Hacking AKAIO v1.0 Officially Released

[Swip]

Hello,

I was wondering if your source code is available on the net.

In fact, I think your OS is very good, and bring new fonctionality, but I want to use a firmware open source, to allow me to see how it works, and may be add some features.
If this is not possible I think I will try another one, but it will be a shame, because I think AKAIO is the best one at the moment, especially for some new features in the 1.1 version, which seems to be very interesting

I don't think his allowed to do that as the ak2 isn't open sourced and the team wouldn't want the source code of the ak2 freely available.

 

[jabjab]

And re: unzip protocol.
AKAIO will now have the DSWifi and zLib libraries in it, enabling us to turn on/off DSWifi and connect to remote hosts, and use zip protocols for files.
zLib was ported to the DS by GPF (http://gpf.dcemu.co.uk), but by default it only supports .GZip files. There's a minilib for standard .ZIP file support, which has now been ported to the AKAIO OS.

This means should, for example, we use the AKAIO to download files remotely that are in .ZIP format, we can unzip them on-the-fly in the OS.
This won't mean total compressed rom support (size issue/time issue... unzip is fast but do you want to unzip a 132Meg ROM each time? Plus you'd still need that 132Megs free on the card). But it definitely is useful, and is currently in my build being used to unzip downloaded files.

You say the unzip is fast but 'how fast is fast' as that could be pretty handy.
The trade off in extra time may be acceptable for some for the increased available space. You'd have to leave the 256mb or whatever free (depending on your biggest game) but the space saved would be alot more surely?
You could always have the games you regularly play unzipped if you wanted and leave the less regularly zipped for uncompression.
May be good for people that cant get to a pc so often or are on holiday etc

 

[Joey90]

Hello,

I was wondering if your source code is available on the net.

In fact, I think your OS is very good, and bring new fonctionality, but I want to use a firmware open source, to allow me to see how it works, and may be add some features.
If this is not possible I think I will try another one, but it will be a shame, because I think AKAIO is the best one at the moment, especially for some new features in the 1.1 version, which seems to be very interesting
I don't think his allowed to do that as the ak2 isn't open sourced and the team wouldn't want the source code of the ak2 freely available.

AK2 is not open source, but AK RPG is... Though either way I doubt that they want other people tinkering with it until they are finished with it. If you really want to see how it works and add new features you could ask to help them as a coder.

jabjab

You say the unzip is fast but 'how fast is fast' as that could be pretty handy.
The trade off in extra time may be acceptable for some for the increased available space. You'd have to leave the 256mb or whatever free (depending on your biggest game) but the space saved would be alot more surely?
You could always have the games you regularly play unzipped if you wanted and leave the less regularly zipped for uncompression.
May be good for people that cant get to a pc so often or are on holiday etc

I would have thought that if you trim your ROMs (which if you are that space conscious you probably should) then there is very little to compress. And it would be an annoying hassle. You would probably need a very large memory card for it to trade off.

Also, will there be a Homebrew Directory, similar to the DSOrganize one? That would really make the most of the unzip feature. The only problem with that is the continual updating required to keep it up to date.

Anyway, keep up the good work!

 

[Slan85]

Hello,

I was wondering if your source code is available on the net.

In fact, I think your OS is very good, and bring new fonctionality, but I want to use a firmware open source, to allow me to see how it works, and may be add some features.
If this is not possible I think I will try another one, but it will be a shame, because I think AKAIO is the best one at the moment, especially for some new features in the 1.1 version, which seems to be very interesting

I don't think his allowed to do that as the ak2 isn't open sourced and the team wouldn't want the source code of the ak2 freely available.

AK2 is not open source, but AK RPG is... Though either way I doubt that they want other people tinkering with it until they are finished with it. If you really want to see how it works and add new features you could ask to help them as a coder.

Yes, I understand they may don't want to share their code right now. I was just asking it to be sure.

I don't think I am able to help them right now, because I never code anything for the nds, but I wanted to learn using this code, and try by myself to do little changes. So I think I will do this with another AK RPG firmware, and may be ask them to help later, when I will be able to create some cool features.

By the way, I don't think their is any problem with acekard team if this source is released, because it's based on AK RPG source code, which is open source.

 

[Bri]

I believe you can get ahold of the source code of AKBBS (AIO's predecessor for the RPG), which is based on the open source RPG source code. Of course, it won't run on the AK2 though.

-Bri

 

[Smiths]

Because the AK2 is not open source, we cannot open the source to AKAIO. That's the rules stated to us when we got the AK2 sources.
If we modify any RPG code, we are allowed to paste that openly for others to use. But since the RPG devs are basically me, Norm, and gelu.. and gelu has said to us it's okay to use his stuff and will inquire should he want source mods, we're pretty good with our system.

The only annoying aspect from our perspective is the fact we have to mail sources back and forth (Norm and I).

@ Normmatt.

On a good note, the AK team will be sending me replacement cards soon, so I can go back to development.

I'm gonna keep my bricked card though I think, probably try to write a NAND formatter on the NDS as a sort of "low level" method.

On a plus note, the errors last night I was having that made me revert source was actually due to the storms outside somehow screwing up my router's connection... so my new routines are fine (full URL parsing!), but the timing of the hardware mess-up made me think they weren't cuz downloads kept timing out (which there is no prompt for due to the protocol... so hard-resetting is needed

)

 

[Skydancer]

If I select either one of those, it will show a box with the word "text" in the box and freeze.
I don't believe anything is shown on the upper screen, either.
If I press start, it will freeze.

I've tried a completely fresh install. Same issue.

Try reformatting your memory card "USING THE FORMATTER BUILT INTO WINDOWS" It worked for me.

But only if you NOT choose "Quick Format"!

I had the same problem with my AK2. i reformattet it 2-3 Times with Windows but it dont works.
Then disabled Quick Format and it works perfect.

 

[Mikeypr]

[/quote]

But only if you NOT choose "Quick Format"!

I had the same problem with my AK2. i reformattet it 2-3 Times with Windows but it dont works.
Then disabled Quick Format and it works perfect.
[/quote]



Nice one SkyDancer, totally forgot to mention that.

Had not thought of that.



Mikey

 

[ROM Troll]

According the Microsoft,

Quick Format - removes files from the partition
Standard Format - removes files from the partition and scans it for bad sectors

You could simulate a Standard Format by
1) running a quick format
2) running chkdsk /r from the command line

So unless there were bad sectors previously, it should work after a quick format; based on what Microsoft support has shared.

 

[Skydancer]

According the Microsoft,

Quick Format - removes files from the partition
Standard Format - removes files from the partition and scans it for bad sectors

You could simulate a Standard Format by
1) running a quick format
2) running chkdsk /r from the command line

So unless there were bad sectors previously, it should work after a quick format; based on what Microsoft support has shared.

This dont work for me. First i hat the Official AK Firmware, then change to AKAIO. Everything was perfect.
Few Days later i format my A-Data Card put AKAIO on it and it dont works! Only on Standard Format everything is fine.

The only weird is: 1 Week before, there where no problem mit Quick Format. (with Official AK Firm)

 

[Normmatt]

The probable cause of it not working on quick format is that your microsd has bad sectors which are in use by the file system, I'm unsure why this causes problems though.

EDIT: forgot to say that 2472 DQ5 (J) has been fixed.

 

[Samal22]

Finally got is to work on my patrolit sdhc card. Gobal setting is missing and if your sd card is not listed on sdlist.ini it won't created one on first bootup.


Here is the settings. Just copy this into notepad and save it as globalsettings.ini. Place this file into the __aio drawer.
This should fix the blue screen problem. Fix mine.

[system]
uiName = Adv.Evo
fileListViewMode = 0
brightness = 2
language = 0
langDirectory = lang_en
fileListType = 0
romTrim = 1
downloadPlayPatch = 0
cheatingSystem = 0
resetInGame = 0
SlowMotion = 0
Shortcut = 0
ShortcutPath = none
ShortcutStr = none
ShortcutLongPath = none
useFAS1 = 0
scrollSpeed = medium
norMode3in1Exp = 0
rumbleStrength = 0
autorunWithLastRom = 0
romNameTypeInList = 1
showHiddenFiles = 0
cheatsDB = fat0:/__aio/cheats/usrcheat.dat
deleteSAVtoo = 0
copySAVtoo = 0

I tried this, and I still get blue screen that freezes

 

[Normmatt]

Finally got is to work on my patrolit sdhc card. Gobal setting is missing and if your sd card is not listed on sdlist.ini it won't created one on first bootup.


Here is the settings. Just copy this into notepad and save it as globalsettings.ini. Place this file into the __aio drawer.
This should fix the blue screen problem. Fix mine.

[system]
uiName = Adv.Evo
fileListViewMode = 0
brightness = 2
language = 0
langDirectory = lang_en
fileListType = 0
romTrim = 1
downloadPlayPatch = 0
cheatingSystem = 0
resetInGame = 0
SlowMotion = 0
Shortcut = 0
ShortcutPath = none
ShortcutStr = none
ShortcutLongPath = none
useFAS1 = 0
scrollSpeed = medium
norMode3in1Exp = 0
rumbleStrength = 0
autorunWithLastRom = 0
romNameTypeInList = 1
showHiddenFiles = 0
cheatsDB = fat0:/__aio/cheats/usrcheat.dat
deleteSAVtoo = 0
copySAVtoo = 0

I tried this, and I still get blue screen that freezes

Reformat your sd card, and try it again. AKAIO 1.1 will be out soon, But we haven't been able to track down the problem as we don't have any microsd cards that exhibit the problem, so it makes debugging the cause difficult.

 

[Samal22]

I did it and I still get the same blue screen, and froze when pressing start.

I have a 1 gb kingston, I guess i'll just wait for the next update, thx

 

[Normmatt]

I did it and I still get the same blue screen, and froze when pressing start.

I have a 1 gb kingston, I guess i'll just wait for the next update, thx

If your on windows did you do a quick format? because doing a quick format doesnt seem to work and causes problems. I have a 2gb kingston so I'm not sure why it isnt working for you.

 

[Samal22]

Nop, did a full format

And yea I'm on windows

 

[Bri]

Do you have the skin that it's looking for installed in the "ui" folder? I think it looks for "Zelda" by default, but you can also change it in "globalsettings.ini". I got the same thing when I first tried it because I had deleted the "Zelda" skin (I had assumed it would use the "black" skin by default"). After re-installing that skin, it worked fine. So I suspect that the blue screen with the freezing "start" menu has something to do with it not finding the skin.

Did you format with FAT16 or FAT32? The reason I'm asking is because I know that FAT16 only has partial support for long filenames, and I'm wondering if that doesn't have something to do with it. I've also noticed that sometimes FAT16 gets "confused" about uppercase vs. lowercase in filenames, particularly filenames that are shorter than 8 characters, where the long and short filenames might match except for case. It seems to think that the filename is in uppercase even when it's in lowercase and will fail to find the file.

Normmatt and/or Smiths, is the code that looks for the skin case independent, or does it use the exact pathname that's stored in "globalsettings.ini"? In other words, if "globalsettings.ini" has ".../__aio/ui/..." as part of the skin pathname, would it find a skin that's in ".../__AIO/UI/..."?

-Bri

 

[Smiths]

Release should be tomorrow.
Seriously was gonna be today but holy shit just coding without thinking I basically created a scrolling messageBox... I don't really know how... but basically it's almost like having a basic text reader in the gui.

I only created it for an idea on the new big function I've been slaving over drunkenly for a week or so... on a total whim of "maybe I can fetch a TXT file too..."

Holy shit it worked.

So uhh, release should be tomorrow. Right now I just need someone with an RPG to test DQ5. A special beta tester to PM me, please.
Hopefully tonight while the vodka's kicking in.

 

[golden]

Release should be tomorrow.
Seriously was gonna be today but holy shit just coding without thinking I basically created a scrolling messageBox... I don't really know how... but basically it's almost like having a basic text reader in the gui.

I only created it for an idea on the new big function I've been slaving over drunkenly for a week or so... on a total whim of "maybe I can fetch a TXT file too..."

Holy shit it worked.

So uhh, release should be tomorrow. Right now I just need someone with an RPG to test DQ5. A special beta tester to PM me, please.
Hopefully tonight while the vodka's kicking in.

I can do it. Go ahead and send it to me and I can test it in less than a couple hours for you.

 

[Smiths]

yay, tested. should be released when Norm wakes up