Ubuntu on Fujitsu Siemens ST5112

Dear folks,

I haven't been a busy blogger lately. The reason is mostly that I do not have much time left for blogging, but a reason may also be that there isn't that much to write about either.

I know that some of the readers of this page might expect some qtpfsgui news, as I more or less promised to look into some bugs. Unfortunately, there haven't been any time left for that this summer. I am a family man, you know. So, no qtpfsgui hacking this summer (and not much of photography either unfortunately). And the fall looks quite busy, so I won't make any promises.

What I can say a few words about, though, is the new computer I got this week. It's a tablet I'm testing out as a notetaking device for meetings and stuff like that - a Fujistu Siemens ST5112. Actually, this is the second device of this kind I have put my hands on this summer. The other is the Sahara i440D from Tabletkiosk - a capable device in itself, but not much to write about here as I left windows running on it, because another more windows friendly colleague was supposed to test it too. From a design point of view, however, the Sahara is a likeable computer!

I have spent a few hours today with the ST5112 installing Ubuntu. Or actually, I did a basic Ubuntu installation yesterday, and used the night to do the necessary apt-get upgrade; the amount of security and otherwise updates on 8.04 is rather long. Today, I have tweaked settings to adapt to the tablet environment. As the ST5112 does not have a keyboard at all I must be able to do most things without one. I have installed the xvkbd package which gives an onscreen keyboard that can be used when absolutely necessary, but I really like to avoid it for most things. But I am getting lost in details here. The important information is:

• X work almost out of the box. Had to add the RandRRotation (True) in order to make rotation with xrandr work.
• Screen rotation works (now), and I tweaked a script I found online that make the mouse recalibrate to the rotated screen
• Wacom pen input works out of the box, as soon as setserial and wacom stuff was installed. Had to add the wacom lines manually in xorg.conf, though.
• Wifi works out of the box
• Suspend/resume work out of the box. I set the option that stores and resumes the VGA but I don't know whether it was absolutely necessary.
• Bluetooth keyboard and mouse works just fine, but must be configured manually by running hciscan/hidd and edit the hcid.conf file.
• Even most of the hotkeys on one side of the ST5112 works out of the box, like page up/down, scroll buttongs, and hotkey for starting the email program.
• The only thing that don't work so far is sound. I have read enough on the net to avoid start thinkering with it; it will probably need some attention...

Bottom line is that I think I can use Ubuntu on this one. I still have to do some scripting in order to move my meeting notes taken with Xournal (probably) over to Evernote, but that is just fun! As Evernote don't have a linux version yet, I must move the notes over using email.

The end is: If you are looking for a tablet pc that works with Linux, the ST5112 from Fujitsu Siemens can easily be your answer.

The major drawback? Only 1024x768 resolution on the screen. But I have to work with it a few days before I make a finale conclusion on that. Maybe it is ok for the intended use!

Take care folks.

And if you like, follow me on twitter.com/mandus; that's where most of my netprecense is now.

Ubuntu 8.04 on Oqo O2

Hmm,

I was pretty sure I wrote something on Ubuntu 8.04 on the Oqo, but I can't find it right now.

Short story: Use the alternate cd to install - everything is smooth. Or you can of course upgrade from and older version of Ubuntu.

Sad things: Wireless network doesn't work (but bluetooth do). And the wacom pen-input is still a joke, with unbearable amount of vectoring. And I can't get sound to work either. And you will still need a special modeline for Xorg (the same as in older versions of Ubuntu, the modeline is available here on the blog somewhere).

Bottom-line - the Oqo O2 with Ubuntu 8.04 is just a brick. Sorry to say so, but look elsewhere for a great, small, linux device. Of course I should have been positive, raving about all the things that do work. But for me wifi is crucial on such a small device, and so is sound. And the pen is the main reason I bought it in the first place.

Take care!

Qtpfsgui 1.9.2 for Mac

Hi folks,

I have uploaded a qtpfsgui v.1.9.2 binary on sourceforge now. I did this rather quick this morning, so I hope I got the steps right.

Just comment if there are any issues!

Take care!

Testing a new device

Sure, I know I am late on this one as the device has been on the market for months. I am testing the Nokia E90, mostly as a better replacement for HTC TyTN II which I have tried in the past and my boss use now.

So far, I am really happy with the performance of the E90. The web browser included is so goos that I even write this post on the phone. The E61i was good, but this one is even better!

A more complete report will follow.

Take care!

Modified Qtpfsgui 1.9.1 is up

I think I have corrected the issues with the first OSX version of qtpfsgui 1.9.1. There is a new disk image at sourceforge now, please go grab it and create some nice images :)

Take care

Apology: align_image_stack and qtpfsgui

Hi folks,

I am so sorry, but I managed to put the wrong align_image_stack binary into the disk image for qtpfsgui v. 1.9.1. I have a working binary on my computer (but obviously I had more than one...). The version in there now will crach and burn.

I will create a new disk image as soon as I can, hopefully today. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Take care

Qtpfsgui 1.9.1 is out!

Hi folks,

I managed to build the 1.9.1 a bit quicker than the 1.9.0 :) Hopefully, the problems with align_image_stack is resolved with this version, I haven't had the time yet to test it myself. User-experiences are welcome!

Take care.

Qtpfsgui 1.9.0 update

Just a short notice - there was a minor problem with the first 1.9.0 dmg I uploaded to sourceforge. A library that is not included on either Tiger or Leopard (as far as i know) by Apple, was dynamically linked into the app. I have now uploaded a new dmg where the libintl library (which was the problem) is statically linked into the qtpfsgui app.

Hope this fix some problems! Userreports are welcome, as always.

Take care.

Qtpfsgui 1.9.0 for Mac

I have managed to sort out most of the issues with Qtpfsgui 1.9.0 on Mac, and have uploaded a diskimage to sourceforge.

Please note:

• This version of qtpfsgui is not universal, you have to use an intel-based Mac.
  
• You should get the latest Qt from trolltech, at least if you run into problems
• I had some issues when testing autoalign features in the binary. I'm thankful for user-reports!

So, go ahead over to sourceforge, and grab the new qtpfsgui, and tell me what it can do for you!

Take care.

MacVim binary for Leopard

Some time ago, I build a binary of MacVim for Leopard, as I couldn't find one online. I suggested that I could make it available online if someone is in the need, but didn't got any requests until now.

As I now got a request, my build of MacVim is available! The version of vim in this build is 7.1.156. So far, that's good enough for me. If I upgrade later on, I'll provide a new diskimage! The binary was build on a MacBook Pro running Leopard. I have not made any attempt making a universal binary, so dependent on how the default build of MacVim is set up, it may or may not work on a powerpc.

If you find it useful, feel free to drop me a comment!

Take care,

Qtpfsgui news!

Hi folks! I have some good news for those of you who awaits the 1.9.0 release of Qtpfsgui for Mac OSX. For a long time I have had problems compiling the dependencies as I have moved to Leopard. Today, I finally got everything running, and will put a diskimage of the app on sourceforge quite soon. I just have to clean up a few things (dcraw and auto align stuff).

There is one caveat, though. I had to let my aim of doing a universal build go. For some reason, I am not able to compile the exiv2 library as a universal binary, which make it impossible for me to create a universal qtpfsgui. So if there still are PPC folks out there, you have to look elsewhere for a qtpfsgui. As I have very little time for this project right now, it might take a while before I look into the universal exiv2 again.

Take care!

Update on Nokia N82

This will be a short post! I said I was impressed with the performance of the N82 after just a few days use. I am still impressed. It's the best phone I ever had, hands down. It's that "just works" feeling. It almost never go in deep freeze (I can't remember now if it actually have happend at all?). Even the GPS works fine. I have used it for navigation a few times, and it helped me to get where I needed to be.

Is it perfect? No, there is no such thing! The only thing I don't like is the keyboard. It is not comfortable to type on. The result is that I rarely write more than a few words at a time. A long email is out of question, at least it has to be extremely urgent. Most of the time I have the Oqo at hand to deal with such situations.

I have seen complaints about battery life on this device, but I don't think it's a big deal. The device is very powerful, so it consumes energy in big chunks. Still, I get it to last a couple of days, even more if I have to. I think this is what we have to expect.

For me, the N82 and the E61i combined will be the perfect device right now. Or an iPhone with similar specs. Let's dream on.

If someone wonder what happend to the TyTN II, I can tell you it died just a few days after I handed it our to my boss. Suddenly, the keys - all of them - stopped working.
It's in for repair, but it doesn't look good for HTC.

Take care, folks!

Nokia N82 in the house!

I now have the Nokia N82! So far I am impressed. It is a very capable device. The camera is so much better than the E61i, the GPS works very well, and the HSDPA network is nice (and dangerous because of my dataplan). Besides that the device function very much as the E61i which I liked very much. From time to time I miss the keyboard of the E61i, but I have to give it more time to conclude.

The HTC TyTN II is now passed on to a colleague of mine. It worked relatively stable, I just had to reboot it a couple of times. The camera was not as good as on the first TyTN, but still much better than the E61i. I keyboard have an awkward feel - you're not certain you pressed the key, so from time to time I pressed twice by accident. The keyboard on the E61i is much better, but the TyTN II (as the first TyTN) is much more comfortable to hold in your hands.

While the TyTN II works much better than the first TyTN, at least in this short time I have used it, it is still not a device for me. I blame the OS most, but probably have to blame my willingness to adapt as well! More important though, is the fact that the TyTN II and the Oqo O2 is to close in functionallity. I chose to go for a smaller phone and the Oqo O2. Maybe I'll try to get my hands on the Nokia N810 as well, I think that will be a better inbetween device than the Oqo.

One last thing about the TyTN II. The GPS device and the Tomtom software works quite well. Together with the assisted GPS software that get some info from the internet to precondition the GPS, it very quickly locks in and starts showing correct location. I have one small nit though. First time you boot Tomtom you can select and download one free city. I, of course, downloaded Oslo, Norway, as this is where I live. But I got the impression that I could download other cities so far. So, when I traveld to Berlin last week, I thought I just could pay a few $10's and download Berlin. That proved not to be possible. I could have bought the full Western Europe for like $60. Problem was that this was a 1GB download - at the time I figured that out it was too late for such a big download over my ADSL, I would have been on the plane long before it could have finished. So I had to stay in Berlin using the old style maps. This was not as flexible as it should have been!

Stay tuned, I'll report on the Nokia N82 soon!

MacVim on Leopard

I had some issues with the Gvim from Macvim.org, related to the python-version linked in that version of Vim. There is also a version of vim delivered with MacOSX Leopard, but that version does not have the python bindings.

A couple of weeks ago I discovered the MacVim at http://code.google.com/p/macvim/, and when I discovered the python-issues today I figured I could try that vim. Unfortunately, the binary that is available there is built against python2.3 (Tiger), and I like to use the python2.5 on Leopard. Luckily, there are some nice instructions in the wikipages! Without much trouble, I was able to build my very own Leopard MacVim with python2.5.

If someone need a binary, just tell me - I can share!

Btw, if you wonder why I wanted a vim with python2.5, check this page: http://djcraven5.blogspot.com/2006/10/send-gmail-message-from-vim.html. Now I have libgmail in my python2.5 environment, a python2.5 enabled MacVim, and I can send email right from my editor. Neat!

I'm still here!

I have been kind of quiet lately. The main reason is probably that my wife and I have another child to take care of - those folks who follows me closely know that we got anoterh daughter on 8. october. She is sweet and cute and sleeps almost all day, as common for babies. Still, with more kids there will be some more work to do, and while we adapt to the new situations, there will be a bit less writing.

I have some things that I will write up on as soon as time permits. On the Oqo O2, I am testing Windows Vista now. I had some issues with linux, and wanted to test Vista such that I can make a fair comparision. I have run Vista for a full month now, and will write up on that. On friday I also got a brand new HTC TyTN II. This is a Windows Mobile version 6 device, and a nice followup to the HTC TyTN I have used in the past. I will check back on my earlier notes on the TyTN and see if this one is better. I am not supposed to keep this device for myself, as I just check it out for one of the bosses at Simula Research Lab. But that depends of course. If it's bad, I have to keep it, while if it is just good enough, I let the boss have it. If I enjoy the device very much, I buy another one for the boss and keep this one myself ;0

I am also awaiting the new Nokia N82, and will review that device when I get it.

One of the really bad things with the Nokia E61i is the camera. If the camera in TyTN II is close to that in the original TyTN, I might restart my photo-a-day project which I just closed down when the TyTN died as the E61i was just to bad.

I will be back soon! Take care.

Was I dreaming?

Some time ago I read about the new Sony Ericsson K850 phone. From what I remember, the phone was supposed to have edge, 3G and super-3G radio, and maybe even wifi. In additionit has a nice camera and other goodies. But maybe it was just a dream? Now the phone is in the stores. And from what I can tell there is no edge and no super-3G. Come on, Sony Ericsson - data connectivity is important to lots of folk these days. Even for uploading those 5megapixel pictures. And there are still lots of places with poor 3G coverage, so edge is still quite handy.

I was really hoping that the K850 could have been the phone that brought me back to Sony Ericsson, the brand I liked so much in the past. But there are too many errors with it now that it is on the market. So I think I just stay with the Nokia E61i for a while, or I switch to a N95 since I have the Oqo O2 for the occasions I need a keyboard.

Was I dreaming, or was the spec of the K850 changed on the official Sony Ericsson pages at some point in time?

[Update 27.10.2007:] According to reviews on Norwegian it/phone sites (amobil.no), the K850 actually got both Edge and super-3g. So I wasn't dreaming after all. I have to rush to the store to get one...

Ink blogging

Gartner: No New Unix Apps to Emerge After 2009

Gartner: No New Unix Apps to Emerge After 2009
This was a really strange post - to the extent that I really want to comment on it.

What is the definition of Unix? As far as most of the world is conserned, there is no such thing? You have HP-UX, I don't see that going away that soon. Then you have AIX which will probably stay with us for some years. Solaris, Irix, and probably a few more - some are quite dead, others live. If you make an app for any if these, wouldn't that be a unix application.

More important, you have MacOSX which is very much Unix. And you have all the freenixes, including Linux. For all practical purposes, you make an Unix app when you create anything for one of these platforms. I know that there are certain archaic rules that must be fullfilled before an operating system can get the label Unix, but when it comes to the applications, these days it usually only takes a recompile to get your app on one of those if you program with portability in mind.

Ah, enough. The original writer probably live in a Microsoft world and don't have a clue. It's Gartner after all. And I just wanted to write something tonight...

Ikke min oppgave, men noe må da lagres...

For de som ikke aner hva nam er, og heller ikke kjører mc, les videre eller gå et annet sted. Av og til faller noen utsagn i baren som bare bør tas vare på. Jeg er vel kjent med at dette er en oppgave som egentlig tilligger andre, og jeg er stort sett bare en lurker i baren. Men allikevel, noen utsagn må jeg bare lagre. 10. September finner altså Morten det for godt å uttrykke:

Søndag var jeg ute for å ta en liten tur. Nesten den første vårturen. Det viser seg at jeg har glemt å kjøre noe særlig i år. Faktisk har det så vidt jeg husker bare blitt en t/r til jobben etter at jeg skiftet batteri i vår.

Vel, vrir rundt nøkkelen og ser med glede at jeg har nok strøm på batteriet til å få lys i den røde dioden som sier at jeg har nok olje. Jeg prøver om lyset virker, og får da nullstilt instrumentpanelet. Heldigvis er Aprilia 250 uten startmotor. Den røde dioden klarer ikke å
holde på lyset samtidig som coilene skal få strøm, men den starter da likevel. Etter en grundig marinering av garasjen i totaksolje og uforbrentbensin kommer jeg meg avgårde.

Ned til bensinstasjonen for å få litt luft i dekkene, sjekker at bremsene fortsatt virker og at ikke drittungene har skrudd styredemperen min helt til. Ut på tur.

Ikke lenge etter at jeg kommer meg ut på veien legger jeg merke til at temperaturmåleren til kjølevannet viser litt rare verdier. Må RS250 er det en gammel myte som sier at kjølevannet bør ligge rundt 68 grader, og hvert fall ikke utenfor 60-75 grader. Detter krever en del tape på
radiatoren for å passe til varierende værforhold. Denne tappingen er noe man ikke skal holde på med alt for lenge uten at det blir litt hysterisk. Uansett - Responsen på kjølevanntempen er ganske rask. Kjører man opp en bratt bakke stiger den fort noen grader. Ute på E18 legger
jeg plutselig merke til at tempen nå er helt oppe i 83 grader. Jeg ventet at det var litt kaldere nå enn ved første tur i vår, så før start hadde jeg lagt en stripe tape midt på radiatoren. Kunne det ha blitt alt for mye tape? Så la jeg merke til at kjølevannstempen nå var blitt enda
mer følsom for hvor hardt motoren arbeider. Jeg gir bare litt gass, så fyker tempen opp mot 87-88 grader. Så slipper jeg opp, og raskt synker den ned mot 70 grader. Jeg vurderer raskt situasjoen og kommer på at David en gang hadde litt samme problem en gang han hadde luft på radiatoren. Det blir ikke ordentlig gjennomstrømning, så da kjører man jo nærmest uten kjøling. Det kan vel neppe være veldig bra, så jeg bestemmer meg for å kjøre inn på nærmeste bensinstasjon. I det jeg skal ta av legger jeg merke til at tempen nå er helt nede i 50 - urovekkende. Samtidig snur jeg hodet til høyre for å se i dødvinkelen. I det hodet vris tilbake sveiper øynene over det høyre lcd-panelet. Med litt liten skrift står det 67, en liten sirkel og så en C. Dette tyder på at tempen står på høyre lcd-panel og ikke på venstre. Ved nærmere inspeksjon ser detut til at det står km/h bak det store tallet på venstre lcd-panel.

Moralen er: Husk å lese bruksanvisningen før hver gang man opererer kjøretøyet.

(klippet verbatim fra no.alt.motorsykler, bare editert formatering og en opplagt trykkleif).

Hugin auto-align in Qtpfsgui

I am still working on the interface to the align_image_stack program in Qtpfsgui. The maintainer of the OSX-port of Hugin, Ippei Ukay, has been so kind to provide us with a statically linked version of the program that at least work quite well on my computers. I have some issues with making Qtpfsgui picking up the location of the binary automatically, but for now you can download the binary here, and place it in a directory usually in your PATH environment. The directory /usr/local/bin may be a good place to store it, but if that does not work put it in /usr/bin. Qtpfsgui v.1.8.12 should then be able to find and use the align_image_stack program.

[edit:] Remark, after you download the align_image_stack binary, you need to set the executable bit on the file. Open a Terminal and do 'sudo chmod 755 /usr/bin/align_image_stack' (assuming you placed the file in /usr/bin).

In the future, the Hugin image aligner will be included with Qtpfsgui, so no extra work should be required to use it - I hope!

[edit2:] You may as well download the align_image_stack binary inside a zip-file - by popular request!
Take care