Version 9 of Windows Mobile 2003 Smartphone

TP Jan 22, 2005. I recently bought a new phone for my mobile service, an Audiovox SMT5600 [L1 ]. This is the same device sold in Europe by Orange as the SPV C500. Other phones with the same O/S include the Motorola MPx 220.

This device runs Microsoft Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition software for Smartphone [L2 ], which is a newer name for Windows/CE, running on a 200 mHz ARM processor [L3 ]. The device is not quite like a PocketPC, in that it has a smaller screen (176x220), and is not touch sensitive. Instead, a 5-way rocker switch is used to navigate, along with two soft menu keys, Home and Back keys. The soft menu keys are application dependent, Home normally returns to the Home screen, Back is used as a backspace in character entry mode, and to return to the previous application otherwise. The SMT5600 also employs T9 [L4 ] for smart text input (dictionary lookup based on the keys, e.g., 2-2-8 will offer "act", "cat", "bat", etc.) In 'multiple keypress' mode, several taps on the same key selects various letters (2-2-2 is 'C'), numbers, and special characters.

I have been experimenting with running Tcl/Tk on the phone. I installed the Tcl/Tk CE 8.4.6 package from http://sourceforge.net/projects/tcltkce . The good news is that Tcl/Tk does indeed run on the phone!!. The bad news is that the limited input is going to need some work to make the device a useful Tcl/Tk platform.

So far, I've been able to start TkCon (after a small bug fix), and run a few other hello world type programs. The 5-way rocker switch is currently interpreted as cursor motion (Up, Down, Right, Left) and Return (press down). The two soft keys and Home/Back keys do not currently pass any keypresses, and the keyboard is locked in numeric mode, so character input with T9 or multi-press is not available.

One of the primary differences is that most applications for the Smartphone run in 'fullscreen' mode. Tcl/Tk CE runs in windowing mode, complete with title bar and a close window 'X' button. I would guess that this will require some low level mechanics to make Tcl/Tk more like a Smartphone application.

I followed the install instructions from the tcltk846ce-arm.zip distribution file. Be sure to get the WinCE Desktop tools from [L5 ] , in order to get the Windows (x86) cereg program needed to make required registry entries. I installed in \Storage\Program Files\Tcl to get the software placed in the flash memory area. The distributed tkcon.tcl needed a small bug fix, at line 678:

  # Place it so that the titlebar underlaps the CE titlebar
  set root $PRIV(root)           ;# ADD THIS LINE
  wm geometry $root +0+0

Perhaps Jeff Hobbs has this fixed in later versions.

There is at least one Bluetooth keyboard that is known to work with the SMT5600, so perhaps I'll have to give it a try [L6 ].

I also have been able to use the SyncCE [L7 ] package to access this device from Linux, in order to do some basic file copying. Most other software you can get for the device requires a working Windows system to install; typically a Windows (x86) executable 'setup.exe' file extracts the actual ARM binary and installs it on the device. I've found a couple of small freebie text editors [L8 ] and [L9 ] that can be used for coding.

More to come as I have time to play.....

Coding on a cell phone can be lots of fun.