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Flashing the rootfs image#

In order to be able to use Sailfish OS on the device, the parts that we built and assembled in the previous chapters now need to be flashed to the device. After flashing, Sailfish OS should boot on your device on the next reboot.

Prerequisites#

  • Android Recovery flashed to your device
  • The stock firmware image (for your version and device)
  • The Android base release (for your version and device)
  • A Sailfish OS rootfs update .zip, created by mic

Flashing back to Stock Android#

It is important that you start with a fresh stock image that matches the Android base release version you are going to flash (which in turn is dictated by the Sailfish OS image you are going to flash).

While the Android base (e.g. CyanogenMod) .zip contains all files in /system/ (e.g. libraries and libhardware modules), the stock image also contains firmware parts and flashables for partitions that are not included in the Android base .zip.

For example, if you are running stock 4.4.2 on a Nexus 4 (mako), and you are going to flash CM 10.1.3 and Sailfish OS to it, you have to first flash the stock 4.2.2 (note that this is 4.2, not 4.4) first, so that the firmware bits are matching the CM version.

If you do not flash the right stock version (and therefore firmware), there might be some issues when booting into Sailfish OS:

  • Problems accessing /sdcard/ in recovery (e.g. adb push does not work)
  • WLAN, sensors, audio and other hardware not working

If you experience such issues, please make sure you first flash the stock system, ROM, followed by the Android base image, and finally the Sailfish OS update. Please also note that you can't just take the latest stock ROM and/or Android base ROM - both versions have to match the Android version against which the Sailfish OS adaptation was built.

Flashing using Android Recovery#

  1. Boot into Android Recovery
  2. Upload the CM release: adb push cm-10.1.3-$DEVICE.zip /sdcard/
  3. Upload Sailfish OS: adb push sailfishos-$DEVICE-devel-1.2.3.4.zip /sdcard/
  4. In the Recovery on the device:
    1. Clear data and cache (factory reset)
    2. Install the CM release by picking the CM image
    3. Install Sailfish OS by picking the SFOS image
    4. Reboot the device