I've tried and tried to get a number of questions answered here and on the Cyanogenmod forum, but either my questions are extremely advanced and esoteric, or everyone here is just users and developers are somewhere else.
So I'm creating this thread of Mysteries To Science, for all those questions you have which no one is able to answer. I've run Debian exclusively for 14 years and am used to having total control, and the lack of knowledge on Android here is perplexing. I have the Nexus One, but I think these questions apply to essentially all Android phones.
Here are my Mysteries:
Messaging Problem - I use ChompSMS. A couple weeks ago I stopped receiving text messages, about the time I removed the stock Messaging app using Titanium. I can send just fine, but I never receive them.
Anyone seen this problem? Does Chomp use its own system, or does it depend on Messaging? I reinstalled GApps thinking Messaging is there, but it's not. Is it a dependency, and if so where is it? If not, why do I no longer receive and what can I do about it?
App Shortcuts - I created a desktop direct messaging shortcut to call my boss, with a pic of an angry boxer dog. Made the pic as a gif and png with transparent background, although it is ending up as black on the desktop for some reason.
I assigned the pic as the shortcut's icon using Gallery, and I suspect that Gallery is converting the background to black, but I cannot find where app pics are stored either on the SD or /system.
App Sorting - Also like so many others, I have many many apps. I have always categorized my apps, since I started using Debian exclusively 14 years ago. To have all my apps dumped into a giant pile as they are in the N1, is irritating. I installed Apps Organizer, but it seems to want me to tag each app with a category, rather than basically making folders with categories such as Utilities, System, Multimedia, etc.
Is there any way to make folders for the apps?
Calendars - I am not sharing my personal information with That-Search-Engine-Everyone-Uses. (Yes, I've deinstalled all GApps except Market, and use exclusively AppBrain's app to install apps, but still haven't found a way to buy apps in a way I trust) Can anyone recommend a calendar app which is compatible with Linux and M$ calendars, yet doesn't sync with some Outside Authority?
Compass - The magnetometer in this phone is completely unreliable in my experience. Any stray magnetic field throws it off by 18 degrees permanently. The only way I've found to almost calibrate it is with the Compass app Calibrate function, but to run that before any other app which requires a compass is a headache. Is there something I'm doing wrong?
SD Card - What relation does the SD card have to the system? Why is it that when I install an app to the SD card, its widget is no longer available and its daemon will not run? Is there some way to add the SD card to the kernel's awareness for these purposes?
Factory Reset - If I back up system and apps using Titanium, and desktop and ADW settings using ADW, and export contacts, is that enough?
What are the data structures in Android? I know there's the kernel, and ADW is the full user interface, but where are contacts stored? Where are apps, /system/apps?, and if so where are their config files? Where are the desktops configured, and where are the shortcuts+icons stored? I can't find any such config files, and the only one I know of is the central system config file /system/build.prop.
How to recover my contacts? Apps installed in phone memory? Would a restore, restore whatever is ostensibly messing up the compass?
So given wherever these data structures are, what effect does a factory reset have? Exactly which data structures does it wipe/replace?
Quantumstate said:
Here are my Mysteries:
SD Card - What relation does the SD card have to the system? Why is it that when I install an app to the SD card, its widget is no longer available and its daemon will not run? Is there some way to add the SD card to the kernel's awareness for these purposes?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Android seems to boot from ROM before the SD card, once the OS is up and running then it starts to mount the SD card, so any widgets you have installed on homescreens while residing on the SD card won't load when first booting. You need to keep all of your widgets on the phones internal memory to stop this problem recurring. If you are having memory shortages you might want to consider using ROM Manager, partitioning your SD card and using an A2SD (App to SD Card) ROM that will install apps to the SD card instead of internal memory.
App Shortcuts - I created a desktop direct messaging shortcut to call my boss, with a pic of an angry boxer dog. Made the pic as a gif and png with transparent background, although it is ending up as black on the desktop for some reason.
I assigned the pic as the shortcut's icon using Gallery, and I suspect that Gallery is converting the background to black, but I cannot find where app pics are stored either on the SD or /system.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I use Gallery in conjunction with Launcher Pro to display my custom dock icons it works just fine. It sounds to me like you're not making one of the layers transparent before saving it as a PNG.
Kalavere said:
Android seems to boot from ROM before the SD card, once the OS is up and running then it starts to mount the SD card, so any widgets you have installed on homescreens while residing on the SD card won't load when first booting. You need to keep all of your widgets on the phones internal memory to stop this problem recurring. If you are having memory shortages you might want to consider using ROM Manager, partitioning your SD card and using an A2SD (App to SD Card) ROM that will install apps to the SD card instead of internal memory.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ya, it -only- boots from the 'ROM' (firmware). Need to keep thos apps that have widgets and daemons installed on the phone, or else they won't work. This is what I'm saying. Am using A2SD as it's built-in to CM6, so must move those apps with widgets and daemons back to the phone. None of this addresses why the system can't load a widget from the SD after boot, nor whether there's a way to tell the kernel about SD widgets.
Kalavere said:
I use Gallery in conjunction with Launcher Pro to display my custom dock icons it works just fine. It sounds to me like you're not making one of the layers transparent before saving it as a PNG.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Examining the images in Linux viewers shows the transparency. (checkerboard background) Viewing it in Gallery does not. gif and png both support transparent background, but it appears to me that Gallery does not.
Quantumstate said:
Messaging Problem - I use ChompSMS. A couple weeks ago I stopped receiving text messages, about the time I removed the stock Messaging app using Titanium. I can send just fine, but I never receive them.
Anyone seen this problem? Does Chomp use its own system, or does it depend on Messaging? I reinstalled GApps thinking Messaging is there, but it's not. Is it a dependency, and if so where is it? If not, why do I no longer receive and what can I do about it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I suggest you break down the Mms.apk and look in there. It does have dependencies, they're written into a file inside the apk telling it where to send the message and where to check for messages. It also contains the user agent information. If you could some how pack that into chomp or another mms/sms app then you might be able to delete the stock app and push/install your choice messaging app to the system.
You no longer get messages (I assume) because when you're sent an sms/mms it sits on your carriers server while it sends a message to your phone (you don't see it) telling it that there's a message waiting to be retrieved. It's expecting a certain response about the phones state and type. If the format is incorrect or it doesn't get a response then the message just sits on the server. To send a message I believe it just uses apn settings to contact the server with 'wait for message' then the server responds 'ready' the phone sends it and all is well. It doesn't request the phones state and type and therefor the lack of a UA has no effect. Of course that's my understanding of how it works but I could be a little off here or there
Thanks KCRic. I did a factory reset and installed CM6.1-RC1, and now I'm getting texts. I find that this has happened to others too. I expected to get an avalanche of texts when I factory reset, but nothing. At least I'm receiving them now.
I'm surprised to read that files are actually modified on-the-fly inside apk's. This would explain alot of things. Is there a way to manually modify those files using some sort of apk tool?
Quantumstate said:
App Sorting - Also like so many others, I have many many apps. I have always categorized my apps, since I started using Debian exclusively 14 years ago. To have all my apps dumped into a giant pile as they are in the N1, is irritating. I installed Apps Organizer, but it seems to want me to tag each app with a category, rather than basically making folders with categories such as Utilities, System, Multimedia, etc.
Is there any way to make folders for the apps?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you are using adw you can set up groups in the app drawer. Not quite the same as folders but pretty useful
Quantumstate said:
Factory Reset - If I back up system and apps using Titanium, and desktop and ADW settings using ADW, and export contacts, is that enough?
What are the data structures in Android? I know there's the kernel, and ADW is the full user interface, but where are contacts stored? Where are apps, /system/apps?, and if so where are their config files? Where are the desktops configured, and where are the shortcuts+icons stored? I can't find any such config files, and the only one I know of is the central system config file /system/build.prop.
How to recover my contacts? Apps installed in phone memory? Would a restore, restore whatever is ostensibly messing up the compass?
So given wherever these data structures are, what effect does a factory reset have? Exactly which data structures does it wipe/replace?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried my backuppro for backing up your contacts and apps. There is a free version that will work for 30days. I personally never restore anything with TB, as it causes me no end of headaches. I use my backup pro to backup my personal data, ( contacts, sms, mms, dictionary, calendar etc ) I use applist to save a txt file with a list of apps i have installed. Then just reinstall the apps via market or diect push. This is just my personal o
I do this on a fairly regular basis ( trying different roms ) and can do it about 15mins
Anyone know why images would duplicate ? Recently 215 black/blank images showed up in my photo gallery and when I look using root explorer/astro/or connected to my PC those "extra"images aren't there..so I have to manually delete the blank images on my phone which is a pain. I am on aokp by the way..and is this a common ics or aokp issue?
booma428 said:
Anyone know why images would duplicate ? Recently 215 black/blank images showed up in my photo gallery and when I look using root explorer/astro/or connected to my PC those "extra"images aren't there..so I have to manually delete the blank images on my phone which is a pain. I am on aokp by the way..and is this a common ics or aokp issue?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
there's an issue with the ICS (and GB) media scanner in google's code that gets activated by the Google+ app (and maybe more too). it wont cause problems in official roms, but anything that messes with it too much causes the bug to show up which makes strange things happen. (music disappears from apps, images duplicate, incorrect thumbnail shows up)
i know i saw a post a while back about it on the cyanogen forums for another phone, but im not sure if they ever got it resolved. your best bet is to download an app from the market that re-runs the media scanner. run that, then delete all the 'ghost' images and clear the cache of gallery.apk.
that should help fix it for ya.
Sorry if this should go in the SlimKat forum, but I figured it is a 4.4 issue, possibly not specific to SlimKat.
I was messing with my camera settings the other day taking some photos, and I came across the option to change from .jpeg to .raw. I changed to .raw hoping to review later and see if I could improve the photos. I took several photos in .raw format, but now I cannot view them. At first they appeared as just gray boxes in the photo gallery (which was my first clue), and then I thought i would just transfer them to my computer and i would view/process them there.
However, I am completely unable to view these photos. I have installed RawDroid on my phone, but it will not view the files (actual or thumbnail). I have also tried several different programs on my Windows 7 PC (File Explorer, Corel Paintshop 6, Paint Shop Pro, and even Irfanview) - none of them will display the photos. I know there is data there - each file is about 10.2MB in size; I just can't get them to display no matter what I try. I am extremely disappointed because there are at least 4 of the files that I would really like to keep.
Any ideas on how I can get the photos to display? I have searched Google and the forums here to no avail. I cannot seem to find anyone or an article on this particular issue.
And, as I said, my apologies if this should go in the SlimKat forum - Mods, please move if necessary.
-Mark
AT&T HTC One X
Rooted and S-Off
SlimKat 4.4 Unofficial Beta 2.3
Slim Gapps
Hello,
since Android 6 on my SGS7 i have a strange problem: Dropbox uploades some ot the images/videos again und again.
I installed a md5sum-app and something on the smartphone makes changes to the images from time to time. Sometimes there are changes on metadata, sometimes the content of the file changes too.
Then i have 2 picture on my computer in the dropbox camera-upload-older. For example: "xxx.jpg" and "xxx-1.jpg" up to "xxx-7.jpg" for older images.
This happens after viewing pictures or after turning the phone on (its turned off (shutdown) while i am working), also when i didnt view photos on the phone.
i use google photo viewer and samsung stock gallery app.
A reset and complete new start with the phone didnt help. I didnt notice this on SGS4 to SGS6.
Has someone an idea, how i can prevent changes on my images on the phone?
Best regards, A.
Hi Friends,
I went on an expedition recently and took a lot of photos & videos from my Google Pixel Build Number 7.1.1
I received (OTA) a security patch update of 97.4 MB on my return.
It seems after the update the photos from 8th Feb till 9th Feb got lost (videos are there).
I've spent 3 hours with google support without luck. It seems to me they are just hidden somwhere and not deleted as the BIN/TRASH is clean too.
Appreciate all you support as the photos are precious memories.
Cheers.
Have you have already checked online for copies? I think it asks which settings to use on setup, and the default may be to backup photos to the cloud and make space by removing items. I have the removal shut off on my phone, yet I left photo backup on, and it tends to ask if the photos haven't been backed up online. Your post doesn't say anything about shutting off the typical online photo backup, so that's where I would start.
If you don't have an online backup and the photos have been deleted, then I would figure some sort of data recovery would be another option. I've never used it, but DiskDigger Photo Recovery is one app that shows up in searches and doesn't seem to require root. Any sort of writing files to the phone, like installing an app, can potentially overwrite deleted files. Since support should know about the typical online backup of photos, I figure using some sort of data recovery software would be the next thing to try if you don't have a backup.
Yup noticed some videos missing