The Hindu : Front Page : Desi solutions fuel device developers' love of Linux

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Apr 08, 2007
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Desi solutions fuel device developers' love of Linux

Special Correspondent

Mistral's Wireless solution (left) and `starter kit' (right) leverage the popularity of Linux.

Bangalore: Indian engineers are helping to fuel the increasing world-wide popularity of the `free-and-open' Linux platform for a host of handy consumer devices from mobile phones to music players to portable life-saving devices — and they are doing this using internationally used chip platforms.

The Bangalore-based Mistral Software has just put together a solution for a Wireless LAN offering — the first available globally, to exploit the recently released ``DaVinci'' platform from Texas Instruments. This will enable product developers to wireless-enable compellingly priced products from smart phones and pocket PCs, to video conferencing, security and projection equipment. It can be run under Windows — or a Linux flavour of software.

Another recent Mistral offering is a `starter kit' based on TI's OMAP P 2340 signal processing chip.

It comes pre-loaded with embedded Linux and all electronics, including a small display screen. Gadget makers can easily fashion the Mistral kit any way they want so that it appears in customers' hands in any one of a dozen device `avatars.'

The Wireless offering is a good illustration of how Indian digital solutions involve collaboration across continents. The `desi' software fuels a Wireless Local Area Network module from Japan-based Murata Manufacturing Company, which in turn works with the DM644x signal processing chips from U.S.-based Texas Instruments, code-named Da Vinci. And TI has a very significant development arm in Bangalore — so the creative trail can be said to start and end in India — with a stopover in two other geographies!

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