If you want to stick with C++ there is maemomm around at http://maemomm.garage.maemo.org/docs...tml/index.html

Thank you all for your various responses, it’s very much appreciated.

The virtual machine running Linux is fantastic – thanks for your work on this Nathan. I have yet to do anything constructive with it yet, but will have a play in due course.

Could you kindly confirm my understanding below:

So as I understand there are two options for development:

• Native applications – Using C/C++ or Python, e.g. zip/unzip utility
• Widgets – Exclusively using HTML, JavaScript, CSS not C/C++ or Python e.g. stock ticker

Am I correct in saying widgets are basically mobile optimised web applications using purely the above scripting languages? If so, with the ever advancing web browsing experience with fully functional web pages rendering on devices (e.g. N900) will widgets become a thing of the past slowly?

I’m guessing for things like a stock ticker, live football scores, Amazon there must be API’s available to retrieve such data from providers, is there any comprehensive list of all available API’s on the web?

Andre – Is maemomm for native applications only?

In the mean time I’ve started reading around C++.

Thanks again,

Rav

@Rav

I spend my days coding coldfusion at work (5x php background though), so my experience may be quite a bit more similar to yours. I had no prior experience whatsoever outside of the web development industry. I'm currently working on my first application, and it's coming along nicely.

Here's my advice to get started:

Stick with python and GTK - as a web developer you will find this a much lower barrier to entry than the others. I flipflopped all over the place until I figured this out.

1. Install the vmware SDK
2. If you want to try and get this working pseudo-natively in windows, read this link. and this post by Nathan
3. Learn the basics of Python. The first 5 chapters, in particular.
4. Learn how to use Python and GTK+ (pyGTK) to create your visuals
5. Start with the Hello World examples and look through the various UI Tutorials in the PyMaemo section of the wiki
6. By now you should have a pretty good idea about what's going on, so it's time to get up to speed and check out the Maemo 5 Development documentation
7. You're still going to need some proper reference material though so bookmark the Hildon Reference Manual, the pyGTK Reference Manual, and the Python Hildon Manual

And when you're done, you can come back here and show off your awesome new applications for us all to play with

Hope this helps...

Edit: for bonus points, here's an api list to get you started: http://www.programmableweb.com/apis

Okay, since you come from a web developer background and Visual Basic (and if you've coded on C# occasionally), maybe you'll find Vala comfortable - it is very similar to C#.

@code177

Thanks for this fantastic post. It would be useful if this answer would appear somewhere on this in a FAQ or getting started section in the documentation.

There are a lot of great resources available on this site. However I found it not so straightforward to get an initial overview e.g. how to develop appliciations with Python. After browsing different threads, documentation and some sources of python projects one can finally get there. Having a up to date section on Maemo for Python Developers would be neat though.

@code177

Nice to meet another CF developer!!

Thanks for your excellent detailed and concise response, really appreciate it. I don’t know why but I am leaning towards using C++, probably from a career enhancing perspective, nothing personal against Python! Although common sense says go with Python for ease of development and learning curve.....

I will rethink my decision to use C++.

Can someone also just please confirm my understanding is correct for the below:

No, you use python or c++ for desktop widgets also -- I can't really say I've seen any pure html/js widgets -- but I haven't really looked, so maybe someone will correct me. ;-)

Nathan

To be honest, I'm not sure what Nathan means by "widget".
Maemo does not use Javascript or related web technologies outside of the web browser (AFAIK).

code177's advice sounds great to me - in fact, I think it ought to be captured on its own Wiki page, so it's easier to find than on the forum.

Rav, I was in a similar position as you and don't regret getting started with Python and GTK as the platform for my own little project (see here). Unless you have something that is computationally intensive, I'd definitely suggest Python, the advantage in productivity and ease of development is significant.

One piece of advice: assuming that you want to develop for the N800/N810 running the Diablo release of Maemo, make sure that you understand that some of the UI elements are only available for the Fremantle Maemo release (targeting the N900), and the documentation on the Wiki is not always explicit about this.

Henning

The way I see it, I'd say that a widget is a simple application, that does something more or less trivial, like retrieve and parse weather data from the web, and has mainly just UI related code.

"Application" is much wider term, with varying emphasis on UI.