Point me in the right direction! - Verizon LG G4

Hello all!
I've been a creeper around here since 2010 (obviously not on the G4 forum), and I have just now decided to register. I got into rooting and ROM'ing with my Droid X, and now I'm a "phone enthusiast" (I suppose that's what you can call someone who irresponsibly spends money on different phones).
So I'm a third year Computer Security student at my University and I know languages like Java and C. Java, being the language that Android is based on, and C, being the basis for Linux systems, I would imagine to be very beneficial to me in Android development. Basically, what I'm trying to find is a good resource to tell me how all of the system image files work. I've had to reflash firmware plenty of times and know of the system files like system.img, boot.img, etc. and I want to know how they all work and work together.
My end goal is to be able to unlock the bootloader (which I imagine is decrypting the file and editing something within it) for the community. But, I can't even try to do that without knowing how all of this stuff works together and what exactly it means in the technical sense to unlock the bootloader.
Are there people on this forum who know or a resource to learn about this stuff, or a user who is experienced enough to explain to me how this all would work?
PS. I know there are some really smart people working on unlocking it, and I'm certainly not trying to jump in and act like I can do it. I'm just purely curious in trying to do this.
Thanks in advance!
dslappy

Related

XDAII Project - Assistance Required - Some Funding Available

Hi,
Have spent a great deal of time browsing through the site, and trying out some of the ROMs. Which has led me to the following...
The Company I work for has deployed a large number of XDA-II's (Himalaya), and we've encountered a number of reliability problems with them, not to mention users unable to keep the devices charged.
The consequences of these problems are: 1) Lost software installs and 2) Extra support time.
We've also found the O2 active UI to be a right royal pain in the ar5e!
So, having been playing around with ROMs, I have an idea of what is possible. But, to date, I've just not been able to find exactly the ROM I'm looking for. I'm quite happy to sit down and try and figure things out for myself, but it's quite difficult to try and find a good chunk of spare time.
So, here's the point of my message.
If I can identify the components I need to be installed within a "special edition" cooked ROM, would someone be able to help me build it? I'm basically looking for WM2003SE, so that the screen can be flipped into landscape - or a third-party progam to do that, a wireless email client that I will provide, backup software that I will provide, all the usual hardware stuff (BT, camera etc), no O2 UI (Hoorah!), and maybe one or two other packages, and as much storage/memory available as possible, and, of course, the ability to add a splashscreen. That's it - nothing too out of the ordinary. All of the additional software will be licensed.
So, that's my idea. What do you get in return? Well, I'm more than happy to donate to the site, and, come to some arrangement with anyone that is interested in helping - perhaps some hardware/software etc.
This would save me a lot of time, and be quite an interesting project - to see so many devices get a decent upgrade, and one that helps reduce support overheads.
Please PM me if you are interested.
Thanks.
Vince
well you can
select the win2003se rom you want and put the rest in a cooked extended rom that was what i did i put all cabs i needed in extended rom if the device gets hard reset it will install everything there
the config file must have the names of course
you can get some of the setting there too like operator settings
you can allways donate to xda-developes....lol
PS ...i m not part of xda-developers or in any way associated with them just a user who is glad they existed.

Interested in Developing in free time

I just recently decided that I have had enough of WinMo on my tilt2 and opted to see how the development of Android OS was coming along for the phone. Not surprisingly, it has developed a lot since I first picked up the phone in December and first thought of the idea of placing Android on the phone.
To my point-- I have some programming experience and would be interested in learning the language behind Android. Obviously it is linux based, but is that the only thing I need to know?
Does anyone know what I need to know to get started?
Links to appropriate sites with details on the language is really what I am looking for. Thanks to any and all that will help (not looking for trolls, get enough of those from other sites).
I too am learning linux, I've had to use linux commands for over a year now as I also own a G1 and you often (when rooting) need to go into a terminal to make changes. I unfortunately don't know much of the language required to create or change much of the android OS I only know the file structure and how to change that. If I were you I would jump over to http://www.android.com download the developers kit which comes with an android emulator and they have lots of tutorials and demo apps for the android OS. It won't do much as far as help you modify the system but it's a good place to get started.
Hope this helps and if you have any questions about the things I do know, feel free to ask me
androidonhtc.com/wiki/Get_Involved[/url] you can try this.

Contact from Kin Developers

About 2 weeks ago, I took johnkussack's advice (I think it was him) and went to LinkedIn to try t be friends with anyone who came up on the search for "kin phone". In the invite email, I just said that I noticed they worked on the Kin phones and would like to ask them a few questions on how one could write to the phone. I have had 3 responses in the last 2 days.
Guy1: didn't know because he worked on the UI for the Kin Studio
Guy2: kindly told me he couldn't release an unauthorized build and that he would be breaking the law by doing so.
Guy3: This guy worked on the phone for over a year. He first told me I was breaking the DCMA by hacking/reverse engineering Kin, regardless of intent. Then he said this important thing:
"You are absolutely right in assuming that the device is locked; in fact, it has a hardware lock that is common to many such devices. When the devices roll of the manufacturing line the programming fuses are blown (literally) preventing any further programming of the device. This is all handled by hardware so unless you find a flaw with that you are out of luck."
So if this is true (sounds like it is), the "dream" is over. Hopefully there is some way that someone out there can find.
If I get more responses, I will post them here. Don't ask me to go back to these three who already replied and asked them more questions, I think I made some of them mad.
Hmmmm... I don't know whether or not the KIN models will accept OTA updates so that's a good question to ask. If OTA updates are possible then it's inherently possible to change the software. I wonder...
Yes, it was me the one who said about "linkedin".
But i also said "in one word NDA". You should known even before ask that the signed NDA are also legal contracts, so i prevented before asking them.
On the DCMA, yes.. on the USA. Outside the big country, the legal question is different and may not operate with that law. (if ever). If they provide a normal (legal?) way to unbrick my factory mode here, or to use the phone options, then i wait for the cost for it.
And everyone knew that hardware was not the way, just at the moment where first flash attempt failed. "Dream" is doable by software, if anything is to be done.
What i don't get is why to ask for rom rom roooooms, where we need drivers drivers driveeeeers... or sdk's. We won't get it anyway from MS, but no flashing means a rom is futile, non useful,crap pack of bytes.
But i also said "in one word NDA". You should known even before ask that the signed NDA are also legal contracts, so i prevented before asking them.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I figured I just take a shot in the dark; hope for the best and expect the worst. Since the phone and suuport from MS was discontinued, maybe the NDAs would be voided.
And everyone knew that hardware was not the way, just at the moment where first flash attempt failed. "Dream" is doable by software, if anything is to be done.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good to know you still think there's a way.
What i don't get is why to ask for rom rom roooooms, where we need drivers drivers driveeeeers... or sdk's. We won't get it anyway from MS, but no flashing means a rom is futile, non useful,crap pack of bytes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just asked if "there is a way to get around the write lock". Had I known ahead of time to ask about drivers or SDKs, I would have put that in the msg.
I strongly believe that we could operate with the device,softwarewise. there is proof that the kin NAND memory (for now on, called "Storage" as label) is writeable. Not sure on the Rom part.
Of course, i mean.. just use it as a normal writable storage memory.
I posted how it could be done and would do it myself but, again, i bricked my phone, and available ones (through bidding sites) are so expensive to buy another one just for this (+ $150). Don't see a way to get it internationally again.
And even doing it, i'm not sure about what could be done just writing on the storage mem....
If the fuse byte is burn't should not it have prevented you from bricking?
kintwouser said:
If the fuse byte is burn't should not it have prevented you from bricking?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nvitem bricked, not flashing bricked. You can succesfully write to the NVItems memory. But i guess it's just configuration memory and not the one "fused".
I just want to mention that jailbreaking a phone is NOT illegal in the United States! Geohot hacked the iphone... Apple went after him... Apple lost.
Also blowing the programming fuses seems a little fishy to me actually. No other phone does that. The majority of other phones have been flashed. I just think it would be pretty odd for a company to do that so that they no longer could update it. I am not sure I believe him. If this really was true... then why wouldn't Apple or Sony be doing it? This also doesn't make sense since Microsoft actually originally intended on putting WP7 on this as well as allowing apps for it. Check this article out:
http://www.intomobile.com/2010/05/12/kin-windows-phone-7-a-lot-closer-than-we-thought/
you must understand, its not possible to blow fuses in the hardware, it would be a top news story if they were able to keep the OS running in complience with the flash memory without it crashing. Obviously that was a lie to discourage us, and i dont even think that was a real kin developer, because microsoft clearly stated that all kin developers would be moved to WP7 or another programming section. And it doesnt matter if its legal or not to jailbrake phones, if we are porting a new OS, we wouldnt have modified the original OS, which is what jailbraking means. Most likely the OS is hidden deep in the flash memory with a write - protection. If you think its saying access denied because they said the fuses were blown, its wrong. They must just have a password or code that needs to be sent continuasly to the phone to access files. If the fuses were blown, then nothing would be able to be accessed by zune, because it would be impossible to reach the memory.
soninja8 said:
Most likely the OS is hidden deep in the flash memory with a write - protection. If you think its saying access denied because they said the fuses were blown, its wrong. They must just have a password or code that needs to be sent continuasly to the phone to access files. If the fuses were blown, then nothing would be able to be accessed by zune, because it would be impossible to reach the memory.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not my expertise field, but this mobiles can (and in fact they do) have several memories, storing the OS in the ROM memory and all the data on the NAND memory (our "8gb" storage).
Zune software has protocols to query for available storages (requiring its label/id) and is allowed to write/read to it. If you dare to click on update version (at least in the 1st version I tried) it expressed that the option was not "available" to that device without web requesting data, apparently.
So.. in the nand flash we may only have the equivalent of a SD Card. And my last wince PDA showed that as /Storage too, apart from main wince ROM.
You can format the nand memory using win explorer if in fact it is the 8gig storage. I did this and it deleted all pics,albums etc. It was interesting to note that we cannot copy or view these pics without an access error but it does let me delete them.
I just wan't to be able to get my pics off this piece of crap without emailing them.
I posted it once. You are able to:
- Query storage properties (label, size, id,...)
- Query storage folders
- Query folder files.
- Query tracks / albums / playlist / images / anyZuneSupportedFile
- Delete * file (whatever)
- Format the storage
You are "unable" to:
- Upload (create) a file into the device
- Download a file from the device.
MTP protocol tools allows you to do so, from command line (not quite sure if they are available on Win32 OS's), but... fails to operate with this device when it comes to the "unavailable" operations.
I am curious as to which former developers you contacted?
I was doing some research and noticed that Microsoft acquired the company Danger, Inc. After Microsoft purchased them, the former president of Danger went to develop Android (later acquired by Google). One thing I read was that most of Dangers employees left after being purchased by Microsoft. Apparently these people don't like Microsoft all that much! I also looked into it a little more and found one of the founders of Danger who had a twitter account. Of course all of his tweets were via a "KIN". Thought that was interesting. It seems to me that these former Danger employees would be interested in helping out if they don't hold to high of an esteem for the big "M".
seems like this is your first "inside the move" trying-to-hack/reverse a thing, so i will say:
people involved doesnt wanna risk through legal issues, even if they were pissed off, just for "some kids" to have a driver or rom. NDA are strong there, and they could either sign them or leave (if leaving, they don't have the interesting things).
At most you would get bad-mood or good-luck comments, and ocassionaly (very uncommon), leaks (wont happen here).
yeah, they purchased danger for an amazing 500 million dollars, which they later developed the kin with it, they were planning to put windows phone 7 on it, but they were to behind and released it with the old windows CE, then the former developer moved to work on a free source OS, later called android. Google wanted to get android while it was cheap, so they bought that company, and made the old developer as 2nd engineer.
Maybe not worth yet, but we should get more *info* about the SBL mode (aka "Ms Pink Bootstrap), as coinflipper said that it was the way to flash OS or parts (like radio's).
I have been trying even OMA wap WBXML bootstrap examples with it, but as we dont know if our phone is standard, it's like looking for a water drop in the sea of possibilities.
We do not need a guide on how to do something, but what-to-do with it.
Maybe, JUST MAYBE, we could design a program like bitpim. I am a mac user and when I used bitpim with my enV touch, I used to edit all sorts of files. Examples would be phone info, server info etc. We could make a program like that to get the info. I know programming may be hard, but its worth a shot. I hate the OS on this phone, ESPECIALLY WHEN YOU PIN APPS! THEY LOOK HORRIBLE
Kinuser1 said:
Maybe, JUST MAYBE, we could design a program like bitpim. I am a mac user and when I used bitpim with my enV touch, I used to edit all sorts of files.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We can't. If we have not the protocols or the supported phone features (protocols, drivers, documentation,...) you cannot guess it and put it into visual basic (or Xcode) and then by *magic*get the program you want.
i will admit that i know very little about protocols and drivers but i would like to point out that bitpim is open source, and that the code can be found here ->
http-//sourceforge.net/scm/?type=svn&group_id=75211 (change "-" to ":")
i seem to recall bitpim already having limited support for the kin, but perhaps with a little research and a little code tweaking we can find ways to improve it? i'm not sure how feasable it is as i have very little experience with programming for phones/usb devices, but it's just a thought.
slimeq said:
i will admit that i know very little about protocols and drivers but i would like to point out that bitpim is open source, and that the code can be found here ->
http-//sourceforge.net/scm/?type=svn&group_id=75211 (change "-" to ":")
i seem to recall bitpim already having limited support for the kin, but perhaps with a little research and a little code tweaking we can find ways to improve it? i'm not sure how feasable it is as i have very little experience with programming for phones/usb devices, but it's just a thought.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We can't. If we have not the protocols or the supported phone features (protocols, drivers, documentation,...) you cannot guess it and put it into visual basic (or Xcode) and then by *magic*get the program you want.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The above applies to any software you want. Unless you magically found documentation or files (like OP), there's no way to. So f#cked.
The thing is always the same, tweaking tweaking... what to tweak, huh?

A collective action

One thing that I seem to notice is that even though this forum may have some releases that people can use it seems to lack both information and tools to get into trying to help the community. Some people, such as me and im sure many others, have some, even if only basic, skills but the process of applying them to the field of Windows Phone. For example a while back I wanted to tinker with the Windows Phone emulator but I failed to find working tools to dump and reconstruct the ROM and sadly no documentation to look at the format to see whats going on. I once saw a tool for HTC ROM's I think but that has since disappeared. Some of the old formats are at least partially known but burried somewhere deep in this forum where it becomes a pain to find them.
Specifically I would be interested to know if there are ways to actually debug the assemblies using tools like IDA on either the emulator or an actual phone (even though they were compiled to different instr sets they still probably mostly share the same code). I am also wondering what tools could be used to atleast compile native binaries, even if they can't be executed yet.
I personally have a little reversing experience and a fair amount of coding experience yet the current barrier of lack of information seems overwhelming and deterring. I can't say I will have either the experience or time to get us all further but I wouldn't mind tinkering with my phone and/or it's operating system and isn't that the whole point of this community?
It would interest me if there are others who feel the same way and whether there are others out there who could maybe help to get others started. XDA has a wiki but it seems to be mainly "consumer" orientated.

[Q] How install a clean Linux Ubuntu on my HDHD

Hello experts on this forum
I`m a total newbie into this technology. I got myself a nice HTC desire HD. After a while, I got aggravated, feeling monitored by Mr. Orwell, whith this Android system. To my great surprise, I believe that I managed to route the phone, and install a Linux firewall. However, I still feel a little paranoid.
I know that people like me, stumbling around on a forum like this, might be a pain in the a. because we don`t "RFTM": However I tried, but there`s so many words that I don`t understand. I`m not a computer expert, and I`m not familiar with DOS programming. However, If I get my hands on a clear list, I know I can do it.
My question is this: I Use a modern iMac, with a card reader. I`ve two separate micro sd cards. Do anyone of you know about a nice, and simple explanation that idiots like me would understand, in order to completely wipe out this Google OS, and install a "clean" Ubuntu? I`m willing to make a real effort to learn, and I have patience. I love my HDHD because of the big nice screen, but I like to keep my personal life only for myself. I can`t stand that Mr. Orwell snap up all my datapackets.
Any help would be greatly appreciated, from you experts. I fear that this might be hard with a Mac, but I do have access to full DOS- utility on my computer. (iMac with i7 processor.
Also, am I pretty safe, with Ubunto on my machine?
Thank you so much in advance.
You do realise that running ubuntu on a device that only has a touchscreen is kinda fail...
Also, i doubt Mr. Orwell - whoever he is ( The only guy i can find on google is some author) would even be able to monitor anything. Android is completely Open source, so it would be kinda suspicious to insert code that sends "Packets" somewhere.
Even if someone is somehow monitoring you through the Android OS, i doubt that they would bother monitoring a single person, out of the tens or hundreds of millions of other android users.
Regardless, following this guide, and doing a full wipe (Download superwipe from android revolution, flash it in CWM) should completely remove android. (And install ubuntu)
314 said:
You do realise that running ubuntu on a device that only has a touchscreen is kinda fail...
Also, i doubt Mr. Orwell - whoever he is ( The only guy i can find on google is some author) would even be able to monitor anything. Android is completely Open source, so it would be kinda suspicious to insert code that sends "Packets" somewhere.
Even if someone is somehow monitoring you through the Android OS, i doubt that they would bother monitoring a single person, out of the tens or hundreds of millions of other android users.
Regardless, following this guide, and doing a full wipe (Download superwipe from android revolution, flash it in CWM) should completely remove android. (And install ubuntu)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi, and thank you very much for answering my question. Mr. Orwell wrote about 1984, if I`m not wrong. Today, my gut feeling tells me, that all the apps onboard my HTC sends away datapackets that I would like to stop. After installing this Linux firewall, I was amazed to see how many apps that sent away packets with headers, containing mye personalia. Even my camera stopped working properly, when activating the linux firewall.
Nix ok for me. To bad, because I found the Android system very nice and intuitive to use. My great challenge, is that I`m not a nerd. I whish a was, in a technical perspective. Many thanks for your link to the guide. As long as I can type text messages, check the web/mail, and maybe the weather forecast, I`m happy.
What I really fear, is that I will manage to mess up this machine of mine. Well, it`s just a thing, and I `ll survive, if I brake it. My economy isn`t the greatest, but heck, it`s worth a try.
Best regards!
You could always try flashing a clean install of CM7. It doesnt have any HTC Apps, just google.
Also, the packets are either log data, or sync data for HTCSense.com contact/etc backup. You can disable it by flashing ROM Cleaner and only removing the HTC Hub related and HTC "Spyware". This is only required if you want to stay on sense.
Google backup can be disabled by removing your google account, or going Settings>Privacy and untick "Back up my settings" (I think its disabled by default on CM/Miui roms)

Categories

Resources