1src Forums - How do I start programming palm applications?

07-28-2003, 04:43 AM	#1
davidtopham Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2003 Posts: 25	How do I start programming palm applications? I've done some programming on desktop computers (some C, Visual Basic, DarkBASIC, PHP and MySQL), and I'd like to start creating applications for my clié. I just don't know where to start, as in, I don't know what software I need to do it. As this will only be a hobby, and it will be very unlikely that I sell anything I create, I don't want to spend any money on software to develop palm applications. Does anybody know of or use any software that they can recommend? Thanks in advance for any help, David

07-28-2003, 08:33 PM	#2
ayasin Senior Member Join Date: Sep 2002 Posts: 420	I suggest taking a look at www.palmsource.com. Download the latest SDK (5.0) and get prc-tools. It's a descent tool chain and its free. If your not comfortable with makefiles I suggest getting at least the demo version of Falch.net and studing the make files it generates. The full copy of falch.net is under $150...but if you don't want to spend the money the demo should teach you enough about make files and how to structure them for palm OS to get by. The other nice thing about Falch.net is that you will get Cygwin and PRCTools installed correctly for you (this can be especially helpful to a newbie). In addition to providing a good IDE Falch.net also hosts newsgroups that you can read through in addition to the ones at palmsource. Some are Falch specific, but others are more general. Since Falch.net is an IDE that sits on the PRC toolchain, almost anything you learn there should be transferable to your own use. A lot of the palmsource discussions end up with how to do things with CodeWarrior ($400) so they may not be as helpful (CodeWarrior has it's own compiler and such). __________________ Start by doing what's necessary, then what's possible and suddenly you are doing the impossible. - St. Francis of Assisi

08-01-2003, 07:00 AM	#3
FredOak Junior Member Join Date: Aug 2003 Location: Buffalo, NY USA Posts: 4	Another great development tool is PDAToolbox. It isn't as code intensive as some of the others (but it can be if you want to). It's great for down & dirty app building, and if you want to get commercial quality that's possible with a little learning curve. You can find it at... http://palmgear.com/software/showso...cfm?prodID=6449

08-12-2003, 05:48 PM	#4
Flash-57 Off we go! Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: Boulder, CO USA Posts: 557	Does PDA Toolbox work for OS5 applications? I've built a few apps with AppForge and, when I upgraded to OS5, I found that they haven't made a booster yet. __________________ -- Flash!

08-13-2003, 07:19 AM	#5
FredOak Junior Member Join Date: Aug 2003 Location: Buffalo, NY USA Posts: 4	Yes PDAToolbox will support Palm OS 5! You can take a look at some of the applications my company has developed using PDATB here... http://www.palmgear.com and just type COMP2 in the search box that's on the upper left of the page. You will see ones marked for PALM OS 5, go ahead and down load a trial version and see how it works.

08-13-2003, 07:38 AM

Perk

Land of the free

Join Date: Oct 2002

Posts: 125 Perk is on a distinguished road

Quote:

Originally posted by FredOak
Yes PDAToolbox will support Palm OS 5!
You can take a look at some of the applications my company has developed using PDATB here...

http://www.palmgear.com

and just type COMP2 in the search box that's on the upper left of the page.

You will see ones marked for PALM OS 5, go ahead and down load a trial version and see how it works.

I don't program often so if I mis-speak I'm sure someone will correct me, however PDAToolbox is not a standalone application, it is a utility, a very powerful one, that works in conjunction with Pocket C from Orbworks. While PDATB is free you do have to buy Pocket C which allows you to compile and run your programs.

Sorry disregard above statement. Ptoolbox is the utility I was thinking of, PDA Toolbox is a seperate stand alone program.

__________________
Perk

You can have your own opinion, not your own set of facts!

Last edited by Perk : 08-13-2003 at 07:45 AM.

08-13-2003, 12:43 PM	#7
FredOak Junior Member Join Date: Aug 2003 Location: Buffalo, NY USA Posts: 4	Actually you are incorrect. PDA ToolBox is a stand alone develpoment tool. You are thinking of Pocket Toolbox , by Joseph Stadolnik, which does work with Pocket C but is an entirely different application. Here are the links for each... This is the Pocket C tool http://www.palmgear.com/index.cfm?f...are&prodID=9852 This is PDA ToolBox for app development http://www.palmgear.com/index.cfm?f...are&prodID=6449 If anyone else has questions on either I'd be glad to help!!

08-20-2003, 09:32 AM	#8
SiouxChief Member Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: West Chester, OH USA Posts: 42	I found a project on SourceForge.net last night that I am going to try out....it's called "Onboard C". It's a C compiler that runs directly on the Palm, that creates real PRC files!!! Since the files are machine code and use the Palm libraries directly, there is no virtual machine needed and it is supposedly very fast. Here's the link: http://sourceforge.net/projects/onboardc/

08-20-2003, 10:16 AM	#9
Ezra4no1 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Some place in Utah Posts: 274	Does anyone know if there are any developer programs for the Palm that have a Visual Basics feel to it where the visual part of the program was easily created and the rest of the coding was fairly easy to figure out? I am far from a programmer...but I have messed around with VB alittle and was wondering if there was such a program for developers on the Palm. __________________ _____________________________________ Franklin Day Planner (1992 - 2000) R.I.P., Visor Deluxe, Ipaq 3635, Nr70v, TG50, NX80v, HP iPAQ 4355, PPC-6700 (HTC Apache) Currently Treo 700wx http://mypdacorner.blogspot.com/

08-20-2003, 10:38 AM	#10
zhamilton1 ScreensOS Designer Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: Israel Posts: 278	OnBoardC OnBoardC just rocks! It compiles your C code into actual assembler code just like any other desktop application would. Use ResEdit to design your forms/controls while use SrcEdit to write the actual code on the device with syntax coloring (: __________________ Zakai Hamilton Screens Environment Designer+Coder MSN+Email: zhamilton1@yahoo.co.uk Blog: http://www.screensenvironment.blogspot.com

08-20-2003, 10:51 AM	#11
brodson Registered User Join Date: Nov 2002 Posts: 50	I agree completely with zhamilton1. I am writing palm applications as a hobby as well. I own Code Warrior, but find that OnBoardC works extremely well for small or medium-size projects. Additionally, I recommend RsrcEdit (see www.quartus.net). This combination allows for effective programming directly on the handheld or on the emulator. One note: I do make regular backups of my development clie onto a memory stick. This is important for archiving purposes and for backup. Good luck on your hobby! Steve Brodson

08-20-2003, 12:24 PM	#12
SiouxChief Member Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: West Chester, OH USA Posts: 42	Thanks for the tips about OnBoardC! I tried it at lunch, and I have to say I'm impressed. One question though...is there a way to get SrcEdit to look nicer on the clie HiRes+ (320x480) screens? It looks very blocky and pixellated, presumably because SrcEdit is designed for 160x160 mode and all the font pixels are just doubled up on the higher resolution. Is there a syntax coloring editor that runs on the palm that supports Hires screens?

08-20-2003, 12:39 PM	#13
SiouxChief Member Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: West Chester, OH USA Posts: 42	I just found an Experimental Hires version of SrcEdit on the OnBoardC Yahoo group, by searching google for "Hires SrcEdit": http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&...q=hires+srcedit Just tried it out and it looks GREAT!

08-21-2003, 08:20 AM	#14
FredOak Guest Posts: n/a	I've programmed with Pocket C and it works great for the geometric calculations I had to do but I hate that you have to include a runtime with it. I'll have to check out Onboard to see if I can get the same results.

09-18-2003, 04:53 PM	#15
mar_ning_2000 Registered User Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada Posts: 158	You can also use QED to edit the source for OnBoardC. QED support twin-document display, I found that being very useful when writing multi-segments programs. __________________ I've Got To Be Me!