Pal Szasz’s blog… or something like that…

Here is a minor update for StickIt. I wanted to add possibility to edit the text on the standby screen, … but I couldn’t. Anyway, there are some usefull changes:

• moving the note and resizing it should be easier now
• you can change the font size in the note

I created a webpage on the main website for the project, you can download it from there: stickit page

I moved the blog to a new place… actually installed wordpress on our server, and imported the posts in it… Unfortunately I couldn’t import the comments (any ideas how it should be done?)

The reason of moving is: keep everything in one place.

I will be changing the theme also to fit more in the website.

Separate pages will be created for each app as well, the blog will be mainly used for news. Screenshots, download links will be on separate pages.

I found the missing piece in the puzzle, and now TOSC (aka The Open Screen Capture) is working even if the app is in the background. I mean you can now start the capture by clicking on the floating window (let’s call it radar?).

You can download the new binary here:  theopenscreencapture_0_3.sis

I havent uploaded the new source code yet (lack of time), but there is only one line changed (added actually): in the AppUi the following method is called:

IgnorePointerEventsWhenInBackground(EFalse)

Well, another little usefull UIQ3 app: StickIt. It allows you to post a note on the standby screen. That’s it

Download: stickit_0_1.sis

Screenshots:

 

Changes:

• Added 3 more clock types (binary led, binary, analog)
• Added “Total lock” mode
• Some minor changes

Download:

• UIQ3 binary: clockss_0_2.sis
• Source: clockss_0_2_src.tar.gz

The “Total lock” means, when turned on, is more agressive in locking: ie if you press the ‘@’ (or internet) button, or long press the back button, it will detect that it is sent to background, and forces the phone to bring it in the foreground. Thus reducing the chance of doing something by mistake.

Here are the screenshots of the new clock types:

… or something like it…

Well, a lot of people miss the clock screen saver in their shiny new UIQ3 phone… so here is a sort of replacement.

It’s not a real screensaver, but looks like a screensaver, behaves like a screensaver, so it’s a pretty good estimate

Ok, and now the serious text

The program should start automatically, when the phone starts. And it also should go to the background. To controll it, just locate it in the task manager, and when you switch to it, you should see:

You can choose the timeout value from 10seconds, 1 minute (the default), 2 mintues or 10 minutes. You can also de/activate it temporary.

After the given amount of inactivity, it switches to screen saver mode:

You can switch back to normal mode (ie. “unlock the keypad”) with ‘*’ and then ‘#’ (note: you should probably need to press ALT as well, to get in numeric mode)

You can switch to a different app with the BACK key (only when you press it longer) or the internet (or hardware) key. Unfortunately I cannot change this behaviour But fortunately, these keys are not easy to press by mistake.

You should turn off automatic keyguard in controll panel (otherwise you will reseave the standard unlock message).

Well, that’s it for now, awaiting opinions

Oh, and next version probably will have binary mode as well (ie. shows the clock in binary instead of decimal… just for the geeks )

Almost forgot the downoad links:

• UIQ3 binary: clockss_0_1.sis
• Source code: clockss_0_1_src.tar.gz (btw, is anybody interested in the surce code, or I just keep posting source codes for no reason ?-)

Well, in the weekend I was working on Pixie, and there is significant progress: the pen tool is working But no loading/saving yet.

The most interesting part is the development process: I created a stub application in FLTK and worked on it in FLTK using some simple abstract interface. The just implemented the interface in Symbian, and recompiled it. Of course it didn’t work at first…neither the second time… abut after a few hours it worked:-)

For the main view I created my own Widget class (the screen components are pretty simple anyway). I also created a simple Graphics class, which has implementation for FLTK and for Symbian as well. Using those it was pretty easy to make a first version of the game (of course some other classes were needed as well, like Event, etc).

But I’m afraid I have to think of a new solution for dialogs, since the program will need some extra views/dialogs as well.

One of the possibility is to use some new classes, with dual implementation.

The other is to use the same Widgets as I use in the main screen.

I think the second option will be easier (and faster and easier to debug), but won’t have the native look and feel…

Btw, it would be really interesting to implement the control framework using FLTK

Well, I found out how to make an app start automatically at boot, hence TABU 0.4 is released:

• now it  starts at boot
• now it starts animation automatically (ie. no need to select More->Start)
• now it automatically hides himself on start (you can still see it in the task list, hence you can bring it forward or kill it)

So it’s ready to be installed (secretely) on your friend’s phone and just wait his reactions (photos are welcome )

Oh, I almost forgot the download link: tabu_0_4_uiq3.sis

Well, it’s about another new UIQ3 prgogram… Well, not quite new, I want to rewrite PIXIE for UIQ3, but with a better design.

Since I don’t have too much time for coding, I want to do the design part well. So, let’s take it step by step

Step 1) What will be Pixie?

Pixie will be a pixel-art oriented image editor. Ie. you will be able to create and edit indexed/palettized raster images (mainly PNG format). So it should support at least load/save, zoom, paint tool and palette editing. Optionally it should support copy/paste with different selection shapes, fill/line/circle/ellips tool, palette loading/saving, layers, etc.

Step 2) How would it look like?

Well, I made a quick concept image:

Some explanations:

• Top status bar should remain, it occupies really small place and it’s good if people can see the battery state, can switch tasks easily, etc.
• The bottom softkey bar is also need to access the menu. The “UNDO” function should be at a very easily accessible place
• The application title area is removed, no need for that, occupies too much space
• In the top left is the 1:1 zoom area
• Next to it (to the right) are the customizable controlls: the toolbar, the palette bar and info bar.
• The rest is the X:1 zoom area (with optional grid)

I was thinking that the 1:1 zoom area should be resizable, the right edge should be able to moved left/right, the controll area will be resized as well. So users can choose between more controlls or bigger preview area. Also it should be resized vertically, by turning the infobar off, or increasing the number of lines of the palettebar.

The toolbuttons should be totally customizable: a long press of them would allow the user to change them (ie. to select from the full list, or to select an empty tool). In fact they would be allowed to select one of the tool_commands.

The keys should be remapped as well, to any key any command could be mapped. Commands are tool_commands + some additional command. Ie users could map to any key any tool command or some special commands, like: select next tool, select previous tool, select next color, select previous color. For example if somebody uses most often the pen and pick tool, he sets as his first (maybe only) tools in the toolbar these tools, and assigns the jog up/down to next/previous tool. Thus he can change quikly to pick and pen by the jog dial.

The palette bar should be customized. It doesn’t neccessarily match the image palette. It could be a sub region or a totally random subset. Ie. it can be for example colors “0 to 10″, or “12 to 23″, or colors “1, 34, 2, 5, …”.

One click selects the color, double click changes the color to another one from the palette. Long press changes the color’s RGB components.

Well, that’s if for today, more ideas will follow soon

Today I made some new animations for TABU, they will be added in the next release:

Update: I made a new release, you can download v0.3 here:  tabu_0_3_uiq3.sis

The only change is the addition of the two animations.