Xournal note taking app ported

[Viacheslav]

Here is a filetype association package for xournal. It installs a gconf schema and creates a new filetype for xoj documents. Unzip to the root of your SD card and click "Add Xournal Extesion" icon. This should probably be bundled with Xournal distribution.

[kadbr0]

Originally Posted by tjdean256

Has V4 locked up on you yet? Mackx has said V4 is still experimental so I am sticking with V3 until he is confident in it.

td

V4 is pretty good. It has only locked up once or twice on me, but that also happens with other apps on the DR1000. Save your work once in a while and you will be free of trouble. What's kind of special is that you do not see any reaction on touching the Save button, but the action does occur.

[windspeedo]

Originally Posted by kadbr0

V4 is pretty good. It has only locked up once or twice on me, but that also happens with other apps on the DR1000. Save your work once in a while and you will be free of trouble. What's kind of special is that you do not see any reaction on touching the Save button, but the action does occur.

I have encounter the same issue.
Previously, the small disk button for saving would flash a little when you pressed it. Now with ROM 1.7 and V3a, it seems that the small disk button would not flash though it does save the file.

[curbarthedog]

I have to say, this is looking superb. Well done to everyone who has contributed to this!

I have managed to work out how to annotate a pdf using Xournal (via the background screenshot function) but I have one question. Is it possible to export handwriting to MyScript as well?

If this could be achieved, it would more or less do away with the dreadful desktop software from iRex.

Also, it seems pretty hungry on battery as an application. Is this normal?

Once again, many thanks for all the effort on this.

[Mackx]

Originally Posted by Viacheslav

I installed xournal for the first time and was very pleased with the software itself, especially the Export to PDF function. However, it lacks proper internationalization.

Some parts of menus (standard items) on my screen are in Russian while other remain English. This is quite inconvenient and makes Xournal the only untranslated DR app. There is an i18n patch for Xournal and a Catalan translation at sourceforge. I started making a Russian translation, but I need an "intltoolized" build to test it. Please, add i18n support to the V4 DR build of xournal.

I could try to apply the patch myself, but I failed to find the patched for DR xournal source. It must be online somewhere or it would be a GPL violation

Hi Viacheslav,

I have been on holidays, so a late reply to your remarks.
Thanks a lot for the hints w.r.t. internationalisation. Since nobody requested it yet (and it seemed like a lot of work to add the i18n support (I am kind of lazy...)), I did not start (or search) for it. I will have a look at the files you provided and make an internationalised version.
Also a lot of thanks for supplying the icons and the 'extention-installer'.

With your remark on the GPL violation, you are right (although I think the code should be 'available', not 'online-available', but I might be mistaking). I am planning to release a new patch V5 shortly, (that has a menu option to switch between the quick-draw and the slow-draw plus some minor updates) and post my complete anjuta project with source code here in this forum.

[Mackx]

Originally Posted by kadbr0

V4 is pretty good. It has only locked up once or twice on me, but that also happens with other apps on the DR1000. Save your work once in a while and you will be free of trouble. What's kind of special is that you do not see any reaction on touching the Save button, but the action does occur.

I think lock-up is caused by some code in a low-level driver (but I am not sure), so I am not sure If I can completely solve this stability problem. I have added some code to avoid scribbling from xournal to be at the same time as a full screen update from the firmware (sysd), but I do not think that this avoids every lock-up. I always disable all keys when I am using xournal (and wait at some strategic moments...).

W.r.t. the save-icon I also noticed that it does not give any feedback anymore with R1.7 as it did in the R1.6 version. Probably the internal display update algorithm or icon-redraw method changed.

[kadbr0]

Mackx,
since you mention that you are working on a new version, i dare to mention a few more issues with this wonderful program.

* The settings for e.g. the eraser do not seem to save. I like the setting Pen Stroke, but have to set that in each session again.
* We can now start the application form a .xoj file, but i notice that in that case writing becomes a lot slower then when i first start the app and then load a file.
* There is no highlight upon selecting a file, and at other places, and so one is never sure what will actually get loaded.
* The 'template' with lines as in a notebook is fine. Only i notice that anything written outside it does not get savd. I.e. we are not using the full size of the screen, while it isn't huge already.
* Is there something like a manual for Xournal? I notice all kinds of icons at the top that may be able to do interesting stuff, but do not know what that is nor which ones actually work in the DR version.

Dik

[Mackx]

Originally Posted by kadbr0

Mackx,
since you mention that you are working on a new version, i dare to mention a few more issues with this wonderful program.

*1 The settings for e.g. the eraser do not seem to save. I like the setting Pen Stroke, but have to set that in each session again.
*2 We can now start the application form a .xoj file, but i notice that in that case writing becomes a lot slower then when i first start the app and then load a file.
*3 There is no highlight upon selecting a file, and at other places, and so one is never sure what will actually get loaded.
*4 The 'template' with lines as in a notebook is fine. Only i notice that anything written outside it does not get savd. I.e. we are not using the full size of the screen, while it isn't huge already.
*5 Is there something like a manual for Xournal? I notice all kinds of icons at the top that may be able to do interesting stuff, but do not know what that is nor which ones actually work in the DR version.

Dik

Hi Dik,

Many thanks for your feedback. Good to hear that you like it. I only ported the application to the DR, the original version is maintained on sourceforge, it also contains documentation.

To your questions:
1) Looking at the xournal website I see that this confuses more people. You first need to Select the Tools->Eraser Options->delete strokes, then Tools->Set As Defaults and then Options->Save Preferences. It seems that only defaults are saved.
2) At this moment there are two 'versions' of xournal for the DR. One version uses direct scribbles like the native DR applications do (V4), the other version uses the gtk refresh mechanism, which updates after about 2 seconds (V3). I think that the version that is started with the short-cut is the 'slow' V3 version. When you start manually you are probably using the XournalEx-shortcut that starts the V4 version. Or are you refering to another effect?
The new version (V5) allows the switch between the slow-safe draw and the fast-possible-lockup draw method via a menu-item.
3) iRex has patches the gtk version that is available on the DR so that it needs less screen-updates (which are slow on the DR). It seems that highlighting files is one of the features that is disabled. Apart from writting a complete new file-chooser I can not do anything on this issue.
4) This is indeed an issue that I also want to address. The initial drawing is done by some extra, DR specific, code that is drawing directly to the low-level display driver. The extra code does not consider the margins that the original code of Xournal uses. After a (high-level) screen-refresh the low-level scribblings will be removed and overwritten by the 'actual' scribblings of the original code. (I hope you understand what I am trying to say ...) It is on my todo-list.
5) The original documentation is on the site indicated above. I try to make most functions of the original program also working on the DR. Please let me know if there are features that do not work (well). (The new version will 'fix' the refresh-after-undo, which seems not work anymore in the new firmware.)

Marcel.

[tjdean256]

Originally Posted by kadbr0

Mackx,

* The 'template' with lines as in a notebook is fine. Only i notice that anything written outside it does not get savd. I.e. we are not using the full size of the screen, while it isn't huge already.

Dik

I have set the margin view as my default. It allows me to write edge to edge. The margin view is set by selecting the magnifying glass icon with the parallel vertical lines. Saving preferences makes this the default.

td

[Gertjan]

Originally Posted by Mackx

3) iRex has patches the gtk version that is available on the DR so that it needs less screen-updates (which are slow on the DR). It seems that highlighting files is one of the features that is disabled. Apart from writting a complete new file-chooser I can not do anything on this issue.

The patches to GTK do change the behavior of drawing on some points but it is more likely that the highlighting is not visible due to the colors chosen in the system's GTK resource file (gtkrc). (see GTK docs)

Applications can override the defaults by supplying a separate .rc file, typically in /usr/share/<package>/<package>.rc. Changing base[SELECTED] might do the job though GTK's resource system is somewhat incomprehensible so it can take some trail-and-error.

[ghostwheel]

I just installed Xournal for the first time. I used V4. It is quite nice!

I have just 2 comments:

1. Is it possible to edit the first post, so that it points to the latest version, or maybe edit the wiki, so that it points to the latest version? (I guess I could do that). It is a bit hard to hunt through the thread...

2. The pencil works really well! It really keeps up with my writing. It would be nice if the eraser would be as fast. Currently it seems to be really slow. There is also a 'shape recognition mode' (which I never used on xournal on the desktop....), which lets you draw cricles and rectangles and triangles. But it seems the recognition is not updated. To see what shape has been recognized you have to manually update the display (e.g. click the menu button...)


thanks!

[Mackx]

Originally Posted by ghostwheel

I just installed Xournal for the first time. I used V4. It is quite nice!

I have just 2 comments:

1. Is it possible to edit the first post, so that it points to the latest version, or maybe edit the wiki, so that it points to the latest version? (I guess I could do that). It is a bit hard to hunt through the thread...

2. The pencil works really well! It really keeps up with my writing. It would be nice if the eraser would be as fast. Currently it seems to be really slow. There is also a 'shape recognition mode' (which I never used on xournal on the desktop....), which lets you draw cricles and rectangles and triangles. But it seems the recognition is not updated. To see what shape has been recognized you have to manually update the display (e.g. click the menu button...)


thanks!

1) I am not the one who made the first post in this thread, so I am not able to edit it. I recognise what you say, I could start a new thread when I post the next version so the latest version can more easily be found. (I updated the wiki (also) refering to the message with the latest version, hope that helps other people to find the correct version easier.)

2) Yes the eraser is not very fast, you can change the eraser options to delete complete strokes (Tools->Eraser Option->delete strokes). The native DR-app also has the same 'slow' erase.
2b) I currently have the (yet to be released) new version installed to do some final testing. The recogniser does an update in that version. So be patient a few more days. I hope to have some time end of this week, there is still a minor bug that I want to fix.

[junkyardwillie]

Well I just jumped on the Xournal Bandwagon as I wanted to see if I could somewhat reliably take notes on the DR, still have an extreme fear of it crashing and losing all my notes. I've been using the writetemplates for a little while now and I just didn't like the quality of the PDF exports. Xournal is a lot smoother and looks much better than the Writepads. The options to add file names and use typing are key as well. I'm still on V3 as V4 is said to be unstable right now but just wanted to say thanks for coming out with this great program. Cheers!

[RobbieClarken]

Originally Posted by junkyardwillie

I'm still on V3 as V4 is said to be unstable right now

I've been using V4 quite extensively for several weeks and it is very stable. It has crashed maybe once or twice (I have all but the left hand side buttons locked to avoid accidental page turns). V3 has the delay between writing and the ink appearing, right? It's definitely worth updating to fix this. If you follow Mackx's directions in this post you can have V3 and V4 installed side by side.

[Mackx]

Originally Posted by RobbieClarken

If you follow Mackx's directions in this post you can have V3 and V4 installed side by side.

This weekend I will post an update here, that allows switching between the delayed-safe write and the quick-less-stable write via a menu option. I just received the (initial) Russian translation from Viacheslav and need to integrate it in the update. So it might be worth waiting a few days before you upgrade.

@junkyardwillie: Thanks should go to Xournal developer Denis Auroux for creating and maintaining the original program.