Notices

Data tables are data bases which can have a copyright while the singular data does not have (can something that does not have uniquness and identity have a copyright?) sinc ethe collection is work on its own. A telefonnumber does not have a copyright, a telefon book can. While you can read the calories from some label thw people that collect their data can have some copyright on their collection.

So it is likely allowed to make your own data base but you cannot copy it from somebody else. Of course how can somebody proof that you did not collect it but only copied it? Their is no signature in numbers. However the labels and names and the size of the portions may have.

Of course downloading an converting for personal use might be something different...

But look for example at http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcom...t/sr18a208.pdf or http://www.ars.usda.gov/Services/docs.htm?docid=15867 (what is its copyright?). Would this something that would suite the needs of you, if you could import it into WeightJinni (the database is big!)?

There are alsotextual or csv formatted versions of the data...

However before I start to convert, perhaps a more compact data base would be more helpful (60 character descriptions are a bit heavy)?

Good heavens, yes. 60 characters are a bit heavy, but needed sometimes. But I'd gladly take a ready to use/import database for weight jinni if someone were to build one. And thanks for the explanation.

I will see what I can do. I would however be nice if someone (you :-)?) could clarify the copyright, especially under what conditions I can package a file based on this data for maemo. Not ethat I have seen at least one portal that clearly states that it is based on this data, so there must be a way to officially use that data.

The data in the database itself is not copyrighted or copyrightable. The way it's packaged however is.

That sound like a philosophic answer. What does it mean? Can I package or not? And if I can, how? Can I convert the data to another format? What must I do? It the result still "free"? In which sense?

Nevertheles, I'm currently writing a little Java converter (should be working under Windows and Linux), that does the conversion for you, so there is currently no urgent need to add the data itself to the package. If the resulting data is acceptable I will possibly add another import menu entry to WeightJinni for direct import.

OK I have now a little java application for converting the data to the WeightJinni import format. The import it self performes well on my dual core Desktop PC, I haven't tested it on the Nokia itself. However I must admit that - as assumed - the data is not realy useful. Labels are too long and too unstructured and there are too many variants o the same food for useful searching and finding.

I might take a look in th evening if the data can be reduced by skipping to be defined duplicates, but I assume that this is not possible.

However if someone is still intersted in the converter I can send it to you. Please leave me a mail with your EMail adress and I will send it to you (or will place it on my web page this evening...).

OK I have now a little java application for converting the data to the WeightJinni import format. The import it self performes well on my dual core Desktop PC, I haven't tested it on the Nokia itself. However I must admit that - as assumed - the data is not realy useful. Labels are too long and too unstructured and there are too many variants o the same food for useful searching and finding.

I might take a look in th evening if the data can be reduced by skipping to be defined duplicates, but I assume that this is not possible.

However if someone is still intersted in the converter I can send it to you. Please leave me a mail with your EMail adress and I will send it to you (or will place it on my web page this evening...).

OK; you can now download the USDAConverter from http://www.anderenen.de/anderenende/USDAConverter.jar. You need the ABBREV.txt from http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcom...d/sr20abbr.zip. Call the jar with java -jar USDAConverter.jar ABBREV.txt <output-file> and import the resulting file into WeightJinni. Make sure to backup your ~/.weightjinni.xml file before.

Other converters should be also possible if the origin format is as simple. Please contact me if you have found other sources.

I found a bug with v1.4 on an n810. If you use the slide out keyboard when entering food items, you can only enter lowercase alpha characters for any of the three fields. The shift and function keys appear to be disabled within this dialog box, which means you cant use the built-in thumb keyboard. The on-screen stylus keyboard dies not exhibit this behavior.

Also, I can't get the stupid converter to work. Can someone convert the file for me and post the database so I can just download it and copy it over? It'd be much appreciated. Thanks.