Function Arguments

Fabio Fumi asked if I could explain why the mdb stack showed six parameters (or arguments) for each function call in the MDB ::stack output. Quite simply the core file was generated on a SPARC. SPARC systems pass parameters using six registers (%o0 to %o5). When more than six parameters are passed the additional parameters are placed on the stack (%o6). MDB does not know how many of these registers are actually used, if indeed any of them are. Or if more parameters were saved on the callers stack. MDB simply prints the registers (as saved in the stack trace).

For public functions refer to the manual page or header files (/usr/include) to see how many parameters are expected.

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Palm Tungsten T3

The Palm Tungstem T3 is my third Palm OS based handheld. Previously I owned a Palm III
(with TRG memory upgrade) and then a Sony Clie T265C… I had thought that I was done with upgrading for a while,
I thought my next pda would include a built in phone. But then my fellow colleague
Peter Harvey went and bought a Palm T3 on my recommendation and I was just so gelouse…. So after a while, once the price had dropped, I purchased a shiny new T3.

[Que dramatic Terminator 3 music…]

The Tungsten T3 is really great. So what is it about it I really like:

• It’s fast! 400MHz Intel® XScale processor
• Large screen 320×480 (for a PDA)
• Virtual keyboard, great for using T3 in the dark
• Plenty of builtin Memory
• SD memory slot, (Sony MS memory on Clie was too cost prohibitive to buy more than one)
• Bluetooth: I can SMS and surf the web
• Powerful Infrared, thus I could migrate OmniRemote Pro from Sony Clie and still switch off the TV!
• Loud alarms, plus vibrate with quick ‘silent’ option from the menu bar
• I can play MP3s 🙂

Of course that’s just the hardware, best of all I can run all the great applications that I have been using since I got my first Palm device.

I Sync my palm in the office using PilotManager. And at home I also sync it to the family PC using the
PalmSource provided Windows software. The down side at work is that I am still using a serial interface that I
had to purchase separately. Hopefully with the Solaris 10 improved USB support a USB Sync on Solaris SPARC wont
be too far off.

I’ll follow up soon with a post with my favourite applications, utilities and accessories.

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Blogging on a PDA

Thought I’d try publishing to my blog from my Palm PDA. I looked at the Blogger API where I learned that I needed a UserId, password and an ID. I spent some time looking around for where I might find my ID for blogs.sun.com. Unlike me I spent to much time looking in the Roller Weblog Guide when I should have been looking nearer to home… I found the answer from P@; turns out my ID is my UserId.

To make this post I used Beta 1 of BlogPlanetLE. I didn’t like the fact that it added a little advert for its self (I removed it before publishing). But I like the fact that it is a Java Applet. Think I’ll see what else there is now I know it can be done.

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