- Wireless comms and Aircraft control systems / JABP: File format an dfuture on new platforms

- Subject: What would you change about your Psion?

- Street Planner & maps for Ireland

- AAs v battery-packs

- Mbook Corrupt Files Problem

- TomTom, bt keyboard,

Date: 20 Jan 2006 11:44:22 +0700
From: Arabbitte <address truncated>
Subject: Wireless comms and Aircraft control systems / JABP: File format an dfuture on new platforms

Michal Jerz - who runs the My-Symbian site - currently has a pre-production P990 on evaluation. I asked him to see what comms were available when the phone was in "Flight Mode". The answer is: Wireless Lan (WLAN) continues to work, Bluetooth doesn't (contrary to what I suggested in my previous post).

Now, I'm no expert, but I know enough to say that WLAN devices are much more power hungry than bluetooth (using more battery power) and therefore, assuming such communications can have a detrimental effect on an aircraft's control systems, should be more problematic in use than Bluetooth. Or is all this a load of cobblers? Cars have had wireless control systems for about 20 years - initially in the form of a cableless accelerators - and they are now ubiquitous. I have yet to hear of any incident where the use of a mobile (handfree of course!) caused a car of slow or speed up involuntarily. And as there are many times more cars in use with such technology than aircraft, is all this just an example of some laziness dressed up in a safety wrapper?

In response to Itamar's question on JABP's data files, these are not compatible with ABP. There is however a feature that allows transactions to be exported in a QIF format which can then be read by ABP. When exporting transactions, you can select the criteria for tx export: specify a date range or select all unreconciled transactions, etc. This would allow you to use ABP as the "mother ship" (where any detailed analysis and reporting can be done), with you phone running JABP acting as the everyday transaction collecter where simple analysis and reporting can be done. As long as you never created transactions on ABP, I'd say this scheme - with transactions flowing in one direction from phone to S7 should work very well.

On a related note, I was in recent contact with Malcolm Bryant - the author of these excellent freeware personal finance applications ABP/JABP/JABPLite - concerning JABP's future on the P990. He said there is a big problem in doing this in that personal java (the Java environment JABP is written in) will not be part of the P990's ROM. All this I have commented on in this Digest in the past, but yesterday I discovered that there is a partial workaround. Now I know *very* little about this, but apparently something called "Java Personal Profile" has become available for the P990 and this offers an upgrade path for Java applications written in Personal Java. I believe it's a huge porting effort, but Malcolm said he would see what was involved. So if any of you out there plan to get a P990 at some stage in the future and would like to have the ability to manage all your personal finances on the device (and who wouldn't?), you could do a lot worse than emailing the author requesting support for the new platform. I won't post Malcolm's email address here as I don't want him to get spammed, but if you think this appeals to you, you can get his contact details at the www.freepoc.de site.

All the best from Dublin, Ireland
Alan Rabbitte

Date: 20 Jan 2006 12:09:06 +0700
From: Franco Cozzani <address truncated>
Subject: Subject: What would you change about your Psion?

Answer to David Steer (and to Itamar):

What would I change?
Actually, quite a bit.

First, the screen of the MC 218/ 5MX for a modern, colour, bright screen. It
really took, and takes, our enduring devotion to Epoc's brilliance and
unmatched 5MX keyboard to put up with the muggy and often plain unreadable
screen of our beloved MC 218/5MX.

Secondly, I used my MC 218 to take tons of notes in multiple-days meetings.
Fine. But more and more in my line of job, the Chair hands out the meeting
docs in the format of USB keys, which of course are perfectly useless on the
spot with a Psion. Therefore, USB support + faster loading of .pdf files
would come strongly as N° 2 wish.

And, yes, I would not mind to have a modern Li rechargeable battery for the
5MX. As for the known problem of typing War and Peace while in the Gobi
desert, one could think of an adapter for AA batteries like Nikon digital
reflex cameras have (Itamar, I guess you know more about this than I do?).

So, in a sense, as the years go by, I miss less and less the actual
realisation of the Psion concept in the specific format of the MC 218/MX of
6+ years ago.
But, be fellow Psioneers rest assured of my unflinching devotion.  As the
years go by, I remain as bitter as ever at the prospect that no "modern" and
"full" replacement of the 5MX is so far in sight.

Best regards,

> Franco COZZANI
> Brussels
>

Date: 20 Jan 2006 16:55:07 +0700
From: "The FD" <address truncated>
Subject: Street Planner & maps for Ireland

Hi all,

I have both Street Millennium GB and Europe for my 5mx.  I cannot find maps for Ireland on either.  Have they missed them out?  I cannot find either Northern Ireland or the Republic!!!!

Are there maps out there for Dublin, Cork, Belfast etc? Or does anyone have any other program with maps for the likes of the above?

Thanks all.

Tim

Date: 20 Jan 2006 19:46:34 +0700
From: Ian Chapple <address truncated>
Subject: AAs v battery-packs

Armin,
>>My phone has a Li-polymer-battery with 770 mAh and 3.5 V. Each of the NiMh-cells in my 5MX has 2500 mAh and 1.2 V. That is 2.7 VA in the phone against 6 VA in the 5MX. My phone would last probably twice as long on 2x AA batteries. The AA-concept would reign supreme even in a cellphone.<<

While I agree with your calculations, I'm not sure I agree with your conclusions. The battery in my P910 is about 4mm thick, compared to about 11mm for an AA battery. To accomodate AA batteries, my phone would need to be about 7mm thicker, which would definitely *not* be a good thing.

AA batteries have their strong points, but being used in modern mobile phones is not one of them...

Cheers, Ian.

Date: 21 Jan 2006 01:10:30 +0700
From: Melvin Woody <address truncated>
Subject: Mbook Corrupt Files Problem

My Mbook has developed corrupt files problems:
1. There is one sheet file that will not close.  However I try to do so, a litle window pops up that says "Corrupt".  I can't get rid of it by trying "Revert to saved" or "Close all Files" from the system menu.  I think that as a result of this file searches won't work any more either.

2. If I try to add to or alter any Word file, I also get a "Corrupt" window when I try to close it.  In this case, I can export the contents to another file and then close the original with "Revert to saved" - and then erase the original.  But this is extermely awkward.

3. I have one folder that is clearly corrupt and cannot be deleted. The names of the files within it are just bits of text from one of the original files, none of which is still available.

What could be causing this.  There's nothing in the Help screens about corrupt files.  Is there a way or program to scan the drives to correct all this? The problem with Word makes it extremely difficult to use the Mbook for writing.

Date: 21 Jan 2006 20:39:28 +0700
From: Itamar Engelsman <address truncated>
Subject: TomTom, bt keyboard,

Answer to: Edgar Brazda

Re.: TomTom - The difference is that you talk about TomTom 700 which is a stand alone unit, the most expensive TomTom unit in their line. I talked about TomTom Mobile 5 which you download and use on your mobile phone with a TomTom GPS unit only. Route66 is another rival program that works on a mobile phone. AFAIK the mobile version does not have all the maps installed and you have to buy them from the TomTom website, but if anyone can say I am wrong so much the better.

Answer to: Max Ozinsky

Re.: bt keyboard - The only problem I have with it is that the space bar is very hard to use. YOu really have to press it deep for it to work, and I get too many words linked together when I type. The keyboard on the mBook (and 5MX) is still master of this size keyboards. Otherwise it is a very valuable addition to my mobile phone.

Best regards,
Itamar Engelsman
London, UK