The Android Site

Here’s a video showing how some crafty developers got Android running on the Sony Ericsson X1. Both Android 1.6 and 2.0.1 have been successfully ported to the X1, with a few things yet to be fixed, such as the camera, GPS and bluetooth. But that’s not the point right? It’s about using Android on whatever device you want. From the video you can see it’s not exactly perfect, but if you’ve got an X1, and you feel a little frisky, head over to xda-developers for all the details.

[via GadgetVenue]

Ben Marvin Hacks, Hardware, How-To 1.6, 2.0.1, Hacks, How-To, ports, Sony Ericsson, videos, X1, xda, xda-developers

First off, this is not a guide to pirating apps. There are legit reasons for wanting to backup your applications. Sometimes an older version of the app worked better, or had features you liked better. Sometimes new versions don’t work with specific phones and you need to revert back. Now, you can use AppManager to backup most apps, but protected apps are not included in this because they are stored in a different directory. With a rooted phone, you can access this directory and copy the apps to your SD card or to your computer. After all, you paid for it, it’s yours. If you want to pirate apps, or buy an app, copy it then return it, that’s on you, I’m not advocating that.

First method, copy with your phone to SD card:

1. Install and open a Terminal Emulator on your phone.
2. Enter su to be superuser (root).
3. Enter cd /data/app-private/ to enter the protected application directory.
4. Use ls to view the apps in the directory.
5. Enter cp filename.apk /sdcard to copy a single app to your SD card.
   (Or to backup all the protected apps: cp * /sdcard)
6. If you want to backup all your apps, they can be found in /data/app/

Second method is to use Android Debug Bridge with your PC:

1. Install the Android SDK on your PC
2. Connect your phone to your computer via USB cable, and make sure USB debugging is enabled on your phone (Settings > Applications > Development)
3. Enter adb shell to fire up Debug Bridge and enter shell mode
4. Enter su to become superuser
5. Enter cat /data/app-private/filename.apk > /sdcard/filename.apk to copy the file to the SD card.
6. exit
7. exit
8. And finally adb pull /sdcard/filename.apk filename.apk pulls the .apk file from your SD card to your computer.

Success? Problems? Moral issues with copying software? Let us know in the comments.

Ben Marvin Hacks, How-To adb, android debug bridge, hacking, Hacks, How-To, Paid apps, protected apps

Remember the excitement when the G1 was first rooted? Now there’s the same for owners of the Sprint Hero and Samsung Behold 2. For the Hero, there’s a thread over at xda-developers with clear instructions on how to Root your Sprint Hero. Not much yet in the way of custom ROMS or other goodies, but you can run applications that require superuser such as wireless tethering.

For Samsung Behold 2 owners, head over to All Droid for your rooting instructions.

I don’t have either of these handsets, so I can test myself, but if anyone successfully roots (or doesn’t), let us know in the comments how it went. And as always with hacking and modifying your phone, do so at your own risk.

[Thanks Ted for the tip on the Behold 2]

Ben Marvin HTC, Hacks, Hardware, How-To, Samsung, Sprint, T-Mobile Behold 2, hacking, Hardware, Hero, How-To, HTC, root, Samsung, Sprint, T-Mobile

Thought this was pretty cool, so I’d share. A simply but effective DIY phone dock for your G1, or any phone for that matter. It only caught my eye because they used a G1 in the picture. If you don’t feel like spending the 10 bucks on one of those fancy dock stations for you G1, or you’re just into cool little DIY projects.

What do you use to hold your Android phone when it’s not in your hand?

[Instructables] [via Lifehacker]

Ben Marvin Accessories, Hacks Accessories, DIY, Knex, phone dock

There’s a tool now out in the wild that can reportedly root your Android with a simple apk and one-click to flash the Cyanogen Recovery 1.4 image. The tool is called FlashRec, and it utilizes this exploit. The exploit has already been patched last week, and T-Mobile and other carriers are likely to be pushing out a fix very soon. But until that happens the tool should work. I’m not personally going to endorse it, because I haven’t tried it. And as always with these sort of things, make sure you make backups and you know what you are doing. It should also be noted this does not work with “32A” HTC Dreams.

You can read more about it here. Or download it here.

If you try it, let us know in the comments how it worked out.

Ben Marvin Hacks, Software cyanogen recovery, FlashRec, Hacks, Rooting

Still a work in progress, as are most of the Android porting projects going on right now, but it boots and that’s pretty much it as far I can tell from screenshots and some of the forum threads. Not surprising these talented people are working furiously, there’s currently a bounty to succesfully port Android to the Omnia. If you’re a developer or a Samsung Omnia user, check out the project here.

Ben Marvin Hacks, Samsung hacking, Hacks, Omnia, port, Samsung, Samsung Omnia

It’s not everyday you see a Windows Mobile smartphone running a Linux-based mobile operating system. But, in the crazy (crazy cool, that is) world of handset hackery, anything is possible. So, it shouldn’t be all that surprising that Android hackers have ported Android OS to the HTC Touch Diamond (Diamond) and HTC Touch Pro (Raphael). The new Android OS ROM has been posted to the HTC-Android forums for anyone willing to use their previous-gen smartphones as Android guinea pics.

To be clear, Android OS runs just fine on the Diamond and Raphael. Unfortunately, there’s still the issue of creating Linux drivers to control all the different devices in the HTC Touch Diamond and HTC Touch Pro. So, for now, Android OS can basically only surf the web and send SMS through the smartphone’s GSM connection (GPRS, EDGE, 3G). Everything else (microphone, speaker, WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, etc.) just doesn’t work… yet.

We’ll  be looking forward to seeing everything fixed hopefully in the near future. But it would be nice if HTC jumped in on this and ported Android to more of their devices.

[PPCGeeks] [via IntoMobile]

Ben Marvin HTC, Hacks, Hardware, How-To hacking, Hacks, HTC, ROMs, smartphones, Touch Diamond, Touch Pro, Windows Mobile, WinMo

If you were drooling all over the demo videos and you wanna take the plunge and play with the HTC Hero firmware, it’s the latest hot topic over at xda-developers. Redone user interface changes inside and out, and a host of custom HTC applications, this is the future of Android and much better over a stock 1.5 build in my opinion. I’m actually surprised to see the firmware out before the actual device even is released.

Leave a comment if you decided to try it out and let us know what you think. Or feel free to comment if you bricked your phone.

[xda-developers] via [Engadget Mobile]

Ben Marvin HTC, Hacks, Software Firmware, Hacks, HTC Hero, leaks, xda-developers

6 minutes of mouth watering Android. The Hero ROM running on the G1 with delicious “Rosie” user interface. Enjoy.

Still no word on when the rest of us mortals will be able to play with this.

Follow Haykuro on Twitter for all the latest. And don’t forget to follow us while you’re at it.

Ben Marvin HTC, Hacks, Rumors, Video Android, G1, Hacks, Haykuro, HTC Hero, Rosie UI

First off, some delicious screenshots grabbed from xda-developers:

Ok, I would like to say, this is a beta version. Some things do not work. Do not ask how to install this, because I do not feel like answering questions when something goes wrong. If you’re thirsty for this, go hang out over at xda-developers and follow the threads. That said, let’s get to the juicy bits.

In addition to all the wonderful things that are packed with the G1 cupcake, this version (still 1.5) has some additional goodies that you won’t be seeing from T-Mobile or Rogers. These is pure HTC additions from what I can tell. This is also probably pretty close to what we’ll be seeing on the HTC Hero when it’s released, rumored to be locked in exclusively to Orange.

I’ll try to keep this short, since this isn’t meant to be an in-depth review.

Some key features:

• There is no “Rosie” included. No word on if it will come as part of the complete OS when the Hero ships. But this may be part of the Personalize section in the Settings that I could see, but nothing in it worked. (“Choose a lifestyle to set widget layout”)
• 5 Home screens.
• Much longer initial setup, including choosing language and setup of Exchange accounts and Twitter, Facebook and Flickr.
• The previous mentioned Social Network services are integrated in with your contacts for getting their updates and sharing items. It matches Facebook friends to your contacts and you can link pictures and birthdays. View Facebook status updates straight from you Android phonebook! I could not get the Twitter or Flickr to work.
• Contacts is now People. Visual makeover. Scrolling has that iPhone “bounce” effect. There’s a cool slider bar at the bottom to check messages, email, updates & events, FaceBook and Flickr photos, and of course call history.
• Text messaging: A bit of a visual makeover here. A nice Compose Message button at the top of your conversations list. And I’m really digging the fact that it uses the contact icon next to the message.
• Calendar: Another awesome visual makeover. Looks a lot better than the old version. There’s a screenshot floating around, you know the one that uses the iPhone icon, yeah, it’s there.
• Dialer is the one from the other HTC roms that we’ve seen coming from Haykuro with a couple of tweak, nothing major here.
• Lock screen shows the current open app behind it instead of wallpaper. You can also choose lockscreen wallpaper, but that feature was broken.
• HTC Footprints app is included and working fine for me. Geotag photos and save your favorite places.
• Music player makeover with album artwork and slick working “swipe to switch tracks” interface. I love this feature.
• The web browser: Ooh, the browser. Little tweaks to the location bar and loading bar, all these minor tweaks make the whole phone feel much more polished. The bookmarks are what people are gonna love. No more boring list of URLs, now you have small preview pages “Visual Bookmarks” ans it’s named, and you can swipe sideways to scroll through. Also the same when switching between browser windows. Very cool stuff here. Full-screen browsing. Zooming of any sort did not seem to work in this build.
• Option in the Settings to calibrate the G-Sensor.
• Option to auto-download firmware, prompt, or never download.

Well, that’s about all I have. It’s 7:00amEST and I’ve been up all night. I’m going to keep playing with this and maybe post more. At the very least more screenshots. Tell me what you want to see!

Update: Yes, I know this isn’t finished. And those of you that follow xda closely will know exactly what’s going on. I just report the news, I don’t make it. The kids just want to see what all the fuss is about.

Ben Marvin HTC, Hacks, Pictures, Software Android, beta, exclusive, Facebook, Firmware, Flickr, footprints, G1, HTC, HTC Hero, new, Rosie UI, Software, Twitter