Another busy day and another quick note...we will try to catch up on all this over the weekend.

1. Why PPC instead of x86:

Selling the Competitive Advantages

2. Here is some text from the Pilot Project master document:

The thin client/file server configuration is the anchor of the Pilot Programs. It is from this point and beginning with the user that the PowerPC will be extended into the entire enterprise eliminating the need for multiple platforms and multiple operating systems. The ultimate goal is to collapse the entire IT infrastructure into a more easily manageable solution and demonstrate that one platform and one operating system with a complete open source software stack can fulfill the needs of users and companies.

We seek to address the needs of the growing thin client and file server application markets. Our intent in the Pilots is to develop the supporting documentation we need to effectively make an argument for our offering. Nevertheless, the success of our offering should not be focused on the PowerPC or even the PegasosPPC, but the total solution we are providing. Our proof points are focused toward a final objective of providing a total system solution and not simply the means to accomplish it. CIO's only seek to maintain the IT environment that they need and lower their costs. There are very few (if any) strategic applications or environments in the market we are attacking. We are not going after the niche high-end specialized applications used in certain office environments - rather we are planning to address the market segments with well understood application set - like those of the thin client space. We are not going after the departments that use Apple computers. We are going after the other 85-90% of a company's users.

Today, many of these factors referenced above are usually not included in TCO calculations. An objective of the Pilot Program is to identify metrics that will establish new criteria for performance and new standards of performance measurement. Long the hallmark of the PowerPC, lower power requirements, lower operating temperatures and thus better reliability, have been ignored by the broader IT market. Our task is to innumerate, document and market these virtues in the context of normal day-to-day computer use.

The goal of the Pilot Projects is to support the introduction of the PowerPC based Open Linux Platform we are launching. The Pilot Programs will validate the following:

The Linux/OSS/PowerPC environment lowers TCO vs. X86 Lintel/Wintel alternatives across a spectrum of configurations from thin client to cluster.

DaveP has the right ideas and we have been working towards them quietly for months. You will be reading about it in a newsletter from one of the companies you mentioned soon...

More later!

R&B

P.S. AGAIN: We are 100% in favor of continuing to develop MorphOS. For the moment, things are slow because it is just a matter of resources and time.