Any experience with pilot-link?

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops (More info?)

In article <cs3j32$pa$1@reader2.panix.com>, Paul Ciszek wrote:
> the first thing I need to do is make a hard link from the serial port
> my cradle is plugged in to to /dev/pilot. Well, my cradle (a Clie
> cable, actually) is plugged in to a USB port, as are most cradles
> these days.

Actually, a symlink will do. Second, the Palms, when syncing,
present themselves as a USB serial connection. You probably want
to set up a symlink from /dev/pilot to /dev/ttyUSB1.

The Handspring ones were the first to do USB syncs, and the
information still applies to other models, like the Clies:

http://usbvisor.sourceforge.net/
http://www.linuxpda.com/visor/howto/current/

The only real gotcha is that the USB device doesn't exist until you
press the hotsync button. So *first* you hit hotsync, *then* you
start up pilot-link. (I can also recommend jpilot, a "Palm Desktop"
style app for Linux that uses pilot-link on the backend.)

--
Sincerely,

Ray Ingles (313) 227-2317

"Reinstall Windows once a year. Windows gets dirty over time,
just like the ones you have in the walls of your home."
- MS Combat Flight Simulator 2 manual, chapter 1, page 18

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops (More info?)

In article <slrncualmn.q67.sorceror@dmc22317.local>,
Ray Ingles <sorceror171@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> Actually, a symlink will do. Second, the Palms, when syncing,
>present themselves as a USB serial connection. You probably want
>to set up a symlink from /dev/pilot to /dev/ttyUSB1.

1) Not ttyUSB0?

2) It looks like all of the ttyUSB's are in a subdirectory /dev/usb/;
I hope that /dev/usb/ttyUSB1 or 0 works just as well.

>start up pilot-link. (I can also recommend jpilot, a "Palm Desktop"
>style app for Linux that uses pilot-link on the backend.)

Where do I find it?

--
Please reply to: | "When the press is free and every man
pciszek at panix dot com | able to read, all is safe."
Autoreply has been disabled | --Thomas Jefferson

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops (More info?)

In article <cs4ohl$f7s$1@reader2.panix.com>, Paul Ciszek wrote:
> In article <slrncualmn.q67.sorceror@dmc22317.local>,
> Ray Ingles <sorceror171@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Actually, a symlink will do. Second, the Palms, when syncing,
>>present themselves as a USB serial connection. You probably want
>>to set up a symlink from /dev/pilot to /dev/ttyUSB1.
>
> 1) Not ttyUSB0?

Yup, ttyUSB1, not ttyUSB0. It's on the *second* USBserial connection,
apparently they reserved the first one for a debugger or something.

> 2) It looks like all of the ttyUSB's are in a subdirectory /dev/usb/;
> I hope that /dev/usb/ttyUSB1 or 0 works just as well.

No problem there.

>>start up pilot-link. (I can also recommend jpilot, a "Palm Desktop"
>>style app for Linux that uses pilot-link on the backend.)
>
> Where do I find it?

Google should turn it up pretty fast. It's like the third hit.
It's probably already in your Linux distribution anyway.

--
Sincerely,

Ray Ingles (313) 227-2317

"Most of us term SCO a 'Strong Sell' since there isn't any
'Radioactive' recommendation."

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops (More info?)

On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 23:52:39 -0500, Richard Steiner wrote:

> Is the OS/2 port of pilot-link supported anymore? Mainly just curious,
> as it seems the older version I've been able to find has a bug when
> restoring (it stops prematurely).

No, it is not. I've asked for help maintaining it, and nobody has
stepped up to lend a hand. I will probably remove all OS/2 support by the
final 0.12.0 release.

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops (More info?)

In article <slrncualmn.q67.sorceror@dmc22317.local>,
Ray Ingles <sorceror171@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> The only real gotcha is that the USB device doesn't exist until you
>press the hotsync button. So *first* you hit hotsync, *then* you
>start up pilot-link. (I can also recommend jpilot, a "Palm Desktop"
>style app for Linux that uses pilot-link on the backend.)

OK, I found j-link in my Linux distro and installed it. It appeared
to work, and I hot-synced, but it left out the same addresses from my
address book that k-link did. What the @#$%^&*! is going on?

--
Please reply to: | "When the press is free and every man
pciszek at panix dot com | able to read, all is safe."
Autoreply has been disabled | --Thomas Jefferson

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops (More info?)

Here in comp.sys.palmtops,
"David A. Desrosiers" <hacker@gnu-designs.com> spake unto us, saying:

>On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 23:52:39 -0500, Richard Steiner wrote:
>
>> Is the OS/2 port of pilot-link supported anymore? Mainly just curious,
>> as it seems the older version I've been able to find has a bug when
>> restoring (it stops prematurely).
>
> No, it is not. I've asked for help maintaining it, and nobody has
>stepped up to lend a hand. I will probably remove all OS/2 support by the
>final 0.12.0 release.

Where have you asked? I see no record of anything in the mailing lists
or OS/2 newsgroups that I follow.

There are a few mailing lists which are devoted to POSIX -> OS/2 ports
that might provide better results, or a posting to comp.os.os2.misc.

The fact that the existing OS/2 port (0.9.3) is somewhat broken might
have something to do with the lack of interest -- almost all Palm users
I know on the OS/2 side of life are using a Java-based solution. :-(

I would help as a tester if you had any interest, but unfortunately I'm
not a developer myself.

--
-Rich Steiner >>>---> http://www.visi.com/~rsteiner >>>---> Smyrna, GA USA
OS/2 + eCS + Linux + Win95 + DOS + PC/GEOS + Executor = PC Hobbyist Heaven!
WARNING: I've seen FIELDATA FORTRAN V and I know how to use it!
The Theorem Theorem: If If, Then Then.

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops (More info?)

Here in comp.sys.palmtops,
"David A. Desrosiers" <hacker@gnu-designs.com> spake unto us, saying:

>On Sat, 15 Jan 2005 18:45:08 -0500, Richard Steiner wrote:
>
>> Where have you asked? I see no record of anything in the mailing lists
>> or OS/2 newsgroups that I follow.
>
> On the os2-pda mailing list a couple of years back now. I'm not
>sure its archived. There's about 1 message every couple of months at most
>nowadays.

That's not a list I follow (or even knew about, admittedly), so it's
likely that I wouldn't have seen it. Not that it matters -- my level
of programming knowledge via EMX under OS/2 is such that I can do a
little Hello World demo using ncurses and not much else. :-)

> I would love to help, if I could get a copy of OS/2 installed
>on my Thinkpad. Unfortunately, the version I have here (from Indelible)
>refuses to install, and crashes early on in the boot process with some
>error in CONFIG.SYS that I couldn't decipher.

Hmmm. Which version of OS/2? If you were to start a thread over in
c.o.o.misc about it, someone might be able to provide better answers
(I think there are a few ThinkPad users still active).

Just a thought, anyway. There are a couple of real jerks in the OS/2
newsgroups, but there are still enough active users to make it a good
place for technical questions.

>> The fact that the existing OS/2 port (0.9.3) is somewhat broken might
>> have something to do with the lack of interest -- almost all Palm users
>> I know on the OS/2 side of life are using a Java-based solution. :-(
>
> Not jSyncManager, I hope.

Yeah, that would be the one. I'm not much into Java software myself.

I personally use the Win32-to-OS/2 on-the-fly translator called Odin
from odin.netlabs.org to run the Win32 version of Palm Desktop 3.1.1
under Warp 4, and it seems to work for routine hotsynching and such.

It also runs the PalmPix plugin flawlessly, which makes my camera a lot
more useful than I would otherwise be. :-)

If it weren't for Odin, I'd probably be using jSynchManager too.

>> I would help as a tester if you had any interest, but unfortunately I'm
>> not a developer myself.
>
> Actually, that would be beneficial, if I could get a machine
>running OS/2 actually working here. Any hints or tips?

If you flipped me an e-mail describing the symptoms you're seeing, I
might have some ideas, but I don't know anything about Thinkpads (the
only IBM hardware I have are a pair of IntelliStations, and those are
quite OS/2-friendly).

> I ran out of steam after spending a week just trying to get it
>installed on any hardware I have here. I'm suspecting the disks I got from
>Indelible were corrupt at the burn level (physically, they're intact).

If you got them from Indelible Blue, it's been a little while. :-)

The latest version (Warp 4) is sometimes available on eBay for not a
lot of money.

If a couple hundred bucks isn't an issue, you might want to consider
looking at eComStation 1.2, which is the latest version of OS/2 being
marketed by Serenity Systems. They've bundled all of IBM's fixes in
the packages plus a lot of third-party software, and the installation
is a lot more flexible (and new hardware friendly) than OS/2 is.

I've seen people give copies away from time to time, also, and if you
are a developer with software that might be of interest (like I think
pilot-link would be), perhaps someone would be willing to donate a copy
of OS/2 to help the cause. It might be worth asking about that in the
OS/2 newsgroups, too. :-)

--
-Rich Steiner >>>---> http://www.visi.com/~rsteiner >>>---> Smyrna, GA USA
OS/2 + eCS + Linux + Win95 + DOS + PC/GEOS + Executor = PC Hobbyist Heaven!
WARNING: I've seen FIELDATA FORTRAN V and I know how to use it!
The Theorem Theorem: If If, Then Then.