[Android Software Development] UltraM8:
Press release

Ho-ho-ho, kids, Santa is here with presents!

Before you open them, I want to speak some words. 2017 no doubt was Sauron's year, we make Mark I and it took us half a year to cook the next big thing - SAURON Mark II. I want to thank everyone here, especially my dear friends [MENTION=5357345]ahrion[/MENTION] and [MENTION=6037748]Zackptg5[/MENTION] for the work they made on their AML installer - this is a scripting masterpiece that gave me stunning API to perform all of the patches and features I wanted to add to the MK II. It won't happen without your skills guys! I also want to thank my bro and another Ainur team member [MENTION=5796885]james3460297[/MENTION] - your JDSP is one of the best equalizer apps that is going to blow the hell of 2018 and the help you provided us with porting xmlstartlet throughout the work on MK II betas was purely awesome. I want to thank all of my 4pda team dudes & every user that supported the mod. I also want to thank several donators - we achieved website, with your help, it's also very motivating to get some donation, despite their size. I can even tell that those funds saved me couple of times)

The biggest thing

Sauron is here - even more badass than before, with absolutely new features. Apart from the info you'll see in the features list at the proper post, I want to tell about several things, that are wrapped into this rocknroll package.

Audiophile setup

Though google, isn't paying attention to one of the biggest android audio problems - the downsampling issues, I wanted people at least get their Qualcomm powered codecs with the desired forced bitsize and discretization parameters. Now the codec, or dsp can be set to particular param, depending on music source values. It's not an absolute killer feature, and it still can't truly overcome google's failure, but at least it's something.

New effects

We've added Fmas effect for universal install. There is not much info about what that is on the web, but my hex studying the lib tells me it's something to deal with virtualization and downmixing. The FMAS (Fraunhoffer ??? Audio Spatializer) is used by google nexus and pixel devices. Probably based off the Fraunhoffer Cingo tech, wich is used by Samsing, LG and Alcatel for their VR headsets. There is no clue, if google is using it for VR, I bet on android car - an effect to downmix & virtualize audio for 2-6 speakers setup.

We also added Qualcomms Audiosphere effect - probably 3d audio virt, that has both software and hardware (hexagon dsp/codec) implementations. Most recent qualcomms already have it, but if anyone wants to play with it on old devices - there you go.

Another 3d audio effect is qualcomm proprietary Shoebox effect. There is no info at all, even hexing didn't helped much. There are no clues what is that for, so it could be anything from

VR/Daydream stuff, or some effect for qualcomms audio routing with dsp.

The reason why these are included - is that despite other effects ports you already know (like arkamys, dolby and so on), these doesen't have any service apps and no framework controllers (apart from audiosphere) whatsoever. There is also nothing in particular found in logs from devices i've taken it from. This leads me to an idea, that there is a possibility we can run them on other devices, since they require a proper hardware - qualcomm for asphere and shoebox, or rely completely on the effector library - as fmas does. There is a chance I missed something, though, but we'll leave them for whole MK II life cycle.

2017 was a big year for Ainur - 50000+ downloads for all of our previous mods & ports, we hit 900 people at telegram chat, so counted roughly there are 1000+ people all over the web, using our mods, and finally the website - a proper home for us. I'm looking forward into the bright future of 2018, with Narsil release and some secret weapon we are putting our hands on with [MENTION=5796885]james3460297[/MENTION], right in the 2018.

Thanks everyone one more time, have a nice holidays and let's get the party started!