Conboy on Fremantle
 

I finally found some time to install the Beta2 SDK and to create a newer version of Conboy for Fremantle.

The current version is 0.5.2 and the only real new thing is that it should now automatically rotate between landscape and portrait mode. The UI should automatically adapt - e.g., remove toolbar in note window, change columns in search window, show different buttons in app menu, etc...

Could someone please test this on a real device?! I can´t test this using the SDK. Also it would be great to get some feedback how the window handling is. This could maybe be problematic because every note you open is a new window. It highly depends on the task switcher of the new devices.

A list of supported features (that all should work) is here.

Thanks!
Conny

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Hmm. At least for me automatically rotating between landscape and portrait mode in Conboy 0.5.2 does not work on (non-recent) Fremantle hardware (while rotating in general works for the default Nokia stuff supporting it).
But getting a second comment would be nice (/me looks at Quim).

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Thanks Andre for testing. Hopefully Quim can try it too. I´m using in all windows that I´m opening. I thought that should be enough :/

Do you know an open source app that is correctly auto-rotating? Would be interesting to look at the source :)

EDIT: What happens if you start Conboy once the device is already rotated?

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Hmm, I assume you used the (very short) explanation in http://wiki.maemo.org/Using_Fremantl...rtrait_Capable , right?

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Actually I wrote this article :) The information is based on a rather long discussion on the mailing list which started here here. Also there is some API doc here.

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

I just asked on the devel mailing list. Maybe someone there knows why it´s not working.

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Andre, Quim, or someone with a real device, could you please test whether or not Conboy starts in portrait mode if you start it with the device already in portrait mode?

There is some talk on the mailing list which suggest that this should work.

Thanks!
Conny

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Right now I have some problems with screen blankening here that make testing hard, hence I'm not 100% sure with my comments:
As far as I understand portrait mode is not a device-wide setting but a per-application setting. Starting a Nokia app that supports portrait mode when having a device in portrait mode makes Nokia apps switch to portrait mode. This is currently not the case for Conboy.

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

After a rather long discussion on the mailing list I've uploaded a new version (0.5.3) to extras-devel. Could you please be so nice and test it again. I'm quite sure that it works now :)

Thanks again!
Conny

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Installed 0.5.3. And automatic portrait vs landscape switching works. This is cool. Congrats!

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

(assuming that the fact that no toolbar is available in portrait mode is not a bug)

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Ah finally! Thanks a lot for testing :)

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

No, that´s intentional :) The idea is that the portrait mode is only for reading.

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

You might want to add that to any documentation that's available from the app.

Tim

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Yea, that might be helpful. Currently there is no help at all. But I was thinking about adding a note which explains basic usage. Not sure if that´s enough, though...

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

I think so. The major hurdle is, in fact, basic usage. Once past that, Conboy is pretty intuitive. Basic Usage and some "Tips & Tricks" would be enough, I think (maybe two pages).

Tim

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Andre (or someone else with a N900), would it be possible to tell me (or better show me) how Conboy is looking on the real device? I'm especially interested about the icons on the toolbar. Are these the same icons like in the SDK? Are they gnome-ish? Or do they visually fit to these black&white icons which are used by the nokia applications?

I'm asking because I might have to ask someone to design a set of black&white icons?!

Thanks!
Conny

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

... nokia told us applications never need documentation, remember? that's why there's no consistent help framework in fremantle.

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

I´ve finally updated the wiki page. The information is now much more verbose and (hopefully) correct :)

http://wiki.maemo.org/Using_Fremantl...creen_Rotation

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Compared to http://talk.maemo.org/attachment.php...1&d=1243450888 the toolbar items look exactly the same.

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Thanks a lot! Then I´ll try to find someone who could create some black & white icons for the toolbar :)

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Conboy is definitely looking very cool, great work with it! I'm impressed with the portrait / landscape rotation, it works like a charm. If there are insights that will then help other developers to do the same, it would be great if you can help in sharing them (in the wikis etc.).

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Thanks! I´m very glad it looks good on the N900. Everything I learned about developing for Fremantle is already covered by a wiki page. Including portrait/landscape rotation :)
http://wiki.maemo.org/Using_Fremantle_Widgets

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

If you can list these for me (and the size you need), I can do them on my flight from here to Germany tonight.

Tim

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

That would be übercool :) You can see the current icons here. They are GTK stock icons, but I think it would be nice to have them look more like those icons which Nokia is using in e.g. Modest or Browser.

The icons are from left to right:

• Decrease indent
• Increase indent
• Create link
• Select text style
• Search in note
• Delete note
• Open note (open window that lets you open and search notes)

About the icon size: I just search for about 15 minutes but didn´t find the answer yet. I also have no access to the SDK at the moment... I´ll check and let you know as soon as I find out.

Another thing is that the new HIG suggests that we use stock icons - but at least the GTK stock icons are not that nice. Are there other stock icons somewhere?

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Good question. The stock icons may actually look much better on the device than in the SDK, so this is hard to know. Hmmm... And, some icons that you need may not be available from the stock depot.

If you find anything out, please let me know!

Tim

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

The nice people on the mailing list helped me out. The icon size needs to be 48x48 pixels.
I´ll check the stock icons later, but I remember from Diablo that they didn´t cover everything I needed.

How many hours do I have to inform you? I mean before your flight is on?

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

I'll be leaving in approximately 6 hours. ;)

Tim

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

I found icons for 'delete', 'search in note' and maybe 'open note' (the folder).

At some point the icons for 'add' (the plus) and 'full screen' might come in handy too.

So the missing ones would be:

• Decrease indent
• Increase indent
• Link to other note
• Select font style

It would be really great if you would come up with something. But please don't feel pressured and don't forget to enjoy your trip. Ah and when you're in "Stugi" make sure to eat some "Zwiebelrostbraten mit Spätzle" or (if you don't eat meat) try some "Käsespätzle". Both is absolutely delicious :)

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Will do on my trip! And, thanks for the suggestions! (I would go for the meatless fare.) ;)

Tim

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Update: I'll have icons for you when I return home. I've made them, but my internet access is shoddy at best. One thing, though... There should be a stock "Text Transform" icon already. Look around -- or, I'll just give it to you with all of mine.

Tim

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

This is really great! Thanks a lot Tim :) I checked again but under /usr/share/icons/hicolor/48x48/hildon/ I couldn't find anything generic for text style, so it would be nice if you could send it along. I'm really looking forward to see you work! Thanks Tim!

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Btw, Conny, what about a LT session at the summit about Conboy ? ;)

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Hmm, nice idea :) I think I could like that - but I would say it heavily depends on whether or not I finish my two biggest tasks in time for the summit. I really want to finish the plugin support and the synchronization with the Tomboy web service. If I can do it, I would be happy to give a small talk and present the new features. There are still quite a lot of slots open in the schedule, so I guess I don't have to hurry?!

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Well, the deadline for submissions is September 13th, maybe we can extend the deadline a bit for the LT's, but the schedule isn't so empty as it seems, we have 27 talks under consideration right now, some will appear in the grid very soon ;)

IMO, you don't need to have a feature full app in order to give the presentation, in the current state I think it already has a lot of potential.

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

I'll think about it a bit more and I'll see how much work I get done on the weekend. Then I'll decide. Thanks for the encouragement :)

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

I'll do it :) I don't really know yet, what I'll talk about, but I guess that's ok for a lighting talk?! I added something like a submission here:
http://wiki.maemo.org/Maemo_Summit_2...mboy_and_Snowy

So if you think it's worth talking about, I'll do it. But it also might depend on the sponsorship, so I guess I can only say something definite once that's decided.

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

Ack! I literally forgot about this until this morning. So sorry.

Download the icons here:

http://samoff.com/random/samoff-conboy_icons.zip

Let me know if you need any additional icons (or if these need to be altered).

Tim

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

I would have asked you in a couple of days, but I thought you might be busy with other things

Great! I like them very much :) I'll post a screen shot as soon as I've integrated them. It's time for me to start a 'contributions' file... Thanks a lot!!!

Re: Conboy on Fremantle
 

I've been loving Conboy a lot, been using it to take notes on meetings etc, and to do shopping lists sometimes etcetera..

I was wondering if each note could be a "view" so it wouldnt jump to the task switcher when you close a note, but I guess that would limit us to having just one note open at a time, which is kinda contradictory to the "tree" idea of linked notes. The each-note-as-separate-window makes one jump to task switcher when closing a note which is a bit distracting, but it works pretty OK. I wonder if it would be possible to jump to a parent note if a closed one has a parent, and otherwise show task switcher?

The icons are a bit blurry, probably because the toolbar icons are not exactly the correct size - I wonder if this could be fixed with some icon theme hacking, so gtk would not scale them to fit, but rather would pick a closest match..?

- t