Messages

1

Gemini PDA - Hardware / Spilled some water, now touchscreen and keyboard problems.

« on: February 09, 2020, 05:25:58 pm »

Seems touch was coincidence. But stuck in infinite loop now. Don't even know how to get a normal boot. Right now I'm wondering how I got a few normal boots, at all...

ESC permanently ''pressed' (or shorted, more likely) or some such thing?

If I close the device, it sits waiting in some bootloader menu. When I open it, I see so. I can move the selection with arrow down, but arrow up (not working otherwise) produces a screen with some yellow thingy image and "unknown". Allthough I have the option of Power Off, I cannot press enter to accept it, as the enter key no longer works. After 10 seconds or so, it then reboots.

Whether showing menu with lid closed, or in inifinte boot loop when the lid is open, the device eats battery and warms up. Must keep it connected to the charger. Wish I could at least shut it off when I go to sleep or leave the house.

2

Gemini PDA - Hardware / Spilled some water, now touchscreen and keyboard problems.

« on: February 09, 2020, 04:01:25 pm »

Was a bit slow with drying / shaking out water. More and more keys started to behave strangely, until the device went into an infinite boot sequence.
At home I removed all keys, but there really wasn't much to dry.

Several hours later, the device booted normally. Unfortunately, some keys have ceased working (q, a, 4, 6, right arrow and enter).
When I press one of them, nothing happens. Strangely enough, pressing a working key after that, does not work once or twice, but then works normally.

As far as I can see, no damage to the keyboard electronic foil (that thin layer immediately below the rubber mat); chances are the point where the connector(?) is, top right of the kbd, got wet.

Worse; when swiping over the touchscreen, I still trigger an infinite boot loop (yikes! not even sure how that is possible! when the boot sequence otherwise seems normal)

Any insights helpful....

3

Gemini PDA - General Discussion / Battery usage on Oreo

« on: September 21, 2019, 08:37:46 am »

wifi-only model, and I have the feeling of a faster draining battery too.

Bad wifi is really sucking power when the unit is not doing anything. up to 20% overnight.

Switching off wifi and allowing the screen to go dark before clsing, however, makes my unit survive the night with a reasonale 1-2% or so.

My hyopthesis: fancy power saving mechanisms in Oreo that require support from the kernel.
Our kernel is to old to provide those hooks/api, or perhaps the hooks/api are badly implemented.

4

Gemini PDA - Android / Compiling Oreo kernel for rooted WIFi model

« on: July 07, 2019, 06:31:41 am »

On Android 7, I think non-rooted, I had this working

Did a `git fetch` on https://github.com/dguidipc/gemini-android-kernel-3.18
Checked out the Gemini_WIFI branch
did a `make oldconfig` which had two questions only.

Repacking and flashing `root_boot.img` so far resulted in an infinite boot loop.

What I do not know:
 - Where is the Planets `.config` for Oreo? I may be starting from a non-bootable starting point and fail forever
 - There is an ID in the boot configuration, but `abootimg` is not meant to set it to the value that Planets put in. I have no idea whether this is relevant.
 - How is my image "rooted"? Is that something in the kernel? ramdisk? other partition?

5

Gemini PDA - Android / 8.1 observations

« on: June 20, 2019, 03:31:10 pm »

I love this too! There is however one major issue with that. It seems that there is no way of navigating back in Google Chrome. Does anyone here know of a method of assigning a key to the back function?

Help is appreciated

Using Hermit, which uses Escape.

6

Gemini PDA - Android / 8.1 observations

« on: June 08, 2019, 04:24:29 am »

Ah, had not found Fn+A, useful.

Tried to reinstall Nova, to check the version (although assuming it had to be latest).
Let is take the Laumcher3 config this time. seems to work now.
Solves the cyan-on-white issue, too.
Edit: Solves the text-underneath-icons issue, too!

Thx!

7

Gemini PDA - General Discussion / Flashing Tool and User Errors

« on: June 07, 2019, 05:29:21 pm »

Ubuntu sees a bit too much. Maybe a running OS, rather than a bootloader?

Switch off the Gemini, then connect it?

8

Gemini PDA - Android / 8.1 observations

« on: June 07, 2019, 05:09:56 pm »

wifi-only version

Pro:
 - full screen usage
 - rooted (couldn't with previous release; now I can run f.lux again)

Con:
 - because of full-screen, I have to use Alt-Tab a lot. Thus triggers Caps all too often.
 - there is a strong tendency to kill apps when I Alt-Tab away from them, so they have to restart. this usually takes more CPU than leaving it be. At least Termux manages to survive 100%, otherwise this would be unbearable.
 - despite this tendency, these "dead apps" are kept around for me to Alt-Tab to (so they restart)
 - there is no telling me what the "default #background processes is" and I cannot raise it above four.
 - when I activated my sleeping Gemini, it takes sometimes takes up to a second  before it actually shows the screen
 - settings widgets are cyan on white (i.e. undistinguishable from each other)
 - Nova ceased to function
 - Yalp ceased to function
 - text underneath app widgets gone
 - there is a battery usage warning, but I cannot do anything with the info
 - one of the two apps using battery is the AppBar, which shouldn't be doing *anything* unless I open it.
 - wifi selection app made a few small tweaks, all for the worse.
 - NO-SIM icon still there

Something's amiss with the balance, here.
 -

9

Gemini PDA - Android / Android 8.1 for the Gemini to be available later this week

« on: June 07, 2019, 02:00:39 pm »

Indeed, I used manual update, needed it because of the partition resize.

10

Gemini PDA - Android / Android 8.1 for the Gemini to be available later this week

« on: May 28, 2019, 07:52:48 am »

Resized my partitions, Changed to rooted version and rooted. Wifi-only model.

8.1 seems to work fine (rooted for wifi-only caused problems on the previous update for me - and I wasn't the only one).

Pro:
 - somewhere in the settings, I found a "hide navigation bar" which is awesome. More screen space for apps, yay! I mean, seriously, with any small screen, this is important to me.

11

Gemini PDA - Android / Android 8.1 for the Gemini to be available later this week

« on: May 25, 2019, 03:36:54 pm »

Just noticed on http://support.planetcom.co.uk/index.php/Main_Page that 8.1 is also available for the Wifi-only model; partition tool updated, also with dual/triple boot.

Will have to try, soon.

12

Gemini PDA - Hardware / A year with the Gemini

« on: April 19, 2019, 11:47:03 am »

I had expected to work on normal linux for Gemini. I didn't. I yielded to Android. After I bought a browser, Hermit, I even kept this Google Store thingy active. Almost all icons on my screen are Hermit light apps. The two major exceptions follow below.

Termux allows me to do most tasks. Emacs as editor and agenda. The Gemini thus good enough to do small-scale programming! I did part of Advent of Code on it. I also use Termux to ssh into my home server, of course. The Gemini has been created to take notes. When I had a contract, I brought the Gemini to meetings. So much less intrusive than a laptop! Still, there are times when I prefer pen and paper.

My other big app is OsmAnd~ It probably helps that my home country is thoroughly mapped not only in Open Street Map, but also the other data sources that the app uses for its maps, such as maritime information.

I think I dropped it twice, from 1m25 or so. Not on concrete. Once when it was open, which caused the hinge to twist. Easy enough to take it off and un-twist it. No problems with its tension since, screen still standing in the correct angle, proper resistance when closing, etc.

The keys did make scratches (on the foil?) on the screen, but I only notice that when the screen is off, or in light so bright that I cannot read the screen, anyway.

Super happy with my Gemini!

13

Gemini PDA - Android / Firmware Update 2018-10-09

« on: November 13, 2018, 03:33:31 pm »

Mailed Planet Computers, will keep you posted.

Planets responded appropriately, but that dd not solve the problem.

I dug a bit through all the changes I made, and started undoing my habitual config changes.
When I revert "Enablw Wi-Fi verbose logging" (to off, aka disabled), the reboots cease. That was unexpected...

14

Gemini PDA - Android / Firmware Update 2018-10-09

« on: November 12, 2018, 02:35:44 pm »

Ah, I see. Those with partitioned Gemini (like me) should not use the Android firmware from Planet support page, but the firmware downloadable from page with partition tool. The first one is (or was at the time I downloaded it) lacking rooted boot image. Which somehow in combination with custom scatter file messed my wifi.  Meantime I solved my problem by fresh install of not rooted stock and rooting by myself (using TWRP and Magisk). Now it seem to work OK.

Yep, you got it!

I started out with that one, got spontaneous reboots right after booting.
Tried to kick Magisk off, then used non-rooted boot.img (from the generic download). Reboots all along the way, sometimes I had much more time to do things adn then when rebooting, it wouldn't stop rebooting anymore..

Spontaneous reboots now happen when I connect to the local wifi network.

Then I found this thread.
Reinstalled the rooted image from the partition tool download (fresh download, but same file anyway). No improvement.

Any ideas welcome.

Mailed Planet Computers, will keep you posted.

15

Gemini PDA - Hardware / Gemini as Keyboard

« on: September 23, 2018, 08:07:52 am »

After some work, I can use my Gemini as if it were a USB keyboard.

https://chmeee.org/#GeminiPDA/AsKeyboard