08:22 AM by Colin Dunstan in E-Book General | News

Israel Steinmetz from BellaOnline (don't look at me like this - I normally don't read women mags) wrote a nice article explaining why to read e-books on your PDA. Excerpt:

The key to the advantages of reading eBooks on a PDA is convenience. Reading eBooks on a PDA provides opportunities for reading that mesh with one's life. One can carry one's grocery list on the PDA, use it for shopping, then read a book while in the checkout line. (Reading the TV Guide or beauty magazine in line is no longer necessary.) Or, one can turn out the lights, get into bed, and read a book on a PDA (with the backlight on) until falling asleep. (No more falling asleep with the room lights on.) eBooks on PDA's are books that fit into our lives.

03:54 PM by Bob Russell in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

BargainPDA has a new article out with some good information if you are wondering about upgrading your trusty PDA.

With a desktop computer, you can do all kinds of upgrades without replacing your computer. All kinds of memory, disk, replacement cards and specialty devices are available for even the novice to do a home upgrade. Not to mention the availability of USB devices that can be added.

But for PDAs, the story is a bit different. While some upgrade of functionality can be done with add-ons like keyboards, screen protectors, GPS modules or memory cards, the only real method of upgrading is to buy another PDA.

And be sure to keep an eye on some of the great sites out there to see what's going on in the industry. My personal favorite is Sammy McLoughlin's Palm Addicts, which is focused on Palm PDAs, and has frequent updates. It is a very fun read. A few other nice sources are www.palminfocenter.com, www.brighthand.com, www.pocketpcthoughts.com. Many more are out there also, but this will get you started if you are "on the hunt!"

My own eye is on that Dell x50v and the Palm T5, but I might wait for the next generation of devices because I'm still very happy with my tiny pocketable Toshiba e405.

05:32 AM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | iSilo/X

Darren, the main guy behind the fantastic e-book reader iSilo, released the first V4.25 beta of iSilo and iSiloX today.

Highlights of iSilo V4.25:

• Added color themes feature:
  - Ability to create color themes with selectable text and background colors.
  - Added ability to use an individual color theme for each document to force the text and background colors to those of the color theme.
  - Added Options/Color configuration page/panel and dialogs for managing color themes.
• Addressing of miscellaneous issues.

Highlights of iSiloX V4.25:

• Added ability to specify a maximum link depth for off-site URLs.
• In iSiloX for Windows, added ability to specify the character set when creating Font Silo fonts.
• Addressing of miscellaneous issues

02:56 PM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

What is palmOne up to? The Tungsten T5, the successor of the popular Tungsten T3, is a solid performer, but it lacks features that we would've liked to see from palmOne's new top-of-the-line device (such as integrated WiFi or OS 6).

With the new polished Treo 650 palmOne might hit a home run, although its true success is still quite difficult to predict (people aren't so happy either about crippled software in OEM versions, nor about the recent price increase for the uncrippled device).

Let's be harsh: Neither the Tungsten T5 nor the Treo 650 are what I'd call revolutionary.

The idea of an hybrid with a flexible display

Imagine: A PDA and a cell phone incorporated into one device by using a foldable dual-sided display. In a closed state, the device would resemble a typical cell phone ('candy bar size'). In an open state, it would use the form of a typical PDA, providing an enlarged viewing area. Sounds very much like a Nokia 9210 Communicator -- except for the foldable display.

palmOne just received patent US 6,850,780, "Compact palmtop computer system and wireless telephone with foldable dual-sided display". Although the company filed it several years ago, it might come useful now when everyone it talking about convergence in the mobile sector (I am not a great fan of convergence myself, but I don't speak for the majority (although sometimes I wish I did)). It's probably also not a disadvantage that flexible displays are just around the corner.

Who knows, maybe palmOne will have the competitive edge once again.

12:50 PM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Michaël reported to us that his company Noreve, based in the wonderful town of Saint-Tropez/France, is now offering high-quality leather cases for mobile gadgets such as MP3 players, PDAs, smartphones and digital cameras.

Until March 1, 2005, you can open an account at Noreve's web site and receive a 5 Euro (US $6) gift certificate, which will then be valid until 31/12/06.

05:15 AM by Colin Dunstan in Archive | Portable Audio/Video

Somebody made a nice 12min video of the Archos PMA430 at Solutions Linux expo, demonstrating USB accessories and giving details about the SDKs that will be available to programmers for improving multimedia and networking applications based on Linux.

Download the video here (WMV, 65MB).

04:55 AM by Colin Dunstan in E-Book Software | Reading and Management

The OpenBerg e-book reader, part of the OpenBerg project, can now open and display books in uncompressed OEBPS (OpenReader) 1.2 format, as well as follow hyperlinks. Note that this is a great forward leap in an open source implementation of OpenReader. Who will be the first to release an e-book reader for PDAs supporting OEBPS 1.2? My bet would be: Plucker.

Jon Noring, member of the OpenReader Consortium, explains:

OEBPS 1.2 (and most other publication frameworks built upon XML) represent digital publications using multiple resources (files). Obviously, for distributing ebooks and similar types of digital publications (newspapers, periodicals, documents, etc.), we want to distribute a publication as a *single* file. Thus, we have to somehow encapsulate an OEBPS 1.2 Publication into some sort of "wrapper" file for distribution/sale purposes.

This is what the OpenReader format is intended to address. Currently, the OpenReader format has not yet been finalized -- at this stage it is still conceptual with a preliminary list of requirements. A technical working group needs to be assembled to finalize 1) the "requirements" list (e.g., "the OpenReader format must do this, that, and the other thing") and then 2) come up with the format spec details that sufficiently meets the list of requirements.

OpenBerg addresses the issue of *how to render* (display) an OEBPS 1.2 Publication, while the OpenReader format addresses *how to move* an OEBPS 1.2 Publication from the publisher to OpenBerg and other OEBPS rendering engines. OpenBerg and OpenReader are not in competition, but rather complement each other.

04:42 AM by Colin Dunstan in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

BargainPDA has reviewed the Asus's MyPal A730W, which features a VGA screen, dual wireless, and dual expansion slots. The reviewers concludes:

The A730W suffers from a certain amount of 'too little, too late' syndrome. When it was announced, no other PocketPC on the market had dual wireless radios and a VGA screen. In the time between when it was supposed to come out and now, four other PocketPCs have come out with dual slots, dual wireless radios, and VGA screens: the iPaq hx4700, Dell Axim X50v, Toshiba e830, and Fujitsu Loox 720. The A730W offers nothing that one or more of these models don't already do, and often do better, faster, and cheaper.