How to run a FULL Ubuntu Desktop on your San Francisco (tested & verified personally)

[Guest glossywhite]

I claim no credit for having created this tutorial, nor for anything involved in the making possible of a fully operational and complete Desktop Ubuntu, running on your San Francisco.

My video of it running (excuse awful audio!):

How to install Ubuntu Desktop on Android (Blade verified)

This is the source of the tutorial which I used to get mine working - please note that I shall not be offering any kind of support, so if you don't feel up to the job, I'd recommend leaving it to someone else. I would recommend a 4Gb/8Gb microSD card, as Googling brings up reports of problems on larger microSD cards, but certainly don't use anything SMALLER than a 4Gb microSD.

Right, one final point; once you have downloaded the "ubuntu.zip" (links in the tutorial, linked above, but a much faster mirror is: http://rapefa.dl.rapidbaz.com/cIza/ubuntu.zip as the others are slooooowwwww!), you should browse to the microSD card path shown here: /sdcard/ubuntu and replace the "bootubuntu" script already in that folder (which you unzipped & copied over, remember?) with the attached one (unzip the attached "bootubuntu" and drag/drop/replace) OR IT WILL NOT WORK AT ALL.

To save a lot of link clicks and reading, what essentially is happening is that you are copying an Ubuntu distro compiled against "ARM" into your microSD card, booting it up inside a terminal on your Blade, installing a VNC server and telling it to serve to "localhost" (127.0.0.1), and then VNC'ing into it on localhost (as there is no X11 server on Android).

I also VNC'd into my Blade from my Mac, to control the Ubuntu Desktop running on my PHONE - w0000t?!

Enjoy this great hack - it really is fun :P

[EDIT] Just attached a 1024x800 PNG image for you to scp to your handset, to use as a wallpaper :-). Nothing special, but it will present you with a challenge, to scp it over (it's trivial, work it out ;-)).

bootubuntu.zip

Edited October 22, 2010 by glossywhite

[Guest BigBearMDC]

Nice! Any screenshots/ vids?

Best regards,

BB

[Guest jsplace]

Have done it with Debian on my Hero but this sounds cool :P

If I can wrestle the SF of the girlfriend for a day I might try it out.

Thanks for the info!

[Guest glossywhite]

Nice! Any screenshots/ vids?

Best regards,

BB

I'll knock a video up as soon as I get a minute (tonight). Here's a screenshot of my VNC'ing from MacBook Ubuntu into SF Ubuntu:

Edited October 21, 2010 by glossywhite

[Guest Rem1x]

Seems like fun! I'll try this when my download speed picks up :P

edit: What's the performance like? Any use?

Edited October 21, 2010 by Rem1x

[Guest YusufP]

Seems like fun! I'll try this when my download speed picks up :P

edit: What's the performance like? Any use?

Yeah, thats what puts me off most of these awesome ports, the unusable speeds.

Hoping this one is better though...

So yeah, it is useable?

Thanks.

[Guest glossywhite]

Yeah, thats what puts me off most of these awesome ports, the unusable speeds.

Hoping this one is better though...

So yeah, it is useable?

Thanks.

Well let's face it - it's not designed to be a functional tool, just a hacker's toy :P

[Guest YusufP]

Well let's face it - it's not designed to be a functional tool, just a hacker's toy :P

Very true.

Fair enough point.

:D

[Guest glossywhite]

Might try and install VirtualBox - see if I can get WIN XP running inside it! haha! :P

Video of it running (excuse awful audio!):

Edited October 21, 2010 by glossywhite

[Guest Rem1x]

Just want to say I'm running the GIMP right now :P

[Guest glossywhite]

Just want to say I'm running the GIMP right now :P

Hah! yeah, I did that last night - takes AGES to load, doesn't it!

[Guest Rem1x]

Hah! yeah, I did that last night - takes AGES to load, doesn't it!

Just a bit.

Drew a smiley face. That was about the limits :P

[Guest glossywhite]

Just a bit.

Drew a smiley face. That was about the limits :D

I'm hoping I can work out how to boot Ubuntu natively on the SF, without it having to run inside Android. People have done this already :P

If you reboot your phone, and then go to terminal, you can resize your "ubuntu.img" before you boot it, making more/less space available for Ubuntu:

su <press return>

cd /sdcard/ubuntu <press return>

e2fsck -fp ubuntu.img <press return>

resize2fs ubuntu.img 3500M <press return>

e2fsck -fp ubuntu.img <press return>

... is what I did. Step 1 does a filesystem check (forced) and the "p" option means "prune", whereby it fixes filesystem errors. The next step resizes my "ubuntu.img" to 3.5Gb (3,500Mb) and the final step does a filesystem check, once more.

Got apache2 and ssh running on mine, although starting them from /etc/init.d/rc.local didn't seem to work. Wrote a basic "index.html" using "cat" command ON THE DEVICE, IN TERMINAL, and saved it to /var/www, then viewed it in the browser. Nicccce :D

Edited October 22, 2010 by glossywhite

[Guest mozzyguy]

hey there, first post lolz

em i just wanted to say this is awesome and was wondering if there are other builds of linux capable of running like this on the sf.

Possibly a build of linux catered for lower end devices, i remember ubuntu netbook remix running on a 02 joggler although that was a lot more capable i believe.

[Guest shawn0]

Off topic I know but this thread got me thinking.

I have a netbook running Ubuntu remix,in the past I've used Opera Mini with an emulator but is there any way I could get the android version of Opera mini to run on my netbook and cut my data costs down?

[Guest hackerse7en]

i tested on my and it worked but now i try and doesnt work i think is because i converted to gen2 ???

[Guest i am not a hacker]

how do u switch back to android?

[Guest glossywhite]

Just to let you guys know that I DO NOT offer help or support for this, as I simply don't have the knowhow or time, yet. Sorry!

[Guest hackerse7en]

Just to let you guys know that I DO NOT offer help or support for this, as I simply don't have the knowhow or time, yet. Sorry!

why not, you are really good you could at least try plzzz

imagine one day we could connect usb devices like a mouse and run ubuntu on top of cm7 just like a pc

[Guest i am not a hacker]

What does it mean when he says that you must have Android SDK installed? I've rooted my blade, and it said i should have it if i have rooted it

[Guest Mushroom_Lord]

What does it mean when he says that you must have Android SDK installed? I've rooted my blade, and it said i should have it if i have rooted it

Google would have told you faster than asking here :unsure:

[Guest Jetba]

Nice to toy with. I cant start anything, but it must be, cause i ave it on 2gb ms.