webOS template project + Python + PyGame = Happy Developers

May 14, 2011 ezequielaceto

So I have created a sample C project for webOS 2 that bundles all your python files into an ipk (so you can distribute this app using the App Catalog) and also launched the Python interpreter when you click on it!
The only condition is that you have to copy all the Python interpreter + WebOS API + PyGame into /media/internal. You can do this just following this simple steps
1] Download this compressed files that contains: Python, PyGame and WebOS API to your computer
Python + PyGame for WebOS (Binaries)
2] Unpack and copy “python” directory to the root directory of your SD Card (must previously mount the phone as Mass Storage Device)
3] Download PDL-Python Template
PDL Template Project
4] Modify, add source code…. IMPORTANT: modify app name, package name
5] Copy the binary to “release”
6] Copy all python source code to “release” (or just work in that directory
7] Create a package with palm-package
8] Install it with palm-install
Have fun!

A picture is worth a thousand words…

May 14, 2011 ezequielaceto

Running Python from a SSH session on the Pre2

The python program…

Running a simple Python program on the Mac

Running the same simple Python program on the Pre2

The C code that launches the Python script (this code was embedded into a ipk file with the Python code)

Python and PyGame meet WebOS =)

May 12, 2011 ezequielaceto

The PalmPDK includes a toolchain of GCC in order to build C and C++ applications, and Python is a nice one. The idea behind this is to allow webOS to run Python apps, but what is more important for my is PyGame. If Python is able to run in webOS and PyGame works without much modifications, then a lot of game can be ported to webOS, and very nice applications can be done.
I wrote this idea in the Palm WebOS C/C++ a long time ago, and after a few tries without success, Thomas Perl got it working with the help of the WebOS Internals PDK http://thp.io/2011/webos/) He did a great job there, and also he is making a library for binding the Plug-In API using SWIG.
My idea now that this is working, and it works nice as you can see in Thomas’ website, is to create a “Python environment” application and a “template application”. The Python environment application will just check if you have the lastest binaries of Python + PyGame inside your SD Card (The complete Python and PyGame lib is nearly 27MBytes). If not, it will download it, and install in on the SD Card.
Once this is done, then it comes the time for the “template application”. This will be a standard SDL project, that will check if you have the “Python environment”. If not it will redirect you to the App. Catalog in order to install it. But if you have it, it will launch “main.py”, a file bundled in this project from where you can start writing your own python application.
The idea behind this is to make Python a popular language for creating games and application for WebOS. May be in a future even it’s bundled by default in WebOS and this will turn into a nice experience but useless. Until that happens, this solution seems to be very good.

webOS low level programming – basic app

March 12, 2011 ezequielaceto

For Windows and Mac OS, Palm provides a low level SDK called Plug-in Development Kit (PDK) which allows you to develop C and C++ native applications or plug-ins that can be called from a web app. In the OS X version of the PDK, a plug-in is installed in XCode (yes, you can use another IDE, but the installer gives a beautiful wizard for Xcode). So let’s create a simple application!

Inside Xcode, go to ‘File’ and click on ‘New Project’ (or Shift + Command + N). You will see a new template called SDL Application, and that is what we are going to create.

This action will create a project with a simple structure that includes some necessary files in order to run the application on your Mac. Yes, you can (fully) develop an SDL application in your Mac (or PC) and then use nearly the same code inside the Palm Pre. What is interesting about this project wizard is that includes all the header files needed, and a script file to build the project for the device.

I will add ‘-lpdl’ to ‘Other Linker Flags’which will let me do some specific calls to the OS. This has to be handle will care. Due to the fact that this functions are only available in webOS, you should place some define to avoid executing and compiling that code when building the app for the desktop simulator.

Let’s create an empty main.cpp file with it’s header file, and the start building the application step by step

Main.h includes SDL header file and also some Palm’s headers. What is more important, it will have definitions that will help running the app in the Mac and in the device properly.

Main.cpp has functions to initialize the screen, setup the device and handles events from the user interface.

The most important part of this tutorial comes now. How it looks like in the emulator? and how to build and deploy this application into the device?

For running this application on the emulator, comment the RUNNING_ON_DEVICE definition and press ‘Build and Run’ or ‘Build and Debug’ in Xcode. You will only see something a blank screen of 320×480 pixels as this application doesn’t do something more instersting.

Running inside the Palm Pre requires going to the terminal and editing a few script files. The wizard generates a file called ‘buildit_for_device.sh’ that gives us a hand with the build process but doesn’t help too much in the deployment process. This file must be editing in order to know where is the source code and how the output file is called. It will looks similar to this

As you may noticed, if you run this script, you will get a binary file called ‘simple’ app. Eventhough you can copy this file to the device and run the code, the recommended way is to generate a package and install that package using palm tools. So the next step involves packaging the application. As in the web application a description file is requiered. I created a STAGING directory and inside that directory created a file called ‘appinfo.json’ with the following content.