It seems Motorola Inc has decided to take the PowerPC Reference Platform specification seriously: it has gone to Mountain View, California-based FirmWorks Inc for an implementation of the Open Firmware boot code. The specification demands that from this summer any machine that wants to call itself PowerPC Reference Platform-compliant has to support Open Firmware. This left both IBM Corp and Motorola in the ironic position of having PowerPC-based boxes that did not comply with their own standard. While IBM apparently plans to stick with its proprietary boot code until its Common Hardware Reference Platform machines appear, Motorola will take Firmworks’ software for use in its PowerStack personal computers and OEM motherboards. So Motorola’s first ‘PowerPC Reference Platform-compliant’ machines are now scheduled to appear in January. Firmworks said Motorola will eventually implement the software across its whole line of single board computers and PowerStack servers.
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