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Handhelds Hardware

Zaurus Development with Qtopia 27

Posted by timothy from the squash-it-in dept.
Radical Rad writes "There is a great article by Bruce Forsberg at Linux Gazette for anyone wanting to develop for the Zaurus platform. Using a mileage calculator as an example, he covers step by step setting up the Qtopia SDK, compiling, testing with the Zaurus emulator, and finally cross-compiling and creating the distribution package. He covers all the bases including compile-time environment variables and the control file for the ipkg."
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Zaurus Development with Qtopia More

Zaurus Development with Qtopia

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  • Great news (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    That's a great news for the Free Software movement. I can't believe no one has commented this story. But when there is MSFT bashing story, we have 1000 of flaimbate comments... *sigh*
    • 1. This isn't on the front page.

      2. It's great news for the FS movement? What is? That you can compile apps for the Zaurus? YAY! ;P

      Don't get me started on the Z. I own one. And I'm pissed.
      • Yeah, why are you pissed?

        I own a Zaurus, and I'm very happy!
        • Well, first, I apologize. I was in a very bad mood this morning. I was doing a little wifi-age this morning on my Z, and randomly I get a blank screen. Take out the card, and it goes back to normal. Somewhat normal. So I reboot. And all of my shit is gone. I have a backup, but from a week ago. This Zaurus- and from my talkingson in #zaurus and on the web, it sounds like the Zaurus is riddled with problems. It sucks. So much potential, but it just bums me out that it sucks so hard. I guess I'm stil
          • I agree it's not as stable as other platforms, currently. But it is much more flexible, don't you think?

            I imagine (and hope) a few iterations of OpenZaurus will put things right.

            • Re:Great news (Score:3, Informative)

              by RevAaron ( 125240 )
              Well, I don't really think it's more flexible. There is potential for it to be more flexible, but considering the mindset of most Linux developers, I don't think it will be in the end. While I still have hopes, I don't see much innovation (excuse the poor word) coming out of OZ or Sharp ROMland. No doubt it will improve, perhaps even rival other platforms in some areas someday.

              Unless by flexible you mean having the ability to compile pretty easily a wide variety of apps which don't really belong on the Z

  • No mention of OpenZaurus (Score:4, Interesting)

    by ccady ( 569355 ) on Sunday May 04, 2003 @09:32AM (#5874227) Journal

    <freesoftwareplug>

    Lots of people use OpenZaurus [sourceforge.net] which is more stable, configurable, and (need I say?) way cooler than the proprietary ROM that comes with the machine.

    </freesoftwareplug>

    • Re:No mention of OpenZaurus (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      it also currently breaks pretty much every non-OZ app (commercial or otherwise). no thanks.

      the stock ROM stinks but at least I know any app I buy or d/l (like from TheKompany) will stand a chance of working.

      Waiting for OZ 4.0....
      • Waiting for OZ 4.0? I'm waiting for the new Sharp ROM! With Opera 6 and Qtopia 1.6 it'll be somewhat of an upgrade. Let's hope they did a little work on the PIM apps...

        The stock ROM stinks in relation to decent PDA platforms, like Newton OS, PalmOS or even PocketPC. But compared to OZ, it's great as a PIM/PDA platform. Which is a bummer.

    • Gtk PDA Environment (GPE) (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Paul Jakma ( 2677 ) on Sunday May 04, 2003 @01:59PM (#5875618) Homepage Journal
      Or what about the even cooler (but not as mature) GTK+ 2 based GPE [handhelds.org]? X based so when at home you can have your apps display to your desktop and make use of a real keyboard. Though the graffiti-like Xstroke app GPE uses is excellent and so you might not miss your desktop keyboard :).
      • I see you're one of the developers of GPE.

        The Familiar HOWTO doesn't mention the Zaurus. Can I run Familiar / GPE on the Zaurus? Easily? Familiar seems very pro-iPaq.

        Does Familiar run the same kernel as OpenZaurus? There are issues with the SD Card driver on the Zaurus; Sharp won't release the specs so Sharp's binary module must be used.

        TIA

        • Oh... just a very minor one :(

          Yes, familiar can run on Zaurus. You'll have to hunt around for instructions though, or ask on the irc.freenode.net#gpe irc channel - i know that at least two of the more active developers have Zauruses (Zaurii?) (the C700).

          Familiar runs its own kernel. I guess you'd have to keep your sharp kernel and run that. SD will (it seems) never be supported openly under linux, as the consortium controlling the specs will not release them.

          Familiar pro-ipaq? Well, handhelds.org was set
      • 1. You can use X11 apps from within Qtopia on the Zaurus or any Linux PDA using an Xserver that displays within a Qtopia window. Just as easy.

        2. There's no way I'll not miss my real keyboard until I have real handwriting recognition on my Linux PDA. Not stroke or character recognition, which is what Xstroke, Graffitti, Jot and the system in Qtopia all are. No one seems to be working on a such a project, yet another case of Linux people not knowing how good they could have it.

        But then again, character
        • X on Qtopia: ah, neat. ie an Xnest server ported to Qtopia? (didnt know it existed - sorry).

          2. Well, what do you mean by real handwriting recognition?

          The trouble is you want the computer to magically recognise whatever you write. but, that just isnt going to happen for now. There needs to be some formal specification for character recognition, and most systems have opted for 'stroke' recognition. Note that one of the biggest reasons for this is that hardware limitations/interfaces make this the most prac

  • mirror? (Score:1, Redundant)

    by (startx) ( 37027 )
    did anyone happen to get a mirror of the this article before the server it's hosted on went poof? What'd they do, host it on the Zaurus?

  • Mirror (Score:2)

    by sydb ( 176695 )
    here [luchs.at].

  • What the Zaurus needs. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I've got one and what it needs to be a decent pda is:

    A good wordprocessor.
    A good spreadsheet.
    More than anything else, a good agenda and good desktop syncronisation.

    All things that suck in the existing Zaurus software. That leaves a gap for 3rd party commercial or freeware replacements.

    The one piece of software which makes the machine worth using is IQNotes. It rocks, definite potential.

  • First off, I'm not trying to be a troll. Really.

    Looking at Handango [handango.com], Zaurus apps sell far less than their Palm/Pocket PC counterparts. Anybody here written/ported a commercial app to the Zaurus and care to share their experiences? Was it worth the time, profit wise? Were there problems with providing tech support for people running OpenZaurus or GPE? How much did it cost to get a commercial license for Qtopia?

    Thanks. (In case it wasn't obvious, I work for a company that sells Palm software, and w

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