Customisation

[Ninjia^]

Im sure this isnt a big issue for most people but for me its something HUGE!! My question is how likely do you think it will be that we will be able customise things in the GP2X software like the startup image, menu colours, sounds etc.

Basically how open will the open source handheld be??

Example :

 

[barnesy]

It'll be possible to completely replace the GP2X's software. Is that open enough for you?

 

[Ninjia^]

It'll be possible to completely replace the GP2X's software. Is that open enough for you?

​

Hehe that would be the best thing, unfortunatly Im not ever going to that good of a programmer What I am hoping for I suppose is that the GPH interface will be hackable through the SDK or hopefully something even easier for people like me to use rather than diving into the code?? :blink:

THanks h34r:

 

[woogal]

All images for the launcher seem to be .png's in various folders. Of course it won't be possible to tell if those images can be replaced until final versions of the hardware and launcher are out.

 

[Aimless_E]

You would replace the entire software package to change the background? Man and I thought I was weird for changing my desktop every few weeks

 

[Jarska333]

I'd wager there is a "Settings" menu option, with color settings.

Damn, I hope those vertical lines are just because of camera...

 

[Ninjia^]

All images for the launcher seem to be .png's in various folders. Of course it won't be possible to tell if those images can be replaced until final versions of the hardware and launcher are out.

​

If its just a case of replacing the png files I'll be ecstatic!

 

[Ninjia^]

I'd wager there is a "Settings" menu option, with color settings.

Damn, I hope those vertical lines are just because of camera...

​

I just watched the newest video posted today again that goes through all the menus and theres nothing in settings that lets you change the interface at all so far, and I doubt its a top priority for GPH at the moment.

By the way the lines are just the camera, its like when you take a photo of a TV

 

[Jarska333]

See, BLU+ had similar lines, occasionally, and GP2X has the same LCD...

 

[Digital Awakening]

GUI in png... that have some nice possibilities A GUI script would be even nicer, I'm sure a lot of people wanna make their own skin.

 

[Eolair]

Definately. It would be really nice if that were possible

 

[aQwaBlaz3]

...I like orange...

that would be cool if I could have some like babes in bikinis or something...

 

[TelcoLou]

I use Windups on my GP32 ... hopefully someone will code a similar alternate GUI.

 

[Epicenter]

I wouldn't panic. I'm sure you'll be able to dump a firmware image onto a card or via the EXT Port to your PC, open it up, edit the relevant image files for backgrounds and startup images, icons, et al, then rewrite the new firmware image to your GP2x. Granted if you screw this up, you might have a fancy expensive paperweight, so you'd want to be quite careful about the writing process, as you should be doing say, a motherboard BIOS update. But you'll certainly be able to get away with editing the GUI in some way shape or form.

 

[aQwaBlaz3]

yeah....I wouldnt want to mess up my system so Flashing my BIOS wouldnt be good...I like the GUI as it is...it looks better than the PSPs...

 

[Cahaz]

in a next version of the firmware, perhaps?

Remember tha GPH will update the firmware after the release, and i doubt it will be for bugs only.

 

[Blah]

Remember, its Linux, you someday may be able to use one of those desktop environments for Linux on it. That would allow for tons of customization.

 

[Epicenter]

That'd be a little slow if you mean something like Gnome or KDE, they're big and bloated and run rather slowly even on hardware more powerful than the GP2x. If you mean ligher-weight window managers like IceWM, Blackbox .. sure.

 

[Ninjia^]

I wouldn't panic. I'm sure you'll be able to dump a firmware image onto a card or via the EXT Port to your PC, open it up, edit the relevant image files for backgrounds and startup images, icons, et al, then rewrite the new firmware image to your GP2x. Granted if you screw this up, you might have a fancy expensive paperweight, so you'd want to be quite careful about the writing process, as you should be doing say, a motherboard BIOS update. But you'll certainly be able to get away with editing the GUI in some way shape or form.

​

The Firmware and Software are totally seperate from one another, to use your PC analogy its like the BIOS and the Operating system. You dont need to flash the BIOS everytime you reinstall windows...

So even If you screw up the Software in some way all you will need to do is replace it with a backup of the original, and as the firmwares untouched theres no way it would brick the unit.

 

[oneandoneis2]

When I've got my WM of choice (FVWM) running on my desktop PC, my total RAM usage sits at around 20MB - and that's with a rather higher res than the GP2X can cope with So I'm pretty much certain that we'll see a few WMs ported across.

Probably getting X11 itself over will be the bigger challenge. . .