[WLANware] SoC Applicant

[Mitar]

Hi!

On Mon, Apr 12, 2010 at 3:13 AM, Charles Boyd <csboyd07 at gmail.com> wrote:
> I am currently using the Motorola Droid. Would this project require a Dev
> phone?

No, but it requires a rooted phone as we have to do things in unofficial ways.

You can always try to get into contact with Google and get official
support for OLSR. But I think is really take a long time because even
getting official support for ad-hoc is taking its time:

http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=82

> I imagine there isn't a great deal of complexity with coding for the N900 since
> (as I understand it), the N900 can run applications from ARM debian packages
> with minimal modification.

Depends on what would we like to see in GUI. So you would have to code
the GUI, not just compile. So it could take time to do it.

> Would the GUI for the N900 be programmed in C or Java?

C/C++. And probably use Qt. But this code could be used for the "main"
OLSR GUI meant to run on PCs. But this all we can discuss later.

> That is, would the GUI for the two projects actually be sharing any amount
> of code (with modifications) - or will they be sharing an abstract design
> goal?

I think just the later. On Android you use special SDK and also
different GUI concepts so I am not sure there is some way to really
share something. Unless you want to make some abstraction/description
language and then converter to Android & Java and Qt & C/C++. :-)

> Do you think this would be worthwhile? Could/Should I start working on that
> immediately? I think writing content to the wiki (related to this project in
> particular) would be a good way to familiarize myself with the tools that I
> would be working with. Translating wiki articles would be a kind of
> preliminary study.

I think this would be really useful. More and more we are trying to
combine our networks internationally. Even this GSoC is a
collaboration of multiple networks (like Freifunk, Funkfeuer, Ninux,
wlan ljubljana) and projects (like OpenWrt). So we are finding that we
have to share more.

http://interop.wlan-lj.net/

And sharing documentation is definitely something which is very
useful. And translations help in this.

But I think we should coordinate this a little bit more. Find a common
ground to do it so that there would be no wasted efforts. I am not
sure but I think Freifunk are planning on internationalizing its page
and maybe its wiki? So it could be good to coordinate with this. Also
maybe there is already somebody working on this? Some projects also
use WikiBooks to document things/manuals/tutorials. There is also
interop wiki page. This are just my ideas, lets hear also others.

> Android has great built-in support with Google Maps, it would be interesting
> to add a layer that shows regularly-updated network activity in the Maps
> view.

Exactly this is also what I would like to see. To have this GUI also
as a diagnostic tool for on-site debugging, planing and deployment. It
could be also interesting to combine it with some augmented reality
display of nodes but this is probably too much. ;-)

This is also one of things which would be harder to do on N900.

> What parts of the android OS pose significant problems?  I've been reading
> through some of the API on the Android developer website, it would be good
> to know what in particular to take note of.

First turn on ad-hoc compatibility. Then configure network interface.
Then run OLSR (with root privileges). Nothing of this is really a
problem, but it it unofficial behavior and we should do it
future-proof and with least tampering to Android system (not to break
other things).

So, you will have to learn about underlying system, not just official
documentation. We will use official documentation for GUI part, but
for putting the phone into the mesh we will have to play differently.


Mitar