The Androux project

Finally, I've completed the linux support for the ports. I have decided to call the project androux. A play on words android and linux. You can grab the source from github. Finally "make" works and the compile script works on linux x86_64. The build scripts still won't run if you are using 32 bit machine. Will try to bring support for that in future. The android shell is not fit to run the configure scripts and hence a port of few utilities like sed and bash shell is required. I am working on it.

As of now you can create a Makefile and compile your projects on the device. I have tried a basic test and make works fine.

Visit github for instructions on compiling.

After compiling, you need to copy system folder created to the system folder of your device. You also need to copy the include and lib folders from platform directory corresponding to android version that your device runs.

The final system image will be quite big and I am quite sure that the partitions that are created in your phone by default are not enough to hold it all. There are two ways of approaching this problem, either extend the system partition, if the inbuilt flash can hold it or create a new partition in the sdcard and change the mount scripts to mount that partition as system instead.

When writing install scripts in make file we need to take care that system partition is mounted r/w. By default the system partition is read only in android. Or you could choose another install location.

I still haven't had time or resources to test on an actual device. Please let me know if any of you can do so and share the results

Cheers ! :-)
Stay Awesome  

MAKE compile script added

Quick repo update. I've added the compile script for make

Have fun!! Cheers :-)

c++ and g++ compile scripts fixed to build on mac OS X

I have finally found time to fix the scripts to build c++ and g++. I have pushed the code to the github. You can grab a snapshot here - https://github.com/heliumfire/androux. Or you can alternatively do

git clone -depth=1 https://github.com/heliumfire/androux

I am also working on getting linux scripts to work so that building can be supported on ubuntu. Next plan is to fix make and bash so that everything can be run smoothly on the device.

Future plans is to grab a AOSP source and integrate into it. I was thinking of first trying it on GB. Still haven't done it yet.

As far as putting it up on a real device. I am trying to procure an android device, unfortunately its an old one running GB (xperia play). I need help to try it out on other devices. Let me know if anyone is willing to.

Source for linux utilities on Android

Hi all,

I have finally made time to push the source of my ports to github. Access the source at https://github.com/heliumfire/androux. To get the source clone the repo by
git clone https://github.com/heliumfire/androux. As of now the source only compiles binutils gmp mpc and mpfr. And will only work on linux. I will put up more stuff as the time comes

Cheers, Have fun :)

Make for Android and associated problems

NOTE: Your phone, your responsibility. (all stuff from previous posts)

I managed to compile make for android. But unfortunately it is not foolproof. Download it here and push the contents to the /system folder in the emulator. But there is one slight problem. There is a function that make uses called ttyname(). This function is supposed to be defined in libc. But as android doesn't run on standard libc but bionic. It has not been implemented and left as a stub. It basically returns the name of the terminal device like "/dev/pts/1". I think the best way to get around would be to implement it in bionic stubs code itself. But that would require replacing libc. And I don't like the sound of it. Another way would be to implement it in make. But I wasn't gonna spend this night doing that. So instead i hardcoded it to return "root".

And fortunately enough make seems to work fine without it. I wrote a small makefile and compiled to check. Sorry I did't include that in the package. But have fun trying it out by writing your own.

Let me know if you have any thoughts on implementation of ttyname.

PS: I have made progress on putting the scripts together for build system. Stay tuned 

System image [android-19] with gcc, g++, file and vim

I have uploaded the system image so that you can simply download it and try it out without having to remount or push. Copy the android-19 directory to "system-images" directory of your sdk and create a new avd for android-19 or use the old one doesn't matter. Just remember to close any avds that are open and restart them.

I have also included two source files for hello world, one for C and another for C++. They are there in "/system/bin" directory. Check the system by

Cheers, Have a nice day !!!

Edit: I've also included file and vim binaries, check em out

C C++ programming on Android [added g++ and vim to the package] (ARM specific)

NOTE: Same as old one. If you are dumb enough to spoil your device or emulator (lol), don't blame me. Try at your own risk

For long we have distanced using android as a development machine. This might not be far.

Yesterday, I successfully compiled gcc that could run on android. And today without much delay g++ is here. I've also added vim from my older post. Now you can push all the binaries to the phone and have a nice programming package on phone. I have done a basic sanity test on the binaries and they seem to be working fine. I've also included three sample programs in the bin directory. If possible remove them before pushing to the device. (for details on how to push them to the emulator see my last post)

This system will create binaries that will definitely run on all arm (32 bit) android devices. That means you can compile on your phone and then send it to another phone and it would work (lol, what am I writing. Sorry, sleepy :( ). This will create similar binaries to that of your ndk. So basically all the executables that you could compile with your ndk. Now you can on the phone.

Now to the backsides of it. It takes up large space (around 500 MB). Most of the system partitions are smaller than this so it would require that the partitions be resized and mounted. I could probably make a zip to install but due to this problem it wouldn't work on most devices. You need to edit the system partition size. And I have no idea how to do that, because I don't have an android phone. But if there is anyone willing to do this, please let me know how that turns out.

I've seen a friend of mine try use vim on his phone. And trust me it sucks. We will need a better editor and also a better terminal. For now I would suggest using terminal emulator to try it out. But it will not be as good as a personal computer. I wonder how it will be on a physical keyboard android device. I will search for my old HTC Dream, and hopefully it will work. I also have memory issues on that to be taken care of (half GB extra system storage on HTC Dream, you got to be kidding me). I will let you guys know how that turns out. Meanwhile have fun trying it out.

And ya I almost forgot download it here.

PS: I did try to make a nice build system out of this. But due to my laziness and non-linear working style it has become difficult to put together a script to do the whole build as I initially intended to. But I promise that in near future that I will try and put it up on github or something, after I get it to work.