Sidekick lives! Hyperspace by Phoenix Technologies

December 16, 12:45 PMGadgets ExaminerDan Appleman

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The Hyperspace AppSpace lives in
conjunction with the full OS

Sidekick was a 1984 program by Borland that allowed PC users to keep a notepad, calculator and time organizer program resident in memory at all times while using their DOS applications. What is old is new again, as Phoenix Technologies (of BIOS fame) present their new Hyperspace environment.

Think of it as a mini operating system that is resident on your system for instant access side by side with whatever other operating system you have on your laptop. This operating system could provide instant access to web, phone or calendaring applications – whatever the laptop vender chooses to put there.

At first glance, this may seem an odd idea – after all, the whole idea of a modern multi-tasking OS such as XP or Vista is to… multitask – to provide instant access to any capability you want. Can the appeal of instant access to those applications justify the hyperspace environment? Given the ever-increasing boot-times of Windows, one could argue that it does.

Remember that Hyperspace is not a consumer product – it’s an OEM product: something a laptop manufacturer would install. I’m skeptical as to whether there will ever be consumer demand, but this could be great for vertical markets, where businesses can customize their hyperspace environment for their own business and still leave their employees with a full OS for general use.