Testing

[GuilhermeMcLL]

I'm implementing improvements in the project but I wanted to know how to test how it's turning out and check for crashes without having to go in the car all the time hahaha, I still don't know how to do it, how did you do it? Can you share? Android Studio?

[MaKi983]

Glad to ear someone who are working to improve the app, thanks.

Wellcome in the hell of testing..... There isn't a clean way to test it, I use a very old smartphone with android ics 4.0.4 using the wifi server in android auto developer settings. At the beginning I used a VM with android 4.0.4 (x86) to test the usb connection but the video wasn't working so I don't use it anymore. Using a such old android version is really a pain.

[GuilhermeMcLL]

Glad to ear someone who are working to improve the app, thanks.

Wellcome in the hell of testing..... There isn't a clean way to test it, I use a very old smartphone with android ics 4.0.4 using the wifi server in android auto developer settings. At the beginning I used a VM with android 4.0.4 (x86) to test the usb connection but the video wasn't working so I don't use it anymore. Using a such old android version is really a pain.

Thanks for the warm welcome to the "testing hell"! Lol, Nothing says fun like debugging on Android stone age hardware!
You're absolutely right about Android 4.0.4 being a nightmare, your VM video issues experience was the reality check I needed. No point fighting ghosts when there are real demons

I'm taking a hybrid approach: modern APIs for development, minSdk 15 for compatibility, and planning to get an old Android 4.x device for testing (your WiFi server method sounds much more sane than VMs).
Good news: I've been making solid progress on performance optimizations, basically learning to squeeze life from those precious CPU and RAM crumbs that 2017 multimedia systems provide! It's like being a digital archaeologist trying to make 512MB feel like 8GB (spoiler: physics still applies, but a dev can dream).

Your testing insights are gold, battlefield experience beats theory every time. I'll keep the community posted as we hopefully transform testing hell into a modern development experience for future contributors.

Best regards,

[MaKi983]

What kind of optimizations are you applying? Performance was one of my primary goal, I'm really curious.

The Wifi server is an AA developer feature, it works well to test everything except usb connection (obviously). You have to enable developer mode on Android Auto, start the server and enable the wifi debug in ODA in advanced settings. On the phone with AA enable wifi hotspot and use this network on the device on which you test the app

[GuilhermeMcLL]

What kind of optimizations are you applying? Performance was one of my primary goal, I'm really curious.

The Wifi server is an AA developer feature, it works well to test everything except usb connection (obviously). You have to enable developer mode on Android Auto, start the server and enable the wifi debug in ODA in advanced settings. On the phone with AA enable wifi hotspot and use this network on the device on which you test the app

Main areas I'm tackling:

Memory: Aggressive bitmap recycling, object pooling, and smart texture loading to squeeze every MB
CPU: Background threading for heavy ops, frame rate limiting, and JNI for critical audio/video processing
Protocol: Buffering USB/network communications and caching frequent requests to reduce overhead

Also working on some tricky audio bugs like the app sometimes using only one speaker side, and the classic issue where you can either hear Waze alerts OR FM radio, but not both properly mixed

[MaKi983]

Also working on some tricky audio bugs like the app sometimes using only one speaker side, and the classic issue where you can either hear Waze alerts OR FM radio, but not both properly mixed

The audio is managed by headunit and how the app is configured in S_Mike's permissions app. I don't think this can be achieved only from ODA side, probably we must use the hondaconnect APIs but they are not public. They require a lot of reverse engineering

[RoiLago]

Hello guys, I'm also trying to join in on the "fun" of testing and developing for Android 4.0.4 in the current year :D

I don't have a phone running Android 4.0.4 so I was trying to make it work on the Galaxy Nexus emulator on x86 running 4.1, which should be fairly similar but after trying for a while I was not successful. @MaKi983 You mention that you tried but you had no video output, do you think I should pursue making x86 work or have you already spent a lot of time trying? I was not even able to make it run, even without video, so I'm considering buying an old phone

[MaKi983]

Yes, I tried an x86 emulator but it was on 4.0.4 and that version of Android doesn't have the MediaCodec API. The h264 decoder is part of the project (and it was one of the hardest), so I wasn't able to test it on an emulator. If you want to try with an emulator based on 4.1 ODA will configure a decoder based on mediacodec api and, maybe, it can work (if MediaCodec is supported by the emulator). Obviously you are not testing an important part of the app (the custom decoder, the module omxvideocodec). It depends on what you want to test.