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Future Linux PDA by Samsung
BigDaddyJ writes "I saw over on The Gadgeteer that Samsung has developed a PDA design that uses Linux. It has a color display and can play MP3's as well. Check it out here. You know you want it... but right now it appears they're still looking for suppliers. " Neato. Strange that the title for the Web page refers to it as a "Samsung USB PC Camera".
check out
http://www.ltc.com/linux-mips/
Not in the same spec ranges but still cool.
Someone for whom English was a second language. Check the TLD: .kr
-- "I believe the human being and the fish can coexist peacefully." - George W. Bush, 29 September 2000
I am already onboard for one of these when it is available, but I thing it would be especially enticing if they added the Springboard component from Visor compatible with Linux. An open PDA hardware component like that with Linux would crush Widoze CE
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Not a great start to the ad campain
More race stuff in one place,
than any one place on the net.
The page doesn't say what it syncs with. OK, the e-mail will probably sync with what's in my mail file. But what about the calendar? ical? gnomecal? Or the address book? In fact, do they even say that it syncs with a Linux workstation? It may be Linux on the PDA, but sync with Windows machines. Yes, it'd be really dumb of them not to support Linux, but don't go assuming that they do.
Other than that, really cool. Want one, but want to know what the price would be, blah blah blah
Thats because it was spec'd to be strong, sort of like those bounty paper towels. The PDA with the processor that can withstand 1 ton PSI!
More race stuff in one place,
than any one place on the net.
It seems like there is something a little odd here--or maybe it's just me--I just can't figure out why this supposed linux PDA has repeat/game1 and launch/game2 buttons
Also if you look at what seem to be screen shots you see some kind of what is supposed to be an mp3 player, and some kind of thing to watch videos(on a PDA?-well maybe it's a good idea?)--and something about development of the OS, and a web browser--the common thing between all of these is that are just screenshots from a regular desktop--there is no way that you would be able to read the text if text this small were on any PDA that I have ever seen
Also, while it looks to my eye like the physical device that you see is a photograph, what they are showing on the screen is definitly some kind of badly drawn artist representaion of what it is linux is supposed to look like
that kinda leaves me two options in my thinking--either this is badly faked, or they don't actually have any kind of working prototype, and are just hoping for someone to..well I really don't know what...
then again, it's kinda seems like whoever wrote the page doesn't speak english either well, maybe it's all just a bad translation
or, maybe I am just an idiot
either way I hope that someone does come up with one of these things soon, cause I know I want one
Slackware: old school feel, new school gear.
My friend you need to wake up. When you say there is no hope for Linux on a PDA, you are thinking of Linux as a huge, everything installed, monster of an all purpose OS. What you need to realize about Linux (which you haven't apparently) is that Linux is whatever WE want it to be. They don't mean there going to slap a full Suse installation on there, they mean they are going to build an OS based on the Linux kernel. What that means is that they can build it to do everything they want it to and leave out the stuff they don't.
BTW: It's not safe to jump off the "Linux bandwagon" right now, you never leap from a vehicle going over 100 MPH.
Munky_v2
"Warning: you are logged into reality as root..."
Jay
Am I the only one who think this looks fishy? Something about the whole think makes me wonder if this is really a product ready to hit the market.
Follow me here -
Does Samsung really need suppliers?
Why is there no info on the amount of RAM?
It suggests that I can watch my soaps (oh joy) which implies a TV tuner which is not listed in the specs and I cannot believe they intend to deliver real time video in 65000 colors over a cell modem.
also no real information on the processor (strong high performance doesn't say any thing)
Then english translation is poor, which doesn't mean anything itself (mine isn't great either) but with every thing else...
As the story poster noted, the title of the page is wrong, which as an ex-webmaster suggests to me a copied page or misused template, this isn't to say that the product doesn't exist, but a major product like this some exec somewhere would complain. (at least the always caught my minor foo's =])
This looks to me more like a product concept, they may even have a prototype, but I'd be willing to bet they are nowhere near production with this.
I carry a Visor and love it, but if something like this were offered at a reasonable price, I'd be all over it. But I just don't this is will be that device any time soon.
"Karma can only be portioned out by the cosmos." -- Homer Simpson
Probably some Spyglass/Mosaic derivative. There have been a number of embedded platforms built up using that.
Well, the code is coming along. Take a look at the web site. Linux-USB.org
This is probably most economically done by sticking a source code TARBALL on the CD that comes with the product.
They don't have to redistribute the source code to Spyglass Mosaic, if that's what they use as the web browser, and so long as it runs as a separate process.
They may have to include sources to customizations to GPLed or LGPLed libraries; this does not mandate releasing source code to applications that aren't linked to GPLed code.
In short, if there's a 660MB CD in the box, it won't likely hurt too much if they drop a couple tarballs in that occupy 50MB of it. Alternatively, they may take the approach Tivo did, and offer to send out a CD with relevant source code for a relatively nominal cost.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
you could buy modular components and basicaly build your own PDA?
Choose how much ram you want, what kind of display, built in stuff like modem or NIC, wireless etc, choose a case for it. Kinda a PDA version of PC's.
There is a "distribution" directed at assisting owners of Acorn RISC and related computers to install ARMLinux on their systems; this likely will bear minimal resemblance to what would be installed on a PDA.
A PDA represents an embedded application; it is highly unlikely that someone building such would use anything that would be recognized as a "distribution" (in the archetypes of Slackware, Red Hat, or Debian).
Quite to the contrary, it is possible that a PDA would not have an init process as we usually know it, and it is unlikely that it would have a "userspace" that would be recognizable.
If they build a PDA, they'd be likely to create a custom init that starts up whatever set of work processes are necessary ( e.g. - X, a "system manager," perhaps something like cron, and so forth), and this init might be highly attuned to the specifics of the nature of what functionality they wish to "embed."
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
"Samsung's" Multimedia PDA is actually GMATE's product.
It's not clear from the info on Gmate's site whether the CHOPIN PDA and the Multimedia PDA are one and the same or whether Multimedia PDA is a more recent model, but it looks real enough. A lot of the questions raised by folk on this thread are answered on their site if you look around.
I love my Palm, but it'll be quite impossible *not* to buy the Gmate/Samsung PDA if it performs as described and does eventually reach these shores.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
If it runs Linux, "what it syncs with" out of the box is almost immaterial, since we'll be able to make it do whatever we want without too much effort.
:-)
As for price, allegedly it'll be 10% less than the competition, whatever that means.
Check out the GMATE site for more details of the PDA.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
t'd be nice to use the ssh client on a PDA, but why would you want to run the daemon on the road?
There is TG ssh for PalmOS -- I use it often with Metricom/Ricochet modem.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
My replacement criteria:
My question: after the Newton brain drain to Palm, what have you Newton guys done? Where's Palm's english-language reader? I have yet to see any real progress back towards the functionality I enjoy with my Newton...
Then again, I guess I've always been a 'too good for popularity' tech collector. Atari Lynx, Jaguar, Sega Saturn, Newton...
Your Working Boy,