Planet MaemoBlog entries from Maemo communityhttp://maemo.org/news/planet-maemo/2009-07-04T07:03:22+00:00planet@maemo.orgFeedCreator 1.7.6(BH) (info@mypapit.net)Going to GUADEC2009-07-02T22:11:28+00:002009-07-02T22:11:28+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-ceafbe18675911deb3ba0365e42de580e580Joaquim Rocha <joaquimrocha1@gmail.com>I mean Gran Canaria Desktop Summit, an event joining GUADEC and aKademy!
Tomorrow I’ll fly to Gran Canaria to attend this great event and I got lots of good expectations since it’s gonna be my first GUADEC.
I hope to attend many conferences and hang out with fellow Igalians and friends.
A lot of important names in our world of Open Source and particularly, Open Desktop will be there so it can only be great!
I’ll give two talks in there. A lightning talk about my OCR project — OCRFeeder — and another one that gives a practical view on the new Hildon (or “The Fremantle Way”).
By the way, I used ReStructured Text to do my presentation (using the rst2odp script) and save time from using Open Office. You should try it too.
So, thanks to my dear girlfriend everything is packed already (I always think my socks time-traveled to Narnia), the camera battery is charged, presentations are finished and I’m ready to go — I don’t mention my laptop because we’re “symbiotically” connected and where I go “he” goes.
Tomorrow I’ll fly to Gran Canaria to attend this great event and I got lots of good expectations since it’s gonna be my first GUADEC.
I hope to attend many conferences and hang out with fellow Igalians and friends.
A lot of important names in our world of Open Source and particularly, Open Desktop will be there so it can only be great!
I’ll give two talks in there. A lightning talk about my OCR project — OCRFeeder — and another one that gives a practical view on the new Hildon (or “The Fremantle Way”).
By the way, I used ReStructured Text to do my presentation (using the rst2odp script) and save time from using Open Office. You should try it too.
So, thanks to my dear girlfriend everything is packed already (I always think my socks time-traveled to Narnia), the camera battery is charged, presentations are finished and I’m ready to go — I don’t mention my laptop because we’re “symbiotically” connected and where I go “he” goes.
Hope to see you there!
3 2 ]]>Openismus 2009 T-Shirts2009-07-02T15:58:56+00:002009-07-02T15:58:56+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-5795fa8c672611dea190bdc50bd91a201a20Murray Cumming <murrayc@murrayc.com>As per tradition, the new Openismus T-Shirts are ready for GUADEC 2009 (GCDS). They are again unlike last year’s, and simple enough to wear among civilians. We were a little rushed this year but they turned out nice. Thanks to Kat for fixing things in Inkscape and getting them done.
We only printed a limited number, so seek out an Openismus developer over the first weekend to get yours.
Now that we’ve found a place to get these done in Berlin we’ll probably do a new design (2009 1/2) for the Maemo Summit in Amsterdam in October.
3 1 ]]>As per tradition, the new Openismus T-Shirts are ready for GUADEC 2009 (GCDS). They are again unlike last year’s, and simple enough to wear among civilians. We were a little rushed this year but they turned out nice. Thanks to Kat for fixing things in Inkscape and getting them done.
We only printed a limited number, so seek out an Openismus developer over the first weekend to get yours.
Now that we’ve found a place to get these done in Berlin we’ll probably do a new design (2009 1/2) for the Maemo Summit in Amsterdam in October.
3 1 ]]>Tracker experimental merged to main development tree, Ivan’s presentation2009-07-02T14:59:29+00:002009-07-02T14:59:29+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-08421806671e11deae95d1438a9682618261Philip Van Hoof <pvanhoof@gnome.org>
I’m currently involved in the Tracker project and our project will be presented by Ivan Frade at the Desktop Summit this Sunday.
We merged our experimental branch tracker-store to master. This means that our reachitecture plans for Tracker have mostly been implemented and are being pushed forward into the main development tree.
I will start with a comparison with Tracker’s 0.6.x series.
Supports aggregates COUNT, AVG, SUM, MIN and MAX in SPARQL
Operates for all its storage functionality as a separate binary
Operates all its indexing, crawling and monitoring functionalities in a separately packagable binary
Tracker 0.6.9x:
Uses RDFQuery as query language
Has its own ontology
Has very limited support for storing your own data
Supports several aggregate functions in its query language
Operates for all its storage functionality in the indexer
Operates for all its query functionality in the permanent daemon
Does file monitoring and crawling in the permanent daemon
Operates all its indexing functionality in a separately packagable binary
Tracker master:
Architecture
The storage service uses the Nepomuk ontologies as schema. It allows you to both query and insert or delete data.
The fs-miner finds, crawls and monitors file resources. It also analyses those files and extracts the metadata. It instructs the storage service to store the metadata.
External applications and other such miners are allowed to both query and insert using the storage service. Priority is given to queries over stores.
Plugins that run in process of the application can push information into Tracker. We indeed don’t try to scan Evolution’s cache formats, we have a plugin that gets it out of Evolution and into Tracker.
Storage service’s API and IPC
The storage service gives priority to SELECT queries to ensure that apps in need of metadata get serviced quickly.
INSERT and DELETE calls get queued. SELECT ones get executed immediately. For apps that require consistency and/or insertion speed we provide a batch mode that has a commit barrier. When the commit calls back you know that everything that came before it, is in a consistent shape. We don’t support full transactions with rollback.
The standard API operates over DBus. This means while using it you are subject to DBus’s performance limitations. In SPARQL Update it is possible to group a lot of writes. Due to DBus’s latency overhead this is recommended when inserting larger sets of data. We’re experimenting with a custom IPC system, based on unix sockets, to get increased throughput for apps that want to put a lot of INSERTs onto our queue.
We provide a feature that signals on changes happening to certain types. You can see this as a poor man’s live search. Full live search for SPARQL is fairly complicated. Maybe in future we’ll implement something like that.
Ontology
We support the majority of the Nepomuk base ontologies and our so called filesystem miners will store found metadata using Nepomuk’s ontologies. We support static custom ontologies right now. This means that it’s impossible to dynamically add a new ontology unless you reset the entire database first.
We’re planning to support dynamically adding and removing ontologies. The ontology format that we use is Turtle.
Backup and import
Right now we support loading data into our database using either SPARQL Update, an experimental unix-socket based IPC, and by passing us a Turtle file.
We currently have no support for making a backup. Support for this is on priority planning. It will write a Turtle file (which can be loaded afterward).
Backup and import of ontology specific metadata
When we introduce support for custom ontologies it’ll be useful for apps that provided their own custom ontology to get a backup of just the data that has relevance to said ontology. We plan to provide a method to do that.
Volume support
Having a static custom ontology for volume support, volumes and their status is queryable over SPARQL. File resources also get linked to said volumes. This makes it possible to get the availability of a file resource. For example: return metadata about all photos that are located on a specific camera, although the camera isn’t connected to this device.
Volume support is a work in progress at this moment.
5 0 ]]>
I’m currently involved in the Tracker project and our project will be presented by Ivan Frade at the Desktop Summit this Sunday.
We merged our experimental branch tracker-store to master. This means that our reachitecture plans for Tracker have mostly been implemented and are being pushed forward into the main development tree.
I will start with a comparison with Tracker’s 0.6.x series.
Supports aggregates COUNT, AVG, SUM, MIN and MAX in SPARQL
Operates for all its storage functionality as a separate binary
Operates all its indexing, crawling and monitoring functionalities in a separately packagable binary
Tracker 0.6.9x:
Uses RDFQuery as query language
Has its own ontology
Has very limited support for storing your own data
Supports several aggregate functions in its query language
Operates for all its storage functionality in the indexer
Operates for all its query functionality in the permanent daemon
Does file monitoring and crawling in the permanent daemon
Operates all its indexing functionality in a separately packagable binary
Tracker master:
Architecture
The storage service uses the Nepomuk ontologies as schema. It allows you to both query and insert or delete data.
The fs-miner finds, crawls and monitors file resources. It also analyses those files and extracts the metadata. It instructs the storage service to store the metadata.
External applications and other such miners are allowed to both query and insert using the storage service. Priority is given to queries over stores.
Plugins that run in process of the application can push information into Tracker. We indeed don’t try to scan Evolution’s cache formats, we have a plugin that gets it out of Evolution and into Tracker.
Storage service’s API and IPC
The storage service gives priority to SELECT queries to ensure that apps in need of metadata get serviced quickly.
INSERT and DELETE calls get queued. SELECT ones get executed immediately. For apps that require consistency and/or insertion speed we provide a batch mode that has a commit barrier. When the commit calls back you know that everything that came before it, is in a consistent shape. We don’t support full transactions with rollback.
The standard API operates over DBus. This means while using it you are subject to DBus’s performance limitations. In SPARQL Update it is possible to group a lot of writes. Due to DBus’s latency overhead this is recommended when inserting larger sets of data. We’re experimenting with a custom IPC system, based on unix sockets, to get increased throughput for apps that want to put a lot of INSERTs onto our queue.
We provide a feature that signals on changes happening to certain types. You can see this as a poor man’s live search. Full live search for SPARQL is fairly complicated. Maybe in future we’ll implement something like that.
Ontology
We support the majority of the Nepomuk base ontologies and our so called filesystem miners will store found metadata using Nepomuk’s ontologies. We support static custom ontologies right now. This means that it’s impossible to dynamically add a new ontology unless you reset the entire database first.
We’re planning to support dynamically adding and removing ontologies. The ontology format that we use is Turtle.
Backup and import
Right now we support loading data into our database using either SPARQL Update, an experimental unix-socket based IPC, and by passing us a Turtle file.
We currently have no support for making a backup. Support for this is on priority planning. It will write a Turtle file (which can be loaded afterward).
Backup and import of ontology specific metadata
When we introduce support for custom ontologies it’ll be useful for apps that provided their own custom ontology to get a backup of just the data that has relevance to said ontology. We plan to provide a method to do that.
Volume support
Having a static custom ontology for volume support, volumes and their status is queryable over SPARQL. File resources also get linked to said volumes. This makes it possible to get the availability of a file resource. For example: return metadata about all photos that are located on a specific camera, although the camera isn’t connected to this device.
Volume support is a work in progress at this moment.
5 0 ]]>Why I disagree with RMS concerning Mono2009-07-02T09:09:31+00:002009-07-02T09:09:31+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-d93c17ce66f411dea3a555d5f746d308d308Dave Neary <dneary@maemo.org>The GNOME press contact alias got a mail last weekend from Sam Varghese asking about the possibility of new Mono applications being added to GNOME 3.0, and I answered it. I didn’t think much about it at the time, but I see now that the reason Sam was asking was because of Richard Stallman’s recent warnings about Mono - Sam’s article has since appeared with the ominous looking title “GNOME 3.0 may have more Mono apps“. And indeed it may. It may also have more alien technology, we’re not sure yet. We’re still working on an agreement with the DoD to get access to the alien craft in Fort Knox.
Anyway - that aside, Richard’s position is that it’s dangerous to include Mono to the point where removing it is difficult, should that become necessary to legally distribute your software. On the surface, I agree. But he goes a little further, saying that since it is dangerous to depend on Mono, we should actively discourage its use. And on this point, we disagree.
I’m not arguing that we should encourage its use either, but I fundamentally disagree with discouraging someone from pursuing a technology choice because of the threat of patents. In this particular case, the law is an ass. The patent system in the United States is out of control and dysfunctional, and it is bringing the rest of the world down with it. The time has come to take a stand and say “We don’t care about patents. We’re just not going to think about them. Sue us if you want.”
The healthy thing to do now would be to provoke a test case of the US patent system. Take advantage of one of the many cease & desist letters that get sent out for vacuous patented technology to make a case against the US PTO’s policy pertaining to software and business process patents. Run an “implement your favourite stupid patent as free software” competition.
In all of the projects that I have been involved in over the years, patent fears have had a negative affect on developer productivity and morale. In the GIMP, we struggled with patent issues related to compression algorithms for GIF and TIFF, colour management, and for some plug-ins. In GNOME, it’s been Mono mostly, but also MP3, and related (and unrelated) issues have handicapped basic functionality like playing DVDs for years. In Openwengo, the area of audio and video codecs is mined with patent restrictions, including the popular codecs G729 and H264 among others.
What could we have achieved if standards bodies had a patent pledge as part of their standardisation process, and released reference implementations under an artistic licence? How much further along would we be if cryptography, filesystems, codecs and data compression weren’t so heavily handicapped by patents? Or if we’d just ignored the patents and created clean-room implementations of these patented technologies?
That’s what I believe we need to do. Ignore the patent system completely. I believe strongly in respecting licencing requirements related to third party products and developer packs. I think it’s reasonable to respect people’s trademarks and trade secrets. But having respect for patents, and the patent system, is ridiculous. Let a thousand flowers bloom, and let the chips fall where they may.
So if you want to write a killer app in Mono, then don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. If you build it, they will come.
6 3 ]]>The GNOME press contact alias got a mail last weekend from Sam Varghese asking about the possibility of new Mono applications being added to GNOME 3.0, and I answered it. I didn’t think much about it at the time, but I see now that the reason Sam was asking was because of Richard Stallman’s recent warnings about Mono - Sam’s article has since appeared with the ominous looking title “GNOME 3.0 may have more Mono apps“. And indeed it may. It may also have more alien technology, we’re not sure yet. We’re still working on an agreement with the DoD to get access to the alien craft in Fort Knox.
Anyway - that aside, Richard’s position is that it’s dangerous to include Mono to the point where removing it is difficult, should that become necessary to legally distribute your software. On the surface, I agree. But he goes a little further, saying that since it is dangerous to depend on Mono, we should actively discourage its use. And on this point, we disagree.
I’m not arguing that we should encourage its use either, but I fundamentally disagree with discouraging someone from pursuing a technology choice because of the threat of patents. In this particular case, the law is an ass. The patent system in the United States is out of control and dysfunctional, and it is bringing the rest of the world down with it. The time has come to take a stand and say “We don’t care about patents. We’re just not going to think about them. Sue us if you want.”
The healthy thing to do now would be to provoke a test case of the US patent system. Take advantage of one of the many cease & desist letters that get sent out for vacuous patented technology to make a case against the US PTO’s policy pertaining to software and business process patents. Run an “implement your favourite stupid patent as free software” competition.
In all of the projects that I have been involved in over the years, patent fears have had a negative affect on developer productivity and morale. In the GIMP, we struggled with patent issues related to compression algorithms for GIF and TIFF, colour management, and for some plug-ins. In GNOME, it’s been Mono mostly, but also MP3, and related (and unrelated) issues have handicapped basic functionality like playing DVDs for years. In Openwengo, the area of audio and video codecs is mined with patent restrictions, including the popular codecs G729 and H264 among others.
What could we have achieved if standards bodies had a patent pledge as part of their standardisation process, and released reference implementations under an artistic licence? How much further along would we be if cryptography, filesystems, codecs and data compression weren’t so heavily handicapped by patents? Or if we’d just ignored the patents and created clean-room implementations of these patented technologies?
That’s what I believe we need to do. Ignore the patent system completely. I believe strongly in respecting licencing requirements related to third party products and developer packs. I think it’s reasonable to respect people’s trademarks and trade secrets. But having respect for patents, and the patent system, is ridiculous. Let a thousand flowers bloom, and let the chips fall where they may.
So if you want to write a killer app in Mono, then don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. If you build it, they will come.
6 3 ]]>Survey: Mobile device usage2009-07-01T20:43:00+00:002009-07-01T20:43:00+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-8e40ed16668711de802f19abb75181108110Daniel Gentleman <thoughtfix@gmail.com>survey posted here. Please help me understand tablet users more by taking this survey.3 4 ]]>survey posted here. Please help me understand tablet users more by taking this survey.3 4 ]]>Qaiku API brings first clients: Mauku, Gwibber and an XMPP bot2009-07-01T20:30:40+00:002009-07-01T20:30:40+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-f19c6e26667d11de901b951297478cc38cc3Henri Bergius <henri.bergius@iki.fi>Qaiku's twitter-like API has been one of the first major contributions I've made to the project, and it is great to see some first applications start to use it. Here are some examples:
Mauku is a microblogging client for Maemo. The new Fremantle version supports Qaiku nicely:
Gwibber is a Linux desktop microblogging client. Qaiku support is now available in the development version:
There is also an XMPP bot that we're going to launch soon for wider use. This enables you to monitor your mentions or some channels and post via any Jabber client:
If you're doing something cool with the API, please let me know! The #Qaiku-api channel is good for usage questions and ideas.
Every now and then people ask me why we're doing Qaiku instead of "just using Twitter". Here are some points why Qaiku just works better:
5 0 ]]>Qaiku's twitter-like API has been one of the first major contributions I've made to the project, and it is great to see some first applications start to use it. Here are some examples:
Mauku is a microblogging client for Maemo. The new Fremantle version supports Qaiku nicely:
Gwibber is a Linux desktop microblogging client. Qaiku support is now available in the development version:
There is also an XMPP bot that we're going to launch soon for wider use. This enables you to monitor your mentions or some channels and post via any Jabber client:
If you're doing something cool with the API, please let me know! The #Qaiku-api channel is good for usage questions and ideas.
Every now and then people ask me why we're doing Qaiku instead of "just using Twitter". Here are some points why Qaiku just works better:
Intended audience: Developers - but other parties may be interested
Abstract/description
Tablets have hundreds of applications now - but who are they for? If the Internet Tablets are intended to attract a more mainstream mobile market, the maemo community needs to get in touch with the needs of the target market.
The first part of this presentation will give an overview of the most popular applications on competing platforms. This information will be collected through app store sales/download counts, direct communication with a sampling of mobile consumers, and communication with some other high-profile mobile technology journalists. This will include actual applications, connectivity options, peripherals, interface (touch/keyboard/icon/etc) preferences, and related consumer desires.
The second part of this presentation will give an overview of the state of the existing maemoplatform including commercial partners, independent contributors, and ports of more popular Linux software.
The conclusion will analyze mobile consumer desires compared to maemo offerings and, hopefully, give developers ideas on what they can write to make the platform more appealing.
The feedback from the Dave, Jamie, and Valerio is (in part) as follows:
Thanks for your submission for the Maemo summit, we appreciate the effort. However, we don't think the content is compelling enough for the summit as is. And certainly "reaching the masses" will be covered by Nokia during the Nokia day. So we are sorry to inform you that we are not accepting the presentation.
Since I'm more of a "put the tablets in others' hands and get a reaction" type and not a "developer" type, I figured that's the only topic on which I am qualified to talk. I'm open to ideas, though. I'm still looking forward to seeing what comes out of the summit.4 6 ]]>
Attracting the Masses
Intended audience: Developers - but other parties may be interested
Abstract/description
Tablets have hundreds of applications now - but who are they for? If the Internet Tablets are intended to attract a more mainstream mobile market, the maemo community needs to get in touch with the needs of the target market.
The first part of this presentation will give an overview of the most popular applications on competing platforms. This information will be collected through app store sales/download counts, direct communication with a sampling of mobile consumers, and communication with some other high-profile mobile technology journalists. This will include actual applications, connectivity options, peripherals, interface (touch/keyboard/icon/etc) preferences, and related consumer desires.
The second part of this presentation will give an overview of the state of the existing maemoplatform including commercial partners, independent contributors, and ports of more popular Linux software.
The conclusion will analyze mobile consumer desires compared to maemo offerings and, hopefully, give developers ideas on what they can write to make the platform more appealing.
The feedback from the Dave, Jamie, and Valerio is (in part) as follows:
Thanks for your submission for the Maemo summit, we appreciate the effort. However, we don't think the content is compelling enough for the summit as is. And certainly "reaching the masses" will be covered by Nokia during the Nokia day. So we are sorry to inform you that we are not accepting the presentation.
Since I'm more of a "put the tablets in others' hands and get a reaction" type and not a "developer" type, I figured that's the only topic on which I am qualified to talk. I'm open to ideas, though. I'm still looking forward to seeing what comes out of the summit.4 6 ]]>Eye of GNOME for Maemo2009-07-01T12:19:50+00:002009-07-01T12:19:50+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-b774a952663c11dea8e64b8f25e28a108a10Joaquim Rocha <joaquimrocha1@gmail.com>Since a while ago, and during my work at Igalia, I’ve been porting EOG to Maemo using the new and great Fremantle widgets!
The project is still in an *early stage* but I couldn’t wait more to let everyone know about it so today I’ve published the git repository.
The project is being done as a branch of the original EOG. You can get the source by doing:
16 0 ]]>SMS as a query-based "mobile internet"2009-06-29T15:39:37+00:002009-06-29T15:39:37+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-817b580864c211debc14e9ca056a30863086Henri Bergius <henri.bergius@iki.fi>
As I've written before, the cell phone is the computer for majority of world's people. Google's new set of SMS services for Africa follows this idea in an interesting way:
...mobile applications which will allow people to access information, via SMS, on a diverse number of topics including health and agriculture tips, news, local weather, sports, and more. The suite also includes Google Trader, a SMS-based “marketplace” application that helps buyers and sellers find each other. People can find, "sell" or "buy" any type of product or service, from used cars and mobile phones to crops, livestock and jobs.
...mobile applications which will allow people to access information, via SMS, on a diverse number of topics including health and agriculture tips, news, local weather, sports, and more. The suite also includes Google Trader, a SMS-based “marketplace” application that helps buyers and sellers find each other. People can find, "sell" or "buy" any type of product or service, from used cars and mobile phones to crops, livestock and jobs.
8 1 ]]>Simple HTTP server in Python2009-06-29T07:59:08+00:002009-06-29T07:59:08+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-38b3ab32648811deb2f7b36f459a0a330a33Enrique Ocaña González <eocanha@igalia.com>Reading blog comments about Meiga out there, I’ve found one particularly interesting. Python has an embedded HTTP server that can serve the current directory from a given port. It can be instanced for port 8282 simply issuing this command:
python -m SimpleHTTPServer 8282
The funny thing is that… it works on the N810 also!
16 1 ]]>Reading blog comments about Meiga out there, I’ve found one particularly interesting. Python has an embedded HTTP server that can serve the current directory from a given port. It can be instanced for port 8282 simply issuing this command:
python -m SimpleHTTPServer 8282
The funny thing is that… it works on the N810 also!
16 1 ]]>Maemo Official Applications Bug Jar 2009.262009-06-28T23:00:02+00:002009-06-28T23:00:02+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-bff978a0646611de873419fa70a1a5aea5aeStephen Gadsby <sjgadsby@ptdprolog.net>A Quick Look at Maemo Official Applications in Bugzilla
2009-06-22 through 2009-06-28
As of 2009-06-29 Maemo Official Applications contains 1274 items (+5 this week),
including 216 open issues (-9 this week):
3772 "Operation failed" is not an acceptable error message when out of disk space
0 bugs were tagged "patch".
0 bugs were tagged "performance".
0 bugs were tagged "security".
0 enhancements were tagged "easyfix".
0 enhancements were tagged "moreinfo".
0 enhancements were tagged "patch".
0 enhancements were tagged "performance".
This summary is also posted to the Maemo developers' list and Internet Tablet Talk.
6 0 ]]>
Maemo Official Platform Bug Jar 2009.262009-06-28T23:00:01+00:002009-06-28T23:00:01+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-b4b54ec4646611de873419fa70a1a5aea5aeStephen Gadsby <sjgadsby@ptdprolog.net>A Quick Look at Maemo Official Platform in Bugzilla
2009-06-22 through 2009-06-28
As of 2009-06-29 Maemo Official Platform contains 1903 items (+11 this week),
including 285 open issues (+4 this week):
This summary is also posted to the Maemo developers' list and Internet Tablet Talk.
6 0 ]]>
Introducing MussOrgsky2009-06-28T20:48:07+00:002009-06-28T20:48:07+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-ea7c29aa642b11de84dd7b34f533865e865eIvan Frade <ivan.frade@gmail.com>MussOrgsky is a music organizer (i.e a metadata editor) for maemo5 that allows the user to edit the basic information inside the music files.
In fremantle/maemo5 we have tracker to retrieve the information of the music files and make the life of Music Player developers easier. It is really cute to browser your music “by artist” but in my case (and i guess i am not the only one) the metadata of my music files is far from perfect and unified (songs without title, without album, misspellings in artists names, no album art at all and so on). There are a lot of programs out there to fix this problem (e.g easytag) but they all require a PC, and i want to edit this stuff directly on the tablet!
So, here comes my pet project “MussOrgsky”: a small application to set the basic metadata of the music files (title, artist, album and album art) directly on the device.
This is the edition window (the main window can be seen here ):
It is an python program that uses:
the new hildon widgets for maemo5 (there is a really helpful tutorial!)
tracker to query the availabe music data (or absence of it),
mutagen to write the information back into the files (i uploaded the package myself to extras-devel few days ago)
gstreamer to play the files (yes, there is a “play” button to help you to know what damn song “gtkpod0123123.mp3″ is)
Some online search engines to retrieve the album art
You can find the source code in garage.maemo and the package to install in extras-devel. I have still some ideas pending to implement, but it should be usable. As usual, feedback is welcome!
14 0 ]]>MussOrgsky is a music organizer (i.e a metadata editor) for maemo5 that allows the user to edit the basic information inside the music files.
In fremantle/maemo5 we have tracker to retrieve the information of the music files and make the life of Music Player developers easier. It is really cute to browser your music “by artist” but in my case (and i guess i am not the only one) the metadata of my music files is far from perfect and unified (songs without title, without album, misspellings in artists names, no album art at all and so on). There are a lot of programs out there to fix this problem (e.g easytag) but they all require a PC, and i want to edit this stuff directly on the tablet!
So, here comes my pet project “MussOrgsky”: a small application to set the basic metadata of the music files (title, artist, album and album art) directly on the device.
This is the edition window (the main window can be seen here ):
It is an python program that uses:
the new hildon widgets for maemo5 (there is a really helpful tutorial!)
tracker to query the availabe music data (or absence of it),
mutagen to write the information back into the files (i uploaded the package myself to extras-devel few days ago)
gstreamer to play the files (yes, there is a “play” button to help you to know what damn song “gtkpod0123123.mp3″ is)
Some online search engines to retrieve the album art
You can find the source code in garage.maemo and the package to install in extras-devel. I have still some ideas pending to implement, but it should be usable. As usual, feedback is welcome!
14 0 ]]>By the way2009-06-26T12:20:22+00:002009-06-26T12:20:22+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-686ce6f6625611de924ac1e10d679a529a52Philip Van Hoof <pvanhoof@gnome.org>Tinymail isn’t a sleeping project. I just stopped blogging about it. José Dapena Paz and Sergio Villar Senin are working very hard making it rock solid. Having worked together with Sergio a lot, I trust him. So a few months ago I made him Co maintainer of the project. He’ll probably perform the first release (or decide to do a few more pre-releases first). Being Modest’s technical maintainer Sergio has worked hard on and contributed a lot to Tinymail. Last few weeks José Dapena Paz is the guy who apparently is on fire, writing patches like a madman.
And it looks like there’s no stopping José! Maybe will GUADEC stop him for at least a few days? Maybe I should help Sergio a bit with reviewing all that stuff?
As far as I know will Modest be the default E-mail client on Maemo’s Fremantle device. It has been available for the N810 for some months of course, but for the Fremantle release I’m sure the guys have improved the user interface a lot. I, personally, have been working on Tracker and didn’t focus much on Tinymail. And of course I’m already thinking about how we can make E-mail part of that RDF platform. But that’s another story (and I think I wrote two articles on that already).
Anyway, just letting everybody know: people are still working on Tinymail. They just don’t blog about it as much as I used to do. No worries, though. They are doing great stuff.
7 1 ]]>Tinymail isn’t a sleeping project. I just stopped blogging about it. José Dapena Paz and Sergio Villar Senin are working very hard making it rock solid. Having worked together with Sergio a lot, I trust him. So a few months ago I made him Co maintainer of the project. He’ll probably perform the first release (or decide to do a few more pre-releases first). Being Modest’s technical maintainer Sergio has worked hard on and contributed a lot to Tinymail. Last few weeks José Dapena Paz is the guy who apparently is on fire, writing patches like a madman.
And it looks like there’s no stopping José! Maybe will GUADEC stop him for at least a few days? Maybe I should help Sergio a bit with reviewing all that stuff?
As far as I know will Modest be the default E-mail client on Maemo’s Fremantle device. It has been available for the N810 for some months of course, but for the Fremantle release I’m sure the guys have improved the user interface a lot. I, personally, have been working on Tracker and didn’t focus much on Tinymail. And of course I’m already thinking about how we can make E-mail part of that RDF platform. But that’s another story (and I think I wrote two articles on that already).
Anyway, just letting everybody know: people are still working on Tinymail. They just don’t blog about it as much as I used to do. No worries, though. They are doing great stuff.
7 1 ]]>Maemo events upcoming2009-06-25T22:20:00+00:002009-06-25T22:20:00+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-3482036461e111dea679c973d33ea992a992Daniel Gentleman <thoughtfix@gmail.com>Gran Canaria Desktop summit. Now, with the Intel/Nokia Linux partnership going on, it makes much more sense to me. Could this be a weekend when they announce the next generation maemo device? I don't know if the Desktop Summit is the right crowd for that - but I take nothing for granted now.
Also coming up: Maemo Summit 2009! Last year's event was simply fantastic. As a non-developer, I spent most of my time listening to developers trade ideas, improve each others' understanding, and consider what they want for the future. It was an honor. Since then, we have not yet seen a new major OS release or hardware device but we have seen new partnerships form and ideas take shape. If you're involved in the maemo community and think you have something to share at the event, go ahead and submit it in the "Call for Content." I already posted my idea but I am sure there are more good developer-centric speakers out there with good ideas to contribute.5 1 ]]>Gran Canaria Desktop summit. Now, with the Intel/Nokia Linux partnership going on, it makes much more sense to me. Could this be a weekend when they announce the next generation maemo device? I don't know if the Desktop Summit is the right crowd for that - but I take nothing for granted now.
Also coming up: Maemo Summit 2009! Last year's event was simply fantastic. As a non-developer, I spent most of my time listening to developers trade ideas, improve each others' understanding, and consider what they want for the future. It was an honor. Since then, we have not yet seen a new major OS release or hardware device but we have seen new partnerships form and ideas take shape. If you're involved in the maemo community and think you have something to share at the event, go ahead and submit it in the "Call for Content." I already posted my idea but I am sure there are more good developer-centric speakers out there with good ideas to contribute.5 1 ]]>Ready for the Desktop Summit2009-06-25T01:27:48+00:002009-06-25T01:27:48+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-e358be0a612811de98aae782a5eaad5bad5bAlberto Garcia <agarcia@igalia.com>Following our traditions, last Tuesday we had a very big party on the beach where we set everything on fire (this pic is not from this year, though).
I’ve already been to Gran Canaria once some years ago, and I keep very good memories of that trip. The island is not very big and has some amazing landscapes, specially in the central part. The Maspalomas Dunes in the south are worth a visit too (a trip is being arranged by the organisation, see here, and hurry up if you’re interested), although that part of the island is full of hotels and I didn’t find it particularly beautiful.
I was in Las Palmas for less than a day and I remember it as a nice city. I think it’s going to be a great place for the Summit. I’m looking forward to seeing many people that I haven’t seen for a long time, and I hope that grouping together the GNOME and KDE teams in the same place for such an important event bears fruit sooner or later.
See you in Gran Canaria!
6 1 ]]>Following our traditions, last Tuesday we had a very big party on the beach where we set everything on fire (this pic is not from this year, though).
I’ve already been to Gran Canaria once some years ago, and I keep very good memories of that trip. The island is not very big and has some amazing landscapes, specially in the central part. The Maspalomas Dunes in the south are worth a visit too (a trip is being arranged by the organisation, see here, and hurry up if you’re interested), although that part of the island is full of hotels and I didn’t find it particularly beautiful.
I was in Las Palmas for less than a day and I remember it as a nice city. I think it’s going to be a great place for the Summit. I’m looking forward to seeing many people that I haven’t seen for a long time, and I hope that grouping together the GNOME and KDE teams in the same place for such an important event bears fruit sooner or later.
See you in Gran Canaria!
6 1 ]]>The Nokbook N9000? Plot thickens with OEM orders2009-06-24T17:19:00+00:002009-06-24T17:19:00+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-e75482a460ed11debf0b0bf00a0aa246a246Daniel Gentleman <thoughtfix@gmail.com> Two years ago, Palm announced a device that would be a "smartphone extension." The 10" screen, laptop form factor, 2 pound device would give users a larger window into all the things their smartphone does: Calendars, address book, email, web, and light media consumption. The price tag was $599. This sad little Palm Foleo was so universally panned that it never even made it to the market.
If Nokia and Intel are going for an "in-between device," they need to do far better than Palm did. It's good that they're starting with Maemo and Moblin as core development models as third-party app developers are familiar with those ystems. The big hurdle here is one that was never properly addressed with the Nokia Internet Tablets: Why do I need one?1 3 ]]> Two years ago, Palm announced a device that would be a "smartphone extension." The 10" screen, laptop form factor, 2 pound device would give users a larger window into all the things their smartphone does: Calendars, address book, email, web, and light media consumption. The price tag was $599. This sad little Palm Foleo was so universally panned that it never even made it to the market.
If Nokia and Intel are going for an "in-between device," they need to do far better than Palm did. It's good that they're starting with Maemo and Moblin as core development models as third-party app developers are familiar with those ystems. The big hurdle here is one that was never properly addressed with the Nokia Internet Tablets: Why do I need one?1 3 ]]>Maemo, Nokia, Intel, and the community2009-06-23T21:12:00+00:002009-06-23T21:12:00+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-7417228e603d11de99d3bfe11849cb00cb00Daniel Gentleman <thoughtfix@gmail.com> The community is weighing in and discussing this morning's news. Here are some highlights:
Peter@Maemo says: "Let me remind you what we have said about Maemo 5: Maemo 5 will support OMAP3 processors i.e. ARM Cortex A8 technology, not more, not less."
He goes on to say: Maemo and Moblin will continue to exist as software platforms, no change to current situation but we will align more of what is underneath the UI framework and APIs.
There's more discussion in the whole thread on talk.maemo.org. I don't think many mobile tech blogs understand exactly what this all means (myself included) but I THINK this is what will happen:
Facts: Intel and Nokia combined have a broad understanding of mobile computing - both development and marketing. Nokia has had vast success in handsets, feature phones, and smartphones and Intel is enjoying many years as the top mobile CPU for laptops and now netbooks and ultra-portables. As these two types of platforms converge into a "middle device," it makes sense to bring the power-players in each together to develop some standards.
Through the success of the iPhone and Android, the whole mobile market has learned that platforms MUST have a strong third party developer base. Intel and Nokia will work very hard to make Moblin and Maemo cooperate with each other even though they will have different styles and hardware platforms. This will make it easier for third party developers to write applications that can be released on both platforms without major rewrites. This will encourage developers to adopt both Maemo and Moblin on their respective platforms.
I could be totally wrong, though. What does everyone else think?5 0 ]]> The community is weighing in and discussing this morning's news. Here are some highlights:
Peter@Maemo says: "Let me remind you what we have said about Maemo 5: Maemo 5 will support OMAP3 processors i.e. ARM Cortex A8 technology, not more, not less."
He goes on to say: Maemo and Moblin will continue to exist as software platforms, no change to current situation but we will align more of what is underneath the UI framework and APIs.
There's more discussion in the whole thread on talk.maemo.org. I don't think many mobile tech blogs understand exactly what this all means (myself included) but I THINK this is what will happen:
Facts: Intel and Nokia combined have a broad understanding of mobile computing - both development and marketing. Nokia has had vast success in handsets, feature phones, and smartphones and Intel is enjoying many years as the top mobile CPU for laptops and now netbooks and ultra-portables. As these two types of platforms converge into a "middle device," it makes sense to bring the power-players in each together to develop some standards.
Through the success of the iPhone and Android, the whole mobile market has learned that platforms MUST have a strong third party developer base. Intel and Nokia will work very hard to make Moblin and Maemo cooperate with each other even though they will have different styles and hardware platforms. This will make it easier for third party developers to write applications that can be released on both platforms without major rewrites. This will encourage developers to adopt both Maemo and Moblin on their respective platforms.
I could be totally wrong, though. What does everyone else think?5 0 ]]>Packaging a python program for maemo2009-06-23T21:11:53+00:002009-06-23T21:11:53+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-00487564603e11de99d3bfe11849cb00cb00Ivan Frade <ivan.frade@gmail.com>To package a python program for maemo, you just need to do in scratchbox the same as you would do on your desktop [using distutils and CDBS]. You add a simple setup.py file to the project, a minimal debian/rules, a couple of details in the debian/control file, run “dpkg-buildpackage”…. and it is done. Right?
No. it won’t work.
For some reason, inside scratchbox some paths are modified and the final .deb package install the files under “/scratchbox/tools/bin” and “/scratchbox/tools/share” (instead of the usual “/usr/bin” and “/usr/share”), so the package is somehow installable in scratchbox but useless for the real devices
I didn’t find any solution on the net, and It took me quite some time to figure out how to solve it. After a hundred tests with different CDBS rules and combinations, it was so easy as add a setup.cfg file on the root of my project with this content:
After that, “dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot” generates a correct package, that can be uploaded to extras!
12 0 ]]>To package a python program for maemo, you just need to do in scratchbox the same as you would do on your desktop [using distutils and CDBS]. You add a simple setup.py file to the project, a minimal debian/rules, a couple of details in the debian/control file, run “dpkg-buildpackage”…. and it is done. Right?
No. it won’t work.
For some reason, inside scratchbox some paths are modified and the final .deb package install the files under “/scratchbox/tools/bin” and “/scratchbox/tools/share” (instead of the usual “/usr/bin” and “/usr/share”), so the package is somehow installable in scratchbox but useless for the real devices
I didn’t find any solution on the net, and It took me quite some time to figure out how to solve it. After a hundred tests with different CDBS rules and combinations, it was so easy as add a setup.cfg file on the root of my project with this content:
After that, “dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot” generates a correct package, that can be uploaded to extras!
12 0 ]]>Nokia and Intel team up - promise to kick butt on mobile Linux2009-06-23T17:16:00+00:002009-06-23T17:16:00+00:00http://maemo.org/midcom-permalink-20d809d8601c11deb3c6499096318f728f72Daniel Gentleman <thoughtfix@gmail.com>Nokia posted a press release with Intel promising several very important things to the mobile space:
Open source collaboration, including cooperation between Moblin and Maemo.
Intel licensing Nokia 3G technology
Increased focus on standards-based pocketable devices.
Wow. I love the Intel Atom. I love the Maemo tablets. I am swimming in excitement for the future right now.3 2 ]]>Nokia posted a press release with Intel promising several very important things to the mobile space:
Open source collaboration, including cooperation between Moblin and Maemo.
Intel licensing Nokia 3G technology
Increased focus on standards-based pocketable devices.
Wow. I love the Intel Atom. I love the Maemo tablets. I am swimming in excitement for the future right now.3 2 ]]>
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