Comments on: ACCESS Licenses Handwriting Tech for ALP

Zi Corporation today announced that it has signed a licensing agreement with ACCESS Systems Americas, Inc. (formerly PalmSource, Inc.) to pre-integrate eZiText predictive text technology and Decuma handwriting recognition technology into the ACCESS Linux Platform.
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When will Access have ALP-OS finally ready for use? 2008?

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 12/18/2006 2:35:18 PM # Q
It's nice to see Access speeding up development by licensing turn-key components for ALP-OS. I hope this is merely an announcement and that they had actually planned to license Decuma or Jot from the beginning. But if this licensing was necessitated by some homegrown Access/PalmSource handwriting regognition code imploding, then... YIKES.

A few problems:

- Access/PalmSource has been a net USER of Open Source - contributing little, while at the same time begging for scraps of code from the Linux geeks. A surefire way to get a poor reputation within the Linux community and thus have all Access/PalmSource's desired additions to the Mobile Linux genepool ignored. Nokia is "using" Open Source the "right" way, but then again they have the advantages of size and lesser time constraints (it's easy to wait for an OS to be done properly if you're your own customer).

- Access/PalmSource is behind schedule. For them to pretend otherwise is disappointing, but not unexpected given the desperate situation they find themselves in. The company should be ashamed of trying to pull the wool over the eyes of the mobile community.

- Access/PalmSource has limited codemonkey resources, with most of the (few) decent remaining codemonkeys that were at PalmSource having fled their cages in late 2005. Can "hired guns" get Access/PalmSource back on schedule? Hopefully, but probably not.

- Access/PalmSource has heavy competition that can leverage significant advantages (like size or cost or non-vaporware status) to snatch up pieces of the pie that Access/PalmSource is struggling to acquire. The release of Nokia's smartphone version of Maemo (likely by the latter half of 2007) will be a crippling blow for Access/PalmSource. The adoption of other cheap Linux-based alternatives that are currently racing to the market will be the second part of the one-two combination that sends Access/PalmSource crashing to the canvas. (And sorry, Marty - the Chinese market will NOT be Access/PalmSource's saviour. China is a cruel mirage that will prove to be Access/PalmSource's Waterloo.)

ALP-OS is starting to take on the same putrid odor of the late, great, dearly departed Cobalt (PalmOS 6).


"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

TVoR

RE: When will Access have ALP-OS finally ready for use? 2008?
nexus6 @ 12/19/2006 6:54:59 AM # Q
Well, I don't know if I'm right, but this seems, that Zi and Decuma will be just an option, not the compulsory text-entry way for the deveopers. I understand the pre-integrate thing the way, that ALP will just be Decuma and Zi ready, am I right? This would mean then, that they still can have some proprietal text entry method as well as they can "license" some other ones. In fact, it will be the device manufacturers, who will pay the royalties for the Zi or Decuma integration.

Or am I wrong?

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ALP is IRRELEVANT. No more stories about ALP please.

Gekko @ 12/27/2006 5:48:48 PM # Q

thank you.


RE: ALP is IRRELEVANT. No more stories about ALP please.
cervezas @ 12/27/2006 11:31:33 PM # Q
So why do you come back to post on this 9-day-old news item? Move on, moron! :-)


David Beers
Pikesoft Mobile Computing
www.pikesoft.com/blog

RE: ALP is IRRELEVANT. No more stories about ALP please.
Gekko @ 12/28/2006 8:16:04 AM # Q

you are what's known as a "smacked ass".


RE: ALP is IRRELEVANT. No more stories about ALP please.
cervezas @ 12/28/2006 11:24:54 AM # Q
Does it make you feel important to say things like that? I sure hope so. I'd like to think I brought a tiny ray of cheer into that tiny, benighted soul of yours. :-)

Thanks for reminding us that because Gekko isn't interested in ALP the rest of us should be content to be ignorant about it as well. Just like the other thing you're so fond of reminding us of: because Gekko uses a Treo 650 no one need ever concern themselves with other devices that they stupidly believe meet their needs better. Not sure what we'd do without your wise and benevolent guidance!

Happy New Year to all!

David Beers
Pikesoft Mobile Computing
www.pikesoft.com/blog

RE: ALP is IRRELEVANT. No more stories about ALP please.
Gekko @ 12/28/2006 1:24:34 PM # Q

Beersie - have you ever wondered why you're universally disliked here? It's because you're a smacked-ass.



RE: ALP is IRRELEVANT. No more stories about ALP please.
cervezas @ 12/28/2006 2:25:33 PM # Q
News flash: You're not the universe. :-)

But you sure do a nice job pointing out that it's your own posts that are irrelevant to the discussion here. I guess my work here is done.


David Beers
Pikesoft Mobile Computing
www.pikesoft.com/blog

RE: ALP is IRRELEVANT. No more stories about ALP please.
freakout @ 12/29/2006 9:50:12 AM # Q
Group hug, everybody!
RE: ALP is IRRELEVANT. No more stories about ALP please.
ChiA @ 12/29/2006 4:21:53 PM # Q
Asking a serious point in an amicable manner, just how relevant is ALP now that the largest PALM OS device manufacturer has the source code to the current Garnet?

The fact is that Palm is the largest manufacturer of Palm OS devices than all the other companies combined.

The two burning questions are whether:
1) ALP can appeal to a wider range of licensees or at least enough to sell a greater volume of devices than the previous Palm OS licensees. (Arguably PalmSource's offerings failed to appeal to enough licensees for it to remain as a viable independent company).

2) If ALP will ever be appealing enough to Palm with its current strategy of two operating systems: Windows Mobile and Garnet.


These questions remain unanswered and thus ALP remains relevant to Palm. There is the added factor that should Palm decline ALP then it raises a potential conflict of interest for ACCESS between how much support it gives to Palm with Garnet and how much to other manufacturers with ALP.

Food for thought during the season of goodwill towards all.

RE: ALP is IRRELEVANT. No more stories about ALP please.
SeldomVisitor @ 12/30/2006 8:28:39 AM # Q
ACCESS is done with PalmOS - they aren't going to be giving any support to PALM for Garnet. They simply said:

== "Here, PALM - take the source and do with it what you will. We keep
== title but everything else is pretty much up to you"

See ACCESS' very nice FAQ for the actual words. The key part, IMHO:

== "...Q. Will ACCESS modify its version of Palm OS Garnet?
==
== A. We will continue to support our licensees and developers. We will
== provide professional services as needed. The functionality provided
== by the current version of Palm OS Garnet will be included in the ACCESS
== Linux Platform..."

which, IMHO, is another was of saying "We're done with it - enjoy!"...

-- http://www.access-company.com/developers/press/palm_faq.html


RE: ALP is IRRELEVANT. No more stories about ALP please.
cervezas @ 12/30/2006 11:39:06 AM # Q
It's always kind of amusing that on the one hand PICkers wring their hands about Palm's small share of the smartphone market and then in the same breath act as though ACCESS is going to be in trouble if they don't get Palm to license ALP.

Both are rather provincial points of view, IMO. ALP could be a huge success without shipping on a single handset within Palm's primarily North American market. Japan alone dwarfs the US smartphone market and China is dwarfing Japan. Both China and Japan are strongly oriented toward Linux.

ALP's relevance to people who use devices from Palm will be the role it plays in keeping up innovation in the Palm OS software market. As long as ALP devices and Palm devices share a common API, each one's success helps maintain the ecosystem of the other. Whether you ever use or even see a phone running ALP you'll stand to benefit as a Palm OS user from whatever success ALP enjoys.

Which isn't to say ALP won't at some point gain traction in markets where Palm OS is popular, just that that isn't the measure of ALP's relevance to Palm OS users.

David Beers
Pikesoft Mobile Computing
www.pikesoft.com/blog

ACCESS planning to drop Palm OS support from ALP?
ChiA @ 12/30/2006 10:51:15 PM # Q
Beersy said
act as though ACCESS is going to be in trouble if they don't get Palm to license ALP.

The Palm OS emulator is there to appeal to those who wish to make Palm OS devices and there's no escaping the fact of Palm being the near monopoly manufacturer of Palm OS devices. The fact that the emulator is there implies that ACCESS feel ALP won't be as successful without it, otherwise why is ACCESS going through the trouble and expense of incorporating it, to keep the Japanese happy who have software leftover from their CLIEs?

There is also the possibility that having granted very generous licensing terms for Garnet to Palm, ACCESS may simply drop Palm OS emulation altogether from ALP.

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