07:38 PM by Bob Russell in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Economic development and growth in developing countries is tied to a number of factors. One important requirement for investment is secure and stable contract law. Certainly, it's important to have some level of political stability. But something that is sometimes overlooked is the need for access to financial services.

That's one gap that might find a solution with mobile devices and cell phones, because they can provide a framework and infrastructure from which financial services can be provided to the masses. According to the ITU Strategy and Policy Unit Newslog, "The proliferation of mobile communications in developing countries has the potential to bring a wide range of financial services to an entirely new customer base..."

The [pdf warning!] report, "Micro-payment systems and their application to mobile networks", examines the case of the Phillipines as an example, and if the idea catches on we might find handhelds contributing to a rise in the standard of living across the world.

Via SmartMobs.com

07:20 PM by Bob Russell in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Generally, I'm a bit concerned even at the dinner table because of potential spills on my precious Treo. But I'd be in a downright panic if my Treo came near a rainstorm, beach or swimming pool!

Well, you may be able to brave the elements without fear with a new case for only $24.95. It's the Aquapac Handheld Case, and unlike some of the more expensive cases it uses a flexible non-form fitting plastic shell to protect the device.

Apparently, you can hear through it, make and take calls with it, or even use it in the shower to play your tunes. I'd say that is pretty good evidence that it could also be used to read e-books in the pool, on the beach, or in the bath.

Maybe I'd consider one for the beach, but that's probably as far as I would take it. But it still looks like a great option if you need to keep your favorite device dry and safe.

Via Treonauts

07:11 PM by Bob Russell in E-Book Readers | Alternative Devices

Sony may make it hard to realize the full potential of your Sony PSP, but they sure know how to make hardware. So when you have a gadget you really love, it's time to test the boundaries and find ways to do the unexpected.

Popular Science treats us to some simple instructions for reading e-books, watching video on your PSP, or playing some SNES or "homebrew" cloned games.

To read e-books you just convert text into images you can read on the PSP. The suggested software is PSPphoto. You can even get RSS feeds using MioMediaBox .

The instructions look pretty generic for compressing video files. Programs suggested include:
* PSP Video 9 (free, for Windows)
* ffmpegX (free for Mac)
* iPSP ($20 Mac or PC)
* XilisoftDVD to PSP Suite ($45 Windows)
Convert to a memory stick file at 320x240 resolution, and 15fps, and you're set!

To play the video games:
Download the games zip file here which also includes a SNES emulator and some ROMs. Run KXploit from the zip file here and you're well on your way.

Check out the full instructions a the Popular Science article here .

06:35 PM by Bob Russell in Miscellaneous | Lounge

Windows Vista may have far-reaching affects on the way we read e-books. But not in the way you might think. It's not because of some new software package or e-book reader software. It's much more basic and fundamental and universal than that. Windows Vista is introducing some new fonts, and we may all be using them very soon.

One of the fonts is called Cambria. It just so happens that it was created to replace Times New Roman, and it may succeed with Microsoft behind it. It's a big deal, too - Times New Roman is almost ubiquitous these days, and if you use Microsoft Word to create a document, you are probably using the Times New Roman font.

As e-book affictionatos, we can't help but be interested when we hear that there are some new fonts coming out with the new Windows Vista OS. And according to Usability News, there are six new ClearType fonts coming with Windows Vista, aimed at the following uses:
* Cambria - for business documents, email, web design
* Constantia - for book typesetting, email, web design, magazines
* Corbel - for business documents, email, web design
* Candara - for email, web design, magazines, informal settings
* Calibri - for documents, email, web design, magazines
* Consolas - for programming environments

Check the full article for all the details, but the two new serif fonts (Cambria and Constantia) were compared to Times New Roman for legibility.

Using an objective measure of legibility (but only one of many possible measures), they rank the fonts in the following order:
1) Cambria
2) Constantia
3) Times New Roman

It may well be that e-book readers everywhere will have a brand new look very soon!

04:38 AM by Laurens in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Engadget Mobile writes:

We just came across an ominous claim, tossed casually into a PC World article about using the 650 as a laptop replacement. The article states that "according to a Palm spokesperson, no new Palm-based Treos are due before mid 2006."

Surely they're not waiting for ALP. (Which is not due to be delivered until the end of the year.) I think the reason is quite simple: they don't want to cannibalize on sales of the still-new 700w. Plus the 650 works well enough as it is.

05:23 PM by cervezas in Miscellaneous | Lounge

Russian site Mobile-Review has leaked more screenshots of the ALP demo that PalmSource gave at 3GSM in Barcelona last week.

Both PalmInfocenter.com and LinuxDevices.com appear to have misindentified what some of the screenshots represent. I'll give my impressions of what we're looking at here, which I grant you are still only best guesses based on the limited information I have.

This first screenshot does indeed appear to be a launcher, although, as we'll see in a moment, it's almost certainly not the launcher application written against ALP's native application framework, codenamed MAX. It's probably something put together just for the demo, which is of a very early version of ALP.

All agree that this screenshot shows the legacy Palm OS MemoPad application running in ALP's built-in Palm OS emulator. This is not to be confused with POSE, the Palm OS emulator that runs on the Windows desktop. It's a different animal, although it will perform much the same function: to enable software written for Palm OS to run without modification on a different OS, in this case Linux.

According to the Russian site, this third screenshot is not a Java game as LinuxDevices.com reports, but a native GTK+ "MineSweeper" game. GTK+ is one of the two most popular Linux toolkits for developing graphical user interfaces and is used in the Nokia 770's Maemo platform as well as the GPE palmtop Linux system. ALP was announced as running native GTK+ applications in addition to legacy Palm OS apps, Java apps, and applications developed specifically for the new MAX framework.

If you go by the Russian site, this fourth image is not a native MAX application as Palm Infocenter reports, but a Java MIDlet running inside a MAX shell. Even that is probably not a very accurate description. PalmSource engineer David Fedor recently explained on the Palm Entrepreneur's Forum that the MAX framework will be designed to "float above" applications that are written against APIs other than MAX, enabling the user to interact with the device via some of the navigation functionality that MAX provides even when you're not running a MAX application. You'll notice a toolbar across the top of the screen in this image that appears to have buttons for accessing other applications. MAX is supposed to provide easy ways to view and switch between different running applications without resorting to the stylus and touchscreen. From these pictures it's my guess that the "float above" feature of MAX hasn't been implemented yet for Palm OS or GTK applications.

The fact that we don't see this toolbar in the first image is (in addition to the fact that the icons are stupidly large!) what leads me to believe it has nothing to do with the MAX application launcher. The launcher was described as enabling all apps on the device to be viewed and launched from a single interface regardless of what API was used to develop them, and this seems to be designed with something similar in mind, but that's about all you can say about it.

In short, I don't think we really have anything here that gives a good idea yet of how MAX will look or work. We'll just have to wait--either for better leaked pictures or an official release of MAX screenshots. If PalmSource isn't releasing screenshots themselves, you can bet it's because they know things are going to look different when ALP ships around the end of the year.

Here's LinuxDevices.com's write-up: http://www.linuxdevices.com/news/NS7558035858.html

12:23 PM by Laurens in Archive | Sunrise

Always pleased to announce a new release. (Hey, that kinda rhymes.)

I did some cleanups in preparation for the final v2.0 release and added Help documentation. Aside from completing the documentation and fixing any bugs that may show up, there's nothing left to do. Thank God the end is in sight!

• New: Incomplete first draft of the Help documentation. (Will be revised and expanded later.)
• New: Option to limit the number of saved feed items automatically.
• New: Menu commands to open the HotSync conduit and application settings directories.
• Changed: Revised the Preferences dialog.
• Changed: Changed "Restrict to host" label to "Restrict to server".
• Changed: Rewrote some of the HotSync Conduit code for transferring documents to memory cards.
• Changed: Update report stylesheet now truncates long URLs to avoid having to scroll the page horizontally.

Download page

As an aside, I also updated the roadmap.

10:21 PM by Bob Russell in E-Book General | Deals and Resources (No...

Go It Alone is a free web book in html that can be found here. According to the book, "A fundamentally new class of entrepreneur is emerging: the go-it-alone entrepreneur." While accuracy may suffer slightly, let me slightly abbreviate the three distinguishing characteristics which are given:
1) Started with a small investment and owned by the founder
2) Run by six or less people
3) Unlimited revenue possibilities

I haven't read the book, so I'm not sure what the main points of the author are, but I'd say that this new class of business is certainly only now possible because of the way technology has enabled large scale business activity via internet technologies and software. One person can reach millions with the right message and product or service. If you can provide something people want, there is no telling how fast word will spread. The power of the internet is clear from the way the latest joke or tidbit of news travels via web sites and email.

Go It Alone is written by Bruce Judson. He "is a successful go-it-alone entrepreneur, a bestselling and award-winning author, and one of the nation's leading experts on marketing and entrepreneurship. Judson's unique approach is to 'battle test' his innovative ideas by founding real businesses based on his evolving principles. These practical tests of his theories, combined with his extensive research, then form the basis for his widely acclaimed books."

It is also available in print form at Amazon from HarperCollins.

A note for those of you that may be intending to read the book on your pda. If you use iSiloX and highlight the table of contents with link depth 1 and no images, you will probably get almost what you want. But if it came out like me, the pages are not in order and the book starts on iSilo page 22. And then various pages are missing, so it seems everything is out of order.

If you figure out how to grab this for portable reading without a web connection, let us know what your trick is!

(Via LifeHacker )