[Bitpim-devel] Ready for build?

[Roger Binns]

My egroupware stuff is ready for the build. Please let me know
when the Samsung stuff is in a good enough shape. (You can
put "if __debug__" around bits you don't want exposed in the build).
The versionhistory (at least) needs updating for the Samsung stuff
as well. I'd also be happy to start the help pages. The main
decision is if you want one page set for each model (like the LG
help) or a single page set for all models (like Sprint Sanyo). I
guess that depends on how much the models are (gratuitiously?) different
from each other.

Roger

[Vic Heintz]

Post by Roger Binns
My egroupware stuff is ready for the build. Please let me know
when the Samsung stuff is in a good enough shape. (You can
put "if __debug__" around bits you don't want exposed in the build).
The versionhistory (at least) needs updating for the Samsung stuff
as well. I'd also be happy to start the help pages. The main
decision is if you want one page set for each model (like the LG
help) or a single page set for all models (like Sprint Sanyo). I
guess that depends on how much the models are (gratuitiously?)
different
from each other.

I noticed the cvs version of the Samsung a670 seems to have a revised
phone number counting scheme that I did not personally add. But it does
not have the wallpaper download stuff that I added and sent to Stephen.
I don't believe it has a revised phonebook write routine that limits
string lengths to the allowed values. I was waiting to see what Joe
came up with for the A650. If a build is done it probably should
include such a fix or else the line in _supportedsyncs:
('phonebook', 'write', 'OVERWRITE'), # only overwriting
phonebook

should be commented out. (It is probably not a good idea to release
something that will corrupt a user's phonebook if they type a name that
is too long into BitPim.)


A note about the new counting scheme: I hope I did not unnecessarily
sound an alarm about the mysterious entry count returned by AT#PCBIT?.
As I said before, the old scheme actually seems to work on a
non-corrupted phonebook. The new scheme takes a little longer. I had
thought maybe we could just read entries until we hit a blank one but
clearly deleting an entry leaves a blank slot until you add another new
one. (It seems a shame to have to run through all 500 of my entry slots
to find the 43rd and last entry in my phonebook just because I happened
to have deleted one of the first 42. Oh well.)

Vic

[d***@netzero.com]

wrt the counting scheme, Stephen suggested, and I didn't disagree with him, that we should not rely on the internal counter, which is non-portable and can be corrupted, and instead just read all available slots. Obviously, this would take a tad longer but would also be more reliable and more portable.

wrt the name length, I did put in a check for that and other conditions of a valid phone entry. However, instead of truncating the name, I just flag it as an invalid entry and display it to the user without sending any phonebook data to the phone, ie. all entries must be valid to be sent to the phone.

Both the Samsung A650 and A310 code are ready for a development build. Vic, I don't have an A670, but please let me know what I can do to help.

-Joe Pham

Post by Roger Binns
My egroupware stuff is ready for the build. Please let me know
when the Samsung stuff is in a good enough shape. (You can
put "if __debug__" around bits you don't want exposed in the build).
The versionhistory (at least) needs updating for the Samsung stuff
as well. I'd also be happy to start the help pages. The main
decision is if you want one page set for each model (like the LG
help) or a single page set for all models (like Sprint Sanyo). I
guess that depends on how much the models are (gratuitiously?)
different
from each other.

I noticed the cvs version of the Samsung a670 seems to have a revised
phone number counting scheme that I did not personally add. But it does
not have the wallpaper download stuff that I added and sent to Stephen.
I don't believe it has a revised phonebook write routine that limits
string lengths to the allowed values. I was waiting to see what Joe
came up with for the A650. If a build is done it probably should
include such a fix or else the line in _supportedsyncs:
('phonebook', 'write', 'OVERWRITE'), # only overwriting
phonebook

should be commented out. (It is probably not a good idea to release
something that will corrupt a user's phonebook if they type a name that
is too long into BitPim.)


A note about the new counting scheme: I hope I did not unnecessarily
sound an alarm about the mysterious entry count returned by AT#PCBIT?.
As I said before, the old scheme actually seems to work on a
non-corrupted phonebook. The new scheme takes a little longer. I had
thought maybe we could just read entries until we hit a blank one but
clearly deleting an entry leaves a blank slot until you add another new
one. (It seems a shame to have to run through all 500 of my entry slots
to find the 43rd and last entry in my phonebook just because I happened
to have deleted one of the first 42. Oh well.)

Vic



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[Stephen Wood]

Post by d***@netzero.com
...
wrt the name length, I did put in a check for that and other
conditions of a valid phone entry. However, instead of truncating the
name, I just flag it as an invalid entry and display it to the user
without sending any phonebook data to the phone, ie. all entries must
be valid to be sent to the phone.

I think an entry should still go to the phone even if the name is too
long. That is the behaviour for other phones and while users may care
to know that an entry is truncated, they probably don't want it to fail
to show up on the phone.

Stephen

[Roger Binns]

Post by Stephen Wood
I think an entry should still go to the phone even if the name is too
long. That is the behaviour for other phones and while users may care
to know that an entry is truncated, they probably don't want it to
fail to show up on the phone.

My view of the "typical" user is that they have data in another program
(eg Outlook, Evolution, Apple programs etc) and have one phone they use
a lot, and a second phone that belongs to a spouse/partner/work that
is occasionally used.

In that context BitPim is useful because it lets them do things with their
phone they otherwise couldn't (eg wallpaper, ringtones, and in the future
SMS, call history, voice and text notes).

For the phonebook (and eventually the calendar), BitPim understands things
such as there being images and sounds attached to entries, or that the
phone numbers have a priority ordering.

This does mean that users are very likely to have information that is outside
the constraints of the phone (eg long names, addresses when the phone doesn't
store them, accented characters). Users are going to want BitPim to do the best
job it can, which is why truncating stuff is fine. (No one wants to sit
there and manually shorten stuff, then worry about syncing not mangling
data sources that don't have the constraints.)

The only time to worry is if the phone doesn't allow multiple entries
with the same name. This could happen if two longer names with the
same stem get shortened to the same string. All the phones I have
allow any number of duplicate names, and even allow entries without
a name at all.

The only major rule is that BitPim should not end up duplicating records.
If you have ever used other sync programs, you'll find it very common that
they end up duplicating all your records whenever you do anything. Something
like that really annoys me!

Roger

[Roger Binns]

So what is left before the build can commence?

Roger

[Stephen Wood]

Well there is lots left to do, but I think things are stable.

Stephen

Post by Roger Binns
So what is left before the build can commence?
Roger

[Vic Heintz]

Post by d***@netzero.com
wrt the name length, I did put in a check for that and other
conditions of a valid phone entry. However, instead of truncating the
name, I just flag it as an invalid entry and display it to the user
without sending any phonebook data to the phone, ie. all entries must
be valid to be sent to the phone.
Both the Samsung A650 and A310 code are ready for a development build.
Vic, I don't have an A670, but please let me know what I can do to
help.

Is this error checking in the current cvs version? It wasn't last time
I looked. Or is it now in com_samsung.py? If not could you send me your
latest com_samsungsch650.py so I can merge it into com_samsungsch670.py?
Vic

[d***@netzero.com]

No, it's not in CVS right now. I'll cc you when I email Stephen the next update tonight.

-Joe Pham

Post by d***@netzero.com
wrt the name length, I did put in a check for that and other
conditions of a valid phone entry. However, instead of truncating the
name, I just flag it as an invalid entry and display it to the user
without sending any phonebook data to the phone, ie. all entries must
be valid to be sent to the phone.
Both the Samsung A650 and A310 code are ready for a development build.
Vic, I don't have an A670, but please let me know what I can do to
help.

Is this error checking in the current cvs version? It wasn't last time
I looked. Or is it now in com_samsung.py? If not could you send me your
latest com_samsungsch650.py so I can merge it into com_samsungsch670.py?
Vic



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[d***@netzero.com]

The checks are done prior to any info being sent to the phone, and I hope the users realized that's the case. I have no problem of the specific case of automatic truncation of a phone entry name.

-Joe Pham

Post by d***@netzero.com
...
wrt the name length, I did put in a check for that and other
conditions of a valid phone entry. However, instead of truncating the
name, I just flag it as an invalid entry and display it to the user
without sending any phonebook data to the phone, ie. all entries must
be valid to be sent to the phone.

I think an entry should still go to the phone even if the name is too
long. That is the behaviour for other phones and while users may care
to know that an entry is truncated, they probably don't want it to fail
to show up on the phone.

Stephen



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[Stephen Wood]

Stephen,
I don't know what the decision is about doing a build soon. You may
check-in the attached a670 module. I merged in all of Joe's recent a650
code and by commenting out all of the code that brings up the "Results"
dialog windows, I was able to get calendar, wallpaper, and ringtone
reads and writes to work. Phonebook reads are still working but writes
are ending with a dialog window popping up and freezing the program. I
couldn't figure out where this one is being launched so for now I
commented out phonebook writes as a supported sync. If there is not to
be a build soon I will look at this further. (I wonder if the poison
dialog windows are only a Mac problem.)

There do seem to be some Mac specific problems. I don't know if that is
what you are getting. To make sure that it is not the Report stuff, go
into gui.py and comment out both places that you see:

todo.append((self.DisplayMessages, "Display Messages"))

I think we should probably disable display messages for this build.

I hated to have to dump the digital_cam image downloading that I
modeled after the a620 code but it didn't seem to fit in well with the
wallpaper stuff from the a650 code. I'd really like for bitpim to
handle both types of "wallpaper" in the future.

We'll find a way to merge wallpaper and photos eventually, for now just
pick one or the other.

Stephen

[d***@netzero.com]

I updated com_phone to turn off reporting for the Mac. To disable reporting altogether, set com_phone.Phone.__enable_reporting=False. I have no problem of not including it in this build.

-Joe Pham

Stephen,
I don't know what the decision is about doing a build soon. You may
check-in the attached a670 module. I merged in all of Joe's recent a650
code and by commenting out all of the code that brings up the "Results"
dialog windows, I was able to get calendar, wallpaper, and ringtone
reads and writes to work. Phonebook reads are still working but writes
are ending with a dialog window popping up and freezing the program. I
couldn't figure out where this one is being launched so for now I
commented out phonebook writes as a supported sync. If there is not to
be a build soon I will look at this further. (I wonder if the poison
dialog windows are only a Mac problem.)

There do seem to be some Mac specific problems. I don't know if that is
what you are getting. To make sure that it is not the Report stuff, go
into gui.py and comment out both places that you see:

todo.append((self.DisplayMessages, "Display Messages"))

I think we should probably disable display messages for this build.

I hated to have to dump the digital_cam image downloading that I
modeled after the a620 code but it didn't seem to fit in well with the
wallpaper stuff from the a650 code. I'd really like for bitpim to
handle both types of "wallpaper" in the future.

We'll find a way to merge wallpaper and photos eventually, for now just
pick one or the other.

Stephen



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[Vic Heintz]

You can check with Stephen but I think we agreed we can freeze the
Samsung stuff where it is. There are still known problems but it is
good enough.

(As a matter of fact I just noticed another problem while testing in
response to Roger's note. Display of ringtones under the Ringer tab
disappears after quitting and restarting the app. It seems that
ringer/index.idx has no info for the ringtones downloaded in the prior
session. Since I basically copied this from the A650 module to the
A670, the problem is probably there too. Joe or Stephen, if you know
how to fix this quickly please do so before giving Roger the go-ahead.)

Vic

Post by Roger Binns
So what is left before the build can commence?
Roger

[Roger Binns]

Post by Vic Heintz
You can check with Stephen but I think we agreed we can freeze the
Samsung stuff where it is. There are still known problems but it is
good enough.

Stephen,

Can you add something to versionhistory so I can start the build?

Roger

[Roger Binns]

Now available at
http://sf.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=75211&package_id=120233

If all testing works out ok, it will go out on the main announce lists
tomorrow morning.

Roger

[Vic Heintz]

Post by Roger Binns
So what is left before the build can commence?
Roger

Since I had a lot of input into this one, can I put in a request for a
Jaguar build this time? There hasn't been one since 0.7.18

Vic

[Steven Palm]

Post by Vic Heintz
Since I had a lot of input into this one, can I put in a request for a
Jaguar build this time? There hasn't been one since 0.7.18

I have to rebuild my Jaguar build system... I had it mostly put
together, but something very strange is going on so I have to redo it
again. That takes a considerable amount of time, starting from scratch
and getting wx* and everything up and running... But I'm not counting
it out, just saying it will take a big chunk of time.

[d***@netzero.com]

Vic, just tested with my A650 and A310, everything's there as they should be between sessions. Not sure why the A670's not working.

-Joe Pham

-- Vic Heintz <***@rochester.rr.com> wrote:
You can check with Stephen but I think we agreed we can freeze the
Samsung stuff where it is. There are still known problems but it is
good enough.

(As a matter of fact I just noticed another problem while testing in
response to Roger's note. Display of ringtones under the Ringer tab
disappears after quitting and restarting the app. It seems that
ringer/index.idx has no info for the ringtones downloaded in the prior
session. Since I basically copied this from the A650 module to the
A670, the problem is probably there too. Joe or Stephen, if you know
how to fix this quickly please do so before giving Roger the go-ahead.)

Vic

Post by Roger Binns
So what is left before the build can commence?
Roger

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[d***@netzero.com]

Stephen, I'll send you my notes on the A650 and A310. Please let me know if you need anything else.

-Joe Pham

Post by Vic Heintz
You can check with Stephen but I think we agreed we can freeze the
Samsung stuff where it is. There are still known problems but it is
good enough.

Stephen,

Can you add something to versionhistory so I can start the build?

Roger


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[Vic Heintz]

Wish I could test it on my Mac. Any other Samsung A670 users on this
list? Mike Young with the A610: your phone seems to behave like an
A670. Could you test it?

Vic

Post by Roger Binns
Now available at
http://sf.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=75211&package_id=120233
If all testing works out ok, it will go out on the main announce lists
tomorrow morning.
Roger
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[m young]

Post by Vic Heintz
Wish I could test it on my Mac. Any other Samsung A670 users on this
list? Mike Young with the A610: your phone seems to behave like an
A670. Could you test it?
Vic

I have had some success with the A610 using either the 670 or the 650
settings. For reading the phonebook, the two appear to be equivalent,
and successful. Neither writes the phonebook successfully, however. When
using the A650 settings, the phone shuts off (!) while trying to send
phonebook data, resulting in a comm timeout exception. No phonebook
entries are affected. When using the A670 settings, BP deletes my
phonebook entries one at a time without replacing them, i.e. the delete
works, but the replacement does not.

Does this behavior reflect known bugs/features, or is this a new
wrinkle? What other data (protocol logs? AT command responses?) might we
need to sort this out?

--Mike

[Vic Heintz]

Post by Steven Palm

Post by Vic Heintz
Since I had a lot of input into this one, can I put in a request for
a Jaguar build this time? There hasn't been one since 0.7.18

I have to rebuild my Jaguar build system... I had it mostly put
together, but something very strange is going on so I have to redo it
again. That takes a considerable amount of time, starting from scratch
and getting wx* and everything up and running... But I'm not counting
it out, just saying it will take a big chunk of time.

I think I understand. I tried setting up my Mac to be able to do a
binary build but could never seem to get all the pieces together to
make it work. (I think it had something to do with usb support.) I gave
up after spending way too much time on it. If there is any way to get
me a disk image of a system properly configured for the build I would
be happy dedicate a drive to it and take over the Jaguar job. Or if you
could describe to me step by step what I need to install, I will try
again. I have an iMac with a clean recent install of Mac OS 10.2.8 and
no Python.

Vic

[Vic Heintz]

Post by m young

Post by Vic Heintz
Wish I could test it on my Mac. Any other Samsung A670 users on this
list? Mike Young with the A610: your phone seems to behave like an
A670. Could you test it?
Vic

I have had some success with the A610 using either the 670 or the 650
settings. For reading the phonebook, the two appear to be equivalent,
and successful. Neither writes the phonebook successfully, however.
When using the A650 settings, the phone shuts off (!) while trying to
send phonebook data, resulting in a comm timeout exception. No
phonebook entries are affected. When using the A670 settings, BP
deletes my phonebook entries one at a time without replacing them,
i.e. the delete works, but the replacement does not.
Does this behavior reflect known bugs/features, or is this a new
wrinkle? What other data (protocol logs? AT command responses?) might
we need to sort this out?

I think I already know what the phonebook problem is.

[Vic Heintz]

Post by m young

Post by Vic Heintz
Wish I could test it on my Mac. Any other Samsung A670 users on this
list? Mike Young with the A610: your phone seems to behave like an
A670. Could you test it?
Vic

I have had some success with the A610 using either the 670 or the 650
settings. For reading the phonebook, the two appear to be equivalent,
and successful. Neither writes the phonebook successfully, however.
When using the A650 settings, the phone shuts off (!) while trying to
send phonebook data, resulting in a comm timeout exception. No
phonebook entries are affected. When using the A670 settings, BP
deletes my phonebook entries one at a time without replacing them,
i.e. the delete works, but the replacement does not.
Does this behavior reflect known bugs/features, or is this a new
wrinkle? What other data (protocol logs? AT command responses?) might
we need to sort this out?

I didn't realize that using BitPim with the A670 selection would have
the nasty side-effect of deleting the A610 phonebook or I never would
have suggested that Mike try it.

We really do need to get the "Add" mode enabled for the A670. I just
copied what Joe had done for the A650. I am hoping he will fix it there
first so I can follow his lead. Having only the "Replace All"
available has already been a topic of discussion on the A670 Yahoo
group. It is potentially a problem with actual A670 phones if the user
should happen to do a "Send" without having ever done a "Get". I know
his is stupid but without having "Add" available it is more likely for
a user to do this. I hope Joe will guide me in this but I want Add mode
enabled for the A670 in the next release.

Vic

[Vic Heintz]

In the latest release with its Samsung phone debuts, I believe Stephen
elected to use the wallpaper handling features to download camera
images from the A620. I modeled my module after Joe's code for the A650
which is not a camera phone so the A670 selection only handles true
wallpaper images and so camera images still have to be downloaded via
filesystem view.

What is the BitPim vision regarding this issue? I view camera images as
a whole new media type deserving a separate tab in BitPim and a
separate line in the Get Phone Data window. Note I didn't mention
"Send". They are always read-only (as in no upload) and, on the Samsung
at least, much different format than what is allowed to be uploaded as
a wallpaper. They have meaningless names on the phone and I'd like to
see BitPim rename them to the embedded timestamp yet retain a
connection to its name on the phone. I'd like deleting them in BitPim
to cause their deletion on the phone. Deleting them on the phone is a
tedious multi-button-press process. I'd like BitPim to offer some sort
of export album option you could use before deleting the images.

(A pie -in-the-sky wish from this Mac user would be that it could
somehow drop an album into iPhoto. If BitPim were AppleScript-able I'm
sure this could be easily accomplished. I don't know how to make a Mac
app scriptable. I only know how to use it if it is.)

Are any of the other supported phones camera-phones? Do they offer any
support for image downloading?

Vic

PS On the topic of new media types, what is the future for memos and
voice memos?

[Steven Palm]

Post by Vic Heintz
(A pie -in-the-sky wish from this Mac user would be that it could
somehow drop an album into iPhoto. If BitPim were AppleScript-able I'm
sure this could be easily accomplished. I don't know how to make a Mac
app scriptable. I only know how to use it if it is.)

Well, as a poor hack alternative you could always set up a folder with
an action script attached to it so that any photos you drop into that
folder get put into iPhoto and then maybe delted. Then, from BitPim,
you just export those you want to the folder and the rest happens
automatically.

[Roger Binns]

Post by Vic Heintz
What is the BitPim vision regarding this issue?

Wallpapers and camera stuff are downloaded together. Each item
is tagged with an "origin" field, so users can move them around.

Post by Vic Heintz
uploaded as a wallpaper. They have meaningless names on the phone and
I'd like to see BitPim rename them to the embedded timestamp yet
retain a connection to its name on the phone. I'd like deleting them
in BitPim to cause their deletion on the phone. Deleting them on the
phone is a tedious multi-button-press process.

For the phones I wrote support for, I don't upload back to the camera
area nor is there a way of deleting images there. This is because
the phone has multiple files detailing the names of the camera images
which can be seperate from the file names, plus several others dealing
with which slots are used. It is impossible to tell that the file
named cam01.jpg with a description of "Foo" read today is the same
one read last week. I could see several ways of screwing up all
these linked records, so I played it safe and only grab images
from the phone. The phone does have the same tedious multi step
stuff for deleting one image, but fortunately is pretty easy to
delete all of them.

Post by Vic Heintz
I'd like BitPim to
offer some sort of export album option you could use before deleting
the images.

You can just select all the images you want and drag and drop them.
Well you could if wxWidgets supported drag and drop on the Mac :-)
You may want to sniff around the wx lists and see how long it will
be before that happens. (This is support of dragging out, not dragging
in which I believe works).

Post by Vic Heintz
(A pie -in-the-sky wish from this Mac user would be that it could
somehow drop an album into iPhoto. If BitPim were AppleScript-able I'm
sure this could be easily accomplished. I don't know how to make a Mac
app scriptable. I only know how to use it if it is.)

I'd be happy to make BitPim scriptable. That is also one of the goals
behind being able to operate without a user interface. The same infrastructure
could be used for AppleScript on Mac, COM on Windows and Corba/whatever
on Linux.

Post by Vic Heintz
Are any of the other supported phones camera-phones? Do they offer any
support for image downloading?

LG VX6000 and VX7000.

On the VX7000, images taken with the camera are indistinguishable from
those on the phone for other reasons. The VX6000 has 5 different
areas and index files that images reside in.

Post by Vic Heintz
PS On the topic of new media types, what is the future for memos and
voice memos?

Code contributions are welcome :-)

Roger

[Vic Heintz]

The preferred audio format for my Samsung phone seems not to be MIDI
(which can be used as a ringtone) but something called *.pmd. This
format is not currently recognized as something playable on my Mac but
I hear of Windows tools which will both play and create these.
Consequently the file selection menu in BitPim won't select these
unless I choose to show "All Files" instead of "Audio". Also BitPim
lists them in the Description column of the ringers window as "Unknown
file type". Is this a function of the Mac not having the proper helper
app? Or the core BitPim software? Or my phone model's .py code (aka
Joe's)?

I just discovered that the voice memos I record on my Samsung A670 are
stored in the /nvm/vst directory as files named vst_memo[0,1,2,3....]
These files are apparently in the above .pmd format because by simply
downloading them and putting .pmd at the end, they can be uploaded and
used as ringers. Pretty cool, huh? I think it would be nice if BitPim
accommodated these as yet another media type probably for download
only. I'm not sure what I would use it for personally but perhaps a
business person might want to record a memo and email it to his/her
secretary for transcription. (As I typed that "his/her" wishing to be
"PC" it occurred to me that I've never noticed a posting by a "her".
Are there any females on this distribution list or are we just a bunch
of nerdy guys?)

Vic

[Roger Binns]

Post by Vic Heintz
Consequently the file selection menu in BitPim won't select these
unless I choose to show "All Files" instead of "Audio".

That is purely because the list of known extensions is at line 38
of ringers.py.

Post by Vic Heintz
Also BitPim
lists them in the Description column of the ringers window as "Unknown
file type". Is this a function of the Mac not having the proper helper
app? Or the core BitPim software? Or my phone model's .py code (aka
Joe's)?

It is the BitPim UI code. See line 201 in ringers.py.

Post by Vic Heintz
I just discovered that the voice memos I record on my Samsung A670 are
stored in the /nvm/vst directory as files named vst_memo[0,1,2,3....]
These files are apparently in the above .pmd format because by simply
downloading them and putting .pmd at the end, they can be uploaded and
used as ringers.

That feature seems to exist on most of the phones. Also note that they
don't use the extension to determine the file type. (You can prove
that by giving it an extension of mp3 and watch it play).

For voice memos, the file is most likely in the Purevoice (QCP) format.

Post by Vic Heintz
Pretty cool, huh? I think it would be nice if BitPim
accommodated these as yet another media type probably for download
only.

BitPim will quite happily let you have any file type for the ringers.
For the phones that I wrote code for, BitPim will happily upload and
download any file. Neither the file extension nor the file contents
are examined in any way.

Post by Vic Heintz
I'm not sure what I would use it for personally but perhaps a
business person might want to record a memo and email it to his/her
secretary for transcription.

I use it when out shopping. If you see a good deal somewhere, record
the make/model and then look it up online. Many times the good deals
are because the model is being replaced, sometimes because it is good
and sometimes because it is bad.

Roger

[d***@netzero.com]

Vic, that's next on my list. I'm working to resolve previous comments from Roger, Stephen, and you. Does anyone know off hand if the "Add" mode means (a) send only new entries, or (b) send new and modified entries?

-Joe Pham

Post by m young

Post by Vic Heintz
Wish I could test it on my Mac. Any other Samsung A670 users on this
list? Mike Young with the A610: your phone seems to behave like an
A670. Could you test it?
Vic

I have had some success with the A610 using either the 670 or the 650
settings. For reading the phonebook, the two appear to be equivalent,
and successful. Neither writes the phonebook successfully, however.
When using the A650 settings, the phone shuts off (!) while trying to
send phonebook data, resulting in a comm timeout exception. No
phonebook entries are affected. When using the A670 settings, BP
deletes my phonebook entries one at a time without replacing them,
i.e. the delete works, but the replacement does not.
Does this behavior reflect known bugs/features, or is this a new
wrinkle? What other data (protocol logs? AT command responses?) might
we need to sort this out?

I didn't realize that using BitPim with the A670 selection would have
the nasty side-effect of deleting the A610 phonebook or I never would
have suggested that Mike try it.

We really do need to get the "Add" mode enabled for the A670. I just
copied what Joe had done for the A650. I am hoping he will fix it there
first so I can follow his lead. Having only the "Replace All"
available has already been a topic of discussion on the A670 Yahoo
group. It is potentially a problem with actual A670 phones if the user
should happen to do a "Send" without having ever done a "Get". I know
his is stupid but without having "Add" available it is more likely for
a user to do this. I hope Joe will guide me in this but I want Add mode
enabled for the A670 in the next release.

Vic



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[Roger Binns]

Post by d***@netzero.com
Vic, that's next on my list. I'm working to resolve previous
comments from Roger, Stephen, and you. Does anyone know off hand if
the "Add" mode means (a) send only new entries, or (b) send new and
modified entries?

For the wallpapers/ringtones, add will send the entries that are currently
selected, or if none are selected then everything.

I will not be doing add for the phonebook for the phones I write support
for. The reason is because users can screw up too easily.

There are two major problems:

- If you haven't read from the phone before, the only course is to
add this as a new entry (since you don't know the serial/id of the
existing entry). This would end up duplicating entries in many
cases since users would expect that if they are adding an entry
of "John Smith" and the phone already has one, then BitPim should
somehow know they are the same thing.

- If you have read the entry from the phone before, then doing "Add"
can overwrite the existing entry on the phone. The alternative
would be popping up some dialog to merge the information and say
which side has the most recent value for conflicting fields. We
already have all that when you read from the phonebook, and I
don't see the point of complicating the writing procedure and
duplicating it again.

Yes, people can lose the phonebook on their phone by not reading from
the phone and then doing a "replace all". However I have zero sympathy
for that small minority. They would have to ignore the tour that came
up the first time they ran BitPim and the do the send choosing "Replace
All" assuming it meant something other than that, and not looking in the
help or anything else. There is only so much we can do to protect
people from themselves.

Incidentally there have been exactly zero help updates contributed by
BitPim users. I can only conlcude that the people that did read it
understood what it said.

Roger

[d***@netzero.com]

Once I got the phonebook feature working properly, I'm planning to add "Todo" and "Notes" (text memos) features to the A650. Personally, I found those features to be very helpful. Really haven't thought much 'bout voice memos since I haven't used them at all; not sure if my A650 even has that feature.

-Joe Pham

-- Vic Heintz <***@rochester.rr.com> wrote:
In the latest release with its Samsung phone debuts, I believe Stephen
elected to use the wallpaper handling features to download camera
images from the A620. I modeled my module after Joe's code for the A650
which is not a camera phone so the A670 selection only handles true
wallpaper images and so camera images still have to be downloaded via
filesystem view.

What is the BitPim vision regarding this issue? I view camera images as
a whole new media type deserving a separate tab in BitPim and a
separate line in the Get Phone Data window. Note I didn't mention
"Send". They are always read-only (as in no upload) and, on the Samsung
at least, much different format than what is allowed to be uploaded as
a wallpaper. They have meaningless names on the phone and I'd like to
see BitPim rename them to the embedded timestamp yet retain a
connection to its name on the phone. I'd like deleting them in BitPim
to cause their deletion on the phone. Deleting them on the phone is a
tedious multi-button-press process. I'd like BitPim to offer some sort
of export album option you could use before deleting the images.

(A pie -in-the-sky wish from this Mac user would be that it could
somehow drop an album into iPhoto. If BitPim were AppleScript-able I'm
sure this could be easily accomplished. I don't know how to make a Mac
app scriptable. I only know how to use it if it is.)

Are any of the other supported phones camera-phones? Do they offer any
support for image downloading?

Vic

PS On the topic of new media types, what is the future for memos and
voice memos?



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[Vic Heintz]

Post by Roger Binns
That is purely because the list of known extensions is at line 38
of ringers.py.

and

Post by Roger Binns
It is the BitPim UI code. See line 201 in ringers.py.

OK since these .pmd files are proliferating on the web as ringtones
with people cranking them out by the dozens with something called CMX
Studio, shouldn't someone add this type to ringers.py? I can add it but
someone else has to check it in to cvs.

Post by Roger Binns
That feature seems to exist on most of the phones. Also note that they
don't use the extension to determine the file type. (You can prove
that by giving it an extension of mp3 and watch it play).
For voice memos, the file is most likely in the Purevoice (QCP) format.

Sorry but you are wrong about this one. Perhaps Samsung phones are
different from others. The file is selectable and hence playable as a
ringtone ONLY if I name it with the .pmd or .mid extension and not with
.mp3, .qcp, or any other thing I tried.

Vic

[Roger Binns]

Post by Vic Heintz
OK since these .pmd files are proliferating on the web as ringtones
with people cranking them out by the dozens with something called CMX
Studio, shouldn't someone add this type to ringers.py? I can add it
but someone else has to check it in to cvs.

Can you please do a little more research on this format? In particular
I would like to know if there are any specs for the file format, an
officially assigned mime type, and any conversion software, preferably
open source.

Post by Vic Heintz
Sorry but you are wrong about this one. Perhaps Samsung phones are
different from others. The file is selectable and hence playable as a
ringtone ONLY if I name it with the .pmd or .mid extension and not
with .mp3, .qcp, or any other thing I tried.

What if you remove the extension? I am somewhat curious as to how
something recorded as digital audio only works when named with an
extension for formats that are polyphonic midi style.

Roger

[Vic Heintz]

Post by Roger Binns
For the phones I wrote support for, I don't upload back to the camera
area nor is there a way of deleting images there. This is because
the phone has multiple files detailing the names of the camera images
which can be seperate from the file names, plus several others dealing
with which slots are used. It is impossible to tell that the file
named cam01.jpg with a description of "Foo" read today is the same
one read last week. I could see several ways of screwing up all
these linked records, so I played it safe and only grab images from
the phone.
The phone does have the same tedious multi step stuff for deleting one
image,
but fortunately is pretty easy to delete all of them.

Agreed that you don't upload photos back to the camera. I also see your
point about the complications of deleting them via BitPim. But isn't
this a general problem for all of the data types? Right now if I delete
all of my ringers in BitPim and Send Data with Replace All and then add
all those same ringers back to to BitPim and Send Data again, all of my
"caller ID" ringers are shuffled. (ie my wife has what was my
daughter's and she has my sister's, etc) I would assume that the same
thing is true for "caller ID" wallpapers but I haven't tested this.
Even phonebook entries are a problem as evidenced by the fact that our
first Samsung release loses all "caller ID" ringer and wallpaper
assignments when a Send is done with the phonebook. It makes sense
because there are other files on the phone with indices that are now
wrong or missing.

Vic

[Roger Binns]

Post by Vic Heintz
Agreed that you don't upload photos back to the camera.

More accurately that it isn't possible to do reliably on the VX6000.
It may be ok on other phones.

Post by Vic Heintz
I delete all of my ringers in BitPim and Send Data with Replace All
and then add all those same ringers back to to BitPim and Send Data
again, all of my "caller ID" ringers are shuffled. (ie my wife has
what was my daughter's and she has my sister's, etc) I would assume
that the same thing is true for "caller ID" wallpapers but I haven't
tested this.

Nope. BitPim stores the name of the ringer/wallpaper, not the id
number. Consequently you can manipulate the content on the phone
in any way you want without issue. You can also read the phonebook
and all the wallpapers/ringtones from one phone and write it out
to another, even a completely different model.

Post by Vic Heintz
Even phonebook entries are a problem as evidenced by the
fact that our first Samsung release loses all "caller ID" ringer and
wallpaper assignments when a Send is done with the phonebook. It
makes sense because there are other files on the phone with indices
that are now wrong or missing.

Three week old code is not the same thing as completely debugged and
working code as expected by the rest of BitPim. The first few releases
of BitPim used to trash voice and speed dials on the VX4400, but I
fixed that.

Roger