Palm is an open platform for handheld computing, especailly PIM. However, the Palm Inc. / Access do not provide any official support for Linux. Thanks to the open source community to bridge the gap between Linux desktop and Palm handheld.

Synchronization

Palm supports various synchronization accesses, serial, USB, IrDA, Bluetooth, Modem, Lan, Wireless. We would address three most commonly used ways.

USB Synchronization
This is the most common and reliable way to synchronize the device with the desktop.
1. Besides the standard USB support, build USB Serial(usbserial) and USB Handspring driver(visor) drivers into modules.

2. Update the udev rule in /etc/udev/rules.d/10-palm.rules:

If you use Sony’s CLIE or Handspring’s Visor, you may take a look at cat /proc/bus/usb/devices to figure out how to identify the device. After you push the button of HotSync cradle, or click the BIG button in HotSync application, the device appears as /dev/pilot in Linux desktop.

IrDA Synchronization
Here is a detailed HOWTO about IrDA Synchronization.

Bluetooth Synchronization
Check this HOWTO.

Integration with KDE

TBD

Developement

TBD

Existed problems

• KPilot does not convert the string from UTF-8 to zh_CN.gbk back and forth in synchronization (FIXED)
• Mail plugin works only for legacy Palm mail