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Android System Programming
Android System Programming

Android System Programming: Porting, customizing, and debugging Android HAL

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Android System Programming

Setting Up the Development Environment

After the introduction about system programming in the last chapter, we need to set up a development environment first before we can go further. We need to know how to build and test Android Open Source Project (AOSP) while we explore various Android system programming topics in this book. We will cover the following topics in this chapter:

  • Installing the Android SDK and setting up an Android Virtual Device
  • Setting up the AOSP build environment and building a testing image
  • Creating your own source code repository mirror

Summary of Android versions

Since we will use Android emulator as one of the virtual hardware platforms, we need to use one particular Android version throughout this book. At the time of writing, the latest Android version is Android 7 (Nougat). We will use Android 7 throughout the book. I started work on this book with Android 6, so the source code for Android 6 is also available in my GitHub repository at https://github.com/shugaoye.

From the first release to Android 7, both the development environment and the AOSP source code have been changed a lot. We will have a brief look at various Android versions first before we talk about the development environment setup.

To set up the AOSP build environment, there are two things that you need to pay special attention to the host environment and Java SDK. Even though the recommended host environment is Ubuntu running on Intel architecture, the hardware architecture...

Installing Android SDK and setting up an Android Virtual Device

Ideally, if you have an AOSP build environment, you can build everything including Android SDK from scratch. However, it is much more convenient to have an Android SDK installation to help with virtual device creation or running emulator images.

You can always download the latest Android SDK from the following website:

https://developer.android.com/index.html

The host environment that we use in this book is Ubuntu 14.04. Download the Android SDK for Linux and decompress it to a folder in your Home directory.

The tools in Android SDK have been changed since API level 25. You may use an older version of Android SDK or the latest Android SDK so I gave the instructions for both cases here.

Creating AVD in an older version of SDK

...

The AOSP build environment and the Android emulator build

In order to create our own Android system, we have to set up the AOSP build environment and build our own AOSP target for the Android emulator. Since Android is under rapid development, the build process and environment setup can change from time to time. You can always refer to Google's website for the latest information, https://source.android.com/source/building.html.

While the Google website and other sources can give general guidelines and procedures about the AOSP build, in this section we will look specifically at how to build AOSP for Android emulator image for API level 25.

The AOSP build environment

Since we want to set up a build environment for API level 25, you can refer to the table of AOSP...

Creating your own repository mirror

It usually takes a very long time to download the AOSP source code. After you have downloaded the AOSP source code, you have actually downloaded a specific version of the AOSP source code from the remote repository. You may have to test different configurations or versions in your development work. It is a very time-consuming task to switch to a different version or create a new copy of the AOSP source code.

In this book, we will use the AOSP source code as the base for our development. To reuse some of the existing open source projects that are not included in AOSP, we have to modify the repo manifest from time to time. This involves changing the repo configuration. To work more efficiently, we can use a local mirror. It can save a lot of time to create a local mirror instead of downloading source code from remote repositories for all configuration changes. It may take hours...

Summary

In this chapter, we set up the environment for SDK and AOSP. We built the Android emulator images for AOSP. We also tested and compared the Android images in Android SDK and AOSP. All these steps are necessary before we continue exploring how to create our own Android system later. We also spent some time discussing how to set up our own repo mirror. This tip can help us later, when we start to create projects from multiple open source projects. In the next chapter, we will start to explore the architecture of Android. We will look into the details of layers related to the porting and customization of the Android system.

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Key benefits

  • Master Android system-level programming by integrating, customizing, and extending popular open source projects
  • Use Android emulators to explore the true potential of your hardware
  • Master key debugging techniques to create a hassle-free development environment

Description

Android system programming involves both hardware and software knowledge to work on system level programming. The developers need to use various techniques to debug the different components in the target devices. With all the challenges, you usually have a deep learning curve to master relevant knowledge in this area. This book will not only give you the key knowledge you need to understand Android system programming, but will also prepare you as you get hands-on with projects and gain debugging skills that you can use in your future projects. You will start by exploring the basic setup of AOSP, and building and testing an emulator image. In the first project, you will learn how to customize and extend the Android emulator. Then you’ll move on to the real challenge—building your own Android system on VirtualBox. You’ll see how to debug the init process, resolve the bootloader issue, and enable various hardware interfaces. When you have a complete system, you will learn how to patch and upgrade it through recovery. Throughout the book, you will get to know useful tips on how to integrate and reuse existing open source projects such as LineageOS (CyanogenMod), Android-x86, Xposed, and GApps in your own system.

Who is this book for?

This book is for Android system programmers and developers who want to use Android and create indigenous projects with it. You should know the important points about the operating system and the C/C++ programming language.

What you will learn

  • Set up the Android development environment and organize source code repositories
  • Get acquainted with the Android system architecture
  • Build the Android emulator from the AOSP source tree
  • Find out how to enable WiFi in the Android emulator
  • Debug the boot up process using a customized Ramdisk
  • Port your Android system to a new platform using VirtualBox
  • Find out what recovery is and see how to enable it in the AOSP build
  • Prepare and test OTA packages

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Publication date : May 31, 2017
Length: 470 pages
Edition : 1st
Language : English
ISBN-13 : 9781787125360
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Product Details

Publication date : May 31, 2017
Length: 470 pages
Edition : 1st
Language : English
ISBN-13 : 9781787125360
Vendor :
Google
Category :
Languages :
Tools :

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Table of Contents

14 Chapters
Introduction to Android System Programming Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Setting Up the Development Environment Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Discovering Kernel, HAL, and Virtual Hardware Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Customizing the Android Emulator Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Enabling the ARM Translator and Introducing Native Bridge Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Debugging the Boot Up Process Using a Customized ramdisk Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Enabling Wi-Fi on the Android Emulator Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Creating Your Own Device on VirtualBox Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Booting Up x86vbox Using PXE/NFS Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Enabling Graphics Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Enabling VirtualBox-Specific Hardware Interfaces Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Introducing Recovery Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Creating OTA Packages Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Customizing and Debugging Recovery Chevron down icon Chevron up icon

Customer reviews

Rating distribution
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Half star icon Empty star icon 3.7
(3 Ratings)
5 star 66.7%
4 star 0%
3 star 0%
2 star 0%
1 star 33.3%
SAKET SINHA Jul 02, 2017
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
I would like to thank Roger for this fantastic new book.Before this, there was no documentation of Different Layers of AOSP except source code itself which makes this book unique.The best part is how emulator has been used to validate the concepts and code flow, just like his last book.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
manjunath Dec 30, 2017
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
Nice book !!!
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Arun SR Dec 29, 2018
Full star icon Empty star icon Empty star icon Empty star icon Empty star icon 1
For advanced users only.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
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