Software Status - Shall I buy or shall I wait?

[Al Johnson]

On Tuesday 01 July 2008, Ingmar RIeger wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I'm watching the OpenMoko Project for more than a year. And now with a
> available Phone with W-Lan I'm thinking, if I shall buy it now. I often
> read the list the last weeks but not everything is clear to me now. I'll
> write a list of Questions what isn't clear for me now and I'm hopping,
> you can help me.
>
> 1.) How long is the battery life? Can I use the FreeRunner a hole day if
> I only use little MP3, maybe a short phone call and maybe a little time
> GPS?

Probably not. To get long life you currently need to use suspends, but resume 
is unreliable. The kernel list shows progress on this front, but it's not 
there yet.

> And are there batteries available which could be charged in the FR? 
> I often read that Nokia batteries are utilizable but not chargeable.
>
> 2.) Whats the state of the software? I mean both, the "normal" software
> and the ASU one. Is it possible to make and recive calls with both? This
> would be the most important thing if some other functions work. And
> which of the following things is working on which version of the
> distribution?

I have made and received calls with both without problems so far. I haven't 
had it long enough to know how reliable this is, but under the light use I've 
given it so far it has always worked.

I should probably qualify that - the mic setting initially seemed too low, but 
there is a button that seems to increase the gain. With the increased gain 
the other end of the call can sometimes hear excessive echo.

> 3.) Is there a browser which basically works and which can use a proxy?

http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Minimo
It wouldn't build for me earlier today though :-(

> 4.) Is there a working application for GPS logging/tracking? I'm a
> OpenStreetMap-User and I want to contribute with the FR.

http://www.tangogps.org/gps/articles/13-Howto-contribute-to-OpenStreetMap.html
I can confirm this works as advertised.

> 5.) Is there a working MP3-Player with basic functions? This is one of
> the most use cases for me.

The GTK image has a media player, but it didn't play the mp3 I tried to feed 
it, failing with a gstreamer error. I haven't looked into this any closer.

> 6.) Is there a funambol-connector for the addressbook and the callender
> or is somebody working on it?