[Acer Iconia A500] mecahi:
Hi everbody,

I do not know if this is an appropriate place to for this post but since I am a new member, it was not possible to post it in development.

Please note that if you choose to apply following steps, I accept no responsibility about whatever happens. Do not come back and whine about a bricked device.

I have been trying to get a Linux system running on my beloved A500, and I also wanted to have X windows system (I have to confess that I suck at command prompt). I have finally achieved it. I thought to sketch a short "how to". Most of things I explain here are from a post by gmaster1440. I just wanted to have a "how to" for specific our beloved A500. I hope this help.

1- You need to root your A500. I do not think this would work on a unrooted device. Also, you need to have an internet connection (preferably a fast one) for installation. During the following procedure, I was using Hacker's Keyboard. It has most of the keys like CTRL which will greatly ease your job.

2-Grab Linux Installer from the market.

3- Read through the documentation (at the very least Quick Installation guide).

4- Install Debian Wheezy on your sdcard. (it is not recommended to install in on external sdcard although I did so). Ubuntu distros did not work for me, so I had to try several installations. finally I did get it working on Debian Wheezy. To connect you debian you need a SSH client. I used ConnectBot for that purpose. In connectBot, just select localhost, give connection any name and hit enter (return). This will give you a prompt with $ sign. Depending on where you put your linuxchroot script, you have to go there. In my case it is in /system/xbin directory. Just go where ever it is and run the script. If you left the option in linuxInstaller as there are, it should be named linuxchroot. Run it. If everything goes ok, you will get a bash (don't know what bash is? maybe more reading for you?) prompt.

5- As explained in the original thread by gmaster1440 here, install tightvncserver. You can do this by the command "apt-get install tightvncserver" (without quotes)

6- Next you need to install a desktop. Here you have several choices with several tastes and capabilities. Including ooo-so-mighty Gnome and KDE, but I just went with lxde. If you choose to install lxed you just need to enter "apt-get install lxde" on your command prompt. This will take a while depending on you internet connection speed so be patient (it took about an hour in my case).

7- You also need a VNC client for your A500. I tried this with android-vnc-viewer and Mocha VNC Lite and later worked better for me (in terms of resolution, color and keyboard input). Any other suggestions welcome.

8- You need to setup a few more things on your Debian before connection. Again quoting from the thread by gmaster1440, you have to issue following command on your debian prompt

export USER=root

additionally I did the following

export TERM=linux

export HOME=/root

You have to do this each time you connect your debian so it is a good idea to put them into your .bashrc file or to create a script.

9- You are ready to start your vncserver, in debian command propot just write "vncserver" and hit enter. This will (hopefully) start vncserver, and asks you for two passwords, enter a password for the first one. vncserver will want you to repeat this first password twice. After the first password, it will ask for a second password for view only connection, Just skip it.

10- After starting vncserver, kill it by issuing "vncserver -kill :1". Navigate to folder /root/.vnc and open the config file "xstartup" with a text editor of your choice. For newbies nano works just fine. Just write "nano xstartup". If you do not have nano then intall it "apt-get install nano". Comment out the line "/etc/X11/xsession" by putting a "#" sign before it (without quotes) and add this two lines

lxde (return)

lxsession (return)

then just save the file. (hit X while pressing CTRL "remember hackers keyboard") it will ask you if you are sure, say yes, hit enter again for not changing the ile name and return to the command prompt.

11- start vncserver again and connect it with your android vnc client. user name is root (remember export NAME), password is whatever you entered when you first run vncserver, host is localhost, and port is (at least in my case) 5901 (port can be different in your case depending on several things including number of vncserver you run, you can check it on the log files under /root/.vnc folder). Say connect and hopefully you will see your X-desktop.

You can specify the resolution o X desktop as you invoke it. That is, "vncserver -geometry 800x600" creates a X desktop in 800x600 pixels.

I still have to play with it to make it more productive and fun. Maybe I will add a screenshot as well. I would like to hear about any suggestions and (for sure) corrections.

Have fun with your X windowed A500.