Status of gprs? (and a bit of a hello world)

[Tobias Diedrich]

Simon wrote:
> Hi there,
>   i'm new to smartphones, i recently got a used HTC TyTN (herm100),
> it's got winmobile on it and i cant stand it much longer!
[...]
> i love my eeepc and now i would like to enjoy openmoko on my pda!
[...]

So...
Do I get you right, you want to install OpenMoko on your HTC?
Or do you have another device (PDA) you want to install it on?

I don't want to discourage you, but if Linux does not already run on
the device in question, than you'll likely have to reverse engineer
the booting/flashing process and hardware details for the Phone/PDA.
(If no one else has done it yet)

At least the herm100 seems to be somewhat supported:
http://www.anytux.org/hardware.php?system_id=1210
http://vivien.chappelier.free.fr/typhoon/index.html

> This eeprom would probably be similar to the bios of a PC.
> So this "thing" that gets loaded is probably some kind of bootloader
> which will start the OS.  So when people say they are flashing their
> ROM, they are actually reprogramming the eeprom and this would be
> somewhat similar to setting up grub or upgrading your bios on the pc.
> Am i right so far?

Basically, yes.

> Ok, let say there is a bootloader and it was successful in starting a
> linux kernel.  The kernel would then load its device drivers as it was
> instructed when compiled.  I believe the hardware found on a HTC is
> quite different from that which is found on PCs and linux on PDAs
> being more rare than linux on a PC, it is likely that the support for
> these devices will be small.  I expect a lot of experimental stuff
> lying around in alpha, some beta, but probably very little stable
> stuff, am i correct?

The biggest problem is getting the Linux kernel to boot.
Both because of lack of hardware documentation (e.g. how are things
hooked up physically, what kind of hardware is inside the device,
how does the hardware work) and possibly also measures that try to
prevent the user from flashing third party firmware.

This is quite different from a PC, where everything is standardized.

> Is there a way i can find out exactly what hardware is inside (like an
> equivalent of lspci, lsusb) but without playing with the bootloader
> yet? (specs on internet arent clear about it, it gives an idea but no
> more precise than that).

Usually not, in embedded devices like Phones and PDAs the
peripherals are not on a standardized enumerable bus.
Instead they are usually hooked up directly to the CPU.

If its not documented, someone has to reverse engineer it.

However, once you have managed to get Linux up and running,
porting OpenMoko to your device should be the easiest part. ;)

HTH,

-- 
Tobias						PGP: http://9ac7e0bc.uguu.de