XRoar on Android

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tormod
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XRoar on Android

Post by tormod »

Here is a port of Ciaran's XRoar to Android. It was more a packaging job than actual porting, no changes were needed to the XRoar code itself, and a port of SDL with a build infrastructure has been made by "pelya" over at http://www.anddev.org/sdl_port_for_andr ... t9218.html so I just had to figure out how to glue everything together.

Please get the xroar-0.31.1-1.apk and readme.txt files from http://www.6809.org.uk/xroar/mirror/tormod/

- There is so far no file picker. However I have added an Android "intent" mechanism so that a file can be requested to be loaded and run for example from an Android terminal window.

- The sound is stuttering, so you might be better off disabling it in your xroar.conf, using "ao null".

- The joystick (or accelerometer) support can probably be improved a lot.

If somebody wants to work on a graphical file picker there are several options. A separate app can deliver a file picker "activity" that can be called from XRoar. See for example http://www.kaloer.com/android-file-picker-activity.

I have no plans to work on these issues since I mainly use it for programming and this gives me all I need (famous last words). I have also ported the lwtools compiler suite to Android, as well as the DrBinCas utility, so that I can write, compile, load and run my assembler code from the command line on my tablet...

Enjoy!

Tormod

EDIT: updated links to 0.31.1-1 package.
Last edited by tormod on Sat Dec 13, 2014 11:15 am, edited 2 times in total.
geirhovland
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Re: XRoar on Android

Post by geirhovland »

Well done!! I am using Android 2.1.1 and it is working fine, but I noticed a few issues:

When typing for example PRINT"TEST", the symbol " is not recognised.

Ocassionally, letters typed in keyboard mode do not appear in the green Dragon window. For example, I type LIST and only LST appears.

The graphical file picker (CTRL+L) will be a welcome addition (I noticed it is already in the TODO list).
grobda
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Re: XRoar on Android

Post by grobda »

geirhovland wrote:
Ocassionally, letters typed in keyboard mode do not appear in the green Dragon window. For example, I type LIST and only LST appears.
that happens on my real dragon :lol:
zephyr
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Re: XRoar on Android

Post by zephyr »

Thanks for sharing this, Tormod. I have just installed it on my Samsung Galaxy S5 (currently Android 4.4.2). It seems to be working quite well so far.


Can you explain how to properly use the on-screen keyboard functions that always overlay the emulated Dragon text and graphic screens?

I can't find a copy of "Ultra Explorer" (mentioned in the readme.txt file) on Google Play Store. Where can I download it?
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tormod
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Re: XRoar on Android

Post by tormod »

If there is enough interest I can think of upgrading the package to XRoar 0.32.

The on-screen "hot keys" I haven't looked into. I used this for cross-development (together with lwasm for android) on my cheap tablet, but over time its battery life was getting short and I am not using it much any longer.

I don't know if Ultra Explorer is on Google Play Store, but it is on the first hit on Google :) http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthr ... p=39772628
zephyr
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Re: XRoar on Android

Post by zephyr »

tormod wrote:If there is enough interest I can think of upgrading the package to XRoar 0.32.
I (for one) would love to see the Android version updated and the sound stutter fixed. IMHO XROAR is such a good emulator that all platform versions deserve to be regularly updated.
tormod wrote: The on-screen "hot keys" I haven't looked into.
I hate the way they always overlay the emulated Dragon/CoCo screen. They can be made to be far less of a distraction by setting the size to "tiny" and tranparency to "invisible".
tormod wrote: I don't know if Ultra Explorer is on Google Play Store, but it is on the first hit on Google :) http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthr ... p=39772628
Thanks! :)
zephyr
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Re: XRoar on Android

Post by zephyr »

geirhovland wrote:Well done!! I am using Android 2.1.1 and it is working fine, but I noticed a few issues:

When typing for example PRINT"TEST", the symbol " is not recognised.
This can be fixed by adding "-kbd-translate" to your xroar.conf file.
geirhovland wrote: Ocassionally, letters typed in keyboard mode do not appear in the green Dragon window. For example, I type LIST and only LST appears.
A temporary workaround for this is to use the XROAR Shift+F12 feature to run the emulator at maximum speed before entering text via the on-screen keyboard. In order to make the Shift+F12 feature available you will first need to use the "Device configuration" feature to remap some of the physical keys on your Android device. I use volume down as the F12 key and the capacitive "back" key as Shift. I also use volume up as the Dragon break key.
geirhovland wrote: The graphical file picker (CTRL+L) will be a welcome addition (I noticed it is already in the TODO list).
I agree. I think this would help to make the Android port more popular.
zephyr
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Re: XRoar on Android

Post by zephyr »

tormod wrote: - The sound is stuttering, so you might be better off disabling it in your xroar.conf, using "ao null".
The sound stuttering seems to have been almost completely eliminated by adding "-fast-sound" to the xroar.conf file. The sound very rarly stutters when using the BASIC PLAY and SOUND commands entered at the command prompt. I have not yet tested it with a running BASIC program or the sound generated by a machine code program.

EDIT: Tested it today with Megabug ML game. The music and sound were pretty much stutter free during game demo.
Last edited by zephyr on Mon Dec 15, 2014 4:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.
zephyr
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Re: XRoar on Android

Post by zephyr »

tormod wrote: I don't know if Ultra Explorer is on Google Play Store, but it is on the first hit on Google :) http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthr ... p=39772628
I installed Ultra Explorer but there is no "Open With" feature available. There is a "Open As" feature, but the XROAR emulator app is not displayed in the list after opening as "file". Only a select few apps are displayed in the list. Same problem with ES File Explorer. :(
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tormod
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Re: XRoar on Android

Post by tormod »

I tried on my mobile phone now, when choosing Open As -> File I was able to choose XRoar (for a .cas file). What kind of file are you trying to open?
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