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Handhelds Hardware

Palm Talks About New OS 142

Posted by Hemos from the fun-new-stuff dept.
SeattleDave writes "CNET's News.com is carrying a story about Palm's new OS, version 4.0. To quote their article: "The new version 4.0 of the Palm OS, which chief executive Carl Yankowski detailed at the PalmSource developer conference here, supports 16-bit color, Bluetooth wireless connectivity, universal serial bus (USB) connections for easier PC synchronization, and support for wireless telephony." Read the original article as well. "
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Palm Talks About New OS More

Palm Talks About New OS

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  • Actually - on a side note, you can pick up the Palm IIIxe for only $149 right now from amazon.com. I won't get into the specifics of it, but let's just say that the palm forum at www.palmblvd.com will tell you all you need - if you're truly interested.

    What the hell's with that Claudia Schiffer edition anyway? Who the heck came up with that idea?

    The Aqua metallic blue is a limited edition color that was selected by Claudia herself.

    Because she wasn't capable of any more input because she's never thought to organize anything - someone else does it all for her?
  • Even a Palm V could a year ago. I had our CEO's Palm V syncing to his (crappy) Sony Vaio USB-only piece of trash around January 2000 via a USB.

    I think what they added was native USB support, not serial-via-USB like Handspring and Palm had previously used.

    At least, I hope that's what they mean.
  • You're right there might be a joke in hair.
  • Is it true that in the early betas of their handwriting system you had to use krylon in order to get the letters to be recognized?
  • anyone have a line on when we will see palm devices running the 4.0 OS? i mean should i hold off on that Vx i've been drooling over or what?
  • I think hardware companies are trying to get away from old-style serial. Serial needs fixed resources on host PCs, and most of us know about fiddling with IRQs, etc. It's considered legacy, and doesn't even appear in some new pcs, like Compaq's iPaq legacy-free desktop.

    Serial also has a ~115kbps limit that tends to impede the synchronization of anything substantial. (read mp3)

    USB controllers, OTHO, support many devices with one set of resources, and at least in the case of my system (Asus A7V) take whatever resources the hardware gives them, and share nicely. They also have a decent 12mbps transfer rate.

    As for ethernet vs. bluetooth, for wireless sync, bluetooth is the way to go. Ethernet doesn't include all the auto-negotiation / auto-configuration that bluetooth does on as low a level.

    Finally, my personal prediction on wireless Internet is that it'll use whatever the dominant cell-phone technology is... I doubt highly that anyone will deploy wireless ethernet on a national/international scale just to support PDAs. I see PDAs using 3g GSM for Internet, even in the US.
  • Right now, I find myself wondering how useful color on a PDA is (for me anyway). It's definitely high on the coolness scale, but for run-of-the-mill stuff like calendar, contacts, and AvantGo, I think I'd almost rather have the greyscale.

    I'm sure, though, that in another 2 years, they'll all be color anyway.

  • Oh yeah... I missed your point alright.

    It seems that we agree...

  • Even the Palm OS platform has had CompactFlash expansion for years now. Check out the TRGPro [trgpro.com].
  • "Palm is trying to enhance its OS to maintain its lead over Microsoft in the handheld market by selectively adding more features"

    WinCE has had 16 bit color and USB support for over a year now.

    Well, USB-syncing is cool but 16-bit colors in a PDA is the most stupid idea I've ever heard of.

    • 3 diagonal inches is not enough for a postcard. (But you could store the top 100 items from your stamp collection!)
    • 16 bits is not enough to give you photographic color quality. (Unless of course your PDA spends some 200 kB of memory on maintaining a 24-bit color map. Which it doesn't.)
    • Do you even have 65535 pixels on the screen? (320x200 is almost there.)
    • Power consumption and battery life. (Some people think that content and service availability is more important than the packaging.)

    --Bud

  • Nope, because Palm used to be owned by US Robotics, if memory serves. Nice try tho. :) I actually met one of the original designers of the Palm OS some time ago but it came up so fast that I didn't have time to think of anything smart to say. I more or less just dissed the memory management in the OS. :)

  • Re:Handspring and important code questions (Score:5)

    by FroBugg ( 24957 ) on Wednesday December 13, 2000 @08:37AM (#562489) Homepage
    Not exactly. The 3.1H used on the Visor Solo and Deluxe is basically PalmOS 3.0 with a few improvements, most of it to support springboard modules and the USB hotsync. There's also some differences in the basic software package.

    The new Visor Prism and Visor Platinum both come with a modified version of PalmOS 3.5. So, all they're really doing is taking the basic PalmOS and adding a few things here and there. So far it hasn't been a problem with them for 3.x, but it might become a little more difficult when 4.0 finally comes out. We'll see.

    Also, I'm not sure about this, but for most wireless modules to work perfectly with old Visors, they have to be sent back to Handspring and replaced with upgrades that reduce RF interference. I believe that these upgraded Visors also come with a modified PalmOS 3.3 or 3.5, but I'm really not all that sure about it.

    In any event, Visors are stuck with the OS they come with, unless you can do what you want with software patches or you want to go in and physically change the chips. The ROM on the Palms is flashable, and can be upgraded to a new OS. But it's still up in the air whether 4.0 will work on the Dragonball devices.
  • Does anyone know when Palm, Handspring, etc. will announce ARM based PalmOS devices?
  • Motorola has said that the new ARMs will work just fine with backwards compatability. All old Palm apps should run without a significant (if any) performance hit.

    Size probably isn't an issue when it comes to the processor, although both the Palm IIIc and the Visor Prism are larger than their B&W counterparts, so color is probably more of a size affecting factor than that. Power requirements will most definitely increase. If they're moving to full color, then there's no way they'll be running these of AAAs like the old Palms and Visors. The color devices that are out now are all (that I know of) running off internal NiMH with chargers built into the cradle. It works well enough as long as you can access a cradle on a regular basis. Again, the color screen is more of a determinant than the processor.
  • Yep - next they'll announce something unheard of, like "better than 160x160" resolution, 16 bit stereo sound or even (gasp) CompactFlash extension slots ! Gee, to think of all this crowd of PalmOS fanatics despizing Windows CE, only to have them chear up when Palm announce features that Windows CE have had for years...
  • When I leave the house in the morning, I've got my analog watch on my wrist (a nice Movado... stylin'), a Palm Vx, a pack of cigarettes and a lighter, a SecurID card, a Panasonic Minidisc player, keys, money, wallet, etc., in my pockets, and a Motorola Timeport hanging on my hip.

    This is far too much crap.

    Unless the PalmOS 4 is going to fix that... I see no biggie.

    Minidisc - because MP3 players and their media tend to be too small and expensive.
    SecurID - so I can get into work e-mail from wherever I may be, including at work but at a computer not on the IT net.
    Palm - notes/phone#'s/and most importantly, games for when I'm sitting at the train station waiting for whatever train may or may not come.
    Phone - nobody's ever at their desk, including me.

    So... where does that leave us? How about someone makes a nice, neat phone which does the phone and palm functions, and maybe has a clik! drive for MP3s? RSA does something where they can use the SIM card in the phone along with some software to provide the unique secure code generation, and bam, I can actually fit my cigarettes in my pocket again?

    -Nev
  • The Handspring visor supports a usb sync

    has a slot for a bluetooth card [widcomm.com]

    and the Visor Prism supports 65536 colors [handspring.com]

  • Are they improving the way it works? (Score:5)

    by cqnn ( 137172 ) on Wednesday December 13, 2000 @06:33AM (#562495)
    I hope this new version also addresses some of the other design limits of
    the current Palm OS such as:

    the 4k Memo limit

    the lack of a standard interface to link data points from the basic apps together
    (such as linking the note fields from datebook and todo lists with the notebook app)

    I really like my Palm device, and I admire its simplicity, but even without
    comparing against other PDAs I think Palm Inc is overdue on making the underlying
    OS a little more powerful and flexible. Particularly in light of the remaining
    challenges of PocketPC and PSION, and the new designs of Linux-based PDAs.
  • Did any one watch the video with the analyst report?

    there was a mention of a modular PC that would go from about the size of a palm all the way onto desktop...

    Anyone know whos making this technology and what is involved. Supposed even the unit the size of the Palm will have full PC power. My guess is using things like IBM microdrives and smaller Intel or IBM chips to achieve this.
  • In perhaps the best-coiffed event of the day, Claudia Schiffer took to the stage to announce that her Palm Vx Claudia Schiffer Edition is now available on her Web site.

    Tech aimed at the adult Barbie Doll! It's (ooh, aah) Aqua Metallic Blue! What? No red? No sleek anodiezed black (the color internationally recognized as the color of real style). "It can hold 10,000 address and" nice english, der. Probably to track all her stalkers...

    --

  • Preemptive multitasking? Justify it to your clients? One of the features of WinCE that I am torn on is exactly that: multitasking. This is a device for managing your contacts, schedule and to-do list. The fact that you can play Chess or Solitaire on it is a bonus. What do you really need multitasking for? You're not calculating spreadsheets on your PDA, are you? This is why we have Laptops (or even the larger WinCE devices the 'sub-notebooks' if you will).

    I honestly can't see why you need more than the scheduling capabilities of the PalmOS. I think one of the reasons why the PalmOS is much more popular is because of its simplicity. Introducing concepts such as multitasking would only cause developers to make programs that just confuse the user. For example, making the 'Find' function run in the background only to pop up windows when it has found things. This distracts you from what you're doing on your 3" x 3" screen. These are things you would do on a full size computer.

    My two cents.

    --

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • My Visor is welded to me, it's great, but I really wish it were Flash upgradable. (Yeah, I know I can upgrade in RAM, but the waste of having duplicated information irks my Scots blood.)

    I've poked around a bit, but not found any mention of trying to replace the ROM with Flash in a Visor. Can anyone point me to such a thing? I'm willing to try such a hardware hack given good instructions, but I'm in no way competent to figure it out for myself.

  • I dunno if that's in the next generation cards, as it were.

    If you want a music device that takes dictation... get yerself a minidisc player/recorder.

    For $150 you can get 74 mintue talk times, play mp3 comparable quality songs, and buy $3 data discs. It's not nearly as neat as having a iPaq handheld, but hey, it plays for 6 or so hours.

    I'm hoping for a next gen PDA device that takes CF+ and a 1gb microDrive, headphone jack, Palm OS, and costs $400... but, unless there's a Visor module to take CF+ and does MP3 decoding, I don't think that's going to happen in the near future

    Geek dating! [bunnyhop.com]
  • Except that if you time a Visor (mine for instance) versus a PalmV (my coworker's for instance) the Visor doesn't seem to sync any faster.

    Add to that it only syncs about 90% of the time without a soft reset...

    Add to that Handspring support says that's normal!

    Bummer, dude.

    #include &ltnosig.h&gt

  • Try the K Browser [4thpass.com] by 4th pass. It will allow you to access WAP applications from a Palm.

  • USB! (Score:1)

    by Cyn ( 50070 )
    FINALLY - we can get a sync done WITHOUT the damn serial port!
  • Okay, whoring for kharma, there's also the San Jose Mercury News article [mercurycenter.com] that points out Palm's investment in OLEDs for color displays. And if the OLEDs can be made like something like an inkjet printer, that's where the poor 160x160 pixel screen works to an advantage- they won't need to refine the printing process all that much.

    Then maybe a color screen would be fine. Right now with my Palm IIIc, I either have the backlight at minimum (indoors) or maximum (any kind of sunlight).
  • I indeed hope they do add all of those things without sacrificing the interface. Its sorta like Handspring modules. they added a new interface without killing it. If you want to use the dictionary, pop in the module and run the app. I guess what I'm saying is that the simplistic interface that exists should remain intact. Don't add extra steps just to go online - make it another communication device over tcp/ip. Same with blue tooth etc, al.

    ---
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Its added as an extension to the base system. There is an item marked 'USB Library v3.0H' when I check my Visor config (via the info menu).
  • if they upgrade the development tools, maybe they don't have to worry about backwards compatibility and developers can just recompile another build for the new system? if you know something's better, why bother supporting the old way when you know it's gonna be slower and resources are limited? (eg, I think MS designs by Moore's law... but handhelds don't have a 18 month half-life...)
    --
    Peace,
    Lord Omlette
    ICQ# 77863057
  • No, the USB is not in the Visor cradle- in fact, it's more that the RS-232 is in the Visor serial cradle.

    If you take apart your Visor, you'll notice a Philips USB chip hiding in there. Sorry, I don't have a Visor around right now to figure exactly which chip it is.

    Instead the serial Visor cradle converts from the TTL level (0-5v) serial from the bottom of the Visor to RS-232 levels (+/- 6 to 15v).

    No, the Palm USB cradle is the one that converted from serial (at whatever speeds the OS could manage) to USB.

  • where'd they get all those cool ideas (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Palm should be commended for taking the lead versus WinCE in USB connectivity, 16-bit color, and wireless Internet access.
  • Palm OS lisencees are allowed to share in
    each others developments. Hence, Palm can
    gain USB technology originally developed
    by Handspring, and Handspring, Sony, TGR,
    et al, should be able to benefit from the
    porting of the OS to ARM.
  • It should also be noted that USB on the HandSpring is standard. If I wanted to use the current 3Com Palm range with my computer I would have to buy a serial-USB adapter. USB beats RS232 serial for transfer speeds.

  • Handspring and important code questions (Score:4)

    by vees ( 10844 ) <rob@vees.net> on Wednesday December 13, 2000 @06:38AM (#562514) Homepage Journal

    The most important questions to me are:

    Did Handspring [handspring.com] fork off their version from the Palm OS code tree by moving to their 3.1H3 for the module support?

    If so, is Palm OS 4 going to reincorporate the code for modules to work with the Handspring? Springboard developers like Xircom [xircom.com] are already working on modular Bluetooth solutions. It would seem silly to not consider that.

    --

  • USB... (Score:2)

    by garcia ( 6573 )
    I really don't understand. I don't use USB that much (due to a Linux based computer) but I do own a USB camera (yes that is only supported by Windows at this time). When I ordered a handheld did I care if it had USB? No. I can plug in serial just as easily, and it is supported by all OS's.

    Bluetooth -- do I really need wireless connectivity other than REAL, true, wireless Internet? No.

    Color, yeah, that's a plus, but not a necessity.

    Show me ethernet, fast wireless Internet (REAL Internet) and I will be impressed.
  • So what? Handspring [handspring.com] has had all of those things for quite some time now.

    A bigger deal would be voice activation support working well. THAT'S something that has a pre-made niche in the handheld market.

    ================

  • My Mac Blue-and-white G3 has both Firewire and DVD. It was a depredated model when I got it in August 1999. The MPAA are scoundrels, yes, but coming up with spurious conspiracy theories doesn't help those of us who are trying to make people aware of MPAA malfeasance.

    If you get an iMac DV, you get both DVD and Firewire in the same box. And the iMac DV is a mass-market machine.


    ---- Hey Grrl Geeks! Your very own geek news site has arrived!

  • We had a little contest at work and came up with these:

    TOP 10 REASONS WHY PALM CHOSE CLAUDIA SCHIFFER

    10. Couldn't do a Palm V promo with only 4 Spice Girls

    9. Claudia already wrote in Grafitti

    8. Cray Research had already taken Naomi Campbell

    7. Palm is the one thing that Tyra Banks couldn't figure out how to turn on

    6. Nobody needs their handheld like Claudia does.

    5. Schiffer Palm was a safe bet after debacle with Deborah Harry sponsorship

    4. Perfect capacity for her memoirs

    3. She's got plenty of experience guiding people's Palms.

    2. She turned down Pocket PC, saying too many people already looked at her through Windows.

    AND #1...

    1. Ad slogan: When you think of your unit, think of Claudia.
  • Palm is doing things right by stripping the interface down to its barest essentials, if only by not giving you enough screen real estate. Instead of making things cluttered, developers have to decide what to show on the screen and what to hide in menus. If they had more pixels to work with you'd have WinCE's attempt at duplicating a Windoze desktop UI.

    Yes, they might be able to squeeze a bit more pixels onto a Palm screen, but then shrinking it down will just make things worse. For instance, the M-100 is a smaller screen and gets enough complaints from people with poor eyesight like me. What happens when you try to shrink that 160x160 pixels onto something as wide as a cell phone? Either you get a cell phone as wide as the Qualcomm PdQ or you get something just barely navigatable. Now just imagine trying to squeeze all the information that you can fit into 320x320 pixels on something like a cell phone screen.

    No, now that there's a decent code base for this resolution and there are enough developers who have the experience optomizing programs' UI for that, the transition to physically smaller screens will be much easier.

    It's sort of the arguement about code bloat- nowadays people don't really worry about a program's footpring since memory is cheap, but fast, compact code is still vital, not just on the Palm platform, but also almost any embedded platform- which the Palm could become.

  • Word documents and Power Point presentations...

    Until they increase the RAM, adding support for MS Office documents is putting the cart before the horse.

    IMNSHO, the 8MB available on the X models is not enough to do what you propose.

  • Oh I'm not counting them out, or saying they don't have market share (with the MS machine behind the wheel I'm surprised palm hasn't simply dissapeared yet).

    I didn't know that the OS was a ground up effort however.

    My main point though was that the Look and Feel of the win9x/nt/w2k/winme desktop didn't work (IMHO) as well as something like the palmos on handhelds. The entire paradigm of windows, start menus, etc is not the way to do it. I admit that my time using a wince/pocketpc handheld was restricted to ~30 seconds, in which time I randomly hit a couple of buttons (wondering what they did) and it crashed with a gpf. Nope, not kidding at all :)

    But I digress....
  • Good point, I tend to forget about the Newton. Any word on Apples latest handheld efforts? I seem to remember them licensing the Palm O.S. for some reason.
  • Bluetooth -- do I really need wireless connectivity other than REAL, true, wireless Internet? No.

    A connected palm is a much more useful palm. The whole point is that it should be an EXTENSION of your existing computer, not a replacement.

    To that end, bluetooth would be VERY nice. I use my palm as the primary interface to my mp3 jukebox at home. I also use it to read usenet (via a telnet session and using slrn...works great!), and check mail if I don't feel like powering up my main box. On occasion, it's also used as a terminal for my (headless) firewall. When I'm on the road I just plug into a small modem and dial up to my home lan to check my mail too...but that's beside the point :)

    It's annoying having to drag that long serial cable all over the house. Wireless networking would be an incredible addition to the palm. The only other thing I'd really like is better screen resolution as crunching 40 characters using 3 dot wide cells can be hard to read sometimes.

  • This is to be expected, given the talent from Newton division that moved in mass to Palm. (32 resigned all on a friday, and went to palm after getting Steved)

    Those Ex-Newton engineers are going to work VERY hard to produce a product that they can point to and say "See Steve? Computers *CAN* exist without a keyboard" Perhaps while inserting said palm into an orfice of Mr. Jobs. Therefore out of the gate, the product should have more stability and code quality than the average .0 release.

    Hopefully that drive on their part will work to deliver a product better than the palm, and better than a Newton 2100.

    Expect the new Palm to be more Newton-like, with a re-written Rosetta handwritting engine. (Translation - built in printed handwriting)

    (Why would the founders leave and do handspring? Simple. Their baby, graffitti was going to be replaced. The graffitti was on the wall for them.)
  • Probably just to piss you off.
    Seriously though, as a community-based site, more can probably be achieved by trying to persuade the majority than by sending an e-mail to the staff (who could just ignore it).
  • try a 2.4 kernal

    i have been syncing a visor
    with 2.4 test kernels for ~
    a year. Sometimes it's a bit
    picky (ie. have to press the
    sync button on the cradle
    before the you can begin the
    sync) but for the most part
    USB & visor & linux works
    perfectly.
  • The lead they have is in market share. Yes, the features they are adding are already in WinCE, which is probably why Palm are adding them - to help maintain their lead.
  • Yeah, but isn't the USB on the Handspring just RS-232 converted to USB. The OS is PalmOS and it doesn't natively support USB, so you can't get all the real benefits of USB and the data rate is limited to whatever the serial port can handle (115k?). Somebody please correct me if I'm wrong.

  • Re:USB! (Score:1)

    by OAB ( 136061 )
    but unless they embrace firewire, screw it.

    What exactly is the point of using a very fast link for a palm? It's not like it takes very long to shove the entire memory of one around using USB. Use the right tool for the right job, this is exactly the sort of thing USB is good at.
  • Think about this for a moment...

    Handspring visors run PalmOS3.5, so why is it that if Palm releases a version 4.0 that they'll have some kind of magical advantage in the market? If the downfalls are hardware related, as you mentioned, then a newer OS isn't going to fix a thing! The visors support USB cradling, and a few other hardware features, all from PalmOS 3.5. No magic there.

    BTW, got a visor platinum and it's really great!

    --cr@ckwhore
  • Handspring already is selling a 16-bit color Palm OS device called the Visor Prism [handspring.com]. I wonder if can be upgraded to the new OS, or if it uses ROM to store the OS like the Visor Solo or Visor Deluxe?

  • IMHO for PalmOS to compete with WinCE we, the developers, need more dynamic Heap and Threads!!! What is the deal with this 128K Heap? Even the RIM pager has 500K of heap!!!! I have tried to use a WinCE device and it is bad. The GUI is confusing and it is hard to develop any apps under WinCE. Of course in typical uSoft fashion WinCE will improve and eventually rule the PDA world. I hope this doesn't happen. Having the extra color is cool but really what keeps people coming back to the palm is that it is as convenient as looking at your wrist watch. Simple and Easy!
  • um...I don't want MS documents in my palm. I want appointments, contacts, some email maybe, the ability to link all this to my cell so that I don't have the same data in 4 different locations.
    MS has created "pocket" versions of their office suite, so that you can zap your latest presentation over to your handheld and present at your marketing meeting. The only problem with this approach (I've tried to use it, believe me) is that it fails miserably. The interface on a PC is totally different than on a handheld.
    I'm not a microsoft basher. They've got to have smart people working for them, it just seems that the effort to make their products feature rich outweighs common sense. I think palm is doing this better than anyone has. I'd like to see em stick to it. I think a move to more powerful hardware and support for some next generation technology, like bluetooth and wireless connectivity, is a step in the right direction. I just hope that it doesn't result in "bloat-palm"
  • Article in today's San Jose Mercury Times said they're also working with somebody to use organic LED's for the displays in a few years. I forget what the benefits of that were.
  • There is a securid program that runs on the Palm platform. Check out 4securedata.com [4securedata.com] for more info. I was going to go this route before cisco incorporated ssh in their IOS.

    SealBeater
  • I completely disagee. I run my own business (web design - don't start) and my Palm V is absolutely vital. It keeps all my numbers and appointments and basically organises my working life. I have a laptop too but I can't really get that out to make notes while I'm walking down the street or in a meeting, can I?

    This has been an advertisement for Palmtops, we now return to ordinary programming.
  • Palm has completed the initial effort to port its operating system from today's Motorola Dragonball chip, which is at the heart of current Palm handhelds, to chips based on designs from England's ARM.

    That's new to me. This is pretty interesting because it means a departure from PALM's traditional market. As some already have pointed out it could be dangerous to compete directly with the PocketPC devices here, which have matured a lot lately.
    A lot of people have been complaining about the fact that PALM has used the relatively slow Dragonball CPU's. I guess it will be hard to compete against the others in the market when in an comparison for CPU's 16/32 to 200 sticks out.
    I still like Palms philosophy but handspring has made a pretty big impact with their devices just because they offer some kind of "upgradeability"

  • <rant>
    This seems to be, much like all these KDE and GNOME releases that you folks all seem to like so much, a me too release to a Microsoft product.

    Where are the new ideas?
    </rant>
  • What I need is palm the size of a letter paper.
    I would be very nice to have that thing and tomwrite my reports with grafitti. I do not
    need a notebook.

    OverLord

  • Palm an offspring of 3Com, and 3Com used QNX Neutrino at the core of their new PalmOS on the Audrey internet appliances. Mr Bergsma of QNX said in a recent article it isn`t strange at all for for QNX to license QNX Neutrino to Palm. Looks good :)
  • Good thing Palm has features that Wince will NEVER have, even if they change the name.

    Like ease of use.
    And battery life.

    I don't think they have anything to worry about.
  • Palm Computing's first big product was grafitti for the Apple's Newton PDA. The idea eventually morphed into a full blown OS and PDA combination. I suspect that the main reason to go with the Motorola 68k series over ARM was to reduce power consumption. The Palm's twin AAA batteries are one of the main reasons a Palm can fit into a shirt pocket. The Newton was stuck with quadruple AA cells. That's almost the displacement of a Palm just for the batteries!

    Anyway, going ARM doesn't mean that Palm is going to beef up the platform's complexity to compete with WinCE devices. They intend to keep it simple and for good reason. The reason Palm is so popular is because it is so simple. I've seen people that are scared of computers (both PC and Macs) because of their complexity take to a Palm like a fish in water. This isn't exactly new either. Rumors of the transition to ARM have been floating around since early last spring.

    have a day,

    -l

  • ...is pretty much the most important feature for me. Up to now, going wireless with a PalmVx has been a pretty expensive thing to do. And I've looked into all the options, and even the cheapest one was the mobile phone kit for around $50 for a cable and some software. And it's not even sold in Canada yet (as of a couple of weeks ago).

    And the kit also implies having the Palm and a compatible mobile phone.

    Now with Bluetooth, you still need the Palm and the compatible mobile, but that's it. And these devices everybody already has. Ok, ok, maybe not everybody, but out of all my friends, I can't think of anybody who doesn't... No other cables, modems, etc. Maybe some software, but I'm betting it will be included in the PalmOS.

    So I'll finaly be able to check my email from my Palm, and not have to run around to find a free terminal in school... Wohoo!

  • I would think the answer to this is maybe a "No", since unlike in the Open Source world, Handspring's module technology is most likely a proprietary thing and will not be shared up the licensing stream with Palm. I'm thinking the fork, if any, will remain forked.

  • First of all, let's make it clear that Motorolla will be maintaining backwards compatability with the Dragonball series. Thus, new Palms can still run old programs.

    Regarding the speed comparison, it is the uninformed buyer that would assume a 200MHz WinCE^H^H^H^H^HPocketPC is faster than a 33MHz Palm. True that at 200MHz you can add integers a heck of a lot faster, but the PocketPC OS requires you to add many times more integers to accomplish the same thing. For example, consider the work involved in drawing an "OK" button in PocketPC-land vs. Palm-land.

    That said, using Palm's simplicity on a fatser ARM-based processor will simply make the Palm's faster -- which will make them perceivablty faster than PocketPCs even if PocketPC can still add integers faster.

  • Re: Palm -> ARM


    I suspect the reasons behind this is that Palm
    has it's eye on the GSM cellphone market, a lot
    of which use ARM chips inside.

    Perhaps Palm are hoping to compete with Symbian's embedded RTOS?
  • It was a show with outtakes from various shows/films.
    Brian Blessed (from the BlackAdder series, the Flash Gordon film and about 1000 other things) was trying to open a Palm Pilot which he was giving to a contestant as a prize. He got more and more annoyed, and came up with the priceless :

    "Pilm Pilot? Sounds like a fucking wanking machine!"

  • So quit smoking; that knocks you down by two. Then, eliminate the phone because talking to people is usually a waste of time anyway, and you're on your way to a reasonable loadd
  • ...as the subject says slightly offtopic but still:

    How about linux on PDAs? There is some sort of port to the iPAQ/Itsy but whats included whats left out? What other PDA/handlheld related open-source software/projects are there? Does anybody have answers?
  • I must continue to disagree.

    The fonts on the PalmOS can be horribly inelligble. The best way to increase distinguishability of letters on these screens is to increase the number of pixels each letter is rendered with. That can be accomplished with bigger fonts (leading to less information that can fit on the screen) or by increasing resolution of the fonts. I'd rather have the latter.

    Certainly it is impressive what has been done with 160x160. And I think what you said about developers acknowleding the small space and designing for it is important. But I also think that seeing the distinct square shape of each pixel from 3 feet away is poor.

    I think the same design philosophy used at 160x160 could be used at, say, 320x320. I only hope that if the resolution is increased that the philosophy is adhered to in practice.

  • Not true. It's true that you can't upgrade the ROM, but "patches" can be installed in RAM. Handspring has already released at least one OS update.

    This does have the disadvantage that if you reset your PDA's memory, you have to reinstall the patch. But you'll have to restore your data and third-party apps, so I don't see what the big deal is.

  • Palm doesn't seem to be sacrificing simplicity in their interface for new functionality with the OS upgrade. It's not like they're adding the ability to import word documents and powerpoint presentations, like some other companies [microsoft.com]. I think they're doing the right thing to remain competitive and to add the functionality that users are going to be looking for, namely bluetooth and compatibility with other devices, like cell phones.Just because Palm is adding support for 16-bit color screens and an ARM processor doesn't mean that they're sacrificing simplicity.

  • Multimedia support (Score:4)

    by IGnatius T Foobar ( 4328 ) on Wednesday December 13, 2000 @07:15AM (#562560) Homepage Journal
    While I personally wouldn't touch a Microsoft-powered device with a ten foot pole, the one thing that I've noticed their users enjoy is multimedia support. People want to use their pocket computers to play MP3's, and even take dictation. This is something Palm OS needs in order to maintain its lead.
    --

  • Elegance in Simplicity (Score:5)

    by CousinChimpy ( 227257 ) on Wednesday December 13, 2000 @07:15AM (#562562) Homepage
    I actually hope they don't go too overboard with the new features (in the OS and, implicitly, in new models). The thing I love about my Palm III is that it's simple, and does its job well. (The introduction to O'Reilly's Palm Programming [oreilly.com] does a good job of illustrating how the Palm's simplicity and appropriate-technology approach has been key to its continued success.)

    I looked at WinCE handhelds when I did my shopping (in '98). Their displays, while color, were hard to read (and also cluttered with Windows UI elements that didn't belong -- once you've crammed all the usual window trimmings onto a teensy screen, there's no room left to work on!). In contrast (pun intended), my Palm III's screen, although monochrome, is superbly sharp and clear. It also eats battery power at a fraction the rate of a color screen. To me, this is an appropriate compromise.

    Geez, though, I thought. This WinCE machine comes with 8MB of RAM built in. How come the Palm only has 2? A quick trip to the WinCE PDA's system info panel made the reason clear: WinCE itself takes up the first few megs of this formerly vast-seeming space! In constrast, the Palm's use of memory is impressively efficient. Under PalmOS, 2MB goes a long way. I can easily go for a year without bothering to purge old datebook appointments, etc. and not run out of RAM. This despite the many games and other apps that I've downloaded to it, and a few AvantGo channels I keep around. The OS' design makes for very compact apps.

    Another bonus: HotSync is a one-button operation, and almost never makes mistakes or requires further intervention on my part. This stands out in my mind as one of the best instances of smart software engineering I've had the pleasure to benefit from...

    To conclude this rant: WinCE is an unwieldy hydra of feature-bloat designed to insure that we can experience the joys of Windows everywhere, even on our PDAs... PalmOS is an elegant piece of engineering, appropriate to its task. While it's probably good news that the PalmOS is continuing to be updated, let's not forget a hard-earned bit of folk wisdom: if it ain't broke, don't fix it!

  • So, let's have a device that, as well as being an MP3 player/cell phone/watch/palm/etc., also has the added advantage of being able to blow someone's head off.

    Actually this isn't so far-fetched. According to this article [go.com], cellphone/gun combos are showing up in Europe. The firing mechanism is controlled by the keypad.

  • Re:higher res. will wait until 5 (Score:3)

    by Trinition ( 114758 ) on Wednesday December 13, 2000 @07:18AM (#562564) Homepage
    ...screen resolution is the biggest killer.

    I've long lectured this same thing. 160x160 doesn't quite cut it (though, they've done quite well with it.

    There are things to consider when adding new scree functionality to PalmOS PDAs which may give some insight into the great delay.

    • Prohibitive cost of larger screens (you just know these 160x160 screens are cheaper than a Happy Meal toy).
    • Memory -- larger sreens means larger bitmaps, larger font definitions, more memory for back-saving, etc.
    • Backwards compatability. Of course, I believe Palm could easily go to 320x320 and provide backwards compatability by making older apps use 2x2 pixels on the screen.

    Considering those things, I think Palm should still do it as long as they are wise about it. For example, this time, build generic hooks into the OS to support a wide range of color depths and reosolutions that they don't yet forsee. Of course, the downside to this is that there willbe more complicated data structures to handle such generic hooks. That will lead to slower programs and more memory consumption.

    So, can they do it without becoming laden with backwards compatability baggage?

  • I was positively drooling over the upcoming Handspring Prism, which supports 16-bit color (never mind there aren't enough pixels to display them simultaneously). However, when I saw it in person, I was disappointed, as it doesn't look any better than the Palm IIIc. White areas look awful; you can see the gaps in between the pixels as a black grid all over the display. It's really ugly. They need to solve this problem before I'll get very excited about color on my handheld.
  • Well, I guess Palm is finally building devices using the ARM family of processors. This brings a number of questions to mind:

    * How will these new devices run legacy Palm apps?

    * Assuming they have a built-in 68k emulator, is it likely that legacy Palm apps will run as fast as on the native processor?

    * Will an ARM-based Palm force the Palm devices to be any bigger, heavier or use power more quicky?

    -Karl
  • Not if you're using Linux, you can't.
  • I'm sure most ppl may (or may not) know that Handspring is comprised at the core of ex-Palm guru's. Ever since it's release, I have not heard one person speak bad about Handspring, I even see them being used on Junkyard Wars by all the guys with Phd's and such. It is about time Palm came forward and announced a new OS with support for all the latest features, however I am sitting here holding my breath that it will not be a fiasco like the 3.5 OS that was only available to a select few, or those that chose to purchase it. Palm's strength has always been an easy, straightforward way to upgrade the OS to take advantage of new developments, and I honestly hope this does not change as the company searches for ways to bring in more capital. just my 2 cents
  • Bluetooth doesn't give me unmetered always-on access to the internet. Why do I want it again?

    Well, there's much more to 'wireless connectivity' than Internet access, for one. Ricochet is a 'dial-up' means, but wireless includes Personal Area Networks - so you can dial your cell phone from your PDA without the two touching; so you could print from your Palm w/o first transferring files to a PC, or plugging it in to a printer; so you could synch with your PC from across the room or swap info Palm to Palm without routing your packets through the ISP's of the people involved. Such non-Internet uses are probably the biggest reason for Bluetooth - though there are alternatives to BT for these uses as well.

    Palm could use Ricochet for Internet access, but why? If a Ricochet device can be fitted with Bluetooth, then BT can serve an an effective way of getting a Palm to use Ricochet. PDA's live in a resource-scarce world, and the fewer features they have to provide the better - less storage for the programs, less hardware (marginally, but still, different types of transmission need different support), faster processing and less battery drain.

    For purposes of Ricochet on a Palm, they're much more likely to arrive as a snap-on MODEM unit, or a Handspring Springboard module than native support.

    Another reason very well may be that Ricochet is more strictly controlled by it's company than Bluetooth. BT isn't completely 'open' either, but it's less dependant on licensing, since it is a consortium standard instead of a product.

    Yet another reason is the bit-rate and range - which do matter together as well as separately. Wireless is by definition a 'shared medium', and as such, the less time you use to send data, the less likely you are to have it corrupted by someone else. The faster you can pump out the data, the more data you can send per burst. This isn't really a big deal in a sparse area, but you also have to consider the effective range of the device.

    Bluetooth is a short range transmission, where you'd likely hand off to a more potent (probably wire-bound) medium. Ricochet, IIRC, is longer distance and your sole link to a central location shared by other users.

    Both technologies use collision avoidance, spread-spectrum transmission and other tricks to optimise their use of the medium, so in this they can be considered equal; and so it boils down to the number of users in your xmit area (the smaller the area, the fewer users) and the rate at which you move data (the faster, the better due to lower likelyhood of cut-off).


    The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196

  • Palm I think needs some kind of update badly. Lately, Visors have been touting more and better features on the hardware front, and Microsoft's PocketPC software seems to be liked by many.

    There's a lot to like about Palms, and right now my Vx is by far the best handheld I've used. A new OS (with useful features) would go a long way to keeping Palm as the dominate figure in the PDA market.
  • ... and I who thought ex-Newton designers worked on Quartz for Symbian [symbian.com]

    (Whose operating system, licensed by "everyone" in the mobile industry, always has run on ARM processors ... )

  • The advantage of the Palm was that it did one thing and did it well. That made it more stable, reliable and efficient than WinCE^H^H^H^H^HPocketPC.
    Once Palm starts trying to compete with microsoft on features, they are doomed. That's playing by Microsoft's rules on their home court. You can't win that way.
    What most people want in a PDA is simplicity, reliability and long battery life.
    You get that by only including essential features, not by adding them willy nilly.
    Mark my words: Palm will die as a result of this.
    --Shoeboy
  • oh yeah, you can use it, but *many* devices are still not supported. My Intel Create and Share USB camera is one of them. A VERY inexpensive product that I recieved as a present.
  • Someone told me that Palm Pilots could be upgraded, but Visors couldn't. Just a question based upon the OS talk here.
    ----------------------------------
  • In perhaps the best-coiffed event of the day, Claudia Schiffer took to the stage to announce that her Palm Vx Claudia Schiffer Edition is now available on her Web site.

    Am I the only one who thinks there has to be a joke here somewhere, but can't quite put my palm^M^M^M^Mhand^M^M^M^Mfinger on it?

  • Uhhh... couldn't Handspring's devices do this a while ago?

  • Economics of it? (Score:4)

    by Christopher B. Brown ( 1267 ) <cbbrowne@gmail.com> on Wednesday December 13, 2000 @06:24AM (#562595) Homepage
    If the new models cost $600, then the fact that they've got "cool new stuff" doesn't prevent them from being as prohibitively too-expensive as are the "Pocket PC" units.

    When there are models selling for $250 ( insert evil joke about Claudia Schiffer here as needed :-)), the transition will be there.

    Until that occurs, they're not comparable, regardless of how Powerfully K001 they are.

  • From the article: (Score:5)

    by atrowe ( 209484 ) on Wednesday December 13, 2000 @06:25AM (#562598)
    "Palm is trying to enhance its OS to maintain its lead over Microsoft in the handheld market by selectively adding more features"

    WinCE has had 16 bit color and USB support for over a year now.

  • Maybe they can pull an Apple;

    Suffering from a long buzzword noncompliant OS, they buy a company consisting of former employees who have created a superior solution - and combine their technologies to result in:
    Mac OS X for Palm!!!!
    (wait! I don't need no damn translucent menues on my Palm!)
  • WinCE had to be coded from the ground up. The Win9x/NT kernel won't even boot on the MIPS/SH3 processors that Pocket PC's use. It will only boot on x86 architecture.

  • Comment removed (Score:4)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Wednesday December 13, 2000 @08:27AM (#562610)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Go Bluetooth! (Score:5)

    by jandrese ( 485 ) <kensama@vt.edu> on Wednesday December 13, 2000 @06:26AM (#562615) Homepage Journal
    Yes, 3com finally understands exactly what's missing with the current PDAs, decent connectivity. Current Palms only have the slow and flaky serial port or the slow and flaky IR port to communicate with. The Serial port requires a cable attached to another device, and the IR port has a range of about 2" and can be tricky to get working in some environtments.

    With Bluetooth Palms (and other PDAs) can automatically form piconets (small wireless networks only a few meters across) wherever they go. This is for more than just network games (as the article mentioned) but also for true collaboration in a mobile environment.

    In case anyone is wondering, Bluetooth is IEEE 802.15, and can best be summarized as 802.11a and USB rolled into one. Transfer speeds are in the 1-2Mbit range, and the protocol supports a "Service Discovery Protocol" for determing what is available in the local network.
  • Yankowski also talked about a 5.0 version of the operating system that will support higher screen resolutions

    I've borrowed a Palm a few times, and screen resolution is the biggest killer. If they can affordably (<$400) double the horizontal and vertical resolution, I'll be all over it.

  • Along with the 4.0 announcement was a demo of Samsung's upcoming Palm-based smartphone [cnet.com]. It's supposed to be a bit smaller than the already announced Kyocera QCP-6035 (aka pdQ2) and contains a color display and dial buttons on the LCD screen. Should be available Q2 2001 for around $500. This should give the MS Stinger phone a serious run for its money.
  • All of this stuff is good news, but when will we get hardware that supports it? Palm put 256-color compatibility into their OS over a year before the iiic came out, and that's still their only true color model.

    In addition, anyone notice that Palm's software scheme is a little.. backwards? Every other technological advance starts with hardware first, OS and software support second (for example, new video card support in X). Palm starts with software support first, hardware second.

    While this may seem forebearing, isn't this shooting themselves in the foot if their end hardware model becomes drastically different?

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