I understand what you mean Karel, and do not really disagree - but the flaw in your reasoning, as applied to the 770 specifically vs OSS in general, is that I don't feel you have any such choice ATM (ie spending money instead). So maybe frethop's approach is more effective after all :-)

Thanks for the sudoku!
I was missing that.

ODT format worked excellent with ABI, and if I recall correctly, word douments saved in the .rtf extension format worked on every word processor, plus, if you open a .rtf on word, it would save it that way later on.

This helped me; when I had students grab an e-worksheet off my site, it would open as an .rtf, so even if they had that damn-awful "works" or whatever, could check out their uploaded answers on ABI w/ the 770.

wonder how difficult a 2006 port might actually be...

DCARTER

DCARTER

Quite apart from Abiword and Gnumeric (which are fairly mature applications), can anyone recommend a simple GUI based text editor?

is anything on the horizon?

I end up putting all my notes on the gpe to do list.

I happen to like Xournal and MaemoPad+

I realize I'm not going to win the popularity vote in this thread, but I'm standing firm: most people seem to confuse opens source with public domain, and among "most people" I count the developers of open source projects as well.

Just take a look at properly managed open source projects like Ubuntu or Openoffice.org: they don't consider their users a mild nuisance, nor are they in the assumption that they're releasing their software as a gesture of goodwill to the community.

And excuse me, but telling someone that, if they can't contribute, they should shut up and be grateful, is just plainly despicable.

But you are correct in that the 770, like the Zaurus, is a special kind of open source target: it is therefore my opinion that, if the community doesn't grow, or if commercial developers don't chime in quickly, more and more users will come to the conclusion that "shutting up and being grateful" might be a good attitude for those who see the 770 as the geek's version of a game console, but not for those of us who envisioned it as a tool with which to get stuff done.

Here's another thing for the people at Nokia to contemplate: if you make a cheapish tablettoid and arrange for free software to be available for it, your prospective user base hasn't really invested much and therefore bailing out of your platform will not cost them much either. So my nagging here, although directed at developers, is actually more meant for the Nokia crowd.

I for one would be happy to pay a reasonable amount for a working word processor and spreadsheet for the 770. I echo the sentiment that the fact that there is a working application is much more important than the fact that it is free. Could I port it myself? Probably, if I took the time to learn. The point is that I don't currently have the time. So, if money is the issue, I am willing to contribute a reasonable amount. . .

Hair! Hair! :D

As an example: Textmaker and Planmaker for the Wince platform are sold as a bundle for EUR 69.95. Since Softmaker doesn't want to port its software to the 770 platform, I'm more than willing to pay that amount for fully functional versions of Abiword or Gnumeric -- or any other combination of wordprocessor and spreadsheet for that matter. Hancom, are you listening?

That is true, but as you emphasise, those are managed projects, which also implies funded and supported by the big guns. We're not in the enthusiast crowd anymore. However, even those wouldn't bring you a maemo version of OpenOffice (if that made any sense) : you'd still need the personally motivated rogue hacker for that to happen...

I agree. My remark was more tongue-and-cheek than argumentative.

...and the two, in turn, are of two kinds again. The Zaurus is clearly an accidental OSS hacker target : Sharp designed it as a closed platform, tailored for the japanese domestic market. They never sold it abroad, or claimed it was good for anything else than its intended use (a glorified dictionary, basically). The fact that hackers jumped through hoops to lay their hands on one because it was the first Linux PDA, and a good one, is incidental, and its shortcomings in this regard perceived by said hackers cannot be blamed on Sharp. Mostly.

Nokia's attitude with the 770 is more ambiguous. They do market the thing globally (if discreetly), but as an online device that does well all that phones and PDAs do badly, but none of what they do well. Sort of.
Yet the choice of Linux, the openness of maemo, the progress made with ITOS2006 (whereas the Sharp OS has stagnated for years, which makes sense for an embedded device)... all that cannot be innocent of hope that third parties will broaden the possible uses way beyond that. But that hope stays stubbornly unsaid.

I think that is 100% true. But have you thought that your remark is true, first and foremost, of Nokia themselves ? This situation reeks of internal cacophony. On the one side, a visionary and creative team that invents something sexy, but totally outside the corporate core business and competencies (phones and Symbian OS come to mind :-). On the other side, entrenched corporate factions dragging their feet (like customer relationships and repair centers), with a marketing dept. that clearly doesn't understand any of it, and/or doesn't want to. In the middle, some intrigued top management that decides to give it a go, just for kicks : hey, if it's a runaway success there'll be time to pour resources in a new market segment ; if it flops, nothing much lost, it was just a skunkworks project anyway...
I am furiously reminded of the Renault Twingo scenario in the first case, and of the BMW C1 scooter in the other. I personally do hope there will be an Internet Tablet dynasty...

Well, here's my thing. Back when I was 15/16 (I'm 27 now) I spent a lot of Saturday mornings screwing with Slackware Linux in my basement. That's the *only* thing saving me on the 770 right now. While I disagree that a monkey should be able to use it out of the box, I don't think a couple of months of Linux experience should be necessary. The 'everything must be simple enough my dog can use it' crowd probably forgets the amount of time it took them to become mildly proficient in Windows.

Emphasis is being placed on just getting something working rather than polishing it for use. In the same turn, most of these devs have day jobs just like everybody else. Most of them are proficient at programming because this is what their day job consists of. You couldn't pay me to sit down and crank out some SQL outside of work. I barely want to sit in front of a computer for pleasure by the time I get home.

Basically, to turn my pointless rant into a point: Porting/writing apps takes a lot of time and even if someone was willing to spend an hour a day on it, that could still add up to months. Bounties are good incentive and count as action on the part of people who don't know how to code... but I think the main thing people can do is be understanding. Try the OSS developer test. Sit in front of a PC doing nothing for an hour a night for an entire week. Now ya know how they probably feel.

Don't misunderstand me, I don't want OpenOffice for the 770; it's too big and a lot of its features are overkill for the platform. The ideal WP for the 770 IMHO would be Textmaker, but Softmaker can't be bothered.

But how about a port of (as I hinted at in another post) Hancom Mobile Office? If it runs on the Zaurus, it should be easily portable to the 770, right? Of course, I haven't the slightest idea if Hancom are still around; their website is under reconstruction and all the old links to Mobile Office are dead.

And my snipe wasn't addressed at you. Sorry.

Good analysis.

I think it must be clear by now for even the most clueless Nokia manager, that the 770 is not perceived by the users as what Nokia originally intended it to be. The Nokia product description declared it a wireless Internet browser, but the user base is treating it as a universal "thinnish" client ("thinnish", because it does have some onboard storage and a reasonably capable processor).

This change of perception has gone beyond the recuperative capabilities of any marketing department.

I'm thinking of another possible scenario: Nokia have seen how successfull Linux smartphones are becoming on the Chinese market, and how these Linphones take device control back from the network operator to the device manufacturer. Nokia themselves are still committed to Symbian, but it just might be possible that the 770 is, amongst other things, a testing of the Linux waters for future phones.

However, we're clearly veering wildly away from my original question, so back to the important issues:

WHERE THE F**K ARE ABIWORD AND GNUMERIC FOR ITOS 2006???? :D