Setup a Bittorrent download/seed box on Android

I used to run XMBC (now named Kodi) on a Raspberry Pi, which worked great, but it lacked a bit a power. Also, the Linux versions of Kodi are not usually updated as much as the Windows or Android versions.

Definitely being an Android person, I decided to get myself a nice Android TV box for christmas. After having rooted it, installed all the media-center stuff and connected a nice big external USB hard drive for media storage, came the part of looking for a way to install a Bittorrent client.

As it turns out there are quite a lot of choices from the Google Play Store. But nothing matched what I needed:

• A bittorrent client that runs as a daemon all the time ;
• Must support scheduling to download only at night ;
• Must have a directory watching feature ;
• Must be manageable remotely via Web UI.

I tried different ones with no luck. After some research I came across an acceptable solution: Installing a bootstrapped version of Ubuntu Precise on the top of the Android OS. There is an elegant solution with video tutorials for that here.

The installation is pretty straightforward, you should be done in less than 15 minutes. Just watch the video tutorials first.

I chose a 2GB disk image with a Precise installation. When it finishes installing the base packages, type the following commands from your Android prompt (You can use ConnectBot or Terminal Emulator for this).

- Jump into the Ubuntu chrooted environment:

deb

- Update the packages list and upgrade them to the latest version

apt-get update -y && apt-get upgrade -y

- Install Andromize (A package designed to furthermore adapt your installation to the Android environment)

apt-get install andromize

- Clean the APT cache

apt-get clean

- Create a new user

adduser jeremy

- Create a password

passwd jeremy

- Add the user to the sudo group

adduser jeremy sudo

- Install SSH Server

apt-get install openssh-server

You may optionally want to change the SSH listen port in /etc/ssh/sshd_config.

At this point your base system is set up. You can logout your Ubuntu shell to be dropped back on the Android shell and see the options to the "deb" command with "deb h":

root@NEO-X8H-PLUS:/sdcard # deb h
Script to integrate Debian binaries on an Android phone

Without options: start a root bash shell
bootdeb ?: help, display this help text
bootdeb u: umount, remove symlinks and unmount Debian disk
bootdeb k: kill, kill (-KILL) programs, then unmount Debian disk
bootdeb r: reboot, mount Debian readonly and reboot (last resort)
bootdeb c: clean, clean symlinks to Android root from Debian disk
bootdeb s: sshd, start the openssh server
bootdeb S: sshd-stop, stop the openssh server
bootdeb x: xrdp, start the xrdp server
bootdeb X: xrdp-stop, stop the xrdp server

To umount the Ubuntu image, use "deb u". For now, you can just run the SSH server using "deb s" and then connect to it, either locally with ConnectBot or remotely with any SSH client.

Now for the Bittorrent installation part. I chose the Deluge client as it as activiely maintained and developed, and it matches all the criteria I needed.

- Install the following package to get "add-apt-repository" on your Ubuntu installation

sudo apt-get install python-software-properties

Note: In some situations, you may need to install the package "software-properties-common" instead.

- Add the Deluge PPA to your installation, and install the Deluge daemon and WebUI Server (refer to this page for more details):

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:deluge-team/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install deluged deluge-web

Run the daemon and the WebUI Server:

deluged
deluge-web &

All done! you should now be able to point your browser to http://android.ip.address:8112/. The default password to the WebUI is "deluge". Then take some time to adjust the configuration such as the download paths, bandwidth limits and schedules.

For a more seamless experience, you can make Kodi periodically scan your download folder to have movies added to the library automatically!

Note: When you run certain commands from within your Linux installation, you may see errors such as "passwd: u:r:init:s0 is not authorized to change the password of [...]". In this case, you need to temporarily disable SELinux back on the Android shell by using the command below:
setenforce 0