Android 3.2 #kernel source code

[Guest owenoliver1]

If this is being released will anyone work on it for an aosp version for the vega?

[Guest juancaretta]

Only the kernel source was released, not the rest. Maybe the kernel could be used on the Vega, but a fully AOSP version can't be done. My guess is that until Ice Cream Sandwich is released we won't have an AOSP ROM.

[Guest Zebrahead]

Android 3.2 isn't a kernel...

The kernel is based on a linux kernel and isn't tied to android releases.

And I was under the impression that it was just the 3.2 SDK? They wont have released it as ASOP.

If it's just the SDK (and I'm not too sure, I haven't been reading the news), then that just means that you'll be able to build apps for 3.2. As for "porting" anything, the best you could possibly possibly hope for is the worlds biggest hack job of porting the 3.2 emulator images to VEGA. But this won't happen, If it does, it won't be anywhere near as usable as VegaComb.

Zeb

[Guest juancaretta]

According to XDA (and several other sources) the Honeycomb 3.2 kernel source was released:

http://www.xda-developers.com/android/source-code-for-honeycomb-3-2-available-on-aosp-and/

Editor’s Note: the sources that were released are the kernel sources and not the Rom ones. The latter are licensed under Apache, thus follow a different set of regulations. I apologize for the confusion.

[Guest juancaretta]

According to XDA (and several other sources) the Honeycomb 3.2 kernel source was released:

http://www.xda-developers.com/android/source-code-for-honeycomb-3-2-available-on-aosp-and/

Editor’s Note: the sources that were released are the kernel sources and not the Rom ones. The latter are licensed under Apache, thus follow a different set of regulations. I apologize for the confusion.

[Guest capt.kipper]

According to XDA (and several other sources) the Honeycomb 3.2 kernel source was released:

http://www.xda-devel...le-on-aosp-and/

Editor’s Note: the sources that were released are the kernel sources and not the Rom ones. The latter are licensed under Apache, thus follow a different set of regulations. I apologize for the confusion.

Also announced here

[Guest simonta]

There's a lot of confusion about what Android is. Hopefully, this will clear things up a little.

The kernel is NOT Android. It's a very important part of Android but Android is a whole stack of software, with the kernel at the lowest level. In software, the lower the level, the closer it is to the hardware. The higher the level, the further from the hardware. Think about a browser which is in "userspace", the highest level of software in the stack. It has no knowledge of the hardware, nor should it. Sometimes, developers do stupid things like assume a certain screen resolution but the browser needs to know nothing about the hardware to run. The kernel contains the hardware drivers so if absolutely specific to the hardware.

The kernel used by Android is a version, separately maintained, of the Linux kernel and is currently v2.6 for Froyo which is version 2.2 of Android. There is no link between the kernel version and Android except that particular versions of Android require particular versions of the kernel or higher. I.E., Froyo will run on v2.7 of the kernel (assuming backwards compatibility is always maintained) and might even run on versions of the kernel before 2.6. "Might run" because the Android software relies on functions being present in the kernel which will have been introduced with a particular version of the kernel. I don't know the minimum kernel version requirement for Froyo.

Any particular version of Android will run on many different kernels. There are at least 3 in use in the ROMs on here. You can change the kernel with ease, but you're still running the same version of Android.

The kernel is NOT the Linux kernel. It is a separate "fork" of the Linux kernel source maintained by Google. It is released with the Android source code and is modified by manufacturers to support the hardware on their devices. A requirement of modifying the kernel is that the modifications are in turn released. DSG has released their version of the kernel v2.6 which is hosted here on Modaco.

Android is proprietary software owned by Google. Google may chose to release versions of Android to open source using the AOSP (Android Open Source Project) but they are not required to do so. It's their code and they choose how it's licensed. They can make it open source, like Froyo, or closed source like Honeycomb.

Android does NOT include the Google Apps. There is a whole framework of software which is required by the Google apps to provide functions like authentication, location services, synchronisation etc. The source for the Google apps and their framework, including the market, has never been released and it is highly unlikely it ever will be released. In order for manufacturers to use the Google apps, they must meet compatibility criteria set by Google and then obtain a licence agreement for the apps.

It is unlawful to distribute, in any way, the Google apps without a license. Shuttle and DSG do not have a license for the Honeycomb versions of the apps and Honeycomb itself, as we know, has not been released. This is why the Vega will not get Honeycomb officially unless DSG get a license agreement, which isn't going to happen. Note that distributing the apps is unlawful therefore talk of ports and so on is futile. I cannot see how, or why, DSG would ever get a license for Honeycomb, technically or commercially.

Finally, there is the SDK, the software development kit. The SDK is for developers to produce apps that work with different versions of Android. Therefore, there is an SDK for each version of Android. This is what the link in the OP refers to. Not the release of the kernel (there is no such thing as kernel v3.2) but the SDK. Neither is it the source code. The code for Android 3.2 has not been released and, as discussed above, will not be released.

The SDK does contain an image of Android 3.2 which runs on the Android emulator built into the SDK. It does not have any hardware support, apart from that required by the emulator, and does not include source code. The reason that's interesting to XDA devs and others is because you can in theory extract the kernel and an image of the Android system which can be hacked onto real devices. However, without source code, that is a phenomenally difficult task and unlikely to happen. It would be like trying to build Vegacomb but instead of starting from a port from a real device, with a lot of the required mods already done, you'd be starting from scratch. AFAIK, there has never been a ROM built from an SDK image that has got even close to being usable.

In summary, and the bit most people care about, is that there are only 2 ways Honeycomb will come to the Vega. newbe5 and the gang crack all of the issues remaining in Vegacomb (which might not even be possible) or, Google release the source code for Honeycomb which they have said they will not, a decision I agree with. Ice Cream Sandwich (Android v4) will be the next open source release.

Hope that helps...

Edited July 18, 2011 by simonta