Since Andriod tablets have become so cheap lately (Pandigital for $29.99 plus $4.99 shipping) I would like to see if it is possible to re-purpose one to do server as sort of a single function display device. Does anyone know if it would be possible to reconfig an Android tablet to NOT have a full desktop interface with icons and things and instead have it boot up to the display of a single application?
Also I noticed some of these tablets use a ARM926EJ-S CPU that is supposed to enable the direct execution of 8-bit Java bytecode in hardware and has an MMU on the chip (not always a given for ARM CPUs). Does that mean it would be possible to run a standard Java application without the load of a full JVM? Is all compiled Java code end up being 8-bit bytecode that could be directly run on this CPU?
Also I note that plugging a USB keyboard into an Android device does not seem to work. From what little I have read it is because USB host mode is not enabled in early versions of Android. It is possible to somehow either add this functionality via replacement kernel modules or perhaps even rebuild a new/different kernel for one of these devices to enable this? I have looked at some of the dmesg output from one of my el cheap'o tablets and I see some things happening there when I plug in a keyboard but not enough apparently.
Anyway lots of questions about hacking Android tablets. Is this something like this possible to have a instructional talk on at a PLUGdev meeting at some point? I.E. from someone who knows a LOT more about this than I do?
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Steven DuChene
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