> Home

 > About Us

 > FAQ's

 > Next Meeting
 
 > Past Meetings

 > Upcoming Meetings

 > Download to your Handheld

 > Find the Perfect Handheld

 > Join

 > Message Board

 > Links

 > Reviews

 > Members

 > Weather

 > Contact Us

Past Meetings: December 12, 2002

As par for the course, at first we thought it was going to be a small meeting; just 17 or so in attendance when we started at 7:00. By 7:10, twenty more people had made their way in.

This month we had three different topics:

• A look at various Bible Readers, and Bibles available for Palm handhelds. We looked specifically at MyBible by Laridian, and BibleReader by OliveTree. The big advantage of both of these is the fact that you always have your bible with you. Both Andrew Hackman, who reviewed MyBible, and Carl Brooks, who reviewed BibleReader, both liked the convenience of having the bible with you all the time, as well as being able to search by keyword. Both readers have amazingly fast search engines, especially when you consider the vast amount of text that is being sesarched. Both readers have similar features, some of the differences we noted:
  • MyBible only shows a search results page when you search for text; BibleReader has the option of showing a search results page or jumping to the part of the bible where the keyword exists and highlighting the keyword
  • MyBible does not support color; BibleReader does.
  • Neither allows you to export your bookmarks
  • MyBible costs $10 for the reader, and then depending on the translation, the actual bible can be upwards of $39. A New International Version (NIV) translation is available.
  • BibleReader is free, but they do not have the New International Version (NIV) translation.
• A couple of DPUG members chimed in with some other Bible Readers we may want to be aware of:
  • The Church of Latter Day Saints has a free reader available at www.lds.org.
  • AsaiSoft at www.asaisoft.com also has a free bible reader. It has many free translations as well, and one of the nice features is that it allows you to view multiple versions at the same time via split screen. The NIV version is only $18. However, the search engine is very slow, and until that's improved we don't recommend using this reader.
    
    
• A look at how to take full advantage of the Palm Desktop/Outlook. This was just a quick tutorial and reminder that anything that you can view on your PC electronically, eg a web page, an e-mail, a Word document, etc, can be easily put on your handheld just by using the basic Windows select/copy/paste function. We used some examples of interesting articles on web sites where we used our mouse to highlight over the text of interest, right mouse to copy, then go to the Palm Desktop, create a new Memo, and paste the contents from the Windows clipboard. HotSync and the information is now in your handheld. This is great for meeting agendas, directions to someone's house, etc.
  
  
• A look at how to take full advantage of your external media card (SD card, Sony Memory Stick, or Compact Flash). All the newer PDA's have the slot, so how do we take advantage of it? Especially when you want a memory hog like the bible on your handheld? First and foremost, you should use your external media as a backup of your handheld. We recommend BackupBuddyVFS by BlueNomad. VFS means "Virtual File System" and this is the industry acronym for "external media" whether it be an SD card on a Palm branded handheld, a Memory Stick on a Sony branded handheld, or a Compact Flash on a Handera. Sony's come with a MS Backup utility but we don't recommend you use that one; you can't backup individual files with this utility. BackupBuddyVFS allows you to backup everything, or backup individual files. Let's say you just took copious notes in Memo Pad at meeting--you could then backup your Memo Pad to your external media. If your Palm should die before you get a chance to HotSync you can restore from Memory Card. Having a clone of your handheld on your external media is really handy, especially if you're traveling and can't always get back to your desktop to HotSync.
  
  Other than backing up your memory card, you can use these cards to store pictures, Word documents, or large applications. However, the built-in software to handle transferring of files isn't really the best. To put a file on your memory card, you can use the Applications Launcher "Copy" feature. However, this made a copy; you copied the application to the memory card, but it's still on your handheld's internal memory. So you probably think "I'll just use the Application Launcher's 'delete' function to clear it up off the handheld's internal memory". And that would not be a good thing. When you use the Application Launcher's "Delete" function, it not only delete's the application but all data associated with the application. This means that any databases and/or saved preferences, like registration codes, or no longer available for that application. We recommend FileZ, a very nice free product that displays the contents of your handheld and memory stick as individual files, kind of like Windows Explorer. This utility allows you to just delete an application without deleting all the associated data with it.

Give Aways:

• 3 Bible Study Bonus Pak CDs, compliments of Laridian. This CD includes MyBible with the KJV New Testament, Psalms and Proverbs plus their Memorize program
• 7 copies of different OliveTree bible translations, compliments of OliveTree.
• The following are all compliments of HandheldReporter.net:
  • 1 copy of Quickoffice Pro
  • 1 copy of PrintBoy Anywhere
  • 1 copy of Rook’s Revenge
  • 1 copy of BugMe

Next Meeting