NITdroid video demo : GNU/Linux Android on Nokia 770

A cheap DIY android platform, available worldwide and beyond.
Home :: Tutorials :: Graphics
in Graphics Tools & SDK Multimedia
Platforms: Java Maemo Mobile Linux Android
Keywords: Nokia Google opensource nokia N810 N800 N770 770 tablet port opensource Nokia nitdroid n770 mobile linux Internet gnu Android
As every year, this year will be the year of GNU/Linux mobile and now more than ever before.

Would you expect that NewLC would miss this ? no way !

The G1 phone is out, but who needs to wait for its worldwide availability when you
can get your own android plateform for 200 EUR or less ($50 on ebay) ?

As recently reported, previously on NewLC :

http://www.newlc.com/en/run-google-android-a-n810-internet-tablet

GNU/Linux Android was ported to Nokia tablets, 
since 100% of the Software is open-source and provided under Apache Licence.

The offspring is called "NITdroid"
(you guessed where the name came from : Android on Nokia Internet Tablet)

The project was quite active this past year
It resulted that It's easy to flash an Android firmware on Nokia tablets.

This is impressive how such a litle community of developers could produce a 
replacement firmware for this kind of product, but this was pretty logical
since Nokia set up Maemo (a GNU/Linux Debian Based OS for Tablets 
lead by nokia along an open community), 
there are no excuses not to benefit the previous fantastic work.



Enough talk, now let's go to practice.

Assuming you're familiar with GNU/Linux, that you have a Nokia Internet Tablet (n700 and later) 
and a MMC Memory card (256MB or more)

Unless you installed ssh or another way to access the shell, 
you'll need to have a running version of maemo.

FLASHING THE OS

So here is the procedure to flash 
the "HACKER" version of the firmware 
(understand as unmaintained)

You can skip this part, but it may be useful if you want to restore the
manufacturer's OS later.

Download SU-18_2008HACKER_4.2007.50-6_PR_F5_MR0_ARM.bin from

http://tablets-dev.nokia.com

  sudo flasher -F SU-18_*_PR_F5_MR0_ARM.bin -f && sudo flasher  -f -R
  flasher v0.8.7 (Oct 17 2006)
  SW version in image: SU-18_2006SE_3.2006.49-2_PR_MR0
  ...
  Suitable USB device not found, waiting
Then plug the power supply cable, and the flasher resumes :

  USB device found found at bus 001, device address 018
  Found device SU-18, hardware revision 1802
  ...
  Sending and flashing rootfs image (58368 kB)...
  100% (58368 of 58368 kB, avg. 784 kB/s)
  Finishing flashing... done
Reboot again, to place your MMC card in the tray.
Check your extra card is visible, then partition and format it (Applications / Utilities / Terminal )

Or host's side, since your nokia is seen as an "usb mass storage" device (/dev/sdx)
Mine is sda but it may change depending on your disks :

  dmesg | grep sd | grep 'Attached SCSI disk'
  sd 4:0:0:0: [sda] Attached SCSI disk

  sudo fdisk -l /dev/sda
  GNU Fdisk 1.1
  ...
  Disk /dev/sda: 519 MB, 519569408 bytes
  32 heads, 32 sectors/track, 991 cylinders
  Units = cylinders of 1024 * 512 = 524288 bytes
   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System 
  /dev/sda1               1         488      249840    e  FAT16 LBA
  /dev/sda2             489         747      132096   82  Linux swap
  /dev/sda3             748         991      124416   83  Linux
You can create partitions as you want (using cfdisk or gparted) as long as :
* 1st partition is set to FAT16
* 2d one to swap
* 3d one to EXT3

Then format them :

  mkfs.ext3 /dev/sda3
  mkswap /dev/sda2
  mkfs.msdos /dev/sda1
Copy the filesystem (rootfs in linux slang) :

wget -c http://guug.org/nit/nitdroid/rootfs-nitdroid-0.3.2.tar.bz2
mkdir -p tmp && cd tmp && tar xfvj ../rootfs-nitdroid-0.3.2.tar.bz2
part=sda3 ;  sudo mkdir -pv /mnt/$part && sudo mount /dev/$part /mnt/$part
sudo cp -rfva ./ /mnt/$part/ && sudo umount /mnt/sda3 && reboot
And finally flash NITdroid's Linux kernel in R&D mode :

  wget -c http://www.bundyo.org/maemo/nitdroid/nitdroid_770_20081223.tar.bz2
  tax xvfj nitdroid_770*.tar.bz2
  sudo /usr/local/bin/flasher-3.0 -f --enable-rd-mode -R -k \

   nitdroid_770/zImage-nitdroid-n770
  flasher v0.8.7 (Oct 17 2006)
BOOT

A few seconds later you'll see tux and its verbose console, 
half a minute a splashscreen, 
and less than another 30 seconds the desktop is ready to be used.

OK, now you have an overview of the system,
don't panic if several warning messages appear,
we'll try to shut up those pop up by adding some virtual memory
(if this wasn't done before)

ADDING SWAP

Install the patched version of Android Debugger Bridge :

  wget http://guug.org/nit/nitdroid/adb.bz2

  /usr/local/bin/adb shell
Once logged, you'll be able to use a busybox shell, 
(feel free to investigate at the filesystem)

  # cat /proc/version
  Linux version 2.6.28-rc9-omap1-05327-g52a8b74-dirty (bundyo@bundyo) (gcc version 3.4.4 (release) (CodeSourcery ARM 2005q3-2)) #148 PREEMPT Tue Dec 23 09:10:12 EET 2008
Now we're about to add some swap space from a remaining partition
of the memory card. Be careful and identify the right partition.

  # cat /proc/partitions
  major minor  #blocks  name
    31        0        128 mtdblock0
    31        1        384 mtdblock1
    31        2       2048 mtdblock2
    31        3       2048 mtdblock3
    31        4     126464 mtdblock4
   179        0     507392 mmcblk0
   179        1     249840 mmcblk0p1
   179        2     132608 mmcblk0p2
   179        3     124928 mmcblk0p3

  # /nokia/bin/busybox fdisk -l /dev/block/mmcblk0
  ...
  /dev/block/mmcblk0p2             489         747      132608  82 Linux swap
  ...
Note : mtd* devices are Internal Flash memory, while mmc* are external ones.

Skip this part If you have formatted your swap partition before, this can be done on android side : the second partition of 1st (and only) MMC card, (might take time)

  # date ; /nokia/bin/busybox mkswap /dev/block/mmcblk0p2  ; date
  Sat Jan  1 00:07:49 GMT 2000
  # ...
If I can reckon, it failed on first time, so I had to do it again.

Once done let's mount it :

  # /nokia/bin/busybox swapon /dev/block/mmcblk0p2 && cat /proc/swaps
  Filename                                Type                Size        Used        Priority
  /dev/block/mmcblk0p2                    partition        132600        2072        -1
To make this configuration permanent, the init script must do the job on each boot :

cat<<EOF >> /init.rc && reboot

#{ Adding swap space
service swap /nokia/bin/busybox swapon /dev/block/mmcblk0p2
    oneshot
#}

EOF
Once rebooted let's check again (host side)

  /usr/local/bin/adb shell dmesg  | grep swap
  <6>[ ] Adding 132600k swap on /dev/block/mmcblk0p2.  Priority:-1 extents:1 across:132600k
INSTALL APPLICATIONS

Then you can have fun with the menu, see API demos for instance.

Last but not least, now let's install your favorite applications, using a patched version of adb (android debug bridge client)

  /usr/local/bin/adb install bin/Diet3D.apk
It's icon will appear in the application panel

CONCLUSION

To conclude, before someone ask I won't say NITdroid is better that maemo,
IMHO, I would chose the OS depending on freedom it can provide 
and on applications it can support.

So android is a bit young, and porting native applications is not the philosophy, but Java support fits best.

Other projects need to be investigated on this (obsolete) plateform, I am thinking of mer (Deblet's little brother), but that will be the subject of an other article.

Let me know, if you need assistance or if you have ideas to share.

There are some new GNU/Linux sections just opened in the forum.

See you there.

REFERENCES :

Project headquarter :
http://guug.org/nit/nitdroid/

Diet3D :
http://rzr.online.fr/java.htm

Files:
* http://guug.org/nit/nitdroid/rootfs-nitdroid-0.3.2.tar.bz2
* http://www.bundyo.org/maemo/nitdroid/nitdroid_770_20081223.tar.bz2

Interesting URLs :
* http://elinux.org/Android_on_OMAP
* https://sourceforge.net/projects/android-n810/
* http://www.android-internals.org/index.php?title=Nokia_770
* http://www.internettablettalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=21747
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_770_Internet_Tablet

Video: Ogg/Theora (or flv) :
* http://en.theorasea.org/story.php?title=NITdroid--Linux-Android-on-Nokia-770-1


Promote this project:
* http://digg.com/linux_unix/NITdroid_or_just_another_Android_port_nokia_770_and_later

Special thanks go to bundyo, solca and #NITdroid's hackers and newlc for taking the risk to trash their n770.

Licence: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/

Multitouch feature on any screen ?

Resistive screen vs capacitive one
Platforms: Java iPhone Mobile Linux Symbian OS Android
Keywords: openmoko iPhone g1 android linux tactile screen OpenMoko multitouch iphone Android opensource
Hi,

We all saw minority report , the wide screen demos like the Surface demo from MS Research, or PerspectivePixel (seems Unix based)

And recently on handhelds like this G1 multitouch demo video (which should appear on any capacitive screen soon or later) :

But there is other (cheaper) technology : "Resistive Screen" :

Openmoko people were wondering how to add this feature on the FreeeRunner phone (future one will be capacitive) :

Nothing ready yet, but it could be possible (or not) .

Same topic on Nokia, Symbian etc

BUT there is a BUT , last week the US patent office just validated apple's patent :

"Touch screen device, method, and graphical user interface for determining commands by applying heuristics "

I am not a Lawyer, but I am pretty sure various hacks are about to appear ... to be continued

Special thanks to rudy, our multitouch investigator ...

Android everywhere : phone, netbook and unimaginable devices

Watch video of installation of eeedroid on asus eeepc-701
Home :: News :: Mobile Linux :: Android
Platforms: Java Mobile Linux Android
Keywords: opensource intel htc Google gnu asus eeepc os netbook ink Hack gnudroid eeepc Android
The "android mania" spreads everywhere, it started with a emulator/sdk, then htc phones, and some opensource communities port it to Nokia Tablet (as seen on previous video tutorial) ...

Netbooks like asus's eeepc-701 also supports eeedroid, watch this video proof (software download and procedure to build it and flash it, may be available later if needed). Currently mouse or tactile screen is missing, but the pointer can easily moved using keyboard.



But now it goes a step beyond, using this ink paper display device from moto

What the future will be ? Who know ? you ? then tell us.

Anyway I am curious to know where the opensource communities will drive this OS, will it stay along google or will it fork in "a gnudroid project" ...

I don't know yet if a such project is justified or not, but purchasing a GNU/Linux device where you have no root privileges is very frustrating... openmoko may be a simpler solution to this problem.

NOTES:

* eeedroid: http://virtuallyshocking.com/2008/12/20/building-android-for-the-asus-eeepc-701/comment-page-2/

* License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ 

eeedroid-0.0.20090209.7z

Linux Smartphones also present at Mobile World Congress

Many opensource phones at mobile events... Many mobile at opensource events ...
Home :: News :: Mobile Linux :: Android
Platforms: Java Mobile Linux WebOS / PalmOS Qt Android
Keywords: vodaphone Samsung Limo LG htc Access MWC linux event demo
One of the most important mobile event is taking place in Spain now , the world mobile congress.

As usual it's dominated by mobiles vendors from Europe (Nokia, Sony Ericson..) or Asia (LG, Samsung...) and Software companies ...

But as you expected, Linux has also its place, most of the "Linux" stands are affiliated to LiMo foundation.

We're also exited to get the LiMo's SDK which is expected to be released this year.

Samsung demoed some Smartphones running on LiMo reference system : SGU-i780 SGU-i900 ...
SGU-i780.jpg

Vodaphone announced Android's G2 which may hit the European market (Rumors said that French's TelCo SFR could sell it in march). HTC also showed his android ports also on existing models.

g2-vodafone.jpg
Palm was present too, but very confident about their latest "Pré" device.

Also noticed some interesting stands : Access platform, Sun and its JavaFX and also Opera who joined LiMo plus Adobe promoting a project around flash.

While Apple and Google not, I guess they focus on their own showcases...

Opensource communities were not very represented, the explanation is simple : the annual meeting fosdem took place the same month.

Finally we had the Impression that Nokia is still actively supporting Symbian, along QT and Linux... and just opened its app store.

Other Pictures to come :

Deb packages of Android SDK with bleeding edge "cupcake" images

Debian packages of SDK with bleeding edge "cupcake" images
Platforms:
Java
Mobile Linux
Android
Keywords:
ubuntu
Google
debian
Canonical
android
nokia 770
nit
g1
sdk
packages
linux
devel; emulator
android; debian; ubuntu
Since last summer, a work is in progress for packaging Android SDK into debian ...

Then, I recently got an amd64 ubuntu system, so I decided to build it by my own since android website provides only i686 prebuilt binaries...

Once done, I read that NullWire released some prebuild images of "Cupcake" (Android upcoming release)

So I decided to include thoses "cupcake" images to test the package.



So, It's pretty simple how to test it on any debian based distro,

1st setup your apt sources

  sudo sh -c "
  export DISTRIB_CODENAME=sources ;
. /etc/lsb-release; 
  export REPO='http://rzr.online.fr/docs/contribs/debian/' ;
  wget -O-  \${REPO}\${DISTRIB_CODENAME}.list >> /etc/apt/sources.list
  "
Then install new packages

  sudo aptitude update ; aptitude upgrade ; aptitude install android-sdk android-emulator
Backup your previous settings if it matters :

  mv ~/.android ~/.android.bak
Finally start it :

  android-emulator -system /opt/android-sdk/tools/lib/images/
No major changes at first sight, but you can check (Settings / About phone) :

  Build number: eng.mkr.20090125.031609

  Kernel Version
  2.6.25-00350-g40fff9a 
  android-build@apa27 #1
By the way, If any Debian/ Ubuntu packager is interested into finishing the job or doing collaborative maintenance of the package, please contact me, I'll be glad to help.

Additional notes :

Debian maniacs check this thread on the forum : http://www.newlc.com/en/forum/debian-support-linux-android

I would like to thank, nullwire, LaunchPad PPA service and pkt for eclipse-3.4 (which run file w/ openjdk) , ADT Eclipse plugin needs to be packaged too.

License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Watch Moblin, a distro for "Atom" netbooks and more

Seems to me, more like a technology than a product yet ...
Home :: Reviews :: Devices
in Devices Misc. Tools & SDK
Platforms: Mobile Linux
Keywords: intel asus acer atom xfce x86 moblin linux distro intel fedora atom
Moblin the Intel Linux Open project just released "moblin-v2-core-alpha", available in various form, I downloaded the livecd and tested it with kvm (with hardware virtualisation)

wget http://repo.moblin.org/moblin/releases/test/alpha1/images/moblin-netbook-core-alpha1.iso
sudo modprobe -v kvm_intel # or other hypervisor
kvm moblin-netbook-core-alpha1.iso
Then an isolinux menu appear and the system boot (very fast) until a XFCE desktop appear.

I have quickly tested the desktop and made a video, but it's not very impressive since it's just XFCE running on Fedore distro, the major innovation is Underneath...
(In other words, kernel's drivers set, optimizing the boot process etc).

By the way, tuning a distro on embedded Linux could be the subject of an other article in the future, just ask for in the forums.



Quoting moblin.org :

"The Moblin Architecture is designed to support multiple platforms and usage models ranging from Netbooks to Mobile Internet Devices (MID) to various embedded usage models such as the In Vehicle Infotainment systems. The central piece of the architecture is the common layer we call "Moblin Foundations", a hardware and usage model independent layer that provides one uniform way to develop such devices. Underneath the Moblin Foundations sits the Linux kernel and device drivers specific to the hardware platform, and above the Moblin Foundations are the specific user interface and user interaction model for the target device."
References :

* Video (theora) : http://en.theorasea.org/story.php?title=Testing-Moblin-Core-Alpha-with-kvm
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moblin

License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

OpenMoko : deb packages and fosdem debian video

Challenge, try to run Debian on OpenMoko on qemu on Debian
Home :: Downloads :: Free software
in SDKs Free software Mobile Tools PC Tools Skins Utilities Software components Multimedia
Platforms: Java Mobile Linux Qt
Keywords: fic openmoko debian freerunner linux OpenMoko emulator debian deb
DEB PACKAGE OF OPENMOKO EMULATOR



NewLC is happy to share an other debian package of mobile emulator based on qemu, couple of weeks ago it was android-emulator, now it's about openmoko time.

On any debian based system, you can easly install qemu-neo1973 the same way you installed android-emulator :

1st setup your apt sources

  sudo sh -c "
  export DISTRIB_CODENAME=sources ;
. /etc/lsb-release;
  export REPO='http://rzr.online.fr/docs/contribs/debian/' ;
  wget -O-  \${REPO}\${DISTRIB_CODENAME}.list >> /etc/apt/sources.list
  "
Then install new packages

  sudo aptitude update ; sudo aptitude upgrade ; sudo aptitude install qemu-neo1973 apt-src
  qemu-system-arm  | head -n 1
  # QEMU PC emulator version 0.9.1-openmoko-svn, Copyright (c) 2003-2008 Fabrice Bellard
  openmoko/flash.sh
  sudo apt-src update ; apt-src install qemu-neo1973 && cd qemu-neo1973*
  qemu-system-arm -M gta01 -m 130 -mtdblock openmoko/openmoko-flash.image -kernel openmoko/openmoko-kernel.bin -usb -show-cursor
So far only the emulator is shipped.

Next job is to 
download images (rootfs and kernel) or build them by your own.

There are many distros to test : OM, FSO, hackable1 or plain debian as shown in the later video.

DEBIAN OPENMOKO

For unlucky ones who weren't at fosdem 2009 or those who missed the live streaming, here is a video presentation of Debian on OpenMoko's devices like Neo1973 or FreeRunner.



MORE TO COME

NewLC also supports this platform, we plan to investigate more on it and try to find convergence between many GNU/Linux platforms like Maemo, android, LiMo and other embedded or desktop systems...

Last but not least, you'll be root on openmoko ain't this a killer feature ?

NOTES:

* OpenMoko on qemu : http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/OpenMoko_under_QEMU
* Join Debian Team : http://wiki.debian.org/Teams/DebianFSO
* Video theora: http://meetings-archive.debian.net/2009/fosdem/
* License: http://meetings-archive.debian.net/pub/debian-meetings/LICENSE
Attachment	Size
qemu-neo1973_0.0.20090213-0ubuntu0~rzr9_amd64.deb_.metalink.txt	1.12 KB
qemu-neo1973_0.0.20090213-0ubuntu0~rzr9_i386.deb_.metalink.txt	1.11 KB

FreeRunner runs many OS : OpenMoko, Debian, Android and now Gentoo

opensource vs fragmentation : innovation will win
Home :: News :: Mobile Linux :: Android
Platforms: Java Maemo Mobile Linux Qt Android
Keywords: openmoko gentoo fic freerunner windows qemu OpenMoko gentoo freerunner emulator debian Android
Last month we talked about Debian on FreeRunner, Gentoo is still on the run, because today gentoo@openmoko announced that a Linux source distribution can be compiled for freerunner on the phone itself. quoting Sven R :

We the Gentoo@Openmoko team are pleased to announce that we reached our first milestone for running Gentoo on the Freerunner. This mean you can cross- and naively compile a basic system including X, enlightenment, the FSO framework, WLAN tools and many more packages. Also some phone GUIs went already into the overlay located at

Users like you or your grandma don't care about compiling software on their phone, but this technical challenge means that the device itself is very reliable.

Also note, that FreeRunner is the second android phone released (after G1), and It will takes a few minutes to flash latest beta (to be reviewed soon).

Anyway if you're curious you can test this on your phone or on emulator, because qemu (should) emulates the hardware not just the OS (or VM).

A 2007 version of the emulator is also available for windows and works on wine, see this video proof.



Else you can use this deb recently packaged by newlc and still up to date :

http://www.newlc.com/en/openmoko-deb-packages-and-fosdem-debian-video

MORE DETAILS

http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Gentoo

http://overlays.gentoo.org/proj/embedded

http://gentoo.mindzoo.de/index.cgi/wiki/native-compiling

win32 emultator (to rebuild) : https://admin-trac.openmoko.org/trac/ticket/624

Video: ogv : http://en.theorasea.org/story.php?title=openmoko-emulator-bin-20070625

License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ 
Attachment	Size
Rzrfreefr-openmokoemulatorbin20070625170.ogv_.metalink.txt	1.08 KB
openmoko-emulator-win32-bin-20070625.zip.metalink.txt	1.49 KB
linuxmobile.txt · Last modified: 2022/04/16 12:23 (external edit)
 
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