It's arrived!!! Questions...

[batfastad]

After all that waiting my 1GHz (Craig->ED cross upgrade) has arrived from Germany. It arrived last week but I've only now managed to hold it in my hands. Oh my word!!


I'm blown away by this device already. The build quality it amazing, it feels reassuringly solid. And the screen's incredible for such a small device, seems much better than my original PSP.


The number of software packages available in the PNDstore is amazing as well. Just been blasting through OpenTyrian, I used to spend hours playing a demo of that game years ago. Need to get my SNES games up and running.


So here we go, I've got a few initial questions about the general configuration of the device. I'm familiar with linux but mainly on servers/command line, I've never really used GUIs.


1) Web browser. What's the currently recommended browser that runs with decent web compatibility but doesn't bog down too much, aside from Links of course


I've seen both Chromium and Firefox in the PNDstore, which do people generally go with on the Pandora?


I'm a Firefox guy on the desktop but more concerned about performance on the Pandora.


2) In the PNDstore program is it possible to sort the columns by title and to search for particular programs?


3) Keyboard mapping. When using applications I'd like to re-program the shoulder buttons to be page up/page down and maybe have the X button also be enter. Would feel more natural when using the nub to move the mouse around. Is that possible?


4) At the moment I'm using XFCE and it's working pretty well for me. I've moved the taskbar to the side as I wanted to make sure I could always access dialogue box buttons. The auto-hide of the taskbar is quite clunky and difficult to trigger with the stylus. Is there a way to have the Pandora button activate the taskbar even when it's hidden?


5) Where do I get the codec pack from?


The quickstart guide on the wiki (http://pandorawiki.org/Quickstart#Download_the_codec_pack) says it's linked from the website homepage but I can't see it. Though I can't really read the text on the website so I might just be missing it.


6) How do I find out my current firmware version, just from the boot screen (currently 1.52, kernel 3.2)? Are new firmwares listed in the repo?


7) Every time I start XFCE there's shortcuts of programs I've installed from PNDstore that keep re-appearing even though I delete them. I'd like to keep my desktop clean and only have the programs I choose shown on there. Is there a way?


Well I think that's all for now!


Cheers, B

 

[Wrath Of Khan]

Firefox is the most reliable though a bit slow.http://pandorawiki.org/Firmware codec pack.

 

[Kumaki]

Forget the PNDStore. Get PND Manager thru the PNDStore, then use that instead of PNDStore.


1.52 IS the current firmware.


If you have set up your SD Card correctly


----->Pandora


----------->appdata


----------->apps


----------->menu


----------->desktop


All you need do is move programs you do not want on your desktop from the "apps" folder and the "desktop" folder....to the "menu" folder.


Then they show up only in your menu - you use the Pandora button to access the menu, of course.


If you put a program in "menu" it shows up only in menu


If you put a program in "desktop" it shows up only in desktop, and not the menu.


If you put a program in "apps" it will show up in BOTH the menu and the Desktop.


Does that help?

 

[WizardStan]

1) FF17 is blazing fast now, even on an older 256MB edition.


2) Forget PNDStore. Use it to install PNDManager and then ignore it. *Edit* ninja'd h34r:


3) Yes, information is in the tweaks thread at the top of the support forum.


4) It used to behave different but it didn't work as well as expected: sometimes it would accidentally open multiple menus instead of closing the old one. I've been meaning to figure out how to restore that behaviour because I preferred the way it worked, but I've been too lazy. Simple answer: yes; long answer: yes but it takes some fiddling with scripts.


5) answered


6) As far as I know firmware revision is only displayed on boot. Starting with 1.52 there's no more "updates" like there has been (or maybe there will be, if needed), you connect it to a network and run an update script and it updates from a repo just like a real Linux distro.


7) Install things to "/pandora/menu" to have them appear in the menu, and "/pandora/desktop" for them to appear on the desktop. If you don't want them on the desktop move the PND to the menu.

 

[Kumaki]

I ninja'd you, eh, WizardStan? ooopsie!!


Well, batfastad (I like the name, by the way, it's clever) - since no one else has said it yet...welcome to the Pandora Community.


You will find a lot of help and support here.


even clueless folks like me who can't code their way out of a paper bag get help...and then pass on help, when they can - from experience...to other noobs.


This is a very open, friendly, and helpful community, and we're glad to have you on-board!

 

[freamon]

1) Web browser. What's the currently recommended browser that runs with decent web compatibility but doesn't bog down too much, aside from Links of course


I've seen both Chromium and Firefox in the PNDstore, which do people generally go with on the Pandora?


I'm a Firefox guy on the desktop but more concerned about performance on the Pandora.

My favourite browser for performance is jumanji. It takes a while to get used to, because it uses keyboard shortcuts, but it's faster than firefox, and less memory-hungry than chromium. You can improve things even more switching to MiniMenu after you've set up your Internet connection, and launching your browser from there.

2) In the PNDstore program is it possible to sort the columns by title and to search for particular programs?

PNDstore is still a bit un-polished unfortunately. I'm not sure the original author of it is still around anymore. As others have said, PNDManager is a much more whizz-bangy affair (although I've never actually got it to download stuff myself).

3) Keyboard mapping. When using applications I'd like to re-program the shoulder buttons to be page up/page down and maybe have the X button also be enter. Would feel more natural when using the nub to move the mouse around. Is that possible?

I think the xbindkeys would be useful for this - you can get it from here:

4) At the moment I'm using XFCE and it's working pretty well for me. I've moved the taskbar to the side as I wanted to make sure I could always access dialogue box buttons. The auto-hide of the taskbar is quite clunky and difficult to trigger with the stylus. Is there a way to have the Pandora button activate the taskbar even when it's hidden?

Hmmm ... here's a slightly kludgey way to do it: modify /usr/pandora/scripts/op_xfcemenu.sh (you'll need to be root) by adding these 3 lines to the start (after #!/bin/bash and before POSMENU=)

DISPLAY=:0.0 xdotool mousemove 0 400

DISPLAY=:0.0 xdotool mousemove 10 400

DISPLAY=:0.0 xdotool mousemove 0 400

This will simulate a mouse move to the left and wiggle it a bit to un-hide the taskbar. You may want to experiment with the values.

 

[ekianjo]

For the browser lightweight is not bad at all. Very, very fast, maybe even faster than jumanji. It has limitations but works well for many websites I look at. Firefox is great and all but too slow for my taste. Or maybe it is because of the extensions I use...

 

[_wb_]

About the keyboard mapping: I guess you could remap things, but in my opinion the default mapping is very good. Y/X for pgup/pgdown, A/B for home/end, L1 for shift and R1 for ctrl works very well. I love using the shoulder buttons to press shortcuts like ctrl-q, ctrl-w, ctrl-pgup/dn (to switch tabs in firefox/terminal), ctrl-t (open new tab), ctrl-shift-t (open new tab in terminal), shift-arrows/home/end/pgup/pgdn to select stuff in most text editors, etc.

 

[moxie]

Jumanji for web browsing. For me, there is no contest. Keep a Firefox around for when for some reason Jumanji isn't working the best for you, but apart from that...


And for the problem of dialog boxes and not getting at buttons: You can always move the dialog box itself by holding shift (which, conveniently enough, is mapped to left shoulder) and then just drag the dialog. That's what I usually do.

 

[batfastad]

That's excellent stuff. Thanks for all your answers!

What an awesome device this is... well worth the wait!

Some additional questions...

8) By default PNDs store their data in the appdata folder.

When using emulators (SNES, GBA, N64, PSX specifically), is there a way to make sure ROM savedata is saved in the ROM directory?

I'm sure it depends on the emulator and if they're anything like zsnes then you choose your ROM directory and it saves states and savedata in the same directory.

But I'm just very protective and I know how quickly a home directory and settings directory can get out of control on Linux.

9) Should I be worried about the amount of stuff that's being written to the home directory on the NAND?

Is it adviseable or possible to move the home directory onto the SD card?

I'm planning to have one SD card permanently installed and the other "removeable" for file transfers etc.

 

[skeezix]

"Temper" wrote pndstore, and he recently got his Pandora (yes, he was writing pndstore blind!)

WizardStan .. theres a binary that does the menu open; maybe its not included in firmware anymore, but take a look; heck, head into the git and go back in time to a year or two back and you'll find the menu script with the old reference in it.

I wouldn't worry about NAND.. theres not much updating there, and really, it'd take a lot of writing to wear it down (wear leveling is on.) Either way, you've got your head on right.. you could direct homedir to SD, with some risks (don't try and eject it, etc), but it works fine if you do that.

jeff

 

[batfastad]

Awesome. Firefox installed and typing this on it right now!

Though i noticed it installed its profile to /mnt/udev which seems to have the same capacity as my SD card when doing a "df -h"

Does that mean my FF profile is stored on the SD card and I can easily copy it off?

 

[moxie]

Most PNDs are polite enough to keep their files in the appdata directory. That includes FFs profile stuff

 

[TrashyMG]

^ PND system, it's awesome magic..

 

[Neelix]

Though i noticed it installed its profile to /mnt/udev which seems to have the same capacity as my SD card when doing a "df -h"
Does that mean my FF profile is stored on the SD card and I can easily copy it off?

More specifically, The PND system magic in question mounts the appdata folder from the SD card on top of the mounted PND in /mnt/utmp/ so anything saved to /mnt/utmp/appname is actually saved to the relevant appdata folder.


- Neelix

 

[Kumaki]

I think that savedata from emulators just stores where it wants to.

 

[skeezix]

With regards to saving state .. the PND 'good behaviour' dictates a best policy the devs are encouraged to follow; we could try to 'force it' through various means, but its alwasys better to trust devs when you can.. and public outcry when they don't

So in general, most PNDs do the right thing .. the PND system makes it very easy ("write to current directory, we'll do the rest"), but a few lazy ports will end up writing to homedir. We could try to redirect that to SD, but with some risks...

So any app _can_ write anywhere it wants on SD or in homedir (not in the OS itself, without asking the user first of course), but in general, most are well behaved.. and the few that aren't, people rip a new asshole in

So savedata for emus.. that woudl be in appdata or somewhere on SD at least.

jeff

 

[Kumaki]

That was what I thought...the emu basically writes the savedata where it wants to...and without altering the program, this can't be changed...but it usually writes them to a place that makes sense.

In most cases, then, appdata is where you find your ROMS folders anyway, with most emu's...and so most probably already write there.  Unless you have a front-end ROMS folder set up like some do...where they put all their roms, regardless what system...since each system will only find it's own ROMS.

I tend to keep my ROMS with the system intended for, in appdata.

I use my second SD card for media, such as movies or music.

 

[hedwards]

"Temper" wrote pndstore, and he recently got his Pandora (yes, he was writing pndstore blind!)

WizardStan .. theres a binary that does the menu open; maybe its not included in firmware anymore, but take a look; heck, head into the git and go back in time to a year or two back and you'll find the menu script with the old reference in it.

I wouldn't worry about NAND.. theres not much updating there, and really, it'd take a lot of writing to wear it down (wear leveling is on.) Either way, you've got your head on right.. you could direct homedir to SD, with some risks (don't try and eject it, etc), but it works fine if you do that.

jeff

That's my plan when I get to open my own box. It's on track to take 2 months from when it arrived at home for me to actually get to open it.

Anyways, my plan was to have one SD card permanently in the first slot and then swap the second one if I needed to.

And I agree with your post about the developers, just make sure you have a large enough stick if they do something obnoxious. I think that was one of the big problems that MS had, the developers didn't both to follow best practices on top of a poorly thought out architecture. I get the feeling that's not the risk it was for Windows here.

 

[_wb_]

If you want to change the location of where some PND saves its data, you can just replace the folder [sDCARD]/pandora/appdata/blah/ with a symlink pointing to a folder anywhere else. I don't really see why you would want to do that though. And this will of course only work if you format your SD card with a file system that can make symlinks, e.g. ext2/3/4, not FAT.