Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On Tue, 20 May 2008 11:36:30 -0400 Ian Darwin [EMAIL PROTECTED] babbled: Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman) wrote: On Mon, 19 May 2008 10:27:25 -0400 Ian Darwin [EMAIL PROTECTED] babbled: 2) The ASU software features a qwerty-keyboard. It is switchable between alphabetics and numerics; unfortunately the gesture needed to do this (a triangle drawn counter-clockwise from lower left) is a bit hard to it is? the gesture is just slide finger up. no triangle :) not sure how you got the triangle thing :) (place finger at kbd bottom, slide, lift finger) Ah, the benefits of documentation :-) There was no doc, so I looked at QTopia's doc, and was mislead for my efforts. Thank you for correcting this. imho this is a major problem with the kbd design - the fact that you NEED a document to tell you how to use it. there is no obvious way to put in a return or a space or change layout... There is no triangle, and no spoon. There is only the finger, sliding up and down. the current version of ASU uses QTopia's input manager, offering what looks like a predictive style but is actually doing a dictionary actually - it doesn't - i wrote one from scratch :) the code is ugly - but it works. That's impressive! And again, I presumed incorrectly. Sorry. well not so impressive if you read the code. man it's UGLY. but i was busy getting the algorithms working. they now work. now i need to clean it up into nicely isolated code blocks that have good interfaces between eachother and later can be plugged in and out easily. it does use standard linux dict files though for the dictionary - the one we ship is an abbreviated one with only 5000 words - but they also have extended frequency counts. have a dig around the illume package files and see - it's just a text file. :) it also maintains a user dictionary for personal words you added in ~/.e/e/ :) same format. lookup; I find this very distracting compared to a plain do-what-I-type keyboard, and would welcome an easy way to turn this off I'd still very much like to see a way to turn it off, so it works the same for letters as for numbers. It's annoying 90% of the time because most of the person or street names I need to enter into Contacts are not going to be listed. I promise not to write my next 850-page book on my Neo, so word lookup is of limited use. I suspect that Contacts, Todo and Calendar is the most common use case for most people, and that writing normal text is the least common for most people. and how does turning it off help? that's my question? in the list of matches is ALSO exactly what you typed with all its typos (or lack of them) so to enter that - select it. i am just failing to see the need to turn it off? you may not need it now as u are busy entering a mountain of contact stuff - but later u will thank the lord for it. then again - maybe in your culture or social group people don't sms much - i know that here sms is done much more often than calls. :) 3) It's easy to accidentally start an application (thus slowing down what you're trying to really do) while scrolling the home screen in icon grid mode. there is an adjustment for this - its in the interaction dialog, yes its ugly - i know. i keep fiddling with it every now and again to see if i can't make it behave a bit more like i intend. :) Ah, thanks. and now its got a big, easy to read and change gui config - at least in upstream svn for illume :) 4) The Preferences that are in the top slide-down panel's Wrench icon should presumably be merged with the Preferences App. currently those are preferences for enlightenment - and thus it has its own settings dialog/panel like all applications anywhere on any desktop do :) Logically I agree with you, but for the hypothetical end-user, who doesn't know that there is such a concept as a window manager, there is an un-necessarily fine distinction between what belongs to E (which applies window behavior to the phone as a whole) and what belongs to the phone as a whole. I think it's going to be confusing. sure - BUT doing it elsewhere is also jumping through hoops. right now that would mean some dbus or ipc messaging system to pop up e's dialogs, or vice-versa (everyone else's config gets rolled into e's and e execs each config tool just like it execs all applications). but neither of those exist currently. 5) The shutdown dialog does not have a cancel or Back button. And, it often doesn't actually shutdown. that may actually go - that's just qtopia's default dialog - the # of app icons will likely reduce by a lot as we trim out things we don't really need. Great. Speaking of the app icons, I'd love to see a way to hide ones I'm not using, and move ones I use frequently to a non-default order (my five-year-old Blackberry has this feature, for one). This is probably there and I don't know how, or something Carsten can
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On Tue, 20 May 2008 12:26:55 -0500 Jeremy Miller [EMAIL PROTECTED] babbled: Speaking of needing a sharp nail or the stylus to type easily on the keypad does that mean there is no support for turning the freerunner on its side and the keyboard flipping and enlarging, like say the iphone does? technically u can rotate the screen into landscape mode - e will cope, but illume parts will not - lots of FIXME: cope with screen resize bits of code around. also there wont be a default way to just do it. for now its portrait mode or nothing until things mature. -- Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman) [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Subject: Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions Date: lun 19 mag 08 11:10:50 -0600 Quoting Travis Tabbal ([EMAIL PROTECTED]): On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 10:49 AM, Carlo E. Prelz [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Those apps are the heart of the phone, and I would not want to have C++/QT versions running on my phone. I really don't understand the sentiment there. If the app works well and gets the job done, why does it matter what language it's written in or what widget toolkit it uses? I could see not wanting a closed app on OM, but it sounds like there is source available. There are two levels here. One is the ethically-justified desire to run open software. The other one is the concrete possibility to dig into the code and actually adapt the operativity of the code to your specific needs. The first level is clearly satisfied. With regards to the second one, things differ from person to person. For most of its life, the openmoko project has been based on C and GTK, which I happen to be reasonably versed in. The switch to QT *requires* the abandoning of C in favour of C++, a language that I personally find unsuitable for use. Or, you could pick up the older GTK apps and finish them up. It sounds like the shipping apps are a placeholder to get a nice working phone for shipping Freerunner. It's an open platform, so switch them out if you want the other ones. Or improve the new ones. Or write new ones from scratch in Ruby. Whatever. :) This could come to be true, given enough free time. Nevertheless, there is a big difference between having the core applications of a phone maintained and updated by Openmoko and having to depend on my scarce free time or other voluntary work for the same core apps. Later on, if I read that the GTK apps are usable, I may eventually decide to buy the phone. I just wanted to let Openmoko know that it is because of this switch (which I only learned about yesterday) that I won't be an early adopter. Carlo -- * Se la Strada e la sua Virtu' non fossero state messe da parte, * K * Carlo E. Prelz - [EMAIL PROTECTED] che bisogno ci sarebbe * di parlare tanto di amore e di rettitudine? (Chuang-Tzu) ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
I've just booted it for the first time, can't really say anything about it yet, but the boot screen is perfect for me as an Archaeologist :) Joseph On 19/05/2008, Ian Darwin [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I have been using a FreeRunner for a few days with a pre-pre-alpha snapshot of the ASU software. For those who have been off-list for a while, or who have not been looking at the Wiki much, the April Software Update switches the Window Manager from matchbox to Enlightenment (E17) and the main applications from the GTK-based apps (developed by OpenMoko and OpenedHand) to QTopia (but using X11, of course). The new phone is in the same case, so it looks and feels a lot like a GTA01. I think the partition numbers for dfu-util have changed; newer versions of dfu-util allow you to use the partition names instead of the numbers. Beware. The Home Page (aka Launcher) can now be displayed either in an Icon Grid (conventional cell phone style, e.g., Blackberry, and the traditional QTopia format) or a slider style (the latter demonstrated by MokoNinja here: http://people.openmoko.org/ninjutsu/freerunner1.4.swf (flash required). The small home/current-apps menu has been replaced by a larger slide-down top panel, listing the current apps, and containing the time, battery panel, GSM on/off, qwerty keyboard on/off, Configuration, and the Enlightenment menu. Neither of the above is, AFAIK, cast in stone. I must admit I have mixed feelings about the switch from OM/GTK apps to QTopia. However, I recognize the need to get something finished in a reasonable time and I infer Sean et al felt the need to go this way; in hindsight, building the whole thing from scratch is a daunting task, and something that QTopia has been honing for several years. The QTopia apps do have a somewhat more conventional cell phone feel to them (see my screenshot of the Contacts Overview page here: http://www.darwinsys.com/tmp/contacts1.png). So, I think we're in good hands here. On to the experience. Short form: functionally, it works. Among other things, the phone wakes up reliably on incoming rings (assuming it's booted and suspended, of course), and GSM voice works after a resume. There are still some minor glitches. I hope I'm not out of line reporting these here, given how pre-pre my software is, but Steve has been asking me to report on this list since my FreeRunner arrived. I remind everybody reading this to remember that this is PRE-PRE-RELEASE software. None of this intended as criticism of those who worked under time deadline to make this early release ready for the show I was presenting OM at! Nonetheless these are things that I would not like to have fall through the cracks. 1) Incoming calls do wake up the phone, but by the time the dialer appears on screen, several rings have gone by, and, by the time you press Answer and get it recognized, the screen hasn't responded, the Answer button changes to Hangup, so if you double-clicked it, you can easily hang up on your caller without intending to. 2) The ASU software features a qwerty-keyboard. It is switchable between alphabetics and numerics; unfortunately the gesture needed to do this (a triangle drawn counter-clockwise from lower left) is a bit hard to get right; hopefully there will be a button to switch this. As well, the current version of ASU uses QTopia's input manager, offering what looks like a predictive style but is actually doing a dictionary lookup; I find this very distracting compared to a plain do-what-I-type keyboard, and would welcome an easy way to turn this off (I thought Lorne Potter posted this once, but I couldn't find it). 3) It's easy to accidentally start an application (thus slowing down what you're trying to really do) while scrolling the home screen in icon grid mode. 4) The Preferences that are in the top slide-down panel's Wrench icon should presumably be merged with the Preferences App. 5) The shutdown dialog does not have a cancel or Back button. And, it often doesn't actually shutdown. All for now. Again, please remember that this is very early access. And don't let my nit-picking distract you from the fact that it's looking good for something that was merged only a few weeks ago! Ian Darwin ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 12:39 AM, Carlo E. Prelz [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The switch to QT *requires* the abandoning of C in favour of C++, a language that I personally find unsuitable for use. QT is C++, but you can write your code in C and just use the various classes to get GUI widgets. I really don't see why someone that knows C would have a problem with C++. I find some aspects of C++ irritating compared to Java, C#, Python, etc.. But it's far from unsuitable for use. I can write both good and bad code in most any language. And there is nothing saying you have to write your apps in C++. Whatever, it's your money and your time, do what you want with it. I just find it an odd thing to be so irritated about. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Travis Tabbal wrote: On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 12:39 AM, Carlo E. Prelz [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The switch to QT *requires* the abandoning of C in favour of C++, a language that I personally find unsuitable for use. QT is C++, but you can write your code in C and just use the various classes to get GUI widgets. I really don't see why someone that knows C would have a problem with C++. I find some aspects of C++ irritating compared to Java, C#, Python, etc.. But it's far from unsuitable for use. I can write both good and bad code in most any language. And there is nothing saying you have to write your apps in C++. Whatever, it's your money and your time, do what you want with it. I just find it an odd thing to be so irritated about. C++ is difficult to link against, so that limits the languages that you can use for development. For instance, D has a hard time with linking to C++ (or did last I checked). C, on the other hand is far simpler to link to. That's why many standard APIs use C interfaces - OpenGL for instance. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
list etiquette (was: Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions)
liwei wrote: On 一, 2008-05-19 at 16:27 -0700, Mike Montour wrote: Ian Darwin wrote: Thanks for posting your review. Perhaps you (or another Freerunner user) can answer a few more questions: How good is the audio quality when having a GSM voice conversation with another person? Can the other caller hear you clearly without being distracted by an echo of their own voice (as happens on at least some GTA01s, mine included)? Is the Neo's speaker volume loud enough for you to hear the other caller in the presence of noise (e.g. outside on a sidewalk)? i agree with Darwin,my phone has above problem.The other caller hear my voic is very small.i must speak very loudly.i want to know this problem be caused by hareware or by software? well, you can't be agreeing with me (Ian Darwin) because I didn't say anything on this issue. Please be careful that you attribute quoted material to the correct sender. Also, from this time forward, it is necessary when posing any problem like this, to state whether you have a GTA01 or a GTA02, and, what version of the software you are using. To answer Mike's question, my GTA02 with early ASU software, does not seem to have this problem, based on a few calls. I can't speak to liwei's question (hw vs sw). Cheers Ian Darwin ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
2008/5/20 Ben Burdette [EMAIL PROTECTED]: Travis Tabbal wrote: C++ is difficult to link against, so that limits the languages that you can use for development. For instance, D has a hard time with linking to C++ (or did last I checked). C, on the other hand is far simpler to link to. That's why many standard APIs use C interfaces - OpenGL for instance. Recent versions of dmd can link against C++ code compiled with dmc, but it's a bit unreliable, from what I've heard. And D has *extremely good* support for linking with C++, compared with other languages. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
List Eqituette (was: Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Not to single out one or two posters because they might not be the ones who started this::: The switch to QT *requires* the abandoning of C in favour of C++, a language that I personally find unsuitable for use. QT is C++, but you can write your code in C and just use the various classes to get GUI widgets. I really don't see why someone that knows C would have a problem with C++. I find some aspects of C++ irritating compared to Java, C#, Python, etc.. Please change the subject line when you hijack a thread from impressions of a software release to programming language flame war. Thank you. Ian Darwin (OP of the ASU Software impressions thread) ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 4:21 PM, Travis Tabbal [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:snip I can write both good and bad code in most any language.snip Really? Try writing good code in whitespace [1] or most of [2] :P Anyway, regarding the app icons: perhaps it's possible to move those that are used most often to the top automatically? [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitespace_%28programming_language%29 [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esoteric_programming_language#Esoteric_programming_terms -- Vincent ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Languages (Was: Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions)
I did say most. :) There are a number of programming languages that almost seem to have been designed to be difficult to write well formed code in. I try to avoid them, and usually succeed. I won't get into details as that's a little too far off topic and everyone has their own opinions on such things that are no more or less valid than my own. :) I like your idea about the app icons. On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 10:32 AM, Vincent [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 4:21 PM, Travis Tabbal [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:snip I can write both good and bad code in most any language.snip Really? Try writing good code in whitespace [1] or most of [2] :P Anyway, regarding the app icons: perhaps it's possible to move those that are used most often to the top automatically? [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitespace_%28programming_language%29 [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esoteric_programming_language#Esoteric_programming_terms ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
RE: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
I've noticed that with GSM calls in general there is sometimes an echo. It can be very pronouced or barely noticable. It may be hw or sw, but it may not have anything to do with either caller's phone. If it doesn't happen consistently and is not reproducable, it's likely the network. IMHO. Matt -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of liwei Sent: Monday, May 19, 2008 9:22 PM To: List for Openmoko community discussion Subject: Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions On 一, 2008-05-19 at 16:27 -0700, Mike Montour wrote: Ian Darwin wrote: Thanks for posting your review. Perhaps you (or another Freerunner user) can answer a few more questions: How good is the audio quality when having a GSM voice conversation with another person? Can the other caller hear you clearly without being distracted by an echo of their own voice (as happens on at least some GTA01s, mine included)? Is the Neo's speaker volume loud enough for you to hear the other caller in the presence of noise (e.g. outside on a sidewalk)? i agree with Darwin,my phone has above problem.The other caller hear my voic is very small.i must speak very loudly.i want to know this problem be caused by hareware or by software? ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: Languages (Was: Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions)
The app icon idea should be optional, I know I personally have a tendency to remember locations of icons. If the icon list is updated constantly with the most accessed programs, then I might inadvertently select one program thinking another should really be in that location. I think this is more common in a phone with a smaller screen, then on a computer where icons are much more visible. On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 12:07 PM, Travis Tabbal [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I did say most. :) There are a number of programming languages that almost seem to have been designed to be difficult to write well formed code in. I try to avoid them, and usually succeed. I won't get into details as that's a little too far off topic and everyone has their own opinions on such things that are no more or less valid than my own. :) I like your idea about the app icons. On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 10:32 AM, Vincent [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 4:21 PM, Travis Tabbal [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:snip I can write both good and bad code in most any language.snip Really? Try writing good code in whitespace [1] or most of [2] :P Anyway, regarding the app icons: perhaps it's possible to move those that are used most often to the top automatically? [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitespace_%28programming_language%29 [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esoteric_programming_language#Esoteric_programming_terms ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Speaking of needing a sharp nail or the stylus to type easily on the keypad does that mean there is no support for turning the freerunner on its side and the keyboard flipping and enlarging, like say the iphone does? ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 Ian Darwin schrieb: | I'd still very much like to see a way to turn it off, so it works the same for letters as for numbers. It's annoying 90% of the time because most of the person or street names I need to enter into Contacts are not going to be listed. I promise not to write my next 850-page book on my Neo, so word lookup is of limited use. I suspect that Contacts, Todo and Calendar is the most common use case for most people, and that writing normal text is the least common for most people. I think I will write further more SMS than saving contacts. And the texts in calendar are not this long, at least in mine. Greetings Bastian -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- Version: GnuPG v1.4.7 (MingW32) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQFIMxLYlYiDScJJ+7QRAiCgAKCo+tsz3GjpmaaNDBPBv9JrRKxTPwCgrHlQ O6hT+uPT+/uqVKVE8YwV5tg= =WKuQ -END PGP SIGNATURE- ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Speaking of needing a sharp nail or the stylus to type easily on the keypad does that mean there is no support for turning the freerunner on its side and the keyboard flipping and enlarging, like say the iphone does? The one has nothing to do with the other. This portrait/landscape was in the pre-ASU software; there is no gui control to enable it yet in ASU, but E17 almost certainly supports it, so we can hope that the apps will again support it. Ian Darwin ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
RE: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
What does ASU stand for anyways? It makes me nervous knowing that the phones software shares the same initials with my rival University. Richard -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Ian Darwin Sent: Tuesday, May 20, 2008 11:24 AM To: List for Openmoko community discussion Subject: Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions Speaking of needing a sharp nail or the stylus to type easily on the keypad does that mean there is no support for turning the freerunner on its side and the keyboard flipping and enlarging, like say the iphone does? The one has nothing to do with the other. This portrait/landscape was in the pre-ASU software; there is no gui control to enable it yet in ASU, but E17 almost certainly supports it, so we can hope that the apps will again support it. Ian Darwin ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 08:05:13PM +0200, Bastian Muck wrote: -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 Ian Darwin schrieb: | I'd still very much like to see a way to turn it off, so it works the | same for letters as for numbers. It's annoying 90% of the time because | most of the person or street names I need to enter into Contacts are not | going to be listed. I promise not to write my next 850-page book on my | Neo, so word lookup is of limited use. I suspect that Contacts, Todo | and Calendar is the most common use case for most people, and that | writing normal text is the least common for most people. I think I will write further more SMS than saving contacts. And the texts in calendar are not this long, at least in mine. OK, so there are some for whom text is more common. Variety is good. All the more reason to provide an enable/disable gui control for it. Amusing that I skipped SMS because I hardly use it from my handheld, since I almost always travel with a notebook computer, and even compared to a cell phone with a physical keyboard (like my already-mentioned 5-year-old Blackberry) it's just so much easier to send mail/sms from a full-sized keyboard). Cheers Ian Darwin ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
I'd still very much like to see a way to turn it off, so it works the same for letters as for numbers. It's annoying 90% of the time because most of the person or street names I need to enter into Contacts are not going to be listed. I promise not to write my next 850-page book on my Neo, so word lookup is of limited use. I suspect that Contacts, Todo and Calendar is the most common use case for most people, and that writing normal text is the least common for most people. I think I will write further more SMS than saving contacts. And the texts in calendar are not this long, at least in mine. My current phone changes the keyboard type based on context. If you're typing into a password field, it doesn't try to predict. Same with an email address field. But for the message body it becomes predictive. It also adds words to its dictionary from the current context - words you've already typed which weren't in the dictionary, or words in the message you're replying to. Also if you use a word multiple times it eventually adds it to the dictionary. -- Steven Kurylo ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
ASU is literally the April Software Update. Three letter acronyms give it more geek cred. :) On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 2:44 PM, Richard Reichenbacher [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: What does ASU stand for anyways? It makes me nervous knowing that the phones software shares the same initials with my rival University. Richard ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
RE: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
I thought it was the august update released early! -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Kevin Dean Sent: Tuesday, May 20, 2008 12:20 PM To: List for Openmoko community discussion Subject: Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions ASU is literally the April Software Update. Three letter acronyms give it more geek cred. :) On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 2:44 PM, Richard Reichenbacher [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: What does ASU stand for anyways? It makes me nervous knowing that the phones software shares the same initials with my rival University. Richard ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Kevin Dean [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Language DOES matter. We use English on this list... Programming language. :) Sorry if I wasn't clear on what I meant. I was refering to the generic case - be it spoken language, programming language, painting, music, ... If you want very active involvement of participants then they need to easily grasp the environment and what others have done before. / Fredrik ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
RE: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On Tue, 2008-05-20 at 12:19 -0700, steve wrote: I thought it was the august update released early! Funny... I thought it was the August update released late =P ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On 5/20/08, Fredrik Wendt [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Kevin Dean [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Language DOES matter. We use English on this list... Programming language. :) Sorry if I wasn't clear on what I meant. I was refering to the generic case - be it spoken language, programming language, painting, music, ... If you want very active involvement of participants then they need to easily grasp the environment and what others have done before. In spoken language, however, there is a de facto standard (English). When it comes to C vs. C++, there's always a lot of people that are fluent in one vs. a lot of people that are fluent in the other. / Fredrik -- Vincent ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Carlo E. Prelz [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: With regards to the second one, things differ from person to person. For most of its life, the openmoko project has been based on C and GTK, which I happen to be reasonably versed in. The switch to QT *requires* the abandoning of C in favour of C++, a language that I personally find unsuitable for use. Gtk and C are things I personally find unsuitable for use. So I'm getting mcclim and clisp running on the emulator and just using that to write my applications (almost done even with ffi thanks to a patch I received from an ARM architecture wizard; now I just need to figure out how to automate builds of clisp because the final build stage has to run on the target machine to generate the core image). I bet you could spend a week or two and get KDE's automagic binding generator programs to spit out C bindings if you really wanted. But why bother? Gtk ships with the default image so you can just use that. Or, you could pick up the older GTK apps and finish them up. It sounds like the shipping apps are a placeholder to get a nice working phone for shipping Freerunner. It's an open platform, so switch them out if you want the other ones. Or improve the new ones. Or write new ones from scratch in Ruby. Whatever. :) This could come to be true, given enough free time. Nevertheless, there is a big difference between having the core applications of a phone maintained and updated by Openmoko and having to depend on my scarce free time or other voluntary work for the same core apps. The Qtopia specific data formats are temporary until the freesmartphone dbus services are ready. After that it won't matter what GUI toolkit is in use; the actual applications for accessing contacts and such then become trivial to write. -- Lindsay (Carlton): should i eat more post its ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
How does one go about getting the new software version as a qemu image? I am intrigued... and since I have (in the last week or so) started having doubts about getting a freerunner I would very much like something to inspire me again. It is not the freerunners fault, by the way, that I am having doubts. Just that I have just got myself a new contract and I quite like the phone I am getting with it... while on the topic... can freerunner be used without a simcard (obviously not the gsm parts, but everything else?)? Mo. On Mon, 2008-05-19 at 10:27 -0400, Ian Darwin wrote: I have been using a FreeRunner for a few days with a pre-pre-alpha snapshot of the ASU software. For those who have been off-list for a while, or who have not been looking at the Wiki much, the April Software Update switches the Window Manager from matchbox to Enlightenment (E17) and the main applications from the GTK-based apps (developed by OpenMoko and OpenedHand) to QTopia (but using X11, of course). The new phone is in the same case, so it looks and feels a lot like a GTA01. I think the partition numbers for dfu-util have changed; newer versions of dfu-util allow you to use the partition names instead of the numbers. Beware. The Home Page (aka Launcher) can now be displayed either in an Icon Grid (conventional cell phone style, e.g., Blackberry, and the traditional QTopia format) or a slider style (the latter demonstrated by MokoNinja here: http://people.openmoko.org/ninjutsu/freerunner1.4.swf (flash required). The small home/current-apps menu has been replaced by a larger slide-down top panel, listing the current apps, and containing the time, battery panel, GSM on/off, qwerty keyboard on/off, Configuration, and the Enlightenment menu. Neither of the above is, AFAIK, cast in stone. I must admit I have mixed feelings about the switch from OM/GTK apps to QTopia. However, I recognize the need to get something finished in a reasonable time and I infer Sean et al felt the need to go this way; in hindsight, building the whole thing from scratch is a daunting task, and something that QTopia has been honing for several years. The QTopia apps do have a somewhat more conventional cell phone feel to them (see my screenshot of the Contacts Overview page here: http://www.darwinsys.com/tmp/contacts1.png). So, I think we're in good hands here. On to the experience. Short form: functionally, it works. Among other things, the phone wakes up reliably on incoming rings (assuming it's booted and suspended, of course), and GSM voice works after a resume. There are still some minor glitches. I hope I'm not out of line reporting these here, given how pre-pre my software is, but Steve has been asking me to report on this list since my FreeRunner arrived. I remind everybody reading this to remember that this is PRE-PRE-RELEASE software. None of this intended as criticism of those who worked under time deadline to make this early release ready for the show I was presenting OM at! Nonetheless these are things that I would not like to have fall through the cracks. 1) Incoming calls do wake up the phone, but by the time the dialer appears on screen, several rings have gone by, and, by the time you press Answer and get it recognized, the screen hasn't responded, the Answer button changes to Hangup, so if you double-clicked it, you can easily hang up on your caller without intending to. 2) The ASU software features a qwerty-keyboard. It is switchable between alphabetics and numerics; unfortunately the gesture needed to do this (a triangle drawn counter-clockwise from lower left) is a bit hard to get right; hopefully there will be a button to switch this. As well, the current version of ASU uses QTopia's input manager, offering what looks like a predictive style but is actually doing a dictionary lookup; I find this very distracting compared to a plain do-what-I-type keyboard, and would welcome an easy way to turn this off (I thought Lorne Potter posted this once, but I couldn't find it). 3) It's easy to accidentally start an application (thus slowing down what you're trying to really do) while scrolling the home screen in icon grid mode. 4) The Preferences that are in the top slide-down panel's Wrench icon should presumably be merged with the Preferences App. 5) The shutdown dialog does not have a cancel or Back button. And, it often doesn't actually shutdown. All for now. Again, please remember that this is very early access. And don't let my nit-picking distract you from the fact that it's looking good for something that was merged only a few weeks ago! Ian Darwin ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Subject: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions Date: Mon 19 May 08 10:27:25AM -0400 Quoting Ian Darwin ([EMAIL PROTECTED]): ... and the main applications from the GTK-based apps (developed by OpenMoko and OpenedHand) to QTopia (but using X11, of course). Thanks for letting us know. This makes the phone much less hackable for me (c++-based) and thus, if this decision is not reverted, I will most probably not buy the phone, at least for now. I would like to know if the original GTK-based libraries and apps have been left in a decent (useable) state, and if it will be possible to switch to them in a direct and clean way. Carlo -- * Se la Strada e la sua Virtu' non fossero state messe da parte, * K * Carlo E. Prelz - [EMAIL PROTECTED] che bisogno ci sarebbe * di parlare tanto di amore e di rettitudine? (Chuang-Tzu) ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Hi to all (have been reading along this list for a long time :), Sure you can use the Freerunner without gsm. It will just be was any PDA without gsm-modem (well it will be better ;) Jake On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 4:51 PM, Mo Abrahams [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: How does one go about getting the new software version as a qemu image? I am intrigued... and since I have (in the last week or so) started having doubts about getting a freerunner I would very much like something to inspire me again. It is not the freerunners fault, by the way, that I am having doubts. Just that I have just got myself a new contract and I quite like the phone I am getting with it... while on the topic... can freerunner be used without a simcard (obviously not the gsm parts, but everything else?)? Mo. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
I would like to know if the original GTK-based libraries and apps have been left in a decent (useable) state, and if it will be possible to switch to them in a direct and clean way. OF COURSE THEY ARE :-) Carsten has made it very clear on this same list within the last few days that all the major libraries - GTK+2, QT, efl, - are and will be available. Thanks for letting us know. This makes the phone much less hackable for me (c++-based) and thus, if this decision is not reverted, I will most probably not buy the phone, at least for now. All the libraries are there. All toolkits. All languages(*). It is just as hackable as it was. Make of it what you will shall be the whole of thy law. Ian Darwin * C and C++ and sh ship; many others available but you may have to opkg install them. For Java(tm) install Jalimo. Other languages available. Your language may vary. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Subject: Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions Date: Mon 19 May 08 12:16:30PM -0400 Quoting Ian Darwin ([EMAIL PROTECTED]): I would like to know if the original GTK-based libraries and apps have been left in a decent (useable) state, and if it will be possible to switch to them in a direct and clean way. OF COURSE THEY ARE :-) Carsten has made it very clear on this same list within the last few days that all the major libraries - GTK+2, QT, efl, - are and will be available. He wrote about libraries, not about the phone/pim apps. Have the apps been orphaned? Those apps are the heart of the phone, and I would not want to have C++/QT versions running on my phone. Carlo -- * Se la Strada e la sua Virtu' non fossero state messe da parte, * K * Carlo E. Prelz - [EMAIL PROTECTED] che bisogno ci sarebbe * di parlare tanto di amore e di rettitudine? (Chuang-Tzu) ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 10:27 AM, Ian Darwin [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I have been using a FreeRunner for a few days with a pre-pre-alpha snapshot of the ASU software. I've done Daily Snapshot Reviews since January. I enjoy bug hunting and communication. Where can I get this image? Does it run on a Neo1973? For those who have been off-list for a while, or who have not been looking at the Wiki much, the April Software Update switches the Window Manager from matchbox to Enlightenment (E17) and the main applications from the GTK-based apps (developed by OpenMoko and OpenedHand) to QTopia (but using X11, of course). The new phone is in the same case, so it looks and feels a lot like a GTA01. I think the partition numbers for dfu-util have changed; newer versions of dfu-util allow you to use the partition names instead of the numbers. Beware. The Home Page (aka Launcher) can now be displayed either in an Icon Grid (conventional cell phone style, e.g., Blackberry, and the traditional QTopia format) or a slider style (the latter demonstrated by MokoNinja here: http://people.openmoko.org/ninjutsu/freerunner1.4.swf (flash required). For those without Flash, here's a video of the same concept. http://illume.projects.openmoko.org/illume-vv-01.avi The small home/current-apps menu has been replaced by a larger slide-down top panel, listing the current apps, and containing the time, battery panel, GSM on/off, qwerty keyboard on/off, Configuration, and the Enlightenment menu. Neither of the above is, AFAIK, cast in stone. I must admit I have mixed feelings about the switch from OM/GTK apps to QTopia. I personally had those reservations as well. From a non-technical standpoint, I think Openmoko did right by me. I know nothing about hackability on a code level, but I know my previous dislike of Qtopia was because of the lack of flexbility from not running on X11. I also had doubts... Qtopia has been around for a while and never made waves but Openmoko held promise. I felt making the switch to Qtopia was a comprimise on that. However, I don't think so now. The work done to port Qtopia to Xorg created a LOT of opportunity for the Open part of the Openmoko mission statement to be true. Third part developers have just as much ability to hack as they do with the 2007.1 stack (arguably more so) now that the base includes Qtopia but allows for other languages and toolkits. I think this will be made even easier with the service-based approach that will expose functionality cleanly across those toolkits/languages. However, I recognize the need to get something finished in a reasonable time and I infer Sean et al felt the need to go this way; Sometimes people forget that Openmoko Inc. can't make hackable phones unless they SELL hackable phones. Hardware isn't free. Staffing, advertising, fabrication, procurement, shipping, design (et cetera) costs money. I think everyone here can truly respect that, if not like it. I'm happy that Openmoko was able to make a decision that will generate revenue more quickly without comprimising the objectives in the first place. in hindsight, building the whole thing from scratch is a daunting task, and something that QTopia has been honing for several years. Free Software projects have one major strength - the ability to share. I don't see collaboration and adaptation to be a bad thing at all. I'm actually kind of glad that Qtopia will be an included part of Openmoko. Including it doesn't diminish the ability for someone to write the application they would have liked to see as Openmoko but it does give people who aren't writing apps some more functional applications. The QTopia apps do have a somewhat more conventional cell phone feel to them (see my screenshot of the Contacts Overview page here: http://www.darwinsys.com/tmp/contacts1.png). This is good for a mass market product, I think. Having a hackable phone aimed at end users is a good way to go. For the users who never want to tweak, let it be familiar. For users who are fine hacking, give them the power to. With the expansions of Qtopia by the Om dev team, I think that balance it being struck. So, I think we're in good hands here. On to the experience. Short form: functionally, it works. Among other things, the phone wakes up reliably on incoming rings (assuming it's booted and suspended, of course), and GSM voice works after a resume. There are still some minor glitches. I hope I'm not out of line reporting these here, given how pre-pre my software is, but Steve has been asking me to report on this list since my FreeRunner arrived. I remind everybody reading this to remember that this is PRE-PRE-RELEASE software. None of this intended as criticism of those who worked under time deadline to make this early release ready for the show I was presenting OM at! Nonetheless these are things that I would not like to have fall through the cracks. 1) Incoming calls do wake up the phone,
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 10:49 AM, Carlo E. Prelz [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Those apps are the heart of the phone, and I would not want to have C++/QT versions running on my phone. I really don't understand the sentiment there. If the app works well and gets the job done, why does it matter what language it's written in or what widget toolkit it uses? I could see not wanting a closed app on OM, but it sounds like there is source available. Ideally, all interaction at the API level could go through something like dbus and then you could write your plugin in LISP or BASIC for all anyone else cares. I doubt we are there yet, but it could be added as we go along. Or, you could pick up the older GTK apps and finish them up. It sounds like the shipping apps are a placeholder to get a nice working phone for shipping Freerunner. It's an open platform, so switch them out if you want the other ones. Or improve the new ones. Or write new ones from scratch in Ruby. Whatever. :) ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Ian Darwin wrote: I have been using a FreeRunner for a few days with a pre-pre-alpha snapshot of the ASU software. For those who have been off-list for a while, or who have not been looking at the Wiki much, the April Software Update switches the Window Manager from matchbox to Enlightenment (E17) and the main applications from the GTK-based apps (developed by OpenMoko and OpenedHand) to QTopia (but using X11, of course). The new phone is in the same case, so it looks and feels a lot like a GTA01. I think the partition numbers for dfu-util have changed; newer versions of dfu-util allow you to use the partition names instead of the numbers. Beware. The Home Page (aka Launcher) can now be displayed either in an Icon Grid (conventional cell phone style, e.g., Blackberry, and the traditional QTopia format) or a slider style (the latter demonstrated by MokoNinja here: http://people.openmoko.org/ninjutsu/freerunner1.4.swf (flash required). The small home/current-apps menu has been replaced by a larger slide-down top panel, listing the current apps, and containing the time, battery panel, GSM on/off, qwerty keyboard on/off, Configuration, and the Enlightenment menu. Neither of the above is, AFAIK, cast in stone. I must admit I have mixed feelings about the switch from OM/GTK apps to QTopia. However, I recognize the need to get something finished in a reasonable time and I infer Sean et al felt the need to go this way; in hindsight, building the whole thing from scratch is a daunting task, and something that QTopia has been honing for several years. The QTopia apps do have a somewhat more conventional cell phone feel to them (see my screenshot of the Contacts Overview page here: http://www.darwinsys.com/tmp/contacts1.png). So, I think we're in good hands here. On to the experience. Short form: functionally, it works. Among other things, the phone wakes up reliably on incoming rings (assuming it's booted and suspended, of course), and GSM voice works after a resume. There are still some minor glitches. I hope I'm not out of line reporting these here, given how pre-pre my software is, but Steve has been asking me to report on this list since my FreeRunner arrived. I remind everybody reading this to remember that this is PRE-PRE-RELEASE software. None of this intended as criticism of those who worked under time deadline to make this early release ready for the show I was presenting OM at! Nonetheless these are things that I would not like to have fall through the cracks. 1) Incoming calls do wake up the phone, but by the time the dialer appears on screen, several rings have gone by, and, by the time you press Answer and get it recognized, the screen hasn't responded, the Answer button changes to Hangup, so if you double-clicked it, you can easily hang up on your caller without intending to. 2) The ASU software features a qwerty-keyboard. It is switchable between alphabetics and numerics; unfortunately the gesture needed to do this (a triangle drawn counter-clockwise from lower left) is a bit hard to get right; hopefully there will be a button to switch this. As well, the current version of ASU uses QTopia's input manager, offering what looks like a predictive style but is actually doing a dictionary lookup; I find this very distracting compared to a plain do-what-I-type keyboard, and would welcome an easy way to turn this off (I thought Lorne Potter posted this once, but I couldn't find it). 3) It's easy to accidentally start an application (thus slowing down what you're trying to really do) while scrolling the home screen in icon grid mode. 4) The Preferences that are in the top slide-down panel's Wrench icon should presumably be merged with the Preferences App. 5) The shutdown dialog does not have a cancel or Back button. And, it often doesn't actually shutdown. All for now. Again, please remember that this is very early access. And don't let my nit-picking distract you from the fact that it's looking good for something that was merged only a few weeks ago! Ian Darwin Wonderful feedback, Ian. Thanks very much. And thanks for presenting OM at the show. Michael ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
I second that. Is there a way to test the new software on qemu? Looking forward to start hacking stuff on my OM... Ivo On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 3:51 PM, Mo Abrahams [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: How does one go about getting the new software version as a qemu image? I am intrigued... and since I have (in the last week or so) started having doubts about getting a freerunner I would very much like something to inspire me again. It is not the freerunners fault, by the way, that I am having doubts. Just that I have just got myself a new contract and I quite like the phone I am getting with it... while on the topic... can freerunner be used without a simcard (obviously not the gsm parts, but everything else?)? Mo. On Mon, 2008-05-19 at 10:27 -0400, Ian Darwin wrote: I have been using a FreeRunner for a few days with a pre-pre-alpha snapshot of the ASU software. For those who have been off-list for a while, or who have not been looking at the Wiki much, the April Software Update switches the Window Manager from matchbox to Enlightenment (E17) and the main applications from the GTK-based apps (developed by OpenMoko and OpenedHand) to QTopia (but using X11, of course). The new phone is in the same case, so it looks and feels a lot like a GTA01. I think the partition numbers for dfu-util have changed; newer versions of dfu-util allow you to use the partition names instead of the numbers. Beware. The Home Page (aka Launcher) can now be displayed either in an Icon Grid (conventional cell phone style, e.g., Blackberry, and the traditional QTopia format) or a slider style (the latter demonstrated by MokoNinja here: http://people.openmoko.org/ninjutsu/freerunner1.4.swf (flash required). The small home/current-apps menu has been replaced by a larger slide-down top panel, listing the current apps, and containing the time, battery panel, GSM on/off, qwerty keyboard on/off, Configuration, and the Enlightenment menu. Neither of the above is, AFAIK, cast in stone. I must admit I have mixed feelings about the switch from OM/GTK apps to QTopia. However, I recognize the need to get something finished in a reasonable time and I infer Sean et al felt the need to go this way; in hindsight, building the whole thing from scratch is a daunting task, and something that QTopia has been honing for several years. The QTopia apps do have a somewhat more conventional cell phone feel to them (see my screenshot of the Contacts Overview page here: http://www.darwinsys.com/tmp/contacts1.png). So, I think we're in good hands here. On to the experience. Short form: functionally, it works. Among other things, the phone wakes up reliably on incoming rings (assuming it's booted and suspended, of course), and GSM voice works after a resume. There are still some minor glitches. I hope I'm not out of line reporting these here, given how pre-pre my software is, but Steve has been asking me to report on this list since my FreeRunner arrived. I remind everybody reading this to remember that this is PRE-PRE-RELEASE software. None of this intended as criticism of those who worked under time deadline to make this early release ready for the show I was presenting OM at! Nonetheless these are things that I would not like to have fall through the cracks. 1) Incoming calls do wake up the phone, but by the time the dialer appears on screen, several rings have gone by, and, by the time you press Answer and get it recognized, the screen hasn't responded, the Answer button changes to Hangup, so if you double-clicked it, you can easily hang up on your caller without intending to. 2) The ASU software features a qwerty-keyboard. It is switchable between alphabetics and numerics; unfortunately the gesture needed to do this (a triangle drawn counter-clockwise from lower left) is a bit hard to get right; hopefully there will be a button to switch this. As well, the current version of ASU uses QTopia's input manager, offering what looks like a predictive style but is actually doing a dictionary lookup; I find this very distracting compared to a plain do-what-I-type keyboard, and would welcome an easy way to turn this off (I thought Lorne Potter posted this once, but I couldn't find it). 3) It's easy to accidentally start an application (thus slowing down what you're trying to really do) while scrolling the home screen in icon grid mode. 4) The Preferences that are in the top slide-down panel's Wrench icon should presumably be merged with the Preferences App. 5) The shutdown dialog does not have a cancel or Back button. And, it often doesn't actually shutdown. All for now. Again, please remember that this is very early access. And don't let my nit-picking distract you from the fact that it's looking good for something that was merged only a few weeks ago! Ian Darwin
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Travis Tabbal [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 10:49 AM, Carlo E. Prelz wrote: Those apps are the heart of the phone, and I would not want to have C++/QT versions running on my phone. I really don't understand the sentiment there. If the app works well and gets the job done, why does it matter what language it's written in or what widget toolkit it uses? Language DOES matter. We use English on this list. I doubt that 50 % of those involved and interested in this wonderful project have English as their mother tounge. We're all just interacting with and describing the same physical world, yet there are so many different ways to go about it and, basically, people tend to not be as fluent in more than one or two languages. Hence, if you want people to get up to speed and act naturally with as few obstacles as possible in the way - then you'll want to choose language(s)/environment used carefully. My two euro cents. / Fredrik ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 4:34 PM, Fredrik Wendt [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Travis Tabbal [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 10:49 AM, Carlo E. Prelz wrote: Those apps are the heart of the phone, and I would not want to have C++/QT versions running on my phone. I really don't understand the sentiment there. If the app works well and gets the job done, why does it matter what language it's written in or what widget toolkit it uses? Language DOES matter. We use English on this list. I doubt that 50 % of those involved and interested in this wonderful project have English as their mother tounge. Programming language. :) Openmoko's new software stack is language agnostic. A Python app works cleanly with a C++, for instance. We're all just interacting with and describing the same physical world, yet there are so many different ways to go about it and, basically, people tend to not be as fluent in more than one or two languages. Hence, if you want people to get up to speed and act naturally with as few obstacles as possible in the way - then you'll want to choose language(s)/environment used carefully. My two euro cents. / Fredrik ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
Ian Darwin wrote: I have been using a FreeRunner for a few days with a pre-pre-alpha snapshot of the ASU software. [...] Short form: functionally, it works. Among other things, the phone wakes up reliably on incoming rings (assuming it's booted and suspended, of course), and GSM voice works after a resume. Thanks for posting your review. Perhaps you (or another Freerunner user) can answer a few more questions: How good is the audio quality when having a GSM voice conversation with another person? Can the other caller hear you clearly without being distracted by an echo of their own voice (as happens on at least some GTA01s, mine included)? Is the Neo's speaker volume loud enough for you to hear the other caller in the presence of noise (e.g. outside on a sidewalk)? ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On 一, 2008-05-19 at 16:27 -0700, Mike Montour wrote: Ian Darwin wrote: Thanks for posting your review. Perhaps you (or another Freerunner user) can answer a few more questions: How good is the audio quality when having a GSM voice conversation with another person? Can the other caller hear you clearly without being distracted by an echo of their own voice (as happens on at least some GTA01s, mine included)? Is the Neo's speaker volume loud enough for you to hear the other caller in the presence of noise (e.g. outside on a sidewalk)? i agree with Darwin,my phone has above problem.The other caller hear my voic is very small.i must speak very loudly.i want to know this problem be caused by hareware or by software? ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: ASU software - pre-pre-release impressions
On Mon, 19 May 2008 10:27:25 -0400 Ian Darwin [EMAIL PROTECTED] babbled: 2) The ASU software features a qwerty-keyboard. It is switchable between alphabetics and numerics; unfortunately the gesture needed to do this (a triangle drawn counter-clockwise from lower left) is a bit hard to it is? the gesture is just slide finger up. no triangle :) not sure how you got the triangle thing :) (place finger at kbd bottom, slide, lift finger) get right; hopefully there will be a button to switch this. As well, unlikely :) the current version of ASU uses QTopia's input manager, offering what looks like a predictive style but is actually doing a dictionary actually - it doesn't - i wrote one from scratch :) the code is ugly - but it works. it does use standard linux dict files though for the dictionary - the one we ship is an abbreviated one with only 5000 words - but they also have extended frequency counts. have a dig around the illume package files and see - it's just a text file. :) it also maintains a user dictionary for personal words you added in ~/.e/e/ :) same format. lookup; I find this very distracting compared to a plain do-what-I-type keyboard, and would welcome an easy way to turn this off (I thought Lorne Potter posted this once, but I couldn't find it). it will do what you type - but you'd better have a stylus or a very sharp pointy fingernail :) the dictionary is intended to make it easy to type with your fingers and it fixes your typos for common english entry. the dictionary files are text so other language can be added (note - it won't be that happy with it at the moment, something i need to fix as i was busy just making it work at all). 3) It's easy to accidentally start an application (thus slowing down what you're trying to really do) while scrolling the home screen in icon grid mode. there is an adjustment for this - its in the interaction dialog, yes its ugly - i know. i keep fiddling with it every now and again to see if i can't make it behave a bit more like i intend. :) 4) The Preferences that are in the top slide-down panel's Wrench icon should presumably be merged with the Preferences App. currently those are preferences for enlightenment - and thus it has its own settings dialog/panel like all applications anywhere on any desktop do :) 5) The shutdown dialog does not have a cancel or Back button. And, it often doesn't actually shutdown. that may actually go - that's just qtopia's default dialog - the # of app icons will likely reduce by a lot as we trim out things we don't really need. All for now. Again, please remember that this is very early access. And don't let my nit-picking distract you from the fact that it's looking good for something that was merged only a few weeks ago! Ian Darwin ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community -- Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman) [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
