Develop Bugs

Help with linux

Ok before anyone asks, Yes I did read the linux threads. Problem is my windows box no longer works. I had to take my slide back to stock before i carried it to tmobile. I had it rooted. Now I am trying to re-root it in ubuntu 10 and im not having any luck getting ADB to connect to the slide while in recovery. I am a complete newb to linux. I do have ADB working because I can adb to the device while it is booted into its normal state(OS loaded).
Was wondering if anybody can lend me a point in the right direction so to speak.
So ADB is working but only while booted into the normal OS.

Crap. Time to see if I can fix my winblows Box then!
Thank's

sultan.of.swing said:
Crap. Time to see if I can fix my winblows Box then!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You do realize that there are a lot of other distributions out there other than Ubuntu? Ubuntu is easy, yes, but almost too easy. You're not going to learn anything about Linux with that disguise around it. Besides, openSUSE 11.3 was just released and it has YaST: the best system configuration tool ever. It's almost as easy as Ubuntu. Try it out: http://software.opensuse.org/113/en.
More specifically though, I personally use openSUSE 11.3 and it plays nicely with ADB and rooting with the ADB race exploit (which, for the record, is what you're trying to do).

Ok say I install openSUSE 11.3. Will I have to do any hackery to get adb running? I'm not well trained on linux. But from last nights experience I know how to work with the terminal and nautilus
Sent from my T-Mobile myTouch 3G Slide using XDA App

sultan.of.swing said:
Ok say I install openSUSE 11.3. Will I have to do any hackery to get adb running? I'm not well trained on linux. But from last nights experience I know how to work with the terminal and nautilus
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, nothing other than what you did on Ubuntu. Just install ADB using the Android SDK from their website and plug in your phone to your computer. Done.
Also of note, when you install openSUSE it defaults to KDE as your desktop environment. If you want Gnome, select it during install. Nautilus isn't present in KDE, but it has Konqueror (which is arguably better). Personally I use KDE, but I have a bias towards it since I was a developer for it long ago. Flamewars rage, have raged, and will always continue to rage about what is better: KDE or Gnome. There's no clear answers, but most of KDE's recent bad publicity was due to its 4.0 and 4.1 releases. 4.2 is much better and it can be greatly appreciated.
That being said, you can use Nautilus in KDE if you want as well as Pidgin (Kopete is dieing and doesn't really work anymore).

nbetcher said:
No, nothing other than what you did on Ubuntu. Just install ADB using the Android SDK from their website and plug in your phone to your computer. Done.
Also of note, when you install openSUSE it defaults to KDE as your desktop environment. If you want Gnome, select it during install. Nautilus isn't present in KDE, but it has Konqueror (which is arguably better). Personally I use KDE, but I have a bias towards it since I was a developer for it long ago. Flamewars rage, have raged, and will always continue to rage about what is better: KDE or Gnome. There's no clear answers, but most of KDE's recent bad publicity was due to its 4.0 and 4.1 releases. 4.2 is much better and it can be greatly appreciated.
That being said, you can use Nautilus in KDE if you want as well as Pidgin (Kopete is dieing and doesn't really work anymore).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To get ADB installed and running on Ubuntu I had to follow the guide posted here on XDA which involved some editing here and there. If its the same in openSUSE then I should be able to get it running. Thank's for your help and I am going to probably go ahead and download and install openSUSE. I need to learn linux anyway.
EDIT- Whew, 4gb. Guess I will let this download tonight and come back tomorrow night and install and try it again.

sultan.of.swing said:
To get ADB installed and running on Ubuntu I had to follow the guide posted here on XDA which involved some editing here and there. If its the same in openSUSE then I should be able to get it running. Thank's for your help and I am going to probably go ahead and download and install openSUSE. I need to learn linux anyway.
EDIT- Whew, 4gb. Guess I will let this download tonight and come back tomorrow night and install and try it again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Strange, the SDK worked out-of-the-box for me on openSUSE 11.3 - no editing of anything required.
And yeah, it's 4GB - that is the entire repository. Ubuntu gives you a smaller CD (as opposed to a DVD) then allows you to download anything else you want later. Personally I prefer the DVD, but I also have a 20mbit connection.

nbetcher said:
Strange, the SDK worked out-of-the-box for me on openSUSE 11.3 - no editing of anything required.
And yeah, it's 4GB - that is the entire repository. Ubuntu gives you a smaller CD (as opposed to a DVD) then allows you to download anything else you want later. Personally I prefer the DVD, but I also have a 20mbit connection.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well hopefully I wont have to do any editing to get it to work either.
It's downloading at 400kb/s about 3 hours to download so it aint gonna take that long.
Thank's for your help. If I didn't have work tomorrow I would be up late setting all this up because my slide without root just plain suck's. LOL

sultan.of.swing said:
Well hopefully I wont have to do any editing to get it to work either.
It's downloading at 400kb/s about 3 hours to download so it aint gonna take that long.
Thank's for your help. If I didn't have work tomorrow I would be up late setting all this up because my slide without root just plain suck's. LOL
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i hear ya. I'll be on late tomorrow on IRC (irc.fredenode.net #teamslide) and i can help you with anything Linux related.

nbetcher said:
i hear ya. I'll be on late tomorrow on IRC (irc.fredenode.net #teamslide) and i can help you with anything Linux related.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Awesome. I'm gonna try to do everything by myself and if all that fails then I'm sure I will need some help. I hate having to ask for help. I usually search and find the answers I am looking for so hopefully that will be the case once all this is up and running.
P.S.-- If the Mod's would like to move this thread to the Q&A/General section then feel free. I only posted it here because no one ever seems to look at the linux thread over in Q&A.

Well I'm sitting here trying to install openSUSE and its not working. It goes though all its checks at the beginning and then just goes to a black screen and stays there.
Sent from my T-Mobile myTouch 3G Slide using XDA App

sultan.of.swing said:
Well I'm sitting here trying to install openSUSE and its not working. It goes though all its checks at the beginning and then just goes to a black screen and stays there.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It sounds like it's an X display issue which is surprising in all honesty. What kind of computer do you have? If it's a custom built what is the video card (or if you know the video card and it is a pre-built)?

nbetcher said:
It sounds like it's an X display issue which is surprising in all honesty. What kind of computer do you have? If it's a custom built what is the video card (or if you know the video card and it is a pre-built)?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Its an older prebuilt hewlett crappard. I got out of building custom computers a while ago.
Anyway I got installing now using text mode. Its at 83 percent right now. Will see what happens.
Ok wtf. It finished installing, then rebooted and says something about hard disk not found or something.
Sent from my T-Mobile myTouch 3G Slide using XDA App

sultan.of.swing said:
Ok wtf. It finished installing, then rebooted and says something about hard disk not found or something.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do you have two hard drives? Like, one Windows and one Linux? Also, check your boot order in your BIOS (especially if you have two hard drives).

nbetcher said:
Do you have two hard drives? Like, one Windows and one Linux? Also, check your boot order in your BIOS (especially if you have two hard drives).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nope just one drive and I set it up as the first boot device. Guess its time to see if I can find my windows disk.
Sent from my T-Mobile myTouch 3G Slide using XDA App

sultan.of.swing said:
Nope just one drive and I set it up as the first boot device. Guess its time to see if I can find my windows disk.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
*shrug* I won't stop you from running Windows if you want.
Sometimes certain drivers can interfere with the proper tagging of the drives - most of the has been eliminated which is why I'm surprised to see that issue at all anymore. What I would try first though is making sure that you're NOT booting from the openSUSE DVD when you reboot after that install. Remove the DVD, then boot from your hard drive directly.
If that doesn't fix it then if you're interested you can do this:
Boot into 'Rescue' from the DVD.
Once loaded and at login type 'root' (it won't ask for a password).
Type 'dmesg |more' and look for your hard drive (press 'Space' to go down one-by-one page - it will take a few pages before you get to what you're looking for) immediately followed by something like "sda sda1 sda2 sda3". (The 'a' may be different for you and THAT is what we're looking for).
Once you have that changed letter (e.g. instead of 'sda' you have 'sdb' or 'sdc') type: 'fdisk /dev/sdX' where 'X' is the changed letter.
Then look for the first line that says 'Linux' to the right of it - it will most likely be THE first line. Make note of that number next to '/dev/sdXN' (where 'N' is the number).
Reboot (you can hard reset if you want) and make sure your openSUSE DVD isn't in the drive. Once the boot menu comes up press ESC, then Enter.
In that menu press 'e', then change where it says change 'root=/dev/blahblahblah' to 'root=/dev/sdXN' (where X and N are what you recorded earlier).
Press 'Enter' then 'b'
See if that works.
Otherwise, enjoy the next several hours of installing Windows, Windows patches, applications, and configuration of everything.
EDIT: keep in mind that all of those instructions are from memory, so YMMV
EDIT2: Eh, I had the dmesg grep wrong. Updated to make it a bit more painful, but actually work
An example of the lines in the dmesg you're looking for is something like:
[ 2.640793] scsi 3:0:0:0: Direct-Access ATA HDS728080PLAT20 PF2O PQ: 0 ANSI: 5
[ 2.641334] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] 160836480 512-byte logical blocks: (82.3 GB/76.6 GiB)
[ 2.641459] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[ 2.641465] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00
[ 2.641523] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or F
UA
[ 2.641901] sdb: sdb1 sdb2 sdb3

I'm trying a different install this time. Set up the formatting to see if it will make a difference. If not I will try your method. I was booting without the dvd in the drive as well. I booted into recovery before and tried a bunch of different passwords and what not and decided to try root and that brought up a bunch of stuff I couldn't comprehend. now I know. Lol
Let's see what doesn't happen!
Sent from my T-Mobile myTouch 3G Slide using XDA App

Well it got farther this time. Now its at the yast2 installation screen. Getting somewhere now.
Got a green from now! And bam I'm on the desktop!!!!
NICE!
Ok how the F do I get my internet working? I went through the network settings but it still don't work
Sent from my T-Mobile myTouch 3G Slide using XDA App

razr315 said:
I completed the installation, but of course my wireless card isnt working. Normally on ubuntu it has an option to enable them. I cant seem to find it in Suse.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Same here can't seem to get my internet working. With ubuntu it worked automagically. I'm wired too
Sent from my T-Mobile myTouch 3G Slide using XDA App

razr315 said:
Im wired and on the net now. I just cant be wired up on my laptop the whole time. Id much rather get wireless working.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How did u get your wired connection working if u don't mind me asking
Sent from my T-Mobile myTouch 3G Slide using XDA App

[Guide] Mount Internal Storage in Ubuntu

First, I didn't know if this should go in development or general since most of the people who are going to be on Ubuntu will be devs, but hopefully this will be useful for everyone.
Honeycomb changed a lot of things. Most of the changes are awesome (as we know) but some of them have made certain things frustrating. Honeycomb marked the move from USB Mass Storage to MTP (media transfer protocol). Although for Windows users it actually works pretty well, for Linux users it doesn't...at least at first.
If anyone has hooked up their Xoom to a Ubuntu box then they know at first nothing happens. There is no selection on the tab to "mount" USB Mass Storage because it is not supported (which I thought Honeycomb was supposed to support both so this may change) It's like the computer doesn't even recognize anything is plugged in.
So this was very frustrating but I have put together a solution. Previously I was using a GUI interface called gMTP to connect to the Xoom and transfer files. This was an ok solution and it worked but I would still rather just use it in Nautilus like every other drive I use. Ok so starting here I will just post the commands and then explain after so no code gets lost.
Start with installing a needed program for all of this to work
Code:
sudo apt-get install mtpfs
Next we will create the device rules, so Ubuntu recognizes it as a USB device.
Code:
sudo gedit /etc/udev/rules.d/51-android.rules
NOTE: Some of you may have already added the Vendor ID. If you don't this file will start off blank and then you need to add this next line. If it does not come up blank, then make sure you have a line with Vendor ID 22b8 and 18d1 (for bootloader which uses a different VendorId) and you are all set.
Code:
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="22b8", MODE="0666"
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="18d1", MODE="0666"
You might need to start a new terminal for this change to take effect for adb and bootloader access.
make the mount point and take ownership:
Code:
sudo mkdir /media/xoom
sudo chown user:user /media/xoom
NOTE: "user" in the above code is literally your user name for your box.
ANOTHER NOTE: if you stopped here you could mount by typing mtpfs /media/xoom -o allow_other and unmount by typing fusermount -u /media/xoom...but that's no fun
add the mount point to your fstab:
Code:
sudo gedit /etc/fstab
In the first unused line available you might want to type a comment like:
Code:
# mount point for moto xoom
then add this line after it:
Code:
mtpfs /media/xoom fuse user,noauto,allow_other 0 0
Next modify fuse.conf to allow_other:
Code:
sudo gedit /etc/fuse.conf
uncomment the last line which should read:
Code:
#user_allow_other
uncomment this line by removing the '#' symbol.
add your user to the fuse group:
Code:
sudo gedit /etc/group
a long file will open, press CTRL+F to bring up the find dialog and type
Code:
fuse
close the dialog and fuse should be selected and visible.
At the end of that line with no space add your user name.
Save that file. Close it.
Lastly reboot your computer.
Now when your computer restarts, if you look at your "Places" menu you will see a Drive marked with 'xoom'
Plug in your xoom, and click on xoom in Places.
Nautilus should open with all your files that you have on your device. It will also place a mounted drive icon on your desktop. If you would like to unmount, right click on that icon and click unmount.
As you can see this was a pain for me, but hopefully this solution will work for everybody. I know the instructions are really long but follow it and you will feel old school mounting your storage in your file browser.
NOTE: THIS WAS TESTED ON UBUNTU 10.10 ONLY, IF THIS WORKS FOR ANYONE ELSE PLEASE POST YOUR FINDINGS.
Also, I am fairly new to Linux actually, so if there is an easier way to mount the storage in nautilus let me know. This works for me and I just want to help out so please no flames.

Couple things I have also noticed with MTP, when you have the internal storage "mounted" you still actually have access to the files on the device. Plus the file transfer is a lot faster. Usually I had been getting about 4 Mb/s and now I get about 15. Of course this speed difference from what I am used to might be the internal storage vs. SDCard transfer rate diffs.
Last thing, is this might need to modified when the sdcard access comes since there is only one mount point specified.

not trying the artificial bump.
I guess no comments on 228 views means this is working?
Can someone chime'in if this worked for them so I can know'if it works'as is or needs to be tweaked.
Thanks

I got mount up and running last night. Works like a champ. Great work. I was tired of pushing and FTP.

Thanks for the reply. Glad it worked for you too. One thing I need to add tonight to it is the fact that the xoom uses a different vendor'id when it's in the bootloader. The one vendor id if used alone will not recognize the xoom to use fastboot but ill update it when I get home.

FWIW, the "mtpfs" package in 10.04 was broken when using the Xoom, and causing segfaults. I found the source and rebuilt that and now it's working OK.

kcrudup said:
FWIW, the "mtpfs" package in 10.04 was broken when using the Xoom, and causing segfaults. I found the source and rebuilt that and now it's working OK.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So, I'm on 10.04 and not getting segfaults, but after pugging in (xoom is in usb debug mode) and click on xoom in places, ubuntu gives me the error "could not open location file:///media/xoom. Error stating file '/media/xoom': Permission denied"
Would love to get a copy of your recompiled 10.04 mtpfs package as a deb file...

I found this deb package for mtpfs 0.9-1 that you can try
mtpfs_0.9-1_amd64.deb

roberj13 said:
I found this deb package for mtpfs 0.9-1 that you can try
mtpfs_0.9-1_amd64.deb
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately, that's not gonna work for me. I'm 32-bit.

Ill keep looking, for some reason the 64-bit was the only one there.

roberj13 said:
Ill keep looking, for some reason the 64-bit was the only one there.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks! If i could ge this to work, it would totally be awesome!
--Q

Most excellent guide!! Thanks you for taking the time to figure this out. I'm on 10.10 so I have nothing else to add.

Works flawless on Ubuntu 10.10 running on an older Mac Pro
Thank you for posting the easy to follow guide.

This is semi-working for me in that I can successfully mount and browse the device, but there are a few problems. One, it locks up Nautilus for 30-60 seconds (grayed out and unresponsive) though it does come back. Two, file transfer speeds are very poor.
I'm trying to load two movies totaling 1 GB right now and the copy dialog says 2hrs 56 min to transfer w/ a speed of 99.7 kb / sec. This is unreliable, however, as the copy dialog is frozen on those metrics.
Build is AMD64, distro is 10.10 upgraded from 10.4.
I appreciate the effort to document this, in spite of my issues. Let me know if anyone has suggestions for a fix and I'll try them.

One day later and this solution is now working for me. The Xoom filesystem behaves oddly in Nautilus, with some files not appearing that have in fact been transferred to the device, but otherwise this is the best solution I've found.

sogrady said:
One day later and this solution is now working for me. The Xoom filesystem behaves oddly in Nautilus, with some files not appearing that have in fact been transferred to the device, but otherwise this is the best solution I've found.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I find it odd that Android dosn't play nicely with *nix.. considering they are cousins in the OS family. That it works sooo well with Windows instead offensive IMO

sogrady said:
One day later and this solution is now working for me. The Xoom filesystem behaves oddly in Nautilus, with some files not appearing that have in fact been transferred to the device, but otherwise this is the best solution I've found.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've seen the same thing. Usually an unmount then mount will clear it up.

this did not work for me. i'm getting no application is registered as handling this file
i told nautilus to open it and its saying /media/xoom is not a folder

Using this guide I'm able to mount fine, but I'm seeing a couple issues:
I have my music organized like this:
Artist
-----Artist - Album
----------Music files
When I copy over the top 'Artist' directory to the Xoom's Music folder it works, but, all of the music files have been directly placed in the Xoom's Music folder and the Artist and Artist - Album folders are empty, seems pretty weird?
EDIT: It looks like the Xoom (or MTP?) forces all music files into the root of the Music directory. Even if I try copying the artist folder to the root of the device the mp3 files end up in the Music folder.
EDIT take 2: Nevermind...the Android docs say nested directories are supported for music, and Windows preserves the directory structures fine.
I'm totally unable to copy over movies. I've transcoded a file into mp4 and it seems to copy over but, once the copy is finished the file doesn't show up on the Xoom.
EDIT bonanza: Looks like I'm also able to copy over movies fine through windows...so I guess all my problems are Linux related.

I keep gettting a "Transport endpoint is not connected" error when I try this. I am using 10.04 64-bit. Does anyone know how to resolve this?

[ADDON] NotAndBuntu 11.04 Beta5 (Ubuntu Natty Narwhal)

Hi,
Here is the fourth version. Its not upgradeable, so delete the old /sdcard/ubuntu before, except you know what you are doing and are able to fix upcoming problems by upgrading.
[Hints]
To remove the stupid overlay scrollbars, goto ubuntu shell and type
Code:
apt-get remove overlay-scrollbar liboverlay-scrollbar*
in the next version setupgnome will automatically do that, all which setup gnome befor, do that to get the normal scrollbars.
in gnome goto system -> preferences -> appearance. there to the fonts tab, and there to details. use a resolution of 120 dpi, so you it is a bit more touch friendly
[Requirements]
Archive from http://www.bisme.net/files/xda/ubuntu/ubuntu_b6.tar.gz
Optionall an VNC client like android-vnc
[step by step]
Install the kernel (without you'll not have full functionality, but it'll work)
Extract the ubuntu archive to /sdcard/ubuntu (in adb shell goto sdcard and type: "tar xzf ubuntu_b6.tar.gz")
cd to this dir and type
Code:
su
then
Code:
sh ubuntu install
you will be asked a few questions, if you have no plan just press always enter. after reboot open a terminal and type
Code:
su
then
Code:
ubuntu start
optional if you want gnome via vnc
Code:
ubuntu setupvnc
and
Code:
ubuntu setupgnome
this still takes long, you are installing here almost the complete ubuntu via internet. that are a few hundred megabytes of downloading and over one gigabyte of extracting and installing. leave with exit and on android shell type (first time it asks for a passwod)
Code:
ubuntu startvnc
then connect to it via: localhost:5901 using a vnc client and the password you set.
[what you got]
you start the ubuntu subsystem with ubuntu start (still chroot)
with ubuntu setupvnc you install vnc service
with ubuntu setupssh you install ssh service
with ubuntu setupgnome you install gnome
with ubuntu setupkde you install kde (if you do so, you need to modify inside ubuntu /usr/bin/vnc)
with ubuntu shell you open an bash session
with ubuntu screen you open an persistent bash session
with ubuntu startvnc you start the vnc service
with startssh inside ubuntu shell you the start the ssh service
with ubuntu stopvnc you stop the vnc service
with stopssh inside ubuntu shell you the stop the ssh service
with ubuntu stop you stop (is rebooting)
with ubuntu uninstall you uninstall the script from system(directory /sdcard/ubuntu stays)
in ubuntu you can access:
android's /dev bound to ubuntu's /dev (fdisk /dev/block/mmcblk0 is working fine(sdcard). don't touch /dev/block/mmcblk1 or you'll kill your android system, maybe your whole xoom )
android's /system bound to ubuntu's /android/system
android's /data bound to ubuntu's /android/data
android's /mnt/sdcard bound to ubuntu's /adnroid/sdcard
[working]
With android-vnc Gnome (bluetooth keyboard and mouse)
Firefox 4
Chromium Browser
LibreOffice
Gnome Terminal
SSH Daemon
"D" key needs to remove the gnome keyboardshortcut uses "D" (just open vnc, goto a textfield and type d then you know what I mean )
and a lot more
[not working]
Ubuntu Software Center (use Synaptic instead, find it in the system menu)
[the tecnical side]
Ubuntu Natty Narwhal (11.04) from http://elinux.org/BeagleBoardUbuntu
dd for creating an image (no size limit anymore)
image formatted with ext2
adb push /sdcard/ubuntu/img/ubuntu.img (android shell has gunzip)
chroot env
tightvnc, gnome-session
different kernel features which i'll list here later
[changelog]
Beta 6
small changes in the scripts to ensure compatibility with other roms and devices
you can choose now between UBuntu 11.04, 11.10 and 12.04 Beta2
[next]
providing preinstalled images for gnome, kde and xfce
app instead script
[ideas]
weirdx
wayland
Have Fun
Ralph

GhostOfTheNet said:
Hi folks,
Actually I'm poking around with the common "How to get ubuntu onto xoom", but with an own img file i created based on the maverick arm minimal archive. Now I'm installing unity, but in weekend I'll try to make the installation, configuration, ... more userfriendly. maybe I'll build a small app doing thinks like starting, stopping, starting a terminal with the chroot and so on. I've no plan at this moment what I'll do exact. But you can say me what you would like to have, so I know if there is a need for something. I think with the next ubuntu using something based on opengl as replacement for x and the promised touch support, it might be relly interesting to have in a chroot env and maybe write something like a wrapper for androids opengl es api. in this context maybe also a port of the android sdk to linux arm would be very interesting.
Regards
Ralph
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just posted in the general forum about this lol. I would love maverick meerkat on the xoom. I'm sure the software center wouldnt work, but if you could somehow incorporate compiz fuzion, along with all of the standard apps, that would be the sh*t. Good luck man!

Got it to run on gtab but not sure how to do it on xoom.
Sent from my Xoom using XDA Premium App

i have it already running, but I'm not getting the f*** unity running, because it needs opengl... a bit bad with tightvncserver
so i decided to jump over and try directly this out:
http://rcn-ee.net/deb/rootfs/natty/ubuntu-natty-alpha3-r0-minimal-armel.tar.xz
the omap4 is an arm cortex a9 processor, so it should be binary compatible.
wish me luck, if it will work you will have today a howto, otherwise i'll go back to 10.10 and search for another useful desktop.
edit: apt is working fine with maverick
regards

Ok, so far so good. Ubuntu 11.04 is basically running, all is working fine, but the repository is buggy, so apt is not letting me install unity.
Besause today i'll not google for a missing lib, let see further tomorow. Hopefully the repositories are fixed then.
I'm uploading now a file called ubuntu.zip
To install it do the steps i'll write now in the first post. (the setup is not tested, so you may still need your knowledge)
Regards
Sent from my Xoom using XDA App

Hey Ghost -- thanks for your great work on this!
One thing I was wondering -- would it be possible to break out your instructions on how to do this from scratch? I'm interesting in putting together my own version (probably a minmal Ubuntu 10.04 install), and would really appreciate the source "steps".
From what I've read, it looks like it's a matter of grabbing the right kernel (I thought I saw a recent one on the tegra development site), bootstrapping the right debian-based arm-compatible distro, and copying that over to the device with the right script to get it setup. I'd just love it if I could piggyback on your fine work

GhostOfTheNet said:
It's alpha, so nothing for you if you have no plan whats going on here.
Archive: http://www.bisme.net/ubuntu.zip
Needed:
Rooted xoom with busybox installed
Steps:
1.) Extract the zip to /sdcard/ubuntu
2.) Open a terminal su, cd to this dir and type
./setupubuntu (sh*** i forgot to change the file, all cp commands are not working for some reason, needs to be
cat filename > /system/bin/filename
3.) ... ehm fin
(always su before)
If you replaced the cp, you can directly type for example bootubuntu, if not you need to be in dir /sdcard/ubuntu and say ./bootubuntu
After ubuntu booted(real only mounted) you can start a bash shell with shellubuntu. Unmount it with shutubuntu(in most cases will fail, then you need to reboot before you can say bootubuntu again)
Ehm, yes... i love my xoom :-D most of the time i worked on that... my pc i almost didn't need. Small tipp, it is worth its 4 dollar, better android terminal. Without bash this would be the hell.
Regards
Ralph
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Man you are the best. I really really want to get this up and running but i cant get through setup. idk how to install... this is not my area of expertise lol. help?!
edit: i guess for clarification, after i type in the cat command it tells me write: no space left on device

Is the touch screen working
Sent from my Evo 4G using Tapatalk Pro

Ok, first of all, this is not a rom. Thats not needed in this case, because with linux more installations can share the same kernel. Android has a linux kernel, ubuntu has one. Google for chroot
This is not an attemp to replace android, just to enhance it a bit
In this state it's just something like a technical preview. Give me a few days. For now only advanced linux users wich understands whats happening there can do something with it.
Concerning a minimal ubuntu, this is now a minimal installation.
Regards
Sent from my Xoom using XDA App

After unity 2d is not really working at this moment, I'm actually preparing a version with icewm and lxde. Post will come in a few hours.
Regards
Sent from my Xoom using XDA App

What about Enlightenment?
http://www.linuxuk.org/2010/02/the-new-ui-for-arm-based-ubuntu-devices/

i'm installing it. lets see.
the reason why it's still not posted, i have a problem with the xstartup file of tightvnc. for some reason it is not running the commands for the ui, so there is just an empty xserver in vnc until i start icewm lxde manually. i think it would be the same with efl, and i had until today to less time to check out whats wrong.
edit: netbook-launcher-efl + metacity + maximus is looking fine

Is there any way to not use VNC? Can you dual boot or otherwise get into X ?

or possibly something like freenx client on android maybe??? in hopes that it's faster than vnc. if we can't boot into ubuntu.
edit - scratch that, i read you need X to use freenx... kinda defeats the point there.
i thought there was something else though that fowards all the window data over like lightning fast.

I found until now two possibilities but both needs much work. First taking the wayland xserver client and port it to android, or port weirdx to android.
Sent from my Xoom using XDA App

Hmm... so back to the dual boot question... What about something like this guy did?
http://androidforums.com/samsung-i7500/81090-debian-dualboot.html
https://code.google.com/p/linux-on-android/wiki/BasicSteps
Would that also work on the XOOM?

Me personally, I'm not interested in another Linux Distri as main System
1. I would miss the android functionallity and feel, because of that I would never boot Ubuntu.
2. Only android has the needed touch support for a tablet. Maybe this changes i future ubuntu releases.
Because of that my primary target is a more seamless integration of a ubuntu subsystem in android, so we can use many beloved functions without much work. So there is the best of both worlds in the same time avaliable.
Sent from my Xoom using XDA App

Makes sense. My motivation for research and all this is that I want to do (light) web development and server administration on the tablet as well. Of course, buying that bluetooth keyboard makes it all feasible and I'm not looking to do heavy amounts of work on it, but I want to ditch my netbook. For starters, the tablet lasts longer in terms of battery life and the form factor is better.
Other than that, to me, tablets serve merely as an entertainment purpose (unless maybe you're using it to bill people or for a sales pitch/meeting) and I can't justify the cost. A $600 travel Scrabble is retarded. So I think tablets need something like Ubuntu running on them in order for them to be a more productive device that is a justifiable expense.
Right now the biggest thing that I'm thinking about is gedit and git. If I can get those two... Then I think I'd be pretty much set. I think there's actually two or three text editors for Android as is and I might be able to use those provided I could get git for Android.
The graphical user interface isn't the most important thing so I can even live w/o the VNC. Having a local webserver would be rad, but not a high priority since I can use git to update a server on the net.
If you have any ideas, and I know it's getting somewhat off topic, but your research is really the crux of my situation...I'd appreciate it. Thanks.
--edit ok, so i found www.cloud9ide.com which will cover me I guess. but still I want more power under the hood. I really appreciate your work efforts! Thanks.

updated useful for people which knows whats going on

deleted. got it. Thanks! this is awesome. great work!

[DEV] ArchLinux on the TF300T(G)

I've always been more of an Arch than Ubuntu person (how do you know if someone uses ArchLinux? Don't worry, they'll tell you)
This requires you to be unlocked and on the JB bootloader. I disclaim all responsibility if it somehow turns your tablet into a pile of ashes...
What works:
Dual boot with Android.
Internal storage and MicroSD Card
X11, with compositing
Audio
Mouse and keyboard on the dock, as well as dock hotplugging.
Touchscreen
Playing videos (full 1080P works great.) using Xfce's media player
Sensors (Light, compass, accelerometer, gyro). These are all exposed under sysfs.
Charging / Dock charging. This appears to be managed by the kernel.
USB gadget (as a RNDIS device for network access via USB)
CPU frequency scaling / Tegra LP core. The LP core is automatically used you can see its status in /sys/kernel/cluster/active (when that file reads LP) and its use is simply what the current CPU1 use appears to be.
WiFi, with NetworkManager
3G, on the TF300TG model, with NetworkManager
Battery (and dock) status in Xfce
USB port on the dock
Some sensible key remapping (Back -> Escape, Search -> Alt, Home -> Super)
What doesn't work:
Bluetooth
Two finger scrolling with the mouse
Rebooting from Linux (have to do a sync then hard power off)
Basic framebuffer console - to get dual boot working I had to remove the FB console
Using "standard" xv (as in, mplayer -vo xv). Untested really, use gstreamer.
Cameras
Current priorities:
Get Bluetooth working
Get two finger scrolling working.
Get rebooting working
Anything else is untested. Currently, I'm using the TF300TG's kernel source at https://github.com/cb22/tf300tg_jb_kernel - which is just the standard source from ASUS with a patch or two.
Dual booting:
At the moment, my "hybrid" initramfs checks for a file ".boot_linux" on the internal SD card (/data/media/.boot_linux or /storage/sdcard0/.boot_linux - same thing). If it exists, it boots Linux, otherwise, Android starts up. It wouldn't be difficult at all to make a simple Android app with a "Reboot into Linux" button, and vice versa one for Linux with "Reboot into Android"
Important note:
Currently, the provided kernel / initramfs is built for the TF300TG. It does seem to work fine on the TF300T however.
Downloads:
Kernel + Initramfs blob: https://rapidshare.com/files/2827313479/hybridkernel.blob
RootFS with Xfce: https://rapidshare.com/files/201953815/linux.tar.gz
Installation:
Flash the blob to staging using fastboot.
Untar the rootfs to /data/linux/. The easiest way to do this is probably to copy it across to the Transformer via adb or MTP, then run
Code:
$ su
# mkdir /data/linux
# tar -xzvf /storage/sdcard0/linux.tar.gz -C /data/linux
Issues:
Apparently permissions aren't set properly when untar-ing. This can be "fixed" by a chmod 755, apparently. As soon as I can, I'll make a better way of installing this (update.zip style)
Credits:
This work is based off the Arch Linux ARM distribution

Sounds good, I think would be nice together with a dual boot kernel :good:

AWESOME! This is what I've been looking for. Thanks for kick starting this, I'm flashing the recovery right away. I suppose I'll start playing around with the .config and see where that takes me.
C'mon people! lets get this done so we can then try out dualboot options and bring some GNU/Linux flavor to the Transformer Pad.

Good work. Im waiting for a working Ubuntu so I can install Blackbuntu.
Shame Im on ICS bootloader as I would have tried it.
The Prime Ubuntu project aint had any updates recently sadly.

if you get this working, would you then maybe get the win8 tablet version also working? Loving linux, but Win8 on tablets even a bit better :good:

Valantur said:
AWESOME! This is what I've been looking for. Thanks for kick starting this, I'm flashing the recovery right away. I suppose I'll start playing around with the .config and see where that takes me.
C'mon people! lets get this done so we can then try out dualboot options and bring some GNU/Linux flavor to the Transformer Pad.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's the aim! It would be really nice to have Android for tablet mode, and GNU/Linux for dock mode.
Nekromantik said:
Good work. Im waiting for a working Ubuntu so I can install Blackbuntu.
Shame Im on ICS bootloader as I would have tried it.
The Prime Ubuntu project aint had any updates recently sadly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can always use NVflash to backup your bootloader and such, then freely flash away. That's what I did (I'm on the TF300TG, and no one has uploaded their JB dlpkgfile *hint* *hint* and it's not available on ASUS's site yet) so I simply restored using NVflash to get my ICS with 3G back for when I'm not dev'ing.
Also - the ideas port over to any GNU/Linux system fairly easily once figured out - getting Ubuntu running wouldn't be much more effort. I'm using Arch to start since I understand it better (and prefer it)
-angel* said:
if you get this working, would you then maybe get the win8 tablet version also working? Loving linux, but Win8 on tablets even a bit better :good:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Highly unlikely, sorry, and definitely not my field of expertise!

yeah nP - was just a think if they would have similar kernels...
Video looks very good, but as you say in the first post, nothing for ppl who don't know how to flash it and as I need the tablet for school I'd need dual boot at all... :/
But get on your working, really nice, but unfortunately I don't know anything about developing such things, so I can't help you...

This is awesome i'm gonna have to read up on this to see how it works! great work! Always wanted something like this.

cb22 said:
You can always use NVflash to backup your bootloader and such, then freely flash away. That's what I did (I'm on the TF300TG, and no one has uploaded their JB dlpkgfile *hint* *hint* and it's not available on ASUS's site yet) so I simply restored using NVflash to get my ICS with 3G back for when I'm not dev'ing.
Also - the ideas port over to any GNU/Linux system fairly easily once figured out - getting Ubuntu running wouldn't be much more effort. I'm using Arch to start since I understand it better (and prefer it)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah.
Might try when I get some spare time.

Great initiative! I'd personally prefer a native debian distro over Arch but I figure once you've laid the groundwork the road's paved for more distro's.

Finally, a real reason to unlock the tab. When this works and it's dual boot, I will be unlocking and installing this.

Amazing! I just hope that it will be possible to dualboot with normal android installed. If so, it would be absolutely perfect. Keep going, buddy!

Would it be possible to get it dualboot with an external HDD's? Because you can only get external SD's only up to 64gb (as I know and not all of them work) and external HDD's usually have a bit more storage

I've been playing around with this today, and I was wondering if you could upload a barebones arch system (without KDE) but with any other improvements you might have been working on.
Thanks

spenat said:
Amazing! I just hope that it will be possible to dualboot with normal android installed. If so, it would be absolutely perfect. Keep going, buddy!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's what I've been working on! I have a kernel that supports full features of both Android and Arch (well sorta - no FB console, so no boot messages or such) and an initramfs that allows you to select (at the moment its hard coded, but I'll make a simple interface to select which one to boot, as well as things like telling Android to reboot into Linux, or vice versa). In terms of implementation, essentially it's just an initramfs chain loader.
Valantur said:
I've been playing around with this today, and I was wondering if you could upload a barebones arch system (without KDE) but with any other improvements you might have been working on.
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I shall - I've gotten WiFi working (works great with NetworkManager even) - I just have a very busy week with varsity work, I'll try and put the latest stuff online over the weekend.

Hello,
Can you use the package manager and install other DM the same way we would on a X86pc?

aachour said:
Hello,
Can you use the package manager and install other DM the same way we would on a X86pc?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I guess you could, once you get wifi working. We are waiting for cb22 to upload a new kernel+rootfs with a working wifi interface.

cb22 said:
That's what I've been working on! I have a kernel that supports full features of both Android and Arch (well sorta - no FB console, so no boot messages or such) and an initramfs that allows you to select (at the moment its hard coded, but I'll make a simple interface to select which one to boot, as well as things like telling Android to reboot into Linux, or vice versa). In terms of implementation, essentially it's just an initramfs chain loader.
I shall - I've gotten WiFi working (works great with NetworkManager even) - I just have a very busy week with varsity work, I'll try and put the latest stuff online over the weekend.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This project looks awesome. i have a tf300t and intermediate arch linux experience( have made multiple working setups, compiled drivers etc, and would love to do anything i can to help this project, let me know if there is anything i can do

yeah! always looked for linux on this tablet! keep up the development guys

Valantur said:
I guess you could, once you get wifi working. We are waiting for cb22 to upload a new kernel+rootfs with a working wifi interface.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately I didn't have time over the weekend to get things tidied up and uploaded - I start writing exams soon so things are a bit hectic on my side (coupled with the fact that I actually use my TF for varsity). I'll try to sort things out as soon as I can

Has anyone installed an ARM Linux distro like Arch Linux ARM...

...onto this device? It's the perfect size for an ARM laptop and Arch Linux is a great Linux distro too. I'm helping some devs port/get running natively Arch Linux ARM on the semi-ancient/underrated HP TouchPad from 2011. If it could run natively on this tablet, then I'd highly consider getting it to play with it on it.

I'm looking to do this also, I just rooted my pixel and tried "Linux Deploy" but it failed at "mounting /dev/loop0", looks like the stock kernel doesn't support mounting loop devices so this will be impossible until we get a new kernel.
edit: /dev/loop0 exists so I don't know why mounting fails...
Sent from my Pixel C using Tapatalk

So I've finally got it to install Ubuntu! Here's the steps I took to get it to install successfully:
First mount the system partition as read/write and generate /etc/mtab by accessing the shell and switching to the root account and typing mount -o remount,rw /system; cat /proc/mounts > /etc/mtab
Then install Meefik's (the guy that created LinuxDeploy) version of BusyBox (Stericon's version apparently doesn't have the ar command)
In LinuxDeploy's settings, change the BusyBox Directory to /data/data/ru.meefik.busybox/files/bin and hit Update Environment
After that, go into the preferences and select Ubuntu, then whatever version you want, and ARM64 instead of ARMHF and hit Install and let it finish. If it screws up and you need to re-attempt the installation process make sure to delete /etc/mtab and regenerate it, otherwise LinuxDeploy will think the /sdcard/linux.img file is already mounted, fail and won't tell you why. This kept screwing me up for a while also.

it's interesting that your ubuntu is arm64 and not armhf. i can't understand how that would work. i have a nvidia tx1 which runs armhf ubuntu 14.04 so i would have guessed that the pixel would be the same. i guess i need to read into linuxdeploy a bit and see what that is about.

It's ARM64 because the Tegra X1 is a 64 bit processor ARMHF will work too. All it does it create a chroot easily, a little difficult to look deep into it because a large amount of it is done using a binary he created.

brando56894 said:
So I've finally got it to install Ubuntu! Here's the steps I took to get it to install successfully:
First mount the system partition as read/write and generate /etc/mtab by accessing the shell and switching to the root account and typing mount -o remount,rw /system; cat /proc/mounts > /etc/mtab
Then install Meefik's (the guy that created LinuxDeploy) version of BusyBox (Stericon's version apparently doesn't have the ar command)
In LinuxDeploy's settings, change the BusyBox Directory to /data/data/ru.meefik.busybox/files/bin and hit Update Environment
After that, go into the preferences and select Ubuntu, then whatever version you want, and ARM64 instead of ARMHF and hit Install and let it finish. If it screws up and you need to re-attempt the installation process make sure to delete /etc/mtab and regenerate it, otherwise LinuxDeploy will think the /sdcard/linux.img file is already mounted, fail and won't tell you why. This kept screwing me up for a while also.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How is everything working out so far? I'm tempted to pop the screen off mine when it shows up to flip a switch for some chrome os fun (if I can figure out a way to do it gracefully) but might also just roll with ubuntu. Really interested in hearing how your experience has been... Thanks for sharing.

Youre welcome! I did it just for the hell of it, haven't really used it much since I got it working. A native install would be much better, I plan on seeing if I can get it to connect to a local X server, VNC works but Ive always found it to be odd when controlling the cursor. I always install Linux on my Android devices just because I can, once I have it working I'm like "now what can I use it for?" and I always come to the same conclusion, pretty much all the stuff I want to do in Linux I can do in Android lol Also since I've been at my parents all week since I've figured this out I don't have my Bluetooth keyboard which has a trackpad, which would make navigation far easier than controlling the cursor with the touchscreen. Since I have it working now with LXDE I may try to install KDE on it and then install virt-manager as an easy GUI way for me to control my KVMs since doing it via SSH is kind of a pain in the a$$ and the only Android app just allows you to start and stop your domains.
If you are actually ballsy enough to pop the screen off and flip the dev switch on yours you'd probably be praised far and wide since no one has done it yet hahaha
Sent from my Pixel C using Tapatalk

brando56894 said:
Youre welcome! I did it just for the hell of it, haven't really used it much since I got it working. A native install would be much better, I plan on seeing if I can get it to connect to a local X server, VNC works but Ive always found it to be odd when controlling the cursor. I always install Linux on my Android devices just because I can, once I have it working I'm like "now what can I use it for?" and I always come to the same conclusion, pretty much all the stuff I want to do in Linux I can do in Android lol Also since I've been at my parents all week since I've figured this out I don't have my Bluetooth keyboard which has a trackpad, which would make navigation far easier than controlling the cursor with the touchscreen. Since I have it working now with LXDE I may try to install KDE on it and then install virt-manager as an easy GUI way for me to control my KVMs since doing it via SSH is kind of a pain in the a$$ and the only Android app just allows you to start and stop your domains.
If you are actually ballsy enough to pop the screen off and flip the dev switch on yours you'd probably be praised far and wide since no one has done it yet hahaha
Sent from my Pixel C using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've only seen one paywalled teardown so far in some brief searching to give any hints / clues. After seeing cheep5k8's posts my interest has peaked and I am digging your posts as well. I need to run through the chromium os git and doc stuffs first before I fire up my heat gun and spudgers though...

Hi !
Me too i'm interessed on a linux instalation for my "ryu"
...Pretty interessed on ubuntu touch : the Pixel C seems to be the perfect item for the distro to combine tablet and pc in one.
Sadly i'm not a developper, but i hope somebody will think like me ^^

will this work with ARM64 Fedora GNU/Linux? or are there special instructions for that?

I have been working on this, please see http://forum.xda-developers.com/pix...ux-pixel-c-running-ubuntu-xenial-lxc-t3410655 if you want to run ubuntu xenial on pixel C

kxra said:
will this work with ARM64 Fedora GNU/Linux? or are there special instructions for that?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was just using whatever distros were provided by Linux Deploy, half of them don't work anyway, for example Arch. I was only successful with Ubuntu IIRC.
Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk

For those who are interested :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4B8unHrbZK4
Weston and XWayland are running quite well on Pixel C (without acceleration until now)
I will try to publish something quite soon (there are still stabilities issues)