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Citizen/IBM To Make A Linux Watch
backtick writes: " Yup, they're making the Watchpad.
'Besides telling time, the WatchPad comes with a calendar-scheduling application, a pager-like application for sending and receiving short messages, and a Bluetooth chip for wireless communication with notebooks, handheld computers and cell phones'" If they'll make a watch that runs Linux and takes pictures like Casio's camera watch, I might just switch back to a digital. Gerdts points out that the watch's battery life is either up to six hours, or only six hours, depending on how you look at it.
It is only the interface that has always bothered me with smaller and smaller computers. Has there been significant progress into wearable screens like the cool one in the commercial with the day-trader kid?
Once we have the interface down, things can be as small as we want.
Mattcelt
im sure the watch part uses a standard battery which lasts for years. the backlit/lcd and processor(all pda crap) is the only part that needs charging
The OS it runs comes about 93rd between whether it plays the Star Spangled banner and it's ability to float in orange juice.
Manufacturers who tout Linux as a PDA's main feature or expect the open source community to fix their crappy software may as well give up before they start. Geeks might care about such stuff but no one else does. Get the other stuff right and the fact it runs Linux is just icing on the cake.
i use analog.
why?
- thinner
- lighter
- looks more professional in my white collar job
- can find north when the sun is shining
- i like the ticking sound (it's a primitive instinctive thing harking back to my first nine months of life)
- metal wrist bands fit much better and last longer (why are adult male plastic watch bands sized for kids? is an eight-inch wrist really that abnormal?)
- like telling time in terms of neareast quarter hour compared to the 80s/90s to-the-minute. i'm older now, and enjoying the here and now more.
when commercials come on, i mute. after a period of time passes, i unmute. if i miss a song, it's not a big deal. between cummulus and clear channel owning my town's RF, i'll be sure to hear the same songs all bloody day long. god to have an AOR radio station like back in college.
"Population 1,656"
Even two hours of batter life doesn't seem that bad to me. I'm not always looking at my watch or using an application on my Visor, so why should the Linux watch be on all the time? I would lift up my wrist and press the button, and it's on. It could be like a dual purpose flashlight switch, which can either be on only when it is pressed, or flipped on by sliding it.
LS
There is a fine line between being a cultivated citizen and being someone else's crop. - A. J. Patrick Liszkie
Linux and Watchpad represents a paradigm shift. The classic example of a paradigm shift is the Quartz watch. Although it was originally developed in Switzerland, the Swiss watch makers originally wanted nothing to do with it because it didn't have the gears and mainsprings that had become the pride of the Swiss Watch factories.
Eventually, the inventors went to Japan and approached Seiko. The Swiss have now gone from 60% of the market to less than 30% and the classical mechanical watches represent status symbols rather than timepieces. I recently heard a speaker declare that he had a $5000 Swiss watch that couldn't tell time. He then went on to say that he had to put on his cheap watch so that he would know what time it was. He didn't mention the brand name, but one can guess who makes $5,000 Swiss watches.
Some people buy $5,000 Rolex Watches to impress people, I wear a Citizen myself. It keeps pretty good time.
It seems unfair to have so many negitive posts about this. The ./ posting for the original IBM Linux wristwatch was full of fervent assertions that the poster would buy one like a shot if IBM could just be persuaded to turn it into a product.
Well, now the guys at IBM have done there bit, possibly in part because of that ./ feedback, and they probably had to work hard to do so as it's not easy to get a product promoted from lab toy to product over at Big Blue.) So if you were one of posters who encouraged them by saying you'd buy one then maybe it's time to consider making good on your promise instead of whining about details of the design.
Having said that - and in direct contravention of the previous sentence - I'm assuming that they'll have the battery life up to something usable by the time it ships. (Say 24 hours or better along with a fast-charge cradle)
My top things:
scientific calculator: (for figuring the tip)
remote control (for TV and X10 modules)
IrDa link to PC for Time syncing to Atomic Time
List of important phone numbers/appointments
make Linux, not Microsoft. sin(beast) = -0.809016994374947424102293417182819