Y Technology

XO: SO-SO future

2008-05-17T19:42:00.009-04:00

When I first learned of the One Laptop Per Child program 2 or 3 years ago, I was very, very skeptical. A $100 laptop for kids in developing nations? Meh. Don't children in developing nations have more important needs?

But on second thought, there already were many organizations addressing those needs. Perhaps it is a good thing one group tries a different tack. So in November 2007, I signed up for the OLPC Give-One Get-One program. That I could explore a new piece of hardware running Linux appealed to the geek in me. That my then 7 year old son would benefit from the XO appealed to the father in me. And that an XO would be donated to a child in a developing nation appealed to the "do a good deed" in me.

But after winning me over, the future of the XO laptop seems cloudy. With several departures of key OLPC employees and the replacement of Linux with Windows XP, it appears that OLPC has lost its way. It's not that the children care whether their laptop runs Linux or XP; unlike grownups, their minds are remarkably flexible. No, my concern is that XP, with its attendant viruses, patch Tuesdays, and increased hardware requirements over Linux, would prove to be a frustrating experience.

The XO hardware was thoughtfully built for children in developing nations -- durable screen, water resistant keyboard, mesh networking, low power consumption. That same emphasis on children must be kept in mind regarding the software.

Eyeing the iPhone

2007-08-12T09:44:00.002-04:00

I've always wanted a phone without a keyboard, and HandSpring actually delivered one back in 2001:

But it didn't sell as well as the version with the keyboard, and as a result, HandSpring never evolved its design for a keyboard-less phone. Instead, that path was taken by Apple and has led to the much coveted iPhone.

I confess that I am among those who covet the device, but I have hesitated in buying one. It's not the price, as I feel the hardware and technology is worth it. It's the 2 year commitment to AT&T that gives me pause. Coverage for the areas I frequent is spotty and I would certainly lose coolness points as I run to just the right spot in the office and start speaking loudly to overcome a bad connection.

Sadly for me, the iPhone on the AT&T network would be too much like driving a Lamborghini on a pot-hole ridden road.

Best compliment a software developer can hear...

2007-06-14T22:05:00.000-04:00

"It's kinda' boring. We were hoping to see a little more action..."
-- an operations manager at a major stock exchange

A group of us recently completed a major rewrite of system that I like to describe as "greasing the wheels of capitalism". I can't go into details, but the point is that the system has been running uneventfully since its release. That's music to this software developer's ears.

We -- software developers -- should all strive for such a compliment... unless you work at Apple, in which case the last thing you want to be is boring.

The Princeton Graphics VL1919

2007-01-31T22:09:00.000-05:00

I needed an inexpensive lcd for an aging PC. My next computer might have a built-in display (a notebook or an iMac) so price was a major consideration. For $220 at Costco (in-store purchase only), the Princeton VL1919 got my attention.

Physically, it's a slim attractive monitor. It has both analog and digital ports, and includes cables for both. I have an analog graphics card and the picture quality is quite good for watching dvds, home photo editing, and playing games. The VL1919 is not, however, a display for graphics pros who understand white point and need to adjust their gammas. The viewing angle is too small for a 19" display and the shift in color would be unacceptable to them.

As a software developer, I work mostly with text, and the VL1919's 0.294mm dot pitch made words appear a tad grainy. I could, however, compensate and "soften" the characters using the phase control on the OSD.

The OSD itself was awkward to use. Contrary to the documentation, there is no quick way to adjust the brightness or contrast; rather, I had to cycle through the menus. Also, the power button is in the middle of the 5 button row, and more than once I accidentally pressed it while working the menus. Better (more expensive) displays offset the power button to the right or left.

The display offers stereo sound with built-in speakers. They're better than the typical mono speaker in the PC chassis, and good enough for watching clips on You-Tube. They also save desk space. But music lovers, movie buffs, and gamers who rely on 3-D sound are better off with external speakers.

I may sound critical, but I really like the VL1919. With its thin bezel and affordable price, I bought a second one for a dual display setup.

Update 2/18/2007:

The graphics card does affect the display quality, so I thought it might be helpful if I specified my hardware:

Primary Adapter: AGP Diamond Viper 770D, 32MB
Secondary Adapter: PCI Number Nine Revolution3D, 8 MB
Operating System: Windows 2000

The Mandatory "Optional" Meeting

2006-01-15T21:41:00.000-05:00

I was young at the time. My manager had called an optional meeting for later that morning. Since it was optional, I had planned to stay in my cubicle and bang away on the keyboard; I had bugs to solve and code to write. Later, a colleague came by to fetch me. "Didn't you know we had a meeting?"

"Yes," I replied. "It was optional."

She had an exasperated look on her face, as if I should have known better. Off I went; I wasn't rebellious, just naive.

The good news was that the manager never called a mandatory "optional" meeting again. The bad news was that I would continue to encounter similar goofiness throughout my ongoing career in software.

Ring out the Old, Ring in the New?

2006-01-01T21:36:00.000-05:00

While I look forward to the three new Treo models due out this year, I have no intention to ring out my old T3. I like to take care of my stuff.

After 14 months of use, my T3 lost two of the four screws along its sides. I found replacements -- four for $4.95 -- at InfosystemsPro. It's probably cheaper from a local hardware store, but the right size screws are hard to find.

I am testing my T3 as a USB drive (a T5 capability) with Softick's Card Export II. I haven't decided to register the software yet, but for $14.95, it lets you drag and drop files between your T3's SD card and your desktop (Windows, Mac, or Linux).

And don't forget, you can rotate your T3's screen with a touch of a button (like the LifeDrive). It's available for $5.95 from yours truly.

Happy New Year!

Yam Technology?

2005-11-22T21:39:00.000-05:00

I had briefly considered naming my company Yam Technology (Yam is my last name), but quickly realized how mistakenly popular I could become during Thanksgiving.

"Can you send over a 50lb bag?" "Do you mash?" "Do you have recipes?"

Yam Technology could also be mistaken for a large and serious agri-genetic concern, and it disturbed me that I could be thought of as growing mutant potatoes. So I settled for the more playful Y Technology.

I spend a good deal of time with computer people and our collective sense of humor leans unambiguously on the dry side. Here's hoping your turkey isn't and your bottle of red is. Cheers!

Why Technology?

2005-11-13T21:13:00.001-05:00

It's the name of my company -- Y Technology -- and also a good question to pose now and then.

I worked briefly at a company that used a hand scanner, partly for security, but chiefly as a time card. The technology worked well enough, identifying me correctly on the first attempt almost every time. The implementation, however, was flawed: the hand scanner stood between our desks and the restroom. It was company policy to scan in and out when you arrived in the morning and left in the evening, and also for lunch. This policy was later changed to include bathroom and cigarette breaks(!).

It's no secret that some people don't wash their hands after using the restroom, which made slapping your palm on the scanning surface a good way to spread all sorts of germs. It was also a good reason not to eat lunch at your desk.

The solution to this problem was decidedly low-tech. I carried around a small bottle of Purell Hand Sanitizer.

Rotate 1.4 Available

2005-11-07T22:31:00.000-05:00

What's new in version 1.4:

Added support for the new Palm TX
Improved error handling for unknown devices
Now you can power on your device by pressing the rotate button without rotating the screen
When installing a new version of Rotate, the button would become disabled even though the "Enable Button" was checked. This has been fixed for hotsync installs. Beaming or over-the-air installations still requires you to disable and re-enable the rotate button.

Download it at:

http://www.ytechnology.com/rotate/download.htm

Rotate 1.3 Available

2005-10-16T11:01:00.000-04:00

Here's what's available in version 1.3:

Long Press Option. Hold the rotate button down for half a second and the underlying application will be launched. This is especially convenient for T5 users who don't have an "extra" voice recorder button.
Online help.

Download it at:

http://www.ytechnology.com/rotate/download.htm

Note that Rotate doesn't work on the new Palm TX, but I'm working on it.

Think Outside Bluetooth Keyboard

2005-10-01T10:41:00.000-04:00

My previous musings on coffee did have a Palm related point; they were composed using Think Outside's Bluetooth Keyboard. Folded closed, it's a slim attractive package. Fully open, it's a full sized keyboard -- the kind you usually find on a laptop. It is, however, missing the top row of number keys and that fakes me out. My fingers have "memory muscle" and since the keys feel like a full sized keyboard, I find myself off by one row when I type. Reaching for the "Tab" key, I hit "Caps Lock". Reaching for the numeric key "1", I enter "q". It took a little retraining and I still make typos, but it is still far far better than Grafitti 2, Grafitti 1, or a thumb board for writing anything more than a paragraph.

I connect the keyboard to my T3 via bluetooth. I use "secure" mode, which requires a little more fuss to setup, but in today's times of eavesdropping, I see no other alternative. An infrared keyboard would be more secure in this regard, but then you require "line of sight." Using bluetooth and the keyboard's detachable stand, I can place the T3 anywhere convenient, as well as turn it on its side (this is where my Rotate application comes in handy).

The fit and finsh of the keyboard is excellent, but I still smart from paying $149 for it. Actually, I'm kicking myself because I saw it on Amazon for $91. Advertised for Pocket PCs, it works just as well on bluetooth enabled Palm devices. You just need to download the drivers from Think Outside's website.

One other note: the keyboard has special functions keys dedicated to PocketPC operation, but they are reprogrammable.

Second Cup

2005-09-17T14:03:00.000-04:00

I don't always have time in the morning to make my own coffee. Sometimes, I go to Starbucks, although their naming convention for cup sizes -- tall, grande, venti -- is a bit pretentious. I also discovered that they have an unadvertised "short" or "small" size. Regardless, the cup is less important than the coffee inside, which happens to be quite good.

But if you're ever in New York City, you can get an equally good (or better) cup – small, medium, or large -- at Oren's. In addition, you can buy coffee beans there; for those special occasions, they sell rarities such as Jamaican Blue Mountain, Hawaiian Kona, or Aged Sumatra. For your every day morning coffee, the Oren’s Special Blend makes a fine cup.

While StarBucks offers a pleasant unhurried rest stop, often with WiFi, Oren’s is really coffee to go. Tip: For drinking at your final destination, ask for a flat top. For drinking while walking, ask for a sip top.

Coffee Break

2005-08-21T20:52:00.000-04:00

I started drinking coffee in college. It was more of a study aid than a beverage. Dark, aromatic, slightly bitter, I took it with half and half, along with a donut, or a cookie, or a piece of chocolate. The caffeine and sugar got me through the late hours.

Today, I enjoy my coffee black. I care enough to grind the beans each morning and am rewarded with its sweet aroma. During brewing, I watch the first few pale brown drops drip into the carafe. I leave, but I am never really gone as the bouquet continues to flirt with me. Shortly, upon my return, I behold a full pot of liquid – hot, rich, and dark.

When it sits in my mug, I observe wisps of rising steam. Looking closer, I note faint patches of oil on the surface. I contemplate the day ahead and take a sip. Within moments, anything seems possible.

Rotate 1.2 Available

2005-08-11T15:42:00.000-04:00

Here's what's new in version 1.2:

180 degree screen rotation
Option to autohide the grafitti area after rotation
A soft reset used to disable rotation. This has been fixed.

The 180 degree turn isn't as goofy as it sounds. It was useful to me when I had to show info to someone who sat across the table.

Download it at:

http://www.ytechnology.com/rotate/download.htm

More details are written up in the readme.txt file. And remember, this is shareware. If you find Rotate useful, $5 will buy you a clear conscience. :-)

Rotate 1.1 Available

2005-07-05T22:12:00.000-04:00

Rotate 1.1 is a minor update, but it addresses the number one request: allow the T3's voice recorder button to rotate the screen. You can download it here:

http://www.ytechnology.com/rotate/download.htm

Enjoy!

A Rotation Button for your T3 and T5

2005-06-03T19:15:00.000-04:00

On my T3, whether Avantgo, VersaMail, Plucker, or an eBook, I usually read in landscape mode. When writing in Graffiti, I typically do so in portrait mode. And when I view my photos, well... that depends on the way the images were taken, and I end up switching between landscape and portrait modes more often than I like. The rotation icon on the blue bar is small, so frequent switching is awkward. Also, rotation moves the position of the rotation icon, and I need to make a small, but real, mental effort to find the icon in order to rotate back.

What the T3 and the T5 needed was a dedicated hardware rotation button. A good alternative would be software that mapped rotation to a hardware button, but a cursory search of the web turned up nothing. I had planned to write the utility myself, but just never got around to it. Then I learned that PalmOne's new LifeDrive had just such a button and I was green with envy.

Okay, I'm overstating my state of envy. But it did push me enough to write Rotate. In the hopes that there are users like me who also need a hardware rotation button, I've made the program friendly enough for the general public. It's shareware, so you can try it before you buy it. And the paltry $5 registration fee removes the "*unregistered*" banner, gets you free upgrades, and funds improvements to the program.

And the screen cracked

2005-04-28T21:54:00.000-04:00

Back in September 2004, I was happily using the WiFi enabled Palm T|C. Then I dropped it. While the T|C survived many falls, this was the one that cracked the screen.

I've owned several Palm devices and dropped them too, although not as often as I dropped the T|C, and more importantly, none of those falls were fatal. I suspect it was the T|C's relative bulkiness that brought out the klutz in me. I was annoyed with myself, but this was a good excuse to upgrade. Back then, my choices were:

Repair the T|C for $125
Wait a few weeks for the upcoming Tungsten T5 for $399
Buy the soon-to-be discontinued T3 for about $325

While repairing the T|C was the cheapest option, I felt I would eventually drop it again. I also discovered that WiFi wasn't all that important to me. I do have a wireless router for my home office, and it was cool, if not addictive, to get email and browse the web within a 200+ foot radius. But beyond that, WiFi wasn't useful to me; I'm simply not a regular at WiFi enabled cafes and airports. I also learned I didn't like the thumbboard much. It was useful, but I still preferred graffiti.

Having eliminated the repair option, for my next device, I knew enough to want a large screen. This narrowed my choices to the T5 and the T3. I considered the T5 despite the controversy swirling around it and passed on it because of its high price, because it had features I didn't need, and because it was missing features I wanted.

This left me with the T3, which I didn't embrace right away. When I saw the slider and the spring loaded stylus, I thought to myself "too many moving parts." I bought the T3 anyway.

Having used it for 7 months, my worries were groundless. The slider is OK. But I also found some nice touches that put the T3 in a class by itself:

The stylus has a "standby mode"; it can sit in its silo, extended, and not fall out, even if you turn the T3 upside down.
The reset pin is hidden behind the slider and can be triggered with the tip of the stylus -- no unscrewing or paper clip needed.
Holding the center key down for 1 second will bring you to the applications launcher.
Turning on the T3 using the center button will display the time.
Metal housing.

In a more pedestrian sense, the T3 also preserved my investment in cradles because, unlike the T5 which has a new connector, the T3 comes with the same cradle that came with my M505 and T|C. Now I have more than enough cradles to spread around to different office locations.

Lastly, while I don't use the voice recorder much (mostly to entertain my 5 year old son), having an extra button is handy; I've reprogrammed mine to launch Avantgo.

Sadly, the T3 has been discontinued by PalmOne. Not really a review, consider this entry a requiem for a fine device.

T5 Fury

2004-10-10T17:17:00.000-04:00

When PalmOne announced their upcoming and much anticipated T5, it wasn't news. What was news was the furious reaction toward it by elite and power users. At last count, there were 500+ comments at PalmInfocenter, most of them negative. What could engender such passion? Complaints weren't solely about specifications; barbs were also directed at marketing and price.

The recurring themes include:

no Cobalt
no Wifi
no metal shell
at $399 too expensive
not worthy of the Tungsten T flagship moniker

While the merits of these complaints are debatable, the disappointment in the Palm community is real. And the good points to the T5 don't seem to assuage their hurt:

tablet design
large memory store (256MB)
flash memory retains data even when batteries run down
accessible as a usb drive

The target audience for this device appears to be data-centric people: corporate users who have lots of Word and Excel documents, and healthcare professionals who need lots of reference material on hand.

Perhaps the vocal users on PalmInfocenter are neither corporate nor healthcare, but I do think they have divined correctly the source of their disappointment -- that the T5 is not the successor to the T3, but is actually the successor to the Tungsten E.

PalmOne probably has good reasons for this marketing strategy, which unfortunately, I am not privy to. Nevertheless, I will make an effort at deconstruction. According to the administrator at PalmInfocenter, the TE was PalmOne's top seller since its release last year. The tablet form factor contributed to its popularity, whereas the slider mechanism on the T3 and its predecessors have always been controversial.

PalmOne is a small company with limited resources, and thus, re-using the popular TE platform makes economic sense. Engineering, quality assurance, and manufacturing processes need only be tweaked rather than, had the design been entirely new, reworked. Yet, the decision also limits the feature set. The T5 doesn't have vibrating alarms and voice recording because the TE didn't have them. Retrofitting them would increase cost and delay the product.

So why did PalmOne market this device as the T5 instead of the TE2? I am speculating here, but it may have something to do with upgradeability to Cobalt. PalmOne has made no announcements of any kind regarding upgradeability, but in terms of hardware, the T5, T3, and TC can handle the demands of Cobalt. But the T5, with newer hardware, can probably be upgraded with lower support costs than the T3 or TC. Remember, PalmOne is a small company and can be stretched only so far.

Thus, if you could only afford to upgrade one device in your product line, which would it be? I'd say it should be your flagship device -- the model that appeals to your power users, the model your customers paid the most for. A device named TE2 would not be perceived as a flagship product and upgrading it to Cobalt while ignoring the T3 would make PalmOne's leading constituents feel abandoned. Ergo, we have the T5, which has the Tungsten name, the Tungsten price tag, some interesting features, but sadly, not the Tungsten pedigree.

T|C or Not T|C?

2003-09-01T21:31:00.000-04:00

That is the question (I posed to myself at Circuit City). I had narrowed my choices to the WiFi capable Tungsten C and the compact Tungsten T2. Many favorable reviews have been written about both devices and you can read about them in Pen Computing and at PalmInfoCenter. For those of you with a bluetooth phone, the T2 springs to mind. For those who occupy a campus or hospital setting with WiFi coverage, it is the TC that is palpable. But there are those like me, where the decision is not so obvious, and I hope my experiences help you decide.

The T2 caught my eye first. Although I don't own a bluetooth enabled phone, I may come to possess one in the future. I liked that the T2 was second generation which meant fewer bugs in addition to some nice enhancements such as a brighter screen and increased memory. And the features that made the original TT popular were still a part of the T2: compact form, built-in microphone, stereo headphone jack. But I kept wondering about the slide mechanism; would I find it a nuisance every time I wanted to write graffiti?

Upon examining the TC, my first impression was ho-hum. WiFi was its main selling point but I wondered how much I would use that feature. With WiFi set up in my home office, and a choice of desktops and notebooks from which to surf the web, would I need the TC or would I be better served by the T2?

The TC comes with a thumbboard which I considered a negative. I prefer using the stylus and I would miss the four hot spots in the graffiti area (home, menu, calculator, find). The thumbboard does duplicate some of this functionality, but sometimes at the cost of two button presses.

Then there's the bulk of the TC. My previous device was the slim M505, and in comparison, the TC felt huge. In reality, the TC is about the same size as the Palm III which I once happily carried.

Lastly, I thought the TC looked homely whereas the T2 looked really cool.

Surprising myself, I bought the TC.

It's important to know that I don't travel much, but when I do, I require access to email. Email is my primary method of handling support calls, and consequently, any new device, the T2 or TC, should assist me in that regard. It does not, however, need to keep me connected 24/7. There are usually other sources of internet access, ranging from the laptop in the hotel room, to the complimentary terminal in the hotel lobby, to an internet cafe down the street.

With Starbucks and McDonald's offering WiFi service, the TC fulfilled this requirement better than the T2. Had I a bluetooth phone, the T2 would have come out ahead on this matter, but I've learned bluetooth phones aren't cheap and there's usually an additional charge to your service plan to support data transmission. In contrast, a Starbucks T-Mobile hotspot starts at $6.00 an hour and a McDonald's connection costs $2.99 per day. (I have yet to do some serious field testing so I can't comment on the quality of the connections.)

At the home office, I discovered that I do use WiFi regularly. On some mornings, before I head out the door, I download my Avantgo channels and check my email without turning on my PC. For the times when my PC is on, a wireless network hotsync is fast and convenient. (Note to Mac users: this feature is only available on PCs.) As for web surfing, I use the TC to read pda-friendly content. For a good portal,visit: http://www.pdaportal.us/.

I briefly entertained the notion of doing all this with the T2 and a bluetooth access point. Belkin makes a relatively inexpensive access point, the FT8030, which got a fair to good review on Tom's Hardware. Searching Amazon, I found two reviews rating it an average of 3 stars out of 5; the chief concern was limited range (when compared to WiFi). In the end, I decided against it because I already had the WiFi infrastructure in place.

Back at Circuit City, before I had made my decision, I was fiddling with the T2's slider. I use Palm's auto-lock security feature and realized that on a T2, I would have to open the slider every time I needed to enter my password. A solution would be to buy third party software that enabled on-screen graffiti. Palm's research showed that most people read and navigate on the Palm more often than they write, and therefore, the slider can usually be kept closed. While I agree, when I'm ready to enter data, I want to do so with a minimum of fuss.

The TC has on-screen graffiti built-in. Combined with its thumbboard, the TC was "faster on the draw." I'm not a fan of thumbboards, but I got used to it and found it handy in certain situations.

As for the TCs appearance, well, maybe it's not that bad looking. I'm beginning to appreciate its rounded corners and bevelled edges. The stylus is polished metal with a plastic tip and head. It slides -- or rather falls -- easily into its silo, turning as necessary to align itself. This is in the same tradition as the stylii found on the Palm III devices.

The TC wasn't an obvious choice for me, but in the end, it turned out to be the right one.

The Trouble With Treos

2003-04-23T21:25:00.000-04:00

Hello? Hello? Can you hear me?

So went a recent conversation as I was using my wife's Treo 180. It turned out that the other party could hear me just fine. I couldn't hear the other end because the Treo speaker had died. If I closed the lid about half-way, just so, the speaker would come back to life, but this was a very awkward way to use a near state-of-the-art cell phone pda.

I say near state-of-the-art because the Treo 180 has, remarkably, retained its value, being surpassed only by HandSpring's newer models, the Treo 270 and 300. The Treo line is among the lightest, easiest to use, fit-in-your-shirt pocket phone pda on the market. HandSpring kept the 180 current with a free GPRS upgrade - a fast, persistent connection to the internet that doesn't require an ISP. My wife doesn't use this feature, partly because the service costs extra, but also because she just isn't the type to surf the web on a phone pda. Regardless, it's nice to know GPRS is available. HandSpring, for a limited time, also offered Treo owners a free license to RecoEcho Plus -- software that brings graffiti back to life on models equipped with keyboards. RecoEcho uses the entire screen for stroke recognition, and like the standard grafitti area, reserves the left half for characters and the right half for numbers.

Now, after 51 weeks of faithful service, the speaker no longer works. Fortunately for me, HandSpring's warranty is valid for 52 weeks, which was an unusual violation of Murphy's Law*. Forget about entering a todo item; I called HandSpring support ASAP. I knew this needed to be resolved with an exchange program. Alas, it was Saturday, and after speaking with a HandSpring rep, I learned they did not deal with exchanges on weekends. I would have to call again Monday. That Murphy's law could prevail began to gnaw at me.
The weekend gave me time to wonder if the ear-bud / microphone would work in place of a speaker. My wife humored me as I dialed from the house phone to her Treo. Of course we didn't expect to hear the Treo ring, which it didn't. But when we spoke, she could not hear me, nor could I hear her. End of wondering.

Monday came and I placed my call to HandSpring. I had to be rerouted to T-Mobile, my carrier, but overall hold time amounted to a mere 7 minutes. I described the problem and gave the rep the serial number on the SIM card. He also had me punch up some numbers on the Treo to retrieve some additional information. In the end, I received a working Treo 180 in two days although three to five days is the norm. For those who find that too long, there is an expedited service which delivers in 24 hours, but that incurrs a charge. After testing the replacement unit for a day, I sent the broken Treo to T-Mobile in their pre-paid return mailer.

Overall, I was quite impressed with HandSpring and T-Mobile customer service. And my wife was impressed with me for getting her phone working again so quickly. If you ever find yourself in a similar situation, here are a few things you can do to beat Murphy's law:

Be ready with the serial number
Be polite to the service rep
Return the broken device promptly
If you buy a handheld with moving parts, such as the Treo or Tungsten T, save yourself some anxiety and purchase an extended warranty

*Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong. For more Murphy's laws, click here.

The Palm Enterprise Space

2001-09-03T21:08:00.000-04:00

This September, the Star Trek television series debuts with Enterprise. I happen to like all the Star Trek series because it describes optimistically what could be in our future. It's not just about advances in technology, but also in medicine, philosophy, and the human spirit. Returning to the present, it reminds me how much work needs to be done to improve our society as a whole and in computing in particular.

The late Michael L. Dertouzos, director of MIT labs for Computer Science, believed access to information should be as seamless as breathing, hence MIT's futuristic computing infrastructure named Oxygen. Details can be found on MIT's Lab For Computer Science website. An excellent article also appeared in the August 1999 issue of Scientific American. Basically, Oxygen involves eight novel technologies: a handheld computer, wall and trunk computers, a novel net, built-in speech understanding, knowledge access, collaboration, automation, and customization. The binding philosophy is a refrain familiar to Palm users and developers: doing more by doing less. Dertouzos summarized his goal with three points:

Bring technology into our lives, not our lives into technology -- that is we don't go live in cyberspace.
increase human productivity and ease of use -- and he does not mean pretty interfaces, colors, and icons.
Offer these gains to all -- this means everyone, not just those who can afford it.

Regarding the handheld computer, Dertouzos did not envision a simple and Zen-like Palm device. Instead, his handheld would incorporate a television, a pager, an AM/FM radio, a cellular phone, and a wireless Internet connection. Like all big ideas from academic institutions, Dertouzos did not consider the cost to consumers, corporate interests, or political will. But that does not diminish his vision. Bright ideas should be viewed the way sailors look at stars -- not as a destination, but something to steer by.

In that light, Palm devices are well suited for the enterprise space. For white papers, application briefs, and other references to the Palm Enterprise space, visit http://www.palm.com/enterprise/resources/.

Whether the goal is Oxygen or Star Trek, there's still so much left to be done.

Life with the Palm VII

2000-01-23T17:34:00.000-05:00

There are three words in the English language that end with 'gry.' One is hungry and the other is angry. What is the third word?

So went the riddle. Pulling out my Palm VII, I tapped on the Merriam-Webster Palm Query Application (pqa) and searched for "*gry." Wirelessly, the pqa delivered not three, but only two words: "angry" and "hungry." Humph. Riddles shouldn't be taken literally.

My wife and I were shopping at Crate and Barrel where she spied a book on cooking. "It would make a perfect gift for a co-worker," she said. Pulling out my Palm VII, I tapped on the Amazon pqa and searched for the book by title. A few moments later, I said "Look. It's cheaper from Amazon.com." She bought it at Crate and Barrel anyway, saying something about shipping charges and needing to give the gift the next day.

During an eye exam, the ophthalmologist dilated my pupils. This blurred my vision and made my eyes sensitive to light -- effects that would remain with me for two hours. A local Barnes and Nobles gave me refuge from the sun, but teased me with books upon which my eyes could not focus. Sitting down and pulling out my Palm VII, I went to check my e-mail using the iMessenger pqa. I knew I could read my e-mail if I adjusted the font to the largest size, but the point was moot. I could not get a signal out of the store, even with the antennae fully extended and my arm raised in the air. Resigned, I sank into the chair and closed my eyes. Moments later, a commanding but polite voice said, "Sir, there is no sleeping allowed here."