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Handhelds Hardware

Linux On The Dell Axim 126

Posted by timothy from the michael-are-you-listening dept.
An anonymous reader points to this interesting project to run the Familiar Linux distribution on the Dell Axim. "It includes a picture of the Axim running Linux and directions for loading Linux on the Dell Axim from the CF card. Looks like a good start to this project." It's limited for now (crashes after 15 minutes, must be loaded through the installed version of Windows), but everything starts out that way.
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Linux On The Dell Axim More

Linux On The Dell Axim

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  • Is that Linux in your pocket... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Joey Patterson ( 547891 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @08:49PM (#6335689)
    or are you just happy to see me?
  • step by step guide to installing linux on the axim [clanbv.org] for dummies.

    Have fun.

  • linux on everything (Score:3, Interesting)

    by jnguy ( 683993 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @08:51PM (#6335711) Homepage
    Why is the goal now to run linux on everything, from your xbox to your "Pocket PC" I understand the xbox, but will running linux on your pocket pc really be useful? is it even worth the effort, or is it just something cool.

    • Re:linux on everything (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 30, 2003 @08:54PM (#6335736)
      You're new around here, aren't you?

    • Re:linux on everything (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Erwos ( 553607 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @08:56PM (#6335745)
      As someone who's done a Linux install on his iPaq 3150, the answer is an unequivocal yes.

      You get far more flexibility, device support, and free software with Linux than PocketPC. Perhaps the only niggle is that you can't really get a browser into 16mb of RAM without constant crashes, but the Axim and newer iPaqs do not suffer from this problem. A nice side effect of storing everything in flash is that running out of battery only resets your clock, not your data.

      It's not for everyone, but I think it was worth my time...

      -Erwos

    • Re:linux on everything (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Surak ( 18578 ) * <surak&mailblocks,com> on Monday June 30, 2003 @08:56PM (#6335746) Homepage Journal
      In a way, it's kind of useful from an advocacy point of view. We can truly say that we have an operating system that scales to virtually any device, large or small, and can run on virtually any processor technology. Linux runs on anything from PDAs and small embedded devices to IBM mainframes today. You can't say that about *any* of its competition.

      • I'm not really sure how useful of an attribute that is. It's like the Jack of All Trades, Master of None argument. The competition is usually available on relatively few platforms but performs very well on them. Sure Linux can run everywhere, but is it good everywhere? That kind of generic... osity... may detract from the ability to be an expert type of system.

        No, I haven't used Linux, but a great many argument I've read and agree with have to be usability and nativity to the platform. If Linux isn't nativ

        • Re:linux on everything (Score:4, Insightful)

          by Surak ( 18578 ) * <surak&mailblocks,com> on Tuesday July 01, 2003 @06:06AM (#6337859) Homepage Journal
          No, I haven't used Linux, but a great many argument I've read and agree with have to be usability and nativity to the platform. If Linux isn't native to anything, then who uses it on what? When will standards be developed?

          Au contraire! Linux is native to *every* platform it runs on.

          It's important to note that the Linux kernel, along with the pieces of GNU system that you need to run with it (gcc, glibc, GNU toolchain, etc.) are written in C, which is a mostly portable language. Some parts of the kernel were written in assembler, although I *think* that has changed, and those parts originally had to be ported to each processor, but again, I think this has changed.

          In any respect, Linux is ported to each processor it runs on. Most of the work done in porting Linux to a new platform involves porting gcc and glibc, and then optimizing the kernel and those pieces to run well on that platform, including doing obvious stuff like moving from 32-bit to 64-bit, little endian vs. big endian, etc., but other things including optimizing for the way that that platform handles memory, for instance, optimizing pieces that are timing critical, and writing device drivers for different pieces of the I/O system, etc. (I've never done the work myself, so if I've missed something, hopefully someone more capable than myself will point that out, but this is basically the process as I understand it)

          So there you have it...Linux is native on every platform it runs on.

        • Linux is VERY generic. But linux is both a horizontally and vertically integrated environment.

          That is, many parts of linux are specially aimed at certain target platforms and environment. Also, it helps that linux itself is a very small thing, just a device intergration framework, scheduler, and set of required libraries to help software get onto the ground floor. E

          You get app frameworks on top of it that are targetted to the platform that you run linux on.

          To backpedal, the only real thing that makes one
    • It's just an attempt to run on netbsd, which is reputed to run on everything from univac to a beehive (if you add the proper terminals.)

    • Duh (Score:4, Funny)

      by Hatta ( 162192 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @09:09PM (#6335834) Journal
      If you don't run linux on it, you can't make a beowulf cluster out of it.

    • Useful, in time. (Score:3, Interesting)

      by nurb432 ( 527695 )
      Once its stable, the applications will come..

      Then you arent tied to Microsoft for your updates/licenses/applications/privacy/etc.. You can do as you please.. Its called 'freedom'..

      Unless there comes a time when the hardware agreement forbids you to run anything but what is given you ( such as Xbox.. )

      • Then you arent tied to Microsoft for your updates/licenses/applications/privacy/etc.. You can do as you please.. Its called 'freedom'..

        Unless you're a seasoned Linux (on a PDA) programmer with masses of free time and energy - which rules out 99% of people on the planet - you're going to be tied to someone somewhere for your updates/licenses/applications/privacy/etc..

        Otherwise being able to do "what you please" is pretty much a pipe dream.

    • Re:linux on everything (Score:5, Interesting)

      by dubStylee ( 140860 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @09:16PM (#6335879)
      will running linux on your pocket pc really be useful?

      I'm someone who didn't pay enough attention to that question a few months ago and is way sorry now, here's my story:

      1. I purchase the Toshiba e740 with pocketPC 2002
      for $600

      2. Six months later pocketPC 2003 comes out and Toshiba declinces to make it available to e740 users.

      I now have no possibility of any kind of upgrade for any of my software. I am stuck with what was available pre-2003 for the rest of the life of the device. Now if Toshiba leaks out enough information about their hardware to allow someone to port linux to it, I could eventually upgrade the software.
      • I am new to linux but would this mean i would be able to port any application from linux to my PPC running linux?
        • Well, theoretically yes, although of course hardware will limit some things. This would seem to be one of the answers to the "why bother" question; once Linux works on an Axim an enormous pile of software becomes available.

    • Someday M$ will announce the KitchenPC blender. It will network to your fridge so that you will know when you can make a smoothie. The instant it is announced, a collection of OSS coders will begin porting Linux to it. Six months later, M$ will drop the blender effort, but will have spent its real effort on something useful to someone (ok, another service pack!)

      Why is the OSS community so obsessed with re-inventing the wheel? (Or Unix for that matter...) Lets see another desktop model, for example, instead

      • "Why is the OSS community so obsessed with re-inventing the wheel? (Or Unix for that matter...) Lets see another desktop model, for example, instead of Yet Another Windows Clone..."


        Without re-engineering compition to Microsoft we will within 5 years have, surrendered all digital communication technology world-wide to one small consortium.

        Nothing less than this is the corporate manifesto of Microsoft. If it can't control absolutely then it perverts through lobby in Washington D.C.

        Of course MS never doe
    • i'm been around linux since maybe 6 or 5 years, and have a PocketPC since 2. An Ipaq to be accurate. The point on having linux on this kind of devices are several. As other have point out, one is to be able to say "you can ran linux on a toaster". ie, linux is flexible and powerful -as a tech platform ("you CAN do with linux whatever you want") and as a development model ("you MAY di with linux whatever you want"). Other point, is options. Monopolies lead nowhere, all slashdoter know this. I know, there is
    • I understand the xbox, but will running linux on your pocket pc really be useful? is it even worth the effort, or is it just something cool.

      I think it is useful, for the simple reason that the Linux community doesn't abandon hardware like the commercial companies do. If Dell dropped their Axim line because it wasn't making a profit, the PocketPC version would probably be less useful over time as fewer and fewer new things would be available for it. But with a Linux version, new stuff should typically su
    • Good question, though personally I see more utility in running Linux on a PPC than on an XBox. I mean, it's a hell of a lot easier to just get a cheap PC and stick Linux on it than mod an XBox for the same effect.

      An offtopic observation: I'm waiting on a replacement Axim (dropped it. Doh!) The estimated ship date was June 10, and it's 3 weeks later now. Not a word from Dell, and their order status page just shows 'In Production'. Has anyone else been waiting on their unit?

  • Crashes after 15min? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Eberlin ( 570874 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @08:52PM (#6335714) Homepage
    These guys are getting too good at imitating the competition!

    Relax, it was supposed to be funny.

    • Re:Crashes after 15min? (Score:4, Funny)

      by NotAnotherReboot ( 262125 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @09:04PM (#6335794)
      If they're aiming for imitating the competition, they should write in random crashes. It always crashes after 15 minutes, but why not allow it to crash at 8 minutes, and later at 13 minutes? Keep the users on the edge of their seats!
      • Article: "Though, beware that it currently [colon] panics after about 15 minutes, and when you do the hard reset, it boots back into Windows at factory default settings (meaning, you lose any files you might have stored on it)".

        Imitation is the sincerest form of flatulence.

      • Re:Crashes after 15min? (Score:2, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Or introduce a version of Clippy that goes something like...

        It looks like you're doing something important
        Would you like:
        * A BSOD
        * An obscure error message followed by a BSOD
        * A call from Doc Watson that shuts off the app
        * Info on whom all your base are belong to conveniently placed on a BSOD
      • It should be configurable, preferably with an XML file and an arcane UI. If I want my Axim to crash after 12 minutes, I should be able to.

        It's all about choice, dammit!

  • *waiting* (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 30, 2003 @08:53PM (#6335728)
    Now waiting for the obligatory soon-to-be-Slashdotted "I'm running Apache on my Axim!" news item ...

  • linux remote (Score:5, Interesting)

    by tobes ( 302057 ) * <(tobypadilla) (at) (gmail.com)> on Monday June 30, 2003 @08:56PM (#6335744) Homepage
    Using the Axim as a X client on a wireless network would be kind of like having a kick ass linux remote control.

    • Re:linux remote (Score:3, Informative)

      by dubStylee ( 140860 )
      Using the Axim as a X client on a wireless network would be kind of like having a kick ass linux remote control.

      You don't need linux for that. You can run VNC from pocketpc OS.
      • yes, but can you run a VNC server on PPCOS?
        • yes, but can you run a VNC server on PPCOS?

          Not that I know about. There are certainly a number of other remote control/emultors that will let you run the ppc device from a remote (windows :-() box. I was just pointing out that some open source solutions exist for the platform, not implying that it is as flexible as a linux install on the same device would be.

  • Imagine a... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Atario ( 673917 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @08:56PM (#6335749) Homepage

    ...deck of 52 of these.

    (Fooled ya, didn't I!)

  • Well, I do congratulate this fellow on putting Linux on the Axim, but it seems to me that it has no purpose at all... If you really wanted to do something for the coolness of it all, I would like to see an Axim running Mac OS X, and burning CDs. That would be worth posting about.
    • Someone gave that post a modpoint? Wow. No accounting for taste.
    • Besides the fact that (a) my university only provides a free VPN client for wifi for desktop machines (including Linux), which means I can now use my PDA to get on my campus' wireless network, (b) I can run & compile (assumable, given time) anything for Linux, which means I have a vastly improved collection of software to choose from which I do not have to pay $50 a piece for, (c) I could have Linux in my pocket, and (d) my Grenade-Launcher-Wielding-Penguin background will no longer be just fluff, no, I

  • Familiar Linux? (Score:5, Informative)

    by MoThugz ( 560556 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @09:04PM (#6335793) Homepage
    Before I read the article I thought the submitter was having fun poking RedHat (or in the case of slashdot... gentoo), not stating the actual distro used, but just saying that it's very familiar.

    Who would have thought (besides those who actually does dev stuff on handhelds) that there actually is such thing as Familiar Linux [handhelds.org]!

  • Qtopia? (Score:1, Interesting)

    by $calar ( 590356 )
    I see that it runs Qtopia from Trolltech. Is that GPL or not? I didn't think it was, of course I could be wrong. It's great to see KDE's portable cousin on this thing.

  • Another day another port (Score:5, Insightful)

    by lavalyn ( 649886 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @09:09PM (#6335835) Homepage Journal
    We've seen Linux scale from as small as wristwatches to mainframes (both courtesy of IBM, oddly enough). So porting Linux to any particular handheld with an MMC is almost blase now :|

    Now if only they could make it usable beyond 15min...
  • How is this likely to change the market for PDAs?

    A little, a lot?

    Is it likely that HP Ipaqs or Dell Axims will be the preferred pocket pc platform for running linux?

    If you were going to buy a new device would it already run linux?

    It seems that a Dell device that could run linux would mean lower prices for the performance, particularly for vertical applications.

    I already have a Dell Axim so my decision is made but I am curious to see how this new development will affect people who haven't bought a pocke
    • Well, currently, there are HP employees (researchers, formerly Compaq, formerly DEC employees) helping with making it work on HP iPAQ units. This helps the iPAQ porting efforts go quicker than ports to other company's handhelds. However, the product cycle time on iPAQs seems to have gotten pretty short recently, and we're having troubel keeping up with the model families as they come out (54xx support is appearing, 19xx bootldr work is in progress currently).

      Dell doesn't exactly provide info for these pr

  • Nagware Linux (Score:3, Funny)

    by SynKKnyS ( 534257 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @09:18PM (#6335896)
    Crashes after 15 minutes? Well, you have to register it of course! =P
  • ...never had walk around doing site check of a wireless network using a laptop.

    Walking around a campus checking signal strength with something like this is real nice.

  • you have the other 'cheap' PocketPC, I have accomplished much the same on the iPAQ h1910, of course with the support of the handhelds.org team. Come visit us on IRC on irc.freenode.net, channel #handhelds.org - and say that joshua_ sent you :)

    ~joshua
  • I just happened to be on Dell's web sight looking for a low end Mircosoft 2000 Power Edge to use as a print server and noted that an OS option was "Red Hat Linux 9.0"

  • Obligatory Zaurus quote (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Gothmolly ( 148874 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @09:46PM (#6336028)
    The Sharp Zaurus 5500 et al support Linux, in fact, they SHIP with Linux. Install OpenZaurus and you have real Linux, yet with real apps, SSH, etc. etc. And it runs longer than 15 minutes.
    I mean, this is cool, but hardly the breaking story of the decade.
    • And it runs longer than 15 minutes.

      It does!? Mine doesn't, the battery life sucks so much I stopped using it a few hours after I got it and went back to my blackberry.....

      I hope they made some improvments in the 5600, becuase the 5500 definitly was not practical.

      -Rob

  • Why not? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by gpmart ( 576795 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @09:47PM (#6336032) Homepage Journal
    I know that I will indeed sound like a rube, but isn't a pocket pc really just a toy anyway? I use my Axim to surf the web wirelessly and check my mail, but most of the time I use it just as a toy. Who really does word processing on these things? You can't take notes. Even surfing is pretty painful. On the toy side, however its a relatively useful device. Its multimedia capabilities are pretty good(its a good MP3 player and a good ebook reader [sourceforge.net](which allows me to read linux docs [ibiblio.org])) but I think people that have the geek positive gene wouldn't mind playing with something new simply for the toy potential. Ultimately, their are some upsides to these things:
    • SSH(which I have yet to see for ppc.
    • Coding in other languages than the M$ langs
    • xterm
    • testing embedded stuff
    Its a small, shallow pool of users but for cheap geeks who want to play with operating systems(that might be 99% of us) this is a good way to play embedded linux on a system that we use for other things.
    • >SSH(which I have yet to see for ppc.

      Mocha Soft [mochasoft.dk] makes a really good SSH client for PPC. Pair it with a thumb keyboard and wireless card, and you're good to go.

      It's got a relatively nag free trial mode, and is one of the cheaper ($25) ones to boot! Two thumbs up! (Or on the keyboard.) :)

  • Why not Zaurus? (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Why just don't you get Zaurus SL-5600 ? Same hardware as Axim and it has keyboard!

    The most important is that your money go to company
    supporting Linux on PDA!

    When you buy Axim - your money goes to Dell and Microsoft and neither of them suport Linux on PDAs!

    There is so much talk about no Linux notebooks
    - here you have a very good Linux option,
    why don't you support it ?

  • Web browsing. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by atheken ( 621980 )
    IF NOTHING ELSE.. Maybe we can finally escape the "Pocket IE" crap.. how about mozilla for axim! Incidentally, anybody know what the deal with the Windows Mobile 2003 upgrade from Dell is? I got my axim a few weeks ago and I have yet to find how I can get the upgrade.
    • Go to http://www.aximsite.com, and check one of the forums. The upgrade went on sale last week, and is scheduled to ship in the third week of July for $29.99 + shipping. If you bought your Axim in the last 30 days, the upgrade may be free.

      Cheers

  • Everything starts out that way.. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Peter Cooper ( 660482 ) on Monday June 30, 2003 @11:24PM (#6336520) Homepage Journal
    It's limited for now (crashes after 15 minutes, must be loaded through the installed version of Windows), but everything starts out that way.

    Or in the case of Microsoft Windows ME Upgrade Edition, stays that way!
  • For that terminal application, almost half the screen is taken up by useless junk (buttons, tabs, etc.). With a GUI like that, Linux won't stand much of a chance competing against Palm or even PPC. Unfortunately, the same is true of many of the applications on my Zaurus.
  • Imagine a 400mhz Axim with good game controlers and a ipod-size hard drive.

    Movies, games, emulators, with that kind of hardware the sky's the limit.
  • reboot it and *poof*
    • Boy are you missing the point.
      The memory allocation of the Linux alows it to boot as an os even though it is not using effectively all the file storage access. Try that with a windows based os. Thump, crunch, no go! Put the Linux on its flash rom instead of pocket pc then you will have a real compact versatile os.
      The memory mapping work done by the guy who wrote it is brilliant.
  • You said "crash" and "Linux" in the same sentence! Now /. is gonna have a week of Linuxnazis barking up poor Timothy's tree.
  • This runs linux natively, why not support Sharp for doing this. It has a full , usable keyboard, and runs in landscape mode OR portrait mode.

    I figure that portrait mode is better for the non-CLI crowd (e.g. windows users) and landscape is better for CLI users. This looks perfect, if a little big. SSH from anywhere!

    See the gadgeterr review to get an idea of the real size. http://sharp-world.com/corporate/news/021112.html [sharp-world.com]
    http://www.the-gadgeteer.com/sharp-c700-review.htm l [the-gadgeteer.com]

  • crashes after 15 minutes
    Wow, linux has finally acheived the stability levels of Windows!

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