Lets talk about Ubuntu on Viewsonic 10:) How To's, Tips, Issues, Solutions

[waterhead]

Waterhead, read back that you are using Openseus, I want to try that, can you open a new thread on instructions How to, from creating the preferrable partition size to customizing the distro to suit our touchscreen interface... I think many will be interested

I'll see what I can do, maybe this weekend when I have some time.

For partitioning, I made a small swap partition, then partitioned the rest ext4. I don't see the need or the advantage to having several partitions on a single-user tablet. Go ahead and download the CD version and boot it in live mode. You could also install it to a SD card. My install is using less than 6 GB, so an 8 GB SD card would be big enough.

 

[waterhead]

Waterhead, read back that you are using Openseus, I want to try that, can you open a new thread on instructions How to, from creating the preferrable partition size to customizing the distro to suit our touchscreen interface... I think many will be interested

I started a thread on installing openSUSE. I'm not sure if it is what you're looking for, but I can always add to or edit the posts:

Installing openSUSE Linux 12.1-GNOME

Since I didn't install it along with Win 7 or Android, I didn't get very specific on that part. If any questions, post in that thread.

 

[waterhead]

Since the first beta of Ubuntu 12.04 was recently released, I decided to give it a try. I installed it to a 8GB microSD card, so that I wouldn't disturb the current OS on my hard drive.

I am mainly interested in any improvements for uses in the tablet. Mainly the touchscreen and related issues. I did find that the onscreen keyboard has improved, and may now actually be more functional for a tablet. But, it still covers part of the screen, usually this is the area where you are typing into! The default window handles and taskbar are still too small to be accessable via a touchscreen.

I also wanted to check if there was automatic screen rotation. This still is a no-go, but I did find something that outputs data when you rotate the tablet:

In a terminal window, enter this command:

sudo hd /dev/input/event2

Now rotate the screen, and it should output data. Use the Ctrl+c key combination to exit. On my openSUSE install event0 will give me these results. If you are not getting anything, then try different event choices until you get results. You will notice some of them will respond to mouse movements.

You have to use the hd command because it is binary data. If you use the cat command, you will see what I mean:

sudo cat /dev/input/event2

My research on this says that the accelerometer should be event3 or event4, but this doesn't seem to be so. But it also says the accelerometer should be listed in the /sys/class/i2c-adapter/ section, and it is not. Instead it is listed under the /sys/class/input/ section. If it was in the i2c-adapter section, I don't believe it would be outputting binary data but regular data that we could actually use.

Since this is from my Azpen X1 tablet, I would be interested if the Viewpad 10 has different results.

 

[waterhead]

I booted into Android to see if I could find anything about the accelerometer. In the file /ueventd.rc I see this listed:

/dev/bma150 compass system

And I found this info (PDF file) :

http://www.bosch-sensortec.com/content/language1/downloads/BST-BMA150-DS000-07.pdf

http://www.bosch-sensortec.com/content/language1/html/4377.htm

Next time I have mine apart, I'll look for one of these on the board. In the mean time We need to find the Linux driver for it.

 

[waterhead]

I found some driver source code for the bma150 accelerometer. I found it via the wiki for the OMAP board:

Sensors for OMAP - OMAPpedia

Get the source files from here:

https://github.com/phukat/AccelDriver/downloads

It looks like you have to add the driver code to the kernel source, and then compile a new kernel. I am first trying it on my desktop, with Ubuntu 11.04 (natty). I already have the kernel source installed (doesn't everybody? ), so I inserted the driver files according to the OMAP instructions. After that, I followed Ubuntu kernel compiling instructions "The old fashioned way":

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/K...te_Build_Method:_The_Old-Fashioned_Debian_Way

When you run make menuconfig, go to this section and enable the driver to be a module (M) using the space bar:

Device drivers -->
Input device support -->
Miscellaneous devices -->
SMB380/BMA150 acceleration sensor support

You could also compile it into the kernel using the (*) selection.

[update]: Well, my compile fails with this error:

drivers/input/misc/bma150_driver.c:28:23: fatal error: mach/gpio.h: No such file or directory
compilation terminated.

Possibly a dependency error?

EDIT: This driver has code referring to the OMAP board. I doubt that it will work, as the compile fails when it hits that code.

 

[waterhead]

It looks as if the android kernel source would be a better place to get the driver for the accelerometer.:

https://github.com/android/kernel_common/commit/c17ca3f5a2c98784739bbbcc3f6b6ee177f4f201#diff-0

That page even tells you what you need to change. I'll try it later, maybe tomorrow.

 

[waterhead]

I couldn't wait a day, so I added the driver files and changes to my PC and compiled the kernel. I then installed the new kernel and loaded the bma150 module.

~$ uname -r
2.6.38.82.6.38-viewpad

~$ modinfo bma150
filename:       /lib/modules/2.6.38.82.6.38-viewpad/kernel/drivers/input/misc/bma150.ko
license:        GPL
description:    BMA150 driver
author:         Albert Zhang <[email protected]>
srcversion:     A972BF3FA8A105D7D504C73
alias:          i2c:bma023
alias:          i2c:smb380
alias:          i2c:bma150
depends:        input-polldev
vermagic:       2.6.38.82.6.38-viewpad SMP mod_unload modversions 686

~$ sudo modprobe bma150
[sudo] password:
~$ lsmod
Module                  Size  Used by
bma150                 13115  0 
input_polldev          13735  1 bma150

This doesn't prove anything except that the driver compiles, as I don't have an accelerator in my Desktop PC. I am currently doing the same thing on my tablet with the openSUSE install. This may take a lot longer because of the tablet's tiny Atom CPU.

 

[waterhead]

If anyone is feeling adventurous, they can try my Ubuntu kernel. Keep in mind that it was compiled on my Desktop PC, an Intel quad-core with a Radeon video card. There are no guarantees, and you should always be able to boot back into an older kernel. I haven't tried it on my tablet because it is still compiling the openSUSE kernel.

linux-image-2.6.38.82.6.38-viewpad-10.Custom_i386.deb

https://rapidshare.com/files/3635374762/linux-image-2.6.38.82.6.38-viewpad-10.Custom_i386.deb

 

[waterhead]

Running the bma150 driver on my tablet in openSUSE Linux doesn't seem to change anything. If this is the correct driver for the accelerometer, the system doesn't realize it. I assume Ubuntu will be the same.

Oh well, it was worth a try.

 

[waterhead]

I haven't given up just yet. I saw a few things in the Android repository that looked like they may be needed, so I added them and built another Ubuntu kernel.

input_gpio
gpio_tilt_polled

I want to try the new kernel on my tablet first. I installed Ubuntu 12.04-beta1 on my tablet, but it kept freezing up and then became unbootable. I am now in the process of installing 11.04, the same version that the new kernel was built with.

 

[waterhead]

I think that I came up with a way to auto-rotate the screen. I would have came up with it sooner if I hadn't blown off the post by serouja:

Hi Guys, I'm also interested with Linux on vpad10, i have tried Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, you can see that the Ubuntu can respond by rotating the vpad10, it will show others workspace, maybe it's possible to link the rotate screen scripts somehow....
I have tried the multitouch zooming in photos and it's working but with 11.10 by following the below thread:
[SOLVED] Viewpad 10 on Ubunutu 10.10 (Maverick) touchscreen, gestures and rotation - Ubuntu Forumsorry for wrong spelling or mistyping

thanks

Sorry serouja, sometimes I can be a real @ss.

What seems to work was exactly what he suggested, and it is also pointed out in the link that he posted. When you rotate the tablet, Linux will switch to a different workspace. This proves that you don't need to compile anything to get this to work. You just need four scripts, one for each position. I disable the current workspace switching shortcuts, and then make new ones, each pointing to the specific script for the desired position.

I can get the screen and mouse to auto-rotate, but the touchscreen doesn't follow. I tried it in Ubuntu and openSUSE, and I have the same problem in both. Maybe someone with an actual Viewpad 10 can try it out.

I will post more about this in my screen rotating thread.

 

[waterhead]

OK, I have auto-rotating working on my tablet. The problem I was having was because of a typo that I had in my rotating scripts.

I posted about it in detail in my Screen-Rotating thread. I hope you Viewpad 10/ Ubuntu guys will contribute to it.

http://www.androidtablets.net/forum/viewpad-10/33309-rotating-screen-touchpad-linux.html#post192037

 

[waterhead]

OK, I have auto-rotating working on my tablet. The problem I was having was because of a typo that I had in my rotating scripts.

I posted about it in detail in my Screen-Rotating thread. I hope you Viewpad 10/ Ubuntu guys will contribute to it.

http://www.androidtablets.net/forum/viewpad-10/33309-rotating-screen-touchpad-linux.html#post192037

I have Ubuntu 12.04-beta1 installed, and this method doesn't work on it. The workspace shortcuts were all disabled by default. When I created my own, and linked them to the script, auto-rotating doesn't work.

The auto-rotate works ok in Ubuntu 11.10, so this may just be a beta thing.

 

[waterhead]

Well, it looks as if the screen rotating hack is completely broken in Ubuntu since version 11.04. Not only are the shortcut-keys gone, but I cannot rotate the touch screen. Not even manually.

Thankfully, this works in the latest openSUSE. I want to try Fedora and Arch Linux to see how those are on tablets. Meego was developed from Fedora, so I'm hopeful.

 

[waterhead]

There is a new version of Ubuntu, just released. It is an offshoot for tablets, using the Plasma-Active environment. It is called Kubuntu Active:

Kubuntu Active is Activated | blogs.kde.org

It is so new, the only versions available are the Daily Builds. I just put it on a USB pen drive to try. I have tried other versions of Plasma-Active before, and I always had trouble getting the wireless connection working. I hope this is different.