Vienna wrote on her mailing list that tonight’s show would likely be her last of 2001. With that in mind, a bunch of us, including Eric, Randy, Bill, and Jeff went to the Global Village Cafe restaurant in Mountain View around 6:45 pm.

I had walked by the GVC numerous times in the past, but I never had dinner there. Jim and Preet Dullaghan, the owners of GVC, write on their web site (and on the back of the menu) that they used to work in the high-tech arena for 15 years until one day deciding to leave their jobs to travel around the world. Upon their return, they used their new-found knowledge to start the restaurant. Reading that story and speaking with Jim made me realize that there are plenty of people out there who have gone against the grain, against the flow, and found something worth doing. It’s inspiring!

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It seems like it’s been a long time since we’ve had 11 people come to the SNUG meeting, but the November 27, 2001 gathering had that many people! Wayne was on hand to demonstrate his dissection of a Newton MessagePad 2000 or 2100. The only difference between a 2100 and a 2000 are a bunch of memory chips soldered to the Newton’s motherboard. Apple use to have an upgrade path for owners to transform their MP2000’s into MP2100’s. Now we know the actual process that Apple performed!

Wayne had a bunch of other interesting things to show, including a prototype dongle for the Newton’s Interconnect port that sported dual serial ports and audio in/out jacks. The serial ports worked, but the audio ports, alas, did not. According to Wayne, the 2×00-series of Newton MessagePads were the most serviceable of all Newtons. The original MessagePad was probably the most complicated of all the devices.

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In the 90’s, a small Mac-only gaming company called Bungie released a first-person shooter (FPS) called Marathon. At the time, Mac users were experiencing a case of FPS-envy from PC owners who were playing games like Doom and Quake. Marathon transformed much of that envy to pride, as the game had great gameplay, a wonderful multi-player mode, and a terrific storyline. It’s this last point separates Bungie’s games from those of other gaming companies. Myth, Oni, and now Halo followed in the tradition of Marathon, the latest running on Microsoft’s new XBox gaming console platform (note: Bungie was bought by Microsoft in 2000).

I first saw a demo movie of Halo on the web several years ago. Halo took the gaming world by storm, but it took a couple more years for consumers to play the game. The wait was worth it. Halo is the best first-person shooter I’ve ever played.

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I drove over to campus this afternoon to check my mail and to pick up some equipment from Eric. He was rehearsing for a recital in which he’s performing this coming Thursday with acclaimed musicians Livia Sohn, Barry Shiffman, and Frederick Weldy. They were practicing Brahms Piano Quartet #3 to a crowd of one — me — when I walked into Campbell Recital Hall.

That was quite a trip to sit in Campbell, accompanied by the wonderfully melodic sounds from Livia’s violin, Barry’s viola, Eric’s cello, and Fred’s grand piano. When I was a kid back in San Diego, I played piano, but let’s face it, I wasn’t very good. Mr. Parker was a patient man, but I had more artistic than musical skill. These people, however, showed me what can be wrought with tremendous talent and years of practice. I’m really looking forward to the recital this coming Thursday! At my last count, Sophia, Randy, and Rae were thinking of coming too.

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Friday was spent running errands such as checking my mail over at Stanford and hanging out at the local Fry’s. Yesterday, during lunch with Greg and Jon, I was “mistaken” for a woman by these three women who sat down next to our table. Today, while standing in line at the Post Office, one of the postal workers said to me, “Excuse me, ma’am? Oh! I’m sorry, sir!” I guess that’s what I get for having long hair, no? Maybe it’s the way that I tie it in the back of my head. Oh well!

To the right is a funny picture that I took while at a stoplight along Central Expressway/Alma Street. I calculate directions frequently on the Internet, so it was especially humorous to see this guy holding his directions in his car. I wonder if there’s a higher case of accidents with people who are holding directions while driving.

At Fry’s, I ran into Jon Abilay, my former colleague at Palm. Our group moved to another building today, so they got the afternoon off. It was weird seeing him so soon after yesterday’s events!

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“It is with mixed emotions that I inform you that today is (once again) my last day at Palm.” That’s how I started my goodbye email to my friends and colleagues at Palm, Inc. Today marked the conclusion of my second tour of duty at Palm. My first stint spanned parts of 1998 and 1999, while this one took me from September, 2000 to November, 2001. To say that it’s been an interesting ride is an understatement. it was certainly full of surprises and intrigue around every corner, every week.

Today turned out to be Carl Yankowski’s last day at Palm too. It is ironic that we ended up leaving on the exact same day. I wonder if there was any connection? Well… “that was more of a statement rather than a question.” Carl’s been with the company since December, 1999. I remember when I first joined Palm in 1998, Jeff Hawkins and Donna Dubinsky had just left 3Com to pursue “outside interests,” interests that eventually coalesced into Handspring. After Jeff and Donna, Palm had an interim head in Janice Roberts, a high-level executive at 3Com at the time.

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If you’ve been reading the news lately, you’ll note that Palm is spinning off the Platform Group into a wholly-owned subsidiary. The Platform Group creates the Palm Operating System (PalmOS) that it licenses to companies such as Handera, Handspring, Kyocera, and Sony. The part of Palm which is not spinning off is the Solutions Group. It’s responsible for creating Palm-branded devices such as the m505, the m125, and the Palm VII-series. In this new scheme, the Solutions Group becomes a licensee to the Platform Group much like Handspring, Kyocera, or Sony is today.

Anders Baecklund of Palm Platform Marketing came by to the Stanford Palm User Group at the Printer’s Inc. Cafe tonight to demo a number of Palm licensee products, including the Samsung SPH-I300 phone, Kyocera Smartphone, m505, Visor Edge, Visor Neo, and the Handera 330. What the people at SPUG were waiting for, however, was a first-look at the Handspring Treo. The Treo is a three-in-one device that combines the power and functionality of the cell phone, a Palm-powered handheld, and a data communicator into one small package.

People who have wielded the Qualcomm PDQ or the Visor Phone will be shocked when they see the Treo. This GSM Palm-powered phone/handheld is really, really small. Placed next to my Palm Vx, the Treo was shorter, and less wide, though it was definitely thicker. Kudos to the industrial designers who designed the Treo. It’s remarkable how much they’ve packed into such a small form-factor.

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During my sophomore year, I signed up to take Philosophy 160A, that dreaded weed-out course of the Symbolic Systems program at Stanford. The class encouraged students to form study groups (you would be a very smart or foolish person if you went it alone in that class) and in mine was a bespectacled student named Lester Dorman. I recall thinking to myself that he looked to be a few years older than your typical sophomore or junior.

Unfortunately, Lester and I didn’t get a chance to wax philosophic on 160A that year. After getting scared from the first problem set (that we worked on at the Terra House with too-tall Thomas), I dropped the course, ultimately taking the class the following year with Edwin and Nelson. Lester and I did share a number of courses (like CS154 and CS221) and many Sym Sys memories over the next three years, though. I learned that indeed he wasn’t your typical Stanford student, having stopped out for a number of years before heading to the Farm. I still remember the stories he used to tell about being an Irishman and his bartending adventures in Lake Tahoe. What’s always struck me as cool about Lester is that he always has this youthful outlook on life. Sometimes, it seems like yesterday that we were still in school.

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