vim for PocketBook 622 and 623

[jtt]

Hi,

I now managed to include support for using the touch screen like a mouse. In this new mode taps are interpreted as clicks with the left mouse-button and also dragging the mouse with the mouse button pressed works via swipes. This required a few more modifications to vim and some changes in the "user interface" of vip.

When vip gets started it behaves mostly like the previous version, i.e. taps in the upper, lower, right and left part of the editor area emulate the arrow keys, up and down swipes scroll and pinch guestures change the font size.

To get the new, alternative mode ("mouse" mode) vim first must be asked to accepts mouse events - it doesn't do so by default. To get vim to do that a command like ":set mouse=a" is required. If you want this on whenever you start vim you should put that (or a similar) command into the .vimrc file.

Once vim is set up this way vip will be prepared to switch to the new touch screen "mouse" mode. You can get there either via the menu, which has a new entry "Touchscreen", or by a short click on the backward button (which now toggles between the two touch screen modes). In the new "mouse" mode everything you do on the editor part of the screen will be reported to vim as mouse events (so no scrolling, no pinch guestures, no menu by a long tap are available in this mode!). It seems to work quite well, though my fingers are bit "large" for real precision work;-) I guess the new mode can be most useful for quickly getting the cursor as near as possible to the place where you want to edit - then shortly press the backward button (to switch back to the "normal" arrow key mode) and use the emulated arrow keys to go to exactly the place you want.

Since the backward button is now used for switching between the touch screen modes you can only use the forward button to cycle forward through the different keyboard layouts.

To install the new version you must reinstall both 'vip.app' and the 'vim' binary. Also a few minor details in the configuration file 'vip.cfg' and the keyboar file 'vip.kbd' have been changed. The new version is available via the links in my first post in this thread.

Best regards, Jens

[paolog]

wrong thread, deleted, sorry

[paolog]

Thanks Jens, I'll delete with caution

[jtt]

Hi,

just found a stupid bug in the new 2.0 version (resulting in crashes when opening the new submenu under some conditions) and fixed it. The newest version can be downloaded from the links in the first post of this thread.

Sorry for the inconvenience and best regards, Jens

[paolog]

Hi Jens
the last zip you posted has two vip.app:
one in the main root of zip and one (the earlier I guess) in the 2.0 first subdirectory

bye

Paolo

[jtt]

Hi Paolo,

Originally Posted by paolog

the last zip you posted has two vip.app:
one in the main root of zip and one (the earlier I guess) in the 2.0 first subdirectory

Thank you! I just reassembled the zip file and uploaded it, I hope it's ok now.

Best regards, Jens

[paolog]

Hi Jens,

thanks to your VIP I'm learnig VIM! very usefull!

I've to say, anyway, that the zip you point to is still with two vip.app inside it

bye

Paolo

[jtt]

Hi Paolo,

thanks to your VIP I'm learnig VIM! very usefull!

Same here;-) I always had only used the most basic stuff (I wasn't too enthusiastic about all those modes), but now, due to this project and after more than 20 years of using emacs nearly exclusively, I'm starting to like vi(m) a lot more. It's actually quite an impressive editor with incredible amounts of functionality packed into it.

I've to say, anyway, that the zip you point to is still with two vip.app inside it

Sh*t, I got some symbolic links pointing to the wrong places, sorry! What you'll download now should definitely be the latest and greatest;-) version.

Best regards, Jens

[paolog]

hi Jens

[rkomar]

Originally Posted by jtt

Same here;-) I always had only used the most basic stuff (I wasn't too enthusiastic about all those modes), but now, due to this project and after more than 20 years of using emacs nearly exclusively, I'm starting to like vi(m) a lot more. It's actually quite an impressive editor with incredible amounts of functionality packed into it.

As a long-time vi user, I welcome you both to the club!

[jtt]

Originally Posted by rkomar

As a long-time vi user, I welcome you both to the club!

;-) But I'm not a member of the church of vi yet;-)

Best regards, Jens

[lassen_wir_das]

Great idea!

Unfortunately, I don't even succeed to install it...

I tried to follow your instruction. You write:

The installation requires several steps, first for the vip program:

1) Copy the 'vip.app' program to the "applications" directory on
the mounted PocketBook device

There doesn't seem to be an application-folder on my 623. There is, however, the folder /system/bin which contains other files with the extension .app. I put vip.app there (as well as vim), but that does not add vim or vip to the applications. Neither does creating the applications-folder and putting vip there.

Any ideas? Do I have to update the list of applications manually?

And, out of curiosity: Does an update of the firmware harm your program, once it is installed?

Thanks in advance!

[jtt]

Hi,

sorry for the delay - haven't been checking here for a few days...

Originally Posted by lassen_wir_das

Unfortunately, I don't even succeed to install it...

There doesn't seem to be an application-folder on my 623.

That's strange - if I mount my device I have a directory named 'applications'. That's the one for programs that can be found when you touch the "Applications" symbol on the home screen. In there you find there things like calc.app, dropboxctl.app etc.

There is, however, the folder /system/bin which contains other files with the extension .app. I put vip.app there (as well as vim), but that does not add vim or vip to the applications. Neither does creating the applications-folder and putting vip there.

Any ideas? Do I have to update the list of applications manually?

I'm as astonished as you are - there always has been an 'applications' directory on my PB622 and 623. Is there any chance that you mounted the SD-card instead of the internal memory of the device (and, perhaps at some other time, created a 'system' directory in here)? Sounds a bit unlikely but that's the only idea I have at the moment...

And, out of curiosity: Does an update of the firmware harm your program, once it is installed?

It may happen with some future firmware update if they make incompatible changes to the libraries used by the program. If you have tried installing older programs to be found on the internet you may already have found that some of them don't work (typically ones not written for the PB622/623). That is often due to such a change in the libraries. But this doesn't happen very often, so normally a firmware upgrade doesn't break things.

And if it happens there's the source code, so you can compile (and, if necessary, modify) the program to work with the newer library version;-) In that case also a new SDK would have to be released - the current one seems to be from June 2011, so there were no changes that would break older applications since then.

Best regards, Jens

[faltradl]

Originally Posted by jtt

That's strange - if I mount my device I have a directory named 'applications'. That's the one for programs that can be found when you touch the "Applications" symbol on the home screen. In there you find there things like calc.app, dropboxctl.app etc.

You are mounting devices? So you are using Linux.

I think the problem of lassen_wir_das is the old one of Windows. There are by default system-folders hidden.

[jtt]

Originally Posted by faltradl

You are mounting devices? So you are using Linux.

Guilty as charged, your honour;-)

I think the problem of lassen_wir_das is the old one of Windows. There are by default system-folders hidden.

That's definitely a possibility, never thought of that since I don't use Windows. Perhaps I should add that to the README file to avoid confusion.

Thanks and best regards, Jens