It's one small step for Hewlett-Packard, and one giant leap for Ubuntu Server Edition and Canonical. Specifically, HP and Canonical are working to certify HP ProLiant servers to run Ubuntu Server Edition, Canonical marketing manager Gerry Carr has confirmed to WorksWithU. Here are the preliminary details, and its implications for customers.

Oracle's takeover of Sun Microsystems hasn't been fully sanctioned by anti-trust entities and Oracle already has a message for customers: we'll continue to care intensively about SPARC and Solaris. Something's missing here: MySQL.

Oracle OpenWorld -- a major event for Oracle partners and customers -- kicks off October 11 in San Francisco. Sun Microsystems will be in the house. So will Dell, Hewlett-Packard and IBM. And if you look hard enough, there will even be some MySQL content at the event. Here’s the scoop.

Hewlett-Packard supports and offers only the Microsoft-taxed version of GNU/Linux to prospective users

During a phone briefing with media a few minutes ago, Canonical CEO Mark Shuttleworth said Ubuntu Server 9.04 has been tested to run on 45 different server configurations from IBM, Sun Microsystems, Hewlett-Packard, Dell, Lenovo and smaller providers. And Shuttleworth also hinted that Canonical's server relationship with HP is growing stronger. Here are the details.

At Lenovo's press dinner the other night there was an unidentified handheld on display, sitting casually next to the three new consumer-friendly IdeaPad laptops the company had come to Las Vegas to push.

Sun has really shifted gears lately with regards to Solaris, SPARC, and x86. For many years, Sun seemed to relegate Solaris x86 to the status of red-headed stepchild, undeserving of attention, nurturing, and support.

Upstart multicore, Linux-compatible chip maker Tilera don't need no stinking tier one server makers. That means no IBM, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, or Sun Microsystems. At least not yet.

Oracle Corp. has rekindled its Solaris love. Sun's Solaris operating system will underlie new high-end data center appliances running the Oracle software stack. And Oracle EnterpriseLinux now becomes the preferred OS for lower-end commodity hardware.