[maemo-developers] GSoC2010 global search application proposal discussion

[From: Max]

Hi Carol,
good idea, an index is not bad, but what about starting with a website
index? www.yacy.net
it allows to search for webpages in a browser,
a mameo compatible browser is http://dooble.sf.net
Maybe you want to compile it?
as it has a file explorer integrated, you do not need a new indexer,
as they want launchy.sf.net in the desktop, that is the indexer you
can look for?
Regards

On Sun, Mar 21, 2010 at 4:21 PM, Shapeshifter <shapeshifter at archlinux.us> wrote:
> Dear Maemo developers,
>
> now that Maemo has been accepted as a mentoring organization for GSoC 2010,
> I'd like to ask about joining the action. I've been pondering on what
> project to look into, as quite a few of them interest me (including porting
> Remmina, the Ebook reader idea and an idea of my own, which revolves around
> recovering data from your device if it gets stolen and getting a GPS lock
> upon sending it an SMS or similar things), but I think I'll settle for the
> "Global Search Application" Project.
> What is it about? I'll just rephrase the proposal from the project ideas
> page and then share my ideas on how to implement and present it:
>
> == Global Search Application
> An application which indexes local files and content and supports searching
> for files and content in a convenient and appealing fashion as well as
> opening results in their respective application.
>
> == Thoughts about presentation and implementation
> The search application should respond quickly and present results in an
> appealing fashion while the user is typing - possibly supported by
> thumbnails - and should open them in the appropriate application if
> possible. It should also include searching for contacts (including contact
> fields, e.g. jabber nicknames and such), SMS, emails and other content
> commonly stored on the device. Indexing shouldn't waste battery life or
> impact performance while the user is actively using the device.
>
> While looking around for clues, I've seen that this idea has been around for
> a while with lots of discussions happening around the 2008 Maemo summit (
> https://wiki.maemo.org/Desktop_Search_Hackfest ). Solutions discussed
> included Strigi, Beagle and Xesam, but it seems like there hasn't been a
> final product of sorts. I myself have been thinking about adapting some more
> streamlined solutions like locate (updatedb), and building around those.
> Quite interesting for such a device would be rlocate because it's small,
> fast and will know about file changes, but that needs it's own kernel module
> which might not be feasable for the platform. If using one of these, there'a
> also another component needed for indexing file content, and of course there
> need to be special components for accessing the maemo-specific data like
> contacts and so on. There's definitely lots of way we could do this, and the
> preferred method would need to be found.
>
> Concrete tasks would include collecting the existing bits and pieces,
> choosing the grounds to build upon, writing or adapting, porting and
> packaging a backend indexer, writing a frontend, preferrably as a widget,
> and conduction reliability and speed tests.
>
> == About myself
> My name is Carol Alexandru and I'm studying Computer Sciences at the
> University of Zurich, Switzerland (UZH) in the 4th semester. I've been a
> Linux user for around 5 years and have lots of experience regarding the CLI
> and the underlying mechanisms of Linux. During my study I've acquired skills
> in modeling, project planning and of course programming - the usual stuff.
> I'm highly motivated to work for the community and to write open source
> software. I've been working on a larger project of my own (creating a
> multi-user music streaming server, which I have not yet released; It needs a
> few finishing touches) and lots of minor hacks and tools, mostly for the
> CLI. I'm also the author of the "Alarmed" Qt/CLI wrapper around
> alarmd/libalarm for Maemo 5 ( http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=46594
> ). Now, I *love* Python but I also know the more common languages like
> C/C++. During my spare time, I like to just hack small scripts'n'stuff,
> maintain our student clubs servers and infrastructure and have a couple of
> beers with friends. And of course I've got an N900 ;-)
> Regarding other commitments during summer, I need to pass a few crucial
> exams in the first half of June. Apart from that, I'm 100% available.
>
> == Contact info
> I'm always on IRC in irc.freenode.net#maemo, nickname "Shapeshifter", and of
> course you can reach me through this email address:
> shapeshifter at archlinux.us.
>
> So, I know it's a bit early for a "full-blown" application, as the period
> starts on March 28th, so please consider this an expression of my interest.
> :-)
> I'd really like for possible mentors on this to get in touch with me to
> discuss details and see if this is a project fitting into Maemo and if I'm
> the right person for the job. I think quite a few people would like the idea
> and profit from such an application.
>
> Thanks for your time.
>
> Regards,
> Carol Alexandru
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