Hi all,
I'm currently working on a system to install dictionaries over-the-air (OTA). I'm concentrating on Android right now, but it should be straightforward to use the system on the PDA/PC versions and to extend it for J2ME. On Android I've already a working (unstable) demo, though the following is still open for discussion and modifications!
There is a website (dict-dwn-list.php) that is called by a client with the following two parameters (see example link below):
- p, an identifier for the client's platform (1, for android)
- v, a string specifying the version of the client's software
Using this data, the website returns some status information (e.g. to display a message to the user, or to inform the user to update the client software first) and the list of available/applicable dictionaries with the following information:
- the name of the dictionary, displayed to the user
- url to zip-file on sourceforge
- size of the file specified by url
- fileName, used to save the file on the client
For Android, the list is returned in JSON-format (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JSON), check this link for a demo:
http://dictionarymid.sourceforge.net/dict-dwn-list.php?p=1&v=40 (http://dictionarymid.sourceforge.net/dict-dwn-list.php?p=1&v=40)
The demo on Android continues like this:
- 1.Let the user pick a dictionary
- 2.Download the zipped dictionary
- 3.Extract the jar-ed dictionary
- 4.Extract the real dictionary
- 5.Load the dictionary
I wanted to use the existing infrastructure, so the system is based on the already available zip files on sourceforge. In the long run, especially to also allow OTA for J2ME, we definitely need to provide the jar and jad files directly, which will also speed up the whole process for Android.
On a side note:
Sourceforge updated their file release system recently (http://sourceforge.net/apps/wordpress/sourceforge/2009/07/22/file-release-system-frs-update-complete-2009-07-22/), breaking the automatic mirror selection on Android due to white-spaces in the file names. We can now either wait for them to fix the issue (here (http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/sourceforge/ticket/2628), here (http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/sourceforge/ticket/2674)), or rename the automatically generated directories that have been introduced by the update.
Looking forward to your feedback, criticism and suggestions 8)
Achim
Sourceforge seems to have fixed their FileReleaseSystem, though I cannot find an official announcement and the previously mentioned bug reports have not yet been closed. Anyways, mirror selection and downloads now work again as expected and the beta release of OTA dictionary installation on Android is coming closer...
Achim