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Get Your Palm On The Network
Anonymous Coward writes: "There's a cool article over on O'Reilly network showing how to set up a network connection between a Linux box and Palm Pilot, and then run a Web server on the Palm to access the documents. There's also a VNC client which I'm downloading now. Wild!"
what would be even cooler though is if each palm pilot could act as a node in a self-growing network. with sufficient bandwith and rollout as well as a few repeaters, you could have a totally wireless network that is actually built simply by people having palm pilots near you. that would kick the crap out of just using infared docking.
Don't be mean or my friend Oog will smash your head
Here's another neat palm ditty. IBM had originally made an app called SNAPP for the palm which allowed admins to administer their RS6000 boxes with their palm. They have since released a linux version. Check it here: http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/snapp
It's great to see innovations like these making good on the promise of nanotechnology -- but I still have to wonder, can I network my Sole, Lower Back, or Nose in addition to my Palm?
Yu Suzuki
Yu Suzuki
Deamcast. It's thinking.
What a thrill it must be to type a dozen commands at the console and cross your fingers to sync your Palm instead of just pressing the cradle's Sync button like Windows and Mac users do. Pure comedy.
Why would you need to type more then one command?
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
I wonder why Palm/Handspring used a serial connection (or USB) to do the syncing and transfer. I think an ethernet connection would be the way to go... completely platform independent... that would rock.
I wish we would see more companies use ethenet. I mean, would it be nice to see a Rio with an ethernet port to pump in MP3's? From what I have done with embeded ethernet, it isn't hard at all...
Just a thought...
Ryan
-Vegtables can't run.
Because I'm not really into wasting time (Slashdot posting excluded ;) ). Actually, although the Palm's a great PIM, if you're interested in going outside the box, like with the stuff mentioned in this article, you're much better served going with a real PDA computer, like a PocketPC or EPOC device, or at the very least one of the PalmOS-based Handsprings.
And as for the the dozen commands, it's called exaggeration, nothing to get worked up about. The fact is that it's a pain in the ass to get the Palm going under Linux than compared to the same under Windows. And yes, I've done both. Anyone saying otherwise must not've read the article, which is pretty accurate.
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
you can get full text internet access, read and post to newsgroups, run Unix commands, compile C programs, telnet, use Linux icq, etc. for free with any wireless email device. http://www.trancell.com free wireless internet without the WAP.
aiight... fuck the yopy, i'm buyin this bitch tomorrow... i've just heard too many cool things about the palm... gotta get me one... hmmm... now to decide WHICH i want (can afford)...
Think that was flamebait? You've obviously never met me in person...
$email=~tr/.@/
Who knows, soon we might have palm sized devices that are more powerful than a simple address book holder/pager. The need to run apache on such a device, probally none, the need to be able to access it as if it were just another computer, perfect. I could lay on the beach "working" all day and when I go home in the evening and set the little guy into his little sheath, my data could be automagicly RCS checkin'd on my computer. I just need to learn how to actually write anything with that dumb plastic pen...
Spring is here. Don't believe me, look outside!
cool... very cool... tho, that'd require getting a cell... the service is less than it sounds, but STILL... (actually, if i ever get a cell and a palm, i'll just set this up on my own server... very easy)
Think that was flamebait? You've obviously never met me in person...
$email=~tr/.@/
Here's what I'm waiting for:
1) Bluetooth/wireless Ethernet, Ricochet/cell networking integrated, with automatic fallover
2) Voice recognition (ditch the annoying handwriting style)
3) More convenient form factors (eyeglass clipon, for example)
4) Automatic delegation of complex or computationally demanding tasks to servers over the aforementioned network
I'll get one when it integrates less obtrusively into life. Otherwise, there's not much benefit over my current system (computer and photographic memory)... or does it? Anyone have a good reason to get a Palm that counters anything here?
(begin shameless plug)
There is also a tool to create a connection between a Linux box and a Windows CE device. It's called SyncLICE.
It just sets up a ppp connection between your box and the CE device, creates ipchain rules etc... Check it out Here!
(/shameless plug)
I sent email postcards (including pictures drawn on the Palm) last time I went on vacation. A record of them can be found at http://rumsey.org/trips.html. They were done using nothing but a Palm running MultiMail, with a Palm modem, connected through a shell account using SLiRP.
D'oh. http://rumsey.dhs.org/trips.html
Here's an old article about a hole I found at NSI using a wireless palm III.
It's great to get work done while just sitting at the airport. A palm link
Did I leave my keys here?
Orgs like the Navy pay big money contracts to network Palms together. Higher personal income usually means, on average, that there is a higher chance of female interaction. I'd much rather network my Palm and make big bucks than use my palm for a self-intercourse transaction. The more you know the former, the less you need the latter.
Did I leave my keys here?
Mindless dribble. "Fighting those new Pocket PCs", uh Palm is the one with the monopoly.
And at least with Pocket PCs you have a lot of choice in what you can buy. Compaq has a very small Pocket PC that's the same size as the Palm V. Most other Pocket PCs are only slightly larger, and are comparable to the other Plam models size wize.
Features wise and readability, there's no comparison.
The ppp link is easy, I even scanned my palm from my fbsd box once. Of corse, Nmap had no clue what os the palm was.
Hmmm... from the sound of that article title I thought it was going to be about mixing business with pleasure.
But what to do I know? I'm going back to watching Bowling for Aardvarks.
Ceci n'est pas une sig.
Excellent article! Rarely have I seen an article this well-researched and useful.
Anyway, I just wanted to mention one use for a networked Palm device: an offline newsreader. After setting-up the network connection, one could use Yanoff or another newsreader to fetch articles while connected to the PC, and read/reply to them when in meetings ... err I mean when traveling. ;-)
-Karl
Didn't anyone ever tell you that Hate is a strong word... Do you spend a lot of valuable time rushing to judgement and criticizing people?
Did I leave my keys here?
Better than that, it's been GPLd. :)
http://come.to/lightyear_media
->www.chuma.org, ranting and Newtons, what more could you want?
Ok, so we have a VNC browser but how about a decent web browser? The only ones I know of, Proxy Web and AvantGo both use a proxy to pre-format the content. What I'd like to see is a browser that operates entirely on it's own. It could be a simple text-only bare-bones browser as long as it's reliable and works well without having to rely on the proxy of another company.
Does anyone know of any browser like that for Palm? (I use a Palm IIIx and the IR link to a Nokia 8210 phone that I use as the modem)
I know of a few WAP browsers but as long as there are more WAP browsers than WAP sites, I think I'll wait. In any case, WAP has got to be the worst example of reinventing the wheel ever. Why didn't they just agree on a subset of HTML anyway - you know.. HTML, BODY, HEAD, TITLE, P, BR, B, I, U, A, IMG, FORM, INPUT and SELECT for instance. Or if you have to include tables, then forbid the use of COLSPAN and ROWSPAN and nested tables, which would make table rendering SO much simpler. But no.. they had to invent a new language. *sigh*
The good news is that StarOffice 5.2 beta -- while it has other problems -- does not have this one.
A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
Here is how I connected my Handspring Visor PDA to
my Qualcomm cell phone and got on the net wirelessly...
http://rick.8k.com/handspring/
-Rick
I bet I could walk into the majority of corporations and find that most, if not all, of their Windows machines are not patched.
Patch Availability:
Windows 95 Patch
Windows 98 Patch
The following is from a March 4, 2000 news release from Securiteam.com
Microsoft has released a patch that eliminates a security vulnerability in Microsoft Windows 95/98/98 Second Edition.
The vulnerability could cause a user's system to crash, if they attempted to access a file or folder whose path contained certain reserved words.
Vulnerable systems:
- Microsoft Windows 95
- Microsoft Windows 98
- Microsoft Windows 98 Second Edition
DOS device names are reserved words, and cannot be used as folder or file names.
When parsing a reference to a file or folder, Windows correctly checks for the case in which a single DOS device name is used in the path, and treats it as invalid.
However, it does not check for the case in which the path includes multiple DOS device names.
When Windows attempts to interpret the device name as a file resource, it performs an illegal resource access that usually results in a crash.
Because it is not possible to create files or folders that contain DOS device names, it would be unusual for a user to try to access one under normal circumstances.
The chief threat posed by this vulnerability is that a malicious user could attempt to entice a user to attempt such an access.
For instance, if a web site operator hosted a hyperlink that referenced such a path, clicking the link would result in the user's machine crashing. Likewise, a web page or HTML mail that specified a local file as the source of rendering information could cause the user's machine to crash when it was displayed. If this happened, the machine could be put back into normal service by restarting it.
What causes the vulnerability? The vulnerability results because of a flaw in the way Windows 95 and 98 (including Windows 98 Second Edition) parse file path names. Device names such as COM1, CON or LPT1 are reserved words, and they can't be used as folder or file names. When parsing a reference to a path, Windows checks for the presence of a single DOS device name in the path. If one is found, the path is correctly treated as invalid and an error is returned. However, neither Windows 95 nor 98 check for multiple DOS device names. This is the source of the vulnerability. If a read or write operation is attempted to a path whose name contains multiple DOS device names, it will cause Windows to attempt to access invalid resources. In some cases, the effect of this invalid access would be to cause the application that supplied the path to hang, but the more likely effect is that the machine would present a blue debug screen and crash. What names could cause this problem? It's not possible to compile an exhaustive list of all DOS device names, because third-party application developers can create their own device drivers and add their names to the reserved list. However, Microsoft Knowledge Base article Q256015 provides a list of all standard DOS device names. What would need to happen for me to be affected by this vulnerability? You would need to try to reference a path that contains more than one DOS device name. The operations by which this could happen are familiar file and folder access operations - reading a file, listing a folder's contents, etc. Under normal conditions, this problem is unlikely to occur. Users cannot create files and folders whose names are reserved words like DOS device names. Because of this, it would be very unusual for a user to try to access such a file or folder. For example, it would be very unlikely that a user would try to list the contents of C:\COM1\COM1, since it is impossible for him to have created such a folder. However, a malicious user might use this vulnerability to try to cause other users' systems to crash. How could a malicious user do this? She would need to entice the user into doing something that resulted in an attempt to access a file whose path contained reserved words. For example, if she hosted a web site, she could include a link on a web page that displayed a file located in C:\COM1\COM1. Normally, it's safe to allow a web site to do this - the site can't read or change the file, only display it in the owner's browser. However, when Windows tried to locate the file, it would cause the system to crash. It wouldn't matter that the file doesn't even exist on the user's machine, because the very act of trying to find it is what would cause the crash. There also are scenarios in which it would not be necessary for the user to click on a link to be affected by the vulnerability. For example, web pages can specify that an image file on the user's computer should be used as the page background. If this were done, simply displaying the page would cause the user's computer to crash. HTML mails could be used in a similar manner. Are customers who have Preview Mode enabled on their mail viewers at any greater risk from this vulnerability? Yes. HTML mail renders in Preview Mode, so if a malicious user sent an HTML mail to someone who had Preview Mode enabled, the vulnerability be exploited as soon as the mail was previewed. I have preview mode enabled in Outlook. If I received such a mail, what should I do? Start Outlook from a command prompt, and use the /safe and /nopreview options to turn off preview mode. Microsoft Knowledge Base articles Q197180 and Q182112 provide information on how to do this. Once you're able to get into Outlook, you can simply delete the offending mail. Obviously, you should do this without opening the mail. What would I need to do to put my machine back in service after a crash? You would just need to restart the machine. There's no lasting harm from the crash, although any work that was in progress would be lost during the crash. Does this vulnerability affect Windows NT 4.0 or Windows 2000? No. Who should install the patch? Customers using Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows 98 Second Edition should install the patch. What does the patch do? The patch causes paths containing more than one DOS device name to be treated as invalid paths. This is correct behavior.
Did I leave my keys here?
This maybe slightly offtopic, but this is the best crowd to answer the question.
I want to setup a wireless lan at work with my pc and a handheld. Specifically, I want to use either the Vadem Clio, which is just sooo cool or the Psion 5mx, both of these have pcmcia slots which would accept the lucent wavelan 11Mbps card. Is there any way to setup tcpip between these and my suse box? The options are just endless...Most of my time is spent at work or home and I'd rather have a fast connection than try to use my cell phone...
Sitting in a meeting...playing quake!
This way you don't have to deal with the hassle of WAP or web clipping or whatever it is they call it these days...
Been There Even very old Newton can get onto a network and use Appletalk over LocalTalk, you just hooked it to an network connection and printed out to an postscript printer. More modern Newton Messagepad could also use TCPIP over Ethernet, an of course AppleTalk over Ethernet In fact, my fave way since years ago to back up my Newton is to connect it to my network and backup to another computer on the network running a newton backup program. That program is running on my server, so my file is saved on the server as they should be. Oh, and a www server, sure, was some years ago since we got that for Newton too. The only thing Newton always did lack, except for full support from Apple, is an VNC or Timbuktu thingy....
There are a ton of great network apps for the palm pilot, including web browsers, telnet clients, IRC & ICQ clients... it's too bad that Serial is becoming a "legacy" port, because having the serial port on the Palm is cheap and easy to program. I can walk up to my headless server and plug the palm into the serial port, log in, and see what's going on. You could rig it to a cell phone and check mail. I was even looking at writing an app to use it to talk (via the serial port) to a servo motor driver... there's not much these things can't do! :)
---
Since nobody's mentioned it yet, you might want to check out OmniSky. They just finished their beta program, they're taking orders now, and are shipping in a few weeks. Inexpensive clip-on CDPD wireless 19.2kbps modem for the Palm V, full TCP/IP, unlimited service.
I just ordered mine.
Of course, the Palm V only has 2MB of RAM, unlike the Palm Vx, which can make web browsing, news reading, running a web server, and e-mailing feel a bit cramped. So I'm getting mine upgraded to 8MB next week. There are currently 3 companies who do this, and this one has gotten the best reviews and is also the cheapest. Many of the OmniSky beta testers did this.
.@.
I've been trying to figure out if it's possible to connect a Visor modem to a cell phone to dial in to an account. The upside, of course, would be wireless interenet access to porn wherever you go! From what I've seen, it looks like some GSM phones support this feature (ericsson ones seem better), but I'm still not sure if it is doable in the US. Can anyone say definatively if this is possible, and how?
"Fighting those new Pocket PCs", uh Palm is the one with the monopoly.
Palm doesn't have a monopoly in the pocket-sized PDA market. With a market share of 70-80%, there's still plenty of room for competition. People have been buying Palms not because they're automagically bundled with their operating systems or computers, but because they actually like the product. Remember that Palm/USRobotics/3Com/Palm never even advertised in print or on television until last year, and they had sold several million units when the campaigns started running.
Imagine that. A good product is selling on its merits, and of course on the fact that Everyone Uses It, So It Must Be Good (tm). 'course, I don't want to compare the Palm with AOL any time soon, but hey, there are at least a couple of paralells.
For more information, click here.
I followed the links from the O'Rielly article, and they discuss how to route IP from the Palm through the cradle through Win95. Anyone know how to do it under NT? Knowing NT, it cant be as easy as adding the serial link modem and RAS services.
I remember seeing a link to something about this many many moons ago but can't find it now.
Just in cas you're interested, my Palm III is vulnerable to several well known DoS attacks such as IP frag attacks like teardrop and netsea.
On a related note - I once demoes mp3 streaming from my palm III - by streaming low bitrate mp3 files to players (actually 16kbit, 11025kHz, mono mpeg 2.5 audio). one of these days I want to port the core of iceast to it.... but I think Ill have to wait until I get a faster connection to the palm - the cradle only supports a bandwidth of about 56kbit... not enough for many listeners.
I don't think "Direct Serial" was an option until PalmOS 3.3. (Visor runs modified 3.1 and is not flashable). However, there are a couple of ways to do this.
1. In Preferences -> Network, define a new connection type. Set the phone # to "00". This is an undocumented switch to create a direct connection without dialing.
2. Make the connection at USB speeds using "LinkUSB". Check out usbvisor.sourceforge.net for more info.
This thing works also, now to get a spare cable and use this thing for the occasional emergency when a serial console is needed at work.
/dev/palm and away you go.
If you don't already have a serial console setup...
Just run a getty on
http://www.frotz.net/vt100/