A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

Hello!

I've had my N800 for a couple of weeks now and have been really surprised by how useful I'm finding it. My wife has had one for several months now and my envy finally resulted in me getting one for myself.

Anyway, I had a few questions that I'm sure are very "newbie-esque" so I thought I'd post them here. For what it's worth, my Nokia came with OS2007 and I've continued using that.

1. My e-mail program (just the standard app) doesn't seem to be working very well. Sometimes when I click on the mail icon, the loading box appears on the right off the screen, wheel in motion, then nothing happens. I click the e-mail icon again, it tries to load again, and nothing happens. Eventually it'll start up if I'm persistent. Sometimes, it'll load immediately. Any thoughts? I frequently get messages with the attachments stripped, as well. I thought this might be due to the maximum size limits, but I've sent myself messages with attachments, had those attachments stripped, then when I resent them, they show up. I know the attachments are available, because when I check them through another means, they're visible.

2. Installing Apps: When I first got it, I had no trouble installing applications from the Maemo.org site, using either the Application Manager or clicking on the green "Click to install" arrows. Now, I seem to only have the ability to install via the Application Manager. When I try to click on the "Click to install" arrows it starts to download the file, opens up Application Manager, then conks out saying something like, "Cannot refresh application list." Nothing gets installed.

3. Overnight, my Nokia's power consumption seems to have bottomed out. There are plenty of reasons why this can happen (it's left "on" accidentally, didn't get a proper charge, etc.), but I had my Nokia running on my desk all day on Monday, and today I seem to have barely 1/3 the same amount of active time, if that. The only thing that has changed is that I added another 2 GB card to my External slot (I have a 2 GB card in my internal slot). Does having extra, unused memory, eat up battery time? Before I upgraded to the additional card, I was using the 128 SD card the Nokia came with, in the external slot, and didn't seem to have any problems.

4. Lastly, I've had a couple of Apps show up in the Installed Applications list within the Application Manager. "browser-eal" and "tablet-browser-controls." Neither of these apps were there before and both say that they cannot be erased. I'm guessing these are patches or additions to Opera, but find it strange that they just showed up recently. Thoughts?

Thanks in advance for all your advice/thoughts. I've been lurking for quite a while now (before and after getting my tablet) and it's been a great learning experience. I just haven't stumbled across all the answers yet. :)

Robb

Re: A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

2) A repo is probably not responding. If you go to the menu and options you should be able to uncheck repos. I think they also tell you which ones aren't responding (just untick the box).

3) I think if you use bigger cards it might use more battery. Don't know if that's really the case though.

4) When you update programs or install programs, they can sometimes install dependencies. So those might be it for Opera or whatever.

Re: A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

The built-in one is known to be junk, more or less. I haven't heard anyone say it is better than Modest, though I'm sure someone thinks so. Modest is highly recommended.
Yes, OS2007 package manager is broke. If one repo fails, the whole thing is stopped (rather than carrying on with just the repos that worked, and cached lists from the ones that didn't). Fixed in OS2008, but in OS2007, the only thing is to hunt down the offending repo and disable it.
In my experience, no, and moreover there's no good reason it should. I'd suspect you've got some renegade software running, maybe metalayer-crawler gone berserk...
browser-eal is the engine abstraction layer, that's what lets you run MicroB and Opera engines in the same browser. Not sure about tablet-browser-controls. Have you installed MicroB? If so, that might be it.

Re: A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

Laughing Man & Benson...

Thanks for your input, guys, I really appreciate you taking the time to clear some of this up for me.

I haven't checked out Modest yet. I'll make that a priority. I tried Claws Mail for about ten minutes, and while it was nice, it was also a little overkill for an internet tablet. At least, that was my impression. I like the simplisty of the built-in mail program, but if Modest can do a better job, while remaining fairly simple and easy to use, then I'll probably love it.

After reading about MicroB in this thread, I just upgraded to it. Thanks for the suggestion, Benson.

Robb

Re: A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

If you havent... please update to the latest os 2008. Its far more cleaner and lesser problems

Re: A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

Yeah, Modest is slated as an eventual replacement for the built-in e-mail, and has a comparable feature set, but with less bugs. Claws Mail is just a port of the desktop version -- love it or hate it, it's no lightweight, simple, mobile mail client. I see it as overkill (I'll just use GMail's web interface for anything Modest can't do), but Modest seems quite sane, and, (whatever your preferences), less buggy than the built-in.

Re: A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

Thanks for the recommendation, Sachin007. I've looked at the OS2008 update a few times, but some of the threads on here have scared me off with the tales of battery woes and incompatible applications. I may still give it a try, though. I could always just go back to 2007 if I don't like it (sounds like I wouldn't be the only one).

And, thanks Benson, for the additional info about Modest. It looks like it's OS2008 only. I guess that's another reason to try the new OS and see what I think.

Thanks, guys!

Robb

Re: A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

Actually i hade the same problem(battery dying overnight) because of meta crawler just running in the background for no apparent reason.( and i think the old canola was the culprit)

I really dont understand how os2008 is causing problems especially with the newest update solving the power on problem. Anyway the battery life may be a tad low because of increase in the performance. I have a solution for that. I brought an extra battery for cheap(20$) and now i can have 6 hours of juice.

Just update to the newest os.... and dont backup anything.

Re: A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

Ugh. Too late. How will I know if I have a problem? Should I reflash and not restore my backup?

Robb

Re: A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

Well if everything is ok.... leave it. If not there is always the option of reflashing. Just that the application manager tends to act wierd due to different repositories. Anyway you wont loose much by waiting and watching.

Re: A whole slew of newbie questions...
 

Okay. Great. Thanks! Again, I really do appreciate everyone's input and thoughts.

Robb