Wireless Archive

The usually reliable Wall Street Journal claims that Dell, the world's no. 2 computer maker, will enter the smartphone market in an effort to make up for the lost income due to the economic downturn. They say the Texas company is planning on releasing several models, pitching them against RIM's and Apple's phones.

Sure, you can buy a netbook and run Linux on it, but what if that's still too clunky and big for you? What if you want a mobile internet device, one that is open source, preferably? Even though the OpenPandora project appeared to be shrouded in a cloud of vapour, the product design team has now published a video of the open source MID in action.

InfoWorld's Peter Wayner surveys the development landscape for six smartphone platforms. The survey -- which includes the iPhone, Android, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Symbian, and Palm -- shows how wide open the mobile development field has become. 'Unlike the desktop world, there are more than a few players, and the niches are evolving, merging, and splitting,' Wayner writes. 'Some of the platforms are better for tightly integrated enterprises, while others offer much better opportunities for gamers and experimenters. Some require the highest-end hardware with the most expensive contracts, while others work well with cheap phones too.' Throughout the survey, Wayner offers insights and questions to help you target the right device, as well as extensive tips for pursuing the cross-platform option: Web apps for smartphones.

All those Windows Mobile users waiting for Windows Mobile 7 are going to have to wait a little longer, but at least now they'll have something to keep them busy while they wait. Next month, Microsoft is reportedly planning to unveil Windows Mobile 6.5 and accompanying services at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, which is taking place between February 16 and 19.

Palm announced today the Palm Pre, the company's next generation Linux-based web tech-enabled operating system. It has a fast CPU, Wifi, Bluetooth with A2DP support, removable battery, 3.1" touchscreen 480x320 LCD, gesture-enabled UI at the bottom half of the phone's body, 3 MP camera with LED flash, multi-touch, accelerometer, slide-out keyboard, GPS, EVDO, and an impressive, fresh UI. Sprint will be the first carrier to sell the smartphone, at the first half of 2009. ArsTechnica has a nice write-up too.

Amidst the hubbub over MacWorld 2009, El Reg quietly noted that the company UIQ, the joint venture of Sony Ericsson and Motorola and eponymous creator of the UIQ interface layer for the Symbian smartphone OS, has filed for bankruptcy in the Swedish courts.

Palm recently announced over $500 million in losses, but then we all knew Palm wasn't too hot on the market these days despite their efforts to sell Windows Mobile devices. Palm is hoping to make a comeback, however, with new smartphones sporting Nova in 2009.

The French competition council has ordered the iPhone be opened up to other French carriers (Google-translated), breaking the exclusivity deal with Orange (France Telecom). The complaint was filed by France's third largest operator Bouygues Telecom who said that the deal violated local competition laws. Though the ruling is temporary whilst the issue is investigated further, the ruling did state that the arrangement reduced the effects of price competition, network quality and customer service.

It's time for another phone review. PureMobile.com sent us the Nokia E71 for review. The E71 is a BlackBerry-style phone, with a full qwerty keyboard in a candybar form factor, meaning the E71 is direct competition for the phone we reviewed in October, the BlackBerry Bold 9000. Read on for our findings.

"Before 2007, using the internet on your phone would make you want to kill yourself, if you were dumb enough to believe the crap splattered across that tiny screen even was the "internet." But the combination of increased bandwidth and better mobile software means that more phones really are promising to deliver the real internet, in living color. We tested eight different browsers, and while some put smiles on our faces, others proved that rendering HTML correctly is a far cry from actually giving you an awesome web experience. And what about 3G vs. Wi-Fi? Everything the carriers have told you is a lie. This is the true state of mobile web."

"The T-Mobile G1 Google smartphone, designed by Google and made by HTC, remains firmly in the shadow of the iPhone-for now. The phone, which goes on sale next week in the US and next month in Britain, was released too early. The HTC hardware and Android OS that powers it lack the polish and depth of even the iPhone 1.0 in most respects. It's not a bad phone, but the software and hardware needed more time in the oven to bring them to a golden brown crispness." Full review at Arstechnica.

A Fortune Magazine article looks at hand-held computing's most beleaguered major player and wonders whether it wouldn't be better off hitching its wagon to Google's coat-tails and adopting Android. After shunting aside its own, old-and-creaky OS in favor of Microsoft's it's been hanging its hopes on a long-awaited new Linux-based OS. Android may be Palm's best bet to avoid stemming its inexorable slide into irrelevance.

"Nokia announced today the launch of Qt Extended 4.4, a complete mobile and embedded development platform based on the open source Qt toolkit. It is designed with a modular architecture that provides building blocks for assembling a Linux-based software stack for various embedded devices ranging from phones to set-top boxes." ArsTechnica showcases the various features and enhancements of the platform. There are some impressive screenshots of the Qt widgets as well.

No, Motorola isn't building an army of humanoid robots. The fading mobile phone powerhouse already has 50 developers on its android-based mobile phone OS team, and it intends to expand to 350, according to TechCrunch. Other major handset vendors seem to be expressing interest in the new Google OS as well. Will intense pressure from competitors backing an open OS be just what iPhone fans have been praying for, forcing Apple to loosen the screws a bit?