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4. EPG being as inaccurate as the ones you get on a flat screen TV one.

This is a good point. Even though DVB-T/T2/S (not sure about C) can provide EPG data, Microsoft get their EPG data from third parties. This is a good thing because you get 14 days worth of data and extra meta-data associated with the program listing which allows them to do some quite nifty functionality.

Unfortunately the data is often wrong and (in the UK at least) the series link data is either not there (so you cannot record the season of a show because it thinks it's a one off) or on every single instance of a show meaning that you end up filling your HD with hundreds of repeats.

There is even a hacky bit of vbscript which is designed to attempt to delete any duplicate recordings, it's that bad.

http://www.fourteenminutes.com...

How the hell does slashdot.org not support IPV6, I thought this was a tech website?

Forget IPV6 ... it doesn't have valid HTML, valid CSS and looks terrible on mobile devices.

If you have your own webserver, try this: http://www.fourteenminutes.com/code/avantslash/

Nope, I have an ipad 2 and they're nonfunctional. I wish slashdot would change the interface to make them usable on touchscreens.

I wish Slashdot would change the interface to make it just plain useable.

Have you tried Avantslash?

There isn't a template specifically for the iPad 2 (make one!), but the desktop or classic templates should work just fine.

Create a proper mobile site for those of us who read Slashdot on our phones.

I created AvantSlash in 2001 because the Slashdot site sucked when you tried to read it on a Palm Vx with AvantGo, Nine years later and it still sucks reading it on a HTC Desire HD.

I would expect a site for geeks and run by geeks to have the best mobile version in the world. Obviously not.

I also use it on my netbook these days, although not for posting.

Just a shame they didn't bother to use modern design practices to accommodate mobiles.

I gave up hoping that they'd do that around 2001 and so wrote AvantSlash. It screen-scrapes and then reformats nicely for mobile phones, I've been reading /. on various Windows Mobile devices, iPhone's and now my HTC Desire HD without a problem.

Of course the new design completely killed the code so I'll have to look at re-working it, so that won't solve your issues immediately I'm afraid.

The new redesign has obviously broken AvantSlash so in the next couple of days I'll evaluate the mobile version of Slashdot, determine if AvantSlash is still relevant and (if so) issue an update.

For people who are stuck on computers which aren't powerful enough or just want a clean reading experience (no posting or logging in, sorry) then this could be a better option for you.

Personally, I use it to read Slashdot on my HTC Desire and iPhone when I'm sitting on the tube or train.

http://www.fourteenminutes.com/code/avantslash/

For those of you who want to read Slashdot on your Kindle, I've been told by a couple of people that AvantSlash renders it reasonably well. One day the flaws in the mobile version of Slashcode will be addressed and we won't need to use something like this to read Slashdot on the go.

As soon as I get my hands on a Kindle, then I'll make any updates to get it to look better but that won't be probably until after Christmas. Patches always welcome though.

Slashdot is one of the worst for the mobile web. When I try to read slashdot on my blackberry (peal 8120) not only does it not render, it crashes first the browser and ultimately the phone itself. Just simply trying to load slashdot leaves me needing to pull the battery from my blackberry to execute a hard reboot.

I had this problem with Slashdot over 5 years ago and wrote AvantSlash which turns the pages into something which is readable on just about any mobile device. Please try it if you can.

It kind of saddens me that there are over 50 comments on this article about how poor Slashdot is and yet not one person has mentioned this project. Just goes to show the power of marketing I suppose.

Slashdot is one of the worst for the mobile web. When I try to read slashdot on my blackberry (peal 8120) not only does it not render, it crashes first the browser and ultimately the phone itself. Just simply trying to load slashdot leaves me needing to pull the battery from my blackberry to execute a hard reboot.

I had this problem with Slashdot over 5 years ago and wrote AvantSlash which turns the pages into something which is readable on just about any mobile device. Please try it if you can.

It kind of saddens me that there are over 50 comments on this article about how poor Slashdot is and yet not one person has mentioned this project. Just goes to show the power of marketing I suppose.

And a good mobile version of Slashdot is coming... when?

Avantslash is what you need. It'll produce a mobile version which is perfect for Windows Mobile, Smartphones, Blackberries and iPhone. I use it every day to read Slashdot on the train. Disclaimer: I wrote it.

I did read the site linked in your signature and commend you for a making a good effort. To be honest, although mine is more convoluted, I think it produces a better result. However if you've got some ideas on how to improve it then do let me know.

I'm aware than h1 tags aren't rendering properly on the iPhone causing the headline to be smaller than the actual text in landscape mode. I'm not sure why that is, but I'm working on it.

well, then among the many "cool" updates on the way you will appreciate the work that is currently being expended to make low-bandwidth, small screen, iphone, etc, interfaces much less buggy and faster-loading. :)

I'd be perfectly happy if you just ripped off the layout of AvantSlash.

It's low-bandwidth, small screen, iphone etc interface done correctly and was written over seven and a half years ago to get around the abomination that is slashdot.org/palm.

Glad to see you're finally getting there :)

In practice, I just checked my mail on my phone, saw a slashdot reply notification, and clicked the link. Then stared at the screen in disbelief, as the phone showed me that to show me a message maybe 2KB in size it had to download 1MB worth of crap.

I know your pain, so I wrote AvantSlash to get around this very issue. When the Slashdot developers see fit to produce a decent mobile/PDA friendly site then I'll retire this - but i've been saying that since 2001 and it still hasn't happened.

That's why you surf the lighter-weight versions of pages: http://slashdot.org/palm/ gives a front page that weighs only 8 KB. A page view at those rates is a dime, instead of $25.00

I'm biased, but I would suggest this instead of the Palm version. You need to set it up on a server (after some idiot abused the public copy I had for people) but it does present Slashdot far better.

To be fair, it is at a little more cost, as the current front page weighs in at about 24KB - but better comments and navigation and all can be configured to not be shown.

Actually, in the spirit of "picture worth 1000 words," let me SHOW you what the slashdot home page looks like on my BlackBerry 8700;

I agree. It's terrible viewing Slashdot on a phone, PDA or BlackBerry. I read your comment this morning on the train using my 8700 this morning too.

However the difference was that I was using AvantSlash to parse and filter out all the cruft, hence presenting you with a PDA and mobile friendly version.

Disclaimer: I'm biased as I wrote it, but you're exactly the type of person I wrote it for.

Yes, but it is by no means a single perfect solution. For example, the phone would still have to download the full HTML and stylesheet before adhering to the handheld media type. On a 2G phone, this equates to a painful downloading experience. In addition, certain browsers (such as Obigo) have a limit on the size of the page they can download.

I maintain AvantSlash which takes Slashdots HTML pages and turns them into a more PDA friendly version. Even though their handheld media type does a reasonable job it still means that your phone is downloading 48k's worth of content.

By contrast, generating PDA specific content rather than relying on the CSS to hide stuff you don't want to see means that you can reduce this download size to 13k.

On a standard GRPS connection running at approximately 38kbps (real world scenario) this extra 35k equates to an extra 7 seconds of download time.

If you want to read Slashdot on your pda or phone then I don't believe there is currently any better way than by using Avantslash.

However I do admit I am a little biased :)

Like my mother always said, "It's all fun and games until the government-trained killer aquatic mammals wind up in the hands of your country's enemies."

(Man, that was pretty prescient of her ...)

So long, and thanks for screwing up AvantSlash (again) with your CSS ...

S

Wow, this looks NICE. You guys needed to go to CSS for a LONG time.

Now, how 'bout taking a cue from AvantSlash, and making http://slashdot.org/palm actually work nicely?

AvantSlash is horribly broken, now, due to your changes (although I knew it was coming, and so did they.) So, one of two things needs to happen: the guy behind AvantSlash needs to update it, or you guys need to make the Palm site work.

I hope this is for real since it will mean that I can stop supporting AvantSlash which tries to make Slashdot as PDA and WAP friendly as possible.

Of course, all the parsing of HTML that my code did meant that any little change that occurred on the main Slashdot site completely broke AvantSlash . If you have a look at the change log you can see that they did tinker with the HTML on a fairly frequent basis (v2.18 and onwards are mainly parsing changes to keep up with them).

I hope this is for real since it will mean that I can stop supporting AvantSlash which tries to make Slashdot as PDA and WAP friendly as possible.

Of course, all the parsing of HTML that my code did meant that any little change that occurred on the main Slashdot site completely broke AvantSlash . If you have a look at the change log you can see that they did tinker with the HTML on a fairly frequent basis (v2.18 and onwards are mainly parsing changes to keep up with them).

However, the Odeon site is completely inaccessible. It's not a case of stuff not looking or formatting correctly, but once you followed the "entire site" link it was more a case of nothing actually being displayed to the user - no listings, no cinemas, nothing.

Even worse, if you emailed them to complain, they told you the site was undergoing a re-design. To my mind that has had to be at least a couple of years ago all because they couldn't be arsed to change some IE only javascript.

Anyway, if you've got GreaseMonkey this script will make the site accessable again.

ps. Whilst we're at it, if you have a phone or PDA then you might be interested in Movie Guide which provides you with you with detailed listings of all films showing in UK Cinema's.

Until then, we're stuck using something like AvantSlash which actually formats the page in a way that is not only readable on an offline client but on a PDA and WAP browser.

The quicker Slashdot moves to XHTML+CSS, the quicker we can get away from crufty hacks like this to get handheld friendly content.

What pisses me off the most is that I had to update AvantSlash because they changed the HTML slightly.

Granted, it turned out that it was a case change of the tr and td tags (why? it's not like it'll change anything) and I really should have coded to manage this (forgot the little i at the end).

However the reason I'm pissed is that if it was decent (x)html and css I wouldn't have to write something so it's reasonably viewable on my pocketpc.

If you really are going to use AvantGo (or Plucker) then consider using AvantSlash instead which cleans up the articles and comments for browsing on mobile devices. It can also remove all the hyperlinks from external websites so that you can set your link depth high enough to get all the slashdot content and avoid 3/4's of the general internet.

Of course, if Slashdot was re-written with valid XHTML and CSS then this code wouldn't be necessary.

Feed the entire contents of /usr/dict/words into a markov generator and you get pretty much the same thing. Random words which, whilst not having any meaning, are reasonably syntactically correct.

http://www.fourteenminutes.com/fun/words/.

Head on over to here and take a look at Avantslash.

Not only does it trim down Slashdot to something that can be read on a PDA but it can also be run through Googles HTML to WML proxy and it works really well (the script will determine if you're coming from a WAP phone and redirect you accordingly).

It also works very well on my Series 60 phone with Opera.

Several TV channels here also put out all there tele-text material on wap, which is nice because it is brief, up to date, and meant to read on a low res screen.

If you're in the UK then my tellyguide application and the aforementioned Google HTML to WML proxy will give you TV listings on the go.

Head on over to here and take a look at Avantslash.

Not only does it trim down Slashdot to something that can be read on a PDA but it can also be run through Googles HTML to WML proxy and it works really well (the script will determine if you're coming from a WAP phone and redirect you accordingly).

It also works very well on my Series 60 phone with Opera.

Several TV channels here also put out all there tele-text material on wap, which is nice because it is brief, up to date, and meant to read on a low res screen.

If you're in the UK then my tellyguide application and the aforementioned Google HTML to WML proxy will give you TV listings on the go.

Semi joking aside, it's compelling content - and lots of it, frequently updated - that's required before widespread, mainstream acceptance. This has already been noted many times here and elsewhere.

In my own experience, I've been reading shorter-form ebook content for years. AvantGo is my primary news source, and Richard Lawrence's excellent AvantSlash is a main way I read summaries and comments on Slashdot.

I have never read a novel with an ereader.

Of a more niche front, I'd love to see e content that's more easily annotated: when reading articles, white papers, etc., I'd like to be able to note, quickly and easily, the ideas that hit me at the time. I'd like those ideas to be linked to the passages that spurred them. These annotations should be syncable to a desktop app for further editing and printing.

Per the parent post, it's good to see Mobireader can see at least some of this. I'll check it out.

http://slashdot.org/palm/

Alternativily give up trying to gouge your eyes out with spoons over the brain-dead linking system which means that offline browsers won't work properly and head on over to:

http://www.fourteenminutes.com/code/avantslash/

Where you'll find something that not only cleans up all the cruft to make it PDA friendly but also works just as well on your mobile and WAP browser (via the Google WML browser).

(ob. disclaimer: I wrote it, so I might be slightly biased)

On a Washington State Ferry in the middle of Puget Sound. Although I don't consider this unusual as I do this pretty much everyday.

Someday the ferries promise Wi-Fi connections... until then this is made possible by AvantSlash.

This "upgrade" seems to have killed all the wonderful goodness of AvantSlash. Its the only good way to read /. using AvantGo. Help please. http://www.fourteenminutes.com/code/avantslash/

yes there is a way (two which i have used) to view slashdot on a handheld phone. one is to setup avantslash on a webserver you can access from your phone. if that's not practical for you, there is also http://slashdot.org/palm/ which gives you a basic WAP version of the front page and the articles, with the ability to view 5 or so comments as well. i much prefer avantslash because you can easily view all the comments above a certain threshold with it.

--
babybird

yes there is a way (two which i have used) to view slashdot on a handheld phone. one is to setup avantslash on a webserver you can access from your phone. if that's not practical for you, there is also http://slashdot.org/palm/ which gives you a basic WAP version of the front page and the articles, with the ability to view 5 or so comments as well. i much prefer avantslash because you can easily view all the comments above a certain threshold with it.

--
babybird

There are several other attempts to make Slashdot viewable on mobile devices, including:

http://slashdot.org/palm/
AvantSlash
http://www.fizzl.net/projects/sdwap.php

AvantSlash works well on a WAP browser if you access their WAP link via Google's wmlproxy. The fizzl.net site references a URL that will work directly in a WAP browser. Both make their source available.

Try Avantslash. Works for WAP enabled phones too (automatically routes the phone through the google HTML to WML site).

I am a little biased though.

Use AvantSlash. It's not a replacement for CSS on the /. page (which is seriosly overdue) but it will help make it readable on your Palm's and CellPhones. Just try and host it yourself if you're using AvantGo. Even Custom Channels can be expensive for providers.

Which, last time I looked, sucks for a multitude of reasons.

Try AvantSlash as see how it should be done properly.

I should know better than to reply to an AC but yes, you are right, I don't program for a living.

But don't think that I don't release anything under the GNU GPL.

I should know better than to reply to an AC but yes, you are right, I don't program for a living.

But don't think that I don't release anything under the GNU GPL.

I should know better than to reply to an AC but yes, you are right, I don't program for a living.

But don't think that I don't release anything under the GNU GPL.

I should know better than to reply to an AC but yes, you are right, I don't program for a living.

But don't think that I don't release anything under the GNU GPL.

Agreed, it's pretty aweful. However if you use Lynx on Avantslash then it's perfectly readable.

Of course, the main attempt with Avantslash was to produce a decent PDA version of Slashdot for offline viewing, but it works equally well with Lynx and even WAP browsers (using Googles HTML to WML convertor).

Give it a go.

Use AvantSlash instead until they do.

Try AvantSlash for PDA browsing of Slashdot.

(shameless self plug)

AvantSlash allows you to view Slashdot on your PDA and WAP phone. Granted with the WML, it cheats and renders an HTML version which Google converts to WML - but it works and very well too.

If Slashdot did move to this new HTML, it would mean that viewing the news on the PDA would be possible without having to resort to AvantSlash and the like to pre-process it.

It could just poll the site on a regular basis, pick up new stories and download a mirror of the links before it gets terminally slashdotted.

I think this would be a great idea (given that the /. authors are reluctant to do such a thing).

(Although having said that, we're talking Geocities here which may survive a slashdotting just fine - it just won't give you the content)

Hell, I'll happily write the code if no-one else will. I did Avantslash for viewing Slashdot on your PDA/WAP phone so I already have the code for parsing stories. Just need someone with a lot of bandwidth.

OT I admit, but once you've installed Plucker, head on over to here and either download and install Avantslash or point it to the one already set up on the site (you'll have to put up with my settings though).

Then you can read Slashdot on the go.

I use my Palm Vx as an organisor. Sure, the palm doesn't sync Outlook contacts properly, but KeyContacts solves that.

Apart from that, if you have AvantGo installed then you can get TV listings, Film Listings and even read Slashdot on the go.

Useful for train and tube travel.