TomTom HOME and add-ons · 2008-03-17 08:17 by Wladimir Palant
I have been writing very little about what I am doing in my day job, maybe it is time to change this. As some might know, I am a developer in the team behind TomTom HOME, an application that allows users to manage their TomTom navigator devices (e.g. installing new content on them, sharing it with other users or doing backups).
TomTom HOME is based on XULRunner, it runs basically on the same code as Firefox. This has many advantages for us, amongst others — support for add-ons comes with the platform, almost for free. Still, the usual add-on manager user interface don’t fit into the TomTom HOME concept which is why only developers have been using add-ons until recently (DOM Inspector, Venkman, Live HTTP Headers, they have all been ported over). It has been a bumpy ride (bug 407329) but with TomTom HOME 2.2 end users can now install add-ons as well.
This doesn’t mean that the work is done, it actually just started. The extension manager UI still needs some improvement, in particular updating add-ons should be easier. Also, currently you can only install add-ons from the TomTom server, anything else will have to be installed manually. We are still in the process of discussing how we can support installing add-ons from third-party sites while keeping security in mind. Most available add-ons right now are device emulators that will install automatically if you click “Operate my GO,” those don’t even show up in the add-on manager (yet?). Actually, there is only one user-visible add-on and virtually no documentation on creating add-ons for TomTom HOME. Fortunately, I have four (4!) hours allocated during the current development cycle to create some documentation :)
While we are still solving these issues, Roland Boon already started working on an add-on to convert Google Earth points into TomTom Overlay points. Roland is a fellow TomTom HOME developer but he is working on the C++ part of it and has relatively little knowledge about the XUL/JavaScript part. He tries to use public information sources only and document the whole process. Want to contribute? His email address is on the page quoted above.
Roland Boon · 2008-03-17 21:34 · #
Thanks for the pitch.
I was able to install Venkman. As expected, it does not work out of the box because the overlay points are for FireFox.
How I can get access to the ported version of Venkman and DOM Inspector?
Reply from Wladimir Palant:
It is currently hosted on this server: http://adblockplus.org/tomtom/venkman.xpi
Reply from Wladimir Palant:
Oh, and DOM Inspector of course: http://adblockplus.org/tomtom/inspector.xpi
Reply from Wladimir Palant:
I uploaded new versions of the extensions that will work in release builds as well (meant to do this for a while already). These should hopefully be available via development server as well soon.
Roland Boon · 2008-03-17 22:33 · #
Thanks.
At present, I am documenting my findings in a simple HTML page. The ASP.NET server does not inform the browser that the page has changed. Please press refresh until I get it fixed.
Roland Boon · 2008-03-17 22:42 · #
If I remember correctly, these extension use menu item not found in the release version of TomTom HOME. We need a stripped version of the extension that adds the extra menu items.
quanta · 2008-03-18 22:06 · #
Wow, I never knew TTH was built on XULRunner. Great job, it’s actually a nice program to use.
I do have a question not related to TTH add-ons but is related to the overall extensibility of the TT device itself. Why has the SDK been discontinued? There are a lot of cool programs such as SunTime and Tripmaster that no longer work 100% with the GPS device with the latest software upgrade because it inteferes with the GPS menus. This decision seems to have effectively killed the developer community behind Tomtom. :(
Reply from Wladimir Palant:
I really have no idea. But looking at http://create.tomtom.com/#sdk – it seems that some version of SDK is still available for download, sure it was discontinued?
quanta · 2008-03-19 19:36 · #
Correct Wladmir, the link provided goes to the legacy SDK for devices running the Navcore 6.x firmware. However, all new TTs since mid-2007 use v7.x and are not fully compatible with the SDK.
Even some SDK documentation would be useful at this point! Anyway, I know it is not your responsibility, but if you do bump into any of the hardware engineers in the hall, give them heck.
Jason · 2008-03-22 03:27 · #
Is TT Home 2.2 available for public use/testing? I’ve been eagerly waiting TT Home to run on Linux. I submitted the request to TomTom for a Linux version a few months ago, and just got a “we’ll look into it” response.
Reply from Wladimir Palant:
The download for “TomTom GO and ONE devices” on http://www.tomtom.com/home/ is TomTom HOME 2.2 right now. But there is no Linux version so far, we just managed to figure out most of the issues with the Mac version.
Jason · 2008-03-24 18:16 · #
Ah, ok. The http://www.tomtom.com/home/ link doesn’t show any downloads when using a Linux browser, which confused me for quite a while. Looks like the homelanding() javascript function on that page is detecting the OS and trying to displaying relative content. Unfortunately, if the OS isn’t mac or windows, nothing displays.
Anyway, I’ll keep waiting patiently. :)
Randy Bigari · 2008-03-26 23:01 · #
I would like to find out about U.S. truckers atlas maps?
Would something you have for add on maps be comparible with a Rand McNally Truckers Atlas?
Yuri · 2008-03-29 23:32 · #
“…the link provided goes to the legacy SDK for devices running the Navcore 6.x firmware…” — Really that link goes to “Byu SDK now” option (for £99.95 UKP) – a little bit too much for a preson, but almost nothing for a company…