Pandora Apps Site


Yes, it does exist, I need to put it back in. I removed it for some error checking and never re-added it.


There is a huge update for pandora apps to take it to 2.0 which I need to get online. Time time time...!
 
There is a huge update for pandora apps to take it to 2.0 which I need to get online. Time time time...!

Any chance it will be compatible with the PND repository Specification? So that Tempels most excellent PND store application could be used with it.

There is nothing stopping him grabbing the version number now.


Also your account home page checks what software has been updated anyway, you could just visit that page?
 
Yes, it does exist, I need to put it back in. I removed it for some error checking and never re-added it.


There is a huge update for pandora apps to take it to 2.0 which I need to get online. Time time time...!

Hi


OK, thanks :)
 
There is a huge update for pandora apps to take it to 2.0 which I need to get online. Time time time...!

Any chance it will be compatible with the PND repository Specification? So that Tempels most excellent PND store application could be used with it.

There is nothing stopping him grabbing the version number now.


Also your account home page checks what software has been updated anyway, you could just visit that page?

Yeah, as long as I click pandora logo at top left first, otherwise I get Icontrol pad page missing screen.


Also, that is only new software not updated. You haver to go to each of the other tabs to the left to see updated. Sometimes I also, have to refresh that page as well after I go to it to update.
 
There is a huge update for pandora apps to take it to 2.0 which I need to get online. Time time time...!

Any chance it will be compatible with the PND repository Specification? So that Tempels most excellent PND store application could be used with it.

There is nothing stopping him grabbing the version number now.
Do you mean that Pandora Apps already follows the specification? I don't understand what you mean here.
 
There is a huge update for pandora apps to take it to 2.0 which I need to get online. Time time time...!

Any chance it will be compatible with the PND repository Specification? So that Tempels most excellent PND store application could be used with it.

There is nothing stopping him grabbing the version number now.
Do you mean that Pandora Apps already follows the specification? I don't understand what you mean here.

If you want the version number just grab it from the app page. There is no need to implement a complex system to get it. Just get it from the server.


eg.


Get->http://apps.open-pandora.org/cgi-bin/viewapp.pl?/Game/fargoal.inf


And all the app information is contained within.
 
If you want the version number just grab it from the app page. There is no need to implement a complex system to get it. Just get it from the server.
Unfortunately, screen scraping does require a complex system, at least on the client end. Consider that client software first has to pull out this chunk of HTML:



Code:
<span class="author">by Googer (port)

 - 1.66MB, 1.0

 - 25/4/2011

</span>,
That's easy enough, but then it has to get the version number, which is apparently everything from the comma on the second line to the end of that line. Okay, a client could find that, but what happens when you want to tweak the layout a little? Maybe you decide to just put it all on to one line instead of three? Suddenly the client can't find the version number. And that's only the version number we're talking about; that doesn't even account for title, description, rating, etc., any of which could break at the slightest layout change.


The repo spec is there to present all the same data, but in a way that a client program can easily understand it, independently of how it's presented to a human user. Presumably all the data is stored on your server in some layout-independent way, then Perl scripts assemble it into the displayed pages. Implementing the repo spec would therefore require just one more Perl script that assembles all that data into JSON rather than HTML. When I designed the latest version of the repo spec, I specifically had your app site in mind, and tried to make it as easy as possible to implement; though it may look large and hairy, the vast majority of its fields are optional, and you don't have to implement them if you don't want to.


Of course, if someone wanted to write an updater client that scrapes your site, that would certainly be cool. But, with PNDstore, I set out specifically to make a client for the repo spec. Attempting to shoehorn in site-specific screen scraping just wouldn't be worthwhile; a client would need to be built from the ground up. And I already have more than enough things to do, so it won't be from me. But still, I hope you'll give the repo spec another consideration, since there's a client already waiting to use it.
 
Craig, you don't really get what the repo spec is about, do you?


It is a unified, unspecific and documented way to get all information about PND files on a server.


Consider apps.open-pandora, sure one could build a script to strip all HTML and unnecessary data from the site to get only the raw PND data, but that is, as Tempel well described, hairy - the slightest layout change (say your version 2.0) could break it.


Also that script would ONLY work on your site, not the repo, not dl.openhandhelds, not anything else - for those sites you would have to build another script. Now you could argue, that apps.openpandora should be the only and definite place to get PNDs, but the fact is, it is not - devs don't like it and the person trying to keep it up-to-date is not doing a very good jop imo as he or she is missing a lot of recent updates.


The repo spec solves all that, because by implementing it in any site (which is not that hard) you can have ONE script to gather all PND data from ANY server and get it in a sane and useful way, so implementing a PNDstore application like Tempel's is easier and more stable than having to manually scan the HTML site.


Also there is a vast need and desire for such an app. It is by far the most downloaded and best rated program on the repo and comments show that many people wanted exactly this for a very long time. Having to go to your user page on apps.openpandora, navigating around all those errors, then clicking a couple of more times for every PND to get ONE update just does not cut it, when you can update it with Tempel's program like you would use Synaptic (aka few simple clicks for ALL updates).


I am not trying to bash your site here, I am just trying to show you that you are missing our with your current plans for apps.openpandora. Devs don't like it for several reasons and implementing this spec it the first little step in the right direction.


I am eagerly awaiting 2.0, btw.


foxblock out
 
also just to point out, some ofthe versions for apps on the app store are only 3 numbers long.


i.e.


http://apps.openpandora.org/cgi-bin/viewapp.pl?/Game/SORR.inf


says version 0.0.1


when infact the version is 0.0.1.0 so even if somone did build a data scraper for your site (something i already did in the past) that data would not sucessfully compared with a version on the repo for example or in fact the version already installed on the users SD.
 
Also your account home page checks what software has been updated anyway, you could just visit that page?

This is an inferior solution as it will only check the Apps you've downloaded from the OpenAppStore, not the ones sourced from other places. It will also not install them to your chosen directory.


If you want the Pandora to have a little more mass appeal / user friendliness then it makes real sense to ensure the Official Appstore can work in conjunction with Tempels App.


If you've not tried using Milkshakes Repo & Tempels App then please do so, they really show off the way sourcing & updating software for the Pandora should be done.
 
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