Develop Bugs

[HOWTO] Install Latest WaveSecure in ROM

I found that [email protected]'s ROM had a good idea of adding WaveSecure to the system partition (preventing listing in the My Downloads part of market, and preventing uninstallation through normal means), but his version is slightly out of date now (latest version is 3.0.0.43)
As a result, I set about finding a means to install WaveSecure to ROM myself. Here are my findings for anyone interested in doing the same.
Install the latest version from the market (3.0.0.43 at this time). Now use adb pull to get it off the device onto your pc
Code:
adb pull /data/app/com.wsandroid.apk D:\com.wsandroid.apk
Now open Market back up from the menu, go to My Downloads, and choose Wavesecure Mobile Security Beta and uninstall it for just now (to get it off the data/A2SD location that normal apps are stored in) - thanks, my-space!
Then push the saved apk to the system partition after a remount (to make it read/write)
Code:
adb remount
Code:
adb push D:\com.wsandroid.apk /system/app/com.wsandroid.apk
Then set it all up as usual (will appear in apps list immediately)
and remount system as read only again
Code:
adb remount
And that seems to be it so far. Remember to change the D:\com.wsandroid.apk path to whatever you actually used.
Let me know if anyone finds any problems with this, but I've done it and, fingers crossed, it's worked OK for me.
Obviously, this is only for root users, and there are no guarantees for this.
Couple of questions that might need looked into -
- Do settings carry across after a wipe (as Paul claims Modaco's version does. I've never tried it so can't confirm)
- Is there any disadvantage to using this method? (I guess this is all Modaco's update.zip does, but I don't know)

you forgot to metion to uninstall wavesecure before it is pushed back into system....

my_space said:
you forgot to metion to uninstall wavesecure before it is pushed back into system....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Oops! Knew I'd forget something, as I always seem prone to do. Well spotted, and OP corrected.
Thanks

No worries I got a bit confused when i pushed it back onto the phone and was still in my downloads...

I've rooted my phone already but whenever i try to use the command adb remount I get "remount failed: operation not permitted". Suggestions?

I see more and more often, redundant threads.
What How-to will you post next time? How to change backlight settings?
You're pointlessly spamming the board.

I can't say i agree with the 'pointlessly spamming the board' comment, but i would have thought this would at least be better in the applications and themes subforum rather than in development.
Don't forget that an awful lot of android users (and more recently all HTC devices) are more and more 'newbs' and need stuff like this.
While this is good and provides info that people like that need (and myself cos i'm crap at adb and stuff like that so wouldn't have had a clue how to do this previously), maybe the development forum is not the best place for it....

I'm guessing one won't be notified via Market if there's an update available if you push an app to /system/app/, right?

usb0 said:
I'm guessing one won't be notified via Market if there's an update available if you push an app to /system/app/, right?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You won't be notified, correct

If anybody doesn't already know, WaveSecure have started hosting update.zip files. This means it's now easy to update your "baked-in" version of WaveSecure without much messing around.
https://www.wavesecure.com/installations/update.zip
Download the file, save it to your SD card, reboot into the recovery console and choose the option to apply an update.zip file.
Voila! Your version of WaveSecure will be updated to the very latest version

DJBenson said:
[...]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's really awesome! Thanks for the tip!
Just a question of curiosity: If I push an app to /system/app/ and then issue the rm-command to remove its apk, won't there be lying a bunch of files associated with the program and with absolutely no function, since the app itself is removed? How do I know the name of these files and where they are located for removal?

I'm a bit confused by that question. My understanding (which may be incorrect but from what I've seen of the "guts of a ROM" appears to be the case) is that the applications reside in the apk files, they are not extracted. If you list the content of any of the app folders (/system/app, /data/app or /data/app-private) then all you get is a bunch of apk files (and some odex files). So when you 'push' an apk to the phone, that application is then "installed", when you rm/remove an application, you do so by removing the apk.

if you remove the apk you have left something in /data/dalvik-cache. wiping the dalvik-cache every now and then helps reclaiming that space, though it is not much.
the app settings and data are stored in /data/data, you could delete the files manually by checking their names (no idea if/what convention the names follow), imho not worth the trouble as it is only a few kb.
odex files aren't created if you don't do in a PITA process manually. don't worry about them, don't touch them, then you're good. odex files are only for system apps.

I bought a used phone and it had WaveSecure already installed. I couldn't find it in the applications list to uninstall, so I did a factory reset on the phone. The application was still there and it still didn't show up in the applications list.
I have the Superuser Permissions application, so someone must have rooted it.
Is there any way to uninstall this?

motomeup said:
I bought a used phone and it had WaveSecure already installed. I couldn't find it in the applications list to uninstall, so I did a factory reset on the phone. The application was still there and it still didn't show up in the applications list.
I have the Superuser Permissions application, so someone must have rooted it.
Is there any way to uninstall this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
""Just (re)flash a ROM................""

I just noticed that WaveSecure now points to this post for instructions to install as system application, and I am not sure that the update.zip maintained with them is up-to-date.
However, you can now select to download the .apk directly to your PC thus eliminating the first Market step in this guide.

strife242 said:
I just noticed that WaveSecure now points to this post for instructions to install as system application, and I am not sure that the update.zip maintained with them is up-to-date.
However, you can now select to download the .apk directly to your PC thus eliminating the first Market step in this guide.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I believe it is kept up to date, as VillainROM kitchen uses it as a source for the WaveSecure app (fetched each night to keep it up-to-date).
I've certainly never had any problems with it.

Excellent guide Pulser,... I should really reinstall Wavesecure now Im not using a MoDacO Custom ROM. Nice one bruv.

Found this to be helpful.
https://www.wavesecure.com/blog/how-to-make-wavesecure-hard-reset-proof.aspx

I just did a search in the Market fro 'wavesecure' and two things popped up WaveSecure and WaveSecure UninstallProtection Add-on which needs to be uninstalled before WaveSecure and if the add-on is uninstalled it is supposed to lock the phone. (all this is in the description I have yet to try)

[APP] Apps2NAND - fast data access - choose what to move! [added support for Froyo]

I think this better to be posted to Galaxy S I9000 Android Development.
So I posted it once more at here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=7694817#post7694817
Board Admin, please feel free to delete this.
Hi all,
I took so many from here. It's time for me to contribute little to the community.
The lag issue of Galaxy S bother many ppl.
I tried many different method.
Yes the lag issue was improved and Quadrant score is higher.
But there are always some weird things happen... like sudden lag/black screen.
After I upgraded to firmwre I9000ZSJH1, the lag issue is improved a lot!
But still, there are rooms for improvement.
So I wrote a cmd which will help to generate a .sh file, which will move apps data stored under /data/data/ to the internal NAND memory (/dbdata/data) for faster access.
The Galaxy S built in 1xxMB of fast access NAND memory. It is a waste if we don't utilize them.
However, it is impossible to move all apps' data to the tiny NAND memory.
So here is a tool for you to customize what app's data you want to move.
Recommand to move the core Android apps and the apps that you use frequently.
Like Dialer, Contacts, Dolphin Browser, Facebook, Astro File Explorer......
Steps :
1. open [1.app.list.xls] and edit colume A and B.
colume A should be the data folder name of the apps you want to move.
colume B is the name of the apps (optional)
2. after you've done, simply "copy & paste" everything onto a notepad and save it as [2.apps.list.txt]
3. fireup the [3.Apps2NAND.cmd]
4. within few sec, a file [App2NAND.sh] will be created.
5. use Gscript to load and run the App2NAND.sh file. (the script requires root access. so make sure you have it!)
For experienced user :
Step 1 actually is just for user to manage the apps more clearly.
A user with little cmd knowledge may know the script only requires [2.app.list.txt] to work with.
You can skip Step 1 and directly go to Step 2 to edit the file.
The format should be { app data folder name + <tab> + app name }
Remarks :
Apps that moved to NAND may not be restore with Titanium Backup.
App link will be broken by doing so.
(I also include Linpack and Quadrant to the app list to cheat higher benchmark scores . You may remove it if you don't want to.)

Apps2NAND - fast data access - choose what to move! [added support for Froyo]
update 18 Nov 10:
Found some friends here still want to use this "old school" lagfix
1st of all, thanks to your support.
When I wrote this script, it was still the golden age of Eclair (2.1). So the script is definitely not prepared for Froyo (2.2).
However, just by changing few lines can make this script survives on Froyo. So here I updated a script for Froyo (apps2nand.Froyo.zip).
I haven't tested it since I am very satisfied with the [Spike Speedy Edition v3.0 OC], which comes with more advanced lagfix options (sztupy).
(I wrote something that even myself don't use now.... So it's really suprised and appreciated~)
But this script still has it merit ~~~~~~~~~ simple!
(and battery friendly, just a feeling~ no actually statistic~)
If you are interested in antique and brave enough, try it on Froyo. And let me know if any issues. I will try my best to fix.
===================================================
update 18 Aug 10:
Now included Installation and Uninstallation for this script.
Tried several times on my i9000 and it works.
Please read and follow the readme.txt inside the zip.
One tricky part for this script : it will failed when SU permission is not allowed in time during the script is running.
I have pause the script with 10 secs for you to allow the SU on i9000.
Make sure you allowed it.
If you failed to do so, no worry. it won't change anything.
Just simply re-run the script again.
===================================================
Hi all,
I took so many from here. It's time for me to contribute little to the community.
The lag issue of Galaxy S bother many ppl.
I tried many different method.
Yes the lag issue was improved and Quadrant score is higher.
But there are always some weird things happen... like sudden lag/black screen.
After I upgraded to firmwre I9000ZSJH1, the lag issue is improved a lot!
But still, there are rooms for improvement.
So I wrote a cmd which will help to generate a .sh file, which will move apps data stored under /data/data/ to the internal NAND memory (/dbdata/data) for faster access.
The Galaxy S built in 1xxMB of fast access NAND memory. It is a waste if we don't utilize them.
However, it is impossible to move all apps' data to the tiny NAND memory.
So here is a tool for you to customize what app's data you want to move.
Recommand to move the core Android apps and the apps that you use frequently.
Like Dialer, Contacts, Dolphin Browser, Facebook, Astro File Explorer......
For experienced user :
Step 1 actually is just for user to manage the apps more clearly.
A user with little cmd knowledge may know the script only requires [2.app.list.txt] to work with.
You can skip Step 1 and directly go to Step 2 to edit the file.
The format should be { app data folder name + <tab> + app name }
Remarks :
*** Apps that moved to NAND may not be restore with Titanium Backup. App link will be broken by doing so.
*** Please make a nandroid backup before apply this!
*** I am not responsible for any damage caused by this script.
(I also include Linpack and Quadrant to the app list to cheat higher benchmark scores . You may remove it if you don't want to.)

Is NAND where devices like HTC Desire and Nexus One store their Apps?

well this is almost what paul did some days after the phone got released...

lyno said:
Is NAND where devices like HTC Desire and Nexus One store their Apps?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, which is why they needed APPS2SD in Froyo.

So....when are you posting the script?
If you want I'll create a program that spits out the .txt file rather than do it in excel, copy paste etc.

Jonas.M said:
well this is almost what paul did some days after the phone got released...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yes. that's what Paul did as I mentioned in my script.
But he simply push everything to NAND which oneday, you will find out of space.
Using my script, you can decide what to move, depending on the frequency of the apps usage.

lyno said:
So....when are you posting the script?
If you want I'll create a program that spits out the .txt file rather than do it in excel, copy paste etc.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
the script is updated and posted.
the excel is just for user to maintain their app list easily.
my script only works with the txt file.
you may skip the excel part if you like.
and thanks for your offer, lyno.

Is it possible to make a script that automatically moves smaller apps to the nand?
I mean it's not worth moving large games, but anything under 2MB should be considered.
Maybe use some intellegent calculation, if all the apps under XMB use less than 50% of free space on nand, increase X until it is efficiently used up.
Also there is HEAPS of space to be freed in NAND, delete stock ringtones, and other.

seems great

hmm, would moving to nand make those specific apps run faster than they would be if they were previously running under ext2/3/4 partitions provided for by the various lagfixes out there?

What happens if an app in the list is not on the phone, does it just skip it?

sturmeh said:
Is it possible to make a script that automatically moves smaller apps to the nand?
I mean it's not worth moving large games, but anything under 2MB should be considered.
Maybe use some intellegent calculation, if all the apps under XMB use less than 50% of free space on nand, increase X until it is efficiently used up.
Also there is HEAPS of space to be freed in NAND, delete stock ringtones, and other.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
MiG123 said:
hmm, would moving to nand make those specific apps run faster than they would be if they were previously running under ext2/3/4 partitions provided for by the various lagfixes out there?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
sturmeh, that requires more complex scripting skills, which is out of my knowledge...
and I think instead of choosing the apps2NAND depending on size, I think the "Frequency" of using the apps may be more appropriate.
e.g. I use TouchPal IME a lot. So I move it to the NAND.
Now when I type, TouchPal act lightening!!!
MiG123, I haven't done a serious comparison. But as I remembered, Apps2NAND gives me more "smooth" feeling.
Actually, you shouldn't compare Apps2NAND to other Apps2SD or EXT.
Since Apps2NAND only offers you around 1xxMB of app storage space. Way too far from the others experts' methods.
I suggest using this is because I am using the latest 2.1 ROM, I9000TGYJH1 (http://www.multiupload.com/UTKSZPTKCG), which the lag problem seems improved a lot. But on top of it, I don't want to waste that 1xxMB of internal RAM, so I introduce this method.
To let user choose what core apps that should be put into NAND so
- space is not wasted.
- certain apps enjoy even faster response time.

lyno said:
What happens if an app in the list is not on the phone, does it just skip it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yes.
the script will skip the apps that is not in the list.

MiG123 said:
hmm, would moving to nand make those specific apps run faster than they would be if they were previously running under ext2/3/4 partitions provided for by the various lagfixes out there?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Definitely, the hardware is multitudes faster.

Where's the file? Can't seem to find it on the first page
Anyhow. Do you symlink the old location to the new location, thus being able to keep the link intact? That should sort out any problems with backup solutions such as Titanium Backup.

How do you find the app's data folder name?

mekwall said:
Where's the file? Can't seem to find it on the first page
Anyhow. Do you symlink the old location to the new location, thus being able to keep the link intact? That should sort out any problems with backup solutions such as Titanium Backup.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lyno said:
How do you find the app's data folder name?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
mekwall, sorry. removed by mistake.
have uploaded back again now.
yes. it uses symlink method (from Paul's concept) :
ln -s /dbdata/data/appsname /data/data/appsname
i dunno how's Titanium Backup works but it just failed to restore any apps that has used Apps2NAND...
that's why i provide the Uninstallation method to restore it back and then run Titanium Backup to backup all apps and data.
lyno, you may try the Astro File Explorer (market).
It has a function to backup the installed apps out to /sdcard.
The name of the backuped apps will be named exactly the same as it's data folder name.
e.g. Brut's Google Map -> brut.googlemaps.apk

this whoe procedure demands root-access, right?

yes. since it involves moving folders between /dbdata and /data.
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

[Q] Scripting Application Install

Hi all,
I am not sure if this is the right place or not but worth a shot. I am swapping between quite a few roms at the moment and each time I do, I need to reinstall lots of applications from the market.
Now I know how to install an APK using ADB over USB when I have the package file but what I am ideally after is slightly different that that as I do not have the APK available.
What I would like is a way to install an application via command line from the market. That command line can be directly on the phone using a terminal or via ADB shell.
Is it possible at all to install an application from the market via a terminal?
Thanks in advance.

Read this
http://developer.android.com/reference/android/content/Intent.html
Also read about am command. You will have to open up the Vending.apk, see the intent and action required, pass the app name. I can't be more specific.
This is an example
Code:
#!/system/bin/sh
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:/system/lib
am start -a android.intent.action.SEND -d "Hello World" -t "text/plain"

Hi,
I don't know if what you're after is possible, but you can:
1) leave it to google - with the newer versions of market when you first configure your google account the market starts installing the apps registered under that account
2) use a backup/restore app as mybackup Pro or titanium backup, which allow you to backup or restore all the apps with a single click
Bye,
Ildanish
Sent from my HTC Desire using XDA App

The reason I am looking for an alternative to googles backup within android is that when I am rolling from one ROM to another, this restore does not always work. A price exmaple is Sandvolds ICS ROM. Each time there is a new releast, the restore fails to restore - hence looking for an alternative.
I have previously used Titanium backup but not with this use case. Maybe I will give it a try and see how it works in this sense...
As an alternative, I think I could script something with "android.intent.action." It probably requrires some interaction still but it would get to a more automated install situation than I have now.
Thanks for the input guys, I will see what milage I can get from this.

[MOD] Xoom: symlink /system/apps to /data for GApps on CM10-based ROMs (11/28 update)

Disclaimer: This mod is provided as is. I am not responsible for you or your actions, I can barely handle myself most days. This will probably kill your dog and frame your spouse, so if your not feeling up for it, maybe sit this out.
What is this?
This addresses the lack of space on the /system partition that has been forcing people to compromise on GApps packages, and generally be subjected to wonky behavior.
How do I install it?
First you must make a nandroid. This is a flashable zip that you apply in recovery *in between* flashing cm10 and GApps. *NOTE* There are -NO- GApps in this download. This is just a shim to make room for them!
How does this work?
It's mostly edify, with a shell script that shouldn't have been necessary, but I got impatient, and hell, it works.
What it does is it will create folder on your /data partition called /data/system.app.
It makes sure that the permissions match the original.
Then it will migrate the *entire* contents of the traditional /system/app folder into the new folder, also preserving the owners, permissions and attributes of files
Finally, it deletes the original, and creates a symlink in its place, so that anything that tries to read, or write, to that folder, will end up on the /data partition.
You can now install a full GApps package, and you'll have a lofty 25MB or so to spare!
Is it safe?
I have tested this on my 4G Stingray using CM10 nightlies and Rogue Recovery as both a clean flash and an upgrade. It works under that configuration. See "Before you download" below for currently known issues.
Is this only for the Stingray?
Yes and no. Yes, I only have that one device that suffers the partition issue, and on which to test this. No, I don't see why it couldn't work for at least one other device. But still probably don't try it unless you really know what you're doing.
Why did you make this?
I wanted to solved this problem, and now it's my gift to you all! Enjoy!
Can I incorporate this in my ROM or on my website or at my grandmother's bingo party?
Knock yourselves out. I hope this ends up being super helpful for everybody.
Something broke and it's all your fault!
Before you download!
Make a nandroid! This is twice that I'm telling you, so I mean it!
As of right now, if you were to factory reset your device, it would be necessary to restore or reflash from recovery. Do not factory reset if you apply this mod! (Thanks runandhide05!)
This mod does not work with TWRP recovery at the moment (But I'm working on it). (Thanks dodgefan67!)
Face unlock currently fails to install. I am working to address this.
Some future version will use addon.d so that you don't have to flash this every time. This will be implemented once the above issues have been dealt with.
The zip file was updated on 11/28 to fix an issue where the shell script had windows-style line endings, causing it not to run in TWRP and possibly some other recoveries.
The download:
http://www.tangerinepulsar.com/files/cm10-xoom-system-symlink-mod-signed.zip
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
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"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
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}

the only problem i see here is that you have no way to backup you rom, well, if you run a backup it will say its successful, but you have nothing to get /data/system.app backed up and re symlinked when you restore, and if you preform a factory reset you will loose all of your system apps,
you should look at how EOS symlinks there gapps data at /data/ you have to include addon.d scripts so that if you run a backup it will backup your new folder too, otherwise problems may/will happen.
edit:
for example for the /usr/srec stuff ( google now hotword and talk back files) you have to do something like this
Code:
. /tmp/backuptool.functions
list_files() {
cat <<EOF
EOF
}
case "$1" in
backup)
list_files | while read FILE DUMMY; do
backup_file $S/$FILE
done
;;
restore)
list_files | while read FILE REPLACEMENT; do
R=""
[ -n "$REPLACEMENT" ] && R="$S/$REPLACEMENT"
[ -f "$C/$S/$FILE" ] && restore_file $S/$FILE $R
done
ln -s /data/eos-srec /system/usr/srec
;;
pre-backup)
# Stub
;;
post-backup)
# Stub
;;
pre-restore)
# Stub
;;
post-restore)
# Stub
;;
esac

runandhide05 said:
the only problem i see here is that you have no way to backup you rom, well, if you run a backup it will say its successful, but you have nothing to get /data/system.app backed up and re symlinked when you restore, and if you preform a factory reset you will loose all of your system apps,
you should look at how EOS symlinks there gapps data at /data/ you have to include addon.d scripts so that if you run a backup it will backup your new folder too, otherwise problems may/will happen.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll definitely look at incorporating this approach, thanks!
At the time I didn't think that backups were that big of a deal so long as you backed up both system and data, all of the symlinks would still be intact. I did write the edify script in such a way that it allows for an existing /system.app folder to already be there and will re-symlink it. But there are always times when you want to restore one and not the other, or switch ROMs without losing data, and this doesn't handle that at all. I definitely agree that a factory reset would trash you pretty badly, it's not a scenario that I accounted for in any way.
Thanks for the nudge in the right direction, I'll keep working on this.

Thanks for workings on this, very exciting news.

I'll start cranking out eos test builds soon. Then I'll take a look at what kind of gapps solutions are available. One thing for sure is it will be a bare bones package. That means anything that can be acquired from the Store will be.

this is good news indeed. i will try this out on my wifi xoom in the next day or two
i understand about doing a factory reset, but if i just update from one nightly to another (dirty flash) i would have to run this each time as well, correct?

dodgefan67 said:
this is good news indeed. i will try this out on my wifi xoom in the next day or two
i understand about doing a factory reset, but if i just update from one nightly to another (dirty flash) i would have to run this each time as well, correct?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You should not have to.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

runandhide05 said:
You should not have to.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
doesn't the script actually move the contents of /system/apps though? installing a new version would put apps there right? and overwrite the symlinks?

dodgefan67 said:
doesn't the script actually move the contents of /system/apps though? installing a new version would put apps there right? and overwrite the symlinks?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well it depends on how/if he updated it.
But if its the same as earlier then ya you will need to reflash.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

runandhide05 said:
You should not have to.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
dodgefan67 said:
this is good news indeed. i will try this out on my wifi xoom in the next day or two
i understand about doing a factory reset, but if i just update from one nightly to another (dirty flash) i would have to run this each time as well, correct?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
runandhide05 said:
Well it depends on how/if he updated it.
But if its the same as earlier then ya you will need to reflash.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I haven't released an update yet. Please reflash per the current instructions. I'll make it obvious when the script has changed.

ok, i used CM10 stable from 11/13/2012 and the official GApps JB package from 10/11/2012
flashed CM10
flashed this mod
flashed gapps
on first boot, i did not get any google account sign on screens, went straight to homescreen, no play store or any google apps installed
reflashed gapps and rebooted and this time i got the play store and google search, but that's it. is there more to gapps? i think they took out gmail, but would expect more for a 90meg file. never really looked at this, i have been using the EOS version of gapps with Zigackly's rom
by the way, according to TB i have 29.4mb left on /system and that is before i remove the other stuff i dont want. so it seems to have worked on a MZ604 wifi device
i will use it this way for a couple of days, restoring some apps and installing things and changing settings and see how it goes. then i will update to a nightly and see how that goes
so far so good

dodgefan67 said:
ok, i used CM10 stable from 11/13/2012 and the official GApps JB package from 10/11/2012
flashed CM10
flashed this mod
flashed gapps
on first boot, i did not get any google account sign on screens, went straight to homescreen, no play store or any google apps installed
reflashed gapps and rebooted and this time i got the play store and google search, but that's it. is there more to gapps? i think they took out gmail, but would expect more for a 90meg file. never really looked at this, i have been using the EOS version of gapps with Zigackly's rom
by the way, according to TB i have 29.4mb left on /system and that is before i remove the other stuff i dont want. so it seems to have worked on a MZ604 wifi device
i will use it this way for a couple of days, restoring some apps and installing things and changing settings and see how it goes. then i will update to a nightly and see how that goes
so far so good
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm a little perturbed about the way that first flash went. If you experience that again, will you please post the log from /cache/recovery prior to the re-flash? I want to make sure that there's not some scenario that I'm not handling properly with just one flash.
BTW, Did you flash it all from recovery or did you use something like ROM Manager or ROM Toolbox to script the recovery actions? Just so I cover my bases.

oscillot said:
I'm a little perturbed about the way that first flash went. If you experience that again, will you please post the log from /cache/recovery prior to the re-flash? I want to make sure that there's not some scenario that I'm not handling properly with just one flash.
BTW, Did you flash it all from recovery or did you use something like ROM Manager or ROM Toolbox to script the recovery actions? Just so I cover my bases.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i will do it again and get you the log file. i'm using twrp and did it all from there. i even did each zip one at a time even though twrp lets you do multiple ones in one go

good news and bad, i got the log file but i had to dump it to a plain text file so it is hard to read, but if you search for symlink-mod you will find the section where your mod starts and right after that is where i flashed gapps ***edit***never mind about the formatting, i clicked the attachment below using Chrome and it came up fine
i was able to duplicate my issue. i wiped everything three times and installed a different rom and different gapps package and everything was fine. then i wiped three more times and installed cm10 stable, your mod, then the official jb gapps, rebooted and same thing. no google apps installed. this log file is from right after the first reboot
then i went back and flashed gapps again, rebooted and have the play store
i can put CWM on it and try it with that recovery if you want

Here is the problem, u can not have anything in the /system/app folder.. Nothing at all, so the problem lays that if you try to flash a ROM, then the sy link it will copy everything in system/app to data, remove the directory (system/app) then link it to the new directory in /data. Then you are trying to flash gapps which tries to put stuff in /system/app which that directory does not exist so its going to create it. Which will undo the symlink or will not be able to flash anything to /app.
So for the sy link to work u must flash both rom and gapps, which is where the problem of limited space cause now u won't get all your files over to the /system because not enough room. So to fix this you can do one of several things, one of which would be...
Change the gapps package to where the system apps flash to the new /data directory created by the sysmlink.
So if the new directory is /data/sysapp/ open the gapp package and take all the system/app/ and move it to a new folder on the root of the zip called data then in there create a folder called sysapp and put all the /system/app/ content in there. And remember to update the updater script for the resource "data" "/data" and that "should" fix it
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

dodgefan67 said:
good news and bad, i got the log file but i had to dump it to a plain text file so it is hard to read, but if you search for symlink-mod you will find the section where your mod starts and right after that is where i flashed gapps ***edit***never mind about the formatting, i clicked the attachment below using Chrome and it came up fine
i was able to duplicate my issue. i wiped everything three times and installed a different rom and different gapps package and everything was fine. then i wiped three more times and installed cm10 stable, your mod, then the official jb gapps, rebooted and same thing. no google apps installed. this log file is from right after the first reboot
then i went back and flashed gapps again, rebooted and have the play store
i can put CWM on it and try it with that recovery if you want
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Okay, I see a couple of things that are downright strange. To start off, the reason it looks like a flat text file is because the line-breaks are unix-style ('\n') and windows apps generally don't show linebreaks unless they have a carriage return preceding a newline character ('\r\n'). Open files from android in Notepad++ and they'll render much more nicely. Turn on viewing end of line characters and you'll see the difference between the Windows and Unix styles of newlines.
In practice, these are invisible control characters that don't visibly render, except in so far as their introduction of a line-break. '\r' and '\n' are aliases of them used in programming. They are actually the hex values 0A and 0D. But, since they are also characters, unexpected ones will have some kind of effect.
On lines 4066-4067 I see an error in the copy.sh: "/tmp/copy.sh: line 2: '\r' : not found"
There is a stray carriage return in the middle of this log file. There should be none. Line 2 in that file is BLANK. The source *should* have a single unix-newline '\n' and nothing else. I would bet that busybox is trying to interpret it and as a result, the shell script never runs. Nothing is getting copied out of /system/app.
I checked the zip I uploaded, and sure enough, the shell script has windows-style line endings. Oops. I've replaced it with a version that does not, but is identical other than that. So that part is fixed. Not sure why it works in CWM and not in TWRP, as far as I'm concerned, it shouldn't have worked in either. They must have slightly different busybox binaries is all that I can think.
The other issue is that both the deletion of /system/app and the subsequent symlinking both claim to have worked. However it's clear that /system/app was not deleted because if it were, you wouldn't have booted correctly. The symlink couldn't have worked either because you can't symlink a location that has files in it. So what in the world happened here? I'm kind of not sure, especially since those steps each returned 0, or else we wouldn't have gotten the success messages.
The wrinkle that you got *no* gapps after a flash is even stranger. But There is one more bit of interest here. I see an error message on line 4135 "cp: target '/system/app' is not a directory". At this point, this is the gapps trying to install face-unlock. I went ahead and looked in my own log files and here's what I found: "cp: target '/system/app' is not a directory." I never used it, but further inspection confirms, no portion of the face-unlock is installed using my mod, and the reason is the syntax of the gapps install-optional.sh: "cp -a /tmp/face/* /system/". Because /system/app is a symlink, you cannot copy the folder /tmp/face/app over it successfully.
This begs the question, how is it displaying the properties of being both a symlink and NOT a symlink?
I'm going to work on these issues, and I'll probably flash TWRP and test against it as well and try to come up with some answers and a one-size-fits-all solution. In the mean time, I would appreciate it if you could confirm whether you have a /data/system.app directory, and if so, what the contents are. I have a hunch that you'll find the gapp apks (minus face-unlock) in that directory, but none of the system apps. I'm not sure how that would be possible, or what it means, but it makes the most sense from where I'm standing. In the meantime, I'm going to add some notes to the main post.
I'll hopefully get some of this figured out by this weekend.

oscillot said:
Okay, I see a couple of things that are downright strange. To start off, the reason it looks like a flat text file is because the line-breaks are unix-style ('\n') and windows apps generally don't show linebreaks unless they have a carriage return preceding a newline character ('\r\n'). Open files from android in Notepad++ and they'll render much more nicely. Turn on viewing end of line characters and you'll see the difference between the Windows and Unix styles of newlines.
In practice, these are invisible control characters that don't visibly render, except in so far as their introduction of a line-break. '\r' and '\n' are aliases of them used in programming. They are actually the hex values 0A and 0D. But, since they are also characters, unexpected ones will have some kind of effect.
On lines 4066-4067 I see an error in the copy.sh: "/tmp/copy.sh: line 2: '\r' : not found"
There is a stray carriage return in the middle of this log file. There should be none. Line 2 in that file is BLANK. The source *should* have a single unix-newline '\n' and nothing else. I would bet that busybox is trying to interpret it and as a result, the shell script never runs. Nothing is getting copied out of /system/app.
I checked the zip I uploaded, and sure enough, the shell script has windows-style line endings. Oops. I've replaced it with a version that does not, but is identical other than that. So that part is fixed. Not sure why it works in CWM and not in TWRP, as far as I'm concerned, it shouldn't have worked in either. They must have slightly different busybox binaries is all that I can think.
The other issue is that both the deletion of /system/app and the subsequent symlinking both claim to have worked. However it's clear that /system/app was not deleted because if it were, you wouldn't have booted correctly. The symlink couldn't have worked either because you can't symlink a location that has files in it. So what in the world happened here? I'm kind of not sure, especially since those steps each returned 0, or else we wouldn't have gotten the success messages.
The wrinkle that you got *no* gapps after a flash is even stranger. But There is one more bit of interest here. I see an error message on line 4135 "cp: target '/system/app' is not a directory". At this point, this is the gapps trying to install face-unlock. I went ahead and looked in my own log files and here's what I found: "cp: target '/system/app' is not a directory." I never used it, but further inspection confirms, no portion of the face-unlock is installed using my mod, and the reason is the syntax of the gapps install-optional.sh: "cp -a /tmp/face/* /system/". Because /system/app is a symlink, you cannot copy the folder /tmp/face/app over it successfully.
This begs the question, how is it displaying the properties of being both a symlink and NOT a symlink?
I'm going to work on these issues, and I'll probably flash TWRP and test against it as well and try to come up with some answers and a one-size-fits-all solution. In the mean time, I would appreciate it if you could confirm whether you have a /data/system.app directory, and if so, what the contents are. I have a hunch that you'll find the gapp apks (minus face-unlock) in that directory, but none of the system apps. I'm not sure how that would be possible, or what it means, but it makes the most sense from where I'm standing. In the meantime, I'm going to add some notes to the main post.
I'll hopefully get some of this figured out by this weekend.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Any new news on this?

A little update on what I tried on my MZ-601 Everest. Any feedback will be welcome
Basically what I did was:
1. Trimmed down the CM10 Stable a little (132MB vs the original 141MB) by removing mainly the wallpapers.
2. Flashed the modified CM10 Stable zip (after a full wipe - factory plus cache).
3. Modified the Mod Script to point to "/data/system/app" (just to satisfy my OCD ) then flashed the zip. On first try it aborted with Status 7 on "Fixing permissions" so I had to manually create the directory "/data/system/app" after which the flash was successful.
4. Modified the GApps package (GApps from 11th Oct) by:
a. Removing the "optional" directory, install script and removing the relevant lines from "updater-script",
b. Moving the "/system/app" directory to "/data/system" and
c. Modifying the "updater-script" to reflect the change.
5. Flashed the GApps zip package which went uneventfully.
6. I now have 51.4MB free in "/system" according to Titanium Backup
PS: I am including the modified "Mod Script" and "updater-script" from GApps package if anyone else wants to try it. Of course you mileage may vary and I cannot claim any responsibility for any loss of data that may occur
UPDATE: Tried it with the CM10.1 nightlies and it works flawlessly. Flashed the nightly over the last nightly, flashed this script then the official gpaps and rebooted. All the settings and customizations retained! Still have some 56MB left in /system

Titanium Backup unable to delete system apps?

EDIT: SEE POST #8 FOR THE WORK-AROUND TO UNINSTALL SYSTEM APPS
Rooted last night and one of the first things I did was install TB so I could remove some of the system apps.
But while TB says they're removed (like Chrome & easter egg), I reboot and they're still there.
I did have latest BusyBox installed.
So I tried using TB's built-in BusyBox and had the same issue.
I also made sure to get /system_root Read/Write and still couldn't uninstall using TB.
Are we gonna have to wait for either SuperSU or TB to get an update with fixes.
Any suggestions on a way to get TB working? Other than manually removing apps via Root Explorer which I already know how to do and is not the point of this thread.

try system remove app
Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

Isn't current root system-less.?
Root is actually in system_root and system is not being mounted rw?
If its true you cant change anything in system until it can be switched to rw..

I've already set it to R/W using this command: mount -o rw,remount /system_root.
Didn't help. The apps are still there after rebooting.
An odd thing I noticed. Titanium is showing "Android System Webview" and "Device setup 7.1" as frozen. And I didn't do it. Anyone else noticing this?

DinarQ8 said:
try system remove app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just tried it. Doesn't work either.
Thanks for helping me rule out Titanium Backup specifically though.
Definitely something to do with Google's partition setup (or with root) then.

No big deal, I'll just use Root Explorer to remove the ~35 system apk's I'm trying to get rid of.
I just feel safer seeing app names rather than guessing at apk names when I'm removing stuff.
Plus, TB is just faster & more convenient. And I'm probably going to have to do this a few times over the next few weeks as I make & break my phone.
Btw, I'm a little disappointed there are a bunch of Verizon apps on my Google purchased phone.

DM-Verity, I think it is, is still active with this root. Think that's what your running into.

By the way, I found a work-around.
If you want to uninstall SYSTEM apps via Titanium Backup (or any other method), it helps to do the following first.
Open up a terminal session on your phone.
I use the free app Termux to do this:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.termux
Then type the following two commands:
Code:
su
setenforce 0
This sets SElinux to "permissive". Then you can uninstall all your system apps. Then after you reboot, the phone automatically goes back to "enforcing" for SElinux.
Works great. Doesn't screw up any of my user apps after removing the system apps I don't want (like Chrome, Messaging, etc).
If you want permissive on a permanent basis then check out this thread.
I haven't tried it yet, don't need to:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/xposed/how-to-set-selinux-to-permissive-boot-t3034245

CZ Eddie said:
By the way, I found a work-around.
If you want to uninstall SYSTEM apps via Titanium Backup (or any other method), it helps to do the following first.
Open up a terminal session on your phone.
I use the free app Termux to do this:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.termux
Then type the following two commands:
Code:
su
setenforce 0
This sets SElinux to "permissive". Then you can uninstall all your system apps. Then after you reboot, the phone automatically goes back to "enforcing" for SElinux.
Works great. Doesn't screw up any of my user apps after removing the system apps I don't want (like Chrome, Messaging, etc).
If you want permissive on a permanent basis then check out this thread.
I haven't tried it yet, don't need to:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/xposed/how-to-set-selinux-to-permissive-boot-t3034245
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I really only wanted to backup, switch chrome from a system app to a user app, and restore data but couldn't do this using TiB until I ran these commands. Thanks!!!

CZ Eddie said:
By the way, I found a work-around.
If you want to uninstall SYSTEM apps via Titanium Backup (or any other method), it helps to do the following first.
Open up a terminal session on your phone.
I use the free app Termux to do this:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.termux
Then type the following two commands:
Code:
su
setenforce 0
This sets SElinux to "permissive". Then you can uninstall all your system apps. Then after you reboot, the phone automatically goes back to "enforcing" for SElinux.
Works great. Doesn't screw up any of my user apps after removing the system apps I don't want (like Chrome, Messaging, etc).
If you want permissive on a permanent basis then check out this thread.
I haven't tried it yet, don't need to:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/xposed/how-to-set-selinux-to-permissive-boot-t3034245
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
this.. worked..
i friggin love you guys here on xda... combined knowledge ftw

The workaround doesn't work for me. After reboot, selinux is back to 'enforcing' but the app still isn't Uninstalled.
However, thanks for letting me know about the apk delete method from system/app. It's the only method that works with some MIUI apps.

Yeah, setenforce 0 doesn't work for my N9100ZC (6.0.1)
What's working is, reboot into TWRP, choose Mount -> System -> Internal memory. TWRP main menu -> Advanced -> File Manager.
Make sure to delete the folder and subfolder of your bloatware (\system\app and \system\priv-app).
Hope this help

CZ Eddie said:
By the way, I found a work-around.
If you want to uninstall SYSTEM apps via Titanium Backup (or any other method), it helps to do the following first.
Open up a terminal session on your phone.
I use the free app Termux to do this:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.termux
Then type the following two commands:
Code:
su
setenforce 0
This sets SElinux to "permissive". Then you can uninstall all your system apps. Then after you reboot, the phone automatically goes back to "enforcing" for SElinux.
Works great. Doesn't screw up any of my user apps after removing the system apps I don't want (like Chrome, Messaging, etc).
If you want permissive on a permanent basis then check out this thread.
I haven't tried it yet, don't need to:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/xposed/how-to-set-selinux-to-permissive-boot-t3034245
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It seems that the workaround doesn't work anymore.
Have you find another one ?

chimmot307 said:
Yeah, setenforce 0 doesn't work for my N9100ZC (6.0.1)
What's working is, reboot into TWRP, choose Mount -> System -> Internal memory. TWRP main menu -> Advanced -> File Manager.
Make sure to delete the folder and subfolder of your bloatware (\system\app and \system\priv-app).
Hope this help
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks that worked for me.

chimmot307 said:
Yeah, setenforce 0 doesn't work for my N9100ZC (6.0.1)
What's working is, reboot into TWRP, choose Mount -> System -> Internal memory. TWRP main menu -> Advanced -> File Manager.
Make sure to delete the folder and subfolder of your bloatware (\system\app and \system\priv-app).
Hope this help
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
this work for me on my redmi note 8 stock rom miui 11.0.40

Yeah setenforce did not work for me too

DinarQ8 said:
try system remove app
Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Atleast name the app properly

Atharkhan101 said:
Atleast name the app properly
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You ask me a question after been 5 years anyway just search in Play Store System App Remove and choose what work with you