Re: Tutorial for Making a New Conduit

[Matt Davey <mcdavey mrao cam ac uk>]

On Fri, 2007-12-21 at 20:26 -0500, Tristin Celestin wrote:
> Hello.
> 
> I'd like to learn how to make conduits for gnome-pilot. Is there perhaps a
> null conduit I can learn how to implement the basics from? Are conduits
> drastically different depending on what data they are intended to sync?
> 
> I suppose what I'm really looking for is a walkthrough of somesort, as
> opposed to just digging through the conduit code.

Hi Tristin,

Sorry for the seasonally delayed reply.  The gnome-pilot Documentation
directory contains information on the conduit architecture.  It is
written in docbook format, but I've put a pdf version here:
http://www.inference.phy.cam.ac.uk/mcdavey/downloads/conduits.pdf

The 'glue' between the gnome-pilot daemon and the conduits is a bit
arcane; your best bet is probably to look at the source for the 'time'
conduit in the gnome-pilot-conduits/ codebase (for simplicity) and the
evolution conduits (for gory details).

The conduits work using a plugin architecture and register against a
particular database.  When this database is seen on a device during a
sync, the conduit's 'synchronize' method is called.  The conduit is also
responsible for reporting progress within that conduit, and creating
configuration widgets for the applet.

Hope this helps, and feel free to document your experiences - we could
add it to the wiki page.

Matt Davey			To err is human, to moo bovine.
mcdavey mrao cam ac uk