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Why Open Source Makes Sense For Handhelds
Guylhem writes "Are you still wondering why you should prefer an handheld running free software over one running Palm OS or Windows CE? Here's a short article to explain the main reasons you should consider.
The most important are sustainability and freedom: you don't want your applications to break when you update your handheld OS or hardware, and you certainly want to decide what *you* may do with your data. Palm and Pocket PC's DRM protected and obscure formats stand in your way. That's another good reason to prefer free software: you have the source code so you can develop plug ins to read such obscure formats. Even better - you can stick to standards formats such as divx which are poorly supported on handhelds running proprietary software." On the topic of handhelds, tanmay submits brighthand.com's small chart of some upcoming handhelds and smart phones that may be launched in the coming months.
As the news story said obscure file formats are a big nuisance. Free and opensource on the handhelds will start great things into action. Easier to transport things from one to the other and eventually probably lead to handheld devices becoming more popular.
Not to mention DivX plays well on Palm and PPC. PocketMVP for Pocket PC and MMPlayer for PalmOS both play DivX just fine.
Nice plagarism of Guylhem Aznar's 1/29/04 article at linuxdevcenter!
Even better - you can stick to standards formats such as divx which are poorly supported on handhelds running proprietary software.
Hardly. I have been playing DivX files flawlessly which were encoded with the latest codec off of divx.com on my Dell Axim handheld since PPC2002 and now I run it on 2003.
I watch full length movies on it all the time after encoding them for smaller resolution and transfering them to my SD memory card. Divx support? Its available for any pda running windows PPC2002 or 2003.
From the article:
It sells for less than Palms..
What Zaurus is he talking about? The cheapest one is an SL-5500 on Pricewatch for about $350. You can get a Palm Zire for $70 retail. More featured color Palms are $100 more. Granted, SL5500 vs entry level Zire is like a Lexus sedan compared to a 2 door Kia, but since there is no low end Zaurus unit, the statement should have been qualified. I bought a low end Zire because I won't kick myself if I bust it like I did when I stepped on my Palm V 4 years ago. I'd love a Zire but price does play a role in my purchase decisions too.
The Zaurus was an amazing critter; but most of its value was in pure Geek Factor. In Windows or in Linux, the Zaurus was interesting but plagued by ongoing random minor issues with synchronization, what version of QPE I was using, what the date was, and how I held my mouth. In Windows or in Linux, the Palm is nearly effortless.
The Zaurus had many neat things. I could log in to it over the network (wireless); I could run a webserver on it; I could do all kinds of system things. But in the end, the actual D of the PDA is much more usable in the Palm. I'd love to have the time and the money to develop replacements for the Palm software to run on the Zaurus, but I simply don't; I need something that works, and works well, right now.
Not to mention the fact that, comparitively, the Zaurus is enormous. It's easily half again as heavy, and an inch longer, and a little thicker, than the tungsten E.
If you go with the commercial QPE (that synchronizes well) functionality is low; if you go with the free embedded GUIs, functionality is high, but interoperability (in the form of synchronization with outlook and evolution) is low. Even with all the objections fielded in this discussion, the Palm is like a Sound Blaster - it just works.
And it's sad, too. I love Linux, I love free software, I love the entire Opensource movement, and I wanted to be much more pleased with the Zaurus. I would say, all in all, PDA linux is where desktop linux was at RedHat 5.2. It will get there, eventually.
Thinking outside my Head
The complaints about the Zaurus' PIM apps are well-known and widely-circulated, but just in the 6 months I've had my Zaurus the situation has improved greatly. The Sharp 3.x ROMs have updated apps, but what I've found most useful is korganizer, which obviously syncs flawlessly with korganizer on the desktop (where I was running KDE anyway). That works great for me; I realise others have different needs but there are options out there; the PIM section on the website in the link above has 83 packages.
(This message was posted from a Zaurus, fwiw.)
Palm's file formats are far from protected and closed. The basic PDB and PRC formats are well-documented, and there's lots of open-source software to create both executable programs and PDB's.
Now on the other hand, individual application file formats may be hidden by the vendors. Don't like it? Write your own PIM software, text-editor, etc. etc.
To me, open source is less critical than open-exchangability. Palm's conduits are a little obtuse to create and set up. I'd like to see the PIM data (contacts, e-mail and calendar) have higher-level API's to insert new conduits to work other apps.
Design for Use, not Construction!
You may even find some more arguments (not only from the end-users point of view) in my presentation slides about Linux on PDAs. For example a very important argument for manufacturers to use Open Source software on PDAs and mobile (cell) phones are the costs of operating system licenses.
I've already solved this problem with SuperWaba. It runs on PalmOS, WinCE, PocketPC, Win32 and Java with more to come. Open Source, supports native libraries, fast VM. Works a treat.
:v)
If someone designed a nice launcher for it you could have a consistent user interface across PDAs, even when you upgrade.
Vik
There are plenty of ATMS that run Windows. Unfortunately, I'll see at least one or two a week with a bsod on them. If they ran Linux, I'm sure I'd still have my cash card. Then again, I don't know if Linux is hip to the whole "self-approved cash advance system via empty envelope deposit" scandal.
I also reply below your current threshold.