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mardi 3 avril 2018

OnePlus 6 Forums are now open

The OnePlus 6 might not be official yet, but interest in the phone is ramping up quickly. We’ve covered the device several times in the last few weeks. It was rumored to have a notched display in early March, which was then confirmed by Carl Pei. We also know it will have the Snapdragon 845, 256GB of storage, 8GB of RAM, and a headphone jack. The device has even been revealed in a leaked photo.

Excitement is building and our forums are ready for fans and potential owners to start chatting. The official announcement and launch dates are still up in the air, but that doesn’t mean people can’t start speculating and discussing leaks and rumors. A few threads are already up and running. Visit the link below to join the conversation or start a few threads of your own.

Join the OnePlus 6 Forums

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OnePlus 6 name confirmed, coming with 256GB storage version and possibly special Avengers: Infinity War model

The OnePlus 6 has been a hot topic in the Android world for the last couple of weeks. Last week, Carl Pei confirmed the OnePlus 6 would have the controversial display notch (but also a headphone jack). We’ve been talking about it a lot, but the name actually hasn’t even been confirmed yet. That was finally made official with a tweet from the OnePlus Twitter account.

6et ready! pic.twitter.com/bmvI75xphm

— OnePlus (@oneplus) April 2, 2018

The quick 4-second video flashes the phrase “THE SPEED YOU NEED” and the number 6, which confirms it will indeed be called the OnePlus 6. That speed will come from the Snapdragon 845, which was confirmed by OnePlus CEO Pete Lau on Weibo. He also said the device will have 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. This will be the first OnePlus device with that much storage.

The last bit of OnePlus 6 news will peak the interest of comic book fans. Last year, OnePlus launched a special edition of the OnePlus 5T for Star Wars: The Last Jedi. It was only available in a few select countries, but it was a cool offering. This year, their flagship phone is looking to tie-in with Avengers: Infinity War. The video above was accidentally published to Facebook (mirrored below by AndroidCentral). It features the OnePlus and Avengers logos in quick succession. The post was pulled down, but it’s pretty obvious there will be some sort of connection.

We don’t know the official release date of the OnePlus 6, but Infinity War will be in theaters April 27th worldwide. It’s possible we could see the OnePlus 6 at that time. OnePlus released the Star Wars edition just a couple of days before The Last Jedi arrived in theaters. Hopefully, the Avengers edition will not be so region restricted. We should know more about the OnePlus 6 announcement, release date, and more in the coming weeks.

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Always-listening Hotword Recognition without power drain may soon come to Android apps with TrulyHandsfree

Ever wonder how smartphones such as the Huawei Mate 9 respond to Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant commands (“Alexa”, “OK, Google”) even when the screen is switched off and locked? It’s thanks to a hardware component called a DSP, or digital signal processor, a dedicated audio chip that handles low-power, always-on phrase detection (and other tasks). It’s core to popular voice assistants’ functionality. Silicon Valley-based company Sensory says its software-based alternative, TrulyHandsfree, gives DSPs a run for their money.

TrulyHandsFree, which the company claims is the “most widely deployed” speech recognition engine in the world, is a wake-word and speech recognition suite designed to support low-power voice recognition in applications across Android, iOS, and other platforms. Sensory says the software has been “re-engineered” for increased accuracy, lower power consumption, and expanded device support.

“Hands-free operation for voice control has become the norm, and application developers are now looking to create hands-free wake words for their own apps,” said Todd Mozer, CEO of Sensory, in a statement.

Development of the new and improved TrulyHandsfree began in 2017. Sensory teamed up with chip maker Qualcomm and ARM to figure out how to lower power consumption for voice assistant wake words. It implemented three techniques:

Sensory’s “little-big” always-listening feature uses a small voice recognition model to identify potential wake words and revalidate those wake words on a large model. It doesn’t have demanding power requirements, but it’s more accurate without consuming slightly more power.
Frame stacking, a method of neural network training that leads to more accurate models and faster decoding, cuts certain wake word model processing functions’ MIPS (million instructions per second, a measure of processing performance) in half without impacting accuracy.
Multithreading allows more efficient speech recognition processing and improves the execution time for larger wake word models.

Sensory says together the enhancements reduce power consumption on mobile apps by more than 80%, which equates to 200mAh in a 12-hour day.

If you’ve used the latest version of navigation app Waze, you’ve already seen the new TrulyHandsfree in action. “We recently helped Google’s Waze accept hands-free voice commands by supplying them with Sensory’s ‘OK Waze’ wake word that runs when the app is open,” Mr. Mozer said. “With previous versions of TrulyHandsfree, having our always-on wake word engine listening for the OK Waze wake word during a short trip would have had minimal effect on a smartphone’s battery, but for longer trips, a more efficient was desired — so we created it.”

The latest TrulyHandsfree ships with support for several types of wake word options including fixed words and user-defined wake words. Wake word models for Alexa, Siri, the Google Assistant, Microsoft’s Cortana, and systems from Baidu, Alibaba, and Tencent. Multi-wake word recognition and support for multiple languages including English, Dutch, French, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, and Turkish.

Sensory says an updated SDK for Android and iOS will roll out before the end of Q2 2018.

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Unofficial LineageOS 14.1 now available for the Gemini PDA

It’s not often that we see successful crowd-funding campaigns for smartphones. Planet Computers’ Gemini PDA is one example of a successful Indiegogo campaign, although it’s technically not a smartphone but rather a clamshell mobile device with a fully integrated hardware keyboard. The device has garnered a lot of attention from enthusiasts because it aims to revive the PDA concept but with the ability to dual boot modern operating systems such as Android and a GNU/Linux distribution. We have already seen an unofficial TWRP port for the device, and now an unofficial port of LineageOS 14.1 is now available.

This unofficial build was made by XDA Recognized Contributor deadman96385 and it is based on Android 7.1 Nougat. Most hardware is functional except for the GPS, FM radio, and cellular radio. The built-in camera doesn’t work, but the developer reports that any third party camera app should work just fine.

Planet Computers Gemini PDA LineageOS 14.1

Unfortunately, the lack of cellular radio capability means the ROM isn’t suitable if you intend to use your device as your primary phone—at least not yet. deadman96385 informed us that he should be receiving his own test device soon, and he estimates that FM radio, cellular radio, and encryption may be fixed by next week. However, development isn’t miracle work, so please be patient as the developer works on fixing each of these issues.

It’s interesting to see such development be done for such a niche device. We typically focus on devices from the bigger brands here such as Google, Samsung, Huawei, Xiaomi, and OnePlus. I’m not too sure that the PDA is coming back anytime soon, but the successful crowd-funding initiative by Planet Computers shows that there’s still a market for these kinds of devices.

Download unofficial LineageOS 14.1 for the Planet Computer Gemini PDA

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lundi 2 avril 2018

How to flash a Generic System Image (GSI) on Project Treble supported devices

If you’ve only heard of Project Treble in passing but haven’t looked into it all that much, then you may have heard that it’s supposed to help major Android updates roll out more quickly. At XDA, there’s another benefit that we’ve spoken about at length: the ability to boot an AOSP Generic System Image (GSI) on any supported device. This means that devices that were once running heavily customized Android versions like Samsung Experience on the Samsung Galaxy S9 or EMUI 8 on the Huawei Mate 10 Pro can alternatively run software closer to that of the Google Pixel 2.

After-market custom ROMs (customized versions of Android software that are made by independent developers usually not affiliated with a company) are a big draw to the XDA forums, and thanks to the changes in Android that Project Treble require, Treble-supported devices will have an easier time flashing custom ROMs based on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP). Without Project Treble, developers have to employ a lot of tricks and hacks to get their custom ROMs working, and while Treble support doesn’t solve everything, it certainly helps kickstart the process.

Devices like the Huawei Mate 9, Honor View 10, Huawei Mate 10 Pro, Honor 7X, Exynos Samsung Galaxy S9, or Allview V3 Viper would have had either no AOSP-based custom ROMs available due to lack of developer interest or ROMs lacking some basic hardware functionality. But as we’ve seen with the in the case of each of these devices, the ROMs that are available thanks to Treble support are mostly functional (there are some differences in terms of what works and what doesn’t, and the community has put together a wiki page you should check out to find that information).

Since Treble is so new to users and the process to flash them is a little different compared to the usual custom ROMs, there’s been a lot of confusion about how to flash a GSI onto a Treble-compatible device. This tutorial will broadly walk you through how to flash such a ROM. There may be a few different steps involved depending on the device, but in general the process should be similar. Here’s how to flash a GSI on a Treble-compatible Android device.

How to flash a Generic System Image on a Project Treble-supported device

Requirements:

Your device MUST have an unlockable bootloader.
Your device MUST be Project Treble compatible. That means your device meets one of the following criteria:
- Your device LAUNCHED with Android 8.0 Oreo or a newer version (eg. Android 8.1 Oreo) AND is Google Play certified. (If you rooted your device/flashed another custom ROM and somehow ended up with your device being listed as uncertified in Google Play, then don’t worry. We’re only concerned about the status of the device as it was shipped.)
- Your device UPGRADED to Android 8.0 Oreo or a newer version AND was made Project Treble compatible by the manufacturer. See this article for a list of such devices.
- Your device does not meet either of the above criteria but DOES have access to an unofficial way to be made Treble compatible. Again, refer to this article for a list of such devices.
Your device is free of any heavy modifications such as the Xposed Framework, SuperSU, or Magisk. You can re-install these afterwards, but please be sure you are using the stock boot/ramdisk before proceeding.

Devices such as the Samsung Galaxy S8/S8+ (Exynos or Snapdragon), Samsung Galaxy Note 8 (Exynos or Snapdragon), LG V30, Sony Xperia XA1 series, and more do not meet any of these criteria and thus cannot follow this guide. While 2018 Nokia-branded devices and the Snapdragon Samsung Galaxy S9 launched with Android Oreo and are Treble-supported, they do not have unlockable bootloaders and hence cannot flash GSIs.

Please be sure that, even if your device is listed as Treble-compatible, that you do not follow this guide unless you have actually received the Android Oreo update either officially or unofficially. If your device meets the above criteria, then you’re almost ready to flash a GSI. The last thing that we need to say is that flashing a GSI will require you to factory reset your device, so be sure you’re prepared to lose app data before you proceed with this! We recommend you make an off-device backup (such as on your PC or an SD Card) in case anything goes wrong.

Guide to flash GSI on devices that officially support Project Treble

Preparation

Unlock the bootloader of your device. The steps you take here are different depending on your device. We have many guides available both on the Portal and in our forums for you to peruse. Just do a quick Google search for “XDA unlock bootloader” + your device name and you should find many guides.
Download the GSI of your choice onto your PC. You can either flash a pure AOSP ROM such as phh-Treble, or if you prefer more features you can grab the LineageOS 15.1 or Resurrection Remix GSIs. I have linked the threads as follows. Download the right image for your device type (ARM64 for most of you) and partition type. If your device supports seamless updates, then download the A/B image, otherwise download the A-only image.

The following steps depend on whether or not your device has a functional TWRP that you can use. If your device has TWRP, then we highly recommend you install that first. We have a guide for that here.

Flash GSI with TWRP

Perform a factory reset within TWRP.
Transfer the GSI from your PC to your device’s internal storage where TWRP can access it.
Tap on “Install.”
Change the type from “zip” to “image.”
Find and select the GSI you downloaded.
Choose to flash to the system partition.
Once that is done, reboot your device.

Hopefully, your device should boot up after a few minutes of waiting. If not, skip the following section and go to the troubleshooting tips.

Flash GSI without TWRP

Perform a factory reset on your device. You have two options here:
- Open the settings app on your phone and look for the factory reset option. It’s usually under settings related to backup.
- Reboot to your device’s stock recovery using either a button combination when booting or issuing the following ADB command when booted in Android: adb reboot recovery. Once here, use the volume keys to navigate and the power button to select the factory reset option.
Once your device has been factory reset, reboot to your device’s bootloader using either a button combination when booting or issuing the following ADB command when booted in Android: adb reboot bootloader
With your device connected to your PC, open up a command prompt or terminal window in the same directory where you downloaded your GSI of choice.
Enter a command in the following format: fastboot flash system name_of_system.img

Example: Flashing phh-Treble AOSP System Image
Allow the image to flash, it could take a few minutes. Once it has completed, reboot your device either manually via power key or by entering fastboot reboot.

Hopefully, your device should boot into your GSI of choice. If not, here are some troubleshooting tips.

Troubleshooting Tips

It’s possible that dm-verity is preventing your device from booting with the GSI. In that case, please go ahead and flash Magisk and then see if it boots. I’m told that this is required for the Razer Phone, for instance.
On some devices like the Google Pixel 2/2 XL, Android Verified Boot (AVB) needs to be disabled. You can do so by flashing this image to the vbmeta partition (command: fastboot flash vbmeta name_of_vbmeta.img)
As a last resort, you can try a full format of the data partition (WARNING: THIS WIPES EVERYTHING) by entering fastboot -w from a command prompt/terminal window while in the bootloader. I have had to do this on my Huawei device before it could work.

What to do after flashing the Generic System Image

By default, there isn’t any app to manage superuser privileges. You can fix that by installing phh’s SuperUser from the Google Play Store. Alternatively, you can flash Magisk or SuperSU—it’s up to you.

Next, you can install Substratum for themes or the Xposed Framework if you want further modifications. The Magisk repository has a ton of neat modules you can try as well. LineageOS 15.1 and especially Resurrection Remix already offer a ton of features out of the box, so we don’t believe you’ll really need to tinker with a ton of extra goodies, but the choice is there.

Now, enjoy the world of stock Android! We recommend you follow the Treble-Enabled Device Development forum for any updates on your ROM. Also, follow the XDA Portal for all the latest developments related to Project Treble. The best way to do so is to set up a feed for the Treble tag.

Lastly, please contribute to the Treble Experimentations wiki page so others will know about any potential issues with the ROM (and so developers will know what to fix!)

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Here’s a list of Android devices updated with Project Treble support

Whereas Apple is able to keep most of their devices, even many older ones, up to date with the latest software (which sometimes involve rather controversial features), Android device makers have varying degrees of success keeping their devices up to date. Some device makers like Essential and Google are pretty good at providing security patches, while others can delay updates by months at a time. That’s without considering major software updates such as from Android Nougat to Android Oreo, a software release which is installed on only slightly more than 1% of all Android devices. To combat slow Android updates, Google introduced Project Treble.

Project Treble is a major re-architecture in the way Android works. In essence, it separates the Android operating system (the Android ‘framework’) from the vendor Hardware Abstraction Layers (‘HALs’) that allow for the OS to work with the device’s hardware. Before Project Treble, the Android framework and the HALs usually reside within the same area (the system partition). With Treble, the HALs are moved to their own area (a vendor partition) and now communicate with the Android framework in a more standardized way. The benefit of this is that it allows for companies like Samsung, LG, HTC, and others to work on modifying the stock Android framework while they wait for vendors such as Qualcomm to provide updated HALs. Theoretically, this means that updates should happen more quickly.

For the Android enthusiast community, though, Project Treble has provided another benefit: the ability to quickly boot functioning AOSP ROMs without the need for many hacks. Now, it hasn’t been a perfect solution for those looking to enjoy custom ROMs such as LineageOS or Resurrection Remix since there still may be some lingering issues or certain hardware doesn’t work because it isn’t supported yet in AOSP (such as iris scanners), but it has certainly led to a revolution in custom ROMs for devices that previously never had them.

With how exciting Project Treble is, I’m sure you’re wondering if your device is Treble compatible. We have previously written a tutorial on how to check for Project Treble compatibility on your Android device, but to save some of you trouble we’ll also be cataloging those devices into a handy list that you can refer to below.

This list will be continuously updated as we learn of new devices updated, both officially and unofficially, with Treble support. This list will not cover every single device that supports Treble—that would make this list too long since Google requires every device launching with Android 8.0 Oreo and above to support Treble.

Devices officially updated with Project Treble support

Google

Honor/Huawei

Miscellaneous

ASUS Zenfone 4 (No vendor partition, so cannot flash GSI). Source
Essential Phone. Source
Razer Phone. Source
Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 Pro. Source

Devices unofficially updated with Project Treble support

If your device receives an update to Android Oreo and you think it should be on this list, please check out our guide on finding out if your device supports Project Treble and leave a comment below so we can update this article!

Also, check out our Project Treble device development forum for all the latest updates on generic custom ROMs like LineageOS and Resurrection Remix! Lastly, check out our guide on how to flash a Generic System Image in case you have a Treble supported device and you want to install a custom AOSP-based ROM!

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Here’s a list of Android devices that support Seamless Updates

While some of our readers feel lucky to even receive updates on a consistent basis, others might dread them because of how long an update can take. On most Android smartphones and tablets, an update can take a couple of minutes of your time as the updater has to patch all of the system files which can’t happen while you’re booted into Android. That’s why Google introduced “seamless updates”—a new A/B dual partition scheme with Android Nougat.

The internal storage of each Android device is separated into partitions such as system and boot. Most devices have only a single copy of each partition, but devices that support seamless updates have two copies of certain partitions—slot A and slot B, hence A/B—so that one copy of the partition lies dormant while the other is in active use. Because each partition is a copy, they can be used interchangeably to boot into Android. This also means that you can update one partition in the background and then swap to it when you reboot—thus your update is seamless!

Google adopted this style of partitioning with the Google Pixel and Pixel XL after seeing success on its Chrome OS devices. Besides faster updates, A/B seamless system updates also gives you a fallback in case something goes wrong when updating, and also means you won’t have to have enough free space in order to download an update package.

Unfortunately, many Android device makers choose not to implement A/B seamless updates for one reason or another. We can’t offer an explanation as for why they chose not to support it, as Google explains that A/B dual partitions don’t really take up that much more space compared to non-A/B setups. So if every phone doesn’t have this update system, how do you know if yours does? We previously wrote an article on how to check if your device supports seamless updates, but we’ve also decided to catalog the devices that support it for your convenience. We will update this list if we learn of new devices with A/B seamless system updates.

List of Android devices with A/B Seamless Updates

If you think you have a device that should be on this list, please check out our guide on finding out if your device supports seamless updates and leave a comment below so we can update this article!

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