Hi ctopp,

That's a bit strange.  Syncing works fine for me.  I only tested with my account (don't have any others) on a number of decks.  Other than double-checking your username and password, I don't know what else I can suggest.

Perhaps one thing would be to make sure you're not entering them as Japanese full-width or half-width characters.

The username and password are stored in plain text in file called ~/.ankiqt-lite

Perhaps they aren't being saved correctly to that file?

The menu staying greyed out is definitely a bug though.  I'll fix that in the next release.  Let me know how you go.

Cheers,
Misha

ctopp,

I'll look into it.  Having to tap the screen to refresh it seems to be a Zaurus GUI bug, as it doesn't happen on a PC.  It doesn't seem to happen all the time either, which is somewhat strange.  I may have to find some sort of work-around for it.

The `S' on the last line should read something like `Syncing complete, sent x cards'.  I'm not sure why it gets truncated like that.

Are you sure all the menus stay greyed out when syncing is complete?  After syncing, there is no deck open so most of the deck-related menus should be greyed out.  However, the `Open Recent' and 'Exit' menu items should be available...  You should be able to open the deck you were working on to continue reviewing.  This is all in theory, of course. 

I'll make the client re-open the deck automatically after syncing in a later release.

It may take a while for me to do anything about this, as this weekend I'm busy doing other things, and next weekend I'm in Japan for a little while.

For now, feel free to use the command-line sync option -- I've kept it as a fall-back in cases like this.

rtkrtk,

Glad you got it working.  You're the first person to confirm that it works from an SD card.  Please feel free to talk about the steps you performed in greater detail -- perhaps even on the project wiki.  Alternatively, write back to me and I'll put instructions up there.

I'm not sure what gave you the idea it won't work on the stock ROM...   Oh, I see it. 

"Non-functional" refers to "non-functional requirements" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-functi … quirements), not features of the program that don't work

I'll put up the ARM binary for sqlite3 so people can use it on the Z side.  It's of definite relevance to the project.

The default Anki plugins won't work with ankiqt-lite the way it is now.  The main reason for this is that there is no plugin interface in ankiqt-lite.  If I remember correctly, Anki's plugin interface is provided by ankiqt, the component that sits over libanki and provides a GUI among other things.  In theory, it would be possible to write such a plugin interface (based on ankiqt), but it's not a priority at this time.  The cost vs. benefit ratio seems a bit too high, and there is other stuff I should look at first.

That plugin you speak of sounds useful, though.  I'll add plugins as a low-priority item on my TODO list.

Cheers,
Misha

More notes on installing Anki to the SD card on the Zaurus. The instructions in my last post allowed Anki to start, but without an icon in the task bar, meaning that if you changed focus to another window, there was no way of coming back to the Anki window.

To properly allow the Anki taskbar icon to appear, while keeping the majority of the application files on the SD card, I had to do the following:

1. Install all the ipk files manually as described in my previous post.
2. cp /mnt/card/opt/QtPalmtop/pics/anki.png /opt/QtPalmtop/pics/anki.png
This puts the application icon file on the main flash memory.

3. Create /opt/QtPalmtop/apps/Applications/anki.desktop as follows. This creates a desktop file on the main flash memory, needed for appearance of the taskbar icon. Note the Exec line specifies the file anki.sh, given in the next step.
[Desktop Entry]
Comment=Spaced Repetition Software
Exec=anki.sh
Categories=
Icon=anki.png
Type=Application
Name=Anki
Display=640x480/144dpi,480x640/144dpi   

4. Create /opt/QtPalmtop/bin/anki.sh as follows. This creates the application launcher file in the main flash memory, needed for appearance of the taskbar icon. We need to use a custom launcher shell script to point Python to the libraries/modules installed on the SD card. Edit the --deck parameter as appropriate.
#!/bin/bash

export PATH=$PATH:/opt/QtPalmtop/bin:/mnt/card/opt/QtPalmtop/bin:/usr/local/bin

LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/mnt/card/usr/lib/:/mnt/card/opt/QtPalmtop/lib PYTHONPATH=/mnt/card/opt/QtPalmtop/lib/python2.5/:/mnt/card/opt/QtPalmtop/anki/ankiqt-lite/:/mnt/card/opt/QtPalmtop/lib/python2.5/site-packages/pysqlite2/ /mnt/card/opt/QtPalmtop/bin/anki_qpe_launcher.py --deck=/mnt/card/anki/decks/jlpt-vocab.anki

5. Edit the installed /mnt/card/opt/QtPalmtop/bin/anki_qpe_launcher.py and insert the following line after "import sys". This is needed to make the executing anki application argv[0] match the program executed in the .desktop file created earlier; without this, the application icon will not show up.

sys.argv[0]="anki.sh"

6. In the Zaurus home screen, select the "setup" tab (with a picture of a wrench) and click the icon to edit the home page icons. Add a new application and choose anki.sh as the program to execute (it shows up because you put it into the main flash memory). Select an icon. Close the setup and say "Yes" to update the home screen.

7. Click on the new anki icon to start anki. It takes a while to load the deck, but eventually the Anki icon should appear in the taskbar, and if you click it, you will be in Anki and you can switch back and forth between other applications with no problem.

This was a bit more complicated than I expected (getting the icon to show up); perhaps there's an easier way.

rtkrtk wrote:

2. Anki copies a backup deck file into /home/zaurus/.anki/backups. In my case I didn't have enough space in /home for a backup deck copy so Anki refused to start until I made enough space for creation of the /home/zaurus/.anki/backups files.

You may be able to avoid writing backup decks to your home directory and save a bit of space by symlinking /home/zaurus/.anki/backups to a location on your SD card.

I haven't tried this myself yet -- if you feel like it, let me know if it works.

Cheers,
Misha

I'm considering buying a PDA like Zaurus or a electronic dictionary like casio. Casio looks really great, and does a superb job at what it's aiming for, but how does a PDA like Zaurus handle a J&E dictionary? Like let's say I look up a word, and it uses a word to explain that I didn't understand, can I click on that new word and jump to its explanation real easily? Is the font real small and pixelated?

Would be awesome to have Anki on a handheld, but I don't really want to sacrifice the dicitionary and get something really mediocre.

As a follow up, some thoughts on getting a Zaurus vs getting an electronic Japanese dictionary.  Keep in mind I'm a Zaurus owner, and I've never owned an electronic dictionary myself.  Most of my Japanese class-mates have one though, so I have a tiny bit of exposure to using them.

First, the battery life.  The dictionaries I've seen tend to last a really long time.  A Zaurus will keep going for a couple of hours of non-stop dictionary use (I've never timed this, but I estimate it to be around 7-8 hours) before needing a recharge.

Next, while I like the screen on the Zaurus, it isn't particularly good in bright sunlight.  If you plan to use it when you're outdoors, you may have a problem.  The other dictionaries may or may not suffer from the same fate, depending on the type of the screen.

Versatility is really the main reason to get a Zaurus instead of a dedicated Japanese dictionary.  You can use the Zaurus to listen to music, browse the net (you need a separate wireless card), etc.  Using new software is also another strong point.  With a normal dictionary, you're stuck with whatever program the vendor put on the dictionary, and nothing else.  With the Zaurus, you can use the provided dictionary program alongside other tools, like Anki, for example.  All this may or may not be a huge bonus for you depending on what you expect of your dictionary and what other gadgets you own.

The main reason not to get a Zaurus, in my opinion, would be that they've been discontinued for a while.  And while they're still relatively popular in the community, you'll likely have a tough time getting support from Sharp for a discontinued product.  So if you're having issues with installing a particular package or getting something to work on your own, relying on the Zaurus community is pretty much your only option.  Whether or not this is a horrible thing depends on how used you are to using web forums etc. for finding solutions to problems.

Misha

For Zaurus users:

I've finally gotten round to playing around with building a newer libsqlite3 for the Zaurus.  This was in order to address the sqlite3 representation of floating point numbers on the Zaurus being inconsistent with the representation used on other systems.

The updated libsqlite3 package is now available.  I've added a section about upgrading to the Wiki:  http://ankiqpe.wiki.sourceforge.net/

The good news is that you can now transfer your decks between the PC and the Zaurus without having to modify them.

Misha

@ raseru

The models SL-C1000 and SL-C3200 are still on sale in (some) electronic stores here in Japan.  I have owned so far a SL-B500, SL-C700, SL-C860 and now the SL-C1000, which is by far the best model IMHO -- the best combination of RAM, CPU and Keyboard.  The SL-C3200 is similar, but has a built in harddisk, which makes it *much* more expensive and it also uses a lot more power.  To run Ankiqpe, you will need however a SD-Card, since the built-in memory is not enough.  Out of the box, the Zauri support only up to 1GB, but with an extra driver available somewhere on the net, you can use up to 4 GB.  Beware though that you need to stick to the older SD cards as opposed to the HD-SD cards now available.  I have been using a no-name SD card with 4GB for more than a year now without any trouble.

Ctopp

Although I made my own thread regarding Supermemo, I ran into a new problem with my Palm.... how do I install the Japanese font ? I did for Anki, but it doesnt seem to be helping me with other programs like Supermemo

@ctopp:

Thanks for writing about this.  This is already fixed in the source repository, so will be available with the next release (alpha7).  I'll try and push that out soon (next couple of days, probably before the next weekend).

If you're extremely anxious to get command-line sync going, the file that contains the fix is:

http://ankiqpe.svn.sourceforge.net/view … y?view=log

If you download the revision with the fix and overwrite the existing ankiqt_lite_main.py, it may work.

Cheers,
Misha

alpha7 now available for testing from http://sourceforge.net/project/showfile … _id=609083