New Linux-based Palm OS Unveiled

Access and its wholly owned subsidiary, PalmSource, have announced the Access Linux Platform (ALP), the latest evolution of Palm OS for Linux.

The ALP is designed to be an integrated, open and flexible Linux-based platform tailored for smartphones and mobile devices and to provide a complete, consistent and customizable solution for handset and mobile device manufacturers and mobile operators.

Access and PalmSource expect to make the ALP Software Developer Kit (SDK) available to its licensees by the end of this year (2006).

ACCESS Linux Platform An open and flexible software platform - Major components of ALP include:

* Standard, commercial-grade Linux kernel - version 2.6.12 and above
* Optimized implementation of GIMP ToolKit (GTK+) - popular open source libraries for the creation of graphical user interfaces
* GStreamer - an open source, modular and multi-threaded streaming media framework
* SQLite - a high-performance database engine commonly used in embedded devices

A number of ACCESS and PalmSource technologies have been incorporated into ALP, including:

* ACCESS NetFront™ browser - a proven success with over 200 million deployments in 721 commercial products for more than 30 handset and 90 Internet device manufacturers worldwide
* PalmSource messaging and telephony middleware - a highly modular and scalable implementation
* PalmSource mobile applications including PIMs, multimedia, messaging, PalmSource HotSync® and Palm Desktop -includes the recognized ease-of-use that users expect

Mobile CAD

Power CAD is a CAD software which you can use on move using your Pocket PC.

A short summary of features will include:

* Opens Industry Standard CAD files
* Tons of powerful commands
* Great annotation capabilities

Many of us use Pocket PCs because we are looking for a certain degree of mobility. Much of the software that people use in their daily work now has counterparts on the Pocket PC. Now with PowerCAD, you can take even this software on the move with you.

You can buy the viewer for just USD 99.

Check it out at:
http://www.givemepower.com/home/

PDAs and Smartphones making inroads in India

It started with Hi-Tech mobile phones powered by Symbian OS and mobile phones like Nokia 7650, Nokia 3650 which started this trend. Soon Sony Ericsson started shipping P800 and P900 in India and PDA Phones became a craze and a status symbol. Then there came Phones like Ngage and 6600 from Nokia which really did very well with youth.

Youth started using these bigger and bulkier devices instead of popular smaller and lighter devices used earlier. They saw value in audio clippings and streaming video they can enjoy on these phones. Game enthusiasts always had their favorite gaming station in their pocket in form of these smarter phones cum PDAs.

There were advanced devices like Nokia Communicator already available since a long time, but they never caught imagination of our youth primarily because of their high prices.

Recently Airtel introduced Blackberry on their network, which offers you seamless email connectivity anytime, anywhere.

A few days back TataIndicom started offering Ego on their network. Ego is a very advanced device running Pocket PC platform and windows user will definitely love it due to its already familiar windows interface and applications like word, excel, internet explorer and windows media player.

Blackberry and Ego both are relatively expensive than other smartphones from Nokia and Sony Ericsson. May be if these companies start offering finance and EMI schemes for these handsets like Reliance does for its mobiles, then they can really become popular among masses. Till then Symbian OS is going to rule the smartphone market in India.

Only major PDA OS yet to be widely available in India is Palm inspite of its Treo Smartphone being very popular in abroad. Palm has acquired China Mobile Soft, a Chinese mobile software company primarily offering Linux based pdas and soon plan to launch a special version of Palm running on top of Linux. Well Palm and Linux is an interesting combination, lets wait and watch what does it do to continuously evolving PDA and Smartphone scenario in India. LG is expected to ship first Palm on Linux handset in the market.

PDA phones/Smartphones really make you more productive personally as well as professionally and this fact is slowing being understood by Indians.

My company develops softwares for mobiles and mobile field force, for more info please visit our website www.palewar.com

Related Links:

Nokia - http://nokia.co.in/
Blackberry - http://www.airtelworld.com/blackberry/
O2 - http://www.seeo2.com/web/template/Region.vm?region=in
EGO - http://www.tataindicom.com/misc/ego.asp
Treo - http://www.palm.com/in/products/smartphones/treo600/

Alexa Opened up to Developers

Amazon.com is throwing open its Alexa search engine to web and software developers, to create customized searches and vertical search engines,thereby offering them the ability to specify web crawls for around 5 billion documents in Alexa's index.

Alexa is best known for the web traffic statistics it provides forsites, and was acquired by Amazon in 1999.

The "Alexa Web Search Platform" offers 3 online web snapshots of up to100 terabytes each, plus tools for sifting through content so developers can create their own data sets. Developers can upload, compile, and run their own programs on a processing cluster; store their output on astorage cluster; integrate their data into a search index; and access their search through Amazon's Web services.

Reportedly Rainer Typke, a Netherlands-based web developer, has already used the service to help people search for music by whistling a melody on his web site - musipedia.org.

Asterisk - Open source PBX

Asterisk-based telephony solutions offer a rich and flexible featureset. Asterisk offers both classical PBX functionality and advancedfeatures, and interoperates with traditional standards-based telephonysystems and Voice over IP systems. Asterisk offers the features onewould expect of a large proprietary PBX system such as Voicemail,Conference Bridging, Call Queuing, and Call Detail Records.

http://www.asterisk.org/features