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User:Smarsh/Ideas/FAQIdeaOrig

Latest revision as of 15:58, 27 January 2011

[edit] N900 FAQ original (at [1])

[edit] Hardware

The N900 is a pocketable computer with plenty of power (speed and memory) for running many demanding applications. The Nokia N900 hardware page can be found here

[edit] Operating System

The N900 runs the Maemo 5 Operating System. Maemo 5 is often referred to by its release name "Fremantle". You might be interested in gaming, or office applications, scientific applications, social media, movies or tunes. There will be specific Fremantle versions of your favorite applications.

If there's not an app yet, there almost certainly will be one at some point (you could also write it or port it yourself...). Of course the N900 comes with a collection of built in applications that handle most mobile computing needs.

If you want an easy intro to many of Maemo5's features you might enjoy the videos on the Maemo5 101 page

[edit] Applications

Internet Tablets use the concept of software repositories, a concept carried over from Linux. You can tell your N900 where these repositories are via the Application Manager. The Application Manager automatically then presents you a list of available applications that can be installed on your device, and takes care of any dependancies that may be required.

There are multiple repositories available for the N900:

1.Nokia's Ovi Store

2. Commercial Application Vendors

3. Community Applications

The Application Manager also allows you to uninstall applications as well as keep you notified of updates to your installed applications.

You will also find One Click Install Applications on the web for instance in the Downloads section of this web site.

[edit] Emulators

As well as native applications via the repositories Maemo also supports applications from a range of Emulators.

-Flash Games. As the N900 supports Flash 9 and has a hardware keyboard, many flash games should just work

-Garnet the Palm Emulator

-SNES Nintendo Emulation. nice video here

[edit] Other Applications

How can I monitor my disk usage and how much space I have left?

Does n900 run Office files?

N900 comes with datavz's Office 'Office to Go' reader, so you can read office files. It's not clear yet whether they will release a paid-for upgrade with editing facility. KOffice is available here (need link!) and will view and edit Office files.

Can I edit Office files?

Yes, using KOffice from here.

Does n900 view pdf files?

Yes

Does n900 have a book reader? Will it run Kindle?

Where do I find other applications and widgets for n900?

What do I do if the app I want isn’t there?

First follow instructions from Downloading apps page. If not found, sign up to Maemo Talk and ask. If a few people are interested, or if a particular developer sees value in your idea, it's likely someone will write you an application to do what you want. And yes, that really does work.Or you can learn to program in Maemo or Qt yourself. There's a good set of tutorials here, with a Hello world app too...

[edit] Battery

Do I have to charge it fully before first use?

No. It will come with some battery charge so you can play.

Do I have to discharge it fully each time?

No, n900 has a LIon battery, which doesn't need this. Older NiCad batteries did.

Can I use the device while it’s charging?

Yes.

Is it safe to leave it charging overnight? Will it stop charging itself when it’s full?

Yes

[edit] EMail

See the page on N900 Email Options

[edit] Games

What games run on n900?

I’ve heard it can be used as a wiimote: how do I do that?

Will n900 play games from big companies?

What if I want a game not yet available?

All my previous phones have run java games: why can’t I play them on n900?

Java is not currently available for the N900. You can follow the discussion here

[edit] GPS

How good is the GPS on n900?

What’s the difference between GPS and a-GPS?

GPS uses the Global Positioning Satellites to fix your devices location. A-GPS uses your network operators transmission towers to Assist the satellite signals to fix your devices location.A-GPS is coarse grained typically 100s of meters vs GPS sub Meter.

If I only use GPS (not a-GPS) will I still burn my data plan?

Only if you have to download Map information

What map programmes can I use?

The N900 comes with Ovi Maps. Other map programs from third party developers will be available for download later. Nokia bought Navteq in 2007 and is the basis of OVi Maps

As of October 2009, none of the "big names"--Garmin, Google, TomTom, etc.--have announced any plans to release software for the N900.

Does n900 support google maps?

You can use google maps directly from the browser, or you can try MaeMaps

Can I download Ovi-maps when I’m on wifi, and store them for use so as not to burn my data plan? If so, how much space do they need?

See also... here and here and here.

[edit] Internet

Does n900 need a firewall?

No.

Does n900 need an anti-virus?

No. The N900 runs Linux, an operating system for which few to no viruses exist. Beyond that, the N900 uses a processor (CPU) not used by desktop and notebook Linux machines. This means it's unlikely a (mostly theoretical) virus for desktop Linux could infect the N900.

Can I block adverts?

Adblock Plus is being developed for the Maemo browser on the N900 and will be available as a free download.

Does n900 play YouTube?

Yes.

Does n900 play video from places other than YouTube?

Does n900 run BBC iplayer?

Does n900 have any ‘parental control’ settings?

[edit] Media player

Does n900 support itunes?

Will n900 play all my downloaded music? What if it has DRM?

How does n900 get the album art?

The N900 Media Player supports ID3 Album art embedded in the MP3. Use your favourite Media Tagger application such as Media Monkey or our Own Maemo based Mussorgsky

What video codec does n900 support?

How do I rip a dvd for playing on n900?

How big a file would an hour of dvd be?

Can I download other video to play?

Are there ways of securing the video I’ve downloaded, so I can still give my n900 to others?

What connectors do I need to connect to a TV? What if my TV doesn’t have the right connections?

The N900 comes with a cable to connect it to a composite input on a television. This connection is sometimes called an "RCA" connection and uses a yellow connector for video and a pair of connectors (red and white) for stereo audio.

The video out on the N900 may be switched between NTSC and PAL via "TV out" in the Settings application.

For televisions without a composite input, an adapter will be required. The specific adapter required for a given television will vary according to the input or inputs it accepts.

What can I play over TV out? Will it only play video, or can I view whatever is on screen?

[edit] MSN Messenger

Please see MSN messenger -article.

[edit] Phone use

Does n900 have speed dial?

You can put contact shortcuts on the desktop...

Does n900 have voice dialing?

No.

How do I access my carrier’s answering service - it used to be speed dial set in my old phone?

If it is in the simcard, it should be imported in the abook, if it is not, then you probably want to copy it from your old phone manually.

Does n900 log calls for length?

Yes.

Can I sort calls by received/sent/missed?

No.

I can use the phone in portrait mode: why can’t I use that for other things?

N900 doesn't currently support portrait mode beyond the phone use. It is expected this will arrive in an update before the end of 2009, and some developers are working on applications that use portrait mode. Watch this space.

[edit] Texts

I hear n900 doesn’t have MMS: is this true?

N900 doesn't support MMS at release. This is because MMS uses the old 'WAP' form of connection, which n900 doesn't do. It only has GPRS internet connection. There are developers working on finding a work-around right now. Watch this space.

Does n900 have message receipt?

Conversations, the SMS and IM application, can optionally "Receive text message delivery reports". This option is disabled by default, but may be enabled in the Settings area of Conversations.

Can I use an onscreen keyboard?

An on-screen keyboard is available. It is disabled by default, but may enabled via "Text input" in the Settings application.

The on-screen keyboard is landscape in orientation and alphanumeric. Its layout is QWERTY, QWERTZ, etc. as is regionally appropriate.

Is there a portrait mode keyboard?

There is a portrait mode dialing pad for making calls. Beyond that no, there is no portrait mode keyboard. One or more third party developers may make add-on portrait mode keyboards available for download later.

Is there T9 entry?

No, though this could be added by a third party developer later.

[edit] Troubleshooting

I installed something and now my n900 isn’t working right.

I installed something and now my n900 isn’t working at all.

In case of trouble, you should start by reading article Troubleshooting through. It has both cases <bove covered.

There’s a light flashing on my n900 Look at Maemo5 101 for further info about what different colour and blinking means

How often do I need to update? And why?

N900 is 'updatable software', so it will go on getting better. Your device will check for updates once a day, and tell you when it needs to update by putting a little yellow icon on the screen. Then it will walk you through the update process. You can wait to update when you are somewhere where it's beter to download - for example your using your home netwrk rather than your data plan.

[edit] original FAQ (at [2])

If your question is not posted here, try the search tool in this wiki, full maemo.org search, talk.maemo.org search, or Google ITT search (or your preferred Internet search engine).

If you are looking for information about the Autobuilder, try the Autobuilder FAQ.

[edit] Usage

[edit] How should I encode video files for playback on the device?

See video encoding for information on encoding media for playback (or streaming to) the Maemo device.

[edit] How do I get more memory to install applications?

See booting from a flash card to find out how to gain extra room by moving the system to a flash card.

[edit] How do I get root access?

See root access for information on how to get superuser permissions.

[edit] What alternative operating systems are available?

See alternative operating systems for information about other OSes that can be run on Maemo devices.

[edit] Troubleshooting

[edit] How can I improve battery life?

[edit] My tablet is slow and unresponsive. What can I do?

[edit] I have run out of disk space. How can I add more?

[edit] My system is unstable and applications crash a lot. What's wrong?

[edit] I have trouble connecting to the internet over wifi

[edit] Community

[edit] What is the difference between Maemo and maemo.org?

Maemo refers to the Open source software platform for mobile devices developed by Nokia in collaboration with the Maemo community and some of the best open source upstream projects. maemo.org is the home of the Maemo community, and is a gathering place for people interested in this platform and related software and devices (more).

[edit] Where should I report problems?

Software problems are reported as bugs - please be gentle with the Bugsquad team. Contact Nokia Support for serious problems with your device during the warranty period. In case of doubt use the Talk forum.

[edit] What is the Community Council?

The Community Council is a team of volunteers representing the community and interfacing with Nokia.

[edit] Future

[edit] What is Maemo 5 / Fremantle?

Fremantle is the codename of Maemo 5, which is the next major release after OS2008 / Maemo 4.1 / Diablo

[edit] Will Maemo 5 run on the Internet Tablets?

Not officially but perhaps through the Mer community project. Maemo 5 is optimized for the OMAP3 architecture, the N810 and N800 are based in OMAP2 and the 770 in OMAP1 (discussion).

[edit] Original Troubleshooting (from [3])

This page is a collection of problems you might encounter with your Maemo device, and suggestions for resolving them. Steps go from mildest to the most extreme solution in order.

[edit] Performance issues

Is your device sluggish and unresponsive?

[edit] Check if unnecessary applications run in background

Run the task switcher and close all applications that aren't needed.

How do you run the task switcher? I can't find any application by that name. --Dave Neary 17:11, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Uninstall or remove applets

Applets running on your desktop, or in the system tray, can affect the battery life and performance adversely. If in doubt, remove applets and widgets you have installed, restart your device, and see if the performance has improved.

[edit] Remove possible unstable applications

If you have enabled Extras-devel -repository, you should look at the list of extras-devel programs and see if you have something installed from there.

Programs can interfere with each other. The cause of the problems are most probably newly installed application so those should be uninstalled at inverted order: most recently installed first. After each uninstall, check if the problem disappears before uninstalling other software.

[edit] Last straw

Updating the firmware is the last straw. It deletes all user data and reverts all settings to default.

[edit] Original Q&A (from [4])

This is a compilations of questions and answers, mostly about the N900 and Maemo 5. Most of these questions came from the talk.maemo.org thread New User or enquirer start here.

[edit] General software

[edit] Can the N900 record sound files (like an mp3 recorder)?

Not out of the box. The Recorder hasn't been ported to Maemo 5 yet. You can ask the developers or create a Brainstorm proposal. Or you could use the video camera and ignore the picture.

[edit] Is it true that 'rapier' Bible software will run on an N900 out of the box? Is it very hard to achieve?

A. Not out of the box. You can ask the developer of Rapier for Maemo 4 to port the application or submit a Brainstorm proposal.

[edit] Please describe the simplest, most user friendly and most function-rich ways an N900 can view and edit office type documents so I can choose between them.

I guess this would be the commercial Documents To Go software that exists for a bunch of mobile phones already. Viewing documents is free, editing documents requires you to pay for the software (the Android version is about 20 €, if I recall correctly, so the Maemo version should be priced similarly).

[edit] The N900 manual seems to imply I can't add or edit playlists in the media player: does this mean I can't categorise my music by type (classical, jazz, rock) to play according to my mood?

The Media Player provides "Genres" playlists automatically based on the metadata of the audio files. The community application Mussorgsky/ allows you to edit the metadata in the device itself. Currently in extras-devel (alpha-ish) and hopefully available in Extras soon.

[edit] If I buy a N900 with qwerty keyboard, how do I type "é" or "à"?

There's a symbol menu you can bring up to enter any of these.

[edit] With the exception of handwriting recognition, do I need the stylus to do anything on the N900? If so, where? How finger/touch friendly is the device?

Using normal Maemo apps you should be ok without stylus. There is no handwriting recognition on the device.

[edit] Where should I download apps?

Please see the Downloading apps wiki page.

[edit] Will the N900 be upgradeable to Maemo 6?

At the moment no announcement about this has been made by Nokia.

[edit] Community

[edit] Why are there are two different login systems for talk.maemo.org and the other maemo.org sites like Development, Community etc.?

This is an issue that's being worked on. Historically, the maemo.org sites run on different servers, hosted by different people, and only share the same look. Single sign-on is to be expected within the next few months, though.

[edit] Networking, internet and telephony

[edit] As it is 'always connected' does the N900 consume data just 'staying in touch' even when I'm not using it? If so, how much?

Not a lot. It really depends on what you're running that consumes data in the background. E-Mail or instant messaging only consume a few kBytes when idle. There is a GPRS monitor applet with which you can exactly see how much data is transferred.

[edit] In the browser, does the size of the text adjust depending of the "importance" of the text, like on safari mobile (i.e. on talk.maemo.org, the discussions are written bigger than the "edit", "quote", "join date" etc, and I don't need to zoom at all to read the forum)

No, sites are displayed as they were intended by the designer. They appear as on your desktop PC.

[edit] All my data - pics, music and documents - is on a network drive accessed via wifi, so I can access it whichever computer I'm on. I'd assumed that an N900 can also access them - can it?

If you have a uPnP/DNLA-Server, it will show up in the Media Player and you can then access all your media for replay/viewing.

[edit] Will the device give a summary of things upon a single slide, like number of missed phone called, number of unread SMSes, unread emails, upcoming appointments?

No. But there is probably nothing technically stopping a developer creating such a widget.

[edit] What happens when I'm listening to music and a phone call comes in?

The music is paused, the device switches to the phone app and the ringtone sounds. After ending the call, it resumes music playing.

[edit] How does the device handle SMS?

You can configure the message alerting in various ways. On my device, I just get a short vibrations (also for emails). Next time I turn on the display, the app switcher in the top left is glowing to remind me of events. When selecting the switcher, it show the overview of current programs and events/reminders: this includes missed calls and received messages.

[edit] Will it support OTA syncing of Google contacts, calendar?

It supports the OTA sync of Google Contacts and Calendar using the Mail for Exchange mechanism.

[edit] What is the length of the A/V cable that comes in the box?

The cable is a Nokia CA-75U and is 150 cm long.

[edit] Is there an app to download Youtube videos for offline viewing?

There is a 3rd party app named mYTube that can do all that. Search online / Download to local storage / Replay offline.