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Pocket PC -> SmartPhone Conversion


Guest Ladama

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Guest Ladama

Hey Guys , from what i've read and heard from friends PocketPC software should be "easy" to convert to SmartPhone compatible handsets. As you probably need the Source Code to do that ("duh" :)) i was thinking if we start a search for cool opensource PocketPC games and try to convert them to the SPV(x).

Ok because i know what coding is (i've been coding in delphi for 7 years) i do know the conversion will need serious work (no matter how "easy" some people call it) and i'm the first one to say at this moment i'm not sure where to start or how to actually do it so i'm calling out for the more experienced (Pocket) coders on this board on maybe explaining the actual differences required for a pocketpc based app/game to run on a smartphone...

The neatest would be if "only" the display sizes are wrong...

Anyway, as soon as i get my hands on a SVPx (yes i forced myself to wait for the x one) i can activily contribute and test things but until then i'm hoping to get a "theoretical" discussion started....

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Guest spacemonkey

I've done this a bit... I'm not the best coder but I've got the hang of cleaning up and converting pocket pc stuff...

Certainly if people find opensource pocket pc stuff, I'm happy to port anything that I personally find interesting :)

I was thinking what might be useful for people who haven't tried this yet, would be if on the next thing I try, I could do a bit of a porting diary, with snapshots of code at various stages and a description of what I was doing/looking for as I went? If people are interested I'd be happy to do it. Again I'm not a very good C++ coder, there's probably others out there who could do something nicer...

Thoughts?

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Guest Palindrome

Yes, I'd be absolutely interested in a step-by-step diary, code snapshot, tutorial thingy. Excellent idea. If you could find the time for this I certainly would be very grateful.

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Guest spacemonkey

OK, I'll do it on the next project I do... not sure what that is yet... It'd be pointless trying to recreate a dairy for something I'd already done, cos I'd cheat and miss some vital step :)

If anyone's got a good idea of a pocketpc game they want converted? It must be opensource remember... games rather than apps, apps gets into the end of stuff where you have to start doing proper development for windows (like dialogue boxes and stuff).

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Guest Dave.Burn

dumbo calling........how can you tell the difference between opensource and an app when referring to a game?

if i sound stupid i probably am

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Guest Ladama

Now that you mention it, i was looking around for Opensourced PocketPC games & apps but that isn't such an easy task on itself :/

So it would be very handy if a lot of people go out and "look" for cool PocketPC games (and apps) that are opensource, and propose a conversion in here. If Spacemonkey gets around in making a diary / how to guide for converting it (which maybe not be as "general" as we hope) we could really "ramp" up the conversion speed...

Would be cool, and as everyone know : app support is the thing that makes the difference :)

So, the first thing we need is a "list" of cool games and apps that have source (very important offcourse!) and a link to a page for it... (maybe sticky post ?) so we can have people "convert" it...

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Guest Ladama

OpenSource is another way of saying that the source for the game or application is publicly available for everyone to see and/or alter. It's a great way to learn coding techniques from other (more) experienced coders...

It's a great way to "spread" the knowlegde...

www.SourceForge.net is a great example of a thriving open source community, all the software you see there is free and you can download the source code to look at or alter the code. By the way SourceForge.net is not a PocketPC only thingy (not at all) it ranges from applications for windows, linux, shell replacements, xbox software, ..............

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Guest PsychoDave

Great Idea Spacemonkey,

I've been meaning to learn this stuff but was a bit daunted about starting from scratch (well i used to program in c but that was a long time ago)

Hope it all comes about and I'll see if I can find some games.

Just wonderin how many people will hijack this thread with gameboy advance emu requests tho :)

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Guest benjymous

Ok, here are the differences I can think of

[*]Screen size is much smaller on smartphone - most of the interface will need redesigning to make it fit the phone

[*]No stylus input, so input would need redesigning (for example, there is a PocketPC version of Reversi included in the SDK. This compiles and runs happily on smartphone, but there's no way to play it as you don't have any way of clicking on the squares)

[*]No MFC support (this won't mean anything to you if you're not a windows programmer) - basically MFC is a system used on Win32 and WinCE systems to quickly build dialog based apps. If a game relies on MFC then all of its dialogs are going to need to be re-written to work (not a simple compile and tweak till it fits operation) - MFC also includes classes for working with text strings and other object types. If these are used then they'll also need replacing

[*]PocketPC devices tend to have more powerful CPUs than the smartphone, so games may not run smoothly when converted

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Guest adrianfox
Ok, here are the differences I can think of

[*]Screen size is much smaller on smartphone - most of the interface will need redesigning to make it fit the phone

[*]No stylus input, so input would need redesigning (for example, there is a PocketPC version of Reversi included in the SDK. This compiles and runs happily on smartphone, but there's no way to play it as you don't have any way of clicking on the squares)

[*]No MFC support (this won't mean anything to you if you're not a windows programmer) - basically MFC is a system used on Win32 and WinCE systems to quickly build dialog based apps. If a game relies on MFC then all of its dialogs are going to need to be re-written to work (not a simple compile and tweak till it fits operation) - MFC also includes classes for working with text strings and other object types. If these are used then they'll also need replacing

[*]PocketPC devices tend to have more powerful CPUs than the smartphone, so games may not run smoothly when converted

Also the smartphone:

[*] does not support DirectX which many games will use

[*] has less memory

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Guest clivewilliams

Yep, I've downloaded the sources to PocketCrafty Chess - essentially a PocketPC front end to the Crafty chess - which I was hoping to port to SPV, but I'm not sure I'm going to have the time. It works nicely (after a little tweaking) on a PocketPC emulator and embedded Visual C++ 3.0.

It's 2 components - the crafty chess engine (written in C) and a C++ front end which talks to the chess engine process... both written by different people (not me!). It should be (fairly) easy to take the front end and port that to SPV (it uses MFC though) while leaving the chess engine itself untouched.

Anyone fancy taking it on?

Clive

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Guest benjymous
Also the smartphone:

[*]does not support DirectX which many games will use

[*] has less memory

Yeah, but neither does pocketpc (and the topic was PPC->SP rather than Windows->SP)

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Guest adrianfox

Although Direct-X IS part of Windows CE 3.0, it was not configured as a component of the Pocket PC 2002 platform (as I had incorrectly assumed), and therefore is not referenced in the (Pocket PC 2002) SDK.

I stand corrected.

Maybe the only platform to make use of it is the now defunct Sega Dreamcast.

Adrian

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Guest Paul [MVP]

A diary of porting an FTP Client would be particularly useful :lol:

Seriously tho, I am planning a full step by step tutorial in developing using the .NET Compact Framework on SmartPhone (from non programmer to expert!), but this won't happen until the Compact Framework arrives (next release of SP say the rumours?)

P

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Guest benjymous

Actually, an FTP client should be dead simple, as the SDK includes functions for performing ftp commands. Perhaps something like this could be built into one of the many explorer apps

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