[N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Disclaimer I am not the developer of this application. As Sviox was not a registered TMO user i wanted to share/announce his promising work here. Now he joined TMO.

Hydra Widget Platform
From Ovi store description: Hydra widget platform allows MeeGo users to run locally installable web applications (i.e. widgets) created for mobile platforms. Currently it supports widgets created for Tizen, Opera and Symbian platforms, as well as generic W3C widgets. Comes with a few bundled example widgets. Hydra is powered by Apache Cordova and supports many additional features such as installing widgets directly from the device's browser, support for widget update discovery and partial compatibility with WAC APIs.

Changelog v1.3 -- 30.10.2012
*Implemented support for Cordova 2.1.0 core and plugins (excluding file and contacts API)
*Fixed Cordova Camera plugin to work with DATA_URI destination type
*Fixed Cordova Acceleration plugin to return timestamp in ms instead of micro seconds
*Implemented simple caching support for wiget preferences to preserve IO
*Implemented support for widget.onExit event
*Changed application name
*Improved widget update support by no longer 'downloading' local update description files
*Added system notification for discovered widget updates
*Added support to enable fullscreen mode via preference 'fullscreen' with value 'true'
*Added support to control orientation via preference 'orientation'
*Changed default view-mode (i.e. 'maximized') to no longer show application toolbar
*Widget information dialog now shows if widget update is supported
*Rewrote geolocation handling
*Fixed some vertically pannable widgets allowing slight horizontal pan
*Improved GMaps widget with Street View and Places search support as well us graphical presentation of location accuracy
*Fixed Feature Demo Geolocation page getting stuck
*Updated Feature Demo widget with Cordova examples
*Added vibration support for StopWatch widget

Changelog v1.1.0
* Refactored architecture so that each widget is ran on it's on process
* Implemented support for WAC Webview API
* System's 'application not responding' dialog should now have correct widget name in case JavaScript is taking too long to execute
* Improved responsiveness during JavaScript-heavy operations by processing event loop
* Fixed upgrading a widget with version in format x.y to x.y.z to be considered a newer version if x, y and z are numbers
* Fixed uninstalling a widget not cleaning up any included hidden files
* Fixed links that use _blank as target
* Implemented error page for URLs that couldn't be fetched

Screenshots
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/73783334/Pic..._runtime01.png
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/73783334/Pic..._runtime02.png

Installation
You can install the app from http://store.ovi.com/content/302071 resp. http://store.ovi.mobi/content/302071 from your N9.

Support Webpage / Blog
Sviox's blog contains some useful information how to run Tizen widgets etc.

Some Widget Ressource

• Tizen Sample Web Applications

• Opera widgets

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

cool sh*t :)

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

i dont get it could someone explain?

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

this is based on cordova i guess check :

http://rzr.online.fr/q/cordova

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

Well well, good to see there are others interested in widgets and creating runtimes besides just me :)

In case your interested, my Widget Runtime is not based on anything other than Qt's webkit and MeeGo Touch Framework. I've been working on it since October 2011 and thought it would be about time to publish something (hence the BETA). I also considered naming it something along the lines of "CiTizen Mee" but in the end thought that it wouldn't be very appealing to the masses and besides I'm also supporting Opera widgets and Symbian widgets so it wouldn't have been very fitting :P

As for future developement/roadmap, I'm right now working on separating widgets to run on their own processes (after that one crash shouldn't kill all windows) and also trying to create some sort of plugin API for extending support to new standards and JS APIs. Also, I would want to create support for Symbian WRT platform services and WAC2.x platform services at some point.

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

Sviox, i tried to run google maps widget but it doesn't work - it shows only plain white window and nothing else. Does it only work with GPS enabled?

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

It's quite a simple example widget, so it first waits for geolocation and then creates the map context based on the location. So if it doesn't get geolocation or internet access it might just stick with plain window... Also, due to a bug in QtWebkit it crashes randomly (issue has been reported by others too, see http://crochik.com/webview/ for example), something I haven't witnessed with any other widgets so far.

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

This is just great - would it also be able to support google chrome widgets in the future?

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

Hi BluesLee,

I love the idea behind this app, There are some bugs I noticed though. Such as when you try to rotate the screen some apps graphics mess up. And sometimes apps won't show properly in portrait. Is there a way to detect what type of app it is and lock it its orientation?

Vromoth

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

Hello Vromoth,

as indicated in the initial post i am not the developer of this app which is in BETA stage;-)

Nevertheless, according to Sviox's blog you can unzip your example widget, modify the corresponding config file, zip it back and run it on your N9. For Tizen widgets you would need to modify config.xml
to force orientation to 'landscape'. I did not tried this but i hope it helps...

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

Hi there. Could you let me know some of the apps that mess the graphics? I'm currently aware that there are issues with some pages and rotations related to messed up page size after orientation. I have some plans on how to fix this but nothing concrete yet.

By the way, a new version (1.1.0) is currently in Nokia Store intake with the following changelog:
* Refactored architecture so that each widget is ran on it's on process
* Implemented support for WAC Webview API
* System's 'application not responding' dialog should now have correct widget name in case JavaScript is taking too long to execute
* Improved responsiveness during JavaScript-heavy operations by processing event loop
* Fixed upgrading a widget with version in format x.y to x.y.z to be considered a newer version if x, y and z are numbers
* Fixed uninstalling a widget not cleaning up any included hidden files
* Fixed links that use _blank as target
* Implemented error page for URLs that couldn't be fetched

Expect frequent updates...

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

Recently HTML5 Widget Manager was updated to v1.3 (http://sviox.blogspot.ru/2012/10/project-hydra.html?m=1) and now it supports Cordova.

But how do I run Cordova apps? I know that some applications for Android, iOS and BlackBerry are using Cordova - can I run them directly? Or is there some kind of non-native platform-independent Cordova apps around?

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Excellent!
Gmaps with street view!
I was trying to install more widgets (symbian and some opera) but didn't manage to run them.
What I should do?

Thanks

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Hi. While Symbian and Opera widgets should be compatible, there can be some problems with input (some widgets presume keypad/mouse etc.) and/or other features. Could you name the widgets you were trying? I could check out if there is something I can do about it.

Btw, I discovered a weird, often used mechanism with Opera widgets. Opera actually instructs developers to use window.resizeTo() function for widgets to go to fullscreen mode and some widgets seem to require this mode before loading up due to copy paste from that instruction... Also, Opera specs seem to say for Opera widgets "fullscreen" should actually be same as W3C maximized view mode. So, I'm changing the Opera support in next version so that for Opera, widgets are always run on "fullscreen" widget mode, which seems to make a few more widgets runnable (http://widgets.opera.com/widget/17292/ is a good example of such a widget).

Also, I'm considering adding a toolbar with d-pad buttons (arrows and a selection softkey) for Symbian widgets in a later version. That should make many Symbian WRT games playable.

Re: [N9] HTML5 Widget Manager / Widget Runtime BETA from Sviox
 

I've been meaning to write a blog entry about this subject, but I've been a bit busy. You can't use Android/iOS/BlackBerry apps in format they are distributed in app stores.

The support means that if you have the web app code used to create these native apps (using PhoneGap Build cloud service or packaging them manually), you can install that (.wgt file) directly to Hydra and it should be API compatible (as far as Cordova's own MeeGo API implementation goes, it's not perfect yet). So if your a developer doing Cordova apps, you can run/test and distribute them for Hydra.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

sviox, can you explain how to run Cordova (PhoneGap) apps with Hydra?

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

In fact, I thought I already did. I posted another reply but it seems to have vanished. Heck, I even posted it twice because it wasn't visible but the system said it was duplicate so I thought it would come out eventually... Anyway, here is the third try (luckily I copy pasted the reply...).

I've been meaning to write a blog entry about this subject, but I've been a bit busy. You can't use Android/iOS/BlackBerry apps in format they are distributed in app stores.

The support means that if you have the web app code used to create these native apps (using PhoneGap Build cloud service or packaging them manually), you can install that (.wgt file) directly to Hydra and it should be API compatible (as far as Cordova's own MeeGo API implementation goes, it's not perfect yet). So if your a developer doing Cordova apps, you can run/test and distribute them for Hydra.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Hi Sviox,

Thanks for the great work in Hydra the widget runtime! Now it makes my N9 more apps to run! Cool~~~

I have a question: I am trying to run some .wgz widgets that I used to run on my Symbian phone. However, it gave me an error message saying "Failed to install <widget.wgz>" "Failed to extract the config file." Is there something I can try to get them working?

And I am looking forward to your future version that will add a d-pad for Symbian widgets as well! Thanks again! :)

NAHAHA

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Hi. Could you send me the widget so I can take a look? That error message is shown in case the config file in that package is not found the the expected path (or if some special Zip version/features are used to create the package). It's quite weird if it installs on Symbian as I have tested creating Symbian widgets for E51 and N97 and both of them require the info.plist file to be exactly on the right spot (that is, not in the root but one directory below). You could always try to rezip the package yourself.

I just posted a new version to the store, it should be up in a few days. It does not contain the d-pad yet but rather focuses on bug fixing and some UI tweaks. Here is the full changelog:
* Implemented file selection sheet for all browsing contexts as well as installing local widgets
* Implemented widget details page with similar appearance to installation confirmation sheet
* Implemented support for remote web applications
* Implemented support for persistent http(s) cookies
* Added Facebook shortcut widget
* Added feature demos for file upload and cookies
* Changed tapping list items to always open the details page instead of directly launching a widget
* Changed installation confirmation sheet to be also shown for widgets requesting features
* Changed installing widgets from manager UI to no longer automatically launch the widget
* Fixed installation getting stuck if lisence agreement sheet was closed from recent view
* Fixed internal features being listed on lisence agreement sheet
* Fixed widgets with additional namespaces (i.e. Tizen/Cordova) randomly failing to read config file
* Fixed update list item duplicate after installing widget with local update description
* Fixed submitting a form from internal URL into an external URL crashing the application
* Fixed links inside iframes to no longer fire view mode events in the main frame
* Fixed view mode media query usage when dynamically switching between fullscreen and maximized mode
* Fixed scroll position to always go to top when changing page

EDIT: Seems I forgot to put the Opera view-mode change to the changelog. Now all Opera widgets are run in maximized mode which is actually reported to Opera widgets as fullscreen widget mode.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Hi Sviox,

I figured out why after seeing you mentioning "info.plist" - I opened the .wgz file and found that they have "Info.plist" instead of "info.plist", so as "Icon.png" instead of "icon.png". After I renamed them, it installed fine!

Thanks for your good work again!!! :)

Regards,
NAHAHA

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Great! Can you confirm it installs incasesensitively on actual Symbian devices?

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Darn. I was happy too soon. Realized yesterday that I had caused some serious regression in start file lookup algorithm. I'll skip over 1.3.1 and instead release 1.3.2 as soon as I get everything back together again.

Also, bad news for that Symbian D-Pad idea. I had a working UI prototype of this but it seems QtWebKit blocks non-standard keypress events from being sent to JavaScript side (i.e. basic characters and things like 'backspace' are delivered, but things like left-key). If anyone knows of some workaround please let me know.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

A new version was out yesterday. Let me know what you think and if you encounter any new issues.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Hi,

I just tried to install some Tizen Widgets with Hydra (Annex, Blubblewrap, Rabbit).
Did not work a single time. I got "Could not extract config file" for each of them.
I downloaded to zip version from the site you linked in the first post.
https://developer.tizen.org/resource...b-applications

btw: Thank you for developing such a great application for the N9 :)
I am looking forward to the day, Tizen Phones are released and I can enjoy the apps on my N9.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

You downloaded them with the N9? Those apps are not packaged in W3C compatible format (no idea why since actual Tizen OS expects them to be as well as Hydra!). It seems the zip packages contain a directory where all the files are but in fact W3C requires all the files to be in the root directory.

Currently I have a hack for Symbian that allows it's info.plist config file to be either in the root or one directory below, perhaps I could consider expanding this to other widgets as well...

EDIT: To get them to install at the moment, please download the zip with your computer, unzip it, and rezip it one directory below (i.e. the config.xml must be at the root of the zip). Then rename it from .zip to .wgt and send it to the device via Bluetooth or other means.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Hi sviox,

I had an issue with my documents app unable to open 2007 MS Office formats since around 1.5 months.

A re-flash had fixed it but when my apps were restored the same problem came up again.

However, today I wanted to update the app from Store but although store was showing v1.3.2 it wasn't giving me the update button so I uninstalled your app and my issue has been resolved.

While uninstalling I saw that the system was removing some shared-mime-info:

I think this has been the cause of the issue all along; could you help verifying it?


Edit: Further testing with v1.3.2 being used instead gave the same issue...

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Thank you that worked :)

Maybe you can extend your application and add the functionality to scan the first subdirectory as if it was the top level of the zip file when install fails.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Interesting. And weird, since Hydra used quite basic way of adding the MIME handling information and it shouldn't interfere with other handlers. Might even be a platform bug. I'll take a look at the issue once I have some time again (am a bit busy with other issues until at least the end of the year).

Did you try rebooting the device after installing Hydra? Sometimes the mime handler registry isn't properly updated after installing the package for some reason.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

If you mean reboot after installing v1.3.2 then yes i did a reboot; for the other versions i was living with the issue for somewhile without knowing the cause...

It could very well be a Harmattan bug though...

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Hi! I am impressed with sviox's work, but i have few questions:
1. Why every widget (from Opera, or Tizen) give me error "Invalid configuration file", what should i do to fix it? Example widget: link
2. How can I check version of Hydra, i am running?

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Sorry for the late reply (been a bit busy with the xmas and all!).

1) I've successfully installed that same Bubbles widget several times and it should be working flawlessly. How are you installing it? Also, if you have developer mode enabled, could you check if the installation successfully extracts the config.xml from the package to /tmp/widget-installer/ (not on my Linux at the moment so not exactly sure about the path but something like this).

2) Go to "Device settings", select "Applications", then "Manage installations". This starts the package manager of the device. In it's main view you can see all the installed applications (with their versions below the name) on your device alphabetically sorted. Try finding "Hydra widget platform" (or "Widget runtime beta" if your using an older version). To help you with issue #1, please let me know what version your running.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

I have tried some wigets. Some are ok but most of the cases are slow. It's hard to find more wigets though the Hydra is good app. Continue to follow this topic...

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Dear Dev,

I like to browse picasa photo from GApp of N9 but seems it not good enough. I find the attached wiget (blw link) of Picasa_photo but cannot install. Maybe it's not compactable with Hydra. Can any one convert the file so we can use to the browse picasa photo? tks

https://www.dropbox.com/s/3902yxhhn0...asa_photos.rar

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

I got a bit ahead of myself by planning this feature. This is unfortunately explicitly forbidden by W3C compliancy (http://dev.w3.org/2006/waf/widgets/#ta-dxzVDWpaWg) so I'm afraid it won't happen.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Hi! The widget seems to install just fine with the latest Hydra but the widget seems to have some issues. The runtime stops running the widget's code after it encounters an error in file riff.beta.1.8.9.js, at line 2379. This is an error in the widget since the line is:
Now if you look up widget API defined by W3C in http://www.w3.org/TR/widgets-apis/#widget, you'll see that the widget does not have a window property and thus the execution is stopped.

The widget configuration contains some weird stuff in it too. It defines widget dimensions to be explicitly 400x400, which means that Hydra will scale the app 1.2x in portrait and prevent scrolling in any direction (due to static size). The content seems to be optimized for about 530px wide viewport.

There is also a reference to BONDI (depricated platform API that has been replaced by WAC) feature usage in the configuration file, suggesting the widget was created for Bada or LiMo platforms.

Where did you find this widget?

EDIT: Should have guessed, it's Samsung's quality software work at large here. Samsung seems to be using a weird non-standard Widget API (http://developer.samsung.com/widgets...ocs/Widget-API). I'll have to think if it's worth the trouble to be compatible with that.

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Hi Sviox,

You are right. I got the file from: http://developer.samsung.com/widgets.../Picasa-widget. Thanks for your sharing. The thing we lack is, we hardly find good apps at this time of blooming HTML5...

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

That's quite so - unfortunately.

I kind of got interested on Samsung's Widget API additions and there may or may not be some level of support for them in the next version ;)

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

I have a problem with a widget . wgz tells me "failed to extract the config file " I have the latest version . time ago, elleo ( tizmee developer ) modified this widget , just told me that I had to add a configuration file ( . xml ) , and it worked , the problem here is that they released an update of that widget , and I have to modify it for use with your application , how can I add that configuration file ? or How to convert. wgz to wgt ? This is the file https://www.dropbox.com/s/8w1ibglr7c...ader_1.0.6.wgz

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

New version is at Store intake at the moment. Here are the changes in version 1.3.3:
* Implemented support for WAC 2.1 orientation API
* Implemented support for WAC 2.1 accelerometer API
* Implemented support for Samsung's (SHP, Bada and Windows Mobile) additions to Widget API and configuration rules
* Widget description and update-description can now be decorated with HTML
* Added widget type to details page
* Added Wikipedia shortcut widget
* Fixed launcher shortcut name during installation
* Fixed showing license from files that are embedded in the packaging
* Fixed storage size on details page to refresh when preferences or cookies modified

panukooo: I'll check your widget another day later this week, ok?

Re: [N9] Hydra Widget Platform v1.3 from Sviox, now with Cordova support
 

Okay I tried to install the app and here is what I discovered. First of all, that widget is .wgz, which means that it's created for Symbian WRT platform. As such, it should be supported by Hydra directly, without adding the config.xml. Symbian widgets use a configuration file called "info.plist" instead.

Hydra seems to be looking for info.plist file in case-sensitive manner because W3C demands such behavior for config.xml. And unfortunately this widget contains "Info.plist" file (capital first letter), which prevents the configuration file extraction from working. Nokia documentation doesn't say if this should be handled case-sensitively and this is the first widget with this kind. But since I suppose the file works on Symbian, it is a bug. I'll see about fixing this for the next version.

Meanwhile, you can 'fix' the widget by unzipping it, renaming the "Info.plist" to "info.plist" and then rezipping the whole thing (remember to zip the directory with the files, not the files in that directory, i.e. info.plist should not be on the root of the zip package but exactly one directory below!). Finally, rename the .zip file to .wgz and your ready to deploy it on your N9.