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What is Opie ?

The Open Palmtop Integrated Environment is a 'fork' of Qtopia environment developed by  Trolltech. Opie is a completely Open Source based graphical user environment for PDA's and other devices running Linux. It is maintened by a group of people scatted around the word and convinced by Open Source philosophy. Opie has greatly extended and improved usability of Qtopia to become the most sophisticated free and open graphical user interface for Linux based embedded devices and PDAs.

Opie features a sophisticated personal information (PIM) framework as well as several other productivity apps. It has also extended multimedia capabilities, document model, networking and communication tools as well as multi language support for more than a dozen languages. Based on common industry standards like XML, Obex, IrDa et. al. Opies is capable to interact with lots of devices ranging from cell phones to server backends. Opie is highly optimzed for mobile devices and tries to support the user with shortcuts and ease of use.

No matter whether one would like to organize life issues, keep up to date reading daily news or requires a mobile internet accessing terminal, Opie provides all capabilities necessary for daily usage.

Key highlights of Opie

• Sophisticated PIM framework (including an easy to use access API) with addressbook, todolist, today, mail, drawpad, datebook, texteditor and search-all-facility
• Today application featuring plugins for dates, todos, mail, birthdays, weather and stock values
• Multimedia capabilities provided by the xine based based opieplayer2 (featuring streaming audio and video) and image viewer
• Palmdoc compatible opie-reader for ebook reading and, in cooperation with eg. jpluckx (http://jpluck.sourceforge.net) daily news coverage
• Linux shell/terminal providing access to the operating system (for those who care)
• Network based installation and setup management
• PDF reader based on xpdf
• IRC client, konqueror web browser an mail reader
• Multiple input plugins to ease data input
• Network time support and time correction capabilities
• Full network setup support through plugins (wlan, ethernet, ppp, irda)
• adaptive backlight settings and calibration (for devices light sensors)
• Advanced security supporting Linux security services
• Syncable with KDE PIM/Kolab, MS Outlook and Qtopia Desktop (3rd party tools necessary)
• Voice memos
• Backup and Restore capabilities to CF/SD cards
• Data exchange with Palms, PocketPC, mobile phones and other bluetooth/IrDa capable devices
• Fully localized
• Binary compatibility with Sharp Zaurus applications
• Themes and styles to adapt look and feel to your personal flavor

Opie is designed to run on all Linux based devices. Images and packgages are currently available for HP iPAQs, Sharp Zaurus and SimPad. The platform has also proven to be running on Psion5, Ramses, Tuxphone, Simputer and lots of other embedded Linux devices.

We as the Opie team believe in the strengths of the software as an open productivity and business platform and will be continue to develop it any further- new and exciting features are already in the queue. We would also like to thank our supporters and developers for making this possible.

Finally, what is its main Advantages?

Freedom and Open Source

The market for handheld operating systems is dominated almost exclusively by the Palm and PocketPC operating systems. These platforms are 'closed source', preventing interested people from contributing to their advancement through bug fixes or the addition of new functionality. Opie is based on common, open standards such as XML. The use of open source design methodologies allows any programmer or user to contribute to improving the software.

Compatibility

Handheld devices running an embedded version of Linux share code compatibility with the versions of Linux that runs on PC's, servers and even mainframe systems. This allows quick porting of existing applications and the use of existing drivers to support various hardware devices such as wireless network cards and other peripherals. This is a goal that other embedded operating systems, including Microsoft PocketPC, cannot claim.