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Jul. 13, 2001

Earthlink asked that the following announcement be communicated to the LinuxDevices.com community . . .

Earthlink is sponsoring a contest for Linux, XML, Java, wireless, and Web application developers. The contest seeks creative application ideas for a prototype open-standards "Automotive Vehicle Location" (AVL) telematics platform that was created by EarthLink's R&D team.

Why are we doing this?

There are approximately 60 million trucks and 140 million cars in the US. Yet, automotive computing platforms for independent application development are almost non-existent. As a result, independent developers are totally excluded from the in-vehicle market due to closed systems and proprietary implementations.

The Earthlink AVL was developed in order to demonstrate automotive software applications, study how Linux and Internet technologies can be applied to the automotive environment, and test the feasibility and effectiveness of systems such as remote diagnostics, m-commerce, and location sensitive applications.

With its location-based services (LBS) server infrastructure, the AVL is an open standards-based device that can be installed in any vehicle to facilitate a broad range of Internet-based vehicle security, monitoring and personalized information features. It can be used for WAP/WML, Web, PDA, enterprise, and custom applications.

This contest is intended to help produce awareness of and interest in the emerging automotive telematics market, and to foster development of the best business and consumer applications for the EarthLink AVL platform, currently a prototype product, available in limited quantity through EarthLink.

What's in the box?

The AVL unit incorporates a 12 channel GPS receiver with a 32-bit processor running the uClinux operating system, along with a standard vehicle tracking/monitoring application. The processor can also be programmed for custom applications.

Here is a summary of the hardware specifications . . .

Motorola Reflex wireless network interface
Lineo uCsimm SBC with:
- 32-bit Dragonball processor
- 2 MB Flash memory
- 8 MB RAM
- RS-232 serial port
- Ethernet port
12-channel GPS receiver
Vehicle I/O:
- Two optically isolated inputs
- Two relay outputs
- One analog input

Here is a summary of the system's key software features . . .

On-Demand Position Reports
Interval reporting
Input/output control and monitoring
Event triggers
Personal safety alerts
Geofence reports upon entering or leaving a security-fenced area
Two-Way Messaging
Over-the air system diagnostics and configuration
Data logging
TCP/IP interfacing

AVL API's

The AVL device implements an open protocol, making the AVL core services available to external in-vehicle applications. Such services include GPS location data, input/output triggers, and wireless Internet messaging.

Additionally, the AVL implements a middleware software layer that provides services to a back-end server. This middleware, known as the "Telematic Application Server", consists of applications such as web-server applications, WAP/WML applications, Palm Web Clipping applications, or Enterprise applications. The Telematic Application Server interconnects to Earthlink's developmental mobile AVL network to retrieve the AVL unit's location data, and provides this data to authorized applications via an easy-to-use HTTP interface.

Further information on these APIs is available on the Earthlink AVL website.

About the contest

You now have the chance to win an EarthLink AVL of your own!

The contest is intended to help produce awareness of and interest in the emerging automotive telematics market and to foster development of the best business and consumer applications for the EarthLink AVL platform. If you have a cutting-edge telematics application concept for the AVL platform, we invite you to enter the contest and take a shot at winning an AVL kit (an $895 value). To enter, simply tell us what you want to do (or what you could do) with the EarthLink AVL's SPARK AVL Developer Kit.

All you have to do is tell us what you want to do (or what you could do for that matter) with the EarthLink SPARK AVL Developer Kit. Entries will be judged by EarthLink and six winners will receive a free EarthLink AVL unit. In addition, EarthLink will award the Overall Favorite Application winner one full year of free AVL service. Winners in the best Navigation, Directory, Entertainment, Security, and M-commerce categories will receive three months of free AVL service.

Note: no purchase is required.

For contest rules, additional details, and entry submission information, visit the Earthlink AVL contest website.

Deadline?

The deadline for all submissions is October 31, 2001.

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