Android On The Pandora
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Mr_Loon
Can't Remember
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Wow, I thought Android on Pandora was just a pipe dream, looks like that dream (or nightmare for some, based on on past threads) might become reality.
Can anyone a lot cleverer than I am give an overview of how this would be installed on the Pandora?
Guess my ideal would be a dedicated Android SD card for the OS and android apps, with the other SD card used for storing data.
Can anyone a lot cleverer than I am give an overview of how this would be installed on the Pandora?
Guess my ideal would be a dedicated Android SD card for the OS and android apps, with the other SD card used for storing data.
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I don't think many people doubted it could be done, the argument was to make it the default OS.. which many are against.
Basically how I've done it on a beagleboard was to partition an SD card properly and just copy the files to it. From there you have to tell the Pandora to boot from the SD card.. it's generally just that simple.
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SNESFAN
Retro game fanatic
yay!
Vitel
Active Member
No, thanks.
MarkoeZ
arr matey?
interesting 
moz
load *,8,1
This is a generally good idea, although, from my knowledge from previous threads, there will be no access to the marketplace because of the Pandora has no camera & GPS or something stupid like that.
So my question... What's the point?
So my question... What's the point?
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Yeah, that's something I forgot to mention.. The OS is very bare and it's true what Moz said.. no connection to the marketplace, most likely not because of the lack of camera or GPS.. but a Google policy.
darfgarf
Well-Known Member
but market can be hacked into it, it's been done for plenty of unofficial roms etc
moz
load *,8,1
From the old thread:
may not be correct though, I couldn't find anything about it anywhere on the android homepage or developer page.
may not be correct though, I couldn't find anything about it anywhere on the android homepage or developer page.
Nation.A.List
Member
There will be no 'official' access to the 'official' google android market or to 'official' google apps e.g. Google Maps, Google Navigation etc, and that's 'official'
but as has been mentioned, there may ways around this e.g. my SmartQ 7 has the full Android 2.2 experience, minus the obvious hardware shortcomings. If all else fails there are various alternative markets that have apk's that can be loaded onto your android device.
SNESFAN
Retro game fanatic
no it's correct... or at least was correct for anything android 2.2 (current version) or less. They have openly said this is about to be changed though.
With the addition of google branded android tablets and "google tv" (both very very new additions) google is starting to allow market access to hardware that does not conform to the hardware restrictions to be google branded... the turn will be to restrictions on the software titles in the market... so titles will get "if *blank* piece of hardware exists (gps, 3g etc) then install, all else reject"
this isn't written in stone but I belive this is the game plan for android, google stated about 6 months ago they were planning to opening the market on android to non-standard phone hardware.
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And then there's the 0xdroid-project, seems to run great on the beagleboard. http://code.google.com/p/0xdroid/
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I have to admit, every time I deal with Android I feel like I'm using a neutered OS.. I get it installed it's working I can navigate menus nicely.. But then I try to install or even setup something and realize absolutely nothing is installed by default not even some basic tools to get started with. I can see if your making a stream line system for a phone.. but for a hobbyist device like the Pandora or Beagleboard, you may as well just use a regular ARM linux Distribution. It's more flexible, comes with a lot of tool built on or could be easily installed. The only thing you loose is the flashiness of Android.
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SNESFAN
Retro game fanatic
and the software
over 100,000 games apps etc no porting or tweaking or optimization required
most still obtainable without official market support, all you need is an android phone and a backup program
even if you don't have an android phone, if you can find a rom you can find an .apk (similar to .pnd)
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Oh you only need to buy an Android phone with a data service plan and a shady backup program or troll bittorrent for software.. yeah much better than an a regular Linux Distribution with a ipkg/opkg or YUM repository with just as much free software. You got me convinced.
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SNESFAN
Retro game fanatic
you can also always use one of the many many legitimate 3rd party android markets... and no service plan required, android works fine just over wifi
www.getjar.com
www.androidpit.com
www.slideme.org
www.adroia.com
www.andappstore.com
and lots of others, and it's not any less ethical than retro gaming so get off your high horse about not wanting to look for software, and nobody said anything about bittorrent. And that's only if the official market can't be hacked into it. If it is, then none of that would be needed.
correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't software need to be ported and optimized to be ran on the pandora even if it's natively a linux app? I can't just download and run say... anything on this list http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_gaming and just start going can I? Those need to be ported right? I can just do like "sudo apt-get install awesome_ass_game" and it will just work? I hardly think so. I think that's why there's like 100 titles in the pandora app-store-market-gazeebo-thingy
Nothing at all needs to be done to each software title to use android apps and games once android is ported (correctly) maybe map some keys in some of the games but if the game supports a physical keyboard (most should at this point) the controls should "just work"
the current pandora software liabrary would be 1000x fold at least if this was done. Explain to me why this isn't worth the trouble?
EDIT: by the way... I'm not saying convert... I'm just saying have a android port available for download if wanted
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Sure if someone could get a proper Android port going that could handle native apps properly, I'd be for trying it out.
I didn't intend to make this a big argument, my original message was just mentioning my current experiences of setting up android and it hasn't shown to be convenient. The Sudo apt-get install awesome game as you called it works much better than getting a bare operating system without any system apps or even USB support for the beagleboard, so I couldn't use my USB ethernet or Wifi adapter. Not to mention no compiling tools if I wanted to try to get my USB working. Sure when someone gets around to make a proper Android distro I'd prob love it.. So far none of them have been any good. I still believe a full fledge distribution like angstrom is better than the current releases of Android.
I'll be on my high horse if you need me.
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sebt3
homebrew player (P. & C.)
No you put a file named awesome_ass_game.pnd on your sd card and start playing....
Now go troll away
doublebeta
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Nonsense - forums are *for* big arguments! Man up cupcakes! . (not an insult)
Why anybody would want to run a phone OS on something that is not a phone is beyond me. Why anybody would run such a crappy OS by choice is also beyond me - Linux without GNU(or some other Unixlike userland) is like day without (any) sunshine. Why anybody would want to restrict themselves with a nonfree OS (don't tell me i'm wrong before defining true 'freedom') on something designed to be fully open - is again, something I cannot even think of. Why anyone wants a (nearly) Java-only OS (could be worse - could be running a J2ME only phone OS - but surely you're better than that?)...blar.
Now I assume TrashyMG was being sarcastic here, because of a later quote I make from him - seems he was arguing for exactly the same things , but in case he wasn't, what is this?? How the hell is having to trawl bittorrent easier than ipkg/opkg/apt/yum/pkgsrc/etc? SURELY typing one line is easier than typing in and searching all your torrent sites to find some piece of crap that you'll likely nuke anyway. And then you'll have no handy 'remove' command. The apt package manager is what made me stick with GNU/Linux (as well as being fucktons faster and an infinite load stabler than Windows - with XFCE.).
You can't do sudo apt-get install whatever because we DO NOT HAVE APT on the Pandora. We are apparently getting access to a debian repository - and we will be able to then. You can't take any Linux application and run it on Android neither! It'll still be for x86 - and even if it were for ARM - it still wouldn't run because underneath the system is almost completely different! Some of you people just don't seem to get that there's this thing called 'hardware', it's the hard stuff that you can physically touch - and it's DIFFERENT. Porting to ARM or even to the OMAP that the Pandora uses won't mean anything without some 'tweaking' and 'optimisation' done somewhere on the line - in the kernel, or application specific. Have you seen some certain chinese clone phones and the dependancy hell that occurs with them? I doubt. The same is likely to occur here. And in software? Some 'genius' might use some library, with some android/x86 specific stuff in it, or maybe some inline asm - and you're screwed. And if you're thinking of using that failed VM - 9/10 the 'unoptimised un-leet noob non-CFLAGS=-O3'(I actually hate the people who believe -O3 is everything too - but I always -O3 or -Os) emulators on the Pandora will be faster. Otherwise, you're emulating twice - Emulating your system of choice AND emulating the Java machine. Face it - nothing works out of the box unless the box is made to work out of the box - and that'll require 'effort'. I could hand you a lump of silicon - it'll run everything, no changes required! Some assembly will be though!
Porting each and every *free as in freedom* program in Android is much less trouble than porting Android - because once the trouble of that porting is over, you gotta reboot into Android each time you want to do something lame like bash a virtual cat. I'll do what I can to break support for this crap in my own games - you mightn't care now or ever but my vote is there.
"I have to admit, every time I deal with Android I feel like I'm using a neutered OS" - thankyou, somebody with some feeling (and some nuts!).
Good that you might be able to run something new - but i'm really pissed with Google claiming they're good guys because they use the Linux kernel, people believing that shit(not necessarily you), and then the aformentioned group of people thinking they're awesome elite free software hackers because they now use 'Linux'. And the people IRL who say I should get Android because it's 'Linux'. I pray that this ends up Proof of Concept only - And I now end my flame. </flame>
Think what you want to think, believe what you want to believe, use what you want to use. You are free. And so am I to say "You suck". I take crap from my teachers about refusing nonfree software - but if you want to not follow the pack you gotta take stuff like that. Freedom comes at a price, history repeats itself.
Think what you want to think, believe what you want to believe, use what you want to use. You are free.
Sorry guys. I'll be on a cloud if you need me.
. (not an insult)Why anybody would want to run a phone OS on something that is not a phone is beyond me. Why anybody would run such a crappy OS by choice is also beyond me - Linux without GNU(or some other Unixlike userland) is like day without (any) sunshine. Why anybody would want to restrict themselves with a nonfree OS (don't tell me i'm wrong before defining true 'freedom') on something designed to be fully open - is again, something I cannot even think of. Why anyone wants a (nearly) Java-only OS (could be worse - could be running a J2ME only phone OS - but surely you're better than that?)...blar.
Now I assume TrashyMG was being sarcastic here, because of a later quote I make from him - seems he was arguing for exactly the same things
, but in case he wasn't, what is this?? How the hell is having to trawl bittorrent easier than ipkg/opkg/apt/yum/pkgsrc/etc? SURELY typing one line is easier than typing in and searching all your torrent sites to find some piece of crap that you'll likely nuke anyway. And then you'll have no handy 'remove' command. The apt package manager is what made me stick with GNU/Linux (as well as being fucktons faster and an infinite load stabler than Windows - with XFCE.).You can't do sudo apt-get install whatever because we DO NOT HAVE APT on the Pandora. We are apparently getting access to a debian repository - and we will be able to then. You can't take any Linux application and run it on Android neither! It'll still be for x86 - and even if it were for ARM - it still wouldn't run because underneath the system is almost completely different! Some of you people just don't seem to get that there's this thing called 'hardware', it's the hard stuff that you can physically touch - and it's DIFFERENT. Porting to ARM or even to the OMAP that the Pandora uses won't mean anything without some 'tweaking' and 'optimisation' done somewhere on the line - in the kernel, or application specific. Have you seen some certain chinese clone phones and the dependancy hell that occurs with them? I doubt. The same is likely to occur here. And in software? Some 'genius' might use some library, with some android/x86 specific stuff in it, or maybe some inline asm - and you're screwed. And if you're thinking of using that failed VM - 9/10 the 'unoptimised un-leet noob non-CFLAGS=-O3'(I actually hate the people who believe -O3 is everything too - but I always -O3 or -Os) emulators on the Pandora will be faster. Otherwise, you're emulating twice - Emulating your system of choice AND emulating the Java machine. Face it - nothing works out of the box unless the box is made to work out of the box - and that'll require 'effort'. I could hand you a lump of silicon - it'll run everything, no changes required! Some assembly will be though!
Porting each and every *free as in freedom* program in Android is much less trouble than porting Android - because once the trouble of that porting is over, you gotta reboot into Android each time you want to do something lame like bash a virtual cat. I'll do what I can to break support for this crap in my own games - you mightn't care now or ever but my vote is there.
"I have to admit, every time I deal with Android I feel like I'm using a neutered OS" - thankyou, somebody with some feeling (and some nuts!).
Good that you might be able to run something new - but i'm really pissed with Google claiming they're good guys because they use the Linux kernel, people believing that shit(not necessarily you), and then the aformentioned group of people thinking they're awesome elite free software hackers because they now use 'Linux'. And the people IRL who say I should get Android because it's 'Linux'. I pray that this ends up Proof of Concept only - And I now end my flame. </flame>
Think what you want to think, believe what you want to believe, use what you want to use. You are free. And so am I to say "You suck". I take crap from my teachers about refusing nonfree software - but if you want to not follow the pack you gotta take stuff like that. Freedom comes at a price, history repeats itself.
Think what you want to think, believe what you want to believe, use what you want to use. You are free.
Sorry guys. I'll be on a cloud if you need me.
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