N00bs Of The (z) World, Unite!

[al_do]

to every n00b out there,

I'm starting a discussion on "how to get a better OS for my Z pda".

main goal of this thread is to understand what do newbie like me want most, and what we can do to get it done quickly.

from my point of view:
I'd like a good pim suite for GPE, a well working pdf reader and a media player.
I'd be glad to donate some $$ every month to anyone that could satisfy my needs...


what do you think about it?

bye
al_do

[h2gofast]

to every n00b out there,

I'm starting a discussion on "how to get a better OS for my Z pda".

main goal of this thread is to understand what do newbie like me want most, and what we can do to get it done quickly.

from my point of view:
I'd like a good pim suite for GPE, a well working pdf reader and a media player.
I'd be glad to donate some $$ every month to anyone that could satisfy my needs...


what do you think about it?

bye
al_do
[div align=\"right\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]

the wiki is a good place to start.
[a href=\"http://openzaurus.berlios.de/Main_Page]http://openzaurus.berlios.de/Main_Page[/url]

[starkruzr]

to every n00b out there,

I'm starting a discussion on "how to get a better OS for my Z pda".

main goal of this thread is to understand what do newbie like me want most, and what we can do to get it done quickly.

from my point of view:
I'd like a good pim suite for GPE, a well working pdf reader and a media player.
I'd be glad to donate some $$ every month to anyone that could satisfy my needs...


what do you think about it?

bye
al_do
[div align=\"right\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]

the wiki is a good place to start.
[a href=\"http://openzaurus.berlios.de/Main_Page]http://openzaurus.berlios.de/Main_Page[/url]
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=126572\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]

I wonder if Evolution could be shrunk down enough for a PDA.  Hm.
Also, with respect to a media player, well... there is gxine, but it is dazzlingly slow.  There is mplayer, which of course is flawless but has a bit of a learning curve   For mp3s, I recommend mpd together with glurp or gmpc.  It's a weird architecture (mpd runs as a headless daemon in the background and actually plays the music, glurp and gmpc are both front-ends for it), but it works well after just a touch of fiddling.  Volume control is a bit of a PITA; you have to run gpe-mixer or alsamixer in order to control volume (the volume control features in the applications themselves and in the dock applet don't work for some reason), and even then it doesn't work well.  You can only hear between 80 and 100% - bear in mind that 100% is REALLY FREAKING LOUD with headphones, though

You're right, though.  There is a need for an all-in-one, fast "official" media player.  Don't know when we're going to get that.  xmms worked well under pdaXrom; don't know why we don't have it under GPE.

I'm going to add another item to this list - a WORKING PACKAGE MANAGER.  I've submitted a few bugs about gpe-package, but I don't think anyone's looked at them yet.

[lardman]

Also, with respect to a media player, well... there is gxine, but it is dazzlingly slow. There is mplayer, which of course is flawless but has a bit of a learning curve wink.gif For mp3s, I recommend mpd together with glurp or gmpc. It's a weird architecture (mpd runs as a headless daemon in the background and actually plays the music, glurp and gmpc are both front-ends for it), but it works well after just a touch of fiddling.

Yes, a decent media player would be good. I think a frontend for mplayer would be ideal. Any suggestions?

Volume control is a bit of a PITA; you have to run gpe-mixer or alsamixer in order to control volume (the volume control features in the applications themselves and in the dock applet don't work for some reason), and even then it doesn't work well. You can only hear between 80 and 100% - bear in mind that 100% is REALLY FREAKING LOUD with headphones, though smile.gif

This is mainly a problem with the recent adoption of alsa (afaik), it should get fixed.

You're right, though. There is a need for an all-in-one, fast "official" media player. Don't know when we're going to get that. xmms worked well under pdaXrom; don't know why we don't have it under GPE.

Xmms isn't available as it requires gtk+ v1, and no-one wanted to add it as it's old.

I'm going to add another item to this list - a WORKING PACKAGE MANAGER. I've submitted a few bugs about gpe-package, but I don't think anyone's looked at them yet.

Yes, this is a problem for both GPE and Opie, and one that needs to be fixed, unfortunately, most developers use the command line, which means that they're not bothered about the GUI package managers. I do understand that it needs to be sorted out though for newer users.


Si

[speculatrix]

I've been trying OZ 3.5.4/GPE on 6000L (Tosa) for a few days. Look and feel is beautiful!

Snag is, despite not being a total N00b, I've been completely unable to find a way of bringing up the wireless networking! There's a lovely configuration applet which forgets every time the wireless setting... but no button to start wifi... there's a wireless network monitor applet, but still no "ON" button.

The wiki is virtually empty, even when you have the patience to wait for it to download. Memo to self: make a mirror of OZ website and its wiki.

So, although it *seems* fast and stable, the lack of documentation is a  serious drawback. The OZ developers are all very smart and gifted, but I think they need to do some serious usability testing.

Sorry for the rant BUT I'm very frustrated. I'm beginning to wish I kept my 860 so I could stay with Cacko rather than be stuck with a semi-useless 6000!!!

[koen]

So, although it *seems* fast and stable, the lack of documentation is a  serious drawback. The OZ developers are all very smart and gifted, but I think they need to do some serious usability testing.
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=127871\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]

You're having problems with GPE, which has virtually nothing to do with OZ (except that OZ ships gpe as a gui), so please file bugs in the gpe bugtracker about

1) missing ifup gui
2) non-working config gui

[speculatrix]

So, although it *seems* fast and stable, the lack of documentation is a  serious drawback. The OZ developers are all very smart and gifted, but I think they need to do some serious usability testing.
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=127871\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]

You're having problems with GPE, which has virtually nothing to do with OZ (except that OZ ships gpe as a gui), so please file bugs in the gpe bugtracker about

1) missing ifup gui
2) non-working config gui
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=127876\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]

OZ != GPE != Opie - well, being a noob to OZ the distinction of where one ends and the other begins is one I haven't pinpointed.

I am happy to submit bugs and contribute to the wiki.

I did try all the obvious things to bring up wifi0 or wlan0, but nothing at the command line worked... e.g. "ifup wifi0"; I can't remember the error as it was quite late... so I will try installing extra ipk's until it works and then add something to the wiki.

I decided to try OZ/GPE to deliberately get away from anything qtopia-like...

[speculatrix]

aha! I found out that I have to use "usbctl" to turn on internal USB and thus power up the wifi - and THEN the checkbox for the wireless options gets turned on automatically... then "ifup wlan0" almost works (doesn't set key).

I've started a section on the wiki for it.

[speculatrix]

I'm starting a discussion on "how to get a better OS for my Z pda".
[div align=\"right\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]

BTW, to followup...  yes this plan is excellent, but discussions can often be long and rambling and need to be distilled down to how-to documentation/faqs etc preferably on the wiki:
[a href=\"http://openzaurus.berlios.de/HowTos]http://openzaurus.berlios.de/HowTos[/url]