Running Android Apps in Pyra OS


Sure, if such a possibility exists that yields us a FOSS android runtime in a timely manner with within-an-order-of-magnitude costs :)

I do recognize the risks you mention and generally support FOSS, but practicality comes first. Dual booting is always the last resort, IMO.
 
_wb_ is wrong on this. Alien Dalvik would be a huge win for Pyra.There is no free alternative.
 
He is not wrong to worry about mid to long term support. From the available information it looks like Myriad Group AG has no large customers using this product. My guess is that supporting this product costs Myriad at least 50.000€ per year and much more for major upstream changes.


The comments on the Jolla site I linked to speculate that it will never get an update to newer Android versions. Might be wrong, but that is important information to weigh cost vs. benefit. It might not be a significant selling feature if it only supports a two year old version getting obsolete quickly.
 
Ok, upgrades to newer android may be a problem if myriad goes tits up, but I dont see a problem with it working with newer kernels.
 
The alien dalvik looks neat, but also looks like a total hack job. Sort of a mature apkenv. I think the ideal solution would be to take advantage of the cortex a15's virtualization features and run both Linux and android from a hypervisor like KVM or something. Dual booting is close to the situation we have now as you can't really "flip" back and forth. The virtualization solution does take the complexity of a native booting port and kick it up a notch so without a good port virtualization or dual booting would be worthless. Alien dalvik is a short term band aid if you ask me, but as long as I can run Netflix and slacker radio I'm not going to complain neither short or long term. The likelihood of seeing a native port of android is equally as likely to happen on pyra as it was on Pandora, the same TI developed android package exists for both omap Dev boards of different generations.
 
Hmm, the fifth Humble Mobile Bundle is out and I would only buy it for Pyra (I have no Android device).

Any chance for Alien Dalvik on Pyra now?
 
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Klumpen said:
Hmm, the fifth Humble Mobile Bundle is out and I would only buy it for Pyra (I have no Android device).

Any chance for Alien Dalvik on Pyra now?
Click to expand...
I would hope all these games will run on Pyra. The only one I have running on my OP so far is R-Type II. The Cave requires a multi-core processor and 1GB ram, but I may try to set up some swap and try to run it anyway.

I haven't gotten the other games to install yet, but I'm still trying out a few things.
 
So how come we can't create our own version of andriod "wine" I know of would take work, but it would be worth it, especially with the community behind it. That would get rid of the worries of updates.

Sent from my Z665C using Tapatalk
 
They did, its apkenv, there's also a chrooted android in an pnd. Maybe a different approach than dual boot or a hypervisor which might be preferred but the solutions exist on pandora, they work and are community driven. Alien dalvik takes apkenv to a whole other level but is a closed source derivative of android parts and therefor requires paid maintainer rather than a community one. It has the benefit of being mostly univerally compatible android apps and even ones made with the ndk which I think is amazing. I would still prefer a dual boot proper android port on the pyra even though I doubt something like that is likely to happen unless officially supported and funded. The solution that was suggested is probably the worst solution to android support as far as long term support is concerned. Where minor hacks to a more recent kernel will usually ensure android compatibly to most newer versions of android. Especially if you ran both OS's off the same kernel which I bet is possible especially on a device like this, even if not mainlined which I doubt will happen anyway.
 
Apkenv is similar to a codec pack I guess.... But not really. It is pretty equating to wine or ginge though. The dependencies of some android apps are included and translated for Linux. If you are thinking of it as a codec though I feel that is too simplistic and the wrong way of looking at it. The missing pieces being just a codec, is as much as a virtual machine is a codec, and as much as android is a virtual machine :p the guts of android is a java based virtual machine for close to universal app compatibily on different hardware, but you throw in a tight restrictive front end and GUI interface framework, completely different managers for basically every subsystem (display, audio, connectivity) all sitting on a modified Linux kernel. Lots of deep rooted things make android very much different than most linux's They both share similar types of parts in similar purpose of function, but are very incompatible when compared 1:1 They both have and lack certain parts all together the other has as well.


The roads for convergence is rather complicated because of the different stacks and how they all work together. But the fact they both behave in a similar manner I feel they could still converge if adapted. In a perfect world of convergence, I feel, would be to adapt android to run Linux apps that use xserv. Basically port linux apps because the majoity are open sourse where most of android's apps are commercial and closed. beef out android's ability to compile apps natively and make the standard Linux tools available within Android. Android is ever changing architecturally where Linux is mostly the same and just gets more robust with time. Trying to capture a snapshot of android and make it compatible with Linux is a fairly hard to catch moving target.


Since android and Linux are both free (beer) & open source you would be essentially just paying for maintenance rather than a license like you would be with some codec. The problem isn't lack of the possible, is lack of the willing and capable.
 
I wasn't comparing it to the codec pack in that way at all. I meant, have it separate from the main Pyra OS. Just a program you have to buy extra. And I'm referring to the Alien Dalvik thing, by the way.
 
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EvilDragon said:
Haven't had the time to contact them yet, planning to do it this week.
Click to expand...
Please do - this could be the 'magic link' allowing the Pyra to cross over into business settings. It opens up access to RSA token generation software, encrypted email platforms (corporate style), etc...

As for paying for it to be pre-installed into the OS image, that sounds like a good plan to me. How much do they charge for their licensing per device now? I would expect us to get some form of volume discount for rolling it into the OS.
 
Assuming it is possible to pay per license and just give it to those that pay for it, what is there to prevent someone from just distributing that firmware and how would this be an accepted cost of business?

Just a guess but I don't think they'd allow licensing on a per unit basis unless there was a way to lock it down to that unit, and if that happens I'm not entirely certain I'd want it anymore.
 
Do they sell it to individuals themselves? Perhaps if one wants this for their Pyra, they could buy it and install it themselves?
 
The only Android apps I'm interested in running on the Pyra are games. My phone handles everything else. For me it would be better an enhanced version of apkenv capable of running most games, than a Dalvik VM implementation.

Also I think (I'm not sure anyway) that most "interesting" games are native ARM and do not use Dalvik VM, right?
 
Silent-Hunter said:
Do they sell it to individuals themselves? Perhaps if one wants this for their Pyra, they could buy it and install it themselves?
Click to expand...
No. As far as I am aware they only sell to OEMs.

doragasu said:
The only Android apps I'm interested in running on the Pyra are games. My phone handles everything else. For me it would be better an enhanced version of apkenv capable of running most games, than a Dalvik VM implementation.

Also I think (I'm not sure anyway) that most "interesting" games are native ARM and do not use Dalvik VM, right?
Click to expand...
I think that is correct. If Alien Dalvik cannot run NDK games then it isnt interesting. A quick google didn't yield an informative answer for me.
 
If the cost is very small per unit, I say include it. Like if it's only ten bucks or something. Otherwise, I say just have an Android on an SD card.
 
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