PSP Linux

Can Android run on a PSP? Answer…

Christopher Hatton — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 15:39:12 +0000

Linux cannot normally run on a PSP because the Memory Management Unit (MMU) is not present in the hardware. The PSP has the power to run Linux, but not the hardware. That is why uCLinux (modified Linux) is used as an alternative.

Android is a modified form of Linux; therefore the answer is no, it cannot run on a PSP.

But… that does not mean it is not completely impossible. Using uCLinux to run Android runtime is possible, it just requires a large amount of modification.

You may ask yourself… What happened to the Utopia project?

Source: http://wololo.net/talk/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=9676

Android wrote: Why can’t we install Android on PSPs?

Linux kernel requires a specific piece of hardware called “memory manager”, which is not present on PSP. It does exist on MIPS processors (the one PSP uses) but Sony removed it on their custom MIPS (Allegrex) used on PSP. It has nothing to do with PSP’s power (which is way powerful enough). Linux can run on 486 PCs, which are way less powerful than PSP.

Android wrote: Why are the Utopia devs creating a new OS? can’t they just find a way to make an Android or mini Linux OS compatible with PSP’s hardware?

Because they want to. Anyway Utopia is an abandoned project. Anyway, there’s a heavily modified Linux that runs on PSP: uCLinux. But don’t expect to run a PC-like distro with this…

Android wrote: Why is Linux installable on PS3 but not PSP?

PS3 does have a MMU (Memory Manager Unit).

Back on form…

Christopher Hatton — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 11:53:30 +0000

‘Long time, no status.’

Study work has been the main cause of silence, and it is great to say it is mostly over – you will been hearing more updates from this website.

Over the year people’s comments/emails have been read/answered. It pleasing to see the amount of interest, thank you! The website is receiving 400 hits/mth with many people getting connected to our social media. We’ve had members join our google group, in which it is suggest for you to join if you wish to help out.

Obviously, any bit of news, get in touch!

…more to come!

How to use uCLinux on the PSP (Jackson Mo’s port)

Christopher Hatton — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 12:49:08 +0000

Once you’ve booted in the uCLinux, you will notice a red square block in the top right. Press & hold the shoulder buttons on the PSP to expand the box to show a keyboard layout.

L: Numbers and symbols
R: Letters and symbols
L + R: Capital letters and symbols

With the chosen shoulder button held down, use the joystick to move the red cursor to the required letter. The , , , buttons represent the four characters of the highlight box, in respective location.

Type ‘help‘ for a list of commands.
[ENTER] is pressed without the shoulder buttons being held down.

This will show the following commands…

break:

To escape/pause a process or script. Must actually be in a process before being able to break from it.

cd:

Change directory.

Continue:

Advance within a controlling while, for, foreach or until loop. The opposite of a ‘break’ command.

Eval:

Sort for evaluate, eval is a function that equates a given sum. A Perl example:

my $one = 1;
my $two = 2;
my $total = 0;
my $example = '$total = $one + $two';
eval $example;
print $total;

Exec:

Exec is a BOURNE and POSIX shell command that replaces the current shell process with the command specified after exec and does not create a new PID. Running exec , the shell will be replaced by that command.

Exit:

Allows you to exit from a program, shell or log you out.

Export:

The process of transferring data from one computer or program to another – In another sense, the method of backing up portions of important data.

Help:

Show built-in commands as a list.

Login:

The process of logging in a user with a username and password.

Newgrp:

Log into a group.

Syntax:

newgrp [ -| -l ] [ group ] [argument]

– \| -l	Change the environment to what would be expected if the user actually logged in again as a member of the new group.
group	A group name from the group database or a non negative numeric group ID. Specifies the group ID to which the real and effective group IDs will be set. If group is a non-negative numeric string and exists in the group database as a group name, the numeric group ID associated with that group name will be used as the group ID.
argument	sh and kshonly. Options and operand of the newgrp command.

Read:

To obtain information from a drive so that it can be displayed or processed.

Readonly:

To be able to read data or a directory without making any alterations.

Set:

Sets the value of an environment variable.

Syntax:

set [–] [-a] [-e] [-f] [-h] [-k] [-m] [-n] [-p] [-s] [-t] [-u] [-v] [-x] [ -o option ] [ -A name ] [arg]

—

Do not change any of the flags; useful in setting $1 to -.

-a

Mark variables which are modified or created for export.

-e

Exit immediately if a command exits with a nonzero exit status.

-f

Disable file name generation.

-h

Locate and remember function commands as functions are defined (function commands are normally located when the function is executed).

-k

All keyword arguments are placed in the environment for a command, not just those that
precede the command name.

-m

Background jobs will run in a separate process group and a line will print upon completion. The exit status of background jobs is reported in a completion message. On systems with job control, this flag is turned on automatically for interactive shells.

-n

Read commands but do not execute them.

-p

Disables processing of the $HOME/.profile file and uses the file /etc/suid_profile instead of the ENV file. This mode is on whenever the effective uid is not equal to the real uid, or when the effective gid is not equal to the real gid. Turning this off causes the effective uid and gid to be set to the real uid and gid.

-s

Sort the positional parameters lexicographically.

-t

Exit after reading and executing one command.

-u

Treat unset variables as an error when substituting.

-v

Print shell input lines as they are read.

-x

Print commands and their arguments as they are executed.

-o option

The following argument can be one of the following option names:

allexport	Same as -a.
errexit	Same as -e.
bgnice	All background jobs are run at a lower priority. This is the default mode. emacs Puts you in an emacs style in-line editor for command entry.
gmacs	Puts you in a gmacs style in-line editor for command entry.
ignoreeof	The shell will not exit on end-of-file. The command exit must be used.
keyword	Same as -k.
markdirs	All directory names resulting from file name generation have a trailing / appended.
monitor	Same as -m.
noclobber	Prevents redirection > from truncating existing files. Require >\| to truncate a file when turned on.
noexec	Same as -n.
noglob	Same as -f.
nolog	Do not save function definitions in history file.
nounset	Same as -u.
privileged	Same as -p.
verbose	Same as -v.
trackball	Same as -h.
vi	Puts you in insert mode of a vi style in-line editor until you hit escape character 033. This puts you in control mode. A return sends the line.
viraw	Each character is processed as it is typed in vi mode.
xtrace	Same as -x.

-A name

Array assignment. Unset the variable name and assign values sequentially from the list arg. If +A is used, the variable name is not unset first.

Shift:

Changes the position of replaceable parameters in a batch file.

Times:

Used to time a simple command.

Syntax:

times [-p] utility [argument]

-p	Write the timing output to standard error in the following format:real %f\nuser %f\nsys %f\n < real seconds>, ,
utility	The name of the utility that is to be invoked.
argument	Any string to be supplied as an argument when invoking utility.

Trap:

Acts as an interrupt to tell a process to stop and wait for further instructions.

Umask:

Get or set the file mode creation mask.

Syntax:

umask [-S] [000] [mask]

-S	Produce symbolic output.The default output style is unspecified, but will be recognized on a subsequent invocation of umask on the same system as a mask operand to restore the previous file mode creation mask.
000	Any three octal digits used for permissions.

Wait:

Await process completion.

Syntax:

wait [pid] [jobid]

pid	The unsigned decimal integer process ID of a command, for which the utility is to wait for the termination.
jobid	A job control job ID that identifies a background process group to be waited for. The job control job ID notation is applicable only for invocations of wait in the current shell execution environment, and only on systems supporting the job control option.

Source: http://www.computerhope.com

Anyone know a vm image for compiling the uCLinux port?

Christopher Hatton — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 12:39:35 +0000

Please leave answers/comments below, thanks…

Upgraded Website! – “It’s alive… it’s alive!”

Christopher Hatton — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 04:55:31 +0000

At last, the website has now been upgraded! The site used to be pure HTML and iframes… yucky! It is now controlled by a CMS, which helps to keep everything easily up-to-date and also adds some social media into the mix.

So over the next few months this website will change, grow, and populate. You guys are needed to help keep this website up to date with all the goings-on.

This website is for you to find useful… so make it that way!

Happy Linux-ing!

Jackson Mo has released the latest uClinux PSP!

Christopher Hatton — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 12:02:19 +0000

It is the newest kernel 2.6.22-uc1 and also comes with added extras including ‘Busybox 1.7’, a serial driver to control the remote control port on the original PSP, block device driver for Memory Stick access, Joypad driver for PSP button use, On-screen keyboard, mips toolchain for building custom programs, and more… Check out the link below to his website to find out all the features and files!

To install the pre-compiled package to the PSP, is as simple as extracting it to the GAME150 directory on the Memory Stick!

Awesome Jackson! Keep up the good work!

His website is https://sites.google.com/site/linuxonpspproject/

uClinux kernel running on the PSP

Christopher Hatton — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 12:01:01 +0000

source: http://www.linuxfordevices.com/c/a/News/Linux-ported-to-Sony-PSP/

Chris Mulhearn has actually managed to get the uClinux kernel running on the PSP. He successfully ported Xiptech’s mipsnommu version of uClinux-2.4.19. It can boot and mount the file system, but other than that it’s just an interactive shell. It’s mainly just to show that the maybe impossible, is achievable. It’s now open to developers to create drivers to get more functionality.

Good on ya Chris!

Another step closer to having the world of Linux on our PSP!

Please check out http://df38.dot5hosting.com/~remember/chris (dead link)

Last stutus update quoted from CG…

Christopher Hatton — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 12:00:21 +0000

This was the last stutus update quoted from CG on psp-gnulinux-devel forums:

> – started to read Building Embedded Linux Systems (O’Reilly) and…
> Understanding The Linux Kernel

> – looked over some presentations on uCLinux

> – browsed the net to see what others have done

> – planned to setup the dev environment for compiling the kernel (based on xiptech setup); only the 2.4.19 kernel has been patched for nommu on mips; download the 2.4.19 from kernel.org, patch > it with the uclinux patch from uclinux.org and then patch it with the xiptech patch. Download the toolchain provided by xiptech. I haven’t started the compilation yet, TBD in this weekend

> – thought about this: no mmu => the kernel should be either linked from the starting address where it will be loaded (because the IV pointer is located at a fixed address as far as I know)

> OR

> we first disable all the interrupts (so that raised exception would not bugger us) and THEN move the image from the mem location from where it has been loaded to 0x00010000 and jump to the setup() code