EB600/italica firmware modding/hacking capabilities?

[Reset]

Hello,
I bought an Italica eReader about 3 weeks ago, which works pretty well, considering its 99 Euro price-tag.
Nearly all ebooks/documents in various formats that i've tested were easily readable (not: an old book scanned as lowres images.pdf, by Google), the page turn speed is ok, and even (micro)SDHC cards with more than 4GB work normally, although Italica says the eReader is NOT compatible with SDHC.
The firmware (EM2 variant/ icon interface) looks similar to the Elonex EB621's.

However there are certain things, that aren't as comfortable as they could be, and since the firmware is based on Linux, I'm curious if there are ways to improve, change, or add new functionality to it.

http://www.italica.com/?p=258&lang=en <italica firmware download. manuals are down. If someone wants to look into it.

-skin
I've read about the kewler skin mod for the Cool-er. is it possible to make it compatible with my Italica, somehow?
If not, can i just overwrite images in the eb600e/fs.tgz/fs.tar/skin/ or eb600em/fs.tgz/fs.tar/skin/ directories, and repackage everything?
Or could it brick the device?
(A custom POWER OFF screen would be nice... but it shouldn't be the only thing the eReader can display. )

-changing position of commands in menus/
mapping different commands on buttons
examples:
1) Normally the + and - buttons resize the font, but if you're listening to music, they control the volume.
is it possible to leave the font resize function on the buttons and put a volume command in the menu?
(or change the volume/font resize behaviour for the + - buttons back and forth otherwise)

2) If you want to go fullscreen, you have to open the menu, navigate to "more..." and from there to "fullscreen".
It would be smarter to have the fullscreen option in the first menu, if possible. (and maybe exchange its menu position with "bookmark" wich is already a button command)

3)When the + button is pressed while viewing an image (standard view), the display refreshes, but it doesn't change anything. logically it should go into zoom mode.

-mp3 player bug
I don't intend to use the reader as an mp3 player excessively, but since it has the feature, it should at least play the songs in the correct order.

The thing is, if I choose e.g. song 40, it plays that song, then song 1, song 2, song 41, 1, 42, 2, 3, 43 ... or something similar. In other words, instead of just playing the next song on the list, it keeps going back to the first "page" of songs and plays one or two of those and THEN it plays the next song on the list.
Is there a cure for this bug?

-mp3 player controls while reading
As i've written before, when reading while listening to mp3s the + and - buttons are volume changers.
Other then that everything is ebook related, so there is no way to skip a track, open a playlist/ other mp3, while reading.
whishful thinking:
up/down buttons could be used for mp3 skipping/selection, while left/right is still for page turns.
while reading let the OK/center button open the normal menu, while the "menu" button would open a new mp3 related menu.

-changing details
1)you should be able to decide how far the "camera jumps" when pressing a direction on a zoomed in pdf or image
(is that something "hardcoded" or a changeable variable somewhere?)
2)let me decide if i want to see the cover thumbnails or file extension icons in the explorer view. (or write the file extension somewhere anyway.)
3)always start in fullscreen view. (or remember fullscreen status for every book)
4) what about .ogg support?

(and no, i'm not a total noob, i know that some of these changes/wishes might be a tiny bit unrealistic.)

-changing the whole firmware
AFAIK some Netronix EB600 clone firmwares are exchangeable.
Is it possible and does it make sense to put another firmware on an italica?

-the fear of bricking
... when is it justified?
What can i test without worries?

Since Italica released the whole firmware, not just upgrades, and has this procedure where you put in a new SD card, just with the firmware on it, and then press 2 buttons and reset at the same time to boot from SD and install the firmware anew, is it save to say, that if something goes wrong, this procedure with the original fw would fix it?

That's all for now, for reading everything, I hope you have some answers for me.

P.S: Please excuse my misuse of the english language.

[Cyberman tM]

This is going to be a rather vague answer, but perhaps it helps.
Also, I'm speaking from experience, not knowledge - I did install different firmware and change the skin, and it worked.
But that doesn't mean it'll work every time for everyone.

From what I know, assuming that the firmware is like CoolEr/Kobo/probably most EB600 variants, most of the things you'd like to change cannot be changed.
That is, they are all built into the main program (which provides the GUI), and unless they made it changeable by use of external files, you'd have to recompile it - but you probably won't get the sources.

You could write your own main program and use that instead. But that's probably a lot of work.

Apparently there is an OpenInkpot version that runs on EB600 - but you need to check first if your EB600 is new enough. (My device is too old for example.)

Skin: easy to check - you have downloaded the firmware? See if there is a directory /skin inside the fs.tgz .
(I'd download and check myself, but I'm at work right now.)

While at it, check the /etc/init.d/rcS file to see if any backdoors are called. In the CoolEr for example there is this line, near the end:
"sh /mnt/flash/backdoor.sh"

Probably Netronix standard would be this line:
"sh /bin/mfg_test.sh"
Which in turn would call a binary file on the SD card with this path: /mfg_test/mfg_test .
My KIDesign skin would use this file as well to install the new skin.

Bricking: Always possible. So be prepared for it.
As long as the firmware fits, it should be possible. I don't think there is much risk as long as you take firmware that you know works with your device.
(For example, if you know you have an EB600E, see if there is a fs.tgz file in the EB600E directory.)
Make sure you can access the SD card even without the eBook Reader. (I.e. don't use the reader to prepare the card. You can, but it's slow and if anything goes wrong you can't use the reader to prepare the restore-card.)

Other Firmware:
If you're willing to accept the risk, why not? If everything works as intended, you should be able to switch back, as long as you have the full firmware.

[lunohod]

Originally Posted by Cyberman tM

Apparently there is an OpenInkpot version that runs on EB600 - but you need to check first if your EB600 is new enough. (My device is too old for example.)

AFAIK, italica is EB600EM. OpenInkpot won't work on this hardware. There is no support for broadsheet screen controller yet.

[Bulten]

Since italica seems to be a EB600EM you might want to use the pocketbook firmware. It will probably soon be possible:

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...19#post1529019

[Reset]

thanks for the replys.
I've still not tested anything because of the bricking fear.

@Cyberman tM
yeah, there is a /skin dir in both fs.tgz (in /eb600e and /eb600em)
and yes i think it's a em device, too. (would make sense because italica called the versions of the firmware EM1 and EM2)

"Probably Netronix standard would be this line:
"sh /bin/mfg_test.sh""
yes, that's in there, but commented:
...
#for fs upgrade
#/bin/sd_upgrade_fs.sh
/bin/sd_upgrade_fs.sh
#for factory test
#sh /bin/mfg_test.sh
#/bin/watchdog.sh&
#/lib/modules/usb_mod
#exec /usr/etc/nanoX.local
[eof]
so, if i put the backdoor.sh line there it should work?

@Bulton
i don't know how similar these eb600em clones really are, so i don't know if i could use the pocketbook firmware... (i guess FR_TO_PB is not going to work for italica, right? )

[Cyberman tM]

Originally Posted by Reset

so, if i put the backdoor.sh line there it should work?

If you mean modifying the rcS file, then yes, of course. You can put any call to a script file into it, as long as the script is accessible at run-time. (I.e. not in the root directory, but the SD card or non-system onboard-memory.)
Otherwise I don't think there's too much you can do.

But if there is no backdoor at all, I don't think you can modify the live rcS file.

You could modify the fs.tgz file, though. That should be simple enough, unpack it, modify, pack again.
Then do a simple firmware upgrade. That should work fine - unless you break something (be careful when editing these files - keep the new-line characters intact. Unix/Linux and Windows use different new-lines, which can easily break the script).

[Max84]

It seems they have a new website. Looks much better I must say. The firmware upgrade instructions also back online. Seems to be fairly easy to update. They also have a new domain at www.italica.com