Newb question about ROM porting. - Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I would like to port a KK rom for my device that is currently running 4.1.2 JB to upgrade it. I've looked and there aren't any roms already out there that have KK core for my phone (ZTE Force).
I'm already rooted and have CWM recovery with a full backup on my SD card, so i'm not too worried about trying out a few ports. My question is this, What exactly do I need to have in the PORT rom? I've looked at dozens of porting guides and am a bit confused. Some say the Base rom and the PORT rom need to be from the same company, in my case ZTE, some don't. Some say the kernels need to match, some don't. Same with Android base version, screen resolution, chipset, etc.
So can anyone tell me definitively what the BASE and PORT roms need to have in common?

Related

Noob question: What is a rom??

hi very noobish question but im confused to what a rom is? I have rooted my s2 with a custom kernel and have read about roms but have no clue what they are.
A ROM in this case is basically the Operating System files. It contains all the files required for your phone to boot into a flavor of Android. ROMs come in many variations such as vendor specific ROMs like Samsung's TouchWiz or ROMs that are compiled from the Android Open Source Project using the source code such as CyanogenMod or MIUI.
Furthermore, ROMs built or cooked by the devs contain many tweaks and optimizations that are not found on the Stock Firmware/ROM and are, in most but not all cases, better.
Hope that helped
Basically a ROM is an Android system image file, which contains the operating system and some applications.
The STOCK Roms are created by the device's producers, like Samsung or Lg, modifing the original Android ROM (I think it's called Vanilla) to give personalizations to their devices.
Then ther are the COOKED Roms that are created from Android users in order to change and quite always to improve the experience on a device, like Cyanogen or MIUI.
Read this:http://androidforums.com/precedent-all-things-root/461024-root-terms-defined-rom-shell-s-etc.html
dw9999 said:
hi very noobish question but im confused to what a rom is? I have rooted my s2 with a custom kernel and have read about roms but have no clue what they are.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A ROM is:
http://bit.ly/xLMVUT
Literally it stands for Read Only Memory, in this case referring to the phone's internal memory where your firmware/apps are stored. When people say they're flashing a new ROM, it means they are flashing a new version of the firmware onto their phone - the two terms are interchangeable.
A custom ROM (firmware released for the phone by anyone except for Huawei) might have performance tweaks, new features such as overclocking and so on. I believe the most popular custom rom for your phone is Cyanogen 6 or 7, which are both vanilla android firmware.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Google is always your friend. (No offence at all. Just needed to fill 10 character requirement).

JellyBean on Samsung Galaxy S3

So, I've got a UK Samsung Galaxy S3, and only recently, the carriers have started to push out Jelly Bean to the device. Only Three has done it so far, but, I'm sure my network will follow suit soon.
However, I literally have just rooted my phone. I used the guide which Chainfire provided in the forum - so, CFRoot 6.4.
I have installed CWM, and also TeamWinRecoveryProject - since I preferred TeamWin's interface, and the videos which I saw of it spoke highly of its capabilities.
So, when the Jelly Bean update does come out for my carrier (EE), will I be able to keep my root? I read around on the internet that if you have CFRoot kernel, you can still perform OTA updates (EE disabled the option, anyway, sadly) without losing root.
If so - perfect.
If not, though, would it be perfectly safe to just let Samsung Kies update the firmware? I understand it will remove root capabilities, but some people have posted about conflicts arising when flashing back to stock due to the install custom recovery.
Would it be easier to just install a ROM? I'm looking at CM10, and Paranoid Android. Both are JellyBean 4.1.2 ROMS. If I install them, would that mean that my phone would update to 4.1.2? I understand these are variations, but, is flashing a rom with a higher firmware number the equivalent of updating software through OTA/Kies?
Thanks a lot for your help! Rooting newb, here...
You don't have to think like that.
Samsung official roms are not the same than AOSP (ie pure google source based) roms, like CM, aokp, pure aosp.
In Sammy roms you'll find different framework , all the samsung apps that can't all be installed on aosp roms. You must think about what you want from a rom.AOSP ones are more fast (look at the size of downloads... between 800 MB and more than a 1 GB for most sammy roms, less than 500MB for others, even less than 200 for some), each of them have specific design and features.
You can have 4.1.2 by flashing any rom now, I think most of sammy roms are now based on latest uk Sasmsung JB. Changes between 4.1.1 &nd 4.1.2 are minimal and most of them under the water for end user.
For me rooting and installing CWM and wanting to keep pure samsung offcial rom is antinomic. The spirit of rooting is to get rid of imposed manufacturer choices.
Don't think about numbers but about features.

[Q] GSMart G1345 Gingerbread 2.3.5 to any 4.x update

I have unique phone type witch dont have any custom roms or anything developed yet. I've rooted it. I've looked alot of forums searching for some custom roms or any possibility to make ROM bymyself but its really hard working on such old compilation. This phone have pretty smillar build to Wildfire S. I've tried porting it to these roms but all i get is errors in CWM. My question is: Is there any possibility to upgrade this android to any 4.x? Any tutorials or guides will be helpfull too. Thanks

developing custom rom for G700, all xda veterans please help me!!

Actually I have many question
I think when a newbie like me start to work on rom development then there are several questions arises in mind basically like what I am going to ask here, my purpose is to get all this doubts cleared before starting so that I can start to focus on things. I don't know if my questions will help other newbies like me but it will literally help me a lot .
I am trying to develop a custom rom for ascend g700 as i have seen it among the most hated device among developers , no one want to do anything for this phone and it can accomodate a lot of upgradation. I have seen g700 users begging inside CM forum to build a latest ROM for this device, I have also seen g700 owners begging on huawei website to upgrade their devices but huawei doesn't even feel like to give a word to it. and I feel really bad about this .
So i just want to build a good looking, working, clean, latest by look and feature rom for Ascend g700 for all users, there are various reasons why I want to do that:
1) One of the biggest reason why I am here is I want to see g700 users smiling with joy that finally somebody has updated their device, I want all g700 owners to feel worth buying the device.
2) No working custom rom is available for this device yet.
3) No Cyanogenmod rom available.
4) This device configuration seems potentially great which literally needs update (atleast up to kitkat).
5) And personally I don't like UI emotion of this phone besides that google play store has some bug which makes icons background looks black which is a sore to eyes, Huawei did nothing for this device yet except just earned the bucks from it. I hate the companies who are ignorant about their customers.
I don't want to bore anyone reading my thread but i have lots of questions to resolve before i start to develop something for this device and I hope i will succeed.
Okay so let's get started with my questions, all veterans are requested to kindly share their vast knowledge and help me understanding the facts. thanks in advance .
Objective: what i am trying to do is, trying to find out the latest possible (Lollipop) rom which I can use as base rom to flash this device (Ascend G700) or just build a custom one fully working.
1 First: Are there any neutral latest android rom versions are available from google official websites to start using on any device or to start develop it for any particular device?
If "yes" then from where i can get it?
If "No" then from where the companies get their android roms on first hand as a clean plain base android rom to make it their own rom?
2 second: Can i just install any rom of any phone and it will start to work?
If "No" then what maybe the problems that I would first encounter?, what can I do to fix that any such known problems?
3 Third: I have heard about porting rom by changing things inside rom like replacing kernel of base rom with my stock rom, Kernel of my stock rom (4.2.1) can work with lollipop rom (5.0.0)? if yes then which lollipop rom would be best to use for (G700) and from where I can get one?
4 Fourth: Can I use my old kernel, camera and radio from stock rom in newer lollipop rom will it work? is it possible to do that?
5 Fifth: Can I use any kernel on any phone? or there are any specific particular to device types? or is it necessary to use the old kernel?
6 Sixth: If I flash my phone with custom new rom the radio will also be flashed with it automatically? even if I doesn't want to? How would I know that the rom i am going to use contains the flash files for radio also? and can i remove that? and use rest of the rom?
7 Seventh: If i flash my phone with new custom rom what are chances that it's camera will not work? or radio maybe affected?
8 Eighth: What can i do to port my camera from stock rom to new custom rom which I want to flash. the camera of old rom (4.2.1) can work with lollipop (5.0.0)?
9 Nineth: The device is a dual sim, any special thing to keep in mind before flashing a rom? a rom should necessarily be valid for dual sim? are there any specific types?
Please all the veterans from XDA are requested to provide inside to all these questions of mine, so that I can start working on my custom rom, I seriously want to upgrade this phone please help
Any help from anyone who knows anything related to any question of mine are welcome to share their knowledge.
Thanks in advance .

No name android phones and CM

Hey guys,
Got on hands noname Chinese android phone with lollipop on board (even though it says 6.0.1 in settings) and MTK6580 quad processor, 3.10.72 kernel
can I somehow put cyanogen rom from another phone?
Yes, find another phone using that chip: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_devices_using_Mediatek_SoCs
Then go here: http://www.needrom.com and find THAT phone(s) and see if there is a custom rom for THAT phone also using the same kernal 3.10/3.12 etc
Download that rom and port it yourself using the boot.img from YOUR phone using this guide: https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/development/guide-how-to-port-lollipop-based-roms-t3223938
And get it at least booting on your phone, out of loads I've done on MTK phones, 95% boot up first time, 50% of those have no issues, the other 50% have issues with cameras/wifi/video/phone that can be fixed literally with trial and error of swapping files from your stock rom to the new rom, can take hours/days of trial and error or could take minutes.
Have fun
EDIT: try to use a custom rom from a brand you have at least kinda heard of, doogee, walton, infinix...etc to make it more likely to work well.
robneymcplum said:
Yes, find another phone using that chip: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_devices_using_Mediatek_SoCs
Then go here: http://www.needrom.com and find THAT phone(s) and see if there is a custom rom for THAT phone also using the same kernal 3.10/3.12 etc
Download that rom and port it yourself using the boot.img from YOUR phone using this guide: https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/development/guide-how-to-port-lollipop-based-roms-t3223938
And get it at least booting on your phone, out of loads I've done on MTK phones, 95% boot up first time, 50% of those have no issues, the other 50% have issues with cameras/wifi/video/phone that can be fixed literally with trial and error of swapping files from your stock rom to the new rom, can take hours/days of trial and error or could take minutes.
Have fun
EDIT: try to use a custom rom from a brand you have at least kinda heard of, doogee, walton, infinix...etc to make it more likely to work well.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you for your response!
After few hours of research I have found many ROMs that are applicable for my phone. The thing is, I want it to be and look as close to stock android as possible, and as close to most recent version as well.
But still I have few questions:
1)Am I right by saying that kernel 3.10.72 is suitable only for android 5.x?
2)Is it possible to put android 6.x or 7.x?
3)If it is do I need to ugrade kernel?
4)Is it possible to upgrade kernel?
I really hope it's not too much to ask from you.
Regards,
vant2239
Vant2239 said:
Thank you for your response!
After few hours of research I have found many ROMs that are applicable for my phone. The thing is, I want it to be and look as close to stock android as possible, and as close to most recent version as well.
But still I have few questions:
1)Am I right by saying that kernel 3.10.72 is suitable only for android 5.x?
2)Is it possible to put android 6.x or 7.x?
3)If it is do I need to ugrade kernel?
4)Is it possible to upgrade kernel?
I really hope it's not too much to ask from you.
Regards,
vant2239
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your phone is basically the same as mine, and sadly the kernal has to be the same for every custom ROM, there are no kernel sources so no custom kernels, which means we are both stuck with lollipop
The infinix hot 2 for example, is the same MTK chip and was released with lollipop and kernel 3.10 but then infinix released a stock marshmallow upgrade, with a stock 3.12 kernel so they could get a custom 6.0 rom which im 99% sure we will never get.
If you go here: http://www.needrom.com/author/robneymcplum/ this is me on there, where I have ported the best 5.1.1 roms with our kernel. You will need to port to your phone, which is literally just swapping about 10 files from your stock rom so make a backup of your stock rom or find stock firmware, and get the files from there and use the guide i already posted.
Hope this helps. And if you have never done it, its way, WAY easier than you think it might be

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