O’Reilly continues its examination of Linux on handhelds with
this overview of the Compaq iPAQ. Though not properly considered a
“Linux handheld” because it ships with WinCE, Compaq has designated
it an “open handheld” and provided support for projects seeking to
run Linux on it.
“…Compaq hosts and sponsors the www.handhelds.org
site, which is a community resource center, primarily for
developers, hosting Web, FTP, CVS, and mailing-list services. The
site focuses on Linux under StrongArm SA11xx processors, such as
the iPAQ and the Yopy, but does not mention work on other
processors such as MIPS or 68xxx. At the site are detailed
instructions on installing Linux on a iPAQ, which we will cover in
more detail below.Similar to the situation on personal computers, there is more
than one choice as to which Linux distribution to run on an iPAQ.
Until recently, the reference distribution known as compaq (or hh
for handhelds.org) was the most commonly used. The distribution was
first released as v0.1 (really v0.01) in May of 2000, and has been
steadily improving over the last year, now up to v0.21.”