**** BEGIN LOGGING AT Thu Apr 21 02:59:58 2011
Apr 21 09:22:34 <mokomoko> Greetings, gents.
Apr 21 09:23:27 <mokomoko> I'm playing with the I2C bus on the Freerunner, I've attached some DIY hardware and I've got the communication going. But there is a problem....
Apr 21 09:24:11 <mokomoko> Does any one know why there is a mandatory 20ms delay between read/write operations on the I2C bus, even when the slave acknowledges immediately?
Apr 21 09:24:29 <mokomoko> this is really killing my system's performance...
Apr 21 09:24:48 <PaulFertser> mokomoko: hi there. I'm sorry but it's unlikely you get a response here.
Apr 21 09:25:00 <mokomoko> ok. where should I look?
Apr 21 09:25:25 <PaulFertser> mokomoko: do you know about the "navigational board" for freerunner? It has some additional sensors and kernel drivers ready, you can try to look through it for the reference.
Apr 21 09:25:35 <PaulFertser> mokomoko: and write an e-mail to the guy who did the drivers.
Apr 21 09:25:50 <PaulFertser> (i'm not sure if it was spi or i2c...)
Apr 21 09:26:01 <mokomoko> ok... good enough. :) Thank you Paul.
Apr 21 09:26:26 <PaulFertser> mokomoko: hth :)
Apr 21 09:26:26 <mokomoko> is there another IRC channel where I can go with this question?
Apr 21 09:26:49 <PaulFertser> mokomoko: #openmoko-cdevel but your question is too specific i'm afraid, there's not much hardware hackers around unfortunately.
Apr 21 09:27:28 <PaulFertser> mokomoko: you can try to get ahold of Werner (wpwrak) there, he had quite some fun with this stuff.
Apr 21 09:27:32 <mokomoko> yeah, I know... I bet it's just a SW-side problem or config, but it does take a HW hacker to know about it...
Apr 21 09:27:53 <mokomoko> cool, thx. 
Apr 21 09:28:08 <PaulFertser> mokomoko: btw, do you mean the delay comes from the kernel driver?
Apr 21 09:29:35 <mokomoko> not sure, but I bet that it does. first, it corresponds to 2 jiffies; second, there is nothing in the bus that prevents faster communication; third there is nothing in the SW that causes the delay. So it should be the kernel/driver, or the master's HW config which goes the same place.
Apr 21 09:37:08 <mokomoko> I'm using the generic file open(), ioctl(), read(), write() function from Python, which pretty much map directly onto syscalls, so it shouldn't be a Python thing, right? Obviously, I'm opening the device with zero buffering...
Apr 21 10:12:14 <gremmachook> Hi, just read about the Wikireader. It's an offline reader right?
Apr 21 10:12:48 <SpeedEvil> yes
Apr 21 10:12:52 <gremmachook> How is the data stored on the device in an offline state? ZIM files?
Apr 21 10:13:09 <SpeedEvil> It's some sort of archive of which I don't recall the details.
Apr 21 10:13:28 <SpeedEvil> You can put your own content on
Apr 21 10:13:36 <gremmachook> Must be either ZIM or ZENO, or is there another one?
Apr 21 10:13:43 <SpeedEvil> Why must it be?
Apr 21 10:13:47 <gremmachook> You mean, add content on the go?
Apr 21 10:13:58 <SpeedEvil> No - load on with a PC
Apr 21 10:14:09 <mjr> iirc they rolled their own, for maximal compressibility and indexability given their constraints
Apr 21 10:14:10 <SpeedEvil> Swap the SD
Apr 21 10:14:14 <mjr> but dunno
Apr 21 10:14:17 <gremmachook> They are the popular ones, hence. But I'd like to know.
Apr 21 10:14:24 <gremmachook> Ok.
Apr 21 10:14:24 <SpeedEvil> yeah - that
Apr 21 10:14:39 <SpeedEvil> The processor is tiny
Apr 21 10:14:52 <SpeedEvil> And can't cope with 'best for PC' files
Apr 21 10:14:52 <gremmachook> Yeah, a pretty awesome one too.
Apr 21 10:15:14 <gremmachook> ZIM are meant for devices usually.
Apr 21 10:15:21 <gremmachook> Of such form factor.
Apr 21 10:16:01 <SpeedEvil> It's not a generic content device.
Apr 21 10:16:14 <SpeedEvil> It's specifically meant and optimised for wikipedia.
Apr 21 10:16:20 <SpeedEvil> well - wiki content
Apr 21 10:16:48 <SpeedEvil> there is support for some text formatting, black and white images (?) and not much more
Apr 21 10:17:16 <gremmachook> Ah, okay. 
Apr 21 10:17:31 <SpeedEvil> Oh - no images
Apr 21 10:18:04 <gremmachook> Only text?
Apr 21 10:18:15 <gremmachook> That's a bummer.
Apr 21 10:18:28 <SpeedEvil> It was very much designed to a price.
Apr 21 10:18:47 <SpeedEvil> It does what it does well, but that is looking mroe and more limited over time.
Apr 21 10:19:03 <gremmachook> Was it designed for emerging markets?
Apr 21 10:19:09 <SpeedEvil> No.
Apr 21 10:19:30 <SpeedEvil> I'm not sure who it was aimed at really.
Apr 21 10:19:53 <SpeedEvil> It has great battery life (for the time), and is not as flexible as a computer, with less to go wrong.
Apr 21 10:20:11 <PaulFertser> gremmachook: iirc it has some support for b&w images.
Apr 21 10:20:12 <SpeedEvil> Some people like single purpoise devices.
Apr 21 10:20:14 <PaulFertser> And math formulas
Apr 21 10:20:32 <gremmachook> PaulFertser, Just saw some screenshots..
Apr 21 10:21:25 <SpeedEvil> But the hardware is somewhat left behind.
Apr 21 10:21:30 <SpeedEvil> http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Mini-STM32-Board-STM32F103VCT6-3-2-LCD-Touch-Panel-JTAG-/190506664508?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2c5b15023c - for example
Apr 21 10:23:30 <gremmachook> SpeedEvil, Yeah, Chinese stuff are available at such low rates.
Apr 21 10:24:19 <SpeedEvil> I mean more the BOM - that has to be made in fairly small quantities - and still sell at a profit
Apr 21 10:24:32 <SpeedEvil> But it's got all of the stuff needed for the wikireader.
Apr 21 10:24:59 <gremmachook> Also, what's the current state of the freerunner? Is it still in dev?
Apr 21 10:25:09 <mjr> not really
Apr 21 10:25:28 <gremmachook> These new OS's killed it. :(
Apr 21 10:25:33 <mjr> some third party people are making new innards for the phone under the name gta04
Apr 21 10:25:41 <SpeedEvil> IMO - OM killed it.
Apr 21 10:25:54 <gremmachook> Huh? Why so?
Apr 21 10:26:16 <SpeedEvil> By basically not sticking to one 'OS' - and shipping it.
Apr 21 10:26:49 <SpeedEvil> They could have had a saleable phone for geeks with a working and stable phone stack, and GTK and little else by christmas 2007.
Apr 21 10:27:04 <SpeedEvil> But they went off on a lot of wild goose-chases.
Apr 21 10:27:19 <SpeedEvil> Aimed at making it an awesome phone for everyone.
Apr 21 10:27:47 <SpeedEvil> And failing to realise that the herd of elephants coming over the horizong that other phone makers were.
Apr 21 10:28:15 <gremmachook> They should have seen that really.
Apr 21 10:28:49 <mjr> SpeedEvil, probably fair, yes
Apr 21 10:31:00 <gremmachook> Ok, I'll try asking about the way of storage probably on the mailing list.
Apr 21 10:31:18 <SpeedEvil> google - the file format is out ther.
Apr 21 10:31:25 <SpeedEvil> It's nothing normal, it's custom.
Apr 21 18:39:17 <PBeck> hi
**** ENDING LOGGING AT Fri Apr 22 02:59:57 2011