UBports part 1 - Compiling and booting for Samsung S7

Oliv'

I went down the hole of installing Linux on my phone (Samsung Galaxy S7). The easiest path is compiling and installing UBports, some people have heavily started the process but it is still a work in progress.

This is the first part: step by step description to build and boot the system, with helpers scripts to setup the system once flashed.

UBports screenshot

UBports screenshot

The first part is my notes gathered during the initial build. You can install TWRP then jump directly to the step by step at the end of this page.

State

This is the status of working features with my current build, some others are more advanced.

  • [ X ] Wi-Fi
  • [ X ] Web browsing
  • [ X ] MP4 playback
  • Bluetooth
  • Camera
  • Sim card
  • Phone calls
  • SMS
  • MMS

Documentation

TWRP installation

Just follow official instructions https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/recovery-exynos-official-twrp-for-galaxy-s7-herolte.3333770/

Issue “Custom binary blocked by FRP lock”

Go to Android developer options, activate enable OEM unlock slider.

Halium compilation

Under Debian Bullseye it is not in the docs and might be obvious, but ADB must be installed apt install adb.

First steps

Set up your build device

Package python-markdown does not exists, to be replaced by python3-markdown

The error E: Unable to locate package repo is because contrib repo needs to be activated in /etc/apt/sources.list.

Get Halium source

Adding device-specific source

android_device_[manufacturer]_[device]=android_device_samsung_herolte lineage.dependencies file on Github

File halium/devices/manifests/[manufacturer]_[device].xmlalready exists: halium/devices/manifests/samsung_herolte.xml

Vendor blobs

Nothing to do? At least I did not for now.

Build Halium

Modify the kernel configuration

Clone mer-kernel-check outside of BUILDDIR . Then the command for Samsung S7 kernel is:

 ./mer_verify_kernel_config ../halium/kernel/samsung/universal8890/arch/arm64/configs/exynos8890-herolte_defconfig

Options I had to set:


# https://cateee.net/lkddb/web-lkddb/QUOTA.html
# If you say Y here, you will be able to set per-user limits for disk usage
# It does not work for me, the kernel is not able to mount partitions without.
CONFIG_QUOTA_NETLINK_INTERFACE=y

CONFIG_QFMT_V2=y
CONFIG_NETFILTER_XT_MATCH_MULTIPORT=y
CONFIG_IP_NF_MATCH_RPFILTER=y

Patch against 1046b86e869d6a77bc1f905b3a61bbd5e5478ee1: TODO

Include your device in fixup-mountpoints

Nothing to do, already included.

Building the system.img and hybris-boot.img

mka hybris-boot

Error:

/usr/bin/ld: scripts/dtc/dtc-parser.tab.o:(.bss+0x50): multiple definition of `yylloc'; scripts/dtc/dtc-lexer.lex.o:(.bss+0x0): first defined here

Due to a redundant declaration. Let’s make it extern in

  • ./kernel/samsung/universal8890/scripts/dtc/dtc-lexer.l
  • ./kernel/samsung/universal8890/scripts/dtc/dtc-parser.tab.c_shipped

Error:

mkbootimg: command not found

Add it to the system path after compiling it.

export PATH=./system/core/mkbootimg/:$PATH

Halium reference rootfs

Flash Halium

Restart it download mode, flash hybris boot:

heimdall flash --BOOT out/target/product/herolte/hybris-boot.img

Install Halium rootfs and system

./halium-install -p halium ../halium-rootfs-20170630-151006.tar.gz ../halium/out/target/product/herolte/system.img

I gave up Halium rootfs

But I did not succeed to make Halium rootfs boot: I had a constant reboot loop. When I asked on Halium’s Telegram channel someone told me that it is a 4 years old rootfs and I should move on UBports rootfs, so I did :-)

UBports

UBports is a touch-friendly Ubuntu flavor maintained by a community, since Canonical dropped the Edge project.

Building the images

Fix mount points

No edit necessary to the fstab file, found at:

device/samsung/hero-common/ramdisk/fstab.samsungexynos8890

Fix defconfig

Command:

./halium/halium-boot/check-kernel-config kernel/samsung/universal8890/arch/arm64/configs/exynos8890-herolte_defconfig -w

First time I ran the command:

Config file checked, found no errors.

 Made 110 fixes.

Run it again:

Config file checked, found no errors.

 Made 1 fixes.

But the lineCONFIG_DEFAULT_SECURITY is set, but to "selinux" y not "apparmor".is never fixed. Fix it manually with CONFIG_DEFAULT_SECURITY="apparmor" then run it again without the -w argument:

Config file checked, found no errors.

Ubuntu Touch requires setting console=tty0

console=tty0 is already defined in the kernel config file, so nothing required

Fix Apparmor

I did not try to understand why, but it is recommended in Github issue by and hoster in UBports Github, so let’s do it:

cd kernel/samsung/universal8890/security/
rm -r apparmor/
wget  https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ubports/apparmor-backports-ut/master/apparmor-3.18.tar.bz2
tar -xf apparmor-3.18.tar.bz2

Build halium-boot.img and system.img

Build as instructed

Installing UBports

As instructed in tge UBPort FAQ, use xenial-hybris-edge-rootfs-arm64 from https://ci.ubports.com/job/xenial-hybris-edge-rootfs-arm64

wget https://ci.ubports.com/job/xenial-hybris-edge-rootfs-arm64/lastStableBuild/artifact/out/ubuntu-touch-hybris-xenial-edge-arm64-rootfs.tar.gz

Flash boot image il download mode (phone off, long press on power+home+volume down)

./Heimdall/build/bin/heimdall flash --BOOT files/halium-boot.img

Reboot in recovery, flash system.img+rootfs

/halium-install -p ut ../files/ubuntu-touch-hybris-xenial-edge-arm64-rootfs.tar.gz ../files/system.img

Halium logging in

Wi-fi

As described nmtui then select Activate a connection.

UBpots - The graphical UI

udev rules

sudo -i
cat /var/lib/lxc/android/rootfs/ueventd*.rc|grep ^/dev|sed -e 's/^\/dev\///'|awk '{printf "ACTION==\"add\", KERNEL==\"%s\", OWNER=\"%s\", GROUP=\"%s\", MODE=\"%s\"\n",$1,$3,$4,$2}' | sed -e 's/\r//' >/usr/lib/lxc-android-config/70-herolte.rules

Edit layout (From Github)

Edit /etc/ubuntu-touch-session.d/android.conf to add

GRID_UNIT_PX=29
QTWEBKIT_DPR=3.0
NATIVE_ORENTATION=portrait
FORM_FACTOR=handset

Add user to update

Step described in Github issue, why?

sudo adduser --force-badname --system --home /nonexistent --no-create-home --quiet _apt || true

Install xenial fix dataspace

Again, from Github. Probably linked to the new user creation to update packages

sudo ubports-qa install xenial_-_fix-dataspace
sudo ubports-qa remove xenial_-_fix-dataspace
sudo reboot

Step by step with to flash system.img and halium-boot.img and boot

This step by step guide is working for me, if you have an issue please read the previous chapter which might help to understand it. In all cases please leave a comment so I can fix the instructions.

Backup

Backup your user data if you want. This process will also create a TWRP backup for Android itself.

Install TWRP

Follow official instructions https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/recovery-exynos-official-twrp-for-galaxy-s7-herolte.3333770/

Setup UBports

Reboot in recovery

Reboot in recovery, it can be done with adb reboot recovery or switch off the phone then power + volume down + home keys.

TWRP backup (optional)

If you want to be able to easily switch back to Android backup:

  • boot
  • system
  • data

Format data partition

In TWRP:

  1. Touch Wipe
  2. Touch Format Data
  3. Enter yes
  4. Go back to home menu thanks to the home button

Flash the boot and file system to the device

Still in TWRP:

  1. Clone Halium install.

  2. Download UBports rootfs.

  3. With sudo, or as root: ./halium-install -v -p ut ./path/to/ubports-touch.rootfs-xenial-armhf.tar.gz ./path/to/system.img Note add -i if your want to have your id_rsa.pub key copied

  4. Enter the password for the phone’s new user.

  5. When finished, then reboot in download mode. In TWRP:

    1. Touch reboot
    2. Touch Download

  6. Download and compile Heimdall.

  7. Once in Download mode, flash the bootloader with heimdall flash --BOOT ./path/to/files/halium-boot.img

  8. The phone will reboot, Unity will appear, the screen goes back, the phone restarts then Unity hangs. It is expected, then

  9. Enter ip address show in a terminal, it should make display a new interface. Mine returns:

9: enp0s20u2: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST> mtu 1500 qdisc noop state DOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/ether 00:00:00:00:00:00 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff

So the new interface name is enp0s20u2

  1. Download helpers files from Github.

  2. Run the script to setup the connection, send required files to the phone and connect to it: bash helper-install-host.sh interface_name. Ex: bash helper-install-host.sh enp0s20u2

  3. You should obtain a terminal on: phablet@ubuntu-phablet:~$

  4. Setup Wi-Fi thanks to:

    1. Enter nmtui
    2. Select Activate a connection
    3. Select your SSID
    4. Enter your Wi-Fi password
    5. Push tab to select <Quit> then enter to exit

  5. Start the configuration script thanks to bash helper-install-phone.sh

  6. Answer y when prompted (twice)

The phone should reboot, then you are in! :-)

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