I decided to try the Route66 package when I read the
article in Maximum Linux, and love some of
the ideas, but have problems with others...but that's the beauty of roll-your-own
solutions. Anyone can find something to complain about with any solution they're handed,
but when you hold all the code and know the architecture, you can do something about it.
Also...who says it just has to play MP3s? That's acutally going to be secondary
functionality next to recording GPS data, watching engine performance among other things I
have planned.
I've managed to cobble together a system with items I had laying around the house (I
understand not everyone is able to do this, but for me this was a valid solution). I use a
Toshiba Techra 500CDT laptop for the linux box (already hardened to the environment and
fast enough to handle several tasks, but unfortunately I have to run an inverter some of
the time if I'm playing for more than a couple hours). The display was a bit more of a
challenge as I didn't have a Matrix-Orbital,
and found their price a little more than I was really interested in forking out at this
time. I did however have on old PalmIII with a broken motherboard. $35 to PalmMedic later, I had just a plain old PalmIII
hmmm... what's this??? a compact LCD with backlight AND touchscreen...hmmm... A quick
search on Google , and voila... PalmOrb a (somewhat
bare-bones) Matrix-Orbital emulator for your Palm!!! What it doesn't have any buttons?
Well fortunately it's under the GNU licence, and after a few evenings of setting up a PalmOS development environment (on the Route66 box) and
learning not only how to code C++, but also how to code for the Palm, I had all the functionality needed for "PalmOrb
for Route66".
You can download the results below
PalmOrb for Route66 .PRC file |
 |
PalmOrb for Route66 Source Tarball |
|
Thanks to J Robert Ray for his work thus far on PalmOrb v0.1, and Ander for his work on
Route-66.
Before this I had no experience with SQL, but I'm now laying out my new schema, and going
to start work on my own management system... but the point to all this is, that thanks to
Route66, I now know how to do far more than I did when I started. I've had to dabble with
(and gain confidence with) MySQL, C++, PalmOS, and some areas of Linux that I've never
touched before thanks to the laptop install. Don't look at this as a lot of work and too
expensive toy, but a challenge and building valuable skills.
Keep checking back here for more news and developments not only with my continuing
development of PalmOrb, but also the development of my in-car player.
Things that I'd like/need to do;
-power supply for the PalmIII with 2/3 AAA rechargable batteries (space left for integral charging circuit).
-Figure out the mechanical mounting of the cradle and PalmIII
-Add configureability to PalmOrb for things like bps rate, buttons and a whole mess of other things
-Write a player and management utilities that better serve my need (which I'll document here in the future)
Oh yeah... my costs for the whole deal
$34.45 - PalmIII Motherboard
$ 4.25 - Pair of AAAs
=======
$38.70
Email me with questions, comments or whatever else...
