Re: [OT] Linux palmtop computers?
On Tue, Mar 20, 2001 at 04:05:50PM +0800, csj wrote:
> On Tuesday 20 March 2001 12:13, Jim Richardson wrote:
> > On Tue, Mar 20, 2001 at 07:30:30AM +0800, csj wrote:
> > > Now that you two mentioned them, I find it curious that both the
> > > YOPY and the Agenda VR3 (for virtual reality??) claim to be the
> > > first Linux-based PDAs. Both seem to be in short physical supply,
> > > though the YOPY mockups show it to be a gorgeous color model.
> > >
> > > The Compaq product (dis)appears to be even worse, more of a proof
> > > of concept thing.
> >
> > The yopy and agenda are both available for developers. But not as a
> > general public thing. (Not that you have to be anything special to
> > get one, just fork over the cash, but they (or at least the agenda)
> > are 'not ready for prime time' yet. I got the agenda, and it's fun
> > to play with and dev for, but it's not replacing my palm pilot
> > anytime soon.
>
> Can you program on it (hoping against hope)? Let's say I want to
> compile my own enhanced version of "Hello World." More sensibly, does
> it provide a command prompt, so I can run my favorite bash pipeline?
>
>
For the Agenda
Absolutely. Resources are limited (16MB flash, only about half of which
is currently available for userland) Uses the FLTK toolkit over X, which
is pretty easy to use. Things are a little rough around the edges (bash
is there, but it has issues with the narrow display) But developement is
rapid. There are numerous developers on the lists.
You _can_ develope on the agenda, but frankly, it's a pain with the
limited resources. Vim is no fun without a keyboard :) But it's easy to
dev on a "real" linux box and simply upload the stuff to the agenda.
Telnet, etc are available. Even Xbill is there I understand. I have the
agenda, it was relatively cheap (under $200 delivered) and arrived about
4 days after I ordered it. It is _not_ (currently anyway) a replacement
for my palm pilot, but it is cool.
For Yopy, I believe that most of the above is true, ie, bash, etc.
however, the dev kit costs about $800. But to be fair, the Yopy has a
206MHz strong arm with 32MB Ram and a colour screen of higher resolution
than the Agenda.( from mem, 320x200 vs 240x160) Also, I think that the
Yopy may have an FPU (which the agenda doesn't) but I am not sure.
I'd buy the Yopy in a hot second if it were half the price. As it is, I
couldn't justify it. The agenda was just in the "what the hell" range.
Meanwhile, I am keeping an eye out for a colour Ipaq.
(for topicallity, neither the yopy nor the agenda currently use debian
as a base distro :)
--
Jim Richardson
Anarchist, pagan and proud of it
WWW.eskimo.com/~warlock
Linux, because life's too short for a buggy OS.
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