Android Kernel development: Development Board Purchase

工欲善其事, its prerequisite, as the first article in my Android Kernel development series, let's first address a non-technical issue: Learn Android kernel development, do you need to buy an Android development board? If so, what kind of development boards should you choose?

1. Do I need to buy an Android development board?

The question depends on what your learning goals are, and simply put, there are two types of people who learn the Android source code:

One is to do Android application layer development, want to learn the Android source to learn more about how the Android bottom is working;

The other is to do Android low-level development, such as do Android ROM, do Android custom device (set-top box, smart watch, etc.), do the protocol (such as Bluetooth, P2P,WI-FI display, etc.), do the underlying hardware driver, and so on;

If you belong to the former, in fact, you do not need to buy a development board, just need to read and understand the Android source books and blog on the line, encountered their own special interest in the module, and then combined with the source code carefully read the analysis can be. And if you belong to the latter, is interested in the development of the Android kernel, then I would rather recommend you to buy an Android development Board, so you can verify your changes on the real device, although you can use virtual machine simulation, but with the real device development or the gap is quite large.

2. How do I buy an android development board ?

Here I just give me to buy the idea of Android Development Board, for your reference:

(1) Be sure to support comparing the new Android version

Here I put the Android phone in the Android Development Board too. At present, support Android source version of the best mobile phone/Development Board should be Google's son (Nexus series), the official latest source code is ready to run directly on it, the only thing I think is not very convenient is the mobile phone interface is too limited, such as no serial port, cable network port, Rich Gpio and so on, debugging and scaling up are more limited.

If you do not purchase official source support Android device/Development Board, then you need the development Board manufacturer to provide the corresponding Android source (in fact, mainly patch package), so I would like if an Android Development Board can only provide Android 2.3 version of the source, I suggest you don't have to think about it.

(2) It is better to buy the more popular Development Board

Alone, encounter problems no one communication is the most painful thing, therefore, I will compare the community more perfect and active, attention and developers more Development Board, here is recommended some open source hardware, such as Raspberry Pi, beaglebone and so on, domestic and foreign are very fire, not only a lot of Daniel share development experience , and it's easy to find a solution in the community if you're having problems.

(3) Other comprehensive considerations

For me, the above two factors are my most important, of course, there are other factors to be consulted, such as: price, documentation, Development Board interface (serial, network, USB OTG, HDMI, etc.), the Development Board processor manufacturers (TI? Qualcomm? Marvell? ) Development Board Performance (CPU, memory size, etc.).

3. Android Development Board recommended

According to the principles I introduced above, I believe that we will soon be able to select their favorite Development board, but I am sure there will be children's shoes I would like to recommend a, then here is to recommend my own purchase of the Development Board bar.

The Development Board I bought was Beaglebone Black, which mainly valued its several reasons:

(1) Open source hardware, community active

Community Official website: http://beagleboard.org/

(2) TI official support, rich information

The core processor of this development board is TI's Am3359,ti, which provides a very rich source of documentation. Before I used TI's Da Vinci Platform, the document special specification and rich, suddenly let me to TI's product impression is very good, so also recommend this development Board.

(3) Android version supports up to 4.4

TI official support to Android 4.2, look here, there are many community boards, the highest support to Android 4.4 (Linux3.8 kernel), this version is called Bbbandroid.

(4) High cost performance, rich interface

Price is not expensive, 45 dollars, domestic purchase is only about 400, interface is also rich, support: Uart,usb Client, USB Host, Hdmi,lcd,microsd, and so on

4. Summary

About the purchase of the Android Development Board is introduced here, have any questions welcome message or letter [email protected] exchange, also welcome to follow my Sina Weibo @ Lu _ June get the latest articles and information.

This article is from the "Shadow Three People" blog, please be sure to keep this source http://ticktick.blog.51cto.com/823160/1651725

Android Kernel development: Development Board Purchase