Using Debian binaries instead of busybox (Yes you can!) - HTC Sensation

Yes, it is possible to use Debian (or any other ARM based distribution) binaries instead of busybox. These devices have plenty of horsepower, and a fair amount of space on them. There should be enough room to get proper versions of command line apps baked in
NOTE: This is a PROOF OF CONCEPT. Do not attempt unless you are familiar with linux, chroot, and are fine with potentially screwing up your phone!
Frankly, I got tired of the limited feature set and compatibility issues that come with busybox. So, I decided to see if I could come up with something better... all it took was a free app from the market, 4 GB carved out of my SD card, and a little bit of time.
I've played a bit with chroot (mostly using the "Linux Installer" app):
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.galoula.LinuxInstall&hl=en
My SD card has a 4GB SD-EXT partition on it, formatted as EXT4, and then a FAT32 partition. I have my phone set up to never unmount the SD-EXT partition. And, since I'm using ICS, it's not using that partition for anything yet anyways.
In any case, to save a whole lot of trouble and deal with potential corruption issues, I set up the linux chroot to use a folder instead of an image. This turned out to be handy, because I can access files and play around with bind mounts much more easily than I can with an image file.
Right now I've got Debian Stable installed using chroot to my SD-EXT partition. After getting to a Debian prompt, I updated apt:
apt-get update
apt-get install build-essential
Now we have a fully working GCC environment to use. However, the environment that Linux Installer provides comes with most tools already at your disposal.
Now what? I don't want to have to chroot to use these utilities. That's a waste of my time
Here, we have two options... one is somewhat easy, and one is really easy.
These are not statically compiled applications, so we do need a few libraries. To replicate the functionality of busybox (and so much more), you really only need about 15 of them.
---------------------- THE REALLY EASY WAY ----------------------
The really easy way to do this is to bind mount the following folders from the "chroot" (in my case it's /sd-ext/linux) to the root of the android device:
/bin
/lib
/usr
/sbin
I'm writing this from memory, but I believe (off the top of my head) the proper command is:
busybox mount -o bind,rw /sd-ext/linux/bin /bin
busybox mount -o bind,rw /sd-ext/linux/lib /lib
busybox mount -o bind,rw /sd-ext/linux/usr /usr
busybox mount -o bind,rw /sd-ext/linux/sbin /sbin
Please correct me if I'm wrong (and this is assuming that your chroot environment is in /sd-ext/linux
On some devices, /bin and /sbin already exist. Deal with that however you want.
Now, all you have to do is:
EXPORT PATH=$PATH:/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin:/sbin
If you've done it properly, you can shut down your chroot environment, go to /bin, and run ./ping 8.8.8.8
If it doesn't work, you screwed up somewhere (or I did!).
---------------------- THE SOMEWHAT EASY WAY ----------------------
On the android side, make the following folder structure:
/bin
/lib
/sbin
/usr
/usr/bin
/usr/lib
/usr/local/bin
Also, set your path so you can actually use the programs:
EXPORT PATH=$PATH:/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin:/sbin
Now, let's say we want to have Debian's version of 'ping' without having to chroot. Do the following:
Pop into your chroot environment, head into the /bin folder, and run the following command:
ldd /bin/ping
This will tell you what shared libraries ping uses. In my case, it uses:
/lib/libgcc_s.so.1
/lib/libc.so.6
/lib/ld-linux.so.3
Pop back over to the android side, and run the following commands (assuming that /sd-ext/linux is your chroot environment, and adjusting as necessary for the libraries that are actually used by the program you are attempting to make work)
cp /sd-ext/linux/bin/ping /bin
cp /sd-ext/linux/lib/libgcc_s.so.1 /lib
cp /sd-ext/linux/lib/libc.so.6 /lib
cp /sd-ext/linux/lib/ld-linux.so.3 /lib
Now type:
/bin/ping
You will get either get an error message about a shared library, command not found, or (if you're lucky) the Debian version of ping.
If you're not so lucky, i'd suggest copying over /usr/bin/ldd from the debian side and using it to figure out (on the android side) which libraries you're missing.
***HUGE NOTE***: Remember that folder structure we're using? It will disappear when you reboot your phone, so back it up! I would actually recommend using bind mounts and a shell script to have a more "persistent" folder structure, but that's just me...
Like I said, there's really only about 15 shared libraries or so that are needed to give us a plethora of applications at our disposal. I'll give up a bit of my phone's system space to be able to drop to a proper bash command line and pull up nano, use the full and complete version of tar, gzip, or whatever utility I want.
As I'm still playing with this, I don't have a test package or anything to put up. This is more of a proof of concept idea (that I've already partially implemented on my phone).
Also, GCC can get you a long way Since we're compiling on-device, there is no cross-compiler necessary. Inside of the chroot, I compiled patchELF
http://nixos.org/patchelf.html
I thought that utility might come in handy. Compiles slowly (this is a phone we're compiling on), but it works great.
The next step is to see if I can bake it in...

Related

Debian Working on Hero

So i dont know about others since there are a billion posts and a billion builds.. but i was able to get Debian working on hero today with a few changes to the code and manually typing in the start scrip myself .. i tried to make a stat script but it always fails at mounting. i tried numerous ways of mounting in the script which all fail.. any ideas?
I was having similar issues when I tried this but was able to get it by specifying the fs type of the debian image e.g.
Code:
#mount -t ext2 -o loop debian.img /data/local/mnt
This is assuming of course you are in the directory containing debian.img and you have already created the mnt dir in /data/local. I just tested this from twisted hero 5 but had success on one of the earlier JAC builds and superhero b1. No other modifications were necessary for this and I was able to mount the others listed in the mountonly script included in the 2.1 installer package similarly. I have stopped using the dootdeb script entirely and now just mount and chroot manually when needed.
Hope that helps.
daemontux said:
I was having similar issues when I tried this but was able to get it by specifying the fs type of the debian image e.g.
Code:
#mount -t ext2 -o loop debian.img /data/local/mnt
This is assuming of course you are in the directory containing debian.img and you have already created the mnt dir in /data/local. I just tested this from twisted hero 5 but had success on one of the earlier JAC builds and superhero b1. No other modifications were necessary for this and I was able to mount the others listed in the mountonly script included in the 2.1 installer package similarly. I have stopped using the dootdeb script entirely and now just mount and chroot manually when needed.
Hope that helps.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
question since debian can run flash player has anyone installed it on there just for kicks
i tried it when i was on 1.2 before cupcake. i got as far as getting debian to work and then use lxde for gui. I got ice weasle installed then install flash which somehow broke my iceweasle browser. I would imagine it would be slower than flash on hero rom though.
superg05 said:
question since debian can run flash player has anyone installed it on there just for kicks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
While flash is supported on many desktop linux distributions, I have not found an ARM EABI version of it. I was looking when I first put debian on the phone but without finding the correct package and considering iceweasel was painfully slow in the chroot/vnc environment even without the plugin I did not try for long. I was running a class 2 card at the time maybe it is a little better on my class 6 but I think ill wait for adobe to release an android version anyway
@maydaysos was it an armel package you installed? If so where did you find it? I only remember seeing libflash gnash and possibly swfdec in the armel deb repositories

[HOWTO] Running debian via chroot on OO

This tutorial is based on this one for G1: http://www.saurik.com/id/10
Hi,
I'll show you how to run debian in chroot on our optimus one. It wont affect android in any way, and they can run simultaneously, side by side. You are only running bash from debian, not its kernel or any other low-level part. But you can use debian's programs.
Requirements
* Linux on your pc or in virtual machine
You need debootstrap to make debian image, so you need debian distro (maybe in *buntu it is too, but I am not sure). You dont need GUI, bash is all you need.
* Busybox(-> rooted phone)
Most custom roms comes with busybox, I am not sure how about store ROM.
* Terminal emulator on phone and/or ADB
I suggest you to make sure you have adb, because you dont wanna write it all on small touch keyboard.
Some knowledge about linux systems
If you are following this tutorial only because you want to /flex on your friends and you dont know anything about linux, then you really _should_ stop reading this tutorial.
I also recommend you to have a2sd, so we can put debian image on its partition, when it is on sdcard main partition, it _may_ cause some problems with usb mass storage.
So, lets start.
1. Getting debian image
Boot into debian and get bootstrap tool:
Code:
apt-get install debootstrap
Now, create an empty disk image, I'd say minimum size is about 150mb, but I recommend you use more:
Code:
dd if=/dev/zero of=debian.img seek=*size_in_bytes* bs=1 count=1
You need to create ext filesystem in image with this tool(you can try it with "sudo" if you have problems):
Code:
mke2fs -F debian.img
Image is ready now, now lets mount it so we can install debian into it:
Code:
mkdir debian
mount -o loop debian.img debian
Debootstrap tool will do all the work for us. You can try to use squeeze instead of lenny or download it from your country's mirror. "--variant=minbase" argument will install just base system with apt-get and only few other packages. (This also may need sudo)
Code:
debootstrap --verbose --arch armel --foreign lenny debian http://ftp.cz.debian.org/debian
umount debian
2. Mount the image
Now, we will use ADB shell to mount the image and finish debian installation. Do not forget to write "su" before you start, we need root for this.
You need to decide where to put debian.img. I suggest you to put it on a2sd partition, which is system/sd, so :
Code:
cp /sdcard/debian.img /system/sd
export kit=/system/sd
Our mount point will be /data/local/mnt, so lets make some variable to make it easier:
Code:
export mnt=/data/local/mnt
busybox mkdir -p $mnt
We also need to set these enviroment variables, and we can also make alias for busybox so we dont have to write busybox all the time.
Code:
export PATH=/usr/bin:/usr/sbin:/bin:$PATH
export TERM=linux
export HOME=/root
alias _=busybox
Now we need to create loop device for image:
Code:
_ mknod /dev/loop0 b 7 0
And if nothing went wrong, you should be able to mount image now ("mount: no /etc/mtab" is normal) :
Code:
_ mount -o loop,noatime $kit/debian.img $mnt
3. Finalizing installation of debian
With mounted image, we can proceed to second stage of debian bootstrap:
Code:
_ chroot $mnt /debootstrap/debootstrap --second-stage
If you want install some packages with apt-get, you also need to add repo to sources.list. Of course, if you downloaded squeeze instead of lenny, you need to change "lenny" to "squeeze"
Code:
echo 'deb http://ftp.cz.debian.org/debian lenny main' >$mnt/etc/apt/sources.list
Set correct DNS servers - debian can't take them from Android.
Code:
echo 'nameserver 4.2.2.2' >$mnt/etc/resolv.conf
Done, installation over.
4. Running debian bash
To get to debian bash, use this command. You can try "cat /etc/issue.net" or "uname -a" so you can see its really debian.
Code:
_ chroot $mnt /bin/bash
But its not all yet, you need to mount some things for debian:
Code:
mount -t devpts devpts /dev/pts
mount -t proc proc /proc
mount -t sysfs sysfs /sys
Now link mtab to /proc/mounts. You need to do this only once.
Code:
rm -f /etc/mtab
ln -s /proc/mounts /etc/mtab
And if you want to use ssh server to log in into debian, you also should set root pass:
Code:
passwd root
5. Installing packages
First, you need to update packages list:
Code:
apt-get update
and now you can install whatever you want with "apt-get install"!
6. Finishing
I suggest you to write some .sh script so you can mount it all with one command, for example something like this: http://pastebin.com/VT6272d5
What packages have you tested?
sshd - works great, you can connect to phone via putty or ssh
mc - works, but phone screen is to small
gcc-avr - if you are programming for avr microcontrollers, you can compile it on your phone
netcat - telnet connection
git-core - works great
htop - you can see this on screnshot below
apache2 - works like a charm
xfce4, Xorg server and tightvncserver - working but slow, see screenshots
gnash - working but slow, see screenshots. This is the only option how to run flash content on optimus one xD
Iceweasel - if you are using vnc server, you can browse web pages
gcc, g++, autoreconf, cmake and whatever else is needed to build mangos - working
mysql-server - you have to set "user = root" in /etc/mysql/my.conf, but works
MaNGOS - http://getmangos.com/ takes long to build, but works! See this post and also this one.
..and maybe some more which I dont remember.
Hope this tutorial helped you
I'll try bootstrapping debian when I figure out what the hell is wrong with my system. I can't download files from ftp (but I can with wget and other progs. just not with pacman, debootstrap, and the like).
debian on optimus v
searched around to avoid multiple posts, and found this.
I've been running chroot debian on my V as well, squeeze then sid now going back to squeeze.
the main problem I've encountered was in the "debootstrap --second-stage", which generally froze at "I: configuring sysvinit". I thought that was from overloading the CPU, but turns out android init doesn't create /dev/initctl like debian does, so debootstrap hangs waiting for a response reading/writing /dev/initctl
I didn't have that issue using SL4A's shell instead of android terminal.
being a bit of a 'noid, I have used "mknod /dev/initctl p" in the chroot before running "debootstrap --second-stage" since reading of that solution. not sure if it's making much difference, because that didn't fix the issue before I found SL4A and was still using android terminal for shell functions.
I like xfce4 as a window manager in the VNC, it's small but still functional.
I did a bit of things different than saurik, but used his guide extensively, along with much googling for other deb->droid ports.
my chroot runs in the android root directory with bind-mounts since the custom kernel I like doesn't include unionfs. I also directly use an ext4 2nd partition on the SD rather than a loop-mounted filesystem image. (yes, ext4 journals will eventually frag my SD but the cost of another is worth the crash-resistance to me.)
my short-term goal is to mix inits between the two os's and run X through an android app frontend to avoid the framebuffer copy lag from the VNC. my 3 main reasons for debian on the phone are program development (works currently,) flash (actually gnash, and needs a working full-speed access to framebuffer, not working yet,) and emulators for J2ME and MAME (same boat as flash.)
so far trying to run X directly blanks my screen and forces a battery pull to get it back, so kinda giving up that route for the moment.
so installing Archlinux on O1 must be possible? how?
pymebrahimi said:
so installing Archlinux on O1 must be possible? how?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
All must work, as long as they support running on ARM. AFAIK Arch doesn't have an (official) ARM port. You can try Arch Mobile though
This command fails me
Code:
_ mount -o loop,noatime $kit/debian.img $mnt
The error I get is no device or file exists.
Tried creating more number of loop devises too. Still it didn't work. I am using cyanogemmod 2.3.3 ROM.
onehomelist said:
This command fails me
Code:
_ mount -o loop,noatime $kit/debian.img $mnt
The error I get is no device or file exists.
Tried creating more number of loop devises too. Still it didn't work. I am using cyanogemmod 2.3.3 ROM.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What is the exact wording of the error?
The exact error that I get:
Code:
# busybox mknod /dev/loop0 b 7 0
# busybox mount -o loop,noatime $kit/debian.img $mnt
mount: can't setup loop device: No such file or directory
Instead of using $kit/debian.img, try manually pointing to the debian image.
For example, if you have it on the sdcard's debian folder:
Code:
/sdcard/debian/debian.img
That too didn't work.
make sure that debian image is where it should be. Also try to "ls /dev/" and look for loop0 - i had some problems with loop devices on mik's 2.3, but I did not really solved it, because I went back to froyo after while.
The loop0 device exists is /dev. As you have experienced same issue on the same ROM, I am convinced that its a ROM issue.
I just tried to install xorg, xfce4 & tightvncserver - everything work just fine, although its kinda slow
ext partition instead of loop filesystem
Tasssadar said:
I just tried to install xorg, xfce4 & tightvncserver - everything work just fine, although its kinda slow
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think it runs faster from a sdcard partition than a loop filesystem, if I remember right. I tested a loop-mounted preconstructed debian img from some tutorial for another device before debootstrapping my own.
partition your card with a second partition, ext2 if you're worried about journalling wearing out your sd, or ext4 if you're more worried about corrupting your precious debian filesystem in a crash or unclean umount. gparted in ubuntu seemed to work well for me.
resize your ntfs partition instead of deleting it or android may complain.
with your debian img mounted as a loop filesystem on a linux box at the same time as your new partition, you can copy everything from the img to the ext partition by:
Code:
cp -av /path/to/loopmountedimg/* /path/to/extpartition
if you replace the loop-mounting code in your boot script with a vold mount of your ext partition, android is supposed to umount the partition cleanly on powerdown or reboot.
on my optimus v, the mount looks like the following in my boot script (I'm posting the comments too for info)
# mount 2nd sdcard partition from vold, should prevent dirty unmount at reboot
# if your linux is on a different partition than 2, substitute that number for the 2 in .../vold/179:2 below
# first unmount it; if not already mounted, system will echo 'umount: can't forcibly umount /dev/block/vold/179:2: Invalid argument' but this isn't an error to worry about
Code:
umount -l /dev/block/vold/179:2
mount -o noatime,exec,suid /dev/block/vold/179:2 /$mnt
maybe someone here can use this info.
also, for anyone who wants to save some hours and bandwidth, I have a basic squeeze debootstrap uploaded to 4shared.
it shouldn't be missing any of the readme's or licensing docs, so it should be GPL ok AFAIK.
resolv.conf and sources.list are already configured for 3g access and the main Debian repository, so it's pretty much plug-n-play.
no extra packages. you'll need to apt-get tightvncserver and a window manager unless you just want the bash shell.
the first time you chroot in, you should use passwd to set a root password, and adduser to get a non-root account on there.
the only glitch is that I accidentally tar'd it into a compressed folder; so you can't just untar it into the ext partition, it needs unpacked with an archive manager. sorry!
here is the filesystem image
uncompressed, 9645 items, totalling 264.3 MB
compressed, 116.3 MB (121929580 Bytes)
Tried to put it on ext2 partition without image, its a bit faster but still very slow.
But i took some screenshots this time. You can see flash (well, gnash) player on optimus one working on last screenshot
And I have one question: is debian using its own libc or android's bionic?
Tasssadar said:
Tried to put it on ext2 partition without image, its a bit faster but still very slow.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
guess I'm biased, first linux I used was on a 100MHz pentium 1, so this handheld flies by comparison.
But i took some screenshots this time. You can see flash (well, gnash) player on optimus one working on last screenshot
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I could only get gnash to play ads. boo. froze up iceweasel every time I tried to open a flash video. what browser are you using? oh, man, it's iceweasel, isn't it?? also, chromium just refused to start on my optimus.
And I have one question: is debian using its own libc or android's bionic?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
pretty sure it's standard debian libc. you could integrate the android toolchain if you were so motivated, probably.
bigsupersquid said:
I could only get gnash to play ads. boo. froze up iceweasel every time I tried to open a flash video. what browser are you using? oh, man, it's iceweasel, isn't it?? also, chromium just refused to start on my optimus.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Chromium does not work for me, too.
Well, it froze for me too, but after while it at least got to show what you see on the screenshot
bigsupersquid said:
pretty sure it's standard debian libc. you could integrate the android toolchain if you were so motivated, probably.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was just thinking if this is possible, then normal android aplication could have libc included, if its needed.
Do you know MaNGOS? It is open-source server for World of Warcraft (for more info go to http://getmangos.com/). I just compiled it and I run it on my optimus one. And guess what - without world db, its really fast! I am extracting UDB to database right now, I will post some screenshots and results with full-featured db soon.
And thats why I love linux and android
I got no words to describe my eyes when reading that at the moment.
So, what you might wanna know if you wanna try it too:
All packages needed for mangos to compile are working good, except for mysql server: you need to set "user = root" in my.cnf - it is located in /etc/mysql/ - because you cant put any root rights to any other user than root, so mysql user cant create tcp socket.
You will most likely need swap file - optimus has plenty of RAM, but yet not enough. All you need is to compile kernel with CONFIG_SWAP=y and follow this tutorial: http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/linux-add-a-swap-file-howto/. 512mb swap is enough. Just for the record, swap is working on optimus one, I think nobody tried it here yet.
Now as for the compilation of mangos, it is mostly working as it is, only problems are intel tbb library and g3dlite library.
TBB is not available for arm yet, so you need to compile without it. Use -DUSE_STD_MALLOC=0 in cmake line.
As for the g3dlite, things are little bit more tricky - you need it, and there are some asm() instructions in it, which are different for arm. I only commented them, because I dont know assembler: https://github.com/Tasssadar/mangos-arm/commit/67c442fa0c10e82b282b83a8fe485588f8786e12
I have no idea how it can even work without all that code in g3dlite, but it just does.
You can use scriptdev2 from its git, theres no problem in it.
Thats all, after that just "make" and get something good to read, because it will take really long. At least 5 hours for compilation and nearly hour and a half for linking of scriptdev2 and mangosd binary.
Creating of databases is just like on normal pc, so I just skip it...same goes for dbc files, maps and vmaps.
Loading of mangos takes around 4 minutes with full-featured db. mangos then takes around 180mb of ram and cpu usage is...surprisingly low, considering the fact that our cpu does not have hw float operations. I tried to clear Azjol Nerub instance (well, solo with gm character) and maximal cpu usage was 60%, when fighting a boss with lots of spawns. I could imagine some 5-man dungeon run would be just fine
Also, you will get slight lag when moving into new location, when phone loads map files from sdcard.
Thats all, see screenshots

[Q] Anyone have Linux/Ubuntu/Fedora Working Currently On GB?

Problem:
I've worked with every available distribution of Linux, trying to get the damn thing working on my phone. Troubleshooting the ***t out of it, and no deal. Constant errors/files not found etc. So, rather than post my logs and ask for help troubleshooting them (as I've obviously been unable to do), I thought I'd just ask:
Does anybody have a Linux build (besides android!) working on their phone that's running Gingerbread or ICS? If yes, can you post your software specs?
Here are mine currently:
Busybox- v1.19.3-Stericson in /system/xbin
Firmware Version- 2.3.5
Baseband Version- T959VUVKG6
Kernel- 2.6.35.7-T959VUVKI3-CL611444
Build Number- Gingerbread.VUVKI3
Mod Version- Octaine Team Acid
Thanks, this has been a pain in my **s for too long now!
S
I had both Fedora and Ubuntu working on Froyo at one point through lots of modifying and editing of the scripts.
What do you need them for anyway? I think it's more of a hassle to set them up than it's worth.
Well, I am working quite a bit now with linux for servers and such, and it's good to have a system (even minimal) that I can use/reference, plus it helps me get better at it.
Get this: I was so frustrated that I went back to BlackIce (keeping my gb bootloaders) and the damn thing loads right up, ubuntu 11.04, no problem. So, I then loaded up Valhalla's GB build and, sure enough, that works too. So, going with my luck I load octane 2.x GB which i've been digging of late and no deal, ubuntu just won't load.
Now, trying the same trick I cannot get it to work. It just won't load now when I SH it. Here's the instructions that worked before (and I've tried them all!):
http://www.nerd65536.com/2011/07/installing-ubuntu-in-android-version-2.html
Also, I hard bricked again (corrupted bootloaders from a Parallels Windows stallout) but did Adam's UnBrickable Mod and that's all better. Everybody needs to check it out, it's awesome:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1333424
So FBI, any idea why linux is so temperamental? Once it SH's properly, it always works.
(Thanks to all the developers for their great roms!)
Yeah I noticed that slight changes from different ROMs based on the same kernel base had that effect too. I'm thinking it had to do something with the busybox installations since I had to edit the script sometimes. For some reason on some installs running mount won't work unless you use it as busybox mount. It was very iffy like that. I haven't even tried it again because of how frustrating it is to get even a boot. The other thing is that if you try to do a shutdown from ubutu/fedora it doesn't even kill the processes all the way so the only way you can clear some ram up with with a reboot.
Yeah man, I was figuring Busybox myself. I've tried old installs, new installs, xbin only, bin only, xbin & bin, etc. It's so frustrating because I can't figure it out. When it was working it was great, pretty stable.
So the first problem always lists as:
Remounting /system rw...
Mount: no such file or directory
Usage: mount [-r] [-w] etc, etc
So does this tell us that the system is not mounted rw? I used the Mount/system r/w application, but I cannot verify it's doing it's job. Everything is rooted properly, CWM also.
In Terminal on the phone I ran:
"mount | grep system"
which gave me
"/dev/block/st19 on /system type ext4 (rw,relatime,barrier=0,data=writeback)"
which leads me to believe the system is r/w.
I'm converting the system back from ext4 using CWM Voodoo to disable Lagfix and system Lagfix to see if this has any effect. Will report.
No deal. Didn't do a damn thing. I'm going to crack this if it's the last thing I do....
I'm using Better Terminal Pro, Bash shell, and under command line in options it lists the Shell as: /system/bin/sh-
The sh install.sh also tells me:
"Mounting: Loopback mount
mknod: /dev/block/loop254: File exists"
Does this mean that all (255) of my loops are used? Do I need to remove programs?
The available loop device thing never got resolved. Nameless originally fixed it by making it use 254 so that there was a low chance of the loop device being available, but the phone's OS is very iffy about letting a new loop device get assigned to a system image file. Can't really help you out since I never got it to consistently mount with different roms.
Linux on SGS4G Working! Done and Done!
Figured it out.
I can get Ubuntu 11.04, 11.10 & Debian 6 to mount repeatedly in all sorts of ui updatable configurations using this information:
http://www.nerd65536.com/2011/07/installing-ubuntu-in-android-version-2.html
It's a friggin Christmas Miracle! Can't tell you how much time I've wasted working this out, and it all boils down to the sh and run scripts.
So, without further ado, here goes.
!!Make sure you're rooted!!
!!The quotes just tell you what to type. Don't type them!!
1.
Download one of the three builds on the website listed above (or build your own, it should work fine). Extract it from tar.bz2, they should all extract to a linux file, this includes the necessary scripts. Put it on the sd-card on your phone.
2.
Download the new scripts that (Nerd) listed found here: http://ohm.nerd65536.com/android-linux/scripts-latest.tar.bz2
And extract them. You'll have another file that says linux. Open it, take the three files inside (install.sh, root-scripts & scripts) and paste them in the linux folder you moved to your sd-card. They will overwrite the ones currently there. These scripts work for sgs4g, the originals did not.
3.
Install the latest BusyBox in xbin if it's not already installed (must be rooted). Latest is 1.19.3
4.
Download a terminal client, like Better Terminal Emulator or Android Terminal Emulator. I use the first. The terminal needs to run the commands as root, especially the linux vnc command as it didn't want to work for me no matter if I started by typing su. Better Terminal Emulator has a check box to always start in root.
5.
Open up your terminal emulator and type su if you are not rooted there. Then change directory to the linux file on the sd-card. run the sh file there.
Like this:
"su"
"cd /sdcard/linux"
"sh install.sh"
If it works, the resulting dialog in terminal won't throw up any problems.
6.
Get back to / on sd by typing in terminal:
"cd /"
You should then have a: / # prompt, which means you are still rooted.
Enter:
"linux"
Which should result in a: [email protected]:/#
This means Linux is running. Congratulations. It should continue to run unless you shut down your phone.
7.
Download a VNC client, like Android VNC Viewer (free) or Remote VNC Pro, which I use. Add a new entry in it, with the following settings:
Host: localhost
Port: 5901
Password: cheesecake
Color: 24-bit
Name: Linux
When that's done save if you can or back out if you can't, and go back to your terminal emulator.
8.
It should still say: [email protected]:/#
If it doesn't, fine, if it does, just go back to root prompt by typing:
"exit"
Which should get you: / #. Then type:
"linux vnc"
Which should run itself and mount the chroot environment. It should tell you your new 'X' desktop is localhost:1, and have a: / # prompt again.
It might also ask you for a password, if so then put whatever password you'll remember in that's longer than 6 characters and verify it. This only happens once.
9.
Go back to your VNC client and if you entered a password in step 8. then edit your listing to your password instead of cheesecake, if not then don't.
Click on the Linux link and BAM! (shameless Emerilism), you're at your Linux desktop which should be running a iceWM desktop interface, which is fast. The LXDE desktop is nicer and if you want that then go into you're terminal and get into the linux shell by typing:
"linux"
And then switch to LXDE by typing:
"apt-get autoremove icewm- lxde+"
Which will run through the removal/ installation, and verify you want to download the <400mb files. Type:
"y"
And give it time to finish. When finished, just go back to your VNC client and hit Linux again, and you will have a nice looking functional desktop, with a cpu load graph on the bottom. I tried using Gnome desktop and Unity 2d, but both of these would install and not fully run with all options. They are heavier and slower, but cool non-the-less. Let me know if anyone has luck with these on Android.
Notes-
You only have to type "linux vnc" once in terminal to start linux every time you boot your phone. Otherwise, just open your VNC client and click on Linux to use it. Easy!
You will want to update and upgrade your linux after install, do so by typing in terminal:
"apt-get update"
"apt-get upgrade"
Also, you might run across a problem if you try to add-apt-repository, that's because that python command is not present. To use it, enable by typing:
"apt-get install python-software-properties"
Also of note, the downloadable linux builds are sized to about 2.15gig on your sd, which is big enough for most. There is a way to resize them which I tried but it gave me trouble in loading. I will try again and see if I can get it to work.
Here's the link from Dangermouse:
http://www.androidfanatic.com/community-forums.html?func=view&catid=9&id=1610
Thanks to Nerd65536 for the info, write-up and files. He fixed my problem.
sconsylman said:
Also of note, the downloadable linux builds are sized to about 2.15gig on your sd, which is big enough for most. There is a way to resize them which I tried but it gave me trouble in loading. I will try again and see if I can get it to work.
Here's the link from Dangermouse:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're welcome.
It's actually a lot easier than that to make the image larger. Just pop the SD card into a Linux machine and:
(Assuming the original file is: /media/phone/linux/linux.img)
Code:
resize2fs /media/phone/linux/linux.img 4095M
And you're done. resize2fs is made of magic!
Note: Most SD cards are FAT32, which has a filesize limit of 4GiB. The above instructions will make the file a megabyte less than that.
nerd65536:
Thanks! Worked like a charm. Had to e2fsck -f /media/SDCARD/linux/linux.img (phone plugged in to Mint) before i did it to check over the file system, but then it ran immediately. Much appreciated.
Have you had any luck on native boot? I've been working a little on this, as I can't run BackTrack arm well virtually, it gets buggy. Granted the telephony systems won't work during, but the functionality should be pretty good if we could run it standard.
Also, while I'm thinking of it, is it possible to run the img from an ext4 partition on the card? I have an existing one being used for link2sd files and would much prefer using it as it's a far superior file system to fat32, without the 4G limits. Vnc should have no problem graphically, but would the linux.img chroot properly?
It would probably work but you would have to alter the script to mount the other partition if it doesn't do it automatically and change the path. Shouldn't be too hard.
I'm getting an error when I try running sh install.sh:
Code:
# sh install.sh
readlink: applet not found
Remounting /system rw ...
sh: Can't open /linux/scripts/fsrw
Installing scripts in /system/bin ...
cd: can't cd to /linux/scripts
cp: write error: No space left on device
cp: omitting directory 'root-scripts'
Unable to chmod /system/bin/root-scripts: No such file or directory
cp: omitting directory 'scripts'
Unable to chmod /system/bin/scripts: No such file or directory
cp: omitting directory 'tmp'
Unable to chmod /system/bin/tmp: No such file or directory
Mounting the Linux image ...
install.sh: /system/bin/linux: not found
Customizing the image ...
install.sh: cannot create /data/local/mnt/etc/resolv.conf: directory nonexistent
install.sh: cannot create /data/local/mnt/etc/resolv.conf: directory nonexistent
Installing root-scripts ...
mkdir failed for /data/local/mnt/root/scripts, No such file or directory
Unable to chmod /data/local/mnt/root/scripts: No such file or directory
cp: can't stat '/linux/root-scripts/*': No such file or directory
Unable to chmod /data/local/mnt/root/scripts/*: No such file or directory
Install finished
# linux
linux: not found
NuVanDibe said:
I'm getting an error when I try running sh install.sh:
Code:
# sh install.sh
readlink: applet not found
Remounting /system rw ...
sh: Can't open /linux/scripts/fsrw
Installing scripts in /system/bin ...
cd: can't cd to /linux/scripts
cp: write error: No space left on device
cp: omitting directory 'root-scripts'
Unable to chmod /system/bin/root-scripts: No such file or directory
cp: omitting directory 'scripts'
Unable to chmod /system/bin/scripts: No such file or directory
cp: omitting directory 'tmp'
Unable to chmod /system/bin/tmp: No such file or directory
Mounting the Linux image ...
install.sh: /system/bin/linux: not found
Customizing the image ...
install.sh: cannot create /data/local/mnt/etc/resolv.conf: directory nonexistent
install.sh: cannot create /data/local/mnt/etc/resolv.conf: directory nonexistent
Installing root-scripts ...
mkdir failed for /data/local/mnt/root/scripts, No such file or directory
Unable to chmod /data/local/mnt/root/scripts: No such file or directory
cp: can't stat '/linux/root-scripts/*': No such file or directory
Unable to chmod /data/local/mnt/root/scripts/*: No such file or directory
Install finished
# linux
linux: not found
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
cp: write-error.. no space left on device? You need more space dude

[GUIDE] Creating and using filesystem images on Android

Hey all, This is my first post on the forum, so I thought I'd make it a guide.
I've run into a few roadblocks with installing some development tools like python and stuff, so I figured I'd try and make a filesystem image to hold all of it, what with Android preventing executables on your SD card from actually executing. You should NOT try and use this for freeing up space by moving apps to it. That just breaks things.
Things to know
A mount point is where you access the contents of a filesystem through.
A filesystem is basically a virtual disk.
I'm not responsible for your phone melting into a pool of acid or anything else you want to blame me for. You executed the commands, not me.
If there's been guides for this already, I didn't find them.
Playing with your system files is dangerous. Be careful
Playing with filesystems is even MORE dangerous. Don't do it unless you know what's going on.
Reversing and then combining two words in a sentence, then calling it a bit more dangerous is incredibly dangerous and can kill you. Don't do it.
As I said earlier: This is not intended to free up internal storage on your phone. It is intended to create extra space to put command-line executables.
This was created for those of us who have older phones that don't have a whole lot of internal storage. (Like the Milestone) This should also work on anything that meets the requirements listed below. I use it on a Motorola Milestone A853 running CyanogenMod 7.2.4f UMTS/SHOLES, and it took some tweaking, but it worked. Commands you put into your shell are marked with `bolded text and surrounded by back-ticks. Leave the back-ticks out. (`)`
Requirements! (obtained using `which <command name>` or a specified command)
Free space on your mSD
losetup (configuring loop devices)
mknod (creating loop devices)
mount (mounting filesystems)
mkdir (making directories)
su (root access)
umount (unmounting)
mke2fs (formatting)
Linux filesystem support (`cat /proc/filesystems | grep ext`)
Here we go!
This assumes you are going to use an ext4-formatted filesystem image mounted on /data/development/, with the image located at /mnt/sdcard/development.img. You WILL need to determine your phone's supported ext<num> filesystems using `cat /proc/filesystems | grep ext`. Choose the highest-numbered one.
Create the mountpoint, the image, and then format the image to ext4.
`mkdir /data/development/`​`dd if=/dev/zero of=/mnt/sdcard/development.img count=409600 bs=1024`​`mke2fs -l /mnt/sdcard/development.img -b 1024 -t ext4`​
Create the block device, set it to point at the image, then mount it.
`mknod /dev/block/loop250 b 7 250`​`losetup /dev/block/loop250 /mnt/sdcard/development.img`​`mount -t ext4 /dev/block/loop250 /data/development`​
Test it to see if it works.
`touch /data/development/testfile;ls /data/development/`​
Use it.
Unmounting (/!\ For connecting to a computer to avoid corruption /!\)
`umount /mnt/sdcard/development.img`​`losetup -d /dev/block/loop250`​
Well, that's all I've got. Suggestions and corrections, as well as good feedback are appreciated.
Some PAQs (Possibly Asked Questions)
Q: I'm getting some errors. Here they are: pastebin.com/some-errors
A: Great, I'll see what I did wrong, and if it's something on your end, I'll try and help you out.
Q: It dun werk
A: Tell me the errors instead of complaining about them. Just saying that does not help me and wastes my time and bandwidth.
Q: "No space left on device"; "Operation not permitted"; "No such file or directory"
A: SD card full; not root (or SD card is full, or something broke); Mount point doesn't exist or (if 'mount' returns that and the point exists) something not cool happened.
Usage guide on Non-Android devices
Some interesting bits of information for use on computers:
There's probably not an easy way to read/write/mount EXT2 filesystems on a Windows machine, so if you have a solution that's stable, go for it.
Linux computers definitely should support this, and I'm not sure about OSX computers, but in theory would work if you had the right things installed. iPhones ... well I have no idea what you'd do with it there.
Linux:
On the device:
THIS PART IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT, NOT DOING THIS WILL RESULT IN BROKEN FILESYSTEMS!
`umount /mnt/sdcard/development.img`
`losetup -d /dev/block/loop250`​Plug your phone into your computer, making sure that the computer mounts it and reads it as removable media, and that the image is present.
On the computer: (Path of your user folder, and the mount point at which your device's SD is mounted can and very likely will vary from distribution to distribution. Check your paths.)
`mkdir /home/user/android-devtools/`
`mount -o loop /media/user/android-sd/development.img /home/user/android-devtools/`​Now, you can change things within the image as you normally would a file or folder. Be warned, sometimes doing this can create conflicts in the file permissions, so running the right commands on the phone to change the permissions as root (use `chmod` for the permissions) can save you boatloads of trouble getting things to work, or editing files.
Mac OSX might or might not be the same, but seeing as I haven't picked up an Apple computer since maybe 5 years ago, let alone attempted filesystem management, I just don't know.

[GUIDE]Cross Compiling C/C++ for ARM on Linux

I wrote this guide to make it easy for everyone to be able to cross compile c/c++ for android, the easy way that I know. I admit, I am a total n00b to c/c++. I started learning to cross compile when I got my new nexus 9 for christmas. I, for some reason, couldnt get busybox installed on it. So, I had to manually compile and load it on there. After reading a hundred tutorials and none of them working, I got frustrated. Finally, I compiled a working version. And it was SO EASY. Anyway, Im specifically giving instructions for Ubuntu 14.04/14.10. First thing you need to do is download a package called binutils-arm-linux-gnueabi.
- sudo apt-get install binutils-arm-linux-gnueabi
- sudo apt-get install binutils-aarch64-linux-gnu (for aarch64, or arm 64bit, or armv8)
- sudo apt-get install binutils-arm-linux-gnueabihf (for armhf)
To compile busybox for your platform, you must download the source package you want to compile from http://busybox.net/downloads/. Then extract it
- tar xvf busybox.tar.gz
Then, cd into your root busybox folder.
- export ARCH=arm
- export CROSS_COMPILE=arm-linux-gnueabi- (dont forget the trailing dash(-))
This will setup your variables for compilation. Then
- make menuconfig (if you dont get a config menu, you need to "sudo apt-get install libncurses5-dev")
Now, go into the busybox settings -> Build options. Select the option "build busybox as static executable". You can select/deselect options by hitting the space bar. [ESC] key will take you back. Make sure to save your new configuration. Its almost time to compile! One last thing. If you want to add your name to it, go into the Makefile in the root busybox folder. At the top of the file, where it says EXTRAVERSION = .git, you can add something like -bynarie or whatever you want. That way when you run busybox on the terminal emulator on android, it will print out something like "BusyBox v1.24.0-bynarie". OK! Time to compile. Really simple:
- make install
This will compile every applet, and put everything in a folder called _Install. You will have busybox and busybox_unstripped in the root directory. Please, be aware that this busybox puts an applet named "su" in the bin folder in the _install folder. So, DO NOT COPY THE SU APPLET INTO YOUR ANDROID BIN FOLDER, OR YOU WILL LOSE ROOT!!! Now, to verify it compiled to the right architecture, do "file busybox" at the term and it should spit out something like "ELF 32bit ARM executable". If this is the case, congrats. We have successfully compiled busybox for android arm!! Copy the needed files over to your device and set permissions and you are done. The suggested way to move the busybox binary to your device is as follows:
- adb push busybox /data/local/tmp/busybox
- open adb shell and do "chmod 755 /data/local/tmp/busybox" or chmod it on your linux box before pushing.
- open file manager on device and move busybox to /system/xbin
- If properly done, should work.
For other nix programs like tar, the procedure is as follows:
- Open term, cd into root source folder
- ./configure CC="arm-linux-gnueabi-gcc" CPP="arm-linux-gnueabi-cpp" --host=arm-linux-gnueabi
- make
The CC variable is your C compiler command and the CPP variable is the C preprocessor, if you need to add a C++ compiler just add CXX="arm-linux-gnueabi-g++" but TAR is specifically C only. You can add all three variables I would assume to be safe. Most of the time, the readme or install documents will give you some guidance on cross compiling. But, this is how I successfully compiled TAR for arm and aarch64.
If you want to compile small/single source file c/c++, you will be using the same tools, but in a different way. Cd into your source file directory, and depending on which type of source it is (c or cpp), you will do the following:
- arm-linux-gnueabi-gcc helloWorld.c -static -o helloworld.out (for C)
- arm-linux-gnueabi-g++ helloWorld.cpp -static -o helloworld.out (C++)
Yep, its that easy. I cant guarantee 100% this will work on everything, but its a good starting point. And you dont even have to fool with the Android NDK. I find that the android ndk would mostly benefit "Apps" that need to integrate c/c++ code into them, not little console apps run from the terminal emulator. I hope someone finds this guide useful and if anyone has any problems trying to get somethin to work, you can respond and I will do my best to help.
thanks

Categories

Resources