Re: supported PDA lists

[Adam C Powell IV <hazelsct debian org>]

On Fri, 2003-08-22 at 19:21, David A. Desrosiers wrote:
    > Anyway, the short answer is that there are multiple lists, two of which
    > are relevant here: the drivers/usb/serial/visor.h file with which your
    > kernel was built, and the middle of the gpilotd.c file in the gnome-pilot
    > source tree.
    
    	The latest 2.4 and 2.5 kernel has support for adding vendor_id and
    product_id strings to /etc/modules.conf on the visor.o load line (care of
    Judd Montgomery's [J-Pilot author's] patch).

Very cool, thanks for the info!  In essence, this allows any new 2.4/2.5
kernel to support any bleeding-edge PalmOS device, which is outstanding!

That addresses one point of my previous post (intersection between
kernel and frond-end lists determining PDA support).  But then, for this
to be easy to use/transparent, gnome-pilot (or gpilotd) would have to be
loading the module, instead of hotplug, etc.  Unless we want to use
gnomesu, this doesn't seem to be an option.

The target market for that post (and I think the target market of GNOME)
was the random user who knows nothing about "module load lines" but just
wants to know whether his/her PDA works, from the GUI.  In other words,
I want the future answer to this question to be "Click on the `Supported
PDAs' button."  Then later we can add the "Add support for new device"
druid...

And that gnomesu-enabled dialog/druid is truly ugly!  Might look like:

        * Record /proc/usb/devices.
        * "New device druid.  Please plug in your device and press
          HotSync [OK]"
        * See if gpilotd has recognized a HotSync, and if so: "Device
          recognized, no need for further configuration [Finish]".
        * Diff new /proc/usb/devices vs. old, hopefully there's one
          added entry.
        * "Please remove the device [OK]" and hopefully there's one
          deleted entry matching the previous addition (if there was
          one).
        * Kill gpilotd.
        * "Your Vendor and Product IDs seem to be XXXX and YYYY,
          corresponding to Samsung <unknown>.  This is not a gnome-pilot
          supported device.  Please enter the root password to add
          support for your device."
        * Check lsmod for usage of visor.o, while in use: check devices
          for the device presence, "Please remove your device from the
          USB port [OK]" If no device, then fuser /dev/ttyUSB0 to find
          out what process is tying it up.  If no such process, then
          "I'm sorry, you'll need to reboot and re-run this druid again
          [Finish]"
        * "Removing and reloading Palm PDA USB support kernel module..."
        * rmmod visor, modprobe visor with vendor and product IDs.
        * Restart gpilotd.
        * "Please plug in your device and press HotSync to test this
          configuration"
        * Wait for gpilotd to signal a hotsync (with user Cancel
          option).
        * "Configuration complete, Product ID added to /etc/modules.conf
          so this type of device will be recognized in the future
          [Finish]"
        * Or if we get really fancy, "Please enter the name of the
          device you have just configured" to put this in the list of
          supported PDA strings.
        * To be even fancier: "Click here to report this new device to
          the gnome-pilot maintainers"

I mean, this is one option, but seems like a lot of work.  And then,
only one new device could be supported at a time, right?  Or can we
enter multiple vendor/product IDs in modconf or /etc/modules.conf at the
same time?  If not, we'll have to insert "You currently have support for
the Samsung SCH-I500 non-standard device.  Replace that configuration
with your new device? [OK]" somewhere near the top.  Also, this doesn't
guarantee success, e.g. the Samsung I330 seems to require a different
USB serial module to work.

Do these proposals (last one and/or this druid) make any sense?  If so,
I'll start investigating patches over the next couple of weeks, unless
someone else can get to it sooner.  Feel free to suggest a priority for
those patches...

Thanks again,
-- 
-Adam P.

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