[Xastir] TechCrunch Web Tablet Project

[Curt, WE7U]

On Tue, 22 Jul 2008, Tom Hayward wrote:

> TechCrunch Web Tablet Project:
> http://www.techcrunchit.com/2008/07/21/the-techcrunch-web-tablet-project/
>
> Vaporware at this point, but I can only hope it will run Xastir. No
> mention of available serial or USB (host) I/O yet.
>
> With the lack of new NMEA mapping GPS receivers, I've been thinking
> about an open hardware project that can run Xastir. This one might do
> it.

   "The planned stack so far is to run BSD or Linux, with the Gnome
    desktop."

I hope they mean Gtk+ widget set and not Gnome desktop, but who
knows?  Gnome is a pig.  For that matter, so is KDE.

The current problem with PDA-sized devices is that they generally
don't run X11 underneath.  They often run Gtk+ (Maemo) or Qt (Qtopia
and Opie?).

Why wait for hardware like the web tablet described?  Doesn't the
Nokia 810 perform many of these features right now, with an included
GPS, for about the same price?  I haven't looked so perhaps the 810
is much more.

One would need to port the Motif/X11 code in Xastir to Qt and/or
Gtk+ before it would run on such devices, unless somebody ported X11
/OpenMotif or X11/Lesstif to the device.

Porting Xastir to Gtk+ would make people with Qt devices unhappy and
vice-versa.

-- 
Curt, WE7U.				archer at eskimo dot com
http://www.eskimo.com/~archer
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