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Must-Have Pocket PC Software?
MBCook asks: "I just got a new Pocket PC with Windows Mobile 2003 SE on it. I haven't owned a PDA since my old HP 320LX (7 years ago, with Windows CE 1.0!). So since I've been out of the game for a while, I'd like to ask: what PocketPC software (both commercial and free) do you find essential? What little gems can't you live without? Game, productivity, utility, oddity, or other... I'd love to know what Slashdot readers find to be the best software."
iPodder on your desktop. And a really big memory stick :). And acrobat reader.
Of the 3rd-party stuff I have on mine, I use VNC the most. Other than that I use the pocket IE that's on there lots, but I'd prefer a version of Opera with decent small-screen rendering like the Symbian Series 60 product.
This game is awesome link
It used to be by hexacto or something, I guess they changed their name.
MiniStumbler. It's Net Stumbler for your PocketPC (free)
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http://www.stumbler.net
PocketLAN. It allows you to connect to network shares, and print to network printers. ($15)
http://www.pocketgear.com/software_detail.asp?id=
If you feel like trying to find it, and screwing around with a few hacks, TodayPlus is an abandoned today screen replacement. It was abandoned about a year ago, while it was in beta testing. The beta versions all expired earlier this year, but there is a small but very loyal userbase that has a crack for it. I still haven't found anything that comes close to the features that this program offers, and it's free. Good luck finding a download though.
http://www.jhollin1138.com/todayplus/
Pocket Streets. Take a map with you. The newest version also supports GPS. ($30-$120)
http://www.microsoft.com/mappoint/pocketstreets/d
There was a Palm OS 4 emulator out awhile ago. I'm not sure if it was GPL'd or commercial software, but I tried it out, and was able to play Dope Wars on it. you might be able to find info on it at palminfocenter.
Here's what I have on my Toshiba E805 with Windows Mobile 2003 SE.
Aim Productions Pool Challenge
Microsoft AppLaunch
stumbler.net Ministumbler
Omega One Journal Bar Expansion Pack
Macroedia Flash Player ActiveX
Omega One Journal Bar
Gigabyte Solutions Ltd Animated Today
ZIO Interactive Simcity 2000
Anton Tomov Battery Analyzer
Anton Tomov Pocket Hack Master
IdealTek Pocket Luach
Daniel East's Pocket Quake 2
Nomad Electronics PocketStars
Microsoft Voice Command
JS Ark2
JS Boyan Crystal
JS Turjah
JS Turjah2
Ruksun Telnet Force
Ruksun ScottyFTP
Ruksun Netforce
VL Inc Pocket Gphone
Agfa Monotype Fonts
Conduits TaskSwitcher
Nyditot Virtual Display 3.22
Conduits Peacemaker Pro
Conduits Pocket Spark
Adobe Acrobat Reader 1.0
Aim Productions Trial Halloween
Aim Prouductions Trial Iraqi Track
Game Energy Tic-Tac-Toe
AIM Productions Trial Challenge
SoftWinter StorageTools
LudiGames Rayman
Ansyr Primer (PocketPC)
Toshiba Text to Speech
ArcSoft PhotoBase
MpegTV PocketTV
ScaryBear Software Check Notifications
Glass Lantern PocketLoupe
Zio Interactive Metalion
Amazing Games Chopper Alley
PDAwin TV remote controller
Resco Registry Add-in
Resco Explorer 2003
Resco FTP Add-in
ProCar Racing
Microsoft Activation
ScaryBear Software ClearNotify
Microsoft Power Contacts
Xemi Computers LTD Pocket Explorer MultiIE
PeanutPress Ereader
Microsoft Reader
Pocket PC Magazine publishes the results of their annual software competition. Among the nominations for best game this year, I really enjoy Bust'em, a complex breakout style game. The GameBox games ( Classics, Gems, and Solitaire ) are also a particularly good value at $10. Finally, don't forget to download Nethack for PPC
Here is my list of must-haves for PocketPC/WinCE. I'm not quite what most would consider to be a "normal user," as I've got a lot of Unix leanings. However, I do not use a Zaurus because ... well, the software pretty much sucks. I really like real HWR, which doesn't exist on Linux and does on CE and the Newton. So PocketPC it is. But that doesn't mean you can't have your favorite Unix tools...
:)
First, there are a lot of Unix ports from Rainer. I use his TeX distro for writing papers, Maxima w/ GNUplot and Tcl/tk GUI support for doing maths. I used to use Perl/tk, though Dialect (a really cool pythonish RAD language for CE and dekstop windows) has replaced it when I need to write an app that fits in as a CE app.
The app I spend the most time in is Squeak Smalltalk. It's not quite an application, but a development and application environment. Binary and source portable between oodles of platforms, including but not limited to CE/PPC, desktop windows/x86, linux of all flavors, Mac OS X/classic, Acorn RISC OS, etc etc.
One of the few regular PocketPC apps I use regularily is GowerPoint's uBook ebook reader. It's the best ebook reader I've found for the platform so far, and pretty good. The only thing it lacks that I wished it had was a text-to-speech feature for having books read aloud occasionally. It can read just about any format- txt, pdb/prc (both txt and html inside), html, rtf, and all of those formats zipped- and prolly others. it's nice to put a whole series- say, Peter F. Hamilton's The Night's Dawn series in one zip file with all of the books in the series. I typically buy a LIT and convert it when I have to, though sometimes I get books from fictionWise where you can sometimes get books in unencrypted formats.
Coding and reading... that leaves out the other big thing I do on my PDA (which is my computer): internettin'. (what a horrible word) I really reccomend the NetFront web browser- it's really nice. IE used to be really bad in PPC 2k and 2k2, though I'm told it's improved in 2k3 and 2k3SE, more like the IE that came with Handheld PC 2000 or vanilla WinCE 4.x, which is a very capable browser on the order of IE 5-5.5 or so. Handles most sites well and is pretty fast. However, it doesn't cut the mustard- no tabs, few and not configurable key commands, etc. For that, you need ftxBrowser, which I've bene using for years. Slick. It just embeds the IE control, so it's still IE (a good thing in the case of CE), but you've got a lot of features that are a must for me, a person who can't just do one browser page at a time.
There are a number of SSH clients around there. Some good ones that cost money, but there are some free ones. Rainer has one for free, though it takes a little work to get set up, but it's what I use.
Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad