OK, I'm introducing a new feature here -- the daily countdown to the Nokia 770's availability.

Friday, August 26, 2005
No change. Still 3Q with no further details.

35 days till Sept 30, last day of 3Q.

-- Roger

A month ago I discovered that Koen Kooi had ported GpsDrive to Maemo and put up word on the original 770 ersatz blog. (Where was that? I've already lost track.)

His port of this app still hasn't shown up in the list on the wiki and I haven't heard a word from anyone interested or intrigued by it.

The question that hadn't been answered was whether the 770 would be able to take input directly from a GPS receiver, and that information is now in. Alexander responded in a comment at Koen's blog that:
>>Yes, 770 will be able to connect to the Bluetooth-equipped GPS receiver using BT Serial Port profile. All you need for that is to get a console and configure BT connection.

There's a whole load of devices listed that the software is compatible with.

Given that GpsDrive (see below) can display street maps as well as topographical maps and the 770 screen offers such detail, this seems like a good combo. Of course, if you know where you are, you can enter the information manually too.

You can see a screen capture from Koen's port (resized but still bigger than 770-screen-lifesize) in the news section of this blog:

http://www.internettablettalk.com/content/view/94/2/

GpsDrive on maemo
http://dominion.kabel.utwente.nl/koe...ive-maemo.html

You can learn more about GpsDrive from its main site:
GpsDrive
http://gpsdrive.kraftvoll.at/index.shtml
>>GpsDrive is a car (bike, ship, plane) navigation system. GpsDrive displays your position provided from your NMEA capable GPS receiver on a zoomable map, the map file is autoselected depending of the position and prefered scale. Speech output is supported if the "festival" software is running. The maps are autoselected for best resolution depending of your position and can be downloaded from Internet.

Oh, yeah, the website says you can download NASA satellite images for this. I don't think the image in Koen's example is one of those. Or is it? If you look at the Italy photo at GpsDrive, it's very similar.

Slim pickings today. I may go slightly orthogonal if it stays this way, but I'm sticking with just the one blog.

Will your favorite file format last?
http://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...light=favorite
>>If you have eReader or MobiPocket books, for example, how convinced are you that you'll be able to use them when you move to a linux handheld like the Nokia 770, for example?

This is a perennial discussion topic, in this case combining both computer formats and media/multimedia formats, including one close to my interests, e-book formats.

And Al at 770fan picked up on our discussion of Koen's GpsDrive port and did some poking around of his own there, discovering Koen's mention of Matthias Steinbauer's GPE-calendar port to Maemo. OK, I confess -- I don't want to think of the 770 as a PDA. I'm guilty of passing over that one in silence.

But really, which is more exciting, another calendar app on another device, or connecting a GPS receiver to the 770's 225-ppi, 800-pixel wide screen, both of which you can carry around with you? I rest my defense.

-- Roger, still sitting in for Mike

Saturday, August 27, 2005
No change. Still 3Q with no further details.

The countdown continues: 34 days till Sept 30, last day of 3Q.

-- Roger

The accessories article here at Internettablettalk spawned a brief exchange about what types of RS-MMC work with the Nokia 770 on the Nokia users list:

>> Can anyone confirm which of the following types of RS-MMC would work with the
>> Nokia 770? The specs just indicate "RS-MMC."
>>
>> 1) RS-MMC
>> 2) DV RS-MMC
>> 3) MMC Mobile
>
>I do not know what 3 is but 1+2 should work just fine.

The interlocutor is our Reggie and the answerer is Nils Faerber of Kernel Concepts, who've already ported Plucker Viewer and GPE apps to Maemo.

Guess this clears that up! Now when do those 2GB cards show up?

-- Roger

Интернет на борту самолёта
http://www.livejournal.com/users/k_79/73825.html

Always the international flavor here.

Anyway, this seems to say that the blogger was trying out the WiFi on a Lufthansa flight using a Nokia 770. Makes sense if he's got one.

OK, so how about sharing with your American friends now?

Just wanted to point out that I wished these two babies used RS-MMC instead of SD. I don't know the video format, though. MPEG-2 is doubtful.

http://blogs.pcworld.com/staffblog/archives/000778.html
http://blogs.pcworld.com/staffblog/archives/000782.html

Roger can investigate. Or Reggie. Or Al. Or Mas...

Hint, hint, hint, hint, hint...

Just came across this, which I think would be *the* test for the 770's PDF functionality:

http://www.digipuppet.com/

-- click on Winter 2005 to see the Mother of All PDFs. Scroll through. When you hit page 11, you'll go GAAAAAH!

Perhaps one of the Devs can try it and check in?

Carry on, Roger. And Mas. And Al. etc.

I am shocked.

Sunday, August 28, 2005
No change. Release still listed as 3Q with no further details.

The countdown continues: 33 days till Sept 30, last day of 3Q.

-- Roger