yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Windows 8 General] dazza9075:
no i think they missed the mark, i suspect it was OEM presure, they would perhaps have promised to release low priced parts in x months, we do see that with other hardware, top end gets released first, then back ported to lower end gear.

but yes i agree,it is stupid,MS would have done well to use some of that $40 billion surplus it has to support a low price and gain some traction in the market rather than start from 0 with relitively high prices...

but who am i to argue
[Windows 8 General] aegixnova:
It's $100 cheaper than the iPad for the same storage, and when you look at it the Surface really does scream quality. Everything about the hardware just seems so precisely designed.

I think Microsoft are planning to go after Apple rather than Google. Apple is more of a competitor, as it offers the same services as Microsoft with that distinct Apple twist I despise.

They also don't want to undercut OEMs.
[Windows 8 General] dazza9075:
absolutely as a long term plan, but the more pressing problem is short term market traction,Android holds the cards there and shouldnt be dismissed, dispite it being a crap product compared to Apple and MS
[Windows 8 General] Rolandh:
MS should price Surface RT & Surface Pro mid range so its:

Android, budget Phone/Tablet for people on a tight budget/Linux users.

Windows Mid Range All Rounder, Desktop/Phone & Tablet for people that want a complete affordable package of Desktop, Phone & Tablet with everything working as one semlessly.

Apple premium All Rounder high end Desktop/Phone & Tablet for people that can afford to pay for style and want everything seamlessly synced between all there devices.

Android tablets may be cheaper than Apple Tablets but Android is scales properly on an Android Tablet compared to iOS where the icons are spread appart as if Apple has taken iSO from an iPhone and just flashed it to the iPad.

Hopefully Surface Pro with Windows 8 Pro will be more successfull than Windows XP Tablet Edition, I can't recall ever seeing any resonably priced Windows XP Tablet Edition Tablets advertised.

Roland
[Windows 8 General] lumpaywk:
Yeah its not like I am saying that there shouldn't be top end hardware at a top end price but where is the middle ground.

And now I also want to know where are any of these tablets. Its launch day the big bang of there tablet push and I cant find ANY for sale anywhere bar the surface and that's on a 3 week wait. I have been to PC world, Commet, Currys and nothing but old Laptops with the os put on it and not a single tablet. Its a joke! How do they expect to make big profits if people that actually want to buy cant find anything anywhere. Then to top it off we have the most preview locations in Europe but they are all in London! So once again some Americans thing England is well London.
[Windows 8 General] tricsio:
If you buy what you really need, the price might be right
[Windows 8 General] dazza9075:
your closer to London than i am!! ;) Marketing has always been MSs downfall, hardware is something they often do very well,but alas you may be right on this one
[Windows 8 General] thundr51:
Exactly this. With the pricing that they have they are trying accomplishing 3 goals

1. Placing the surface in everyones mind as a "Premium" product

2. Not annoy their OEMs

3. Give them room to drop the price if they want later.

I REALLY want a Surface pro but I know that it's going to probably be 900+ (based on RT prices) and I can't justify spending that much when I already have a perfectly working Acer w500 with windows 8 and nice i5 @ 4ghz, 16gb ram self built PC that runs pretty much anything decently. I think MS is targeting those consumers that have money to burn and the oems can fight over the 'bargain hunters'.
[Windows 8 General] lumpaywk:
Yes, but nobody is fighting for the bargain hunters, the acer and the Samsung tablets are more expensive then the surface (at least here on pre-order prices). All the windows pro based tablets are stupidly expensive like + £900. I know there are a few that could fill the cheap market but where are they? There is

nothing

available for launch! Its the worst launch I have seen in a long long time and is like launching the next xbox without any games. Whoever was in charge of making sure oems had products really dropped the ball on this one big style and by time they get anything to market the momentum of launch will have faded.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Okay guys. So over the past few days I've tried to compile KXP (AOKP for X8, if you didn't know) and failed.....thrice. The main aim behind this was to get

a) AOKP m6 for X8

b) TWRP running on our device

Now a) is still resulting in failures but b)....well, let's just say it can still be worked on. So this is what I've done so far:

I compiled a CWM version (without compiling KXP) just to get the environment ready for building TWRP. Next I edited the BoardConfig.mk to include these lines under a heading of #twrp like this

#twrp

DEVICE_RESOLUTION := 320x480 (the device resolution)

RECOVERY_GRAPHICS_USE_LINELENGTH := true (this line is supposed to improve graphics on some devices)

TW_NO_BATT_PERCENT := true (this line prevents battery percentage display in the recovery GUI)

TW_NO_REBOOT_BOOTLOADER := true (self-explanatory; we can't reboot into bootloader, can we?)

TW_NO_REBOOT_RECOVERY := true (this option never worked for me and so I removed it)

I sent the binary (obtained by typing make -j# recovery after copying the TWRP repo to the bootable/recovery directory) to feherneoh (the dualboot dude) and asked him to use it in a kernel, changing nothing else but the recovery binary. He said the phone didn't even boot.

Now I've noticed there are a couple of other libs and files built with TWRP. And also there's another recovery binary in /out/target/product/shakira/symbol/system/bin.

What I'm trying to do is compile a kernel with this binary. So far feherneoh's failed. And I'm pretty sure there's something else that needs to be done. I know about the recovery GUI images; I will place them in the res folder and try again but I'm pretty sure it will fail.

So i'm asking experienced X8-ians to help me out, especially devs like Daveee10, Rohin, nAa, alfsamsung, djnilse....the list doesn't end.

Looking forward to replies.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
This is what lead dev of TWRP, Dees_Troy had to say:

Re: Compiling TWRP for X8

Generally speaking, the actual recovery files would be in out/target/product/shakira/recovery/root. What you have to have for integrating into your kernel build will depend a little bit on how your kernel ramdisk(s) are packed. You'll need, at the very least, the etc (for the recovery.fstab), sbin (binaries and libs), and the res (theme and zip signature keys) folders. Recovery usually gets its own init.rc so you'll have to do whatever you need to do to get the recovery/root/init.rc integrated into your kernel or at the very least, modify an exising init.rc so that recovery gets the LD_LIBRARY_PATH value as covered in the guide.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Here's the link to a zip I uploaded: http://www.mediafire.com/?ad374fp01274e3z

It contains the output files when TWRP is compiled as a binary (in the "TWRP(binary files)" folder) and the ramdisk-recovery.cpio when TWRP is compiled as an image by issuing make -j# recoveryimag (in the "TWRP(image files)" folder).

Note: The binary didn't build the res images. They had to be taken from the gui folder of the bootable/recovery directory. However the images were there when TWRP was compiled as an image in the ramdisk-recovery.cpio.

Note 2: This is compiled using jb-wip branch. The first binary and image was compiled using master branch. I later found out that I was supposed to use the jb-wip branch instead of the master branch.
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
Well you should make it to compile with rom together. When its built then u will get "ramdisk-recovery.img" or zip... inside this one you will have all needed binaries and images. Then just open kernel ramdisk and replace those binaries. There are lot more needed binaries than just "recovery".

But first you must compile everything :D

Sent from my mind using fingers
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
You mean like make -j# recoveryimage.
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
Try with brunch :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Problem with brunch is I run into some errors while compiling the ROM (which stop the building) so I won't get any end product. I tried recoveryimage and got a lot of ramdisk-***.img's and cpio's and what-nots.
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
Thats good too :) now extract ramdisk-recovery.img if you have it
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
The brunch not help :( Tried a lot of variant (compile only the recovery/compile with rom/millions of different settings/etc...) The phone start the recovery, but not work (the best result is only a flickering image). Earlier I consulted with Daveee10, but he have same results.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
I couldn't extract ramdisk-recovery.img but I extracted ramdisk-recovery.cpio and I get a lot of files in the sbin directory like recovery, sdparted, fix_permissions.sh, adbd and a lot of libs. In the etc directory there is a recovery.fstab.
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
Then we are missing some files or there are wrong configurations...
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
How did you try pilu1978? I mean where did you place the libs and the binary?
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
Now replace all the files in ramdisk with these new ones
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
It won't work. I'm pretty sure about it.

EDIT: Okay apparently it is the right way. Sorry Xmaster8. Lesson learned.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
Yes. I examined a disassembled recovery binary from other phone (what is working correctly), the recovery depends on these binaries:

libz.so, libc.so, libstlport.so, liblog.so, libcutils.so, libstdc++.so and linker. These binaries needed in the ramdisk.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
But should these be in the sbin?
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
Yes, you can place here. Or any other place, but need to add the path in init.rc. For example:

export PATH /sbin

EDIT: I forgot, libm.so also needed :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
One more thing. Should I try this with ICS or JB?
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
If you built with ics source tree then ics and if jb then jb :)
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
I tried with cm7 :) For my own goal the ICS/JB is too slow/unstable. But Daveee10 working on twrp with his own JB project, looks like he have same results with CM11 than me with CM7. I think the problem source is not the CM version, maybe something missing from the device specific files.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
The ICS kernel init.rc already has this line

export PATH /sbin:/vendor/bin:/system/sbin:/system/bin:/system/xbin

Do I need to write

export PATH /sbin

again?
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
And if I understand correctly, we'll need a new bootrec file, right?
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
No, not needed. It was only an example. You can place the needed binaries into the meowlibs folder (for example), but need to add the path to the init.rc. If you place these files into a pre-defined path, nothing to do. :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Okay so what I need to do with an ICS kernel's ramdisk is:

1)copy over the recovery binary to the sbin directory

2)copy over the libs to the sbin directory as well

3)copy over the images to the res/images directory

Am I missing something?
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
As I remember this is enough, but maybe forgot anything... I tried a lot of thing and not remember what was the best results. Now I don't have free time, I will check it again on the weekend.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
sure thing. i'll try it too.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
I will ASAP. I am a bit busy; tomorrow's Eid-ul-Adha. I'll try my best to send it ASAP. I am gonna try something in the meantime.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Thread updated.

2nd post now has a PM from Dees_Troy. Read it if you think it's helpful.

3rd post now has the link to some TWRP files.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
Need some additional TWRP setting, and need a few modifications in the build environment. Now I will try again, later I will tell the results. :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Everyone use the latest TWRP.zip. The last one was not compiled with jb-wip branch. Sorry for any trouble I caused.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Can anybody check if this set of image and ramdisk boots into TWRP? I can't try it out now; I'll be at my grandma's for the next 2 days. So no flashing. But I'll keep checking this thread. Anyways here's the link: http://www.mediafire.com/?tuchb8iuesi56vi.

NOTE: It's an ICS kernel. JB has custom partitioning which I think may not support TWRP just like that. So you gotta be on ICS with a backup in hand. Bye for now.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
Okay, I will check it. :) But the twrp project designed for phones what have separated recovery partition, so it can work with JB kernels (I working with CM7). Can you post the added twrp setting in the BoardConfig? I tried with millions of combinations of setting, but the best result nothing more than a teamwin logo. :( Today have a few free time, now I can continue this project. :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
The flags I used are mentioned in the OP. Good luck.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
I'm near 100% sure, this is not enough. :(

I add some additional settings:

TW_HAS_NO_RECOVERY_PARTITION, TARGET_PREBUILT_RECOVERY_KERNEL, TARGET_RECOVERY_PIXEL_FORMAT and some other (not remember correctly at this moment)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
I don't think we need the TARGET_RECOVERY_PIXEL_FORMAT flag at this stage of development. I'll add some more flags and try. My Dad allowed me to take his laptop with me. :biggrin:
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
Maybe try with all this (modify for our device ofcourse):

TARGET_USE_CUSTOM_LUN_FILE_PATH for our device is :
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Will try ASAP. Thanks for that.

EDIT: The last set of image and ramdisk didn't even boot up properly. Tell me this. There's this line in the init.rc

export LD_LIBRARIES: blah/blah/..

According to the TWRP building guide, I have to change this to something like this

export LD_LIBRARIES .:/sbin

Is this really necessary for the X8? I'm sure there are some important libs loaded up at boot from /system/lib. They won't get loaded if I edit that line, right?
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
Yes, originally twrp designed for phones what have recovery partition with own init method (different settings in a separated init.rc). Now I'm on other machine, later I will check the settings what I made. But you are right, need to set the path for the linker only if you boot into recovery. :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
And another thing the BoardConfig.mk has two bits related to recovery under the following headings:

#Recovery

#twrp

For this project we need the 2nd heading and all content under it. So I was wondering what the other heading and its contents do and if they are even needed?
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
Can u tell me just one thing for info? did you use normal CM Build folder or the Moded one? Its just a Q as i will play with it a little too :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
I used the KangXperiaProject tree. The one that can be found from my github page. Here's the link: https://github.com/souljaboy11792/platform_manifest. Use -b ics. And use revision=cm-9.0.0 in bootable/recovery in default.xml to get it working. You also have to edit a few files (I forgot which ones). But you can also build using the MiniCM9 tree or any other ICS tree for our device.
[XPERIA X8 General] BuT_TeR:
complicated stuffs!! thanks for trying to make our x8 better :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
I try my best.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
Yes, complicated. :( Looks like need to modify the rom source too, ater editing the linker map the recovery starting without graphic issues, but the touchscreen not working (the phone not freeze, I can communicate with adb, but the recovery not do anything yet).
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
you might want to ask djnilse or alfsamsung for help with touchscreen. As i know the touchscreen in their recovery didnt work on start.

Btw very nice progress :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
What changes did you make and how?
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
We need to change the maxX and maxY values like when compiling CWM touch, I guess.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
Need to modify the linker mapping in device/semc/msm7x27-common, and some mod in the build environment. Touch driver looks like ok. Now on mobile, details later.
[XPERIA X8 General] Daveee10:
You can see aroma file manager sorce for touch. It didnt need change maxsx and maxy values... it detect things and touch working
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
Looks like everybody interested in this project ;)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
I just came up with this thought. Now I'll try compiling it with some more flags that Xmaster8 mentioned. Let's see what happens.

EDIT: It still didn't boot up. I think something's wrong in my init.rc. I'll check again. In the meantime, where did you find the linker mapping?
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
In the init.rc not need to do more than merge the /sbin to the LD_LIBRARY path. I used approx. 20 different settings in the boardconfig, later I will send it (now working in the real life)
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
Im compiling it now. Will see how it goes on.

EDIT: compiled ok with no errors.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Mine compiles OK but it doesn't work. I found out my problem. The init.rc did not load up the /system/bin directory for the ROM libs. So pilu1978, you got it working!! Like it recognizes touch and everything.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
I don't know why not recognize the touch, now I not have free time, later I will build again from the jb branch (earlier I worked from master branch).

The phone completely not boot? Or adb started? With an earlier build I had same problem (the phone not booted, just a black screen), but I could start the recovery in terminal. If the adb working, but the phone not boot, try to view the logs why not boot.

EDIT: I not tested it with CM9/CM10 source tree, I working with CM7
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
No the phone wouldn't boot the ROM. In other words, bootloop. Maybe post the changes then. And I still didn't get the linker change-y thingy you mentioned. Where'd you get it?
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
Can u list all flags that u used when u have time? Mine doesnt show kernel bootlogo but then goes to bootanimation and stucks there. It says it cant load dbus.conf...
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
Somewhere in device/semc/msm7x27-common. I not remeber the exact filename, something similar: prelink-linux-x8 map. Need to add some libs and modify the linking map addresses. But I don't know it working on CM9/10 or not. :( And the bootloop. You see the kernel logo? or not? Boot animation? Try QtADB, you can see the logcat in real time from the beginning of boot process (of course: from the adbd start :)) Today and tomorrow I'm very busy but from thursday I will have 4 free day, I can work on this problem with full capacity :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Anyways, we have made significant progress, thanks mostly to pilu1978. If I hadn't run out of thanks for the day, trust me I would thank you.

EDIT: I don't even have that directory in KXP source. :surprised:.
[XPERIA X8 General] Xmaster8:
you must apply these changes in build folder as much as i understand.

https://github.com/Dees-Troy/TWRP2-CM7_build/commit/6675c01373720498967ff50a8ade40a2aaa68309
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
As I remember, the working twrp config is something similar (I'm not 100% sure, I not checked the BoardConfig now, just write what I remember :))

BOARD_HAS_NO_REAL_SDCARD := false

DEVICE_RESOLUTION := 320x480

RECOVERY_GRAPHICS_USE_LINELENGTH := true

TARGET_RECOVERY_GUI := true

TARGET_RECOVERY_PIXEL_FORMAT := "RGB_565"

TW_CUSTOM_POWER_BUTTON := 107

TW_EXTERNAL_STORAGE_PATH := "/sdcard"

TW_EXTERNAL_STORAGE_MOUNT_POINT := "sdcard"

TW_FLASH_FROM_STORAGE := true

TW_HAS_DOWNLOAD_MODE := false

TW_HAS_NO_RECOVERY_PARTITION := true

TW_INCLUDE_CRYPTO := false

TW_INCLUDE_JB_CRYPTO := false

TW_NEVER_UNMOUNT_SYSTEM := false

TW_NO_BATT_PERCENT := false # it can be true :)

TW_NO_REBOOT_BOOTLOADER := true

TW_NO_USB_STORAGE := false

TW_SDEXT_NO_EXT4 := false

But I must say again: I'm not 100% it was the working config :)

Later I will post the new linker mapping too (it is too complicated and I can't remember :))

And if anyone have free time, need to check the twrp code where defined the touchscreen coordinates (variable names, etc) I not checked yet

---------- Post added at 01:53 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:48 PM ----------

@Xmaster8: I tried it earlier, but not worked. :( This is also have modifications in the linker map, but not good. The shakira device use different mapping, need to manually edit.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
I checked the usual recovery_ui.h. Nothing there. @Xmaster8 I don't have any of those folders. I think it's because I use ICS sources instead of GB ones.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
The recovery_ui.h related to the CWM recovery. Try to check the BoardConfig.mk and find the #Prelink section. There you can find a variable with something similar name: TARGET_PRELINKER_MAP. This is define the device specific linker map. You can see it in the linked stuff what Xmaster8 mentioned, but it is not good for x8 (wrong addresses, and not contains all needed lib)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
No I was checking the folder for any touchscreen co-ordiantes. The BoardConfig.mk (the one I'm looking at) doesn't have any such heading.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
I don't know ICS/JB need to modify the prelink map or not, Dees-Troy made a sample patch for CM7 only, maybe it is not needed for CM9/10. But not sure. Try to check the prelink map in device/semc/msm7x27-common instead of device/semc/shakira, and check BoardConfigCommon instead of BoardConfig. But I not have knowledge about the KXP source tree structure. :(
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Unfortunately KXP doesn't even have device/semc/msm7x27-common folder either.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
????? and where you found the BoardConfig.mk to insert the twrp related settings?
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
device/semc/shakira. I think I should MiniCM9 source into action. Gonna take some time to prep.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
And this BoardConfig not contains the TARGET_PRELINKER_MAP settings? With this variable you can see where is the linker map. (in CM7 source tree the TARGET_PRELINKER_MAP point to /device/semc/msm7x27-common/prelink-linux-x8 (or similar))
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
It doesn't have any #prelinker heading. I'm going to unpack the whole of the MiniCM9 source (remember you helped me download it as .zip files). The AOSP bits like abi/cpp and device/common.....can I use the ones from the KXP tree? If so, I am going to start working again tomorrow.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
I think you can use all aosp related code from the kxp source tree (and the prebuilt toolchains too). :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
Thanks for the info. Will start first thing tomorrow.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
Status report:

ROM booting normally, touch controll working... :D:D:D:D:D

Actual bug: problems with mounts, too tired to examine now, continue tomorrow. ;)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
You have to change the recovery.fstab, I believe.
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
And I got the MiniCM9 source up and running. I also found the linker thingy.
[XPERIA X8 General] pilu1978:
:) Okay, now working on real work, later I will post the working binaries (maybe with a sample kernel) and the used sources, BoardConfig settings, linker map, etc... :)
[XPERIA X8 General] sgt. meow:
The frak. You got it working already. Kudos to you brother. Apply for a RD right away.