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Astraware, one of the most well-liked and longest-running game developers for the Palm OS, has announced plans to support various flavors of mobile Linux; starting the ACCESS Linux Platform (ALP), the follow up to the Palm platform. Popular Astraware titles include Bejeweled, Astraware Sudoku, Text Twist, Zuma, Bookworm, Tradewinds, Chuzzle, Cubis and My Little Tank.

Last week, ALP developer ACCESS announced the delivery of the new platform’s Product Development Kit (PDK) to licensees and a pre-release Software Development Kit (SDK) to some developers. The PDK makes the creation of smartphones built on ALP possible, while the SDK does the same for third-party applications.

The first fruits of Astraware’s labor were demonstrated running under the early SDK and on hardware at last week's 3GSM show in Barcelona. So it shouldn't come as a surprise that Astraware has also signed up as a charter member of the ACCESS Connect Ecosystem (ACE) Global Partner Program, which is designed to drive the development and adoption of new mobile and converged technologies and solutions based on ALP.


                               Bewjeweled 2

"Extending our platform support is a key part of our strategy," said Astraware CEO Howard Tomlinson in a statement. "We see mobile Linux as being an extremely important part of the industry over the coming year, and we're aiming Astraware to be the games provider of choice for this platform. As a charter member of the ACE program, we're taking a lead in the growth of the mobile Linux community."

In addition to the Palm OS, Astraware offers games for the Windows Mobile Pocket PC & Smartphone platforms. The company plans to add Symbian titles next year.