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scheme for Nokia N900?

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jdelgado

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Jan 26, 2010, 6:20:14 AM1/26/10
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Hi,

I am toying with the idea of using scheme in a Nokia N900 (maemo5). I
compiled Aubrey Jaffer's scm and apparently it works fine (it passes
all the tests). Not a big deal, pretty trivial.

But, I wonder... do you know of any other scheme implementation that
may be compiled in a N900? I was thinking of Guile, Andy? There used
to be a Guile for previous versions of maemo, but I do not know
whether it has been updated.

Bests,

Jordi

Colin Fleming

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Jan 26, 2010, 6:53:27 AM1/26/10
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Hi Jordi,

This guy got scheme running in the iPhone:

http://jlongster.com/blog/2009/06/17/write-apps-iphone-scheme/
http://jlongster.com/blog/2009/07/5/remotely-debugging-iphone-scheme/

I'm guessing you really want a scheme that has a good FFI to C/C++
since IIRC the APIs for the N900 are C++. Chicken has Qt bindings I
think, that might be interesting.

How do you like the N900? I looked at it a while ago but decided
against it in the end.

Cheers,
Colin

Andy Wingo

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Jan 26, 2010, 2:42:47 PM1/26/10
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Heya,

On Tue 26 Jan 2010 12:20, jdelgado <jdelga...@gmail.com> writes:

> But, I wonder... do you know of any other scheme implementation that
> may be compiled in a N900? I was thinking of Guile, Andy? There used
> to be a Guile for previous versions of maemo, but I do not know
> whether it has been updated.

Guile should run fine on the device. If you could use it, you would also
be able to hack it live using the awesome Geiser, if Jao ever gives us a
presentation about it :)

Guile on a previous maemo: http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=1496

I don't know of packages for the current maemo though.

Cheers,

Andy
--
http://wingolog.org/

Andy Wingo

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Jan 26, 2010, 2:43:36 PM1/26/10
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On Tue 26 Jan 2010 12:53, Colin Fleming <co...@colinfleming.net> writes:

> I'm guessing you really want a scheme that has a good FFI to C/C++
> since IIRC the APIs for the N900 are C++. Chicken has Qt bindings I
> think, that might be interesting.

I'm pretty sure they use Clutter, which is C. I had a binding for 0.8,
but versions move on, eh...

Andy
--
http://wingolog.org/

jdelgado

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Jan 26, 2010, 3:09:05 PM1/26/10
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Hi,

Prologue: Why I am so excited with the Nokia N900?

Once upon a time there was one of the most amazing machines man ever
invented: The Palm m125. A couple of AAA batteries and you had weeks
of fun. You, your Palm, a Scheme interpreter (LispMe, almost R4RS
compliant!), a Forth environment (Quartus Forth), a bike and a
complete evening ahead were the definition of happiness. Not that I
wrote amazing code (I have never written any amazing code), just those
snippets that make your head hurt but at the same time provide you
with hours and hours of satisfaction. Whatever. One day, some clever
guy decided that these machines needed graphics, sound, video,
internet, and some other bells and whistles, and AAA batteries were
not enough. Bloated operating systems, and lots and lots of featuritis
running wild filled these once wonderful machines with buggy and
unreliable software... and they were not fun anymore. The Palm m125
was the last PDA I had (well, that's not true, I had a HP Jornada 720
with which I learned Smalltalk-Squeak, but that's another story).

The idea of carrying your computer in your pocket was a beautiful one.
But "computer" means, let us not forget, "Turing complete programmable
device", not "HI-FI & TV Set, lots of colors and icons and graphics to
waste your time just watching/listening what others produce".

So, we get to...

> How do you like the N900? I looked at it a while ago but decided
> against it in the end.

It is very difficult to me to argue... there is some emotional stuff
involved. Why I never felt any interest in iPhones but I bought a N900
as soon as it hit the store? I really do not know. It's kind of "the
Palm experience" again. Yes, the battery does not last for weeks
(carrying the small supplementary charger allows like six-eight hours
of use), but it is a *real* computer in your pocket. I installed build-
essentials and compiled pforth, newlisp, picolisp and scm *in* the
phone and installed a useable Squeak vm, so I can even program in
Smalltalk. There is even a full installation of Python and Perl
(5.8.3). I installed Vim and FBReader, so I also carry some books and
papers with me, and it is not that bad reading them on the phone. I do
it on a regular basis. The keyboard is such that you can get used to
it.

Ah! I almost forgot! you can also call and receive calls, I mean, it
is a real phone (who cares?)

Yes, but as far as I understand, he is not programming *in* the phone.

> I'm guessing you really want a scheme that has a good FFI to C/C++
> since IIRC the APIs for the N900 are C++. Chicken has Qt bindings I
> think, that might be interesting.

I do not think Chicken will do. It should be a lighter scheme, like
scm. Anyway, I am not that serious on developing software for the
N900. It's "the Palm experience" again. I just would like to program
simple code, like problems or book exercises or code snippets from
papers, to understand them better. Or experiment with new concepts on
the road, and scheme is ideal for this kind of experimentation.

OMG! Enough is enough! I definitely wrote too much. My son is in my
lap disguised as a ghost making loud noises, so I guess it is a clear
sign that I should stop...

Bests,

Jordi

jdelgado

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Jan 27, 2010, 10:11:50 AM1/27/10
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Hi,

I was soooooo wrong! There is a port of Bigloo to maemo:
http://www-sop.inria.fr/mimosa/fp/Bigloo/bigloo-2.html

So, I think I am going to try to port Chicken... thanks Colin!

Bests,

Jordi

Colin Fleming

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Jan 27, 2010, 10:29:20 AM1/27/10
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No problem - I doubt you'll have much of a problem doing it, since
Maemo 5 is basically Debian and the N900 should be sufficiently
powerful. Chicken's actually fairly lightweight too, I believe. Take a
look at the Qt bindings first though, I'm not sure how mature they
are.

Cheers,
Colin

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