# Heimdall

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Heimdall is a cross-platform open-source tool suite used to flash
firmware (aka ROMs) onto Samsung mobile devices.

## Supported Platforms

Heimdall should work on AMD64/x86-64 (64-bit) or x86 (32-bit)
computers running GNU/Linux, macOS or Windows.

However, several third-parties have reported success running Heimdall
on ARM chipsets (in particular Raspberry Pi), as well as additional
operating systems such as FreeBSD.

## How does Heimdall work?

Heimdall connects to a mobile device over USB and interacts with
low-level software running on the device, known as Loke. Loke and
Heimdall communicate via the custom Samsung-developed protocol
typically referred to as the 'Odin 3 protocol'.

USB communication in Heimdall is handled by the popular open-source
USB library, [libusb](https://libusb.info).

## Free & Open Source

Heimdall is both free and open source. It is licensed under the MIT
license (see LICENSE).

Heimdall is maintained and predominantly developed by [Glass
Echidna](https://glassechidna.com.au/), a _tiny_ independent software
development company. If you appreciate our work and would like to
support future development please consider making a
[donation](https://glassechidna.com.au/donate/).

## Documentation

For more details about how to compile and install Heimdall please
refer to the appropriate platform specific README:

#### Linux

 - Linux/README ([online](Linux/README))

#### OS X

 - OSX/README.txt ([online](OSX/README.txt))

#### Windows

 - Win32/README.txt ([online](Win32/README.txt))

### Odin protocol and PIT format

For more details on the Odin protocol, and the PIT files, see the
external project [samsung-loki/samsung-docs](https://samsung-loki.github.io/samsung-docs/).