The SP Android: July 2019

The Best Free/Paid Custom Kernel Managers For Android

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Its no doubt that if you are reading this then you might be searching for some of the best kernel managers to tune kernel settings to get the maximum or balanced performance out of your phone. Other things which I am sure of is that - you know about root, installing ROMs and Kernels. Thats a good start and I don't need to explain you about kernel and root.<br />
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A kernel manager allows you to tweak the settings of your device at the kernel level. A kernel is the heart of your phone and you need to take care of it sometimes to keep everything working well and fluid. Most of the Android devices are shipped with a default kernel which are already tuned for best performance but that might be not true for all. An average user does not care about much these things and maybe do not know about these things. All these stuff for the nerds. So a default kernel which is shipped with devices does not provide much options for users to tweak the settings, meanwhile a custom kernel opens a vast array of options for tweaking.<br />
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With custom kernels you can tweak the CPU/GPU speed , manage the screen colors, get options for optimizing sound controls at kernel level and a lot of other things. It is not like that you will get all these options in a custom kernel automatically, for this the developer of that kernel has to add all these things in kernel. You can have more or less features compared to other custom kernels.<br />
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Since we are looking here for kernel managers, then we do not have much options to choose from. Personally I found 3 kernel managers which serves the purpose of tweaking kernel very well. One of them is free and 2 are paid. So lets start with the free one.<br />
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<h2><span>1. SmartPack Kernel Manager</span></h2>SmartPack-Kernel Manager is a heavily modified version of official Kernel Adiutor (KA), which is originally developed by Recognized Developer @Grarak. Kernel Adiutor has been abandoned and have not received any update from July 2018. Since it was an open source project ,so a new dev SunilPaulMathew picked this up and has been improving it since then. This is not available to download from play store , you need to download this from the app release page on github. Interface of the app is pretty simple and settings are divided in section using a sidebar. The best feature of this app is - Custom Controls. With custom controls you can even add support for the things which has been added in kernel but are not supported by kernel manager yet. You can read more about these controls in the app itself. They are not easy as they seems because you need some knowledge of shell scripts. <br />
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You can also save the kernel and devices logs to your sdcard using the export logs option in settings.<br />
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As I said earlier the features you will see in this app regarding the tweaks of kernel depends on you custom kernels. All I can say is that it supports most the things which you need to tweak if your custom kernel supports it. The other features which are available for all are - <br />
<ul><li> Dark Mode</li>
<li>Dark Mode</li>
<li>Option to flash recovery zip files while running Android OS, that is even without rebooting to custom recovery.</li>
<li>SELinux Switch.</li>
<li>GPU and CPU Frequency live stats and their usage</li>
<li>Custom Controls</li>
<li>Build Prop Editor</li>
<li>Profiles with tasker, allows you to tweak settings automatically when an specific even occurs, like launching a game or an app. </li>
<li><a href="https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/apps-games/app-smartpack-kernel-manager-t3854717" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">More Features and info on XDA thread </a></li>
</ul><br />
<div class="datagrid"><table><tbody>
<tr><td>Name</td><td>SmartPack</td></tr>
<tr><td>Download</td><td><a href="https://github.com/SmartPack/SmartPack-Kernel-Manager/blob/master/download/com.smartpack.kernelmanager.apk?raw=true">Direct Link </a> / <a href="https://github.com/SmartPack/SmartPack-Kernel-Manager/releases/">All Versions</a> </td></tr>
<tr><td>Support </td><td><a href="https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/apps-games/app-smartpack-kernel-manager-t3854717" target="_blank">XDA Thread</a></td></tr>
</tbody> </table></div><br />
<h2><span>2. FK Kernel Manager</span></h2>This is a paid app and one of the most popular kernel manager out there. It has a nice and modern which I think is needed for the tall display devices. It has its navigation bar at the bottom of the app and makes it easy to reach settings and other options. It also provides live CPU/GPU speed , input/output speed, info about wakelocks, RAM, Zram, thermal temperatures of different things and kernel logs too.<br />
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It has per-app profiles support which is the best things. You can make and profile with different setting and save it. These settings will get applied automatically when you launch that app for which you made that profile. It has a script manager which allows you to write a shell script and it will get automatically executed every time your phone boots. You can import and export these scripts easily from/to storage.<br />
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It has a nice dark mode by default but you can that to light from settings. If you enable the battery monitor , it will start showing you the battery stats in notification bar which details of idle battery drain and on screen usage drain percentages. Its a very useful feature for me. <br />
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You can flash kernel zips directly from this app, as well as other zips which modify the system.<br />
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<div class="datagrid"><table><tbody>
<tr><td>Name</td><td>FK Kernel Manager</td></tr>
<tr><td>Download</td><td><a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.franco.kernel&hl=en_IN">Play Store </a></td></tr>
</tbody> </table></div><br />
<h2><span>. EX-Kernel Manager</span></h2>EX Kernel Manager (EXKM) gives you total control over your hardware with premium features and a beautifully optimized material design user interface.  EXKM is the ultimate tool for performance tuning, maximizing battery life, configuring gestures or tweaking color and sound. <br />
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<b>Dashboard:</b> your homepage within the app, Dashboard summarizes your current settings and shows real-time CPU and GPU frequencies, temperatures, memory usage, uptime, deep sleep, battery level and temperature, governors, and i/o settings.<br />
<b><br />
Battery Monitor:</b>  the most accurate way to measure battery life.  EXKM’s Battery Monitor is  designed to show battery statistics that you can use to improve battery life scientifically.  EXKM Battery Monitor measures % battery use per hour and gives separate statistics for screen off (idle drain) and screen on (active drain).  It automatically measures only when the battery is discharging so you never have to remember to reset the stats or create markers.<br />
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<b>CPU Settings:</b> easily create, share and load CPU governor profiles for maximum battery life.  Adjust max frequency, min frequency, CPU governor, CPU boost, hotplugging, thermals and voltage (if supported by kernel or hardware)<br />
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<b>Graphics Settings:</b> Max frequency, min frequency, GPU governor, Adreno Idler (requires kernel support)<br />
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<b>Advanced Color Control:</b> RGB controls, saturation, value, contrast and hue,  Save, load and share custom profiles.  (requires kernel support, most custom kernels for Qualcomm devices implement this driver)<br />
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<b>Custom User Settings: </b>This feature allows you to add any kernel setting you want.  Kernel settings are located in the /proc and /sys directories.  Simply navigate to the desired path and you can quickly and easily add the setting to the app where it can be changed on the fly or applied at boot.  Plus you can easily import/export your custom settings and share with other users.<br />
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<b>CPU Times:</b>  Show CPU frequency usage and deep sleep, and optionally sort by most used frequencies.<br />
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<div class="datagrid"><table><tbody>
<tr><td>Name</td><td>EX Kernel Manager</td></tr>
<tr><td>Download</td><td><a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=flar2.exkernelmanager">Play Store </a></td></tr>
</tbody> </table></div><br />
If you have any questions regarding kernel managers, you can drop your queries/question in comment section.<br />

The Best Free/Paid Custom Kernel Managers For Android

Its no doubt that if you are reading this then you might be searching for some of the best kernel managers to tune kernel settings to get ...

[Updated for Beta 5] Android Q Beta 4 For Moto G5 Plus

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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-LPrMvoU74p8/XPoP7uYepYI/AAAAAAAAF6Y/OzYOGKeO7-wDhG5SaaZSgBj-m7PcBpWKQCLcBGAs/s1600/Android-Q-800x584.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="420" data-original-width="760" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-LPrMvoU74p8/XPoP7uYepYI/AAAAAAAAF6Y/OzYOGKeO7-wDhG5SaaZSgBj-m7PcBpWKQCLcBGAs/s1600/Android-Q-800x584.jpg" /></a></div><br />
<b><h3>Files and instructions has been updated to install Android Q Beta 5 now.</h3></b><br />
Android Q beta 4 is recently released by google bringing new features, UI improvemets , new animations a lot of things which were hidden or we can say needed use of adb to bring them out.<br />
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I earlier posted Q beta 2 installation guide but didn't post anything related to Beta 3 because it was not much stable and had more issues than beta 2. In ths guide I am gonna tell you how to install this Q beta 4 on your Moto G5 Plus.<br />
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The most important thing I want to tell you is that if you use magisk a lot ,even just for root, then its not for you. The things is - Magisk is working for root but its creating system unstablitity issues. You might face random crashes , freezes and lag because of it. So choice is yours :p . [Beta 5 - Use magisk canary build, everything is fine with it]<br />
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I hope you have all the basic knowledge of Treble, GSI, Flashing . If you don't know about all this please learn them about first, Google is your friend.<br />
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It is going to be a little bit of long process to setup this GSI and get everything running perfectly. This GSI itself is made with a lot of hacks and Android Q is still in beta stage. I will try to explain everything simple as much as I can, but I hope you know the basics of installing a GSI.<br />
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<h2><span>Requirements </span></h2>1. Patience, You really need this while setting up Q on G5 Plus.<br />
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<h2><span>Downloads </span></h2>1. <a href="https://mirrors.lolinet.com/firmware/gsi/Pixel-Aonly-10-20190711-ErfanGSI.img.7z" target="_blank">Pixel GSI </a> (Extract the img inside it)<br />
2. <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1S5lpOt4deRa2nUSxbyncEWJEoIVpTEEd/view?usp=drivesdk" target="_blank">Pie Vendor New</a> .<br />
<b>Its a TWRP backup, extract it and place it in TWRP/BACKUPS/*deviceid*/HERE</b><br />
3. <a href="https://www.apkmirror.com/apk/google-inc/google-play-services/google-play-services-18-3-81-release/google-play-services-18-3-81-120400-257258062-android-apk-download/" target="_blank">Google Play service apk</a><br />
4. <a href="https://github.com/topjohnwu/magisk_files/blob/master/canary_builds/magisk-release.zip">Magisk Canary</a><br />
5. <a href="https://dl.twrp.me/potter/" target="_blank">Latest TWRP </a><br />
6. <a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/1sDxt9YMRd66yKeqoyETl6sQTUWsJBgNk" target="_blank">Zygote Fix V2 and Q-Beta-5-Fixes.zip </a><br />
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<h2><span>How to flash - </span></h2>• Extract the GSI and you will get a img file out of it. Extract the Pie Vendor and place it at right place as I told in downloads section.<br />
• Make sure you are already on Latest TWRP which supports both treble and non treble roms.<br />
<ul><li>1. Boot into TWRP , click on restore and you will see the pie vendor backup folder (if you extracted and placed the files at correct location) . </li>
<li>2. Tap on the Pie vendor backup and restore the boot and vendor.</li>
<li>3. Now go back and tap on <b>Install</b> and go to the folder where you extracted the img, after going there tap on the <b>Install Image </b>button given in bottom right, select the Pixel Q img then choose system image and swipe to flash it. </li>
<li>4. Now flash the Q-Beta-5-Fixes.zip </li>
<li>5. Flash the Fix_Zygote_V2 zip and Magisk </li>
<li>6. Reboot and wait until you reach homescreen.</li>
<li>7. Reboot to recovery again.</li>
<li>8. Flash the Q-Beta-5-Fixes.zip again and reboot.</li>
</ul><br />
Now you have reached homescreen , now next thing is to install google play services and get rid of the notification showing up in notification panel. Change the wallpaper also because it will lag a lot because of live wallpaper which is given by default.<br />
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<b>Installing Google Play Services - </b><br />
1. Just install the apk of google play service with the default files app.<br />
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<b>No files showing in third party apps/File managers ?- </b><br />
If you got into this issue follow these instructions- using root<br />
1. Install Terminal Emulator<br />
2. type<i> su -c sm set-isolated-storage off</i> and press enter, your phone will reboot after this.<br />
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If you want to do this adb , then connect your phone to pc and make sure your phone is showing up in terminal. If that right then type the following line and press enter - <br />
<i>adb shell sm set-isolated-storage off</i><br />
Your phone will restart after this and you will be able to use apps which are not detecting storage.<br />
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<h2><span>Notes</span></h2>• Moto Fingering gesture for home/back/recent works as well as chop chop works.Flash any treble compatible kernel for these to work. Moto Actions option in settings will force close always.<br />
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<h2><span>Bugs</span></h2>• Google camera settings/Video recording force closes. Moto cam works but video recording broken.<br />
• It won't pass safetynet.<br />
• There maybe more other issues.<br />
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<h2><span>Credits -</span></h2>Vache, for the Pie vendor.<br />
Erfan Abdi - The man behind pixel GSI, thanks to him.<br />
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Want to ask any question ? Join our Android Q group on Telegram <a herf="https://t.me/thespandroid">@TheSpAndroid</a><br />
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[Updated for Beta 5] Android Q Beta 4 For Moto G5 Plus

Files and instructions has been updated to install Android Q Beta 5 now. Android Q beta 4 is recently released by google bringing new fea...

How To Port OEM Specific ROMs as GSI Using ErfanGSI Tool

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  <a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-zs-wxLnBU_w/XSChNWBTMiI/AAAAAAAAF7o/6a_DlVdGMFQa1d1GJeX5SrfIsbqDa2cVwCLcBGAs/s1600/Untitled%2Bdesign.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="789" data-original-width="940" height="537" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-zs-wxLnBU_w/XSChNWBTMiI/AAAAAAAAF7o/6a_DlVdGMFQa1d1GJeX5SrfIsbqDa2cVwCLcBGAs/s640/Untitled%2Bdesign.jpg" width="640"></a>
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<p>
  Updated on - 8th June 2020
</p>
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Most of the people may not understand the meaning of title this post but if you ever read about Generic System Images i.e GSI then you have understood it. Back in kitkat, lollipop and Marhsmallow days people used to port ROMs, they still do from other devices with similar specifications. Its a tedious work to find phones with most similar specification and OS version. After the implementation of Treble in Oreo, it has become very easy (kind of) to port OEM specific systems. In easy words - You can port MIUI from Xiaomi, OxygenOS/HydrogenOS from One Plus, ZenUI, ZUI , Nubia UI and some more. Well, you need a treble supported phone with either 8.1, 9.0 or 10 Android Version. These GSIs will not work on Pre-Oreo Versions of Android.
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ErfanGSI tool by developer Erfan Abdi is the best tool available for porting OEM specific ROMs. You can build a GSI just in just one or two minutes once you understood how it works. It is very user friendly tools where you have to just type some commands and tool will handle the rest of the porting process. Don't expect a perfectly working GSI from this tool because all OEM specific systems are different and system structure varies with each different device specially when the processor is different. Bugs will depend on the treble ROM of your device as well.
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This guide is intended for users who have some idea about using linux/Ubuntu or Cloud platforms such as Google Cloud. Its possible to build on Mac as well, since I have no about it I am not going to tell about installation on Mac. This guide only ports the OEM systems which are on Android version 9 and 10. You can not port an Oreo firmwares from other OEMs with this tool. This GSI tool support building of Aonly and AB partition type GSI. It will automatically output both version, if you want to build Aonly version or AB only then you have to use some different command which you will see later in this post. If you are complete noob and have no idea about these things ,just head over to google and read about them.
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<b>The system you need to build GSI -</b>
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1. A powerful PC , 4GB RAM and dual core is not enough but it may take a lot of time. Higher the RAM and Cores lesser the build time.
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2. A good internet connection , needed for downloading the OEM specific Zips which are usually more than 1GB. You can work with locally downloaded firware zips as well.
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3. Ubuntu OS on your PC (thats what I use).
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4. A working brain.
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If you have all needed things above mentioned , I am considering that you have a good working PC setup. Now we will move to next steps of Installing some required things which will be used by the tool.
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<ul>
  <li> Open the terminal on your PC</li>
  <li> First we will clone the repo with all submodule repos. It will take time in cloning and everything is around 500-700MB.<br>
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    <i style="color:#FFFF00; background:black">git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/erfanoabdi/ErfanGSIs.git</i>
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    Second- Now after cloning we will move to ErfanGSIs directory with <br>
    <i style="color:#FFFF00; background:black">cd ErfanGSIs</i>
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    <br>
  </li>
  <li>Now we going to install all the packages which are required for building the GSIs from this tool. Its fairly simple, just type - </li>
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<i style="color:#FFFF00; background:black">bash setup.sh</i>
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  If you face issues related to permissions during package installing the use sudo to execute the script.
  <li> When everything is above is installed, you are ready to build your GSI. </li>
</ul>
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The next step is finding the OEM specific system zips. These are basically the OTA zips which are released by smartphone companies to upadate their phones. All you need to find is a full OTA zip which is based on Android Pie. One Plus releases all OTA zips on their website, you can find other OEMs update zips by searching on google. You need a direct link of the URL of zip or you can download the OTA zip to your PC as well. I will tell both ways of building GSI directly from a URL as well as from the OTA zip which you have downloaded locally on your PC.
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The name of systems (Android Pie/Q) which are supported by ErfanGSI tool. -
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1. Android Q/10 
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2. ColorOS
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3. Flyme
<br>
4. Generic
<br>
5. MIUI
<br>
6. Nubia
<br>
7. OneUI
<br>
8. OxygenOS
<br>
9. Pixel
<br>
10. Xperia
<br>
11. ZenUI
<br>
12. ZUI
<br>
<br>
"Generic" tag is used for building GSIs based on AOSP. You can build GSIs from custom ROMS such as Havoc, Pixel Experience and more.
<br><br>

<h2><span>Generating GSI from a URL</span></h2>For example if you want to generate GSI of a One Plus 7 pro OTA/Firmware, then just make sure you are in the <b>ErfanGSIs</b> directory first, then enter this command -
<br>
<br>

<i><b>sudo ./url2GSI.sh https://oxygenos.oneplus.net/OnePlus7ProOxygen_21.O.07_OTA_007_all_1905120542_fc480574576b4843.zip OxygenOS</b></i>

<br>
<br>
The above command contains 3 things. First is the url2GSI - which is a bash script that handles rest of the things. Second is the URL of the firmware (Just replace it with a any OnePlus firmware link you want), third is the type of the system/Firmware, it is basically the name of the system which I have written in list. It can change accordingly to the firmware which you are trying to port. Like if you porting a MIUI firmware then you have to type <b>MIUI<i></i></b> instead of OxygenOS. Above command build both A and AB both version of GSI. You will get your GSI img in the <i><b>out</b></i> directory. These are usually img files over 2GB. You can compress them with 7z before uploading on the internet.
<br>
<br>
<h2><span>Compressing with 7z </span></h2>Just go the <b>out</b> folder and enter the 7z archive name and the name of the img file -
<br>
<i><b>7z a [archived-filename] [names-of-file-to-be-archived]</b></i>
<br>
<br>
Like if I have an img file named <b>HydrogenOS-Aonly-9-20190614-ErfanGSI.img</b> , I will enter this -
<br>
<i><b>7z a HydrogenOS.7z HydrogenOS-Aonly-9-20190614-ErfanGSI.img</b></i>
<br>
<br>

<h2><span>Generating Aonly or AB only GSI</span></h2>
Suppose you have Aonly device and you don't want to build AB version then in this case you have to use the command like this - <br>
<i><b>sudo ./url2GSI.sh https://oxygenos.oneplus.net/OnePlus7ProOxygen_21.O.07_OTA_007_all_1905120542_fc480574576b4843.zip OxygenOS Aonly</b></i><br><br>
This will make only A vesion of GSI img. The same way you can use AB tag for building AB GSI img.
<br><br>

<h2><span>Modifying System Before Building GSI</span></h2>With this method you can also modify the system before getting the final GSI. It is useful when the system is filled with bloat and you want to keep the GSI size smaller in order to fit into the system partition of your device.
In this I am using the url of OP6T firmware.
<br>
<br>
Make sure you are in <b>ErfanGSIs</b> directory. I am using all commands with <b>sudo</b> to avoid any kind of permission/access error.
<br>
1. This steps include the downloading of the firmware. You can use this same method on locally downloaded zips. Zip will be downloaded in <b>downloads</b> folder. Ignore all the errors you get after executing this command.
<br>
<i><b>sudo ./url2GSI.sh https://oxygenos.oneplus.net/OnePlus6Oxygen_22_OTA_031_all_1905281326_bc947291e7ba4ce3.zip</b></i>
<br>
<br>
Do not type the firmware/system name in the end like we did earlier.
<br>
<br>
2. This step unzips the zip contents and converts the system to system.img and stores the system.img in <b>cache</b> directory.
<br>
<i><b>sudo ./zip2img.sh downloads/temp.zip</b></i>
<br>
<br>
3. Now make an empty <b>system</b> folder in ErfanGSIs directory where we will mount our system.img<br>
<i><b>mkdir system</b></i>
<br>
<br>

4. This step is to for mounting the system.img to system folder. Once mounted you can make changes in system before building the final img.
<br>
<i><b>sudo mount cache/system.img system</b></i>
<br>

<br>
You will see a system folder now with all the contents of system. Make whatever changes you want and proceed to next step.
<br>

<br>
5. This step will give the final output of GSI img in the out folder. You can make changes in the commands according to your use.
<br>
See the basic structure of this command -
<br>
<i><b> ./make.sh [path to GSI system] [firmware type] [output type] [Output Dir]</b></i>
<br>

<br>
<b>-Path to GSI system:</b> Mount GSI and set mount point
<br>
<b>-Firmware type:</b> Firmware mode, it means the name of the system like MIUI, ZUI, ZenUI, OxygenOS etc(see list above in post)
<br>
<b>-Output type: </b>AB or A-Only
<br>
<b>-Output Dir:</b> set output directory, we don't need it mostly because without this the img output will be in "out" folder. You can change it as you like.
<br>

<br>
Now everything is done , so my final command will look like this for OxygenOS GSI build. I am making Aonly img here. If you want to build for AB devices , just use AB instead of Aonly. If you want both , don't write Aonly or AB 
<br>
<i><b>sudo ./make.sh system OxygenOS Aonly</b></i>
<br>

<br>
thats it, you will get your img in out folder.
<br>
<br>
<br>

<h2><span>Notes</span></h2>1. You will not be able to build Android Q GSI because the system does not mount properly due to changes from google in the factory images of updates. This thing only applies to Android Q on Pixel Smartphones and Oneplus 7/7T. These phones comes with dynamic partitions and building from these requires some hacky workarounds. If you are still interested in building from these devices you can check out the <a href="https://gist.github.com/shivvvvvv/6ff35518eca03b86d2ec92a33c8407ba" target="_blank">MakeDynamic.sh script here.</a>
<br>
2. To build HydrogenOS you should use OxygenOS:HydrogenOS as the system/firmware type name.
<br>
3. Some GSI may need for a patched surfaceflinger to boot. This is fixed now and ErfanGSI can patch surfaceflinger automatically when booting.
If you get isHDRlayer error in logs or tombstone crash. Then you need to patch it, the tutorial is given here to patch it - <a href="https://github.com/erfanoabdi/ErfanGSIs/blob/master/docs/HDRfix.md">Fixing isHDRlayer</a>
<br>
4. ColorOS is not booting for most of the devices at this moment.
<br>
<br>

<h2><span>Channels for downloading GSIs</span></h2>
Erfan has stopped publishing OEM GSIs and he only posts Android R GSIs and Ubuntu Touch Port updated in his channel. There are some other guys who build GSIs with ErfanTool and post in their channels. I am linking some telegram channels here where you can find a lot of GSIs.
<br>
1. <a href="https://t.me/oemgsis" target="_blank">OEM GSIs</a><br>
2. <a href="https://t.me/nippongsi" target="_blank">Nippon GSIs</a><br>
3. <a href="https://t.me/heliosgsis" target="_blank">Helios GSIs</a><br>
4. <a href="https://t.me/vegagsis" target="_blank">Vega GSIs</a>

<br>
<br>
<h2><span>Credits and Links</span></h2>1. All credits goes to Erfan Abdi and other contributors at github.
<br>
2. Download links of already available GSIs:<a href="https://mirrors.lolinet.com/firmware/gsi/"> Lolinet</a>
<br>
<a href="https://forum.xda-developers.com/project-treble/trebleenabled-device-development/pie-erfan-gsi-ports-t3906486">XDA thread</a>
<br>
<a href="https://t.me/ErfanGSIs">Telegram group </a>
<br>
<a href="https://t.me/ErfanGSI">Telegram channel <br>
</a>
<br>
<br>
If you need some help you can comment here.

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