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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.
Let's make a table: Handheld Platform: Porting Effort Linux/X11 (handhelds.org, Yopy): trivial (some layout changes) Linux-QPE (Zaurus): modest (reuse libraries, rewrite GUI) PocketPC: significant (lots of API limitations relative to XP) PalmOS: extreme (can't write all-native apps, memory limits, no file system, no resizeable windows, no layout manager, no multitasking, no standard APIs). Ironic, isn't it, that popularity is inversely proportional to difficulty of software development? Of course, that's a pretty general rule. Now, why is that? Well, look at this news item. When someone ports a Commodore 64 emulator to a Linux/X11 handheld, it's not news because it's so trivial. When someone ports it to PalmOS, it's big news. I once ported a web browser to a Linux/X11 handheld, and that wasn't news either. You still can't get anything of comparable quality for PalmOS, and so every junky PalmOS web browser is a news item. Bad OS platforms make for good press, lots of business opportunities, and lots of PR. Programmers feel proud when they have mastered a bad platform and managed to create the tiniest app for a bad platform. That's why PalmOS and Windows XP keep winning in the market. What to do about it, I don't know.
Not to mention DivX plays well on Palm and PPC. PocketMVP for Pocket PC and MMPlayer for PalmOS both play DivX just fine.
...arguments that apply equally to handhelds and to full-sized computers. Why should it be any more important that you have the extra control/privacy that OSS provides on your portable than on any other computer?
Nice plagarism of Guylhem Aznar's 1/29/04 article at linuxdevcenter!
This is slashdot...don't we all already think opensource is right for handhelds?
You're right - this is Slashdot, where we think open source is right for everything from servers through to electric can openers, from cellular phones to shoes.
Coming soon to Slashdot - the open source cravat.
I can hardly wait!
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.
Somehow I don't think that 99% of handheld users are developers (or at least develop software for handhelds). Whilst modification is a good reason to use open source for people like myself (who program for a living), it's probably the least compelling reason for most.
Go here for teh [sic] funny.
Just because a Linux-based PDA is not as "friendly" to newbies as PalmOS or Windows CE means nothing. "No software" is just a plain lie, btw. Look here for evidence.
You seem to forget the fact that PDA's are very open to development. There are Divx players for both Palm and PocketPCs. People have ported version's of GCC that run on the actual device. Open Source is one of the greatest achievements of PDAs, how do you think we got quake running on pocketpc's? You also seem to forget that if these closed source Operating Systems never existed, these PDA's would never exist either, You cant depend on Open Source nuts to develop an intuitive User Interface. Look at Mac OS X vs Linux. Yeah, both are just as powerful as each other, but Mac OS X's UI is light years ahead of any GUI for linux, and you know what, Aqua is a closed source GUI developed by a commercial company. For PDA's, The UI is even more important then the power of the OS, people want a UI that allows them to get their work done as efficiently as possible, they dont give a rat's ass if its open source or not. People wouldnt buy PDA's if they had clunky UI's, thankfully because of Palm, they managed to develop a GUI that is semi-decent, yet its not amazing yet. The good thing is though that these companies have money they can burn on R&D to develop the OS and make it more intuitive. Open Source is not the greatest thing for PDAs. Not to mention, there is a Linux port for some PocketPCs, and you know what? It sucks compared to Windows Mobile 2003, in every regard. Open Source this, Open Source that, you people forget why people actually use computers.
Yeah Open Source is the ticket. Why would you want to be able to choose from some 17,000 PalmOS apps? Too many software choices, it's overwhelming! And PalmOS apps are designed for PalmOS. Why would you want purpose-designed handheld apps when you can get ports of apps designed for a 19" monitor? That's what scrollbars are for anyhow.
All the main advantages pointed out are irrelevent. I buy a new PDA every 2 years minimum and pass my old one to family or friends. They don't want to monkey around with open source. I don't need to be get their phone calls asking for help.
More to the point: How long do people actually plan on using a PDA? Who is still carrying around a five year old Palm?
This article is unabashed ideology over smart tech info. Just more incestous amplification for those socially clueless folk who occupy the open source echo chamber.
Though I can't say that I'm surprised, this story is 100% pure troll.
The article makes some legitimate arguments about the benefits of Linux on embedded devices (not Open Source in general), and though it's definitely written with a bias at least that's not disguised.
I don't think the poster even read the article however; the claim that you can't see the source code to WinCE is incorrect, thinking that your applications are any more likely to survive an upgrade intact is laughable (WinCE & PocketPC go through extensive AppCompat testing, who does that for embedded Linux?)
I know, I know, slow news day and a Pro-OSS post came up on the radar, but for cripes sake if you're going to be brutally biased at least try to hide it, you're making the cause look even worse!
Okay, I haven't yet RTFA but I do have a couple of comments. I went from Palm (a Palm III, then a Handspring Visor) over to a Zaurus and now back to Palm with my new Treo 600.
First off, I loved my Zaurus. Still do. I was a college student and it was like having a small laptop with me at all times. I could jump on WiFi networks, play games, listen to music, whatever. What I couldn't do very well was use the Zaurus as an organizer. Sync support varied and was often horrible for Linux. The standard PIM apps were poor and everyone knows it. It was great having tons of free software and even new operating systems to play around with (Opie and OpenZaurus were great), but the Zaurus ended up just being another hobby and toy, not a tool that I could consistently use and rely on.
I went back to a Palm and the Treo600 because I wanted something that would just work. I work on plenty of other open source software. I wanted something that did it's job well and the Treo is amazing. It doesn't have quite the power of the Zaurus or even the screen resolution, but I'm using it as an organizer more than I ever used the Zaurus.
So in the end, I personally think that open source PDA software is still only appropriate for a small niche of technically savvy users. There's nothing wrong with that, but I know when my sister asks me about a PDA for medical school, I'll be suggesting a Palm, not a Zaurus or other open source system.
Who said Freedom was Fair?
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.
PDAs are all about the UI. Once certain other standards are met (i.e. not losing data, synching ok) then everything else is secondary.
...not sure how the Opensource options are doing, I'm not sure I've ever even seen one in the wild, come to think of it.
Palm realized this, and built a very friendly UI from the ground up. Microsoft tried to capitalize on its desktop monopoly and scaledown its desktop interface, which was a disaster. I think Microsoft finally started doing a bit better by copying Palm...
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
No they won't put the girls off. My girlfriend stole my Zaurus SL5500 and refuses to give it back, so I had to go out and buy a C750 instead. Oh the pain.
Beep beep.
No, I can't. I do not "code apps", "develop plug-ins", or otherwise design or build software. Nor do I "compile from source". I, like most of the market, am strictly a consumer.
If you would like to see OSS thrive, you do the work. I guarantee that you will get satisfaction. Double, in fact, because not only will your OSS thrive in a competitive market and reduce the power of CSS, but you and people like you will be able to earn a comfortable living along with a well-earned sense of pride.
Go for it. Just don't expect the Great Unwashed like me to be able to code along with you.Freedom of choice is always better, Dude (or Dudette).
I just bought the Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 and it kicks the snot out of my Palm Pilot. It's a few years newer but is still a better machine than the most recent Palms. And when I get the addons sneaked in past the lovely but untrusting Morticia, then I will have far more than had I upgraded the Palm.
Mine came from Amazon.com @ $300.00 - new in the box. This is the best techno trinket I've had years.
Original poster has to be a troll - or his significant other won't let him get the better toy and it's just sour grapes talking.
Too lazy to create a sig...
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
Not ironic at all. When designing for a system with constraints (limited MIPs and RAM for early mainframes and PC's, mAH of battery and viewable kilopixels in handhelds, etc.), a developer who is capable of hand crafting an application to fit in that environment will be able to produce something far more usable than a trivial port of some bloatware meant for a system many times larger.
Technology advances will help out some types of bloatware (e.g. Mr. Gates depends on Intel keeping up with Moore's law). But advances in battery energy density are very slow; so, in some ways, the constraints for optimal applications for handhelds will always be different than for PCs.
One of the main failings of PocketPC handhelds is that a large portion of the applications for it are ports of applications meant for hardware with bigger displays, larger caches, and unlimited power (AC wall plug plus noisy fans).
I have a Palm Pilot - specifically, a Tungsten E, their newest low end model, which I got for $170.
So far, I've gotten movies to play in divx format with mmplayer (which means they're about 1/10 the size they were with the included app); 15 books to be stored in 3MB with plucker; a better light dimming system (you could hardly affect the light before) with dimmer, a NES emulator from nesem, and a remote control system (using your palm as a remote) through Omniremote.
It also comes with Documents-to-Go, which can read and write word, excel and powerpoint documents (the same kind you find on the PC, not an import).
What exactly am I missing in freedom of choice? All the stuff I chose didn't come with my Palm device, with the exception of Documents-to-Go, and one app is even GPL (plucker).
I think I'm limited only by the speed of the processor, and for wireless stuff. I could have gotten the faster ones, or wireless, but I'd have paid more for those. I got a lot of bang for my buck, without paying the extra $130 that you did.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
I guess this story is true. It explains why the Palm and the Pocket PC have had no luck with sales, and the Zaurus has done so well. /sarcasm
People want something that is easy to use, has lots of add of parts (camera, CF readers, network cards), and runs the software they want.
I don't see any reason anyone should buy an OSS handheld, unless they hate MS and Palm that much, or are going to port some of their apps to the device.
I look at what this article and the resulting discussion are talking about, and I can't help but think that I must be crazy. Everyone else seems to want a completely different device than I do.
Playing movies on a PDA? Browsing the Web from it? MP3s? Who cares!? I don't even want to read stuff on a PDA. If I want a book, I'll buy a book. If I want to do just about anything else computer-related, I'll use my computer.
What I want a PDA to do is to remember my contacts, appointments, and lists of stuff (movies I want to see, etc.). THAT IS ALL. I don't want color, sound, video, Bluetooth, or anything like that, and I probably don't even want a keyboard. I just want something with its own rechargable battery that lasts a good long while between charges and syncs to Linux reasonably well.
From what I've seen, I'm going to need to buy an old refurbished Visor Edge, because absolutely no one makes a PDA like this anymore.
WMBC freeform/independent online radio.