Droid48 Reader 1.5 Released

[Chris Dreher]

Droid48 Reader 1.5 has been released on Google Play.

To download for Android go to https://play.google.com/store/apps/detai...id48reader

Read more about it at http://www.drehersoft.com/droid48-reader/

Droid48 Reader Features:

• Read HP 48-Series calculator files
• Read data from Droid48, a separate HP 48 calculator emulator
• Easily navigate through the data
• Save or share portions as HP48 files
• PNG support: HP48 graphics are convertible to standard PNG files

New Features:

• Android 8.0 (Android O) supported via minor UI tweak.

Bugs:

• Fixed: On Android 7.0 and up (Android Nougat and up), sharing files and images caused a crash.

[compsystems]

Unfortunately, droid48 has many bugs and the author is not willing to correct them, expecting a real emu48 port from our friend CG, as it did with emu48 for pocketPC.

Survey, you are willing to pay for a version of emu48PC on android-os?


emu48 PC 20 years
http://hp.giesselink.com/emu48.htm

[Chris Dreher]

(08-08-2017 04:22 PM)compsystems Wrote:  Unfortunately, droid48 has many bugs and the author is not willing to correct them, expecting a real emu48 port from our friend CG, as it did with emu48 for pocketPC.

Survey, you are willing to pay for a version of emu48 on android-os?

emu48 PC 20 years
http://hp.giesselink.com/emu48.htm

Are the bugs you are most concerned about from that the author chose x48 as the engine instead of emu48 or bugs from the Android-specific code the author wrote to get the x48 engine running on Android? I am just curious.

Before anyone writes a new emu48 app for Android, does anyone know what engine Olivier De Smet's apps use? I don't know if his 4 apps use emu48, x48, or something else. His are the go48* series of apps.

Here are all the HP-48 related Android apps I know about. Notice how many installs have been done for the free apps versus the paid apps.

• Droid48 - free - 1,000,000 to 5,000,000 installs
  Emulates 48GX and 48S based on x48 engine, file import-only, no printer, the first emulator on Android for HP-48 series
• Droid48sx - free - 100,000 to 500,000 installs
  Emulates 48SX based on x48 engine, file import-only, no printer
• go48g - free - 50,000 to 100,000 installs
  Emulate 48G with unknown engine, no file import/export, no printer
• go48s - free - 10,000 to 50,000 installs
  Emulate 48S with unknown engine, no file import/export, no printer
• go48gx - $12 - 100 to 500 installs
  Emulate 48GX with unknown engine, has file import/export and printer emulation
• go48sx - $12 - 50 to 100 installs
  Emulate 48SX with unknown engine, has file import/export and printer emulation
• Droid48 Reader - free - 10,000 to 50,000 installs
  My app. No engine since it isn't an emulator, provides file export from Droid48 and sort-of for Droid48sx
  

[compsystems]

The simplest engine is X48, but it is the most incomplete and with many BUGS, the engine that is well developed is emu48 (20 years of development) now GOxx emulators have their own engine, but are bad, crashes, resets etc.

We need an RPN and RPL enthusiast who makes an emu48PC port to android or i-os, I think he could earn some money, as there are many RPN and RPL followers

[Jlouis]

(08-09-2017 02:45 PM)compsystems Wrote:  The simplest engine is X48, but it is the most incomplete and with many BUGS, the engine that is well developed is emu48 (20 years of development) now GOxx emulators have their own engine, but are bad, crashes, resets etc.

We need an RPN and RPL enthusiast who makes an emu48PC port to android or i-os, I think he could earn some money, as there are many RPN and RPL followers

I've been playing around with Go49g+ and Go48g for some years and have not experienced crashes or resets.

Olivier are doing a great job in developing and maintaining his apps and it cost little money.

Cheers

[compsystems]

Droid48 problems

[EugeneNine]

I haven't seen any bugs in x48 yet.

Testing some of my devices I don't see the UI issue.

a quick search on emu48 looks like its runs on windows only.

[Chris Dreher]

So it sounds like your main complaints with Droid48 are:

1. Use of the x48 engine
2. UI layout issues when used in landscape mode (portrait mode is typically fine)
   

Have you contacted the author about these issues? I don't know if he can do much for the 1st issue but the 2nd is definitely within his control.

I've been meaning to ping him about the same UI layout issues and have contacted about lock-up issues in older versions.

[compsystems]

The author of droid48, never answered my emails


I want to see in droid48 reader a simple program editor like notepad with a chars table for paste symbols and then you can transfer them to the emulator stack,
who is in the capacity to do it?

[Jlouis]

(08-09-2017 02:45 PM)compsystems Wrote:  now GOxx emulators have their own engine, but are bad, crashes, resets etc.

OK, the problems are with droid48, not GOxx.

I don't use Droid48 much, so I cannot tell, but looks like you showed layout bugs, but only in landscape mode. Let's hope the developer correct this soon and let's not forget that he did it for free and there's no AD in the app.

We should thank him, anyway.

Best Regards

JL

[Chris Dreher]

(08-10-2017 01:12 AM)compsystems Wrote:  The author of droid48, never answered my emails


I want to see in droid48 reader a simple program editor like notepad with a chars table for paste symbols and then you can transfer them to the emulator stack,
who is in the capacity to do it?

Droid48 would be the better program for that. Alternatively, Droid 48 Reader theoretically could partly implement where you'd write the program in Droid48 Reader and save it to a file but then the user would switch to Droid48 to transfer the file to the stack. Droid48 Reader currently only reads data out of Droid48; it doesn't push the data back into Droid48.

The catch with either solution is that the mechanism for putting a file/data on the stack is that the HP stack is designed for binary HP files and not text HP files. For a program editor, creating text is easy but the binary is harder. There are two main options:

1. Have Droid48 or Droid48 Reader generate the binary file/data directly from the text the user typed in. However, this is not trivial to do since the code to do this requires implementing the first few stages of a language compiler. There is additional complexity if the text program calls out to any functions or commands from installed libraries (i.e. libraries not built into the calculator). All in all, it's doable but not easy.
2. An easier to implement option (but more work for the user) is to install a text-to-binary converter program into the emulator. One example is ASCIIBIN.48. You can read what these extra steps are at http://www.drehersoft.com/droid48-reader...eader-faq/ under the "How do I get my programs back into the emulator, Droid48?" section.
   

[Chris Dreher]

FYI, my access to the Internet will be limited for the next week. I expect to be able to intermittently reply, but the replies will come slower.