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Ask Slashdot: Where Can I Find Resources On Programming For Palm OS 5?

First time accepted submitter baka_toroi (1194359) writes I got a Tungsten E2 from a friend and I wanted to give it some life by programming for it a little bit. The main problem I'm bumping up against is that HP thought it would be awesome to just shut down every single thing related to Palm OS development. After Googling a lot I found out CodeWarrior was the de facto IDE for Palm OS development... but I was soon disappointed as I learned that Palm moved from the 68K architecture to ARM, and of course, CodeWarrior was just focused on Palm OS 4 development.

Now, I realize Palm OS 4 software can be run on Palm OS 5, but I'm looking to use some of the 'newer' APIs. Also, I have the Wi-fi add-on card so I wanted to create something that uses it. I thought what I needed was PODS (Palm OS Development Suite) but not only I can't find it anywhere but also it seems it was deprecated during Palm OS's lifetime. It really doesn't help the fact that I'm a beginner, but I really want to give this platform some life. Any general tip, book, working link or even anecdotes related to all this will be greatly appreciated.

124 of 170 comments (clear)

  1. Not worth it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Don't waste your time. Learn iOS, Android or some other platform that isn't dead.

    1. Re:Not worth it by cheesybagel · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yes this. Especially Android. Since it is Java based you can use that knowledge to program server side apps as well.

      Programming for an OS without memory protection is a nightmare.

    2. Re: Not worth it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      Seriously agree 100%.

      Find an open source project that could use coders.

      Heck, I hear Linus is pretty upset about the kernel right about now.

    3. Re: Not worth it by narcc · · Score: 2

      This is Slashdot, right?

      This is the last thing I expected to find here.

    4. Re:Not worth it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      As much as it may interest you to do this, I highly recommend NOT developing software for PDA devices made before 2008, as they are battery-backed RAM, not flash. So if you crash the device, you will lose everything on the device.

    5. Re:Not worth it by baka_toroi · · Score: 1

      Yup, it already happened to me while I tinkered with it. Fortunately I was just a sync away from recovering all the data and software (not that it was invaluable in any way). The only things that don't get restored are the Java VM and the Wi-fi drivers.

    6. Re:Not worth it by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 2

      If you and everybody else responsible for the code running on the device aren't sloppy programmers, perhaps...

      Even if your code is perfect, you still run the risk of having the other guy's program start scribbling over yours unless you feel like re-implementing absolutely everything whose behavior you don't entirely trust.

    7. Re: Not worth it by maccodemonkey · · Score: 4, Informative

      Android Java knowledge is reusable for... Server side development?

      The biggest time suck for learning a new platform is the platform itself, not the language. If we're comparing platforms, Android is like programming on the moon, and server side development is like programming on Saturn. A new programming language should only take a week or two to learn. The platform takes years. Android doesn't have much in common with a web platform. Unless Tomcat got an API to do mobile UI and touch handling, and Android got an API for failover and distributed services, they don't really have much in common at all.

      If a developer is scared to cross to any platform because they don't want to be multi-lingual, they're doing it wrong. Java, Obj-C, Swift and C# are all pretty much the same thing, just with some syntax changes. Heck, there is even a family tree there. Java was based on Obj-C, and C# was based on Java. Swift is based on all of them.

    8. Re:Not worth it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Wow what did you do? The Tungsten E2 used flash so you can crash it or let it go dead and nothing is lost. I don't remember losing anything with the similar non-flash devices (say Zire 72) with a crash, only if you let the battery go fully dead at which point you would have to revert to your last backup (i.e. hotsync or backup to sd). I crashed plenty of times while developing for them (and hence locked up the device to require a soft reset) and don't ever remember losing anything.

    9. Re:Not worth it by baka_toroi · · Score: 1

      It got stuck on an infinite loop at boottime. Something about an invalid birthday, can't remember the exact error message. Apparently it was a known bug at the time, since a couple of users on some forums were looking for help as well.

      Nothing a hard reset didn't fix.

    10. Re: Not worth it by Matheus · · Score: 1

      Every once in a while you can find good advice here... On first glance I agree with you but there's a tidbit at the end of TFS that led me to this place as well: "It really doesn't help the fact that I'm a beginner, but I really want to give this platform some life"

      He may be able to give some life to his gifted device but he's never gonna breath life into the "platform". It's dead Jim. I fully support a beginner wanting to play with interesting things that currently being the Palm device he was just gifted and if he can get some use out of it more power to him BUT as far as investment in time and energy goes the Good Advice(tm) is to walk away from that Palm and invest time on a platform that will be usable for him into some length of future.

      This is /. SO he'll probably not follow that advice and have a bunch of fun (hopefully) fighting with a dead device and probably learn some important lessons dealing with a painful OS but that doesn't change the advice itself being right.

      Just sayin...

  2. Be ready for a lot of frustration by ZorinLynx · · Score: 4, Insightful

    PalmOS is a rather antiquated system. No memory protection, no native multitasking, clunky APIs...

    Depending on your personality type and the coding experience you have, it's either going to be a TON of fun, or you're going to want to smash and break things on the very first night.

    Or maybe both. :) I don't have any pointers, but as a former Palm OS user, godspeed.

    (Palm IIIxe from 2000-2005, Palm Treo 650 from 2005 to 2009)

    1. Re:Be ready for a lot of frustration by armanox · · Score: 1

      I remember my PalmIII fondly. And my Palm V that replaced it. And my Zire, that was the last one I had (although the V had some niceties the zire did not). Or maybe I'm just remembering them for what they were then, and not compared to iOS and Android. I bet if I booted the old PocketPC in my desk I'd go nuts (and not in a good way)(PocketPC 2003).

      --
      I'm starting to think GNU is the problem with "GNU/Linux" these days.
    2. Re:Be ready for a lot of frustration by pushing-robot · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Palm had one thing going for it, at least in the early days: excellent battery life. With no wireless, no background serivces, and no traditional backlight, battery life was measured in days—or weeks—or months!

      While they don't hold a candle to modern devices in every other respect, I loved being able to tap away at the thing forever without ever worrying about finding a charger. And the EL backlight was pretty darn cool (though it made you really hate dimly lit rooms)...

      --
      How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
    3. Re:Be ready for a lot of frustration by SumDog · · Score: 1

      I had an old Handspring Visor, Palm Treo and Centro. I came here to say this.

      I had the IDE for a while. No multitasking (you could have timers that ran background tasks) and you could read/write directly into other programs' memory spaces. It was so easy to crash that OS. It's seriously only a few levels above MS/PC DOS with a really crappy C API. I'm really glad we're so far past those devices.

    4. Re:Be ready for a lot of frustration by msobkow · · Score: 1

      You've got to be kidding. My Palm III ate batteries like a fiend. I was lucky if they lasted a week, and I hardly used the thing. I'd guess I got about 6-7 hours of functionality out of a set of batteries. And I'm not talking rechargeables, but good quality alkalines.

      --
      I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
    5. Re:Be ready for a lot of frustration by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 2

      In my experience the power consumption of the Palm III varied significantly. I think there was a switchmode power converter of some sort in it, and it could be good or very, very bad, depending on individual device. Probably related to the capacitor in it. That's how I vaguely remember it, anyway.

    6. Re:Be ready for a lot of frustration by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

      I used CodeWarrior at the time, for some time, and then switched to prc-tools. CW was pretty buggy.

      --
      Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
    7. Re:Be ready for a lot of frustration by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 2

      The 'conduit' synchronization concept was pretty good as well (in an environment where 'eh, it's a computer, just give it TCP/IP and call it a day.' was not yet practical). The actual sync client, at least for Windows, was a total piece of shit; but conceptually the 'conduits' model was about the nicest flavor of PDA synchronization available before the rise of handhelds with their own data connections. PalmOS never handled those particularly neatly.

    8. Re:Be ready for a lot of frustration by robinsc · · Score: 2

      Also the UI was really good for getting things done quickly....
      it was an organizer first and foremost which today's multi-functional devices are not and hence they always suffer for some form of identity crisis.

      --
      Linkedin http://in.linkedin.com/in/robinsaikatchatterjee
    9. Re:Be ready for a lot of frustration by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I don't have any pointers

      Neither does PalmOS when the battery goes flat...

    10. Re:Be ready for a lot of frustration by jandrese · · Score: 1

      I had a Palm IIIe and the NiMH batteries I used in it lasted roughly a week or two depending on how heavily I used the backlight. But these were the old school NiMH that would be dead after a couple of weeks even when they weren't plugged into anything. Alkaline batteries lasted a crazy long time, like a month or more. I was a pretty heavy user of the device as well, using it to read e-books on the bus every day, playing games, and taking notes.

      --

      I read the internet for the articles.
  3. Try by MouseTheLuckyDog · · Score: 2
    1. Re:Try by sootman · · Score: 4, Funny

      SPUG: "The group is on hiatus."

      The most recent "previous meeting" mentioned was 12/5/2006, and there's a link at the bottom that says "Palm is hiring" if you want a hint of when that page was last updated.

      Even the link to the article about the death of Palm is two years old now. Seriously man, it has run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible.

      --
      Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
    2. Re: Try by Bill,+Shooter+of+Bul · · Score: 2

      Sucker! I'm sending a telegram via the pony express! I'll get that job, before you can lick that stamp!

      --
      Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
    3. Re: Try by Noah+Haders · · Score: 2

      don't forget to include a link to your geocities page.

    4. Re:Try by RoverDaddy · · Score: 1

      Seriously man, it has run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible.

      THIS IS AN EX-PLATFORM!!

      --
      RETURN without GOSUB in line 1050
    5. Re: Try by Bill,+Shooter+of+Bul · · Score: 1

      Link? Not sure what that is, but I did take a Daguerreotype of my Prodigy screen. I sent it via my fastest Baltimore Clipper.

      --
      Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
    6. Re:Try by ncc74656 · · Score: 1

      it has run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible

      Are you sure it's not merely pining for the fjords?

      --
      20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
  4. Where Can I learn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Where can I learn how to send smoke signals?

  5. Why? by pushing-robot · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It's hideously slow and limited by today's standards, the standards are horribly out of date (802.11b anyone?) the ten year old battery is surely shot, and the platform is dead, dead, dead.

    If you're looking for a cheap hackable device, get a no-frills Android tablet. If you're looking to get into mobile development, get any decent smartphone.

    Still, if you really want to work on that old Palm, you should still be able to find the Garnet OS Development Suite.

    --
    How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
    1. Re:Why? by baka_toroi · · Score: 1

      Still, if you really want to work on that old Palm, you should still be able to find the Garnet OS Development Suite.

      I'm looking for it but can't find a working copy. Most of them point to www.accessdevnet.com which looks like just a Wordpress front end for some random posts.

  6. prc-tools by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Writing ARM-native code on Palm OS 5 was never easy. I used prc-tools and Peal to write pssh (which needed ARM-native code for fast crypto and terminal emulation).
    http://prc-tools.sourceforge.net
    http://sealiesoftware.com/peal/
    http://sealiesoftware.com/pssh/README.code

    1. Re:prc-tools by gl4ss · · Score: 2

      wow an actual response to the question, mod up.

      also some guys were telling him to just learn java.. there's a java vm available for palm os 5
      http://thepiratebay.se/torrent...

      --
      world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
    2. Re:prc-tools by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

      Is there a FORTH interpreter? That could just plain clench it.

    3. Re:prc-tools by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I used PEAL for Frodo emulator and it worked fine. There is also the native PalmOS 5 reverse engineered SDK http://www.mobile-stream.com/devzone.html for building native arm binaries, this avoids m68kARM parameter swapping and allows some lowlevel API.

    4. Re:prc-tools by Phaedra · · Score: 2

      Why, yes there is!

  7. Check your local library, or Amazon by sootman · · Score: 4, Informative

    My local libraries all have tons of outdated (5- to 15-year-old) books on a variety of computer subjects. You just might get lucky and find the one you need at yours.

    Or, check Amazon. Lots of people list lots of useless old books for basically nothing plus shipping. First hit for "palm os programming" is this meaty tome, from 2002, for 30 cents plus $3.99 shipping. Bang, zoom, $4.29 later, you're set. Palm OS Programming for Dummies, 22 cents plus $3.99. Whatever version you need is out there somewhere.

    And they usually come with interactive CD-ROMs. Interactive, my friend. Check the descriptions on Amazon and make sure they're included.

    --
    Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
    1. Re:Check your local library, or Amazon by cpollett · · Score: 5, Informative

      I taught a course on this in Spring 2004 and my notes are still online at: http://www.cs.sjsu.edu/faculty... (albeit handwritten and scanned). The book I was using was Palm OS Programming Bible, Second Edition. John Wiley & Son. by Lonnon R. Forster. which you could probably pick up cheap from amazon or Ebay.

    2. Re:Check your local library, or Amazon by baka_toroi · · Score: 1

      Yesterday I got a copy of that book. Thanks for your input! I will be checking your notes.

    3. Re:Check your local library, or Amazon by cpollett · · Score: 2

      I also noticed that the old PalmOs documentation is largely still viewable on Internet Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20...

    4. Re:Check your local library, or Amazon by greg1104 · · Score: 1

      Most of the Palm programming books with a CD bundle shipped a copy of Code Warrior Lite. As already mentioned in the summary, that's not really useful for Palm OS 5 development work.

      I don't think this poster was completely serious though. But they were very interactive.

  8. Re:Dear Slashdot by baka_toroi · · Score: 2

    You are 100% right in criticizing me. Actually, I wasn't expecting this to get to the frontpage.Nonetheless, I thought Slashdot was the best place to ask. Many times I've seen pieces of news about Amigas and usually they're warmly received (are they not outdated?). I'm wondering why so many people are saying stuff like "let it go", "it's useless", "learn a language." Other people are linking me to LMGTFY as if I haven't spent hours looking for working links.

    Don't get me wrong, maybe they're right and I shouldn't spend/waste my time learning about a dead platform, but at least I'd like to hear their rationale.

  9. Re:just a thought... by baka_toroi · · Score: 1

    As far as I can tell they're completely different. WebOS was supposed to be the evolution for Palm devices but it looks like they developed it from scratch rather than inherit all the backend stuff from Palm OS 5.

  10. What you're doing is akin to learning Latin by chromaexcursion · · Score: 1

    From an old limerick:
    Latin is a dead language, dead as can be. ...

    Some previous posts mention other current platforms. Try those. Palm is dead.

    side note. a 2E that sill works? Mine died years ago.

    1. Re:What you're doing is akin to learning Latin by baka_toroi · · Score: 1

      Great analogy. So why are some people still learning Latin then?

    2. Re:What you're doing is akin to learning Latin by excursive · · Score: 2

      Latin is still spoken in the Holy See. If you want to learn to speak it, you could try Rosetta Stone or Transparent Language. Or learn to speak it in Rome! http://www.slate.com/articles/...

    3. Re:What you're doing is akin to learning Latin by chromaexcursion · · Score: 1

      roflmfao
      too funny for words. amazing.

  11. Re:just a thought... by spire3661 · · Score: 1

    Palm OS was a real contender....My wife finally retired her Palm Pre Plus last week. :(

    --
    Good-bye
  12. archeology by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Funny

    Where Can I Find Resources On Programming For Palm OS 5?

    I'm pretty sure they were written in cuneiform on clay tablets, so you might want to learn the language of the Anunnaki

    I might be wrong. Maybe they were written in Middle Egyptian on papyrus.

    Either way, you could start by asking a very very old nerd. If you can find an old pay phone, wait for someone with long greasy grey hair to pick it up and start whistling into it. Make sure you have some jelly worms on hand, but not the green ones.

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
    1. Re:archeology by greg1104 · · Score: 1

      Luckily there's an entire guide available to stalking the wily hacker.

  13. Too soon by jlv · · Score: 2

    Come back in 10 years when it can be called a "classic" platform.

  14. Re:Dear Slashdot by NotInHere · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Many times I've seen pieces of news about Amigas and usually they're warmly received (are they not outdated?).

    The Amigas are outdated. However the stories are warmly recieved, because Amiga has been popular, and lots of people still have one in their basement. Palm OS wasn't this popular. People love their Amigas, Amiga became a part of culture. This has many reasons, not just popularity. The fanboy group for Palm OS is smaller but I doubt it doesn't exist. Its not mainstream culture though.

    I don't know why you shouldn't "waste" your time learning about a dead platform. As long as you see it as your hobby. Some people like reenactments, and dress in historic uniforms to "play" historic battles. Others know every part of the steam engines used from 1860 to 1892 by Santa Fe. So why not Palm OS?

  15. Good luck by TheRealMindChild · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I had the same happen with Codewarrior for Sharp Zaurus. Metrowerks was sold and Freescale erased all traces of it. Can't be found anywhere, legit or warez. I even contacted Freescale and they said they looked everywhere they could, but they said it was nowhere. Gone forever

    --

    "When life gives you lemons, don't make lemonade. Make life take the lemons back!" -- Cave Johnson
  16. The best thing about Palm was the task manager by sandbagger · · Score: 3, Interesting

    If someone would code that for iOS i'd pay. It was the best to-do list application ever.

    Apple's Reminder's is so useless I can't imagine why any effort was expended coding it.

    --
    ---- The above post was generated by the Turing Institute. Maybe.
    1. Re:The best thing about Palm was the task manager by jareth-0205 · · Score: 1

      Yeah, me too. Currently using Todo.txt for Android, which is alright, while writing my own based on the Palm staple...

  17. I still have Palm Treo ringtones if anyone wants by sandbagger · · Score: 2

    Reach out to me.

    Once my phone went off and an older man next to me began roaring with laughter when he heard the Treo ring tone. Ah well, it was great in its day.

    --
    ---- The above post was generated by the Turing Institute. Maybe.
  18. Re:Dear Slashdot by narcc · · Score: 4, Informative

    See, old stuff that *they* like is important. Working on that stuff is a great idea.

    Working on old stuff that they don't care about is clearly a waste of time.

    Anyhow, here's a start for you: GCC PRC-Tools Which is likely what you want. Ron's Obsolete Palm OS Computing Information Page has a working link to HotPaw, which is better than nothing.

    You'll also want to take advantage of the Wayback Machine to see what's behind all the dead links you're surely running in to.

  19. Re:Dear Slashdot by Charliemopps · · Score: 4, Informative

    You are 100% right in criticizing me. Actually, I wasn't expecting this to get to the frontpage.Nonetheless, I thought Slashdot was the best place to ask. Many times I've seen pieces of news about Amigas and usually they're warmly received (are they not outdated?). I'm wondering why so many people are saying stuff like "let it go", "it's useless", "learn a language." Other people are linking me to LMGTFY as if I haven't spent hours looking for working links.

    Don't get me wrong, maybe they're right and I shouldn't spend/waste my time learning about a dead platform, but at least I'd like to hear their rationale.

    Because Amiga, C64, Early DOS and UNIX's were great and successful. For me, all that stuff was my childhood and messing around with it is like going to a garage sale and finding my old favorite GI Joe figure or something. PalmOS5 failed right out of the gate. There's nothing to be nostalgic about.

    If you want to do some cool hobby stuff (and I don't blame you, I do that sort of thing all the time) I recommend the following:
    RaspberryPI or one of the several 3rd party variants out there: It's basically a small PC with a UART (hardware interface with buttons) You can turn it into a media player, an Audio DSP, a "car computer" whatever you can think of.
    http://www.raspberrypi.org/
    http://www.pcworld.com/article...

    Arduino is a micro controller. Not to be confused with the RPI. An arduino will teach you how to solder :-)
    You can run scripts written in C, and control lights, relays, sensors, etc... You can build something that automatically waters your garden, turns on your lights, feeds your pets... basically anything you can script.
    http://www.arduino.cc/

    AX84 is a website that has a host of amplifier projects. They are all tube based. Why tube? Well a lot of us think it sounds better, but that's a long argument. Even if they don't, it's how electronics started and if you want to know how things were done originally... and why that lead to how things are done now, Tubes are a great way to start. It's like learning to build a campfire by rubbing 2 sticks together. Yea, you could just throw a road flare on a dead tree, but somethings are just worth doing the old way. If you're not a musician, there's a Stereo amp near the bottom.
    http://www.ax84.com/sel.html

    Then there's steam engines... There's no collective site for that, but I've done them and they are fun. No codding involved unless you count the valves ;-)
    These are super fun though. Imagine a device that can generate power from any source of heat. Even mirrors reflecting the sun. I recommend starting on youtube.

    Anyways, there are lots of "useless" projects you can do that will have a far larger community and be far less of a waste of time in the end. Good luck.

  20. Re:Dear Slashdot by Bill,+Shooter+of+Bul · · Score: 1

    Thats an OSNews kind of question. Ask it there, you'll get a better response.

    --
    Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
  21. Re:Dear Slashdot by baka_toroi · · Score: 1

    This is a really great post, I really appreciate it. Even though I've read about the RPI and Arduino I never thought about doing something with them. The Arduino particularly interests me but I'm not sure what I would do with it. Thanks!

  22. You could try CASLsoft 4.3 by excursive · · Score: 2

    It's free from http://windows.novellshareware... . There are also other app-building tools out there. When I had a Palm, I used several programs from Tealpoint Software. Their web page is dead tonight, but the Google cache copy from yesterday shows dates from 2013. Perhaps your question provoked a huge run on Palm software and their server couldn't handle the load. https://webcache.googleusercon... Palm had the best calendar program (DateBk, not to be confused with DateBook) I've ever used on any platform.

  23. Sure by CODiNE · · Score: 4, Informative

    Since you're a C guy, there's http://onboardc.sourceforge.net/ that compiles right on the Palm Pilot. A bit tough by modern standards, if there's an API call you want that's not in the standard header file you have to find the ROM address for it and put it in yourself.

    Much easier but of course limited is http://smallbasic.sourceforge.net/ which runs on Palm OS and has a lot of little games in the forums.

    --
    Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
  24. Re:Dear Slashdot by camperdave · · Score: 1

    I thought Slashdot was the best place to ask. Many times I've seen pieces of news about Amigas and usually they're warmly received (are they not outdated?).

    That's nostalga kicking in. The Amiga was an amazing piece of technology back in the day; a powerful, multimedia capable, grown-up computer for those who cut their teeth on the Commodore 64 and Vic-20 computers. A last generation, PalmOS 5 based PDA is not going to tug at the nostalga heartstrings. Furthermore, the warmly received stories are about people who have accomplished something with the old hardware, who have gotten their machines to do something above and beyond what people thought they were capable of; not stories about noobs who dug their dad's old computer out of the attic and are trying to get it going again.

    I'm wondering why so many people are saying stuff like "let it go", "it's useless", "learn a language." Other people are linking me to LMGTFY as if I haven't spent hours looking for working links.

    I think there is a parallel phenomenon to XKCD's Today's Ten Thousand. It is a lot easier to say "You're doing it the wrong way", than to try to understand what you might be trying to actually do, and provide guidance accordingly. Sadly, when people do that, both you and they miss out on a little piece of life.

    Consider why you are doing what you want to do. I know it can be exciting to get a free whatever, and spend lots of time trying to get that whatever running. It can seem like a golden opportunity, but it can be a really easy way to waste a boatload of time. If you are not locked in to getting the Tungsten E2 going; if it is just an excuse to get into programming something, perhaps you should consider something like the Raspberry Pi, the Arduino, or the BASIC Stamp. These systems are meant for hacking, have active user and developer communities, boast loads of open source software, and are relatively cheap, as opposed to the closed source, unhackable Tungsten E2.

    Having said that, I don't have any concrete advice to give you. I have never done any programming for portable devices, although I used a Handspring Visor regularly up until a few years ago when the case fell apart. PalmOS was already considered dead before that point. Perhaps you could try the Wayback Machine for some leads.

    --
    When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
  25. Re:Dear Slashdot by Noah+Haders · · Score: 1

    I don't know why you shouldn't "waste" your time learning about a dead platform.

    I think the only reason why not is that time is a finite and limited commodity and if you spend it on one thing then you can't spend it on another thing.. people are saying if you're going to learn something new and arcane you might as well learn something that they deem more applicable. this is ultimately them speaking about their own life limitations like kids or what not; obviously you (you, the submitter not you the parent) are the only one who can make that decision about yourself. But I believe that this answers the question that you (you, the GP, also you, the submitter) posed about the rationale.

    my personal reaction is that it's a horrifically extravagant use of precious spare time, much like buying solid gold cat toys is an extravagant use of discretionary income. but I'm speaking from my own life situation.

  26. Re:4! by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

    Well, in a hundred years or so people will still want to listen to Bach and Mozart's music. And preferring Bach or Mozart's music. Can't necessarily say the same for Nirvana or The Sex Pistols (RIP Sid), even if there are people who would whip into a frenzy for the fact being stated as so.

  27. Re:Dear Slashdot by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

    You misspelled the word 'cult' in your post.

    It's true that the PalmOS devices weren't owned by a lot of people in their adolescence, and the developers for PalmOS were much more similar to those into Mobile development (in it for the money, not the enjoyment of hacking code), so PalmOS don't have the same sort of cachet.

    PalmOS in earlier versions would be much easier to find resources for; the Dragonball processor was fairly popular in it's day, and you can reach out to all the 68K platforms to a degree. Still, a Dragonball developer I knew back then referred to it as "Draggin' Balls."

  28. Re:Dear Slashdot by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

    The Arduino is cool because you can 'steal' from it's software stack so easily. That is, you can buy one of the low end boards that has a socketed Atmel processor and treat it like a development board/part burner. Then, the stuff you 'develop' on it you can fork off from the overpriced Arduino hardware by just unplugging the processor chip out of the board and onto your own perfboard circuit.

  29. Re:Dear Slashdot by baka_toroi · · Score: 1

    Just to be clear: my intention wasn't to bash the Amiga, at all. I never owned it but most of the stuff I saw on it was mind-blowing for the technology of that time. I love listening to Module files (MODs).

  30. Not exactly what your asking for. by allaunjsilverfox2 · · Score: 1

    A quick search shows that, at one point at least, you could run linux on it. Not very useful, but it's still mildly interesting.

    --
    Restore the madness of youth's lechery
    1. Re:Not exactly what your asking for. by menkhaura · · Score: 1

      I ran Linux (OE) on my Zire 72 back in the day. As you say, not quite useful; slow and with few utilities (and running X was a bit overkill on that platform). But I could say to my nerdy friends that I ran Linux even on my Zire. And now I can tell my nerdy son that I ran Linux on my Zire. And in time I will be able to tell my nerdy grandson that I ran Linux on my Zire.

      --
      Stupidity is an equal opportunity striker.
      Fellow slashdotter Bill Dog
    2. Re:Not exactly what your asking for. by menkhaura · · Score: 1

      Found where I got my Linux-for-Zire:

      http://l4p.hackndev.org/

      --
      Stupidity is an equal opportunity striker.
      Fellow slashdotter Bill Dog
  31. OnboardC ! by robinsc · · Score: 1

    Try onboardc which is an onboard c compiler for palm... basically you can program the palm in c from the palm. How cool is that ?

    --
    Linkedin http://in.linkedin.com/in/robinsaikatchatterjee
    1. Re:OnboardC ! by robinsc · · Score: 2

      http://onboardc.sourceforge.net/

      --
      Linkedin http://in.linkedin.com/in/robinsaikatchatterjee
    2. Re:OnboardC ! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      there is also onboard pascal http://www.ppcompiler.org/?lng=en , it even has native arm compiler, also the aditional tools (like BIRD) are good for on device resource hacking

  32. Re:just a thought... by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 1

    I vaguely remember some talk about an emulator at one point; but aside from that the two OSes have essentially zero in common. WebOS was (in my opinion) sadly underrated and died tragically young (I wouldn't be surprised if the situation has improved markedly; but back when 'Android tablet' meant 'Motorola Xoom running 3.0' it wasn't even fair how superior webOS was... Now that LG has it, it's probably gone to shit.); but it had absolutely no relation to palmOS, other than organizational.

  33. Re:Dear Slashdot by Anrego · · Score: 1

    I think much like many tech groups I "grew up with", slashdot has gone from a large number of high school and university students hacking stuff in their basement to predominately professionals working out in industry. Some of the "hacker spirit" has vanished and been replaced by practicality, and you see these kinda responses to projects we all probably would have found cool 10 years ago.

    I'll admit that even I have fallen into this kinda thinking. I find myself approaching my hobby stuff the same way I approach a problem at work, and sometimes it worries me. I miss the old me who thought he could rewrite everything "a billion times better".. the current me that acknowledges maturity as a vital component of systems engineering is kinda dull at times.

    I too have a tungsten E2, and I even did a little programming for it. As others have said, it's a really shitty platform and equally shitty device. That said, sometimes it's fun to get old stuff working for the hell of it. The problem you will run into is exactly what you are seeing.. the documentation, tools, and community that would have helped immensely is mostly gone. Don't really have much in the way of advice. Archive.org might help, but chances arr you are going to have to re-learn or just plain discover on your own how to make shit work.

  34. Hopefully you;ll find some help here by phrackthat · · Score: 4, Informative

    Check out Code Project - lots of great articles on Palm programming: http://www.codeproject.com/sea...

    Go to Sourceforge - it may take a while to pick through the weeds, but you should find some useful projects to examine the code:

    http://sourceforge.net/directory/os%3Apalmos/?q=palm&sort=update

    C programming for Palm: http://onboardc.sourceforge.ne...

    http://www.vb-helper.com/review_palm_ides.html -- a review of Palm IDEs - may give you some ideas

    http://porganizer.sourceforge.net/ -- Palm Organizer has the essential files for creating a Palm program if you look at the bottom of the page

    Try the 1stSource forums, check out the menu on the left for various Palm models and you'll be sure to find some useful info:

    http://www.1src.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=156

    For some fun - and perhaps some code to review:

    http://sourceforge.net/projects/phoinix/ -- Gameboy emulator for Palm

    http://sourceforge.net/projects/palmapple/?source=recommended -- Apple II emulator for Palm

    More emulators to consider: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2004/...

    http://www.codejedi.com/shadowplan/castaway.html -- Atari ST emulator

    http://frodopalm.sourceforge.n... -- commodore 64 emulator

    Good luck and have fun!

  35. Re:Dear Slashdot by gnu-sucks · · Score: 1

    Also, look at the beagle bone. These are about $50 and they come with analog i/o and digital i/o, but unlike a micro controller, they run a full operating system (linux). Lots of fun!

  36. Duplicate story... by BigIrv · · Score: 1

    from 1998!!

    --

    --Good morning fellas; Hand me that thing; Boy, this work's hard; Guys, break's over.
  37. Don't. by ledow · · Score: 2

    Take a look at some Palm code.

    If the hideous restrictions and limits there don't put you off, then find out what they recommend to compile.

    Flashy IDE's probably aren't going to be easy to find, there weren't many around in the first place and the majority of stuff I know is just command-line compilers which can plug into any IDE (if you're brave enough).

    All I remember of Palm coding was having to break C files into tiny parts, jam them together and hope the individual object files never went over a certain size because the linker had to play all kinds of tricks to load them.

    Take a look at something like this:

    http://www.chiark.greenend.org...

    The base code of which is generally easy to port (Simon Tatham's PORTABLE Puzzle Collection). That Palm version is quite a pain to compile even with the right tools.

  38. Re: let it go by viperidaenz · · Score: 1

    I'm using an old laptop. It pulls about 10W with the screen off, 20W with it on full brightness.
    About 17W average usage which gave it 3.5 hours battery life back in the day. It's about 12 years old now.
    I don't think any laptop has ever been produced that consumes more than 150W.

    There used to have some that came with 160W PSU bricks back when they put Pentium 4's in them, but that also charged the battery at the same time.

  39. SDK available here: by tlambert · · Score: 2

    SDK available here:

    http://gl.access-company.com/p...

    Perhaps next time you will read the acquisition history for the software you are trying to find in the Wikipedia article, and then go to the OpenSource/Downloads section of the company website for the current owner of the technology yourself?

    1. Re:SDK available here: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Perhaps next time you should actually try your suggestions and see if they actually work? "File not found."

    2. Re:SDK available here: by David+Jao · · Score: 1

      Following the link to the SDK gives a 404. Palm development tools were never readily available even when the platform was popular. Now they're almost impossible to find. Obstructing access to development tools is one sure-fire way to kill off a platform.

    3. Re:SDK available here: by tlambert · · Score: 1

      Perhaps next time you should do a little searching around for the fille PODS_1_2_OpenSrc_Orig_Mods.zip which can no longer legally be distributed before you ask me to distribute it, rather than merely giving you enough information that you could find it if you were smart enough to be able to do the type of programming that the OP is asking to be able to do in the first place, since it's going to be pretty useless to you otherwise.

    4. Re:SDK available here: by tlambert · · Score: 1

      Following the link to the SDK gives a 404. Palm development tools were never readily available even when the platform was popular. Now they're almost impossible to find. Obstructing access to development tools is one sure-fire way to kill off a platform.

      Pretty sure they want it dead.

  40. Re:let it go by viperidaenz · · Score: 1

    The Palm has similar CPU performance compared to a Raspberry Pi.

  41. Re:Dear Slashdot by viperidaenz · · Score: 1

    Why not short cut it even further and buy a $10 including shipping clone from China?
    They're all over ebay and aliexpress

  42. Re:Dear Slashdot by viperidaenz · · Score: 1

    and unlink the Raspberry Pi, it has a modern Cortex ARM CPU instead of a 12 year old ARMv6, and a PRU to do real-time hardware interfacing if you need it.

  43. here is the sdk... by sithlord2 · · Score: 2

    I found a copy of the Palm 5r3 SDK here:

    http://www.mediafire.com/downl...

    Didn't download this myself, so I don't know if the docs are in there too.

    --
    ...You are over-qualified and under-paid. If we give you a raise, we will break the cosmic balance of the universe.
  44. Re:Dear Slashdot by Dr_Barnowl · · Score: 1

    I would really have liked a PalmOS cart for my Nintendo DS ; the form factor would have made it an awesome little organizer, it had a touch screen, etc, and the CPU power would probably have been good enough to run the original OS ROMs in an emu.

    There were rumours of it happening (maybe I even started them by discussing it on BBs...) but alas, it never came to be.

    One thing I really liked about the PalmOS stuff, which other software suites took ages to catch up with, was the way they all integrated. Some of the things that make me go "Oh, cool!" in Android apps now are the sort of things that PalmOS had 16 years ago.

  45. Re:Dear Slashdot by Zedrick · · Score: 1

    > You are 100% right in criticizing me

    No. If you have a Palm and want to code for it, there's absolutely nothing wrong with that - and I find the reactions here very strange and un-slashdotlike. It doesn't matter if it's a good machine or not, or if you have fond childhood memories of it or not. If you happen to have something that can be explored and programmed, and you feel like doing it, great. How is reading a book or trying out some other hobby (as others suggested) in any way "better"?

  46. Re: let it go by jones_supa · · Score: 1

    An old laptop pulling 150-200w or more. Sure makes sense. 200w can power 4 50" LED TVs now...

    That's ignorant talk. Most laptops pull 10W to 50W depending on the load. Even old ones.

  47. Re:Dear Slashdot by ruir · · Score: 1

    Why strange? I had a Palm, and it was basically a piece of crap even back in the day. Once the novelty wore off, and after losing all the metrics of a project, and on top of that, having a netbook issued by the company, it was basically a deadweight. Back in the day, I did not even understand why my consulting firms was burning resources developing for it.

  48. Re:Some advice by captjc · · Score: 1

    He is trying to learn a language. It is just a dead language!

    --
    Slow Down Cowboy! It's been 1 hour, 47 minutes since you last successfully posted a comment
  49. Re: let it go by Lumpy · · Score: 1

    "I don't think any laptop has ever been produced that consumes more than 150W."

    I had one, the Samsung Series 7 gaming laptop monster with dual video cards.

    200 Watts.

    --
    Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
  50. Re:Dear Slashdot by greg1104 · · Score: 2

    PalmOS was more popular than the Amiga. At one point about 90% of smartphones were based on Palm software, and by 2000 they had already sold more than 7 million units--compared to roughly 6 million Amigas across its entire lifetime.

    The only Commodore computer that outsold Palm was the Commodore 64, with 22 million units. The main reason Amiga seems like a much larger influence than Palm is that overall computer sales were so much smaller when it was active. 6M computers in the late 80's/early 90's was a lot. Smartphones are already shipping over 250M units a year.

  51. Also, Palm OS Companion by Dr.+Manhattan · · Score: 2
    Documentation put out by Palm that covered most of the API and such. Still available here: http://www.cs.uml.edu/~fredm/c...

    The main difference in OS5 was the addition of "PNOlets", chunks of native ARM code. Chapter 14.

    It's still tricky. When I ported Palm's OS4 emulator to Android, I had to do some library coding and tracking down sample source code was... nontrivial. Definitely look for open-source Palm programs, like pssh, and learn from them.

    --
    PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
  52. And Palm OS Programmer's API Reference by Dr.+Manhattan · · Score: 1

    A fairly complete API reference: http://icmp.ru/man/programming...

    --
    PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
  53. Nice trip through memory lane, but go for Android by jiriw · · Score: 1

    I wrote an app almost 10 years ago . Just looked through the code a bit. It says "Build with PRC-Tools 2.0 and Palm OS SDK 4.0 or better". Written all in C++. Most of my work I did in a simple text editor. Not in an IDE. And I used makefiles I wrote myself and a command-line to compile the lot. I remember compiling for the m68k mostly because that would cover all our potential customers. But there was already ARM support in the works... until we just dropped it. We had too few sales to warrant further development. Not that our version for WinCE PDAs was doing any better, by the way. A couple of years later the first IPhone was released. And for that platform we still develop and sell.

    There was partial support for C++ in 'recent' versions of PRC tools... classes and use of new and delete, and if you really wanted them, exceptions and RTTI. But no STL, streams... I wrote a file io and string class to keep the back-end code compatible (we had a significant chunk of back-end code already written in C/C++ and used it in apps for many platforms).
    Also you had to manually segment your code for Palm OS because there was a fixed code segment size (my app used five code segments and I had to specify for each function in which code ). Long function calls were used to make the segments interact and you had to keep in mind to use them as little as possible because, although the compiler did the work of adding those long function calls for you, they still incurred a performance hit.
    I finally retired my company Palm M515 two years ago when I got a second hand HTC HD2 from a friend (and promptly updated it with CyanogenMod). I managed to save most of my (calender, notes, contacts) data and it's now part of the Google cloud...

    It was fun to program for that platform, I learned a lot from it but I would say, in this day and age, it's utterly useless to start a new project for it. I would recommend Android over iOS, if you just want to make a mobile app. Although Apple's tools (XCode) are better IMHO, you can do a lot more with Android and the apps you make for them before you have to spend money on it (AFAIK the only thing Google asks is a $25 one-time fee if you want to publish on the play store and you can always side-load for 'homebrew'). And you can develop and compile an Android app on a variety of computer hard- and software platforms, while a recent Apple (i)Mac(book/mini) is required to make iOS apps.

    If you're really adamant to create a PalmOS app, get yourself PRC-tools, cygwin and a 'recent' PalmOS SDK and you might actually manage to get a working app. Time-stamps of my versions are of april 2004 so I do not have the final versions... Also, the PalmOS 4 emulator and/or PalmOS 5 simulator, with roms and of course the full Palm desktop suite installed on your machine so you can make backups and install .PRC's on your PDA. Did I forget anything else (except for the fact some of these are a bit difficult to find on the 'net).
    Ow, yes, there is a PalmOS developer suite for PalmOS 5 and 6, using Eclipse and a lot of integrated goodies. A 250MB sized beastie... but I haven't got the faintest clue where to get it nowadays.

  54. Don't repeat yourself in a multilingual project by tepples · · Score: 1

    If a developer is scared to cross to any platform because they don't want to be multi-lingual, they're doing it wrong.

    An application can be separated into logic and presentation, or model and view, however your framework prefers to describe them. A program may require separate presentation for each platform, but versions of a program for multiple platforms should ideally share the logic. But some platforms strongly recommend or even require use of certain languages. How can a programmer follow the rule of not repeating yourself to share logic across languages? Say I developed a game in Java or Objective-C but I want to port it to a Microsoft platform that allows only C#. (In theory it allows any language that compiles to verifiably type-safe .NET Compact Framework bytecode, but in practice that means C#.) How would I go about making and maintaining that port so that fixes to defects in the logic of the version on the original platform propagate to the version on the Microsoft platform ?

    1. Re:Don't repeat yourself in a multilingual project by maccodemonkey · · Score: 1

      An application can be separated into logic and presentation, or model and view, however your framework prefers to describe them. A program may require separate presentation for each platform, but versions of a program for multiple platforms should ideally share the logic. But some platforms strongly recommend or even require use of certain languages. How can a programmer follow the rule of not repeating yourself to share logic across languages? Say I developed a game in Java or Objective-C but I want to port it to a Microsoft platform that allows only C#. (In theory it allows any language that compiles to verifiably type-safe .NET Compact Framework bytecode, but in practice that means C#.) How would I go about making and maintaining that port so that fixes to defects in the logic of the version on the original platform propagate to the version on the Microsoft platform ?

      I don't think writing logic should be a gating factor that keeps a developer from using the right tool for the job, or keep a developer or a community locked in single language programming hell. There are edge cases (I've worked on an Android/iOS app that kept a bunch of code in JavaScript because it runs on both), but this doesn't even make the answer automatically "Java". I could very well say that developer should just go learn JavaScript because it runs on everything.

      But more to the point, I don't usually see server architectures and client architectures sharing too much in the way of logic code, and the code they share typically isn't that complex, and doesn't usually require much work to port from one language to the next.

    2. Re:Don't repeat yourself in a multilingual project by tepples · · Score: 1

      I don't usually see server architectures and client architectures sharing too much in the way of logic code

      Input validation logic and any logic related to offline use needs to be the same (or at least provably identically behaving) on server and client.

    3. Re:Don't repeat yourself in a multilingual project by maccodemonkey · · Score: 1

      I don't usually see server architectures and client architectures sharing too much in the way of logic code

      Input validation logic and any logic related to offline use needs to be the same (or at least provably identically behaving) on server and client.

      I don't buy that's a reasonable excuse to force the client and server to be the same language.

      First off, I don't buy that a client necessarily needs to do validation at all if the server is doing it. In fact, if you're doing complex validation on the client end, I think that is a Bad Thing (TM). What if your validation is wrong? Well you could just fix your server. But now your client's validation doesn't match, unless you're going to go around and force all your clients to update. Maybe at gunpoint or something. Who knows. But regardless, your client is going to think input is valid, and your server won't. Have you handled that case? What does that UI response look like? Have you unit tested it? Were you silly enough to think if it passed validation on the client end, it MUST pass on the server end? Cause if you did, you're screwed.

      So I guess my simplest answer would be, if you need to do complicated validation why the heck are you doing it on the client? Just send it to the server, and then let the server return an error. That way you can fix your validation quickly server side if anything goes wrong, and you don't end up in test case hell in case the server and client disagree. You can also update your validation without touching your client code. And it really reduces your test cases and simplifies your unit testing flow.

      For very simple validation (i.e. a credit card is always X number of digits, or a user needs to fill in these fields before they can press the submit button), I could see doing client side work. But that validation is so simple it's not hard to re-code. It's also usually so tied to the UI layer, you're going to be writing a lot of platform specific code any way.

      I also still don't buy that being able to share code like that is worth the cost of locking entire ecosystems to a language and stifling language development in favor of a monoculture.

      Again, if this is the metric we're working on, I could just take it up one level and say everyone should learn JavaScript instead of Java (and everyone should stop using Java) because you can't run Java in a web browser... Well... I take it back. Maybe it's an argument for the return of Java applets instead. :)

    4. Re:Don't repeat yourself in a multilingual project by tepples · · Score: 1

      But now your client's validation doesn't match, unless you're going to go around and force all your clients to update. Maybe at gunpoint or something. Who knows.

      Online games won't play unless at the latest patch level, for example.

      offline use

      if you need to do complicated validation why the heck are you doing it on the client? Just send it to the server

      Because the user is using the application during a 2-hour period of having no access to the Internet.

      and then let the server return an error

      So your suggested workflow is just to let the user enter grossly invalid data for two hours then have the server present pages of error messages once a connection is reestablished.

      Again, if this is the metric we're working on, I could just take it up one level and say everyone should learn JavaScript instead of Java

      Hence the growth of Node.

    5. Re:Don't repeat yourself in a multilingual project by maccodemonkey · · Score: 1

      Online games won't play unless at the latest patch level, for example.

      Because the user is using the application during a 2-hour period of having no access to the Internet.

      These are mutually exclusive. Online games stop you from doing client side things because they online. An offline application can't know that validation has changed or there is an app update because it's offline. At that point, what do you do, toss out any data the user entered while they were offline?

      One easy fix (again): Do your validation on the server end only. Save the data locally, and when the user goes to submit it and it fails, then you throw an error. User doesn't lose any data, and your validation will always be good.

      So your suggested workflow is just to let the user enter grossly invalid data for two hours then have the server present pages of error messages once a connection is reestablished.

      As I noted above, there isn't really a way around this. Even if I follow your approach, when the client and server versions mismatch because the user was offline they'll get the same pages of errors. An offline user can't get a client update to fix the client side validation because again (drumroll) they're offline.

      And, when they come back online, and they get the automatic update, they now have a local user database chock full of invalid data according to local validation. Do you just toss out all that data now because it no longer meets local validation? Or are you intentionally going to punch holes through local validation to grandfather now broken data in?

      Boy, I hope your QA team has a large alcohol budget and the world's largest whiteboard for their validation testing matrix.

      Hence the growth of Node.

      It's true Node is growing, but again, data validation is usually either trivial enough it can be done on the client end in any language, or complicated enough you probably don't want to be doing it on the client end any way.

  55. Get a Raspberry Pi instead by ganiman · · Score: 1

    Don't waste your time with that old piece of junk. Get a new piece of junk instead, with a community behind it.

    --
    geek n performer who performs morbid or disgusting acts, as biting off the head of a live chicken
  56. Retroactive: Thanks by DrYak · · Score: 1

    Oh, you're the author of that ?

    Thank you, man.
    I used your soft back then and liked it !

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
  57. Re:Dear Slashdot by slashdice · · Score: 1

    There are people who can help, but they're not on slashdot. Try usenet (comp.sys.palmtaops, perhaps) or IRC (#hairypalms). A lot of niche groups have a presence but not on the web and definitely not on slashdot.

    --
    Copyright (c) 1990 - 2014 Dice. All rights reserved. Use of this comment is subject to certain Terms and Conditions.
  58. OrbForms by NotFamous · · Score: 1

    I've used OrbForms - it's a pretty easy to use IDE with simple GUI development. It is much easier than CodeWarrior (which I have also used). www.orbworks.com

    --
    Some settling may occur during posting.
  59. Re:Dear Slashdot by baka_toroi · · Score: 1

    Care to explain why you think it was a piece of crap back in the day? I found 2 reasons: lack of stability and really bad web browser, but I also reckon most mobile browsers were bad. Windows Mobile (6.5 and downwards) was much worse in my opinion.

  60. Re: let it go by jandrese · · Score: 1

    Oh, my balls!

    --

    I read the internet for the articles.
  61. Re:Dear Slashdot by ruir · · Score: 1

    Windows mobile/CE is much worse, I actually threw a Windows CE based GPS out of the window of my car, and bought another Linux based on the very same day. As for Palm, ugly, slow, cumbersome use except for the writing recognition, no command line interface ;) and really no incentive to program the darn thing; no manuals...I was used to have all the ROM listings, Spectrum, XT, AT, name it. And losing everything due to battery failure was not funny. I also ended up backing it up with linux in command line, as the official software was horrible. Nevertheless the thing lasted for ages, and it was the first time, with it paired with my phone that I used IRC and www while in the go.

  62. Re:4! by Tablizer · · Score: 1

    The point as I see it is the distinction between version 4 and 5. The poster suggests that they want "the latest" rather than 4, which they CAN find docs for. They are both obsolete, dead even, such that focusing on "the latest" strikes me as odd. Perhaps I came off too sarcastic, but the "logic" is bugging me.

  63. If you want to code for a dead platform.... by ogdenk · · Score: 1

    If you wanted to write code for a clumsy dead platform, why not the Apple Newton? Far cooler and more interesting. At least the Newton is the same CPU architecture.... just with a much better OS, 2 PCMCIA slots and a bigger screen.

    Hell, even the Atari 8-bit is more interesting than a piece of crap from Palm.

    Seriously, PalmOS sucks. I've written a couple things for it in the past and I wish I hadn't.

  64. Re:Dear Slashdot by gnu-sucks · · Score: 1

    So then add a short USB cable. If you're building something for production, then make a custom board. Beagle Bone is a fine product to have fun with.

  65. Once again... by Patent+Lover · · Score: 1

    Lots of advice instead of actually answering his question.

  66. As a general comment... by tlambert · · Score: 1

    As a general comment... it's pretty funny that this wouldn't be an issue, since they complied with the GPL as they were required to do, and published their sources.

    Only the politics of Open Source is such that the projects that they published the changes for were not updated to include the changes, because they felt that it was not their responsibility to update their projects to include someone else's changes to their projects. They felt, instead, that it was the responsibility of the people making the changes to join their projects, and then make the changes with the editorial oversight of the community.

    This is somewhat ironic, since they wouldn't have published the sources in the first place, if it hadn't been for the license.

    So it's interesting to me that you can more or less not comply with the license by complying with it, and that the license is only effective for however long your product and company are around, and, if not picked up by the community to be carried forward, get lost after a short period of time, even if the company continues to exist.

    I guess I wonder if it's legal to sell remaindered product (or used product) without offering the sources, per the terms of the license, or if, after that period of time, the products become illegal to transfer the binary licenses, since the originators are no longer around, and you cant appeal to them in order to get around your personal obligation, as the seller/reseller, to make the sources available any more (but you, as the middleman, failed to take advantage of the offer while it was possible to do so).

    Probably, projects need to be a little less pissy about integrating third party changes, fixes, and extensions back into their main line.

  67. Re: let it go by jones_supa · · Score: 1

    No, I don't forget them. I said that most laptops do not consume that much.

  68. Server n communicates with clients n and n - 1 by tepples · · Score: 1

    [Online games and offline apps] are mutually exclusive.

    True. Should I have instead split the two scenarios into separate comments?

    An offline application can't know that validation has changed or there is an app update because it's offline. At that point, what do you do, toss out any data the user entered while they were offline?

    In the case of an application with a substantial offline component, the server would handle the current version of the client and at least one previous version.

    Even if I follow your approach, when the client and server versions mismatch because the user was offline they'll get the same pages of errors.

    Granted, the user may see a few errors when server version n communicates with client n - 1, mostly related to the (hopefully small) schema changes between n - 1 and n. But ideally, this should introduce far fewer errors than if there had been no client-side pre-validation at all.

    Boy, I hope your QA team has a large alcohol budget and the world's largest whiteboard for their validation testing matrix.

    It's a bit easier when the testing matrix is a band matrix. If X is the client version and Y the server, the server only needs to gracefully handle a small number of client versions.

  69. Where Can I learn by dave.leigh7335 · · Score: 1

    Where can I learn how to send smoke signals?

    http://adventure.howstuffworks... Well, you did ask... ;)

  70. Re:Dear Slashdot by dave.leigh7335 · · Score: 1

    It's not your time, therefore not your call.