Hi everybody. I'd be very keen on an hypothetical Ubuntu for Android like ROM. I've searched it without success. Is there any project like this? If not, could you tell me which should be the way to go? I mean, I've played a bit with ROM development, but of course I don't have any idea of how to start a project like this.
I'd be very grateful if you could provide any information about it. How Canonical created Ubuntu for Android? How Motorola created Webtop? There are ways to install a Linux distro on a phone, but they are usually virtualized. Basically, what I'd like to have is an Android ROM that, when docked, started a GNU/Linux environment with all the power that a distro has. Package manager, desktop apps and so on. Something like Ubuntu Edge software or Microsoft Continuum, but with Android.
I know that I'm noob but I'd really appreciate you're orientations
It's possible to run (most of) a desktop Linux distro and Android concurrently under the same kernel. The main issue is how to unify the GUI - Android uses SurfaceFlinger and X11 needs its own drivers which are not available for most/all Android devices. You could play with the XSDL app.
Related
This isn't a guide, more an informative post and discussion for Android application and platform developers, AND regular users. Maybe a guide in the future will be a goal of mine.
Some of you may or may not know what VMware is, what it is for, or never used it. Trying to keep the OP brief; VMware is a virtualization solution(s) for desktops and servers. In layman's terms it allows an operating system to be run inside another operating system, instead of setting your desktop to dual boot (have an option at startup to load either windows or Mac as example). There are many applications and benefits to this kind of solution that I won't get into in the OP.
Currently there are solutions available and being built, but are not yet completely optimized, but you can do it. For a developer this means you can be developing Android applications or platforms on whatever OS you want by virtualizing the OS and software currently supported. It also means that you can replace the Android virtual emulator with an Android OS inside VMware for application development, but also means you can load your Android platform into VMware for testing while you develop. Why would you want to do this? Well we all know how painful slow the emulator is, and it is just made worse if your hardware is slow. Because the emulator emulates software running on an arm processor inside an x86 environment things are slow, which means your development is slowed. Using VMware however you are using binary translation to "port" your platform to x86 processing. Currently this solution is not completely optimized, or "official" but it will be. That means less development time, more support, and a more convenient option!
The other edge of the sword is also a VMware virtual machine environment inside Android's Dalvik virtual machine. For users, and developers in certain scenarios this opens even more possibilities. Imagine having the ability to use your personal Android, and that pesky dumbed down corporate phone running together, the corporate advice running inside your personal device, or vice versa. Also, the ability to run any other OS in your device. Windows, Linux and UNIX distributions, solaris, Mac, whatever you wish. This opens lots more doors for Android devices.
Now not everything is complete, but it will be. It sounds like VMware will end up and be the de facto standard for virtualization for Android, as the solution is in the works for google to put VMware into the Android core, in the kernel. Now that would be sweet, because if you have used VMware you probably agree with me that it is THE virtualization solution in any application or solution you need it in.
Maybe this isn't as exciting to others as it is for me. What do you guys think? Let the topic begin!
The following links are meant more to cite my sources, but each one of them is a more detailed read into the topic, and well worth reading to inform yourself and see what is in the works:
http://i.downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/02/15/android-dalvik-vmware-virtualization/
http://gigaom.com/2011/09/27/vmware-mobilize-201/
http://www.android-x86.org/
Run ICS in x86!
gborn said:
Currently a thread about running ICS x86 in Virtualbox is spreaded here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=19815659#post19815659
And I managed at least to create a version of ice cream sandwich running in VMware workstation 7 (should run also in VMware player 3 and 4 and in Workstation 8 as well). The steps to convert the Virtualbox image to VMware are described here.
http://www.borncity.com/blog/2011/11/29/running-ice-cream-sandwich-in-vmware/
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I use VMware and vSphere at work to manage a bunch of our servers. I'll have to check in with the guy at work who actually implements/sells this to customers to see what he thinks. It seems interesting for sure though.
DoctorComrade said:
I use VMware and vSphere at work to manage a bunch of our servers. I'll have to check in with the guy at work who actually implements/sells this to customers to see what he thinks. It seems interesting for sure though.
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I don't know if it applies to what your doing, but it is pretty cool to be able to use VMware on your mobile device. If you are managing virtual servers there is already an official solution from VMware you can download from the Android market. It is called VMware view, for Android. Pretty cool.
There is a thread currently at top, with 30 people saying the solution wanted is impossible. You are wrong guys, not impossible at all. You can have windows and Android booting on the same device. Arm processor, x86, doesn't matter with this solution.
Sad Panda said:
There is a thread currently at top, with 30 people saying the solution wanted is impossible. You are wrong guys, not impossible at all. You can have windows and Android booting on the same device. Arm processor, x86, doesn't matter with this solution.
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Nothing is impossible, but where are you going to get a bootloader, Windows binaries, and SoC drivers?
EGOvoruhk said:
Nothing is impossible, but where are you going to get a bootloader, Windows binaries, and SoC drivers?
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Well in terms of doing dual boot natively, I agree, probably never going to happen...ever. However if you run it in a virtual machine, just like Android runs in the Dalvik virtual machine, it can be done.
The bootloader and drivers are already built and would be taken care of by VMware. You make or hint at a valid point, there would never be enough desire for anyone to do it natively. It isn't impossible, but just would never see anyone take the time to do it
Ice Cream Sandwich x86 in VMware
Currently a thread about running ICS x86 in Virtualbox is spreaded here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=19815659#post19815659
And I managed at least to create a version of ice cream sandwich running in VMware workstation 7 (should run also in VMware player 3 and 4 and in Workstation 8 as well). The steps to convert the Virtualbox image to VMware are described here.
http://www.borncity.com/blog/2011/11/29/running-ice-cream-sandwich-in-vmware/
gborn said:
Currently a thread about running ICS x86 in Virtualbox is spreaded here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=19815659#post19815659
And I managed at least to create a version of ice cream sandwich running in VMware workstation 7 (should run also in VMware player 3 and 4 and in Workstation 8 as well). The steps to convert the Virtualbox image to VMware are described here.
http://www.borncity.com/blog/2011/11/29/running-ice-cream-sandwich-in-vmware/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Bingo! Awesome contribution! Yeah this is one of the two examples I speak of, Android running on an x86 CPU (instead of arm like our phones and tablets) running as virtualization of hardware. Great reply to back me up, and even a guide to boot, AND ics!! If you must play with ICS before it gets to evo 3D
Added the ICS in VMware to OP.
I have tried this a few way and in no way can i get it to work on VMWARE gets stuck on found androidx86
Sad Panda said:
Added the ICS in VMware to OP.
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works fine, just make sure you follow the steps to the t and convert the .vdi images to .vmdk to run smoothly in vmwareplayer (the link to instructions is kinda hidden away)
i used virtualbox to convert, then vmplayer to run the vmdk
thanks for the info... fun to play around with
digitaljeff said:
works fine, just make sure you follow the steps to the t and convert the .vdi images to .vmdk to run smoothly in vmwareplayer (the link to instructions is kinda hidden away)
i used virtualbox to convert, then vmplayer to run the vmdk
thanks for the info... fun to play around with
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No problemo
heres some links to the vmdk images to work in vmplayer, dont thank me, thank the guy who wrote the guide on converting vdi to vmdk
ICS vmdk
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=FZWH3G20
SD card vmdk
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=15TLJZ87
as many of you know, android and Linux kernels started re-merging at version 3.3. People said that a short way down the road, android apps would be able to run natively in linux. the kernel is now version 3.6 and I've heard nothing more about running android apps in linux. people on these and other forums put a lot of great work into getting linux running on android devices. now with windows 8 coming out, the market will be full of both ARM and x86 based touch devices of all sizes and shapes. I for one would love to be able to boot up ubuntu on one of these devices, and use either traditional linux apps or android touch apps as my mood and situation dictate. so- any new word on when we will be able to run android apps in linux?
we are exploring this possibility, and did some work, but nothing to release yet.
I assume you already know that for now, you can run Android as a virtual machine on Linux host.
cool to hear the work is progressing, good luck!
I heard about using a VM but was never able to find where to get it.
nothing substantial yet, we wanted to run android apps directly on desktops, Linux or Windows. Using a virtual machine is really an over kill.
You can download a prebuilt vm from ours:
http://www.vmlite.com/index.php?option=com_kunena&Itemid=158&func=view&catid=9&id=8838
it has been downloaded millions of times. You can search "Android vm" on google to find instructions.
interesed
I am also hoping to see a solution to this question also. I understand that Debian, fedora and Arch Linux all have different packaging systems i always thought is was a smiler difference with android with more Java worked into the core of things. So i would think that adding the proper Java support to any Linux distro to support the apk package it should work but i am not a programmer.
Recently I have been having to use Linux more and more, I was thinking about just switching to Linux in general and for Android development. I have some general questions;
1. OpenJDK or Oracle JDK?
2. I know how to use Linux but have never attempted to use Android SDK and Eclipse in Linux, is it pretty straight forward/similar to Windows?
3. I recall in the past having trouble with dex2jar in Linux, maybe I was naive then but are there any issues/useful tips I should know or read up on before making the switch?
4. Is there a recommended distro that I should use? By that I mean is there one used by more of the android development community and thus easier to find/ask support for? I was thinking of just sticking to Ubuntu because of its large support community.
It doesn't matter, actually.
Yes.
-
Any distro will be ok, if you like Ubuntu, the use it (personally, I prefer Linux Mint or Arch Linux).
This might be a weird one, but has anyone has come up with the notion of chrooting android x86 inside a pc linux distro. The reverse is quite common ( linux deploy, lil debi etc bundling a debian environment inside a linux device ). I was googling my day to something describing this as something common yet, nothing ( it can be done almost casually on android devices an likewise on major linux distros ).
Has it crossed anyone else's mind ? Whould anybody be interested in postinge something I might have missed or stopping me from trying ( providing sound reasons for not doing so or shouting "this is madness" for maximum drama effect ) .
Whould anyone find it interresting if..... should..... maybe.... provided that i succeeded I post the proccess ?
Hi, yes I thought about this too and spend way too much time looking for a solution like that Plase post if you find anything or even manage to do something on your own. This would totally rock, as I don't want to use any proprietary OS but would like to play some Android games on my computer.
I found a thread where someone managed to do this, but running on the Android kernel. It's still different from running GNU+Linux chrooted, because on the Android kernel runs GNU+Linux and then Android chrooted (kinda complicated ). I asked whether it's possible to have the GNU+Linux kernel running isntead of Android's, you can check it out here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1780378
Also, maybe we can just copy from Chromium/ Chrome OS when they are done implementing support for natively running Android Apps on the OS (which they announcend on Google IO 2014). Hmm, probably not so great (fast) since it will run inside the browser...
A google search got me here. What you guys what to do is a lil different then what i want. I have a really neat device an ASUS TRIO an intel atom powered device.
It has android 4.3 and a windows 10 in the keyboard. The problem is the android 4.3 is so dang old. Id love if it had an update available but only the french tablet asus made that copied the trio tablet only (not dock) got an update to android 4.4. So it got me thinking could I run chrome os on this tablet and gain back more of the support ive lost since the android is so old. That led me to chroot and I know I can run debian but like I said Id love to run chrome os but no one is working on this or I cant find it. Suggestions?
I do not get why this should be a problem. You simply can not chroot into different architectiute (PC is x86 or x86_64). But you can use emulator to provide "bridge" between those architectures. Its called Qemu. You can use qemu binaries for chroot into another architecture. But I do not think that what you want, you area talking about gaming a android games on PC. Thats possible too but I think its not called chroot but its again emulator (not qemu but android emulator) for example AnBox.
I'm looking for a way to install arch Linux NATIVELY on the touchpad, I tried with kexec and the images available for it and it's all broken, it won't even complete the installation, I also tried this install guide with this image because the install guide uses images that are no longer available to download, but also no luck, there is also this post but the guy said it's really old and the txt file that is in his archive keeps repeating that it's "hacky".
So I really need a nice and modern approach, I know a lot about Linux, just not about porting so if someone wants to try and make a new port and a new installation method I could try to help.
We should really try to do this because it would bring a new life to the TP, imagine running i3-gaps on this beautiful piece of hardware.
Hope you guys can help me and before I post this I gotta say: "Btw, I use Arch".
arrudagates said:
I'm looking for a way to install arch Linux NATIVELY on the touchpad,
That will require a new Kernel and drivers for WiFI, Sound, Touch Screen and any other hardware.
I tried with kexec and the images available for it and it's all broken, it won't even complete the installation, I also tried this install guide with this image because the install guide uses images that are no longer available to download, but also no luck, there is also this post but the guy said it's really old and the txt file that is in his archive keeps repeating that it's "hacky".
So I really need a nice and modern approach, I know a lot about Linux, just not about porting so if someone wants to try and make a new port and a new installation method I could try to help.
We should really try to do this because it would bring a new life to the TP, imagine running i3-gaps on this beautiful piece of hardware.
Hope you guys can help me and before I post this I gotta say: "Btw, I use Arch".
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The only way that I know that is reliable and works using the lastes Ubuntu, Debian or Arch in a chroot environment.
Click HERE for how to How to install Ubuntu 18.04 LTS Bionix Beaver, armhf on the HP Touchpad Desktop Environment XFCE and LXDE on a partition as chroot.
HP_TOUCHPAD said:
The only way that I know that is reliable and works using the lastes Ubuntu, Debian or Arch in a chroot environment.
Click HERE for how to How to install Ubuntu 18.04 LTS Bionix Beaver, armhf on the HP Touchpad Desktop Environment XFCE and LXDE on a partition as chroot.
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Click to collapse
I mean, that would work, but would require Android and wouldn't be native, I want to have arch and webos, both running native.
arrudagates said:
I mean, that would work, but would require Android and wouldn't be native, I want to have arch and webos, both running native.
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Click to collapse
The kernel is what makes the OS works by providing support for the hardware. WebOS Kernel is OLD and not supported by any current Linux, even LuneOS use the Android Kernel.
Android can be install and keep WebOS, it was a great OS but not nothing current will run on it.
Using the method posted, the most up to date and current Linux distribution of Arch, Debian, Ubuntu and more can all be install on the same Tablet running Android and use any Linux flavor without rebooting.
Android provides a very stable newer kernel that will share the resources with any listed Linux flavors and those built are native arm, runs super fast. If you want it to have all that done natively and not using Android, then the Kernel must be modified and all the "private drivers" ported to the most current version of Linux. The OS can not be updated as Linux will modify the Kernel, breaking everything. But everything is possible, is up to the user how much time and dedication plus the knowledge required to make it work.
HP_TOUCHPAD said:
The kernel is what makes the OS works by providing support for the hardware. WebOS Kernel is OLD and not supported by any current Linux, even LuneOS use the Android Kernel.
Android can be install and keep WebOS, it was a great OS but not nothing current will run on it.
Using the method posted, the most up to date and current Linux distribution of Arch, Debian, Ubuntu and more can all be install on the same Tablet running Android and use any Linux flavor without rebooting.
Android provides a very stable newer kernel that will share the resources with any listed Linux flavors and those built are native arm, runs super fast. If you want it to have all that done natively and not using Android, then the Kernel must be modified and all the "private drivers" ported to the most current version of Linux. The OS can not be updated as Linux will modify the Kernel, breaking everything. But everything is possible, is up to the user how much time and dedication plus the knowledge required to make it work.
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Click to collapse
I don't mind running old kernel/package versions, I am actually trying to run the old projects but most have the Images down and unavailable and the ones that don't just straight won't work.
arrudagates said:
I don't mind running old kernel/package versions, I am actually trying to run the old projects but most have the Images down and unavailable and the ones that don't just straight won't work.
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I never installed any native Linux Os on the Tablet. The Ubuntu Touch was promising but never took off. The system must be stable for anything to be use otherwise is just experimental as most of those builds were. Running Linux in a Chroot environment is somewhat, not the same, as a Linux guest virtual machine and Android as a host.
That is the only way I know of, that is stable and current.
Ok so right now I have two more options available to try but they are probably not gonna work, in that case I'll start to look about making my own port of ArchLinuxARM
arrudagates said:
Ok so right now I have two more options available to try but they are probably not gonna work, in that case I'll start to look about making my own port of ArchLinuxARM
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Click to collapse
I did search for a working native linux OS for the Tablet, but did not found any.
It can surely be done, take a look at this video and the source at GitHub.
Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vx8_u1jhXJY
GitHub
https://github.com/CalcProgrammer1/kernel_tenderloin_debian
The Tablet uses LVM and can easily be partition in any way. It can also boot directly into Linux. The only thing to do is rename the file in /boot uImage.moboot to the Linux uImage ( example ) uImage.ArchLinux.
If any help, let me know.
Have fun!
I'm making some progress
arrudagates said:
I'm making some progress
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Congratulations !
You did it ! once it boots is all it matters.
This is an idea, a chroot Arch can be built inside Android
A partition can be created in LVM Arch_Linux ( any size )
Inside Android with the App I posted, create the Chroot Arch Linux ( up to date )
Then modify the Ramdisk to direct at the partition Arch_Linux ( same it was use in the Chroot )
Then it should boot up ( some other changes will need to happen I guess)
Arch armv7l as chroot in Android 8.1 with HpTp_MAX
Testing the new kernel settings in Android and installed the latest version of Linux Arch using Linux Deploy.
It is fast and it would be even better running native!
Attached are the screenshots.