Microsoft today formally announced the Color Palm-size PC: "Addition of Color Spurs Several Hardware Manufacturers to Offer Palm-Size PCs". Three new manufacturers will now produce PPCs: Auctor Corporation, Compaq Computer Corporation", and Hewlett Packard with the Jornada 420 (announced today). In addition to the standard languages, Microsoft for the first time will provide the software in both Chinese and Japanese.

NS BASIC Corporation has announced the immediate availability of NS Basic/CE 1.10 (US$99.95) for the Hewlett-Packard's (HP) Jornada 820 (powered by a 190MHz StrongARM 1100 processor). NS Basic/CE is a complete programming environment for Windows CE that offers interactive code/variable debugging, and a 191 page pocket-sized reference handbook.

Power Media has released a new "task manager" for PalmPilot devices called "MultiTask" (US$35) that was developed by Innovative Computer Solutions (ICS). The goal of MultiTask is to "maximize productivity with seamless organization of important tasks."

Patrick Rhone has announced the downloadable release of HandJive Magazine v3.01 at www.handjivemag.com. This issue includes: "First impressions of a Palm III from a Newton user"; "movie reviews of 'Star Trek: Insurrection', 'The Truman Show', and 'Blade'"; and gadget reviews of "Dashboard for the Newton, the Throttle Classic stylus, and two PalmPilot books."

Peter Belanger has announced the release of version 2.0 of "San Francisco Map" for the Newton. The new version lets users search by street name. You can learn more (downloads and screen snapshots) via www.peterbelanger.com/newton.html.

-Steve Holden (sholden@pencomputing.com)