Hello pinetime devs,
this is post is about a project that was taking shape on the Discord/Telegram group, but the need for a static reference
pushed me to write here in Pine64 forum.
After earlier contacts with Lup Yuen on Twitter, I started to ruminate and then to draw a possible UI for the Pinetime,
something suitable for its 240x320px pixel and the hardware feature.
There are some pictures of sketches in early February, but the place to see the UI take shape are the interactive prototypes:
Fonts
The UI use 2 fonts carefully selected across the one with open license:
- the Free Sans, a redesigned version of Helvetica, used mostly for content text
- the Share font, a narrow font used in label and system titles.
Other candidates were the
- Free Mono (monospace)
- Lato
- Source Sans
- Oswald Heavy
UI structure
The UI is based on a dark background with a HomeWatch screen,
and Springboard with all the apps and settings.
Gestures:
- (on HomeWatch), any click or swipe go to the Springboard
- (on Springboard), swipe from top to get to HomeWatch
- swiping from top exit the active app
- pushing the physical button exit the app
Stacks
Every app can be a
- Single page, with vertical scrolling to see more content (there is a "HW acceleration" on this) or a
- Multi-page app, in this case it's composed by a stack of screens on the right:
[EXAMPLE] If I have to setup a calendar, I may set Hour/minutes on page 1, date on page 2, and details on page 3.
An undo and a next/Set button helps me to move on the procedure. Swipe right and swipe left as a extra method to move in stacks of pages.
Comment
The OS UI actually inherit some useful tool from the Meego Harmattan experience, without being too gesture reliant. Most of navigation is still based on simple tap, and coloured buttons. (We need to verify how the detection of swipe will be on the hardware).
Finally, the UI is modular, made by blocks with spacers, and designed to lend itself to a replacement of the 2 fonts by the developers, with similar-sized characters.
I will post more detail and some guideline at the next stage of works.
Giovanni
Minodesign
[url=https://twitter.com/MisterTechBlog][/url]
After purchasing a Pinebook Pro recently I was faced with the fact that there was no out-of-the-box Slackware (or derivative of thereof) installer available.
After spending some time interacting with forum user mara/sndwvs at LinuxQuestions ( https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions...?p=6093972 )
I managed to cross-compile (on x86_64) an installer file system image with his script that's available at https://gitlab.com/sndwvs/slackware_arm_build_kit
Unfortunately the installer image doesn't seem to work: it doesn't boot on Pinebook Pro for some reason.
What I see is that when the micro SD card is inserted, and the system powered on, the screen stays blank, and seemingly nothing happens.
How could I debug this boot-related problem? Do I need the serial cable to do that, or can it be debugged some other way too?
Anybody do a clean install of Manjaro 20.02 KDE to EMMC yet (Manjaro-ARM-kde-plasma-pbpro-20.02-emmc-installer)? I have tried it now a couple times (each with fresh download and SD re-image) to my PBpro (ISO verison) w/128GB EMMC and it installs fine, but trying to launch certain apps like the updater from the tool bar or right click to configure desktop causes a plasma crash or kicks me back to the login. I have also had the screen lock up on me if sitting unattended for awhile at the login...mouse works but does not wake up (not blank screen, just frozen login screen (clock frozen at time locked up)). Ran an update from the command line but I think it only updated one package (did not pay attention) and that did not resolve the issue.
Version 19.xx was working perfectly, going back to it tonight if I cannot get it sorted. Just wondering if anybody else is experiencing this...or if I am lucky ? Might try XFCE for giggles....
I've been running the "stock" Debian/MATE Linux and it has been improving but it still randomly crashes and has odd problems with video, audio and printers.
Another issue is that many of the packages in this distro are out of date and many versions behind current releases.
(Most recently Kdenlive, Firefox)
Can anyone recommend a more functional and up to date distro?
* I have been fairly impressed with the progress UBPorts is making with each new release.
BUT
I have not been able to complete a download of their Feb. 25, 2020 edition.
I have made over 40 'failed' attempts starting about 2 hours after they released it until about
12 hours after this release.
The download speeds vary greatly from 100+kb/sec to 3mb/sec, wondering if there is a server problem or too many attempting to download at the same time ?
Any one else having this problem ? OR Just me, maybe the problem is at my end...?
UPDATE :
I have found that just clicking "retry" does continue the download...
AND so far these downloads have worked when I flash them using Balena Etcher....
Just a bit Frustrating, sometimes it is just a few 'retrys'
Sometimes many 'Retrys'
I have a Rock64 with OMV 4 installed and it works pretty well. My router and network switch are programmed to power off completely every night so I want to schedule an automatic shutdown on OMV itself and I know this can be easily done with cron jobs. However, when my router does power on I don't want the Rock64 to power on as soon as power is detected and instead use wake-on-LAN to boot it at a specific time.
Is it possible to disable the automatic power on and does the Rock64 support wake-on-LAN?
This is an attempt to nail down a basic set of apps people would generally expect a smart watch to have (from a discussion in chat):
* Heart rate monitor
* Clock (set time and date (with zone), timer, stop watch, alarm) - attempt to sync with local phone clock data
* Step counter
* Notifications (from phone)
* Weather forecast
* Predicted calorie burn (based on user input height, weight, age, etc)
Stretch and reach:
* Breaking news (possibly from an RSS feed from phone)
* Navigation (open street view from phone, use case: navigating whilst on a call, texting/messaging, browsing, watching media, phone charging in a backpack, etc)
I know Pine64 does a great Job with the PinePhone. And I know there are a lot of Problems like the Corona Virus, the delay because of the FCC/CE Certifications and the Closed Habour in Hongkong. But i still wait for my PinePhone BH Edition. I would love to get more Information how to proceed and when delivery can be expected.
I just want to give a quick heads up that boot-tools, which has a script for the pine64 and pinebook to boot into UMS mode through FEL, is working with the Pinephone.
The only way of accessing FEL for the pinephone is by having a microsd boot into FEL. There I found the image which you have to burn onto your SD as explained. Then you have to turn on the phone while being connected to your PC. When you "lsusb" and see a new device, for me it is recognised as an Onda v972, it means you succesfully booted into FEL mode. You can also check it with "sunxi-fel version" (binary from sunxi-tools) just in case. From that point foward, you just have to run the boot-tools script in order to set it up.
I used "make pinebook_ums" (over pine64_ums) to make it work. Yesterday it failed to do anything, but the gist of it might be that you have to take out the battery for it to work. Also try pine64_ums in case the other one is problematic.
I found out about FEL and UMS from some comment under a post on reddit, so the credit shall go to them. This post is just a heads up that it actually works.
