Salve Bill! On Tue, 14 Nov 2006, Bill Hope wrote:
> I am very excited about this phone. ;) me, too. > IMHO, 1.3megapixel cameras in cell phones are worthless. That would be 4 times more than the display shows, not so bad ;) I agree that a camera is not a feature that makes me wait for month or years till there will be a (cheap) open linux smartphone with a camera but some ideas for the use of a camera: I think even a much lower resolution would be fine enough to use it as bar code scanner - give all your equipment, books, clothes or what ever a uniq barcode and run a database on your smartphone... And the high resolution screen make it interesting to photograph maps inside buildings, of cities... of subway systems or when you hiking in the wood the map of the tracks of this wood..... Or when you lend somebody or you borrow from somebody something: open the adressbook with the entry of borrow partner and store the picutes directly linked to this person - with date and time. Chose the time when your smartphone will show you the pictures of this person and the borrows objects.... to remind you... This will be quicker and more informative then typing a discription of the objects... When better text recognition will become available for linux, it will become possible to photograph an interesting article (while you are in your cafe) and send this as text via email. BUT beside of Bluetooth, Wifi or I2C with an altimeter - I see no need that the camera is connected with my smartphone while I have my phone in my trouser pocket - the only advantage would be that I didn't have another thing in my pockets and I would be a bit quicker before I can make my first picture.... AND some IT people complained that they coustomers do not allow to visit them with a mobil with camera. And hey, there is already the green phone from trolltec for those who think they need a build in camera. ;) BTW Trolltech I don't want to start a flame Green Phone vs. Neo1973, I'm happy about both chances, but the Trolltech's product director Adam Lawson told ZDNet UK one point that makes my doubt that the green phone is an open phone and makes me even more happy about Seans anouncement about the Neo1973: "The openness of this OpenMoko device, if it is intended for broad consumer use, does raise a lot of questions about security," Lawson added. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/communications/3ggprs/0,39020339,39282823,00.htm <frankly> Lawson: When you a hacker, you will like the Neo1973 </frankly> Well that makes me think that the Trolltech Green Phone isn't so open. Also Suns Vision - presentated with speeches from Kira Patel on a "Sun-day" at my university (4.Mai 2006) I got the fear that do not like to have a smartphone and would prefer a PDA with Bluetooth GSM/GPRS connections because of security reasons: 1. sun does care much about Digital Right Management that the use of games could be controlled and limited with communication with servers and 2. with the next generation of phones the provider could access the memory of the phone and change the settings of the phone - without interaction of the user. The user would have the advantage to get the latest skins automaticaly for his phone. *horror!* This could be the *e* dreams of the GSM and content provider to have full controll of the users device - but such visions doesn't make me think that I do want have a smartphone - nor to develope something for such untrustworthy devices. I would like to have a firewall on my phone that I use for data comunication I would definitive *not* use a device as terminal where a providers can access the memory of that device. I would like to have encrypted SMS and GSM phone communications I never would use Sync-ML via GPRS without encryption I like to setup a SSH Tunnel to my servers for all data communiction via GPRS... And I would like have the chance to compile my encryption software myself. Security through obscurity does not work. So dear Mr. Lawson (what does this name make me think?), haven't you understood yet that: smartphone = mobil PC + GSM/GPRS ? Will you say that Linux raise a lot of question about security like the big problem of dialer with modems did on workstations? Ok, you are right that a distribution for the Neo1973 should be as trustworthy as Debian - with signing of every packed due the packet maintainer... SECURITY has to be a topic for OpenMoko - but I would't say it would raise a lot of questions about security. Whose security did you mean, security of the user? Realy? Why, Mr. Lawson, do you think when a smart phone would be just a mobil PC with GSM/GPRS for the first time (?) and the consumer could decide which OS, even wich version he will install (or assign a professional to do this for him) will raise any new question about security? Any new question we haven't allready about PCs yet? I'm very happy that FIC with Sean and OpenMoko anounced the freedom to use a smart phone as what it is: Smartphone = mobil PC + GSM/GPRS! And without a camera and even without integreated Wifi, will a Neo1973 be so great, so amazing, so .... :))))) (sorry to went Offtopic again), back to Bills mail >I would do more home automation if I had a small device like the >NEO1973 (had been waiting on the next generation of the Nokia 770 >hardware) to use as a controller. Range on BT isn't good enough. Consider powerconsumtion of Wifi: 2-4 Wlan router with USB and Bluetooth. BUT because the Neo1973 will be a smartphone and not a PDA, a hack can save power: for home automatisaition you mustend sniff the whole time to get an alert or message form the server - the same with GPRS, no need¹ to stay 24/24h online - just use asterisk, copy a callfile with your script into the folder /var/spool/asterisk/outgoing/ and your asteriks server will call your smartphone via GSM. The smartphone will known your Caller ID, reject this call without GUI signalisation and will start Wifi, Bluetooth or GPRS for you. And for internet radios, a router could buffer your favourit station and via wifi could be 5 minutes transmitted at once (like mobil CD-MP3 player save power). ¹this GPRS from time to time could have one big dissadvantage, your GSM provider could count your trafic with 10k or 100k blocks - and different IP is very likly, so a new ssh handshake would be nesseccary.... so this trick could reduce power consumtion, but encrease traffic and your costs... Bill your right, home automatisation would be very interesting to do with a OpenMoko. Do you have already have some experiances/ideas or know some good articles and open source projects of home automatisation? Localistaion via BT or Wifi could be used that light and heat controll could offer you directly the right menue for the room you are momentarily in. Or when your system knows where you are and how you are moving, the light (and musik) could walk with you... ;) rob _______________________________________________ OpenMoko community mailing list [email protected] http://lists.openmoko.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/community
