As for the battery:
https://www.oesf.org/forums/index.php?showt...ce+menu+batteryBeware, there be dragons there...
As for your ipkg problems:
go to /usr/lib/ipkg and find the status file. Open it in an editor and remove the line near the end that is causing all of the trouble.
Actually, it would be a good idea to run ipkg from the command line to see exactly what the problem is, but I'm guessing that it is getting hung up on an incompletely installed package.
The command line for ipkg should be:
"ipkg install package"
Where "package" would be the name of the actual package.
You might need to either elevate yourself to root or return to user depending on what package you are installing.
"su" takes you to root (look for the "#" prompt)
"su zaurus" makes you a regular user ("$" prompt)