As someone who has been programming palm software for about 10 years now I am really excited about the Palm Pre. I believe the hype that the Palm Pre will be the iPhone killer (or at least, maimer). When you combine my experience with Palm software with my recent obsession with Twitter it might make you wonder why I haven’t written some Palm Pre Twitter software or some sort of Twitter program for the Palm Pre.

The answer is brief- the Palm Pre doesn’t need a Twitter program. What makes the Palm Pre such a great device is that it uses the internet seamlessly. With such power you don’t need to have a dedicated Twitter app for the Palm Pre- it can simply run off the internet. This is a concept known as Cloud Computing and will make local software for phones obsolete.

So, in a sense I have written some Palm Pre Twitter software- it’s called FeedTwit. Sure it exists on the web but that means you don’t have to buy an app to install on your device (like you might for that stone-age iPhone device). My Palm Pre Twitter software involves no extra expense to use and nothing extra to download. All you have to do to is follow @FeedTwit from your twitter account, login to the FeedTwit homepage and tell it you want your Twitter @replies. If your new Palm Pre is set up to take device updates from Twitter, you will be able to do anything on Twitter with your Palm Pre that you might otherwise be able to do with a dedicated Twitter program- keep up with your Twitter friends, read your Twitter messages and Twitter mentions, play Twitter games, and even get your favorite RSS feeds through Twitter.

No software to install. No program to download. It’s even free. Very simple. Very easy.

The US government has a web page that posts the Privately Owned Vehicle (POV) Mileage Reimbursement Rates. You can check this site whenever you need to know the current reimbursement rate. This is where I get the information posted at the top of this website.

You can be automatically informed when this rate changes by subscribing to this RSS feed, which uses wotzwot.com’s RSSxl page to take that information off the GSA website. This rate changes every year or so, but potentially could change more frequently as gas prices increase rapidly (as they did with Katrina in September of 2005, as you can see from the site’s “Previous Automobile Rates”).

If you want to keep track of your vehicle mileage (whether airplane or car) for reimbursement or income tax deduction, use the Mileage program for PalmOS.

http://dizzysoft.zimorama…aintain_0_5.zip

Years ago I developed the very successful and simple Mileage program for the PalmOS. It was a great way to keep track of automobile mileage for business use and saved me a lot of money on my taxes. Recently I decided I needed an easy way to keep track of the maintenance on my vehicle, so I wrote this simple program- Maintain. Although this program can be used separately from the Mileage program, it is designed as a companion to Mileage; it reads your latest mileage entry and tells you if there is any service that is overdue for your vehicle.

Download Maintain exclusively from dizzysoft.com

I’ve tried to make this as intuitive as possible, but just in case you can’t read my mind, here’s how you can use the program:

1. If you are not currently using the Mileage program (by dizzysoft), when you first start Maintain it will ask you for your vehicle’s current mileage. Just enter it on the field provided. If you have been using Mileage, the Maintain program will skip this step and read the latest mileage entry from your Mileage program. In either case this mileage figure will appear in the upper-right corner of your screen. You can always change this figure by entering an “m” on the main screen or by the menu.
2. At this point you will need to enter the service requirements for your vehicle. These are usually found in your owner’s manual or perhaps online. To do this, tap the “New” button to pull up the “Service Details” form.
   1. On the “Service Details” form you can enter the type of service you wish to record.
   2. Next enter the frequency of the service (in miles) in the “Every:” field.
   3. Last enter the last mileage reading where this service was preformed in the “Last:” field.
      
      Maintain only accounts for services considered by mileage, not date. I chose this route because I figured that customers of Mileage use their vehicle enough so they encounter the mileage requirements before the date requirements. If you have a service requirement that is only suggested in a time period, you can either estimate the mileage to that time period or simply note it on the “Service Type” field.
3. Once you have some service details entered into Maintain, it will warn you if some of them are overdue. If you have a color-enabled handheld, it will display the overdue services in red (or any color you choose from the menu).
4. The services will be displayed in this list by order of the last time the service was preformed. That means the most overdue services will be on the top.

Although this program is for fun, I wrote it for a purpose. I had a problem that needed to be solved and decided to write a palm program to help. In keeping with a good programming philosophy, I decided to write the program to not only solve my own dilemma, but make it as broad as possible so other people could use it for other purposes. My conclusion was to create an abacus. I have added various features to the program to make it very useful.

You can download dAbacus only from dizzysoft.com.

I’ve tried to make this as intuitive as possible, but just in case you can’t read my mind, here’s how it goes:

• Tap the bead that you want to move. The bottom 5 beads each hold a value of one. The top 2 beads each hold a value of 5. These values are multiplied by 10 per column to the left of the first. Once you have a value greater than 10 in a column, the abacus automatically rounds the value to the column to the left.
• If you would like to account for decimals, use the page-up/down hard button. This moves the decimal bar.
• You can copy the value into the clipboard from the “Ftns” menu or c-shortcut.
• You can change the color of the bead or bars from the “Prefs” menu.

I’ve tried to make Mileage as intuitive as possible, but just in case you can’t read my mind, here’s how you can use the program:

1. From the starting screen, press “new” to enter a new trip.
2. This will bring you into the “Specific Trip” screen where you can enter the information for this trip. The date on top will first show the current date, if you want to change this, tap it with your stylus and select a new date. Enter the appropriate information. I usually start with entering the “Purpose,” “From,” “To,” and “Start” odometer reading and come back later to enter the “End” odometer reading.
3. The program will automatically enter the latest ending odometer value as the starting value for each new trip. After you enter a trip, the program will enter the starting odometer reading as the ending odometer, in order to save you graffiti strokes.
4. In this screen, you also have the ability to use cut/copy/paste/undo with graffiti strokes or using the menu. You can also navigate the fields with the previous/ next field graffiti strokes.
5. You can write a brief note for each trip, if you wish. To access this note, from the “Specific Trip” screen select the note button next to the “Purpose” field. This will open a screen where you can enter a brief (255 character) note. Use it for the names of people you met on your trip, directions to your destination, stops you made along the way, tolls or expenses for the trip, or whatever else is useful to you. You can also access this trip by calling the Keyboard function from the menu while the cursor is in the purpose field.
6. Back on the “Specific Trip” screen, press “OK” to keep this information. Press “Cancel” to erase your new information. Press “Delete” to remove this trip from the handheld.
7. Either of these buttons will return you to the list of all trips, and you should see the trip you just entered. This list is sorted by the date (most recent on top) and by the starting odometer reading you entered.
8. If you want to enter more information about a trip or change something simply tap on the trip’s line on the list. This will return you to the “Specific Trip” dialog with the trip’s information ready for updating. Return to the list by tapping one of the three buttons on the bottom.
9. If you want to delete multiple trips at the same time, you can use the Purge function. This will allow you to delete all the trips between the two dates you determine. Presumably, this is helpful to remove trips once they have been reimbursed. To use this feature, look in the menu of the main “Mileage” screen and choose “Purge”. Note: this cannot be undone. Once they are deleted, they are gone forever!
10. You can use the Global Find button to seach the Mileage database.

This is the long-awaited program that will allow you to access your Mileage data from your desktop computer. This program will convert your Mileage database into a readable file that can be viewed in any web-browser, or editable in almost any word-processor or spreadsheet program.

Download GetMileage

This program has been written in the Java programming language, which will allow it to run on ANY operating system, provided you have downloaded and installed the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) appropriate to your operating system. Get it from the Java web site (www.java.com). Follow the installation directions at the web site to install the JRE.

The history of GetMileage

0.25

• You can select what format you would like the data to be written in- HTML or CSV.

0.21

• You can bypass the automatic search function.

0.2

• Program searches for the Mileage database for you, and if it can’t find it, asks you to look for it.
• Program didn’t “remember” location you last sent the HTML file to. Now it does.
• If HTML file already exists, asks if you want to overwrite it.
• Compiled as a package to avoid potential conflicts with other Java programs.

0.1

• Original Release- for testing only.

Before you can use the GetMileage program, you will have to do the following:

• Download the free Java Runtime Environment (JRE) for your particular computer operating system (e.g.: Windows, Linux, Mac) from the Java web site. Follow the installation directions at the web site to install the JRE.
• Move the GetMileage program (GetMileage.jar) to a location that you will be able to easily find it.
• Click (or Double-Click, depending on your operating system) on the GetMileage.jar program to start it.

Once the GetMileage program is running (by clicking or double-clicking on it) you will see the program’s main window. In order for the conversion to take place, you will have to:

• First, click on the top “Source” button in the GetMileage program. GetMileage will search your computer for the Mileage database. If it does not find the file, you will have to search for it yourself (with a file dialog window that will appear. Once you have found the database you will see the file path (directory and file name) for the Mileage database appear to the left of the “Source” button.
• Second, decide where you would like the output file to appear upon conversion of the database. Press the “Destination” button and another file dialog will appear. Go to the destination directory you desire from this file dialog. Pick a name for the destination file, such as “mileage” and choose a format for the file to be written in. By default, the program will convert your data into an HTML file (like this one) which can be read using any web browser. If you would like a little more flexibility with your data, you can get the data in a CSV (Comma Separated Values) file that can be read in a spreadsheet program, such as Excel. Press the “Save” button. (IMPORTANT: GetMileage will over-write an older file that is in the directory with new information so you will lose any old information if you use the same file name each time). Once you press the “Save” button you will return to the program and see the file name and path to the left of the “Destination” button.
• Third, to complete the conversion, press the “Convert MileageDB to readable file” button on the bottom of the window. If the conversion is successful, a window will pop-up to tell you where the destination file has been written.
• Fourth, go to your destination directory and click on the file. You will notice that the file lists all your trips and gives you a total mileage for those trips on the report, at the bottom of the file. Also at the bottom you will see a date and time the report was generated and the file from which it was created (this might help you distinguish between different handhelds who are using the same computer).
• Note that you cannot write information to the Mileage program’s database using the GetMileage program- it only reads and converts your database to a readable format. You can only add information to the Mileage database from your handheld computer, or add it later by opening the file with a word processor or spreadsheet program.

1. Before you have a copy of the Mileage database on your computer you will have to install the Mileage program on your handheld, enter data into the program, and perform a hot sync with the desktop computer. Do this before searching for the Mileage database or using the GetMileage program.
2. If the automatic search feature does not find the database, and has completed its search, it will call up a file dialog for you to search manually. If you would like to skip the automatic search feature (for instance, if the search is taking too long) you can bypass the automatic search by holding the CTRL key on your keyboard as you press the “Source” button with your mouse. From this dialog locate the Mileage database, select the database, and press the “Open” button. If you don’t know where the database is located…
3. The file (MileageDB-DZMI.PDB) is typically found in a “Backup” directory under a directory named after the HotSyncID for your handheld which can be found under a directory named for the brand of handheld you have the Mileage program installed on. For instance: if you have a Palm Tungsten E with a HotSyncID named “Dizzysoft” you might find the Mileage database in the palm/dizzysoft/backup directory. The easiest way to do this is using your operating systems file-search program, looking for “MileageDB-DZMI.PDB” (without the quotes).
4. If that still doesn’t find the database do a wildcard search for all the PDB files on your computer (usually: *.pdb) and see if the Mileage database is found in that list.
5. If you still can’t find the database on your computer, check to see you have information stored in the Mileage program of your handheld and perform a hot sync with your computer.