Remember the Agenda Vr3 PDA? Vanity of vanities... I’ve been amused to watch the latest round of mobile Linux projects. As Koheleth says, “That which hath been is that which shall be, and that which hath been done is that which shall be done; and there is nothing new under the sun.” (Eccl. 1, 9) [See Paul Krill’s report Mobile computing now an open source driver for a summary of mobile Linux projects at OSCON.] Lying in a corner of my office, gathering dust, is an Agenda Vr3 PDA, which I reviewed for Byte.com something like 8 years ago. It ran a customized Linux kernel called Linux-VR and had a MIPS 4000-compatible CPU. It was powered by alkaline batteries, and sucked them dry every few weeks even if you turned the device off when you weren’t using it.The Vr3 appealed to me greatly as a developer. As a user, however… My biggest problem was that I just didn’t have the patience for a slow PDA. My second-biggest problem was that the applications were skeletal and buggy. I would have fixed some of the applications myself, eventually, were it not for the slowness of the device and its propensity to eat batteries. Eventually, Agenda Computing basically dried up and blew away. 2 Vanity of vanities, saith Koheleth; vanity of vanities, all is vanity. … 10 Is there a thing whereof it is said: ‘See, this is new’?–it hath been already, in the ages which were before us. … 14 I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind. 15 That which is crooked cannot be made straight; and that which is wanting cannot be numbered. … 17 And I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly–I perceived that this also was a striving after wind. 18 For in much wisdom is much vexation; and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow. What have we learned? And has that increased our sorrow? Software Development