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Jason Haslup
jason at haslup dot com

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Mon, 29 Jan 2007

Zaurus Time Again
blog

Well, I've actually done some development on my Zaurus, just as I said I would. I fired up my C1000 and installed the latest version of the pdaXrom... or actually, someone's improvements on pdaXrom.

Anyhow, it's basically a slimmed down X running my zaurus. The nice part is that there's a lot of libraries already compiled for it (especially SDL and libmad which I'll be using), plus I have gcc + friends loaded on the device so I can compile on it and not mess around with a cross-compiler. I don't have the patience for setting all that up anymore... I just want to start hacking on something.

Which I did. I successfully compiled my first SDL application for the Zaurus... and it worked! It was actually the first program of a tutorial I found, so I really can't claim too much credit. But I was happy to see that it compiled on my linux desktop and my zaurus without any problems.

I also compiled a sample program that uses libmad for mp3 playback which in turn worked on the zaurus as well. I'll probably use that library for mp3 playback, and I think I might have to throw in libao for audio output, as well, although I'm still investigating that.

I took a stab at the graphics side of things, too, and I think that's going to be the worst part. I'm not good at that, but I'll give it the old college try. Heck, I'm not even sure what I'm building, but it's fun.

Ok... I've done a bit of research on whether or not I need libao for my sound output. I don't think I need it, but it seems to be the most documented way of getting sound output. I'm pretty sure the Zaurus is using libesd for output, but that documentation is extremely lacking for a newbie like me. I've sort of used libao before (my python mp3 app was written with python bindings for libmad and libao), and it's supposed to be a simpler interface to audio output. So... I don't know. I'm sure there's some additional overhead, so I think I'll look at the source for madplay and see if I can figure out what's going on. If not, I'll go to the libao docs and do it that way. And if that doesn't work... back to Python.

Wed, 24 Jan 2007

My feed was down
blog

I now have the explanation for the dramatic drop in the readership of haslup.com... my RSS was down! It must have happened during the drastic remodeling of my site. For that, I apologize to my loyal reader. Fear not, my feed is back up and running. Bring on the pageviews!

In other news... Nokia released the Nokia N800 which is their new Internet Tablet. They still sell the N770, which I have, but really... spend the extra $50 and get the N800 if only just for the new version of Opera and faster processor. I still use my N770 everyday... the screen is awesome for browsing the web in bed or on the sofa. The fact that it is 800 pixels wide makes a big difference compared to my Zaurus' 640 pixels. Now it's just wide enough to handle most web pages (especially bloglines) and even better, PDF documents.

I love the idea that Nokia is seeding ~500 developers with coupons to buy the N800 for a big discount ($99 I think. Or 99 euros, maybe it's both depending on your location). That's awesome... I'd love to see more development done on the Nokia, I'm just hoping they don't forget the N770 with all their cool apps!

I've got the development environment installed but I still haven't cranked anything out. Someday, perhaps... I think porting Dillo or Links might be cool for even quicker web browsing. If Nokia ever releases the GPS kit for the US, I'd consider that, as well.

I think my next big project, though, might be turning my Zaurus CL-1000 into a mini car-puter. Something I can mount on my console and use to play podcasts and music on my drive home. Sure, I can use my iPod, but that's just not as much fun.

And to make it more interesting, I'm thinking about writing a fully graphical UI using SDL. I already wrote a podcast app in Python using Qt widgets, but the coolness factor isn't there. I want Canola on my Zaurus optimized for local content and the 640x480 screen. I even want to write it in C (gasp!). I'm going old school. Or lisp. Now that would be fun...

Mon, 22 Jan 2007

Bloglines 'Return' for w3m
blog :: emacs

Inspired by this post (a great emacs blog, by the way), I put together something for bloglines and w3m. I use w3m in emacs a lot to read my Bloglines feeds (using the 'mobile' version of bloglines) because it's nice and quick. Once I descend into a blog or group, I can always use 'back' ('B') to get back to my list of feeds, but because it's a cached version, the feed counts aren't up-to-date. Instead, it's better to click the 'Return to Subscriptions' link at the bottom of the page since it forces a refresh of my listing. The code below adds the binding 'L' to a function that does just that automatically.

(defun jh-w3m-bloglines-return ()
  "Click the 'return to subscriptions' link in bloglines."
  (interactive)
  (when (search-forward "Return to Subscriptions" nil t)
    (backward-char 1)
    (w3m-view-this-url)))

;; two bindings... one for full keyboard use, the other is 
;; handy when just my left hand is on the keyboard 
;; (right hand holding coffee :) )
(define-key w3m-mode-map (kbd "L") 'jh-w3m-bloglines-return)
(define-key w3m-mode-map (kbd "w") 'jh-w3m-bloglines-return)

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