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How many people build their own ROMs? When I bought my Pixel I tried my hand at building my own ROM, but I kept stumbling and eventually gave up. Admittedly, I

How many people build their own ROMs? When I bought my Pixel I tried my hand at building my own ROM, but I kept stumbling and eventually gave up. Admittedly, I was running a newer version of Ubuntu than the one they suggested in the docs, but I didn't expect it would break everything. Am I right in guessing that using a VM would be the easiest path to success? I've been a bit frustrated with android's sparse docs and unreliable build tool. Whenever I try searching for additional information, all I find are questionable tutorials and xda-developer threads. I don't have anything against the forum itself, but I find it a bit questionable to see so many people happily propagating and flashing random binaries. Is xda-developers still the main place to go when looking for help, or have any other communities started to overthrow them? Now with 8.0 out, it seems like a good chance to retry building my own ROM. I'm thinking of forking CopperheadOS [0], and applying some minor patches on top. Is anyone here running their own ROM, or Copperhead in particular? I'd love to hear about your experience, along with any pros and cons. F-Droid seems to be capable of handling all of my requirements. My only big remaining concern would be with Project Fi; I'm uncertain if the service will work if Google Apps aren't installed. [0] https://copperhead.co/android/ https://copperhead.co/android/

Veratyr 9y ago
> Am I right in guessing that using a VM would be the easiest path to success? I've been able to successfully build Android on Arch Linux. Depending on which particular ROM you're building, much of the required build environment is packaged with the source. I just needed repo's dependencies and to rebuild the prebuilt Bison with the included source. > I've been a bit frustrated with android's sparse docs and unreliable build tool. The guide at https://source.android.com/source/ https://source.android.com/source/ should result in a working AOSP build. I've followed it before without problems. My guess is you're trying to do something weird that makes sense to you that isn't really supported. > Is xda-developers still the main place to go when looking for help, or have any other communities started to overthrow them? XDA is still the primary place ROM development is carried out, yes. Finding a ROM's IRC channel can be helpful too. > Is anyone here running their own ROM, or Copperhead in particular? I built Copperhead for my Pixel but unfortunately it resulted in a bootloop so I gave up on it. I'm running PureNexus right now and might try Copperhead later. > My only big remaining concern would be with Project Fi; I'm uncertain if the service will work if Google Apps aren't installed. I don't think it'll work totally bereft of Google services but you might be able to manage it with MicroG: https://microg.org/ https://microg.org/
nimrody 9y ago
Using Fedora 25 building Android 7 for Nexus 5X is relatively simple. The only caveat is that to really take advantage of the hardware you need vendor blobs which you can get by running the scripts at https://github.com/anestisb/android-prepare-vendor https://github.com/anestisb/android-prepare-vendor
yeswecatan 9y ago
I haven't tried building my own ROM, but XDA is my first (and usually only) stop when I want to flash a new one. Don't most developers make the code open source? Perhaps poking through others' code would clarify some things. I'd be willing to bet people hang out in some IRC rooms, too.

Veratyr 9y ago

> Am I right in guessing that using a VM would be the easiest path to success? I've been able to successfully build Android on Arch Linux. Depending on which particular ROM you're building, much of the required build environment is packaged with the source. I just needed repo's dependencies and to rebuild the prebuilt Bison with the included source. > I've been a bit frustrated with android's sparse docs and unreliable build tool. The guide at https://source.android.com/source/ https://source.android.com/source/ should result in a working AOSP build. I've followed it before without problems. My guess is you're trying to do something weird that makes sense to you that isn't really supported. > Is xda-developers still the main place to go when looking for help, or have any other communities started to overthrow them? XDA is still the primary place ROM development is carried out, yes. Finding a ROM's IRC channel can be helpful too. > Is anyone here running their own ROM, or Copperhead in particular? I built Copperhead for my Pixel but unfortunately it resulted in a bootloop so I gave up on it. I'm running PureNexus right now and might try Copperhead later. > My only big remaining concern would be with Project Fi; I'm uncertain if the service will work if Google Apps aren't installed. I don't think it'll work totally bereft of Google services but you might be able to manage it with MicroG: https://microg.org/ https://microg.org/

nimrody 9y ago

Using Fedora 25 building Android 7 for Nexus 5X is relatively simple. The only caveat is that to really take advantage of the hardware you need vendor blobs which you can get by running the scripts at https://github.com/anestisb/android-prepare-vendor https://github.com/anestisb/android-prepare-vendor

yeswecatan 9y ago

I haven't tried building my own ROM, but XDA is my first (and usually only) stop when I want to flash a new one. Don't most developers make the code open source? Perhaps poking through others' code would clarify some things. I'd be willing to bet people hang out in some IRC rooms, too.