Impressions of DictonaryForMIDs

[zz85]

I wrote this initially in an email to the developers. 'pasting here for interest of others.

Dear Developers,

First of all, thanks for the great job and effort into this great software.

Although its UI wasn't impressive, the link to the webpage was extremely hard to find, I found the software very usefully and love it! IIRC, I came across this software when looking for a j2me English/Chinese translator (and I remembered using "translate" button to lookup meanings in the oxford dictionary).

As for now, my phone is now a Nokia 5300, a S40 3rd Edition, but unfortunately it has only a jar limit of 1MB. But thankfully, it supports microSD/transflash, so I'm really in favour of the development of JSR-75 filerecord implementation aka 'Loadable Dictionaries' for DictionaryForMids.

Well, I only have some basic knowledge on j2me programming, but hopefully I could be of some help in this project. Just an idea: its quite cool that a keyword looks up encyclopedia information too be implemented for DictionaryForMids. Its would like using http://answers.com which I love using too.

Anyway, just a short thank you note to you guys. Keep up the good work!

Happy 'coding,
Joshua Koo
Singapore
http://zz85.is.dreaming.org/

[Gert]

Thanks for your feedback !

Well, I only have some basic knowledge on j2me programming, but hopefully I could be of some help in this project.

There are so many things where we need support on our project - most jobs are not even related to Java programming ! Just have a look at the "We need your support" section of our homepage.

Best greetings,
Gert

[zz85]

Gert, on 2nd thoughts I would like to help development of DictoinaryForMIDs by programming, esp. on the loadable dictionary feature, which I hope to get it moving. 2 thing in my mind I would like to implement.

1. ZIPed dictionaries
2. File Browser

With regards to your email, yes, jar files actually uses the zip algorithm so they are sort of zip files.

May I know whats the development platform that you all are currently using? WTK with CVS for sources? If you allow, I would like to start a branch to start working with these features.

[Gert]

Joshua,

great to know that you want to support the Development of the DictionaryForMIDs project !!

Yes we are using CVS for maintenance of the source code. You can use the anonymous CVS access to get the latest source. If lateron you completed some updates and you want to check in your updates to CVS, you need to get developer access to CVS.

And yes, we usually use Sun's WTK for compiling and building.

Best greetings,
Gert

[Gert]

Besides, for the file browser we received a source code that we may use. See here: http://dictionarymid.gottfried-signs.ch/index.php?topic=38.0

Gert

[zz85]

I had some problems using the code for the File Browser so I decide to use some code from WTK examples. However, I have noted the way the provide sources was coded and have make some attempt to retain its structure. As for the zip implementations, I will be modifying from classpath's implementation of java.util.zip

[Gert]

Just a short note on the zip classes: Some time ago I had a very quick look at the classpath zip classes (so that DfM could read the JAR-file via JSR 75). For me it seemed that it would take quite some effort to make these classes available for Java ME. Hope you manage to do it !

Gert

[zz85]

Extracting the codes from classpath issnt too much of a problem, (with some help from eclipse), but there are certainly other concerns (like performance)

Regarding UI, I might think launcher filepicker from the main form, but would you want it from the settings? Maybe now I would try placing it into the settings now.

[Gert]

Right now, when the focus is placed in the dictionaryPathTextField of the DictionarySettingsForm, then the selectDictionaryPathCommand becomes active. Currently the selectDictionaryPathCommand displays the root devices only (this is a temporary solution till a 'dictionary chosser' will be integrated).

My idea was, that selectDictionaryPathCommand should launch the 'dictionary chooser' (or however you call that component) and the chosen dictionary (respectively the path to the dictionary) is stored in the dictionaryPathTextField.
So the 'dictionary chooser' would be launched from the settings.

Well, that is just what I had in mind. If you have other ideas, just tell me.

Gert

[stevenc]

Hello all.

In response to Joshua's issues with the DirectoryChooser, I've updated it (http://dictionarymid.gottfried-signs.ch/index.php?topic=38.msg164#msg164).

The problem stemed from 'System.getProperty("file.separator")' returning Windows' file separator, not the emulated phone's