Re: [pc110] Benefits of LINUX on PC110

Alan Cox (alan nospam at diamondage.cymru.net)
Wed, 31 Dec 1997 09:35:41 +0000 (GMT)

> I am just curious as to what the real benefits are to running LINUX on a
> PC110, I like the whole idea & am very tempted to do it, but will I gain
> any 'real' benefits from using it on my PC110, I know the benefits of
> having all the command line tools from the shell, but I guess this more
> of a Xwindows question.... Are there any PIM's for X windows, will I
> still be able to use the dialer & phone functions?

I think it depends what you want to do. I didn't buy the PC110 to be a PDA
(a Psion 3 or a palmpilot is far cheaper 8)). I bought it so I could do
development work on the move and for things like being a secure network access
terminal.

> I guess I'm just a little intimidated by X windows, but I am not all
> that crazy of WIN95 on my PC110 and was just unsure if switching the
> PC110 to all LINUX would be a benefit more than WIN95.

I would find out what you are going to do with it first before deciding.
Getting Linux running on the PC110 requires a little bit of messing around
but works fine. In terms of PIM software - ical is ok, not brilliant but
ok and you can hotsync it with a palmpilot nowdays. There are some nice
friendly X11 desktops around - notably KDE- www.kde.org which I'd recommend
anyway if you want your machine to be friendly rather than merely powerful

> I know Netscape & email are avaialble easily for LINUX, but how about
> using the sound & APM functions...

Linux supports APM. I originally just used the "lid close turns off the box"
and speed switching by keyboard but after a while changed to using the APM
idling so I could leave it compiling code while in my pocket.

Alan