Re: [gentoo-user] OT: Openmoko Freerunner as USB client

[Stroller <stroller@stellar.eclipse.co.uk>]

On 18 Oct 2009, at 10:42, daid kahl wrote:

>> I think what has really killed Openmoko is the inability to get  
>> hold of 3G
>> chips in the low quantities and licensing terms they required. Lack  
>> of
>> camera and 3G were the biggest source of "this is lame, i was really
>> interested but lacking these i'm not buying a freerunner" whinges  
>> on the
>> mailing list. I think now, a year or so later, and looking to the  
>> future
>> this looks really dated. I gather Openmoko have pretty dropped  
>> development
>> of phones, although this WikiReder was announced last week, and  
>> apparently
>> something else is in the pipeline.
>
> I agree.  I don't really care about the camera, but I moved to Japan
> recently.  I'm not sure if the 3G itself is required, but the likely
> carriers (SoftBank, for example) would charge exorbitant rates per
> month because Apple isn't paying them off...

Uh, I'm kinda surprised by that. I mean, here in the UK it costs about  
$15 to add a free unlimited data plan to your standard mobile traiff.  
And smartphones are really popular in Japan. I don't know what you  
mean by "because Apple isn't paying them off".

> But I really really wanted a Freerunner.  I still dream of getting one
> and not getting a service plan..just using it as like a PDA with wifi.
> Any thoughts on this?  There are other PDAs with wifi and such (a
> friend was trying to sell me an old Palm with wifi a few months ago),
> but I really want it to run Linux. ...
> But I really want SSH on my phone...grrr.  Laziness for the win!

Well, this seems kinda contradictory. Either you want just a Linux PDA  
without phone functionality, or you want ssh on your phone. Seems to  
me like you do indeed want a single device.


SSH on the Freerunner is really pretty nice. I haven't used mine much,  
but it almost seems like the Freerunner's best or "killer" feature.  
The Freerunner has a particularly high-resolution screen, so that you  
can fit a lot in the terminal, and even tiny fonts display fine. I'm  
not completely convinced about the on-screen keyboard, but like I say  
I haven't used it much.


Downsides of the Freerunner:

- it's a bit large, it was described as a "brick" by a 20-something  
female I know. I wouldn't want to have to carry it _and_ a separate PDA.

- may need some hardware fixes, which require surface-mount soldering  
skills. There are people offering these fixes, but it could cost you  
some $. I'm not sure on the status if you were to buy a new one today.  
Keywords: buzz-fix, #1024 (the latter is supposed to significantly  
improve battery life in suspend).

- just a lack of slickness, really. I mean, I don't like the iPhone's  
closed ecosystem, they're apples and oranges, but the iPhone blows the  
Freerunner out of the water. Have you tried the email setup on an  
iPhone? It's just slick and it works, you can set it up in 2 minutes,  
and your new mail is there. End of story. I hate the iPhone Store and  
this whole thing of $3 apps, but I'll bet you could get a decent SSH  
app for the iPhone for not much money. Install Pidgin on the  
Freerunner and it just looks like a typical X-windows application from  
the Linux desktop; it's not really very inspiring.


There was a video on the BBC website the other day which showed the  
interfaces of the Palm Pre and an Android phone. I think they're both  
worth considering, particularly Android-based models.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/technology/2009/10/palm_pre_and_o2_a_marriage_of.html

 From what I'm seeing of the Freerunner's user space applications,  
it's at least a couple of years behind these, just a lot slower and  
less responsive. Yet both the Palm Pre and Android phones are based on  
Linux, so that you may be able to find one that's easily unlocked and  
which you can install whatever environment you want (e.g. Google's  
developer edition of the Android G1). You might well stick with the  
original firmware for the moment, but because these ship with Linux  
they give a decent opportunity to developers who want to develop a  
Linux / 3rd-party / X-windows based user space, and that might be  
really good in a couple of years.

I'm probably not the best person to write about mobile phones, because  
I get really excited about the tech, and then when I get a new mobile  
phone I tend to find it too fiddly to actually use. Maybe an iPhone  
would actually be ideal for me. I think there are lots of other  
alternatives to Openmoko, and most of those you can get from your  
mobile phone provider for an extra £10 or £15 a month, spread over an  
18-month contract so you basically don't notice the cost.


If I was in the USA, I think the Kindle looks like a killer device.  
You can get a refurbished one from Amazon for $175 and the built-in  
web-browser works with a web-based SSH GUI (see xkcd's kindle 2 blog  
post). It's been hacked enough to get a shell prompt on it, and that  
opens the way for a native SSH app and PDF readers &c. I think ideally  
you wouldn't just install a completely new Linux distro on it, because  
the Kindle's dictionary and stuff look quite slick, but I think  
there's the potential to install an alternative "main menu" so that  
you could download books from Google's book service and from project  
Gutenburg.

Stroller.