The app is available for jailbroken iPhones only obviously, and it’s available through Cydia. It’s called “Windoze” so search for that… It’s in the xSellize repository, or you can install the .deb package manually through the terminal if you so choose. The package (which includes both OS images) is about 35MB.

I have to give the author(s) of the original program called “Bochs” some credit though. It’s an open source IA-32 emulator that works on most operating systems… read more about it on their site. Definitely a pretty cool project, but the port to the iPhone lacks value. I can definitely see value in the app if it had proper input interfaces, but it doesn’t so all you can do currently is point and click and even that doesn’t work too well.

I thought I’d share some screenshots I took, we’ll start with Windows 3.1 then do Windows 95:

Here's the Bochs icon, right next to FB which I use rarely.

After adding the xSellize repo in Cydia and installing windoze, this is the icon you’ll see on your iPhone.

Initial Bochs/iPhone Screen

Choose your image…

Info Screen

Thanks, xSellize for giving the original author credit. There are a lot of stolen applications floating around out there, but this isn’t one of them. I have yet to try the original emu out, but I’m a fan of DOSBox for my old games like Doom2.

WINDOWS 3.1 (Even though it says 3.11, I was hoping for networking)

Bochs loading up on the iPhone

Now you tilt your screen and let Bochs load. Windows 3.1 loads pretty fast, probably even on a 3G or first gen.

Bochs continues to load the disk image...

Hey I remember SMARTDrive! No need for that anymore.

The Windows 3.1 Startup Screen

Ahhh, I remember you. The nostalgia starts kicking in right about now.

At one time, people would type “win” after DOS loaded fully (windows was installed on top of dos… a program essentially) then people just said %&*# DOS and added that win command to their autoexec.bat files.  Good thing whoever made this image did the same because you can’t type in windoze for the iPhone.

Loading... kind of like an 80386

All loaded up.

Here’s the long lost program manager shell. People used this for a long time, well into the 90’s. Ask me sometime about the FOB Chinese guy I worked with at Motorola who was given a very thick Toshiba Satellite complete with a 3.5″ FDD and windows 3.1 to do his job a couple years ago in… 2006. Yeah it was 2006, wow. I’ll never forget that.

MS-DOS Prompt

Whoops! I clicked the MS-DOS icon, now I have to exit the app and restart it because I can’t type “exit.”

File Manager

Windows 3.1 Games

Minesweeper was my favorite.

It was hard to click the square, so I gave up :'(

WINDOWS 95

It loads just like Windows 95... because it is.

Not too large of an install huh – 99MB. Gone are those days. I think my first Windows 95 machine had a 6GB drive in it and 16 or maybe 32MB RAM. It was a Pentium 133 (HP Pavilion) which ended up breaking several times before they gave us our money back. I kind of miss those days, I was in sixth grade well actually I got it during the summer after fifth grade. I was to go to a new school, which was when things took a turn for the worse for me. If only I could go back, I would change so many things. But I have no regrets – yeah right.

Windows 95 Startup Screen

Yeah, the bottom bar does it’s little animation. Very cool to see on the iPhone.

The Windows 95 Desktop, on the iPhone

The first time I started it up it started in safe mode, but after I restarted it it resumed in it’s normal mode.

Standard Start Menu stuff

Dammit, can't they make the network connection work?

It’s not so different from IE6 which way too many people still use. I wished the internet connection would’ve worked, not that the IE5 or whatever it was experience would be better than the Safari Mobile experience. The iPhone should’ve included a stripped down version of flash though and an embedded JVM – at least on the 3GS which can handle it.

Control Panel, Kind of

The Control Panel icons take about a second each to load once they get going on the 3GS. I wanted to try to increase the mouse speed, but none of the control panel applications would load! I think I would have just had to wait a long time, but I had things to do.

Windows 95 on iPhone Shutdown Screen

Always shut down your computer the way Windows tells you do or you could damage your computer.

Please wait while your computer shuts down.

THE END.

The most used router in the consumer market is by far the Linksys WRT54G(x), and that’s what I use – I actually have several versions of these, some doing hard work and others just laying around. Most of these routers I didn’t have any issues with, but I can remember a time several years back when I bought a new one and it would freeze up without failure pretty much every day. Restarting (unplugging) the router didn’t do anything to fix the issue, I actually had to push that little reset button down on the back of it for thirty seconds and reset everything. That meant I had to reconfigure all my settings every day! This was more than a little pain in the butt, and seeing that a firmware upgrade did not fix the issue I almost thought it could be the hardware – perhaps bad memory in the router. I was wrong

I Googled for awhile and stumbled upon a few different third party firmwares that could be used on the WRT54GL. It amazed me that there was such a thing, I never new that third party router firmware existed. I found several: Tomato, OpenWRT, and DD-WRT. The first one, Tomato, seemed cool and everything but not very visually appealing and the features list wasn’t too long. OpenWRT is a great firmware and it’s very extensible, but not quite as robust or as popular as DD-WRT. I’m not sure about Tomato, but OpenWRT and DD-WRT are both based on Linux. DD-WRT is based on OpenWRT. Keep in mind that this isn’t an exhaustive list of router firmwares – there are a lot of them out there. There’s even some small distributions of *nix floating around for weird router architectures that aren’t generally supported.

So at this point you might be wondering why you would want to have a third party router firmware. Here’s a bullet point list of some reasons why you should use the DD-WRT firmware, if your router supports it (we’ll get to that):

• It’s easy enough for an average user to use. Just follow the install directions for your router provided on their site.
• It’s the most popular and therefore has the most support in the form of threads on their forums and elsewhere.
• DD-WRT has been through 24 major releases, plus all of the other intermediate releases. This means that it’s generally very stable and probably a lot better than whatever firmware you’re using on your router right now.
• DD-WRT provides MANY more features than what comes with your OEM firmware. We’ll get into the features real soon in the next post, but I’d describe them as being just as robust as a router that would cost hundreds of dollars.
• DD-WRT is based on Linux which means you can install new packages and log into the shell to use all your favorite command line utilities like SSH, SCP, RM, LS, PING, TRACEROUTE, etc.
• The source code is available, so if you’re a developer and you’d like to contribute or tweak something, it’s all there.
• There are seven different versions in each release ranging from micro to mega. Depending on the hardware specs of your router you may be limited to micro, or you may be able to use mega.
• I could go on and on, but once you look at the screenshots and features, you’ll be planning your first DD-WRT install in no time!

A note to the beginner, or intermediate computer user

Flashing your router with a third-party firmware requires some knowledge of networking, and the ability to pay attention to details. There is a risk of “bricking” your router if you do this wrong, so you’ll want to make damn sure that everything you do is correct and that there isn’t some sort of a power disturbance during the install. You’ll have to search around on the DD-WRT site to find an install guide for your router, if it’s supported there will be one there.

In order to set up a wireless router, you will also need some information from your ISP to get things working properly. If you use Comcast, the setup is very simple; the WAN side just gets a DHCP assigned IPv4 address, and you set up your WIFI and LAN as you normally would. DSL users will need to know all of their login credentials, etc. Most of this stuff is either in your computer (if you don’t have a router) or on your router. Just log in and grab it! If you have a T1, you can still use this – I’ve seen it done! Just take note of the subnet mask, routable IP addresses and DNS servers.

All the extra features are a little more geared towards people who know what they’re doing, but I encourage you to jump right in and start playing around with them too. If you have the time and the willingness to learn, this can be a very fun adventure for you.

Finding a router / checking if yours is compatible

DD-WRT.com has a cool little AJAX page that will allow you to search for your current router, or a router you’re thinking of buying. It’s on their supported hardware page. Under where it says “Router Database – Beta” enter in your router’s model number and without even clicking a button, some routers should appear on the page. Find the one you’re looking for and check if it’s supported. If nothing comes up, or it says it’s not supported, you’re out of luck – try another firmware maybe. If it says work in progress, it might be awhile, but eventually you will be able to use DD-WRT on that router.

The Best Routers for DD-WRT

Linksys WRT54GL

Linksys WRT54GL 1.1

Right now there are three routers that are considered to be the “best” for DD-WRT. The first one is obviously the Linksys WRT54GL which is the current model in the line of WRT routers that DD-WRT was designed for. The current model has a 200MHz CPU, 16MB RAM, and 4MB Flash. It usually retails at around $60. This router is claimed to be the most compatible with DD-WRT, and will work right out of the box almost (with a TFTP flash). This isn’t the fastest router though, nor is it the most feature rich.

Asus WL500G Premium V2

Asus WL500G Premium V2

The Asus WL500G Premium V2 is one of the best consumer routers on the market for the price, and it’s also compatible with the beloved DD-WRT. This router boasts two USB ports on the back for perhaps a security webcam or an external hard drive for use as a file server. I cannot attest to the functionality of it’s stock firmware, but I do know that it’s hugely popular with DD-WRT. The CPU runs at 240MHz (not overclock-able as of the latest DD-WRT release). It also has a whopping 32MB of RAM and 8MB of flash memory, making it a great candidate for DD-WRT and blowing the WRT54GL out of the water. It also only retails at $10 higher or around $70.

Linksys WRTSL54GS

Linksys WRTSL54GS

Also worth mentioning is the Linksys WRTSL54GS. It is compatible with DD-WRT and is a lot more powerful than the WRT54GL, but it’s no longer on the market. If you dig around on EBay you may find one, but you’ll probably pay an arm and a leg for it.

The router has a 264MHz CPU, one USB port, 32MB of ram, and 8MB of flash memory. These specs put it in the ring with the WL500G Premium, but unfortunately Linksys decided to stop manufacturing them and hand all the profits over to Asus. I guess it doesn’t surprise me though, and I’m sure Asus’ stock firmware is much more capable and less buggy than the Linksys firmware – I hope.

Buffalo AirStation WHR-G54S

Buffalo AirStaion WHR-G54S

The Buffalo AirStation WHR-G54S is perhaps the most sought after router out there. It was the best bang for you buck, and a cheap router for DD-WRT. It was pulled off the market in the USA along with all their wireless products because they were sued for patent infringement by the Commonwealth Science and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO). Buffalo is a cool company because they like to push things – some of their products actually used to ship with DD-WRT already on them!

You can find these on EBay once in awhile, but the price usually shoots up pretty fast so you might try to find one that’s listed poorly (if other people can’t find it the price won’t go as high). Paying higher than normal prices for this one kind of defeats the purpose of buying it in the first place.

The specs are: 200MHz Broadcom 5232, 16MB RAM, 4MB Flash. I don’t know what the street price is or was in the USA, nor does it really matter at this point. I do know that this router was pretty cheap, under $50 if I’m not mistaken. Keep your eye peeled though, this one or something better may show up in stores again someday soon.

Apparently Mark Shuttleworth said something along the lines of “linux is hard to explain to girls.” Now, I’m not sure what he meant by it or if he really even said it, but I’ll take the Kirrily Robert’s word for it. You can check her letter to Mr. Shuttleworth out here. I’m not a feminist, and to be honest a lot of feminists are off the deep end (in my opinion) and are completely irrational, but Kirrily seems to have raised a good point and I totally understand her frustration.

I’ll let you, the reader develop your own opinion about this whole controversy but I do want to let you know what my opinion is on this whole thing. First off, I’m not going to call Mark Shuttleworth a male chauvinist quite yet, but I do think he needs to recant, as do some of my readers. The field of engineering, computer sciences, and software development are male dominated fields, and they could use more females. It is a medical fact that women ARE different than men, psychologically and physically. The physical part doesn’t really matter when it comes to engineering, but what about the psychological part?

I don’t imagine the IQ distribution among women is that much different than it is for men, so logically it follows that women are just as capable of working in engineering. That being said, they think differently – perhaps this is why most women don’t choose engineering or software development as careers. In my previous post, “Misconceptions about Ubuntu Linux” a guy by the name of Frank posted a great comment which I’d encourage everyone to read. He mentioned that he’d worked with some women in his undergrad computer science studies at UMN and had a delightful experience. I think he’s right on – women could add new dimensions to software!

So I’d like to close with asking Mark Shuttleworth to please recant his comment or at least explain it. I’d really hate to think that this OS I love so much is headed up by a guy who doesn’t respect women.

-55MHz ARM 32-bit processor
-2MB Flash Memory
-8MB SDRAM
-10/100 Lan (FD / AutoSensing)
-2 Indicator LED’s, one programmable
-OS: uClinux 2.4.27 Big Endian (native)
Will work with BusyBox (as a shell), and others as well.
-Supports CRAMFS, JFFS2, NFS
-I think I read somewhere that there’s a POE mod for this thing, well… there’s a lot of mods for it.

Doing a Google Image Search reveals a lot of mods and proof-of-concept’s that companies and individuals have done. Some are rather interesting, so that’s worth taking a look at as well. Oh yeah, and one last thing – it will run a webserver, but wouldn’t make much of a router. I may buy one of these to make into some sort of a spy device or something; admittedly I can’t find any good use for it at the moment, but it sure is cool!

Linux is just as easy to use as Windows

False. Ubuntu is easy to use relative to other distributions, but it’s not easier than Windows. Windows users are guaranteed to have all of their hardware work, with very few exceptions. In Linux hardware support has gotten better, but it’s not what it could be quite yet. A lot of devices are supported in odd ways such that you can use them, but not to their full potential. I can think of two good examples. Let’s take a look at these hardware support issues, then we’ll get into some other problems you might encounter if you switch.

Hardware Support Issues

The first one that comes to mind is a variety of ATI cards and how they act when using an OpenGL (3D accelerated) application. You’ll often see snippets of the windows behind it in between frames, or it will drop frames entirely making the video choppy. Those are just a few of the problems with ATI cards, but don’t get me wrong – many cards work flawlessly in Ubuntu. Sometimes the issues can be resolved by using a more updated, restricted driver from the manufacturer, but it didn’t fix the problem on my laptop which has an ATI Radeon xPress 200M integrated card.

Another example of how hardware is harnessed in odd ways is with most Broadcom wireless cards. You have to download a restricted driver which takes the firmware from the Windows driver and extracts it with a program called FWCutter. This allows Linux to access some of the features of the card, but they don’t all work right. You won’t be able to make an ad-hoc network, and your network speeds will be noticeably slower than if you were using a native driver.

I know I said two examples, but there’s actually a third. If you’re lucky and your integrated sound card works, it may not fully support all the ports. I can’t use my microphone, which sucks because when I Skype I’m forced to use the mic on my Creative Live Video IM Ultra webcam which quite frankly sucks.

So while hardware support has gotten better, it’s still not quite there yet. You’re also not likely to get support for Linux from your vendors or manufacturers unless they sold the computer to you with Linux on it. Dell and Pystar (among others) are two manufacturers who sell Linux desktops.

Software Issues

Bottom line here is most mainstream software doesn’t work on Linux. It’s an entirely different OS which means it needs to be compiled specially to work on it. OpenOffice (by Sun, now Oracle) is a very robust office suite which will allow you to open Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Excel files (and others too) but don’t expect 100% compatibility. A lot of the advanced features in Microsoft Office don’t translate to OpenOffice. You can try Open Office on Windows before you make the switch to Linux by downloading it at http://www.openoffice.org/.

I might as well list the remainder of the issues with the most popular software before I move onto talking about Wine (the Windows Emulator):

• Skype has a Linux version, but some of the features are missing and it also requires that your hardware is working properly which it may not be.
• Google Video and some of their other features don’t work under Linux, which is ironic considering their commitment to the open source community.
• Most Java programs don’t work, or don’t work well unless you use Sun’s version of Java. Ubuntu doesn’t come with that because it doesn’t fall under the GPL (General Public License). You have to install that and make it the default JVM for your java apps to work. Eclipse is a great example of a Java program that doesn’t work on the default JVM. Switching the default JVM isn’t easy for most average users.

About Wine (WINdowsEmulator) EDIT: Wine IS NOT an emulator (of x86…)

Wine is a great piece of software, don’t get me wrong I love it and I use it often when I need to run a Windows app at near-native speed on Linux. That being said, wine is not something that beginners or average computer users are going to find easy to use. They’ll give up almost immediately because it’s just not made for the average Joe!

Another problem with Wine is that it doesn’t support everything; it can’t emulate Windows 100% so expect some bugs and incompatibilities. I was able to run DVDShrink among other programs though, so it’s pretty cool and well written.

Video Codecs

There are a lot of video codecs out there ready to be installed so you can play all your favorite videos in Linux, but you’re going to run into videos that you just can’t play period. The biggest example of this is the WMV format (Windows Media Video). There is a codec for it, but it still won’t play most of them, and unfortunately a lot of websites use WMV. The Apple video formats pose similar issues.

The Bottom Line

Ubuntu Linux is an awesome distribution. They push Linux as far as they can, and try to make it as user friendly as possible. It’s a great operating system for the power user that wants to learn how to use the command line interface, the ins and outs of the OS, how to edit configuration files, etc. It’s certainly usable out of the box on a compatible system by average users as well, but if the people you communicate with on a daily basis use Microsoft Office, you’re going to hit some inconveniences. You’ll also encounter a host of other issues that aren’t easily resolved. I encourage everyone to back up their computer and at least try dual booting it. Linux isn’t going away any time soon and it’d be a wise idea to start learning about it and getting involved in the community – even if that just means trying out new free and open source software.