Any experience with Python on a PDA ?

Stef Mientki

hello,

I wonder if anyone has (good ;-) experiences with Python on a PDA ?
And if so,
- what OS
- what GUI

thanks,
Stef Mientki

Feb 22 '08 #1

Duncan Booth

Stef Mientki <S.**************@mailbox.kun.nlwrote:

hello,

I wonder if anyone has (good ;-) experiences with Python on a PDA ?
And if so,
- what OS
- what GUI

thanks,
Stef Mientki

I haven't done much programming yet on my Nokia n810, but a lot of the
community software for it is written in Python. Google for "n810
python" or "maemo python" and you'll find plenty of hits. The OS is a
Debian Linux variant called Maemo 4 (chinook), the gui is something
called Hildon which sits on top of GTK.

Here are videos and screenshots of something that is implemented largely
in Python:

http://openbossa.indt.org/canola/

and from another page on that site:

Canola uses and contributes (when possible) with the following
components :

* Python as main development language
* Atabake as media engine
* LMS as media scanner
* EFL for drawing, thumbnails and UI scripting
* We also created all the required bindings to enable python to
use EFL; get them here
* Components licensed under GPL/LGPL such as Canola daemon and LMS

We also encourage and promote the use of Python and EFL for rich UI
applications that require increased performance and flexibility over
today's available SDL or Pygame. So feel free to talk to the
development team at #canola on the freenode IRC servers.

Feb 22 '08 #2

Martin Blume

"Stef Mientki" schrieb

hello,

I wonder if anyone has (good ;-) experiences
with Python on a PDA ?
And if so,
- what OS
- what GUI

Python runs here on:
- Sharp Zaurus SL-C3100 (with the exception of Tkinter)
(Linux 2.4)
- Mio A701
(Windows Mobile)

But I only do small stuff on these machines, like my
own hp-like (rpn) calculator or other computations
directly in the python shell.

Experience is very good (with the exception of Tkinter
not running on the Zaurus), scripts can be moved to and
from PC and PDA and run unchanged (except for speed and
screen size issues).

HTH
Martin

Feb 22 '08 #3

Grant Edwards

On 2008-02-22, Stef Mientki <S.**************@mailbox.kun.nlwrote:

hello,

I wonder if anyone has (good ;-) experiences with Python on a PDA ?
And if so,
- what OS
- what GUI

Not a PDA per se, but a target platform very similar to a PDA:
PXA-255 at 200MHz with a 1/4 VGA LCD, and something like 128M
of RAM and 64M of flash.

It's OK, but dependnig on what you're doing, you might have to
put some effort into getting the app to run fast enough to be
usable.

--
Grant Edwards grante Yow! for ARTIFICIAL
at FLAVORING!!
visi.com

Feb 22 '08 #4

Heikki Toivonen

Martin Blume wrote:

- Mio A701
(Windows Mobile)

Experience is very good (with the exception of Tkinter
not running on the Zaurus), scripts can be moved to and
from PC and PDA and run unchanged (except for speed and
screen size issues).

Hmm, my experience running Python 2.5 on Cingular 8525 was not very
good. Launching Python itself took close to 10 seconds, and then you add
your application launch on top of that. I used Tkinter for UI, and
Tkinter often failed to load, requiring soft reset.

Once the app was running, though, the speed was ok.

--
Heikki Toivonen

Feb 28 '08 #5