UK Linux User Groups

We have asked Moray Allan, one of the three candidates for DPL elections 2013, to tell our readers about himself and his ideas for the Debian Project.

You can also read the interviews to the other two candidates: Lucas Nussbaum and Gergely Nagy.

Please tell us a little about yourself.

I'm Moray Allan, from Edinburgh in Scotland. I'm 32. After working in academic research for a few years, I'm now working freelance on a wide mixture of topics, with recent projects in Indonesia, Romania and Kuwait. When I'm not working, I'm likely to be found walking through a city or the countryside, or otherwise relaxing at home reading a novel in French or Spanish.

What do you do in Debian and how did you started contributing?

In recent years, most of my Debian time was taken up organising the annual Debian conferences. But I still have a load of packages, mostly connected to an upstream Linux-on-handheld-computers project I was working on before I joined Debian to create packages for it.

Why did you decide to run as DPL?

I've been involved in Debian for about 10 years now, including working for the last few years in DebConf in a way similar to how the DPL acts within overall Debian. Previously I'd ruled out running due to lack of time, but currently I'm in a more flexible work situation. It seems the right time to put myself forward, and see if the ideas in my platform interest project members.

Three keywords to summarise your platform.

Transparency, communication, openness. (Three ways I'd like us to think about teams in Debian.)

What are the biggest challenges that you envision for Debian in the future?

I think the biggest challenges are for free software in general.
End-users are moving to more closed hardware -- will our software be able to run on the phones and tablets people are shifting towards? At the same time, end-users and server users are moving to "the cloud", and often depending more heavily on non-free infrastructure outside their own control.

What are, in your opinion, the areas of the project more in need of technical and/or social improvements?

In my platform I give a few ideas about teams and delegations, coordination and mediation, and both internal and external communication, including more organised fundraising. These are areas where I think relatively simple changes can give big benefits.

Why should people vote for you?

I have proven leadership experience within Debian, as I've been working on coordination and mediation tasks for some years already. At the same time, I do regular packaging work, and work in other parts of Debian like the press and publicity teams, so I'm in touch with the experience of normal Debian contributors. People should vote for me if they support my platform, which is about coordination-level changes that I would have no mandate or authority to push through unless I am elected.

Name three tools you couldn't stay without.

APT, emacs, ssh.

What keep you motivated to work in Debian?

I've used Debian on all my computers for a long time, and by now working on the distribution myself feels a natural part of that.
Fortunately I'm constantly positively surprised by Debian and by the Debian community.

Are there any other fields where you call yourself a geek, besides computers?

Certainly history (such as the eastern Mediterranean region in late antiquity), languages (including dead ones) and music (especially Josquin to Monteverdi).

We have asked Lucas Nussbaum, one of the three candidates for DPL elections 2013, to tell our readers about himself and his ideas for the Debian Project.

You can also read the interviews to the other two candidates: Gergely Nagy and Moray Allan.

Please tell us a little about yourself.

Hi! I'm a 31 years old french computer geek. In my day job, I'm an assistant professor (Maître de Conférences) of Computer Science at Université de Lorraine.

What do you do in Debian and how did you started contributing?

Like many, I started contributing to Debian by creating and maintaining packages for my own software, in the Ruby team. Then, I discovered that, even if it's not so obvious from the outside, there are a lot of areas in Debian that could use more contributors. So I just started to contribute to more and more things.

There's a list of things I did in Debian in my platform. What I have been doing recently is:

• rebuild all packages in Debian on a regular basis in order to identify packages that can no longer be built, and file bugs accordingly. In order to do that efficiently, I use cluster and cloud resources (more info)

• develop and maintain Ultimate Debian Database, a data aggregator that collects data in most Debian services so that it is possible to expose it in interesting ways (e.g. find release-critical bugs affecting popular packages).

• write and maintain a Debian Packaging tutorial, (packaging-tutorial package), to provide an easy-to-read introduction to packaging in Debian.

Why did you decide to run as DPL?

Two main reasons:

• Most of my Debian contributions aim at addressing problems at the distribution scale (cross-distro collaboration, Quality Assurance, data-mining). Being DPL is a great way to contribute to Debian at this level.

• the DPL campaign is a great time in Debian where we discuss the project's problems, politics and visions. Being a candidate is in itself a way to contribute to Debian (though it would be better if we had those discussions outside DPL campaigns too).

Three keywords to summarise your platform.

(re-)make Debian the center of the Free Software ecosystem; foster innovation inside Debian; reduce barriers to contributions

What are the biggest challenges that you envision for Debian in the future?

I often have the impression that the project is losing momentum, positive energy, and slowing down. It feels like we are living on the benefits of the past. A lot of very cool things happen in the Debian ecosystem, but very often outside the Debian project (in derivative distributions).

Debian should aim at reinforcing its position in the center of the Free Software ecosystem: it should be the main active intermediary between upstream projects and final users. To achieve that, we need to reinforce the visibility and the impact of Debian. This is extremely important because the values we fight for as a project are often neglected by our derivatives.

What are, in your opinion, the areas of the project more in need of technical and/or social improvements?

Fostering innovation inside Debian: we should be more welcoming towards innovation and experiments inside the project. Often, we merely tolerate them, and bureaucracy makes them hard and slow to conduct. As a result, people tends to innovate outside the Debian project.

Making it easier to contribute to Debian: we compete with more and more projects to attract contributors. While we are already quite good at welcoming new contributors with good documentation and mentoring (much better than people usually think), there's still a lot of room for improvement.

Why should people vote for you?

A great thing in Debian's voting system is that you don't vote "for" or "against" a specific candidate. Instead, due to our use of the Condorcet method, you rank candidates (and also indicate those who you consider suitable for the role by ranking a virtual "None of the above" candidate).

Why am I a good candidate? My previous contributions to Debian show that I have a pretty good understanding of the inner workings of the project, and that I have a track record of managing projects successfully inside Debian. I think that those are two required qualities for a DPL.

Name three tools you couldn't stay without.

vim, mutt, ssh.

What keep you motivated to work in Debian?

Debian is a fantastic project from a technical point of view (focus on technical excellence, lots of interesting challenges), but also from a social point of view: the Debian community is a great community where I have lots of good friends. Also, what's great when you contribute to Debian is that your work has a real impact, and that you see people using stuff you worked on everywhere.

Are there any other fields where you call yourself a geek, besides computers?

I'm not sure this really qualifies as "besides computers", but I've gotten very interested in the OpenStreetMap project lately. I very much enjoy exploring unmapped areas on a mountain bike. It feels like being Christopher Columbus or Marco Polo, but 20 minutes from home. ;) The OpenStreetMap and Debian projects also share many values, such as a great attention to quality and details.

We have asked Gergely Nagy, one of the three candidates for DPL elections 2013, to tell our readers about himself and his ideas for the Debian Project.

You can also read the interviews to the other two candidates: Lucas Nussbaum and Moray Allan.

Please tell us a little about yourself.

I was born in Hungary, a little bit over three decades ago, as a son of a biochemist and a pharmacist, who gave me the name Gergely Nagy (however, online - and offline too by now - I'm mostly known by my nickname, algernon).

I went on to study human arts (hungarian grammar & literature, in particular), and to support this passion, I work as a software engineer, one who gets paid to work on free software. As such, I'm in a fortunate situation where my hobby supports my passion, and my hobby aligns well with my Debian work too.

What do you do in Debian and how did you started contributing?

At the moment, apart from maintaining a few packages, I'm doing a few other, mostly invisible things, like reassigning misfiled bugs so they don't end up being forgotten; or review newly uploaded packages before they enter the archive, making sure we are allowed to distribute them, and that their quality is up to our standards. I used to do quite a lot of other things, but I chose to spend the past year mostly invisible, learning.

I started contributing by packaging an editor I was using at the time, but quickly ended up adopting another package - things escalated from there quickly.

Why did you decide to run as DPL?

There were two reasons that motivated me to run: one is that I believe I can bring something new to the table, that I can help Debian expand in new directions. The other reason is that I'm always on the lookout for new ways to contribute back to Debian, and being the project leader is a position where I believe I could contribute most at this point in time.

Three keywords to summarise your platform.

Non-technical contributors.

What are the biggest challenges that you envision for Debian in the future?

The biggest challenge is growing up, to become more than a group of computer geeks creating an amazing distribution. To become a community of a wide variety of people, where both computer geeks and art geeks feel equally at home. Yet, at the same time, where we as a project, keep our focus straight, and be the champions of Free Software.

We just need to realize that there's much more to Free Software than the software itself.

What are, in your opinion, the areas of the project more in need of technical and/or social improvements?

I believe that while we do have many areas where we could use technical improvements, we are reasonably safe there, because we do have very skilled technical people to help us solve these problems. We can make our tools better, we can develop our infrastructure better to aid us even more - and so on and so forth. While we need work on many areas, we're on the right track there.

However, when it comes to social issues, we're at a loss. We have serious trouble keeping certain topics civilised on mailing lists, we have trouble attracting women, and we have trouble reaching people who are not naturally exposed to Debian (or Free Software). We could really use a more diverse community, but that requires us to overcome quite a lot of social roadblocks, so to say. Outreach is one particular area where we need much more technical and social improvements.

Why should people vote for you?

People should vote me, because they found my platform, my answers on debian-vote@, and my ideas and goals convincing and worthy to pursue. People should vote me, because they trust I'll be able to serve the project well.

Name three tools you couldn't stay without.

Emacs, git and a pencil. Because with these three, I can pretty much do anything.

What keep you motivated to work in Debian?

The community. Over the years, I had the good fortune to meet with a lot of people I hold in high esteem, whose enthusiasm and motivation I found inspiring. For any other common goals Debian and I may share, in the end, it is the people within Debian that keep me motivated.

Are there any other fields where you call yourself a geek, besides computers?

I'm not quite there yet, but I'm working hard on becoming a human arts geek, or at least a geek of the hungarian language.

It’s been quite a week. But in a really good way. It started off last Sunday with a trip to see Richard Herring‘s latest show, “Talking Cock.” The subject matter should be obvious from the title, and it says something about the topics he has covered in the past that this is probably the lightest and fluffiest of the four shows that I’ve seen. It’s very enjoyable and not particularly crude.

I spent the middle of the week at the Photography Farm, a three day residential workshop run by the award-winning Lisa Devlin. I’ll write more about it and share some of my photographs in a couple of weeks, but for now suffice it to say that it was a challenging, fun and exhausting time. It will take me a while to fully absorb it all, but I know it will have a huge impact on my wedding photography. But most importantly I met some fantastic new friends.

This weekend was Big Finish Day 3 in Barking, where I was proud to be representing The Doctor Who Podcast, wearing one of their rather snazzy t-shirts. Laura and I recorded lots of interviews with contributors to Doctor Who and Big Finish. I won’t list them all here to preserve some element of surprise, but I’m grateful to so many people for giving up their time to talk to us.

Then back home, via a whistle-stop visit to Emma Jane and James Westby’s wedding reception in Nottingham, where I managed to fall over spectacularly on sheet ice less than two seconds after warning others not to do the same. Ow.

The last thing I wanted on Sunday evening was to go back out into the cold, but I’m glad I made the effort to see Mark Thomas’ show “Bravo Figaro.” It’s a performance piece rather than stand up, and is in turns funny, dark and touching.

And now, I’m off to bed.

Pin It

I use get-iplayer to download TV programs so I can watch them on the devices that suit me, when it suits me. What follows is how I install get-iplayer on a headless Debian 6.0 server I have a home. The server is question is really low powered so building from source was not an option.

In order to install the latest version of get-iplayer (currently 2.82) on Debian Squeeze a couple of additional package respositories need enabling.

• Debain Multimedia
• Debian Backports

Enable the Debain Backports repository by adding the following line to /etc/apt/sources.list.d/backports.list.

deb http://backports.debian.org/debian-backports squeeze-backports main

Enable the Debain Multimedia repository by adding the following lines to /etc/apt/sources.list.d/multimedia.list.

deb http://www.deb-multimedia.org squeeze main non-free deb http://www.deb-multimedia.org squeeze-backports main

Update the repositories.

sudo apt-get update

Install the deb-multimedia-keyring package.

sudo apt-get --allow-unauthenticated install deb-multimedia-keyring

Install get-iplayer (currently v2.78) from the official Debian repositories, this will also install the dependencies.

sudo apt-get install get-iplayer

Install the get-iplayer suggested packages.

sudo apt-get install ffmpeg rtmpdump libdata-dump-perl libid3-tools libcrypt-ssleay-perl libio-socket-ssl-perl

I have seen it suggested that mplayer should also be installed. I've not determined if that is an absolute requirement. But this is how to install it on a headless Debian computer.

sudo apt-get --no-install-recommends install mplayer

Finally, upgrade get-iplayer to v2.82.

sudo apt-get install libmp3-tag-perl libxml-simple-perl wget http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/pool/main/g/get-iplayer/get-iplayer_2.82-2_all.deb sudo dpkg -i get-iplayer_2.82-2_all.deb

At this point get-iplayer should be good to go and the get-iplayer website and man get-iplayer will assist you.

References

• http://www.infradead.org/get_iplayer/html/get_iplayer.html
• http://www.deb-multimedia.org/
• http://backports-master.debian.org/
• http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/get_iplayer/2012-June/003065.html
• http://tech.leeporte.co.uk/get_iplayer-under-debian-squeeze/

So via hackernews I recently learned about fight code, and my efforts have been fun. Currently my little robot is ranked ~400

, but it seems to jump around a fair bit.

Otherwise I've done little coding recently:

• slaughter has had its code moved to github.
• The bookmark code got one patch and has had some interest

I'm pondering libpcap a little, for work purposes. There is a plan to write a deamon which will count incoming SYN packets, per-IP, and drop access to clients that make "too many" requests "too quickly".

This plan is a simple anti-DoS tool which might or might not work in the real world. We do have a couple of clients that seem to be DoS magnets and this is better than using grep + sort against apache access logs.

For cases where a small number of source IPs make many-many requests it will help. For the class of attacks where a huge botnet has members making only a couple of requests each it won't do anything useful.

We'll see how it turns out.

It's a while since I bought my desktop PC. I tend to keep kit a lot longer than most of the people I know, indeed I still use kit that is older and slower than what some people throw away!

My desktop system is now getting too slow and full. I would never say I'm a good photographer but I do take pictures and the ancient 120 GB drive on my desktop system is full. I've got a lot of that backed up on my home server but even so the drive is just full. It also doesn't have enough memory or CPU grunt to edit a decent sized RAW image in GIMP. It's swapping far too much.

The best thing to do is buy a new box. I think that a 180 GB flash drive for root and a 2 TB hard disk for bulk storage should hold the OS and my pictures for a while. RAM is reasonably cheap so I'll probably go for 16 GiB off the stuff which should allow the system to breath more than it is with just 2 GiB that it has now. Not sure on the CPU, the quad-core AMDs are pretty cheap and come with a decent built in GPU but the twin-core Intels are faster if more expensive.

I bought a budget Android tablet a little while back that turned out to be really rather good. However, there were issues with the initial firmware.

• Connecting to, or maintaining connection with, some wireless networks was unreliable.
• When the internal NAND was under moderate load the tablet would become unresponsive.

Ployer relased a firmware update in November 2012 which addressed these issues. Here's the translated change log.

1. System, audio and video decoding, browser, Flash player, 3G module, boot animation module BUG repair.
2. Update NandFlash, Mali, Wifi module drivers, while addressing some CTS tests BUG and the stability of the system as a whole has been further enhanced.
3. Optimize Flash stability, improve the efficiency of the implementation of the DDR.
4. Default input method Sogou input method.
5. Update Google Pinyin input method.

However, the updated firmware comes pre-loaded with a selection of Chinese apps and defaults to a Chinese language.

Objectives

I decided to have a go a making my own custom firmware for the Ployer Momo 8 IPS with the following goals.

• Pre-rooted.
• Removal of pre-installed Chinese apps.
• Removal of bloatware.
• Extend `/data' partition.
• Make it a "Google Experience" device.
• ClockWorkMod Recovery.

I think I've been fairly successful. My firmware includes Android 4.1.2 features and even some Android 4.2 features. Until someone succesfully ports cyanogenmod to the Ployer Momo 8 IPS or Ployer release a 4.2.x update then my firmware is the most complete "Google Experience" you'll find for the device.

Changes

Below are the changes I made to the official Ployer Momo 8 IPS firmware.

13.080.1958

• Based on the Official Ployer MOMO8(IPS)-4.1.1-Firmware-20121120
  • http://download.ployer.cn/downdetail.asp?id=763
• Extended /data partition to 2GB.
• Removed Chinese applications.
  • UCBrowser_V2.1.1.219_Android3_pf147_(Build12110718).apk
  • dopoolplayer
  • iReader_android_v2000_108044_guanwang.apk including shared objects in /system/lib.
  • market_hd.apk
  • qiyiyingshi_V3.0_mumayi_e3d3e.apk
  • qq_mini_hd_1.9.1.apk
  • sougoushurufa.apk including shared objects in /system/lib.
  • zhonghuawannianli_ECalendar_V3.2.3_mumayi_3ee39.apk
• Cleaned up build.prop
  • Changed Chinese strings to ASCII
  • Configured English (UK) as default language/locale.
  • Configured Europe/London as default time zone.
  • Default display brightness set at 50%
  • Deleted settings for Chinese applications that have been removed.
• Removed Rockchip Utilities.
  • ApkInstaller.apk
  • RkExplorer.apk
  • RKUpdateService.apk including shared objects in /system/lib.
  • RkVideoPlayer.apk
• Removed bloatware.
  • Adobe Reader including shared objects in /system/lib.
  • DocsToGo.
• Integrated SuperSU 1.25
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1538053
• Integrated Clockworkmod Recovery 6.0.28
  • http://androtab.info/clockworkmod/rockchip/
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2102679
• Integrated Google Apps (JZO54K) 4.1.2
  • Adds the first boot Setup Wizard.
  • Adds Picasa photo syncing.
  • Face Unlock 4.1.2
  • Google Talk 4.1.2
  • http://rootzwiki.com/topic/31532-gapps-412-485486-jzo54k-gapps-package-1012/
• Integrated Launcher2 4.2, includes 50% transparency on app drawer.
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1995812
• Integrated some Jelly Bean 4.2 features:
  • Jelly Bean 4.2 clock.
  • Jelly Bean 4.2 keyboard with gesture.
  • Movie Studio video editor.
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2010535
• Integrated Cyanogenmod 10.0 APKs
  • Calculator.apk : Adds different calculator panels.
  • Galaxy4.apk : Smaller APK
  • HoloSpiralWallpaper.apk : Smaller APK
  • LiveWallpapers.apk : Smaller APK
  • LiveWallpapersPicker.apk : Smaller APK
  • MagicSmokeWallpapers.apk : Smaller APK
  • NoiseField.apk : Smaller APK
  • PhaseBeam.apk : Smaller APK
  • SoundRecorder.apk : Smaller APK
  • VisualizationWallpapers.apk : Smaller APK
• Integrated Adobe Flash 11.1.115.47
  • http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/archived-flash-player-versions.html
• Integrated Quick Boot 4.2
  • https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.siriusapplications.quickboot
• Integrated File Wrangler 1.4
  • https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.amon.filewrangler
• Integrated User Management
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1824066
  • https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appaholics.um
• Integrated busybox 1.20.2
• Added additional permissions files for increased compatibility.
  • android.hardware.camera.autofocus.xml
  • android.hardware.camera.front.xml
  • android.hardware.ethernet.xml
  • android.hardware.sensor.accelerometer.xml
  • android.hardware.sensor.light.xml
  • android.hardware.touchscreen.multitouch.xml
• Replaced ring tones, alerts and notifications with the audio from Nexus 4.
• Replaced boot animation with the Nexus animation.
• Replaced the default wallpaper with one from the Jelly Bean SDK.
• Updated the following, as of March 18th 2012:
  • CalendarGoogle.apk
  • Gmail.apk
  • GooglePlayMovies.apk
  • GooglePlayMusic.apk
  • GooglePlayServices.apk
  • PlusOne.apk (Google+)
  • Maps.apk
  • Phonesky.apk (Google Play Store)
  • Street.apk
  • YouTube.apk
• Removed Chrome.apk but updated /system/lib/libchromeview.so.
  • This was a space saving measure but ensures the ROM is Chrome compatible.
• Patched framework.jar so that Gameloft titles work.
  • http://www.slatedroid.com/topic/50354-gameloft-game-fix-for-license-check-or-loop/
  • http://dragondevs.com/index.php?/topic/1265-gameloft-game-fix-for-license-check-or-loop/
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=955847
• All APKs are ZipAligned.

What didn't change

• I haven't modified build.prop to make the Ployer Momo 8 IPS masquerade as another brand or model of Android device. I will not be making this change, please don't request it.
• Although my firmware includes many features from Android 4.1.2 and some from Android 4.2 I haven't bumped the Android version or Build number. That would be dishonest and misleading.

Known Issues

• Adobe Flash is enabled the first time the Browser app is run.
• Although busybox is included in the ROM, no symlinks are created.
• Using Launcher2 4.2 it is possible for icons to be positioned at the extreme edges of the home screens when in landscape orientation. The app drawer is not affected by this minor annoyance however.
• I've tested Asphalt 7 to confirm the Gameloft fix works. The game runs but accelerometer control input doesn't work. Do other Gameloft titles work properly?

Downloads

You'll need RKBatchTool for the RockChip USB drivers and also to flash the firmware. I've modified RKBatchTool to default to English language and removed old logs and transient data to reduce the size of the download. You'll also need the firmware itself.

• RKBactchTool 1.5 (~680 KB)
  • MD5 : 100c5effa6c3b062b3edb4179ddeef39
• Ployer Momo8 IPS Repack 13.080.1958 (~260 MB)
  • MD5 : 75eb65d0751371f31ec26ccb19611be9

Unzip both archives when they are downloaded.

How to Flash Recommended Wipe `/data/` and `/cache` from the ClockWorkMod Recovery when installing my firmware for the first time.

This will effectively factory reset your tablet to factory defaults and wipe your installed apps, app data and preferences. If you have rooted your tablet your might want to consider making a backup with Titanium Backup * root. If you have not rooted your tablet then you could use Carbon - App Sync and Backup.

• Install the Rockchip USB drivers included with RKBatchTool.
  • This was simple of Windows XP but I couldn't get Windows 7 to accept the Rockchip drivers. However, installing MoboRobo on Windows 7 provided the correct driver.
• Turn the Ployer Momo 8 IPS on.
• On the tablet go to Settings -> Developer options and untick USB debugging.
• Start RKBatchTool.exe.
• In RKBatchTool choose firmware file, click the Switch button. The device icon should change to green to indicate a successful connection.

Note The first time switching to upgrade mode is used Windows may prompt you to install additional Rockchip USB drivers.

• Only if the device icon changed to Green, click Upgrade.
• The firmware will be flashed and the tablet will reboot into ClockWorkMod Recovery.
• If flashing my custom firmware for the first time consider doing the following from the ClockWorkMod Recovery.
  • wipe data/factory reset
  • wipe cache partition
• Reboot the tablet and follow the Setup Wizard.

The first boot may take a little longer than usual. You will be presented with the Welcome wizard where you can configure language and locale, etc. You can optionally enter your Google Apps or Gmail account credentials and doing so will prompt for which Wifi network to associate with.

RKBatchTool Video

I've also made a video showing how to flash the firmware. Frankly, the hardest part is getting the Rockchip drivers installed.

ClockWorkMod Recovery

Booting to recovery can be achieved using the pre-install Quick Boot app.

The Ployer Momo 8 IPS only has one hardware button (power) so CWM is controlled with gestures.

• Swipe up/down: up/down
• Swipe left: select
• Swipe right: back

The Power button also acts as select, which I find to be the most reliable way to select an action.

Feedback

Your feedback is welcome, please use the comments are below.

References

• http://www.rockchipfirmware.com/

I bought a budget Android tablet a little while back that turned out to be really rather good. However, there were issues with the initial firmware.

• Connecting to, or maintaining connection with, some wireless networks was unreliable.
• When the internal NAND was under moderate load the tablet would become unresponsive.

Ployer relased a firmware update in November 2012 which addressed these issues. Here's the translated change log.

> 1. System, audio and video decoding, browser, Flash player, 3G module, boot > animation module BUG repair. > 2. Update NandFlash, Mali, Wifi module drivers, while addressing some CTS > tests BUG and the stability of the system as a whole has been further > enhanced. > 3. Optimize Flash stability, improve the efficiency of the implementation of > the DDR. > 4. Default input method Sogou input method. > 5. Update Google Pinyin input method.

However, the updated firmware comes pre-loaded with a selection of Chinese apps and defaults to a Chinese language.

Objectives

I decided to have a go a making my own custom firmware for the Ployer Momo 8 IPS with the following goals.

• Pre-rooted.
• Removal of pre-installed Chinese apps.
• Removal of bloatware.
• Extend `/data' partition.
• Make it a "Google Experience" device.
• ClockWorkMod Recovery.

I think I've been fairly successful. My firmware includes Android 4.1.2 features and even some Android 4.2 features. Until someone succesfully ports cyanogenmod to the Ployer Momo 8 IPS or Ployer release a 4.2.x update then my firmware is the most complete "Google Experience" you'll find for the device.

Changes

Below are the changes I made to the official Ployer Momo 8 IPS firmware.

13.080.1958

• Based on the Official Ployer MOMO8(IPS)-4.1.1-Firmware-20121120
  • http://download.ployer.cn/downdetail.asp?id=763
• Extended /data partition to 2GB.
• Removed Chinese applications.
  • UCBrowser_V2.1.1.219_Android3_pf147_(Build12110718).apk
  • dopoolplayer
  • iReader_android_v2000_108044_guanwang.apk including shared objects in /system/lib.
  • market_hd.apk
  • qiyiyingshi_V3.0_mumayi_e3d3e.apk
  • qq_mini_hd_1.9.1.apk
  • sougoushurufa.apk including shared objects in /system/lib.
  • zhonghuawannianli_ECalendar_V3.2.3_mumayi_3ee39.apk
• Cleaned up build.prop
  • Changed Chinese strings to ASCII
  • Configured English (UK) as default language/locale.
  • Configured Europe/London as default time zone.
  • Default display brightness set at 50%
  • Deleted settings for Chinese applications that have been removed.
• Removed Rockchip Utilities.
  • ApkInstaller.apk
  • RkExplorer.apk
  • RKUpdateService.apk including shared objects in /system/lib.
  • RkVideoPlayer.apk
• Removed bloatware.
  • Adobe Reader including shared objects in /system/lib.
  • DocsToGo.
• Integrated SuperSU 1.25
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1538053
• Integrated Clockworkmod Recovery 6.0.28
  • http://androtab.info/clockworkmod/rockchip/
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2102679
• Integrated Google Apps (JZO54K) 4.1.2
  • Adds the first boot Setup Wizard.
  • Adds Picasa photo syncing.
  • Face Unlock 4.1.2
  • Google Talk 4.1.2
  • http://rootzwiki.com/topic/31532-gapps-412-485486-jzo54k-gapps-package-1012/
• Integrated Launcher2 4.2, includes 50% transparency on app drawer.
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1995812
• Integrated some Jelly Bean 4.2 features:
  • Jelly Bean 4.2 clock.
  • Jelly Bean 4.2 keyboard with gesture.
  • Movie Studio video editor.
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2010535
• Integrated Cyanogenmod 10.0 APKs
  • Calculator.apk : Adds different calculator panels.
  • Galaxy4.apk : Smaller APK
  • HoloSpiralWallpaper.apk : Smaller APK
  • LiveWallpapers.apk : Smaller APK
  • LiveWallpapersPicker.apk : Smaller APK
  • MagicSmokeWallpapers.apk : Smaller APK
  • NoiseField.apk : Smaller APK
  • PhaseBeam.apk : Smaller APK
  • SoundRecorder.apk : Smaller APK
  • VisualizationWallpapers.apk : Smaller APK
• Integrated Adobe Flash 11.1.115.47
  • http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/archived-flash-player-versions.html
• Integrated Quick Boot 4.2
  • https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.siriusapplications.quickboot
• Integrated File Wrangler 1.4
  • https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.amon.filewrangler
• Integrated User Management
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1824066
  • https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appaholics.um
• Integrated busybox 1.20.2
• Added additional permissions files for increased compatibility.
  • android.hardware.camera.autofocus.xml
  • android.hardware.camera.front.xml
  • android.hardware.ethernet.xml
  • android.hardware.sensor.accelerometer.xml
  • android.hardware.sensor.light.xml
  • android.hardware.touchscreen.multitouch.xml
• Replaced ring tones, alerts and notifications with the audio from Nexus 4.
• Replaced boot animation with the Nexus animation.
• Replaced the default wallpaper with one from the Jelly Bean SDK.
• Updated the following, as of March 18th 2012:
  • CalendarGoogle.apk
  • Gmail.apk
  • GooglePlayMovies.apk
  • GooglePlayMusic.apk
  • GooglePlayServices.apk
  • PlusOne.apk (Google+)
  • Maps.apk
  • Phonesky.apk (Google Play Store)
  • Street.apk
  • YouTube.apk
• Removed Chrome.apk but updated /system/lib/libchromeview.so.
  • This was a space saving measure but ensures the ROM is Chrome compatible.
• Patched framework.jar so that Gameloft titles work.
  • http://www.slatedroid.com/topic/50354-gameloft-game-fix-for-license-check-or-loop/
  • http://dragondevs.com/index.php?/topic/1265-gameloft-game-fix-for-license-check-or-loop/
  • http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=955847
• All APKs are ZipAligned.

What didn't change

• I haven't modified build.prop to make the Ployer Momo 8 IPS masquerade as another brand or model of Android device. I will not be making this change, please don't request it.
• Although my firmware includes many features from Android 4.1.2 and some from Android 4.2 I haven't bumped the Android version or Build number. That would be dishonest and misleading.

Known Issues

• Adobe Flash is enabled the first time the Browser app is run.
• Although busybox is included in the ROM, no symlinks are created.
• Using Launcher2 4.2 it is possible for icons to be positioned at the extreme edges of the home screens when in landscape orientation. The app drawer is not affected by this minor annoyance however.
• I've tested Asphalt 7 to confirm the Gameloft fix works. The game runs but accelerometer control input doesn't work. Do other Gameloft titles work properly?

Downloads

You'll need RKBatchTool for the RockChip USB drivers and also to flash the firmware. I've modified RKBatchTool to default to English language and removed old logs and transient data to reduce the size of the download. You'll also need the firmware itself.

• RKBactchTool 1.5 (~680 KB)
  • MD5 : 100c5effa6c3b062b3edb4179ddeef39
• Ployer Momo8 IPS Repack 13.080.1958 (~260 MB)
  • MD5 : 75eb65d0751371f31ec26ccb19611be9

Unzip both archives when they are downloaded.

How to Flash NOTE! I recommend wiping `/data/` and `/cache` from the ClockWorkMod Recovery when installing my firmware for the first time.

This will effectively factory reset your tablet to factory defaults and wipe your installed apps, app data and preferences. If you have rooted your tablet your might want to consider making a backup with Titanium Backup * root. If you have not rooted your tablet then you could use Carbon - App Sync and Backup.

• Install the Rockchip USB drivers included with RKBatchTool.
  • This was simple of Windows XP but I couldn't get Windows 7 to accept the Rockchip drivers. However, installing MoboRobo on Windows 7 provided the correct driver.
• Turn the Ployer Momo 8 IPS on.
• On the tablet go to Settings -> Developer options and untick USB debugging.
• Start RKBatchTool.exe.
• In RKBatchTool choose firmware file, click the Switch button. The device icon should change to green to indicate a successful connection.

NOTE! The first time switch to upgrade mode is used Windows may prompt you to install additional Rockchip USB drivers.

• Only if the device icon changed to Green, click Upgrade.
• The firmware will be flashed and the tablet will reboot into ClockWorkMod Recovery.
• If flashing my custom firmware for the first time consider doing the following from the ClockWorkMod Recovery.
  • wipe data/factory reset
  • wipe cache partition
• Reboot the tablet and follow the Setup Wizard.

The first boot may take a little longer than usual. You will be presented with the Welcome wizard where you can configure language and locale, etc. You can optionally enter your Google Apps or Gmail account credentials and doing so will prompt for which Wifi network to associate with.

RKBatchTool Video

I've also made a video showing how to flash the firmware. Frankly, the hardest part is getting the Rockchip drivers installed.

ClockWorkMod Recovery

Booting to recovery can be achieved using the pre-install Quick Boot app.

The Ployer Momo 8 IPS only has one hardware button (power) so CWM is controlled with gestures.

• Swipe up/down: up/down
• Swipe left: select
• Swipe right: back

The Power button also acts as select, which I find to be the most reliable way to select an action.

Feedback

Your feedback is welcome, please use the comments are below.

References

• http://www.rockchipfirmware.com/

I recently switched ISPs at home and now have unlimited high speed broadband.

Finally I can participate in torrenting Linux .ISO images. I always download the latest distros using BitTorrent and can now contribute to the community by seeding the distros I've downloaded.

I have a small (in size and resources) Debian 6.0 headless server at home that I wanted to turn into a torrent box. I'm a big fan of Transmission since it can be managed from the shell, web and Android phone/tablet. Sadly, the Transmission packages in the official Debain squeeze repositories are quite old, 2.03 at the time of writing, and there are no Transmission packages in Debian Backports.

However after flexing my google-fu I found a 3rd party Debian Squeeze repository that includes fairly current (2.73 at the time of writing) Transmission packages specifically for headless use. Yah!

Install Transmission Daemon

First become root.

sudo -s -H

Add the repository key.

apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-key 92B84A1E

Add the repository.

echo "deb http://apt.balocco.name squeeze main" > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/balocco.list

Update the package list.

apt-get update

Install Transmission.

apt-get install transmission-cli transmission-daemon transmission-webinterface Basic Configuration

The Transmission settings can be found in /etc/transmission-daemon/settings.json.

Information If `transmission-daemon` is running when you make changes to `settings.json` the changes you make will be discarded the next time `transmission-daemon` is started.

Therefore either stop transmission-daemon before you make any changes or you can make the daemon reload settings.json by sending it the SIGHUP signal.

Connect from anywhere

If you want to be able to connect to Transmission from anywhere on the Internet stop transmission-daemon, make the following changes to settings.json and then start transmission-daemon.

"rpc-password": "YourPlainTextPassword", "rpc-username": "YourUsername", "rpc-whitelist-enabled": false,

The rpc-username field will need adding but you can edit the existing entry for rpc-password. Enter the rpc-password as a plain text string, Transmission will automatically convert the password to a hash the next time it is started.

Connect via a browser

You should now be able to access the Transmission web interface via http://yourhost.example.org:9091. If you didn't change the username and password (you really should) the defaults are:

• Username : transmission
• Password : transmission

Connect via Android

I have an Android phone and an Android tablet. I use Remote Transmission on my Android devices to manage my torrent box.

Connect via the shell

If, like me, you spend the majority of you time at the shell. Then transmission-remote-cli is probably for you. All my workstation run Arch Linux so I install transmission-remote-cli as follows.

sudo pacman -S transmission-remote-cli

See the GitHub project page for tramission-remote-cli for instructions on how to connect to a remote Transmission daemon.

Block List

Regardless of how you intend to use Transmission you should enable a block list, this can be done via settings.json and the web interface. The following block list seems to be recommended.

http://list.iblocklist.com/?list=bt_level2&fileformat=p2p&archiveformat=gz

That covers the basics for getting Transmission running on headless Debian 6.0 and how to connect to it from just about anywhere and on any device. I recommend reading the Trasmission Wiki as Transmission is capable of so much more than I have covered in this blog post.

Happy torrenting.

References

• http://apt.balocco.name/changelog.txt
• http://www.lowendtalk.com/discussion/1001/squeeze-repository
• https://trac.transmissionbt.com/wiki/EditConfigFiles
• https://github.com/fagga/transmission-remote-cli
• http://www.iblocklist.com/

There’s something rather swish happened to my wedding photography website. It has a brand new design which I’m really happy with.

So, why the new design? I wanted more space to show off my photographs which is, after all, what it’s all about. Fewer words, more pictures. All the images are now a much larger resolution and I’m pleased with how much better they look. Each image on the home page now links straight to the blog post for that wedding.

I had to produce larger versions of all the images on the site, as I had been rather too efficient when originally uploading them and made images that were too small for the new theme. It was enlightening going back over old images and re-processing them for the new page layouts. I hope you’ll agree that they look even better than before.

The new design is also much more responsive than the old one, so there’s a much better experience browsing the site from mobile devices. The old design worked well enough, but web designers can now do much more for sites viewed on mobile devices. In the last twelve months mobile traffic to my site has increased by over 10%, so I wanted to be sure those users had a great experience.

The old design

The site runs WordPress, the open source blogging and content management system. One of the nice things about WordPress is that, for the most part, it separates content from presentation. It’s nowhere near as much work to switch to a new design than back in the good old days of hand-crafted HTML. It’s still not exactly easy, as things like widgets and custom menus need changing when you move theme.

Anyway, I hope you like the new design!

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