So after 15 years my last try, I decided to work again on CastCE sources. It is a very good and compatible Atari ST emulator for Pocket PC. But it doesn't run on handled PC's even with Gapi and every other DLL hacks. This is my first attempt at programming on Windows CE environment, and even anything Windows. I just know C with GCC. So I'm using this project to learn coding for Windows CE with Gapi.
So far, after the first day I've got the display working. I made it full screen because I don't like small windows when you've got a full 640 pixels wide display in your hand. It needs Gapi and RedGear to work.
I've got rid of the virtual keyboard because it doesn't matter when you've got a real one. But I haven't implemented the Jornada's keyboard routines yet. I still need to learn Gapi's handling of the keyboard, but it looks quite simple.
Joysticks work, nothing needed to make that work, CastCE already let you choose some keys and it works OK with my Jornada 710.
Sound is working, nothing needed to make it work.
Mouse with the stylus not working yet. CastCE was designed to work with another orientation of the screen and with a 320x240 display. Gapi doesn't help to correct that. So I'll need to rewrite/fix the stylus part.
I intend to make the Atari ST mouse work like if you use your stylus in any Pocket PC application. It means you just need to press the stylus where you want on the screen, instead of moving the mouse cursor with the stylus then press a virtual mouse button. I don't even understand why it was not yet implemented in CastCE because that's very simple.
Floppy disk management
(ST and MSA files
) was already implemented in CastCE and of course it still works.
Compatibility is just amazing, but all the credits go to the CastAway developers on which CastCE is based.
At last, the speed is not 100% without frame skipping
(even if not full screen
). This is something I don't understand because it works full speed with no frame skipping on my Jornada 560. This Jornada has got the same ARM processor than the Jornada's 7xx. On PhoneDB website, unlike the 7xx, the Jornada 560 has no 2D acceleration mentioned. But let's face it, on every things I tried on both devices, the Jornada 560 is a lot more snappy than my Jornada 710. I wish someone can explain this.
No release yet as at least I wait to make the keyboard working, then I'll upload the emulator in the download section of the website.