(ZDNet)-Through a strange set of converging circumstances, Linux could end up as the pre-eminent operating system for Intel's 64-bit Itanium chip, due in the second half of this year.?Microsoft is holding to the party line that it will have a 64-bit Windows release ready to ship once Intel officially releases Itanium.?But according to an internal Microsoft memo, dated Jan.?1, 2000, the software company expects to release Beta 2 of Whistler - its next version of Windows following Windows 2000 - as its first Itanium offering.?Sun and Microsoft aren't the only major OS companies working feverishly to deliver 64-bit offerings simultaneously with Intel's Itanium.?But of all these offerings, only 64-bit Linux is at the beta testing stage at this point.?The others are in alpha or pre-alpha.?In early February, the Trillian Project -- a group consisting of Caldera, CERN, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Intel, Red Hat, SGI, SuSE, TurboLinux and VA Linux -- released its first beta of a version of Linux optimized for Itanium.?Major operating systems typically go through at least a year of rigorous beta testing before they are released commercially.?More ...
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