Release Hotfix 3 Released

[Pleng]

it's a **** feature if it is one! People want to refer to cards by name, not bizarre abstract acronyms. Besides which you should never NEED to refer to cards directly; that's what appdata is for.

You could, of course, get around it by creating symlinks upon card insert so cards can be accessed by their name, and by mmcblk (or why not use a nicer name, say SD1 and SD2?) but again this encourages sloppy programming by using direct access to the SD cards.

 

[GizmoTheGreen]

well, if you want to browse roms on a card, i can see the use of knowing which card is in which slot, so links for SD1 and SD2 would serve a purpose in that case

though im perfectly fine with mmcblk0p1 and mmcblk1p1

 

[likwidoxigen]

it's a **** feature if it is one! People want to refer to cards by name, not bizarre abstract acronyms. Besides which you should never NEED to refer to cards directly; that's what appdata is for.

You could, of course, get around it by creating symlinks upon card insert so cards can be accessed by their name, and by mmcblk (or why not use a nicer name, say SD1 and SD2?) but again this encourages sloppy programming by using direct access to the SD cards.

Don't be a twad. If you're writing an app that keeps PND files up to date you do need to use the card path. Also name like mmcblk1p0 isn't "bizarre" or "abstract" it's shockingly literal and specific just because you or others may not understand it... that's a personal problem.

It amazes me that you think needing to access the SD cards directly is "sloppy", lets open our minds a bit now eh?

 

[NickLoTurco]

Hmmmm, Hotfix 3 has buggered everything again. I formatted my card but now Mame and a few other pnd's don't show in the menu like they used to. Also, I can't download pnd's in fennec, it come up with an error and asks whether I wanna try again, anyone else have this? Really though, Snes has also disappeared even though it's in the menu folder with all the other pnd's, before it disappeared I had the no sound issue after installing hotfix 3, deleted it and put it back in menu but thats when all the problems started. Naffed off again.

 

[Pleng]

If you're writing an app that keeps PND files up to date you do need to use the card path.

Why? If I have 4 SD cards then I can only have 2 in at once. An app that keeps PNDs up to date would need some way of differentiating between them.

Also name like mmcblk1p0 isn't "bizarre" or "abstract" it's shockingly literal and specific just because you or others may not understand it... that's a personal problem.

Jesus geeking Christ! I just can't stand this total nerd mentality. It may be shockingly literal and specific to you, but if you ever manage to leave your house and meet average joe and ask him where he'd look to find the files on the SD cards, I'll guarantee that not 1 of said Joes will come up with mmcblk*.

It amazes me that you think needing to access the SD cards directly is "sloppy", lets open our minds a bit now eh?

I'm willing to accept that it might be required in occasional extreme circumstances, though I don't buy into your example. And I didn't say that needing access was sloppy, I said exposing them directly encourages sloppy programming. Just look at the germb PND, which expects data files t reside in mmcblk0p1/germb as opposed to using an appdata as an example.

 

[EvilDragon]

...

Automount: Now using Label names (if the card has one) instead of mmcblk*

Hey ED didn't craig say that the whole mmcblk* things were features because they would be the same for every device. So you could always get to the card in slot one or slot two?

[/quote]

Well, it never was like that, as udev always names the FIRST inserted card /media/mmcblk0p1, regardless what slot it's in.

Also, if you use the SNES emulator or programs like Exaile which remember your last used directory, those programs had problems when the mountpoint moved (i.e. just putting the card in after the other one).
This leads to problems. Exaile refused to run and crashed when trying to play media which weren't there anymore.

But the fix for you is easy:
Don't label the cards and you're back to mmcblk0p1 and mmcblk1p1-naming scheme.

Hmmmm, Hotfix 3 has buggered everything again. I formatted my card but now Mame and a few other pnd's don't show in the menu like they used to. Also, I can't download pnd's in fennec, it come up with an error and asks whether I wanna try again, anyone else have this? Really though, Snes has also disappeared even though it's in the menu folder with all the other pnd's, before it disappeared I had the no sound issue after installing hotfix 3, deleted it and put it back in menu but thats when all the problems started. Naffed off again.

That's pretty weird, as libpnd does do this, and this hasn't even been touched with this hotfix.
It sounds like there were some other things wrong before with your OS - and the HotFix 3 triggered something there,

 

[budliz]

I had an issue with my SD card stopping to work correctly after installing hotfix 3. It stopped working with xfce but still worked fine with MiniMenu. The issue seems to be caused by the way hotfix 3 uses SD card labels so it can remember the card in future. My card must have had a label with extended characters in the name or have been in some format the Pandora didn't like. I renamed the card with a SD card reader under Windows and it works fine now (just go into 'My Computer' right click on the card & rename). My card is a bytestor 16gb class 4.

 

[likwidoxigen]

Why? If I have 4 SD cards then I can only have 2 in at once. An app that keeps PNDs up to date would need some way of differentiating between them.

I don't understand why you'd have an app on multiple cards. And an app that keeps them up to date wouldn't if the user has the same app in multiple places they can manage that OR if they update with the new card it it'll pick that up and update that.

Jesus geeking Christ! I just can't stand this total nerd mentality. It may be shockingly literal and specific to you, but if you ever manage to leave your house and meet average joe and ask him where he'd look to find the files on the SD cards, I'll guarantee that not 1 of said Joes will come up with mmcblk*.

Lol. Hey jerk... normal people should never know what the name of the mounted folder for their cards are. They can use the desktop shortcuts or the ones in the side panel of thunar. Now before you say you need that for some of the emulators, that just means that the emulators aren't "average joe" friendly. And if they want to use them they can learn. The emulators will EVENTUALLY be "average joe friendly". Seriously grow up and try to make a point without trying to make fun of someone you know nothing about. When people don't actually HAVE a point is when they usually devolve into speaking from their asses.

I'm willing to accept that it might be required in occasional extreme circumstances, though I don't buy into your example. And I didn't say that needing access was sloppy, I said exposing them directly encourages sloppy programming. Just look at the germb PND, which expects data files t reside in mmcblk0p1/germb as opposed to using an appdata as an example.

How does exposing them directly encourage sloppy programming? Just because you "hide" something doesn't mean someone still won't try to do it wrong if they think they "need" to. If the developer doesn't know how to program their app properly trying to "idiot proof" it is a waste because idiot's always find a way.

 

[likwidoxigen]

Also, if you use the SNES emulator or programs like Exaile which remember your last used directory, those programs had problems when the mountpoint moved (i.e. just putting the card in after the other one).
This leads to problems. Exaile refused to run and crashed when trying to play media which weren't there anymore.

Now that makes sense to me as a reason to switch it. The /dev/ path will always stay the same though so I can just run mount and strip it out I guess.

 

[God Ginrai]

I'm willing to accept that it might be required in occasional extreme circumstances, though I don't buy into your example. And I didn't say that needing access was sloppy, I said exposing them directly encourages sloppy programming. Just look at the germb PND, which expects data files t reside in mmcblk0p1/germb as opposed to using an appdata as an example.

How does exposing them directly encourage sloppy programming? Just because you "hide" something doesn't mean someone still won't try to do it wrong if they think they "need" to. If the developer doesn't know how to program their app properly trying to "idiot proof" it is a waste because idiot's always find a way.

Exposing them makes it easier for them to do. You can't tell me that people don't do something because it was easier or the first thing that came into their mind. If you hide this functionality, they won't be used to using it, and therefore won't think to do it when they need a solution that can be handled by the other way.

-God Ginrai

 

[JurnD]

I'm willing to accept that it might be required in occasional extreme circumstances, though I don't buy into your example. And I didn't say that needing access was sloppy, I said exposing them directly encourages sloppy programming. Just look at the germb PND, which expects data files t reside in mmcblk0p1/germb as opposed to using an appdata as an example.

How does exposing them directly encourage sloppy programming? Just because you "hide" something doesn't mean someone still won't try to do it wrong if they think they "need" to. If the developer doesn't know how to program their app properly trying to "idiot proof" it is a waste because idiot's always find a way.

Exposing them makes it easier for them to do. You can't tell me that people don't do something because it was easier or the first thing that came into their mind. If you hide this functionality, they won't be used to using it, and therefore won't think to do it when they need a solution that can be handled by the other way.

-God Ginrai

I just want to say here that the gemrb PND I made was just a first test. I do understand that hardcoding to /media/mmcblk1p1/bg1 will not stand. But as God Ginrai said, it was the easiest thing that came to mind at the time.
Just wanted to explain that.

Jurn

 

[Pleng]

Why? If I have 4 SD cards then I can only have 2 in at once. An app that keeps PNDs up to date would need some way of differentiating between them.

I don't understand why you'd have an app on multiple cards. And an app that keeps them up to date wouldn't if the user has the same app in multiple places they can manage that OR if they update with the new card it it'll pick that up and update that.

OK I'm guessing English isn't your first language so I'll explain in nice easy steps:

On SD1, which is labelled 'Business', I have OpenOffice, Firefox and Some Calculators.
On SD2, which is labelled 'Games', I have OpenJazz, Doom and Quake.
On SD3, which is labelled 'Emulators', I have PicoDrive, PSX4Pandora and Mupen64.
On SD4, which is labelled 'Multimedia', I have VLC and MilkyTracker.

Now if your PND updater only catalogues SDs by mmcblk* mountpoints then it can only ever keep track of PNDs on 2 of your cards and only providing that they are inserted into the slots in the SAME order.

Lol. Hey jerk... normal people should never know what the name of the mounted folder for their cards are. They can use the desktop shortcuts or the ones in the side panel of thunar. Now before you say you need that for some of the emulators, that just means that the emulators aren't "average joe" friendly. And if they want to use them they can learn. The emulators will EVENTUALLY be "average joe friendly". Seriously grow up and try to make a point without trying to make fun of someone you know nothing about. When people don't actually HAVE a point is when they usually devolve into speaking from their asses.

Lol. Normal people. Nice. Being a geek makes you totally superior.

So, yes 'normal' people can use the icons on the desktop. Of course they can. But when they get curious and want to look around the system they shouldn't HAVE to read into the depths of Linux mounting naming conventions to find out where the SD cards are mounted.

How does exposing them directly encourage sloppy programming?

Let me demonstrate:

I just want to say here that the gemrb PND I made was just a first test. I do understand that hardcoding to /media/mmcblk1p1/bg1 will not stand. But as God Ginrai said, it was the easiest thing that came to mind at the time.
Just wanted to explain that.

Jurn

Now I'm not intentionally knocking Jurn here (well, sorry, I kind of am. Sorry you got caught in the crossfire, Jurn) but had the SD cards been mounted by their names in previous releases, he would have been forced to find a better solution, and use the recommended appdata (or tell every user that their SD card HAS to be labelled Games).

FYI Jurn, as far as I'm aware if you declare an appdata in your PXML, this gets mounted as $HOME. So you can simply refer to the path $HOME/BG1 etc... I hope somebody with more knowledge of the PND system can confirm this for me?

 

[likwidoxigen]

Now if your PND updater only catalogues SDs by mmcblk* mountpoints then it can only ever keep track of PNDs on 2 of your cards and only providing that they are inserted into the slots in the SAME order.

Clearly you're failing at the whole "thinking" part. The updater app wouldn't and should care which slot a card is in. It should just that it CAN get to both cards so it can easily search for PND's and then see if they are up to date.... Longwinded fail on your part.

Lol. Normal people. Nice. Being a geek makes you totally superior.
So, yes 'normal' people can use the icons on the desktop. Of course they can. But when they get curious and want to look around the system they shouldn't HAVE to read into the depths of Linux mounting naming conventions to find out where the SD cards are mounted.

Not superior, <deleted by MOD>, DIFFERENT. Normal people aren't developers are geeks, most normal people don't WANT to be a geek or being a geek would be NORMAL. Again, you fail at that whole thinking thing.... "Normal" and "Geek" are qualifiers not quantifiers. A qualifier separates a group out, a quantifier would tell you its worth. Seeing as YOU added the quantifier "superior" you are showing your own pointless and stupid prejudices.

Also if they (normal users) do get curious enough to look into the depths because they WANT to become a bit geekier then they should see how it's really done. It helps gain useful transportable knowledge and practice their researching skills.

Let me demonstrate:
Now I'm not intentionally knocking Jurn here (well, sorry, I kind of am. Sorry you got caught in the crossfire, Jurn) but had the SD cards been mounted by their names in previous releases, he would have been forced to find a better solution, and use the recommended appdata (or tell every user that their SD card HAS to be labelled Games).

Unless he didn't have his SD card named in which case he would have done the exact same thing and would have ended up with the exact same mistake. Developers live and learn with new systems. It would have been tossed back as a bug and subsequently been fixed in later versions. Or in an open source app fixed there as well. But again, for anyone who does need to do it and does it properly it's useful.

Serious Pleng, there's no reason for you to be <deleted by MOD> when you're clearly not understanding what's actually going on. Now if you want to continue to act like <deleted by MOD> I'm done with this. If you want to actually be reasonable, I'll continue checking on the post.

(edit: stay civil, please)

 

[Pleng]

No don't worry. I'm done. You can't teach an old dog new tricks. And you've selectively ignored every point I've made.

I find it amusing that you ask me to act reasonable when every response of yours has had to resort to name-calling and cussing. I know a last cause when I see it one.

 

[likwidoxigen]

No don't worry. I'm done. You can't teach an old dog new tricks. And you've selectively ignored every point I've made.

I find it amusing that you ask me to act reasonable when every response of yours has had to resort to name-calling and cussing. I know a last cause when I see it one.

I responded to every one of your points and don't forget, you get what you give.

 

[mali]

I responded to every one of your points and don't forget, you get what you give.

You ought to learn good manners, dude. Next time you might get a warning.