Hello,
I want to compile Android from source. I want to just build a fully default Gingerbread that would run nice on my phone. I got the Android source, kernel source (kernel-2.6.32-U8800-Froyo) and now I don't know what to do next. I compiled the generic one already (lunch full-eng) and it ran fine on the emulator.
My most important question is, if I make it otapackage and flash it, would it start? If it doesn't, can I recover? What folders/files are essential if I make my own device for example in "device/huawei/u8800"
Also, where can I find a GOOD porting guide? I have found some that are old and not used anymore.
Some links
Start by going through source.android.com for the general basics if you havent already.
Also, even though Google removed the PDK (Platform Developer's Kit) from the site, it has been mirrored on kandroid here: http://www.kandroid.org/online-pdk/guide/index.html
The stuff in the the PDK, although inadequate, is still very important and explains how to create the necessary makefiles to add to the build, configuring for a new market, etc. etc.
Also,
watch these two videos over here. These were very helpful in my ROM development:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_H4AlQaNa0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFqELLB1Kk8
Learn to use github. It is helpful for you to keep track of your changes as well as incorporate others works into your own.
http://help.github.com/
Finally, Cyanogenmod repos are your BEST friend. Almost all major AOSP ROM devs owe some sort of thanks to those guys who have done so much. If you want to check out some of the code changes and patches that you want to incorporate look here on their gerrit:
review.cyanogenmod.com
If you want to look at the other changes that are actually in the cyanogenmod builds, best to look at their git repos here:
https://github.com/CyanogenMod
I am still learning right now while I create my ROM but your welcome to PM me if you have any questions
Glad someone helped. Now that ICS is available, I will build that instead. Now, I will follow the kandroid tutorial and add hardware_msm7x30 from cyanogenmod's repos. Then I'll make my own makefiles in the huawei/u8800 and I'll see if that works.
Also, some things I am not still clear. If I am not adding any recovery files, it shouldn't replace it, right? I want to make sure I can recover. However, my phone has a bootloader mode, which should still work, even if other's messed up. And the kernel, if I already have a compiled kernel for android 2.2, should it work for newer versions?
Thanks
Well AOSP as far as I know adds the stock recovery into the build so if you have a stock ROM, then you will lose your recovery (unless you change the source to skip the adding of recovery to otapackage).
Your bootloader should be fine. so you will theoretically be able to re-flash a custom recovery with fastboot as long as your bootloader is unlocked (assuming your phone is already rooted and has a custom rom, then it should be unlocked)
If you are using CM7 as base, then you dont have to worry about it as it is configured to NOT replace the recovery during the building and creating the otapackage.
The kernel should not be compatible as there were significant changes from Froyo and you should not use it. By the way, for now, work on the ROM first. Creating a custom kernel from scratch is hard work and should be left as the last task to do (assuming you know linux kernel development). Just use the stock pre-built kernel that comes with the source.
Also, according to Google:
Starting with IceCreamSandwich, the Android Open-Source Project can't be used from pure source code only, and requires additional hardware-related proprietary libraries to run, specifically for hardware graphics acceleration.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This means you need to find the correct hardware drivers first. Where to find that is beyond me. Check CM repos. It would be easy if everyone had a Nexus S/ Galaxy Nexus as the drivers are immediately available on source.android.com. Ah...well....
Personally, I am going to wait a few weeks before dabbling into ICS ROMs. Wait till CM7 comes out with a nightly for my nexus one and then rip the drivers from their ROM and use it for mine
I got ICS source and made the necessary Android.mk, AndroidProducts.mk, BoardConfig.mk and u8800(my device).mk, also vendorsetup.sh . Now, when I am trying to build it doesn't give me an error, more of a suggestion. It says to include "LOCAL_MODULE_TAGS := optional" in the hardware/msm7k/liblights/Android.mk. I added that, and tried again. Got that message again, but with other type /libril/Android.mk
About fastboot, I am not sure if my device has that. It can be turned on with volume up and down + power, but it boots to so called "pink screen". When I mount phone using usb to my pc, I can browse the recovery.img and other related stuff. If I have the otapackage, can I just take the recovery out from there or what should I modify in source? Add something to the makefiles?
Yeah I am pretty sure you should add the LOCAL_MODULE_TAGS to all of the relevant pre-built files. maybe they made the compiler less harsh in ICS when compared to the one for gingerbread. In gingerbread, it outright crashed the compile and asked you to add the tags.
According to Google engineers, here is the reason why they use these tags:
Short answer: lack of time.
The urgent concern was to prevent new modules from using a user tag
(implicitly or explicitly), and we took care of that. We haven't had
time to deal with the existing modules, there are over 1000 of those.
JBQ
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
By the way, I hope you have git setup and the changes you have made are being staged and commited to your repo in github. If you ever make a mistake that hardcore crashes your compile and you dont know what you did, git will be there for you to rollback the changes as well as keep track of everything you have done from commit to commit
As far as I know, CM repos dont have everything complete for a full build of ICS but I could be wrong.
So you are working with AOSP correct?
As for the fastboot every android phone should have a fastboot by default but I believe each phone has a slightly different version. I will post how my fastboot looks like in a bit.
As for the removal of recovery, there should be somewhere in either source, makefiles or argument for the otapackage command that should leave out the recovery when making update.zip. You could just remove the recovery from the update.zip, change the updater-script and repackage it but its not a clean solution and those changes should be done in a uniform manner so you dont repeat this step every time you do a new build.
Where exactly is it, I have yet to know. Still learning much of this myself.
I now completely understand what modes of turning on my phone has... First one is normal, second is recovery, third is update-bootloader(I can access all files with it too) and four being the fastboot. The custom recovery I have on has an issue that it wants to boot to charging mode when I type "adb reboot bootloader". I can get to fastboot with the custom ROM I have on right now though. I think I am safe if I have issues.
I edited msm7k Android.mk to remove libaudio and libgralloc (errors with those), and it compiles to the step where it says it has no rule to make kernel requied by boot.img. I have put into BoardConfig.mk the line TARGET_PREBUILT_KERNEL with my kernel. I don't understand, what's wrong now...
My goal is to simply get it booting up. I'll look into libraries and other later.
-e-
Got the kernel thing sorted out. Copied device.mk from tuna device and edited to fit my device. Also modified full_u8800.mk and made the call to inherit from device.mk. Compiling now and I think I got past that.
-e2-
Got it built successfully. Fastboot won't let it install, because it has no mount points. Added mount points and let's see...
Nice to see you are making progress.
Got it built, but the fastboot is kinda buggy in my device, maybe custom rom issue. I can't make otapackage, it says "no rule to make target otapackage". I have a possible fix, trying that later.
Otherwise, I read its possible to flash system.img from recovery via advanced restore, update.zip package or advanced flash_image, but I don't know. Will post results.
Sent from my u8800
-e-
Tried make otapackage again. It still says "make: *** No rule to make target `otapackage'. Stop.". Maybe some things are still missing, I don't know. adb flash_image command will always post -1 to me, update.zip didn't work, advanced restore is not for this. I have a compiled image and I can't wait to test it, but I can't flash it...
If nothing works I'll revert to stock ROM and try again.
Blefish said:
Got it built, but the fastboot is kinda buggy in my device, maybe custom rom issue. I can't make otapackage, it says "no rule to make target otapackage". I have a possible fix, trying that later.
Otherwise, I read its possible to flash system.img from recovery via advanced restore, update.zip package or advanced flash_image, but I don't know. Will post results.
Sent from my u8800
-e-
Tried make otapackage again. It still says "make: *** No rule to make target `otapackage'. Stop.". Maybe some things are still missing, I don't know. adb flash_image command will always post -1 to me, update.zip didn't work, advanced restore is not for this. I have a compiled image and I can't wait to test it, but I can't flash it...
If nothing works I'll revert to stock ROM and try again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you successfully compiled, take the boot.img and system.img and package them into a zip and use dsixda's kitchen to make it flashable
Blefish, is it possible for you to share your device/vendor structures somewhere? I just finished setting up a build machine for ICS (using Cyanogenmod's repos in my case), and made a working full-eng image that seems to boot just fine in the emulator, so I'm seemingly all ready to hack around our device's specifics. But I would rather not do duplicate work, so I decided to ask
I'm also grabbing Huawei's new 2.6.35-based package to get the new kernel config, can't wait for them to release the actual sources for the update.
I'll share them on GitHib once I get a working build. I haven't got much time, and I changed to CM9 alpha now (repo branch ics). Since we got a 2.3 update, my first task is to port the latest clockworkmod recovery and then the ICS.
Compiling Android is long task and I'll do it in weekends, but the recovery should be available sometime, it shouldn't be hard to port that.
Oh yeah, look up stockwell's, dzo's and genokolar's github, they have done the device configuration. You can get much help from there. This weekend I'll propably test the build, I got otapackage command working now (it needed some things I can't write on mobile).
Sent from my U8800 using Tapatalk
Related
Hiya I am interested in compiling my own version of the android project from the latest sources for Hero but I am having a little bit of trouble, I have been attempting to follow this guide android.modaco.com/index.php?showtopic=301857&view=findpost&p=1179830 but it does not seem to make a lot of sense to me. For instance there is no .repo/local_manifest.xml file only a .repo/manifest.xml file and editing this as outlined gives me an error. Could somebody point me in the direction of a fairly noob friendly guide for this kind of stuff, thanks a lot.
Conb123
P.S Sorry about the dodgy link, newbie restrictions prevented me from formatting it properly
this should be in Q&A Section not development really. But im looking for this too! installed ubuntu using Wubi set up JDK,SDK testsign etc and repo but god knows how to do it all! I only want to port cyanogenROM
follow this: http://source.android.com/download
when you got everything synced you can basically type "make" and watch it compile for a while. i managed to do it with just above zero knowledge about compiling.
if you want the cyanogen sources try it with the according repo. i have zero idea about vendor overlays, as i needed to compile only the recovery (watched two hours of eclair compiling, then was told i need cupcake sources and can compile the recovery only...)
Yes I am aware of how to get sources and how to compile them, I am fairly well versed in linux. But I do not know how I can compile it into a usable rom for hero.
the result of the compiling are image files that can be flashed to the phone: system.img etc. you can extract them using unyaffs.
I ran the make command, but i really have no idea what to do from there. What is the end result of doing the first make command? Im fairly sure that it is not a single .img file you can flash onto your phone. You need to make a kernal if i am correct(anyone know how to do this?)
the result of the compiling is at least a system.img. if you compiled it correctly you can flash that to /system partition. further you need a boot.img, which also contains the kernel. the the rom-cooking howto in dev section how to create one, or just get one from a working rom.
fwiw, the .img files are in out/target/product/generic/ (although there probably is a device specific directory in there if you handled the vendor overlay correctly. <- this is just a guess, i have actually no idea).
Wanna link us to that how to thread? I cant seem to find a complete one with working links.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=551711
This is not a thread to say ‘thanks’ to developers. Only post here if you have some input in this development progress, by either fixing bugs, or coming up with ideas (and ideally, try your idea and report what happens).
Having that said, let’s move on to where we are at the moment. Currently, we have a build which is based upon Ice Cold Sandwich 6.2 Test Edition for the HTC Desire HD. This build boots up by flashing my custom kernel on it, based on Flyer HC Original Kernel Source, with some patches:
-Quota2 Support
-Genlock Support
-Updated KGSL driver by applying Lord Clockans patches from his kernel
The ZIP we are working on now, can be downloaded here:http://w728685.open.ge.tt/1/files/9iI3CbF/0/blob?download
This ZIP contains a build which is mainly Lord Clockans ICS, with essential changes in the ROM to get it booting (we used LeeDroid’s Flyer HC as the donor ROM). This ROM is made for a HoneyComb HBOOT!
After you have flashed that ZIP, this is the kernel you need: http://ge.tt/9iI3CbF/v/1
You MUST flash this kernel to get it up and running, or it’ll just loop in the logcat complaining about unsupported stuff.
This set should do the following:
-Boot up (bootanimation resets after some time, it’s ok, it will boot within 5 minutes).
-Touchscreen works after you did this: open ADB Shell (by entering ‘adb shell’ on your pc,), and send the command “echo ‘1’> /sys/android_touch/event_google”. Now touchscreen should be working. (For some reason the file 90flyerhacks in /system/etc/init.d doesn’t do its job. If anyone has a clue > say so!) Also, the ntrig.c file in /drivers/input/touchscreen/ is modified in the kernel, don’t know if it helped though.
-Full Hardware Accceleration
-Screen is bugged at certain moments (seems to happen especially during things concering wallpapers. Rendering a wallpaper, showing a heavy LWP, etc.). The build.prop file contains some lines such as:
ro.fb.mode=1
debug.composition.type=gpu/mdp
debug.fb.rgb565=0
Perhaps we have to change these lines to get it running without issues (strange thing is, logcat doesn’t seem to make an issue about this). We can also try a recompile of the kernel using the entire driver folder from Lord Clockans kernel (it’s in /drivers/gpu/msm/ in his kernel, and /drivers/video/msm/gpu/kgsl_adreno205_hc in ours, moving the folder to where it should be causes issues, so we keep it like this for the time being).
-Sound is working
-Backcamera seems to be working fine, haven’t tested frontcamera.
-Hardware buttons under the screen aren’t working, and this should be a low
priority for now. It isn’t ideal to use them in ICS anyway (different button functions in comparison with the softbuttons), and I think we shouldn’t focus on this for now.
-GPS switch can be enabled, haven’t tested whether it works.
-Bluetooth switch can be enabled, but turns off automatically after about ten seconds.
-WiFi switch can’t be changed, logcat tells us that it can’t connect with /dev/rfkill, applying this patch in the ramdisk could fix it:
https://github.com/OpenSensation/an...mmit/da09360d70888a7e126871ab2ae5b218514cad18
-Power button and Volume buttons work fine.
-Pen works after we send the event_google command mentioned before.
If the ROM immediately reboots within 10 seconds and it seems like it’s looping, and you can’t even logcat, hold down Power and Volume Down until you get to HBOOT, select FASTBOOT, and enter ‘fastboot erase cache’ in the CMD/Terminal, and reboot, and it should work.
And that’s about it for the current things we know I think. If you manage to fix something, please write down and report what you did to fix it, so we can keep a list. I will work on a vendor folder using the known information, so we can compile a ROM from source, made for our device.
And last, but not least: don’t post here asking for release dates. We will do our utmost best to bring ICS experience to the Flyer, but do not bug us. Thanks.
Now let’s get this up and running guys! I will keep a log of what is fixed and what is not, so we can keep the thread organized. Else we’ll have 50 ZIPs around, not knowing which one is the right one et cetera.
Source code of kernel: http://github.com/Chaosz-X
Ramdisk will be uploaded tomorrow.
Donations are much appreciated, as I'm developing and building atm on a 1.67GHz Dual core...
Donations can me made to [email protected] using Paypal.
i suggest creating two repos... one for ROM and one for kernel... that way single file changes can be tracked even on ROM front, not just kernel...
willing devs can fork those repo and send pull requests to main repo when they get stuff working
I'm not a developer, and I have nothing but love for all the great devs that worked so hard to bring ICS to the Flyer.
Might I suggest, however, that instead of pursuing CM9 builds, the next effort be centered around porting the Android Open Kang Project (AOKP) ROM? In terms of features and customizations, it's considerably ahead of CM9, with numerous supported devices to boot.
I think this ROM, versus CM9, would give users the most flexible and dynamic ICS experience for their Flyer.
Chaosz-X said:
-Touchscreen works after you did this: open ADB Shell (by entering ‘adb shell’ on your pc,), and send the command “echo ‘1’> /sys/android_touch/event_google”. Now touchscreen should be working. (For some reason the file 90flyerhacks in /system/etc/init.d doesn’t do its job. If anyone has a clue > say so!)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Does it work if you add
write /sys/android_touch/event_google 1
to the init.rc file?
Could you post the init.rc file where you trigger the init.d scripts?
nickiberli said:
Does it work if you add
write /sys/android_touch/event_google 1
to the init.rc file?
Could you post the init.rc file where you trigger the init.d scripts?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yes that should work correctly
No, I didn't add that. I'll try it tomorrow (or one of you, if you have a Linux machine ready. Laptop with Ubuntu is having some issues atm, can fix it tomorrow).
So, assuming that's working, let's get to the display. We know that it causes issues, but how?
-Logcat doesn't error (except for HtcEbdLog, saying something about rotation, which seems to happen when glitches occur. Perhaps we need to swap the files?)
-At the very beginning, it does tell that initOverlay failed. This overlay-thing is baked in the ROM, and can be disabled in the ROM itself by setting an option to 'false' in the vendor setup. We don't know if it fixes the issue, but since the attempts to add this functionality to the kernel failed, it could be a better idea to fix it in the ROM to get rid of the error.
Any other suggestions?
Edit: and before I forget, tomorrow I'll check the ZIP for what is changed in comparison with the ROM it is based upon, so we know what we have to add in to a new build too.
Chaosz-X said:
No, I didn't add that. I'll try it tomorrow (or one of you, if you have a Linux machine ready. Laptop with Ubuntu is having some issues atm, can fix it tomorrow).
So, assuming that's working, let's get to the display. We know that it causes issues, but how?
-Logcat doesn't error (except for HtcEbdLog, saying something about rotation, which seems to happen when glitches occur. Perhaps we need to swap the files?)
-At the very beginning, it does tell that initOverlay failed. This overlay-thing is baked in the ROM, and can be disabled in the ROM itself by setting an option to 'false' in the vendor setup. We don't know if it fixes the issue, but since the attempts to add this functionality to the kernel failed, it could be a better idea to fix it in the ROM to get rid of the error.
Any other suggestions?
Edit: and before I forget, tomorrow I'll check the ZIP for what is changed in comparison with the ROM it is based upon, so we know what we have to add in to a new build too.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
u want me to add stuff to that ramdisk?
start a github repo for the ramdisk and ROM too... trust me... its VERY helpful...
I'll start installing Ubuntu within 30 minutes, and will add everything to a GitHub by tonight within about 3 hours I think.
Chaosz-X said:
I'll start installing Ubuntu within 30 minutes, and will add everything to a GitHub by tonight within about 3 hours I think.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thats great... it should make keeping track of changes much easier and other interested devs can contribute if they want...
Hello, all.
Attempting to help by working on the build.prop settings. I'm S-OFF with revolutionary and have my device fully configured with the Honeycomb HBOOT/radio/bootloader/etc.
After flashing the ROM and the kernel, the device would immediately reboot upon attempting to return to the main recovery menu. I had to fastboot oem rebootRUU and reflash Globatron's PG41IMG-WIFI-light-B10 zip to get recovery back.
The device never proceeded to the boot animation.
Thracks said:
Hello, all.
Attempting to help by working on the build.prop settings. I'm S-OFF with revolutionary and have my device fully configured with the Honeycomb HBOOT/radio/bootloader/etc.
After flashing the ROM and the kernel, the device would immediately reboot upon attempting to return to the main recovery menu. I had to fastboot oem rebootRUU and reflash Globatron's PG41IMG-WIFI-light-B10 zip to get recovery back.
The device never proceeded to the boot animation.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can confirm this happened to me also. The only difference is that I was using the kernel for a port of mine, and it did the same thing.
Yes, it is known that for some reason, Go Back already reboots the device. It's no problem though, it works fine anyway. If it is really looping the bootanimation every ten seconds, keep Vol Down and Power pressed, until you get to HBOOT. Select FASTBOOT, and enter 'fastboot erase cache' in the terminal. Then reboot on the device, and it should boot up fine.
Also, kernel won't work on Honeycomb, haven't checked why it doesn't though (and I won't btw, our goal is not to make a new kernel for Honeycomb, but for ICS, where it does its job fine).
Kernel source is uploaded to my Github: http://github.com/Chaosz-X
Edit the CROSS_COMPILE for your toolchain, and it should compile fine (it does here).
Will add the link to the OP within 5 minutes, ramdisk will be uploaded tomorrow.
If chaos has a device tree set up for the Flyer/View, no build prop editing should be necessary, can just submit requests - but I don't notice it on the git.
Thanks for uploading, I'll have a look and see what has changed so far. It's a little difficult to keep track of the changes since there are no commits that document the patches applied over time, but I'll try to make do with what you've got.
Is this straight from flyer HC kernel source?
I may be doing this wrong, but the touch screen commands do not seem to be working for me
Cimer said:
I may be doing this wrong, but the touch screen commands do not seem to be working for me
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You have to type it in manually. Copying and pasting does not work, at least it did not for me. I think the issue is with the '
lawguy said:
You have to type it in manually. Copying and pasting does not work, at least it did not for me. I think the issue is with the '
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It may just be me, I tried manual too. I had to use http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1379875 since I'm stuck on Windows 8..maybe something is up with that. I guess I will just need to sit and wait =/
Cimer said:
It may just be me, I tried manual too. I had to use http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1379875 since I'm stuck on Windows 8..maybe something is up with that. I guess I will just need to sit and wait =/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hang tight for now. Wifi Does not work and the screen freaks out. I'm sure that these things will be fixed soon.
Going to upload ramdisk source within an hour, and try to apply a fix for WiFi, and try to fix the touchscreen by using the command in init.rc mentioned here earlier.
The new modem arrived, I have Internet again, so we have remote access to our Linux machine and can start compiling etc again
Indeed, we're grabbing AOKP source code now. Within about 2 hours we think, we'll start compiling the ROM for the HTC Flyer. Don't know if it will work out, but we have to start somewhere
I just went through the process of compiling a custom ROM and they used a stock kernel. I would like to incorporate a different kernel when I compile and instead of the stock. I know I could compile them separately and have them flash together but I want one zip to flash. Just would like to go through the process to learn.
Any help on how to do this or what I have to do when compiling?'
Thanks.
MAXGEN said:
I just went through the process of compiling a custom ROM and they used a stock kernel. I would like to incorporate a different kernel when I compile and instead of the stock. I know I could compile them separately and have them flash together but I want one zip to flash. Just would like to go through the process to learn.
Any help on how to do this or what I have to do when compiling?'
Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
One of the easiest ways of doing this would be to take the boot.img thats contains the custom kernel you want and deleting the stock boot.img containing the stock kernel in your .zip file and replacing that with the boot.img of the custom kernel. Essentially you are just swapping the boot.img file in the .zip files with the one containing the custom kernel rather then the stock kernel. Let me know if you need me to explain things further or have any other questions I'll be happy to help you out.
shimp208 said:
One of the easiest ways of doing this would be to take the boot.img thats contains the custom kernel you want and deleting the stock boot.img containing the stock kernel in your .zip file and replacing that with the boot.img of the custom kernel. Essentially you are just swapping the boot.img file in the .zip files with the one containing the custom kernel rather then the stock kernel. Let me know if you need me to explain things further or have any other questions I'll be happy to help you out.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the response.
I have to first compile the custom kernel then it seems like an easy process after that. I'm going to try to compile Franco kernel for nexus 5 if u heard of it. Its been pretty good for me.
Any tips for compiling another project or Franco kernel would be great!? I will make a separate folder for that kernel git project and compile it there.
I also want to use tool chain like Linaro and maybe Sabermod but those are for nexus 4, maybe I can port it over.
MAXGEN said:
Thanks for the response.
I have to first compile the custom kernel then it seems like an easy process after that. I'm going to try to compile Franco kernel for nexus 5 if u heard of it. Its been pretty good for me.
Any tips for compiling another project or Franco kernel would be great!? I will make a separate folder for that kernel git project and compile it there.
I also want to use tool chain like Linaro and maybe Sabermod but those are for nexus 4, maybe I can port it over.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Franco kernel is an excellent kernel can't really go wrong with it. On your other note, Linaro is not Android device specific it can be used to compile kernels for a plethora of devices, I would recommend taking a look at this great guide on how to use Linaro to compile your kernel and how to customize the Linaro toolchain to suit your needs.
shimp208 said:
Franco kernel is an excellent kernel can't really go wrong with it. On your other note, Linaro is not Android device specific it can be used to compile kernels for a plethora of devices, I would recommend taking a look at this great guide on how to use Linaro to compile your kernel and how to customize the Linaro toolchain to suit your needs.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So I tried following the post. Just not sure about a lot of things and got confused and couldn't compile.
So what I'm trying first before I use the LInaro tool chain is to try to compile the Franco kernel without it. I clone Franco hammerhead git and link the arm-eabi-4.6 toolkit
make hammerhead_defconf
make -j7
Seem to compile with no errors, took a minute though which seems quick but not sure where it exported to.
Tried looking in the arch/arm/boot/ but no look.
I want compile a boot.img as well.
MAXGEN said:
So I tried following the post. Just not sure about a lot of things and got confused and couldn't compile.
So what I'm trying first before I use the LInaro tool chain is to try to compile the Franco kernel without it. I clone Franco hammerhead git and link the arm-eabi-4.6 toolkit
make hammerhead_defconf
make -j7
Seem to compile with no errors, took a minute though which seems quick but not sure where it exported to.
Tried looking in the arch/arm/boot/ but no look.
I want compile a boot.img as well.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would recommend trying the following procedure:
Code:
mkdir franco
cd franco
git clone https://github.com/franciscofranco/hammerhead.git
After the clone operation completes rename the cloned folder to hammerhead or make sure it named hammerhead.
Now make sure your are in the franco folder you created and run the following commands:
Code:
git clone https://android.googlesource.com/platform/prebuilts/gcc/linux-x86/arm/arm-eabi-4.6
export PATH=$(pwd)/arm-eabi-4.6/bin:$PATH
export ARCH=arm
export SUBARCH=arm
export CROSS_COMPILE=arm-eabi-
cd hammerhead
make hammerhead_defconfig
make -j4
Once it finishes this you should now have a zimage outputted in the path arch/arm/boot/zImage. To make the process of putting your zimage and module together run the following commands:
Code:
mkdir ~/franco/kernel_output
cp ~/franco/hammerhead/arch/arm/boot/zImage ~/franco/kernel_output/zImage
find ~/franco/hammerhead -name "*.ko" -exec cp {} ~/franco/kernel_output \; (You may have to run the command without the ";")
You should now have everything you need to make a boot.img. Let me know how it goes and if you still have questions.
Thanks for your help, W-XC (curious what that means and you have flying shoe is it because you run? You running in the next Boston Marathon?)
The kernel is actually using 4.7 so I just used the right git. I also found out it wasn't compiling because there was any error in that specific driver for CPU governor. The dev actually was about to push a fix and supposedly it will be push tomorrow but shared the commit so I was able to make the fix manually. Either case it compiles now. Working on step 2 which is to compile into the ROM.
I was curious you seem to know your stuff. Are you kernel dev? How did you gain your knowledge? I wanna learn more about Android OS and linux kernel? I taken basic OS classes in college so a lot of introduction to concepts but nothing on coding it though. Any books or anything you can recommend on any of these areas or anything closely related worth knowing? Thanks again.
For making a boot.img I tried the following. What would you suggest for mkbootimg?
I used this script to get my ramdisk.
http://www.enck.org/tools.html
But I'm little confused on where do you get the script for mkbootimg?
Is it from the android source or is it generated when you build the kernel or is it some script that someone made?
I found this posting for building a kernel with mkbootimg but the dilemmaI"m no having is what is correct commands for building.
http://www.droidforums.net/forum/rescue-squad-guides/31452-how-compile-your-own-kernel.html
The dev mention some commands in a posting several months ago.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=47167725&postcount=291
That might be a way to go but the argument doesn't take with the mkbootimg from the droid forums. Syntax is not right so it makes me think that mkbootimg is unique.
MAXGEN said:
Thanks for your help, W-XC (curious what that means and you have flying shoe is it because you run? You running in the next Boston Marathon?)
The kernel is actually using 4.7 so I just used the right git. I also found out it wasn't compiling because there was any error in that specific driver for CPU governor. The dev actually was about to push a fix and supposedly it will be push tomorrow but shared the commit so I was able to make the fix manually. Either case it compiles now. Working on step 2 which is to compile into the ROM.
I was curious you seem to know your stuff. Are you kernel dev? How did you gain your knowledge? I wanna learn more about Android OS and linux kernel? I taken basic OS classes in college so a lot of introduction to concepts but nothing on coding it though. Any books or anything you can recommend on any of these areas or anything closely related worth knowing? Thanks again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
MAXGEN said:
For making a boot.img I tried the following. What would you suggest for mkbootimg?
I used this script to get my ramdisk.
http://www.enck.org/tools.html
But I'm little confused on where do you get the script for mkbootimg?
Is it from the android source or is it generated when you build the kernel or is it some script that someone made?
I found this posting for building a kernel with mkbootimg but the dilemmaI"m no having is what is correct commands for building.
http://www.droidforums.net/forum/rescue-squad-guides/31452-how-compile-your-own-kernel.html
The dev mention some commands in a posting several months ago.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=47167725&postcount=291
That might be a way to go but the argument doesn't take with the mkbootimg from the droid forums. Syntax is not right so it makes me think that mkbootimg is unique.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The W-XC in my avatar stands for Watertown Cross-Country which is the team I used to run on and the flying shoe with the track wings represents our track team, as I love to run I thought it was a fitting avatar. As far as running the Boston marathon I am not running this year but I would love to someday, I am unfortunately not in good enough form to run a marathon right now due to a prolonged battle with an injury I sustained last spring, but I'll keep training and keeping running!
I'm glad you were able to make the fix on the kernel, often times errors that seem to pop out of nowhere are related to fixes not being pushed to the repository you were syncing and using to build at the time. Thank you for the nice compliment it is greatly appreciated, I am not a kernel developer just an overall aspiring developer who loves everything Android related and trying to contribute and help others however I can. I would say 99% of my knowledge of everything Android related has come from XDA and hours upon hours of Googling things related to kernel development, reading about something not understanding something then Googling the parts I didn't understand, piecing together things then Googling more things to help me understand, after a while you slowly start putting the pieces of knowledge together as you learn more and then you still keep learning. For resources on learning kernel development I would recommend learning the C programming language as it is the building block of kernel development. A great resource for learning C is the free online e-book Learn C The Hard Way. Another critical element of understanding Android kernel development is the Linux Kernel and it's drivers which is why I would recommend taking a look at Linux Device Driver's Third Edition, while parts of it are outdated the fundamental concepts are still very much applicable. As far as pure Android Kernel aspects and Linux Kernel aspects go the free-electrons group has some invaluable presentations that cover these subjects as well as other critical areas of embedded development that relate to kernels.
For the mkbootimg binary I would recommend downloading these unpack, repack, ramdisk tools. They have proven invaluable for me when working with img files and kernels. Download the scripts and binaries and put them in your ~/bin folder and make sure to give them the proper permissions that way they will be in your path and you can use them properly. Once you have them installed I would recommend obtaining a copy of the Nexus 5's latest boot.img (The factory images Google Provides should have it in the images .zip file included in the factory image). After doing that decompile the stock boot.img file using the umkbootimg binary, this should present you with an output of a ramdisk and a zimage. Next, take the zimage you compiled with the franco kernel source and replace the stock boot.img zimage with the zimage you compiled from franco kernel. Then run the mkbootimg binary with command (In terminal it should give you the command to easily re-pack the boot.img) to re-pack your new boot.img. The output of the new boot.img will have the default name new_boot.img or similar name. Re-name this file to boot.img and delete the old boot.img from your .zip file of your ROM and swap in the boot.img file you just created. You have now included the custom kernel you wanted in your ROM.
As always let me know if you still have questions I'll be happy to answer them :good:.
Thank you so much!!! Probably going to have to take some time to digest everything but definitely will have more questions when I'm done.
Quick question, do you have see "C" being replace? I have read some C code but haven't not yet coded anything in C. I been told that low level access you get with C is not comparable with other languages. I guess you would have to go to ASM to get even more access. ASM personally I run from it, probably should do more of it for practice. We do a lot of high level language C++, java, python and some others in school but no C. I probably can't avoid not being comfortable in it? C is not going to be replace by anything in future??
MAXGEN said:
Thank you so much!!! Probably going to have to take some time to digest everything but definitely will have more questions when I'm done.
Quick question, do you have see "C" being replace? I have read some C code but haven't not yet coded anything in C. I been told that low level access you get with C is not comparable with other languages. I guess you would have to go to ASM to get even more access. ASM personally I run from it, probably should do more of it for practice. We do a lot of high level language C++, java, python and some others in school but no C. I probably can't avoid not being comfortable in it? C is not going to be replace by anything in future??
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You are correct in that to get even more low level access you start getting into assembly territory. What makes assembly difficult and what makes people from run form it is unlike very high level languages such as Python, Java, etc. it is much less human readable and a lot closer to machine language (Binary code), however like anything practice makes perfect the more you practice with a language the easier things get and the more confidence you have in programming things with it. If you really want to customize and develop kernels C is a must there is no getting around that unfortunately. As far as C being replaced with anything in the future, will it ever be replaced, probably as is the case with technology, but as far as it being replaced with anything equivalent or better in the next 10-20 years I doubt it, as it would take years to develop a new standard and even longer to be adopted and standardized to the point C is used and accepted today.
Hello,
I'm willing to try and build a custom rom, but I've been diving through the site for a few days and I still don't get it. I believe I do have the required background to do this: programming, linux, etc. and I have wide experience as a phone user, etc. It's just that either I'm not reading what I need or the way I want it. The problem, I believe, is that all I find are guides telling me to install this and those tools and then open this and that and voila! you got your rom. But they're not explaining WHAT exactly goes into those roms, or what is expected to go there, what's the purpose of those contents, etc., and I can't really catch with that. I feel at a loss and hate wasting my time turning around for nothing.
1. I don't understand the difference between a flashable rom and one that is meant to be installed through recovery, although I can see they're different. Do they both models contain the same kind of data? Is there any restriction to what one model can contain over the other one? If so, how would I convert from one to the other? But please, don't tell me to use this or that tool. I just need the theory behind it. Something of sorts like: "You need to extract this or that from this tarball, then mount this image, then the directory tree there goes in that directory over the other model of rom"
2. update-binary: Okay I guess this is run when installing from recovery, and this takes care of installing the rom, right?wrong?. Is this a per-rom thing, per-device thing? generic? If it's per-rom, how to generate it? do I need to compile something? Is there any generic source code that can be used as a start?
3. Although I have a basic understanding of how the Linux directory tree works, I know Android works on top of a heavily modified Linux. So can you explain briefly how the directory tree works? For instance, I believe /data/data is where Android apps install to, in /system/bin or xbin I can find busybox binaries/symlinks if present. /dev and /proc look the same as in Linux. I don't know about /sys. Also how are both rom models deployed to this tree? What is basically being copied?
4. If I were to compile a kernel, where do I find the Android kernel sources? or is it just a generic Linux kernel? where can i get a basic config for the device? Last time I checked my device hadn't /proc/config.gz but maybe I could get it from another rom with it enabled or something. What toolchain and where to get it? Oh and if you know of a native arm version of gcc or whatsnot, I'd prefer that. Setting up IDEs or toolchains is a nightmare. I don't like crosscompiling. But crosscompiling or not, a directory with all needed binaries without needing to set up system variables nor other stuff, would be amazing.
I surely have a lot more questions that I can't get from the back of my mind now, and I'll have yet more as you explain. But the point of my questions was mainly trying to explain the degree of the loss I'm at, so you can assist me better.
If it looks like a foolish petition, well, that's because I'm quite stubborn and can't catch things that don't go my way. I really need to understand the basics before I can move into actually doing something. I want to build a rom for the right reasons(to me). It's not just about packing a set of apps or themes with it, but about learning and doing other stuff like trying to fix things that are not supposed to work for the device in that Android version, etc.
If you can't help, congrats for reading through here anyways But any help is greatly appreciated :good:
oxiroxt said:
Hello,
I'm willing to try and build a custom rom, but I've been diving through the site for a few days and I still don't get it. I believe I do have the required background to do this: programming, linux, etc. and I have wide experience as a phone user, etc. It's just that either I'm not reading what I need or the way I want it. The problem, I believe, is that all I find are guides telling me to install this and those tools and then open this and that and voila! you got your rom. But they're not explaining WHAT exactly goes into those roms, or what is expected to go there, what's the purpose of those contents, etc., and I can't really catch with that. I feel at a loss and hate wasting my time turning around for nothing.
1. I don't understand the difference between a flashable rom and one that is meant to be installed through recovery, although I can see they're different. Do they both models contain the same kind of data? Is there any restriction to what one model can contain over the other one? If so, how would I convert from one to the other? But please, don't tell me to use this or that tool. I just need the theory behind it. Something of sorts like: "You need to extract this or that from this tarball, then mount this image, then the directory tree there goes in that directory over the other model of rom"
2. update-binary: Okay I guess this is run when installing from recovery, and this takes care of installing the rom, right?wrong?. Is this a per-rom thing, per-device thing? generic? If it's per-rom, how to generate it? do I need to compile something? Is there any generic source code that can be used as a start?
3. Although I have a basic understanding of how the Linux directory tree works, I know Android works on top of a heavily modified Linux. So can you explain briefly how the directory tree works? For instance, I believe /data/data is where Android apps install to, in /system/bin or xbin I can find busybox binaries/symlinks if present. /dev and /proc look the same as in Linux. I don't know about /sys. Also how are both rom models deployed to this tree? What is basically being copied?
4. If I were to compile a kernel, where do I find the Android kernel sources? or is it just a generic Linux kernel? where can i get a basic config for the device? Last time I checked my device hadn't /proc/config.gz but maybe I could get it from another rom with it enabled or something. What toolchain and where to get it? Oh and if you know of a native arm version of gcc or whatsnot, I'd prefer that. Setting up IDEs or toolchains is a nightmare. I don't like crosscompiling. But crosscompiling or not, a directory with all needed binaries without needing to set up system variables nor other stuff, would be amazing.
I surely have a lot more questions that I can't get from the back of my mind now, and I'll have yet more as you explain. But the point of my questions was mainly trying to explain the degree of the loss I'm at, so you can assist me better.
If it looks like a foolish petition, well, that's because I'm quite stubborn and can't catch things that don't go my way. I really need to understand the basics before I can move into actually doing something. I want to build a rom for the right reasons(to me). It's not just about packing a set of apps or themes with it, but about learning and doing other stuff like trying to fix things that are not supposed to work for the device in that Android version, etc.
If you can't help, congrats for reading through here anyways But any help is greatly appreciated :good:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am not terribly knowledgeable about all of this, but I will take a crack at it. Others can feel free to correct me.
1. "Flashing" is usually done through the recovery from a zip with an update script inside. That script is in a language called "edify". Read more about Edify Here and Here.
The only other common way that I know of installing a ROM is through fastboot in the bootloader, but that is normally only used with official factory images. Also, I think Samsung ROMs are often flashed with a proprietary program called Odin.
2. I think that the update-binary is standard across all recent devices. I think it is just an interpreter for the Edify scripting language. Old versions of android used a somewhat different scripting language and required a different file. You can probably pull the binary out of another recent zip and use that. The main thing you have to worry about is the update script (instructions for what the zip does) and the folder structure of the zip.
3. I am not confident to explain much here, but the apps and their data are stored in different places. User apps are stored in /data/app with app data stored in /data/data, I think. System apps are installed in /system/app. There is more files stored on the "sdcard" partition which can be internal or external, depending on the device.
4. Kernel sources are usually provided in the source code from whatever repo you are using. Different ROMs use different bases. Here is some info about grabbing the AOSP kernel sources with git: http://source.android.com/source/building-kernels.html
Many of the more popular ROMS have specific build instructions on their individual github pages (Cyanogen, Paranoid Android, etc), so you might what to look at those, too. Also, depending on the individual devices, there might be proprietary binaries sourced from the device or hardware manufacturers for things like camera drivers, graphics chips, etc.
If you want a walk through of the basic build process google has a tutorial. The last time I checked there seemed to be some outdated info, but it might give you a general idea of the build process. http://source.android.com/source/initializing.html
Hopefully someone more knowledgeable can give you more info, but that is all I got
synesthete said:
I am not terribly knowledgeable about all of this, but I will take a crack at it. Others can feel free to correct me.
1. "Flashing" is usually done through the recovery from a zip with an update script inside. That script is in a language called "edify". Read more about Edify Here and Here.
The only other common way that I know of installing a ROM is through fastboot in the bootloader, but that is normally only used with official factory images. Also, I think Samsung ROMs are often flashed with a proprietary program called Odin.
2. I think that the update-binary is standard across all recent devices. I think it is just an interpreter for the Edify scripting language. Old versions of android used a somewhat different scripting language and required a different file. You can probably pull the binary out of another recent zip and use that. The main thing you have to worry about is the update script (instructions for what the zip does) and the folder structure of the zip.
3. I am not confident to explain much here, but the apps and their data are stored in different places. User apps are stored in /data/app with app data stored in /data/data, I think. System apps are installed in /system/app. There is more files stored on the "sdcard" partition which can be internal or external, depending on the device.
4. Kernel sources are usually provided in the source code from whatever repo you are using. Different ROMs use different bases. Here is some info about grabbing the AOSP kernel sources with git: http://source.android.com/source/building-kernels.html
Many of the more popular ROMS have specific build instructions on their individual github pages (Cyanogen, Paranoid Android, etc), so you might what to look at those, too. Also, depending on the individual devices, there might be proprietary binaries sourced from the device or hardware manufacturers for things like camera drivers, graphics chips, etc.
If you want a walk through of the basic build process google has a tutorial. The last time I checked there seemed to be some outdated info, but it might give you a general idea of the build process. http://source.android.com/source/initializing.html
Hopefully someone more knowledgeable can give you more info, but that is all I got
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OMG Finally some light! THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU for all the info. I didn't get much right now, I'll need to read through your post a few times before I get it all, haha. I'll be sure to check the links too. Thank you!
Hi everyone,
as title suggests, I'd like to "port" clean AOSP to be able to install and run it on the custom device.
Basically, the situation is following: I got a custom device, based on rockchip rk3288 SoC. The device currently runs Android 5.1 successfully. I'd like to update Android to version 6 (got AOSP sources and AWS builder image up and running), but the company that created Android v5 for us no longer exists.
Thus I am here to ask for advice(s) on how to proceed (or whether it even is a good idea to do that myself, given the fact that I have zero experience with Android ROMs development), possibly a step-by-step guide on what to do.
The question is, do I just find drivers for hardware components present in the device (usb hub, ethernet, etc.) and just somehow "link" those to existing sources (of AOSP) and just run the build with different parameters? Or do I need to build a whole new kernel for the given device-OS combination?
Thank you for any advice or opinion!
Well this is an interesting one. There are several routes you can take here.
If you have the kernel source code, and the source code for the drivers, you could probably build the kernel from source and use it to boot Android, however, as that's unlikely, you're looking at a more regular porting process, which usually consists of pulling the vendor blobs from the existing Android system, building AOSP/Lineage with those blobs involved, and hacking together a new ramdisk that HOPEFULLY will be compatible. It's a very long and very tedious process, but it's certainly possible.
From that you'll then get in to the debugging stage of finding out what works out of the box, you'll very well need to make changes to AOSP for it to work on that SoC.
abtekk said:
Well this is an interesting one. There are several routes you can take here.
If you have the kernel source code, and the source code for the drivers, you could probably build the kernel from source and use it to boot Android, however, as that's unlikely, you're looking at a more regular porting process, which usually consists of pulling the vendor blobs from the existing Android system, building AOSP/Lineage with those blobs involved, and hacking together a new ramdisk that HOPEFULLY will be compatible. It's a very long and very tedious process, but it's certainly possible.
From that you'll then get in to the debugging stage of finding out what works out of the box, you'll very well need to make changes to AOSP for it to work on that SoC.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for pointing in the right (or at least some) direction! I found some guide on porting ROMs which I followed, basically like you said. So I just replaced some files in System image. Will flash later today, so maybe I will get some results!
abtekk said:
From that you'll then get in to the debugging stage of finding out what works out of the box, you'll very well need to make changes to AOSP for it to work on that SoC.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So I was following this tutorial, although found some irregularities, let's say: For example, none of those 2 folders contained init.d/ directory, thus I didn't update it. Also, I haven't found META-INF folder therefore haven't updated updater-script.
Basically, when I did (or at least what I think I was doing was that I took /system partition from our current ROM, that is working on that custom device and replaced stuff in there by stuff from the new system I wanted to port. My idea from what I've read was that i took kernel (and boot/recovery) from the original, working ROM and "injected" the new system onto it. Is that correct? Is that what I needed to do? Because the problem is, I cannot boot into the system (might as well be because of Kernel version, because I am trying to port Android 6 on Kernel 3.10. which was used in the current ROM running Android 5). It looks like the device is stuck in bootloader, or "somehow doesn't know what to start" (sorry, I can't put it better), displaying only my device's logo.
When I connect it to the computer via USB cable, running adb devices shows me that device, but when I try to access shell using adb shell I got error saying that /system/bin/sh wasn't found, which made me thinking that somehow the /system partition isn't "linked" properly, like I stated in the beginning.
Was I doing everything correctly? Do I need to do something above that? (maybe do you know about some tutorial). I am trying to port AOSP 6 Android.
Thank you!