Getting started with Android on Neo FreeRunner

Getting ready for Android

• The sd-card: The android want a sd card placed into the Neo FreeRunner before it will successful start. The sd card also has to be configured with 2 partitions. The first may be fat32 or ext3, but may not be bigger than 256mb. (Edit: Some people has already stated it work with a bigger partition) The second partition has to be ext3. The first partition will be used for storage for music/pictures/movies/... The second will be used for storing settings and for cache.
  
  These partition should preferable be empty, because the Android can stop booting if he finds certain files in one of the two partitions. (That gave the early people who tried running Android a headache. After hours of trying and chatting on the openmoko channel, we finally figured it out.
  
  If you follow these instruction on the wiki for partitioning and formatting your sd card, Android should boot.
  
  
• The SIM card: Firstly you will have to disable PIN security on your SIM card. (You will have to disable it with another phone, because there is no distribution for the FreeRunner that allow you to disable PIN security) (Edit: Apparantly you can disable PIN security in Qt extended) If you don't do this, Android will ask you to type your PIN on boot. That's no problem, because you get an onscreen keypad for typing your PIN, but even if you type the correct PIN code, the android will tell you otherwise. So you will not get past that screen.
  
  Also you need a working SIM card in the FreeRunner, before Android will start. On the other hand, there are already people confirming they can start the android without SIM card. Though there are also people confirming they need a SIM card, before the Android will start. So if you want to try Android, you have more chance for letting it work if you insert a working SIM card.
  
  
• Power: Make sure your battery is not empty. I just say this, because you can't tell the difference between a booting Android and a Neo FreeRunner that has an empty battery. They have both black screens.
  
  
• U-boot: Normally it should be no problem for booting Android with an older bootloader. Though if you don't get your Android working, maybe try upgrading your u-boot to the newest version.

Installing Android

• Download the Android images made by Sean McNeil
• Flash them using Dfu-util or the easier Neotool. It is at the moment not possible for putting the Android on a SD card. So you will have to overwrite the distro that's located on your Nand memory.

Now you will be able to boot the Android. Just boot by pressing the power button and wait. First you will have a black screen for a minute or two and then the icon of Android will appear. After another minute, you will see the home screen.

Configuring Android

• Disable screen timeout: If you don't disable the screen timeout, Android will go into suspend after a minute. The problem is, you will not get Android out of suspend, so you should better disable it. You can do that by scrolling the main button up, than click on the icon 'settings'. Than click on 'Sound & Display', than scroll down and push 'Screen timeout' and choose 'Never timeout'.

Navigating Android

• The aux button is the back button. So if you want to leave some part of the system, you will have to press the aux button.
• The power button (if you press it shortly) is the menu button. This will give you extra buttons for doing various things. (like customizing)
• The power button (if you hold it for 2 second) will lock the screen. I don't get it out of this state without rebooting.
  
• The power button (if you hold it for 4 second) will give you the closing menu. This will let you shutdown Android or choose silent mode.
• The power button (if you hold it for 10 seconds) will shutdown android.
  

What's working?

• The GUI: The graphical interface of Android is totally working. There are some glitches with transparency, but it's still very usable. Also the GUI seems to respond very fast.
• Calling: Some people are saying they can place outgoing calls, but that's not the majority of the people trying the Android. (And the sound isn't loud enough for understanding eachother) With my Neo FreeRunner I always get 'No SIM card' and can't call other people. Also nobody has already archieved to attend incoming calls.
• SMS: You will not be able to send SMS, because there is no onscreen keyboard and that will probably not change very soon. Although Google has already announced they would make one in the first quarter of 2009, maybe somebody of the community can make an onscreen keyboard in the meanwhile. I also don't have read about someone receiving SMS. (Edit: Some people have claimed they can receive SMS)
  
• WIFI/GPS/...: The hardware specific code isn't fully ported yet, so these services will not work now. But Sean McNeil and other people are still busy with porting the Android. So maybe soon.
• Batterly life: Because the Android can't go out of suspend, we have configured Android to not to suspend. So battery life will suck. I had a battery life of 6 hours yesterday. But this will most lickely become better.

Edit: I've added some remarks that were in the comments of this blogpost. Thanks Ceci and Tobias, I appreciate it.