[Android] NITdroid 0.4.x
 

NITdroid 0.4.x releases:

0.4.3 (Mar/15/2009) Release Highlights:

• Updated AndAppStore client (SoftwareDirectory v.1.2.3).
• Dalvik VM tunables tweaks for better performance.
• Changes by the upstream Android project.

0.4.2 (Jan/30/2009) Release Highlights:

• Improved battery metering by replacing kcbatt for a modified retu-adc, special thanks to Matan for retu-adc.c and for providing insights about the RETU registers.
• Updated WiFi driver.
• Random fixes upstream by Google.

0.4.1 (Jan/26/2009) Release Highlights:

• Switched back to phone policy until MID matures.
• Many changes upstream by Google.

0.4.0 (Jan/20/2009) Release Highlights:

• Switched to MID policy.
• Many changes upstream by Google.
• Thanks to AndAppStore.com for asking me to include their App installer client which is included in this release.

Kernel releases:

2.6.28-5 (Jan/25/2009) Release Highlights:

• Based on stable 2.6.28.2
• Based on latest omap-2.6.28 branch of the Linux OMAP tree.

2.6.28-4 (Jan/20/2009) Release Highlights:

• Based on stable 2.6.28.1
• Based on latest omap-2.6.28 branch of the Linux OMAP tree.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Since you started a new thread, it would be good to add links.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Here is the project home page: http://guug.org/nit/nitdroid/

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Flashed and reformatted partition 3. Booted fine. Soft keyboard app crashed multiple times while entering my WEP key. I was excited to see the Software Directory icon in the app folder, but so far it fails to populate the list of installable apps. Wifi and browser work fine.

The blue and red "IM" app has never launched for me ever. The app folder starts to slide out of the way but immediately returns to its open position.

Don't forget to re-enable the Debug mode when USB is attached to make adb work again (I forgot!) Any chance we can delete Snake and IM and replace them with Meebo or aTweeter?

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

And maybe even give a hint about what NITdroid actually does. I've never heard of it before. Just sayin'.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

New release and AndAppStore.coms Software Directory worked well on my n810.

Thanks again solca :P

I found only 2 things that aren't working in thi MID-version.
- Power-button
- Screen orientation in browser can no more be flipped.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Same here for the power button. I'm also unable to locate shutdown in adb. Is it still in the rootfs?

How long do you have to wait for the Software Directory to populate, and are you able to install apps via that utility?

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

NITdroid is the product of an effort to port Google's Android to Nokia's Nx0 (770, 800, 810, 810W) line of Internet Tablets.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

When the notice about download came, i just pressed the back button and started browsing the internet. After a short while (~2min?) i came back to Software direcory and it was done. Did you press the back button when the notice about download came?

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

I've had it sit for 5 minutes or more without producing a directory. I have a theory, however. To avoid surfing with 'links' on my Linux host, I tried to download the apk with the android browser, followed by an adb pull and an adb install. The browser refuses to save any files since I don't have a separate SD card. I wonder if the software directory refuses to download and save anything without an SD card.

Do you have a separate SD card?

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

i have formatted the first partition of my internal card as FAT. that's working well with android.

There is an option in settings to allow installing non-marketing apps.. do you have that checked?

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

I have the same formatting scheme for the internal card, but I don't have an external card. Thanks for the tip about the non-market apps. I checked it, but still, no luck bringing up the app directory.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

I've just flashed my N800 with the 0.4, couple findings so far:
- the power button indeed doesn't work, can't shutdown but via removing battery
- once the screen dims, my N800 won't wake up (I think this bug has already been reported in previous releases)
- I can't get the onscreen keyboard to show up - pressing, clicking any other action on a text field doesn't do anything. Could somebody with N800 try that?
- nice new wallpaper ;)

In any case, megakudos to Solca et al for making this happen!!!

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

I created a link to push the Jaiku updates to Twitter. Please follow 'nitdroid' on Twitter or add it to your social networking aggregation tools (like FriendFeed).

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Lock screen and power button doesn't work in the MID policy, what do you think ppl to return back to phone policy for 0.4.1 release?

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Why is that? A mobile internet device still needs to power itself off every now and then and even lock the screen. I guess I am not understanding the difference between MID and phone policy.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Also the battery charger doesn't even show me that it's charging (separate from the discussion on what's actually happening behind the scenes). I'm not a fan of yanking the cover off the back of the unit once or twice a day. Its pretty flimsy.

There's no way to add shutdown back into the rootfs? or hack together an app to shut it down? Even a soft shutdown would be better than nothing.

P.S. 1 vote for returning the phone profile while other things get worked on (sound, camera, gps, bluetooth)

EDIT - I'm wondering if we symlink reboot to shutdown, perhaps we can get a soft shutdown app

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

In the Android source code it exists two different code paths for phones and MIDs.

I have seen many contributions to the phone policy and fewer to the MID part, too the license could be a factor too as it is not copyleft (so contribution back is not required) I have seen many projects with closed sources... hopefully this year big companies will ship Android MID devices so maybe contributions to the that part will make it feature complete...

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

I flashed .4 on my N800... same as others... no soft keyboard. Snake runs! Cannot sign into WIFI :(.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

I can confirm that reboot -p does perform an instant shutdown and poweroff via adb shell. It turns out that reboot is a symlink to 'toolbox' but 'toolbox' is unaware of how to handle the shutdown command. Being an instant poweroff, it does not save the time. Anyone know how to recreate the terminal app icon? Or create an icon that executes 'reboot -p'?

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Missing external card is'n a problem. External card inside while tring to boot is.
So far, i have had to take external card out to get the nitdroid boot up. (Might be my shitty SD, it was cheap and it acts sometimes weird)

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Hey Solca, great stuff man, keep up the good work.

As for phone branch vs MID branch, I would vote for sticking with the MID branch and uploading patches to Google. If they are reasonable options (like screen lock and power button) patches then they should be accepted. I'll try and chip in where I can with patches Solca, but I'm a bit slammed with a couple of other projects at the moment.

I just think that this would be the best community to kick start the MID support, rather than hoping that some Android based MID comes out. Also companies will be more likely to build MID devices if they see a working MID android (wifi + wimax + voip > w-cdma). Branching off of Google's phone branch to create our own could fragment the android MID community, and being as small as it is, I think that would be not so great a thing to do.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Thanks Solca for your work.

Is this version installable on 770 ?
Any particular thing to do diferently from the N8x0 install ?

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

check this specific thread on nidroid+n770 :

http://www.internettablettalk.com/fo...770#post259170

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Thanks I already checked this thread but I was wondering if anybody tried the 0.4 release on a 770 ?

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

anyone planning on making the installation process a bit more userfriendly. :)

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

I think the biggest issue here is figuring out how the internal card is detected by the installation host when the USB is attached. Apparently Ubuntu sees the card as /dev/sdc but for me on CentOS, the card was detected as /dev/sda. And does it register as a different scsi device if the usb cable is connected to a different usb port? With all of the different distros out there and kernel module options, I don't think there's an easy way to tell which scsi device is the tablet. Perhaps do an fdisk -l and look for the only 2GB scsi drive? Is there something in proc that shows the vendor of each attached drive?

I'm waiting for approval to formally host the project at a community development site. Once that gets up and running, perhaps we can get some more visibility and start up an installer sub-project. I know someone who knows dialog. Its just a matter of getting his time. As I've said before, my ultimate goal is to publish a bootable USB key for each release.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Yes, here is my random listscsi script I used for something similar before (maybe there is better solution)
Sample output:

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Could not agree more. I love reading these threads and seeing the progress, but I have no clue whats being said about 75% of the time. Lol.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Excellent. Once the site gets approved I plan to go through all 50-60 pages of the various nitdroid threads and assemble the most useful, and still relevant, information. I'm sure this will prove handy in the early stages of development of the installer.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Some of the "easy install" steps were a little quirky, even for a 15 year Linux guy. It was at times unclear where some of the steps were to be executed (on the Linux host or the tablet, and if on the tablet via the tablet's own terminal emulator or via the adb shell), and instructions to power down and/or disconnect the USB cable were also completely missing in places. Believe me, I read the first thread for 3 good weeks before diving in, and even after that I was pleasantly surprised to find out how easy it was to return to Maemo.

After 0.4.1 comes out, and we see how it behaves, how about in the spirit of "everyone contributing something", maybe you and I can sit down and "newbyize" the instructions? I've had to write simple instructions for people for almost 30 years, but I'm sure there's some stuff that I assume everyone knows or can easily figure out, but they just don't or can't.

Have you tried the install yet or is it still too confusing to even try it out?

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Don't know what happened, but the Software Directory worked within 90 seconds today. Weird.

Also, wifi is dropping a *LOT* now. I wonder if the MID profile is trying to put the wifi in some kind of sleep state but is killing radio altogether.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Awesome idea! I'll try and help as much as I can but like I said I really dont know whats going on. I just see people saying this isnt working then someone says try this and it works or it dosnt. Its like traveling to a foreign country and not knowing the language at all, but I can make out the body language and facial expressions!

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Have you guys even read my install guide lately?

I wrote a script that does EVERYTHING, assuming you have the packages. All you have to do is select your partition sizes. If you need, get Linux (Ubuntu Live CD would be perfect). Really, it isn't that difficult. There are also steps in it that tell you exactly what to do.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

The /dev/sdc was just an example. The script works like this:

It then asks you for the last result, which would be the just-plugged-in tablet. It then asks for it again without the number on the end, then with a 3 on the end. These entries are used as variables that are referred to during the partitioning, mounting, etc.

The problem with looking by size is that different people have different sizes (that's what she said) of SD cards and having used a bunch of them, many have weird sizes when coming from strange places in Shenzhen, China. (931MB instead of 1024MB)

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Sorry if we set you off a bit :) But seriously, fanoush posted code on the previous page that generates a list of scsi drives and the vendor. If we were going to go for a polished installer, I would use his code to find the drive with "NOKIA" as the vendor.

And to answer your earlier question, the only "easy install guide" I'm aware of is in the "getting nitdroid running" thread. I ran your script, when 0.3.2 first came out but all it did was download the latest versions of everything and untar them on my linux host. It didn't actually try to mount or untar them to the nit. Plus at the time, solca missed out on updating the symliks so I ended up having to download everything by hand before untarring again and reflashing by hand.

If there's a newer guide somewhere else, or if you've gone back there and updated it, then awesome, please post a link! Finally, the Ubuntu CD when booted into live doesn't recognize any of my three Thinkpads' built-in wired or wireless Ethernet adapters, and I can't blow away my Rocks Cluster frontend, so I never got to test out the instructions in an Ubuntu setting.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

the power button doesn't work and the original worked maps application cannot work any longer. :(

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

found some of the clue to make maps and some other applications run available:
--- platform.xml.save 2009-01-25 00:47:53.000000000 +0800
+++ platform.xml 2009-01-25 00:48:00.000000000 +0800
@@ -117,6 +117,10 @@
<!-- This is a list of all the libraries available for application
code to link against. -->

+ <library name="com.google.android.maps"
+ file="/system/framework/com.google.android.maps.jar" />
+ <library name="com.google.android.gtalkservice"
+ file="/system/framework/com.google.android.gtalkservice.jar" />
<library name="android.awt"
file="/system/framework/android.awt.jar" />
<library name="android.test.runner"

But now, i am running meeting with the issue like:
I/MapActivity( 1372): Handling network change notification:CONNECTED
E/MapActivity( 1372): Couldn't get connection factory client
E/MapView ( 1372): IllegalStateException on drawMap. Wiping cache.
E/MapView ( 1372): java.lang.IllegalStateException: Null Bitmap!/loading_tile.png=17301864
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.google.common.graphics.android.AndroidImage.<i nit>(Unknown Source)
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.google.common.graphics.android.AndroidImageFac tory.createImage(Unknown Source)
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.google.googlenav.map.MapTile.c(Unknown Source)
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.google.googlenav.map.MapTile.getImage(Unknown Source)
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.google.googlenav.map.Map.a(Unknown Source)
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.google.googlenav.map.Map.drawMap(Unknown Source)
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.google.android.maps.MapView.drawMap(MapView.ja va:997)
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.google.android.maps.MapView.onDraw(MapView.jav a:443)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.View.draw(View.java:5660)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.ViewGroup.drawChild(ViewGroup.java:14 47)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchDraw(ViewGroup.java :1211)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.ViewGroup.drawChild(ViewGroup.java:14 45)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchDraw(ViewGroup.java :1211)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.ViewGroup.drawChild(ViewGroup.java:14 45)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchDraw(ViewGroup.java :1211)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.View.draw(View.java:5663)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.widget.FrameLayout.draw(FrameLayout.java:3 24)
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.android.internal.policy.impl.MidWindow$DecorVi ew.draw(MidWindow.java:1725)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.ViewRoot.draw(ViewRoot.java:1167)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.ViewRoot.performTraversals(ViewRoot.j ava:989)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.view.ViewRoot.handleMessage(ViewRoot.java: 1418)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:99 )
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:123)
E/MapView ( 1372): at android.app.ActivityThread.main(ActivityThread.jav a:3779)
E/MapView ( 1372): at java.lang.reflect.Method.invokeNative(Native Method)
E/MapView ( 1372): at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:521)
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit$MethodAndArgsCa ller.run(ZygoteInit.java:745)
E/MapView ( 1372): at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main(ZygoteInit .java:503)
E/MapView ( 1372): at dalvik.system.NativeStart.main(Native Method)

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

0.4.1 userspace released.

2.6.28-5 kernel released too.

Re: NITdroid 0.4.x
 

Went to 0.4.1 and latest kernel. OSK is back but crashes after one use. ADB hasn't worked for me under Linux in 0.4.x at all. Has the device id changed again? Is it time for a new version of adb?

I believe the system clock interface may have been improved, as I didn't have to set the date and time after reformatting for this install. Software directory comes up reliably now but I still can't install software without an SD card.