Author Topic: Let's hack the HP Prime! (Read 128451 times)

quitte · « **Reply #165 on:** November 19, 2013, 02:58:04 am »

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Advanced users have no problems with "i am in charge of creating a variable". However, we have very strong feedback from lower end users and educators that having a set of predefined variables is very important and useful to them for many reasons.

Prime in its first release is not targeted directly at high end users. What was and wasn't in the first release was not targeted at the top 1% of users. If that messes up "your workflow" as was posted in that thread, and even the fact that someone is posting about calculators, pretty much by definition means they fall in that tiny power user minority.

I feel honoured to be put into the 1% by you. Of course those unspecified many reasons might actually be good. However let me put it in a 99%ish way:

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8+3*i=:A Error:Bad argument type

Why the hell can't I assign?

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8+3*i=:L1 {8+3*i}

Ah great now it works. I wonder why. And where do those curly brackets come from? There was something about different variables in the manual. I guess I'll store that in one of the complexes.

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8+3*i=:C1 Error:Invalid input

timwessman · « **Reply #166 on:** November 19, 2013, 09:32:28 am »

Quote from: willrandship on November 18, 2013, 11:56:56 pm

It makes sense to have a system set of variables that can be transferred from program to program, but it would also be nice to have local-program variables. It seems like having both should be an option.

You do have local variables (local in the function, and local to the whole file).

Quote from: quitte on November 19, 2013, 02:58:04 am

...8+3*i=:C1 Error:Invalid input

Change that to a Z<N> which is the complex and it will work.

You are missing the rest of it which is "why is my list variable not a list?" The vast majority of users want to know that certain variables will ALWAYS be a certain type. L1 is a list. Always a list. L1 being a single number messes them up. Why is my X a matrix? Why isn't my matrix a matrix?

They associate certain variables as being a certain type.

I agree that the error messages need serious work though.

quitte · « **Reply #167 on:** November 19, 2013, 01:58:12 pm »

At least I can take comfort in knowing that I actually got heard out by someone that could do something about it. I actually do - thanks for that.

I never asked and always assumed that there was nothing I could do about it, with what is provided - so I'll do that now: Is there a way, such as writing a PPL app, that gives me control of the "lost" variables in CAS and (optionally) the normal calc?

DJ Omnimaga · « **Reply #168 on:** November 19, 2013, 02:46:27 pm »

Quote from: quitte on November 19, 2013, 01:58:12 pm

At least I can take comfort in knowing that I actually got heard out by someone that could do something about it. I actually do - thanks for that.

Yeah same. With Texas Instruments, the only way for this to happen is in France on TI-Planet and even then, the only person that sometimes posts there is not in any way involved in the programming team, so if you send him bug reports/suggestions, he can send them to TI in America, but then, who knows if TI isn't sending the e-mail to the Thrash Can out of laziness?

With HP, the main issue is that if we send suggestions to Tim and the others and they upgrade the OS, then that OS update has to go through the usual layers of bureaucracy like with TI before it finally reaches the public.

MacBernick · « **Reply #169 on:** December 02, 2013, 02:04:54 pm »

Hi guys !
So no news about low level programming on Prime yet ?

DJ Omnimaga · « **Reply #170 on:** December 02, 2013, 02:41:14 pm »

Heya and welcome to the forums!

Unfortunately, as far as HP Prime hacking goes, it's pretty much dead. Nobody will ever hack the HP Prime because nobody seems interested in doing it for a platform that has less than a million users in the world

Even TI-Nspire hacking is dead, although there are a few games still coming out every now and then. No more Ndless development nor anything else, and that's with a much more popular (although more closed) platform. It took three years until ASM arrives on the Nspire too. Same for the Casio PRIZM, but again, hacking it is no longer as needed, since Casio has done nothing to block third-party ASM/C code.

For the next few years, we'll have to stick to HP PPL language (although that's already quite fast enough for the time being, since it's compiled).

On a better note, apparently it was discovered not so long ago that the HP Prime pretty much lacks any viable protection against third-party OSes. In other words, someone could disassemble the HP Prime OS then modify it to add a LaunchASM() command that runs ARM assembly or C programs. He could even write his own OS or make such mod avaialble as IPS patch to avoid getting in trouble by releasing an OS containing copyrighted content.

Besides that, if you or anyone else knows enough ARM assembly, hacking and stuff, they are well welcome to help finding other alternatives. Of course, keep in mind that in the future, HP might release OS updates that could unintentionally (or if they're like TI, intentionally) block ASM exploits.

Jim Bauwens · « **Reply #171 on:** December 02, 2013, 03:36:22 pm »

Quote from: DJ Omnimaga on December 02, 2013, 02:41:14 pm

Heya and welcome to the forums!

Unfortunately, as far as HP Prime hacking goes, it's pretty much dead. Nobody will ever hack the HP Prime because nobody seems interested in doing it for a platform that has less than a million users in the world

The device is just out and the hacking scene has already been declared dead. Maybe the fact that not many developers in the community have one helps that there is low activity _at the moment_?

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Even TI-Nspire hacking is dead, although there are a few games still coming out every now and then. No more Ndless development nor anything else, and that's with a much more popular (although more closed) platform. It took three years until ASM arrives on the Nspire too. Same for the Casio PRIZM, but again, hacking it is no longer as needed, since Casio has done nothing to block third-party ASM/C code.

Wrong. It's not dead. You just think it's dead. How do you know that there is no Ndless development anymore? As far as I know you aren't in the Nspire dev team. At the moment there may be little development but when I look here and there I still see development and updates being done. I personally (and I know of others) continue to hack the platform. We just only decide to release certain things when the time is right.

Please DJ_O, stop saying these kind of stuff because the only thing you do with that is harm the community.

critor · « **Reply #172 on:** December 02, 2013, 03:48:48 pm »

Although Ndless 3.1 is dead, it doesn't mean than Ndless and Nspire hacking are dead yet and are not being worked on.

Seeing what TI did those last months for the sake of exams and security, fixing many things and even things which were never exploited or misused (the J04/JTAG connector removed on HW-J/K, TNOC being forbidden with OS 3.6, new CAS check in OS 3.6 which does brick TI-Nspire DVT prototypes even if they are CAS...).

With all this, it's clear that TI is reading both TI-Planet and Omnimaga. So if anything is achieved, I can only tell you that you probably won't know about it before it is about to be released.

quitte · « **Reply #173 on:** December 02, 2013, 03:49:21 pm »

I plan to visit home beginning tomorrow. At least one of the two usb to usart cables I had has got to be there...
Still I'm somewhat disappointed that still no one checked if there is any data coming out the TX pad.

DJ Omnimaga · « **Reply #174 on:** December 02, 2013, 03:52:20 pm »

I guess that it's possible that evrything happens behind the scenes indeed. Otherwise, I suspect that there are just not enough people who meet all three following criterias at once in the community right now:

-Have enough time and motivation
-Has interest in the platform
-Has the knowledge to hack it. ExtendeD had 9 years of ASM experience when he got involved into Ndless.

And since the HP Prime fan base is considerably smaller than TI calcs, this inevitably means that it also has considerably fewer people who meet the three criterias above.

The only people we can count on in short terms are disgruntled TI-Nspire users who are sick of TI's actions, because most hardcore HP fans were born decades before video games became popular and are now way past their possible gamer time frame, meaning that they are most likely not interested in hacking any calc.

quitte · « **Reply #175 on:** December 02, 2013, 04:02:49 pm »

I guess I should make a positive comment about the prime since those are rare. And actually I think it deserves it, despite all the problems that exist.

I never used an nspire calculator, but from what little I used a TI-84 and having used a Casio Algebra FX2.0 plus the Prime is just infinitely better. It's easy to use and it has great built in help. It's actually possible to start playing with it and make great use of it without digging through manuals.
And it is that ease of use that I partially blame for all the complaints about bugs. I would have never discovered the same problems on the Algebra FX, since using it was so much a pain in the bottom that I never got to similarily advanced use cases.
The other problem is that a lot of Prime users are able to compare to the best of the HP calculators. This sets expectations that coming from another calculator wouldn't exist.
The Prime is a very fast, easy to use and all in all great calculator.

So if you're reading that because goole lead you here: Try the simulator and make up your own mind.

DJ Omnimaga · « **Reply #176 on:** December 02, 2013, 04:07:06 pm »

Yeah it's still one of my favorite calcs personally despite the bugs. At least many bugs coming from the 39gII were fixed in the Prime. It freezes much less often, for example, and the calc is much more stable than the emulator.

The only issue is that some bugs can impact usage in class, which is the main calc's user target. They need to be fixed as soon as possible. Other than that, performance-wise, it's really impressive.

I will never judge the Prime based on past HP calcs, because:
1) It's aimed at a completely different market.
2) The HP 49g/+ had serious issues when it came out. So much in fact that it never recovered from its bad reputation then HP changed the name to HP 50g once it got fixed. Maybe the HP Prime is the same, but I hope it doesn't get to the point where the name has to be changed as well.

Quote from: quitte on December 02, 2013, 04:02:49 pm

So if you're reading that because goole lead you here: Try the simulator and make up your own mind.

I don't like the simulator anymore. It crashes at many places where the calc has no problem running ("The application has crashed and will be restarted"). For example, very large code or drawing stuff outside the screen. It's annoying because I keep losing lots of progress when using it (on the real calc, I only lose progress if the program code was still open during the crash, which never happened so far), so I prefer sticking to the real thing or the connectivity kit now.

SpiroH · « **Reply #177 on:** December 02, 2013, 04:07:39 pm »

Quote from: DJ Omnimaga

...
-Have enough time and motivation
-Has interest in the platform
-Has the knowledge to hack it. ExtendeD had 9 years of ASM experience when he got involved into Ndless.
...

Well, IMHO it mostly depends on your luck. One of these days a prestigious hacker knocks at the Omninaga's door offering his/her services for free. Until then, keep your hopes as high as possible. Yeah, on this matter I agree with Jim why should we be so negative? After all there are great (TI-Nspire) contributions on this site and some and still rather recent! Come on DJ_O cheer up a bit, brighter days are coming!

Streetwalrus · « **Reply #178 on:** December 02, 2013, 04:10:53 pm »

I totally agree with SpiroH. +1

Vogtinator · « **Reply #179 on:** December 02, 2013, 04:16:53 pm »

I got into nspire development only because we got this calc at school.
It has so many bugs that it is almost unusuable at school, and I'm sure the Prime will get a chance if it meets the requirements.
Almost nobody buys calcs just to hack them. Often they're also used properly

I'd say wait a few years, the situation will look entirely different when the prime overtook the nspires.

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Well, IMHO it mostly depends on your luck. One of these days a prestigious hacker knocks at the Omninaga's door offering his/her services for free. Until then, keep your hopes as high as possible. Yeah, on this matter I agree with Jim why should we be so negative? After all there are great (TI-Nspire) contributions on this site and some and still rather recent! Come on DJ_O cheer up a bit, brighter days are coming!

Reminds me of nLaunch (CX).. but that was probably only because of TI's madness.

Author Topic: Let's hack the HP Prime! (Read 128451 times)

quitte

Re: Let's hack the HP Prime!

timwessman

Re: Let's hack the HP Prime!

quitte

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DJ Omnimaga

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MacBernick

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DJ Omnimaga

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Jim Bauwens

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critor

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quitte

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DJ Omnimaga

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quitte

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DJ Omnimaga

Re: Let's hack the HP Prime!

SpiroH

Re: Let's hack the HP Prime!

Streetwalrus

Re: Let's hack the HP Prime!

Vogtinator

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