Hi Mitar!<div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin-top:0px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-left:0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204, 204, 204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex">
I am not accustomed with it. Is it a full-blown emulator? So you will<br>be able to run OLSR in it? You do not have N900? Definitely is good to<br>test it on hardware. But I think it is also possible to get some<br>sponsored N900.</blockquote>
<div><br></div><div>Scratchbox is a cross-compiling tool, so anything I can get to compile and run under Scratchbox (correctly configured) should compile and run just the same on an actual N900. It uses your native compiler to produce binaries that are intended to run on another platform, and then it uses the toolchain to run them "natively". </div>
<div><br></div><div>If I worked on that project, I would find a way to get a real N900 to test on throughout the whole process. </div><div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin-top:0px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-left:0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204, 204, 204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex">
Which Android phone do you have? </blockquote><div><br></div><div>I am currently using the Motorola Droid. Would this project require a Dev phone? </div><div><br></div><div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin-top:0px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-left:0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204, 204, 204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex">
Maybe you could do only Android GUI <span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">and somebody else would do N900 GUI and you would cooperate.</span></blockquote>
<div><br></div><div>Sure! Doing it that way is actually more interesting, and I am more familiar with the Android platform than I am with the N900. I imagine there isn't a great deal of complexity with coding for the N900 since (as I understand it), the N900 can run applications from ARM debian packages with minimal modification. </div>
</div><div><br></div><div>Would the GUI for the N900 be programmed in C or Java? I know there is a JVM for Maemo, but the OLSRd port would definitely be in C (like the system underlying it).</div><div><br></div><div>That is, would the GUI for the two projects actually be sharing any amount of code (with modifications) - or will they be sharing an abstract design goal? </div>
<div><br></div><div>In general, I think the idea of a GUI for OLSRd is really interesting - and there is much to be done in developing that by itself. Porting it to Android and N900 are just icing on the cake. I will have to learn a lot about how to develop for Android and work closely with routing protocols, but I've been meaning to do both of those things for a while since I use them quite a bit and see ways to improve them or use them in new ways.</div>
<div><br></div><div>To answer your question briefly - Yes, I would gladly take on building the OLSR GUI for Android and collaborate with the N900 team for the sake of consistency between the two separate ports.</div><div>
<br></div><div>It also occurred to me that I could contribute by (1) translating/re-writing some of the existing relevant documentation on the wiki to English and (2) creating new content on the wiki as our work develops and requires some technical reference that users and other developers will need to make the most out of what we produce. </div>
<div><br></div><div>Do you think that would be worthwhile? I've been checking out a lot of articles on the freifunk wiki through google translate (and some rough German), but autotranslate tools are pretty bad. I would be able to translate important sections and articles literally, and with other things I would just write similar articles (same basic information and section titles, etc.) but in my own words in English.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Do you think this would be worthwhile? Could/Should I start working on that immediately? I think writing content to the wiki (related to this project in particular) would be a good way to familiarize myself with the tools that I would be working with. Translating wiki articles would be a kind of preliminary study.</div>
<div><br></div><div><br></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; border-collapse: collapse; "><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0.8ex; border-left-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-left-style: solid; padding-left: 1ex; ">
But it would be great to pack it in a stand-alone package (for rooted phones) which</blockquote><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0.8ex; border-left-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-left-style: solid; padding-left: 1ex; ">
will have to enable ad-hoc mode (for different Android WiFi hardware),</blockquote><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0.8ex; border-left-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-left-style: solid; padding-left: 1ex; ">
set IP and other network configuration and make an interface to OLSR.</blockquote></span></div><div><br></div>
<div>Yes! It would be a lot of fun to test out too!</div><div><br></div><div>Android has great built-in support with Google Maps, it would be interesting to add a layer that shows regularly-updated network activity in the Maps view. I've done some work previously with the Google Maps API (I made some simple PHP scripts that incorporated it for a job I used to work at), so that is a specific GUI feature I can think of that I would like to work on. </div>
<div><br></div><div>The GPS and seamless incorporation of Google Maps makes Android a very powerful platform for building ad-hoc networking tools. </div><div><br></div><div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0.8ex; border-left-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-left-style: solid; padding-left: 1ex; ">
Many of this things will have to be workaround/hacks into the Android <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; border-collapse: collapse; ">system around officially supported things so quite some research will be necessary to find the most benign (and future-proof) way of doing it. Ah, yes, and there are different versions of Android. So this is also something to play with.</span></blockquote>
<div><br></div><div>What parts of the android OS pose significant problems? I've been reading through some of the API on the Android developer website, it would be good to know what in particular to take note of.</div>
</div><div><br></div><div>By the way, I am regularly idling in #freifunk on Freenode. I'm also regularly in #android and #android-dev. My IRC handle is "bezdomni".</div><div><br></div><div>Thanks for your response! :)</div>
<div><br></div><div>-Charles</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div>