Posts Tagged n900
Today’s the day. Maemo 5 PR1.1 was released at 7am local time in Finland.
Apparently the release is staggered through the various countries over the next 24 hours, so you might not have it in Application Manager just yet.
The update also brings changes to the SDK so be sure to update those if you’re a developer.
Extensive list of changes available here.
Vagalume, a last.fm client for maemo, was released for N900 a while back, but had been castrated thanks to Last.fm’s rules about being able to stream to mobile devices.
All is not lost as it seems there is a very easy way to get it to work. It’s a quick process and works perfectly. Head over to NokiaAddict for the instructions.
As I’m sure most people already know a minor firmware update has been released for the N900.
Apparently the main reason for this update is to allow the for the much larger PR1.1 firmware update to be installed OTA (Over The Air) through the Application Manager. The two most visible changes are to the Application Manager (new icons give it a better look and feel) and that the N900 Ovi Store is now open.
The update can be installed OTA via the Application Manager or using the Nokia Software Updater in Windows. I’d recommend the first method as it’s faster, easier, and you wont lose any settings. If you run into an error message about no space to install then read this.
Here’s looking forward to the release of the big update.
Update:
fairly good info on the changes in this release here from Urho Konttori
The rootfs of the N900 is stored on a 256mb partition of NAND memory. This memory is faster than the 32gb of storage. However sometimes this space limit can cause issues when installing apps.
The main problem here is that some poorly packaged apps install things in the rootfs instead of the 2gb application parition on the main memory. Also sometimes downloaded packages haven’t been removed by the application manager.
If you receive a no space message then try these steps.
Firstly clear downloaded packages by rebooting the device. You can also do this with the command “apt-get clean” whilst root in an X-Term, if you don’t understand this then reboot the device.
If this doesn’t clear sufficent space then you have probably indulged in Extras-Devel a little too much and now you’ll need to start removing apps that you have installed. Unfortunately without a lot of hassle there isn’t an easy way to determine which apps are taking up space in rootfs and you’ll need a bit of trail and error.
Hopefully this should clear up sufficient space for you to install new app or updates.
Update: If you’re still short of space then disable repositories you don’t need and refresh your updates. This will remove the database files for these repositories and free up more space. If you only need a few meg then it may well be worth trying this before removing apps. Finally reboot to clear up any temporary files no longer required. If this still doesn’t do it and you’re trying to install a Maemo firmware update then you’re probably going to have to use the Nokia Software Updater, remember to run a back up first.
Just a little reminder concerning Extras-Devel, the software found here is really in alpha or beta stages and may well cause much more serious problems than filling up your rootfs. Please remember this before you hit that install button.
Unfortunately because Google don’t use the standard ActiveSync protocols the Mail for Exchange (MfE) system on Maemo doesn’t support it offically.
It seems to be hit and miss, some people say it works fine, others say it doesn’t work at all.
There is however a solution.
Using Nuevasync you can now sync with Google (and other) services. Contacts and Calendar are free, but to get Push Email support you need to pay 25 dollars for a year. One of the nice things about it is the ability to get data from different accounts. I have my contacts come from my gmail account but my calendar comes from a google apps account.
You can sign up for a 5 day trial account (lets you try the email) here. Configuration instructions are available here.
I don’t use it for email myself, but it works perfectly with my contacts and calendar.
My N900 finally arrived on monday after UPS failed to find an 8 story office block in central London two days running. I think it would have gotten here quicker if Nokia had tied it to a blind monkey and thrown bananas in my general direction. Anyway it got here eventually.
So far loving it. There are some software glitches but i’d expect them to be ironed out in the next firmware or two.
Currently writing this is on the phone with MaStory, a wordpress app for Maemo. Seems to work pretty well and can upload media too.
Another thing i’m enjoying is watching normal standard def divx videos. No need to reencode anything, just copy across and watch. The media player also plays ogg music files which is good as i ripped most of my cd collection to ogg.
Will update with more details as i explore the available software further.
Just got this from Nokia:
Welcome to the N900 meet-up !
The London meet-up is held in the St. Martins Lane Hotel (www.stmartinslane.com) Tuesday the 17th of November.
The doors open at 7.30pm and the ‘official’ part starts at 8pm. For the following couple of hours you will be able to meet likeminded people, as well as Maemo folks from Nokia and the community.
We will provide some nibble food and N900 demos, so you can get a feel for the device in case you have not had the chance yet or just have fun with it. The event then ends at 10pm after which we can continue the chats elsewhere. We will also have a surprise lottery at the end of the event.
As the space is limited, we have a name list at the door so we ask you to bring a piece of identification with you.
We are very excited about the N900, and we hope you are as well!
Should be interesting.
This weekend I had a play with the Maemo SDK and tried out a number of the apps available. I’m trying to setup the dev environment so I can try out some of my rusty python skills, but part of it wasn’t agreeing with Windows 7 too much. I may have a solution that I’ll try later.
Popped into Nokia Flagship Store again today, but no Maemo Lounge open yet. As it was announced the N900 was shipping out today hopefully that’ll be up and running soon.
Yesterday I heard down the twitter wire that the UK Nokia Flagship store had a N900 in for people to check out so I headed down there at lunch.
I played with it for about 15 minutes. I wont go into too much detail but I definitely liked what I saw. The touch screen was very responsive and the slide out keyboard gave good feedback. The software on the device looked pretty nice but it’ll take a bit more time with it to be sure.
Rumour is that the device will be released on Monday (9th Nov) but the guys in the Nokia store are keeping very tight lipped.
I went back down there today with a friend who wanted to check the device out and whilst there we had a quick chat with Adam who mans the NokiaFlagshipUK twitter account. Whilst there is nothing definite he mentioned there may be a get together with the Nokia Bloggers when the phone is launched.
They are currently setting up a room at the back of the store dubbed the Maemo Lounge which will have 5 N900s to play with and a maemo expert on hand to answer questions. This should be open Saturday or Monday. I’ll be down there Monday to have another look.
On the 17th there is a N900 meetup at the store which is now taking registrations here, I’m signed up and looking forward to it.
My N95 died last night so the sooner the N900 is released the better!
Seems my plan to get easy entry to the London N900 meetup failed.
Currently you can’t register for the London event as they’ve not announced the date. However last week I found with a little javascript trickery you could get around it and signed up myself and a friend. I got confirmation emails and the number of seats available did go down by 2. It seemed I wasn’t alone and by earlier today the number of available seats was down to 73 (out of 80).
I just checked now and noticed the available seats were back up to the original 80. I guess this means my registration is not valid. Being a bit cheeky I did try the same method I used before to register, but it seems they’ve gotten wise to the hole and plugged it. 
I’m thinking this could mean that they are going to announce the date very soon and open up registrations properly. I will be watching the page very closely and hope to get into the event the old fashion way.
I love my Nokia N95, I’ve had it over 2 years and it’s pretty much always been good to me. In return I’ve done my best to take good care of it. I’ve bought it two new screens and two new cases in it’s life (ok, I’m not the most careful owner).
However good things come to an end and now I’m back in the UK and using the internet over the phone I really need a full keyboard and a bigger screen.
Most of my friends fell for the iPhone and swear by it, but there are somethings that make it a no go for me:
- No multitasking 3rd party apps (seriously, what the hell?)
- Lame bluetooth support
- Apple control over the apps you can use
- No physical keyboard
Now the most obvious upgrade path for me was a Nokia N97 and until a month or so ago that was what I was going to buy. Then I started to read more and more about the Nokia N900.
Firstly the hardware looks great, ok it’s not the smallest phone in the world but I’m going to be using it as an internet device way more than I’ll be holding it to my ear. The software is the interesting part. Rather than using Symbian S60 like Nokia’s other smartphones it uses Maemo. Maemo is a linux distribution for mobile devices that’s been in development for a while but is now starting to mature. Videos of it in action on the N900 are really quite impressive and it seems to handle multitasking very well indeed.
The main problem is the apps. There is a fairly large library of apps from previous version of Maemo, some which were originally desktop linux apps that have been modified for the mobile device. The trouble is I’m quite attached to a number of the Symbian apps that I’ve been running on my N95 for the last two years. Some are written by Nokia so may get ported across, others like Shozu are less likely. It makes it a tough decision, but the fact that the Maemo OS is very open really is swinging it at the moment. Having a fully accessible linux device in the palm of my hand is very attractive to the geek in me.
I hope to get my hands on a N900 as soon as possible, even cheating my way into an N900 meetup in London soon. I just hope that it lives up to everything I’ve read and seen so far.
