DSHobro news

Hello,

it's been almost 9 months since I last posted on this blog.
You know what this means... no no, I wasn't pregnant or anything!
It's just that I've been too busy with real life (mainly) and with other projects.

I do not have any plans to update DSHobro as of today.

If someone serious is willing to continue the project, I will gladly provide the source code.
Be sure to send me an email describing your intentions, your motivation and your past experience if you want to obtain the source code from me.
I'd be more than happy to have DSHobro updated by someone else!


I realize this will be a disappointment for a lot of you guys so I kind of expects insults and whatnot. Just bear in mind that behind every computer programmer there is a human being, with a life of their own (well, for some of us anyway).

Stay tuned for more projects :)


ps: supinfo grenoble en force

DSHobro 0.3 released!

I am glad to announce the release of DSHobro 0.3
This new version comes with the following changes:

• Automatic network configuration. You no longer need to enter your IP address & port, it will detect them and connect automatically!
  
• Flash animations, Java and ActiveX are now allowed. It means your PC will download and start/play them, but your DS will still only receive an image of the animation, not the animation itself. It's still useful for menus or sites that are made 100% in Flash. There's one downside though: in flash videos, the sound is outputted on the PC! I can't prevent it. But why would you want to watch videos anyway... since you could only get 1 frame every 5 or 10 seconds.
• Basic text input is implemented. Basic, because all you can do is: 1) write text with the virtual keyboard; the text is visible on the DS screen until you decide to send it to the PC by touching the ENTER key. 2) erase the whole text in a text field, by sending the keyword :erase to the PC. See, this is basic, but it still works and you should be able to post messages in forums with this.
• The "Wifi Transfer" icons now show up every time there is a WiFi communication between your PC and your DS. When the icon blinks, it means you have just sent or received a new data block.
• "Fatal errors" are no longer fatal. You should be able to resume your connection when an error occurs. I was unfortunately unable to produce any of these error myself, so I had to simulate them (generate an error). I can't promise the connection will be resumed in any case.
  

Download DSHobro 0.3 here:
http://gbatemp.net/up/dshobro03.zip

As always, I strongly recommend that you DO NOT DOWNLOAD THIS FILE FROM ANOTHER SERVER. Ill-intentioned people could replace the .exe file inside this zip package by a virus/trojan/spyware...

Enjoy this new version!
Costello

titre: live from DSHobro!

ici votre contenu. Hi! I am writing this message with DSHobro 0.3! Text support is very basic but it works great!

DSHobro 0.3 Upcoming features

The upcoming features for DSHobro 0.3 are:

- automatic configuration: start the server, start the DS and it works immediatly. No need to enter an IP address & port.
- flash animations & java supported
- text input supported: you can write text using the virtual keyboard
- icons now show up during all load times, so users no longer believe DSHobro is locked/frozen
- resume connection on errors

Some of these features are already implemented, I'll try to finish them all tomorrow in order to submit DShobro v0.3 to the NeoFlash summer competition.

EDIT: some people have been asking questions regarding FLASH support. Remember how DShobro works: the pages are parsed on your PC and an image of the page is sent to the DS. It means the flash animations are played on the PC, and you're only going to get a screenshot of the animation! So don't expect to be able to play videos. Flash support is only useful for navigation on flash websites.

DSHobro ranked 3rd

DSHobro was ranked 3rd at the Dev-Fr competition!
Read the full story here
Congratulations to every participant!

I don't know if I deserved to be 3rd since DShobro is not in a very advanced state.
Also, I wanted to say that I didn't enter the competition for the prizes, so I've decided to give my prize to Schyzo (author of SpsychoDS, homebrew that was ranked 4th).

Regarding DShobro 0.3, I haven't had any time to work on it at all yet, but I've already written down a list of features that I'll try to implement in the next release. Will let you know more soon.

DSHobro 0.2 released!

I've just posted my entry for the Dev-FR.org coding competition.


DSHobro 0.2

IMPORTANT README
You need to read this before you download DShobro!
It explains how to use DSHobro, lists the features, explains the controls, and above all it tells you what DSHobro CAN'T do so you aren't surprised by any of the missing features!

If you've read the topic then I guess you're ready to download this:
Download here

I strongly recommend that you do NOT download DSHobro from another server than http://gbatemp.net. Simply because in the ZIP archive, there's a win32 binary file (.Exe) which is the DSHobro server application. If you download it from another server, you are exposed to running viruses or trojans.


Costello

DSHobro 0.2 video

Hi,
here is a video of DSHobro 0.2 running:


Video size: 32 megabytes
Video length: 5 minutes

My apologies for the crap quality. I would actually have needed 3 hands: 1 to hold the DS, 1 to hold the camera, and 1 to click with the stylus!
I only have two hands so...

I'm pretty happy with this new version. It's sooo much better than 0.1a (the only version I've ever released). Far from perfect though.
Tomorrow I'll correct the last few bugs, everything I can fix in one day.
Then I'll write a short readme file with instructions, keys, etc.


I'll be submitting my entry for the competition, DSHobro 0.2, tomorrow in the evening.

Check back later for more news!

DSHobro 0.2 in time for competition

Good progress has been made on version 0.2, I've just finished the first beta version.
The major changes in this version are:

• A real user-interface, thanks to Mollusk!
• Scrolling is now supported (so you can read more than just the top of a page)
• There are 2 views, one for each screen: a miniature one; and a large one on which text is perfectly readable. You can switch views (switch screens) using the L/R triggers, zoom out on the miniature view, click somewhere on the miniature to view the 1:1 version on the other screen, etc...
• Many options available: a better control over the image compression, enable/disable images, etc.
• Multi-user support (multiple DS's may use DSHobro at the same time, with 1 server)
  
• Privacy (people using the computer can't see what you're doing with the DS)

... and more good stuff that you will hopefully enjoy when you try it!

Version 0.2 *final* will be published for the Dev-Fr Competition.
I will not add anything else in this version because we've already reached the state of beta version.

DSHobro development continues

Although I lost all my data in a hard disk crash (click here for the full story) I had sent an old version of the sources to Mollusk so I will be able to resume the development of DShobro, starting today. I would also appreciate it if you stopped sending me private messages to ask me about the progress of the browser, bear in mind I am doing this project for free and with my spare time so I do not owe anything to you, I will take all necessary time to finish it. Also, I don't read my blog comments anymore, there are just so many of them these days...
BRB, reinstalling devkitpro ...

Update...

People keep emailing me so I think I need to post an update!

First, let me tell you that the past few days have been very busy for me. It's the end of year here and I've had to terminate many different projects for uni. This is the reason why I haven't been able to keep up with the delays I announced. This project is not dead, we're not pulling "another gnirfleo" and I'm sure you know it.

Another problem I wanted to raise. Lately, I've been working on the download speeds. On LAN (at home only, when data doesn't travel on the internet), the download speeds from PC to DS are correct, fast enough for the application. However, using WAN (internet) the speeds are quite terrible. I get something like  8 kilobytes/s. I've written several different protocols and algorithms, with acknowledgements or not (acknowledging every data block, acknowledging 1 data block only, etc...) and I still get the same crappy speed. I've contacted the author of DSFTP, but he didn't reply to my email.
So, I'm facing a choice here: I'm either going to wait until I solve the speed issues, or release a v0.2 that will only be efficient for local usage.

If you have any lead on how to solve the speed issues, please post a comment.
Thanks!

PS: I apologize for the delays, and for not being able to keep up with the delays I originally announced. I hope to make that up with an interesting v0.2 release.