DR800 my latest findings

[repods]

so.. just to update people that own this unfortunately dead device..
I don't use dr800+, so maybe those info can be not very usefull

as you know the dr 1000 uds can do some more things than the dr800 one, like fullscreen and continuous mode..
but the dr800 uds is better for reading books on dr 800, infact the dr1000 uds adds 2 bold lines to the margins of the page if the book form size is different from screen shape, and, most important, the contrast ratio is way better in the dr800 uds.. test it.. this means that you can see better the gray text.. (btw I would suggest to the dr1000 owners to test the dr800 uds on their devices in order to obtain more quality in reading..)
but you cannot set the fullscreen and so on ..
this is the reason why I usually use the dr1000 uds to setup fullscreen, continuous etc.. , and than the dr800 one to read books..
to do this confortabily I wrote a script that switches the two uds on the fly, without the need of restarting the device
moreover the dr-800 has a bug, well it has "some" bugs, but this one is very annoying..
as many of you for sure noticed if you setup fullscreen or zoom, or continuous for a book after some time, and some page turns for some reasons your settings are resetted, and this is very annoying expecially for zoom level that you have to setup carefully for every single book..
to avoid this problem I wrote a very simple script that copy metadata.sql on the reader and another one that restores it..
so essentially I use the dr 1000 uds to setup all my preffered settings for all the books and than save the "good" metadata file.. than I start using dr 800 uds for reading..
when things screwup I simply restore the good metadata with a single click and I'm ok again..

about the fact that the battery life can last even for years if the device is properly turned off, instead that put in standby mode some old messages have been already written

what instead I would need by now is a way to control the led of the device (btw I noticed that the led can do orange, green but even blu and red colors), in order to use it as a confirm signal in my scripts..
I'm not good at using sdk, and I don't have the time to learn..
so if someone can tell me a way to turn on and off the led, or can wirte a little program with the sdk that can do that so I can use it in the scripts I would be very thankfull.

[fekhner]

Originally Posted by repods

so.. just to update people that own this unfortunately dead device..

sorry to hear that, nothing that can be done ?

Originally Posted by repods

moreover the dr-800 has a bug, well it has "some" bugs, but this one is very annoying..
as many of you for sure noticed if you setup fullscreen or zoom, or continuous for a book after some time, and some page turns for some reasons your settings are resetted, and this is very annoying expecially for zoom level that you have to setup carefully for every single book..

what happens to me while reading fullscreen mobi books with FBReader is that the device freezes after several page turns, after rebooting all settings are indeed gone and the book does not even appear in the recently opened smart folder, I would really like to try both your scripts, could you attach them ? ( and maybe also instructions where to copy the other dr1000 uds)

Originally Posted by repods

so if someone can tell me a way to turn on and off the led, or can wirte a little program with the sdk that can do that so I can use it in the scripts I would be very thankfull.

have a look at Mackx's patch for the DR1000, he has introduced settings options for the leds so he must be able to control them ....

[Mackx]

Originally Posted by fekhner

have a look at Mackx's patch for the DR1000, he has introduced settings options for the led's so he must be able to control them ....

I took a look at that. The LED is connected to a separate controller that is connected to the main processor via a serial port. This port is opened by sysd during startup. sysd has no public interface to control the LED directly. Since sysd opens the serial port I do not think that it can be controlled by any other program.
The only option is to change sysd and add a function that allows direct control of the led, but I do not think that that is what you are looking for.

[Gwaihir]

Originally Posted by fekhner

sorry to hear that, nothing that can be done ?

Was shocked to read that too, but I think he just means dead as in company dead, no further (official) development.