A week ago, Mozilla (in time for the 10th birthday of Firefox) released the Firefox Developer Edition — the only browser made for developers. Among one of the coolest features of Firefox Developer Edition (formerly known as Firefox Aurora) is the WebIDE.

WebIDE is the replacement for the App Manager (on previous Firefox versions). Like the App Manager, the WebIDE enables one to run and debug Firefox OS Simulator or even a real Firefox OS device.

WebIDE inside Firefox Developer Edition.
WebIDE inside Firefox Developer Edition.

Also this week, Mozilla announced the availability of the first Firefox OS device to be sold in the local Philippine marketCherry Mobile’s Ace — made all Pinoy Mozillians even prouder as we were the first in Southeast Asia to launch such devices.

One of the coolest things one can do with his/her Cherry Mobile Ace, powered by Firefox OS is to connect it to a computer (Windows, Mac or Linux) for debugging.

The Cherry Mobile Ace appears as a USB device under WebIDE's Runtime environments.
The Cherry Mobile Ace appears as a USB device under WebIDE’s Runtime environments.

But, during the first time you will connect your Cherry Mobile Ace to your PC or Mac, it might not appear right away inside the WebIDE. Here’s what you need to do (assuming that you have ADB installed in your machine and that ADB Debugging is enabled in your device:

1. You need to edit (or create) the adb_usb.ini file. Where to find this file?

In linux / mac, the path will be …

~/.android/adb_usb.ini

In windows XP, it will be …

\Documents and Settings\<yourusername>\.android\adb_usb.ini

And windows 7 /8, it will be …

\users\<yourusername>\.android\adb_usb.ini
or you can type %HOMEPATH%\.android\ in the folder path of an 
explorer window to jump straight there

2. You need to add “0x1782” to the end of the adb_usb.ini file (which may be empty by the time you open it). “0x1782” is the vendor ID for Spreadtrum, so when you have added this value, all Spreadtrum devices should work (unless they change ID in future devices).

3. Disconnect the device (CM Ace) then restart the ADB server (open the Command Prompt or Terminal and execute the command “adb kill-server”).

For Mac users (like me) and Linux fans, you may simply execute this command and you’re all set:

mkdir -p ~/.android && echo 0x1782 > ~/.android/adb_usb.ini && 
adb kill-server

If you have a Cherry Mobile Ace (powered by Firefox OS) device already, please join the discussions via this Facebook Group.

 

UPDATE: For Windows users, if the instructions above do not work, you may opt to download and install manually this driver for devices with chips provided by Spreadtrum [here].


ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Robert “Bob” Reyes is a technologist, an ICT Consultant and Tech Speaker, a certified Google IT Support Specialist, and an Open Source advocate representing the global non-profit Mozilla (makers of Firefox) in the Philippines. Bob is a Technology Columnist for the Manila Bulletin Publishing Corporation and an aviation subject matter expert contributor for Spot.PH.

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