CE Linux Forum (CELF) Announces Availability of CELF Specification and Reference Implementation for Consumer Electronic Products

SAN FRANCISCO, June, 29, 2004. The CE Linux Forum (CELF) today announced that it has released its first CELF Specification and Reference Implementation. This release represents another step toward optimizing Linux for use in consumer electronic (CE) products, consistent with the goals and vision of the CELF organization.

The specification and implementation can be freely downloaded from the CELF website at www.celinuxforum.org.

This release incorporates output from several working groups operating within the CELF, and it expands on the number of platforms supported by the CELF source tree that was originally released in November 2003. The source tree reflects most of the function of CELF specifications. This work represents consensus among Forum members operating within the working groups on software technologies deemed important to the use of Linux in CE products.

“With the first year anniversary of the CE Linux Forum comes a reaffirmation of the strong desire of major CE vendors to promote and use Linux as a major technology component of digital CE products,” said Scott Smyers, CELF Steering Committee Chair.

The CELF working groups, whose initial results are incorporated into the tree, have an ongoing focus in the following technology areas:

1) Reduction of device startup and shutdown times

2) Energy-saving features (low power consumption)

3) Audio Visual and graphics functions

4) Improvement of real-time characteristics

5) Reduction of memory requirements

6) Security enhancements

“CELF hopes to draw upon its members’ technology resources and to collaborate with the open source community in order to continue to improve the technologies on which we are focused,” added Ikuo Minakata, Co-Chair of the CELF Steering Committee.

Organized to promote the use of Linux in digital CE products, CELF was established last June by eight major consumer electronics companies (Panasonic (Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.), Sony Corporation, Hitachi, Ltd., NEC Corporation, Royal Philips Electronics, Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., Sharp Corporation, and Toshiba Corporation), and now includes more than 50 member companies.

Linux is a registered trademark owned by Linus Torvalds in the U.S. and other areas.

Press Contacts:
Asian region: pr-asia@celinuxforum.org
European region: pr-europe@celinuxforum.org
U.S. and all other regions: pr-other@celinuxforum.org

[Reference]
CE Linux Forum Office
TEL: +1-408-955-4941