OESF Portables Forum
General Forums => General Discussion => Topic started by: omro on June 21, 2005, 07:24:37 am
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I was reading another tread in which Mickeyl wrote:
All the nice hardware won't buy us anything if the Zaurus developer situation stays the same. We need many more developers to make inherently complicated tasks seem easy for the casual user.
OK, I'm not a dumb person, though some of my posts probably sound very dumb, I just haven't got the major background needed in Linux and Linux development and as I've said before, I really don't know the first place to start sometimes. I read some of these posts and I feel like I'm missing key information required to help me follow some of the instructions, almost like I'm hearing another language without enough of the vocabulary to understand. The odd word makes sense, but the overall meaning is lost.
Perhaps the best way to encourage more developers would be to set up some kind of "developer school", to teach people the essential basics required. As soon as someone gets the basics, or knows where to learn them, you might suddenly get more people who make the appropriate mental leap into developing. I bet there are tons of people out there who'd love to learn how to develop for the Zaurus.
Just an idea.
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Hello? What are you talking about? What school? And who is supposed to spend his/her time to teach you the basics? And at what expense?
If you really have motivation to learn, get down to the damn code and READ IT. After that, try to WRITE your own. If you can't do that, please don';t waste other people time.
-albertr
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Make a friendly suggestion, and get pissed on your feet for that... riiight, that's what the community needs, albertr. Thanks for discouraging someone who's interested in development for the community.
But he's somewhat right. If people keep reacting THAT way to newbies who don't know how to start, there's just no way something's gonna change. And from my own experience I know that what YOU suggested is highly frustrating, takes a lot of time, and when you get stuck at some point and nobody's helping... Probably a "school" isn't the right idea, but newbies need to be taken by the hand, same as everywhere else.
Cheers
Philipp
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I'm a newbie developer.... but my code has been sitting ready to release for a while now.
I need to find out how to package it up... I can't really find any info on it.
I'm going to end up writing a shell script to install it and that seems kind of lame, but it *will* work.
:-<
Scott
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We all need to frequent the "Eveything Development" thread more often, post more question and ask for help.
As a developer (novice) even I face the same frustration, but I have seen that asking question, dumb questions and some more in the development thread always elicits some response and some help over time. In the python forum I was once the stupid asking away questions like how to start a python program etc - but people (like Mickyl and others) always helped me out and step by step I have come some way (not a long way yet).
So that is a FIRST step to learning - go to the Development forum and post questions. And inspite of Albertr's rather harsh put down, he himself and others have frequently answered questions and helped without the question of "And at what expense" .
That thread by itself is a little "Developer school".
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I'm a newbie developer.... but my code has been sitting ready to release for a while now.
I need to find out how to package it up... I can't really find any info on it.
I'm going to end up writing a shell script to install it and that seems kind of lame, but it *will* work.
:-<
Scott
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the ipk packages are just tar.gz files just gunzip and untar one and have a look at its structure. you will find a data.tar.gz inside which is just a tarball of the files in the directory structure they are to be extracted to and control.tar.gz contains a control file which is basically a manifest of the content of the package and there are also some optional post, pre scripts that can do some extra processing during install and uninstall. there is info about this out there. just google for it.
also, what albertr said is right, he just didn't say it in a very nice way. if you are a good developer, then you can develop code for any platform/environment, but you need to learn how to code first which is the difficult part that cannot be taught by a mere tutorial. tutorials are useful once you know the principles of programming and learned a programming language. simply saying you are a newbie doesn't cut it. programming is an art embedded in a science, not everyone is cut out for it and it takes time to master it. there are actually a lot of zaurus developers out there, they just dont speak english
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If I sounded too harsh, I'm sorry for that. I didn't mean to offense anyone. Nor to discourage any potential developers. But I've seen so many posts asking about basic things... In my experience they never amount to nothing.
If somebody asking help about specific issues, I can understand that, and I would be glad to help myself if I could. But just asking about being schooled out... in general? Do you really believe it would work out? Do you really think he/she understand what he/she is asking for?
My point was - if the people have ability and motivation, they would do their homework and learn it themself. They ain't need no goddamn school for that. It's just like if you want to make a donation - JUST DO IT. Donate the money, hardware, beer, etc. But don;t post a thread about
making donations in general. It just doesn't work.
Ok, sorry for venting out, I better shut up for now.
-albertr
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And my point is that sometimes people just don't know where to start. The ZUG site is great, but some of the stuff still assumes a higher level of knowledge.
I was thinking only of something really simple like a section of a website, with a few building blocks, starter lessons, tutorials and how tos, the basics that more advanced people get frustrated answering the questions to over and over again.
Even a recommended reading list or recommended site to visit list would be a help.
Sometimes all it takes are a few pointers in the right direction and sometimes some people take a little longer to work things out than others.
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Even a recommended reading list or recommended site to visit list would be a help.
Here's a great resource to use. I first used it to compile my very first kernel... but there's much more then that available. Try the on line tutorials... you can start where ever you feel comfortable:
http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/training/ (http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/training/)
Greg
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I'm a newbie developer.... but my code has been sitting ready to release for a while now.
I need to find out how to package it up... I can't really find any info on it.
I'm going to end up writing a shell script to install it and that seems kind of lame, but it *will* work.
:-<
Scott
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Maybe you should think about adding it to OE. Once it's in, rebuilding and packaging is a breeze
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Maybe you should think about adding it to OE. Once it's in, rebuilding and packaging is a breeze
Righto, and before everyone complains about that ruling out everything but OpenZaurus, let me reassure you that it would just take a couple of hours work from someone being interested enough to make OE build SharpROM + derived ROMs and pdaXrom compatible packages.
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There are many things one could do to contribute. One could work on making documentation for instance. Since I don't have programming skills, that's what I've been trying to do on elsix and on the wiki for zaurususergroup docs.
Once you rename the ipk to .gz or .tar or whatever it is, you'll find that everything inside is accessible to you. From there you can study its contents and how things are structured. Browse through your own Z and you'll see which directories that it needs for the various things.
Programming for the Z is pretty much the same as programming for linux afaik, except for the unique directories/locations that it wants things.
Good luck!
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I think the biggest problem for me has been converting from native development to cross-compiled embedded GUI. I've downloaded all the qt/qtopia/qte stuff and built them and all the examples on linux/x86. I find that cross-compiling is tricky because one package uses the binary from another, which is not x86, and thus doesn't work. You have to build twice, once native, save binaries, then again arm, and switch in binaries as required.
That said, I've been able to build command-line tools no problem, even submitted some applications ported to zaurus to ELSIX. But I still haven't created my first qtopia app for Z, with all the variants of ROMS, libraries and so on is not easy. I installed Guylhem's development kit and the example program doesn't build at all - not even compiles, let alone links and runs on Z! I'm not a batchelor with hours and hours to spend, but I'm not a total noob, but I want to write an app, not fiddle around with cross platform packages!
There are people here who are probably quite talented artists who could do some nice GUI work, with others being able and happy to do the backend stuff; the former could probably achieve a lot if it were simple to get them up and running.
Why could we not get a server set up with shell accounts for interested people, where the environment is ready made? When you have a complete working example which builds and runs, you can then compare it with a setup on your own machine? The examples would include "hello world" programs in a number of variants: command-line, ncurses, and a qtopia app.
Paul
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wow.. I'm getting more followups here than in the developer forum -- anyway, I didn't mean to get off topic so this will be my last off-topic post in this thread reagarding this topic... what I mean is -- I have a Qt program ready to do ... I can probably hack together some tar.gz of the code and/or even hack together some makefile that does an install and then make an ipk -- the part that I'm missing is probably trivial to old timer developers, but I seem to be not understanding it ... how do I set a path when compiling so that my program knows where the code will be once it's installed... and, how do I then test the code without installing it, etc.
ie: all my loads are defaulting to "." and/or file browser.. but how do I know if the user wants to put the code in /usr/local/blah or /usr/share/blah or /opt/blah -- etc. I think I'll just write a perl script since I'm comfortable with perl and sooner or later I'll figure this out.
Now, on to USEFUL stuff. I probably pestered Mickey a lot... about python (and pyqt) -- although I found python just too slow for my needs and I have since moved on to C++ (and Qt). I spent about 6 months reading books and now I've started to code and although I'm sure my code is embarassingly newbie-ish, it actually DOES something. You can see that I'm playing with scons, but I don't think I really need that if I already have qmake (although it is full python -- hell, I might as well use perl which I already KNOW and then just call qmake, etc).
If you are bored... if you want to help ... http://www.spy.org/tmp/bwb30.tar.gz (http://www.spy.org/tmp/bwb30.tar.gz)
I spent a lot of time on C++... I also want to try to do things that are useful -- so I want to make a texas hold'm (and blackjack trainer) and some stuff for pdaXrom (ntp settings?) etc.
The big issue with me is just time. I need to maximize my time. If you saw how bwb started, it is my third c++ program and only my second Qt program (see http://www.spy.org/tmp/gync.cpp (http://www.spy.org/tmp/gync.cpp) as my second c++/first Qt) ... so bwb grew from about 10 lines with trying to figure out how o use Qt to a project where I was mostly trying as many Qt widgets as I could cram into the program. Along the way, I made a little hinge checker class that I'll use in my other Zaurus projects.
Now, you ask, why so much rambling? Well, I write this code because it compiles on my desktop, runs on my desktop and also runs on my Zaurus. I don't know if this runs under Qtopia -- but eventually I may try to make my programs work under each. I know this works under pdaXrom, but that also probably limits its audience. The Zaurus world is small, but things like OE seem to maximize this smaller community. I, personally, have been lame and went with pdaXrom because I can run straight X stuff which increases my ability to get software. I have looked at wxWidgets (c++) but Qt seems very professional and I don't mind GPL at this point.
Scott
ps: spec, pdaXrom has a livecd and also I think an SDK cd... boot, compile. env is all there.
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Could a developer look at this book at amazon.com and let me know if it is a good resource for a brand spanking new programmer to be? The title is:
Embedded Linux: Hardware, Software, and Interfacing
by Craig Hollabaugh
Search for it on amazon and click on the "look inside this book" link. It shows how to make a developer/cross-compiler setup, has info on interfacing with serial, parallel, usb, and memory i/o, a hello world type example and some other practical examples. This looks good to me, but since I know very little about programming, I'm not sure this will get me up and running.
Any input from developers on whether this is a useful resource or not? Also, will programs cross-compiled for arm work with the SL-6000?
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Embedded Linux: Hardware, Software, and Interfacing
by Craig Hollabaugh
http://tinyurl.com/7l2ca (http://tinyurl.com/7l2ca)
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One of the barriers to "development" on the Zaurus is that there are different kinds of development. Are we talking kernel development? ROM development? Application development? And in each one of those categories there are subcategories -- for example there's console app development, Qt app development in C++, Qt app development in Python, X11 app development, GPE app development, etc.
For each group of developers there's a substantial collection of "tribal" knowledge that can be really hard for beginners to come by. Yes, it's possible for a motivated individual to pick up the knowledge they need on their own, but every hour they have to spend learning is one less hour they'll be able to spend developing. And one has to wonder how much time will they spend reinventing the wheel or wandering down dead-end trails?
The good news is that for each type of development there are some educational resources available and quite a few people willing to help. The bad news is that there are few higher level roadmaps. So the question an aspiring developer needs to ask is not "how do I learn Zaurus development" but "I want to create ________ for the Zaurus; where should I start?"
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Newbie developers should start by checking the ZUG FAQs...
There's a Programming topic in the Unofficial Zaurus FAQ which provides some good high-level overviews:
https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Programming (https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Programming)
The HOWTO links in the FAQ are dead (referring to the defunct docs.zaurus.com) but all the HOWTOs are mirrored on the ZUG. (Go to ZUG main page, look on left under "Zaurus Resources".) Here's a direct link to the "Developing HOWTO" page with lots of good info including: how to set-up the cross compiler, how to develop for Qt, **how to create IPKGs**, etc....
https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Developing (https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Developing)
This was all I had (and needed, for the most part) when I started developing. (Of course, I've been an SE for ~18 years and had familiarity with Linux and Unix, so YMMV.
These FAQs and HOWTOs have essentially served as Zaurus Development 101 for quite some time now. Apparently they've been forgotten by many.
~ray
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Programming for the Z is pretty much the same as programming for linux afaik, except for the unique directories/locations that it wants things.
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Only if the whole universe revolves around Qtopia, which it doesn't.
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Only if the whole universe revolves around
Qtopia, which it doesn't.
Well, that's right, there are plenty of alternative to Qtopia.
<mode rant=ON>
And IMHO this is the reason why, basically, the software suck on the Zaurus: too many different ROMs/interfaces, so people reinvent the wheel every other day. Choice is good, and it's a marvel to see how the Zaurus devices can be tweaked and customized to everyone's taste... but alas, it also means a serious lack of software when compared to the other PDA available (PalmOS, Symbian, PPC).
It's great to see that Sharp makes some efforts to provide a development solution (by sticking to Qtopia), but unfortunately not everyone loves Qtopia, and the Zaurus software has become so segmented that it's nothing more than a niche market on any given ROM/device...
There are almost no commercial (as in 'quality' vs. 'alpha/beta stage') applications. Where are the business tools (spreadsheets/wordprocessor/pdf)? Where are the simple and efficient PIM applications? The bundled applications are pretty much limited, and impressively slow to run even on the more recent Zauruses. Replacement PIM apps are available, sure, like KaPI/KoPI, but they are not faster than the original ones, and their complexity make them more suited to a big screen on a Linux laptop than on our tiny loved PDAs.
As mentioned earlier in this thread, there are quite a lot of FAQs and HOWTOs out there, but sadly a lot of material has become unreachable because Sharp stopped caring about the "rest of the world" (read: outside of Japan), and I suspect that a good deal of interesting things are in Japanese only...
But with some patience, everyone can find the right docs and pointers, and start coding simple Qtopia (or whatever interface you like) applications. It's not easy, not time-efficient to gather the docs first, but it can be done, and that's a good thing!
I'm seriously considering writing my own datebook application (because I have specific needs not handled by the available stuff, and because it's a great opportunity for me to try learning a new development environment), but it's a real shame to have to build your own tools yourself, because that means that most people (those without programing knowledge or skills) can't do that, and will be disappointed by the Zaurus, should they purchase one without thinking when they see such a beautiful piece of hardware...
<mode rant=OFF>
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I will add my .02.
I would like to develop for my Zaurus. (opie + 5600). My frustration with getting going on it is, the development docs that are out there. My current system that I have to work with is a HP Omnibook 6000 w/256mb ram and a 20GB HD (FC3). Now, reading the docs about using Bitbake, there is no way my system could handle that.
Now, what I have done is the following. I followed the setup instructions on http://opie.handhelds.org/cgi-bin/moin.cgi/DocsHowTo (http://opie.handhelds.org/cgi-bin/moin.cgi/DocsHowTo) and build opie on my laptop. It works and I can can write applications and use them under qvfb. What I am not sure about is what compiler to use to compile for the arm. Can I use 2.95? or should I build a cross-compiler for the arm from sources? What would be nice, IMO, if there was a current toolchain that I could download for compiling on the arm.
As to learning, the way I did it was get the sources, which I got from the link above, and went through some of the code. Compiled it, changed it and that way I got a feel for it.
Chuck
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I would like to develop for my Zaurus. (opie + 5600). My frustration with getting going on it is, the development docs that are out there. My current system that I have to work with is a HP Omnibook 6000 w/256mb ram and a 20GB HD (FC3). Now, reading the docs about using Bitbake, there is no way my system could handle that.
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Since a few weeks bitbake only uses 20MB for the package graph (instead of >1GB) and a typical build is about 6GB, so your laptop has a reasonable chance to build everything.
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The HOWTO links in the FAQ are dead (referring to the defunct docs.zaurus.com)
fixed
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I would like to develop for my Zaurus. (opie + 5600). My frustration with getting going on it is, the development docs that are out there. My current system that I
I would point you to raybert's reply:
https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Programming (https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Programming)
https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Developing (https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Developing)
both of which the links are now fixed
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And IMHO this is the reason why, basically, the software suck on the Zaurus: too many different ROMs/interfaces, so people reinvent the wheel every other day. Choice is good, and it's a marvel to see how the Zaurus devices can be tweaked and customized to everyone's taste... but alas, it also means a serious lack of software when compared to the other PDA available (PalmOS, Symbian, PPC).
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The same can be said for Linux on the desktop. If you're developing a Linux app, which distro do you target? Debian ... ok, which flavor -- pure (stable or unstable), Ubuntu, Morphix, Knoppix? Pure Debian -- do you go for stable or unstable? RedHat ... ok, Enterprise or Fedora Core (and which version of Fedora)? Got your distro figured out, great now which app framework? KDE, Gnome, Qt, WxWindows (or whatever they changed the name to), or something more basic like GTK or even straight X11? Which libraries is it safe to use? Which versions?
I'm not saying freedom of choice is bad (I'm very happy to have it) just that it comes with a high price (as most forms of freedom usually do). Windows and Mac developers have the luxury of a stable (in terms of rate of change) and well defined (you know that every single user will have a base set of libraries) target. If you bang out an OS X app following Apples's development guidelines, it's a pretty safe bet that every Mac owner in the world with your target version of OS X (or later) will be able to install and run it without difficulty. If you try to do the same for Linux you have to choose your target very carefully and even so it's unlikely you'll be compatible with more than 10% of the world's Linux boxes.
In the handheld world, the same is mostly true for Palm OS and Windows Mobile. The Linux mobile space is just as fragmented as the desktop and in fact the small number of Linux handhelds (relative to desktops) to begin with makes it even worse. If you're going to play in the Zaurus space you have to pick a camp and just accept the fact that your choice limits who can use what you develop. That's the very reason I've stayed with Sharp based ROMs despite the obvious technical superiority of solutions like OE. It's also why I try to use Python for app development whenever possible.
In the Linux world (desktop or handheld) there will never be "one ring to rule them all"
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http://www.qtopia.net/modules/developers/ (http://www.qtopia.net/modules/developers/)
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I've owned a Z now for three months, been trying to write a qtopia program for it for two. Last night I finally managed it!
Getting a working cross-compiler wasn't too hard - so I was able to build command-line programs, and even talk to the serial devices.
I downloaded and built the qtopia-x11 stuff on my desktop, so I felt I knew roughly how it worked.
Getting even the example program in the downloaded cross-built qtopia-1.5 stuff built wasn't trivial.. I had to manually hack the Makefile it autogenerated.
I've got a similar setup at work on another suse92 machine, but it won't build the example.
Now, what I wished I'd done was use the knoppix-based live CD.
Anyway, to end this rambling... I don't think of myself as an idiot, but it ain't trivial to get started with qt for Z. I suspect it's made much harder because any recent linux distro is based on much newer versions than the antique gcc-2.95 etc of the Z. I even tried creating a full 2.95 environment "chrooted", but quickly gave up.
It's a sad day when I have to admit two things: *IF* Palm survive long enough to start doing Palm-on-linux, and they do some up to date hardware, then I'm likely to go that way and drop the Z entirely. Secondly, I've realised I'm unlikely to stop using my palm t3, which is annoying as I was going to sell it to pay for all the Z accessories.
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Secondly, I've realised I'm unlikely to stop using my palm t3
Slightly off topic question from me, but why are you unlikely to stop using your palm? I had a zire and I couldn't get rid of it fast enough when I got my C1000.
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Secondly, I've realised I'm unlikely to stop using my palm t3
but why are you unlikely to stop using your palm? I had a zire and I couldn't get rid of it fast enough when I got my C1000.
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reasons to keep my T3
0) datebook5 (pimlico software) - I bought a license, it's a brilliant program, and so easy to use
1) games - I have a number of licensed games, and there's a huge choice
2) book readers - I have some DRM'd books I bought which seem to only work with PalmReader, er, eReader
3) trivial synchronisation
4) things just work
reasons I love my 860
0) the VGA display and the keyboard
1) the stability of the networking (bluetooth CF card problems aside)
3) its linux
4) serial, CF *and* SD slots
5) I can be arsed to learn to develop for it, but not for the palm
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things just work
As I grow older, I feel more and more that things should "just work". I factor this reason as the primary reason I ditched Windows and went Mac.
I love the hardware of the Sharp Zaurus a lot more than the software that runs on it. If Apple made a handtop computer, OQO sized perhaps, then I'll leave the Zaurus behind for it.
Despite all this, I see great promise in handheld Linux and things like OE, which is why I started this thread. I think we should encourage more developers and after reading all these posts, I still believe that by providing a central point that would allow total beginners to learn the skills from one place, rather than the "it's out there, just put some effort into finding it" mentality - more developers would be encouraged.
To be honest, the biggest failing I see with handheld linux isn't the operating system, it's the lack of decent goodies which run upon it. The average everyday user wants things that a developer doesn't. However, developers are often average everyday users that have made a leap. But if the general software isn't popular enough to make the hardware worth the effort (hence the failing of the 5500 in the UK, people thought it was fab for a PDA until they used the naff software and couldn't find anything decent to run on it).
Anyway this is all mixed in with another argument about how to make something popular enough for more people to have.
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I love the hardware of the Sharp Zaurus a lot more than the software that runs on it. If Apple made a handtop computer, OQO sized perhaps, then I'll leave the Zaurus behind for it.
I feel like purchasing a Mac mini to replace my current (old) PC for the same reason, but even if Apple made a OQO-sized handtop computer, I'm not sure I'd go that way. The reason is that different interfaces (small tactile screens vs. big displays and a real mouse and keyboard) call for different apps or interface, so there would still be the problem of available apps (even if those available would "just work", unlike what we have now).
Despite all this, I see great promise in handheld Linux and things like OE, which is why I started this thread. I think we should encourage more developers and after reading all these posts, I still believe that by providing a central point that would allow total beginners to learn the skills from one place, rather than the "it's out there, just put some effort into finding it" mentality - more developers would be encouraged.
I agree with you, it would be nice to have a single place to get started. Right now, you have to find some faqs here, download some SDK's there, browse this or that board's archive for previously asked similar questions, find out that the stuff you have downloaded doesn't work on your particular device or kernel version, hunt again, experiment... Granted, this will make you learn a whole lot of things along the way, and after spending two or three months doing that, having managed to collect a decent-sized bookmark list, you'll look like a guru to newer users, but you shouldn't have to do this.
The trick is: Palm or PalmOne (and of course Microsoft, or the Symbian group) can and do afford to spend considerable amount of time and money to maintain such "single stop" places where you can have it all. I'm not sure it would be worth (in a "what the company can earn vs. what it has to spend" sense) for Sharp to do the same. I mean, sure, easing the task for would-be developers (or simply for experienced developers on other platforms who want to port their apps on the Zaurus) would mean having much more applications available for the end user, but just look at the fact: the Zaurus sales are very restricted, geographically, and I don't think that with more apps the Zaurus would become even a serious competitor to Microsoft or Palm. Hell, Palm is more or less dying already, and the Zaurus is so much more confidential than PalmOne's PDAs...
So as much as I would love to see this, I won't hold my breath for Sharp to get as heavily involved in the development stuff as other PDA manufacturers.
This leaves only end users to try and do the same, but who's willing to donate the time and money required? Who has the skills to do this, anyway? 'Experienced developer' seems the minimum level required to get started on explaining things to other people, and it seems that the few experienced developers we have in the Zaurus arena already have their plates full, and very often not enough time to make their own apps grow as fast as they'd wish, so it seems unlikely they can afford to do much more than what is already done...
Anyway this is all mixed in with another argument about how to make something popular enough for more people to have.
Well, it's true that the two subjects are interdependant, anyway...
Maybe, instead of re-inventing the wheel (i.e. trying to create a Zaurus development specific website from scratch), we could try to improve the existing material? This kind of stuff cannot be a single man project, by essence (as I wrote earlier, only big companies have enough bucks and manpower for that), but if enough experienced and would-be developers were willing to bring some help, maybe the existing faqs and howto can be regularly updated, improved and refined so that someone who wants to get started does not have to retrace the history of Zaurus development to be able to program for his new toy?
I know that some here have multiple Zaurus devices simultaneously, but I only have a C3000, with a Sharp-based ROM (Cacko 3kb1), so there's a lot of things I cannot do because some stuff is specific to other devices or ROM... That being said, I'm willing to help - as time permits, as is the case for most if not all of us - if this can be useful. I have some limited (read: as a hobbyist, it's not my job and I have no diploma in that area) programming skills on other platforms (most recently on PalmOS), and I have succesfully installed the cross compilation toolchains on my Linux laptop (and the dev-image on the 3000 itself ). Hey, I was even able to build some of the examples provided with the SDK!
Who's in? Who wants to coordinate the effort? We'd need at the very least some help/advice from OE Forums moderators and specialists... and the start would probably be to try to track down most/all of the existing stuff before even thinking about adding new content!
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Well, I add things to the WIKI when I can.
I am often disappointed that the same old questions come up in the forums, people answer, but the answer's not put in the wiki. How many forum members actually do contribute to the wiki?
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How many forum members even know the wiki even exists?
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Despite all this, I see great promise in handheld Linux and things like OE, which is why I started this thread. I think we should encourage more developers and after reading all these posts, I still believe that by providing a central point that would allow total beginners to learn the skills from one place, rather than the "it's out there, just put some effort into finding it" mentality - more developers would be encouraged.
I agree with you, it would be nice to have a single place to get started.
<snip>
The trick is: Palm or PalmOne (and of course Microsoft, or the Symbian group) can and do afford to spend considerable amount of time and money to maintain such "single stop" places where you can have it all.
<snip>
This leaves only end users to try and do the same, but who's willing to donate the time and money required? Who has the skills to do this, anyway? 'Experienced developer' seems the minimum level required to get started on explaining things to other people, and it seems that the few experienced developers we have in the Zaurus arena already have their plates full, and very often not enough time to make their own apps grow as fast as they'd wish, so it seems unlikely they can afford to do much more than what is already done...
openembedded.org already has a wiki, feel free to add some more notes there about getting started using it. Although it may require an experienced developer to understand it all, they don't remember what they wanted/needed to learn to begin with (nor are they needed for these first steps) - what it really needs is for the new users to document their issues as these are far more pertinent to other would-be developers.
Si
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Maybe we should all learn Japanese. I have this feeling it would give us a whole new perspective on this Zaurus development thing. I'd really like to have an accurate picture of the state of Zaurus development in Japan. Does anybody know?
Felipe
P.S. Seriously, though, the people wanting to write commercial software for the Zaurus should at least team up with somebody who speaks Japanese and offer Japanese localization on their product.
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I don't think the Zaurus should be considered the do all and be all of linux hardware. I actually think the lack of linux haldheld hardware is a direct result of the lack of sufficient quality haldheld linux software and by this I don't mean the OS and the great work the developers have made with the OS, but lets face it, people buy a device for the apps, not the OS, most couldn't care less what distribution of the various linux ROMs were on their handheld, as long as it had the apps they wanted, and to be frank, embedded linux apps, suck. How long has it taken to get a decent PIM? and that ko/pa pi thing is all very well and good, but it's overkill for a hand held and the interface is just too clumsy, am sure it's great on a desktop or laptop with a big screen, but give me something with a clean, crisp looking appearance and decent functionality over a cluttered mess anyday. I've always said and will continue to say that handheld linux needs a decent word processor and spreadsheet and office package in general. The lack of emphasis on these as well as the lack of emphasis on core apps, is why everyone bought a windows or a palm pda when PDAs were the in thing. Now PDAs are dying out, just as handheld linux is trying to catch up.
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and to be frank, embedded linux apps, suck. How long has it taken to get a decent PIM? and that ko/pa pi thing is all very well and good, but it's overkill for a hand
I don't know, I'm perfectly happy with the sharp PIM as it synchs nicely with the palm desktop. There are a ton of PIMs in elsix and killefiz.
to say that handheld linux needs a decent word processor and spreadsheet and office package in general. The lack of emphasis on these as well as the lack of
I don't do a ton of writing on my Z, but when I do, I think hancom or textmaker is fine for writing. hancom reads my spreadsheets fine. As long as it gives me functionality, I dont mind living with certain limitations, like fancy fonts.
I'm quite happy that the Z has many more apps than your standard PDA does. AND I'm happy it's not at that standard 320x320 that most PDAs are. AND I'm happy it's not as slow as those ipaqs and such with windoze. Sure, there are apps that would be nice to have. I have a lot more functionality that I bargained for, like zbedic and nfdb and dmblogger, and so forth.
It's about the journey. And the fact that progress is being made everyday.
If you want the total functionality that windows apps has, then you're in the wrong device. Linux is about choice and not having to pay ms for everything. There are quite a number of devices on the windows side that will have everything you want - at a price of course.
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I don't know, I'm perfectly happy with the sharp PIM as it synchs nicely with the palm desktop.
Then you're a lucky guy, because I only managed to make it sync once... OTOH, I don't really need it to sync except for backup purposes, so I don't complain too much about that side of things. But syncing capabilities is certainly one area where Sharp didn't over-perform, especially considering that they changed the PIM database format on the most recent devices, and broke everything save the Windows/Intellisync solution, that isn't particularly rock-solid or foolproof.
There are a ton of PIMs in elsix and killefiz.
No, there are only a couple of alternatives, as far as datebook or addressbook are concerned. And nothing that meets my needs, anyway, whereas I could find other OSes and apps that can handle things like setting a background color for a given day depending on what's scheduled at that date, for instance. But like most other stuff out there for the Zaurus, a lot of those alternatives are generally not updated on a regular basis. (well, except for KDE/PIM, which is actively maintained, but which I do not consider very much PDA-oriented as it is platform-independant).
A quick search with the "PIM" keyword brings only two results on ELSI (of which only KDE/PIM is relevant), a bit more on killefiz but basically with two relevant apps, LDE/PIM and Zcalendar. This last one looks good, but has a very limited feature set (no sync, no beam, runs on 5600 only and hasn't been updated since v0.1 beta one year and a half ago).
A search with the "datebook" or "agenda" keyword doesn't return any find on ELSI, you have to "manually" search for "Qualendar", for instance, to find it there.
As far as address book is concerned, a search with the "Address" keyword returns two relevant entries in ELSI (opie-addressbook and tKcAddressBook), and of course there's still KA/PI.
All in all, we have only a few apps, not all of which are easily found even when searching ELSI or killefiz... I don't call this exactly "tons of PIMs"!
hancom reads my spreadsheets fine. As long as it gives me functionality, I dont mind living with certain limitations, like fancy fonts.
I like Hancom sheet too, except that with large files it becomes completely unusable (speed issue). Also, I've encountered a few bugs (couldn't copy a text cell into another, it seemed that the copy function would not work for that cell - not protected in any way, BTW), and one feature (or lack thereof) that disappointed me is that it is not able to save the "freeze panes" setting, so you have to get to the right cell, and activate that menu item every time you open your file. Otherwise, I think that spreadsheet/word processor is an area where the Zaurus performs better than the average Palm PDA!
I'm quite happy that the Z has many more apps than your standard PDA does.
Uh? More apps on the Zaurus than your standard PDA? I must have bought a different Zaurus, and different PDAs before...
AND I'm happy it's not as slow as those ipaqs and such with windoze.
Well, I've used an iPaq for a while before, and numerous PalmOS PDAs as well, and the Zaurus is by far the slowest when it comes to launching new apps, or actually using basic apps like the builtin datebook for instance. I don't want to get too deep into a (off topic) comparison of those platforms, but the software seems to be the biggest cause of the overall slowness, because the C3000 CPU is the fastest I've had on a PDA, and all my previous PDAs were faster in most reards... I mean, as a mini laptop, the Zaurus is a geek's dream come true, but as a PDA, well... it's quite far from the best thing available, and pretending otherwise is bordering to fanaticism!
And the fact that progress is being made everyday.
Yes, that's true. But essentially, as was noted before, progress is being made by individual during their freetime, which means that it's slow at best, and the obstacles for would-be programmers are sometimes discouraging... By the time your favorite application reaches maturity, unfortunately, most people will have switched to another Zaurus (we're a bunch of geeks, and most of us can't resist the urge to buy the latest and fastets gizmos, can we? ) or another OS. That's why making it easier for the developers would be a good idea - in an end-user perspective!
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No, there are only a couple of alternatives, as far as datebook or addressbook are
The "categories" on the left side, one of which is PIM probably fits what you're interested in.
other OSes and apps that can handle things like setting a background color for a given day depending on what's scheduled at that date, for instance. But like most
That sounds like the tkc apps would suit you. http://thekompany.com/embedded/ (http://thekompany.com/embedded/)
A search with the "datebook" or "agenda" keyword doesn't return any find on ELSI, you have to "manually" search for "Qualendar", for instance, to find it there.
all those searches are probably not needed. Just choose browse and look through what's in the category PIM. I'd probably suggest killefiz for that, as it's easier to see initially.
too, except that with large files it becomes completely unusable (speed issue). Also, I've encountered a few bugs (couldn't copy a text cell into another, it seemed that the copy function would not work for that cell - not protected in any way, BTW), and one feature (or lack thereof) that disappointed me is that it is not able to save the
I believe there was another app that clones excel stuff, I don't recall as I wasn't interested. I could browse at some point and do a look see later.
A few of the apps I use is here:
https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Applic...6000L/Sharp_ROM (https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Applications_that_run_on_the_6000L/Sharp_ROM)
I haven't said much about it, as I'm still working on the page.
well, and the Zaurus is by far the slowest when it comes to launching new apps, or
There is always fast load ...
as a mini laptop, the Zaurus is a geek's dream come true, but as a PDA, well... it's quite far from the best thing available, and pretending otherwise is bordering to
Depends what you're looking for, of course. Once guylhem is done with his rom (if he ever gets the time), the 6K will be able to launch things much faster. Also, depending upon where you install your stuff, it may be slow or fast. Stuff on the SD will be slower of course. Especially if you put /home and everything there.
(we're a bunch of geeks, and most of us can't resist the urge to buy the latest and fastets gizmos, can we? ) or another OS. That's why making it easier for the developers would be a good idea - in an end-user perspective!
When zaurus.com was taken down, it was a big setback for many of us, as well as when killefiz got tired of maintaining his site. However, I think you'll find that some momentum is building again, as the resources that were scattered are slowly being revived and put together. As an example, I find myself almost daily updating things on elsix. Whether it's repairing dead links, or updating file versions, or whatever, it's getting better. As well as the howtos that I'm trying to work with.
The issue has been raised that it was hard to find developer information -- that's now been partially resolved, by relinking a few things, and putting a few things together. All it took was for the issue to be raised ...
I think you'll find that of the various 'toys' out there, the Z is not that bad. All the effort put in here won't be wasted either, as other new toys, such as the Nokia 770 will also run linux.
I should mention that as I've been updating elsix and such, I've noticed newer versions of the same apps that I've been using. This is an almost daily thing that's been happening. I find that very exciting.
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I dont understand what people are trying to do here
We have a wiki
we have a development team (pdaxrom, open zaurus, cacko)
i started posting in forums of a theme gallery and also wallpapers for the z
so whats the problem?
hey on a diff. note, have you seen palms lifedrive?
bluetooth
wifi
4gb hardrive.
next year its gona be linux os
even after reading about this, i decided to still buy a c1000
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i started posting in forums of a theme gallery and also wallpapers for the z
That reminds me. I added you to elsix:
http://elsix.org/index.php?w=project&p=zaurusthemes (http://elsix.org/index.php?w=project&p=zaurusthemes)
hey on a diff. note, have you seen palms lifedrive?
I hear it's slow
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I dont understand what people are trying to do here
The original point of my original post was:
It's hard to develop for the Zaurus or handheld linux in general, most people don't know where to start.
It would be nice to have some webspace dedicated to teaching people how to start, with baby steps, the A B C of the linux development perhaps.
OK, it has been pointed out that there is a lot of info out there and that people only have to look. BUT, that said, lots of people don't know what to look for, a lot of resources online, the wiki included assume a level of knowledge that some people just do not have.
To use an analogy. A lot of people are like preschoolers when it comes to Linux and development. How can you expect a preschooler to understand something a graduate can understand, without teaching them the steps in between? I find a lot of the technical posts cater for people with graduate level knowledge and the preschoolers are left wondering what the hell is going on.
There a lot of bright people on here, to whom certain people's lack of a knowledge is met with scorn, derision and a "go and search for it mentality" and this is counter productive.
A lot of people learn better by instruction, than by being told the information is out there, find it. If there were some structured, learning resources for the zaurus or handheld linux in general, I feel that people would ask less on the forums.
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understand, without teaching them the steps in between? I find a lot of the technical posts cater for people with graduate level knowledge and the preschoolers are left wondering what the hell is going on.
this discussion alone has helped me a lot, people have pointed out resources that I didn't find before.
qtopia.net has been pretty useful; although there are broken links. It does actually start from scratch, so as long as you know how to download and install an RPM, you can get going. The error messages from qt are not very helpful (and I've found myself using "strace" to discover what it was trying to do when it throws an error).
I've made great leaps forward since discovering the discussion on qtopia.net about the "qvfb" program, which I didn't know about, and didn't exist in what I'd built before, and I'd been trying to get the linux kernel virtual frame buffer (experimental stuff, which simply corrupted the screen!). I can now run and test the program on x86 which makes life MUCH faster than copying it over to the Z every time.
Maybe I simply had overly high expectations about how straightforward it should be, I kind of assumed I'd just download a cross compiler and the right version of QT, but no... there's three different types of QT - qtopia, qt-e, qt-x11, each of which has many versions, you've got to get the right combination etc etc.
Maybe I should have gone OpenEmbedded, those guys have bitten the bullet, it seems, and made a complete toolchain rather than the patchwork above.
I was very close to giving up QT and going down the java or python route. If that hadn't worked, the Z would have gone on ebay
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I dont understand what people are trying to do here
The original point of my original post was:
It's hard to develop for the Zaurus or handheld linux in general, most people don't know where to start.
[div align=\"right\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
(http://index.php?act=findpost&pid=85583\")
[a href=\"http://handhelds.org]http://handhelds.org[/url] would be a good (and obvious ) place to start
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qtopia.net has been pretty useful; although there are broken links. It does actually
actually, if you look at the link itself, many of them are almost correct.
For example:
http://www.qtopia.net/%22http://www.handhe...z/wiki/iPKG/%22 (http://www.qtopia.net/%22http://www.handhelds.org/z/wiki/iPKG/%22)
Which should have been:
http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/Ipkg (http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/Ipkg)
This error occurred when they went to the new wiki. If you find a broken link, use the same name of the wiki, in this case: "ipkg"
For your convenience, I've placed a few of the links you probably are interested in:
http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/BuildIpkg (http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/BuildIpkg)
http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/BuildingIpkgs (http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/BuildingIpkgs)
http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/BuildingIpkgsFor5600 (http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/BuildingIpkgsFor5600)
http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/IpkgFeeds (http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/IpkgFeeds)
http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/IpkgTodo (http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/IpkgTodo)
http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/MaintainingIpkgFeeds (http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/MaintainingIpkgFeeds)
Hope this helps
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http://handhelds.org (http://handhelds.org) would be a good (and obvious ) place to start
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85591\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
not for Sharp ROM, yes for ipaq/X11 type stuff?
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http://handhelds.org (http://handhelds.org) would be a good (and obvious ) place to start
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85591\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
not for Sharp ROM, yes for ipaq/X11 type stuff?
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85599\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
see previous message (I was writing it while you wrote yours)
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I dont understand what people are trying to do here
The original point of my original post was:
It's hard to develop for the Zaurus or handheld linux in general, most people don't know where to start.
[div align=\"right\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
(http://index.php?act=findpost&pid=85583\")
[a href=\"http://handhelds.org]http://handhelds.org[/url] would be a good (and obvious ) place to start
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85591\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
The Zaurus, Open Embedded, Open Zaurus don't even feature on the home page. I have been to that site, again a lot of the content assumes a higher level than beginner knowledge.
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I agree with the last comment. Comming from a Windows / OS/2 development environment mostly in Pascal / Delphi I find Linux development realy taxing. The starting point is usualy something like.. now you have compiled your xyz you can now start to install the IDE.... once you have completed this now install the cross compiler and dance round the computer three times clockwise with your Z taped to your forehead. Which for anyone who hasnt done this before is somewhat over thir heads.
I seem to have seen a bootable CD in the past for development would this be a good starting point for new developers. This would need some documentation on the how to build your first app. with sample code if possable. Im sure lots of the old hands have quite alot of examples of old code kicking about that would help out here. This is one reason that MS has taken off... You done need to be a good programmer to be productive and develop working apps as the IDE is easy to pickup and there are lots of examples to get you going.
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http://handhelds.org (http://handhelds.org) would be a good (and obvious ) place to start
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85591\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
not for Sharp ROM, yes for ipaq/X11 type stuff?
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85599\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
It says: Open Source for handhelds, and the sharp stuff is far from opensource
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I agree with the last comment. Comming from a Windows / OS/2 development environment mostly in Pascal / Delphi I find Linux development realy taxing. The starting point is usualy something like.. now you have compiled your xyz you can now start to install the IDE.... once you have completed this now install the cross compiler and dance round the computer three times clockwise with your Z taped to your forehead. Which for anyone who hasnt done this before is somewhat over thir heads.
craigtyson, for the record, this isn't directed at you in particular, but more at the general attitude of this thread.
I don't understand where comments like this are coming from. I've been programming for ~25 years -- 18 professionally -- and I've had to learn many new platforms during that time. Every platform takes some time and effort to get up to speed on. In the grand scheme of things, developing for the Z and getting up to speed on it isn't any more difficult than any other platform. All the same basic concepts are there in a very similar form as on any other platform.
I wonder if what's happening here is that folks who know one platform have simply forgotten how long and how much effort it took to get up to speed on it. To use craigtyson as an example (and, again, not to single him out or anything), it surely must have taken you some significant time to get up to speed on the platforms you mentioned (Windows, OS/2, Delphi). You're now trying to move to a new environment that is more than just a new set of tools: unix is very different in some ways than Windows and OS/2. You can't expect to learn that overnight. Think back to your early days in Windows and OS/2 and ask yourself if you can honestly say that learning Z development has really been that much more difficult. I seriously doubt it.
And frankly, anyone who isn't already an accomplished developer on at least some platform has no reason whatsoever to expect this to be easy; and no amount of documentation in the world is going to change that. Those who want to do must invest the time and effort to learn the necessary skills and there's simply no way around that. Those who are developers had to deal with the same learning curve and often times had *fewer* resources to help them (the late-comers always have an advantage w.r.t. resources for learning).
Complicating this particular situation is the fact that this is a strictly volunteer community. No one is getting paid to write documentation and organize it for you to make your efforts easier or develop tools for same. And, since Sharp bowed-out (and even before, some might say), there has been no company with an incentive to pay folks for those things (Trolltech is the probably the only exception, but their hands are tied somewhat by Sharp's proprietary stuff). The developers and volunteers that are active can barely keep up with the stuff that *they* want to do and it's unrealistic to expect anything more out of them.
And the fact of the matter is that the information IS out there. If you want it you merely need to help yourself to it. And I can tell you with some confidence that this situation isn't likely to change any time soon.
It is true that if we had some better resources we would probably attract more developers. And it's also true that other organizations do have those resources and as a result fare better in terms of number of developers and their output. But those organizations also have one thing that we don't: a sugardaddy. (And it should be noted that the support of a sugardaddy is far from altruistic. They do it only to increase their own bottom line; a far cry from the motivations of a volunteer community.) Even when Sharp was supporting us, they put very little into it.
Frankly I think it's amazing what this community has accomplished with so little support. And it's largely for that reason that I tend to regard complainers with some disdain. This community didn't accomplish what it has by being negative and bitter about every little issue. It approached issues with a positive attitude, learned to help itself and made the best of what it had. That's the only road to success.
Sorry for the rant, but it had to be said...
... This is one reason that MS has taken off... You done need to be a good programmer to be productive and develop working apps as the IDE is easy to pickup and there are lots of examples to get you going.
I can't help responding to this one also....
Do you really think this is a good thing?? I, for one, would prefer to use software that's written by competent programmers. If what you say is true, then this probably accounts for the all the crappy, bloated Windows-ware that abounds. (In fairness, there is lots of good Windows-ware also.)
~ray
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Frankly I think it's amazing what this community has accomplished with so little support. And it's largely for that reason that I tend to regard complainers with some disdain. This community didn't accomplish what it has by being negative and bitter about every little issue. It approached issues with a positive attitude, learned to help itself and made the best of what it had. That's the only road to success.
I agree that what has been accomplished has been amazing
This thread wasn't started as a complaint, in places it has sounded like one, I'll admit.
The general aim of this thread, when I started it, was to suggest that a starting point for people who wanted to develop was set up in order to encourage more people to learn how to develop and hopefully increase the number of developers.
One of the reasons why I suggested setting up a "school" was because I believe that being taught the basic principles is better than going out and finding them. Being taught them saves time and hopefully encourages people to use a common starting point and standard.
The things I learnt best and with greater thoroughness were instructor led, teacher led, classes. I achieved more in less time than through self study. I will admit many self studiers are out there, who want to learn something and spend ages finding all they need and learning that way, but the vast majority of people learn through instruction and that was the aim and point of this thread, to encourage some central point of instruction, basic lessons and encouragement for development.
I know it's out there if people can be bothered to look for it, but why make it that difficult for people, but be obstructive? If it's in one place, easy to learn the basics, more people will be encouraged. If people have to google everything that they have to learn, most people will be put off from even trying.
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I agree with the last comment. Comming from a Windows / OS/2 development environment mostly in Pascal / Delphi I find Linux development realy taxing. The starting point is usualy something like.. now you have compiled your xyz you can now start to install the IDE.... once you have completed this now install the cross compiler and dance round the computer three times clockwise with your Z taped to your forehead. Which for anyone who hasnt done this before is somewhat over thir heads.
craigtyson, for the record, this isn't directed at you in particular, but more at the general attitude of this thread.
I don't understand where comments like this are coming from. I've been programming for ~25 years -- 18 professionally -- and I've had to learn many new platforms during that time. Every platform takes some time and effort to get up to speed on. In the grand scheme of things, developing for the Z and getting up to speed on it isn't any more difficult than any other platform. All the same basic concepts are there in a very similar form as on any other platform.
I wonder if what's happening here is that folks who know one platform have simply forgotten how long and how much effort it took to get up to speed on it. To use craigtyson as an example (and, again, not to single him out or anything), it surely must have taken you some significant time to get up to speed on the platforms you mentioned (Windows, OS/2, Delphi). You're now trying to move to a new environment that is more than just a new set of tools: unix is very different in some ways than Windows and OS/2. You can't expect to learn that overnight. Think back to your early days in Windows and OS/2 and ask yourself if you can honestly say that learning Z development has really been that much more difficult. I seriously doubt it.
Having also done a fair bit of development on epoc Im able to compare tools and not everyone has a manweek to spend setting up a system to develop for the Z. Hence the query about a cd distro with all the tools/doc/examples ready to go.
And frankly, anyone who isn't already an accomplished developer on at least some platform has no reason whatsoever to expect this to be easy; and no amount of documentation in the world is going to change that. Those who want to do must invest the time and effort to learn the necessary skills and there's simply no way around that. Those who are developers had to deal with the same learning curve and often times had *fewer* resources to help them (the late-comers always have an advantage w.r.t. resources for learning).
Well I used to develop in machine code on Z80s but if your saying I can use those skills to deveolp on the Z then Im afraid it dont work. Most folks dont have 20 od years as a professional programmer. And alot of applications dont need 20 years of experience to code unless the implication is that to develop anything on the Z you require months of free time to get the simplest application running or need 20 years of experience to fully understand and decode the Z compexities.
Complicating this particular situation is the fact that this is a strictly volunteer community. No one is getting paid to write documentation and organize it for you to make your efforts easier or develop tools for same. And, since Sharp bowed-out (and even before, some might say), there has been no company with an incentive to pay folks for those things (Trolltech is the probably the only exception, but their hands are tied somewhat by Sharp's proprietary stuff). The developers and volunteers that are active can barely keep up with the stuff that *they* want to do and it's unrealistic to expect anything more out of them.
And the fact of the matter is that the information IS out there. If you want it you merely need to help yourself to it. And I can tell you with some confidence that this situation isn't likely to change any time soon.
It is true that if we had some better resources we would probably attract more developers. And it's also true that other organizations do have those resources and as a result fare better in terms of number of developers and their output. But those organizations also have one thing that we don't: a sugardaddy. (And it should be noted that the support of a sugardaddy is far from altruistic. They do it only to increase their own bottom line; a far cry from the motivations of a volunteer community.) Even when Sharp was supporting us, they put very little into it.
Frankly I think it's amazing what this community has accomplished with so little support. And it's largely for that reason that I tend to regard complainers with some disdain. This community didn't accomplish what it has by being negative and bitter about every little issue. It approached issues with a positive attitude, learned to help itself and made the best of what it had. That's the only road to success.
Sorry for the rant, but it had to be said...
Wasnt complaining.. I too belive that the Z comunity has done some incredible work. What this post is about is how to help beginers get up to speed quickly so they can do the programing that makes their app work and develop the idea rather than spending the time doing what has been done before.
... This is one reason that MS has taken off... You done need to be a good programmer to be productive and develop working apps as the IDE is easy to pickup and there are lots of examples to get you going.
I can't help responding to this one also....
Do you really think this is a good thing?? I, for one, would prefer to use software that's written by competent programmers. If what you say is true, then this probably accounts for the all the crappy, bloated Windows-ware that abounds. (In fairness, there is lots of good Windows-ware also.)
I have to agree there are lots of windows apps that suck. Lots of them professionaly writen too. But if the application has been developed in a half decent environment with the right tools its more dificult for the uninitiated to make a hash out of the project no. Im not talking bells and whistles here just a good solid RAD / IDE which dosnt require a phd to get up and running.
~ray
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I'll throw in my 2 cents here....
Sorry, folks. The trend in programming is *not* going to be to create low-level stuff from scratch in which you need three months just to compile "Hello World". The trend in programming *is* going to be high-level languages that allow "beginners" to create what they want easier. I'm sorry to all Microsquish detractors, but you aren't going to convince me to, say, write hardcore XML text processors using C++ code, makefiles, several days, etc. when Microsquish has .NET modules that allow me to write four or five lines of code in 10 minutes.
The easy way of course to do XML processing on the Z is Python, and Python's pretty good for other things along those lines. Now Python isn't as RAD as what the folks at Borland did for Pascal and what the Microsoft folks have done for now many languages with .NET, and I honestly think the language is a bit clumsy compared to C++ and the RAD langauges above. But I thought Python was the best hope for a RAD Sharp Z development environment. Alas, the GUIs for Python seemed very blah, even commercial ones liked Blackadder seemed remarkably clumsy with limited good tools for beginners.
If you want to develop in C++ for the Zaurus, it seems like I had to go through a lot of hunting and pecking just to find best development environment practices. Like a lot for the Z, dead links abound. It got frustrating for a while and in the end, hell I didn't care too much. Most of what I need for the Z, I already had. To develop apps on the Z seemed more troublesome than it seemed to be worth, just because it wasn't easy. If someone is ticked off that someone has this attitude (and I'm no programming slouch), sorry. But my time is valuable and I'm not going to waste it hacking away when I can have fun elsewhere and find alternate solutions for my needs.
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lot for the Z, dead links abound. It got frustrating for a while and in the end, hell I
seriously, when someone finds a dead link it really really helps if someone says something.
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The trend in programming *is* going to be high-level languages that allow "beginners" to create what they want easier.
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I have yet to figure out why most folks that want to develop for the Zaurus immediately dive down into C/C++. Development costs (in terms of time and effort) are always high in compiled languages. That cost can be justified when you're doing OS or library development, but for apps, it's often overkill.
Solutions like Python and Ruby let you avoid the whole cross-development challenge. As long as you're cognizant of the limitations of the Zaurus, you can develop natives apps on the desktop that will run just as well on the Zaurus. You can even achieve some degree of cross-ROM portability that you can't get with C/C++ development since all the major ROMs need a different cross-development environment.
Is it just that people don't know about the higher level development solutions? Or is it that lots of folks are using them but since it's so much easier we don't hear from them?
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The trend in programming *is* going to be high-level languages that allow "beginners" to create what they want easier.
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85714\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
I have yet to figure out why most folks that want to develop for the Zaurus immediately dive down into C/C++. Development costs (in terms of time and effort) are always high in compiled languages. That cost can be justified when you're doing OS or library development, but for apps, it's often overkill.
Solutions like Python and Ruby let you avoid the whole cross-development challenge. As long as you're cognizant of the limitations of the Zaurus, you can develop natives apps on the desktop that will run just as well on the Zaurus. You can even achieve some degree of cross-ROM portability that you can't get with C/C++ development since all the major ROMs need a different cross-development environment.
Is it just that people don't know about the higher level development solutions? Or is it that lots of folks are using them but since it's so much easier we don't hear from them?
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Yet another reason why a "school" for developers would be a good idea, would point people down the right path at the beginning... ;-)
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OK id suscribe to that. What do we need then to provide / promote a high level language school for the Z?
A CD distro for the PC with tools ?
A HowTo for yxz on Z ?
A library of code stubs / framework apps for yxz on Z ?
What else ?
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A CD distro for the PC with tools ?
Not a CD, but http://oe.handhelds.org/cgi-bin/moin.cgi/GettingStarted (http://oe.handhelds.org/cgi-bin/moin.cgi/GettingStarted) is really rather easy to follow and if you do follow it you will have all the tools you need.
A library of code stubs / framework apps for yxz on Z ?
Choose an app from the openembedded packages (there's lots in there >2000 iirc), run 'bitbake <package-name>, see if it does what you think it should, if not look at the source code which will be in your work directory. Easy enough - certainly plenty of example apps .
Modifying or creating something new based on it is as easy as copying/renaming the .bb file (recipe) and placing the source somewhere in a tarball. Again this is documented on the website (and if it's not clear enough, then please modify it/speak up to make it clearer, etc.)
A HowTo for yxz on Z ?
Generally speaking, programming for the Z is no different to programming for Linux - there are books and courses for this kind of thing (and as a Windows programmer there was a general learning curve moving to Linux, but it wasn't that hard with a bit of patience & perseverance), not to mention the web in all its glory - do some googling.
Si
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A CD distro for the PC with tools ?
Not a CD, but http://oe.handhelds.org/cgi-bin/moin.cgi/GettingStarted (http://oe.handhelds.org/cgi-bin/moin.cgi/GettingStarted) is really rather easy to follow and if you do follow it you will have all the tools you need.
I have read this before and didnt find it left me with any confidence that I would have a development environment anytime soon. This takes me back to my original point I can use epoc tools or windows tools and have an application or utility put together in hours or I can spend the same time starting to setup a development area for the Z which needs perl / python / compilers / an intimate knowlage of other bits to get the framework installed before any development can start.
A library of code stubs / framework apps for yxz on Z ?
Choose an app from the openembedded packages (there's lots in there >2000 iirc), run 'bitbake <package-name>, see if it does what you think it should, if not look at the source code which will be in your work directory. Easy enough - certainly plenty of example apps .
Modifying or creating something new based on it is as easy as copying/renaming the .bb file (recipe) and placing the source somewhere in a tarball. Again this is documented on the website (and if it's not clear enough, then please modify it/speak up to make it clearer, etc.)
Im not qualified to comment as I dont have the manhours to spare to investigate.
A HowTo for yxz on Z ?
Generally speaking, programming for the Z is no different to programming for Linux - there are books and courses for this kind of thing (and as a Windows programmer there was a general learning curve moving to Linux, but it wasn't that hard with a bit of patience & perseverance), not to mention the web in all its glory - do some googling.
Si
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If you want a refreshing view on development, check http://www.maemo.org (http://www.maemo.org) and http://nokia770.com/ (http://nokia770.com/) . It features a sane development platform, testing tools, a live-cd created by users and OpenEmbedded integration before the product even launched.
We'll just have to see how well the 770 sells and how the community evolves, but I for one have faith in it.
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I have read this before and didnt find it left me with any confidence that I would have a development environment anytime soon. This takes me back to my original point I can use epoc tools or windows tools and have an application or utility put together in hours or I can spend the same time starting to setup a development area for the Z which needs perl / python / compilers / an intimate knowlage of other bits to get the framework installed before any development can start.
For one thing, the learning curve for EPOC C++ is significantly steeper than for Linux Qtopia C++ IMHO, if you can learn all of that in a couple of hours then well done .
Yes, it takes a while for OE to build its toolchain, (this does get around the issues of GPL and having to provide source for the toolchain on request) but once you've installed a few RPMs and grabbed the BB code and OE meta-data it really is as simple as issuing 'bitbake <some-package>' and all the deps (which will include the toolchain for the first build) will be generated for you automatically - that said, after looking at the links on koen's post I think creating a live CD with a pre-built toolchain and perhaps just a plain pre-built toolchain too would also be a good idea.
You also don't need the intimate knowledge you speak of - you do need to install these apps, but their use is largely hidden from the user.
Si
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IIRC, the http://www.nslu2-linux.org/ (http://www.nslu2-linux.org/) people are planning to have such a live cd, and allready have a frontend for OE, so you just type 'make' and out rolls your flashable firmware image after a few hours and a few gigs of diskspace.
Adapting that for the zaurus (or any other machine) requires: editing the conf and changing 2 parameters (DISTRO and MACHINE) and set another path to the metadata (nslu2 uses symlinks to part of the data, and you'd want everything).
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OK id suscribe to that. What do we need then to provide / promote a high level language school for the Z?
A CD distro for the PC with tools ?
A HowTo for yxz on Z ?
A library of code stubs / framework apps for yxz on Z ?
What else ?
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85786\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
At one point I considered putting together some kind of "Zaurus Python Programming Guide" but I haven't even been able to find the time to finish and release other projects that are much farther along, let alone start a new one.
Perhaps the best way to actually see such a project completed would be for someone who is actually going through the learning process to correspond with experienced developers and document what they learn as they go. Such an approach has two advantages. One is that it's much easier for developers to find time to answer a handful of specific questions every day than to sit down and rediscover and organize their knowledge. The other is that such a guide written by a newbie rather than a multi-year veteran is far more likely to capture the knowledge that other newbies need in a way they're actually likely to understand
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I'm not a developer, just a hobbyist. My experience writing programs for the Zaurus and, more to the point, compiling Linux apps for the Zaurus, is that there is very little difference in programming for the Zaurus and programming for Linux.
EXCEPT....
for the GUI part. The problem is not the Zaurus, the problem is Qt. I guess experienced Qt programmers would have no problem moving to the Zaurus, but learning Qt is the hard part. I confess I never quite managed, although I didn't try very hard. Once I got X/Qt running on my Zaurus and could run my Tcl/Tk programs with minimal changes, I lost the motivation to figure out Qt.
Felipe
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I'm not a developer, just a hobbyist. My experience writing programs for the Zaurus and, more to the point, compiling Linux apps for the Zaurus, is that there is very little difference in programming for the Zaurus and programming for Linux.
EXCEPT....
for the GUI part. The problem is not the Zaurus, the problem is Qt. I guess experienced Qt programmers would have no problem moving to the Zaurus, but learning Qt is the hard part. I confess I never quite managed, although I didn't try very hard. Once I got X/Qt running on my Zaurus and could run my Tcl/Tk programs with minimal changes, I lost the motivation to figure out Qt.
Felipe
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This points out another problem: not everybody uses QT on his handheld device. And not every handheld is a zaurus.
The 'ease' of development depends on the target platform. The people wanting to develop for the original sharp image will face the toughest challenge. The lucky people are the users of OZ or pdaX
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qtopia.net has been pretty useful; although there are broken links.
hmm.. where are these broken links??
PM me and I wil fix them.
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Like I said before, if I knew then what I know now, I'd not have gone the download-tools, I would have gone for a "live cd" boot:
http://www.pellicosystems.com/demolinux/zdemolinux/ (http://www.pellicosystems.com/demolinux/zdemolinux/)
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The general aim of this thread, when I started it, was to suggest that a starting point for people who wanted to develop was set up in order to encourage more people to learn how to develop and hopefully increase the number of developers.
I agree that would be a fine thing. My main point though was that I think such a thing already exists in the form of the ZUG FAQs and HOWTOs. I'll admit though that it is not the best organization one could imagine. If someone has the time to make improvements on that it would certainly be very worthwhile.
One of the reasons why I suggested setting up a "school" was because I believe that being taught the basic principles is better than going out and finding them. Being taught them saves time and hopefully encourages people to use a common starting point and standard.
The things I learnt best and with greater thoroughness were instructor led, teacher led, classes. I achieved more in less time than through self study. I will admit many self studiers are out there, who want to learn something and spend ages finding all they need and learning that way, but the vast majority of people learn through instruction and that was the aim and point of this thread, to encourage some central point of instruction, basic lessons and encouragement for development.
Well, this is a philosophical thing, of course. I've personally always favored self-study and I wanted to promote that idea here. I think there are many advantages to it, such as the ability to work at your own speed and the ability to concentrate on the areas that you're most interested in, but probably the main advantage is that it makes one self-sufficient. I think that is a powerful advantage in a circumstance likes ours where the community just doesn't have the resources to provide much more than it already does (especially given the variety of directions that one could go in; i.e. platforms, languages, etc.).
Someone suggested looking to Linux books and classes and that is probably a great idea for those who are not already very linux/unix knowledgable.
OTOH, great things can happen sometimes when someone has the initiative to push for something new, and I hope that turns out to be the case here.
~ray
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I've personally always favored self-study and I wanted to promote that idea here. I think there are many advantages to it, such as the ability to work at your own speed and the ability to concentrate on the areas that you're most interested in ...
So how about a combination of the two and setting up an organised mentoring programme.
Something like, beginner posts his current level, and future interests ... experienced developer agrees to help direct their efforts.
We could develop some kind of framework through which each party is happy that they are not wasting each other's time.
Clearly it would only work if people approached it in the right spirit ...
Mike.
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And frankly, anyone who isn't already an accomplished developer on at least some platform has no reason whatsoever to expect this to be easy; and no amount of documentation in the world is going to change that. Those who want to do must invest the time and effort to learn the necessary skills and there's simply no way around that. Those who are developers had to deal with the same learning curve and often times had *fewer* resources to help them (the late-comers always have an advantage w.r.t. resources for learning).
Well I used to develop in machine code on Z80s but if your saying I can use those skills to deveolp on the Z then Im afraid it dont work.
I've nevered worked on Z80s (I was more of a 6502 guy) but I'm not convinced that there aren't elements of your experience with them that aren't applicable to development on the Z or on a modern desktop, etc. There are a set of core principals that apply to all programming environments and I believe that once a person has a solid grasp on those that picking-up a new environment is just a matter of learning the specifics of it. To put it another way, the concepts are mostly the same, only the names have been changed.
Most folks dont have 20 od years as a professional programmer. And alot of applications dont need 20 years of experience to code unless the implication is that to develop anything on the Z you require months of free time to get the simplest application running or need 20 years of experience to fully understand and decode the Z compexities.
I mentioned my experience only as an attempt to establish my credentials to speak to this subject, not to imply that one needed that much experience to get anything done on the Z (or on any other platform, for that matter). I was attempting to address some comments (and I don't recall who said them) that appeared to be complaining that one had to already be a developer to understand the materials that are out there. My point being that this is in fact true to a large extent and it shouldn't be a surprise to anyone! Learning to develop is not an easy thing regardless of the platform one chooses to start on and regardless of the resources one has available (more resources can make it easier but it still requires a commitment of time and effort). Once you have trained yourself, learning future platforms should be much easier. The point is simply to not have unrealistic expectations.
... This is one reason that MS has taken off... You done need to be a good programmer to be productive and develop working apps as the IDE is easy to pickup and there are lots of examples to get you going.
I can't help responding to this one also....
Do you really think this is a good thing?? I, for one, would prefer to use software that's written by competent programmers. If what you say is true, then this probably accounts for the all the crappy, bloated Windows-ware that abounds. (In fairness, there is lots of good Windows-ware also.)
I have to agree there are lots of windows apps that suck. Lots of them professionaly writen too. But if the application has been developed in a half decent environment with the right tools its more dificult for the uninitiated to make a hash out of the project no. Im not talking bells and whistles here just a good solid RAD / IDE which dosnt require a phd to get up and running.
There's nothing wrong with good tools. I was reacting to the part about not needing to be a good programmer to develop working apps.
Bad programmers with good tools can still develop bad code (and probably will).
Good programmers with bad tools can still develop good code (and probably should).
The existence of bad professionally-written Windoze apps (presumably due to the existence of good tools that allow bad programmers to develop "working" apps) is testament to this principal, I suspect.
~ray
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Yet another reason why a "school" for developers would be a good idea, would point people down the right path at the beginning... ;-)
Ooh ooh ooh [raising hand]! Can *I* get to choose what "the right path" is?? Please? Please? Please?
~ray
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If someone is ticked off that someone has this attitude (and I'm no programming slouch), sorry. But my time is valuable and I'm not going to waste it hacking away when I can have fun elsewhere and find alternate solutions for my needs.
In case I am the ticked off someone that you're referring to, I just want to clarify a couple of things. First, "ticked off" is a bit too strong to represent my feelings; I'm not really angry at anything. Second, I have no issue with your choices regarding whether it is worth it to you to do any development work or your choices of tools, etc. I think you should use whatever works best for you. Additionally, doing development work (including getting over the initial learning curve) takes a commitment that not everyone is capable of making. There's nothing at all wrong with that; everyone's situation is different and everyone has to make choices. I only get bothered when I hear things that I perceive to be unrealistic.
~ray
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I've personally always favored self-study and I wanted to promote that idea here. I think there are many advantages to it, such as the ability to work at your own speed and the ability to concentrate on the areas that you're most interested in ...
So how about a combination of the two and setting up an organised mentoring programme.
Something like, beginner posts his current level, and future interests ... experienced developer agrees to help direct their efforts.
...
Well, that's a good idea. Unfortunately, making it an "organized program" implies that folks on both sides have to make commitments to it (primarily time commitments); otherwise, it's not really going to be very organized. My concern is that our mentor candidates simply aren't capable of making a commitment such as that. As I said earlier, I suspect that most developers can hardly find the time to work on their own projects (I know that's absolutely true about myself).
Having said that though, it's important to add that I believe most developers would be happy to help others as they can. I'll speak only for myself: I'd be happy to help by answering the occasional question; but my ability to do so will be spotty at best, since my schedule simply won't permit any more than that. I do already try to help whenever I can.
Maybe a solution (a partial one, at least) is to create a forum just for newbie developers to ask questions that veteran developers can answer as their availability allows. Think of this as a one-to-many approach which optimizes use of our current resources (as opposed to the one-to-one approach which I think just won't work here due to lack of resources). The archive from this forum would prove invaluable to later budding developers and it will probably also provide the raw material to build a new developers FAQ.
We do already have the "Everything Development" forum with a bunch of sub-forums for specific topics. This new forum would probably be exclusively for newbie questions on all development topics and would hopefully encourage newbies to post their questions there. (I can imagine that some newbie developers might feel intimidated posting in the primary developnent forums.) It might also encourage newbies to cooperate with each other in their shared learning experience (yikes, that sounds little too touchy-feeling....
So, what do you think of that? It might fall a little short of "developer school" but it may be the best we can do with our current resources. Perhaps we can name the forum "Developer School" (or "Development 101").
~ray
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Well, that's a good idea. Unfortunately, making it an "organized program" implies that folks on both sides have to make commitments to it (primarily time commitments); otherwise, it's not really going to be very organized. My concern is that our mentor candidates simply aren't capable of making a commitment such as that. As I said earlier, I suspect that most developers can hardly find the time to work on their own projects (I know that's absolutely true about myself).
What about something along the lines of the "learn X language in 24 hours" style books - lessons laid out which can be followed and give people a grounding in various aspects of the black arts (I imagine there could be a few different ones - General Linux, X11, Qt, Python, etc.).
Then if people still need help they could ask their peers, and if needs be some of the more experienced developers.
I think this would be a useful resource (in general) and it would probably produce the kind of thing which the thread was looking for with not too much investment of time required (my understanding is that this is the way companies operate to get people up to speed with languages which they don't already know).
The major issue here is coming up with the 'course', however I think this investment of time would be better than individual mentoring in terms of the number of people it could help, etc.
The question is, as ever, is it possible/probable that such a course could be organised/put together?
Si
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I dont see y a book wouldnt work. After all. there are exactly this sort of thing for epoc, windows and most other computer
systems in use today. the question is who would write it?
would trolltech/sharp be interested in publisling something like this to promote development on qt/sharp. if it was in the same mould as the 20hr books then it could have a cd distro with it no ?
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I dont see y a book wouldnt work. After all. there are exactly this sort of thing for epoc, windows and most other computer
systems in use today. the question is who would write it?
would trolltech/sharp be interested in publisling something like this to promote development on qt/sharp. if it was in the same mould as the 20hr books then it could have a cd distro with it no ?
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Trolltech does offer Qt and Qtopia training, but this is for developers that already know c++.
[a href=\"http://www.trolltech.com/training/index.html]http://www.trolltech.com/training/index.html[/url]
Perhaps what is needed is an inexpensive on-line training session either via irc-like or video stream.
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Trolltech does offer Qt and Qtopia training, but this is for developers that already know c++.
http://www.trolltech.com/training/index.html (http://www.trolltech.com/training/index.html)
Perhaps what is needed is an inexpensive on-line training session either via irc-like or video stream.
OK, lets just test the water. Suppose I set up a server into which you can SSH with X forwarding, on which there's a full development kit, example programs which build and run on both the Zaurus as well as the dev server, so all you have to do is connect and use it.
You then download a training video for each example, and get to discuss it one-to-one with a tutor at scheduled times.
How much would you personally be willing to pay for
a] use of the dev server
b] viewing each the training videos
c] discussions with and/or help by the tutor?
Here's my wet-finger-in-the-air-guess at how much I'd need to charge just to make it worth my effort
a] US$10 per hour to use
b] US$50 per video
c] US$50 per hour
that is, you'd be paying very cheap commercial rates for a tutor's time, and relatively low charges to use the server.
I'm quite serious about the idea of setting up a development server which would be ready to use. But to fund a co-locate somewhere's going to cost REAL money. As far as I can see, not many people even donate money to reward their favourite ROM developers let alone be willing to pay to learn how to develop. Maybe I'll run a poll?
Paul
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OK, lets just test the water. Suppose I set up a server into which you can SSH with X forwarding, on which there's a full development kit, example programs which build and run on both the Zaurus as well as the dev server, so all you have to do is connect and use it.
I was thinking more that the book (online book) would explain how to set up your own dev environment too (or provide a tarball, or an ISO image of a liveCD, etc.) which would remove the need for this infrastructure.
You then download a training video for each example, and get to discuss it one-to-one with a tutor at scheduled times.
Why the need for videos? I'm more than happy, in fact I think it's less distracting, reading stuff from a page/website. I'm also a bit anti this 'speaking to the tutor' thing. Speaking to the tutor allows people to be lazy, and pretty much everyone is lazy if they can be. I think that they should attempt to do the course, and if they get stuck (which hopefully won't happen as it's so well written and explained ), then they should be able to ask in a part of this forum/IRC (for example) for some pointers.
I really don't see any reason to go more high-tech than the learn-it-in-24-hours style books - they don't use videos, and they only contain CDs so that you can get the example code - this could all be done on the web without any issues other than writing the course (though that's a pretty big issue I admit).
lpotter's pointer:
Trolltech does offer Qt and Qtopia training, but this is for developers that already know c++.
http://www.trolltech.com/training/index.html (http://www.trolltech.com/training/index.html)
is exactly what I was talking about. Learning C++ could just be added as a pre-requisite
Si
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OK How about setting up a bounty?
We would need to put together a spec of what is needed - content - examples - distro / tar ball et al, and setup a pot to entice some of our hard working developers to spend some time putting an online course together for programming on the Z (hosted where?).
We would need to discuss for which platform (qt/gpe?/x/opie) or cover all platforms with a development trail of some sort.
Would a poll be an idea before going any further?
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I'm not a programmer, but I dug around for a few minutes and came up with this:
https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Compiling_on_the_6000L (https://www.oesf.org/index.php?title=Compiling_on_the_6000L)
Since I'm not a programmer, I can't really go any further than that. I was however, able to compile a program and so forth as per the instructions that were there.
I'm assuming that this isn't the part of "this is hard to do" as I found it rather straight forward.