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Palm Unveils Foleo, Linux-Based "Mobile Companion"
An anonymous reader writes "Contrary to recent rumors, it's not Palm's first Linux smartphone, and no, it's not a competitor to Nokia's Linux-based N800 Internet Tablet. Rather, Palm today unveiled the Foleo, which it's calling a 'new class' of mobile device. The device is designed to expand the email, Internet, and productivity application capabilities of mobile phones such as the Palm Treo, by adding a full-size keyboard and a larger screen. Company founder Jeff Hawkins predicts that the Foleo will be more successful than Palm's original Palm Pilot, which he designed, and more successful than its current Treo smartphones. He touts its simplicity: 'Press a button, it's on. Press it again, it's off. There are no other modes.'"
Small, low-power Linux laptop....
My blog
It's too big to be a PDA, too small to be a laptop. This thing looks like a solution looking for a problem. Other than the fact that it's a portable device that runs Linux, I see no reason to spend $500 on this. I'd rather buy a sub-notebook and have the extra functionality.
'Press a button, it's on. Press it again, it's off. There are no other modes.'
Power controls like that are always a pain. You have to look to see if they're on to turn them off. And if they have other states, like "booting", "shutting down", or "crashed", it's even worse. Two buttons, "On" and "Off", please.
It looks like a subnotebook, it walks like a subnotebook, it bounces around in the briefcase like a subnotebook...
So why not get a real notebook?
Test your net with Netalyzr
Bwahahahahahahhhahahahah!!! This is Palm's next great idea? Really?
Tech execution (features) of this looks good. Business execution looks inversely proportional.
Piconets are good.
I understand aiming this at people looking for a low-level laptop replacement, but as an alternative to a Blackberry or some smartphone? Look at the size of the thing...what's the killer app that's going to convince people to pick this up?
Laptop. I mean, honestly, this just looks like a small special purpose laptop. What's to differentiate it from any other extremely small laptop running Linux? The article was a little light on details about what exactly makes this a whole new class of device.
A 2.5-pound notebook running Linux with WiFi and Bluetooth sounds sweet...but one report says it's a closed system, which means until somebody hacks past that limitation, it's a dead-end. For about $500, I'm expecting at least a mostly-open system (like Maemo with the Nokia N800).
The Busy Coder's Guide to Android Development
This, while not a terrible idea, will only be a good one is it runs at a price that is super competitive. Like 100-150. Otherwise, they'll be trying to sell only to a segment that already can afford a notebook and probably already has one.
FTW?
:(
Looks like Jeff Hawkins is so confident in the Fooleo that he decided to dump 15000 shares of PALM.
Instead of spending R&D $ to fix the issues with their aging OS, they "invent" another piece of hardware that neither me nor any of my coworkers want to have to carry around. We already have notebooks.
Palm has officially jumped the shark, IMHO. Looks like I'm getting a Blackberry soon.
...run Linux? Oh, wait. Nevermind.
I hope this device actually gets a decent battery life. I've been frustrated that all the new PDAs have worse battery life than the early generation machines. The venerable (and discontinued) Psion 5-series got 25-35 hours of use on a pair for AAs and the original Palm Pilot series got maybe 15-20 hours on a AAAs. Every device since those machines has been distinctly inferior (usually getting only a few hours of real use per charge). If the new machine can't last a full day at a conference or a trans-oceanic flight, then I'll just keep using those older (and better) machines.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
so that i can fit this in my pocket. That is the advantage of the devices they are competing with.
It is simply an external monitor and keyboard for my smart phone. What I don't get is who's asking for such a device?
I had hoped it might be like a VR3 with updated hardware, but no... Darn.
Please, please can somebody build a VR3 with a GB of Flash, 256 MB RAM and a faster ARM? The concept was fantastic, it just needed a little more performance.
thegodmovie.com - watch it
Come on - this is new? It looks like beter executions on a five+ year-old product.
Take a look at the IBM z50
And the Toshiba Libretto
And remind me, what is the new product here - faster CPU? Better battery life? Oh wait, it runs LINUX! When can I pre-order it?
Ken
Yummy,another OLPC style laptop.
Assuming I can run regular Linux on it, I will buy a Foleo, OLPC, or that Intel thing.
Important features:
- No moving parts
- long battery life.
- cheap.
As the owner of a Fujitsu P2000 (P2120 specifically) this is certainly a device I'm interested in, but 5 hours of battery life is way too short and I don't see much to indicate whether this is a fully open Linux system.
I'm running WinXP Pro on my P2000 and although it's getting on in age and leaves a lot to be desired in the CPU department (Transmeta CPUs never lived up to the hype), I certainly wouldn't trade it in on a locked down device.
If this thing from Palm doesn't support fully open installation of standard desktop applications then I don't see much point in it.
No "on" switch. No "off" switch. Lame.
Please help metamoderate.
I'm thinking about "Palm Fellacio"
What processor is this thing running on? How much RAM does it support (Max)?
If it pleases me on these points, which I can't seem to find the data on, I have many interesting ideas for a machine like this. Has anyone "seen under the hood" on this thing?
I'll give it a whirl, that is after their warehouse grows dusty and they realize it's cheaper to lower the price-point than hire hundreds of janitorial staff to keep peeling away the cobwebs for the occasional sale...
prometx42
Unless that email client has search-based folders ala Gmail, and Mail.app, welcome to the last fucking century.
What device have you seen that has a separate button for on and off?
Big shop tools do (my drill press, for instance).
A slider would be much better in this case, I think. The Treo already has one on top.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Like the Psion Netbook this thing is for a pretty limited market. It would likely function best running something like Sales Force or SAP-ish stuff. But, those markets often require specific functionality as well, like barcode readers.
It will be interesting to see how Palm created the interface to the Linux core.
Hmm....Atari Portfolio...Tandy Pocket Computer...Sharp Pocket Computer...HP Journada....
Besides WiFi and high-res, any new ideas in there that aren't 20 years old?
Nothing to see here, move along please.
I already have a notebook, but I still want one of these. It's actually the first Palm product I have ever coveted.
My main machine is a 15" Core 2 Duo Macbook pro... and it's just not portable enough. 2 hour battery life, yipee. I keep (and carry when I travel, along with the MBP) a G4 powerbook and spare battery for when I just want to bash out some text or leech wifi. My N95 is ok, but it just doesn't have enough screen space or a keyboard I can type on, unlike this thing.
If I could replace my Powerbook with one of these, so I only have to carry a MBP, Foleo and N95 when I fly, I can cut 2.5lbs out of my rucksack. That device will do everything I want when I go to a coffee shop to work. Good for my back, if not for my wallet.
Beep beep.
Does about 1/3 as much as my MacBook and costs as much as a cheap laptop at Fry's....
2 cents,
QueenB.
HDGary secures my bank
... the actual press release, including the estimated price - $600-$700.
The Army reading list
All the craptops you compare this to enrich the Windows empire.
This is the ONLY 2.5 lb machine I will consider. It is the smallest machine I have seen that both runs Linux and offers VGA out. The rest is silence.
Palm doesn't own PalmOS, so they have to choose things they have control over for their development. They appear to be replacing PalmOS with Windows Mobile and Linux anyway.
What good is stock as compensation if you can't ever sell it and spend the cash?
I think this device is pretty cool. You would have a hard time paying me enough to carry a laptop around, but a lightweight device with really long battery life, low price, and wireless? That's a different story. I bet these are expensive though...
It is pointless trying to stuff productivity applications into a PDA format. Try doing word even simple processing on a PDA or blackberry.
This is also much more like what an OLPC should be. ARM == low power & cost relative to an x86. I think OPLC got it wrong when they went x86 - which looks like it was done solely to support Windows. Linux runs great on ARM (there are probably more Linux devices using ARM than x86).
Engineering is the art of compromise.
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
I see it being a non-system. Who is going to buy this in enough volume to keep it alive?
For $200, then you might be able to sell enough of them.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
It looks like a subnotebook, it walks like a subnotebook, it bounces around in the briefcase like a subnotebook...
Disadvantages of a real subnotebook: fragile, expensive, gets malware (Windows), interfacing to use Bluetooth DUN can be hit-or-miss, esp. for the salesmen of the world, an extra machine to sysadmin. Does this thing have VGA out for PowerPointing?
I'd be happy to find a linux subnotebook of similar formfactor in a similar price range, if anybody has pointers.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
I see what he's going for... this is basically the old Apple DuoDock concept applied to a phone, where the phone is the core device and you can use a bigger, less-conveniently-sized device to extend the utility a bit. [And yes, as I was writing this I noticed this comparison has been made elsewhere by now]
Great.
How about instead of obex and proprietary and this and that, "they" start making cell phones that "just appear" within one's device landscape? For example, when I place my cell phone near my computer, shouldn't I be able to just sync it up [didn't Palm get that ball rolling, and didn't SyncML un-motivate universal device sync...], share the display [ala those little sidecar lcd screens popping up on the outside of laptops and messenger bags now for Vista] and in both directions, have the phone keyboard appear as another UID, storage mounts as a disk, etc etc etc.
I know some of this is possible if you're running Windows and you've installed the right proprietary warez, but for those of us unencumbered by Microsoft OS products, it's catch as catch can.
How about a smart phone that implements wireless USB and the appropriate device class stuff so that I can use my future Nokia N10K or Treo 999l or whatever for all that stuff above. Hell, just mounting the filesystem when my phone and desktop or laptop are near each other without jumping through hoops would be sweet. I would buy that phone yesterday if it existed. Until then, it's openobex and quirky bluetooth connections and mild disappointment with the state of the "smart phone" world.
I have a Palm TX and many Palm OS apps. However the Foleo is too big to be a Palm and too small to be a laptop. I like my Palm because it is very small and light and fits in my palm! I like my laptop because it is full featured and when I'm at a desk or table where I can take it out and plug it in I use it instead of my Palm which is nice but less capable -- especially the browser. Palm OS apps are nice but there is no draw for me to this large form factor. BTW when I want a keyboard for my Palm I have one of those folding ones. Both together are half the size and weight of this thing.
The basic concept, an instant on, no hard drive, Linux notebook is solid. I love my Palm T|X and find it preferable to a laptop for portability and simplicity, so a bigger screen, integrated keyboard, and linux support would be a big win.
But:
-5 hours is a tad dodgy on power, 'tho external battery packs would help.
-The price is equally problematic, with the OLPC costing nearly half that.
If Palm held the price down to $300 it would be awesome.
The problem may be that the XO solves the problem better and more cheaply.
But there is a market for this kind of device.
When I saw the Foleo, I was in shock. I was certain that the "mystery" product was overhyped, but this was a jaw dropper. The company that arguably invented the first successful mobile computing device has been reduced to *this*? Palm is on the ropes, this being perhaps their last chance to become relevant again, and they not only blow it, they miss the target by 180 degrees.
I lost a lot of respect for Jeff Hawkins here. This doesn't seem to hold out much hope for his other gig either [http://numenta.com/] I also find it notable that Jeff and Donna Dubinsky have been steadily bailing out of Palm for the last year, as have all the rest of the senior management. It seems that they are out of ideas there, and are just sucking as much of the blood out of the corpse as they can.
I note they still have Eric Benhamou still on their board. Having destroyed 3Com, I guess he will not rest until every company he has ever been associated with is reduced to ash. Amazing.
... the smaller versions of the Fujitsu Lifebook, the P1610. I still run Ubuntu on my old P1120. And the battery life is usually about 4.5 hours (even with wifi running).
That is all.
I don't get who they're marketing this to. Treo owners are mostly business people or techies, who most likely already have a laptop. At $500 it's not cheap enough to be a budget laptop replacement.
The point is that it is something IT departments can trust their travelling business people to have with them while on the road without fear of them bringing back a compromised laptop to the corporate network. There is also very little to lock down or configure and the end user will receive a clean interface without the usual distractions of games and similar programs.
Jesus was a compassionate social conservative who called individuals to sin no more.
It needs 3G and phone capabilities, like HTC's Advantage.
The sort of person who will use this device is the road warrior who needs comms and office on the move. Wifi can't be depended on.
A $600 minimalist Linux notebook that's a peripheral for a $300-$600 phone.
:)
Joy.
At 2.4 pounds it's as massive as an ordinary ultralight notebook that could run a full OS and applications. The sort of person would would go for this will already be likely to have a real notebook PC with them that can do all these same functions as well or better than this device.
It seems that almost all gadgets introduced as being a "new class" of device can be found a year later being sold by the pallete-load at bay area surplus and auction places. A year from now we can go in together on a lot of 100 of them for $1 each
G.
Since the people Palm is trying to sell Foleos to can't buy XOs, the fact that the Foleo is about 4x as expensive ($600-700 vs. $175) the launch price of the OLPC doesn't really mean a lot.
And I expect that you could get a much better price from Palm if you wanted to have them dropship you a quarter-million Foleos not packaged for individual retail sale, instead of buying them one at a time at retail.
I would love to take this thing in my backpack when I'm out on the weekend and need to check email or browse the web at a cafe. The concept of a "quick laptop" sounds neat. It is a logistical pain to boot up some of these laptops on-the-go. I hear the MacBooks boot from cold in about 30 seconds but this seems like a cheap upgrade for people who already own a 700p.
Oddly enough at the top of this post there is an advertisement for a $200 trade up from a current Palm device to a BlackBerry.
Jack Gold, founder of industry analysis firm J.Gold Associates, said "I don't know where it will fit in the market."
At $499 after a $100 rebate, the device is an expensive sidekick. For another $200, users can get themselves a laptop, says Gold.
"I am not sure why anyone would want to buy this device if they already have a laptop," he says. "I would not personally carry it because it does not provide me with enough benefit."
Hey, Windows users, there is no such thing as "forward" slash, there is only slash and backslash.
Wouldn't you want some kind of tablet device for reading, not a fold out laptop?
I am still waiting (more than a year) for Palm to support Treo syncing with Windows XP Media Center Edition. It will be a cold day in hell before I buy any more Palm products, lest I be left in the lurch again.
"Why not just get a laptop?" "What about blackberry?"
For people who actually use their laptops for being mobile, the vast majority of them are not programming, compiling, designing graphics or doing CAD. They're doing email, updating their presentations, writing up documents and spreadsheets and the like. (I haven't read where it can have external video for delivering presenations, but I imagine if it's not in the first release, it'll find its way into the next.)
This thing looks like it will do exactly what these mass market users already need. On top of that, they'll get extended battery life and a smaller size? That's awesome. And if you're the IT guy for the company that buys these? I'm guessing administration will be a snap since there won't be a lot of variation in hardware or software to deal with. Simple, easy. The mass market doesn't really WANT a laptop... it does too much more than what they need, it takes time booting and shutting down, catches malware and then becomes unstable and unreliable. The original palm devices weren't popular because they had a lot of features and capabilities. They were popular because they suited the needs of the users pretty well.
So I won't be able to play unreal tournament on it... I won't be watching movies either... (well, maybe I will... it uses SD cards and I am pretty handy with a transcoder...) Will I want one? I'm undecided actually. I actually like using my laptop because I do a lot of the extra things that the mass market doesn't do; what a majority of the slashdot demographic does. But I think I like it.
Utterly pointless. I am probably in the target demography. Traveling much, technology addicted, geeky, disposable income, gadgetry enthusiast. But that thing? What for?
Please indicate clearly where in the specs you see the Foleo runs on ARM. As far as we know, we don't know anything about RAM, CPU, etc.
What good is stock as compensation if you can't ever sell it and spend the cash?
No one says you "can't" sell it, but if Hawkins truly thought Palm had a hit on their hands he'd be stupid to sell before the product is released. Ergo, by selling now, he demonstrates that he has little faith in the Folly-o.
All devices like this are quite near but they have to fail it somewhere. Whether they don't fit in my pocket and run Linux/UNIX or they don't have a usable keyboard. Am I really the only one seeking for such device?
I'd actually like to have something that runs some kind of UNIX and fits in my pocket so I could carry it wherever I go. Laptops are too big and PDAs lack usable UI and keyboard.
Some UNIX in my pocket would be nice as I could use my favourite shell and apps that in addition are fully compatible with the same apps in my workstation. At the moment I use Nokia 9500 with putty, but it's far from having a UNIX shell in your pocket.
The nearest thing I've heard is that I could probably install NetBSD on my old Nokia 9110, but I don't have enough time and interest to investigate on that.
Hawkins is an insider, and an executive to boot. The times when he's allowed to buy or sell stock are regulated by the SEC. If I were in his position, I'd probably exercise my trading rights at every opportunity.
I used a Toshiba Libretto and later a Sony Picturebook for quite a while. Both very similar, pocket-sized but full function laptops. With a smart phone and a portable printer, I could get a portable office and development environment in under five pounds and in carry-on luggage. With a battery upgrade, I got 8-12 hours use. I also had network diagnostic tools and adapters. It was not for heavy work, but for getting things done when I was stuck unexpectedly one place or another and I did not want to lug a lot of equipment. I could pull it out of a pocket, work on something for a few minutes, then just close the lid and slip it away. I generally had a full-sized workstation at my own office and at client sites. If not, a couple adapters at least let me steal a keyboard and monitor. Very versatile.
This form factor is not at all new or special. Toshiba, Sony, Fujitsu, probably others as well. Several problems with this one: not open-- can't necessarily install own apps; price too high-- apparently more like $7-800. Battery life not impressive for the form factor.
The claim of being a closed system is totally unsubstantiated. Meybe they are confusing it with the iPhone. The Foleo will be an open-system, SDK will be available at the time this device will be on the market. Developers are actually encouraged to make applications for the Foleo. From the webcast :
"The device is powered by a Linux core with a custom Palm graphical interface. The Foleo will be a fully open platform, with Palm encouraging creative third party applications. A SDK was promised to be posted when the product becomes available."
But heck, A PC maker could make one tomorrow nearly, chuck a transmetta/via chip in a uber small laptop chassis, remove all the perhipherals, add maybe 2GB flash instead of a HDD and something like XFCE and your mostly there. All you'd have to do is figure out the mobile phone syncing stuff which ain't going to be too hard.
Personally I like it, though I'm a programmer and need a proper laptop, although I can see that this _may_ fit a niche/market.
At newegg, 11.1" and smaller will cost you at least $1500. Here's something smaller for a thousand bucks less. Sounds good to me.
Of course, you'll get less machine in this deal... presumably it has no hard drive, no optical drive, and so on. But that's what tradeoffs are all about.
For me, I think it's a great device. I would love to have a subnotebook that is just powerful enough to run X and ssh and fits in a reasonably sized man-purse. But I don't want to spend over $1200 on such a thing, especially when a normal laptop costs only $600 or $700.
But I have serious doubts that this thing can work well for Palm's business. The trick is marketing technology to non-geeks. The iPhone is almost certainly going to make a mint, not because of the new technology it has, but because Apple can use its phenomenal reputation to sell a smartphone to the masses. An ultraportable or a subnotebook is great to have for meetings, trips, conferences, mass transit, etc. But right now, no one but a geek would consider buying one.
Palm is trying to use the appeal of smartphones -- not just Treo, but competitors' phones as well -- plus its industry position to get this thing into phone stores and convince normal, non-geeks to try it out. I don't think it will work, but I do wish them luck.
One thing that could work in their favor is software integration. There really is a ridiculous amount that needs to be done in this area. The sad thing is, it's often not even a matter of technical problems, but obstacles like the DMCA that are thrown up by the powers-that-be.
Palm is on the ropes, this being perhaps their last chance to become relevant again, and they not only blow it, they miss the target by 180 degrees.
You're more generous than me.
Palm blew it years ago.
It's a pity this product is only half-baked.
In fact, it might have been better received as a inexpensive ultra-light laptop that takes advantage of the ability of Linux to run on ARM SoCs. Why do I want the Palm mail reader when I rely on Thunderbird plug-ins for calendar sync, gmail, hotmail, etc. They picked the wrong way to try to add value to Linux.
You can buy a Compaq 440 for $399. If I wanted a cheap portable device for communicating, that would do the job, and a few other things too. And, being a standard laptop, would give me a wide choice of Linux distros and add-on apps, straight out of the distros' repositories. The Foleo has to deliver benefits over and above the commodity PC solution. Is the light weight and fast boot-up really worth hassling with a non-standard machine, plus $100 more?
I wrote parts of this stuff
That's all I can tell. It's just like buying LCD and keyboard for your laptop, now you buy Foleo for your Treo.
It really does depend on the price point.
With Wifi cropping up everywhere there are times when I wish I had my laptop with me but I don't really want to haul my Thinkpad around with me.
This with OpenOffice and a few SD cards could be a very handy tool for students.
If they can get the price down to $300 then yea I will buy one. $500 is just a bit too much.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
I've been carrying around Zaurus clamshells for several years, and while I wouldn't want to do word processing on them, I use them with text editor (joe) and outliner (hnb) daily. The Zaurus is also fine for using ssh to remote administer *nix systems and to remotely read mail over mutt from my desktop. It's also fine as a Web browser. There's quite a lot I've gotten written that I never would have without it, since it's just not practical to always carry a laptop, and ideas both don't show up on schedule, and more often come to me when I'm out in the world in the midst of other business. My typing's slowed down by the small keyboard, but it's still faster than my handwriting, and it's much more useful to end up with the results in a computer file than in a stack of small paper notebooks.
Now, it would be nice to have something sized between the Zaurus and a subnotebook - a little more screen and a little more keyboard would work better for editing. But the top size I'd want would equal a trade paperback, with not much more weight than that. I still want something that I can carry easily in my hand - perhaps along with a book or two - if it can't go in a pocket. And for sure I want it running Linux, like the Zaurus does, like all my systems do. ARM would do fine - I've no speed complaints about the Zaurus at all for my uses.
The natural question is how many people there are like me. Back in the early 80s, those Kaypros and Osbornes were largely bought by people wanting superior writing tools - and the degree of portability they had was important to this market. For writing, text editors are still better tools than word processors - which are really aimed squarely at churning out business letters. (Real layout is another thing, and best done on a workstation.) I don't thing there's even one example of a well-optimized writer's machine now - of the sort of thing a news reporter or trail-wandering poet would find truly ideal. But it's precisely in the space between pocket-fitting Zauruses and subnotebooks that such a machine someday has to arrive, and if it's done right succeed wildly.
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
ultraportable laptop alternative? the Sony TX series are damn small, damn light, damn sexy and powerful, and damn expensive!
You can already cut 2.5 lbs from your rucksack and get everything else you want. Just buy a Panasonic R5. Heck, I'll bet you could cut close to 2.5 lbs out of your rucksack by buying a beast like the Panasonic Y5 (I have the Y2) - 3.3 lbs with a 14.1 inch 1400x1050 display. 6 hr battery life (although be warned, after the first couple of years it drops to 3 hrs, but I think that's pretty standard for lithium ion batteries (a crummy technology if there ever was one)).
... but - you get what you pay for!
Of course, these solutions are grossly more expensive than Palm's offerings. Like, $2,000 more expensive
And i just don't see how Palm is better.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
Less power than a PB G4 12", and not silver. Lame.
This is a solution looking for a problem. Carrying two devices is way worse than carrying one, so if I need a laptop, then I'll carry a laptop, but I'll expect laptop functionality such as being able to run flash, Firefox etc.
A device like this might be ok if it subsumed the phone, or provided additional functionality that people couldn't live without, but it doesn't look like it does. Don't expect people to give up their Pearls for this anytime soon.
-- "It's not stalking if you're married!" My Wife.
This thing reminds me a lot of the IBM Workpad z50 I had. Yes, it's not as powerful as a laptop. Yes, it's bigger than a PDA. But I still miss the little thing. Sometimes you just need a full-sized keyboard and reasonable display and don't want the overhead of a laptop. I don't care if I can't run Eclipse. I don't care if it won't run some hulking Adobe application, I just want something a step up from a word processor where I can write documents and code fragments that gets out of the way and lets me think about the problem. I want to turn it on and start typing, not sit there stewing while it boots or lose my concentration because applications are nagging me about trivial updates.
Think of it as a modern Tandy 102 and it begins to make sense. I'm not sure I trust Palm the company, but that's somewhat unrelated to this specific piece of hardware.
I liked it better when it was called "Oragami"... ...no, wait...when it was called "eMate"...
Hasn't this been done (and failed) a thousand times?!
[Nod "yes"]
Won't anyone *ever* learn?!?
I hate to press the jaded button here, I actually have a love for Palm, but its a whole lot of ~big deal~. Palm needs to bring PalmOS into the 21st century, and with that new OS bring in some really smart new portable devices if it wants to stay in the game.
Python: 'And then suddenly you have a language which says "we're all stuck with whatever the whiniest coder wants".'
at Tigerdirect?
I had fun modding the 3Com Audrey and the Virgin Webplayer. This looks like it will be fun too!
I kind of understand what Palm is going for here, but I sincerely doubt that people who already carry around laptops with EvDO/xG connections are going to carry around _another_ device to pair with their "smart" phone.
Having said that.. here are a couple of things that are interesting to me:
1. It could allow people to leave the laptop at the office. Not everyone has or can afford a really slender, light-weight laptop or, if they do, perhaps this could lighten the daily load.
2. Presume the O/S's pairing with a smart phone does something so supremely exciting, Palm could sell the O/S separately for a much smaller price. Tun it emulated and provide something you _can't_ getting carrying a laptop and a smartphone together. (I'm not sure what that would be.)
I hope I'm wrong here, but right now this looks suspiciously like those old NEC MobilePro systems. Instant-On with O.K. connectivity options for the time, but it ran Windows CE, was dreadfully slow, and the slow serial connection for synchronization didn't inspire confidence.
Cheers,
Mike...
If Nalgene water bottles are outlawed, only outlaws will have Nalgene water bottles.
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
It managed to attribute both ARM processors to the wrong company:
"One possibility are Intel's ARM-based Xscale processors, which Palm uses in its Treo smartphones. Another possibility is TI's ARM11-based i.MX31, which recently gained an Opera 9 port."
The handheld device XScale variants (PXA) are now owned by Marvell.
The i.MX31 is and always has been a Freescale part.
TI's ARM devices are called OMAP I believe.
It would be open when you can rebuild and install the whole system from source.
I really doubt that it is "fully open"
unless you assume:
Step 1: Ignore Palm hacked Linux OS. Install real Linux.
My 12" Apple Powerbook is only a little bit bigger then this and it fits neatly into the same shoulder bag or day pack I'd have to carry a Foleo in. So...no way. Far as I'm concerned, I already have a conveniently sized carry-around laptop. The nice thing about my Kyocera smart phone on the other hand, is I can clip it to my belt, or slip it into a coat pocket.
I confess I caught my breath when I read the blurb. Full screen keyboard? PalmOS? Instant on? Sounds great. I am a writer and have yet to find a portable writing tool more convenient and portable than a laptop and more useful than most of the PDAs on the market. This sounded like just the thing. Wrong.
I have yet to find a better tool than the Psion 5 (http://therandymon.com/content/view/86/79/), and increasingly it's my PDA as well. Where's the tool you can keep in a coat pocket, whip out, turn on, and start writing while you're waiting for a train? The Palm T|X with an external keyboard is close, the Nokia 800 with some better software gets close, but that's about it. And they both fail in comparison with the Psion 5, which is now a full ten years old.
The floundering in the PDA market these days is so loud you can actually hear the splashing.
This thing is too big to be useful to me, requires an expensive cellphone I don't want, and seems to cost an arm and a leg. And that means, I get to keep typing away on my Psion, hoping to God it doesn't break, because the market has roundly failed to produce its equal.
And that reminds me, who was on the test panel that told Palm this hunk of junk was a good idea?
If this were Usenet, I'd killfile the lot of you.
With Intel promising similarly sized, but half the thickness and half the weight solid state storage notebooks before the end of the year, with the ability to run a full OS, I can't see this having much chance of success. Especially not when it's marketed as a cell phone companion, and a Treo-only companion to start with.
The only reason to pick one up is because they're going to become collector's items, much like other big flops. Like the Palm Audrey (remember that one, folks?)...
Regards,
--
*Art
I really, really long for a big palm pilot, somewhere around the size of a tablet PC. PalmOS supports XGA resolutions and it would be great for web browsing on WiFi/BT DUN, doing light data entry (Docs to go is pretty good, IMO), VNC/RDP to my PCs, run my handy PalmOS apps, support BT stereo audio for my MP3s, and have at least 2 flash memory slots to ensure plenty of storage.
This....is like they took that idea and threw away the good parts. They are NOT running a PalmOS emulator on Linux or else they wouldn't need to port Opera or Docs to Go. They are NOT making it tablet-like since it has no touch screen and the display won't fold all the way over.
Unless Palm hacked up the OS or used special libraries, there's nothing that the Foleo does that couldn't be done with a Nokia N800.
And if I could get a PalmOS emulator for the N800 so I could keep my palm apps, I might be satisfied with that, even if it is a little smaller than I'd really want.
I've been on slashdot so long I'm starting to get out of touch with the cool stuff if it ain't on slashdot.
Remember the 3Com Audrey? Palm tried something like this before, and it was an complete failure. Unfortunately, I see this device meeting the exact same fate. It's just awkwardly-sized and not quite useful enough. WHY are they making this mistake again!?
Here is my home page.
The basic idea is a good one: mostly, what people do with a laptop is write, present, email, and browse the web. A device like this can solve that better than a laptop. It's the same idea as the Nokia 800 and Pepperpad, just with a keyboard.
However, people like to be able to install some stuff even on mobile devices: little games, VPN clients, ssh, etc. If they kept the Foleo open and compatible enough, it may work.
But a bigger issue is: if the PC is supposed to be your smartphone and this is just a keyboard/screen for that, then we need better smartphones. The Palm, PocketPC, and Symbian platforms are awful platforms: slow, limited, hard to program, and they can't figure out how to do a scalable GUI.
I frankly would rather have an OLPC with a decent keyboard, and that would cost half as much and run standard Linux apps. Let's hope Quanta will make those.
I'm very disappointed about this particular feature being missing. When I first heard about this being a "companion" to smart-phones with a 10.X" screen, my thought was "Woot! Data pads!!!" The whole iPhone hype has been annoying me because you can't put a screen big enough to view photos and video in something you are going to hold against your head for a lengthy period of time. The two operations are mutually exclusive. Here's my recommended setup:
Stylishly small and easy to use cell phone. Pretty much what we already have. (which is good, because then no one has to re-invent that market) But make sure it has bluetooth and/or wifi.
To go along with this is a data pad like device, maybe a convertable form factor.
Hardware: Multi-touch touchscreen(cause they're cool!), wxga resolution so you can get 780p movies as well as enough room for a desktop. Gravity sensor for auto rotation. Don't bother with speakers, small ones are never worth the trouble, a headphone/external speaker jack should be fine... idealy use bluetooth headphones or speakers... Memory card reader, preferably multiformat. USB port(s) w/ optional external power bus. Small webcam. Maybe use a camera on the phone (if so equipped) with a clip/stand?
Software: Personally, I don't care if it's linux or widows or mac... as long as the darn thing works. Needs an office suite (NOT documents to go, bleck...) (that VGA port out on the folio is a good idea for presentations, or hooking it up to a projector for movies too), it would be nice to be able to play games to kill time; a flash player would do the trick (see below)... Media library software, such as itunes or some such... A standard web browser with flash and java, using the phone as an access point if no other wifi is available.
And all of this for under $400.
And what is there that my Palm T|x doesn't have? Large screen, proper keyboard, decent media library organizer. (It has a player, and it plays mp3s and movies just fine, it just has a crummy UI.) Actual office software and a standard web browser. It cost $250... A keyboard is $40. Attaching them with a hinge shouldn't be too much, so that leaves plenty of budget for enlarging the screen and maybe the battery too just a little bit.
I want something to expand the functions of my phone. I cannot watch movies on a phone. I cannot edit word documents on my phone. I cannot view websites properly on my phone. I cannot browse file systems on my phone. I cannot transfer photos from my DSLR camera to my website with my phone. I cannot draw sketches with my phone. I cannot use my phone as a portable hard drive (although I think some can be used as microSD card readers when connected to the computer via USB...)
Is this really too extraordinary to ask for?
This is also much more like what an OLPC should be. ARM == low power & cost relative to an x86.
That's funny, given that the OLPC costs half as much and its battery lasts more than twice as long.
And I have some Linux ARM devices--believe me, an x86 compatible chip is a blessing.
You might not want it, but I know of at least one vertical market that will. I'm the TC at a small all-girls school in PA. We have been closely watching other schools who use full-blown laptops and have come to the conclusion that it won't work for us. Why?
Full-on XP (or God help us) Vista is too much. It's slow to start, gets messy fast (kids do take these things home ya know), and the bigger machines are prone to breakage.
Some schools have tried PDAs, but it seems they are mostly used as an address book and IM center.
This form factor is EXACTLY what we've been looking for. Instant on, 10" screen, full sized keys for in-class notetaking, wi-fi, a secure OS (hopefully lockdownable), and only 2.5 lbs. For what the students need in classroom, it's perfect! I hope Palm is paying attention to this because I think they might have something special here for the educational market. The cell phone connectivity is a bonus, but it's not what we'd want it for...
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
...I am a massive Palm fan, and was convinced today's announcements would be an iPhone competitors or some amazing next gen Treo. The OLPC has more future proof and network centric technology than the Folio and I just do not see how people will step backwards from watching DVDs, PowerPoint, YouTube, Excel files on their laptop to a device the same size, almost, but that has to sync with a phone. Jeff, who I admire a huge amount, had a great opportunity here to launch an Apple level revolutionary device, such as an eINK rollup PDA/Phone and has taken a step backwards. He forgets, 90% of the world run MS applications and/or services and already carry laptops that do everything - including syncing with their phones using Microsoft Exchange. I would much prefer to carry a roll up cloth keyboard (they are available) and an iPhone or Treo and actually use the phone's screen with a large font if I'm going to leave my laptop behind. Damn, such a wasted opportunity. But, he may well find a niche market if the battery life is more than 24 hours - sich as writers who wish to lock themselves away on a mountain for a few days. "Here's Jack!"
O'WONDERWe're working on it.
I'm always amazed at people who complain because their laptop takes to long to boot up and shut down. A MacBook doesn't take all that long to boot up and shut down. On top of that, I probably don't shut mine down and boot it up more than about once a month. Why are all you people booting so damn often that the bootstone becomes a marketing advantage? You need to consider a new metric when evaluating a platform, I propose we call it the:
howOftenDoINeedToBootThisHunkOfCrapStone.
And your guessing administration will be a snap, eh? Clearly you haven't been around an organization that had thousands of Palm Pilots. Small and lightweight, yes, it simply means that, pound for pound, the Palm devices destroy more systems administration and support resources than anything other than exotic forms of matter, say, a black hole.
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
That should be: " too long to boot up..."
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
I am still waiting (more than a year) for Palm to support Treo syncing with Windows XP Media Center Edition. It will be a cold day in hell before I buy any more Palm products, lest I be left in the lurch again.
Ah, the Windoze advantage, things just work like that. No one but M$ ever wins when they deal with M$.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Is that companion like a dog, or companion like Inara Serra?
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
This thing is ghey. I can just hear the conversation now ...
Helpdesk Guy: "Hello Mr. New VP. Here is your Palm and Foleo"
New VP: "Gezunteit"
Helpdesk Guy: "No, it's called a Foleo. You see, it runs Linux and has an Opera browser and you can open Office documents."
New VP: "Where's my Windows laptop?"
And that will be the end of it.
Dunno what the hubbub is about over this device - I was downsizing my laptop and got an Inspiron 700m subnotebook. Threw on Ubuntu to run with XP and I'm good to go.
A little heavier but this one runs virtually everything and has an optical drive. To me it seems like the sacrifice of Windows is a little forward at this moment - if something is going to be deployed in a business environment it's a neccesary evil. I use it for maybe 10% of my tasks but that 10% is what keeps me from having two computers.
I have a Sharp Zaurus C-3100, and it's a sweet little machine. Sure it doesn't have a full size keyboard or screen, but it really does everything this thing says it does, including the instant on and off. Plus I just attach a folding USB keyboard if I want, though I find the built-in keyboard is very easy and fast to thumb through. Batterylife is extreme, too. Normal PDA-like usage, I don't plug it in for recharge for at least 2 weeks.
Alas, they stopped making the Zaurus recently, even in Japan. Didn't Palm notice the fate of the Zaurus, or did they really think making a laptop-sized Zaurus would fare better in the market?
Go follow your link again, the article ahs been updated, striking the closed part and adding an explicit statement from Palm that it is OPEN. Guess I should not have doubted Palm (in another post) on that part, they built the company on 3rd party developers.
Democrat delenda est
I think that the parent poster was asking for something that could actually be purchased somewhere other than Japan.
When the Zaurus 6000 first came out I was dying to get one. Never could because Sharp doesn't know how to sell products in the USA.
I just hope that this little xPDA actually handles different languages better than their current implementation in Palm OS...
Just for kicks, I tried to find a Japanese language pack for my Palm, only to find out that to allow Japanese characters to be shown, a special extension must be installed on the system that runs the risk of BREAKING any Western language! I need to find the page that details this information.
If it cannot do that, then I would much rather stick to the fully-capable laptop that I have now.
Plus, I think people get PDAs because they are MUCH smaller than their current laptops. I'm not sure if the market is really looking into sub-portable sized PDAs for a change. Even if they were, one can get full PDA functionality on their phone now (smartphones, anyway), so to plan the next meeting is as simple as digging into your pocket, not your backpack.
Then again, great criticism is [almost] anyways the paved road before a great product.
I've always wanted something with the libretto form factor with a modern processor, memory, etc. Could this be what I'm looking for?
I think for a lot of people it's not full shutdown, but time to suspend and resume.
I think the sys admin challenges comes from trying to synch Palm w/ Outlook and other MS crap. If you don't need that, and rely on Palm's excellently UI'd software, it's pretty IT friendly.
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
So did Palm time the announcement so that it would look slightly less boring than Microsoft's table-with-a-screen on it, or was it the other way round?
On LinuxDevices.org they also mention an "accessory module for handheld devices"( http://www.patentdebate.com/PATAPP/20070080935 ) and it is the same concept I emailed Sharp about for the Zaurus in 2002. Who would have thought that putting an interface to a PDA on the back of a display unit would be patentable... Oh well. :-/
Glad to see somebody thought it was an interesting idea. All that power behind such a small screen is just begging for a large screen add-on.
I think this would be good for college students. A small, light device for taking notes that was cheap and had internet and word processing would be useful. I got a Dell Axim with a bluetooth keyboard but having the two deices instead of one isn't real handy. If this new device had a vga out so I could hook it up to a projector for when I show video clips or powerpoints to my students I might get one. However, at $500 there's no way. Shop around and you can find an occasional clearance model laptop with a core 2 processor for that price.
http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
Of course, I can also not buy my devices from Palm, right?
Seriously, not to troll, I have not had good experiences with Bluetooth on Palm devices. TFA stated that will be a primary I/O so I really hope they have their shit in one bag now for the bluetooth. I for one use a lot of wireless data and trouble free cellphone tethering is a must and with that said cables are a drag.
You mean the 3Com Audrey?
After they end-of-life'd the lifedrive, I was hoping for a linux based pda that isn't a phone. Not some sort of sub-notebook.
Such is the infinite Grace of Popeye.
Fut the Whuck?
Cause "For the Win" makes zero sense.
"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
Indeed. Different name, same shame.
US Robotics acquired Palm, and was in turn acquired by 3com, before URR was shut down, recreated and Palm spun off. Thus you find Palm devices with all three names, sometimes even a different name on the packaging and device.
People who get stock options typically buy the stock and sell it right away. Unfortunately a corporate executive isn't as free as you or I to sell stock. They have to report that they've sold stock, and this alarms ignorant investors: "Palm, Inc. Jumping Shark! Founder sells 15000 shares!" To avoid doing this, they set up automatic stock sales. These sales go through regardless of what the executive knows about the stock (including material good or bad news). Forbes prints it because it's news, but that doesn't mean that it's meaningful.
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
You crave small, you don't want pain, and yet you ask for the most bloated editor in the realm. Sounds a little left of centre, n'est ce pas?
NOTE: I'm not anti-Emacs. I concede that it is a feature rich editing environment. Me? I'm a minimalist, so I choose to use vi.
The price is actually $599 with an introductory $100 mail-in-rebate.
Yes, that difference is important. Not only do you lend the company $100 without interest, but in states with sales tax or use tax, you pay the tax on the full amount. Then there's the unpaid time and hassle of having to send in the mail in rebate, following the instructions to the letter, cutting out UPS codes, making photocopies of sales receipts, et cetera. And, finally, you risk the rebate not being honored after all, which is a rather common occurrence for MIRs.
I like to read a lot of e-books...mostly in pdf format, and my old Palm Pilot, while able to do the job, just isn't living up to what I want, which is a much larger screen, colour, and able to surf the internet, light, hand held, and have a really great battery life...oh, and be somewhat affordable. My Toshiba Satellite laptop is too bulky, and it suffers from over heating way too much, so that's out, so other than that, what are my options? Would you fellow /.'ers suggest this?
He had to plan well in advance when he could sell this stock. He has a regular stock sale plan. It's illegal for him to change his purchase plan because he has inside knowledge of a product release.
Plus, the stock went up 2.6% on the announcement.
Here's an obligatory post that we can point and laugh at, 5 years later!
No phone. Less capability than a sub-notebook. Lame.
The only thing I need and don't see yet is a terminal services client. However, it's a Linux box so nothing stops me or someone else from putting it on. Then I can simply have my users login to my terminal server for their apps.
My clients rely heavily on their mobile handhelds. I've shown them how to use MS Mobile PowerToys to use the thing on their main laptops.
If this thing is in fact capable of what I think it is capable, as a Palm reseller I will sell tons of them, literally. I have a laptop that does nothing except run PowerPoint. That thing is old, slow, and bulky. I am actually going to try doing PowerPoint presentations directly from my handheld.
Unfortunately, Margi has discontinued its "Presenter-to-go" hardware products so now I have to look at what else is out there.
Leonid S. Knyshov
Find me on Quora
Apparently, it sounds like Jeff Hawkings or whatever haven't heard of HTC Shift / Kaiser...
Btw I'm posting this from Cingular 8525...
I have often been tempted to buy palm products but they are always inferior to everything else in the same price range. I mean their brand new 750 only has a 1.3mp camera with 2x digital zoom, lacking in memory, runs windows mobile 5.0, 240x240 screen, and only a 300mhz processor which is not enough for windows. Please palm come out with some decent numbers and ditch windows mobile for a decent OS like symbian or stick to palmOS or even give Linux a try.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
can it perform Fellatio? Or will I contract Polio. If so, I certainly hope the Foleo contains lots of Folic acid.
God, who devises such a crappy name for such a cool device?
"Update: As noted in the comments, apparently the Foleo is open to external applications. As Palm puts it, "Its Linux-based operating system and built-in Wi-Fi radio make it easy for developers to create new applications that can be installed with a single click in the browser" -- though Palm's not released any information for developers, nor given any indication of how strongly it will engage the open-source community."
From the title ("Stick A Fork In Palm") to the tone of the rest of the article, it sounds more like Techdirt's got a problem of some kind with Palm than anything else.
Well, I for one was expecting something exciting from Palm to revive them.... This is just booring and except for the syncing stuff nothing new. They just created a new line of PDAs, like they have allways done. In a different formfactor yes, but still a PDA.
Visit http://www.crunzh.com/ for free software. Mac/Lin/Win
Come on Apple, show us the real portable, lightweight computer.
Please tell me you're joking? Unless he's just using his macbook to do e-mail and web browsing, there is a LOT that it can do that a Linux box flat out can't. Not things that are kludgy on Linux, just things that Linux absolutely cannot do.
Please name me one piece of photo editing software on Linux that will do full color management, 16 bit images, etc. And don't try the Gimp because it can't.
Name me an accounting package on Linux that 80% of accountants in the UK will accept books from? I can't think of one.
These headlines always fool me into believing that finally the time has come when I can telnet into my Treo, kill processes as I want to and compile a small webserver, while still being able to do something useful by tapping on its screen.
Oh what a chance the iPhone would have been.
Christian
Most comments below seem to be missing the point, this is not a solution looking for a problem. For your basic word processing, spreadsheeting, emailing and (sans flash) web surfing a multi-gigahertz laptop with 720i widescreen, DVD RW and about 30 minutes battery life is overkill. Laptop makers have been constantly upgrading the laptop into a full-blown PC and leaving the laptop ethos behind.
.1 of a second.
This is a solution to a very current problem. Smartphones are too small to be used for serious work, and laptops are too big, heavy and powerful to be lugged around everywhere.
My ideal "notebook" computer would be somewhere between this, the Psion Revo and Psion Series 7. Personally i dont even see the need for the color screen for the four tasks i described above (the revo is 16-shades-of-grey) but it's needed as a feature so that people at least consider the thing.
All you need then is enough RAM to get around in (256mb seems fine to me), enough storage to store a good chunk of files (a few gigs) and enough power to use a USB flash drive. Build in Wifi, bluetooth and an RJ45 for wired ethernet and that will do me fine. So long as the thing runs passively cooled the battery life should be fine.
The Revo's grey-backed non-lit LCD is quite readable in a reasonable amount of ambient light so eink would probably be overkill for the time being but i'd even consider that once the update rate gets to about
If you don't risk failure you don't risk success.
The Folio looks like an excellent idea, but it certainly diverges from all previous Palm offerings. It does retain a number of the "Zen of Palm" elements: It does have instant on, and instant off. It does have full-screen, saved-state, instantly switchable apps. It does have hard buttons to launch frequently-used apps quickly. But I believe that the Folio's audience is very different. Just look at what's not included: Gone is the touch screen--no drawing or hand-written note taking capabilities. Gone is handwriting recognition/navigation. (OK, so the keyboard obviously replaces that, but I and many others always had huge successes with Graffiti.) Gone is the long battery life. Gone is the tablet design. Gone is a pocketable device. (Pocketable doesn't necessarily mean shirt-pocket--cargo pants have nice big pockets to accommodate a decent sized device.)
The Folio targets email and web-browsing users that do lots of keyboard input. Again, this diverges from Palm's original PDA's that, though they could handle text and graphic input, were more suited as "viewing" devices. Yet, previous Palm PDA's could handle user input in many ways very well, as long as the user took the time to understand the requirements.
The Folio looks like it will fill a need, but I'll take a pass for now. After well over a decade of using Palm PDA's, I'm still waiting for my "dream PDA" to come out. I think the Palm V styling was the best ever designed, and has yet to be surpassed. I'd like to see that design revived, but larger, say 4"x6" or 5"x7", making it easily pocketable in the front pocket of cargo pants. A touch screen with a flip-over cover is essential for graphic input. It COULD be a clamshell design with a keyboard, but the screen would need to be the "twist and flip" design found on the old Sony NX70V and some newer TabletPC's. I find the tablet form factor so useful, so for me, it's an essential. It would include Wi-fi and Bluetooth and an SD expansion slot. It would have the nice 5-way nav-pad and a few extra hard buttons. Oh, and the battery life needs to be measured in days, not hours. And how about adding some basic "smart" Newton-like drawing capabilities? You know, draw a rough circle, and the OS cleans it up into a perfect circle or elipse; draw a rough line, and the OS "corrects" it. Why has this never caught on?
My mom always said, "Jim, you're 1 in a million." Given the current population, there are 7000 of me. God help us all!
... the Jornada 820 because...?? http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/abouthp/histnfacts/museum /personalsystems/0038/index.html
Vi havas e-poston.
I have a Treo 700W for work and it's a piece of junk. The ONE thing I wanted it for was to be able to put PuTTY (or something similar) on it and be able to do basic sysadmin functions from basically anywhere. All the SSH clients I ve been able to find for Windows Mobile are (apparently) written for PDAs with larger screens than the Treo has.. and the keyboard falls woefully short when it comes to important functionality, like being able to transmit CTRL+C through the SSH client. WTF?! What good is an SSH client if you can't transmit a CTRL+C?!
So... If I can get a decent ssh client on this thing... and I can easily hop on the internet (either via WiFi or through Bluetooth connection sharing) and I can operate for a while (a few hours) without plugging in... groovy.
I don't really care if it plays movies or music.
In fact, I really don't care if it's got a color screen. I'd be content with simple Linux machine with monochrome VGA, a good and complete keyboard, a few basic ports that don't require dongles (eth, ttyS, usb), wifi, ssh, vi, and bluetooth. The rest of it is candy.
They appear to be replacing PalmOS with Windows Mobile and Linux anyway.
Umm... what? It's PalmSource that is spearheading the move to Linux, as a basis for the next gen of PalmOS. And Palm is continuing to use PalmOS in their products, selling them alongside their WM offerings.
Honestly, stories of the demise of PalmOS are highly exaggerated.
Feature > Palm Foleo > Dell 1501N
Notebook form factor > Yes > Yes
Linux OS > Yes > Yes
Dual Core x86 Processor > No > Yes
>=512MB RAM > No > Yes
$500-600 > Yes > Yes
3rd party apps > ? > Yes
Sync w/ PDA via Bluetooth > Yes > Yes
Instant on/off > Yes > No
Yes > ?
5 hr battery life > Yes > Yes
Sorry for the formatting. Blame the lameness filter.
This isn't a bold, innovative new product. It is an under-powered, over-priced laptop,
There isn't a whole lot more to say. This product should prove to be an expensive gambit for Palm. Unless they can get the price down to $200-300, it seems obvious that you would be better off with and honest to goodness laptop.
PalmSource was acquired and no longer exists. Their assets are owned by Access software, and as far as I'm aware Palm is working off a source code license to the old PalmOS software (now called GarnetOS). The next-gen PalmOS (Cobalt) has been canceled, and pieces of it have been merged into the "ACCESS Linux Platform". Palm has announced no plans to use the Linux based platform from Access in any devices at all. They are simply releasing their new products with the old PalmOS and a Windows platform as options. There is no next-gen of PalmOS on anybody's roadmap right now.
Who said anything about "demise"? I don't think that PalmOS is going anywhere any time soon. It's going to stick around largely unchanged until people stop buying it. With software support and device sales rapidly declining though, it's only a matter of time until Palm's devices don't run PalmOS anymore. Which is unfortunate, since despite being archaic, it's still the best PDA OS available to end users on the market right now.
PalmSource was acquired and no longer exists.
Actually, it's an operating subsidiary of ACCESS, though they changed their name late last year (apparently I missed the news).
There is no next-gen of PalmOS on anybody's roadmap right now.
What do you think the "ACCESS Linux Platform" is? It's a Linux-based platform with a PalmOS compatibility layer. Much like MacOS X was the next gen of MacOS, providing an OS9 compatibility layer.
And while you may be right that Palm hasn't announced devices for it yet, if it works as advertised (though, until there's something out there, I'm skeptical), I'd be very surprised if they didn't deploy it. After all, there's still a sizeable customer base out there that uses PalmOS and the wide variety of applications available for it. Ditching PalmOS entirely would be a sign of the true beginning of the end for Palm, IMHO, as it would involve them actively cutting out a large portion of their (as you say, dwindling) customer base.
Guess the Foleo will run a variant of Palm's Linux platform (not ALP, that's another thing) and not the aged Garnet.
One of the problems is, though, the public doesn't know much about that platform yet.
It seems to me that, the Foleo is directed to the business people whose daily job can be done by mainly reading and sending emails, with only occasion needs to use word processors, spreadsheets, and the web. It probably won't appeal to the general public, since it's too function-limited when compared to a notebook PC.
Also, the quoted battery life (5-hour?) is too short. I'll be expecting at least 10-hour for such device to be useful.
If Palm can get this right, it can as well be the next Blackberry in terms of popularity among the business people.
OK photo application mmm try video...
Try any commercial creative application.
For those that bought a mac cause they needed a unified UI on LINUX "actually BSD"
correct this is a macbook replacement.
For those of us whose laptop is the center of the universe, it does ot make any sense to limit your universe for the sake of $500, otherwise I would just buy a second hand PC.
-- email me @ 30,000 ft
I'm an avid Palm user, and a former developer of Palm software. I'd like you to be correct, but I just don't see it. The new PalmOS (Cobalt, before the rename) *did* work as advertised. There was a simulator and "publically" available images for you to use to develop Cobalt apps. The UI was good. The APIs were good. It worked. Years have passed since then. I've even seen demo devices in Access' trade show booths. They're good. If Palm was going to move in that direction, why haven't they already?
I am very surprised they didn't deploy it. It should have been on the Treo 600 and the Tungsten T series handhelds. They had another opportunity to use it with the LifeDrive (That product may have even been successful if they had gone that route. Instead, it's canceled.) and the Treo 700 series. But if they haven't switched by now, I don't see them switching in the future.
Somebody drag this guy out from his time-warp under-a-rock bunker, and make him take a vacation/tour of Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Make him see where the current state of the smart/phone is at (including stuff like Felica and GPS), how people are actually using high tech products in these places of high-churn.
Maybe then he'll be able to grasp what modern technology is at, and that five years of R&D actually left him seven years behind.
It really looks like a Flybook subnotebook, which is about the same size and has the same 1024x600 resolution. I own two of them. The good thing about Flybook is that it can connect to the Internet through cellular networks supporting GPRS (53 kbps), UMTS (384 kbps), and HSDPA (1.8 to 3.6 mbps) and that it runs on a x86 processor (Transmeta or Pentium M). The bad thing is that its standard battery has just 1-2 hour autonomy depending how you use it (but the extended battery has much more, from 3 to 4 hours depending on use) and it lacks an integrated DVD drive. I would like to point out that Flybook is designed to be usable while you walk, as the pointing device is located at the top right position (unfortunately there is no left-hand version!). I notice that this Palm Foleo machine has its pointing device on the centre, which would make it difficult to use it while walking. Palm's claimed battery life is 5 hours, which is too low for an ARM-based machine (my HTC Universal with the extended battery has 22 hours autonomy, and I'm able to connect to the Internet through cellular GPRS and UMTS networks from it, connect to my servers via SSH, code in Python, and browse Slashdot at 640x480 thanks to OzVGA. Actually I would say that HTC Universal would be completely perfect if it had more memory, wasn't based on Winblows, and could connect via HSDPA just like Nokia's E90 does). I also notice that the Palm Foleo's keyboard seems very well designed, while I can't say the same about Flybook's keyboard (try coding in C or another language with lots of brackets, or use any application requiring heavy use of PgUp and PgDown keys on a Flybook keyboard while standing up and you'll understand). There are many interesting mobile devices out there (see HTC's new toy or Sharp's Zaurus) and only time will tell whether Palm's new machine will be a hit in the mobile warriors's market. It's interesting to note that as x86 subnotebooks become smaller and ARM machines larger there are less and less differences between them, to the point where we may have difficulty distinguishing them at first glance.
I found this quote interesting:
..
"Marketing VP Paul Cousineau commented, "Some things that are easy to do in Palm OS are hard to do in Linux. Like instant app switching and long battery life, which are inherent in Palm OS." "
What does marketing know about the limitations of linux?
And why specifically state such useless information?
As I recall PalmOS was specifically designed to forbid multitasking,
though it posessed the capability. And my treo still dies every day
If you're interested in facts I'll tell you what they are and I'll give you sources - Chomsky on The Big Idea
I just talked to a colleague of mine who's been on a business trip all over Latin America and Central America recently - he's seriously tempted by this, purely to be able to leave his heavy laptop behind and make travelling a lot easier. He's even willing to buy a large SD card and sync his laptop's key data files onto the Foleo to enable this. And this is not a Linux geek, but a technical manager who travels a lot.
I think Palm has hit the spot just right here - there's a definite trend for people to dump laptops for smartphones, and this will make it a lot easier. Just having a sub-laptop that is instant-on and never needs antivirus updates is very attractive. My main Windows laptop, provided by employer, spends a huge amount of its time and disk throughput just running antivirus scans, software updates, etc, and Windows needs defragging and lots of general maintenance to keep it reasonably fast and secure (everyone should really run Secunia inspector to ensure non-MS apps are updated btw).
Making it Linux-based was very smart too - it enables them to do better instant-on with a platform they can fully customize, and use more power-efficient hardware, and of course the open source community will start porting apps and improving the platform for free, enabling the techier business users to get more done.
The more Windows bloat is on your heavy laptop, the better the Foleo looks...
---GEC
I'm but the humble pupil, seeking to snatch the scratchbuilt pebble from the master's fully articulated hand
If you reread my post, you will see that I wasn't "dumping" on Emacs. Take it for it was - an analysis of lightweight versus NOT lightweight with a sprig of humour thrown in. You will notice that I do, in fact, relate that Emacs is *NOT* a bad product.
Talk to your analyst - perhaps they can help you to deal with your hostility.