I was just successful in running Wordpress from maemo-extras on the N950 using a chroot Maemo 5 PR1.3 rootfs image. As I am not allowed to post the image here I will post instructions shortly, but for now you have a teaser video.

DISCLAIMER: I don't know what works, maybe the first app that came to my mind (WordPress) luckily worked and nothing else does. Also the virtual keyboard doesn't work so for the N9 you'll need a bluetooth keyboard.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIlD7NsO1QI&feature=plcp

More applications do work partially (e.g. gnumeric) but I have to run hildon desktop first. Anyone got any idea how to run hildon-desktop in xephyr? I checked how it is being done in scratchbox but there are a lot of sb-only functions in that script file.

EDIT: Tutorial on post #14

Status
Due to the chroot using the Harmattan dbus, and the fact that Maemo relies heavily on dbus to work I think it's futile to try to make hildon-desktop work from within the chroot. Another fact is that after trying to initialize hildon-desktop through scratchbox's init script, weird things happen to the N950 like loss of vibration, and weird lighting patterns on the hwkb. Thus I stopped work on the chroot and shifted to making hildon-desktop work natively in harmattan. This would allow us to run a native h-d in Xephyr and run applications from within the chroot on the h-d outside. In the future, we could possibly create an inverse MeeCoLay, without need for a chroot and thus without need for open mode. Another possible experiment would be to change the default window manager of harmattan from mcompositor to hildon-desktop.

Now I have trouble compiling clutter, see post #61

Post history:

EDIT2: Current status is described at post #17. Please read and comment if you know something about the blocker issue at post #19

Help needed

by using a modified af-sb-init.sh script from scratchbox I have managed to get hildon desktop to flash on screen before it dies with

Code:

ERROR:PipDate.c:569:pip_date_to_string_format: assertion failed: (pip_date_is_valid((date))
Attempt to remove filter function 0xcca8 user data (nil), but no such filter has been added

This happens, either directly, or in xephyr. Please share your knowledge if you happen to understand what is happening.

It would be even better if we didn't have to start the whole hildon desktop but only the notification/menu bar. The actual problem is that apps now run without a menu

Thanks to matan, this problem is now solved, and matchbox-window-manager starts successfully (I can see desktop widgets, and applications with the menu bar).
We still cannot start hildon-desktop however, and I suppose that the problem lies with dbus (probably session) bus. The question is this Does the chroot use the parent OS dbus or does it start it's own? Please note that hildon desktop does not throw any errors, it just displays a black screen. Screenshots will be posted soon @post #55.

Another, unrelated, question is how to get rid of the bottom toolbar in harmattan windows.


List of relevant threads, wikis etc for reference

• keyboard thread, how to unpack rootfs
• harmchom thread
• kingoddball's maemo chroot on android thread
• SDK wiki
• fremantle and xephyr thread