Messages

1

Cosmo Communicator - CoDi / Cover Display Subforum?

« on: January 23, 2020, 06:58:01 pm »

I just tried it and I got to see "Hello world      this is a static image" followed by a pattern of pixels  

I'll play around with it these days

2

Cosmo Communicator - CoDi / Cover Display Subforum?

« on: January 22, 2020, 11:01:19 am »

Thanks, Ninji.

I was afraid I had to root my Cosmo. I'm not sure if rooting the cosmo would leave me without the dual-boot update. I want to run GNU/Linux on my cosmo, so I'll think I'll wait until the update.

Then I'll root my cosmo. Even so, I think by then it will be easier to work with CoDi from Linux.

On the meanwhile, I can still flash custom firmware with the assistant and then just reboot the device, right?

Also, once I want to go back to the original firmware, will the assistant just download it as an update or I have to manually download it?

3

Cosmo Communicator - CoDi / Cover Display Subforum?

« on: January 22, 2020, 05:47:51 am »

The CoDi is exposed to the main OS via a UART on /dev/ttyS1 for general communication and files in /proc/ that map to certain bits of functionality (wake up, reset, enter-FW-update-mode button). Updates are handled via the same UART - the CoDi bootloader detects whether the update "button" is being "pressed" (obviously not a real button ) and if so, loads into an updater mode which accepts a file via a YModem transfer. Like most of the CoDi code it's heavily based off STM32 SDK samples.

I've been trying to write custom firmware for it, and I've gotten to the point where I have a binary I can flash that boots up, sends debug information over the UART and displays an image on the screen, but there's an issue with the display interface that I've not figured out yet.

My current code for this is here, if you're curious: https://github.com/Treeki/OpenCodi
And, an example of what it's doing right now: https://twitter.com/_Ninji/status/1219362735378530306

Wow! That's great news! Thank you Ninji for your hard work

I'd like to test it, could you please give some instructions on how to reproduce what you were trying?

I do have some experience working with ARM microcontrollers with C and assembly. It would be nice to combine that with your advancements.

Thank you again for your work!  

4

Cosmo Communicator - CoDi / Cover Display Subforum?

« on: January 21, 2020, 06:15:34 pm »

I agree. But if the main reason they would release such API specification is to get Linux support... They are better going to release the source code for CoDi.

The community would give more and more value to the Cosmo with all the software and tweaks they would build on top. This is for me the ACTUAL value for the Cosmo. Without that it's just an android phone for those that have a fetish on keyboards (sorry, no offense).

The Cosmo has the potential to become something beyond PC's capability on developing (at least currently). If getting CoDi to work on Linux is too hard for them... Give us anything that could be helpful.

I want to play around with my CoDi. And then, and only then, if I'm happy with the experience I got making something for it, I'll invest my knowledge into creating something useful. This would give the Cosmo a little bit of more value, but if PC ensures a good experience working on CoDi I don't think I would be the only one tempted to create new functionality.

5

Cosmo Communicator - Linux / Linux community?

« on: January 21, 2020, 05:54:26 pm »

What about Plasma Mobile? I think that could work on top of Debian, and it would bring a phone UI.

https://www.plasma-mobile.org/get/


Also, I'd like to point out that there's some work going on with Halium support for the Cosmo (https://github.com/gemian?tab=repositories). This makes sense when you want to port GNU/Linux to an Android device with closed source drivers... It would be easier for PC to get Linux support if they got to free the drivers. Maybe they want to free such drivers but they have some sort of enclosure with the manufacturer, and this issue doesn't depend on PC.

6

Cosmo Communicator - CoDi / Cover Display Subforum?

« on: January 21, 2020, 07:04:50 am »

Hi,

I believe that there is a lot of potential in the Cover Display hardware. (I'll call it CoDi from now on)

What do we know at the moment?

- It can be manually flashed with the Cover Assistant app. That would help us to run custom firmware.
- It's based on a STM32 microcontroller (as pointed out in https://wuffs.org/blog/pulling-apart-the-co...emfota-updater)
- There's a well-defined protocol, so the main OS can communicate with the microcontroller.

Questions for the future:

- Will PC publish any information on the CoDi?
- Which protocols is CoDi using? (I suspect it could be SWD for flashing, and SPI for real-time data).
- Which model of communication is CoDi using with the vanilla firmware? Is the microcontroller pulling the data, or is the main OS pushing data? (This is relevant on how it would behave with other OS than Android)
- Has anyone done any experiment? Any working custom code?

I think there are lots of topics regarding CoDi, I just can't help wanting to know more about it.

It depends on the openness of PC with CoDi but the hardware nerd inside me wants to play with it, make some tweaks, run custom code...  

That's why I bring this topic to hopefully build some community around it. It would be nice to have a CoDi subforum, so other subforums don't get spammed with CoDi specific topics. Also, currently, is difficult to tell where CoDi topics belong.