PND system is crocked (New user)


jpmorris

Still Fresh
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Oct 20, 2008
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Okay, my initial experience with the Pandora has been... well, something of a disaster, so pardon me if I vent a little. I'll gloss over the bit about WiFi not working on the installed OS, the fact that there's no quickstart guide installed, the 'please enter your name' dialogue not having default focus and various niggles like that which would confuse or completely floor a newbie.


I've reflashed it with 1.5 Beta 4, and Wifi now actually does things, which is good. There's no web browser so the online quickstart guide about installing the codec pack is useless, which is not so good.


So, installing applications, see if I can make it do something because out-of-the box it's basically a calculator, presumably because of the NAND limits. I've read a little bit about the PND system over the last few years while waiting for the system to arrive, but using it has been... interesting. I knew about that NAND limitations so the first task is to set the machine up to use an SD card for the installed applications.


This being a pretty important step, and the Pandora nominally being targeted at people without linux experience, you'd expect a some handy utility to reformat the card into whatever filesystem the Pandora likes best and prepare the directory structure, right? If there is, it's very, very well hidden.


I found a little tutorial which involved manually creating the directory structure on the disk, which I did. 'Course, it didn't bother to state which filesystem it should be, so I created an ext3fs partition and took it from there - I might add that tune2fs isn't there and can't be installed, so you can't change the maximal mount count and other such things.


Anyway, I set the 'pandora' directory to have 777 permissions, and created the rest as the logged-in user rather than root.


Once this was done, I used the PND Store to attempt to install a couple of applications - which I notice are almost - but not quite - sorted alphabetically. If there's a rhyme or reason to the sort order it's lost on me. Either way it makes it hard to locate applications, which is IMHO the whole idea.


Okay, so I install Firefox in the hopes of being able to follow the Quickstart guide later on. I install what I hope is DOSbox, but am not quite sure because there are two entries and the PND store does not tell you what the program actually is or does, unlike, say, Synaptic or even the horrific dselect. I also install what is probably a ZX Spectrum emulator.


At this point things have been okay-ish, if rather rough and unpolished. Now it goes bad, because it does absolutely nothing. I spend 15 minutes trying to figure out how the hell you're supposed to run a PND application once it's been installed and eventually find a forum post implying that the applications appear on the desktop, which of course they haven't.


What appears to have happened is that it's dumped the application onto the SD card, but not written anything to the 'menu' subdirectory for whatever reason.


Eventually I figure that maybe I screwed up somehow by using an ext3fs partition on the SD card, maybe some weird permissions problem? So I have the mac reformat it as a stock FAT32 partition. Then things really go bad because the PND store is convinced the applications are still installed, which they aren't because the card has been reformatted. It won't re-install them, it won't upgrade them and it goes into an infinite loop if you try to remove them.


I suppose in the worst case I could reflash the OS, but there must surely be a less destructive way.


Oh, and I get an error 13 (permission error) if I try to install a PND to the NAND (e.g. the PND manager)


Any suggestions for fixing this? Because after a five-year wait, I can't help but feel a little let down.
 
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Don't feel down....


First take your SD card and under Linux/Win OS format it Fat32.


Now create a dir called pandora inside.


Now create 3 dirs under pandora dir...


apps/ where to put PND that will appear on both Desktop and Menu ( i always use this dir to store PND )


menu/ where to put PND that appear only on XFCE menu


desktop/ where to put PND that appear on desktop ( i don't use it for ex..)


Now populate your SD card with PND and enjoy.
 
If you have strange errors consider to reflash your unit...maybe something got corrupted.
 
Don't feel down....


First take your SD card and under Linux/Win OS format it Fat32.


Now create a dir called pandora inside.


Now create 3 dirs under pandora dir...


apps/ where to put PND that will appear on both Desktop and Menu ( i always use this dir to store PND )


menu/ where to put PND that appear only on XFCE menu


desktop/ where to put PND that appear on desktop ( i don't use it for ex..)


Now populate your SD card with PND and enjoy.

Yeah, I've been through that, twice now. The card is a class 10 Lexar which I successfully used as the root filesystem on an AC100, so I'd be surprised if the card itself is at fault.


Reflashing the OS again sounds worth a try, though.
 
in pnd-store just do an "update lists" and all the "not anymore installed" packages will be unchecked
 
in pnd-store just do an "update lists" and all the "not anymore installed" packages will be unchecked

Yeah, I tried that too, sadly it didn't help.


However, clearing down the card again and reflashing the system (again) seems to have made it behave itself, so it looks like the rootfs was corrupted somehow. Obviously the design issues taking up the bulk of the rant still apply and it would be nice if those could be flagged, but the Pandora is now usable which was my primary concern.
 
Check out PNDManager. I would personally like to see this replace PND Store. It's only been around for a month, so good reason it hasn't been included with the firmware yet. You can manually download this and copy it to your SD card, or try to use PNDStore to install it. If you're having issues, I recommend the former.


Strange that your ext3 didn't work, though. I use an ext2 and it has no problem, but there was likely other confounding issues going on. Best not to dwell on it unless you want to try again.

Oh, and I get an error 13 (permission error) if I try to install a PND to the NAND (e.g. the PND manager)
That's expected. The NAND is soft-write protected. If you want you can chmod the /usr/pandora directory but it really isn't recommended. Just how not recommended depends on the PNDs you want to install.
 
You actualyl dont' need to use the directory structure; you can drop the .pnd applications right in the root of the card.


Most people use FAT formatted cards..


So, you buy a SD card, drop pnd files on it, and it works :)


The trick of course, is knowing you can do that, and if you get led down the wrong path, it surely is quite confusing. I always just assume people downlaod their first few apps from the Repo using their desktop and drop them on SD, but that assumes people know about the Repo, and how to copy files around; PndStore and eventually PndManager will help, but they really need to get highlighted .. some default icons on the desktop, or something. Its a gradual process, cleaning it up :)


jeff
 
What is the OS you use to decompress the data to the card ?


What is the filesystem (ext2, fat32) of the card ?


Is your card a Lexar premium ?
 
Don't feel down....


First take your SD card and under Linux/Win OS format it Fat32.


Now create a dir called pandora inside.


Now create 3 dirs under pandora dir...


apps/ where to put PND that will appear on both Desktop and Menu ( i always use this dir to store PND )


menu/ where to put PND that appear only on XFCE menu


desktop/ where to put PND that appear on desktop ( i don't use it for ex..)


Now populate your SD card with PND and enjoy.

Minimenu is a bit bonked as of Zaxxon Beta 3 and 4. PNDs placed in desktop or menu folders show up both in XFCE and minimenu.


The "mmenu" folder is ignored totally.


Veteran Pandora users who usually just put everything in apps probably wouldn't notice this :)
 
What is the OS you use to decompress the data to the card ?


What is the filesystem (ext2, fat32) of the card ?


Is your card a Lexar premium ?

Apologies, it's a Sandisk Extreme. The Lexar was a CF card I use on one of my laptops (via a PATA->CF bridge).


Unpacking was done using infozip on OSX 10.6. It did work correctly the second time around.

That's expected. The NAND is soft-write protected. If you want you can chmod the /usr/pandora directory but it really isn't recommended. Just how not recommended depends on the PNDs you want to install.

Fair enough. At the time it was the default option provided by PNDstore, though.

The trick of course, is knowing you can do that, and if you get led down the wrong path, it surely is quite confusing. I always just assume people downlaod their first few apps from the Repo using their desktop and drop them on SD, but that assumes people know about the Repo, and how to copy files around; PndStore and eventually PndManager will help, but they really need to get highlighted .. some default icons on the desktop, or something. Its a gradual process, cleaning it up :)

One would assume that the Repo is the backend repository for the PND store. I guess not. Some kind of simple quickstart PDF on the device would have helped tremendously.


FWIW dumping them on the card probably wouldn't have helped since there was something gravely wrong with basically all of the PND system at the time. (And yes, I did try double-clicking on one to invoke it, but it was just opened in a text editor)
 
One would assume that the Repo is the backend repository for the PND store. I guess not.
It is :) But (in my opinion) PNDStore is more useful for someone who is already reasonably familiar with the software library. Going to the repo directly is a much better way to browse software and get a feel for things.
 
the PNDStore works, but I find that PNDManager is fantastic if you want browsing around and see what's available.. It's almost a full interface in itself.. Both are tied to the repo..
 
One would assume that the Repo is the backend repository for the PND store. I guess not. Some kind of simple quickstart PDF on the device would have helped tremendously.
"The Repo" is really just a database and storage facility with a standardized JSON interface. PNDStore is one front end to that database. The repo website is another front end to the same database. PNDManager is a third front end to the database. There was also a command line interface in one of the other projects if you're the "apt-get install" kind of person.


A quickstart tutorial is something that a lot of people have tossed around for over a year now, the problem is no one has just DONE it yet. Blame apathy, I think.
 
Minimenu is a bit bonked as of Zaxxon Beta 3 and 4. PNDs placed in desktop or menu folders show up both in XFCE and minimenu.


The "mmenu" folder is ignored totally.

I don't know about mmenu and SuperZaxxon since you're not specific on what's happening for you (it should cause it to not show up in XFCE at all, only in MiniMenu), but I'm pretty sure putting a PND in /desktop or /menu also causing it to show up in MiniMenu is intended behavior. You control what you see in MiniMenu with MiniMenu's option to show/hide apps (though this doesn't work perfectly in HF6 at least; it doesn't seem to affect the "all" tab) rather than the directory structure.


I'm pretty sure it's intended behavior because otherwise it wouldn't be possible to have an app show up in both XFCE and MiniMenu without also cluttering your desktop with icons you never use (or, in the case of some, cluttering up the XFCE menu with items you never use).
 
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Minimenu is a bit bonked as of Zaxxon Beta 3 and 4. PNDs placed in desktop or menu folders show up both in XFCE and minimenu.


The "mmenu" folder is ignored totally.


Veteran Pandora users who usually just put everything in apps probably wouldn't notice this :)
Thank's for noticing...i have usually the habit to put everything in apps or create a new folder for every new port that i try to do.... :)
 
the PNDStore works, but I find that PNDManager is fantastic if you want browsing around and see what's available.. It's almost a full interface in itself.. Both are tied to the repo..

That one just crashes when you tell it to get the list from the repository.


How do PND's actually work, anyway? Are they mounted as a filesystem or something? How would I go about manually running the program inside to see the console output or run strace on it?
 
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How do PND's actually work, anyway? Are they mounted as a filesystem or something? How would I go about manually running the program inside to see the console output or run strace on it?

I don't intimately know how it works, but from what I understand, the contents of the PND are "mounted" to a directory in /mnt/utmp along with the appropriate appdata directory. Then, when the program ends, anything in the /mnt/utmp directory that isn't in the PND is copied into the appropriate appdata directory before "unmounting" (deleting) the /mnt/utmp directory.


In any case, while the program is running, you can go to /mnt/utmp to see the actual program files, and unless it's badly programmed (i.e. uses absolute paths rather than relative paths), you ought to be able to just copy all those files somewhere else and run it normally.


However, if you just want to see output from running, you'd be better served to just look at the output file, which is found in /tmp and has a name similar to "pndrun_thepndname.out".
 
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It uses aufs to overly the mountdir with the appdatafolder, so everything, that is written to . Is actually written to the appdatafolder.


If you want to mount a pnd use:


/usr/pandora/scripts/pnd_run.sh -p /path/to/pnd/pnd.pnd -m


It will be mounted into /mnt/utmp/pndname
 
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Okay, my initial experience with the Pandora has been... well, something of a disaster, so pardon me if I vent a little.


I've reflashed it with 1.5 Beta 4
Please keep in mind that you are testing beta software. I had the same experience, why do you do this to you? Why did i?


I went back to Zaxxon HF6 and enjoy a working network connection and PNDmanager is running fine.


The only issue is that Zaxxon can't handle more than 256MB RAM, but i don't see an urgent requirement for this now.
 
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