You might think that Windows or Linux has the market cornered when it comes to operating systems, I know I did; I was wrong. Turns out a little known, but highly used kernel, ITRON, is. ITRON, a japanese real-time kernel for small-scale embedded system that runs on mobile phones, digital cameras, CD players and countless other electronic devices.

ITRON, the first in a series of open-source specifications for the TRON architecture, answered a pressing need for Japan's electronics firms, which traditionally have written their own software for embedded systems, a time-consuming and cumbersome process that often results in a plethora of different and incompatible systems.

Now, the T-Engine Forum, an offshoot of the TRON project with more than 250 member companies, has been working to create a standardized development environment for embedded applications based on ITRON. Vendors of proprietary solutions are worried -- or at least should be.

In late September, Microsoft surprised the industry by joining the T-Engine Forum. Microsoft intends to work with the Forum to establish specifications for an environment in which the T-Kernel and Windows CE can coexist on the T-Engine hardware reference platform.

Microsoft will continue to develop its own OS, but the company hopes T-Engine developers will be attracted to Windows CE's user interfaces. The company will demonstrate prototypes derived from the joint effort at December's Tokyo TronShow.

Microsoft's decision to join the T-Engine Forum is not without irony. The company was the main beneficiary of U.S. government actions against the TRON project in 1989. Tom Robertson, Microsoft's Tokyo-based director for government affairs in Asia, is a former official of the United States Trade Representative office that issued the threats against the Japanese government.