TamsPalm – the Palm OS / web OS Blog

Palm OS / web OS news and opinion source

December 31st, 2005

Data security on Palm OS Handhelds


Tam, you are such a silly idiot. The same s*** happens to you over and over again, no vacation without hardreset.-a good friend

People who know me know that I never take a notebook to vacations. Instead, I stick to my good ole T3-and it always hardresets in the middle of a vacation. And, as always, I never have a backup on me and have to stick to the 3GhZ PC in my vacation house. An extra handheld for testing stuff was purchased, a big SD card was bought,… . But some things never change.

Indeed, the biggest problem with data security for most of us is not a technological one. It sits in our heads, covered by a few mm of bone and a load of hair. We are simply put-damn lazy.

I had backup software on my handheld and even had a spare cradle-but that didn’t help because I forgot to plug the T3 into the cradle properly. Now don’t say that NVFS would have helped, some other stupid bug would have eventually killed the handheld anyways. But the problem was dead simple: I was too lazy to run the backup software every evening, and also forgot about it.

And this is the point. If backup software should work for you, it needs to become an everyday thing! If you start running backup software only when your vacation starts, you can be sure that you will have problems later on. The program may not be able to restore your handheld(had that once), it may not even be able to complete the backup, or you may simply forget about the 50 Megs of free space needed.

So, in order for backup software to work, you should begin using it when still in your home base. Select a good backup program, and use it every day. Before going to bed, clicking backup should become a standard move like taking your socks off or changing into a pyjama. If you once have that routine established, data security woes will be a thing of the past-that is, unless your SD card breaks down….

Did something like this ever happen to you? How do you protect your handheld’s data?

Tam, du bist so ein Dummkopf. Der gleiche Mist passiert dir jedes Mal, kein Urlaub ohne Hardreset.-toller Freund

Leute die mich kennen wissen dass ich nie ein Notebook mit in den Urlaub nehme. Stattdessen nehme ich meinen guten alten T3 – und habe immer einen Hardreset in der Mitte des Urlaubs. Und ich habe nie ein Backup und muss zum 3GhZ PC in meinem Ferienhaus greifen. Ich kaufte einen extra Handheld für Experimente, eine große SD-Karte, … Aber manche Dinge ändern sich nie.

Tatsächlich ist das größte Problem der Datensicherheit kein technisches. Es sitzt in unseren Köpfen, bedeckt mit einigen Millimetern Knochen und Haaren. Wir sind einfach zu faul.

Ich hatte Backup-Software auf meinem Handheld und sogar ein Ersatz-Cradle – aber es half nichts weil ich vergaß den T3 ordnungsgemäß in das Cradle zu stecken. Sagen Sie jetzt nicht dass NVFS geholfen hätte, irgendein blöder anderer Bug hätte wahrscheinlich trotzdem die Daten zerstört. Aber das Problem war sehr einfach: Ich war zu faul um jeden Abend das Backup-Programm auszuführen und vergaß es auch.

Das ist der Punkt: Wenn Backup-Software bei Ihnen funktionieren soll, muss sie alltäglich werden! Wenn Sie die Software nur nutzen wenn Ihr Urlaub anfängt, können Sie sicher sein dass Sie später Probleme haben werden. Das Programm könnte Probleme haben die Daten zu wiederherstellen (hatte ich einmal), das Backup könnte vielleicht nicht einmal fertiggestellt werden, der Sie könnten vergessen dass man 50 MB freien Speicher braucht.

Um also die Software zum Laufen zu bekommen, sollten Sie damit anfangen wenn Sie noch daheim sind. Wählen Sie ein gutes Backupprogramm und benutzen Sie es täglich. Das Backup anzufertigen bevor Sie zu Bett gehen sollte zu etwas Alltäglichem wie Strümpfe ausziehen oder Pyjama anzeiehn werden. Wenn das zur Routine wird, wird Datenverlust der Vergangenheit angehören – bis Ihre SD-Karte kaputtgeht.

Hatten Sie so etwas schon mal erlebt? Wie schützen Sie Ihre Daten?

December 30th, 2005

Vote for your favorite Palm Blog! (TamsPalm of course!)

Palm Addict is currently running a poll for the best Palm sites/blogs/forums on the web. TamsPalm is currently in third place in the blog category. This is where you come in, because we all know we should be in first! Please vote here! Hurry, since you only have the rest of 2005 to vote! Thanks!
Zur Zeit läuft bei Palm Addict eine Abstimmung über die besten Palm Seiten/Blogs/Foren im Internet. TamsPalm ist im Moment auf dem dritten Platz in der Blog-Kategorie. Hier kommen Sie ins Spiel, denn wir alle wissen wer der erste sein sollte! Bitte stimmen Sie ab! Beeilen Sie sich, Sie haben nur noch den Rest des alten Jahres Zeit! Danke!

December 29th, 2005

Picsel ProView-Picsel Viewer available for purchase

Apperently, someone at Picsel Technologie’s finally understood that their products could sell well. HandAngo now offers a 35$ product called Picsel Proview! The whole information available is this:

Open word, pdf, excel, powerpoint, photos, emails, web pages and more in amazing clarity and at extremely high speed, and all in one exceptional user friendly environment.

Read the same thing here: Picsel Proview@Handango

Overall, I am not sure how this should be interpreted. There is no evaluation version available, and the HandAngo description does not contain much info either. Do you have something to share?
Schließlich scheint Picsel Technologies doch verstanden zu haben dass sich ihre Software gut verkaufen könnte. Handago bietet ein Produkt namens "Picsel ProView" für 35 USD an. Die einzig verfügbare Informationen ist:

"Open word, pdf, excel, powerpoint, photos, emails, web pages and more in amazing clarity and at extremely high speed, and all in one exceptional user friendly environment." (öffnen Sie Word, PDF, Excel, PowerPoint, E-Mails, Webseiten und mehr in beeindruckender Klarheit und extremer Geschwindigkeit, und das alles in einer außergewöhnlich benutzerfreundlichen Oberfläche.)

Lesen Sie es selbst: Picsel Proview@Handango. Trotzdem sind wir uns nicht sicher wie das gedeutet werden soll: es gibt keine Testversion, und die Handago Beschreibung enthält nicht viele Informationen. Haben Sie welche?

December 28th, 2005

More info on the Treo 700w

Well, the Treo 700w seems to be in real son. According to HowardForums.com, the unit should ship on the 5th of January. Member VZW posted the following infomation:

Description

Ring in the New Year with the Palm Treo 700w!! This compact all-in-one smart phone features Broadband speed and Windows Mobile 5.0!! The all-digital Palm Treo 700w also comes with Wireless sync, Active Sync 4.0, Built-in Blue tooth technology, Windows Media Player 10 and a 1.3 mega pixel digital camera. Combine these powerful features with its integrated organizer functionality and you get a smart phone that delivers on everything you need when you need it.

General Features
All Digital

128MB Flash/60MB RAM
1XEVDO
1XRTT
240×240 color TFT touchscreen

Back lit QWERTY Keyboard
Blue tooth Enabled
Calendar
Call Waiting
Caller ID – Picture
Camera Resolution – 1.3M Pixel
E-mail and Internet Access
Hearing Aid Compatibility: M3
High-Performance & Robust Antenna
Infrared Port
MS Windows Mobile 5.0
Microsoft Active sync
Microsoft Media Player
Microsoft Pocket Excel
Microsoft Pocket Internet Explorer
Microsoft Pocket Outlook
Microsoft Pocket Word
MultiMedia Services (MMS)
OTA Capable
PC Synchronization
Removable Memory Slot – SD
Speakerphone
TTY compatible
TXT Messaging
Video Messaging
Wireless SYNC
Specifications
Up to 280 Minutes Usage Time
Up to 360 Hours Standby Time
6 oz.
2.30H x 4.40W x 0.90D inches

Packaged With Handset
Getting Started CD-ROM
Headset
QRG
Standard Battery
Stylus
Travel Charger
USB Sync cable
Welcome CD
National Pricing Info
High Tier

1Yr Contract – $549.99
2Yr Contract – $499.99
No Contract – $619.99

Read more here:
http://www.howardforums.com/showthread.php?t=803423&page=1&pp=30

Will you get a Treo 700W? Personally, I beleive that it will have a hard stand aganst the HTC Magician/MDA Compact. I already spent quite a few hours with this machine at a friend’s and I have to say that it is pretty funky. The screen is good(and much bigger than the Treo’s), it is pretty fast for a Windows Mobile device(altough a full Tungsten T3 beats it hands down) and it costs you just 49€ at a major austrian(!!!) carrier.

Der Treo 700w scheint bald da zu sein. Laut HowardForums.com soll das Gerät ab dem 5. Januar versendet werden. Das Forenmitglied VZW postete die folgenden Infos:

Description

Ring in the New Year with the Palm Treo 700w!! This compact all-in-one smart phone features Broadband speed and Windows Mobile 5.0!! The all-digital Palm Treo 700w also comes with Wireless sync, Active Sync 4.0, Built-in Blue tooth technology, Windows Media Player 10 and a 1.3 mega pixel digital camera. Combine these powerful features with its integrated organizer functionality and you get a smart phone that delivers on everything you need when you need it.

General Features
All Digital

128MB Flash/60MB RAM
1XEVDO
1XRTT
240×240 color TFT touchscreen

Back lit QWERTY Keyboard
Blue tooth Enabled
Calendar
Call Waiting
Caller ID – Picture
Camera Resolution – 1.3M Pixel
E-mail and Internet Access
Hearing Aid Compatibility: M3
High-Performance & Robust Antenna
Infrared Port
MS Windows Mobile 5.0
Microsoft Active sync
Microsoft Media Player
Microsoft Pocket Excel
Microsoft Pocket Internet Explorer
Microsoft Pocket Outlook
Microsoft Pocket Word
MultiMedia Services (MMS)
OTA Capable
PC Synchronization
Removable Memory Slot – SD
Speakerphone
TTY compatible
TXT Messaging
Video Messaging
Wireless SYNC
Specifications
Up to 280 Minutes Usage Time
Up to 360 Hours Standby Time
6 oz.
2.30H x 4.40W x 0.90D inches

Packaged With Handset
Getting Started CD-ROM
Headset
QRG
Standard Battery
Stylus
Travel Charger
USB Sync cable
Welcome CD
National Pricing Info
High Tier

1Yr Contract – $549.99
2Yr Contract – $499.99
No Contract – $619.99

Lesen Sie mehr:
http://www.howardforums.com/showthread.php?t=803423&page=1&pp=30

Werden Sie einen Treo 700w bekommen? Ich persönlich denke dass er es gegen den HTC Magician / MDA Compact schwer haben wird. Ich brachte schon einige Stunden mit einem solchen Gerät bei einem Freund und muss sagen dass es funky ist. Der Bildschirm ist gut (und um einiges größer als der der Treos), es ist relativ schnell für ein Windows Mobile-Gerät(obwohl der Tungsten T3 schneller ist) und kostet nur 49 EUR bei einem großen österreichischen (!!!) Anbieter.

December 27th, 2005

Web Browsing on a Palm – Eudora Web Review

Eudora Internet Suite is a free package with a mail client and a web browser. The developer is Qualcomm, well-known because of Eudora for Windows, a famous mail client. It is already more than 4 years old and not developed anymore.

Mail Client
The mail client has many features: filters, multiple accounts, HTML mail view, secure connections to server (GoogleMail). But it lacks one important thing: attachments. So there is IMHO no reason to replace e. g. VersaMail on newer Palms, but better than the mail client on OS3 devices e. g.

Web Browser
The main part of this review is the browser “EudoraWeb”. It is a proxy-less browser, so it doesn’t need a proxy server like Blazer 1/2 or OperaMini. The browser starts with the bookmarks list. You can add bookmarks of your favourites sites’ and manage them in categories. It doesn’t support any images. A lack or a feature? On the one hand, almost every site has images today. On some pages you don’t need them absolutely (on news sites with photos of stories e. g.), but on other pages images contain links, and you probably don’t know where to navigate. On the other hand, no images mean less data to transmit.

On POSE (Wireless LAN 2 MBps DSL connection) it renders pages very fast. I could view every page I surfed to and it seems as it supports bigger pages, too.

Forms are supported, I could post a comment on TamsPalm successful. On a T|C I couldn’t type something into a label, a OS5 problem? So no chance to use Google, web mail,… It doesn’t render tables or frames. Thre is no support for cards, so you can’t view offline pages or download files. If you want to download files, tap on “Details” and copy the link into a download manager like Downloader or LGet.

There is no function to save a page. Of course you can copy text to the MemoPad, but there is the 1K limit. Also there’s no history function. EudoraWeb supports SSL Security, there’s a file “sslplus” included.

My results
If Qualcomm had continued developing, it would be a probably great program, but today a mail client without attachment support or a browser without image support is almost useless. But I noticed that most pages use text links or image links with alternative text. I think it’s useful on old devices, on newer devices you should consider which browser is better: EudoraWeb or the built-in one, or perhaps NetFront or Opera?

What do you think about Eudora?

December 27th, 2005

The Brando T5 cradle-modded for TE2

Palm Inc’s Tungsten E2 handheld does not ship with a cradle. Brando offers a cradle for the T5, but the E2 doesnt fit in mechanically.

Brando ships the cradle in a regular envelope via snail mail. The box was a bit squashed, but the cradle was o.k..
squashedbox The Brando T5 cradle modded for TE2
A day was spent in the workshop and the E2 now fits in:
unmodded The Brando T5 cradle modded for TE2 modded The Brando T5 cradle modded for TE2
The secret is to remove the bar in front of the cradle. I erroneously tried to file off stuff from the back. Anyways, the E2 now fits in well, the cradle does not shake around. The machine stands straighter than in the original PalmOne cradles.
angles The Brando T5 cradle modded for TE2
Power is supplied to the handheld via USB. A TE2 charges even when powered on. However, there is no way to attach an AC power supply:
brightcharge The Brando T5 cradle modded for TE2
A blue LED at the front of the cradle signals power. It light up if power is available, even if no handheld is docked:
charge The Brando T5 cradle modded for TE2 led The Brando T5 cradle modded for TE2
The USB cable is about 90cm long-this is a bit too short for my taste. The cradle lacks a dedicated sync button and is not detected as an USB peripheral by AutoSync,… . BTW, the E2 fits into the cradle even if in Brabdo’s aluminium hardcase:
caseside The Brando T5 cradle modded for TE2
Overall, this cradle is funky. Modding it is not difficult if you know what to remove. The lack of a hotsync button is no problem for me as AutoSync detects the cradle as a power supply if connected to a PC. Automatic synchronisation really helps. The charging speed is fast enough for me-an external AC charger is faster though. However, the short USB cable can be a major nuissance. Also, it is absolutely useless if no PC is close!

December 25th, 2005

On procedure/file headers

File headers are a topic of discussion in many areas of the world. Some consider them absolutely neccessary(bad informatics teachers who don’t now what they are talking of, e.g.) while others consider them a stupid waste of time and disk space.

Actually, I did both styles of project. And I have to say that I got to like those headers. However, before discussing the reasons why I love them so much, see the one I use here(feel free to use it as a template, it compiles in OnBoardC and PODS):


/********************************
BinaryClock V1.0
Copyright Tamoggemon 2005

FILE:BinaryClockVfsSelect.c

DESC:Event handler for VFS file selector

CONT:Boolean vfsSelectFormEventHandler(EventPtr pEvent)

EDIT:190905tvh

********************************/

The first two lines are obvious. Program name/version and copyright statement. File designates the name that the file has on your hard disk, DESC describes the file and its history in a few short words. CONT lists all the functions contained(one per line), and edit contains the date of the last editing and the shortcode of the one who edited the file. Pretty simple overall.

But what benefit do they bring to the developer?

Better understanding of a projects “Gestalt”
If your files each contain a little description of what they do and what they contain, it is much easier to get a mental plot of how the fils belong together!

Easier finding of functions
If you ever want to find in which file a function resides, text searching usually is a good thing to do. However, a txt search usually can’t differentiate between definition and call. Now, when you have file headers, a quick opening of the file brings you security!

Printouts are easier to understand
Most source code editors are pretty dumb when printing files is concerned. Syntax highlighting works ok, but that’s it. No banners, haders, footers,.. are placed onto the pages. A formal header makes it a bit easier to identify batches of paper, as you now have EOF-Markers!

Do you do file headers?

December 24th, 2005

Merry Christmas!

The TamsPalm team wishes all readers a merry christmas . . .

This is the post that you prolly saw at a few thousand web sites today. However, we decided to use this opportunity as a quick “flashback” to ask you all for feedback and give you further insight into what will happen in the future!

Things that happen now

We celebrated our first birthday a few months ago-tamsPalm is now 1 year and three months old

We moved to WordPress

TamsPalm now does hardware and software reviews

AutoSync 1.1 was released

Things that shall happen soon

A theme switcher will let you customize TamsPalm to look the way you wish it to

A link list of sites we like will debut

Indeed, the wordpress migration gave us issues to deal with! We lost almost 100% of our google popularity, and it will still take us at least 6 more months to regain it. Every new inbound link is-of course-greatly appreciated! Our link list is intended to give you a nice overview of sites that we TamsPalm authors visit-it will apear in a few themes very soon!

Please tell us what you liked and what you disliked! Have a merry 2006-and lets keep TamsPalming!

December 23rd, 2005

PalmInternals – the Palm OS system analyzer

When developing for the/using the Palm OS platform, you will soon wish for a way to list pending alarms, see which applications are registered for which notifications and file types,… .
If analyzing alarms is all you need, Alarms will probably suit you better. If not, PalmInternals will be your best friend!

The program starts by scanning all databases in RAM and ROM-a dialog displayed on my E2 claims that crashes could happen due to NVFS-I didn’t experience any so far. Anyways, you can start an alarm and a notification scan with the command buttons at the bottom of the screen. The notification scan options can be adjusted in the menu!

alarm PalmInternals   the Palm OS system analyzer notif PalmInternals   the Palm OS system analyzer notifdetails PalmInternals   the Palm OS system analyzer
The exchange manager can be analyzed with a menu command. The program then displays all kinds of information about file types and their handlers!
receivewhat PalmInternals   the Palm OS system analyzer sendmethods PalmInternals   the Palm OS system analyzer
Port analysis lets you look at the various communication ports of a handheld. Actually, it even shows you a bit about the internal architecture of the machine.

ports PalmInternals   the Palm OS system analyzer

The database manager isn’t safe from PalmInternals either. It lets you look at heaps and even locked/protected databases-a huge help when debugging!

lockedres PalmInternals   the Palm OS system analyzer

Reports can be exported to the memo pad for further studying. HiRes+ is supported well, the application didn’t crash a TT3 and a TE2. While the UI takes a bit of time to understand, the features definitely are worth the wait.
This test covered version 1.10.2-we archived it on Tamoggemon.com for reference in case it ever disappears.

December 22nd, 2005

Desinfecting Symbian phones

Symbian OS handsets are vulnerable to a variety of virii-some of them actually are very active. My SX1 mobile phone already got ‘attacked’ by a virus in vienna.

F-Secure is known to have a good list of Symbian Virii. Now, our comrades at F-Secure’s went a step further. Their employee Jarno will be speaking about virii for Symbian mobile phones at both the european and the US blackhat conferences.

This is interesting for us too. He posted some of his slides about removing a virus from a Series 60/Symbian machine on F-Secure’s blog. They can be found here:

http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/archive-122005.html#00000732

While I never was infected because I always click no when receiving an unwanted file. However, if you ever catch a virus, it will be good to know. The slides really are more than just a stupid buy F-Secure AV advertising.

Did you ever catch a virus?

December 21st, 2005

On CoreCodec’s open letter

Recently, PalmSource announced the winner of its PoweredUp awards-needless to say, AutoSync didnt win. Tamoggemon has little problems accepting this fact. However, CoreCodec, the developer issued the following open letter to PalmSource(quoted text)-I inserted some comments:

“An Open Letter to PalmSource”
First… I would like to thank the community who had tried to vote for TCPMP during the PalmSource Poweredup Awards, we at CoreCodec and the Developers of The Core Pocket Media Player value and thank you for your continued support.

It is a question if this voting did not invalidate your submission. Motivating users to click on AdSense ads invalidates your earnings. Anyways, PalmInfoCenter says that the winners were chosen by judges-so, user votings apperently were worthless.

We would like to point out some ‘non-bitter’ obvious things (or in this case not obvious) to PalmSource and why we think their PoweredUp Awards and the process for judging IS WAY BEHIND THE TIMES and note that their purchase by of ACCESS Co., Ltd, has not changed their way of thinking one bit.
PALM POWEREDUP AWARDS FACTS
– No Open Source Software is allowed

Giving money to open-source programs can be damaging! I can darkly remember a german magazine’s report about the xbox linux project when a cash prize was announced. The coordinator feared fights when the cash is due for distribution!

– PalmSource was to announce winners Dec 14 but pushed it to Dec 19th, why?

Delays do happen. Should not, but Murphy’s laws apply here too!

– The contest is built with one purpose in mind, push closed source products
I am 100% behind the fact that a business like PalmSource wants to push products to potentially generate revenue for their third party software vendors. The Poweredup Awards are a great way to do so, but the reality is that there is substantially better open source software then the current winners from this years awards and that these Open Source Projects could use the same amount of advertising and revenue that their closed source competitors have.

I beleive that the decicion for PocketTunes was influenced by Palm. I personally never understood WHY they didn’t include TCPMP instead-but having a free program beat yours could look painful!

I am simply stating that “PalmSource might want to get with the times and truely adopt (or even recognize) Open Source in their process flow and let the Palm Community speak the truth on what is actually good software!”
There is a happy medium to be had… but to SNUB Open Source in general and to have been aquired by a company that openly embraces it and the freedom it brings… says nothing for this contest.. and the time to change has come, not today, but yesterday.

Please keep in mind that this is not a PalmSource-only thing. There are lots of companies involved, and each one of them has its own interest.

Overall, I totally agree that TCPMP needs to be honoured somehow. However, I am not sure if those awards are the right way. Two or three handhelds can not be divided among developers ‘fairly’-and what is fair? Giving a price to a company is considerably easier, there is no risk of quarrel if the stuff becomes company property…
What do you think?

December 20th, 2005

Linux story continues

We already reported the last week about Hack&Dev (http://www.hackndev.com) and their success with Linux on a LifeDrive or Tungsten|T3. Now their are some news:

  • On their news site you can read that there is a patch for Palm Zire 72, so this device should be compatible now.
  • As you can see on one of their pictures, they managed to run X (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_Window_System) on Treo 650. The touchscreen doesn’t work yet, but as it uses the same codec as the LifeDrive it should be done soon.
  • The member _H_o_L_E_ of the German Palm board Nexave managed to run GPE on his Tungsten|T3. Below some screenshots:



You can see GPE – the GUI and some apps. While you run GPE the Palm has to stay connected with the desktop by cable as it runs GPE via NFS. The device cannot be powered off, and there is no support for Bluetooth, etc. – yet. You can view further pictures in the German board: http://www.nexave.de/forum/thread.php?threadid=18691 (it’s a very large thread. You can find the pictures in the 60th reply).

December 19th, 2005

The art of beta testing-Part 4

Our column is pretty far already! The last three parts covered all kinds of things associated with beta testing and beta testers. In case you missed something, here are links to the last issues:
The Art of beta testing-On testers
The Art of beta testing-Completely outsourcing tests is dangerous
The Art of beta testing-Random testing is useless-structured testing rules
Now, we shall shift focus to the developer side-and cover stuff that happens right in your IDE. Confused? Just read on…
Release an unprotected beta and loose cash
Many developers tend to see beta testers as ‘employees’ rather than as random voluntary users-what they essentially are. Thus, the testers are given access to versions that are compiled with debugger support-or even worse-without time and use restrictions.
These ‘internal builds’ can be incredibly dangerous! Beta versions usually work reasonably well-and can sometimes even be used in production environments. Social engineering usually is successful-trust is one of the major ruses used. A beta tester beams the beta to two friends, each of them beams it over again,… . Eventually, the file gets to a web freak who puts it online-and we all know the rest of the story just too well!
The counter measure is simple here. Don’t ever release a beta version that doesnt either expire hiddenly or is seriously locked down. It may be a bit of extra work-but trust me, not having your program cracked is worth it!
Any experiences?

December 17th, 2005

The Samsung i300-another mobile hard disk handset

The LifeDrive really sees some competition. Its idea of the harddisk based mobile device apperently caught on.

According to Gizmondo, the Samsung i300 is a mobile phone with a 3GB hard disk. It also contains a 1.3MP digitals camera and an MP3 player and is available from O2.

It is said to integrate well with Outlook and be usable as a storage for the PC as well. It is powered by Windows Mobile, altough the version used is not mentioned. I dare to guess that it will be 2003 or 2005 smartphone though, as a touchscreen is mentioned nowhere!