Exchanging Data with a Palm Pilot

Introduction

FoundationStone can exchange data with the third party free Palm Pilot program MiniFlash. The basic functions of MiniFlash are showcased below -

Given how cheap a basic Palm Pilot (such as the one at the top of this page) is now, this is a good way of learning on the go. Additionally, you can obtain a commercial Hebrew-English dictionary for it from ectaco.com (requires an Internet connection).

If you don't have a Palm Pilot, and don't want to purchase one, an alternative is to make use of the FoundationStone Mobile service.

Southpaw Software's MiniFlash website can be accessed from the FoundationStone Palm menu - it will launch your browser and take you there. Alternatively click here (requires an Internet connection).

You will need a Palm Pilot running PalmOS version 3.3 or later in order to run MiniFlash on it. Please check the MiniFlash website for their latest release information.

FoundationStone 3.0 was tested to be compatible with MiniFlash version 3.0.5.

Exporting Data

In FoundationStone, pull down the "Palm" menu and choose "Export Current Wordlist to MiniFlash...". Save the resultant *.pdb file somewhere. Use the Palm Install tool to queue the *.pdb file for transfer to MiniFlash on the next HotSync. Finally, perform a HotSync operation. This procedure exports the currently selected tutor panel language to MiniFlash.

Importing Data

To import data from the Palm, first perform a HotSync operation. In FoundationStone, pull down the "Palm" menu and choose "Replace Wordlist with Import from MiniFlash...". Locate the *.pdb file you are interested in amongst the files that have come from the Palm (it has the same name as the wordlist name on the Palm). This procedure imports the MiniFlash wordlist to the currently selected tutor panel language - leaving the other languages blank.

Support for Non English Languages

If you are running Java 1.5.0 or later, you can control what codepage the Palm wordlists export in. Remember MiniFlash can only handle one language at a time. The translation text in MiniFlash can be displayed in various 1 byte languages by purchasing the third party Piloc localisation (requires an Internet connection). Be sure to match your selected codepage on the Palm with the codepage in FoundationStone's Preferences (see the Palm tab).

Here are two examples: Russian1 and Russian2.

Considerations

FoundationStone currently cannot synchronise the updated or new words between the desktop and Palm Pilot wordlists. However, you can perform a "Transfer Old Wordlist Statistics and Notes to New Wordlist..." under the "Utility" menu to achieve essentially the same thing.