Blue-tooth, named after the Norwegian king who was
famous for bringing together two warring factions...
I don't think we will see a Bluetooth sollution for
the Newton (and not because of any animosity between
England and Norway, mind you...<Sir Isaac Newton was
English and Bluetooth was Norwegian? Get it?
Huh?...oh, ok, I admit it wasn't THAT funny, but hey,
it improv!)
No, the reason why we won't see Bluetooth is because
Bluetooth is more than just a communication medium.
(short distance 2.4ghz transmission). Bluetooth will
not be an "add-on" device that adds functionallity to
a product...Bluetooth functionality will be an
integral aspect of not only the hardware, but also the
software (or ROMware)
While I don't think that it would be very difficult to
add the hardware transmitter and receiver to a Newton
"card", the links to the software would be a different
story. Here is how a Bluetooth session might go:
You have two devices that are bluetooth aware. One is
your cellphone (you pick the brand) and the other is
some form of pocket data device. You pickup your phone
and hit the find button and then proceed to type in
the name of someone you want to call (that Ericsson
t-whatever thingy is really cool, kinda reminds me of
the IBM Simon in the way it anticipates your next
letter) The phone will initiate a bluetooth session.
Now, earlier you assigned a fixed IP to your PDA and
to your phone. Your PDA is within 15 feet (they are
thinking of shortening it what with the limited IP
requirements coming into play with the running out of
IPs and such) The Newton answers on the IP the phone
is quering, recieves the question and performs a
lookup and relays the data to the phone for immediate
dialing.
Another scenario would be in syncronysing your
cellphone and PDA phone books. In your PDA, you would
assign 99 names to be in your cellphone. Everytime you
turn on your cellphone, it would query the PDA for
updated names and phone nubmers an them update it's
address book. Similar things can be done with GPS
devices and such...This type of tightly integrated
interoperabilty is crucial for bluetooth to
succeed..The Newton has never been good at sharing
it's data...I doesn't need to be...it's a stand alone
product that really doesn't need the support of a
desktop or such...btw, bluetooth is not designed for
extended transmission. Meaning that you can't browse
the web or maintain continueous connectivity. It is
burst mode only. Now you will be able to send requests
from the PDA to tell the cellphone to go fetch a
page...It might seem interactive, but it certainly
isn't dynamic. You will be dealing with static
pages.(meaning if you were to look at your web logs,
every page that you would call would look like a
seperate browsing session and would count as an
additional hit)
Now, don't get me wrong...the newton community has
pulled some really cool rabbits out of their
respective hats, so I wouldn't be suprised if some
industrious geek was able to get Bluetooth to work on
a Newton..but it won't be easy!
Ed
Web/Cellphone/Wireless guru!
--- Michael Stephens <mike1964@flash.net> wrote:
> Great summary, Ed. Thanks, much. I really am
> interested
> in the Sierra wireless solution. Their AirCard has
> low
> enough power consumption that it would likely work
> in the Newton; as you pointed out, the scripting is
> the challenge. I played with a Palm VII at a
> meeting
> recently, and it really gave me the bug for wireless
> for
> my MP2x00. Wireless stock quotes, e-mail, etc, is
> really
> attractive.
>
> Will Bluetooth be a possibility down the road
> for Newton?
>
> Mike
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Ed Kummel [mailto:tech_ed@yahoo.com]
> Sent: Sunday, February 27, 2000 11:41 PM
> To: mike1964@flash.net; newtontalk@planetnewton.com
> Subject: Re: NTLK RE: Wireless Connectivity for
> MP2x00?
>
>
> There were two different types of "wireless"
> communication options for the Newton.
> 1) Pager
> 2) Packet data.
>
> In the pager arena, you had the Socket Pagecard and
> Mobilecom's Messaging card. Both of these were one
> directional messaging. The cool part is that the
> pager
> card could still collect pages without being
> connected
> to the Newton. Then when you plugged it in the
> Newton,
> it would "download" the pages into your inbox.
>
> The Packet data consisted of services from two
> different companies. These were RAM and Ardis. Ardis
> was purchased by Americal Mobile Satellite, and RAM
> was purchased by Bell South Wireless. These services
> were resold by two predominent companies, Wynd and
> what is now called Go America. They used the
> Megahertz
> AllPoints card and charged you by the kilobyte! Wynd
> was a little more proactive on the Newton stuff, but
> they have both long since discontinued service to
> the
> Newton...Now that's not to say that if you go and
> get
> a Megahertz AllPoints card, plug it into your
> Newton,
> load up the software (which I happen to have) enter
> in
> the server information that this woudn't work! Of
> course it works, and works well! But you are limited
> to email and text only! Both services have fax,
> email,
> voicemail, and even rudimentary web stuff. A web
> page
> can be captured by sending an email to the service,
> they go and get the page and send the text to your
> Newton. The links are then listed at the end of the
> text with cooresponding numbers to where they would
> normally be. You rend the HTTP page that cooresponds
> to the link number and you get THAT page. You do
> this
> till you get the information you need. I did this on
> the way to a meeting with a company that I had
> neglected to view their website. Every traffic
> light,
> I downloaded more of their site and while I was
> waiting in their waiting room, I read their
> site...impressed them with my up to date knowledge
> of
> their company!
>
> A third and not really supported option was using
> CDPD. This is Cellular Digital Packet Data. This
> card
> originally was a type III card by IBM. Now it is a
> card created by Sierra Wireless. You might be able
> to
> get an older Bell Atlantic card but don't hold your
> breath...The CDPD required some pretty fancy
> tweaking
> of TCI/IP settings and scripting...You basically set
> it up as a seperate internet account...a real pain
> in
> the butt and I only got it to work once or twice...A
> police force in California used the Newton and a
> CDPD
> modem on their bicycle cops and they showed it at
> the
> '98 Wireless World in Atlanta...real cool stuff.
> They
> got it working and even gave me their notes to look
> at. After extensive talking with one of the
> engineers
> who set it up, he was going to send me the notes,
> but
> their lawyers stepped in and wouldn't let me have a
> copy...something about intellectual property...Oh,
> well...But, Sierra Wireless is pretty open to
> "hackers" trying to get stuff to work on their
> modem.
> I met with several of their engineers at Wireless
> World in Las Vegas in '99 and they were very open to
> helping me develop drivers and scripts for the
> Newton...but alas, I left the job that gave me
> access
> to these toys and lost contact with all these fine
> people. I still have phone numbers for anyone that
> may
> want to pursue this...but, be forwarned...most
> people
> approach the Newton sollution as not even worth
> considering! Especially when they see the market
> saturation of the palm! (kinda like the Mac/Wintel
> thing you know...why spend money developing for only
> 2-3% of the target market when the same amount of
> money could be spent to the other 97%!
>
> Ed
> Web/Cellphone/Wireless data Guru
>
> --- Michael Stephens <mike1964@flash.net> wrote:
> > I dug up my old Newton Solutions Guide booklet
> that
> > came -new- with my
> > MP2000 back in '97. In it are a couple of
> wireless
> > card & service options:
> >
> > 1. Socket Communications Pagecard Wireless
> > Messaging System
> > This looks like a pager attached to a Socket
> PCMCIA
> > card.
> >
> > 2. RadioMail - similar service to Socket -
> E-mail,
> > WWW, paging, etc.
> > The card looks like it has a bigger attachment,
> > with antenna
> >
> > 3. WyndMail - Looks like a similar card to
> > RadioMail (Megahertz??). Same
> > type of service, again. This is wireless "radio"
> > modem service. They
> > actually offered free use for 30 dyas - then
> either
> > purchase or renting
> > for $39.95/mo....
> >
> > 4. Personal Media - from Gaia - wireless e-mail,
> > company web info. The
> > same
> > Megahertz card here.
> >
> > Man, if it were only '97 again.
> > My question is, are any of these services still
> > available? I suspect not.
> > What is the difference between these cards and the
> > Merlin or Sierra Wireless
> > AirCard
> > that are in the latest MobilePlanet catalog that I
> > received yesterday? I
> > would
> > think that power requirements of the older
> Megahertz
> > wireless card wouldn't
> > be
> > significantly different from the Merlin card
> (which,
> > by the way, is listed
> > for
> > $129.95 with 1 yr. service commitment...).
> >
> > I'm game, as others seemed to be, to try this, if
> it
> > doesn't destroy my
> > MessagePad.
> >
> > Mike
> >
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: DrNewton [mailto:DrNewton@kc.net]
> > Sent: Sunday, February 06, 2000 9:16 AM
> > To: mike1964@flash.net
> > Cc: newtontalk@planetnewton.com
> > Subject: Wireless Connectivity for MP2x00?
> >
> > Mike,
>
=== message truncated ===
=====
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