OESF Portables Forum
General Forums => General Discussion => Topic started by: ludo on January 03, 2006, 08:14:47 pm
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You know, when you're new to a subject but are motivated to learn, you have tons of questions.
I thought I was moving forward but in fact at the exit of the small hall-way, the ROM land extends to too far for my short-sighted eyes to see.
So I would need some guides... I'm sure this will help make things clear also for a lot of us.
Let's go...
I've got a C3000, sharp ROM 1.01, haven't got Linux yet on my PC (maybe I shouldn't say that?) but know about Unix, and on my Z, I often have a consol open (trying to run things with the command line).
So I want to learn!
Meanie has a very nice introduction page about ROMs:
http://www.users.on.net/~hluc/myZaurus/distros.html (http://www.users.on.net/~hluc/myZaurus/distros.html)
From my readings, I could flash another ROM on my Z. Different are available:
pdaXrom
cacko
sharp
open Zaurus
openBSD
...
-Should I see each one of them as an alternative distribution of linux, as well as there's RedHat, Debian, knopix...?
- All this ROM are based on linux aren't they? So why a software or program designed for the sharp ROM won't work on the pdaXrom? A ROM is not an operating system is it?
- if I flash pdaXrom (I think I like it), what will happen to my chinese and japanese dictionaries? And my other programs? Can I still run application written with Personal Profile?
-what about hand writting input method/program: are they the same for all the ROM? and fonts: will the chinese and japanese be displayed all right?
-What is X/Qt exactly?
-Qtopia is a platform for Linux pda. How does it relates to the different ROMs? Does it necessarily goes by pair with the sharp rom? I'd say no... I'd say Qtopia is an environment, isn't it? Similar to the X system on pdaXrom.
http://www.trolltech.com/products/qtopia/pda.html (http://www.trolltech.com/products/qtopia/pda.html)
-an extra question: what is Python? A development environement, a programing language? It seems, besides its size, to be a great tool anyway!
http://pyqplayer.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/b...thonZaurusImage (http://pyqplayer.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/bin/view/Main/PythonZaurusImage)
Any help to guide us beginners will be much appreciated!
Ludo (also woodworker in my free time)
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A ROM is an image of a computer's memory which retains its contents when electrical power to the computer is shut off. A ROM can contain anything, but for Zaurus computers, it contains the bootloader, which gets everything started; initd, the first Linux/Unix process that is run; the kernel, which controls all hardware resources; the shell, which allows users to interact with the computer; and some of the file system, where some of the system files are stored. The different distributions of ROMs are all different in some way. They may use a different kernel, a different shell, a different file system, and different files stored in the file system. All of the ROMs that you mentioned are forms of Linux with the exception of OpenBSD. Linux and OpenBSD are both descended from Unix.
pdaXrom provides a different user interface and a different programming interface than Sharp ROMs. pdaXrom uses the X Windows graphical user interface while the Sharp ROM uses the Qtopia graphical user interface. X Windows is an open standard while Qtopia is proprietary. Programs written for either graphical user interface must use different functions to present the same information to the user. X/Qt is software that translates the X Windows programming function calls to ones that the Qtopia windowing system understands.
The pdaXrom does not come with all of the same applications software that comes with the Sharp ROM. I do not think that pdaXrom comes with an asian dictionary or the same asian support that Sharp ROM does, but I might be wrong, since I have never used pdaXrom.
Qtopia comes with Sharp ROMs. Opie is an open-source relative of Qtopia. I think that OpenZaurus is also based on Qtopia.
Python is a programming language, but I have never written in that language.
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You know, when you're new to a subject but are motivated to learn, you have tons of questions.
I thought I was moving forward but in fact at the exit of the small hall-way, the ROM land extends to too far for my short-sighted eyes to see.
So I would need some guides... I'm sure this will help make things clear also for a lot of us.
Let's go...
I've got a C3000, sharp ROM 1.01, haven't got Linux yet on my PC (maybe I shouldn't say that?) but know about Unix, and on my Z, I often have a consol open (trying to run things with the command line).
So I want to learn!
Meanie has a very nice introduction page about ROMs:
http://www.users.on.net/~hluc/myZaurus/distros.html (http://www.users.on.net/~hluc/myZaurus/distros.html)
From my readings, I could flash another ROM on my Z. Different are available:
pdaXrom
cacko
sharp
open Zaurus
openBSD
...
-Should I see each one of them as an alternative distribution of linux, as well as there's RedHat, Debian, knopix...?
- All this ROM are based on linux aren't they? So why a software or program designed for the sharp ROM won't work on the pdaXrom? A ROM is not an operating system is it?
- if I flash pdaXrom (I think I like it), what will happen to my chinese and japanese dictionaries? And my other programs? Can I still run application written with Personal Profile?
-what about hand writting input method/program: are they the same for all the ROM? and fonts: will the chinese and japanese be displayed all right?
-What is X/Qt exactly?
-Qtopia is a platform for Linux pda. How does it relates to the different ROMs? Does it necessarily goes by pair with the sharp rom? I'd say no... I'd say Qtopia is an environment, isn't it? Similar to the X system on pdaXrom.
http://www.trolltech.com/products/qtopia/pda.html (http://www.trolltech.com/products/qtopia/pda.html)
-an extra question: what is Python? A development environement, a programing language? It seems, besides its size, to be a great tool anyway!
http://pyqplayer.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/b...thonZaurusImage (http://pyqplayer.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/bin/view/Main/PythonZaurusImage)
Any help to guide us beginners will be much appreciated!
Ludo (also woodworker in my free time)
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=109442\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
Fundamentally ROMs are distros, as in your first question, but one fundamental difference is the graphical environment, Qtopia or X. Graphical applications written for one don't run on the other. PdaXrom is strictly X, Cacko and Sharp are Qtopia. Openzaurus has two variants, Opie is (a fork of) Qtopia and GPE is X. Now, X/Qt is a program that allows you to run X (hence X applications) on top of Qtopia, so you get the best of both worlds. There is another issue that sometimes breaks apps is that some different ROMs do floating point emulation differently. OpenBSD is X based but is actually a different operating system.
Python is a programming language. The Python image that you linked comes with some extra stuff that allows you to write graphical programs that run on Qtopia.
I don't know anything about Chinese and Japanese.
I am sure other people will make corrections or expand in what I said.
Felipe
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gx773 and Felipe,
You made things much clearer to me, and in a concise way.
Thanks a lot for those explanations.
I hope any newbie will read your replies, they should be added to the FAQs or in an introductory material to the Zaurus world.
Then rather than going to try pdaXrom, I may try X/Qt, unless someone points out that I won't lose any of the Japanese and Chinese possibilities with pdaXrom (I'll also search a bit the pdaXrom threads about this).
For programing, I'm now into java Personal Profile, and my next try would be forth, so I'll let Python aside for the moment.
Thanks again
Ludo
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Qtopia is proprietary
qtopia is developed by trolltech and is open source, but sharp has added its own closed source extensions.
I do not think that pdaXrom comes with an asian dictionary or the same asian support that Sharp ROM does, but I might be wrong, since I have never used pdaXrom.
There is a number of japanese and chinese users of pdaxrom.
For dictionary there are qbedic and stardict, ask in the pdaxrom forum if these users are using japanese/ chinese dictionaries you should get an answer.
what about hand writting input method/program: are they the same for all the ROM?
AFAIK only sharp/qtopia provides hand writting recognition for japanese/chinese.
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qtopia is developed by trolltech and is open source, but sharp has added its own closed source extensions.
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=109458\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
One of the Qtopia development systems is open source but the other IS proprietary. Check the site for Tree!Explorer vs Tree!Explorer+Plus for example. It mentions this in reference to why source is available for the first but not for the second.
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The pdaXrom does not come with all of the same applications software that comes with the Sharp ROM. I do not think that pdaXrom comes with an asian dictionary or the same asian support that Sharp ROM does, but I might be wrong, since I have never used pdaXrom.
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=109446\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
I'm a recent migrant from Sharp to pdaX (less than 3 months), and I can verify that the range of applications and their functionality for pdaX are greater than Sharp rom, thanks to its completely open development. One big bonus is that the pdaX apps I use on my Z are actually the same things on my iBook (using fink or darwinports to port): tuxcards, vym, grisbi, planner, jpilot, to name but a few, so there is no more need to do any PDA-style synchronization or to struggle with conduit issues. I created a folder called "_Life_" both in my CF and my iBook, with the same folders and arrangment.Exchanging, updating and maintaining the data is just a simple matter of throwing the identically formatted data back and forth between my Z and my iBook, much in the same fashion as people 'synchronize' their home and office PCs. In a word, pdaX makes my Z a genuine powerful linux box in the pocket.
Actually quite a number of 'killer apps' originally developed for Sharp Rom have already been availale for pdaX, such as KO/Pi, FreeNoteQT, Portabase, FBreader, Qbedic (compatible with Zbedic; in fact the databases of StarDict are at least as good as those for Qbedic), etc, if you're looking for them. TreeExplorer has its powerful relatives such as xfe and Rox; for ZEditor we have Leafpad and SciTE, etc.
Another very good example is word processor (which I work most with and live very much on it). While Sharp rom has got the very basic Hancom Office and the not that inexpensive TextMaker, pdaX has a much much better Abiword and awesome gnumeric. OpenOffice is still being ported to pdaX, and in the meantime using chroot Debian or X/Qt is Sharp rom is a nice alternative.
And the cross and native SDKs in pdaX are now at a pretty mature stage. Even for a non-hacker and programming illiterate such as me can port and compile apps directly from the common Linux source such as freshmeat and sourceforge easily and smoothly.
PdaX also has a wide range of different popular window managers to choose from (matchbox, xfce4, window maker, icewm, fvwm, enlightenment, now even a full KDE 3.5!). I can enjoy more and nicer eye candies (not just got stuck with Qtopia) without worrying much about performance. They are all highly configurable to suit your taste and need, and many users are just busy discussing how to fine-tune and streamline them, which is really a big fun.
Handling CJK things is not a big problem at all in pdaX. To be frank, I find CJK is supported much better in pdaX than in Sharp rom: no need to convert to qpf fonts (just use the normal unicode TTF), much more complete and mature inputmethods (SCIM, GCIN, etc). The handwriting in Sharp rom is designed primarily for Japanese and the Chinese characters there are only a limited set of kanji (words as common as 'you' in Chinese are just missing!). CKeyboard and murphytalk are fine, but they still have a long way to go.
As for OZ I'd also like to try but I am totally ignorant of what it is and how it fares. One very first thing I want to check out is its CJK support. Maybe someone can enlighten me here.
No, please don't get me wrong as there is no intent to start any meaningless flame war. Choices are always good and they should always be available to the users, the more the better. IMHO an open development enviroment is more promising than the proprietary ones, at least for me as a user who wants to do some elementary development at the same time.
Just my $0.02 worth.
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ZDevil
your 2cents are priceless!
You're a convincing pdaX embassador. It would be good that some representatives of other ROM give their opinion.
But it seems that one day or another I will move to pdaX. I like fine tuning my hand woodworking tools and pdaX would suit my way of thinking.
The lack of handwriting recognition would be the only minus for me, but not a major issue.
Thanks a lot
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Now, X/Qt is a program that allows you to run X (hence X applications) on top of Qtopia, so you get the best of both worlds.
How much memory does it "eat"? What's about speed? Thank you.
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I'd say X/Qt runs slower than native. But Meanie surely has a lot more to say about this.
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Now, X/Qt is a program that allows you to run X (hence X applications) on top of Qtopia, so you get the best of both worlds.
How much memory does it "eat"? What's about speed? Thank you.
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=109614\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]
It depends on what kind of x applications you run. small apps wouldn't take much memory and are quite fast, but then there is openoffice which is a memory hog. just use a swapfile and you'll be fine. abiword and gnumeric for example are much better than hancom apps which are very basic.
with the release of pdaxrom 1.1 beta1, there is now a special xqt feed as well, so the latest apps for pdaxrom can be run in xqt as well.
i cant wait till my c3000 comes back, then i got a free machine to run pdaxrom. i wonder whether my oqo or my c3000 will arrive first.
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It depends on what kind of x applications you run. small apps wouldn't take much memory and are quite fast, but then there is openoffice which is a memory hog. just use a swapfile and you'll be fine. abiword and gnumeric for example are much better than hancom apps which are very basic.
Thank you. I'll think about trying it.
I'm not sure because my SD card ist still vfat formatted. I've heard that it might be not a good idea to use ext2 on a flash card. Reformatting the card also means some more work because I installed as much software as possible on the SD card.
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Hello ppl,
Im Tasos and I Live in Greece. Im reading this forum and searching the web some weeks now. I start to heve interest on Z (sl-c3100..) some months ago when I saw OpenBSD on Z (Im a user/fun of oBSD since 2.8) but next month Im going for a trip to Japan for architectural reasons and I would like to make a present to myself
Back to topic, I didn’t want to make a new topic for my questions so Ill add them here.
Im a PocketPC (yes… I know..win sucks ), c3100 has 128mb rom and 64 ram.
-Is this smthng like ppc? Main OS is on rom and extra apps in ram or rom (with battery bead you get only ROM saved on PPC)??
-The roms(or only init/kernel) are stored on ROM?(is clear to my about the parts of the HD.. but I was wondering about the main part of the ROM)
-Dualboot is risky? Can I have pdaX + oBSD (and way not Cacko)?(I saw about the hack for the Sharp ROM/Cecko init check on HD parts)I only found info about the dootloader on OpenBSD install doc.
My main reason is to make an ultra portable laptop with Unix OS and less PDA.
Sorry for my bad writing skills!
Thanx,
Tasos Varoudis
www.daemons.gr
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Unlike some PocketPCs which lose any files stored in RAM, Zaurus computers store their applications and files in flash memory. The newest Zaurus, the 3100, also has an internal hard disk. The kernel, root file system, and part of the /home file system are stored in Flash memory.
I know that someone was working on dual booting for the Zaurus SL-5500, but the other models as far as I know currently do not have dual-boot capability.
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kalimera tasos,
like gx773 said, kernel, bootloader are stored in flash (well, maybe not for the c3000, and 5500 if you boot from sd)
you can then install application on the external card (including the internal micro-hd)
the ram is only used as ram (except for 5500)
Dual booting openbsd-linux is not a problem, from what I read, as openbsd in fact boot from linux.
Dual booting different linux roms is not currently possible, some people use pivot-root trick to start different roms but you need to use the same kernel and might experience some incompatibilities.
Nothing is really risky, you can generally recover without problems.
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THnx gx773 and pqas. another q! Is it possible to write with "full" hands on Z?at least with 1-2 fingers per hand.
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I use only my thumbs because:
- my fingers are too fat to do otherwise.
- I usually use and hold it at the same time ( ie I don't have it on a table)
The keyboard is nowhere like a normal keyboard, but it's actually very usable.
For instance I typed this: http://mail.pdaxrom.org/contrib/docs/ipk.txt (http://mail.pdaxrom.org/contrib/docs/ipk.txt) while traveling in a bus.
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... I cant wait to go to japan!!! (Yea..I know about procejapan.. but I have work to do and if I get a Z now..Ill have to "play" alot with it)
btw if u need smthnk from japan let me know..