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Issue 10    September 20, 2000 Check out Be related web sites like BeNews, BeOSCentral and more on the The Wired World of Be web page. return to top BeIA vs. the Competition: Support for Internet Technologies by Brennan Spies, Sr. Market Analyst Last time around, we looked at BeIA-based Internet appliances versus some other competitive products that are currently shipping in terms of pure speed. This time we'll look at the degree of support that different Internet appliance OS/Browsers have for standards such as HTML 3.2/4.0, Java, Javascript, Macromedia Flash™, MP3 (playback and streaming), and RealPlayer®. Let's face it: the Web is becoming a vast and varied world that ranges from simple HTML-based news pages to sophisticated entertainment sites that use audio, video, and Macromedia Flash™. While some companies are content to build Internet appliances that can do basic HTML and e-mail (and little else), even relative newcomers to the Web are likely to tire of this quickly. There are many news, entertainment, and educational sites out there now, and many more on the way, that offer much more compelling and interactive content in the form of audio, video, and animation. Good examples of this include Icebox.com, which recently signed a deal to air some of its content on the Showtime network, iCast.com, which has tapped into the Net community's need for self-expression, and MP3.com, which is changing how we listen to music. The price of admission to these sites is the support for these "beyond basic HTML" technologies. Who wants to buy an Internet appliance that can only go to certain areas of the Web? In all likelihood the answer is -- not many people. So to create a compelling product you need a little more than a good design and price. You need an environment that can give you the full experience of the Internet. With this in mind we turn to ZDNet's i-Bench once again, this time to run Capability tests. We'll also use some more "real world" sites just to see how the products measure up. The products we'll compare are the following: Company Product OS Browser Netpliance i-Opener QNX Voyager ePods.com ePods One Windows CE 2.12 Internet Explorer The NIC Company NIC Linux Netscape 4.7 Merinta i-Brow Linux with Java VM Espial’s Escape (Java-based) Compaq Code-name "Clipper" BeIA Wagner (Opera) Compaq iPaq Home Internet Appliance Windows CE 3.0 (MSN Companion) Internet (MSN) Explorer The Netpliance was not included in our tests last time because it was unable to complete the Performance tests at i-Bench (most probably due to a problem with the scripts that loop the pages); the Compaq MSN device is a new arrival. Compaq is selling both BeIA and MSN Companion versions of its Internet appliance. The table below shows the results. Through a series of tests, i-Bench allows you to gauge which technologies are supported by an Internet client and how well they are supported. Other sites used to evaluate specific technologies include Icebox.com and Campchaos.com (Macromedia Flash™), Sakoman.net (Real™, MP3, streaming content), Sun's Java page (Java) and High.demon.nl (Javascript). What's not included: QuickTime. There are no Internet appliances that currently support this standard. See Note 1 BeIA iPaq MSN NIC i-Brow i-Opener ePods HTML 3.2       X X   HTML 4.0 X X X     X Macromedia Flash™ X X X2       Java X X X X     Javascript X X X X X X MP3 X X X3       MP3 (embedded) X X         RealAudio® 5 X   X X X   RealAudio® 5 (embedded) X           RealAudio® G2 X   X X     RealAudio® G2 (embedded) X           RealVideo® G2 X   X       RealVideo® G2 (embedded) X           Windows Media   X         Notes: 1. Results based on our tests of products purchased from the relevant manufacturers. 2. In our tests, Macromedia Flash™ tended to be unstable, crashing the browser (www.icebox.com). 3. In our tests, MP3 playback tended to be very glitchy, with noticeable audio dropout. BeIA also supports other media formats that are less frequently encountered on the Web, such as Wav, AIFF, AU, and MIDI. It's close, but with support for Real™ audio and video formats -- which represent the majority of streamed audio and video content currently on the Web -- BeIA clearly wins the battle of the check marks. The #2 technology, Windows Media, is supported by the iPaq Home Internet Appliance (Windows CE 3.0/MSN) alone; however, there are few sites that support Windows Media that do not also support RealPlayer®, and many sites that support RealPlayer® that do not support Windows Media. Thus BeIA remains the Internet appliance platform with the most comprehensive support for Web technologies. The evolution of the Web has come from its roots in very simple, information-based pages and is evolving into complex, media-oriented entertainment and interactive sites. Building a robust and potentially successful Internet appliance also means guarding against premature obsolescence. return to top Jean-Louis Gassée Column by Jean-Louis Gassée, CEO and Chairman There is no JLG column this week. Please look for an article in the next issue. return to top Advanced BeOS Keyboarding by Nathan Schrenk, Director, Applications The stalwart old 101-key keyboard has grown a few extra keys in recent years to become the 104-key keyboard. But keyboard manufacturers were not content to just add 3 keys. Many keyboards now on the market have extra buttons above the top row of keys or somewhere else. These buttons are not standard, and have various labels such as "Back," "Forward," "Stop," "Mail," "Volume +," "Prev Track," "Next Track," "Sleep," and so on. Many of these keyboards that I've seen have been marketed as "Internet ready;" the extra buttons are aimed at controlling a web browser, controlling the playback of audio CDs in the computer's CD-ROM drive, or adjusting the volume. To support the extended functions of these keyboards, many manufacturers ship software for the dominant PC operating system, which causes something to happen when the user presses the new buttons. If you have one of these keyboards and it uses the AT interface, this article should help you with using those buttons. Please note that the technique described in this article doesn't work with an ADB or an USB keyboard or with any version of BeOS prior to BeOS 5. This technique is supported in BeIA, which includes an Input Server add-on that performs some common actions or runs a script when a special buttons is pressed. First, a little background information: when a key is pressed, the BeOS driver that interfaces with the keyboard controller reports a number to the Input Server's keyboard device add-on. This number is called a "scan code" and it identifies which key was pressed. The Input Server keyboard device then converts the AT keyboard scan code to a BeOS key code, which is independent of the type of keyboard used. BeOS supports AT, ADB, and USB keyboards, so it's valuable to have a common mapping of keys to key codes so that the rest of the system doesn't have to know which type of keyboard is plugged in to interpret keyboard events properly. In BeOS 5, a mechanism allows a user to change the mapping of AT keyboard scan codes to BeOS key codes. The Input Server's keyboard device looks for a configuration file named "AT_Keyboard_Info" in the user settings directory (which is /boot/home/config/settings by default) and uses the mapping of scan codes to key codes contained in that file if it exists. A sample AT_Keyboard_Info file is contained in the archive for this article at ftp:// ftp.be.com/pub/samples/input_server/KeyboardMapping.zip. The file format is documented in the comments at the top of the sample file, so I won't repeat that information here. The basic idea is that each line contains a mapping from an AT scan code to a BeOS key code. For example, a line reading "0x1e[TAB]0x3c" specifies that the scan code for the 'A' key, 0x1e, should generate a BeOS keyboard event with the key code 0x3c. All numeric values in the file are specified in hexadecimal. All you need to do to support the extra buttons on your keyboard is to find out which AT scan code each button generates, and to add a line to your AT_Keyboard_Info file for each key. It's not easy to find out which AT scan code a key generates with a standard installation of BeOS 5, so I've included a replacement Input Server keyboard device add-on in the archive for this article. You'll need to copy this add-on, which is named "keyboard," to the /system/add-ons/input_server/devices/ directory, and then restart the Input Server, either by running "/system/servers/input_server -q" in a Terminal window, or by bringing up the Team Monitor by pressing Ctrl+Alt+Delete, selecting "input_server", and then pressing the "Kill" button. Killing the Input Server might seem to be dangerous, and likely to leave you with an unresponsive system, but luckily the Input Server is automatically restarted if it is killed. When the Input Server restarts, the mouse cursor will move to the center of the screen and you'll be ready to find out which scan code is generated by each special button on your keyboard. With this new keyboard add-on installed, an alert box pops up every time you press an unmapped key on your keyboard. You can write down the scan codes from these alerts, and make your own customized AT_Keyboard_Info file that includes mappings for your extra buttons. The buttons on various keyboards are different. We haven't developed any type of standard for which BeOS keycode should be used for a certain type of button, but the convention we've been following is to map the special buttons to BeOS key codes starting with "0x100000." When you have your own customized mapping file, you can copy it into place and restart the Input Server again. Now that you've mapped the extra buttons on your keyboard to BeOS key codes, how do you use them? I recommend Jeremy Friesner's nifty SpicyKeys program, which can be found on the web at http://www.lcscanada.com/jaf. SpicyKeys can be used to launch applications or run scripts when a key or combination of keys is pressed. Make sure to download version 1.24 or later, because support for unmapped keys was added in version 1.24. If you're a BeOS developer and you want to support the extra keys in your own application, you can add code to handle the B_UNMAPPED_KEY_DOWN and B_UNMAPPED_KEY_UP events that will be generated when one of the extra buttons are pressed. Look for the keycode field in the message to determine which unmapped key was pressed. A special note for those of you who like the keyboard layout of Sun SPARCstation keyboards: if you'd like to bind the Caps Lock key to Left+Ctrl, you can replace the default mapping for scancode 0x3a, and map that key to 0x5c. Enjoy! return to top Statements contained in this Newsletter that are not historical facts are "forward-looking statements" including without limitation statements regarding the demand for, future market penetration and market acceptance of BeIA and BeOS, the shipment dates of Be's products, and the future operating results of Be Incorporated. Actual events or results may differ materially as a result of risks facing Be Incorporated or actual results differing from the assumptions underlying such statements. Such risks and assumptions include, but are not limited to, risks related to competition, market acceptance and market penetration of Be's products, ability to establish and maintain strategic relationships, the benefit of Be's products to OEM and Internet appliance manufacturers. the continued availability of third party BeOS applications and drivers, and the ability to establish and maintain strategic publishing relationships. All forward-looking statements are expressly qualified in their entirety by the "Risk Factors" and other cautionary statements included in Be Incorporated's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 1999, and other public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The BMessage Copyright (c) 2001 by Be, Inc. All rights reserved. Be, Inc. 800 El Camino Real, Suite 400 Menlo Park, CA 94025 Tel: (650) 462-4100 Fax: (650) 462-4129 Web: http://www.be.com/ Be, BeOS and BeIA are trademarks or registered trademarks of Be Incorporated in the United States and other countries. Other brand product names are registered trademarks or trademarks of their respective holders. All rights reserved. The BMessage is sent to subscribers of one or more of the Be mailing lists. For more information about subscribing/unsubscribing, see the Be web site: http://www.be.com/world/mailinglists.html. The Be web site also offers a complete set of current and back issues of Be Newsletters: If you have any comments about The BMessage, please e-mail them to:newsletter@be.com.

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