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Handhelds Software Communications Hardware Linux

Review Of Linux-based Motorola A768i 106

Posted by timothy from the not-in-your-mouth dept.
Eugenia writes "MobileBurn published a review of Motorola's A768i, the Linux-based smartphone that employs a PDA-style form factor. It may not have much in the way of photo-taking abilities, but the A768i might be the thing for business users as it excels in the phone/messaging category."
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Review Of Linux-based Motorola A768i More

Review Of Linux-based Motorola A768i

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  • A cellphone without extra doo-hickeys? (Score:5, Funny)

    by physicsphairy ( 720718 ) on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @03:47AM (#10573403)
    "It may not have much in the way of photo-taking abilities, but the A768i might be the thing for business users as it excels in the phone/messaging category."

    Since when to people use phones for that anymore? ;)

  • At CeBit this year .. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by torpor ( 458 ) <ibisum AT gmail DOT com> on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @03:55AM (#10573432) Homepage Journal
    .. I saw a Motorola Linux phone that really had me drooling - it was just a simple "bar of soap" form-factor, no keys, one big O-LED display on one side of the rectangular black plastic form, and when you hit the On button, the whole thing lit up.

    It was running Linux, only the guy demo'ing it wouldn't really let me play with it too much .. he did show me some videos on it, and demo'ed the voice-recognition features, which seemed pretty workable. But, alas, it doesn't look like Motorola are releasing this one too soon .. anyone know of the "bar of soap" Linux phone from Mot?

    • Re:At CeBit this year .. (Score:5, Informative)

      by aka.Daniel'Z ( 586849 ) on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:03AM (#10573463)
      I'm not sure I got that "bar of soap" idea right, but maybe you're talking about the Motorola [symbian.com] A1000 [mobileburn.com]?
      • Well, that is 'bar of soap' (its a design philosophy) but the one I saw had no buttons on its face - the front of the OLED display covered the entire face of one side of the rectangle, and it had 'flipper buttons' and a scroll wheel on the sides, so you'd hold it between your two hands to watch a movie or read e-mail.

        Maybe it was just a prototype.. but it was really impressive. If I ever see it, I'll consider upgrading from my aging Siemens ..

      • The A1000 [motocoder.com] is the follow-on to the A925 [symbian.com] and the A920 [symbian.com], all of which run the Symbian OS, not Linux... Sorry, I don't have the list of linux phones right this instant...
        • It's a bit odd, but in this case, the easiest way to confirm they're in the same family is to compare screen resolutions. So far, all Symbian UIQ phones (the p800 and p900 [symbian.com] are the other two that are in the same family) have a 208x320 pixel touchscreen.
      • No, thats not it, but close.

        The one I saw at CeBIT had -nothing- on the front of it - the screen covered the whole front side of the rectangle, and it had a scroll-wheel and thumb flipper buttons on the sides. It was completely black; when the rep pulled it out of his pocket, it just looked like a flat black plastic lozenge, and then he turned the OLED on and one face of it came alive .. really impressive.

        Though, the interface in that picture looks like the one used on this proto I'm describing, so its c
    • no keys, one big O-LED display on one side of the rectangular black plastic form, and when you hit the On button, the whole thing lit up.
      Excuse my ignorance, but that sounds just like a very expensive MagLite to me.
      • heh heh .. it was more like a 'glowing black bar of soap', which seems kinda useful to me in many ways, but .. it really did work pretty well. the O-LED screen was touch-sensitive too, so you could still dial buttons and such ..

        Ah well. Maybe we'll see it one of these days ..
    • it was just a simple "bar of soap" form-factor

      If they bill it as standing up well to being dropped, I'd say they're squarely targeting the "showering inmate" market niche.

    • Sounds like the e680 (Linux, touchscreen, no numeric keypad, just onscreen version where needed). It's silver on the front, black on the back. Think that one's a TFT rather than an OLED though.

      Can find specs on www.gsmarena.com, or a user review in www.howardforums.com (see motorola section - use search if no recent posts on that thread). Though I think gsmarena have the length wrong (their claimed 124mm would make it longer than the SE 910, but the review above has photos of the two together, and it is c

  • No pad? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by HotshotXV ( 710849 ) <dhocking@gma[ ]com ['il.' in gap]> on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:02AM (#10573457) Homepage Journal
    So I tried to RTFA, and I got a 500 error past the first page - so my question is without a numeric keypad, how the heck do you dial the phone? Do you use the stylus - cause that would just be annoying.

    • Re:No pad? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:10AM (#10573491)
      Here you go -- I don't have the full text, but there's the first three pages (before the site went down)

      Motorola A768i Review

      Review by Guest Contributor on Tuesday October 19, By Michael Puhala

      Motorola A768i
      Motorola A768i
      I've recently gotten my hands on the Motorola A768i, a feature rich tri-band GPRS smartphone that boasts a Linux operating system along with Bluetooth, MP3 player, speakerphone, 65K TFT color screen, multi-function camera capable of shooting both stills and video, and a slew of other hidden features. Do I have your attention yet? Well then, let's find out if this phone delivers on everything it promises.

      Design

      If you are a flip phone zealot, then the design of this phone will appeal to you. However, if you are drawn more to the candybar or slider type of phone, as I am, then it might take some time to get used to the A768i.

      At first glance, the A768i doesn't look much different than your typical Motorola flip phone. Upon closer review, and after opening the flip, you'll notice the absence of any physical numeric keypad and the presence of a fairly generously sized display. From here on out, there are very few similarities to the Motorola of the past. The form factor has been kept fairly compact considering its category (phone + pda = smartphone). The A768i weighs in at a respectable 120 grams. It is noticeably smaller than many other smartphones, but this Motorola model probably will not get any style points when compared to some of the ultra compact phones now on the market.

      Back in Black

      With many of the new phones donning the oh so popular silver exterior, Motorola went the other way with A768i and chose a dark gray exterior with chrome like accents. However, depending on the light, it often appears to be more black than grey.

      On the left side of the phone are a volume rocker switch and a select button for navigating the user interface UI without the included stylus. On the right side is a single button that acts as the shutter button when in camera mode. It also enables the status and time when the flip is closed. Rather than going with a dual screen layout (one exterior and one interior), the a768i sports a clear plastic window that reveals roughly two thirds of the overall area of the main display when closed.

      The back of the phone houses the camera lens, with its adjacent mirror for taking self-portraits. The face of the lens is almost flush with the phone, which lends itself to possible scratching. Also on the back, in close proximity to the camera lens, is the external speaker that is used for the speakerphone as well as other audio functions. A noticeable protrusion is the small fixed external antenna, which is obviously seeking function over form in this case.

      Display

      The a768i's display is quite impressive. Technical specifications indicate a 65k color TFT display. The display really shines is when it comes to internet browsing, where it shows off remarkable clarity and detail even on zoomed out web pages with a lot of images. Viewing the screen outdoors in direct sunlight is better than average; the display remains very readable.

      Which comes first, Phone or PDA?

      When it comes to smartphones, there are usually two camps: the devices that are more phone and less PDA, or just the opposite with the PDA taking center stage. If I had to allocate a percentage, I would suggest that the A768i is 70% phone and 30% PDA. Let's first cover the phone functionality.

      Motorola has always delivered solid communication devices, and the A768i is no exception. Reception and voice quality (incoming and outgoing) are both exceptional (using 1900 band in the USA). The speakerphone is also top-notch. Most people could not even recognize that I was on a speakerphone when I was using it.

      There are effectively three ways to dial out. The first and most basic is by touching numbers on the TFT screen. While the numbers are spaced far enough apart that you can use your finger

      • Re:No pad? (Score:4, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:19AM (#10573521)
        Ah, here's the rest of the text --

        ==

        Messaging

        For writing messages (SMS, MMS and email), the A768i works very well. It is generally quicker to use than is T9 on a traditional numeric keypad, , especially when using the on-screen keyboard. However, when using the handwriting recognition function, the text recognition is not as responsive as one would expect - even when set to 'fast' text recognition. That being said, the A768i is very accurate and includes predictive text, meaning as you begin to write a word, it will give you a list of closest matches from an internal word list. Additionally, you have the option to use the on-screen QWERTY keyboard, which also works well (but excludes predictive text). My only other complaint is that the space bar is awkwardly placed to the side rather than at the bottom of the virtual keyboard, where one would expect it to be.

        In any application that requires text entry, you have a choice of using either the handwriting recognition function in a designated area at the bottom of the screen (much like Palm's graffiti function) or of using the virtual QWERTY keyboard or number specific virtual keypad.

        I believe in order for a smartphone to be truly useful, it must have near equality with today's pure-play PDAs in terms of text entry and keyboard. Simply providing T9 or other predictive text on top of a numeric keypad just doesn't cut it for me. The A768i performs well under these criteria. If you use text messaging and/or email on a mobile phone often, it's hard to go back to a numeric keypad system once you've grown use to a system such as the one provided by the A768i. If you are drawn to physical keys (eg. Blackberry or Palm Treo 600), then the touch-screen of the A768i will take some time getting used to. Overall I preferred to use the QWERTY virtual keyboard in most applications. Handwriting recognition in the A768i has some usability issues, in my opinion, and is not as mature as that found in Palm OS or Microsoft Pocket PC platforms.

        Battery Life

        Lets not forget that last essential component: battery performance. In my own tests, the battery performed well considering the wonderful TFT screen. However, with Bluetooth on, and a lot of active use during the day, I would run out of battery life after about four hours of talk-time and 16 hours of standby time. In low usage scenarios, I achieved about 50 hours of standby time and about 2.5 hours of talk time. Compared with phones with a similar screen resolution and feature set, the battery life of the A768i could be deemed above average.

        Conclusion

        So, the question becomes will this be my mobile phone of choice for any length of time? Overall, I really like this phone. The A768i is refreshingly unique in many aspects and it does excel in the phone and messaging categories. But will it replace my Palm Tungsten T3? I don't think so. The A768i is not a PDA powerhouse, but it does have a much better contact database than the traditional Motorola OS offers. If I can get over my lack of desire for flip phones in general, then this phone will be a keeper. That is, until I get to try out the A780...

        Recommended
        Pros: Bluetooth, messaging, good browser, contact management
        Cons: camera, dialing effort, mediocre calendar

        More photos of the Motorola A768i are available on the following pages.

    • Re:No pad? (Score:1, Insightful)

      by muftak ( 636261 )
      Most people only dial numbers that are already in the phonebook, so you only need to enter numbers once, or sync it with your pc. So it's not that annoying.
      • Actually, I find it faster to dial someone's number if they're located somewhere in the middle of my phonebook, and I have the number memorized - maybe that just comes from the slow OS on my Motorola v300. Syncing it with my PC seems like the only viable way to enter contact information - I don't want to have to use the stylus every time I want to enter someone's information, but I never really did that with my Palm either.

        • Re:No pad? (Score:3, Insightful)

          by LinuxHam ( 52232 )
          I find it faster to dial someone's number if they're located somewhere in the middle of my phonebook

          Have you tried hitting the first letter of their entry while looking at your phonebook? That jumps right to their area on most phones. Also, if the second letter is pretty far down in the alphabet, try hitting the next letter that comes AFTER the first letter of your desired entry. For instance, to look up Stuart, hit T (8) to get to the T's and then go up from there instead of scrolling down through all th

    • Re:No pad? (Score:2, Funny)

      by Combuchan ( 123208 )
      There's a reason they call it a "touchscreen." Have you forgotten about your tactile abilities already?
      • Looking at the size of the phone, and my enormous fingers, I have a feeling I'd have trouble dialing correctly without a stylus, and who wants to use a stylus everytime they want to dial a number?
        • If the "touch keypad" takes up whole screen width and considerable amount of height (i.e. leaving only enough to display the number) then the keys will be way bigger than in most of modern phones. This thing is not tiny and placing 3 keys in a horizontal row on this screen will make them BIG.
          And if you still can't get that right, you can use stylus. Or voice dialing. Or PC sync and phonebook entry.

  • Predecessor (Score:5, Interesting)

    by obeythefist ( 719316 ) on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:03AM (#10573462) Journal
    I have the A920, a very similar Symbian OS 3G phone from Motorola. It's excellent in terms of design and functionality (a bit low on battery life with the 266MHz CPU in it, but that has been fixed).

    For someone like myself who loves and uses gadgets but can't justfy carrying a seperate PDA, MP3 player, cell phone, camera... the smartphone is the only serious choice. Having one that runs linux instead of Symbian can only be an advantage.

    • Re:Predecessor (Score:3, Informative)

      by zurab ( 188064 )
      Motorola has more up its sleeve. It looks to me like the A768i is a reworked A760, which was for Asia only and didn't work in the U.S.

      A780 [shopforphones.co.uk] is a flip-phone, just like A76x, that also has real buttons.

      But a real nice one is E680 [shopforphones.co.uk] that's also capable of MPEG-4 encoding and decoding, can carry up to 1GB SD card, and much more. Check it out.

  • Lockdown (Score:5, Interesting)

    by tomalpha ( 746163 ) on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:06AM (#10573476)

    I'd love to know exactly how well this Linux phone is locked-down to prevent tampering and "copyright abuses", or another way, how easy it will be to write cool hacks for it myself.

    Will they release a tool-chain? Will every piece of software have to be certified before use (as most network operators seem to like). Will it be hackable like the Linksys Wireless routers [slashdot.org]

    Am I being naive and engaging in wishful thinking?
    • Dunno if it's possible to write cool hacks for it, but if it were, then I'd probably use it with a usb roll-up keyboard (not necessary, but handy for my situation, which would be at a desk) and use it with a console screen (on the screen of the phone) for entering records quickly (using a stylus would take longer - data entry via a keyboard is better that way).

      Maybe the app would be ncurses based.

      I guess I could even add a few sketches (and the occasional photo) into the record - it has about 58MB of user


      • I have one of those already

        it's called a Nokia 6600 with Stowaway Bluetooth Keyboard

        complete with SSH client for that remote terminal feeling

        ok it's Symbian but you can code in Java for it, no need to wait for Siemens to release the toolchain and signing etc.

    • Re:Lockdown (Score:2, Interesting)

      by hazard ( 2541 )
      Indeed, I hope that Motorola is smart and will release a toolchain which would allow to build native applications (not just Java stuff).

      Make a tri-band GSM Linux phone with ssh client and VNC client, and I'm your customer.
      • ...because even if you could ssh into your phone, it'd still be nice to be able to bring up your phone's display on your laptop. This could potentially reduce the need for even syncing your phone with your PC if you can easily access your PDA /phone data from your remote computer.

    • Re:Lockdown (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Tim C ( 15259 ) on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @05:15AM (#10573676)
      Will every piece of software have to be certified before use (as most network operators seem to like).

      I've not had a very wide experience of installing third-party software on 'phones, but with my old 3650 (on the O2 network in the UK), it would warn me if the app wasn't signed, but was perfectly happy to let me install it anyway. I see this as a good thing personally - a rogue app could quite easily run me up a huge bill by dialing out and/or sending text messages to premium sevices, which would not be cool...

      Of course, there's no guarantee that a properly-signed one won't do that, but you'd hope that there's more to getting is signed than just buying a certificate, and that there's a certificate revocation mechanism in place. (I know, all probably wishful thinking...)

  • Messaging? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anne Thwacks ( 531696 ) on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:07AM (#10573479)
    So long as internet use over a mobile phone is more expensive than buying your own internet cafe, there's little future in this.

    The phone operators should realise that they could make a lot of money if they were not so damn greedy with their download rates.

    • Re:Messaging? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Realistic_Dragon ( 655151 ) on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:22AM (#10573528) Homepage
      Orange in the UK used to offer free 0800 28.8k/sec access to the internet (via some service like OneTel).

      A month before GPRS was lauched this was increased to 35p/min, and GPRS was advertised as being '35 times cheaper than dialing up'.

      Anyone else remember the first BT GPRS tarrif that could cost you &pound;114/min if they actually delivered on their advertised data rate?

      Now at least you can buy unlimited GPRS from some suppliers in the UK (for around &pound;50/$80mo) but it's a damn sight more expensive and not as quick as (HS)CSD used to be AND they have the unmitigate d gall to cap use at 100mb in their AUP! Bastards through and through. I await the revolution when they are first against the wall (well after Old Bill and patent lawyers of course).
    • I have a pair of phones (one for the wife), unlimited web browsing, $15/month. I don't have a cable over to my laptop, but I keep thinking I might do it. I'm still waiting for a better Treo or something to come along.

    • T-Mobile USA offers unlimited GPRS for $19.99 a month. You can get it for $4.99 but a bunch of ports are blocked, $9.99 with fewer blocked. With either of the lower priced options you aren't supposed to acess the net using your laptop connected through your phone but no one will notice...

      The T-Mobile rep has yet to be informed of what the rates for EDGE access will be once it's rolled out in January but he said it won't be too much more and will nearly 100% be a flat rate.

  • Why a 2G phone? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by millwall ( 622730 ) on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:14AM (#10573506)
    I find it quite strange that innovative phones like this one is still being made for the 2G networks.

    Since the market for this phone is business users, and the network coverage for the 3G networks is more than adequate almost everwhere where you will find a concentration of businesses.

    In many areas you will find that there are even more than one 3G network provider. With this in mind I find it odd that you will still see so much development on the 2G phones, especially with data intensive devices as this one.

    • Re:Why a 2G phone? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:24AM (#10573534)
      Hmm, primarily because the backbone is not entirely 3G yet.

      Besides, 2G definitely has more of a coverage than 3G does.

      Hence a lot of continuing investment in 2G networks.

      I think.
    • Because nobody has written Linux drivers for 3G network yet? ;)
    • I think primarily because of the massive amount of work involved in not only getting a 3G stack up and running, but then porting the software to Linux. Motorola likely have a pretty standard GSM stack that they've spent the last 10 years optimising. Their 3G stack, on the other hand, is pretty new (only a few years old), and considerably less portable (probably).

    • Re:Why a 2G phone? (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Since the market for this phone is business users, and the network coverage for the 3G networks is more than adequate almost everwhere where you will find a concentration of businesses.

      I.e. central Tokyo? Here in the northern part of Europe, ComputerWorld (I think it was them) is still writing about the difficulties getting the 3G networks online, and the phone companies would rather rent bandwith from other phone companies than buying their own equipment. And the US is years behind, not even fully on GSM

    • The funny thing is, the A768 is hardly a "new" phone by any measure. I doubt putting an "i" on the end really did anything for it either.

      But oddly enough, Motorola do have an A780 which is due for release this year allegedly... or is the A780 already out? And that is still a GSM phone.

      As for why... I assume it's just because not everyone wants to get sucked in by video calls. Having seen how "smooth" (intense sarcasm there) video chats are on a 3G network first-hand, I would happily say that I won't be

      • As for why... I assume it's just because not everyone wants to get sucked in by video calls.

        With regards to data transfer for e-mails or whatever you want to send/receive, a 3G phone has got better bandwidth than a 2G phone. This is my point.

        If video calls using 3G are "smooth" or not is a completely different issue.

        • *shrug* Guess what feature the 3G providers market? Hint: not email.

          • Yeah well I thought it could be read inbetween the lines of my reply, but what I meant was that if you want to develop a data intensive device, why do this with 2g and not 3g? (Regardless if you are expecting to transfer voice, video or e-mail data)

            The technology, the network, the coverage (to a reasonable extent) is already there. So far I've mostly seen video phones that utilise the 3g capacity.
      • Does Motorola have a product page about it anywhere? I can't seem to find mention of it on motorola.com.

        I find it strange that some companies simply don't acknowledge their own products.
  • "Might be the thing for business users as it excels in the phone/messaging category."

    Well, you know, you can never tell when you need your phone to make a call or to take a message now do you? I think that feature would be useful to some people.

  • *the* thing for business? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by melonman ( 608440 ) on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:26AM (#10573543) Journal

    the A768i might be the thing for business users as it excels in the phone/messaging category

    Because no other equipment competes for this niche? Or is it because obviously the only acceptable solution is a Linux solution, and if this is the only Linux option in the niche it's therefore what everyone should be using? I like Linux, use it almost exclusively, but I can't say I'd go for a Linux PDA or phone if, say, a Symbian alternative had better features.

  • Technical specifications indicate a 65k color TFT display. The display really shines is when it comes to internet browsing

    Today TOO early in the morning *or more in the night) alarm in my new phone woke me up. Okay, I can sleep longer but I need to reset the alarm to the right time. And damn, I can't. Damned display shines so brightly that it blinds me...

    Finally keeping it far away from myself, getting eyes a bit adjusted to the brightness, tilting and turning it I managed to set the alarm...

    Note to sel

  • Someone should have known better .. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @04:50AM (#10573612)
    Someone should have known better than to combine the words Linux and Mobile in the same posting, now you know that site is going to get slashdotted

    Having finally got to the site (2 mins to download a page), it looks nice, pity we will never see it in the UK.
    • Don't forget the obligatory "Looks like he was hosting the server one one!" comments which we will all invariably have to suffer...

      Crap... I just made one myself, didn't I...

    • I wouldn't be so sure. Half a year ago, people thought that the A768 would never even make it to the US.

      I wouldn't worry though. UK should be trialling the A780 by now, which is a much better instrument and actually does have a megapixel camera, unlike this dinosaur they're reviewing.

  • Business Phone without a key pad? (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    What is the use of receiving emails if you can't reply to them? And how are you going to do it without a keypad? Annoyingly slow. Much prefer a Treo for that task.
    Now, I wonder how much of the sources for the phone Motorola actually discloses? I could imagine that part of this must remain unmodifiable simply to retain its phone license...

  • Symbian or Microsoft? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by DLR ( 18892 ) <dlrosenthal@g[ ]l.com ['mai' in gap]> on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @05:32AM (#10573704) Journal
    Quoth yon article: In terms of operating system choices, Motorola definitely chose the road less traveled for the A768i. The obvious choices in the market are the Symbian OS and, of course, Microsoft.

    While I'll grant you that Linux is certainly "...the road less traveled..." for smartphones they didn't even mention PalmOS? I know (and am very disappointed) that there are few enough of them out there, but PalmOS is such a strong player in the PDA market that I can't figure out why there aren't more Palm based phones out there.

  • Business (Score:5, Insightful)

    by StevenHenderson ( 806391 ) <[stevehenderson] [at] [gmail.com]> on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @05:43AM (#10573723)
    It may not have much in the way of photo-taking abilities, but the A768i might be the thing for business users as it excels in the phone/messaging category.

    Not necessarily. The fact that it has a camera at all makes it unuseable for me at work (security). Give me an option if I want a camera or not, and adjust the price accordingly. Then we will talk.

    By the way, does this look just like a Palm m100 to anyone else?

    • Paint the camera lens on your phone black or just smash it. Don't demand a manufacturer puts out two models because your workplace is paranoid. Two basically idential models increase the price on both.

  • Linux on a telling-bone (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ajs318 ( 655362 ) <sd_resp2@@@earthshod...co...uk> on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @06:42AM (#10573830)
    It's all very well that the phone itself runs Linux underneath. What's more important from where I'm sitting is, can I use it with my Linux {single-booting and proud of it} notebook? For instance, does it use standard {or at least, well-documented and free for the asking} APIs so I can write my own perl scripts to do cool things with it? Can I use it to get on the Internet? Do Motorola provide the drivers as source .tar.gz files which I'll be able to compile on any system, not just the "commercially viable" ones? Does the phone have a scripting language {I mean, more sophisticated than ash} on-board?

    My wishlist would be for something that looked to the host PC as though it was a USB network adapter plugged into some sort of network. You would assign it an IP address in a subnet of your choosing, from the phone's "console". There would be standard servers on standard ports {21 for FTP, 22 for SSH, 80 for web, 3306 for database, &c.; maybe even an Asterisk proxy for hardcore VoIP users} so as to keep the interface clean and simple {I'm implying that they would just be using regular files and databases for storing ringing tones and contact info; there's no reason to assume otherwise}. While you were on the Internet, the phone would do NAT, just like one of those little ADSL gismos.
    • It runs the "phone" version of Qtopia. However, the way it syncs data with a PC seems to be proprietory (it doesnt use the qtopia desktop) and the PC-side software is Windows-only. I've had one of these phones for a while, and I havent yet figured out a way to put cool apps on it, or even to get it to sync addressbooks etc with my linux box.

      • Re:Linux on a telling-bone (Score:4, Insightful)

        by ajs318 ( 655362 ) <sd_resp2@@@earthshod...co...uk> on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @08:18AM (#10574138)
        the way it syncs data with a PC seems to be proprietory (it doesnt use the qtopia desktop) and the PC-side software is Windows-only.
        Bloody typical.

        I am seriously thinking of writing to my MP to try to get it made law that manufacturers must provide full disclosure of driver specs if they want to sell their goods in this country. Placing the driver source code under BSD licence or GPL would of course satisfy the requirements. {I know BSD can be poison; but it isn't actually too bad for situations like drivers, where there is no danger of proprietary extensions taking over from the main code base. The manufacturer can't add proprietary extensions themself, since that would break the requirement for full disclosure.}

        Meanwhile, has anyone got any success stories re. getting a Linux laptop on the internet with a mobile phone? Any mobile at all? If I use my own dial-up server, will it just be counted as any old mobile-to-landline call {and therefore covered in the monthly allowance on my current tariff}? I don't need a feature-packed phone with a colour display, camera and integrated self-rolling ashtray, just something that lets me send and receive text messages and answer voice calls. Oh, and go on the internet, obviously :)
        • While this doesn't help you much, here in the US of A, you can use Samsung phones (VGA1000 is a good one) with Sprint to do so.

          You simply buy a data cable, subscribe to the PCS Vision data plan ($20 a month for unlimited data), and plug in your phone to your laptop via USB. It will be recongized as a modem. Dial out using the number #777, and you're set.

          This is not officially supported by Sprint, but there have been no reports of them cracking down, either. Just don't abuse it.

          -Erwos
          • So it's just like an "old-fashioned" modem that you used to plug into a serial port, and with an entry in /dev/ that acts like a ttyS* port? Does that mean I can dial my spare phone line at normal mobile-to-landline rate {which on my tariff is nil in the evening and at weekends for the first 300' a month}, have mgetty auto-answer and gateway myself through my broadband connection? Or am I stuck with using my own telco's dial-up access, or is the call charged extra anyway just because it's a modem call?
            • Yes, as far as I know, it's just a regular modem.

              The #777 is what activates the data stuff on Sprint's network. There should be nothing stopping you from dialing any number you want, I think.

              -Erwos

        • Meanwhile, has anyone got any success stories re. getting a Linux laptop on the internet with a mobile phone?

          Well perhaps I've misunderstood you (or I'm being an insensitive European clod), but getting a connection to the internet through a mobile phone isn't at all difficult (on GSM networks [gsmworld.com] - which is why I'm probably being an insensitive clod)

          I've used a

          • Nokia 6210 [nokia.com],
          • Nokia 6310i [nokia.com],
          • Nokia 6230 [nokia.com]

          (and a host of others I've had access to) connected to my Linux machine(s) (G4 Powerbook and desktop PC) v

    • You know, just about every Motorola phone that supports USB shows up in Linux as a TAPI modem, and supports the use of standard AT commands to make calls, manipulate the phone book, and send SMS. I would be extremely surprised if this one DOESN'T have these features. Software that uses this GSM-spec (open) interface is pretty rare, though, and I've never figured out why.

      Newer Mot phones (esp those with bluetooth) support SyncML over USB, BT, or IP if your carrier supports it. Mot is an early adopter of

  • I've been waiting for a Motorola handset that runs Linux for ages. They've been talking it up for years now.

    I want:
    bash, gcc, java, phone, browser, camera, and wlan at the minimum.

    Sort of like the Sharp Zaurus, but coupled with a phone.
    • Erm... ages? The A768 has been out for ages. And perhaps you also missed its predecessor, the A760?
    • Would you be willing to pay a thousand bucks for it?

      Even the A768i is still running for $400 or so on eBay. Retail, it's going for about $600.

      Adding all the stuff you would want, qa'ing it, and then redesigning the hardware to accomodate would push the price to at least $800. What's worse is that you'd still have anemic performance, and battery life would get worse due to the additional memory and larger display.

      This is not to mention any potential size or interface issues.

      -Erwos
    • Just use the Audiovox Tri-Band GSM/GPRS CF card with your Zaurus and you are in business.

      Audiovox Tri-Band GSM/GPRS CF Card [expansys.ca]

      There is also a slightly cheaper model for data-only.

  • I'd probably be happy. It's running QTE phone edition, so I could port my fave apps over from the Zaurus. I'd probably port IRK over to it so I could use my Pocketop IR keyboard (on-screen keyboards leave me cold).

    Would have got one of these puppies instead of my K700i :(
  • The disadvantage of being a first mover, however, is challenging, as there are not many applications written specifically on this platform for the mobile market, especially when compared to Symbian, Microsoft, or PalmOS. That will change if Linux OS devices become popular in the mobile market space, which I hope they do.

    Will it? Something that tells me just because two devices are based on Linux, the chance that an app that works on one will work on another is probably quite slim. What's on top of this
  • you could compile emacs for this.
    That's what I'm talkin' about!

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