DPUG - Detroit Palm Users Group

Vince supplies the snacks for our meeting, and is is also offering DPUG members 10% off any Palm accessories purchased at his store. Just mention DPUG when you're in his store to receive the discount. In addition, Palm is offering a promotion to all stores; if they sell 15 Palms (any model) before July 14 the store will get a free Palm m500. Vine will donate the Palm m500 to our group for a give away if 15 DPUG members buy Palms at his store. His store has already received 8 free Palm m505's! So if you or someone you know is thinking of buying a Palm, go to the Royal Oak Office Depot store (southwest corner of Woodward and 13 mile), and make sure they mention DPUG when they make their purchase. We really appreciate Office Depot's support.

Vince also showed us the Palm m505, which is the model he currently owns, and the various expansion modules that are available for it. Not too many available right now, but like Springboard Modules more should be coming. Vince mentioned that the serial port is now a new standard that all new Palms will be released with, so that cradles, keyboards, modems, etc. will all be compatible, and the headache of the Palm III-series accessories not working with the Palm V-series will be alleviated. Vince felt the Palm m505 worked really well outside, much better than the Palm IIIc, but he said the Palm m505 really sucks batteries, more so than the Palm Iiic does.

Thinmodem Springboard module review by DPUG member Matt Sonefeld.

Unfortunately, Matt was unable to connect via his ISP with the module; it was a scripting issue that he was unable to resolve. Matt liked the small packaging of the modem and the ease of setup. The modem comes with Browse-It (a browser), Multi-Mail Pro, and a telnet-like software package. Overall though, Matt thought it would be worth spending the extra money and getting a 56Kbps modem. Click here to view Matt's complete PowerPoint presentation.
Guest Speaker Eston Bond, CEO of Pine Tree Software and creator of Torpedo, the first HTML editor for your Palm OS handheld.

Eston is just 15 years old, and has written a great Palm OS software application. He's started his own company, Pine Tree Software, and in late April of this year released Torpedo. Eston walked us through a quick HTML tutorial, and then showed us how to use Torpedo to write HTML code on your Palm. Torpedo is not a WYSIWYG editor, and you need to understand the raw HTML tags to use it effectively. However, Torpedo does format some of the most frequently used tags for you to minimize your Graffiti input (hyperlinks, images, titles, META tags, etc.). Torpedo comes bundled with CSPotRun, and PalmScape browser (trial versions). What's great about PalmScape is that it allows you to view your HTML page on your Palm OS device--export it to MemoPad from Torpedo, then use PalmScape to view the HTML file from the MemoPad. Torpedo also supports LFTP which allows you to upload your HTML files to your web server. Torpdeo is just $12.50 for a registered version.

Now that Eston is out of school he has more time to devote to his application; he expects to release an upgrade in a few weeks, and he is also working on Torpedo Pro which will offer ASP support, and many many more features. Torpedo Pro is marketed for the web professional.

Eston did a remarkable job for a 15 year old; this young man has a very bright future ahead of him. We thank Eston for coming out (and his Mom for driving him!) and we hope to have Eston back in the future.

Give Aways

One Thinmodem SpringBoard module, compliments of CardAccess
A registered version of Torpedo for all attendees, compliments of Eston Bond of Pine Tree Software

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