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Subject:Android Compatibility 

bixthedog

20:28
Thursday
17-Feb-2011

Hello Stephen.

Apologies this is technically in the wrong forum (the Phone Compatibility one seems a bit quiet), but here's a friendly prod in the hope that you will be able to look into developing Android compatibility at some point soon...

After upgrading my previous phone towards the end of last year I've come to realise how much I miss TMJ. I do still use my handset and the software as PAYG, but with an external dongle it's a bit clumsy.

And it could look sooo good on a decent size touch screen!
 

Stephen

21:49
Sunday
20-Feb-2011

Location:
Surrey, UK

Phone Model:
BB 9800 Torch
BlackBerry 8900
SE W910i
Nokia 5800

Hi,

Well it looks pretty good on my BlackBerry Torch!! ;-)

Seriously though, I'm in a bit of a quandry about Android. I'd definitely still like to port TMJ to it (in preference to any other platform), possibly in a simplified format, but it still comes down to finding the time/energy to rewrite so much of the existing code (as well as learn the Android APIs etc), and going back to square one in the debugging process that has so far taken over 4 years with J2ME!!

Still, it is very much on my mind at the moment, so I'll see how things go in the coming weeks... (Its good to hear that there's still a use for it on Android - I know they're not short of GPS apps in general!)

Cheers,
Stephen
 

bixthedog

8:28
Monday
21-Feb-2011

That's good to know (not being a software developer myself I can't imagine what you would have to go through to get a new version up and running).

A simplified version would be good - generally speaking I only really used the map and tracking features on my Nokia 6500c, which was probably down to the limitations of the phone itself. Wonder if that's representative of others?

Another reason for starting with a simpler version is that from my experience of the Android Marketplace so far, the best ratings go to the applications that do what they say on the tin and perform reliably. Unfortunately people seem to have an itchy trigger finger when it comes to placing bad reviews on buggy software (instead of contacting the developer first)...and it's the star rating that could put off a prospective buyer. Hope the above doesn't put you off...perhaps you could release a beta version for testing for users such as me that have migrated to Android? If you can find the time, of course :o)
 

shchenka

19:57
Monday
28-Feb-2011

I'm not an android user (yet), mostly because I love tmj so much :) but I second that an android port may be a must, and the sooner it appears the better. Of course I know it's much easier to say this than do the actual coding and I hope you'll forgive it, Stephen. Then there is the cost of support of course. Still, it seems to be a must.

BTW, do we know which of the tmj-mobile functionalities are most used/most wanted (for the simplified version) ?
 

Stephen

11:06
Tuesday
1-Mar-2011

Location:
Surrey, UK

Phone Model:
BB 9800 Torch
BlackBerry 8900
SE W910i
Nokia 5800

My thinking would be to base it around the current Plan screen [4], with the recorded track and vector maps, perhaps with overlays to show selected text info (from screen [1]), and then also implement the web uploading and waypoint functions.

Still, its a long way off (if at all), I haven't even begun to experiment with the Android SDK as yet!!
 

shchenka

21:29
Friday
4-Mar-2011

Indeed, plan screen, track recording and waypoints seem to be the must. I undertand it's a tough decision to make the first step, and if you do it will have its cost. Some of it will be probably at the cost of the current version as you'll not have enough time. OTOH android seems to become the prime mobile platform soon so it would be a shame not to have the port, even if you call it tmj-lite :)
 

meinalf

22:46
Friday
4-Mar-2011

Phone Model:
SE W810i, Nokia 5800, MDA IV

Hello,
I can only support the advice or wish of porting TMJ to android, otherwise I fear TMJ will not have a future (excuse my hard words).
I'm not a developer but I just searched for ways to migrate from j2me to android and found the following:
http://www.enough.de/products/j2me-polish/janus/
I looks as if with this you can develop in Java/j2me and J2ME Polish ports it automatically into native applications for other mobile platforms.
Perhaps it's worth to take a look at.

Good luck,
Meinalf
 

Stephen

15:29
Thursday
10-Mar-2011

Location:
Surrey, UK

Phone Model:
BB 9800 Torch
BlackBerry 8900
SE W910i
Nokia 5800

Hi Meinalf,

Mmmm, looks clever, though I guess it would still require J2ME TMJ to be re-coded to integrate the J2ME-Polish APIs!! Overall I would prefer (time allowing) to port it manually - this is really the only way to get the full benefits of the Android platform, as I see it...

Thanks for the link though!

Cheers,
Stephen
 

javalan

20:27
Sunday
10-Apr-2011

Hello,

I have another suggestion to make j2me compatible with android. Here's the link: http://www.netmite.com/android/srv/2.0/getapk.php
To use any of the converted apps the android phone must have this one time install: http://www.netmite.com/android/rc/andme/2037/andme_signed.apk
This eliminates reprogramming. But I'm not sure how it will behave with GPS.

Regards,
Alan
 

Stephen

12:30
Monday
11-Apr-2011

Location:
Surrey, UK

Phone Model:
BB 9800 Torch
BlackBerry 8900
SE W910i
Nokia 5800

Hi Alan,

Yes, I wondered about the GPS compatibility too - I tried NetMite in the Android PC emulator a while ago, it managed to install TMJ fine and everything seemed to run as normal except for the GPS connection. I didn't know if this was due to running it in the emulator (which often have issues simulating a GPS signal) - I'd be interested if anyone has any success with it on an actual device...

Cheers,
Stephen
 

menion

20:49
Thursday
14-Apr-2011

Hi Stephen,
I'm just searching internet for some vector map rendering engine and I discovered your project. Looks very nice. To introduce myself. I was developing mapping software Locify on J2ME with Polish GUI. Now I'm developing mapping software on android (mainly this one https://market.android.com/details?id=menion.android.locus). I'm looking for some engine that allow me displaying vector osm maps. I know it's too much work to one person and I'm really surprised by your work. Anyway I discovered this http://www.droyd.org/, which looks and works nice. But it costs a lot a of money and it do not exactly fit my needs. So I have an quick and not much intelligent idea :) if you do not plan create some "library" for vector map rendering that I should use in Locus application, or maybe connect both projects a little bit? Hmm I'm writing as I'm thinking so excuse me a little.

Anyway think about it a little and contact me if you have any idea. Also if you have any troubles with android, try to write me.

regards
Menion
 

rolfovo

18:12
Friday
15-Apr-2011

Location:
Prague

Hi, I also bought a phone with Android, and therefore I would really appreciate if there was a version of the TMJ for Android ;-) Rolf
 

shchenka

18:28
Monday
18-Jul-2011

I wonder, now that Nokia is officially ditching symbian, what is the future of TMJM ? :(
 

ChrisM

14:02
Friday
29-Jul-2011

Location:
Bedfordshire, UK

Phone Model:
Sony Ericsson W770i, Blackberry Playbook(?)

Well, I can only speak for myself, but I have an old battered SonyEricsson that I use exclusively for TMJ, and I think older symbian phones are going to be available (2nd hand, at least) for a good few years yet, so hopefully TMJM will be still be around for some time to come!
 

shchenka

20:39
Friday
29-Jul-2011

That's what I should be doing, too. Indeed, a dedicated phone for TMJ exclusively.

TMJM with OSM is so rich and powerful that no specialized handheld gps device e.g a garmin even compares.
 

Martian

6:48
Thursday
20-Oct-2011

Location:
Sofia, Bulgaria

Phone Model:
Nokia E52

Android is evil! In my opinion it is using open source for advertisement. It is not the mobile operation system of the future. Yes it's widely used as well as Symbian and iOS, but whey doesn't then support native j2me? Because of market politic. I want to see mobile operation system that can be truly used as pocket computer and mobile phone at the same time. I want to see free (as a free speech) open source mobile operating system where every one is allowed to install whatever he want and to be not monitored by huge corporations. Our privacy those days is almost gone. Thank about that. http://www.fsf.org/blogs/licensing/android-market-has-drm-too

TrackMyJourney is the best software I ever wanted for use with GPS. I like it much it's my favorite! For me is sad that its not open source if it was so far I guess it would be much advanced.But anyway I admire the work of Stephen for this great piece of software!

P.S. I will stick to my Symbian phone until I see truly open and not corporate dependent OS for mobile phone. My hope so far is in Tizen https://www.tizen.org. Only the time will show :)

Martin
 

shchenka

21:47
Tuesday
28-Feb-2012

Hi Stephen,
Still not hopes for an Android port ?
 

Stephen

19:36
Thursday
1-Mar-2012

Location:
Surrey, UK

Phone Model:
BB 9800 Torch
BlackBerry 8900
SE W910i
Nokia 5800

Hi Shchenka,

No, I'm afraid this is looking very unlikely, for the near future at least - I simply don't have enough time to concentrate on an Android rewrite/port, and so BlackBerry is still the platform-of-choice for running TMJ.

Cheers,
Stephen
 

shchenka

15:23
Friday
2-Mar-2012

Good, I'll stick to my current phone then. Thanks!
 

Martian

7:50
Monday
21-Jan-2013

Location:
Sofia, Bulgaria

Phone Model:
Nokia E52

Hi Stephen,

Have you every tried the available convertors that are able to convert J2ME applications and run them on Android?
I mean this http://www.enough.de/products/j2me-polish/janus/ and this http://microemu.blogspot.com/2009/08/converting-javame-applications-to.html

Let me know if you have ever tried some way to do it or what is your opinion about those.

I may give them a try. :)
 

Stephen

19:30
Monday
28-Jan-2013

Location:
Surrey, UK

Phone Model:
BB 9800 Torch
BlackBerry 8900
SE W910i
Nokia 5800

Hi Martian,

As far as I understand it J2ME-Polish is another layer of APIs that can help to make an app run in a more cross-platform way, but would still require recoding of existing code. I've not tried the microemu method but I guess its similar to the Netmite one mention earlier in this thread from a while ago.

The trouble with all these converters as I see it is that although they may work for simple foreground apps that are started, used, then exited, I can't see how they would handle background apps like TMJ. Android works in a totally different way to J2ME, whereby once you have switched to a different app (ie putting TMJ to the background), the OS is quite likely to kill the previous TMJ instance at will. So apps need to be written from the ground up to expect this, and be ready to save their state when necessary, or run specifically as a background service, which the OS will then know needs to be kept alive. So a converter will not be able (I assume) to separate a J2ME app into its foreground and background components.

So no go there, really. However I'm making a bit of headway in getting to grips with Android/BlackBerry 10, so things may improve in the future...

Cheers,
Stephen
 

bixthedog

21:52
Monday
28-Jan-2013

However I'm making a bit of headway in getting to grips with Android/BlackBerry 10, so things may improve in the future...

...hopefully :)

 

MrTom

22:02
Friday
22-Mar-2013

ANDROID BLUES: I finally replaced my antiquated BB 8120 with an LG Opt 9. Android does offer really some good apps that appeal to me, but in my opinion there is NO Android map-app that comes close to what TMJ offers. Fortunately the BB will connect to the web via WiFi so I can stay with TMJ..
 

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