folks, a thousand words couldn't describe how great Comdex 2001 was this year for me. But, about 300 pictures may help. Your pal pt from flashenabled.com/mobile has it all. Memory stick and SD GPS units, Cameras, Microwaves and Bluetooth; The new Sharp Linux PDA with keyboard; Bluetooth everything, Pocket PCs, Sony robot dogs, Sony Ericsson and Nokia phones, Windows XP, Xbox, Merecedes Benz test drives, Klingons, the Strip, virtual keyboards, DoCoMo, Harry Potter and more. The coverage is almost as good as being there."

yankeehack writes: "Oh Joy! The Standard published this article which explains predicted shortages of critical memory and LCD components (resulting in-of course-higher prices and delayed product launches). Component makers including Intel, Hyundai, NEC and Sharp Electronics are among those quoted for the article. Those afflicted by the shortage include Nintendo's Game Boy Advanced handheld console (Does anybody *still* use those?) which will be released 6 months late and mobile phone manufacturers, who are having trouble getting the hardware for all those nifty features they advertise."

In his responses to the Slashdot interview, Miguel shares the deadly truth about GNOME, the shocking story of the future of Bonobo and CORBA, and the titillating tale of adventure and intrigue that lies deep within the bowels of popular Free Software development projects. Okay, so it's not all that shocking, but Miguel has brought us some really great news and answers from his neck of the open source woods.