Date: Sat, 11 Jan 2003 11:27:01 +0100 (CET) From: Oliver Fromme <olli@secnetix.de> To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG, Gunnar Flygt <flygt@sr.se> Subject: Re: Sharp Zaurus sync Message-ID: <200301111027.h0BAR1qx061010@lurza.secnetix.de> In-Reply-To: <20021013081738.GA33907@sr.se>
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Hi, Sorry for this very late reply of mine in this thread, but I think this information might be worth ending up in the archives, in case someone else searches for it, too ... Gunnar Flygt <gunnar@oldie.sr.se> wrote: > Is there any work going on, to sync Sharp Zaurus 5500 to FreeBSD via usb? It currently is not supported, and won't be (at least not soon). Here's some background information. The Zaurus' USB port can work in two different modes: - In network mode. This works exactly like one of those PC-to-PC USB cables (except that Sharp modified the protocol slightly), running TCP/IP directly on top of the protocol. This is the default mode. In Linux, the "usbnet" driver supports such PC-to-PC USB cables, but because of Sharp's modifications, a newer version called "usbdnet" is required. As far as I know, FreeBSD does not support any of those PC-to-PC USB cables, so a driver would have to be written from scratch. - In serial mode. This, in fact, emulates an ucom device. It then runs PPP over the serial connection over USB, and then TCP/IP on top of that. This is _not_ the same as a native serial connection (which the Zaurus also supports, but you have to buy a special serial cable first, because it's not included). Linux supports that with the "usbserial" driver in generic mode. FreeBSD supports serial USB adapters, too, however, we have got a small problem here. In FreeBSD, the drivers are separated in the frontend driver "ucom" which makes the actual serial tty devices, and several backend drivers (uplcom, uvscon, uftdi) which support specific variants of serial-over-USB protocols by different chip vendors. We do not have a "generic mode" like the Linux folks do. However, I _think_ that one of those backend drivers could be talked into accepting the Zaurus' USB serial protocol, without too much trouble. (Or maybe, one of them could be even cloned and converted into a generic USB-serial driver, like Linux has.) You can switch the Zaurus between those two modes using the /etc/usbcontrol script. There's no GUI for it, so you have to open a terminal (I recommend installing OpenSSH on the Zaurus and then make an ssh connection to it, because it's more convenient). "/etc/usbcontrol serial" switches to serial/PPP mode, "/etc/usbcontrol net" switches back to network mode. So, the bottom line is, it does not work with FreeBSD, unless someone knowledgeable writes a driver or modifies an existing one. HOWEVER -- There are _so_ many ways to connect the Zaurus to a network or to a PC, that you really should not worry much about it. Most of them require buying additional hardware, though, such as a serial cable, a WaveLAN CF card, or an Ethernet CF card. If you've got a notebook with infrared port, you can also sync via IrDA (you can use /usr/ports/comms/birda), although that won't be very fast, I guess. I haven't tried this. Personally I decided to buy a FastEthernet CF card for my Zaurus, which isn't terribly expensive (I found one for 50 Euro at a German online shop). It's plug&play at its finest: Insert the card, connect to switch, configure IP with the GUI "Internet Wizard", and there you are. I got 20 MBit/s raw throughput from/to my fileserver at home, which isn't really bad for a PDA. ;-) For more information, I have created a small web page which lists some of the Zaurus connectivity possibilities, and which contains some more information: http://www.secnetix.de/~olli/Zaurus/CF/FE/ Hope that helps. Oh, by the way, the Sharp Zaurus is a _really_ cool PDA. I would recommend it to everyone who is looking for a PDA. Well, it doesn't run BSD, but a Linux-variant known as Embedix, but it runs quite smoothly, and _much_ better than WinCE. Because it's Linux-based, you can run almost any UNIX software on it (I've installed ssh, sshd, a VNC server, Python for writing scripts, DooM and Quake and a bunch of other games, and more). I _really_ like it. There's also a gcc package which runs on the Zaurus, so you can compile stuff yourself. And there's a crosscompiler for Linux/i386 with complete development environment, but I haven't figured out yet how to run that under FreeBSD. (Has anyone tried?) Regards Oliver -- Oliver Fromme, secnetix GmbH & Co KG, Oettingenstr. 2, 80538 München Any opinions expressed in this message may be personal to the author and may not necessarily reflect the opinions of secnetix in any way. "All that we see or seem is just a dream within a dream" (E. A. Poe) To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message
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