Nokia N800: What’s on YOUR Nightstand?
I will admit that I’ve thought a device like a Chumby might be kind of a cool nightstand clock. It provides a lot of functionality at your fingertips and has kind of a cool form factor.
The thought of dropping $200 or more on a handheld gadget is not something I like to do. It also seemed quite wasteful when much of the functionality I want can be had with a device I already own: the Nokia N800 tablet.
What you see here is the home screen of my Nokia N800, which has all the information on it I need 98% of the time: the current time and the weather. The clock is a program called cairoclock, which is an applet that appears on the home screen. It’s resizable and movable.
The weather is an applet called omweather, which I configured to pull the 3-day forecast for Gig Harbor (and those temperatures are in Fahrenheit, also configurable).
The IP information is courtesy of the HomeIP applet. Good for “just in case” I need to SSH into the tablet (I have Dropbear SSH installed).
The only other thing I configured on it is a bookmark for the one site I’m likely to need to look at while in bed: the website for the local school district. They post school closure/delay information on the front page.
Granted, the tablet can do a lot more. However, for a nightstand device, that’s really all I want. If I need to do anything more serious, there’s always my office just down the hall 
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=14df0a88-926a-47af-bc48-f4b796c68079)
Bookmark with: del.icio.us Digg it Furl iFeedReaders ma.gnolia Maple.nu RawSugar reddit Simpy StumbleUpon
Tags: Chumby, Maemo, nokia n800 Fnord
Comment by Texrat
I need to do the same thing. Thanks for the motivation!
Comment by Dave Michels
This is really what I want in my IP phone which is on my night stand. The sad part is I have a much better chance of getting it on cell phone than a wired IP phone. But shouldn’t a wired IP phone be much more chumby like? I have a Polycom IP550 on my bedstand. More expensive than your device and a whole heck of a lot dumber.
Though if I give up on the wired always on, always powered, large format, interactive with large buttons and speaker device to do this – functionality – and resort to a wireless device from Nokia (or Apple, etc.) – then I would assume I would travel with it. If that’s true, then the local weather and time should be based on location automatically.
Comment by PhoneBoy
Actually, omweather will update location automatically with GPS, though the N800 does not have it. The Nokia N810 does. The Nokia N800 can run Skype and/or Gizmo Project, so it can be a phone, too
Comment by Texrat
Both N800 and N810 have made invaluable travel companions for me on business trips. I can’t wait to see the next iteration.
Comment by Dave Michels
I hadn’t thought of Nokia before, but they should consider making IP/SIP phones. They understand phones, and their Maemo OS apps (like clock, weather, and more) would be instant hits.
Comment by PhoneBoy
Nokia’s higher-end mobile phones ARE SIP capable, but the configuration of said stack is not exactly friendly, though I’ve done it.
Comment by eViLrAcEr
try Fennec on it