Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Tether via USB from Android G1 to Ubuntu

I installed Cyanogen's mod version 4.2.5 on my Android G1 phone, and it's been working great. On feature that was added since version 4.2.3 is USB networking. Turns out it's simple to use with Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic). It may work with earlier version as well. The steps:
  1. Check the box for 'Internet tethering' under Settings->Wireless controls
  2. Plug G1 into Ubuntu box with USB cable. Btw, looks like the order of these first two steps doesn't matter.
  3. Click on the networking icon in your toolbar on the Ubuntu box. In the menu that appears, I have an item entitled 'Wired Network (HTC Android Phone)'. Underneath it is a choice 'ifupdown (bnep0)'.
  4. Click on 'ifupdown (bnep0)'.
  5. Now you should be connected to internet.

So this is pretty straightforward, and in particular, it doesn't seem that the Android application, Wired Tether for Root Users, is necessary.