Agenda VR3 Review 110
jlam writes: "Brighthand has a review on the Linux based Agenda VR3 PDA. Sounds like the product was rushed out the door after being delayed almost a year, has performance problems, and is depending on the talents of the open-source community to help fix the problems. The review has screenshots of the PDA including the boot up screens." I've also been using mine. I agree with parts of the above review -- there's some definite problems with the device. However, from what I've heard there's a device with a 130 MIPs chip, rechargeable battery and some other goodies in development right now. The additional speed will help out, as the current device has speed issues. Summary: It's got definite potential, but I think it came out a bit too early.
Re:Vaporware, vaporware, how I adore thee . . . (Score:5)
That's a cheap shot. They're being sued by Milberg Weiss, who with an ounce of research you'd find sue any company whose stock drops a lot. The scam, of course, is "give us some settlement money or we'll trash your company in the press and drag you through court for the next five years. Past victims include VA Linux [slashdot.org], amongst many, many others.
Fun links: Milberg Weiss nailed for $45M [coopercook.com]
... or try searching for "Bill Lerach" on Google.
An article titled "Bloodsucking Scumbag" [lycos.com]
Okay, so its a sows ear. Where do we start? (Score:2)
Personally, I like the looks of it as a hardware platform - certainly if it's open enough for me to hack with it using regular Linux-style tools, I'd consider getting one if just for the sake that it's a hackers tool.
So, what do we get? Do we get details on the hardware? Do we get the cross compiler? Is there a FAQ/Howto from Kessler on how to build apps for it?
Do the bundled apps come with source? What's the environment *on the thing* like? Just how much potential does it represent to me, as a hacker, interested in building my own environment in a handheld architecture, using tools I'm familiar with?
If I get good answers to any of these questions, regardless of the fact that it's a sows ear right now: I'd buy a VR3, sight unseen.
I think *THAT* is the point of this whole article. Lord knows we don't need to crap on these people - let's instead discuss the *POTENTIAL* this platform gives us hackers from a fun/candy perspective... because obviously it's not a CONSUMER-ready product.
But we are not all Consumers. Some of us are hackers
Also, where do we buy these things form? Anyone got a URL?
We should port this to it: CVoiceControl ... (Score:2)
More details on CVoiceControl here:
http://www.kiecza.de/daniel/linux/cvoicecontrol
I'd imagine it'd be a pretty easy port
Re:Okay, so its a sows ear. Where do we start? (Score:1)
And I presume it's actually got an MMU, which I'd be pleased to see - people can go on about how marvellous PalmOS and ucLinux are, but I don't like the idea of any app being able to turn my PDA's stored data into random bits, or, for that matter, go rifling through any stored files on there.
Anyone managed to boot it with an NFS-root? There's no particular reason why you can't test it that way, afaics. (And develop on it, for that matter - I did my CompSci course on DEC 3100s, and if this is twice the machine and doesn't need to run X for network-based use, it should be relatively nippy.)
I should also point out that at $179 (developer price) it's a bit of a bargain, certainly compared to UK prices. (Palm m105: 110 quid tax included; Agenda VR3: 125 quid plus shipping/tax/whatever, for something potentially 4x as fast.)
Yopi (Score:1)
Unfortunatly, I can't seem to find the link :-( Was I dreaming? (I'm 85% sure I bookmarked it, At work :-(... I'll post it tomarrow AM if no one finds it first).
Found the Yopi Link (Score:1)
Re:trying to beat yopy (Score:1)
hack job (Score:1)
review was marginal at best, I'd consider it just plain sloppy .
he seemed upset that it slowed down with 6 apps? I have a Handspring (which I love) and you cannot run more than ONE app at a time. So he's bitching about a feature that is totally unique in it's class because it's slower? how was ONE app at a time, or two or three? what apps did he test beside grafitti? and was it grafitti or his lousy penmanship that caused the problems?
looks like this is still not ready for prime time, but then neither is this reviewer!
Re:Ugh. This is not what we need. (Score:1)
Ugh. This is not what we need. (Score:3)
Re:This is a very bad way (Score:1)
You missed the "open six or more (apps)..." bit of that line. First off, who in the hell would run 6 apps at a time on a tiny screen like that. Also, it hardly seems fair to slam linux for not being ably to cram 6 apps into a pathetic amount of RAM, and juggle 6 tasks on that CPU.
Re:Okay, so its a sows ear. Where do we start? (Score:2)
Bit longer answer... Yes, you get source...you can browse the CVS tree from the developer site. There are FAQs on building apps...heck, as sold, it's X! The cross-compiler tools are readily available at the Linux VR site [linux-vr.org]. Another good Agenda development site is here [umbc.edu].
Potential?? TONS. X is pretty heavy on the thing...so I'm probably not gonna use it! I'm working on setting up a rootdisk with Microwindows [microwindows.org], an OSS windowing environment that's a lot lighter-weight than X. Still in development, but I think there's a lot of promise there. If you can still get into the Developer's Program rates, you can get an Agenda for $179. (I got one for that price two weeks ago). As a hacker, you Cannot Beat That. It's awesome...I'm running a full-fledged Linux box in my hand, and I have total control, source, development tools, etc. It may not be ready for the Masses yet...but we aren't exactly the Masses now, are we?? *grin*
Re:Ugh. This is not what we need. (Score:2)
Re:I see no points against Agenda (Score:2)
Umm, this is a PDA not a laptop. As a PDA user, I can tell you that I regularly flip between 5-6 applications in the course of a day. These apps are in memory (I use a Palm m105 these days) so there is a delay of at most a second or two, if the app is large. A delay of 4-5 seconds would annoy me to no end, let alone 40 seconds.
It seems that Agenda just didn't put that much effort into turning Linux into an embedded os. There are more issues than simply Will it run on a PDA?
I don't know. I haven't seen one for real yet. Based on this review and another I read in Palm Computing Magazine, I'm probably going to hold off until v2.0, if there is one.
Re:What about this one (Score:2)
That VHS Video Tape size is horrible. Anything much larger than a pack of playing cards is too big to carry around all the time.
Re:if you want to program it, for example (Score:2)
Programming PalmOS is a breeze for anyone with a working knowledge of C. I actually prefer programming for PalmOS to programming GUI apps in Unix because of the simplicity and consistency of the platform. You don't have to bother worrying about widget placement, or color depth, or any of that extraneous crap that makes X windows programs so cumbersome to program (and so great to use).
Just because you can't program it in Visual Basic doesn't mean that it's impossible to work with. Oops, my bad, you can crank out apps for PalmOS in VB. [www.appfor...argetblank] Well, there goes your argument
Here is the Developer Info! (Score:2)
http://developer.agendacomputing.com/ [agendacomputing.com]
One design flaw (IMHO) is that all of the user applications on the machine are written in C++, due to the embedded design of the software.. C may have reduced the footprint required to "push" the applications, but that is my opinion..you don't have to agree
The graphics toolkit (C++) they are using is very cross platform, perhaps they decided to use it incase they would later decide to move to WinCE?? It is called FLTK [fltk.org]. The machine itself runs XFree86, so all of your existing X11 applications should run fine; although the screensize may be a little limiting.
This platform just needs optimizations, they are using very open technologies and opened it up to developers, infact.. most of the software is already on most linux machines!
As far as the WindowManager is concerned, it is FLWM.. of course based on this high-level graphics library. For speed's sake, there are definately much "lighter" windowmanagers out there! A modification of RatPoison or ION would be perfect for this device, much cleaner.. faster..
It shouldn't take much to make this a much faster machine, just remove all the applications shipped with it!
If I get the money, i'm buying one!
Re:Credibility of Review (Score:2)
Hmm, he runs Linux on his web servers, and has given a very good review of Linux efforts on the iPaq side. Maybe it's because he has seen how well Linux can run unofficially on another PDA that he's, well, a bit disappointed that a commercial effort couldn't beat a few people working away in a Compaq research lab.
Type? (Score:1)
Re:We should port this to it: CVoiceControl ... (Score:1)
Wow, is this guy for real? (Score:2)
Where should I start with this? Poor spelling invalidates any claim to being human? OK, whatever. Does that mean we can round up and slaughter all the poor spellers?
The "liberals" are responsible for Ruby Ridge? The shooting occured on August 22nd, 1992. Pray tell, who was president then? That would be George Bush, wouldn't it?
Women have "nothing to offer an employer"? That's because they should be at home it the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant, right? I hope you didn't vote for Bush Jr. You must be sorely disappointed at all of the "unproductive dead weight" he has working for him at the White House. Judging by your rant, I'm guessing that you voted for Buchannan.
Anyway, if any moderaters see my post, please mark it -1 offtopic, along with the sexist white supremacist post I'm replying to.
Re:Port or not a port? You decide. (Score:1)
Microsoft realized they got this wrong. Look at a Windows Powered Pocket PC, and you'll see they've changed the interface quite significantly. There are still things like a "start menu", and app menus, and dialogs and such, but they're cleaner, easier to use, and, most importantly, faster. As well, Auto PC has never used the win32-ish interface that most people think of when they here "Windows CE". Nor do any Dreamcast games that use WinCE (admitedly very few games use WinCE, but that's a different discussion), nor the upcoming (are they out yet?) Microsoft Powered Handheld PC (the revamp of the old clamshell machines, targetting mainly at business customers), nor the upcoming CE-powered cell phone. In short, Microsoft learned, and advanced their design.
Consider reading the book I referenced in my previous post (you should be able to find it at any bookstore, so just sit down at the store and read the first few chapters). If you did so, you'd realize that the reason behind bringing over the win32 API was not to protect the desktop operating system, but instead the leverage the developer workforce that already knows win32 programming. By using a subset of win32, they significantly reduced the learning time neccessary for programmers to write apps for Windows CE. True, not every single function was ported, and there are other functions that are CE-specific (and have no analog in normal win32), so there's still a curve, but it's much shallower than learning a new API.
Rather than blindly bashing on things you don't understand, why not try learning about them instead?
Re:Is Linux really the OS you want on your handhel (Score:3)
Windows CE (also known as Windows Powered * PC, where * is Pocket, Handheld, Auto, and Cell phone, and whatever else) is not a port of Windows (any version, 9x or NT). It's a complete rewrite from the ground up. The misconception comes from the fact that Windows CE supports a subset of the Win32 API (look around on MSDN sometime and you'll see a lot of functions that either aren't supported by CE or have limited functionality -- the goal was to reduce the number of APIs that have duplicate functionality).
Windows CE is actually very nice OS -- extremely modular, able to take advantage of several hardware platforms (MIPS, SH3/4, ARM, PPC, and x86), and written explicitly for embedded systems. Most people seem to dislike Windows CE (prior to Pocket PC, anyway) due to the clunky gui. What most people don't realize, though, is that it's not difficult for a development house to replace the gui with something nicer-looking (look at the AutoPC, for instance, or the Pocket PCs, which run Windows CE 3.0), thanks to the modular nature of Windows CE. For an interesting read about the origins of Windows CE, check out Inside Microsoft Windows CE [barnesandnoble.com] (John Murray, Microsoft Press). It's a bit old (September 1998), but it gives a good account of how Windows CE was originally supposed to be a stripped down NT, but ended up being written from scratch.
Re:trying to beat yopy (Score:1)
There's room for both systems. Agenda's the lower end one. Yopy will be the higher end. Just like there's room for iPaqs and Palms today.
Re:Ugh. This is not what we need. (Score:2)
They've normally got plenty, and at good prices too.
Re:Ugh. This is not what we need. (Score:2)
You could probably find someone who would, the question is whether it'd be worth it once you'd sorted the currency changes and shipping.
Just noticed they've got Loot USA which might be worth a try.
http://www.lootusa.com/
Good luck, they're worth it in the end. Proper little computers and lovely to work with.
Performance is fixable (Score:1)
I think Agenda is concentrating on getting feature-complete and bug-free before tuning for performance. Isn't that what y'all would be screaming for anyway?
The easiest way to fix the "lots of apps running eats all memory and the machine dies thrashing" problem is to do what WinCE did to deal with the same issue: automatically ask background apps to close. This would certainly solve the problem for two important classes of users: the casual "hey what's this do" newbie, and...reviewers.
This shouldn't be too hard to implement. Until then, just close apps you aren't using---that's the usage model everybody here wanted on WinCE: explicit app shutdown.
I'll paste in Shane's comment [brighthand.com] from the Brighthand discussion:
The romdisk there is quite speedy. So again, my speculation is that Agenda wanted to concentrate on getting feature-complete and bug-free for launch before the ABI switch. Isn't that what you'd do?
PalmOS : MacOS :: WinCE : Windows (Score:1)
The VR3 is slow not because of the CPU, but because the root filesystem is cramfs. (For the uninitiated, this means file contents are compressed with zlib and must be uncompressed to RAM before use.) If you have a 10 meg box, 15 megs of crap, and a tooled-up production line in China, you do what you gotta do because busybox will only take you so far and rework isn't cheap. Masked ROMs are far cheaper than flash in production quantities, so once the code gets finalized, they can devote a 16MBx8 ROM to the kernel and default application suite and the sucker will fly.
The consumer system ROMs could easily afford to lose things like bash, top, chroot, strace, and rsync (which isn't really a good solution for desktop synchronization anyway, since it handles only files, not records). If a user really wants bash on a palmtop they can blow their own megabyte on it. They can probably strip out enough of the incidentals to fit the resulting system into 10MB. Or, they could add another 8MB (or 16MB, if they feel generous), devote a whole 16MB chip to the system disk, spend less CPU and power on decompressing executables, and everyone goes home happy.
But is Linux a desktop OS or a server OS? Or an embedded OS? Or two or more of the above? Or might it have purposes outside those pigeonholes?
-jhp
Re:Yopi (Score:2)
-russ
Re:Vaporware, vaporware, how I adore thee . . . (Score:1)
The Clinton-damaged economy has taken enough blows.
So I guess you're ready to go back to Regan Economics with the trickle down bullshit and double digit unemployment?
Quite frankly, I'm enjoying the so called "Clinton-Damaged" economy for the last few years. Hopefully, your buddy boy Georgie W Bush doesn't destroy what we built for the last 8 or so years.
Have a good day. :)
Re:Going to wait for a post-release review (Score:2)
Though Linux isn't perfectly suited to handhelds, it isn't bad. The reason these things are slow is because they run X. Though it "isn't ready for prime time" yet, I and a couple others have been working on creating a usable PDA system. It will work on nearly any CPU, but the focus is on the 68EZ328. Yep, the same one in Palm computers.
The OS is uClinux [uclinux.org], and the user interface is a project I've been working on since last March, PicoGUI [sourceforge.net]. The video drivers still need lots of work, but for the most part uClinux and PicoGUI gives good results even on a little 16mhz CPU. This will allow better battery life no matter what CPU used. Smartdata [smartdata.ch] has been working on a handheld computer using PicoGUI, and I have a piece of hardware [sourceforge.net] or two [sourceforge.net] that will run it.
Login? (Score:2)
Gimme a break! I treat my palm pilot like my wallet; I wouldn't hand it to just anybody to riffle around with.
---
Cheap, high-speed, full featured domain hosting: LoudServer.com [loudserver.com]
Re:Login? (Score:1)
And I won't give accounts to just anybody either. :-)
It runs a real OS, when it's connected to the network, any authorized person can upload or download files. When I'm near computers with big screens and real keyboards, I don't want to mess with the PDA screen and stylus, but I do want to update the todo list and calendar.
I want it to come with me, when I'm going somewhere away from real keyboards.
Re:Why not just build a controller yourself? (Score:1)
I'll let the Mindstorms run the motors and poll the sensors, and the PDA can talk to the outside world. I've got 2 Mindstorms, so I can control 6 motors and read 6 sensors.
The PDA can run a web server for public stuff and ssh for programming.
Slightly more expensive than a Lego Mindstorms (Score:2)
I expect a small machine running Linux with a tiny display, a serial port and an IR port. I hope to run ssh, a few tiny programs I write myself and scripts written in Perl, Python or Tcl.
The most important feature: it is small enough to ride in a robot built out of Lego Technics, and it can communicate with the Lego Mindstorms.
It'd be cool if it was usefull as an organizer, but that's not required. Heck, I've been happy with some toys that were clearly only release 0.1 material.
Re:6 to 8 hours of use? (Score:1)
I guess it all depends where your priorities are. Right now I've got a Palm IIIc, and I get close to 2 weeks on a charge. Not bad. It's perfect for what I need it for. I take notes on it, keep my phone book, do term papers, tune my guitar, blah blah... and it's a hell of an improvement over my old Nino, which (though outdated) was over kill for me.
I could see uses for a $250 grayscale PDA that's slow as hell and runs for 6-8 hours... coolness factor, expensive terminal and what not. Let's face it, chicks dig PDA's... err... but anyway, I guess some people just have different needs than you and me. And most likely bigger budgets. Hell everytime I enter a deposit into GnuCash the thing laughs at me.
Mike.
Re:Childish nonsense (Score:2)
Re:Login? (Score:1)
Just think if your competitor got a hold of your PDA with all the sales/costings/forcast figures and all the future strategy presentations for your company. PDA's are easier to lose than your wallet so you better watch out.
PS: If you think people won't carry that kind of info around on their PDA think again. Execs can't wait until they have a Powerpoint viewer and VGA out on their PDA's so they don't have to lug their laptop to a 3 hour meeting just so they can show a presentation and access email.
Re:Is Linux really the OS you want on your handhel (Score:1)
I haven't read the book you mentioned... I'll look for it the next time I'm at Barnes and Noble. So consider this post from a semi-informed person
While WinCE is not a port in the strictest definition of the word, it is *strongly* based on the desktop version of the OS (not just the GUI). Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't CE have the same basic directory structure and APIs? Doesn't it use DLLs and a registry? If so, I disagree with your statement that WinCE is "...a complete rewrite from the ground up."
As far as I understand it, M$ did it this way to make development easier for NT/9x developers (as you mentioned in another post about the APIs). In many respects, that's a smart (and ethical/legal, IMHO) way for M$ to take advantage of their large developer base for their desktop OSs.
The apparent downside to this strategy is that CE appears to have inherited many inefficiencies and buggy behavior from the desktop OS. Just compare the Psion Netbook to CE devices with similar hardware... the Psion is extremely responsive while the CE devices are sluggish (EPOC is not a perfect OS either, but that's besides the point).
Of course, you could argue that Linux is also a poor choice for a mobile computer due to it not being efficient (and that's a legitimate point). But even if we ignore the efficiency issues and bugs of CE, there's still the existence of DLLs and the registry (and the various problems that come with those things... not being able to fully uninstall programs, conflicts, etc...)
So, I think M$ should've *really* designed CE from the ground up to run on a handheld.
Re:Ugh. This is not what we need. (Score:2)
But for adjenda, they don't have the profits from another line of EQ to prop up the other line so they can survive long enough to come out with a working version.
And, if this curses all future Linux handheld efforts, there is NetBSD and Wind River backed FreeBSD as options for Open Source based PDA's. Or, if you can live with access to 90% of the source code of a Palm PDA, they have source you can look at.
(The other choice is a Windows for Pen platform, complete with just plain wrong code examples
Re:Going to wait for a post-release review (Score:2)
Re:Slightly more expensive than a Lego Mindstorms (Score:2)
What you want really is to take a commercially viable PDA like the iPaq and find a way to subvert the consumer orientated OS in favour of something open you can hack about etc.
Re: Spending money (Score:1)
Re:I see no points against Agenda (Score:1)
POSIX and X (Score:2)
I wonder if similar work is done to the Linux and the X server that Agenda uses. If it implements the full POSIX and X interface, no wonder it is such a slow beast.
Remember: even small software with small footprints on your desktop machine become bloatware when run on a PDA.
Re:Vaporware, vaporware, how I adore thee . . . (Score:1)
damn (Score:1)
Re:This is a very bad way (Score:1)
I can see it how it might work differently, but I wodner if the reviewers were expecting it to eb more Palm-like.
-J
Re:This is a very bad way (Score:2)
I don't have a theseis for this post... it's part agreement and part disagreement and part me ranting, so bear with me...
rather than be forced to recommend a winCE powered, or palmOS powered device.
You say that like it's a bad thing. Now, I'm no fan of WinCE, but Palm is a good handheld OS.
Think about recommending a PDA to someone. Say this is a co-worker with significantly less tech experience than yourself asking for a recommendation. Do you really think they want to work with Linux on a handheld? Maybe they do. Or maybe they want something that's fast, clean, user-friendly, and designed to be a handheld OS. PalmOS or PocketPC may be better for this.
(Forgive me if I misinterpreted what you said about recommendation.)
It worries me that people are so swift to discount PocketPC and PalmOS in favor of Linux. One of the problems with WinCE (and this may still be a problem with PPC) is that MS basically tried to scale Windows95 down into a handheld, and it just didn't work (not "work" in a program-won't-run sense, but in functionality and ease of use). One part of the review caught my eye: "That's right, the Linux operating system that works so phenomenally well for web servers (including the two running the Brighthand web site) grinds to a halt in this version "
I admire the attempts to make Linux work on more than just servers and desktops. If someday I can switch between ("dual boot" :) ) PalmOS and Linux on my handheld, I will be very happy. But Linux is not necessarily the be-all and end-all OS for every application.
PS...It looks like Agenda is trying to make Linux work as a good handheld OS. But as you point out, people will be reluctant to see it as such if Agenda keeps this rush-release practice up.
-J
Re:Ugh. This is not what we need. (Score:3)
Re-badged Psion Revos. Best handheld device on the market - Runs the Symbian [symbian.com] Platform, aren't much bigger than a Palm V and has a good keyboard.
Re:Wow, is this guy for real? (Score:1)
I've got a palmIII and a visor why an agenda? (Score:1)
Why should I get an agenda? I don't have time to retype my 700+ address section, my 500+ memos or my schedule for the next 3 months?
Tell me why I should get an agenda?
Review is correct, but potential of device is good (Score:3)
Would I suggest it to a normal PDA user? Definitely not yet. It needs to have its task switching system fixed, its X optimized or stream-lined, and its startup procedure tailored to end users. However, if you hook up the serial port to your linux box, start up ppp, and then telnet into the device, its amazingly passable as a unix machine. Of course that is not what it's designed for. Most people don't want a 2x speed DEC 3100 workstation
As to the limit on the number of apps: First I noticed that swap wasn't used, nor should it, but a 2.4.x kernel running out of memory without any swap-styled VM pages seems to "fit the bill" for what happens to these devices when you run too many apps. My guess is that some kernel hacking needs to be done to better handle low-memory management. But consider this. I got python on it, and it works, a few threads and all.
End result: It needs a lot of help, but it has enough ooph (66mhz, 16mb flashram, 8mb rom) to be a very reasonable PDA.. it just needs to have its resources re-oriented and one needs to not attempt "quick ports", which are easy, but do not take into account that its such an under-powered linux device that tweaks are a must!
This is what we need. (Score:1)
The software cannot be worse quality than Windozes, but this is not really important.
Anyways a commercial entity will not be able to provide good software. Keeping it longer should only inflate the price or the chances the company goes belly-up. Now you pay mostly for the hardware, which is the real value you should pay for.
The important thing is that since all the specifications are open it can generate a real culture and generate value around it, as happened many times in the past with open platforms.
And runing Linux gives it appeal to real potential developers who can make it happen.
So, I ordered one just to encourage the company
and I'll take the chances to junk it or to have the best PDA on the market after one year (well, the best to my standards which do not depend too much on being easy to click).
Re:The OS doesn't matter that much (Score:2)
PDAs are handheld devices, with limited memory (management), display and input capabilities. Most Linux apps don't even think about these things. By the time you've gotten to work slashing the footprint and rewriting the UI, it would have been just as quick porting it to any other PDA.
The OS doesn't matter that much (Score:5)
For PDAs the bottom line is the applications, battery life and form factor. What operating system it's running comes in a long distance behind these biggies. The OS certainly plays a part in all of the above things, but the end user simply doesn't care that much. Get the apps running right and it could be running CrapOS 0.1 for all the user cares.
Personally I think Linux has the potential to be great for PDAs but maybe not with the Agenda.
Rechargable Batteries (Score:2)
For a PDA user, that uses two AAA batteries, I recommend 4 of the Nexcell AAA [thomasdistributing.com], which have a 700mAH capacity. Having 2 sets of 2 lets you cycle between charging and using the batteries. To charge those little bad boys, I recommend the MAHA MH-C204F [thomasdistributing.com]. It charges my totally drained AAAs in under an hour. For those who need to use AA batteries, check out these 1740mAH capacity bad boys! [thomasdistributing.com] With that much juice, you really can catch 'em all! Anyway, just some FYI for the power users out there.
Re:Rechargable Batteries (Score:2)
because it runs linux (Score:1)
Debian distro (Score:2)
Still, I'm glad to see SOMETHING in the handheld in Linux, even if it wasn't ready for production. Now, when Debian comes out with one, I'll think about it.
DanH
Cav Pilot's Reference Page [cavalrypilot.com]
Re:Ugh. This is not what we need. (Score:1)
SealBeater
Re:Childish nonsense (Score:2)
Besides, you seem rather trollish anyway -- Theonomist, huh? The Blavatsky school of tax reform, no doubt -- you never know when California will fall into the sea and we all have to move back to Atlantis.
At least you're making no pretensions about who and what you are -- you're either a delusional supply sider/Ayn Rander or a troll with a Mocha Java IV drip.
/Brian
A Linux fan, but not an Agenda fan... (Score:2)
I am a Linux fan, okay? I want to get that out of the way right now, because I'm about to perpetuate an egregious act of anti-Karma whoring. The Agenda was a bad idea. Linux is a great server system. It could be a great desktop system. But Agenda's way of doing things has flagrantly ignored the lesson Microsoft should have learned: you can't scale a desktop OS to a palmtop. IT JUST DOESN'T WORK.
Linux is not an embedded OS. It's too damn big to do the job effectively without cutting out massive sections of the code -- and would you still have Linux when you were done cutting? We have Elks -- close enough to Linux for the purpose. We have Minix. Both are fairly small and royalty-free.
Agenda blew it on other counts; nobody will disagree with that. The interface is choppy, the marketing nonexistent, and the implementation is a mess. But I still believe that running Linux on a PDA for anything other than sheer hack value is almost certainly a ticket to disaster.
/brian
Re:This is a very bad way (Score:1)
I wonder if people's expectations have been steadily dropping, and they no longer actually expect technology to work when they buy it.. Perhaps thats what they are bettting on -As long as it has nice packaging, lets not worry about those little functionality issues..
Re:This is a very bad way (Score:1)
- -You mean it's free? As in free beer? No licensing costs? *rubs hands in glee*
..We'll be rich, RICH I Say! Mua ha ha..
I assume this because I worked with someone who called me up when 'Linux' meant 'big ol' IPO' and asked me if I knew anything about it.. turns out they had a penny stock mining company and they wanted to jump on the bandwagon and get the stock up.. -They were going to do 'Linux Training'.. funny thing is that by the time they had done up their news releases the market had begun to slide..6 to 8 hours of use? (Score:3)
Re:Credibility of Review (Score:2)
Yes, the reviewer should have gotten out an accurate scale and measured exactly how heavy it was, and then gotten a second scale and verified it - but we can't have everything.
Re:Rechargable Batteries (Score:2)
Granted, the Energizer NiMH batteries are only 1200 mAH, but the difference is more than made up for in the cost of shipping those "bad boys" of yours.
Going to wait for a post-release review (Score:5)
I eagerly await a review after the April 23rd ship date - I want to see the potential this thing really has. I will probably seriously consider a second generation device, but it must have usability as well as the "toy" factor, including these features:
- lithium ion battery with decent (10-20 hour) lifetime. This is one of my largest considerations because otherwise I have to plunk down more money for less-convenient NiMH batteries (which I use in my current PDA and digital camera).
- Slightly larger screen. This agenda has a 3" x 2 1/8" screen (interesting that a Hong Kong company uses English units, or so it seems). This is just too darned small, like the Palms, for my liking (my WinCE palmtop has a wonderful 2 1/2" x 4 1/2" - unreasonable for handhelds, I know.) Also, reverse backlighting annoys me, there should be a switch to make it normal like the Palm hack.
- A set of physical scroll buttons (up and down) is essential; I like to read on my palmtops, and to tap to scroll down too much of a pain.
- The applications should run about as fast as Palms - after all, the Palms have less than a 30 Mhz processor. This is the true test of how fast Linux can be on slower devices.
- expansion cards for storage and wireless networking are essential - modems are practically useless (at least to me), but a wireless network card would give me access in many buildings I occupy.
We'll just have to see how it goes.
Re:Port or not a port? You decide. (Score:1)
Well maybe not the biggest, but its up there.
do not click that link.. (Score:1)
Re:This is a very bad way (Score:1)
This is a very bad way (Score:3)
I would have much rather had to wait a few months and had a product that worked nearly flawlessly, so that I could recommend it to my friends, rather than be forced to recommend a winCE powered, or palmOS powered device. It's really a shame that market pressure ruins so many good ideas.
trying to beat yopy (Score:1)
Bingo Foo
---
Trenchant Insight (Score:2)
<RANT> Oh what a steaming pile of self-righteous crap! I'm sorry to have to inform you that in the private sector these days, virtually everything is always shoved out the door before the engineers say it's done. The fact is we all love to perfect our creations, but time (or VC funding) waits for no man, and the suits do indeed have a job -- get the product out there and start pulling in revenue before all the cash is gone. </RANT>
Take a look at Mozilla at any time over the past two years -- it always seems like they just need a couple more months and it'll be perfect. Netscape bit the bullet last fall and shoved NS6 out the door -- now it's four months later and Mozilla just issued a new roadmap [mozilla.org] that delays '1.0' until Q3. Should Netscape have waited "a few months"?
Things get done in this world by people who design, execute, tweak it up a bit, shove it out the door, evaluate, re-prioritize and do it all again. "Works flawlessly"? Ha! Product design is asymptotic -- you'll get closer and closer, but you're never really THERE, and so someone has to stick their neck out and say "enough already". Companies run by engineers do NOT necessarily succeed -- you need a balance of technical and fiscal considerations in any decision.
Sounds like Agenda's got problems, but as has been stated elsewhere, it's too early to make a judgement on that.
- Master Of The Obvious
Not for 85% of the market yet. (Score:1)
For Us...
In order to become a great consumer product, it's going to take a while. Someone tell me the last time a great open source app, or any app was ready to go in under a few months.
From what I understand is that Agenda isn't building the bulk of the software. Rather it is turning to people, like you and me, and saying 'Oh you'd like that? Well go build it!'
But the great thing about that is, if you read the mailing list is some of the great ideas that come up for applications. Although I do think it will be a little time before people start engineering pure palm apps for it, cause so many people are way to excited about a linux os on a PDA.
Whoa I just installed Apache on my PDA man!
"If you can't beat them, arrange to have them beaten."
-- George Carlin
What about this one (Score:1)
Latest excuse for bugs? (Score:5)
I can just see the letter to customers now...
Dear Customer: Thanks for buying our PDA. Sorry it is a very buggy. But you can volunteer to fix it for us!
how's the interface? (Score:1)
Re:Login? (Score:1)
I know I wouldn't want anyone to find my top secret stash of ipaq pr0n! [brighthand.com]
--------------------------------------
This isn't suprising... (Score:1)
the next one will be better, the one after that will probably be as good if not better than competing PDA's
take a breather, and then realize that this is the natural course of the computer industry, new products have problems, it's unavoidable
personaly if I had the money, I'd buy one of these because it's a handheld device that runs linux
Re:Excuses (Score:1)
go back and read it again, without reading into it that which I did not put there...
Not too disappointed (Score:1)
Some Reality Here (Score:1)
2. Agenda hurts themselves by realeasing this with an older image of the software-- a very buggy one. You must flash the sucker with a new image. This solves numerous problems (not all). I attribute these fixes to the fact that this is a Open Source project-- and has a Source Forge home page (I forget it, but you can link to it of Agenda's developers site).
3. This is the only PDA that I have seen that out of the box you can Telnet into, run BASH, micro-emacs, vi, soon Perl, currently Python, ect. Since it runs X- it runs tons of simple games-- which also run plenty fast after they get done loading. The apps are also open source. If anyone does not like them-- make your own.
4. The screen quality is not the hottest-- but I paid 179 dollars for something with 66 MHZ proc, 8 Megs RAM, 16 Flash, and IRDA. I can telnet to it over the IRDA, I can run BASH-- I can program for it in C, C++ and soon Java (Kaffe is ported to it soon), I can print to my IRDA printer.
5. Battery life: The agenda does not last a mere 8 hours. This guy (in the article) is full of crap. Mine has been running for weeks on the same set of alkalines. It will last only 5-7 hours of Continous use. This article presents some good facts, but the author shows extream carelessness and ignorance.
6. He is correct about the Palm sync stuff, where is this? I sure I can find it if I look through open source sites, but it should come with it, as well as be available on the web site. Until then, I can always telnet and copy stuff.
Bottom Line is if they: increase Ram, increase screen quality, and make it wireless enabled--maybe add a handspring syle port on the back of it-- I would be more than willing to pay mucho cash. The OS is not at present an issue for me-- its 2.4.x.
Odd... (Score:1)
Review is out of date (Score:2)
It is important to note that this is not a consumer release. It is easiest to use the VR3d with Linux, not Windows. (Although, I just synced mine with my PC and am upgrading using 3rd party developer tools under Windows).
Non-hackers should wait until a consumer version is released. Hackers will probably have fun doing what they want with the system. The VR3d is completely open (except for the bootloader, or PMON). When I see a bug in the system, I am free to download the source and fix it for myself.
-Sean
no subjuct you stupid computr (Score:1)
Credibility of Review (Score:1)
The Review, which is more like a rant comes into better focus and you realize the whole thing was as unprofessional as it sounded on the front page. Mabe this guy is ticked off at Linux for some reason, but why is he using the devel Agenda and reporting bugs that have already been reported about the devel version? A reviewer needs to have some sort of knowlege before reviewing something like this.
I see no points against Agenda (Score:1)
The performance and the amount of big X-processes is no serious point against agenda.
A classic Linux user needs console-based apps and cross-compiling functionality.
Brighthand brought a good point (Score:1)
Port or not a port? You decide. (Score:1)
Windows CE, of course, isn't a straight port of Windows 9x or NT code but it is a port of the interface. And while this interface is fine for a 800 by 600 or greater desktop, it's far too clunky for a handheld display a fraction of that size - the Start menu, dialog boxes, the whole windowing metaphor are all inappropriate for something that small. This is where Microsoft has fundementally got it wrong and Palm has got it right.
Yes, it might not be too difficult for a development house to replace the traditional WinCE GUI with something nicer-looking, but such changes require time and money to develop. Have you ever worked in a design process that involves GUIs and usability testing? It's not as easy as it sounds.
And what about the factthat every UI change makes a device harder to sell (because reviewers, salespeople and purchasers have to learn how to do something or other a whole different way)?
The most important part of any OS as far as the average user is concerned is the UI. Us techheads might go ga-ga over kernels and hardware abstraction layers, but Joe Average is only interested in getting the job done as easily as possible. PDAs are far more personal than PCs - hell, some people would "die" without their Palm - so a fast, usable and recognisable UI is often the deciding factor in a PDA purchase. That's why few manufacturers tinker with the Windows CE front-end and make the best of the bad GUI had that Microsoft has dealt them.
If Microsoft had truly wanted to develop a new modular OS for embedded systems it would have started with a truly clean slate and given us a new OS suitable for the task. It chose not to do so because protecting Windows was a higher priority than creating the best product avaiable.
And do you know what Microsoft call this? They call in innovation.
Is Linux really the OS you want on your handheld? (Score:3)
Handhelds have smaller displays, less memory and are put to different uses than desktop or notebook PCs. Because of this, porting over a desktop OS to a handheld isn't always the great idea that it originally seems - Windows CE anyone?
The two OSes that have done well in handhelds have been PalmOS (used by Palm, IBM, Handspring, Sony, etc) and EPOC (used by Psion and its licensees). Both of these were designed from the ground up with handheld usage in mind.
Linux functionality in a handheld might cool but is it any more beneficial to a handheld user than the other OSes already in the market place?
Re:Ugh. This is not what we need. (Score:1)
Subset of X/gtk etc.. not that scalable and easy to use.
Perhaps this is when QNX or subset of BeOS can be
more usefull for pdas
Re:Going to wait for a post-release review (Score:1)
- lithium ion battery with decent (10-20 hour) lifetime. This is one of my largest considerations because otherwise I have to plunk down more money for less-convenient NiMH batteries (which I use in my current PDA and digital camera).
- A set of physical scroll buttons (up and down) is essential; I like to read on my palmtops, and to tap to scroll down too much of a pain.A rechargable unit has already been mentioned several times and will likely be available for the consumer release...
??
Unless I misunderstand you, the scroll buttons exist. They are on the upper left hand side of the device and work great (for rightys, that is )
- expansion cards for storage and wireless networking are essential - modems are practically useless (at least to me), but a wireless network card would give me access in many buildings I occupy.
I too am waiting to see what happens here. It looks to be very possible, but it will be interesting to see which approach Agenda takes.
However, it's unfair to simply denounce this as a horrible product when the reviewer has nothing more than a pre-production release. I imagine he got something that was put together between a few days to a few weeks ago. A lot of changes can happen in the one month previous to a release.
Good call. I wish everyone would take that as a perspective. As mentioned many times, this idea has tremendous potential.
Re:Is Linux really the OS you want on your handhel (Score:1)
Yup, without a question.
True, the Agenda is not ready for prime time yet although huge leaps have been made in the last few months. As such, it might be considered a "poor" way to give Linux to the masses as another reader mentioned.
On the other hand, Linux clearly has the potential as demonstrated by the IBM watch project and the advances the owners of VR3's (myself included) have seen in the last few months. Even if the implementation by Agenda is lacking at this point, don't judge the viability of Linux as a handheld OS based solely on that one example. Furthermore, I expect that Agenda's solution will improve faster than we anticipate. Give it time.
Re:Going to wait for a post-release review (Score:2)
That's a lame excuse. I've run a commercial X11 server on a 386/20 with 4Mbyte in the past and it worked fine. XFree86+FLTK may not be adapted to the needs of small devices, but current "small" devices are positively luxurious compared to the kind of machines people used to run X11 on. (I suspect part of the overhead is that FLTK, in the name of cross-platform compatibility, just ignores many of the facilities X11 already has built in.)
Re:This isn't suprising... (Score:2)
Incomplete products (Score:2)
All your constitutional right are belong to us.
You poor little man. (Score:2)
They (unfortunatly [sic]) dont [sic] vote because they are more apathetic and lesse[sic]-faire . . . Most Liberals are enlightened and wise enough to not try and starve his [sic] neighbours [sic] children for his [sic] own benefit . . .
. . . and several butchers' aprons.
Welcome to planet Earth in the year of our Lord 2001. There's still an 'e' in "unfortunately", we still put apostrophes in contractions like "don't" (not to mention "what's", "it's", etc.), and the French still haven't made any radical changes in the way they spell "laissez". Futhermore, plural pronouns haven't yet become singular, and the possessive of "neighbor" is still "neighbor's", unless you mean the plural -- in which case "neighbors'" would do nicely. Your misspelling of "neighbor" itself suggests the source of the problem: You're either European, or a sadly ill-educated liberal American pretending to be European -- presumably because the other guys down at the leather bar find it a turn-on.
Now that we've disposed of your implied claim to human ancestry, we can move along and demolish the substance of your outburst.
"Liberals" are "moral"?! Your definition of "morality" seems to include men having anal sex with hundreds of partners in a given year. It also includes Ted Kennedy's murderous crimes, the "mysterious" rash of killings surrounding the Clinton regime, the wholesale butchering of unborn children for profit, armed robbery of an entire nation (income tax), the forcible disarming of a free population, the murder of innocents at Waco, Ruby Ridge and elsewhere, divorce, paganism, satanism, drug addiction (encouraged and paid for by YOUR TAX MONEY, thanks to the insane liberal welfare religion), broken homes, shattered lives, a crippled educational system, wealth-creating businesses destroyed by lawsuits and crippled by insane legal impositions ("affirmative action", anyone?), and a thousand other crimes against humanity.
Is it "moral" when I am forced to hire and retain hopelessly incompetent employees by "affirmative action"? Is it moral that women are driven out of the home and into a workplace in which they have nothing to offer an employer? Do you think they enjoy their positions? Their employers hate them because they're a constant reminder of the abuses of a tyrannical government. Their co-workers hate them because they're unproductive dead weight. They soon learn to hate themselves, and rightly so. Deprived by abortion of any natural outlet for their natural maternal drive, instead they're mismolded into crude, hapless pseudo-men for the delectation of the feminist bull-dykes who exert absolute control over the legal system. These bull-dykes (like "Mrs." Clinton, for example) have hated themselves all along. They can do nothing but try to get a poor sort of revenge on their own twisted, malfunctioning biology by inflicting their own misery on women who were born healthy.
The crimes of the liberals defy description. You, my little friend, are either deluded are genuinely evil. Since you're clearly an idiot, I'm betting on "deluded".
Your "knowledge" of economics is laughable. (Score:3)
Quite frankly, I'm [sic] enjoying the so called "Clinton-Damaged" economy for the last few years.
I think you're trying to say that you've been enjoying the economy -- but even if that is what you mean, you're quite confused.
The Republicans fought Clinton every step of the way. We fought like tigers to preserve the gains of the Reagan/Bush years. We sweated blood to preserve the prosperity that we'd brought to America in the 1980's. And we did not fail. True, if we'd been able to stay on track between 1992 and 2000, you'd be looking at a 15,000 Dow today -- and you'd be enjoying a hard currency, too, not the same old soft "Democratic funny money" based on the "paper standard".
The entire "Internet Bubble" was the direct result of government interference in the economy. The real, solid prosperity of the 1980's was based on the financial acumen of brilliant men like Michael Milken. The false, soap-bubble "prosperity" of the 1990's was based on the grimy jabberings of a million "nerds" creating "products" which don't even really exist. Software is a nice hobby, but there is no product there. A long series of zeroes and ones is not something a sane man will spend money on -- regardless of how much care was lavished on putting them in just the right order.
Government interference, you say? Yes, indeed. Read up about the ARPANet: That's the government pork-barrel boondoggle that grew into the Internet. During the 1980's, honest businesses in a fair, competitive environment produced far superior alternatives: Compuserve, AOL, Prodigy, the list goes on. All were more resource-efficient than the wasteful Internet, with its bloated packet-switching and insane reliance on text files for so many purposes (and even by text standards, they're still fat -- look at how much space in an XML file is wasted on "tags" some time). Any one of those private-sector innovations was far superior to what we've got now -- but the government essentially went into competition with the private sector, and steamrollered them with massive expenditures of tax money.
Imagine that -- an innovative, honest company called Prodigy was TAXED INTO PENURY, with the government's ill-gotten gains immediately spent to destroy what was left.
Naturally, the government-created Internet spawned a culture of lies, delusions, and theft.
And now we reap the whirlwind. The psychotic "Internet mentality" has taken such a deep hold that Americans actually oppose a tax cut that will restart the economy by putting wealth back into the hands of the justly wealthy who created it in the first place, and who will gladly create more if they only have some spare capital to work with.