I need a specific solution… something that doesn’t have to be too neat and easy, but if it isn’t, it’s well documented.
So whats the task I have in mind? I need to be able to control a computer remotely with a configurable set of remote buttons on a Touch Screen PDA.
My original thinking on this problem went along the lines of utilising a Webserver on the remote PC and accessing a series of small webpages that clicking the buttons would run scripts on the server machine that would do specific tasks, or run specific programs. I guess this is still possible, however in somecases I would need to provide feedback from those application to the PDA. I’m sure some of thise would be possible… I just need a push in the right direction.
Can anyone help with that push? Or even another solution entirely?
How remotely? The infrared serial communications on the Palm are fairly easy to program; you could write a simple program in Lua or Lisp or (gods forbid) Forth or C, that would run quite cheerfully on the Palm and talk to the IR port on a PC. Alternatively, you could write something in C using the Windows- or Linux-hosted gcc compiler and communicate via Bluetooth. This would not be a huge task; if there were money in it, I’d be happy to help, but of course given my well known lack of free time and my recent adventures with aquatic PDAs, I couldn’t do it immediately.
Suppose we went with the Bluetooth solution. The method of attack would be to design a suitable control panel, with the buttons and sliders and edit controls and whatever else you thought you might want. The backend would be very very simple: it would synchronise with a Bluetooth program running on the PC, and every time you pressed a button the PDA would send a message. It would be literally a screen full of code for the PDA side. The PC side could use Perl, C or whatever language you were happiest with: all it would need to do is synchronise with the PDA and then sit there listening for messages and dispatching whatever scripts or functions you cared to associate with it. It wouldn’t be a big job, actually.
Actually it would either be through Wifi, Bluetooth or the USB cradle connector… and the PDA is actually a PocketPC running Windows Mobile 2003. And just to make it really difficult, the computer it would be controlling would either be a Mac or Linux running on Mac G4 Hardware.
The applicatio… to provide a minimalistic control to a pc running as an in-car entertainment system.
Yes, I know… I don’t do things the easy way do I.
Though I think might be working on something similar shortly… Guess I’ll have to wait and see.
The PC in question isn’t a problem, since your best bet for that sort of automation is always Perl. That’ll run on anything. There are programming solutions for the Wince machines too — probably more than there are for the mid-90s technology of the Palm. You shouldn’t have too much trouble rustling up something.