Quickies: PalmReader, Digi-Map, Bluetooth, and More

Palm Digital Media has released free versions of PalmReader for both the Windows and Macintosh operating systems. -K. Buffaloe

Digi-Map 2002 is a navigation app that works with GPS receivers. Maps are available for most of Europe. Users can plan routes on their handheld or PC. It supports storing maps on SD cards It costs € 150. -Davide Sacco

Micrologic Research is reducing by about 20% its estimate for the number of Bluetooth-enabled devices that will be sold this year , according to ZDnet UK. The research company says slower mobile phone sales are hurting Bluetooth, though the company predicts Bluetooth will eventually catch on. -Ed

Pen&Internet has released of the final beta of riteMail, which allows users to send their own handwritten notes and drawings to any email address. It now works in conjunction with Microsoft Outlook or any default email program and takes advantage of all wireless connection methods. -PR

The Developer’s Digest from PalmLoyal highlights the people that make Palm OS handhelds successful – the developers. In the premier article, they introduce Ben Combee of Metrowerks. -Carl Brooks

MomsPDA.com has recently launched with articles of interest to mothers, women, and parents who are PDA enthusiasts. -Ed

As promised a few days ago, Kinoma Producer 1.1 and Kinoma Player 1.1 were released today. They include integrated widescreen encoding, improved audio synchronization for long movies, and a number of bug fixes. Kinoma Producer 1.1 sells for $30 but is a free upgrade. Kinoma Player 1.1 is a free download. -Ed

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Sorry - but nothing really new

Phil @ 7/17/2002 10:42:26 AM #
Sorry, but the only new thing about this are the PC/Mac-Versions of the PalmReader. The apps fpr PalmOS and WindowsCE have been there for a while. They haven´t even been updated.

Phil

RE: Sorry - but nothing really new
Ed @ 7/17/2002 10:50:18 AM #
Phil, that's what that quickie is about, the versions for Windows and Mac. I'm not sure how you got any hint from what I wrote that there might be new handheld versions.

---
News Editor
RE: Sorry - but nothing really new
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/17/2002 10:53:52 AM #
This is cool. Now I can read all of my Peanut Press books on my PC instead of a 3 inch screen. Way to go Palm!!!
RE: Sorry - but nothing really new
Phil @ 7/17/2002 11:00:37 AM #
Sorry Editor,

either I am to tired or the text changed: what I read was "free versions of palmreader available".

No offence meant!

Keep up the great work.


Phil

RE: Sorry - but nothing really new
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/17/2002 11:55:46 AM #
I'm looking at the email I received at it says XP, 2000, ME and 98. So No NT so I can't look at this at work? Does anyone know otherwise I'll just ask tech support
Thanks
RE: Sorry - but nothing really new
Ronin @ 7/17/2002 1:19:18 PM #
I am running on an XP machine without any problems (the reader is quite nice BTW). I am not running NT any more but isn't the XP kernel and the NT kernel very similar? I know that the NT kernel is the basis for the XP kernel and I seem to recall reading that most everything that could run on NT would run on XP and vice versa.

In the Spirit of Umoja,
Ronin
RE: Sorry - but nothing really new
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/17/2002 2:43:22 PM #
We work on NT 4. There must have been a typo in the announcement. Sorry for the confusion.

-peter fry
palm digital media group

New Kinoma 1.1 released

I.M. Anonymous @ 7/17/2002 11:29:21 AM #
Sorry, I may have missed your announce earlier, but Kinoma released their version 1.1 today. It does the Clie wide screen conversion so you don't need to do a conversion before Kinoma makes it Palm OS worthy. As well, it has better voice to movie matching.
RE: New Kinoma 1.1 released
Altema @ 7/17/2002 12:15:34 PM #
Yea, the audio/video not being synced threw me off at first. I thought the frame rate was too high, but dropping the frame rate and/or overclocking did not fix it, so I figured it was the software.

Palm Read EULA

potter @ 7/17/2002 11:53:58 AM #
Wow, there is actually something positive for the end-user in the End User License Agreement:

> 7. LIMITED WARRANTY. Palm represents and warrants to
> Licensee that for a period of ninety (90) days
> following the installation of the Software (the
> "Warranty Period") the Software shall operate
> substantially in accordance with the Documentation;
> provided that: [...]

It then goes on to limit this statement, however it is rare to see any thing positive to the End-User. Usually this clause in a EULA states in effect:

> We warrant nothing.

RE: Palm Read EULA
Beavis @ 7/17/2002 1:17:31 PM #
Nothing beats the "Bloodthirsty License Agreement" from HavenTrees "Easyflow"

An excerpt:

"We don't claim EasyFlow is good for anything - if you think it is, great, but it's up to you to decide. If EasyFlow doesn't work: tough. if you lose a million because EasyFlow messes up, It's you that's out the million, not us. If you don't like this disclaimer, tough. We reserve the right to do the absolute minimum provided by law, up to and including nothing.

This is basically the same disclaimer that comes with all software package but ours is in plain English and theirs is in legalese.

We didn't really want to include any disclaimer at all, but our lawyers insisted. We tried to ignore them but they threatened us with the attack shark (see license agreement above) at which point we relented.

The whole license agreement:

www.geocities.com/Heartland/Plains/4188/sw_doc.html

RE: Palm Read EULA
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/17/2002 2:11:30 PM #
Beavis:

That brought back some memories of the early 1990's to me. I used to use that product until my company shoved Microsoft Visio down my throat.

I wish I had a for real copy of that license agreement. It was a classic.

lazy book reading

I.M. Anonymous @ 7/17/2002 1:39:53 PM #
I have long enjoyed reading books on my Palm OS via many methods available. Peanut Press, iSilo, or even WordSmith (doc files).
Getting even more mobile in this cut throat world of layoffs, I found it so easy to get books on CD in either wav or MP3 format. Dump them onto a Clie and listen as I go. The price of these read books is lower than I had thought they would be, especially in the MP3 format.

So what do you guys think of the New Palm Reader?

Alslayer @ 7/17/2002 5:04:30 PM #
I am downloading it right now but I want to know what people think of it? I am about to buy those new Terminator books and maybe i'll be able to test this thing out.

So what do you guys think of the desktop versions?

RE: So what do you guys think of the New Palm Reader?
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/17/2002 8:30:38 PM #
I tried a beta of it, and it was pretty sweet. I don't read a LOT of ebooks, but it's definitely one I'd use again.

--Abe in Boston

DIGIMAP - GPS Navigation - better than some in-car-systems

I.M. Anonymous @ 7/18/2002 5:33:47 PM #
Some time ago I was looking for a car-navigation software for my wife’s Palm IIIc/car.

After some time I found a programm called DIGIMAP, which I wanted to show you since it’s great value for the money and the nearest to „real“ car-navigation I’ve seen on Palms for the European region.

(I don't include the link to screenshots since its
posted in the news section. I also recommended this
application to PIC for their news section. So - thanks to the author for his quick response!)

What I liked about DIGIMAP:

It’s available for different European countries until now, the developer Harald Körtge is charging about 150 EUR (or Dollar, as it stands ) for it with one region (e.g. Britain) included. For this you get the software and the up-to-date- card-material from Navtech.

The maps are great: Everything, even with small paths (biking) and the smallest road: It’s all there in the windows part of the program. You zoom the areas as you need them and sync them to your Palm. The software let’s you select the amount of details you need, so you can get to the file-size you can afford on your Palm. I got a big area in middle-west Germany up to the smallest roads and it is about 2.5 MB on the Palm. Germany with every motorway and main road is about 3-4 MB.

The Palm-application is showing you the adequate map; turning the card in the direction you drive, giving you the street names and signaling the way you ought to drive. It’s got an automatic, like the „big ones“: Once you leave your route, ist auto-calculating the new route in about 20-40 seconds (not bad for 16-20 MHZ).

Besides the map, you get a distance-bar, showing you the distance to the next turn and an arrow above it, indicating where you’ve got to turn next. It also tells you the street-name you’ve got to turn to next. When you leave one of the „maps“ on your Palm, the Software is changing to the next best one available.

Of course, the software can’t make your Palm TALK, but instead it beeps in different ways, according to the direction (left/right) and distance to your next turn.

I compared it with the Becker-Car-Navigation-System I’ve got in my own car. There, I’m left on my own in every small area or town, once you come to the really small roads. With the Digimap-Software and the Navtech-Data – it’s all there, period. That was really a surprise – I thought that this was the best map-material for the price I know of.

All in all:

This is really as near to „real“ car navigation as I’ve ever seen for Palms. I think it’s well worth the money- for my car-navigation, they want 250 EUR/$, just for the new CD alone. For those who understand german, there is a well-done test at www.palmrouter.de.
The guy who runs the site somehow came to selling/adapting gps-systems and software, for those interested I can also recommend buying gps/software of him.

Of course, I’m not in any way related to either of the mentioned developers. I just bought of them like a lot of other people and think they’re doing a great job.

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