Hi all, We randomly had an impromptu IRC meeting yesterday, here is the IRC log:
<OdyX> Damn. This android business is so backwards. <OdyX> Today I realised how broken all that shit is by bricking my Motorola Defy. <OdyX> I realised it has eFuses, that physically forbid you to come back to earlier "stuff" * OdyX vomits. <johndescs> Think about windows phone before trashing too much andoid… :D <OdyX> The _biggest_ evil in all that shit is that there is no canonical documentation: only old wikis and xda-developers' threads scattered around the place; started over every 4 months. <pabs> OdyX: ouch, is it completely bricked? <pabs> OdyX: welcome to the world of Secure Boot btw :) <pabs> OdyX: XDA do have a wiki FYI: http://forum.xda-developers.com/wiki/ <OdyX> pabs: in fact no. I just managed to reset it to stock Android from motorola. <OdyX> without blur even. <pabs> ah, good <OdyX> I was salvaged by the fact it has a an unchangeable bootloader. <OdyX> which is bad per se. <OdyX> but it's good as you also can't break it. <pabs> kind of like the openmoko, but without the writable bootloader and debug board <OdyX> so you always have a way to boot "something", that lets you send things over USB for instance. <OdyX> yeah, kinda <hug> what are the current goals of the debian-mobile team? short term/long term? <OdyX> hug: those you help define. :) <OdyX> hug: seriously, it is an attempt at merging forces between the past framework-specific teams (Meego, Maemo, moblin, enlightenment, etc). <hug> I was looking through the wiki's and it looks like we want everything :) <OdyX> it had the hope of building stuff from the mostly-free MeeGo stack. <pabs> yeah, its not very organised <OdyX> But now that it died. <OdyX> well. pabs and myself have been running in circles since DC11, with one BoF in DC11 and one in DC12 but without much more results than interesting discussions. <pabs> lack of hardware supported by Linux mainline kinda limits what can be done <hug> one problem with all those mobile frameworks is that a big part of the work is the integration of the packages it consists of and if we just move the packages to debian we loose most of this integration <pabs> not sure what you mean by that? <OdyX> yeah. My vision is not necessarily to have pure-Debian run on /blah/, but to have Debian as a good platform one might want to build something on (similar to what Mer is currently) <hug> I think mainlining hardware support should be a high prio. <pabs> (hardware stuff is a topic for #debian-arm/#debian-kernel though) <hug> so the idea is: use Debian as a base for the root file system and put your framework on top (e.g. android, maemo,.,,) ? <hug> but is that realistic? debian is a lot bigger than the usual minimalistic busybux build.. <OdyX> I also foresee (as discussed in the DC12 BoF) the possibility to have a Debian-on-Android sort-of-thing: take the kernel question out of the picture and bring the power of dpkg, apt and stuff to the mobile world. <OdyX> which is achieved through chroots in various flavours <hug> OdyX: I think this would be a great idea, e.g. like the ubuntu on android plan <pabs> as we saw on the list recently, there are lots of those being done already <hug> consolidation would help <hug> e.g. we take one of them and call it the "offical" Debian for android <OdyX> yeah, that'd be great. <OdyX> As I explained above, the hack-on-android world is scattered with shit all around the place. <hug> yeah and skills of Android 'developers' varies a lot. <lindi-> same goes for openmoko developers and maemo developers :) <lindi-> and it's good, it shows that new people are getting to the field easily <hug> that's true <OdyX> but working in a proprietary forum with threads all over the place and outdated doc isn't efficient at all. <pabs> I don't particularly like that idea, but I guess it is better than twiddling thumbs waiting on hardware support <pabs> so what approach do we want, Android kernel + Debian init & userland? or Android kernel+userland, Debian chroot+apps and a bridge between them like xpra? <hug> pabs: I don't think hardware support is the biggest issue. even if you have a running kernel, which framework would you use on top? <OdyX> contacting the people who did LilDebi all the other ones would be good. It'd be good to have them on board, with "us, old bearded DDs" providing advice, and us altogether making "an official Debian-on-android "thing"" <hug> I'd like an easy to install android apk <hug> and no messing with the original system <OdyX> LilDebi is mostly that. <pabs> hug: depends one what the apps/desktop you want depend on. for an SHR style thing, FSO <pabs> just like with KDE/GNOME/etc <hug> well kde/gnome is not really useful for a small touch screen <OdyX> (nor for a big one could say :) ) <hug> unless you use the external HDMI and usb <pabs> KDE Plasma Active could be though <pabs> not sure what it uses for lower levels, I guess KDE stuff <hug> OdyX: did you try LilDebi? <pabs> anyway, there are lots of stacks (and associated UIs) we can use but we don't have anything to run them on that we could put in Debian <hug> pabs: why? because of missing mainline kernels and missing OpenGL libraries? <OdyX> hug: I'm busy updating my Cyanogenmod currently. I tried it shortly but it uses lots of space unfortunately. <hug> hehe, I have my build server on amazon for that :) <OdyX> lots of space on the sdcard I mean. <hug> ah <OdyX> and I'm notrebuilding my CM yet. <OdyX> wanted to, but had no time. <hug> I also played with a one of those cheap chinese HDMI sticks MK808 <pabs> hug: right. I estimate some years before we get a device with mainline support. maybe that will be gta04 (expensive) or the vivaldi tablet <hug> how about the allwinner? <hug> is it used in mobile phones or just tables? <hug> tablets <pabs> not in mainline yet either IIRC <pabs> so in the meantime do we go Debian from the init(ramfs) up or bridge plus Debian apps? <pabs> maybe one step at a time, bridge first <hug> but is there a device which has open source opengl libraries? <pabs> there are a few reverse engineered gl libs, probably the one for the Mali hardware is the furtherest along <hug> except the broadcom VideCore chips <pabs> thats a shim layer not a proper driver :) <hug> it's a client driver to a proprietary blob running on the GPU <pabs> no, its a much thinner driver than other stuff. it basically passes OpenGL calls direct to the GPU. even the shader compiler runs on the GPU <hug> mali would sound nice as it's used in many devices. <hug> but it doesn't really make a difference as long as you have a black-box GPU with unknown code running on it. <OdyX> same with black-box CPUs with unknown VHDL-compiled transistors running on it. := <johndescs> if there were a way to directly put things into framebuffer from chroot it would aleady be a big step, isn't it ? <pabs> well, the more code running on the GPU, the less you can fix. Mali you can fix much more <johndescs> just start slowly, and beeing able to use the device alongside woth testing would make thing mush easier IMHO <OdyX> do we know how Ubuntu did his proof-of-concept? <hug> which part? the integration of the android apps into Ubuntu? <OdyX> well, the integration of Ubuntu with Android.. <pabs> OdyX: I seem to remember its the Android kernel <hug> they share the kernel but use the external HDMI exclusivly for Ubuntu which makes it easier. <pabs> aha <hug> I think we could do such a thing with cyanogenmod. but with which device? <hug> the only devices I have with external HDMI aren't mobile phones but some arm dev boards. <hug> but it could be useful on my chinese arm google TV stick to switch between a real OS and Android <hug> but this wouldn't fall into the #debian-mobile category <OdyX> I' be tempted to Debian-buildd-create a Debian-chroot apk, that could then be byhanded to Debian mirrors. <pabs> how would you build that on Debian tho? <OdyX> dunno, yet. :) <OdyX> like the debian-installer e.g. <hug> all the tools needed are apache licensed <hug> to build APKs <OdyX> being able to build Android apps with only Debian tools would be really neat. <pabs> ITP away <pabs> packaging the whole stack would be interesting <hug> has anyone looked at the XBMC app for android? <hug> they build the whole app including dependencies as APK <hug> and it performs quite well <hug> so, it should be possible to do something like this. <OdyX> .oO(There, root on my Defy. Sigh.) <pabs> I have to go make dinner, but I think someone should mail the log from this impromptu meeting to the list <OdyX> fine for me. hug ? <hug> fine -- bye, pabs http://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise
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