Linaro Releases

Linaro releases monthly binary Android images for the Snowball platform.

About the Android Snowball Release

This release includes Linaro Android Jelly Bean (4.2.2). Sources are also made available so you can build your own images.

Where To Find More Information

More information on Linaro can be found on our website.

Feedback and Support

Subscribe to the important Linaro mailing lists and join our IRC channels to stay on top of Linaro development.

• Linaro Android Development mailing list
• Linaro Android IRC channel on irc.freenode.net at #linaro-android

• Bug reports should be filed in Launchpad against the individual packages that are affected. If a suitable package cannot be identified, feel free to assign them to Linaro Android project.
• Questions? ask Linaro.
• Interested in commercial support? inquire at Linaro support

Fixed in this release

None listed.

Known issues

• LP: #1034789 external sdcard partition is mounted – but Gallery thrown error “cant play this video”
• LP: #1083645 misc benchmark of 0xbench test crashes on snowball android JB image
• LP: #1034886 youtube video not playing on snowball android Jellybean build
• LP: #1102306 audio mp3 not able to play on snowball linaro android jellybean builds
• LP: #1034774 Wifi/BT enabling does not works on snowball android JB build
• LP: #1034820 Camera application missing on snowball android Jellybean build
• LP: #923667 Snowball kernel does not use device tree
• LP: #1097136 speech-recorder crashes on snowball Linaro android jb builds
• LP: #1032538 snowball: when trying to download and install apk the download is never finished or results in kernel panic
• LP: #1182761 GCC and G++ compiler is unavailable on Linaro Android image

Instructions for https://android-build.linaro.org/builds/~linaro-android_snowball-jb-gcc47-igloo-stable-blob/

Get artifacts

Scroll down to the ‘Downloads’ section

Click on each link to download:

• boot.tar.bz2
• system.tar.bz2
• userdata.tar.bz2

Accept the end-user license agreement

Get linaro image tools

Run these commands to get all the dependencies for linaro-image-tools and the tip of linaro-image-tools

  $ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:linaro-maintainers/tools
  $ sudo apt-get update
  $ sudo apt-get install linaro-image-tools

If you’re using a released build (with a -release or from releases.linaro.org), skip this step.
If you’re using a “tip” build do not skip the step and do the following:

  $ sudo apt-get install bzr
  $ bzr branch lp:linaro-image-tools

Create media (SD card)

Disable automount (instructions provided for Gnome)

  $ TMP1=$(dconf read /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount)
  $ TMP2=$(dconf read /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount-open)
  $ dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount false
  $ dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount-open false

Insert an SD card

Run ‘dmesg’

$ dmesg

Look for a line that looks like the following at the end of the log

[288582.790722]  sdc: sdc1 sdc2 sdc3 sdc4 < sdc5 sdc6 >

WARNING In the next step, make sure you use /dev/“whatever you see above”.
You can erase your hard drive with the wrong parameter.

Run linaro image tools

$ linaro-android-media-create --mmc /dev/sdc --dev snowball_sd --boot boot.tar.bz2 --system system.tar.bz2 --userdata userdata.tar.bz2

If you’re using tip of linaro image tools

$ ./linaro-image-tools/linaro-android-media-create --mmc /dev/sdc --dev snowball_sd --boot boot.tar.bz2 --system system.tar.bz2 --userdata userdata.tar.bz2

Restore automount

  $ dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount $TMP1
  $ dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount-open $TMP2

Remove the SD card from the device writer and plug it into the board. Note that the linaro android snowball build only supports booting from sdcard at this time.

Check console output

Plug in an USB-to-serial converter and run minicom

$ minicom -D /dev/ttyUSB0 -w -C minicom.txt

Notes

• Note 1 – Outdated U-Boot

During the 12.05 cycle, U-Boot changed and must be upgraded in eMMC if your
boot line is older than: U-boot 2012.04.01 (May 24 2012 – 19:50:12)

The solution is to do:

If you don’t have riff:

   $ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:igloocommunity-maintainers/snowball-tools
   $ sudo apt-get update
   $ sudo apt-get install riff

Download startupfiles from http://www.igloocommunity.org/download/linaro/startupfiles/latest

   $ tar -xvf startupfiles_3.0.8-0.tar.gz
   $ linaro-android-media-create —image-file snowball.img —image-size 1500M —dev snowball_emmc —boot boot.tar.bz2 —system system.tar.bz2 —userdata userdata.tar.bz2


	

(OPTIONAL) Remove the PPA

$ sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:igloocommunity-maintainers/snowball-tools

Turn off the board

$ sudo riff -f snowball.img

Connect your board using the OTG USB port (next to power supply port) to your PC
Turn on the board
Riff will detect the board and start the execution
When execution is finalized riff will exit

On the first boot, the user interface can take up to 10 minutes to come up.
Please be patient. If the board doesn’t come up, you might be affected by
bug 8823313

Instructions for https://android-build.linaro.org/builds/~linaro-android//

Get artifacts

Scroll down to the ‘Downloads’ section

Save linaro_android_build_cmds.sh to where you’d like to make your build.

Run the build script

The linaro_android_build_cmds.sh script will download the source and create the build.

  $ chmod +x linaro_android_build_cmds.sh
  $ ./linaro_android_build_cmds.sh -h #To print the script usage

Most commonly used build options:

  $ ./linaro_android_build_cmds.sh -t #To build from the tip of the branch without overlay
  $ ./linaro_android_build_cmds.sh -t -o <overlay> #To build from the tip of the branch with provided overlay
  $ ./linaro_android_build_cmds.sh -m <pinned_manifest> -o <overlay> #To reproduce an exact build from pinned manifest
  $ ./linaro_android_build_cmds.sh -t -l <login-id> #Provide login/access ID to clone and build code from linaro-private repositories

Get linaro image tools

Run these commands to get all the dependencies for linaro-image-tools and the tip of linaro-image-tools

  $ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:linaro-maintainers/tools
  $ sudo apt-get update
  $ sudo apt-get install linaro-image-tools

If you’re using a released build (with a -release or from releases.linaro.org), skip this step. If you’re using a “tip” build do not skip the step and do the following: $ sudo apt-get install bzr $ bzr branch lp:linaro-image-tools

Create media (SD card)

Disable automount (instructions provided for Gnome)

  $ TMP1=$(dconf read /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount)
  $ TMP2=$(dconf read /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount-open)
  $ dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount false
  $ dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount-open false

Insert an SD card

Run ‘dmesg’

$ dmesg

Look for a line that looks like the following at the end of the log

[288582.790722]  sdc: sdc1 sdc2 sdc3 sdc4 < sdc5 sdc6 >

WARNING In the next step, make sure you use /dev/“whatever you see above”.
You can erase your hard drive with the wrong parameter.

Run linaro image tools

$ linaro-android-media-create --mmc /dev/sdc --dev <BOARD> --boot out/target/product/<BOARD>/boot.tar.bz2 --system out/target/product/<BOARD>/system.tar.bz2 --userdata out/target/product/<BOARD>/userdata.tar.bz2

If you’re using tip of linaro image tools

$ ./linaro-image-tools/linaro-android-media-create --mmc /dev/sdc --dev <BOARD> --boot out/target/product/<BOARD>/boot.tar.bz2 --system out/target/product/<BOARD>/system.tar.bz2 --userdata
out/target/product/<BOARD>/userdata.tar.bz2

Restore automount

  $ dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount $TMP1
  $ dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/media-handling/automount-open $TMP2

Remove the SD card from the device writer and plug it into the board.

Check console output

Plug in an USB-to-serial converter and run minicom

$ minicom -D /dev/ttyUSB0 -w -C minicom.txt