Pocketworkstation Basics, (for the newbie) Options

[grog]

Hi all. I'm really interested in trying out PocketWorkstation and/or PocketWorkstationXQT on my C860, but can I please get a few questions answered first?

For starters, I am in the right forum (X/QT = PocketWorkstationXQT)? And what's the diff between the above two? Do the above pages have the right info to get me started, or should I go through the main pinned topic first? It seems that if I want a 'true' X desktop I'll have to go the PocketWorkstationXQT way, correct?

And what's pdaxqtrom all about? That seems to be entirely pdaxrom based, right?

And it seems either needs a 'base' install of something else. Do I have to use the official sharp rom, or can I use cacko? Can I use OZ/OPIE? And after I get comfortable with debian, do I ever have to boot back into the other for any reason? Is there any way to install just PocketWorkstation to flash?

thanks in advance

[miskinis]

Hi,

I'll take a stab at answering your questions. It's a little complicated, and although
I am not affiliated (at this time) with any of these projects, I'm hoping to save the
developers some time, and also to verify that I have a complete and clear picture of
all this. (I used to develop X11 apps for big companies for years in the past)

First, the X Window System, also known as X11, or just X, uses a server called the
X Server, to display graphics and accept user input from keyboard, mice etc.. Once this
is running, programs (called X clients) can display their GUIs on the X Server. They can be
running on the same system, or any system in the network. (Amazingly flexible)

OK, now the Zaurus as shipped with the Sharp ROM has none of this, and its
graphical system is called Qtopia or Qt for short. But many folks missed the power
of X, and decided to implement an X Server for the Zaurus platform. This can be
done, as was done in many ways as follows:

Pocket Workstation uses a modified VNC (Virtual Network Computing) that uses
the FB (frame buffer) to display the graphics, and chrooted environment that
"fools" LINUX into thinking the / directory is somewhere else, like an SD card.
It also provides a base Debian release in this "fake or auxilliary" / and not any
of the normal Sharp ROM software.

Xqt uses an X Server implemented within the normal Qtopia environment, using
its API for graphics, etc.

Then there is pdaXrom, which is another ROM (sort of my favorite) that provides
a "native" X Server, probably by using the normal XFree86, X.org, or TinyX
X server, the first two which are used by most major LINUX desktop distributions.

OK, now there's pdaXqtrom which is a packaged-up version of pdaXrom, but
uses the Xqt server, and runs on (or really under) the Sharp ROM or variants
like Cacko. This is done again by using a "chrooted" environment. Although
slower than the running the real pdaXrom ROM, it is very flexible and is implemented
by using a couple of loop devices, which are files that are mounted in a way that
they appear and act like partitions. They are typically installed on external media,
but do not have to be. I have been checking this out recently, since it allows the
(extremely stable and predictable) Sharp ROM to be used, and offers great flexibility.

Xqt-Jumbo and Xqt-Super-Jumbo, are from the same person (Meanie) who
put together pdaXqtrom. They are again X environments (apps and a server)
that can be installed as loop devices (compressed RAM filesystems or cramfs
images that can be mounted, and voila you have a system), and I believe they
can also be uncompressed and installed anywhere.

OK, then there is PocketWorkstationXQT which appears to use the Xqt server
instead of the frame-buffer-based modified VNC server for graphics.

SO, I would say you are in the correct forum for any of the above that use Xqt!

Lastly, I think the term "true X desktop" would refer to any of the above environments
in which X clients (programs) will run on, but I think the purists would say that
if the Sharp ROM's Qt panel, etc., are visible and taking up screen space, that its
not a "true" X desktop.

OK, I did my best, and have potentially opened myself up for criticism and correction,
but what the heck!

John

[Meanie]

Hi all. I'm really interested in trying out PocketWorkstation and/or PocketWorkstationXQT on my C860, but can I please get a few questions answered first?

For starters, I am in the right forum (X/QT = PocketWorkstationXQT)? And what's the diff between the above two? Do the above pages have the right info to get me started, or should I go through the main pinned topic first? It seems that if I want a 'true' X desktop I'll have to go the PocketWorkstationXQT way, correct?

And what's pdaxqtrom all about? That seems to be entirely pdaxrom based, right?

And it seems either needs a 'base' install of something else. Do I have to use the official sharp rom, or can I use cacko? Can I use OZ/OPIE? And after I get comfortable with debian, do I ever have to boot back into the other for any reason? Is there any way to install just PocketWorkstation to flash?

thanks in advance

PocketWorkstation is a Debian distribution, in short, Debian on the Zaurus (PocketWorkstation is not X/Qt). PocketWorkstation is almost a complete distro, except it does not come with a kernel and boot loader so you need to boot off some other distro and then load PocketWorkstation. This is usually done by either using a pivot boot (which was invented by the OZ team I think) or the conventional chroot method. Since PocketWorkstation is running X11, it needs a X server. This currently is implemented in two ways, a vnc frambuffer or X/Qt which is also a framebuffer via Qtopia (QT/E).
The PocketWorkstation originally and by default uses a vnc framebuffer. To do this, you need to exit the current GUI environment (which is Qtopia on Sharp/Cacko). By using X/Qt instead you do not need to exit Qtopia so you can access both environments at the same time.
Because PocketWorkstation runs in chroot. its essentially a separate distribution and you can update its libraries indedenpently from the parent environment.
pdaXqtrom is an extension of X/Qt. It runs natively on the Sharp/Cacko ROM and uses its libraries and adds extra ones that are needed to run many of the popular X applications. pdaXqtrom mimics pdaXrom, ie it has the same library packages and versions as well as the applications. The goal for pdaXqtrom is to allow people who need Sharp/Cacko (because there are applications that only work on these) to run X11 applications without having to switch to pdaXrom or OZ/GPE.
So both PocketWorkstation and pdaXqtrom alllow you to run X11 applications under Sharp/Cacko ROM. Which one is better? It depends. The way PocketWorkstation works is similar to say using Windows XP inside VMware under Windows 2000. Both the parent and child environment are independant in a way. You need to update both separately and each has their own file system, user accounts, network settings, etc.... but there are a lot of packages for Debian (PocketWorkstation). You will need around 512MB - 2GB for PocketWorkstation depending on how many extra applications you want to install. In most cases you don't want to install that many applications on your Zaurus anyway since it does not have that much space unlike a desktop PC where a few hundred gigabytes is not a problem at all.
On the other hand, pdaXqtrom is just a collection of extra packages added to Sharp/Cacko. All the pdaXqtrom files are available as individual packages which you can install manually or from a feed. http://www.thegrinder.ws/Meanies_XQT/pdaxqtrom/feed/
In order to simplify the installation and also to save space pdaXqtrom is also available as compressed images which you just need to mount and create symlinks to (all done for you by the pdaXqtrom installer). There are less applications available thru pdaXqtrom than PocketWorkstation. pdaXqtrom has about 40 applications only.
Of course, there is nothing stopping you from installing PocketWorkstation under pdaXqtrom so you get everything.

[stormer]

I suggest that we rename and sticky this thread as it is the most comprehensive and accessible description of the relationship between the various ROMS to date!

[grog]

Thanks for the details, guys. That does clear most of it up. Just for clarity then, I can start from a cacko install & then install either pocketworkstation or pocketworkstationxqt onto an sd card. There's also no way to have just pocketworkstation installed to flash, 'cause it needs another distro to 'fill in the blanks', so to speak. Correct?

Is there a way to default the Z to pocketworkstation when it reboots, or will I always have to start up with qtopia then switch over?

[grog]

And can I flash/update the base rom (cacko) later on & then run the setup scripts again & use my same install of pocketworkstation (without having to reinstall that as well)?

Thanks again

[grog]

Well, I've answered one of my original questions. I can use my sd card with pocketworkstation installed under diffferent roms, I just have to rerun the postinst.sh script each time & reflash.

I've managed to get pocketworkstation working under Cacko 1.23 but not under OZ/OPIE 3.5.4.1.rc4. In OZ, at first I got a cannot open display error, which I just created a ~/.xinitrc & added 'export DISPLAY=:0.0' to fix, but then I got another error 'cannot open /dev/ts'. Anybody have any ideas on that one? I'd really like to use OZ instead (newer kernel for one thing).

Pocketworkstation seems to work well under cacko, although I haven't tried much yet. Is there any way I suspend/resume (this is just straight pocketworkstation, not running under xqt)? I figured out how to use cru to access the 'external' filesystems. I don't quite get the difference between cru & crd. Anyone care to enlighten me?

thks

[grog]

Is there any way I suspend/resume (this is just straight pocketworkstation, not running under xqt)?

Answering my own question by RTFM (HELP file). <fn>-Cancel suspends just nifty .

[InSearchOf]

I agree this should be sticky'd... I've been thinkin about using Pocketworkstation... and this has just moved me one step closer to tryin it...

Late


Edit: ok... I lied... It says it support SL-5xxx and Cxx0... no C1000 support from the looks of it...

Still good info....

[grog]

I finally got enough time to get my cf nic up & running, which I had to do in qpe. Is there any way to configure & start a card directly in debian? I'd like to know when I get around to trying out my wifi card next, as I'll have to configure it with a wep key.

I then first tried 'apt-get update', which failed trying to get the testing arm lists (which don't exist. Sad to think that this'll all be out of date one day) so I changed /etc/apt/sources.list to point to stable, and that worked great. I then did a 'apt-get -y dist-upgrade' & set it to only prompt on critical changes, which went without a hitch (well, it still prompts you for a few things, which I found annoying, but that's life). I also installed xmms & xmms-mad, which again installed & run just fine.

But of course I now try to point xmms to the mp3's on my cf card & I can't figure out how from with the chroot'd environment. I can 'cru df' & see the mounted filesystem, and 'cru ls -l /mnt/cf' shows what's on the card, but 'ls -l /mnt/cf' is empty (local). There's no /etc/fstab, do I have to create one & mount the cards again under debian? Then again there's no /dev/hda* device blocks in the chroot, so how would I go about creating those (if that's the right approach to take)?

thks

[grog]

Edit: ok... I lied... It says it support SL-5xxx and Cxx0... no C1000 support from the looks of it...

I was browsing through the (very low volume) mailing list archives & I did see a couple of posts from another C1000 user saying that he got it working, You should check it out .

[Meanie]

Edit: ok... I lied... It says it support SL-5xxx and Cxx0... no C1000 support from the looks of it...

I was browsing through the (very low volume) mailing list archives & I did see a couple of posts from another C1000 user saying that he got it working, You should check it out .

C1000 support is the same as C3000 support except that it needs to be put on a slow SD or CF card instead of the internal microdrive and suspend/resume/card insertion/ejection will cause trouble/hangs....

[grog]

I can 'cru df' & see the mounted filesystem, and 'cru ls -l /mnt/cf' shows what's on the card, but 'ls -l /mnt/cf' is empty (local). There's no /etc/fstab, do I have to create one & mount the cards again under debian? Then again there's no /dev/hda* device blocks in the chroot, so how would I go about creating those (if that's the right approach to take)?

Another one I managed to figure out myself (well, I got some help from a local linux buddy ). All from within the chroot'd debian environment:

CODE

# mknod /dev/hda b 3 0
# mknod /dev/hda1 b 3 1
# mount /dev/hda1 /mnt/card

I'll make a /etc/fstab & see if it'll do it automatically.

This post has been edited by grog: Jun 28 2006, 09:33 AM

[adf]

This is the site for debian on the 3000. I think it has what you need. combined with meanie's xqt stuff and a "corrected" fstab it should be a great setup.

[omro]

Does anyone update pocket workstation anymore?
Has anyone thought about taking over it's updating if no one does update it anymore?