Develop Bugs

Bug tracker website? Would that help? (I'm offering)

Ok. Short story of what I want to do and why.
I am a developer and I feel that I don't contribute enough to this fantastic site and its users. After the recent unpleasantness I went away and thought about what it is that I could do to try and fix this. My idea is a site or section of the wiki built specifically to track bugs and issues in new roms (I was specifically thinking WMXL but there is no reason this can't be used for all of them).
I am currently working on my own XML based site with PHP5 driving and if people think it will be useful I'd write and host this service before I continued with my own site (hopefully before WMXL 0.30 is released).
I want to try and restrict the way people enter and search the information relating to problems with new roms and try to cut out the background noise. I was thinking about having fields such as ROM version (drop down list), radio version (text box), boot loader (drop down list), main program affected (text box), extent of interference (drop down list), description of problem (text area), how to reproduce error (mandatory text area!).
This will hopefully encourage more people to think about what might be causing the problem rather than just posting what they cant do and expecting someone else to work everything out. Forcing a description of how to recreate the problem will hopefully find most users not needing to post after they work it out, and if the recreation steps dont work then the post will be closed. Hopefully people will think enough that I will be able to moderate this forum (type thing) myself and maybe someone in another timezone (closer to the UK) can take care of it while im asleep.
No one can stop n00bs posting silly questions but hopefully we can reduce the amount this annoys everyone else.
Sorry it took so long to describe my idea.
Maz
UPDATE: STARTED!
I got started as soon as I'd got a couple of replies but I still need you all.
For the chef's and other brilliant people:
1. What info do you need with each ticket to try solve them?
2. Do you want to be the only one to close tickets? Or should the submitter be able to?
3. What info do you want to store for the roms to filter to the smallest pool of specific tickets?
For the users:
1. How do you want to be able to search this?
I DON'T ASK FOR DONATIONS! ALL I ASK IS THAT PEOPLE SEARCH BEFORE SUBMITTING!
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http://maz.net.au/

Bugzilla? yes please

This is a very good idea. In fact, I think that we need too a place to store the temporary fixes generated after each ROM publishing. It will be a good place for this too.

Good Idea.
It Would Help A Lot, Sounds Like Finding Answers Would Be Easier And Should Cut Down On The Hostile Atmosphere.
Cheers

Yes, very good idea.
This become easyest forum for everyone.

If it would be of any use, i can host this on one of our UK servers so we get very good speeds? I know 'iammaz' has said he can host it but he is in Australia so for the UK guys it might be a tad slow.
If not then no worries, but just trying to do my bit!

jaso2005 said:
If it would be of any use, i can host this on one of our UK servers so we get very good speeds? I know 'iammaz' has said he can host it but he is in Australia so for the UK guys it might be a tad slow.
If not then no worries, but just trying to do my bit!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Cheers and I'm sure everyone appreciates the offer. My site is hosted in the US. At the moment this is being built as a module to my current CMS. Whether or not this adds too much overhead I won't know until I try. The problem will be if I use too much cpu time im sure it's against the ToS with my hosting company and they will shut me down.
I hope that I will have it built as a stand alone object by then and anyone else can take this and run this on php5 hosting or in fact I could run it as web services from my personal server at home.
Progress goes well. Just working on possible searching and indexing algorithms to make searching fast and useful.
Maz
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I can't believe I forget to type this.
http://maz.net.au/

Great idea

It's 2am. I'm piking for the night. I'm expecting a phone call at 7am tomorrow so will be back into it then for 5 or 6 hours. Hopefully will be almost done by the end of that.
I need to work out how you want to have logins work. I don't think i can make it authenticate against this forum (i havent tried integrating with vBulletin before). Do I allow open registration? do I try make it force you to register the same name but PM'ing the password to that username here? do i manually add people as they ask and restrict the group?
let me know in the next 6 hours or so.
Maz
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Badly styled CMS can be seen here. (new version looks so much better )
http://maz.net.au/

Open registration, but obviously grant privileges to those of us who classify as developers.

Olipro said:
Open registration, but obviously grant privileges to those of us who classify as developers.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And super-user privileges for the chef's for bug tickets that apply to their cooked roms.
Maz
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hard at work again at http://maz.net.au/

XDA-Wiki concern.

alright, im a regular of the xda-devs irc. there have been more people the last 2 weeks that have come in there with questions that couldve been solved by a 2 minute read on the wiki.
i've read the annoucement, however i do not..understand what the issue was.
XDA's old wiki software was hacked and represented a security threat to the entire site.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i'd like to ask would it not be more timely to fix the hack. i'm unsure as to what they did, however from the sound of it they got database access.
in which case, move the tables from mainserver to another and make them readonly. i cannot grasp why shutting down the wiki for weeks on end is a better idea than a few file adjustments as a stopgap.
somebody willing to put out more information on the matter?

cheapusenet said:
alright, im a regular of the xda-devs irc. there have been more people the last 2 weeks that have come in there with questions that couldve been solved by a 2 minute read on the wiki.
i've read the annoucement, however i do not..understand what the issue was.
i'd like to ask would it not be more timely to fix the hack. i'm unsure as to what they did, however from the sound of it they got database access.
in which case, move the tables from mainserver to another and make them readonly. i cannot grasp why shutting down the wiki for weeks on end is a better idea than a few file adjustments as a stopgap.
somebody willing to put out more information on the matter?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The wiki software is old, and probably has a few vulnerabilities. I'm guessing it's more than just the wiki's database been hacked that is the securing concern. Most of the db tables will probably be written to, so read-only might not be a viable option. Remember the old wiki has integrated login with vB.
The admins have setup a new MediaWiki wiki and people are currently helping migrate the content over. I'm not sure of the "Go Live" for it, but it's starting to shape up.
Dave

i just now found it, its looking..pretty good. still seems to me an hours work on the old one could fix it enough to suffice until the new ones all ready to go.

At the moment, there's only a handful of folks working on porting (migrating) the information over.
We could use (and appreciate) any and all help on this effort. If you or others members are wish to assist, please contact svetius via PM.
Cheers,

so its still dead for the foreseable future. why is it we don't give my plan some thought. it cannot hurt. it'd be alot faster and alot better than waiting for every page to be moved over by a handful of people, and at the rate its going it's not exactly speedy.

cheapusenet said:
so its still dead for the foreseable future. why is it we don't give my plan some thought. it cannot hurt. it'd be alot faster and alot better than waiting for every page to be moved over by a handful of people, and at the rate its going it's not exactly speedy.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Every visit to a page writes to the database, so read-only's not an option.
To use it, it still needs read access to the vB user login database, so we cannot secure XDA's vB database from it, meaning if there are SQL IV vulnerabilities someone could access parts of our vB database.
Dave

o use it, it still needs read access to the vB user login database,
^
bingo, why. why does it HAVE to access login data?
as for writing to the database stripping that code out couldnt be that hard,.

cheapusenet said:
o use it, it still needs read access to the vB user login database,
^
bingo, why. why does it HAVE to access login data?
as for writing to the database stripping that code out couldnt be that hard,.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It will have access to the login data so that we only need one login for the wiki and for vB.
I've seen the code for it from when it was on Source Forge, it's a mess - if we miss something that could be a problem.
Also if we were still getting SQL IV attack's against read-only databases, I'd still be worried .
Dave

I've started a thread for discussion on the wiki migration:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=729576

daveshaw, you're missing my point completely. the data in the wiki is in no way dependant on userlogins. it could be moved to a completely different server if needbe, mysqlhaxing across into another db onto another server .. over xda, would be a pretty darn extravagant feat id say.

cheapusenet said:
alright, im a regular of the xda-devs irc. there have been more people the last 2 weeks that have come in there with questions that couldve been solved by a 2 minute read on the wiki.
i've read the annoucement, however i do not..understand what the issue was.
i'd like to ask would it not be more timely to fix the hack. i'm unsure as to what they did, however from the sound of it they got database access.
in which case, move the tables from mainserver to another and make them readonly. i cannot grasp why shutting down the wiki for weeks on end is a better idea than a few file adjustments as a stopgap.
somebody willing to put out more information on the matter?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As Dave mentioned, the old wiki software has inherent vulnerabilities, and because it is no longer supported, we don't get periodic updates from the creator. MediaWiki is much better supported, so that over time we can continually update the software to keep it secure, etc.

in no way am i objecting to using mediawiki. moving it all over to mediawiki is a great idea, i agree.
however restricting access to the current one for weeks just because somebody doesnt want to edit some files, jerry-rig it a bit, is a bit of a..pain for everyone. alot of data is stored in that wiki.

cheapusenet said:
in no way am i objecting to using mediawiki. moving it all over to mediawiki is a great idea, i agree.
however restricting access to the current one for weeks just because somebody doesnt want to edit some files, jerry-rig it a bit, is a bit of a..pain for everyone. alot of data is stored in that wiki.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We're just trying to migrate it as fast as possible.

To the mods: Urgent request

Please, please for the love of god write a post, and sticky it, about what multitasking and background scheduling is, and why most apps shouldn't be allowed to run in the background. I'm so sick of reading about users complaining about "the lack of multitasking" (Eeeeew! Now I said it, and I feel dirty! :S ) when what they really want is the ability to run annoying programs in the background that will allow them to complain about the poor battery life, how WP7 raped them economically etc etc...because they really don't know what they want.
Please? Pretty please with sugar on top?

tiwas said:
I'm so sick of reading about users complaining about "the lack of multitasking" ... when what they really want is the ability to run annoying programs in the background that will allow them to complain about the poor battery life, how WP7 raped them economically etc etc
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Most users?!
Most people want the ablility to continue being navigated to their destination while listening to streaming music (not thru Zune as their region does not allow it - like yours) or check their email or even make a phone-call to say they'll be late.
Or perhaps they want an Exchange task manager that will actually remind you of your tasks without having to keep the app open at all times, or maybe they would like their phone to automatically change "profiles" at certain times of the day (ie., very simplified; 8-12 ringer on, 12-13 on silent except certain numbers, 13-18 all on, 18-23 same as lunch, 23-8 all silent apart from alarms).
These are all, relatively common, things you cannot do without real multitasking.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE! stop calling that multi-tasking! It's background scheduling!
And, yeah, I see your point, but apps like that should have special authorization to ensure they're not spinning in the background stealing processor cycles, downloading data, draining the battery etc...

tiwas said:
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE! stop calling that multi-tasking! It's background scheduling!
And, yeah, I see your point, but apps like that should have special authorization to ensure they're not spinning in the background stealing processor cycles, downloading data, draining the battery etc...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, no. The examples I gave were a mixture of actual multitasking and scheduling. Some could do with a simple "register this event for execution at this time" but others really do need the full app running in the background at "all" times.
I definitely agree though, not every Tom **** and Harry should be allowed to write fully multitasking apps - or rather, they should be allowed to, but their release in the marketplace should be limited to those certified by Microsoft. I.e., what I'm saying is that the OS should have been fully prepared for multitasking from the getgo, with developers having to use technical exceptions during app certification to be published. As is, I very much doubt we'll see multitasking until the first major update which will likely come hand in hand with much higher HW specs to make sure the OS is still silky smooth.

Running the app in the background at all times is still background scheduling...Multitasking is, in all fairness, what the OS uses to run threads in the background, but multitasking is fully supported by the OS. It's the lack of subscribing to background scheduling events that's causing "the problems".
At least we agree about letting everybody schedule whatever they feel like is a bad idea, and hopefully, at some point, MS will let developers use "advanced functions" that require "advanced testing" before letting them into marketplace. All the bits and pieces seem to be there, though, as OEMs can make background apps...

WP7 cannot multi-task at all, and attempting to infer that it does with garbage semantics is pretty lame.
How about the mods sticky a thread on users who don't know what they're talking about attempting to force their own lexicon on the rest of us and attempting to appear so intelligent and above us unintelligent sheep.
Thank you for showing us the light....
What some of us actually want out of WP7 is an actual ability to run more than one freaking application at once. Does that spell it out for you?
If I am using a 3rd party podcast app because the zune one sucks, I want to be able to then check my damn email without my podcast cutting out. If I am playing a game and I get a text, I want to be able to respond without having to reload the entire game.
Call this whatever the hell you want to call it, but WP7 cannot do it, Android and iOS can.
Get off your high horse and help development instead of attempting to condescend on the rest of us.

lol what a stupid post. It's 2011 and we can't have the ability for multiple applications to run at once? what is this world coming to.. and asking for a sticky because you *THINK* multitasking = slow apps? I got news for you, it's a discussion forum, if you don't like it don't read the thread.

orangekid said:
WP7 cannot multi-task at all, and attempting to infer that it does with garbage semantics is pretty lame.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Oh...want me to tell my programs to stop running more than one thread, then?
And what are you calling "bull**** semantics"?
1. The OS can multitask, and it allows special applications to run in the background (scheduling). Proof: you can listen to music while surfing the web, and accept calls while checking the calendar. Of COURSE it can multitask!
2. Programs can multitask. I can asynchronously call a web service and do stuff while I wait. I can also display a wait animation while processing stuff
So please try to keep your mouth closed when you have no idea what you're talking about.

Besides Microsoft stuff there is absolutely no multitasking. Is that better?

tiwas said:
Oh...want me to tell my programs to stop running more than one thread, then?
And what are you calling "bull**** semantics"?
1. The OS can multitask, and it allows special applications to run in the background (scheduling). Proof: you can listen to music while surfing the web, and accept calls while checking the calendar. Of COURSE it can multitask!
2. Programs can multitask. I can asynchronously call a web service and do stuff while I wait. I can also display a wait animation while processing stuff
So please try to keep your mouth closed when you have no idea what you're talking about.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
once again you prove that you have no idea what you're talking about. Being able to launch a couple of crappy MS apps and then open IE is not multi-tasking in any practical form. What you reference is about the only time it can background anything.
What if I want to use a non-MS app that does not suck and do anything else? Not going to happen. This is a real issue. I cannot use any other music player or podcast player or music streaming app and open IE or text or email or anything, I cannot text or email while playing a game if I don't want the game to reload.
Claiming that WP7 can multi-task is like saying it has a comparable app store to iOS, it's complete garbage.
vetvito said:
Besides Microsoft stuff there is absolutely no multitasking. Is that better?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lol, beat me to it, and more concise

Yes, it actually IS! Now we don't have all the problems from WM6.5, which is proof that even professional developers have problems setting up their programs correctly.
And still - it's called scheduling.
Multi-tasking (which even an old 8086 can do): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_multitasking
Multi-threading: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multithreading_(computer_architecture)
Scheduling: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scheduling_(computing)
Now PLEASE read and understand...

orangekid said:
once again you prove that you have no idea what you're talking about. Being able to launch a couple of crappy MS apps and then open IE is not multi-tasking in any practical form. What you reference is about the only time it can background anything.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
FFS! You're just proving you have no reading comprehension. I'm talking about threads in a program, not tombstoning an app.
orangekid said:
What if I want to use a non-MS app that does not suck and do anything else? Not going to happen. This is a real issue. I cannot use any other music player or podcast player or music streaming app and open IE or text or email or anything, I cannot text or email while playing a game if I don't want the game to reload.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Why do you think that? We're on a beta OS, and MS is still ironing things out. The OS *can* multitask, they're just not exposing it to 3rd party developers (yet), which I think is an excellent idea.
orangekid said:
Claiming that WP7 can multi-task is like saying it has a comparable app store to iOS, it's complete garbage.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For crying out loud. Now you're literally comparing apples to oranges, and you're not even able to see in how many ways the comparison fails.
Go read up on the links I posted, then TRY to control your adhd while reading my initial post. Then I *might* consider your postings anything but a complete waste of perfectly good bits...

wrong again, my friend.
If the OS "can" multi-task but only does it to the crapware that comes on the phone, then it essentially can't multi-task.
And the OS would have to be modified to to be able to actually multi-task and not just keep playing zune when you press the home key.
Once again you're trying to play the semantics game bill clinton...
when people here say they want multi-tasking, they are talking about apps that actually matter, third freaking party apps, and the OS cannot do it, this is a problem to a lot of users.
I don't care if the OS is in beta stage, are you saying we should wait 5 years to buy a WP7 phone?

This is quality - good we can have a constructive discussion! LOL.
For me the point is the phone doesn't do what I want it to, Android and the iPhone do appear to so if we can get Multi-schedule-task-switching like the other OS's in the next update I'll be happy.
Maybe those who can't help but get too excited by terminology could spend some time writing an app that replaces offending words to their preferred alternatives when viewing the forums?

orangekid said:
...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Man, you're stupid. From what you're saying, I can call you an illiterate just because you choose not to read what people write. I can, like I just did, call you stupid because you choose not to think (at least I hope it's a choice).
It's there. MS can let anyone they chose access it. You're not on the list. More companies might get on it eventually, but until then it's special access. That does NOT mean the OS cannot multitask or schedule.
But...since you don't even know the difference between multitasking, multithreading, and scheduling and the effects they have in a program or a program launching other programs (like an OS) you really should just stay quiet. You might learn something...

gc48067 said:
This is quality - good we can have a constructive discussion! LOL.
For me the point is the phone doesn't do what I want it to, Android and the iPhone do appear to so if we can get Multi-schedule-task-switching like the other OS's in the next update I'll be happy.
Maybe those who can't help but get too excited by terminology could spend some time writing an app that replaces offending words to their preferred alternatives when viewing the forums?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, I wasn't the one who grabbed the ball and ran with it Forrest Gump style. I wanted to get the facts about multitasking/scheduling out so people could start asking the right questions instead of asking questions that doesn't make sense because they're plain wrong.
I *do* see the point in getting scheduling, and I would love to have some hand picked scheduling programs myself. Most programs don't use it, but some do - like streaming. There should be a stringent verification process and it shouldn't be available to everyone.
Like Mr Moron pointed out, he wanted his apps to tombstone correctly so he could continue from where he left off (sorry, orangekid, but you *are* stupid). That is a clear example of when NOT to run a program in the background. He's angry at MS because the game developers doesn't tombstone correctly so he can continue from where he left off. That's the *exact* reason why I don't want everybody to have access to background scheduling, as people would start yelling at MS for all the crashes and Samsung for making phones with crappy battery life - even though the fault is somewhere else.
Regarding the app you're talking about, you want me to use regular expressions to transform sentences like "orangekid, you're an f-ing ass-O" to "orangekid, you're an f-ing donkey-hole"? (sorry...couldn't help myself )

gc48067 said:
This is quality - good we can have a constructive discussion! LOL.
For me the point is the phone doesn't do what I want it to, Android and the iPhone do appear to so if we can get Multi-schedule-task-switching like the other OS's in the next update I'll be happy.
Maybe those who can't help but get too excited by terminology could spend some time writing an app that replaces offending words to their preferred alternatives when viewing the forums?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good points.
@tiwas, your original point is for people not to think that WP7 cannot mulit-task because it can run only Zune in the background. You then attempt to refine and back up your point by claiming multi-threading and scheduling and all this garbage, when it has been pointed out that when people in this forum say they want multi-tasking, they basically want to run an app other than Zune and continue the app running while doing other things, which WP7 cannot do, yet iOS and Android can.
Throw all the terminology you want into the mix and the above still holds true.
Your "urgent request" will not be considered by any mods because they have not been smoking crack today as far as I know.

tiwas said:
Regarding the app you're talking about, you want me to use regular expressions to transform sentences like "orangekid, you're an f-ing ass-O" to "orangekid, you're an f-ing donkey-hole"? (sorry...couldn't help myself )
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
paragon of eloquence. simply amazing.

orangekid said:
Good points.
@tiwas, your original point is for people not to think that WP7 cannot mulit-task because it can run only Zune in the background. You then attempt to refine and back up your point by claiming multi-threading and scheduling and all this garbage, when it has been pointed out that when people in this forum say they want multi-tasking, they basically want to run an app other than Zune and continue the app running while doing other things, which WP7 cannot do, yet iOS and Android can.
Throw all the terminology you want into the mix and the above still holds true.
Your "urgent request" will not be considered by any mods because they have not been smoking crack today as far as I know.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're a moron. Even more, you're a moron who cannot read.

tiwas said:
You're a moron. Even more, you're a moron who cannot read.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
when one cannot reason with logic they can be counted upon to resort to imbecilic and puerile insults.
Furthermore, my moronism and illiteracy are the byproducts of having to read posts such as the one quoted above which studies have shown reduce the general intelligence quotient of forum readers by an estimated 20%.

Is everyone out to steal our info?

I swear, everytime I look at an app on the market it requires more permissions than it should need. Especially games.
Am I paranoid or are they really out to get us?
Are there any apps we can trust?
Anyone with info on how we can recognize thieving apps please tell us.
This has been a paranoid telepathic transmission from the Outer Limits.

You got something to hide?
Sent from my PC36100 using Tapatalk

Games just want to track how you use it. But some things [sketchy apps and you know them when you see them] ask for ridiculous things indeed.

I know what you mean man kinda got watch out for keyloggers and some apps out there can get your phone number hint all the annoying unknown callers calling your phone. It's getting annoying.

Well, I don't want my contacts and whatnot spread around all over the place.
This has been a telepathic transmission from the Outer Limits.

ccossin said:
Well, I don't want my contacts and whatnot spread around all over the place.
This has been a telepathic transmission from the Outer Limits.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Gotta check the permissions, or find a different app.

teh roxxorz said:
Gotta check the permissions, or find a different app.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Understood. However, it's sometimes hard to tell the apps that need permission for legit reasons and those that don't.
This has been a telepathic transmission from the Outer Limits.

Is that why I've been getting a lot of unknown calls and weird numbers calling me? I don't owe money so I know it's not BC's.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

novanosis85 said:
You got something to hide?
Sent from my PC36100 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is not an answer to privacy concerns. Yes, I do have something to hide (my #, contacts, SMS, GPS location) from shady developers releasing crap apps that ask for way too many permissions, and you should too.

I think for the vast majority of apps, they're not trying to do anything wrong. Of course, you should always check and see if they make sense. But often there's a legitimate reason that isn't immediately obvious. The Angry Birds debacle with SMS permissions a few weeks ago is a good example. It turned out to be that they wanted to implement carrier billing via SMS (they've since removed the permissions). Granted, that itself could be abused, but it's theoretically legit.
One thing that would improve the permissions system - Allow developers to (optionally) specify that a permission is to be confirmed upon use, and not just at install. I think that some people would be a lot more comfortable knowing Android will ask them for permission prior to actually doing something, rather than granting permission for an app to do it whenever it wants. Obviously some permissions do need to be full time, but a lot of the permissions (especially ones that freak people out) are only needed under specific situations, and often for rarely performed activities. Take the Angry Birds situation. Rather than them needing to ask for permission at install to send texts whenever and to whomever they want, people would be much more comfortable if Android would prompt "Angry Birds wants to send an SMS to #####. Do you wish to proceed?". There's no such mechanism, so if an app wants to do something under ANY use case, they have to ask for permission to do it whenever.
It'd also be nice if developers could enter a description in the manifest of WHY they need a permission and have Android include that when it prompts the user. Granted, this would be on the honor system, as they could make up something legitimate sounding and not disclose a nefarious use of the permission. But it would still provide more clarity.

...or you could root your phone and just hope that the ROM devs are on the up and up. Being relatively paranoid myself, some ROMs seem like they would steal credit card or paypal payments made into the market, one in particular
Not true, but just saying

[Q] this may be more general to android but, root question

Out of curiosity why isn't root allowed out of the box on the Nexus 7?
I mean I get that no one should use superuser access/root privileges on anything more than a "need to use" basis and honestly, I'll even admit that with the way the ecosystem has evolved, root isn't really entirely "needed" but, it still boggles my mind that there is no way I can just open up a terminal, type in a code, and get root.
I've tried googling the issue but, I generally get a bunch of responses about things which aren't quite related.

Snow_fox said:
Out of curiosity why isn't root allowed out of the box on the Nexus 7?
I mean I get that no one should use superuser access/root privileges on anything more than a "need to use" basis and honestly, I'll even admit that with the way the ecosystem has evolved, root isn't really entirely "needed" but, it still boggles my mind that there is no way I can just open up a terminal, type in a code, and get root.
I've tried googling the issue but, I generally get a bunch of responses about things which aren't quite related.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think its fine the way it is. its jailbroken out of the box so you can use your device how you wish and that is what matters. You can't expect a company to support users to change everything about it. Then people complain about bricked devices or contact them for support for some custom rom.
However I believe they made it pretty easy to root. They certainly could have made it a lot harder. Anyone who has the skills (or patience to learn how) to use root certainly can root a device based on the tutorials given. And other users who don't want to worry about it don't ever see it. The little bit of effort helps weed out the people who would mess things up for themselves.

firesoul453 said:
I think its fine the way it is. its jailbroken out of the box so you can use your device how you wish and that is what matters. You can't expect a company to support users to change everything about it. Then people complain about bricked devices or contact them for support for some custom rom.
However I believe they made it pretty easy to root. They certainly could have made it a lot harder. Anyone who has the skills (or patience to learn how) to use root certainly can root a device based on the tutorials given. And other users who don't want to worry about it don't ever see it. The little bit of effort helps weed out the people who would mess things up for themselves.
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I don't expect a company to support me changing anything I want about it. If I misuse root privileges, then I don't expect to have a lifeline when I call asus/google. I don't expect say Dell or HP to cover my PC if I try to install ubuntu and I botch something up.
However, refusing to let me have root because "might" mess something up is also flawed logic. I may also for one reason or another need root access.
While I am glad they make it easy to root, the reality is there is they are being counter productive. Honestly, just leaving in root access would decrease the chances of me bricking my device at this point. As of now to get root access I'll have to flash a custom recovery compared to just giving the ability to go into a terminal and type in "oem -su enable" or something.
If the flashing issue is really that big of a deal, then why force users to flash to get what they want in the first place?

Snow_fox said:
I don't expect a company to support me changing anything I want about it. If I misuse root privileges, then I don't expect to have a lifeline when I call asus/google. I don't expect say Dell or HP to cover my PC if I try to install ubuntu and I botch something up.
However, refusing to let me have root because "might" mess something up is also flawed logic. I may also for one reason or another need root access.
While I am glad they make it easy to root, the reality is there is they are being counter productive. Honestly, just leaving in root access would decrease the chances of me bricking my device at this point. As of now to get root access I'll have to flash a custom recovery compared to just giving the ability to go into a terminal and type in "oem -su enable" or something.
If the flashing issue is really that big of a deal, then why force users to flash to get what they want in the first place?
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Root can cause problems. It can cause security problems if not used right and can brick not only while rooting but while flashing custom roms and things.
while you and I don't go asking for support, a lot of people do. People try to pass things off as warrenty problems and do call and email asking for support for things not originally on that phone.
And it hurts them in other ways. Google makes pretty much all their money from ads. Rooting makes it easy to block ads and you average rom might have it built right in. The only reason google bothers with android was for the ad money. So there is no incentive for them give root out of the box. They already are more open and free than their main competitions.
You could look at samsung. THey make their money of the hardware and so have been more open with rooting with odin, thought they still don't really care for it (probably because of the support issue)
And the carriers are even worse because rooting allows for things like wireless tethering for free and data is their biggest costs. Their certnaly isn't any reason for carriers to push for root.

I honestly don't know the true answer; only Google would know.
But in my opinion, it's because Android is an open source OS, and giving users root access allows them to alter .apk's very easily. This is bad for developers, because most developers make money from advertisements or in-app currency, and allowing users to alter their .apk to easily block ads or change in-app currency would thwart developer interest.
In Windows for example, the OS is not open source, but users have "root" access because they can always get to the root of every program/file. BUT users CANNOT EASILY alter the programs installed on Windows - if they want a hacked version, they usually have to download a hacked version that someone else hacked.
Whereas in Android, it's very easy for me to download any .apk I want, run my hack app that says "Search for this value and change it to this" and BAM it's now hacked in literally seconds.

firesoul453 said:
Root can cause problems. It can cause security problems if not used right and can brick not only while rooting but while flashing custom roms and things.
while you and I don't go asking for support, a lot of people do. People try to pass things off as warrenty problems and do call and email asking for support for things not originally on that phone.
And it hurts them in other ways. Google makes pretty much all their money from ads. Rooting makes it easy to block ads and you average rom might have it built right in. The only reason google bothers with android was for the ad money. So there is no incentive for them give root out of the box. They already are more open and free than their main competitions.
You could look at samsung. THey make their money of the hardware and so have been more open with rooting with odin, thought they still don't really care for it (probably because of the support issue)
And the carriers are even worse because rooting allows for things like wireless tethering for free and data is their biggest costs. Their certnaly isn't any reason for carriers to push for root.
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I'm not going to deny adblocking is one of my many vices. While many people have many views on it, all I can say is until ads no longer break my experience completely, I'll be stuck using adblockers. While this is becoming less of a problem with phones/tablets that have faster processors I've had my entire phone lock up before because of certain types of ads my phone couldn't handle. On top of that many are frustrating to deal with as there is no "x" visible for me to tap and I have to back out of whatever I was doing because the phone can't handle the discrepancy in size and find some way to navigate around the ad.
While this is only one example there have been other issues. Hell I had to use a script that required root back when I had my captivate just to get it it to work on my schools wifi. There were a number of issues and I imagine there are still a number of issues that make the lack of root almost a deal breaker.
Sure you can argue from a support issue point of view but, realistically as I already said, I wouldn't have to flash anything if I had access to root... I guess they just chalk it up to "some people are going to do whatever it takes anyway...." but, that just doesn't make much sense to not let people have it anyway.
Geodude074 said:
I honestly don't know the true answer; only Google would know.
But in my opinion, it's because Android is an open source OS, and giving users root access allows them to alter .apk's very easily. This is bad for developers, because most developers make money from advertisements or in-app currency, and allowing users to alter their .apk to easily block ads or change in-app currency would thwart developer interest.
In Windows for example, the OS is not open source, but users have "root" access because they can always get to the root of every program/file. BUT users CANNOT EASILY alter the programs installed on Windows - if they want a hacked version, they usually have to download a hacked version that someone else hacked.
Whereas in Android, it's very easy for me to download any .apk I want, run my hack app that says "Search for this value and change it to this" and BAM it's now hacked in literally seconds.
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This is actually one of the best reasons I think I've ever heard and I've actually asked this question a lot in different places over the years. That's a pretty feasible answer.

Geodude074 said:
I honestly don't know the true answer; only Google would know.
But in my opinion, it's because Android is an open source OS, and giving users root access allows them to alter .apk's very easily. This is bad for developers, because most developers make money from advertisements or in-app currency, and allowing users to alter their .apk to easily block ads or change in-app currency would thwart developer interest.
In Windows for example, the OS is not open source, but users have "root" access because they can always get to the root of every program/file. BUT users CANNOT EASILY alter the programs installed on Windows - if they want a hacked version, they usually have to download a hacked version that someone else hacked.
Whereas in Android, it's very easy for me to download any .apk I want, run my hack app that says "Search for this value and change it to this" and BAM it's now hacked in literally seconds.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Rooting has nothing to do with decompiling apks. apk hacking is bad but thats a whole other thing. Anyone can get a hold of pretty much every apk easliy, no need for root.
Windows doesn't really have root, its pretty different. You can give programs administrator privileges I guess, but not exactly the same. Decompiling apks is only easier because its java, it has nothing to do with the os or root privileges.
Don't expect any of these companies support to support root until they have a reason to.