Nexus ROM for Xperia S benefits the Play? - Xperia Play Android Development

Hey guys,
I just read an article on a dutch electronics website (tweakers) that Google would make a 'nexus rom' for the xperia S. They would build it from the ground up and Sony will help google with providing closed source files (drivers, etc) so they can use that as well.
Google wants to do this to develop a stock AOSP version of android!
What are the potential benefits for Xperia play? Is there a possibility that the touchpad framework would go open source?
Also, please correct me if some of this info is wrong, as you guys probably know, the interwebz isn't always right...
edit: https://groups.google.com/forum/m/?fromgroups#!msg/android-building/zji_sQGN9Oo/MoaS0xidmRMJ
Verstuurd van mijn R800i met Tapatalk

Is this true? if so I'm getting an Xperia S!

I could see this helping the PLAY to an extent, but not as far as the Gamepad and Touchpads are concerned. Unless devs continue to port the touchpad libs from GB.

After having read the memo, it's going to be a pre-alpha thing for possibly longer than the lifespan of the phone itself. If you read it, he says that it won't be a daily driver for a very long time, especially with the way they'll be implementing the changes (i.e. slowly). The only thing that it seems like this would help is laying the foundation for future phones, to make AOSP development more fluid.

Related

How can we get some quality Developers for Ray?

Hey guys,
New to the board, new to the Ray. I used to frequent the Arc, Play, Nexus S, and Desire S boards under a different user name but I've not posted in a while so I've since forgotten my User info, so thought I'd make a new one.
Anyways...
I got my Ray, bought it out unlocked, and unlocked the boot loader. I was really excited to get my Cyanogen on and enjoy this beautiful device. Only...Cyanogen Rom for the Ray is HORRIBLE. The Camcorder is broken, the live wallpapers option is non-existant, and the control widget is completely useless for brightness control. Seriously, WTF is wrong with that ROM its is absolute garbage.
I can understand the Ice Cream Sandwich ROM being bug ridden, its early time, but at the very least I expected Cyanogen 7 to be fully functional. Geez.
Those are the only 2 ROMS I've tried so far, the rest look boring. MIUI I am not interested in, and outside anything that slightly alters the Stock firmware there is NOTHING AVAILABLE?
Where are the ROMS? Where is the support? Where are the quality developers?
All we have are half backed ideas, ROMS that don't work properly, and nothing else.
Maybe we should start up a fund and maybe donate a few Rays to some good developers that can actually provide because at this point, there is no point in using anything other then Stock Firmware.
The Ray is a capable device, similar to the Arc, there should be more support. I miss the great support that the Nexus S and the Desire S recieved. Especially the Desire S, the Developer from that board are truly amazing. Proxuser and Super kid were really really good developers, and we need developers like them who dedicate the time needed for quality ROMS. Our support is a joke compared to what they have, and I think we need to either put up some money or some incentive, like maybe donating a few Rays, to get the ball rolling.
I agree with you, it's pretty disappointing.
Anyway, I'm pretty sure the differences between Ray and Arc are minimal, so it's quite surprising that Arc gets tons of support and Ray gets basically nothing. Even more that inferior devices such as the Minis are more supported. Maybe the device is not selling well and not many people have it? I don't know.
Obviously I'm just a tinkerer and not a developer, so I don't know how hard it could be to port Arc stuff to Ray, but yeah, this devices needs more support. How to get it? I have no idea.
I think the stock rom is pretty good, I don't find any major problem with it, it look pretty good and it's decently fast (with Supercharger it's much better), so for now I don't really feel the need to install an unofficial one.
Also, many Arc mods to the interface work on Ray too, so check out those forums too and see if there is something you like. I installed the Xperia styled torch widget and the modded battery icon (with percentage) from the Arc board and they worked fine.
MarkMRL said:
I agree with you, it's pretty disappointing.
Anyway, I'm pretty sure the differences between Ray and Arc are minimal, so it's quite surprising that Arc gets tons of support and Ray gets basically nothing. Even more that inferior devices such as the Minis are more supported. Maybe the device is not selling well and not many people have it? I don't know.
Obviously I'm just a tinkerer and not a developer, so I don't know how hard it could be to port Arc stuff to Ray, but yeah, this devices needs more support. How to get it? I have no idea.
I think the stock rom is pretty good, I don't find any major problem with it, it look pretty good and it's decently fast (with Supercharger it's much better), so for now I don't really feel the need to install an unofficial one.
Also, many Arc mods to the interface work on Ray too, so check out those forums too and see if there is something you like. I installed the Xperia styled torch widget and the modded battery icon (with percentage) from the Arc board and they worked fine.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Re-reading my initial post I may have sounded a bit harsh. Its just very very disappointing coming from a device that had a TON of support to one that has virtually none.
I will take your advice and check out some of the Arc's mods.
I've owned a ton of Android devices (Xperia x10, Captivate, 2 Xperia Arcs, Nexus S, another Xperia Arc, HTC Desire Z, HTC Desire S, and finally the Xperia Ray) and this is by far the worst support I've ever seen.
Adreno said:
Re-reading my initial post I may have sounded a bit harsh. Its just very very disappointing coming from a device that had a TON of support to one that has virtually none.
I will take your advice and check out some of the Arc's mods.
I've owned a ton of Android devices (Xperia x10, Captivate, 2 Xperia Arcs, Nexus S, another Xperia Arc, HTC Desire Z, HTC Desire S, and finally the Xperia Ray) and this is by far the worst support I've ever seen.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree with you!...even my previous worst phone...Se X8...got tons of support ...i am really disappointed seeing Ray being put aside...
Sent from my ST18i using Tapatalk
What are you guys on anyway? The X8, since it was mentioned, was released 1 year ago. With 1.6 on it... there have been, what 4 different versions? And Gingerbread is sub par on it.
Regarding Adreno's note on HTC Devices.... As you are aware HTC makes phones for many companies, including T-mobile and Google. So most of these devices have almost the same internals. Hence development on those devices is really easy (you just copy paste files from one rom to another and bam you got your kang).
So on to the Ray... It was released 4 months ago. It has a different screen than most phones (480x854) so porting any generic rom onto it requires some smali editing skills. And... There is NO AOSP release for Xperia devices... at least so far. What makes other devices so "different" than the Xperia's is that some of them have been build on AOSP.
For example the DesireZ - Tmobile G2. One has Sense, the other is built on AOSP. So you have 2 completely different builds for the same device.
And some food for thought... Sony Ericsson needs about 6 months, an enormous team of developers and a ****load of money to build their own Firmware based on Already released Code. What makes you think you will see something "new" from some amateurs in less than 6 months time?
Yes i have built my "own" Rom based on the Stock Rom for the Xperia Active. I dont even consider my self an amateur. I am a total noob.
So, to finish this rant, since development for these devices is young, yet the android system as it is, is quite mature, I would recommend you to assist the people who have already developed a Rom for the Ray, in order to make something good from it. Creating a Thread in the development section, complaining about the development being "dissapointing"... then i rest my case.
/rant off
dumraden said:
So, to finish this rant, since development for these devices is young, yet the android system as it is, is quite mature, I would recommend you to assist the people who have already developed a Rom for the Ray, in order to make something good from it. Creating a Thread in the development section, complaining about the development being "dissapointing"... then i rest my case.
/rant off
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I personally don't want "assisting" of the developers that have been working on the Ray thus far, as I said my original post I don't believe that they are up to the job.
I want to entice more talented developers. What can we do to bring experienced developers that know what they are doing to the Ray?
At this point, rooting and unlocking the bootloader is pretty pointless. You are screwing yourself out of over the air updates, and there is nothing that can fill the void from the development community thus far. What. is. the. point.
This is where you are wrong.
What do you actually want from a Rom? Speed? Stability? Battery Life?
I have managed to do all these with no real coding at all. The Xperia Active with DooMLoRD's Kernel and various tweaks that i found on XDA, when on max OC ranks between the Sensation and the SGS2. Both are Dual core with a far better GPU than the Adreno 205. Oh and the OC is completely bulletproof.
For the time being, the best developers for these devices is Sony herself. It is stable, and battery efficient. You on the other hand can make it more "personalized" and fitting to your needs... Gaming-browsing... whatever...
dumraden said:
This is where you are wrong.
What do you actually want from a Rom?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Even if I had just Cyanogen working properly I'd be happy.
On the Desire S board Superkid had Ice Cream Sandwich ported (AOSP) to the desire S within 2 weeks, only being able to work on it on the weekends. Thats like 6 days.
On top of that, he had everything working flawlessly other than the camera by week 3.
Thats the kind of development I am talking about. Imagine how hard that was.
We don't have anything like that over here.
No it wasnt that hard. I say again. You need to be able to edit THE WHOLE DAMN BASE, if you want it in a different resolution than the one it was intended.
Yes some guys are simply amazing at what they do, but as i said earlier, most HTC devices use the same chipsets, boards, cpu's, modems etc. Sony uses a board (codenamed mogami i think) specific to the mini's. It uses a different one for the Ray, Play etc.
You will almost never have something like that. Be happy that the Cyanogenmod Team is actually working on these devices.
Hell, the mini's dont even have a MIUI build. Its either CM7 or Stock. But honestly i couldnt care less. I got bored of flashing a new rom every 2 weeks, just to see nothing different. The only difference was Sense 2.1 Sense 3.0 Sense 3.5. The rest ROMS use the same old AOSP build with an ADW launcher or a LPP on top... Big deal.
Now if someone gets sense on these devices... i'd be impressed
Complaint/rant threads about developers are not allowed at XDA. If you want something done, make it happen!

[REQ] JB drivers for sony 2011 models

Hi guys, seems sony is not going to support us and not going to update our phones to the latest Jelly bean android os. Looking around the thread i see the only problem with sony not updating to jb is with the drivers for jelly bean for our phones, i also found out that making the drivers is not a impossible task but a very hard one ( seems X8 has no problem running JB as devstaff said ). I on behalf of all the owners of 2011 xperia devices kindly request all the great developers here in this forum to join togeather to develope drivers for these devices, pls guys help us keep our great phone RAY up-to date.
As far as I know it's NOT an impossible task (because nothing is impossible), but our developers have to deal with reverse engineering and believe me concerning drivers it's a very complicated thing. Too much effort and time put with minimal or no gain at all.
I remember WM 6.5 ROMS for HTC Touch HD whose support was so quickly dropped by HTC and we, simple folk, didn't get the desired 6.5 update. So there were cooks and lot's of 6.5 Blackstone ROMS but, as genius as they were, developers didn't manage to get them work full throttle because, guess what, of them blasted drivers!
So the answer to your question is probably "no"..
am i missing the point of this thread?
there is CyanogenMod 10 jb which supports well most 2011 handsets - CyanogenMod the best you can have on the xperia ray.
i too have an xperia ray and was very unhappy with the original Sony bloat - the phone constantly crashed, rebooted, froze up - you name it, it made no fun at all. after throwing it around out of anger, i put myself together and installed CyanogenMod 9 at first, all previous errors were gone spontaneously. now a month or two ago i started to move to CyanogenMod 10 and guess what, it works great - running android 4.1.2. i'm anxious to install the latest fxp146 which will be online soon.
you can find the stuff here http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1409053
-sanguine- said:
As far as I know it's NOT an impossible task (because nothing is impossible), but our developers have to deal with reverse engineering and believe me concerning drivers it's a very complicated thing. Too much effort and time put with minimal or no gain at all.
I remember WM 6.5 ROMS for HTC Touch HD whose support was so quickly dropped by HTC and we, simple folk, didn't get the desired 6.5 update. So there were cooks and lot's of 6.5 Blackstone ROMS but, as genius as they were, developers didn't manage to get them work full throttle because, guess what, of them blasted drivers!
So the answer to your question is probably "no"..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Xperia X8 support stopped with 2.1, but they have jelly bean, so it's not impossible as you say. If the developers wish they could do it for ray too.
thyssen2k said:
am i missing the point of this thread?
there is CyanogenMod 10 jb which supports well most 2011 handsets - CyanogenMod the best you can have on the xperia ray.
i too have an xperia ray and was very unhappy with the original Sony bloat - the phone constantly crashed, rebooted, froze up - you name it, it made no fun at all. after throwing it around out of anger, i put myself together and installed CyanogenMod 9 at first, all previous errors were gone spontaneously. now a month or two ago i started to move to CyanogenMod 10 and guess what, it works great - running android 4.1.2. i'm anxious to install the latest fxp146 which will be online soon.
you can find the stuff here http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1409053
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ya man CM is awesome, but it dosen't contain the awesome picture quality of the sony ics camera, there was a picture preview glitch in CM. I'm saying that it would be great if developers could make the drivers for ray and make a debrand engine of sony jb version it will be fuc**in awesome thats all mate.
Well. Only sony has to do this. No developer is able to build drivers. We can port ones as FXP do. And see what is haappening. You dont ahve a full working and cool JB. SO you will never will. There is no engineer that knows sonys hardware and would like to be part of xda and share. No possible way
MrTapa said:
Well. Only sony has to do this. No developer is able to build drivers. We can port ones as FXP do. And see what is haappening. You dont ahve a full working and cool JB. SO you will never will. There is no engineer that knows sonys hardware and would like to be part of xda and share. No possible way
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Then can you tell me how xperia x8 having only 600mhz processor runs jelly bean so smoothly, with its software support stopped by sony in android 2.1 foryo. There is a way, the devolpoers could do it, i personally think if the FXP,AOKP,PA join hands they could do it
cooldude9119 said:
Then can you tell me how xperia x8 having only 600mhz processor runs jelly bean so smoothly, with its software support stopped by sony in android 2.1 foryo. There is a way, the devolpoers could do it, i personally think if the FXP,AOKP,PA join hands they could do it
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It seems you do not fully understand how drivers are developed. And with x8 devs were just lucky to get hands on something similar which they adapted for this xperia model. Hell, you can have legendary HTC HD2 running Android and WP7 smoothly but you won't find not a single driver created from the ground up by our XDA tech gurus! So I repeat, what you suggest is very complex and most likely impossible.
cooldude9119 said:
Then can you tell me how xperia x8 having only 600mhz processor runs jelly bean so smoothly, with its software support stopped by sony in android 2.1 foryo. There is a way, the devolpoers could do it, i personally think if the FXP,AOKP,PA join hands they could do it
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well for us jelly bean is smooth too but when it's not fully useful and it freezes a lot. For x8 its the same
Sent from my Ray with the FORCE
We need good devs, like Nobodyatall to help us port drivers and more.
Maybe we should start a donation to Naa to help us? Cuz nAa is a superior dev, he made 2.2, 2.3, 4.0, 4.1 for the X8, and the X8 only runs eclair on stock.
Is my idea good? Should we ask nAa for help?
Another idea is to port DesireHD roms because the HW is almost the same, or maybe Xperia J?
Nothing is impossible, we just need good developers thats good at working with drivers.
Skickat från min ST18i via Tapatalk 2
devstaff said:
We need good devs, like Nobodyatall to help us port drivers and more.
Maybe we should start a donation to Naa to help us? Cuz nAa is a superior dev, he made 2.2, 2.3, 4.0, 4.1 for the X8, and the X8 only runs eclair on stock.
Is my idea good? Should we ask nAa for help?
Another idea is to port DesireHD roms because the HW is almost the same, or maybe Xperia J?
Nothing is impossible, we just need good developers thats good at working with drivers.
Skickat från min ST18i via Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you're really willing to put some effort into it, go for it! Ask Naa and see what he says. I bet he'll also have useful information when it comes to porting :good:
MrTapa said:
Well for us jelly bean is smooth too but when it's not fully useful and it freezes a lot. For x8 its the same
Sent from my Ray with the FORCE
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Jelly in my devices is superb, better game performance, better battery live, ect, all whit stock GHZ speed, no need to overclock on JB. :fingers-crossed:
devstaff said:
We need good devs, like Nobodyatall to help us port drivers and more.
Maybe we should start a donation to Naa to help us? Cuz nAa is a superior dev, he made 2.2, 2.3, 4.0, 4.1 for the X8, and the X8 only runs eclair on stock.
Is my idea good? Should we ask nAa for help?
Another idea is to port DesireHD roms because the HW is almost the same, or maybe Xperia J?
Nothing is impossible, we just need good developers thats good at working with drivers.
Skickat från min ST18i via Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ya thats a nice idea dude, surely we can ask him, +! from me :good:
oshmoun said:
If you're really willing to put some effort into it, go for it! Ask Naa and see what he says. I bet he'll also have useful information when it comes to porting :good:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
finally we are getting someplace, soon a proper jb for our ray
Ok, I contact nAa later today
Skickat från min ST18i via Tapatalk 2
good man, any other developers who could help us willing to join this project ??

Not a good bye, maybe a "see you soon" (explanation)

Well, this day should come soon or later.
I had a chance for trading my Xperia Ray for a phone with similar specifications, and I did.
I own now a LG Optimus Black (white version). If you guys check the specs of both phones you'll note that they're very similar, with only few differences. I miss the great quality of the camera, Optimus camera is crappy. But what I like most of this phone is the bigger screen and the unlocked bootloader, thanks to it I could install and taste (at last) Jelly Bean. Everything is working in a CM10 based ROM, the performance is very good, but the battery drain is a little bit faster than ICS, I guess this is caused by project butter.
That's why I don't understand why SONY won't give JB to our 2011 Xperias. I just can't believe that custom ROMs built by the community and devs are so good enough to use them daily, but SONY engineers can't (or don't want) to give Android 4.1 to Arc, Neo, Ray, etc. That has disappointed me a lot and it was one of the reasons to take the decision of trading my phone.
However, I still want to give a chance to SONY because, after all, I'm a fan and I love their devices (if you ask me, what I really like of this LG I own now is the unlocked bootloader and the screen, the physical design is ugly, so "iphoned"), so I'm waiting for CES this january 7th and see what they have to offer. I hope they don't disappoint us, and now SONY have to work harder since a new strong competitor is on his way: Ubuntu Phone. It really looks interesting, plus, I'm a Linux fan since 2004 and I've seen how this great system has evolved, until the point of being almost ready for smartphones. But I also love Android, so, we'll see.
Anyway guys, I can't say definitely "bye", I'm sure we'll meet again in some point, of course, If I decide to get another Xperia and if you also do and keep developing for these devices. For now I want to thank great developers such JJ doctor, MrTapa, arcatarc, xparanoidx, and everyone else (sorry if I don't mention all of you) for rescuing me of being stuck in Android 2.3.4 =P I learned a lot while I had my Ray and I was happy using 4.0.4 ROMs, your work is awesome and this community is just great.
So, see you later!
PS: pending projects (such banners and wallpapers) will be accomplished in sometime of the current year. Sorry about that, my free time is smaller now.
PS2: I post this here because most of the time I was in this section. But if moderators consider it's necesary to move it, OK.
El Brillantinas said:
Well, this day should come soon or later.
I had a chance for trading my Xperia Ray for a phone with similar specifications, and I did.
I own now a LG Optimus Black (white version). If you guys check the specs of both phones you'll note that they're very similar, with only few differences. I miss the great quality of the camera, Optimus camera is crappy. But what I like most of this phone is the bigger screen and the unlocked bootloader, thanks to it I could install and taste (at last) Jelly Bean. Everything is working in a CM10 based ROM, the performance is very good, but the battery drain is a little bit faster than ICS, I guess this is caused by project butter.
That's why I don't understand why SONY won't give JB to our 2011 Xperias. I just can't believe that custom ROMs built by the community and devs are so good enough to use them daily, but SONY engineers can't (or don't want) to give Android 4.1 to Arc, Neo, Ray, etc. That has disappointed me a lot and it was one of the reasons to take the decision of trading my phone.
However, I still want to give a chance to SONY because, after all, I'm a fan and I love their devices (if you ask me, what I really like of this LG I own now is the unlocked bootloader and the screen, the physical design is ugly, so "iphoned"), so I'm waiting for CES this january 7th and see what they have to offer. I hope they don't disappoint us, and now SONY have to work harder since a new strong competitor is on his way: Ubuntu Phone. It really looks interesting, plus, I'm a Linux fan since 2004 and I've seen how this great system has evolved, until the point of being almost ready for smartphones. But I also love Android, so, we'll see.
Anyway guys, I can't say definitely "bye", I'm sure we'll meet again in some point, of course, If I decide to get another Xperia and if you also do and keep developing for these devices. For now I want to thank great developers such JJ doctor, MrTapa, arcatarc, xparanoidx, and everyone else (sorry if I don't mention all of you) for rescuing me of being stuck in Android 2.3.4 =P I learned a lot while I had my Ray and I was happy using 4.0.4 ROMs, your work is awesome and this community is just great.
So, see you later!
PS: pending projects (such banners and wallpapers) will be accomplished in sometime of the current year. Sorry about that, my free time is smaller now.
PS2: I post this here because most of the time I was in this section. But if moderators consider it's necesary to move it, OK.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
...i'm sure you'll back bro'!
Inviato da me!
Moved to General section
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2066898
bye.

Cascades for BB10 thread proposal

Hi! I've been developing apps for BB10 using cascades lately, and I would like to know if anybody is interested in that topic, and if you think it would be agood idea to have a thread for that (Sorry if I'm breaking any rules, I don't even know if BB10 devices are something xda users are inerested in)
Thanks in advance for your time and your attention.
ClowReedd.
Anyone interested in this?
... I don't know if nobody is interested in this platform, or if it is against the rules to request a forum for another platfomr as I did... I hope it is just against the rules, as it would be great to have more developers working on BB10 and cascades. The more competition there is, the better apps the final user will get
Thankd for your attention, and sorry if I'm doing something against the rules.
ClowReedd.
BB10 ? i think BB is so difficult to dev
bb
android is better than bb os
BB10 is awesome for devs!
I explored bb10 platform and it's awesome.People who develop for android can feel home here as they provide tools to port the apps with little or no coding.They support Native c++,adobe air,html5 apps.
The thing that interests me is they are very supportive giving away devices to devs and bounty promotions.
U guys have to understand that BB10 is evolving with time,see 10.2 is coming this or nxt month and it upgrades the Android runtime upgrades to 4.2.2
BB10 has android like in an emulated environment but can be easily usable with launcher app but currently it restricts many things like rooting and other but don't know abt that cause most devs and modders for bb10 are all-time bb users.So android hackers and modders may be able to root it.
Don't complain abt low app support,like bloatware on android phones which can be removed by custom roms.BB10 can use android app which are converted by tools which can be found everywhere.
I use most of the apps on my Z10 LE-instagram,snapseed,xda app,all....even games like NFS MW:victory:
Anyway just go through BB10 dev site and have a good time!
https://developer.blackberry.com/
Yes! I'm interested! The best thing of BB10 is that it natively allows Qt development!

ELI5: Why are most features like camera, wifi etc not working on custom ROMS?

My last phone was Xperia Arc S, and that phone had lots of cool ROMs with all features working. When I look on ROMs for M4 now, most say that only screen, sound etc is working the rest is not, so they sound like proof of concept or just experimental ROMs. Why is that? Did Android architecture and drivers change that much over years? Or it just Sony bad at providing access to drivers? Or is there less talented developers interested in this device?
"Or is there less talented developers interested in this device?"
Also fact that sony is horrible at supporting device doesn't help much.

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