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Dell Axim X50 Running Linux
Venture37 writes "the guys at handhelds.org have managed to boot the linux kernel on a Dell Axim X50 handheld, the project is at alpha stages, you can grab a copy of the files from
handhelds.org or fisherss.com."
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Some may find this article informative.. http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/library/l-em bdev.html
It discusses the various pros and cons of file systems, graphic systems, etc.
http://www.freeos.com/articles/3800/
IBM's Linux Watch enhanced shell with Bluetooth
But does it run Lin... i mean Win... i mean OS Xi?
I know - it's bad. Mod me down.
You can also install it on a dead badger.
TBH though, I don't see the hype. So, it runs Linux, and does absolutely nothing useful. Big freaking deal. Lots of geek points, yes, but minus several million engineer points in the practicality department?
There is a similar project for Toshiba pdas. http://www.mnementh.co.uk/eseries/
After spending over a year both contributing and waiting for the linux port to become useable on my ipaq 2215, I decided to just buy a pda that supported linux natively. I commend these guys for their hard efforts, but really I wanted to be able to program _my stuff_ on it, not spend all my time programming to get a not-so-stable linux port that is only useable 30 seconds to a minute at a time.
perhaps that axim people will have better luck, i surely hope so. But really if this is what you are looking for you should consider buying one that supports linux natively. Not only will it save you some time but you also get to put your money where your mouth is and support companies that support you.
"TBH though, I don't see the hype. So, it runs Linux, and does absolutely nothing useful. Big freaking deal. Lots of geek points, yes, but minus several million engineer points in the practicality department?"
Gotta say I concurr. Supposing I did buy an Axim and put Linux on it, what useful stuff could I do with it that I couldn't before? This is a serious question. These days, you can almost affordably buy one of these with a 480 by 640 display, 3d accellerator, and equip it with a 4 gig micro drive. Any real advantage to putting Linux on it?
"Derp de derp."
I have a Dell Axim X30 and I could not be more impressed with MS's latest PDA OS offerings. The unit is cheap, light, fast, stable and with pretty respectable battery life. It has loads of impressive software availible for it. I had a Palm based PDA/Cellphone hybrid for two years and had gotten used to Grafiti - the Transcriber handwriting recognition that lets you just write whole sentances on the screen simply amazing and on an entirely different level. On top of normal note taking and scheduling I can view/edit word documents and excel spreadsheets. I can surf the web including secure online banking sites and check my email with a 802.11b wireless VPN connection. I can watch videos and play music. I can take over PCs using RDC or vnc and connect to them with ssh and ftp. I can read books and manuals in either the Adobe or MS e-book formats. I have never had a problem with any of these things - a testament to how well it has stood up to my extensive use.
From what I gather from the site Linux is nowhere near there on most, if not all, of these points. For your average user Linux might be there on the desktop, and it is my desktop OS, but it certainly is nowhere near there on the PDA. I enjoy tinkering with my PC OS but when it comes to my PDA it has to just work and it is for getting serious work done quickly. It is the device I turn to when all else fails to get the job done. This is one Linux user that is not going to be running Linux on his PDA. I think it is many years away from being close to functional in the way that I need it to be and the way MS's product is today. I give credit where it is due and MS is due it for their Windows Mobile OS.
Any real advantage to putting Linux on it?
Keeps girls away.
I have been working with fisherss on this project (I'm Richard), and I thought I'd post a summary of the status, for any interested. We have a linux kernel booting, but we don't yet have wirless drivers working. USB networking is also in progress. This should go a little faster because the x50 (and x50v) use the same chipset for the wireless network that the ipaq hx4700 does, which is further along in the port. We hope to soon have a graphical interface up, and I will be trying to load the kernel on my x50 just as soon as I can get the files from Fisherss (I've been gone for a few days). It will probably be 6 months or so before linux is really usable on this device, and it could be longer before we can completely remove windows ce from the device. Anyone with low level distribution, drivers, and/or kernel experience who is interested in contributing to the project, we could definitely use your help! We learn quickly, but this is new to us... we just want to get past the limitations imposed by windows ce! =]
You want practical? It's a blue-sky open source development project, you nitwit. The potential applications are legion. But let me give you a run-down of several of the uses to which I've put my own HP Ipaq (running Linux from handhelds.org!):
1) Mobile FULL-FEATURED WiFi scanner and auditing kit. Run Kismet, Airsnort, and a lot of other Linux-only tools (any Windows equivalents cost $$$ and have stripped-down handheld versions) for serious portable work. 100x easier than carting a laptop around. Break WEP keys, perform breakin demos, and hunt down rogue APs with a pocket-sized monster.
2) During the NYC blackout, my ISP was still up and laptops had juice, but my routers ran down the UPS batteries in about 30 minutes. Jury-rigging a car battery, some DC-DC conversion stuff, and an Ipaq w/ PCMCIA sleeve holding 2x PCMCIA network adapters = an instant router that stayed up, routing 1.5 Mbps DSL to five users, for 12 hours. Do you know how much a 12-hour UPS costs??
3) Since the Ipaq (like the Axim) has a microphone and WiFi, it makes a killer wireless microphone. Turn on a recording app, stream the data via wireless to a laptop somewhere nearby, and you've got at least an hour of recording time on batteries alone. Makes an excellent conference-room bug, for checking up on meetings that you can't attend or negotiations that you shouldn't know about--and you record all day if you plug your Ipaq in to charge and then "forget" about it.
4) Portable streaming MP3 player. I've got kerberos-protected NFS shares full of music, and I can stream music out of those shares from anywhere I can reach my APs.
The point is that the sky's the limit with Linux--whatever you can think up, within the limits of RAM and battery life (which are pretty substantial!) is yours to do.
Here be a picture:
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your # makes me think it could also make a decent voip phone. Can it run skype (IIRC skype requires a full xserver and qt3)?
-kaplanfx
Visualize Whirled Peas
I am very keen to remove my reliance on the poor (yet just usable) tools. The RAPI, the cecopy etc was a bitch to get a real development cycle going, using Java (superwaba.com.br).
As a veteran of 3 wireless applications that link to a remote interface I have seen a great deal of potential in the handheld paradigm, there was a slashdot link about a many to many pradigm in computing screens, where angles dictate what you saw, well my idea if different handhelds have differnet views on a computer system, like thin clients.
Right now the ipaq is an up and coming bluetooth tv remote control, which shows the tv guide on the ipaq, and allows you to email using the qwerty keyboard, or web surf (built in apps).
Right now it is a bad set of programs, and hacks, with linux opening up the system, I can make customised system designed for this.
Imagine, watching seinfeld on xvid through your RF link to you 42" screen, from your PC, but then watching satellite channels on yoru handheld, while you check for latest news on an earthquake, and then at a push of a button send the image you are seeing to the tv screen.
Yes, it is already here, but not working nicely.
Wray for linux!
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
The IPAQ H1940/H1930 has also had some recent progress - Opie/GPE can now be booted via an NFS-mouted root, or from a ext2 loopback filesystem, mounted on a FAT16 SD card. Still a little work to be done, to replace the flash with a boot image though.
H1940/30's are pretty cheap 2nd hand these days, and would make a reasonable linux handheld.
Red.
For some selected applications, sure.
For the average user? Probably not.
A couple of possibilities:
* Getting openvpn to run, so that you can connect back to a linux gateway, whilst on the road.
* Being able to share contact/appointment data between evolution and the handheld (multisync/synce is a bit touchy at the moment).
* Being able to install applications without needing a windows box hanging around.
* Wireless LAN sniffing for security evaluations (kismet, etc).
* Coding on the road (if you're VERY desperate...)
* Having control over your data, not having it stored in some wierd proprietary format, and potentially being able to import the stuff back into your linux box.
* Custom applications (warehouse floor, inventory control, etc.) may be easier to code in some cases.
Red.
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
I enjoy tinkering with my PC OS but when it comes to my PDA it has to just work and it is for getting serious work done quickly. It is the device I turn to when all else fails to get the job done.
There are dozens of handheld devices with Linux pre-installed and supported (often in innovative form factors and applications). There is nothing to tinker: they turn on and are rock solid. They also have lots of software available for them.
Handhelds.org is an effort to bring Linux to unsupported devices, in addition to the supported devices. Why do people do that? Because they can and because they like to have an even broader range of hardware available to them. Generally, installing Linux on unsupported devices involves some effort, but in my experience, the end result is as solid as it is on supported devices.
but noone wrote a post on /. to inform the masses...
too bad but it's probably because develope do not want to many lusers asking questions arount untill things get a little more stable...
Once the port gets done you'll be able to use Opie or GPE with it.
Opie is the OpenSource fork of Qtopia, the same interface that powers the Sharp Zaurus. It's quite usable, and I installed it on my iPaq 3970 without any problems. As a matter of fact, handwriting recgnition is better than WindowsCE one.
Check those screenshots http://opie.handhelds.org/gallery/
GPE is a GTK+2 based enviroment for handhelds, is a little bit cruder than Opie, but it uses a X server instead of the frame buffer, so it's easier to port software to it. There's already stuff like SNES9x, Quake and Doom running on it!
Again, some screenshots http://handhelds.org/~gpe/gallery/
Also, one may guess that Nokia's Maemo could get ported to it.
So, there's lot of usefull things to do with it once the port is stable.
---- You know how some doctors have the Messiah complex - they need to save the world? You've got the "Rubik's" complex
The entire Zaurus PDA line, the line of TomTom Navigators (probably the best navigation systems you can buy), a number of high-end MP3 and media players, and half a dozen cell phones. And the next generation of Palm will be based on Linux as well.
Come on, half the world's inventions would have been absent if geeks hadn't played about with new toys/ideas. There may not be any practical uses of it yet, but they may just come about later. Remember that if linux was just restricted to the platform it was originally designed for, there would be no linux for the PowerPC, or for the hundreds of odd handhld devices, or for xyz ... zzz.