Make Standalone apps on the phone ?

[clv0]

Dear,

I'm about to decide between PyS60 and M-Shell - www.m-shell.net - as a language to start learning and writing some little apps.

I've first considered M-shell because it has an IDE for developing directly on the phone, and mostly, it doesn't require installing a complete interpreter just to be able to create standalone applications, as PyS60 requires Python 2.5 plus Application Packager. Is there any way, perhaps a third party app, to make all this on my phone only?

Also, according to the PyS60 doc, it seems not to be so powerful on the audio area, e.g. it doesn't allow to choose the codec and sample rate for recording a file, but it's probably a subject for another thread.

Thanks for any tip.
Cleverson

[mvuori]

M-shell seem to be exactly what you need. Still, the keyword here is "learning"... learning what and with what goals? If you want to learn how to program little applications - and to do it on the go, all is well.

But if you want to learn skills that can leverage your career forward and can be of immediate use in other domains too (and that are such skills that organizations need or can utilize right now), Python or other more widely used languages might be a better choice. After all, Python is supposed to be so easy that a "programming-oriented person" doesn't need a visual IDE on the phone, just an editor (like Ped http://code.google.com/p/ped-s60/ ) and quick fingers.

And yes, PyS60 has weak areas, but so has every language. Part of the PyS60 experience is learning to hunt for components that others may have already written for the things that the basic package does not support. This is the benefit of large user base of software development tools: people who provide infrastructure, support, future... I'm not sure about M-shell in that regard.

[ashraf fawzy]

Hi mvuori,

Part of the PyS60 experience is learning to hunt for components that others may have already written for the things that the basic package does not support.

I hope it's not a silly question , but I got interested with this phrase of yours , and I hope if you can explain what does it mean ??


Many thanks in advance.

[clv0]

Hello, many thanks for the kind answer.

In fact, m-Shell seems not to have many users, nor it's free/open software.

My goal for now is to try learning how to write in some language (I'm able to read some source code already), by writing for Symbian some little audioPC -games for children which are part of a brazilian educational project, hence my interest on audio flexibility and features, like specifying the play and record quality. I'm gonna do it for fun, but who knows, perhaps I invest more seriously on programming in the future.

BTW, last year I've installed some apps written in Python which required installing the Python interpreter and script shell on the phone as dependencies. Does Python 2.0 still requires installing them prior to any standalone app?

Well, I may install Python 2.5 here in my PC if necessary, but if there was a way to make all on the phone, that would be better....

Thanks,
Cleverson