David Pogue Gushes Over the Chumby 134
stoolpigeon writes "IHT is running a David Pogue review of the Chumby. The Chumby is a small computer embedded in a soft case. The Chumby hardware and OS are open, and the review mentions that the device already has a large developer following, cranking out new widgets for owners. Pogue is obviously quite taken with the Chumby and gives a good introduction to a device that may be the inspiration for a new generation of hackers."
I have a Chumby... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Chumby's cool but... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:NO! Get it away from me. (Score:1, Informative)
goatse spam
Re:"Gentlemen!" (Score:5, Informative)
How do I clean my chumby?
Why is the squeeze sensor stuck?
I won't post the one about children handling the Chumby, because that would just be over the line.
Re:Sounds good, but... (Score:3, Informative)
$180? (Score:4, Informative)
I don't work for Nokia. I just love mine.
Consumer-oriented reviews tend to emphasize its lack of pre-installed PIM apps and synchronization, but that's not a problem for your average technophile [slashdot.org].
To give you an idea of how hackable it is, I hacked the init scripts to set up swap and mount my home directory from an SD card's ext2 partition. I SSH into it when I want to do this kind of stuff.
Parts of the hardware (and thus some of the drivers) aren't open. If you're a purist, this might put you off. Which brings us back on topic: the Chumby is completely open. Maybe this'll push Nokia to open more. Ari Jaaksi has even said that the open source software on the N800 is of far better quality than the in-house stuff - it's just convincing the suits that embracing it is a good idea that's difficult.
Re:NO! Get it away from me. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:I have a Chumby... (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Sounds good, but... (Score:3, Informative)
Bought one for the wife (Score:4, Informative)
She currently uses it to listen to news and music streams and get weather reports and such. I don't think she's discovered the alarm features yet.
Nice and small and is excellent for the bedside, easy to operate, comes on quick and the touchscreen size is good for its purpose. The widgets are getting better more information feeds and stuff - even slashdot articles (not reply chains though)
I too wonder what happens if the parent co goes under what would be left, though I know it is flashable, as upon first power up it downloaded and installed a system update.
Re:Sounds good, but... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Sounds good, but... (Score:2, Informative)