Slashdot Mirror

Cranky Spice (and everyone, and everyone's brother) writes: "Get it here: ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/redhat/beta/fisher They've moved to mainstream the 2.4 kernel (surprise), there's an IA64 set of .iso files, the installer can wizard you up a basic firewall config, all the usual minor tweaks and enhancements. Though they say PCMCIA support is still flaky, meaning my VAIO Z505 slimline might not be running Fisher anytime soon. :/" The flood will only increase now -- even PocketLinux was demonstrating 2.4 on their iPAQs today at LinuxWorld.

grek writes: "Just noticed that TVT have announced that Pocketlinux (their combination of linux, kaffe, and xml) v1.0 has been released -- as yet no packages but you can get the source via CVS using the v1 (or branch-v1) tag. I've benn playing with an earlier CVS version and writing apps for the pl framework is real nice, and easy. Now I just need a ipaq!"

grek writes: "Just noticed that TVT have announced that Pocketlinux (their combination of linux, kaffe, and xml) v1.0 has been released -- as yet no packages but you can get the source via CVS using the v1 (or branch-v1) tag. I've benn playing with an earlier CVS version and writing apps for the pl framework is real nice, and easy. Now I just need a ipaq!"

If the iPAQ looks nice, the Yopy looks sexy, the Agenda intrigues you, and a V-Tech Helio running Pocket Linux looks interesting to you ... then you may enjoy this sweep of the available Palmtop GUIs with an emphasis on Free ones, written by reader 1010011010.

There are several Linux-based palmtop OSes emerging, and I would like to know what people are expecting from a non-WinCE, non-PalmOS handheld. I have put together minature reviews of three current offerings that I was able to test on my iPaq for comparison.

The TrollTech Qt Palmtop Environment

QPE was demoed recetly at Comdex, and in my opinion is the best-looking hand-held Open Source OS so far, even though it is merely a demo of Embedded QT and has not been released as a product. On the iPaq; instead, it installs a new /usr filesystem on top of handhelds.org linux distro.

I think there are a number of advantages to using Embedded QT rather than an X windows + toolkit solution. One, it does not use X, but writes directly to the frame buffer instead, which makes it lighter than X-based solutions, and provides the capability to do things X cannot -- like anti-aliasing and alpha compositing. [Ed. Note: See also recent Slashdot stories on just such developments.]Another nice (future) feature might be cleartype-rendering for the final output, to improve sharpness for all display elements (not just text). The X Window system's most useful feature is remote display. QPE also includes support for remote display -- it can draw to a VNC framebuffer as well as the Linux framebuffer.

Another advantage to QPE is that it uses the popular QT toolkit, making porting applications from KDE relatively easy, and easing cross-platform development (QT also runs on Windows and other non-unix OSes). Addtionally, QT and QPE are both very space-efficient, all handheld-type applications included. The libraries, framebuffer driver, etc. fit into a 3.7MB .tgz file for the iPaq (mirror). If anyone knows of an Embedded GTK project, please post a link below.

One of the most compelling features of QPE is the variety of input methods it allows. It includes five input methods: pickboard, handwriting, keyboard, opti (modified keyboard), and unicode (apparently understands Cherokee out of the box). Every method includes -- this is the really cool part -- dictionary look-ahead. If you type out part of a word, a ticker presents a list of likely candidates. You simply tap on one to erase the partial you already typed and insert the entire word in its place. This is, I think, its best feature, and one that other environments would do well to copy. it also includes support for "right-clicking" -- tap and hold -- to bring up context menus, set flags in minesweeper, etc.

And though perhaps unpolished, QPE is anything but incomplete: it includes 14 applications -- address book, games, etc. -- plus several applets (like a slider to set backlight brightness and a load monitor) and some silly stuff, like a Tux plush-doll simulator (a shaped window with Tux in it). It also includes an HTML-based help browser. And, of course, it's both Open Source and Free Software.

For all of its niceness, QPE does have some cons as well. A lot of them are related to the fact that QPE is a demo, not a released product. For instance, there's no way to suspend the iPaq. It must be shut off, which requires re-calibrating the display each time. There's a menu option for exiting QPE, but it does not also shut down Linux, so you have to power off the running OS, which can't be good. Crashing applications can bring down the whole GUI. For instance, playing a bad MPEG video in the MPEG player hangs the whole UI. I can restart it using the serial-port console, but that's not really a solution. It currently does not have working audio, which is a shame, because the MPEG player also plays MP3s.

Handhelds.org

Handhelds.org provides the father of all iPaq linux distros (which is also a required base install for QPE). It runs TinyX, written by Jim Gettys. It's really kind of minimalist and unintegrated. However, it's linux, it's free, and Compaq and the iPaq team should be congratulated for providing Linux support on the iPaq. Compaq also provides some other benefits, such as you ability to compile apps using their Skiff Cluster -- making development much easier, as there's no space for a compiler on 16MB of flash. The UI for the Handhelds distro is pretty ghastly -- X + TWM + xterm + TWM menus for few installed apps and administrative tasks, such as changing brightness of backlight.

TWM and xterm are quite tedious to use with a stylus. They're also pretty unattractive. It includes a lot of utilities and programs, but very few GUI apps, which is what you need on a handheld. The three major apps are "scribble" for handwriting recognition, a qwerty keyboard, and a statically-linked GTK mp3 player (note: menus don't work well with stylus). And Xterm makes four, if you want to bother counting it.

The two input methods are strange to use -- you have to get the input focus set just right, and be careful to not obscure the scribble or keyboard app with the target app. In contrast, WinCE and QPE both resize the display area available for apps when the input methods are invoked, and reserve space at the bottom of the screen for the input handler.

Again, the major thing about the handhelds.org Linux distro is that it exists; it's not really meant to be a useful PDA environment. However, it does illustrate the numerous reasons why an unmodified desktop GUI does not belong on a handheld.

PocketLinux

PocketLinux is an interesting beast. It is linux-based, but the GUI and all of its apps run in Kaffe and use XML for interface definition and other data storage. The GUI is themeable, and PocketLinux included several themes. I actually didn't care for any of them. Perhaps they should look at SkinLF, a skin engine for Java/Swing.

They have certainly achieved Buzzword compliance with the use of Java + XML. The downside is, it's slooooow. The UI is simply not very responsive, and the iPaq is the most muscular of the current handhelds. The upside is, it's portable. And since it's Java, I imagine it's theoretically possible to beam apps and data to other PocketLinux devices, even if they use a different processor. That's not an insignificant advantage. Plus, because all apps run in the Java VM, it's likely to be stable (assuming the VM is) thanks to the garbage collection, lack of pointers, etc. that Java provides. Plus, the PocketLinux environment can be used to develop (both compile and test) apps off-unit without having to resort to using a special cross-compiler setup and ftping or syncing builds of apps to just see if they run.

Like QPE, it uses the framebuffer; but it does not include any remote display functionality. I'm not certain that's really an issue with a handheld, anyway -- although it might be nice to open your handheld display on your desktop PC while it's in its cradle so that you can use a mouse and a keyboard to more quickly use the UI to manage the device.

The major downfalls of PocketLinux are its slowness and its clunky UI. It's better than xterm, but not as nice as either QPE or WinCE. Otherwise, it's in the same vein as QPE -- includes all the usual suspects as far as apps go, and an MPEG player to boot.

Thoughts -- I am interested in what you all are looking for in a handheld GUI. Please post! I'm looking for a number of things:

• Flexible, easy to use "sync" feature. This would preclude ActiveSync, as it does not work (at all, either USB or serial) on my iPAQ.
• Standard file formats. None of the Linux handhelds options I've discussed here provide a way to "sync" data to another computer, but when they do, a standard resource file format would be nice.
• Easy to use interface. This means, no need to type out words to start apps (or to use most apps). A "start menu" is the best thing going in the launcher department that I've seen, and the use of things like context menus and QPE's dictionary lookahead make using a stylus easier.
• Free Software.
• I actually spent a couple of months getting to know WinCE before I wiped it, and I never did really care for it. It does include Microsoft Reader, though. All handheld environments should include a good, standard document reader. I reccommend PDF rather than MS Reader or any other proprietary format, because it's an open spec and tools to create and view it are available as free software. It also supports sophisticated layout and compression and delivery of all document elements as one file -- something XML and HTML cannot do.
• Variety of working, non-intrusive input methods. QPE's dictionary is great. WinCE and QPE both resize apps to reserve an area for the input method at the bottom of the screen. This is much better than handhelds.org's TWM focus-game method.
• Standard app toolkit. There's not a lot of space on handhelds, but handhelds need a rich GUI toolkit to be useful and provide a way to write lightweight apps. Palm does this well, even though it is a very limited platform. I can't install GTK and QT and whatever, because there's not a lot of space. I use Gnome on my desktops and laptop, and program for GTK, but am very happy with the slim, trim QT/Embedded used in QPE. PocketLinux sort of half-wins. Demerits for slowness and ugly themes. Handhelds' X+TWM+Xterm wins in the oops-thought-this-was-a-desktop category. WinCE does a moderate job; It looks mostly like windows, but different enough to be mildly strange at the beginning. And, of course, Media Player is totally different. What is it with media players these days? Do they all have to be ugly and slow?
• Speed. Handhelds.org and QPE win here. PocketLinux, of course, does not.
• Support for common features: syncing, serial/ppp/ethernet/other connectivity setup, etc. No one does this yet.
• Apps. Including games. MPEG video player optional. Really. Mp3 player would be cool. Doc reader a requirement.
• Attractive interface. I don't mean gaudy. I mean, easy to look at. Microsoft's cleartype for text does make a difference. QPE's anti-aliasing and alpha-compositing both make a difference in this area. Handhelds.org gets no points here. QPE wins, and PocketLinux, while themeable, is somewhat cluttered and awkward to use.

What are your thoughts? Be liberal with those links!

Note: You may also be interested in reading this piece on PocketLinux and reading more about the iPAQ.

With a planned move to San Francisco next summer, last week saw San Jose's last Linux World Expo, at least for now. The future as always is stubbornly uncertain, but it's impressive that the serendipitous combination of Free tools (from GNU) and a Free kernel (from Linus) has inspired enough interest and prosperity to excite a larger group of people each year. If you've not had the chance to attend one of these expositions, we hope this article will give you a flavor of what it's like. Note: Here are a few pictures from the floor (Day 1 & Day 2) contributed by Sensei^); do you have any cool shots to link to in comments?

First, the prelude: If you've worked on the pre-show aspects of anything from a high-school play to a LAN party, you know all those booths, displays, people and computers don't materialize by themselves. For several days before the show floor opened on Tuesday, forklift crews zipped cargos of wooden, fiberglass, plastic, aluminum and steel cases from moving trucks to exhibit spaces. These contained banners, snap-together modules, computers, lighted signs -- and Yes, more gratis logo-imprinted toys than you can wave a TuxTops LED light at.

Spiderwebs of CAT-5 and electric cord (run beneath the show floor) sprouted from the centerpoints of many booths, with strands for each computer to be connected to the Net during the show. Rolls of padding and carpet came next, then the slow assembly of display booths. These ranged from no-nonsense fabric partitions that housed companies like TuxTops and Sendmail (and legions of volunteers from PerlMonks, the Simple End User Linux project, Flightgear, and many others), to elaborate constructions with motorized signs, projected lasers and huge illuminated logos. Note: Slashdot (the site) was put together last week mostly from the comfy chairs of the PerlMonks booth.

The "C" (as in conference) part of LWCE got started on Monday, and for the days that followed, attendees got instruction -- on everything from Linux security to evangelizing Free software to their bosses-- in half-day doses. Meanwhile, the setup work continued into the wee hours, as exhibitors raced the clock to make sure that at least their signs, if not their networks, were up for the next day. And at the OSDN booth (home of the red-carpeted Slashdot stage and beanbags), prep work included stacking thousands of boxed distributions of Debian, and attempted to pawn a few copies off on every passer by.

Tuesday morning, at a shade before 10:00, visitors willing to miss Michael Dell's keynote began to stream into the halls, on a quest to find new distros, old friends, and swag. It's amazing what companies will give away in order to snag a little nook in your brain. Besides the usual trinkets (keychains, T-shirts, stickers) and the distributions that a Linux show would be empty without, booth visitors were handed everything from knives (Sendmail) to cute monkeys (Helixcode) to embarrassing pictures of themselves (BSDi), as well as too many toys with embedded LEDs to bother counting. Rather than a full swag accounting (which would only annoy those unable to attend), let me just say that you won't hurt for toys when the chance presents itself. (CT:I just wanted to note that VA gave away 2300 pounds of shrink-wrapped boxed Debian. Like 5000 copies. It was beautiful)

The things on display around the LWCE floor were more interesting than the toys, though. (And unlike a museum, most were available for hands-on demonstration, not hidden behind glass.) Indrema showed a prototype player (not in the sleek black box you see on their Web site, but still sporting that cool blue LED) hooked up to a HDTV display, playing a very fast game of Quake. (CT:Actually it was an HDTV demo, they promised the real deal will be less vaporous before I have children) In the Intel booth were server clusters populated with quad Itanium processors, demonstrating failover when one system was rudely but intentionally shut down. The amazing-like-emacs-is-amazing Flightgear project showed a really nice looking demo which is enough incentive by itself to invest in a better video card for my system so I can play with it.

Both Helixcode and Eazel made their first LWCE appearance this time around, exciting for those filling their anti-FUD cannon for the perpetual "Linux is tough to use" argument. The Eazel folks showing off Nautilus seemed to be all but cackling as they showed off the smoothness of the zooming information available for documents and the cool music-integration abilities it contains. It would have been cool if they'd had some sample CDs, but they promise a developers' release soon. (CT:They also promised .deb's, but I'll believe it when I see it. The UI was awesome, I just hope that someone hacks in something like the GUI command line in EFM)

Considering that Sun was showing off the GNOME desktop on Solaris (hinting at its inclusion in stock Solaris systems sometime very soon, too) and that the GNOME project itself was not only in one of the small booths against the wall but the subject of a big announcement -- about the advent of the GNOME Foundation -- it looks it's showing up everywhere. Happily, there seems to be no shortage of room for window managers right now: the KDE folks were also there not only in their own booth, but showing up in software demonstrations all over the floor, as SuSE, Caldera and others demonstrated the very slick KDE 2.0. (Can't we all just get along, anyhow?)

SuSE, by the way, was the only distributor I noticed showing off Linux on Apple hardware, and their current distro was sweet and fast on a G4. Beyond the curious lack of Apples, and the obvious ubiquity of x86 machines, there were machines based on everything from microcontrollers to StrongArm, MIPS, Alpha, Itanium ... even the IBM S/390s which have gotten attention for the ridiculous number of concurrent Linux systems they can support.

For all the cool hardware and cusp-of-reality, bleeding-edge distros, it's interesting that the announcement which seemed to generate the most buzz of the entire show was the long-awaited release of Debian's Potato. Considering the reputation that Debian has for intelligent upgrading, stability, and diligence in guarding the license of the software which makes it up, it's not as surprising as it might otherwise be that Debian's new release made people sit up a bit more than the newest offerings from the large commercial distros.

(CT: Also extremely impressive was the Pocket Linux booth, where they actually had iPaq's running Linux. The first dude that demoed the box to me was very nice, but what I really wanted to see was X11 running on it ... oddly enough, I encountered one of his cohorts in the bar later that night who showed it to me: X, xeyes, xterm, and twm running on an iPaq. When they get the wireless action going on these things I'm totally there ... I'll just need to hack minimalist interfaces onto pronto and my MP3 player software and use the thing as a portable X terminal on the local 802.11 wireless lan. Yum.)

Oh, and there were people on the floor as well -- close to 20,000, all told. I met some folks I've known previously only through IRC, and quite a few I might never have otherwise encountered.

It's interesting to see in the space of a few hours many of the smart people who you may experience vicariously through writings, speeches, code, art or IRC chatter -- and it also belies the idea that software celebrities of the Free software world are becoming celebrities of the traditional variety, since everyone from ESR to Jon "maddog" Hall (and Linus himself) are willing to talk to anyone who catches up with them long enough to say hello. The atmosphere (especially outside the mondo corporate-castle booths) is mellow and accomodating, and suprisingly so even within most of those castles. There were undoubtably personality conflicts at work, but it seems like most people have the good grace to deal nicely with each other for these few days at least.

At the close of each day, people shuffle out to drop laptops, T-shirts and bags of stuff at their hotels, then thousands of them show up to parties sponsored by companies from AMD to Red hat to VA, which are full-blown events in themselves. Mandrake's party, for instance, had go-go dancers in cages, which may be the most bacchanal thing I have ever witnessed. Ironically, though, many coders couldn't attend even events sponsored by their own companies, or thrown in the honor of their projects, because of strict carding policies. Wouldn't a chem-free party or two be a thoughtful way to include people?

(CT: This has been a consistent problem for several years. Although I know at "Someones" party (no names *grin*) they weren't carding, and I recieved many a happy note from fellow attendees proclaiming that they were able to get in. The parties themselves weren't bad: the OSDN/Potato release party was fun, with San & Zak spinning the tunes (next time we'll force CowboyNeal to scratch for us under threat of death). They had 2 buildings: one was a pool hall, where we tormented The Pope for nearly an hour, carefully distracting him, and then returning his balls to the table. He never noticed. We also met up with Nitrozac from After Y2k, and I snuck accross the street to the Eazel party for a bit, and got to meet Dave "You might remember me from cheat codes in some first person shooter" Taylor.) Attendeees mostly filed out for flights or drives home Thursday and Friday, but some are still in San Jose for the Intel Developers Conference, or otherwise enjoying the Northern California weather. It's a strange familiarity that many of them will feel when the next big conference rolls around, to see many of the same fellow attendees or workers -- of course, by the time the next big conference happens, perhaps we'll all be too excited by the release of 2.4 to notice.

An unnamed correspondent writes:"Transvirtual has released PocketLinux for the iPaq. It features Video4Linux, mp3 playing ability, web synchronization, Kaffe OpenVM, GUI Themes, and displaying in standard or portrait mode. PocketLinux runs on VTech's Helio, iPaq's, and various other platforms." PocketLinux V.P. of Engineering Peter Mehlitz took some time off from the LWCE booth the other day to tell me about Pocketlinux -- read on for some details.

With the buzz that screenshots of X and other windowing systems running on svelte handhelds have generated lately, it's not surprising that the aisle by the PocketLinux booth was swamped with rubberneckers who actually wanted to play with the demos, not just grab t-shirts. If there's a prize for "oohs" and "ahhs" per square foot, Transvirtual may have swept the show with their demo machines, which use an integrated framebuffer device rather than coax on X. The Pocketlinux system consists of an XML framework running on Java -- using Kaffee means no Sun license required -- running on Linux. It's themeable, extensible, and slick.

"Java makes sense for this [because] it makes sense to have a machine that gives you access to distributed apps," said Peter. He anticipates applications equally at home on cell-phones, kiosks and PDAs -- and provides proof in the form of running systems, with handwriting recognition, games, audio players, and (quite nice to see) streaming video."Kaffee and XML let us do just about anything," he says. "With Kaffee, we really learned from the Linux example," he says, adding that Kaffee is now under the GPL.

The LWCE display featured the OS on both a Compaq iPaq and the exotic Itsy, as well as on a V-Tech Helio. While the Compaq machines can also run Windows (for those so inclined), PocketLinux is primed to become the default OS for the Helio, which currently comes with V-Tech's VTOS. Though the grayscale screen isn't as sexy as the Itsy's, the $150 Helio has both more RAM (10MB, including 2MB of flash) and a more powerful processor than my Visor. Helios running PocketLinux were available for sale, too -- not just vaporware -- though the PocketLinux Web site cautions that buyers who want a standard PDA should stick to V-Tech's OS until more PDA features are implemented.

(Interestingly, rather than the obligatory note that only Red Hat-based distros are supported, the installation instructions for the Helio software says instead "our development effort has standardized on a Debian Linux hosted environment and our documentation and operation under Debian is better supported. If anyone wants to write documentation for RedHat installation and submit it, we would be happy to include it.")

Despite their tendency to wolf down batteries, the color machines showed off few things the Helio couldn't, such as a small selection of colorful themes. "They're just XML files -- everything is XML files," said Peter, a point he emphasizes as important for keeping information portable. Streaming video, too -- slightly jerky, but very watchable -- had more than a few onlookers drooling. The important thing, according to Peter, is to rely on hardware to do as much of the tough work of decompression as possible. The video is transmitted with the aid of triggers embedded in Javascript. Viewing compressed movie files is "no problem, he says, "as long as we're not forced to use streaming in user space." Despite Peter's assertion that people will rely on collections of small, nearly disposable appliances rather than an "anything box," some aggregation and assimilation looks inevitable, not to mention fun. All work and no play would probably make for slow sales.

While the software inside the user's machine is free, Transvirtual intends to make money by selling server-based translation software to convert external data types for viewing and listening, as well as by providing businesses (and content providers) with specialized apps.

With the Embedded Linux Consortium, LinuxDevices.com, handhelds.org, and a gaggle of others, Free software for handheld devices has a woven a comfortable net of support for tiny systems. Welcome to the fray.