One of my deceptions with Android platform was the lack of Python support. Nokia (while supporting Symbian and Maemo) had a great commitment with Python support [audio]. In fact, SL4A isn’t just Python, it’s scripting language support for Android: it means that you can use: Lua, Perl, Rhino, TCL, etc; even add your own. This is possible due it’s design:

The heart of sl4a is the RPC. Each script that is started is given it’s own instance of the intepreter, a text screen (if started in foreground) and a tcp connection to an instance of the RPC. rpcHandling opens a socket, and listens for incoming requests (ie, api call). So, for example. droid.makeToast(“Hello”) is formed into a JSON packet. JsonRpcServer reads this, sees if it knows what method is being asked for, and passes it to the appropriate facade for processing. Every part of the API is managed by a facade. Each facade are compiled as seperate projects, with different platform targets [due SDK compatibility]. Then JsonRpcServer runs through all the available facades, sees if they can run on the current platform, and puts them into the method list if so.

Although a alpha quality software you can try in your device. To install SL4A go to download page and get sl4a_rX.apk and PythonForAndroid_rX.apk [replace X to number  referenced by Featured label]. All my steps are focused on Python support but I guess that other script languages follow the same path.

Connect your device and install.

$ adb install sl4a_rX.apk
$ adb install PythonForAndroid_rX.apk

Follow the steps on device you’ll need a network connection to finish the process. Open PythonForAndroid on your device and click on Install [this will download all necessary packages]. After you’ll see:

….

Save as 1st.py and copy to your phone:

$ adb push 1st.py /sdcard/sl4a/scripts

Select the console logo do start (you can use engine logo too but without console output)

Also you can choose run script from your host computer.

$ adb shell am start -a com.googlecode.android_scripting.action.LAUNCH_FOREGROUND_SCRIPT -n com.googlecode.android_scripting/.activity.ScriptingLayerServiceLauncher -e com.googlecode.android_scripting.extra.SCRIPT_PATH /sdcard/sl4a/scripts/1st.py

Now you can start write some Python code that will run on Android device. Check API reference for possibilities.

This was a introduction text about SL4A necessary to describe my learning process and some cool things that you can do. Wait for the next posts.

Download QR-Code Cacomp: small, original
Download QR-Code UNIFEI: small, original

If you want create your own, theory or other logos visit HackADay link.

$ echo /dev/sda > ~/.blocklist-dd
$ echo /dev/sdb >> ~/.blocklist-dd

Then run you dd wrapper, I choose call my code “cc” (near dd in keyboard layout) and associate in $PATH environment.

$ wget https://raw.github.com/gist/1100234/b59055e9ab1e3db8ab9d8185287852330d30e777/cc
$ chmod +x cc

And use “dd” normally. Bellow we have a correct example to backup MBR. Since /dev/sda is on our blacklist you need  confirm the operation.

$ cc if=/dev/sda of=mbr.img bs=1 count=512
ooops, you are associating a blocked device (/dev/sda) on dd, proceed? (Y/n)
Y
512+0 records in
512+0 records out
512 bytes (512 B) copied, 0.00221805 s, 231 kB/s

Sometimes adding a layer of complexity sometimes could simplify your life.

Code is here.

Note: I used this approach because I’m transferring few files, it’s not a good idea use this technique with many files.

I’m studying Android Framework to implement automated functional and stress testing in many devices. I’ll describe my learning experience with some Android tools, starting with monkeyrunner [1] – quoting SDK documentation:

“The monkeyrunner tool provides an API for writing programs that control an Android device or emulator from outside of Android code. With monkeyrunner, you can write a Python program that installs an Android application or test package, runs it, sends keystrokes to it, takes screenshots of its user interface, and stores screenshots on the workstation. The monkeyrunner tool is primarily designed to test applications and devices at the functional/framework level and for running unit test suites, but you are free to use it for other purposes.”

How Install?

monkeyrunner is available at default Android SDK.

$ cd ~
$ wget http://dl.google.com/android/android-sdk_r11-linux_x86.tgz
$ tar zxvf android-sdk_r11-linux_x86.tgz
$ cd android-sdk-linux_x86/tools/
$ ./android

Go to Available packages item, select Android Repository and check Android SDK Tools, revision XX

To give path-independent access to your user, you can edit bash config, like:

echo “PATH=~/android-sdk-linux_x86/tools/:$PATH” >> ~/.bashrc
echo “PATH=~/android-sdk-linux_x86/platform-tools/:$PATH” >> ~/.bashrc

Basic usage is simple, just command and script file:

monkeyrunner <script file>

To get the idea, our first code not communicate with emulator or device yet but will list all functions from main classes. Get your favorite editor and type:

Run:

monkeyrunner monkeyrunner-list.py

This will output three main classes with respective functions ( “private” methods were intentionally omitted). Behind the scene monkeyrunner is a shell script that starts a jar file that contains jython implementation.

MonkeyRunner

• alert
• choice
• help
• input
• sleep
• waitForConnection

MonkeyDevice

• DOWN
• DOWN_AND_UP
• UP
• broadcastIntent
• drag
• getProperty
• getSystemProperty
• installPackage
• instrument
• press
• reboot
• removePackage
• shell
• startActivity
• takeSnapshot
• touch
• type
• wake

MonkeyImage

• convertToBytes
• getRawPixel
• getRawPixelInt
• getSubImage
• sameAs
• writeToFile

Take a look on each method and image the possibilities to automate things. Stay tunned for next posts.

[1] http://developer.android.com/guide/developing/tools/monkeyrunner_concepts.html

adb shell dumpsys

Also you can apply filters to running services:

Some examples:

adb shell dumpsys wifi

adb shell dumpsys cpuinfo

I suggest you try other items on the list above and be creative using all the power of Unix pipes. Example, to get all memory allocated by each process you can do something like:

adb shell dumpsys meminfo | grep "allocated:" | awk '{total = total + $5}END{print total}'

setenv bootargs ‘console=none root=/dev/mmcblk0pX rootwait init=/sbin/init’

But this parameter broke the output of my start code (a shell script) located on /etc/rc.d/…

Checking for solutions I go back to getty and added two parameters “-l” and “-n” to specify your program (or script) and prompt for nologin.

$ cat /etc/inittab

::sysinit:/etc/rc.d/rcS
::respawn:/sbin/getty -L ttymxc0 115200 vt100 -l /path/to/your/program -n
::ctrlaltdel:/sbin/reboot
::shutdown:/etc/rc.d/rcS stop
::restart:/sbin/init

Now I can see the serial output without kernel boot messages.

mmc init
mmc rescan 0
fatload mmc 0 0×82000000 boot.scr
source 0×82000000

After install… I put a usb/ethernet dongle and got fully supported by APT syncing from ports.ubuntu.com

I suggest try it.

javascript:void(location.href=’http://www.facebook.com/plugins/like.php?href=’+encodeURIComponent(location.href))

To use just move the link below to your bookmarks bar.

I like

I don’t know if it’s the correct way… just opted for that because I want share some content that aren’t integrated with Facebook API.

If you need know the steps to creante an UBI/UBIFS check the official documentation or my ubifs tag on del.icio.us.