… and the fact that I already have an Internet connected supercomputer in my pocket.
This is the biggest problem with all these devices, I love them, but I have to grit my teeth, squint my eyes, and put my fingers in my ears in order to pretend to live in the parallel universe where they actually make any sense 
…
… all I really want is an android phone with a hinged physical keyboard
… which will then be too big for me to comfortably want to carry it about .
I rather want something simpler than an android phone. I don’t think I actually want the full internet access part of it - I just want the information and knowledge without the bickering, infighting, and doomscrolling. Perhaps such a thing cannot exist, but it sure felt like it could when using a cow spotted Gateway 2000 25 years ago.
that thing already exists and was named book!
I currently use the uConsole as a portable writing device for novels.
Is the PicoCalc something that I could also work on personal documents with? I really like the design of the device, but I’m not at all familiar with BASIC. But as I understand it, it would be easy to input established programs others have coded?
IMO you’re almost certainly better off with your uConsole.
I’m not sure the PicoCalc (at least with the PicoMite/MMBasic firmware) is a good fit for your stated requirement. Its internal editor (type EDIT) is only intended for editing ASCII text files and will syntax highlight them as if they were BASIC. In theory someone could write more general document editors but they would be primitive compared with what the full Linux environment on the uConsole can provide. The only benefit I can see is that the PicoCalc might be used to provide a more focused, less distracting writing environment than a full laptop.
Best wishes,
Tom
I’ve been poking around looking at other interesting Pico projects that might be related to PicoCalc, and this looks interesting:
It’s a custom classic home computer type design, but can be fully emulated on the Pico. In the case of this project, it uses different hardware to host the Pico, with the video meant to go to a TV, custom input, etc. But I wonder how difficult it would be to adapt this and get it working with the PicoCalc screen for display, keys for input, and audio output?
While PicoMite/MMBasic is probably more optimized and practical, this virtual HBC-56 is almost like a retro virtual console that was made real, and then emulated with the Pico. There doesn’t appear to be much software for it, but it reminds me of something like Pico-8, but if it was meant to be a personal computer from the 80s. While it might not be as practical, it’s got good nostalgic vibes, and since it’s emulating similar hardware of the time, it even sounds and looks like a home computer from back in the day.
There’s even an emulator on the web for it (with some sample programs):
Seems like it could be a fun thing to have on the PicoCalc, but I’m not sure how much effort it would take to adapt it to a different platform.
And while I wasn’t expecting the PicoCalc to be much of a gaming device, “Galapico” is an interesting experiment: https://forums.raspberrypi.com/viewtopic.php?t=382006
It’s not yet as polished as Galagino for ESP32, but it shows that some classic arcade games (Galaga, Pac-Man, Donkey Kong, Frogger, Digdug and 1942) can be fully emulated and made to run on the Pico. Similar to the HBC-56, I wonder how much a hassle it would be to adapt this to use the PicoCalc display, audio, and input?
There seem to be plenty of other emulators for early consoles and classic computer systems on github, both for Pico and ESP32, though some tend to target a TV for the display. This one caught my eye, as it would be amazing to see the old Atari 8-bit computers running on something like the PicoCalc. This would require even more porting effort since it was made for ESP32, but the Galapico/Galagino projects show that porting from ESP32 to Pico is at least possible, if not easy.
Check out the guys that make an attachable keyboard for iPhones. They are now building them for certain models of Android phones. Maybe you will get lucky.
Hell yeah! Dudes! I just got a shipping notification for my picocalc! Woo!!!
This was my idea as well, and I’m in the same boat with unfamiliarity with BASIC. I found an old word processor that works on Linux 7 that I’m pretty sure we’ll be able to install: WinWorld: WordPerfect 7.x (Unix)
Just ordered my PicoCalc today so we’ll see!
Ordered when and to which country ?
Interesting! I can’t wait to find out how your experience goes if you provide us with a followup!
I’m planning to write games for it, like I did with my TRS-80 Model I starting in 1978. I’m mostly interested in the fun of programming, which somehow a 40 year career as a software developer failed to beat out of me. Coding was far more fun in those days, compared to wrestling with the arbitrary and capricious cruelties of modern web development frameworks.
united states, i ordered 15 min after it launched
wont be for 2 weeks 
stuck on an away mission
See recent Andy Kirby video.
you can meet andy there!
I like to see some old emulation less jntensive like pico8 etc. And some older classic games like doom etc. Using Lyra Board.
doom a few posts below