Every time I mention the Nokia Internet Tablets — on the web or in conversation — I always describe them as running “a full Debian Linux (modified to be aware of the hardware keys).” I used to say “virtual keyboard and hardware keys” but the N810 obviates that.
This passes the truth-in-advertising test, I think. But it’s not one-hundred percent true.
Sure you can take just about any Linux application and compile it so that you get something that runs on a NIT. This screenshot of the particularly idiosyncratic font-creation program Fontforge running on my N810 is proof enough for me.
Even if some apps are slow or not really suited to a tablet, I am generally tempted to say you can do anything on a NIT that you need to do on a computer.
Except you can’t print.
Can’t print out that email with the address and time of the meeting. Can’t print that web page with the neat info. Can’t print out the short notes entered on the train coming in to work. Can’t print out that sketch of the new design to hand to your wife.
Supporting every printer imaginable — OK, it’s not something I want to ask for. I think a “full” Linux ought to, but I’m pragmatic enough to know that’s a fool’s errand.
It would be nice if some apps could print to a generic inkjet or Postscript device.
See, sometimes I want to surf away from my desk, on the walkaround web.
And sometimes I want to walk around with a piece of paper in my hand.
We just received a quick note from Quim Gil about Maemo.org’s participation this year at LinuxTag 2008, a Linux and open Source exhibition, at Berlin, Germany. This is a great opportunity for Maemo.org to become more visibile, as well as showcase the best Maemo applications, and its current and future plans.
There is currently a draft of the session over at Maemo.org and Quim is soliciting suggestions for tracks and additional speakers. If you would like to suggest topics and/or nominate speakers/developers, this is your chance. The deadline is on April 10, 2008.
I’m getting ahead of myself. I’m not actually developing anything for the Nokia Internet Tablets. I don’t know C or C++ or Python*. (Or Ruby either for that matter.**)
Still, I’m intrigued by a reference to PluThon, which lets you develop Python apps for maemo without requiring Scratchbox.
PluThon is an Eclipse plug-in that allows you to interact with your N800 or N810 and run/debug your Python app directly on the tablet. You work in Eclipse, get your usual language support, and SSH the app to the device from within Eclipse (er, PluThon). And skip the emulation stage entirely.
Right now, PluThon is Linux-only, but it seems like it could be made to work with a Windows setup too.†
Not that I can use it‡. But I can dream, can’t I?
__________
* Hey, lucky Java isn’t available on the Internet Tablets or I’d go 0 for 4 on the big ones, eh?
** I have at least made Ruby’s acquaintance. Just barely enough to nod in recognition when we pass in the hallway though.
† And if you want that, why don’t you send a note to eclipse-integration@maemo.org and ask for it. I have.
‡ Hey, what’s to stop an Eclipse-fond Rubyist from doing the same for that language?
I think maybe I mistitled the two posts I wrote recently about setting up a environment for internet tablet software development. No one read them. And maybe that’s because people don’t realize what they’re about.
The point of these posts and the thread started by BOFH and contributed to by OSEmuTech, Run Linux on top of Windows, without a virtual machine, is that you don’t have to have a Linux computer — or a dual-boot Linux, or Linux running on a virtual machine — in order to write and test applications for the Nokia Internet Tablets.
And that seems to me to be newsworthy.
So I’m repeating myself by posting again, but this time under a more appropriate heading.
Point: You can easily install andLinux on your Windows computer. Took me all of five minutes.
Point: What you don’t get with this (to quote the andLinux FAQ) is:
another desktop
the bench of applications that usually ship with Linux distributions (you have to fetch whatever you want)
a printer driver
trouble with further drivers
Point: You can run Linux apps side-by-side with your Windows apps, and use the Windows desktop for all the file-management stuff you already know how to do. And use your Windows printer drivers.
This is way cool, and I think we should make a big thing of it!
Since the internet tablets have an ARM processor (and not an x86-based cpu the way desktops and laptops do), you need to be able to write an app for the NIT, see how it looks while you’re on your own computer, and make a version that will run on a NIT.
So you install Scratchbox and Maemo 4.0.1 to do that. Pete Savage has written a full step-by-step how-to that tells you each thing you need to do. Even I, a perennial Linux tourist (and never a resident), managed it on my first try.
I’m going to repeat myself again: This is way cool! I definitely think we should make a big thing of it!
This screen capture shows the example application from Pete Savage’s how-to on getting Scratchbox working to compile and test software for the Nokia N800. A Maemo development environment, in other words.
Being one man’s continuing quest for happiness despite years of unfulfillment
I’ve been using computers a long time (don’t ask) and using microcomputers long before Microsoft even sold an OS. I was a DOS guy before I could afford a Macintosh, though I was using Macs at work starting back in 1985. And I happily benefitted from the Mac’s strength in desktop publishing software for more than a decade.
When I re-oriented my publishing career towards XML and e-books in 1999, I was forced to be a dual-platform guy. There just weren’t any XML tools on the Mac, so I bought a cheapo PC and moved back and forth between my two computers depending on the task.
As I used XML more and my Mac grew ever more gray-bearded, I started buying new programs for the PC instead of for the Mac. This was a huge emotional issue. Where the dollars go, there follows the heart (at least in electronics). Gradually I was transformed from a full-blown Mac enthusiast (and off-hours tech support for various family members long-distance) into a full-time WinXP user. It helped that my job now supplied me with a laptop that I carried from Manhattan office to home office (where I work two days a week) to out-of-state offices every week or three.
When the replacement for XP — then known as Longhorn, now as Vista — first raised its head, I found myself unable to accept the transition. Microsoft wanted me to pay more for the OS than I thought I should pay for the computer itself. And forget Apple. That was a company everyone agreed was the next Polaroid, Xerox and Kodak combined, destined never to regain financial security or market strength.*
I figured then that my next OS would be Linux.
I won’t go into my beliefs regarding open software, copyright and monopolies. Suffice to say that I’m an extremist. Probably many of you here at ITT have followed the same path towards the sanity of open software (maybe not as far as I). But that pushed me towards Linux, too, of course. Continue reading ‘Me and Linux, round 4 and a half’
Nokia has released a new firmware update to OS2008. Maemo.org is reporting that this release (v2.2007.51-3) fixes the following bugs:
2417 No includes for libapt-pkg (aka libapt-pkg-dev)
2917 libgdbm-dev is reported missing with chinook’s apt-get
2766 Missing libxslt1-dev in chinook
2901 Can’t install blues-utils-tools on current n810.
Reports from Internet Tablet Talk members say that the only thing this update fixes is the power-on problem. It looks like however that this update is more for the developers, as indicated at Maemo.org and from the release notes and from the Maemo 4.0 to 4.0.1 comparison table.
Got any questions about what and why in the development of the Internet Tablet?
Next Tuesday, Feb. 12, looks like a good chance to get them answered.
Thoughtfix (aka Daniel Gentleman) will be talking with Quim Gil, Nokia’s point man in communicating with developers, bloggers and users. (Here’s a link to Thoughtfix’s Live Show page at ustream.tv.)
Well, you can already see my bias — I’ve identified Quim’s communication role, but Thoughtfix thoughtfully notes his professional position: development platform product manager for Maemo, which inclines one to conclude that as the Maemo product manager he has signficant say in the development of our platform.
And it’s in that guise that Quim — his name is pronounced Kim Jill, btw — will be appearing and taking questions. As Thoughtfix notes in his blog,
[S]upport questions [should] be pertinent to his role as the guy in charge of the development platform. [Gil] knows maemo inside and out and we should focus our interaction on that — so questions like “Why can’t we charge over USB?” don’t belong here.
I know firsthand that Quim’s tolerance for IT users’ quarrelsome behavior rivals that of any grandparent with a three-year-old, so I don’t expect to be scolded if I stray from the assigned parameters. (Well, maybe by Thoughtfix.)
The show will start at 11 p.m. for me on the East Coast, 9 p.m. for Thoughtfix in Arizona and 6 a.m. for Quim in Helsinki (which, come to think of it, may strain his ability to tolerate the benighted), Feb. 12.
Thanks to Thoughtfix for having this talk and for sending us a note about it!
A lot of discussion brewed from this move from Nokia. A hefty discussion brewed at itT and posting the same question at the Maemo Developers List received some interesting responses worthy of a ‘free software opera’ as Quim Gil, Nokia Development Platform Product Manager puts it.
Quim, as most of us know from Maemo.org, has just posted a new entry on his blog to hopefully put some perspective on Trolltech and Maemo. Here are some snippets:
…I made some research to confirm the guess. When it comes to maemo, there are no Trolltech/Qt related plans at the moment.
On the mid term… well, nobody knows. What follows are my thoughts today.
Trolltech develops Qt, a cross-platform application development framework that powers KDE and is also licensed to many commercial software projects. Nokia pushes the Symbian OS with several own platforms on top like S60, plus S40 running on top of Nokia OS, plus several non-mobile applications like Nokia PC Suite (developed with Qt, by the way). Trolltech’s toolkit and its C++ native language (which is native in Symbian as well) fit very well in Nokia’s short term strategy to improve cross-compatibility between the Symbian platforms. If making a good use of the Qt library helps having in maemo some of the cool stuff available in S60, all the better then.
This morning, the next-to-last on the list — contributors buying from the U.S. stocks — were notified that they could now apply their discount code to purchase a Nokia N810 Internet Tablet.
Alas, the usual glitches are still preventing this — developers report Friday morning that inserting a discount code results in either an “invalid code” or “zero balance” response and operators at Let’sTalk.com who hanclle phone orders decline any knowledge of the discount.
I’m posting this info now in hopes that someone at Nokia might see this and straighten things out.
* * *
Added Jan 22: New email, new results: orders accepted and delivery due in two days.
Added Jan 24: People who placed orders as recently as Jan 22 in the evening have been notified that the N810 is back-ordered and they shouldn’t expect their devices for three weeks.
