Launcher X is in beta.

Aesthetics aside, there are few differences between Launcher X and Launcher III.

One nice thing though - applications copied to card are kept in a different directory to other files. When the card is scanned, it happens much faster than Launcher III can manage. Launcher III had to trawl through 30 MB of ebooks!

One thing I would have Really liked to see - when moving an application to a memory card, optionally allow prefs and databases to be moved too. If they were, they should be copied back to the handheld when the application is launched, just as the application itself is.

SuperWaba 3.0 is out.

SuperWaba is a Java Virtual Machine for mobile devices.

MobileCreator 1.3 is an IDE for SuperWaba.

See also Galmast - an interesting looking strategy game for Palm.

Strategic Commander 1.1 for Palm is in beta.

It's a fab game. It's one of two games which I play a lot (along with Space Trader).

The new stuff in version 1.1 consists of:

• Colour support. I don't have a colour Palm, so this makes no difference to me.


• Speed improvements. I must say, the difference here is radical - the computer turns are very much faster.

There are some other changes which I would very much like to see:

• On the planet screen, 'next planet' and 'prev planet' buttons would be nice. Once you have a large number of planets under your control, the 'your planets' drop-down gets a bit clumsy to use.


• On the battle report screen, I'd like to be able to skip to the end of a single battle to see the result, rather than just being able to skip to the next battle.


• On the map screen, when moving ships from one planet to another, I'd like to be able to specify the number of ships to move using graffiti, rather than just the '+' and '-' buttons. If you want to send 100 out of 200 ships, it takes a while!


• A screen listing all your planets, showing name, class, number of factories, research facilities, free slots, and orbiting ships would be very useful, especially if you could sort by any column, and go straight to any planet from there.

That's it in terms of UI enhancements. As for gameplay enhancements, well...:

• There could be multiple tech levels, for speed, range, and combat. The player could split their research between these as they see fit. Perhaps there could be a 4th tech level for factory effectiveness, also?
• As well as factories and research facilities, the player could be able to build ground defenses also. More powerful than ships (worth 10 ships each, perhaps?), but expensive, and would take up slots.

Not too much to ask for version 1.2, is it? ;-)

Oh, one other thing. I don't have a hi-res palm, so I wouldn't benefit, but Strategic Commander is crying out for a hi-res mode.

I want one of these! The Sharp Zaurus SL-5500 (see the PC Pro Review.)

It's a Linux PDA, so naturally you can run Python on it.

If only I had five hundred quid to spare!

Update 12th June: O'Reilly review - The Sharp Zaurus - A Lovely Little Computer

Good Lord, yet another release of MegaWiki from Jerry Hedden. Does the man not sleep?

This application is one of my Palm must-haves. Others include:

• Pippy (free)



• X-Master (free)



• EasyLaunch (free)



• Launcher III



• WordSmith



• Quicksheet



• MetrO (free)



• Pilot-DB (free)



• EasyCalc (free)



• HappyDays (free)



• A5 (free)



• CSpotRun (free)



• SpaceTrader (free)



• Strategic Commander

Am I missing anything?