Re: malsync/AvantGo + a few other things
Rev Simon Rumble <simon@rumble.net> writes:
> The easiest way, user interface-wise, would be for us to have a
> downloadable pdb file that adds entries into the Dates application under
> our own category title with attached notes perhaps.
Hmm, you do know that there are no categories in the datebook? ;-)
Anyway, more on this in a moment...
> Is there some nice, nifty piece of script or otherwise to perform this?
> Ideally something that takes some sort of standard formatted text (comma,
> tab or XML) and churns out a .pdb file?
Nope... to do what you want to do, you'll probably be doing at least
some custom programming.
To add stuff to the datebook, you will have to modify the datebook
database in place -- there is no support for automatically merging a
pdb file into an existing database, so if you try to download a new
datebook DB, it will replace the one already in the Palm.
One way to do what you want is to write a custom conduit for the
desktop. The sync protocol allows you manipulate the contents of the
Palm directly, so your conduit can insert records into the datebook DB
directly. Alternatively, you could download a custom database (*not*
a replacement for the datebook DB) and write an application for the
Palm that would move the data into the datebook, but this would
probably require user interaction.
After looking at the sort of data your site has, I would recommend
writing a custom Palm application to view it, rather than inserting
events directly into the user's datebook. My rationale for this
recommendation is that I think there is good reason to have most or
all of the data available (for those "hmm, what do I want to do
tonight" kind of decisions) but putting it all in the datebook will
just cause needless cluttering. It would seem advantageous to have
the data available in an application customized for exactly the sort
of views and searches that people will want to do... and once they
find something they like, have a "remind me" button that puts just
that event in their datebook.
(For another application with a similar theme, check out Showtimes at
http://jrray.org/showtimes/showtimes.html)
On the technical side of things, it is probably easier to support a
custom application than a conduit, because you only have to write one
application for all Palms, but conduits are very platform-specific
(and on Unix, they are specific to which desktop application you are
using).
--Rob
--
Rob Tillotson N9MTB <rob@pyrite.org>
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