The Raspberry Pi is yet another community focused development/education ARM board in the mould of many a Gumstix, BeagleBoard and others before it.

That in itself is not overly remarkable but the Raspberry Pi foundation managed to keep one little trick up their sleeve. It’s well priced coming in at around the £25 for the basic ‘Model A’ and £35 for the ‘Model B’ (The ‘Model B’ giving you a highly useful Ethernet port, driven off USB, and extra USB host port). Neither model features a connector for a serial console but it is put out on the GPIO header at 3.3v so easy enough to convert if you need it (like I do ). There is also an abundance of other I/O to play with on the headers.

Considering you get 256MB of RAM mounted over a Broadcom BCM2835 ARMv6 SoC (more commonly used in things like STB’s and media streamers from people like Roku) and access to a beefy, admittedly closed source, GPU/video decoder it is pretty damm impressive and rather hard to complain. Ok, some might say an v7 ARM core would not have hurt and more of this and that but if your going down that road you are completely missing the point of this little budget device. Just pay a little more and get something like a BeagleBone or it’s big brother the BeagleBoard-XM to hack on and enjoy it (I already enjoy hacking on them).

This neatly brings me on to my interest in the Raspberry Pi. It’s low end by todays ARM standards, but it’s still got a hell of a lot of power to play with, cheap, quirky (another way of saying full of interesting features that may blow up in your face ) and with a little luck it will bring out that wonderful streak of madness in people.

Hopefully it will become ubiquitous in the lower end of this market and bring in more and more hobbyist developers, hardware hackers and students. Take a few of these devices and mix with a liberal helping of Arduino’s and you have some awesome options for cheap experimentation.

All that makes this a pretty appealing platform to hack on and fits well with the other stuff I like to mess about with.

Hardware pictures (click for larger jpeg’s):

Here are a few random pictures of the ‘early release’ retail model B unit the Raspberry Pi foundation have kindly provided me for some hacking (the logoed shipping label on the package was cute by the way). Rather than overly comment on the workings (the specs are well known) I’ll just provide some soft-core hardware p0rn pictures and comment on the physical build.

Not a huge amount say on this but I’ll note that it is nicely built, soldering seems precise and of good quality and no diff joints I can see. There is no solder in the test points (handy), most connectors are well attached and there is a only a little flex in the board.

The HDMI port does seem a lot more fragile than I would like and it’s a tight fit but I guess the cost of battening connectors would push the board outside its price envelope and consume board space, just don’t yank cables out or it will end in tears.

All in all, it seems a lot like the earlier boards in respect of the build and layout and that’s quite a good thing just remember the price constraints when considering that.

A big concern I have is how well these will last uncased but I understand the educational units are cased (Raspberry Pi, please make sure that case provides some battening for connectors) and that is surely going be be where the boards see most abuse. In fairness the uncased concern could be levelled at any of the development boards I have.

I know the foundation is going for a model that will see several manufacturers turning out boards under license but as long as they all hit this quality level or get above it I can’t envisage that many build problems as long as people are gentle with them and understand what they are buying.

After all that fluff lets move on to what I actually plan to use this device for…

OpenEmbedded/Angstrom:

As the hardware is at the lower end proper optimisation is highly important to get the most out of the device and this is where OpenEmbedded comes into the mix. I have put together an OpenEmbedded-Core based BSP layer for the Raspberry Pi A and B hardware that ensures every package built for the machine is tuned for both the ARMv6 architecture and the ARM 1176jzf-s core. This was actually fairly easy to get going bar the time consuming mess that is the usual platform specific quirks, hacks and munges. However as the OpenPandora has used OpenEmbedded/Angstrom since its inception (and has it’s own set of quirks) I should be pretty familiar with it by now .

Currently the layer it has a number of rough edges but the basics. kernel, bootloader and supporting bits and bobs are building and if you so desire it can be used to (almost, needs a small fix) create you a pre-configured SD card image file (currently setup for a 4GB > SD card) with the kernel and bootloaders on a vFAT partition and the RootFS on EXT4 all ready to write onto an SD and boot the unit.

Some more work is needed to clean up the recipes, fix a few bits and currently there is no support for the GPU libraries (coming as soon as I clean up some of the more obvious hacks and get confirmation of licence and redistribution terms). But you can already use this layer to boot an Angstrom (my OE based distribution of choice) console image or some of the more interesting image flavours (Xfce/E17 etc.) up on actual hardware.

Just don’t expect everything to work yet, ok, being honest don’t expect a lot to work yet!

Building OpenEmbedded/Angstrom packages for the RaspberryPi

If your interested in trying this (and assuming your familiar with OpenEmbedded-Core and have a build setup) you can just add the meta-raspberrypi layer (git@github.com:djwillis/meta-raspberrypi.git) to your build setup and use MACHINE = "raspberrypi" in your local.conf.

If you have never tried building an operating system from scratch using OpenEmbedded/Angstrom you can find a really good guide on the Angstrom site. With a few little tweaks you can get a build going in no time (just be prepaired to use a LOT of disk space and waiting many hours for it all to build, not to mention having to deal with the odd snags that come along).

Following the above guide if you change:

git clone git://github.com/Angstrom-distribution/setup-scripts.git

to

git clone git://github.com/djwillis/setup-scripts.git

This will ensure you grab a fork of the setup scripts with the RaspberryPi layer already added.

Then if you proceed to use ‘raspberrypi’ as the machine you should be off the starting blocks and on the journey to getting something built.

What happens next?

Once things have settled down a little and the GPU libraries are all working my aim is to get the meta-raspberrypi layer into a state that can be included by default in the upstream Angstrom distribution. That would bring lots of nice benefits like ARMv6 and RaspberryPi optimised software feeds and use of the Angstrom online image builder to put RaspberryPi images together.

I’ll also find a way, if I can, to distribute images all setup with binaries for the GPU and ready to go. People can then grab it and write to an SD just like other distributions.

It would be great to get some input into this as it is just something I have been hacking on in my (limited) free time for a while, if anyone wants to help with this work this please fork and send over pull requests.

Regards,

John

Most interested people will have realised that my ScummVM backends (GP2X, Wiz, Caanoo and OpenPandora) missed the entire 1.3.* release cycle leaving the official releases stuck back in the old 1.2.* cycle.

There are a number of reasons for this (all my fault) but rather than dwell, lets just say I am trying to get them all back into shape for future releases. With that in mind I am going to start doing test ‘point in time’ builds of the code for various devices when things reach a point that I would like some community testing done.

The first of these test releases is for the GP2XWiz and Caanoo. The GP2X build will follow once I nail the last annoying little input bug that is causing the cursor to go off for a wonder on it’s own (simple bug I am sure but you know how it is when you stare at something). Then I will turn to fixing up the OpenPandora backend.

They have been built from the main ScummVM GIT (Revision:  6b8fb196cbd58e20ef57bf367d5ecbf0ee2ebdad).

These builds exist purely to get some feedback and testing from the community so I can try and get a good solid release done when we get into the next official ScummVM release cycle.

If your not interested in testing and providing feedback (and dealing with the odd issue) please stick with the old 1.2.* releases. These are not robust, fully tested release builds but I am also pretty sure they will not eat or damage your GPH device.

Note: Please don’t mirror or hotlink these preview/test/alpha etc. releases or put them on download services but rather, direct people to this page.

This helps me ensure that users always have the most recent versions and cuts down on me being requested to support ancient releases.

Also note that these test releases are not officially (or unofficially) supported .

They are built from the new unified ScummVM backend for all the GPH devices (to make supporting them somewhat easier for me and to cut out the rot that had set into the old dedicated stand alone GP2X backend).

All the engines enabled in configure are included in this build but I make no promises about the usability of any WIP game engine.

Specific restrictions:

GP2XWiz: My GP2XWiz has died so this build is totally untested but before the Wiz died the builds had been working well and there is so much in common with the Caanoo that I am fairly sure this build will work. Please test it and give me some feedback.

If you selling a Wiz cheap I also want to talk to you .

Caanoo: The build seems fairly solid. If you find issues please report them.

Providing feedback:

If you would like me to consider a feature or fix a bug help me to help you by ensuring the reports end up recorded in official places.

• Bug Reports (ScummVM’s Sourceforge bug tracker)
• Feature Requests (ScummVM’s Sourceforge feature tracker)
  • Source Code Patches (ScummVM’s Sourceforge patch tracker or  github pull request)
  • General Forum Feedback (ScummVM’s GPH Devices forum) – I also check Comments on these posts.

Downloads:

Please ensure you download the correct version for your device:

• GP2XWiz: download
• Caanoo: download

Extract the contents of the zip to the game folder on your SD card, ensuring that you have a “scummvm.ini” in your game folder and the rest of ScummVM in a “scummvm” subfolder.

Launch “ScummVM” from the main launcher menu to run.

Review the README-GPH for more information.

Regards,

John

I have been happily using the Shift for a few years now (since a good friend kindly passed it on to me) with various Windows and Linux setups (on both the ARM and x86 side).

But in fairness I have been using it less and less of late. As it feels that the Origami work is spiritually being dusted off and rolled into Windows 8 with the healthy dose of the Metro design language and friends it seemed only right to dust off the venerable old Shift and see how it coped with the latest software incarnation.

No part of this process is very complicated, it mostly came down to installing the right drivers in the right order , just read the post and follow each point and you should not go far wrong.

Read this: Please make sure….

• You are 100% happy to totally wipe the Shift’s HDD. Don’t bother with an upgrade from Windows 7. Not worth the hassle!
• You don’t mind manually reinstalling Windows Vista or Windows 7 when you decide 8 is not for you.
• You are signed up on XDA Developers
• You are well aware you are installing an unsupported pre-beta bit of software on your device, and the device is under MS’s recommended minimum specs. The chances are it will not work well! But it’s fun to try.
• You understand not all the hardware is 100% supported and there may be driver issues.
• You have removed any external storage from the device other than the USB stick (no SD card inserted, no random USB HDD connected etc.).
• You have enabled WiFi using the Shift Control Panel before you start the install inside the old OS. If you don’t you may need to have a USB Ethernet adaptor before you can enable WiFi to get on the internet.

Prerequisites:

I am assuming people have access to another Windows PC to setup the install, if your using a Linux distro or something cool and exotic I am sure you can adapt the guide.

Hardware:

• Large (say 8GB or bigger) USB stick.
• USB Ethernet adaptor (optional but very handy)

You can also save yourself a lot of pain by using that after you have completed the install to get on the internet initially and let the Shift install drivers from Windows Update and get things up and running that little bit quicker. The guide assumes you don’t have a USB Ethernet adaptor so is worst case.

Windows Software:

• Windows 8 32bit Developer Preview
  (Sha 1 hash – 4E0698BBABE01ED27582C9FC16AD21C4422913CC)
• Windows USB/DVD Download tool
  (or some other way to write the bootable ISO to a USB stick).

Drivers: Use the mirror links if you have download issues.

• HTC Shift Windows Vista drivers

You will need to download the following from the above link.

1. “Control Center” (Shagctrl_1[1].2.6.122-control center) – Mirror
2. “Vista EC Driver” (VistaECDrvV1[1].0.1.10) – Mirror
3. “TouchScreen Driver” (TouchScreen(1[1].1.0.2)) – Mirror
4. “Synaptics Micro Pad Driver” (Synaptics MicroPad(10[1].0.11.1)) – Mirror

• Marvell sd8686 Wireless LAN SDIO Adapter Driver
• Intel GMA Graphics Driver for Windows 7 (15.12.75.4.1930) – Mirror
• Windows Mobile Device Center 6.1 – Mirror (Works on Windows 8 just fine)

Making a USB Install Stick:

Ok, this one is REALLY simple.

Download the ISO, install the USB download tool, select the ISO you downloaded, select the USB stick you want to install to and start the process.

It will take a few minutes and check at the end that there are no warning shown and you should be good to go.

Adding useful stuff to the USB install stick:

Now you have a Windows 8 install on the stick you will need to graft in some extra goodies that will make the Shift install a little less painful.

Open the USB stick in Explorer and create a Drivers folder on the root.

Copy over the Intel GMA drivers and Windows Mobile Device Center to the Drivers folder on the USB stick.

Extract all the other ZIP files you downloaded into this folder (so you end up with :\Drivers\shagctrl_1[1].2.6.122-control center\, :\Drivers\TouchScreen(1[1].1.0.2) etc.).

Note: Don’t try and work with compressed ZIP files when installing on the Shift. Until everything is setup it is just pain you don’t need , you better off just extracting everything that is not an EXE to it’s own folder before you start.

Installing:

Pop the USB stick into the Shifts USB port and turn on the device. At the BIOS boot screen select Fn + 0 (F10) and pick the USB stick as the boot device. If it is not shown chances are something stopped the stick being marked as bootable.

Note: If when you run setup it does not find a hard disk on the Shift the chances are you may have an odd partition layout (I noticed this after I had Meego installed to the HDD with BtrFS). If that is the case you will need to use DISKPART from the Windows recovery command prompt to wipe the disk and add back a traditional disk layout. If you need help with that leave a comment.

Setup will take a few minutes to show anything on the screen.

• Select your appropriate Language and Keyboard settings and hit Install
• Accept the license terms
• Hit ‘Custom Install’
• Click ‘Drive options (advanced)’
• Select every disk partition and select ‘Delete’ to remove them (yep, this really will delete everything on your Shift)
• You should be left with one device showing ‘Disk 0 Unallocated Space’
• Click ‘Next’ and go and grab a Caffè macchiato while you wait 30 minutes or so

The actual Windows 8 install is pretty uneventful and will just sit there for a while churning its way through the install. It will culminate in a reboot.

After it starts for the 1st time you will be presented with the setup wizard (highly reminiscent of Windows Phone 7 ).

Note: Leave the Shift to settle for a few minutes as Windows is actually installing a lot of the device drivers in the background and you will not actually have a working keyboard for the 1st few seconds anyway.

Graphics, touchscreen and the like will not be correctly setup at this point so you will only be able to use the trackpad mouse and keyboard for input.

Just run through the setup wizard (you have no working wireless at this point so unless you have a USB Ethernet adaptor and hub connected you can’t link your Windows account to your Windows Live ID just yet as that wants internet access).

Once the finalise process has finished you will be dumped at the main Metro screen. At this point your Shift is running Windows 8, all that remains is to actually get the hardware drivers working so we can get some graphical goodness, touchscreen, 3G and the like working.

Getting the hardware working:

Tip: Don’t forget that the Windows key switches between the active application and the Metro interface. This starts to make more sense when you consider that the classic Windows desktop is actually being run as an application from Metro.

Now your logged into Windows 8 you will need to do a few things to get the Shift up and running.

Warning: The driver install order below is the one that worked well for me and mitigated the problems that arise with the hardware or SmartScreen filtering (now baked into the core of Windows) not allowing installs due to the lack of internet access to check digital signatures.

If you install the drivers out of order be prepared to deal with Windows not letting you run files due to SmartScreen errors at various points .

Everything else not mentioned here like the fingerprint scanner and webcam sees to work well out of the box once you get online and it grabs drivers from Windows Update.

Start off by navigating to the Windows Explorer tile on the Metro screen and click it, this will take you to a traditional Windows Explorer screen on the classic desktop surface, select the removable disk you installed Windows 8 from and navigate into the ‘Drivers’ folder you created earlier.

1 – Install the Embedded Controller driver:

Note: Both the EC and TouchScreen drivers must be installed in compatibility mode for ‘Windows Vista (Service Pack 2)’

After the reboot navigate to the Windows Explorer tile on the Metro screen and click it, select the removable disk you installed Windows 8 from and navigate into the ‘Drivers\VistaECDrvV1[1].0.1.10’ folder you created earlier, then right click on ‘Setup.exe’ and select ‘Properties’, from there select the ‘Compatibility’ tab and setup the program to in in compatibility mode for ‘Windows Vista (Service Pack 2)’. Hit return to close the properties window.

Now run ‘setup.exe’ from the ‘Drivers\VistaECDrvV1[1].0.1.10’ folder and run through the install until finished. It should say the EC driver was successfully installed.

2 – Install touchscreen support:

Next up we need to install the touchscreen driver.

Note: The TouchScreen driver must be ‘Run as Administrator’.

The TouchScreen driver install also pokes some I/O addresses behind the scenes, setup by the EC driver, enabling later parts of the install and is critical.

Navigate into the ‘Drivers\TouchScreen(1[1].1.0.2)’ folder you created earlier, then right click on ‘ATSV1102(WHQLed).exe’ and select ‘Properties’, from there select the ‘Compatibility’ tab and setup the program to in in compatibility mode for ‘Windows Vista (Service Pack 2)’. Hit return to close the properties window.

Now right click on the ‘ATSV1102(WHQLed).exe’ from the ‘Drivers\TouchScreen(1[1].1.0.2)’ folder select “Run as Administrator” (very important). Run through the install until finished.

It should ask for a reboot (got to love drivers). Let it reboot. After the reboot you should have a working touchscreen and a bunch of other processes kicked off and drivers being automagically installed.

3 – Installing the Synaptics Micro Pad Driver:

Note: This driver must be installed before the Shift Control Center.

Just run “setup.exe” from ‘Drivers\Synaptics MicroPad(10[1].0.11.1)’ and run through the setup process.

Select no when asked about rebooting at the end.

4 – Installing the HTC Shift Control Center:

Navigate to the Windows Explorer tile on the Metro screen and click it, this will take you to a traditional Windows Explorer screen, select the removable disk you installed Windows 8 from and navigate into the ‘Drivers\shagctrl_1[1].2.6.122-control center’ folder you created earlier.

Right click on ‘Setup.exe’ and select ‘Properties’, from there select the ‘Compatibility’ tab and setup the program to in in compatibility mode for ‘Windows Vista (Service Pack 2)’.

Now you can ok the properties window and actually run ‘Setup.exe’. Select all the prompts and let it run through the setup.

Warning: At the end of the setup you will get a message asking you to enable the ‘Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5.1’ feature.

You should cancel the request to enable .Net (not the main install) for the moment and let the main install finish. It is not actually needed by the part of the Shift Control Center we wish to use to enable WiFi.

This step is necessary as you will need working Internet access before you can enable the .Net feature and you don’t have working Internet just yet ..

Once setup has completed select yes and let the Shift restart.

5 – Hackish steps to get WiFi driver working and get Internet access

Now you have the device rebooted and the Shift Control Center installed (but not fully working due to the lack of .NET 3.5.1) you can use it to toggle the Wireless LAN setting and start the process of getting connected to the internet.

Navigate to the “Shift Control Center” tile on the Metro screen (scroll over to the far right to see the Metro tiles for things you have installed) and click it, this will take you to the Shift Control Panel just as you remember it. Turn on Wireless LAN (toggle it if it thinks it is already on) and let Windows find a nice unknown bit of hardware.

Close the Shift Control Center and navigate to Windows Explorer. Scroll down to ‘Computer’ on the left hard side and right click it then select ‘Manage’.

Now select ‘Device Manager’ and scroll down to ‘Other devices’.

Select ‘Marvell 820.11 SDIO ID: 0B’, right click and select ‘Update driver software’.

Browse your computer and select the Drivers folder you extracted everything to earlier. Hit next and let Windows install the Wireless driver.

Tip: You may need a reboot (I did on one of my test installs) so if you have wireless problems try that (power options are now hidden under ‘Start’, ‘Settings’ and ‘Power’ in the menu that pops up on the right hand side.

Now you can connect to your wireless network by clicking on the wireless icon in the tray area (classic desktop). Control Panel/Wireless in Metro does not seem to work until the system has visited Windows Update, hmmm…

Once you actually have a working network connection (USB Ethernet or Wireless) you can finish off the install and put the digitally signed executable drivers on the Shift.

6 – Install Windows Mobile Device Center:

Navigate back to the Windows Explorer and just run “drvupdate-x86.exe” from wherever you put the drivers and run through the setup process. The install starts automatically and just silently exits at the end.

7 – Install Graphics Drivers:

Next up run “win7_1512754.exe” from wherever you put the graphics drivers and run through the setup process. Select yes to rebooting at the end (do this or things get very messy).

Once the system restarts it will come up in a very high resolution interpolated mode (1152*864 to be precise) that is not very easy on the eyes in the classic desktop .

Warning: Some Metro apps (a lot actually) require a minimum resolution of 1024*768 to run so the 1024*600 normal high resolution interpolated mode is not enough to run everything in Metro.

Setting the screen manually to 1152*864, or not changing it after you install the graphics driver, fixes this. I’ll try and knock up an app to toggle the screen resolution 3 ways rather than the current 2. That way people can stuff use the desktop at 1024*600 and Metro at 1152*864.

8 – Enable .NET 3.5.1:

There are a few last missing things from having a basically feature complete setup. The handy little app that switches between the normal (800*480) and regular high res interpolated (1024*600) mode is actually the component of the Shift Control Center that is written in .NET.

The easiest way to force the install of .NET now you have a working network connection is to press the resolution switch button (above the touchpad) and have Windows try and run the app then switch to the classic desktop, it will then detect the app needs .NET and guide you down the process.

Once that is done your shortcut buttons for the resolution change and Shift Control Center should now work as expected and you can toggle 800*480 and 1024*600 on the fly.

9 – Check Windows Update:

Almost done, we just want to check Windows Update from the Shift and make sure we have picked up all the driver updates and other stuff that may be needed.

Just navigate to ‘Control Panel’ in Metro and scroll down to ‘More Options’ and then select ‘System and Security’, ‘Windows Update’. Then click ‘Check for Updates’.

10 – Link your user with your Windows Live ID:

This step is solely optional but as a lot of the Metro apps in the Developer Preview are tied up with Live ID integration it may not a bad idea to do this.

Navigate into the ‘Control Panel’ tile and tap ‘Users’, from here you can link your user to your Windows Live ID so integration with cloud cruft like SkyDrive becomes seamless.

All done….

With that you are just about done, that is the old HTC Shift running Windows 8.

The setup could have been a little easier but in fairness this is a very specialised device that is well under MS’s recommended hardware specifications (both in graphics resolution and CPU) for Windows 8.

The fact it runs at all, not to mention that it is actually pretty damm usable with Windows 8, even bells and whistles like the fingerprint scanner and webcam work fine, is somewhat impressive. Regardless of what you may think about Windows 8 itself or the direction it is going (that’s a debate for another day) it scores fairly high on the geek factor.

I would be really interested to hear of any other interesting hardware (outside the normal laptops and desktops) that is running Windows 8 or other people’s experiences trying this working on the Shift.

Regards,

John

The 1.2.1 release is mainly a bugfix and cleanup release for 1.2.0 and also introduces some additional translations of the GUI.

There are few changes to my backend code but all the core changes are rolled in.

Oh, I also just noticed the date so “Happy New Year” everybody.
Maybe I should try and find more hacking time in 2011 .

Providing feedback:

If you would like me to consider a feature or fix a bug in my backends help me to help you by ensuring the reports end up recorded in official places.

• Bug Reports (ScummVM’s Sourceforge bug tracker)
• Feature Requests (ScummVM’s Sourceforge feature tracker)
  • Source Code Patches (ScummVM’s Sourceforge patch tracker)
  • General Forum Feedback (ScummVM’s GPH device forum or ScummVM’s OpenPandora device forum)

Downloads:

All the 1.2.1 releases including my GP2X/GP2XWiz/Caanoo and OpenPandora backends can me found on the main ScummVM download site.

• ScummVM’s Main Download Page: download

The entire ScummVM team is rather proud of this release and you can read the official announcement here. One of the major ‘headline features’ is that this is the first release to feature the fruits of the integration/refactoring of the FreeSCI codebase and it’s substantual enhancement and extension by our own SCI engine team.

There are also enhancements for several engines and the addition of support for “Fascination” (An amusing risqué point and click adventure from Coktel) in the Gob engine.

From my point of view the 1.2.0 release marks the 1st official release of 2 new device backends/ports I have put together (GPH Caanoo and OpenPandora) and also features quite a few enhancements and speedups to my existing GP2X and GP2XWiz backends.

It also marks the official release of new backends for Android and Dingux and the unfortunate retirement of the venerable old PalmOS backend.

The upshot is that this should be our best release yet and I would certainly recommend this release over any older versions of ScummVM for the devices I support.

Noteworthy features for my backends since the last major release:

Below are the main features and fixes added with this new release. Please make sure you scan over the linked WiKi pages for important information before using.

GP2X:

Performance tweaks/code clean-up (quite noticeable in some areas, not giving up on the old GP2X any time soon).

Revised the button layout (please read http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=GP2X for more info).

Add support for TouchScreen ‘Tap Modes’, Left Click, Right Click and Hover.

GP2X Wiz:

Performance improvements.

Add support for TouchScreen ‘Tap Modes’, Left Click, Right Click and Hover.

Revised the button layout (please read http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=GP2XWiz for more info).

Caanoo:

Revised the button layout (please read http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=Caanoo for more info).

Add support for TouchScreen ‘Tap Modes’, Left Click, Right Click and Hover.

OpenPandora:

Performance improvements over earlier test releases.

Add support for Touchscreen ‘Tap Modes’, Left Click, Right Click and Hover and ‘Trigger Tap’ .

Small tweak to the touchscreen to stop the cursor ‘drifting’ when outside the game area.

Revised the button layout (please read http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=OpenPandora for more info and controls).

Providing feedback:

If you would like me to consider a feature or fix a bug in my backends help me to help you by ensuring the reports end up recorded in official places.

• Bug Reports (ScummVM’s Sourceforge bug tracker)
• Feature Requests (ScummVM’s Sourceforge feature tracker)
  • Source Code Patches (ScummVM’s Sourceforge patch tracker)
  • General Forum Feedback (ScummVM’s GPH device forum or ScummVM’s OpenPandora device forum)

Downloads:

• ScummVM’s Main Download Page: download

Note: This is is quick guide aimed at developers/porters looking to fix issues with custom SDL cursors (Cursors made up using an SDL_Surface) and the OpenPandora touchscreen, if your not using SDL then the chances are your not seeing the issue.

Normally I would not put together quick posts with small code snippets (I tend to direct people to code and tell them to work it out ) but as several people pointed out to me recently ScummVM for the OpenPandora works around a ‘feature’ in the SDL build on the device that causes relative screen coordinates to be returned to the event stack when you hit the screen edges with the touchscreen. In essence this is a code fix for the ‘cursor drift’ bug people report.

Nubs, mice, in fact any relative input device are fine, it is absolute input devices like the touchscreen that ‘drift’ and end up offset making some types of application unusable with the touchscreen (ScummVM was one of them).

As the same issue seems to cause problems several other applications on the OpenPandora I thought I would do a quick howto with a work around and give a little background on the issue.

Symptoms:

After calling SDL_ShowCursor(SDL_DISABLE); and instantiating the SDL_Surface that contains whatever you want to blit as your custom cursor you will find that touchscreen presses on the sides of the touchscreen will cause the pointer to drift.

This leads to future touchscreen presses being offset from the cursor position. Relative devices (i.e. Mice/Nubs etc.) are no effected and carry on updating the cursor as normal.

What is actually happening is that SDL is reverting to returning relative X and Y’s at the screen edges even when your using something that only works with absolute values and is asking for/checking the absolute values (i.e. a touchscreen ).

Work Around:

The work around for the issue is very simple (well in fact there are several work around’s, I’ll just highlight the one I choose to use in ScummVM).

To fix the issue you need to get SDL to behave the same way with the SDL Cursor hidden as it does with it shown. The simplest way to do this is not hide the SDL Cursor, ok that’s not very helpful as it will give you a bog standard SDL Cursor printed over the top of your nice fancy cursor. What if you could hide the SDL Cursor without disabling it?

Yep, the fix really is as simple as that, just leave the SDL Cursor enabled but use SDL_CreateCursor to create an empty transparent cursor. This way all you will see is your nice custom cursor but SDL internally will behave using the logic path for SDL_ShowCursor(SDL_ENABLE);

Other options may include playing with calls to SDL_MoveCursor() or playing with the status of the SDL WM Grab features. I’ll leave the reader to work them out.

Sample Workaround Code:

static SDL_Cursor *hiddenCursor;

void someSDLinit() {
    …
    …
    uint8_t hiddenCursorData = 0;
    …
    … (Init SDL here)
    …
    hiddenCursor = SDL_CreateCursor(&hiddenCursorData, &hiddenCursorData, 8, 1, 0, 0);
    …
    /* On the OpenPandora we need to work around an SDL assumption that
       returns relative mouse coordinates when you get to the screen
       edges using the touchscreen and a custom surface for the cursor.
       The workaround is to set a blank SDL cursor and NOT disable it
       (Hackish I know).

       The root issues lies in the Windows Manager GRAB code in SDL.
       That is why the issue is not seen on framebuffer devices like the
       GP2X (there is no X window manager ).
    */
    SDL_ShowCursor(SDL_ENABLE);
    SDL_SetCursor(hiddenCursor);
    …}

void someSDLdeinit() {
    …
    SDL_FreeCursor(hiddenCursor);
    …
    …
}

Why does it happen?

The problem stems from the way SDL handles Window Manager grabbing at the edges of the surface when full screen.

To quote a comment from part of the SDL source that illustrates the point:

/* Determine whether the mouse should be in relative mode or not.
   This function is called when the input grab state or cursor
   visibility state changes.
   If the cursor is not visible, and the input is grabbed, the
   driver can place the mouse in relative mode, which may result
   in higher accuracy sampling of the pointer motion.
*/

There is some debate about this representing a bug in SDL or ‘expected behaviour’ when you have hidden the cursor. You would never see the issue with a relative input device only absolute devices.

This could be patched at the SDL level and in fact that maybe desirable (I am personally not in favour of patching this in SDL just for the OpenPandora, there needs to be a more generic fix). But either way, the work around above will work regardless of any SDL patching and continue to work.

I hope this quick fix is valuable to people, it may provide some quick fixes to applications that exhibit the problem .

Regards,

John

This post is to announce the release of a testing preview of the upcoming 1.2.0 ScummVM release for the OpenPandora handheld.

It is a little later (and a bit close to the final 1.2.0 release date) than I would have liked but that’s real life for you, always getting in the way of perfectly good hacking time .

This release supersedes any recent ‘SVN’ builds you may be using and should provide a very good indication of what to expect in the final 1.2.0 release for the OpenPandora.

Note: Please don’t mirror or hotlink these preview/test/alpha etc. releases or put them on download services but rather, direct people to this site.

This helps me ensure that users always have the most recent versions.

Also note that these test releases are not officially (or unofficially) supported but I will help if I can.

I am hoping to get at least another preview release out for the OpenPandora before the final 1.2.0 release as I carry on fixing bugs. This is why it is important to provide feedback, patches, fixes etc.

Please give these releases a go and provide feedback.

Noteworthy features:

Below are the main features and fixes added with this new release since the unofficial 1.1.1 preview.

Performance improvements over earlier releases.

Add support for Touchscreen ‘Tap Modes’, Left Click, Right Click and Hover and ‘Trigger Tap’ .

Small tweak to the touchscreen to stop the cursor ‘drifting’ when outside the game area.

Revised the button layout (please read http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=OpenPandora for more info and controls), feedback on the button layouts is appreciated.

TODO List:

Add support for a proper ‘Left Handed Mode’ (the current setup supports left handed use but is not IMHO optimal).

Make the ‘Trigger Tap’ configurable by the user.

Anything on the TODO may not happen in time for the 1.2.0 release, it is all rather dependent on my free time and that is at a premium at the moment.

Supported engines:

These releases feature support for all the game engines enabled for the upcoming ScummVM 1.2.0 including support for the SCI engine (early SCI games) and adding Fascination support in the Gob engine (remember, it’s really not a children’s game).

Full details of what you can expect to see in 1.2.0 can be found in the testing news post.

Providing feedback:

If you would like me to consider a feature or fix a bug help me to help you by ensuring the reports end up recorded in official places.

• Bug Reports (ScummVM’s Sourceforge bug tracker)
• Feature Requests (ScummVM’s Sourceforge feature tracker)
  • Source Code Patches (ScummVM’s Sourceforge patch tracker)
  • General Forum Feedback (ScummVM’s OpenPandora device forum, I also check any official news posts I make to the GP32x forums or OpenPandora forums)

Downloads:

• download (Uncompressed PND, 17meg) | download (PND in tar.bz2 archive, 6meg)

To install just download and extract the contents of the archive and copy the resulting scummvm-op.pnd to the following folder on your SD card (or USB2 stick):

/pandora/menu –> This will cause the ScummVM app icon to show up in the Xfce menu sorted by category.
/pandora/desktop –> This will cause the ScummVM app to appear as an icon on the Desktop of Xfce.

Either folder will also ensure the application icon shows up in MiniMenu.

To run, just select the icon as normal, the ScummVM GUI will start up and you can add games as you would normally do with any other ScummVM release (including Mass Add).

Review the documentation (added to the Documentation menu in your launcher when the PND is loaded) and http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=OpenPandora for more information.

Regards,

John Willis

This post is to announce the release of a testing preview of the upcoming 1.2.0 ScummVM release for the GPH (GamePark Holdings) devices I support.

This release supersedes recent ‘SVN’ builds as should provide a very good indication of what to expect in the final 1.2.0 release.

Note: Please don’t mirror or hotlink these preview/test/alpha etc. releases or put them on download services but rather, direct people to this site.

This helps me ensure that users always have the most recent versions.

Also note that these test releases are not officially (or unofficially) supported but I will help if I can.

I am hoping to get at least another preview release out for the GPH devices before the final 1.2.0 release as I carry on fixing bugs. This is why it is important to provide feedback, patches, fixes etc.

Please give these releases a go and provide feedback.

Noteworthy features:

Below are the main features and fixes added with this new release.

ALL:

Changes to the way the music drivers are loaded (should fix game loading issues).

Performance improvements.

Add support for TouchScreen ‘Tap Modes’, Left Click, Right Click and Hover.

GP2X:

Performance tweaks/code clean-up (quite noticeable in some areas, not giving up on the old GP2X any time soon).

Revised the button layout (please read http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=GP2X for more info), feedback on the button layouts is appreciated.

GP2X Wiz:

Fixes to 16 bit graphics support (still not sure this is 100% working well).

Revised the button layout (please read http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=GP2XWiz for more info), feedback on the button layouts is appreciated.

Caanoo:

Revised the button layout (please read http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=Caanoo for more info), feedback on the button layouts is appreciated.

TODO List:

ALL:

Add support for a ‘Left Handed Mode’ (swapping the Left and Right trigger behaviour).

Make the ‘Trigger Tap’ configurable by the user.

Anything on the TODO may not happen in time for the 1.2.0 release, it is all rather dependent on my free time and that is at a premium at the moment.

Supported engines:

These releases feature support for all the game engines enabled for the upcoming ScummVM 1.2.0 including support for the SCI engine (early SCI games) and adding Fascination support in the Gob engine (remember, it’s really not a children’s game).

Full details of what you can expect to see in 1.2.0 can be found in the testing news post.

Specific restrictions:

Each of the platforms has a small number of restrictions and quirks that have an affect on the games/engines you are able to use well with said platform.

GP2X: The biggest restriction with this platform is the overhead of the scaling when using 640*480 games on the 320*240 screen making such game perform relatively poorly.

GP2X Wiz:  I have spotted a minor issue where the screen is not totally cleaned when some types of screen movement occur, that combined with the Wiz’s LCD tearing can lead to the odd graphics glitch.

Caanoo: This backend is new, it’s not as well tested as I would like, I think I have most of the ‘show stoppers’ fixed in this preview but expect minor bugs and kinks.

SCI Engine: This game engine is a big and complex beast. Performance is not yet as optimised as I would like for devices like the GPH handhelds.

Providing feedback:

If you would like me to consider a feature or fix a bug help me to help you by ensuring the reports end up recorded in official places.

• Bug Reports (ScummVM’s Sourceforge bug tracker)
• Feature Requests (ScummVM’s Sourceforge feature tracker)
  • Source Code Patches (ScummVM’s Sourceforge patch tracker)
  • General Forum Feedback (ScummVM’s GPH device forum, I also check any official news posts I make to the GP32x forums)

Downloads:

Please ensure you download the correct version for your GPH device.

• GP2X: download

Extract the contents of the archive to a folder your SD card.

Launch “ScummVM” from the main SD launcher menu.

Review the README-GP2X and http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=GP2X for more information.

• GP2X Wiz: download

Extract the contents of the archive to the game folder on your SD card, ensuring that you have a “scummvm.ini” in your game folder and the rest of ScummVM in a “scummvm” subfolder.

Launch “ScummVM” from the main SD launcher menu to run.

Review the README-GP2XWIZ and http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=GP2XWiz for more information.

• Caanoo: download

Extract the contents of the archive to the game folder on your SD card, ensuring that you have a “scummvm.ini” in your game folder and the rest of ScummVM in a “scummvm” subfolder.

Launch “ScummVM” from the main launcher menu to run.

Review the README-CAANOO and http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=Caanoo for more information.

Regards,

John Willis

This is just a quick post is to announce a new set of SVN builds of ScummVM mainline code for the GP2X Wiz and new Caanoo.

Note: Please don’t mirror or hotlink these preview/test/alpha etc. releases or put them on download services but rather, direct people to this site.

This helps me ensure that users always have the most recent versions.

Also note that these test releases are not officially (or unofficially) supported but I will help if I can.

This release is mainly to give users a chance to preview updates to some of my ScummVM backends and try a bug fixed version of the Caanoo port with working controls. They are not by any means bug free.

All of my backends will get further preview/test releases before the 1.2.0 release as I carry on fixing bugs.

These releases are built straight from the mainline trunk ScummVM code for the given SVN revision number.

OpenPandora and original GP2X ScummVM SVN releases should be ready late next week (very busy with work at the moment). The GP2X code is being merged in with the Wiz and Caanoo to create a GPH backend so expect the GP2X to get all the new features from it’s siblings. The OpenPandora code has now been merged into ScummVM but is still in need of a lot of bug fixing.

Please give these releases a go and provide feedback.

New features since r52440 releases:

Below are the main features and fixes added with this new release.

GP2X Wiz:

Fixes to 16 bit graphics support.
Revised the button layout (please read http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=GP2XWiz for more info), feedback on the button layouts is appreciated.
Add support for TouchScreen ‘Tap Modes’, Left Click, Right Click and Hover.
Performance tweaks/code cleanup.

Caanoo:

Solved the annoying issues with the button layout (please read http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=Caanoo for more info), feedback on the button layouts is appreciated.
Add support for TouchScreen ‘Tap Modes’, Left Click, Right Click and Hover.
Performance of this new backend should be similar/better than the GP2X Wiz.

Caanoo support will become official with the upcoming 1.2.0 ScummVM release.

Known Snags:

If a game fails to run/crashes out try changing the following in the ScummVM global options before reporting the failure:

• Music Device: AdLib
• AdLib Emulator: MAME OPL (or DOSbox OPL if you prefer, more CPU but also more accurate)

I am still trying to get to the bottom of what is causing this bug.

Supported engines:

These releases feature support for all the game engines supported in ScummVM 1.1.1 and additionally include support for testing the SCI engine (early SCI games) and for testing Fascination support in the Gob engine (remember, it’s really not a children’s game). It is the testing of these engines that is the main motivation behind the release.

Specific restrictions:

Each of the releases has a small number of restrictions that have an affect on the games/engines you are able to use with each platform.

Caanoo: This backend is new, it’s not as well tested as I would like, I think I have most of the ‘show stoppers’ fixed in this new preview but expect bugs and kinks.

Feedback appreciated.

GP2X Wiz:  I have spotted a minor issue where the screen is not totally cleaned when some types of screen movement occur, that combined with the Wiz’s LCD tearing can lead to the odd graphics glitch.

SCI Engine: This game engine is a big and complex beast. Performance is not yet optimised for handhelds like the Wiz/Caanoo.

Providing feedback:

If you would like me to consider a feature or fix a bug help me to help you by ensuring the reports end up recorded in official places.

• Bug Reports (ScummVM’s Sourceforge bug tracker)
• Feature Requests (ScummVM’s Sourceforge feature tracker)
  • Source Code Patches (ScummVM’s Sourceforge patch tracker)
  • General Forum Feedback (ScummVM’s GP2X/GP2X Wiz/Caanoo forum, I also check any official news posts I make to the GP32x forums)

Downloads:

Please ensure you download the correct version for your device.

• GP2X Wiz: download

Extract the contents of the zip to the game folder on your SD card, ensuring that you have a “scummvm.ini” in your game folder and the rest of ScummVM in a “scummvm” subfolder.

Launch “ScummVM” from the main SD launcher menu to run.

Review the README-GP2XWIZ and http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=GP2XWiz for more information.

• Caanoo: download

Extract the contents of the zip to the game folder on your SD card, ensuring that you have a “scummvm.ini” in your game folder and the rest of ScummVM in a “scummvm” subfolder.

Launch “ScummVM” from the main launcher menu to run.

Review the README-CAANOO and http://wiki.scummvm.org/index.php?title=Caanoo for more information.

Regards,

John

This is just a quick post is to announce a set of SVN builds of ScummVM mainline code for the GP2X Wiz and new Caanoo,.

“Edit 05/09/2010: Thanks for the feedback on the control issues on the Caanoo release, a fix is in the works.”

This release is mainly to support SCI testing and give users a chance to preview updates to some of my ScummVM backends.

These releases are build straight from the mainline trunk ScummVM code for the given SVN revision number.

An OpenPandora and original GP2X ScummVM SVN release should follow next week(ish). Been a little busy to track down some bugs in them.

Note: Please don’t mirror or hotlink these preview/test/alpha etc. releases or put them on download services but rather, direct people to this page.

This helps me ensure that users always have the most recent versions.

Also note that these test releases are not officially (or unofficially) supported .

Please give these releases a go and provide feedback.

New features since 1.1.1 releases:

Below are the main features and fixes added with this new release.

GP2X Wiz: Further cleanup to the downscaling support. Most of the glitching that has been seen in previous releases should now be gone.

A few small performance tweaks.

Caanoo: The Caanoo is GamePark Holdings new console and it is based on a slightly upgraded version of the platform used for the GP2X Wiz.

Performance of this new backend should be similar/better to the GP2X Wiz. It’s also VERY new so expect a few snags and issues.

I hope to make Caanoo support official with the upcoming 1.2.0 ScummVM release.

Supported engines:

These releases feature support for all the game engines supported in ScummVM 1.1.1 and additionally include support for testing the SCI engine (early SCI games) and for testing Fascination support in the Gob engine (remember, it’s really not a children’s game). It is the testing of these engines that is the main motivation behind the release.

Specific restrictions:

Each of the releases has a small number of restrictions that have an affect on the games/engines you are able to use with each platform.

Caanoo: The biggest restriction of this backend is simple. I have not tested it as I do not yet own a Caanoo (it’s in the mail). Several testers have tried it and told me it works well but it has been coded blind. Feedback appreciated.

GP2X Wiz:  I have spotted a minor issue where the screen is not totally cleaned when some types of screen movement occur, that combined with the Wiz’s LCD tearing can lead to the odd graphics glitch.

Providing feedback:

If you would like me to consider a feature or fix a bug help me to help you by ensuring the reports end up recorded in official places.

• Bug Reports (ScummVM’s Sourceforge bug tracker)
• Feature Requests (ScummVM’s Sourceforge feature tracker)
  • Source Code Patches (ScummVM’s Sourceforge patch tracker)
  • General Forum Feedback (ScummVM’s GP2X/GP2X Wiz/Caanoo forum, I also check any official news posts I make to the GP32x forums)

Downloads:

Please ensure you download the correct version for your device.

• GP2X Wiz: download

Extract the contents of the zip to the game folder on your SD card, ensuring that you have a “scummvm.ini” in your game folder and the rest of ScummVM in a “scummvm” subfolder.

Launch “ScummVM” from the main SD launcher menu to run.

Review the README-GP2XWIZ for more information.

• Caanoo: download

Extract the contents of the zip to the game folder on your SD card, ensuring that you have a “scummvm.ini” in your game folder and the rest of ScummVM in a “scummvm” subfolder.

Launch “ScummVM” from the main launcher menu to run.

Review the README-CAANOO for more information.

Regards,

John