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Handhelds Hardware

Linux + Ipaq + MIT = Project Mercury 52

Posted by timothy from the will-it-happen-oh-oracle? dept.
NineSeventy writes: "Infosync has a short but interesting article and photographs regarding an 'ueber' PDA project being developed by Compaq and MIT called Project Mercury. Despite being somewhat sketchy, the article explains that this new mobile compututing 'solution' will involve an expansion sleeve, a camera and a 'downscaled version of linux' running the whole thing in place of Windows CE. I want one." There are also some interesting Linux-PDA-related sidebars.
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Linux + Ipaq + MIT = Project Mercury More

Linux + Ipaq + MIT = Project Mercury

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  • unfortunately it's unlikely that this gift from heaven to PDA geeks will be commercially available any time soon as it still only has the status of a research project.

    why would compaq sit on something this potentially cool? I mean, this isn't marketroid fluff and vaporware--the guy in the pictures is actually holding one. it's right there. how about someone sticks it in a box and sells it?

    you could argue that they don't think there's enough of a market to make a device like this profitable, but if that's the case why spend money to develope it in the first place?

    sean

  • One problem I'd see was that not all of them would support syncing well. That was a problem with gnome-cal and the palms a few months back, actuall syncing couldnt be done automatically because gnome-cal didnt record enough info, or something of the sort.
    treke
    Fame is a vapor; popularity an accident; the only earthly certainty is oblivion.
  • Probably left up to the user, most Windows users are going to be syncronising with a small set up applications. Who knows what joe-Linux-user's preffered mail client, calender program, whaterver is going to be.
    treke
    Fame is a vapor; popularity an accident; the only earthly certainty is oblivion.
  • who said that you wouldnt be able to....
  • You're worried you wont be able to run Wince? hahahahahhahahhaha. Dude get a clue. Wince isnt going anywhere. It will be more expensive of course, and be a closed environment... but to each his own.
  • I just saw a movie yesterday named Project Mercury.. The Project Mercury was an NSA-encryption system, which an authistic child could break by just looking at it. Bruce Willis was saving the Kid from the NSA - Killers .. hmm, well, in the movie, the project just went down the shitter because it wasn't worth anything anymore, I hope this doesnt happen to the PDA ;)
  • Okay, stupid question, but a quick search hasn't given me an answer. Can Linux be ported to the Palm or Handspring PDA's? Why try and convince people to buy a different piece of hardware that *won't* run PalmOS? Why not just try and replace PalmOS on the already popular PDA's, the way Unix widely replaced DEC's operating systems on the PDP's and Vaxes?

    John

  • I mean, this isn't marketroid fluff and vaporware--the guy in the pictures is actually holding one. it's right there. how about someone sticks it in a box and sells it?

    The thing that looks strange to me about it is the lack of any screenshots. Sure, they have a neat little mock-up, but that may be all it is. I'm betting it's vapor.

    you could argue that they don't think there's enough of a market to make a device like this profitable, but if that's the case why spend money to develope it in the first place?

    Hey, this is Compaq, makers of the $650 iPaq. They seem to have a niche for useless stuff that few people will actually buy.
    --
  • An essential on any handheld. The most used program on my old TI-85 was Tetris, and on my Palm.....what better to get me through a boring class or meeting than a little Tetris? And it even looks like I am working on something :-)
    ----
  • Who'd run access as a web server backend? :)
  • Maybe a hoax? Check out the Apple/Palm [infosync.no] handheld - A poorly done photoshop hack. Here's another one [infosync.no].

    Milinar

  • This is nowhere near cutting edge technology that they're doing with an Ipaq. I have high expectations from MIT but this seems like a lame project. Digital cameras have already been put on almost every pda already, i can even buy one for a gameboy. If i was going to buy a gameboy camera it would be a lot smaller and a lot cheaper. I could buy 2 gameboys with 2 digital cameras on them for the same price i'd pay for an ipaq sans digital camera. So buy using a free OS and using a digital camera i would have to pay hundreds of dollars more? How well does linux even operate in the PDA enviroment. My handspring visor works fine. If it's not broke don't fix it.
  • So many people want them that we had to introduce one with a greyscale screen. I'm not certain if what you say about iPaqs not being allowed is true, I've heard of one person who did have one on site. To my knowledge it's basically the same as a laptop, just don't bring it into contact with the red net or you'll lose it. Most modern laptops have mics and speakers, with recording software. They were banning those to my knowledge until it became difficult to find notebooks without those features. Of course I could be totally wrong in all of this. In which case please dis-regard.
  • This new Compaq gadget looks like a step in the right direction. We just need to work on a cloth with embedded display that can go ridgid when current is applied.

    Why? We're already working with organo-phosphate displays which are laminated onto a plastic that can be rolled up. They are brighter than conventional LCD, and if you mount it on a spring loaded roll like projector screens, and put it on small rails for the top and bottom It'll stretch and still stay somewhat rigid along the top and bottom edges.

  • LINK (Score:1)

    by Xuther ( 223012 )
    The link for the mercury project at compaq's crl.

    www.crl.research.digital.com/projects/mercury/

    Double pc-card expansion pack with integrated video camera. The prototype calles for an ipaq with linux loaded, and is a step towards portable video-cell phone/personal organizers.
  • Yea, the thing looks pretty cool...does it turn on?

  • Maybe openwave.com [openwave.com]? They have a nice mobile phone emulator. I don't know if this is the type of experimenting you want to do though.

  • On my ipaq where it's been since November 2000.
    I have ipaq running full debian distro using wireless nfs connection to the bulk of the files.
    Now with stowaway keyboard, it's either a pda if I want to use the apps in familiar distribution or a full-fledged computer (I can browse, ssh, etc. into anything like any other machine).

    Only difference I see with Mercury/Oxygen is the enhanced sleeve interface. With the dual-sleeve coming out, I think this would be easy to do for the rest of us.

    -Nowt

  • I see what you're saying here, but it would have been good marketing to pick a GPL'd Linux app or two that hot-syncing would be supported with as delivered. As it stands, this is a device which runs Linux, but is most useful to those running Windows as a primary OS. The marketplace will soon tell if this was such a great idea.
  • Probably some silly person decided to log web requests to an MS Access database, live. Ha.
  • This is straight from the site you linked to.

    That's right! Every contributor making a donation of either money or project-related services is automatically entered for a chance to win the very first production MyLinux PDA unit.

    You see the word money in there. There is a reason why its there.

    Arathres


    I love my iBook. I use it to run Linux!
  • Thanks for the link--that's encouraging, but I still don't see where it mentions any specific application which runs under Linux for it to sync with. I can "exchange information" between darn near anything with a serial port and my Linux box, but I can't synchronize a Palm with pine (or other Linux hosted MUA) or gcal (or other Linux hosted calendar). Can the Agenda do that out of the box without custom scripts? Or if it can do it with custom scripts, do they tell the user what the Agenda needs to see to do it?
  • Linux-based, indeed. And that's about all the Linux support one gets with this, apparently (boldface mine):

    The bundled QuickSync software in Agenda synchronizes
    Outlook from the unit. QuickSync is compatible with any PC operating system that can run Outlook including Windows 95, 98, 2000, Windows NT 4.0 and Windows Millennium. QuickSync requires 2MB of hard drive space and 16MB RAM.

    No where do I see information on synchronization support for anyLinux application.

  • Generally, I've liked Gene Rodenberry's worlds (Star Trek, Earth Final Conflict, Andromeda).

    Every since I first say Earth Final Conflict (EFC), the only near future world of Gene Rodenberry's, I've be obsessed with two technolodgies on the show. The first is the Holo-Lilly (no longer featured, was from when Auger was around and Lily wasn't dead). The other (and more relevant here) is the handheld computers that they have. Those things are soo cool. An expandable screen. Lots of CPU power. And built in wireless networking and a video camera.

    This new Compaq gadget looks like a step in the right direction. We just need to work on a cloth with embedded display that can go ridgid when current is applied.
  • Yes, those pictures of the Ipaq are quite pretty, but where is linux?
  • Actually you can download their Linux sync software right now. I haven't used it myself, but it appears to work with Korganizer right now.

    See their CVS [agendacomputing.com]

    I admit that Agenda Computing has not made it very clear that they have developed the Linux sync software. In fact they did not develop any Windows sync software. They contracted it out to another company as one of their employees said on the developer list:

    We have contracted out the windows portion of syncing the VR3. They are writing the software to sync the VR3 with Outlook, Outlook Express, Scheduler +, Lotus Notes, Lotus Organizer, Acts, Goldmines, Palm desktop. It is not finished yet, but I'm sure a message will go out to the list when it is ready.

  • And I quote:

    NineSeventy writes: "Infosync has a short but interesting article and
    photographs regarding

    Next time look before you post.
    __________________

  • SALAD BARF! DELI-DUMP SUSPECT NABBED

    A gross-out gourmet was caught dumping human waste on a Midtown salad bar - and is suspected in more than a dozen similar stomach-turning incidents, police said.

    Workers at the deli grabbed the feces-flinging fiend after they noticed him emptying two bottles of disgusting-smelling liquid onto food trays in the back of the store at around 5:40 p.m., police said.

    Cops responding to the bizarre call arrested Arellano and confiscated the bottles, which were sent to the Health Department for testing.

    "Oh, it makes me sick just thinking about it," said Alpine customer Dawn Riggins, a 33-year-old beautician from The Bronx. "What kind of person would do that? It's disgusting."

    Arellano was charged with reckless endangerment, criminal mischief, criminal tampering and public urination.

    And in a twist sure to make Midtown workers lose their lunch - or never eat it again - police said they are investigating numerous other incidents at eateries in Penn Station, Grand Central Terminal, and around 42nd Street.

    Officials said Arellano has already been identified by witnesses as the man who recently tried to foul the food at Mike's Take-Away Deli in Grand Central, and will soon be charged in that case.

    Other suspected victims of the dung-disher in the past few days include a Krispy Kreme, Zaro's Bakery, and Caruso's Pizza in Penn Station, police sources said.

    Police are also investigating him for other alleged incidents, officials said.

    Police said several proprietors witnessed what they thought was bizarre behavior by a man matching Arellano's description - while others had customers complain of foul odors coming from certain foods.

    Deli customer Keshia Williamson said the incident explains why deli salads often taste like, er, garbage.

    "I'm sure this happens at other delis, too," said the 21-year-old college student. "The person who did this is an animal. He could've gotten people sick.

    "I'm not going to eat anything more from a salad bar."

  • sweet. (Score:2)

    by pb ( 1020 )
    These plans are always sketchy, but I'd love to see a Linux PDA.

    More importantly, I'd love to see the software!

    Heck, I wouldn't mind having handwriting recognition apps on regular Linux to play around with...
    ---
    pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate [ncsu.edu].

  • Oh, I have one (probably more then one). I also know that a few bugs linger after any testing and are only found in real life use. I had one bug stand five years of daily use. It took three years to show up the first time, two more to get enough debug info, and then I fixed it in half an hour.

    Or maybe I just don't want to go back to an unprotected environment after so many years of using them...

  • with a Linux PDA you could do all sorts of things. You could run various server daemons, code, browse the web, etc, but why?

    Well, the one big advantage of Linux would be the new shareware scratchpad scribbling thing couldn't accidentally overwrite my calendar or memo pad info. PalmOS has pretty much no memory protection. Not only no protection, but everything that would normally be stored on the hard drive is sitting around unprotected in RAM (except the small amount in FLASH or ROM).

    That's the main reason I haven't written any PalmOS apps. Sure it would be great to have a custom darkroom timer, but it's more important to me that the whole thing not go up in smoke.

  • The Compaq iPAQ has 32M RAM and 16M flash. It's a real computer. The Agenda device is just a PDA that happens to run Linux.
    -russ
  • Here. [handhelds.org]
    -russ
  • This is a research platform. The camera is as much to look at the user to see what they're doing as anything else. The accelerometer lets the machine know the direction that it's camera is pointed. The Mercury has an *additional* 32MB flash built into it. And the audio interface / headset jack is an acknowledgement that the output-only stereo headset jack on the iPAQ was a mistake. The iPAQ really needs to have an audio jack which can accept either a 1/8" stereo headset, or 1/16" cellphone headset (mono out, mono in) jack. And it's a dual PCMCIA sleeve, not single like the original PCMCIA product.
    -russ

  • yer, all through that movie you have to appreciate the doublethink exhibited by character played by Alec Baldwin. He talks about being patriotic and at the same time is trying to cover up the fact that the cryptography they are using is weak, something that will ultimately hurt his country. He is capable of using the argument of patriocy and simultaniously being incapable of seeing the obvious flaw in his argument.
  • This is the first time I have seen a actual picture of the artist mockup that was posted a while back. This thing is pretty cool, from what they are saying. The earlier posting had said compaq was looking more at using Linux for this thing. I am glad to see this addition is being persued. We'll have a handheld with almost as much power as a desktop and that's pretty cool. I am waiting to see if this thing becomes a reality. If it does, I WANT ONE! :) I imagine this thing would be popular with someone like Jenni from Jennicam or one of the other cam girls. Tis is something they/I have been looking for. I would use it for amateur radio SSTV.
  • I'd love to be able to experiment with programming 3G, gprs and location sensitive devices, but unfortunately these services aren't available where I live (yet). Is there anyway to get around this problem? Simulators perhaps?
  • I don't know just how efficient a Linux PDA would be.

    "Palm and Handspring pretty much have the PDA market wrapped up."

    There's a good reason why, too. The OS's that run on these PDA's are specifically designed to run on PDA's. They're designed to have a small(ish) memory footprint with limited multitasking and maximum functionality. I know in Palm's case, PalmOS is an extremely nifty little OS, and I don't really see what more people could want from a PDA.

    Sure, with a Linux PDA you could do all sorts of things. You could run various server daemons, code, browse the web, etc, but why? The majority of stuff you'd be doing would be pretty trivial notes, addresses, appointments: all things that existing PDA's do efficiently enough. (probably more than the bloated (for a PDA) Linux kernel would be)

  • It looks like Compaq is doing the hardware and MIT is doing the software. They have some extremely ambitious, yet vague, goals for Oxygen.
  • These plans are always sketchy, but I'd love to see a Linux PDA.

    *AHEM [agendacomputing.com]*
    --
  • But what about those of us who just want to run it on the original WinCE?
  • Only money will get the Linux PDA's out there - Wrong. [azpower.com]

  • So the current list of linux PDAs here or on the horizon now stands:

    Agenda's Palm Clone [agendacomputing.com]

    Sharp [cnet.com]

    PalmPalm's Phone PDA [palmpalm.com]

    VTech's Updated Version [linuxorbit.com]

    Samsung's Yopy [samsung.co.kr]

    Lernout & Hauspie's version with Speech Recognition [lhsl.com]
    maybe more?

    At this rate, I might as well develop one.

  • The article link: "The Network is busy"

    The picture link worked. (kewl!) But the link from the picture to further text revealed:

    Microsoft OLE DB Provider for ODBC Drivers error '80004005'

    [Microsoft][ODBC Microsoft Access Driver] The Microsoft Jet database engine stopped the process because you and another user are attempting to change the same data at the same time.

    /en/ssi/ssi_ad1.asp, line 28

    Now that's one I haven't seen in before -- at least as a result of clicking on a "read more" link.

  • I don't see what's so great about this thing. The only actual features they mention on that page are the accelerometer (which I doubt the usefulness of) and the camera (kind of cool, but who needs a camera on their PDA? If you want a camera, get a real digital camera). All the other "features" are simply the same features the regular iPAQ + PC card sleeve has. Bluetooth, GPS, 802.11b, 1GB MicroDrive, GSM, CDMA, those are all available through PC cards with the regular iPAQ.

    The "audio interface with a headset jack" is built into the iPAQ, as is the 32 MB RAM and 16 MB Flash ROM (which they somehow confused with 32 MB "flash ram"). The Linux and X-windows software package is likewise available without this "backPAQ" thingy.

    What's the big deal?

  • Re:why wait? (Score:3)

    by jimhill ( 7277 ) on Sunday April 15, 2001 @05:38AM (#290690) Homepage
    What do you mean, "that few people will actually buy"? Compaq has sold millions of iPaqs and recenly announced (again) an expansion of manufacturing. They've got a backlog of 700,000 orders at the moment. Every Palm user I show my iPaq to (who has the disposable income) orders one.

    Now if only I could take it to work...(Los Alamos doesn't allow items with voice-recording capability behind the fence, which means no iPaq, note-taker, or Furby.)

  • in Dertouzous' new book (Score:3)

    by peter303 ( 12292 ) on Sunday April 15, 2001 @10:36AM (#290691)
    See the Unfinished Revolution [amazon.com] by MIT PRof Michael Dertouzos (inventor of structured programming) for a description of Mercury and other MIT CS projects.

  • Not top-secret (Score:3)

    by Russ Nelson ( 33911 ) <slashdot@russnelson.com> on Sunday April 15, 2001 @04:20AM (#290692) Homepage
    Those of us working on Linux handhelds [handhelds.org] have known about it since Jamey started designing it. The main problem with putting it into small-scale production is paying Compaq Research for it. They're not set up to take people's money. Plus, it's not FCC certified since it's not a production device.
    -russ

  • Re:Deja vu (Score:3)

    by EvlPenguin ( 168738 ) on Sunday April 15, 2001 @03:46AM (#290693) Homepage
    No where do I see information on synchronization support for anyLinux application.

    You didn't look far enough. [agendacomputing.com]

    • With our QuickSync Cradle and software, you can easily exchange information between your Agenda and your Windows or
    • Linux PC. You can also send & receive email and connect to internet.

    --

  • Deja vu (Score:3)

    by EvlPenguin ( 168738 ) on Sunday April 15, 2001 @03:28AM (#290694) Homepage
    A linux-based PDA, you say? [agendacomputing.com]
    --

  • This could work. (Score:3)

    by LordArathres ( 244483 ) on Sunday April 15, 2001 @03:26AM (#290695) Homepage
    I do believe the biggest problem with the PDA market is that there are tons out there to choose from. Palm and Handspring pretty much have the PDA market wrapped up. Recently we have seen Linux versions out there but the reviews have been less than good. So many bad things why would this one work. I think the biggest problem with a company wanting to get into the PDA market is financing. And with the market financing is about as hard to get as the RIAA to endorse anything that "might" infringe on their profits. By getting well funded organizations into the fray getting a good, stable and inexpensive PDA that runs Linux to the market becomes more of a reality.

    I know about the IPaq but I dont like Windows. So I bought a Handspring which I love. The biggest reason for the Handspring was that I needed good applications which is one of the PalmOS based PDA's greatest selling factor. That and the Handspring has the expandable modules.

    Linux PDA's will be out in due time. They will be good and they will be inexpensive. The key is we need to get the RD factor funded by a company that wont fold because their stock drops. Only money will get the Linux PDA's out there and able to compete with the current one. Money and Linux, two words that do not usually go nicely together.

    Arathres


    I love my iBook. I use it to run Linux!

  • Re:sweet. (Score:4)

    by Russ Nelson ( 33911 ) <slashdot@russnelson.com> on Sunday April 15, 2001 @04:21AM (#290696) Homepage
    Handhelds.org [handhelds.org] has a WIKI. Search it for "stroke" or "scrib" and you'll find multiple handwriting recognition apps.
    -russ

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