I'm an ex-Geoworks Employee
The Fun Part
I worked at Geoworks from June 1995 to
June 1999 in the portable OS group. I worked on the Liberty operating system
(known publicly as Geos-SC). Liberty is a portable OS targeted for small
PDA-like devices. It is currently shipping in three devices: the Toshiba
Genio, the Toshiba Dialo, and the Mitsubishi Moem-D. All three are "smart
phones" -- a blend of a mobile phone and a PDA. Word is that Toshiba has
released a bunch of other devices with the OS on their own.
The first device based on Liberty, the Toshiba Genio
Mostly a PDA, but also a phone!
Some screen shots of the device -- it was pretty cool!
The Toshiba Dialo (basically a Genio)
The Toshiba Camesse
The Mitsubishi Moem-D
More like a cell phone, less like a PDA. I think a bit off the mark -- it is
big and clunky compared to other cell phones in Japan.
Overall, my time at Geoworks was great. It is not often a grad right out of
college gets to be a key member developing a new OS. It was an ideal learning
environment and the people I was working with were top notch both personally
and technically.
Unfortunately
Unfortunately, the market for smart phones didn't take off as planned and
the company went through a few years of pain before starting to re-invent
itself as a non-OS company. Now, Geos-SC doesn't even show up on
Geoworks' products web page and the technology appears to have been
mothballed as a product. On the upside, I know of a few products in
active developments which still use it.
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