UPS to Deploy Ultra-Connected Wireless Handhelds 160
Lyle E. Dodge writes "According to this article at Yahoo.com Symbol Technologies announced (on Tax Day of all days) that in 2004 UPS would deploy 70,000 handheld delivery computers based on Symbol's Fourth Generation hardware. Color screens, 128 megs of RAM, and uber-connected (GPS, GPRS, CDMA, WiFi, Bluetooth, Infrared, Analog modem), and, of course, the familiar barcode scanner. The obvious /. question is: Can we run Linux on Brown? Maybe UPS can fund an OSS startup, "BrownHat"? We'll see..."
Picture (Score:5, Informative)
Alternatives to this device (Score:5, Informative)
The best part about WANDA: it's $130 for the integrated board. Add a battery, display and a few controls, and you could have whatever kind of PDA you wanted.
Additionally, Metrowerks [metrowerks.com] has been working to get their OpenPDA [openpda.com] Linux distribution (formerly Lineo's) working on WANDA.
Symbol has a less than stellar track record of opening up their devices to alternative technologies, and their licensing relationship with Microsoft all but guarantees that you'll never see them shipping a Linux or Symbian device from them.
Shipping, Tracking, Wireless OpenSource Rodeo... (Score:5, Informative)
From the Article Link: The incorporation of three different types of radio communication links in each unit will ensure that package delivery information is available to customers almost instantaneously...
FedEx has done this sort of real-time updates on packages since the early 1980's when we started using the DADS radio network. Thats right, back when I was using an Apple IIe, and many slashdoter's weren't even in Kindergarten, FedEx had near-time tracking updates on packages. Let's not act like it's rocket science.
As for running Linux on the device, that's not really important, except for a coolness factor. I do know that FedEx has many projects headed towards Linux and OpenSource.
Funding an Open Source startup seems silly too. Why not just hire experienced Open Source talent. That's what we've been doing @ FedEx. Seems to work pretty well provided the hacker-types can live in the business-type environment. 200k person companies aren't for everybody.
Anyways.. I digress. Cool hand-held custom built. Neat. They still call themselves "brown" and that speaks for itself. ;-)
Going wireless inside too... (Score:5, Informative)
In may, these systems will be replaced with a system with better wireless performance. And the eye piece will be wireless too, so we can wear the computer on our hip.
Re:UPS and OSS (Score:5, Informative)
The main thing I needed from it was their rate calculator. After much digging around on their web site and several calls to my account rep, I finally found their rate tables. They came in tab delimited format which was great, except these spreadsheets were not suitable for automated processing because there were many formatting inconsistencies - the data was obviously maintained by hand.
To make a long story short, in the end I was able to make some perl scripts for looking up domestic and international rates using those files, without having to go across the net. But I wasted a LOT of time finding out out how badly their XML interface sucks, and we still don't have a solution for automated shipping - only rate quotes.
When it comes to software, UPS is as clueless as it gets. I'm going to be getting set up with Fedex soon and if they're any better software-wise, it will be my pleasure to drop UPS.
When I worked at UPS (Score:3, Informative)
For what it's worth, this new model looks a whole lot better than the original. For starters, it's a lot smaller, not to mention all the wireless capabilities. You used to have to "dock" the DIADs in big metal racks and spend a lot of time getting information on and off of them each night. That took quite a bit of time.
I don't know if they still use it, but back then, the DIAD system was run under OS/2, which is why I'm still a fan of that OS.
The only thing I'm curious about is the durability of these units. The original DIADs were pretty good, however, a significant drop or other mistreatment would either knock it out or send it into "bootloader" mode. And it was a pain to have deliveries done on paper.
Anyway, this one looks pretty good- it almost makes me want to go back so I can play with them. Then again, the current carrer track is a whole lot more profitable.
linux...never (Score:5, Informative)
Just to let you know: I work at UPS. Switching to Linux will never happen. UPS is a Microsoft joint. Plain and simple, and i really doubt they will ever switch. They have too many programs written for Windows and that seems to be all the developers know. And, what's really scary, too much stuff runs on Access. A company their size takes forever to roll out new equipment and software, heck, the system i work with (runs all the scanning in the hub) is still on OS/2. We are waiting for our new scanners, which will run on a Windows 2000-based system. The new scanners for hub use(loading trucks) will even be running Windows CE. No chance of tux invading this place.
Re:UPS and OSS (Score:3, Informative)
perl -MCPAN -e \
'readme Business::UPS;
readme Business::FedEx::DirectConnect;
'
possible solution (Score:3, Informative)
If you don't want to build one, rubbermaid has an exterior folding lawn furniture container/box you can purchase, then it's just a matter of installing the lock. Then you don't have to worry about weather damage or having an obvious brown cardboard package sitting unattended in the front yard/down by the road whatever. I do that here but without the lock seeing as how it's so rural and there's a long private drive. If we aren't going to be home I just leave an empty rubbermaid square container like you can get at wallymart for 5$ in front of the front door, the private delivery guys all know to use that now, same with the rural post office carrier, I made a point to talk to all of them early on living here. I lost one really expensive hand signed hardback that was left hanging on the box in a bag, some fool snagged it,so I told the carrier NO WAY leave stuff down there anymore. Seems to work out OK. Shooting them a cold lemonade or a choke~a~cola on a hot day seems to work, too, heh. Honey/vinegar, binary choice there
As to the PDAs, I still think for most purposes a small notebook is better, well, if you got older eyes. I really can't even see the small screens on cell phones or pdas all that well any more. My laptops are bad enough. I guess PDAs are OK, everyone here mostly seems to love them and be enthusiastic about them, so far now though I seem to get by without one. I might get one once they got 256 ram, a nice hard drive and cost 100 clams and are e-z to keep upgraded and run all open source. That wireless jazz is a definete plus. I'll put up with the toy screens and keyboards then.
Re:Aaaaand...how is this better? (Score:2, Informative)
The GPS in the unit will most likely be used to record lat/long coords of packages, which will be matched up to an address. This will allow the company to correct for inconsitiencies in publicly available mapping data used in internal route designation programs.
The current UPS DIAD has been in use since the early 90's, and was a breakthrough and a first for the company. During the use of them for 10+ years, ideas come out, and internal procedures change to better use the tools available. The biggest reason it has so much horsepower is so that it will be doing alot of processing with adress and package data. It's alot bigger than you think.
It should also be noted that with as many trucks and units the company has, a savings of a few seconds per driver per day over the course of a year adds up.