exclusive content published on June 30, 2006

J-Pilot is an open source application written by Judd Montgomery that replaces the Palm Desktop. Occasionally, I find a replacement for something that is better than the original. Packets of NutraSweet, for example. J-Pilot on Linux is another example, offering features not available in the original Palm Desktop for Windows/Mac. It is also rock stable.

Introduction to J-Pilot

Don't let the J in the name mislead you. J-Pilot is not written in Java. It is a C program created with the Gimp Tool Kit (GTK+) which accounts in part for it's speed. It uses the pilot-link library to communicate with attached Palm devices and perform two-way synchronization. I made a few notes about connecting Palms to Linux elsewhere.

J-Pilot main screen

In addition to the regular personal information management applications, (date book, tasks, address book, and memo pad), J-Pilot comes with native support for the GNU keyring and the Palm expense application. The GNU keyring stores IDs and passwords in an encrypted file on the Palm. J-Pilot lets you view and edit the keyring entries from the desktop if you know the master password.

Installing new Palm applications in J-Pilot is as easy as browsing and selecting it for installation. During the next sync, the application[s] will be installed.

J-Pilot install dialog

It was built with a plugin architecture that lets you add features without recompiling the program. Just drop a new plugin in the system plugins folder (/usr/lib/jpilot/plugins/ on Fedora Core 5) or your personal plugins folder ($HOME/.jpilot/plugins) and it will recognize and integrate the plugin into the menu (after the next start).

Excellent and complete documentation is available on the J-Pilot web site.

J-Pilot vs. Palm Desktop for Windows/Mac

The Palm Desktop for Mac looks like it hasn't been updated in a while. While it works as advertised, it uses a design where each application (date book, tasks, etc.) opens in a separate window. This seems strange and made me very unproductive while I was using it. I was constantly opening and shuffling windows around to get to my information.

The most annoying quirk is that Palm desktop for Mac doesn't let you create notes for a date book appointment. It recognizes notes that were created on the Palm and lets you edit them, but I could not find a way to create a note for a new date book entry. Searching the help file and the Internet led nowhere. I add notes to most of my appointments so this was a big deal. If anyone knows of a way to create notes for date book appointments using Palm Desktop for Mac, please enlighten me. I have given up for now.

This case for J-Pilot over Palm Desktop for Windows is a harder case to make. Two features I like better about J-Pilot are native support for the GNU Keyring and support for setting the time on the Palm during sync. The only feature I miss from Windows (also available for Mac) is third party conduits. Adobe provides an Acrobat reader, conversion tools and a conduit for the Palm, but the tools are Windows and Mac programs. The tools compress Acrobat files into a special format used by the Palm Acrobat reader. Since I don't use many third party conduits, this is not a major sacrifice for me, but it might be an issue for some people. The Linux platform advantage along with the extra features make J-Pilot more compelling.

J-Pilot preferences showing a USB connection

J-Pilot vs. other Linux Palm software

As much as I like Gnome and KDE, I don't really like their Palm synchronization solutions. In most cases, the data is scattered around between different applications. For example, the KDE Kontact application is a wrapper around KDE applications like KMail and KAddressbook. While it does pull the Palm data together from a display point of view, the data is not in one place. I can't tell if the Gnome-pilot application is still under development. The project home page was not available at the time of this writing. With the ease of synchronization, familiar interface, and window manager independece, J-Pilot is hard to beat.

Works with the latest devices

I have used J-Pilot for more than five years. It has worked flawlessly with devices as old as a Handspring Visor to to a Palm Tungsten E2. If you are Linux user with a Palm device, you should give it a spin. Penguins and Palms play nicely together.

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