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[DEV] Lenovo Ideapad A1 Kernel Development/Testing

Warning/disclaimer: This thread is intended for those who already know how to compile a kernel and have a working knowledge of Linux and its derivatives. There shouldn't be a great deal of risk involved, but you are responsible for what happens if you decide to follow these instructions.
Polite request: Please don't post replies to this thread that aren't of a technical nature directly related to compiling, modifying, or testing the kernel.
Introduction:
It appears as if Lenovo have released a buildable and bootable kernel source. I've done some preliminary testing with it. However, it would be better if we could get lots of people building and running the kernel, so that we can spot any remaining problems. This is also an opportunity to start hacking it to add/fix features such as USB OTG, etc.
Kernel source:
Get it from the Github repository at: https://github.com/gmarkall/lenovo_a1_07_kernel
Toolchain:
The Makefile seems to suggest that Codesourcery 2010q1 has been used by Lenovo to compile the kernel. Get it from https://sourcery.mentor.com/sgpp/lite/arm/portal/release1293, and make sure that the arm-none-linux-gnueabi-* binaries are on your path.
Building the source:
You may wish to edit the Makefile around line 192 to set CROSS_COMPILE=arm-none-linux-gnueabi- instead of the hardcoded path that is the default.
Then, to build the kernel:
Code:
make distclean
make a1_07_defconfig
make uImage
Booting the kernel
Normally, Android devices have two boot images that consist of a kernel and a ramdisk. One boot image is for the recovery, and the other is for the Android system. This makes it safe to flash a new boot image containing an untested kernel for the Android system, since the recovery can always boot up using the other boot image. However, the A1, by some bad design decision, only has one kernel - the bootloader always loads the same kernel, and just loads a different ramdisk depending whether it is to boot into recovery or system. As a result, it is not safe to flash a kernel to your A1 unless it's already been tested, since a bad kernel will make it impossible to boot from the internal memory, and you'll need a bootable SD card.
The solution to this problem is to make a bootable SD card for loading the kernel and ramdisk from. A bootable SD card consists of two partitions:
* A small bootable VFAT partition, that holds the X-Loader (MLO), U-Boot (u-boot.bin) and the kernel (uImage).
* An ext2 partition that holds the root filesystem.
In order to create a bootable SD card, use the omap3-mkcard.sh script that is attached below. To invoke it for making /dev/mmcblk0 a bootable SD card:
Code:
sudo omap3-mkcard.sh /dev/mmcblk0
You may need to hack the script if your SD card device isn't a /dev/mmcblk* one, since the script searches for partitions denoted "p1" and "p2" - this may need changing to just "1" and "2" respectively (thanks Xbdesign and Brancaleone for this).
This will create the necessary partitions, set the bootable flag, and format them. You will then need to mount the first partition (e.g. /dev/mmcblk0p1), and copy MLO and u-boot.bin to it (also linked below). Then, copy the uImage that you built from your kernel tree, which will be located in /arch/arm/boot. You can now unmount this partition.
Next, mount the second partition (e.g. /dev/mmcblk0p2). This will need to contain the same set of files that the initial ramdisk contains. There are two different ramdisks that you might want to use - one is from the Cyanogenmod 7 build, and the other one is from the stock system. Download links for these are also below. To extract the ramdisk, copy it onto the SD card second partition, then run the following commands (assuming the ramdisk is called ramdisk.ub):
Code:
dd if=ramdisk.ub of=ramdisk.img.gz bs=64 skip=1 # Strip off the U-Boot header
gunzip ramdisk.img.gz # Unzip
sudo cpio -idmv < ramdisk.img # Extract the cpio archive
Then, unmount the second partition of the SD card.
You should now be able to remove the SD card and insert it into your A1. Power down the A1 and power up again, and it should hopefully boot from the SD card and load your kernel. If it's booted from the SD card and loaded your kernel, you should be able to see that it was compiled on your host by looking in Settings -> About Phone -> Kernel Version.
Troubleshooting:
This is not a comprehensive guide, just a few pointers to where a problem might be - please post replies to the thread to get troubleshooting suggestions.
System boots up, but is not running my kernel - it didn't boot from the SD card. If the A1 is plugged into the charger/USB, you sometimes need to reboot multiple times before it boots off the SD card (I think it doesn't always turn off fully when the charger is plugged in).
The static Lenovo logo flashes up over and over again - it's booted from the SD card, but didn't manage to load your kernel
The static Lenovo logo comes up and stays there/goes to a black screen - it's probably loaded your kernel and mounted the root file system, but failed to mount /system. Try running adb shell to see what happens. If you get something like
Code:
/system/bin/sh: no such file or directory
then your kernel is running but /system isn't mounted.
IRC Channel
Join #ideapad-a1 on irc.freenode.net to discuss the kernel and other A1 development-related topics!
Download Links:
MLO
u-boot.bin
omap3-mkcard.sh
Ramdisk for Cyanogenmod 7
Ramdisk for ROW 2643 stock release
I've added the two ramdisks that I suspect will be most common - if you need another ramdisk, you'll have to extract it from an OTA.

Also, I compiled a tun.ko - www.doc.ic.ac.uk/~grm08/ideapad/tun.ko
Here's a cifs.ko - http://www.doc.ic.ac.uk/~grm08/ideapad/cifs.ko
EDIT: AutobahnA1 and infraredevans have confirmed that tun.ko works on ROW_2643.
EDIT 2/3: Please test out cifs.ko! (It doesn't work - it needs slow-work.ko. Will get that done when I can. Thanks to Ilikecokethree on the Lenovo forums for pointing that one out).

你懂中文吗，大神！
我是中国人 关注你的帖子很久了，我不懂英文，用翻译软件看的大概，我们这里很多人支持你，都在用你的rom 很棒！比联想官方的好多了，谢谢！

I think I did exactly the steps as you told, but it still boots the original kernel, may something be wrong? Thank you very much.
PS: I'm a chinese too, and my English is not good either

gmarkall said:
This is also an opportunity to start hacking it to add/fix features such as USB OTG, etc.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Please do not forget to try the WiFi-based geolocation, which is also missing!
I wish I had the knowledge to work on it myself but I am far from taking over such tasks...do not have the slightest idea about how these things work.
Good luck and please keep us informed!

geoponer said:
Please do not forget to try the WiFi-based geolocation, which is also missing!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Geolocation bug has nothing to do with kenerl. It's a missing entry in framework-res.apk in ROM from Lenovo
see : forums.lenovo.com/t5/IdeaPad-Slate-Tablets/A1-Geocode-Bug-in-Firmware-Solution/td-p/709701

betabox said:
Geolocation bug has nothing to do with kenerl. It's a missing entry in framework-res.apk in ROM from Lenovo
see : forums.lenovo.com/t5/IdeaPad-Slate-Tablets/A1-Geocode-Bug-in-Firmware-Solution/td-p/709701
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Also, it's working in CM7.

hohoxu_hao115 said:
I think I did exactly the steps as you told, but it still boots the original kernel, may something be wrong?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sounds like it's booting from eMMC instead.
Can you post the partition table of the SD card as listed by fdisk, and also a directory listing of each of the two partitions? I ask this to confirm what's happened - seems like you're the first person to follow these instructions, and it's quite possible I made a mistake somewhere.

betabox said:
Geolocation bug has nothing to do with kenerl. It's a missing entry in framework-res.apk in ROM from Lenovo
see : forums.lenovo.com/t5/IdeaPad-Slate-Tablets/A1-Geocode-Bug-in-Firmware-Solution/td-p/709701
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Apologies for the off-topic, but I think that we are discussing two different things here: I am referring to the Geolocation bug, which prevents me from e.g. checking in with Foursquare by using only WiFi location information (active GPS signal is needed) while you have solved the Geocoding bug, which has nothing to do with the Geolocation one...
Please correct me if I am wrong.
@Graham: I plan to install the CM7 that you have been working on (with the feedback from other users - I keep an eye on that thread!) but since I use my A1 for professional purposes as well, I would like to make sure that everything is working fine before moving to CM7. Apologies for not being able to contribute to the beta testing of CM7 but I am really looking forward to seeing a version based on the source code provided by Lenovo, which I think will lead to a more stable version of your CM7. I cannot thank you enough for taking the time to work on this, really!

geoponer said:
Apologies for the off-topic, but I think that we are discussing two different things here: I am referring to the Geolocation bug, which prevents me from e.g. checking in with Foursquare by using only WiFi location information (active GPS signal is needed) while you have solved the Geocoding bug, which has nothing to do with the Geolocation one...
Please correct me if I am wrong.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think that whether it works in CM7 or not, it almost certainly isn't a kernel issue. I'll test it by signing up for Foursquare and give it a try out on CM7 to see if it works later on. Will post my findings in the CM7 thread.

Hi Graham,
just gonna pile up several questions/thinkings and feel free to comment them the or answer on your liking
We do have few hickups on CM7 but I am more excited about idea of having proper recovery then ironing current CM rom that works more than satisfactory right now. Do we have enough code (I assume that target here is u-boot) on our hands that someone can implement necessary changes to internal partitions and boot procedures?
what is your opinion on replacement of u-boot with something else? for example LK loader or to be more precise with its current HD2 implementation known as cLK. it allready has some neat features like HBOOT like GUI, ability to change partition sizes on device itself (without computer), ability to boot from different partitions (would be nice to have android and ubuntu side by side loaded on our devices) and last but not least it has fastboot support enabled...or is it better way fill up u-boot with desired features if possible?
so...just my wishful thinking...not enough knowledge on my side to do anything regarding all this just hoping that some of you, more capable guys gets interested in this

dusko_m said:
Hi Graham,
just gonna pile up several questions/thinkings and feel free to comment them the or answer on your liking
We do have few hickups on CM7 but I am more excited about idea of having proper recovery then ironing current CM rom that works more than satisfactory right now. Do we have enough code (I assume that target here is u-boot) on our hands that someone can implement necessary changes to internal partitions and boot procedures?
what is your opinion on replacement of u-boot with something else? for example LK loader or to be more precise with its current HD2 implementation known as cLK. it allready has some neat features like HBOOT like GUI, ability to change partition sizes on device itself (without computer), ability to boot from different partitions (would be nice to have android and ubuntu side by side loaded on our devices) and last but not least it has fastboot support enabled...or is it better way fill up u-boot with desired features if possible?
so...just my wishful thinking...not enough knowledge on my side to do anything regarding all this just hoping that some of you, more capable guys gets interested in this
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I do want to implement something that's pretty much as you describe. My biggest motivation is that it's currently not safe to flash a kernel since you can break both system and recovery that way in one go - I really want to make the boot process more robust.

gmarkall said:
Also, I compiled a tun.ko - tun.ko
I haven't tested it yet - is anyone able to try it please?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The module loaded without a problem on my 2643_ROW Kernel. Installed "Rooted AnyConnect" from the "Play Place". Now I can connect to my company VPN.
gmarkall: YOU ROCK! THANK YOU!!!

tun.ko
Graham
The tun.ko module works perfectly with openvpn on 2643_ROW.
I can now access my Amahi home server,awsome.
Thanks a lot you are doing a great job.
Dont want to sound presumptuous but any chance of a cifs.ko to go with it .
Cheers

Infraredevans said:
Dont want to sound presumptuous but any chance of a cifs.ko to go with it .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll give it a whirl... give me a few minutes.

gmarkall said:
I'll give it a whirl... give me a few minutes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Here it is: http://www.doc.ic.ac.uk/~grm08/ideapad/cifs.ko
To compile it I had to copy md5.h from another kernel source to fs/cifs in the kernel tree. I also had to edit init/Kconfig so that CONFIG_SLOW_WORK defaulted to yes. I configured the module with the options:
Support Legacy LANMAN servers which use weaker security
CIFS Extended attributes
CIFS POSIX attributes
and without statistics, debugging, or experimental features. Let me know if this is a suitable config - I could always tweak it and build another one.

arm-2010q1-202-arm-none-linux-gnueabi.bin
Did someone manage to install arm-2010q1-202-arm-none-linux-gnueabi.bin on 64bit system?

xbdesign said:
Did someone manage to install arm-2010q1-202-arm-none-linux-gnueabi.bin on 64bit system?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did - I didn't have any problems, but my random guess about how to solve it could be to install ia32-libs. If installing that doesn't solve it, can you post a bit more detail about the problem?

I am using ubuntu 10.04 LTS and just cant install / find Getlibs to install a 32-bit version of xulrunner :-(

xbdesign said:
I am using ubuntu 10.04 LTS and just cant install / find Getlibs to install a 32-bit version of xulrunner :-(
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do you need that to run the installer? I just downloaded the tar version instead and extracted it. I saw there was an installer as well, but I thought it would be more hassle than using the tarball so I just ignored it.

Development Questions

I've been waiting for agrabren to drop his cm code for several months now. Guess that kid really did swallow him whole. Well, I got tired of waiting and decided to see if I could get cm to build myself. Heh, not so much. I can't even get cwm to build and boot correctly. So, I'm here to see if someone can point out what I'm doing wrong.
Here's what I did to build. Pulled CM 11.0 and set up the build directories. Copied device/nvidia and vendor/nvidia from the most recent shield tree. Copied the kernel from the shield tree into device/nvidia/roth and modified the configs to build from there. I modified some of the configs and made cm.mk based off the tf701t port which also uses a tegra 4. A lunch and a couple makes later, I got a recovery.img, but it's too big. 8.2MB won't fit in a 8 MB partition. The kernel came out at 5.9 MB and the ramdisk-recovery.img is 2.3 MB. In an official shield build, the ramdisk-recovery.img is 777KB. I know cwm has a lot more in it, but I seem to be missing something to shave 200KB off it. BoardConfig.mk has the recovery partition size set to 8MB, but that doesn't seem to make a difference. Is there something somewhere that can be used to strip less useful stuff out the recovery image?
Thanks for any help,
Steel01

Steel01 said:
I've been waiting for agrabren to drop his cm code for several months now. Guess that kid really did swallow him whole. Well, I got tired of waiting and decided to see if I could get cm to build myself. Heh, not so much. I can't even get cwm to build and boot correctly. So, I'm here to see if someone can point out what I'm doing wrong.
Here's what I did to build. Pulled CM 11.0 and set up the build directories. Copied device/nvidia and vendor/nvidia from the most recent shield tree. Copied the kernel from the shield tree into device/nvidia/roth and modified the configs to build from there. I modified some of the configs and made cm.mk based off the tf701t port which also uses a tegra 4. A lunch and a couple makes later, I got a recovery.img, but it's too big. 8.2MB won't fit in a 8 MB partition. The kernel came out at 5.9 MB and the ramdisk-recovery.img is 2.3 MB. In an official shield build, the ramdisk-recovery.img is 777KB. I know cwm has a lot more in it, but I seem to be missing something to shave 200KB off it. BoardConfig.mk has the recovery partition size set to 8MB, but that doesn't seem to make a difference. Is there something somewhere that can be used to strip less useful stuff out the recovery image?
Thanks for any help,
Steel01
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was previously working on cm but failed as I don't have the device. I suggest building the aosp 4.3 for the shield then work your way up to cm
http://nv-tegra.nvidia.com/gitweb/?...;a=blob_plain;f=README;hb=rel-roth-r3-partner
My idea was to see what's needed and not needed as a lot won't be used in cm.

Unjustified Dev said:
I was previously working on cm but failed as I don't have the device. I suggest building the aosp 4.3 for the shield then work your way up to cm
http://nv-tegra.nvidia.com/gitweb/?...;a=blob_plain;f=README;hb=rel-roth-r3-partner
My idea was to see what's needed and not needed as a lot won't be used in cm.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've got the device and some development knowledge, but a complete lack of android build system knowledge.
I've got the nvidia 4.3 recovery to build (on a VM since it's less tolerant of JDKs than cm), the rest should compile easily enough. So if I was to build up from there, what kind of process would I be looking at? I would presume start with replacing the recovery with cwm. If so, where am I looking to replace stuff at?
Do you still have any of the work you had started?
Steel01

Steel01 said:
I've got the device and some development knowledge, but a complete lack of android build system knowledge.
I've got the nvidia 4.3 recovery to build (on a VM since it's less tolerant of JDKs than cm), the rest should compile easily enough. So if I was to build up from there, what kind of process would I be looking at? I would presume start with replacing the recovery with cwm. If so, where am I looking to replace stuff at?
Do you still have any of the work you had started?
Steel01
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, getting the recovery booting is the first thing.I can't really help right now but in a few hours or so I will pm you here's the github i'm going to be working at (removed) as you see there's not really anything there. I'm working on making the device tree work in a cm tree. It will probably be a while before my aosp build finishes. If you wish to chat on hangouts pm your email address .

Unjustified Dev said:
Yes, getting the recovery booting is the first thing.I can't really help right now but in a few hours or so I will pm you here's the github i'm going to be working at https://github.com/CM-Shield as you see there's not really anything there. I'm working on making the device tree work in a cm tree. It will probably be a while before my aosp build finishes. If you wish to chat on hangouts pm your email address .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks, pm sent. Guess I'll fire off a full aosp build so we'll have the same trees available at that time.
Steel01
Edit: Today's just not my day. None of my builds from nvidia's aosp 4.3 r3 tree boot. A normal boot hangs at the shield logo. The recovery gives me the red triangle (not terribly surprised since nvidia's official gives me that too, only agrabren's cwm recovery works for me). I didn't think too much of it when I built off of openjdk 1.6, but now that I pulled sun's 1.6-41 and it still doesn't boot, I'm a bit miffed. Shouldn't be a reason why I can't build off CentOS. Maybe I'll load up a Debian or Mint VM and try building off that. I really don't want to touch Ubuntu which all the android docs are written for...

Okay, so I don't feel so bad anymore. The kernel boots fine. But the system image generated from the official shield tree doesn't. It starts the boot animation and hangs. But I have adb and complete shell access. Wipes don't help. Which if I was to guess means I have a java problem on the build VM. The C only kernel is fine, but nothing else works right. Big surprise there. That or something like the graphics blob didn't get packaged in. I'll play with it some more and might be able to build a working system by the time Unjustified Dev pushes some code up...
Steel01
Edit: And according to a logcat, I'm missing some so's. Don't know if I missed a build failure or if the official tree is broken.

Steel01 said:
Okay, so I don't feel so bad anymore. The kernel boots fine. But the system image generated from the official shield tree doesn't. It starts the boot animation and hangs. But I have adb and complete shell access. Wipes don't help. Which if I was to guess means I have a java problem on the build VM. The C only kernel is fine, but nothing else works right. Big surprise there. That or something like the graphics blob didn't get packaged in. I'll play with it some more and might be able to build a working system by the time Unjustified Dev pushes some code up...
Steel01
Edit: And according to a logcat, I'm missing some so's. Don't know if I missed a build failure or if the official tree is broken.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you get the closed source binaries extracted?

Unjustified Dev said:
Did you get the closed source binaries extracted?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah I did. I'm running another build and capturing the output this time to see if there's a build failure. The files the log was complaining about are in a vendor prebuilt folder, but didn't get copied to out like most of the other files in that directory did. If this build does the same, I'll hand copy the files into the out directory and hope the command to build the system image just globs that directory.
Steel01

Steel01 said:
Yeah I did. I'm running another build and capturing the output this time to see if there's a build failure. The files the log was complaining about are in a vendor prebuilt folder, but didn't get copied to out like most of the other files in that directory did. If this build does the same, I'll hand copy the files into the out directory and hope the command to build the system image just globs that directory.
Steel01
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I suggest creating a better call to vendor blobs you can clearly find which ones are needed create an extract-files.sh script as so. I've began partially haven't had time to work on it. I chose a nvidia device because some of the blobs are the same naming less time.
https://github.com/CyanogenMod/android_device_asus_tf700t/blob/cm-11.0/extract-files.sh
https://github.com/CyanogenMod/android_device_asus_tf700t/blob/cm-11.0/proprietary-files.txt
https://github.com/CyanogenMod/android_device_asus_tf700t/blob/cm-11.0/setup-makefiles.sh

Unjustified Dev said:
I suggest creating a better call to vendor blobs you can clearly find which ones are needed create an extract-files.sh script as so. I've began partially haven't had time to work on it. I chose a nvidia device because some of the blobs are the same naming less time.
https://github.com/CyanogenMod/android_device_asus_tf700t/blob/cm-11.0/extract-files.sh
https://github.com/CyanogenMod/android_device_asus_tf700t/blob/cm-11.0/proprietary-files.txt
https://github.com/CyanogenMod/android_device_asus_tf700t/blob/cm-11.0/setup-makefiles.sh
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ah, okay. It would be better to base off the tf701t, though. It's a tegra 4 device whereas the tf700t is a tegra 3. I'll see what I come up with after I flash stock back.
Steel01

Steel01 said:
Ah, okay. It would be better to base off the tf701t, though. It's a tegra 4 device whereas the tf700t is a tegra 3. I'll see what I come up with after I flash stock back.
Steel01
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually I was just looking at it. We have an advantage we already have a device tree and I like their layout so I'm going to copy that when I have time and build from it.
Still some unsolved things I will discuss later

Unjustified Dev said:
Actually I was just looking at it. We have an advantage we already have a device tree and I like their layout so I'm going to copy that when I have time and build from it.
Still some unsolved things I will discuss later
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, that would make it much simpler. I had that device tree building inside the cm11 repo a couple days ago, but I broke the kernel build somewhere along the way and haven't figured out what I did yet.
I'm currently working on getting the blob list together. Skimming the tf701t down to what exists on the shield, then building up from there. Will probably take a couple days with my schedule though, so you might beat me through it.
Steel01

Steel01 said:
Yeah, that would make it much simpler. I had that device tree building inside the cm11 repo a couple days ago, but I broke the kernel build somewhere along the way and haven't figured out what I did yet.
I'm currently working on getting the blob list together. Skimming the tf701t down to what exists on the shield, then building up from there. Will probably take a couple days with my schedule though, so you might beat me through it.
Steel01
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I got latest ota image from nvidia and extracted the system.img will be tomorrow when I finish gathering all blobs and I will send you a pm. once we get cwm working we can move forward wish the guy who compiled it got a change to upload his source so I can see how to do the dtb stuff . I know someone who can help I will contact them tomorrow

Unjustified Dev said:
I got latest ota image from nvidia and extracted the system.img will be tomorrow when I finish gathering all blobs and I will send you a pm. once we get cwm working we can move forward wish the guy who compiled it got a change to upload his source so I can see how to do the dtb stuff . I know someone who can help I will contact them tomorrow
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Okay, great. I Got a hack of cm build together using the attached proprietary-files.txt and a prebuilt kernel from the shield tree. Ended up missing a couple so's, but I'm done for the night. Once you get the device tree to compile, can you push that to the github org and give me access to it?
On the dtb issues, doesn't the normal kernel compile output the dtb?
The official BoardConfig sets:
TARGET_USE_DTB := true
TARGET_KERNEL_DT_NAME := tegra114-roth
BOOTLOADER_SUPPORTS_DTB := true
Then kernel.mk sets:
KERNEL_DTS_PATH := $(KERNEL_PATH)/arch/$(TARGET_ARCH)/boot/dts/$(TARGET_KERNEL_DT_NAME).dts
BUILT_KERNEL_DTB := $(NV_KERNEL_INTERMEDIATES_DIR)/arch/$(TARGET_ARCH)/boot/$(TARGET_KERNEL_DT_NAME).dtb
and further down calls
+$(hide) $(kernel-make) $(TARGET_KERNEL_DT_NAME).dtb
That correctly gives me the dtb file. Though, chances are there are other lines I missed that affect it.
Steel01

Steel01 said:
Okay, great. I Got a hack of cm build together using the attached proprietary-files.txt and a prebuilt kernel from the shield tree. Ended up missing a couple so's, but I'm done for the night. Once you get the device tree to compile, can you push that to the github org and give me access to it?
On the dtb issues, doesn't the normal kernel compile output the dtb?
The official BoardConfig sets:
TARGET_USE_DTB := true
TARGET_KERNEL_DT_NAME := tegra114-roth
BOOTLOADER_SUPPORTS_DTB := true
Then kernel.mk sets:
KERNEL_DTS_PATH := $(KERNEL_PATH)/arch/$(TARGET_ARCH)/boot/dts/$(TARGET_KERNEL_DT_NAME).dts
BUILT_KERNEL_DTB := $(NV_KERNEL_INTERMEDIATES_DIR)/arch/$(TARGET_ARCH)/boot/$(TARGET_KERNEL_DT_NAME).dtb
and further down calls
+$(hide) $(kernel-make) $(TARGET_KERNEL_DT_NAME).dtb
That correctly gives me the dtb file. Though, chances are there are other lines I missed that affect it.
Steel01
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I read that from the OC kernel thread and it's 1am here so I'm done for the night as well. I am giving you permission to CM-Shield right now. I already cloned tf701 device tree and renamed it. I was working on adding in the files from nvidia tree some are going to go prebuilt might need some patches from nvidia git as well not so sure right now. I really need to get this device. Blindly working isn't much fun. As far as I know you use fastboot flash dtb that dtb is never updated and might not be needed not sure yet I have never had to deal with dtb.

Unjustified Dev said:
I read that from the OC kernel thread and it's 1am here so I'm done for the night as well. I am giving you permission to CM-Shield right now. I already cloned tf701 device tree and renamed it. I was working on adding in the files from nvidia tree some are going to go prebuilt might need some patches from nvidia git as well not so sure right now. I really need to get this device. Blindly working isn't much fun. As far as I know you use fastboot flash dtb that dtb is never updated and might not be needed not sure yet I have never had to deal with dtb.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Alright. If you haven't got the dtb stuff straightened out by the time I get back to my dev machine tomorrow night, I'll tackle that. I've had some hobbyist experience with that on some embedded dev boards. In general, I wouldn't think the dtb would ever change. Definitely not within a kernel version. Definitely needed, though. But in the spirit of open source and building as much as possible from source, it will be good to make that build. Shouldn't be too difficult. And yes, 1:30 AM does bad things to cognizance. *passes out*
Steel01
Edit: I took a look at the tf701t kernel tree this morning. The dtb part may already be done if we base from there. A dts file already exists for roth (arch/arm/boot/dts) and the make file a dir up appears to glob the dts directory and build dtb's for each. I don't have access to a build tree to verify that atm, though. Bit if that's true, the kernel should be as simple as cloning tf701t, renaming its defconfig and modifying what little differences there are if any, then copying the dtb to the out directory.
Edit 2: A bit of googling turned up http://www.armadeus.com/wiki/index.php?title=Kernel-with-device-tree which says a config flag handles building dtb's. The tf701t config already sets CONFIG_MACH_ROTH=y, so I'm wondering if that kernel won't boot on the shield out of the box. Something I'll try once I get back to my dev machine tonight.

Well, I did get the dtb to build using the CM-Shield device tree and the kernel from tf701t. Haven't been able to test yet, though. And it was kind of a hack, but I don't know a better place to plug it than modules. In BoardConfig.mk after the two target kernel lines:
KERNEL_DTB:
*tab* make -C $(KERNEL_OUT) ARCH="arm" CROSS_COMPILE="arm-eabi-" tegra114-roth.dtb
*tab* mv $(KERNEL_OUT)/arch/arm/boot/tegra114-roth.dtb $(OUT)
TARGET_KERNEL_MODULES := KERNEL_DTB
That should probably pull arch and compiler prefix from cm env cars, but I don't know what they are. The dtb name should also be set as a const. Once I see if the kernel boots in a couple hours, I'll push my device branch up. Only kernel change was renaming the defconfig.
Steel01

Steel01 said:
Well, I did get the dtb to build using the CM-Shield device tree and the kernel from tf701t. Haven't been able to test yet, though. And it was kind of a hack, but I don't know a better place to plug it than modules. In BoardConfig.mk after the two target kernel lines:
KERNEL_DTB:
*tab* make -C $(KERNEL_OUT) ARCH="arm" CROSS_COMPILE="arm-eabi-" tegra114-roth.dtb
*tab* mv $(KERNEL_OUT)/arch/arm/boot/tegra114-roth.dtb $(OUT)
TARGET_KERNEL_MODULES := KERNEL_DTB
That should probably pull arch and compiler prefix from cm env cars, but I don't know what they are. The dtb name should also be set as a const. Once I see if the kernel boots in a couple hours, I'll push my device branch up. Only kernel change was renaming the defconfig.
Steel01
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So far going to push unmodified kernel now https://github.com/CM-Shield/android_device_nvidia_roth

Progress finally. Got a cwm recovery that boots and looks like it works plus fits in the partition. Most of the buttons aren't mapped yet and the screen is rotated, but that should be the east part to fix.
Steel01

Getting closer. But still no dice. Logcat of current iteration.
Steel01

The Theory of Everything (Building MTK from saucery) asop cm miui ubuntu

Welcome​
I have started this thread for the THEORETICAL development of the mt6732/mt6752 from source if such a thing happened to exist which of course it does not.
While compiling from source is pretty well documented :good: compiling MTK is not so well documented especially the mt6732/6752.
I have tried to keep this thread as ambiguous as possible and hopefully we will be left in peace to iron out any difficulties.
DO's:
I am a Total Noob myself to compiling from source but experienced enough to use the xda search box, Google and Youtube first before asking any questions. If your still confused after using the above then by all means ask here.
DON'T s:
If your a noob who should happen upon this thread then by all means read and learn but please respect the dev's by not asking random question without searching first :fingers-crossed:
SHARING:
Please only share things of a sensitive nature with recognised members who you know and via the PM. :good:
Lets just see how far we can push this Kernel
Recommended Reading:
[GUIDE]Building a Kernel from source{Mediatek}
Build Kernel MT6577 - Can't boot after build
How To Port CyanogenMod Android To Your Own Device
XDA:DevDB Information
k01q_e k01q_h, Kernel for all devices (see above for details)
Contributors
bigrammy
Kernel Special Features: Remains to be seen
Version Information
Status: Testing
Created 2015-02-25
Last Updated 2015-02-25

I am here, reporting for duty. If anyone wants an extra "potato" because he has too much "ketchup" for use feel free to ask me

Just to be clear
I am new to compiling from source in any shape or form
I believe the kernel to be not a problem and I know dev's are working on getting our phone on cm and maybe others :fingers-crossed:
But me being me I am very curious and would like to understand how we would go about doing what @varun.chitre15 managed to do for the mt6582 Here
I have the PC all setup for building now thanks to @carliv great guide Here and the cm and android tut's I also found this useful guide on youtube by Dave Bennet Here
Our device is not on the cm or google repo so how do we add it locally.
Do we need any special commands for mediatek
Could we use the mt6582 repo and substitute or mod the files
As you can see I have more questions than answers as normal :laugh:
I dont want to tread on any toes here or take over current developing but just want to learn as said in the OP there is a lack of mtk guides regarding this.
If I missed a clear mtk guide then please post the link to it. :good:

In short your looking at manifests. http://wiki.cyanogenmod.org/w/Doc:_Using_manifests
carliv (I think) posted the device config on github - link in your SPFlash thread somewhere.
Found it: https://github.com/carliv/device_elephone_p6000?files=1
Vendor files

I have compiled and flashed a kernel, I've been running it for 24+ hours with no obvious issues. It's honestly very easy to just get it to build if you don't try to make major changes.
I have (very lazily) tried to change a couple of things in the config to fix the known issues (OTG, compass): unfortunately I have no way to test the OTG function right now, while the compass did not magically start working. On the other hand, the notification light issue which is introduced by V8.4 is not strictly or exclusively kernel-dependent, since I am running V8.3 with my own kernel and the notification function is intact. That's all I can share at the moment.

xenonism said:
I have compiled and flashed a kernel, I've been running it for 24+ hours with no obvious issues. It's honestly very easy to just get it to build if you don't try to make major changes.
I have (very lazily) tried to change a couple of things in the config to fix the known issues (OTG, compass): unfortunately I have no way to test the OTG function right now, while the compass did not magically start working. On the other hand, the notification light issue which is introduced by V8.4 is not strictly or exclusively kernel-dependent, since I am running V8.3 with my own kernel and the notification function is intact. That's all I can share at the moment.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can you switch on and post the /proc/config ?
Regarding the notification lights, I think v8.4 introduced the custom partition (might be wrong on that). Running grep -r "ro.notification.breath" /system/ the only result I got was services.odex (might have been settings.odex). I've bak(smali)ed it but couldn't see the difference between the two that would explain the change.

HypoTurtle said:
Can you switch on and post the /proc/config ?
Regarding the notification lights, I think v8.4 introduced the custom partition (might be wrong on that). Running grep -r "ro.notification.breath" /system/ the only result I got was services.odex (might have been settings.odex). I've bak(smali)ed it but couldn't see the difference between the two that would explain the change.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The config file is attached to the post, it's too big to paste it.
I have tried the new ROM which came out today, then flashed my kernel. I can't use either SIM card anymore. Flashed the boot.img that comes with the ROM - same. I guess I gotta go back to V8.3 for now.
The new ROM doesn't seem to be the same as the OTA: it reports as: Elephone_P6000_02_V8.0_20150206.
About the notification issues (which bothers me the most), I haven't had much time do to more experiments, but I was thinking this (which probably also led to my confusion*): there's a chance the functionality is not removed or shut down, at least in the intentions of the maker. After all, in V8.4 (and in the new ROM), when the phone is connected the light stays on, while notifications make it breath. While not a desirable behaviour (at least IMO), I wouldn't call it... a non-behaviour, so to say. So perhaps the functionality itself is intact but something is altering the way it works, for whatever reason. I also did some unpacking and grepping a few days ago, but I couldn't find anything useful.
* At some point I thought the issue was fixed because the light was breathing while connected to my PC, but it was probably because I had a notification to read.

xenonism said:
The config file is attached to the post, it's to big to paste it.
I have tried the new ROM which came out today, then flashed my kernel. I can't use either SIM card anymore. Flashed the boot.img that comes with the ROM - same. I guess I gotta go back to V8.3 for now.
The new ROM doesn't seem to be the same as the OTA: it reports as: Elephone_P6000_02_V8.0_20150206.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Lets not speculate too much - but perhaps there was a minor board change between the first and second preorders, notification could be a problem with granting notification access (in settings) - could this be a selinux issue? It would explain why things like Light manager work - as you grant them notification access.
For lost Imei - can you compare the custom partition to the one in the ota?

If anyone needs an easier way to grab the 'ketchup', my GitHub has it. Click on my blog link in my signature.

BachMinuetInG said:
If anyone needs an easier way to grab the 'ketchup', my GitHub has it. Click on my blog link in my signature.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks bro,
Nice log
I was going to try use the sprout config as this is nice and clean Here when I have worked out how to do things that is.
My eyeballs are bleeding now with all this reading but from what I can see most of files are the same names so maybe we could just replace them with ours probably 98% ish
I did see one ROM some place for the mt6732/52 that had mt6582 references I just wish I could remember where I had seen it
Like I say I am a noob to this compiling and linux stuff so I maybe talking out of my ass :laugh:

bigrammy said:
Thanks bro,
Nice log
I was going to try use the sprout config as this is nice and clean Here when I have worked out how to do things that is.
My eyeballs are bleeding now with all this reading but from what I can see most of files are the same names so maybe we could just replace them with ours probably 98% ish
I did see one ROM some place for the mt6732/52 that had mt6582 references I just wish I could remember where I had seen it
Like I say I am a noob to this compiling and linux stuff so I maybe talking out of my ass :laugh:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm actually a noob too, and honestly I've only ever successfully built a fakeflash (temporary recovery) that didn't even work.

bigrammy said:
Thanks bro,
Nice log
I was going to try use the sprout config as this is nice and clean Here when I have worked out how to do things that is.
My eyeballs are bleeding now with all this reading but from what I can see most of files are the same names so maybe we could just replace them with ours probably 98% ish
I did see one ROM some place for the mt6732/52 that had mt6582 references I just wish I could remember where I had seen it
Like I say I am a noob to this compiling and linux stuff so I maybe talking out of my ass :laugh:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can anyone actually make a guide noob friendly to build kernel from source? I got kernel with me locally zip file I want to build it please any help?

Tech N You said:
Can anyone actually make a guide noob friendly to build kernel from source? I got kernel with me locally zip file I want to build it please any help?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think you can use the scripts in the root of the source code to build the kernel? make<something>.sh.
Make sure you're on Linux (Ubuntu preferred) and that you have all dependencies installed correctly. To execute the script, simply go to the Terminal, cd to the location, then type . make<something>.sh

Tech N You said:
Can anyone actually make a guide noob friendly to build kernel from source? I got kernel with me locally zip file I want to build it please any help?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have a look at the README.
Does make menuconfig work here?

These few simple instructions from the readme file enable you to build a working kernel (at least in a Linux environment):
Code:
How to Build
kernel
======
1. Get the prebuilt cross compiler from AOSP website:
$ git clone https://android.googlesource.com/platform/prebuilts/gcc/linux-x86/arm/arm-eabi-4.6
2. Add required cross compiler to PATH:
$ export PATH=/YOUR_TOOLCHAIN_PATH/arm-eabi-4.6/bin:$PATH
$ export CROSS_COMPILE=arm-eabi-
3. Then use the following commands to build the kernel:
$ ./makeMtk k01q_e new k
make menuconfig can be made to work, but you need to set some parameters and I can't look into it right now.
You previously asked something about the custom partition, I need some guidance there as I am not familiar with the IMEI issue.

xenonism said:
These few simple instructions from the readme file enable you to build a working kernel (at least in a Linux environment):
Code:
How to Build
kernel
======
1. Get the prebuilt cross compiler from AOSP website:
$ git clone https://android.googlesource.com/platform/prebuilts/gcc/linux-x86/arm/arm-eabi-4.6
2. Add required cross compiler to PATH:
$ export PATH=/YOUR_TOOLCHAIN_PATH/arm-eabi-4.6/bin:$PATH
$ export CROSS_COMPILE=arm-eabi-
3. Then use the following commands to build the kernel:
$ ./makeMtk k01q_e new k
make menuconfig can be made to work, but you need to set some parameters and I can't look into it right now.
You previously asked something about the custom partition, I need some guidance there as I am not familiar with the IMEI issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yea wasn't sure about menuconfig as mtk uses projectconfig rather than def_configs.
In the custom partition there are files like /custom/etc/firmware/modem.img etc. When messing with a Flyme port it was these files (and possible conflicts in /system) that caused an IMEI:nul.
FYI I opened the custom partitions on windows using an ext viewer after running the imgs through sgs2toext4.

Kernel building Mediatek
Tech N You said:
Can anyone actually make a guide noob friendly to build kernel from source? I got kernel with me locally zip file I want to build it please any help?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not sure if you guys have seen or read this but it's a pretty comprehensive guide to building the mediatek kernel by @MasterAwesome and should really be compulsary for all kernel related things thread here http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2754513
@HypoTurtle
Regarding the custom partition this is or could be a problem for us now and in the future and may require further investigation. The cm sprout branch has the modem.img in the (normal place /system/etc/firmware) but as you say ours is in the custom partition which is probably to protect it from bad /system flashes
Thing is I see no normal type link to it in the /system/etc/firmware so it must be linked some other way which may explain why all my port attempts failed as none of them used a custom partition (Asus_X002)
Maybe we will have to repartition the emmc to a standard config and alter the kernel (if the links are set via the kernel that is) for cm and other ports to work smoothly as I am unsure just how everything is linked up.
I have not had much experience with custom partitions so someone one know's of a good info source please link it. :good:
Hopefully Master @Santhosh M can figure out what's going on with the custom partition :fingers-crossed:

bigrammy said:
@HypoTurtle
Regarding the custom partition this is or could be a problem for us now and in the future and may require further investigation. The cm sprout branch has the modem.img in the (normal place /system/etc/firmware) but as you say ours is in the custom partition which is probably to protect it from bad /system flashes
Thing is I see no normal type link to it in the /system/etc/firmware so it must be linked some other way which may explain why all my port attempts failed as none of them used a custom partition (Asus_X002)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The partition is symlinked from .../by-name/custom (which is symlinked by the kernel from dev/block/mmcblk0p12) to /dev/customimg which is mouned after an e2fsck to /custom. /custom isn't linked to /system, it's just added to the global environment (init.environ.rc), will need to check on the environ, I'm on flyme and it has /custom/lib added to the library path (which doesn't exist).

HypoTurtle said:
The partition is symlinked from .../by-name/custom (which is symlinked by the kernel from dev/block/mmcblk0p12) to /dev/customimg which is mouned after an e2fsck to /custom. /custom isn't linked to /system, it's just added to the global environment (init.environ.rc), will need to check on the environ, I'm on flyme and it has /custom/lib added to the library path (which doesn't exist).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Haha thanks that explains a lot of weird things perfectly. :good:

What's the problem or what is the issue here.
Mediatek compiling guide ( by masterawesome ) that you have linked to is not actually practically this mtk kernel is done and is just way too complicatedly explained.
There is no defconfig stuff or pulling config.gz from phone in mtk. In this new source its just simple. Set up your toolchain path. Execute the makeMtk followed by the project no u want. Get zImage and patch it for mtk header and merge it with stock ramdisk. For this newer mtk chipsets repack has an extra stuff where u have to be careful of kernel command line parameters.
That's it the kernel stuff in mtk

UNOFFICIAL CM12.1 for Nook HD/HD+ [2015-12-18]

This thread is a direct continuation of @Hashcode's work for porting to Lollipop. Because of his and @verygreen's heavy lifting, porting to CM12.1 happened almost painlessly, for which I'm grateful. Their contributions compelled me to share something back. Thus, I'm uploading personal builds of CM12.1 for HD and HD+ in this shared Box folder. While I do not own a hummingbird, sister builds are generated more or less concomitantly.
Some of the important device-specific changes from KitKat/CM11 are described in Hashcode's thread. The goal is to keep as close as possible to CM upstream, and integrate whatever fixes and enhancements we find over time. More progress information will be added here gradually, as I have time. A lot of useful discussion happened on the CM12.0 thread, and the status of things is available to anyone willing to search. Hunting for possible bug fixes, understanding how to actually boot a newer kernel are some of my current priorities. I am not a developer, and the usual disclaimers apply.
Recovery Information
Up to date eMMC TWRP images are included in the respective device folders. Personally, I've had a good experience with TWRP, and do not plan on looking at other recovery distributions. Now, there have been (very) sporadic reports of broken partition tables, soft-bricked devices, etc, blamed on recovery. Although recovery is usually not the actual culprit, here are some ways you can rescue a completely unresponsive device:
It's a good idea to keep a microSD card around, with verygreen's external recovery image from here.
Once booted off the external recovery, you can easily fix whatever is broken (ADB is your friend here). There's no need to re-install CM11, as re-flashing recovery and/or boot will most likely fix your issue.
Recovery partition: dd if=<path to recovery image> of=/dev/block/platform/omap/omap_hsmmc.1/by-name/recovery
Boot partition: dd if=<path to boot/kernel image> of=/dev/block/platform/omap/omap_hsmmc.1/by-name/boot
Afterwards, you should at the very least have a working internal recovery. I don't recall any instance where /system and/or /data became corrupted because of recovery, but you can certainly fix them now.
I've never tested this part, but I believe that you may be able to install an eMMC CM12 ZIP with verygreen's external CWM, even if /data and /cache are F2FS (assuming you copied all ZIPs onto the external card). My understanding is that only /dev/block/platform/omap/omap_hsmmc.1/by-name/system (always ext4, mountable by any recovery) is touched during installation, so you may even bypass TWRP completely.
P.S. If you broke you bootloader by flashing the wrong recovery flavor, despite all images being clearly labeled as hummingbird or ovation, well, no sympathy for you… Still, you can bring your device back to life within minutes as described above.
Progress towards Official CM12 Nightlies
As of now, most things are ready for turning official nightlies on, including official TWRP images and SELinux Enforcing support, albeit with this proviso:
My HW composer changes described in post #3 and #602 are not included upstream, since the plan was to fix upstream for all devices using CyanogenMod/android_hardware_ti_omap4.
The stumbling block with SELinux Enforcing had been remounting /system upon each new install, to write the customized WLAN NVS BIN. I'm avoiding this step by modifying the scripts to store the Wi-Fi calibration data in /rom now, with the added benefit that it only needs to be generated once. These changes are also not captured upstream, and may never be. If someone figures out an upstream-approved way of writing to /system upon first boot under Enforcing, then we'll probably switch back to the old fix-mac script.
On a personal note, posting on my threads is pretty tricky business... My builds were never intended for general consumption, but rather a way to move porting and development forward, and I often debate only keeping the GitHub repositories for people to build themselves. Obviously, that would upset hundreds of people at this point, so I make an effort to upload reasonably bug-free builds, as well as help even with trivial non-problems whenever I can. Nevertheless, low quality, or badly written posts (and I don't mean bad English) are a sure way to get ignored, and my memory is pretty long term Basically, I won't police content here, but I also don't want to deal with the the kind of stupidity and entitlement so prevalent in real life.
In conclusion, no need to thank (unless you really want to), or ask about donating, etc, but do reassess the limits of your current understanding before making bold claims, as I do too. Nothing worse than having to fix a trail of misinformation... Also, comparisons to other people's work (unless constructive), complains about the state of things, or simply starting with "no offense" and such, will make your problem much less likely to be solved by me.
XDA:DevDB Information
UNOFFICIAL CM12.1, ROM for the Barnes & Noble Nook HD, HD
Contributors
amaces, Hashcode, verygreen, Jon Lee
Source Code: http://github.com/airend
ROM OS Version: 5.1.x Lollipop
ROM Kernel: Linux 3.0.x
Version Information
Status: Testing
Created 2015-04-16
Last Updated 2015-09-14

All Things Kernel
The information below (branch names, kernel progress, etc) is slowly becoming out of date (post #2 in the Marshmallow thread has more details). Although it feels pretty archaic at this point, I'm leaving this information here, mostly for historical reasons.
My primary focus has been and continues to be an even better kernel. Instead of opening a separate thread, I will be using this space for kernel updates and related information, in a sort of log format.
Since making any of the fancier OMAP-specific kernel trees work properly is a huge headache with limited benefits, I just merged the linux-3.0.101 patches, mainly for testing (the d-3.0 branch). These patches may help with the ARM core, not so much with OMAP parts, and certainly no change to any of the Nook-specific systems. Subjectively, the normal kernel still feels marginally more stable, but hey, everything still works.
It's mid May, and for the past couple of weeks, branch g-3.0 has slowly become my default kernel. It contains additional merges from the Google 3.0 OMAP kernel, the .101 commits, plus cherry-picked changes from various sources. Hopefully, all these make for a better kernel, although the holy grail remains K3.4…
I've been experimenting with improvements upon KSM; UKSM and PKSM are supposed to better recover duplicated/lost RAM (the former in the default g-3.0 branch, the latter in p-3.0). As with KSM, they need to be enabled (and optimally tuned) through the sysfs interface (echo 1 > /sys/kernel/mm/[up]ksm/run).
A significant number of patches were added for LZ4 support, and to make zram/zcache actually use it. I think it makes things snappier, but we'll have to wait and see. Also, it turns out that good old KSM is better after all; PKSM creates instability, and UKSM is a lot more CPU hungry, very much undesired on an already underpowered device.
Another exciting week for K3.0… @Hashcode uploaded a bunch of LMK/low RAM/etc optimizations for some AMZ/OMAP44xx variants, which I'm stealing for the HDs. As I'm better understanding the use of MFLAG/QOS for frame prioritization, I ported some of these changes from K3.4. The most exciting however, is the DMA-buffered K3.0 that I have working (branch dma-buf). It definitely feels better, although figuring out how to completely switch away from memory carveouts, fix the communication with OMX/Ducati for HW accelerated video, is complicated. This branch will remain an experimental project till K3.4 is up and running.
Just for testing, I'm rebasing most of my changes on top of the official CM12.1 kernel, and made the new iosched branch default for a while. This branch contains many changes to the block layer, cherry-picked from @faux123's tuna kernel. We now have newer I/O schedulers, such as FIOPS, ROW, and eventually BFQ. The current default elevator is ROW with 256 KB readahead. A few other interesting patches popped up, mainly related to unaligned access on ARM, and related optimizations.
Since July, all changes are grouped into feature branches on top of the upstream kernel, which are finally merged into the cm-12 branch, the default for the foreseeable future. This way of doing things is easier to maintain, and makes these changes easier to read, when deciding what to keep/discard for upstream.

HW Composer Issues & Fixes
The goal, and probably one of the base requirements to have these devices included in the CM12 nightlies, is to have a stable ROM with normal HW accelerated overlays. As of now, we achieved this by mostly reverting to the HW composer in CM11, although understanding why the newer code in hardware/ti/omap4 creates these underflows is equally important. Post #602 contains more information about this issue.
Starting with the July 14th builds, disabling HW overlays shouldn't be necessary any longer.
Before mid-July, we were using the upstream HWC in CyanogenMod/android_hardware_ti_omap4. As discussed ad nauseam, that combination of upstream K3.0/PVR modules/SGX DDK binaries/HWC runs into serious GFX buffer underflows. With five or more composer overlays, the panel attempts to reset constantly, which causes display flickers, followed by reboot (dumpsys SurfaceFlinger|grep -A 10 type will show how consistent this bug is).
In the meantime, a poor workaround was to disable HW overlays in Developer options. To make it stick across reboots, you could use this /data/local/userinit.sh:
Code:
#!/system/bin/sh
(while :
do
sf=$(service list | grep -c "SurfaceFlinger")
if [ $sf -eq 1 ]
then
service call SurfaceFlinger 1008 i32 1
break
else
sleep 2
fi
done
) &

First!!! Great to see you start your own thread. Thanks for all the great work

ac-t660 said:
If I have the 3/24 ROM already installed, should I dirty-flash the 4/8 version or do I need to reset and fresh install it in order to properly get the changes?
And like everybody else has said - thanks amaces and hashcode, incredible job!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Doh! I must have been typing my question as you were creating this new thread. Moving it since you and everyone using your builds are moving over here. Thanks again!

Based on this, I'd say that should be possible soon, if not already. However, that wasn't the case with the initial builds. I'd say no harm wiping just /system, and maybe /cache, flashing a CM12.1 ZIP, plus the proper GApps, and see how it goes.

Thanks!
I've flashed your 8 Apr build, and it (mostly) looks good. I still get the occasional forced reboots after some flickering. The flickering tends to occur when changing from portrait to landscape and pulling down the settings bar.
I very much look forward to see some progression.
Can you provide some instructions with installing TWRP on the HD+? I have Cyanoboot installed and flashed your build using CWM recovery.
Thanks.

In response to this post in the 12.0 thread.
amaces said:
The changelog would basically be the CM12.1 one
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Great, so can you point to the latest CM12.1 commit that you've included when you make a release? Knowing the date doesn't pin it down completely.
amaces said:
About the ovation kernels, those images were for CM12.0, and while they may work with current builds (for reasons stated above), they don't provide any benefit anymore.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So we should use our original boot/kernel images?

Thanks!!
Hey amaces,
Thanks so much for the 12.1 builds. On the 4/4 build and will be testing out the 4/8 build over the weekend.
Thanks!!

shdware said:
Can you provide some instructions with installing TWRP on the HD+? I have Cyanoboot installed and flashed your build using CWM recovery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Flashify can do that for you inside the ROM, or you could dd if=recovery.img of=/dev/block/platform/omap/omap_hsmmc.1/by-name/recovery inside adb shell or terminal. Also, current TWRP allows flashing of boot/recovery images directly.

MossyTC said:
Great, so can you point to the latest CM12.1 commit that you've included when you make a release? Knowing the date doesn't pin it down completely.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sure, can do, although that kind of tagging needs to be thought out. I could simply append the CM review change number, but that's not very useful since most changes are in repositories that don't affect our devices. I'll look if anyone found a good way to do it (frankly, I don't recall seeing it done).
MossyTC said:
So we should use our original boot/kernel images?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The ROMs come with their own kernel. Those independent kernels were simply testing a few patches for the buffer underflow/flickering issues, and were meant for easy swapping within compatible CM12.0 builds.

Hi amaces,
I had done the 5.0 build, what do I need to do in order to pull in the 5.1?
TIA

andtron said:
Hi amaces,
I had done the 5.0 build, what do I need to do in order to pull in the 5.1?
TIA
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think it's better to backup your apps (I use titanium), do a full wipe and then install the 5.1 rom and gapps.

I am running the 04/08 and it is working fine except one major problem that is the bane of Android everywhere since kitkat...
It keeps telling me I have insufficient storage space to do anything, update apps or install new apps, and there are hardly any apps on the device.
When I go to Settings -> Storage it says total space 12.67GB but "Available" is only 700MB, which doesn't add up and doesn't agree with the graph.
I have:
Apps 0.92GB
Pictures, videos 5.62MB
Audio 296KB
Downloads 1.20GB
Cached data 1.24MB
Misc 1.65GB
Adding that up is just under 3.8GB total so I should have about 8.9GB free, but it only reports 700MB.
Something is wrong with the free space calculation. Any help here? This wasn't a problem on the previous CM12.
BTW I did a clean install (full system wipe) before installing the CM12.1.
Any help is appreciated. I am at my wit's end on this issue.

Thanks Tschumi.
My question is more on how to pull the sources and build the 5.1 myself.

mr72 said:
I am running the 04/08 and it is working fine except one major problem that is the bane of Android everywhere since kitkat...
It keeps telling me I have insufficient storage space to do anything, update apps or install new apps, and there are hardly any apps on the device.
When I go to Settings -> Storage it says total space 12.67GB but "Available" is only 700MB, which doesn't add up and doesn't agree with the graph.
[…] Adding that up is just under 3.8GB total so I should have about 8.9GB free, but it only reports 700MB.
Something is wrong with the free space calculation. Any help here? This wasn't a problem on the previous CM12.
BTW I did a clean install (full system wipe) before installing the CM12.1.
Any help is appreciated. I am at my wit's end on this issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That must be… frustrating. So, you're saying this happened on CM11, then CM12.0 was fine, and now the bug is back on CM12.1? There are a couple of unusual/puzzling issues that people report, including the reboot-instead-of-poweroff bug. Never having experienced these, it's hard to figure out the cause, but I'll keep it in mind.
andtron said:
My question is more on how to pull the sources and build the 5.1 myself.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
These days, it's very easy; you simply upgrade your LP5.0/CM12.0 sources with: repo init -u git://github.com/CyanogenMod/android.git -b cm-12.1

mr72 said:
I am running the 04/08 and it is working fine except one major problem that is the bane of Android everywhere since kitkat...
It keeps telling me I have insufficient storage space to do anything, update apps or install new apps, and there are hardly any apps on the device.
BTW I did a clean install (full system wipe) before installing the CM12.1.
Any help is appreciated. I am at my wit's end on this issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think it has something to do with updating from stock to cm. Go to 'terminal emulator' app, type 'su' then 'df'. Let us know what is the output.
Also, backup all your data. Do you mind clean install again? Which recovery are you using? If you convert your data partition to F2FS I'm sure it'll fix it. Not because F2FS will fix it, but because converting it to F2FS will format the entire /data partition (including the virtual /sdcard). There might be old files downloaded when you used stock rom.

extrem0 said:
...If you convert your data partition to F2FS...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Quick question, how does one go about converting the partition to f2fs on the ovation? I've done a couple searches but can't find anything definitive such as which recovery I should have installed and if it is a zip that I would need to flash.
Thanks!

J-Pod said:
Quick question, how does one go about converting the partition to f2fs on the ovation? I've done a couple searches but can't find anything definitive such as which recovery I should have installed and if it is a zip that I would need to flash.
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did it using twrp recovery 2.8.6.0 built by amaces. There's an option that allows you to convert some partitions to f2fs. Remember, it will erase all your files in your nook. Do a backup of your files before converting to f2fs.

J-Pod said:
Quick question, how does one go about converting the partition to f2fs on the ovation? I've done a couple searches but can't find anything definitive such as which recovery I should have installed and if it is a zip that I would need to flash.
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Using @amaces TWRP, go to Wipe, check the data box, select "advanced wipe then it's something like " repair file system". I'm sure you can figure it from that.

"Vanilla" device tree

Hey folks,
i'm trying to get a "vanilla" aka unmodified device tree for the Shield Tablet K1. I know that you can sync over from nvidia's gitweb, tough the device tree is looking weird.
When i look at let's say cm's android_device_nvidia_shieldtablet it looks different. So i wonder how i would go from nvidias mutated tree to cm's layout without actually just forking it from cm.
Reason is, i want to port another custom rom over to the shield tablet, but i can't neither figure out how i'd do that with nvidias sources, nor how i would create a device tree similar to cm's, without any modifications.
I googled around for about 2-3 months now and still have no clue, so if anyone could give me a hint, i'd be very grateful!

What's wrong with the cm tree?
Unjustified Dev did the initial port of everything by hand. I've done maintainance manually since then. And to my knowledge, there's only been one other person to do a manual conversion (vartom). All custom ROMs derive from my tree. Should work in aosp as well. If there's something you need different from the cm tree, you can just add it on top. Or if something is broke in general, I need to know and fix it.

There's nothing "wrong", just not " clean", if you catch my drift. It's just a matter of reverting inwanted things, but yeah.. feels dirty.
Anyways, thanks for the info, man.

*shrugs* Okay, if you want to set up a new tree, nothing's stopping you. I wouldn't mind someone else knowing how to do it (pretty sure I'm the only active dev that has experience there), but it's a lot of parsing and research. I'll say that CMs trees are 95% unmodified from Nvidia's upstream, though. It's just rearranged into an aosp style tree. The kernel is a merge of the console and tablet since they were 98% identical anyways. I do my best to keep everything as clean as possible since I don't want to do through the work of making a lot of modifications every time a new release comes out... Engineers are lazy like that. I think the only things that aren't pure identical copies are the LTE init files and the unified device stuff (making the wifi only and lte models work in one ROM).

Nah, don't get me wrong there, i don't want to discredit you there.
I'm more talking about cm specific things like gello browser and stuff. Like i said, just a matter of a few changes to not include these. I'm just a beginner in any way, i can just follow instructions at best, i don't know c, and almost no java at all. So what you do is an astounishing task - it's just a personal preference coming and starting with nexus devices to tinker around, i have had the luxury of an AOSP tree, that's pretty much "my dilemma". I'm unexperienced and thus this might take a while for me. I've started to modify your device tree the day before yesterday, but i have something done wrong, as when i start compiling it'll ask if it should use " full_eng" config. (6.0.1 is used)
Again, thanks for putting me in the right direction, also for your efforts in maintaining our device.

What ROM are you trying to build? You could look at Carbonrom or Blissrom to see the rename changes needed to use the tree in a different ROM. Those should be similar across the board. I think the only CM specific package references would be gello and snap. Those commits could be reverted easily enough. Or if the ROM doesn't have them, I think they'd be ignored even if left as is.

Hi,
you can take a look at here
the base was the official cm tree, this is not vanilla but it s a K1 only tree.

Steel01 said:
What ROM are you trying to build? You could look at Carbonrom or Blissrom to see the rename changes needed to use the tree in a different ROM. Those should be similar across the board. I think the only CM specific package references would be gello and snap. Those commits could be reverted easily enough. Or if the ROM doesn't have them, I think they'd be ignored even if left as is.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm trying to port OmniROM https://docs.omnirom.org/Porting_Omni_To_Your_Device
Shouldn't be that difficult, i'm just doing something wrong.
kylon said:
Hi,
you can take a look at here
the base was the official cm tree, this is not vanilla but it s a K1 only tree.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you, man.
I've forked it and will use it as a base.

Oh, omni. I build TWRP from omni. Take a look at the following two commits.
https://github.com/TeamWin/android_...mmit/c8e564a5ea44d963ab8d0e7829d9becd2ad5b0c0
https://github.com/TeamWin/android_...mmit/9b8772627795492f3380d2bf86680c09aada92c9
I haven't built the full ROM, but that should work. If you're using a K1 specific tree, the only difference should be in omni_shieldtablet.mk, instead of gsm.mk, use whatever omni has for tablet wifi only.

Steel01 said:
Oh, omni. I build TWRP from omni. Take a look at the following two commits.
https://github.com/TeamWin/android_...mmit/c8e564a5ea44d963ab8d0e7829d9becd2ad5b0c0
https://github.com/TeamWin/android_...mmit/9b8772627795492f3380d2bf86680c09aada92c9
I haven't built the full ROM, but that should work. If you're using a K1 specific tree, the only difference should be in omni_shieldtablet.mk, instead of gsm.mk, use whatever omni has for tablet wifi only.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you, man. In fact i heavily orientaded on TWRP sources in this case. Also took a look at zombipop's repo.
Still whatever i do all i get is
[[email protected] omni]$ brunch shieldtablet
build/core/product_config.mk:241: *** No matches for product "omni_shieldtablet". Stop.
WARNING: Trying to fetch a device that's already there
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "build/tools/roomservice.py", line 352, in <module>
fetch_device(device)
File "build/tools/roomservice.py", line 320, in fetch_device
git_data = search_gerrit_for_device(device)
File "build/tools/roomservice.py", line 81, in search_gerrit_for_device
device_data = check_repo_exists(git_data, device)
File "build/tools/roomservice.py", line 58, in check_repo_exists
"exiting roomservice".format(device=device))
Exception: shieldtablet not found,exiting roomservice
build/core/product_config.mk:241: *** No matches for product "omni_shieldtablet". Stop.
** Don't have a product spec for: 'omni_shieldtablet'
** Do you have the right repo manifest?
No such item in brunch menu. Try 'breakfast'
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Oh, brunch won't work because it wants to sync from the upstream server. Use lunch instead. Then run make to build.

Steel01 said:
Oh, brunch won't work because it wants to sync from the upstream server. Use lunch instead. Then run make to build.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Looks like a derp moment, i just had to modify the devicetree in another directory which is the actual working dir, instead on androidsrc/device/nvidia/shieldtablet directly. Like i said i just did something wrong.
It' compiling now, thank you for all the support!