Messages

211

Gemini PDA - Hardware / Keyboard label wear

« on: June 28, 2018, 02:45:22 pm »

this does look as if not the "printing" is worn of, but it is just darkend by absorbing oil from the skin of the fingers.

Mmm, that could well explain it.

It actually looks like a tiny micro 3D printing.

Yes, it does.  Of course, actual 3D printing wasn't available 20 years ago when the Psion 5 was made, which is why silk-screen printing (where the ink/whatever is forced through a fine silk mesh) seemed a possibility.  Ink-jet-style printing (which is what 3D printing was based on) could also result in something like that.

However, videos such as these definitely show lettering being created (in impressive style!) by laser.  And that's apparently the standard way for keyboards, especially when they're not in long production runs.  (Other methods are ‘double-shot’ moulding where the lettering is in a contrasting colour of plastic, and dye-sublimation printing.)

I haven't seen a good explanation of laser engraving, but I suspect that the laser heats the plastic, causing it to expand and discolour (perhaps in the same way that soft plastics can change colour when bent/stretched).  This would explain everything: why the lettering is slightly raised, why it's slightly pixelated (as the laser will be directed to individual spots), and why the process is described as ‘laser etching’.

If so, it means there's no danger of the lettering coming away — it's not separate, but part of the same plastic mass as the rest of the key.  And there's no dye, ink, or paint to fade or separate.  The discolouration isn't from any permanent deterioration, but as you say, can only be from finger grease and/or other dirt.  This means it should be removable — though the rough surface of the letters might need chemical rather than physical means to get it all off.

So all we need to do now is to identify the best way of cleaning the keyboard!  Since we don't need to worry about dissolving any dye/ink/paint, just the plastic itself, I guess a wide range of cleaning agents might work.  Anyone care to try some??

(The main caveat is of course that the keys need to be removed first.  The preferred method I used on Psions still works, which uses a big blob of Blu Tak: press it firmly onto a key, then lift it off sharply.  If you get it right, the key top comes up with it — with much less risk of damaging anything.)

This has become a very interesting topic

212

Gemini PDA - Hardware / Keyboard label wear

« on: June 28, 2018, 11:27:02 am »

I just got reply from Planet:

...The keys on the Gemini are lasered, so they will never completely wear off. While it might discolour, they will eventually stop fading.
...

Hmmm…  It's pretty obvious, even without a microscope, that the lettering is in relief — it sticks up from the keys, rather than being sunken into them.  So while a laser may be involved somehow, this doesn't seem like ‘etching’ as a layperson would understand it.

The microscope pictures above are very interesting, thanks!  And the pixelation of the lettering does suggest a process more like silk-screen printing.  (I can just about see it with a magnifying glass — both on my Gemini and a 5mx.  Which surprises me, as I thought there was nothing about the 5mx I didn't already know  )

But yes, the bottom line seems to be that they seem to be made pretty much the same as Psion keys.  And my two decades of experience with those indicates that while the lettering does unfortunately discolour, it doesn't get removed, even after many years of use; and in most cases it never progresses far enough to endanger the legibility.

213

Gemini PDA - Android / Magisk manager not working?

« on: June 28, 2018, 09:39:46 am »

Did you follow the instructions on that page?

It was a few weeks ago, so I don't recall exactly what I did; it involved several steps, but it seemed straightforward.

(The first gotcha is that ‘Magisk Manager’ is not the same thing as ‘Magisk’.  AIUI, the former is a tool which installs and/or sets up the latter, and it's the latter which enables root access.)

As described on that page, after installing Magisk Manager (which may need you to enable installation from unknown sources), you need to tap its ‘Install’ button and let it install Magisk itself, and then reboot afterwards for that to take effect.

214

Gemini PDA - Hardware / Keyboard label wear

« on: June 28, 2018, 09:29:56 am »

The lettering does indeed look and feel very much like that on the Psion 5 series.  And yes, while that lettering often got a little discoloured, in many years of use I never saw it disappear; in most cases it didn't get much worse than the screenshots above.

So while any discolouration at all is clearly not good, I don't think it's necessarily as serious as it might at first appear.

215

Gemini PDA - General Discussion / Accessories?

« on: June 28, 2018, 04:46:09 am »

The designers must weep: they expend all their effort and ingenuity in making phones and laptops as thin as humanly possible, shaving off every possible millimetre — and then people keep them in great big thick cases!

216

Gemini PDA - Android / Don't show taskbar when opening

« on: June 27, 2018, 08:09:00 pm »

It's probably worth working out how to update manually, even if it's awkward.  This probably won't be the last issue you have that a later firmware would fix.

If you've already flashed it with rooted Android, then it should be mostly the same process.  And if you're sticking with the same choice of OS, then it should be possible to do so without wiping your Gemini.  (However, backups are always advisable!)  I did it the other day; the important bit is to untick the userdata partition (which will force ‘Download only’ mode); in fact, you may only need to download the boot partition.

217

Gemini PDA - Android / Making Android usable?

« on: June 27, 2018, 08:03:46 pm »

11 - Add entries to /system/etc/hosts to block tracking, analytics, ads, and malware sites.  (Needs root access.  Can block far more than just Google, and can reduce your data transfer and speed up your access.)

218

Gemini PDA - Android / How to test if Android is rooted

« on: June 27, 2018, 07:57:16 pm »

root_boot.img is the right image.

But after flashing that, you also need to install an app to give you root access.  Planet recommend Magisk Manager, and that's what I used.  (I don't know why that's needed, but it is.)

After that's set up, you can then e.g. ‘su root’ in Termux.

219

Gemini PDA - Android / Termux-Widget?

« on: June 27, 2018, 07:52:04 pm »

I've got it working.  The add-on does exactly what it says on the tin: creates widgets.  But it might not be obvious what a ‘widget’ is in the Android world…

Go to the home screen.  Find an empty space, and tap and hold on it.  The screen will zoom out a bit, leaving room for three new icons at the bottom: WALLPAPERS, WIDGETS, and SETTINGS.  Tap on WIDGETS, scroll down to the Termux section, drag the ‘Single shortcut 1 x 1’ onto your home screen somewhere, and then choose from the list of shortcuts (i.e. the files you created in ~/.shortcuts).  Hey presto!

(Caused me some head-scratching and web searching, too…)

It looks like any files in ~/.shortcuts are eligible; they don't need to be have the executable bit set, or have a particular filename or extension, or have anything special on the first line.

220

Gemini PDA - Android / Don't show taskbar when opening

« on: June 27, 2018, 01:35:38 pm »

You sure?  I think it was there right from the first firmware version.

Open Settings (Fn+Del), then scroll down to the ‘Device’ section; it should be the first entry there.  (Its first option is ‘Show App Bar on open’.)

221

Gemini PDA - Linux / Flashing Gemini without losing data?

« on: June 27, 2018, 09:54:56 am »

As Adam says, I don't think that's possible.  You can preserve your apps/files/data by not flashing the userdata partition; but that's only possible if it keeps the same size (and, I guess, location).  However, installing triple-boot would probably need to shrink that partition to make room for (at least) two new ones.

An alternative might be to back up all the necessary files somewhere else, flash, and then restore them.  You may need root access to copy some of them, though.  And I don't have a definitive answer to which files.  I looked into this yesterday when I tried to back up my Gemini before flashing; but I was updating an existing OS and preserving the userdata partition, so I haven't yet tried to restore anything.  From looking around the filesystem, I'd guess you should back up /data and /storage, except for /data/media/0 (which is another hardlink to /storage/emulated/0) and, if you have an external SD card, its folder in /storage.  There are several cache folders which can probably be omitted, too.  Also back up /system/etc/hosts if you've changed it, and /magisk if you've installed that.  (Anyone have a definitive answer on what to back up?)

222

Gemini PDA - Android / Entering other characters

« on: June 27, 2018, 04:36:06 am »

You can get at some of the characters via the symbol keyboard by pressing and holding on keys.

EDIT: I'm afraid misunderstood that comment — and it's a rather good point!

I was confusing it with long presses on the physical keyboard.  Holding down e.g. the ‘a’ key pops up a list of related characters (æ ã å à á â ä &c).  But that only works for some letters, and no symbols.  And I had to disable that setting (Gemini Keyboard Settings app -> Preferences -> Show alternative keys on longpress), as it prevents you using autorepeat on keys which I use a lot in e.g. vim.

However, the virtual keyboard has related characters behind most of the symbols as well.  For example, if you press Fn+, to show the symbol panel, press the bottom-left button* to show the digits and basic symbols, then tapping and holding on the hyphen, you get a pop-up with em dash, underscore, en dash, and bullet.  (* Confusingly, the bottom-left button is labelled ‘ABC’; I suspect the label has got mixed up with the ‘?123’ button just above, which does show the letters…)

Pretty much all the characters I want are available this way, so it's the best answer so far!

Not ideal, though — two keys, a tap, and a tap-hold-drag is still a lot slower than on most other keyboards.  (E.g. Alt+] on macOS, or Ctrl+1+4+5 on the Psion).  And there's still no way to pop up a list of all the available characters (like the ‘Show Emoji & Symbols’ menubar widget on macOS, or Shift+Ctrl+C on the Psion).

223

Gemini PDA - Android / The New Firmware / MultiBootTool

« on: June 26, 2018, 07:07:40 pm »

If I use the new image tool and select rooted android, do I still need to manually replace boot.img with the rooted version?

When I used the image tool, it generated a scatter file with root_boot.img…

224

Gemini PDA - General Discussion / Anyone got a HOWTO on rooting the Gemini?

« on: June 26, 2018, 07:01:05 pm »

I agree that flashing is very awkward and opaque.  (Especially from a Mac — it took me many hours to find and set up the right Linux distro on a bootable USB key…)

But I've just flashed my Gemini with the latest firmware, without losing any apps/files/data, so I know it can be done!

The important points seem to be:

• You must be using exactly the same partition layout (sizes &c) as before.
• Deselect the final 'userdata' partition.  (The type will change to 'Download only', which is what you want.)

The scatter file created by Planet's new online tool had some extra partitions (for Linux, judging from the names — even though I was single-booting to rooted Android!), so I edited it, comparing with the scatter file I used last time, updating the filenames but leaving the partition sizes &c the same.

When set to 'Download only', the Flash Tool will compare the partition map from the scatter file with that currently on the Gemini, and will refuse to proceed if they differ.  So it's relatively safe to use.

And I guess all your apps, files, and other data is on the 'userdata' partition, so deselecting that seems to preserve everything.

Of course, it's well worth making sure you have a backup of everything, just in case something goes wrong…  (It's well worth having a backup of everything anyway!  You never know what might happen.)

225

Gemini PDA - Android / Importing Contacts from .vcf does not work properly

« on: June 26, 2018, 05:52:33 pm »

I don't use Gmail, so I can't say anything about that.

But I did import a load of .vcf contacts successfully: I exported them from the Contacts app on my Mac (200-odd, all into a single .vsf file), transferred that to my Gemini, opened it form a file manager, and it imported every one of them.  They now appear in the Contacts, Messaging, and Phone apps, and all the details (names, numbers, addresses, notes, photos) seem present and correct, and editing works as expected.