[FAQ] Android Customization: Tips and Tricks

red dragon

Master troll
First freeze them,if everything works,uninstall.
Do not uninstall core components like stock dialer,phone book,launchers(very careful with it..can lead to serious issues)
After rooting,first install a kernel with CWM recovery.
Once you boot in CWM recovery,take a backup of your system.
Once backed up...start messing around with the phone.

DO NOT FORGET TO BACK YOUR SYSTEM UP(root...install a kernel with CWM recovery...back up...mess around in this order)
 
OP
coderunknown

coderunknown

Retired Forum Mod
re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

@techfreak, list apps that you want to get rid of. we can atleast suggest which apps you shouldn't remove.
 

thetechfreak

Legend Never Ends
re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

:)
Finally I have rooted my Android phone.
now I want to uninstall the bloated apps I waa talking off earlier

some ebuddy messengers (2 of em)
and few.other similar

any recommendation for a app to uninstall them as the default app manager cant delete it.
 

Vyom

The Power of x480
Staff member
Admin
Titanium backup. Be careful in using it.
But first install a good custom recovery like AmonRa and take a nand backup. So in case anything goes wrong you can revert back to the original condition.
 

thetechfreak

Legend Never Ends
re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

Titanium backup. Be careful in using it.
But first install a good custom recovery like AmonRa and take a nand backup. So in case anything goes wrong you can revert back to the original condition.

Thanks Vyom. Will definitely do these and report back. Might take a few days as I am busy :(
Thanks again :mrgreen:
 
OP
coderunknown

coderunknown

Retired Forum Mod
re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

UPDATED
removed a few questions & gave better reasons for certain points.

updated last night. forgot to bump it :smile:
 

Vyom

The Power of x480
Staff member
Admin
re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

Came across a Note on FB about some terms which every Android enthusiast must know! Sharing in the interest of spreading knowledge! :)

Here is a well organized post providing abbreviations and terminology so that any one, Droid master or droid newb, can have a quick reference guide to all things droid.

adb: Android Debug Bridge, a versatile tool lets you manage the state of an emulator instance or Android-powered device

ADK: Android Development Kit, What people use to develop anything for the droid such as ROM's

Baseband: In communications and signal processing, the baseband describes signals and systems whose range of the frequencies measured from close to 0 hertz to a cut-off frequency, a maximum bandwidth or highest signal frequency; it is sometimes used to describe frequencies starting close to zero

Boot Loader: State in which the droid can be flashed from RSD with an appropriate .sdk file that reprograms the phone into a specific ROM or update. This is typically a last resort when the recovery screen cannot be reached to make a much simpler and less risky solution

Boot Loop: simply means something is preventing the phone from completing it's boot cycle and is stuck between the boot animation and the unlock screen, creating a looped animation. This is often fixed by either reloading a Nandroid, or Reflashing a rom from the Boot Loader.

Brick or Bricked: Jargon for a completely unrecoverable device, (no more than a brick or paperweight)

Bug or Software Bug: an Error or flaw in software that produces a failure or unexpected/unwanted result. Typically created from incorrect code, this is why some ROMs are better and smoother running than others because certain developers have taken the time to input "perfect" code

Busybox: BusyBox is a single multicall binary that packages the functionality of most widely used standard Unix tools, BusyBox provides a fairly complete environment for any small or embedded system.

ClockworkMod: A recovery program that is often used to apply updates, ROMs, or create a back up or restore a backup file

De-odex: Apk files have respective odexes that devs use to supposedly save space. Deodexing means you convert it back to a .dex file and put it back inside the apk. This allows you to easily replace files (not having to worry about odexes), but the main point was to deodex services.jar so that you can change all text to different colors (such as the clock color to white) and to deodex services.jar, you need to deodex everything.

Dev. or Developer: An individual that creates, or alters a file in such a manner as to advance the program

Flash or Flash Memory: a program technology that can be electrically erased and reprogrammed

Froyo: Short for Frozen Yogurt, is the latest iteration (2.2) of Android, Google's mobile operating system.

Kernel: The governor of the CPU usage and Battery output, one can upload certain Kernels to achieve greater performance speed of their device at the cost of some battery life

Root: Common word associated with giving a user "super user" access to their phones programming and other various aspects that would normally not be possible, also known as "Jailbroken" for iPhone's

Nandroid or Nandroid Backup: A file typically created in the custom recovery program, such as SPRecovery, that is a carbon copy of whatever state your phone is in before a drastic change is made. the file then can be moved onto or off of the SD card for later use in case something should go wrong in the ROM or Update, or a Boot Loop occurs

OS: Operating system, I.E. Windows Vista or MAC or ANDROID

OTA: Over the air...

Overclocking: Speeding up the CPU past the factory presets to achieve a faster and more responsive device

ROM: Read Only Memory, a program used to make changes to anything from the look of the home screen, to icons to custom boot animation

RSD or RSD lite: Remote Software Download, Motorola's own tool in flashing virtualy any type of program, (so long as its in .sbf form) to the Android OS

Shell or SSH: secure shell or ssh is a network protocol that allows data to be exchanged using a secure channel between two networked devices

SPR or SPRecovery: A recovery program that is often used to apply updates, ROMs, or create a back up or restore a backup file

Stock: Simply means an unaltered state, such as when you first purchase your phone from Verizon, or when you do a factory reset

SU: "Super user", or root permissions

Theme: A set of icons, backgrounds and app trays that change the ascthetics of the overall look of the droid and its applications

TUN/TAP: Refers to a network Tunnel, operates within layer 3 packets, or ip packets. Packets sent by a system via a TUN/TAP device are delivered to a user-space program that attaches itself to the device. A user space program may also pass packets into a TUN/TAP device. In this case TUN/TAP device delivers (or "injects") these packets to the operating system's network stack thus emulating their reception from an external source.

Underclocking: Slowing down the CPU mainly to limit battery usage

.sbf: Summation Briefcase File

.apk or APK's: An .apk file extension denotes an Android Package (APK) file, an .apk file can be opened and inspected using common archive tools

.tar: Similar to a zip file, a tar file archives multiple files into one file

.tgz: TGZ files are commonly used as install packages for Slackware Linux.

More Glossary @ Glossary | Android Developers


Source: *www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=364390993576575
 

acidCow

Broken In
re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

Brick or Bricked: Jargon for a completely unrecoverable device, (no more than a brick or paperweight)

Bricking is completely unrecoverable? I mean isn't it a just completely messed up software? You can flash stock ROM again right?
 

Vyom

The Power of x480
Staff member
Admin
re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

Bricking is completely unrecoverable? I mean isn't it a just completely messed up software? You can flash stock ROM again right?

In many cases yeah. But, I do think there are many other cases, where you can't recover it.

I am not "experienced" in this regard, so can't comment further! :D
 
OP
coderunknown

coderunknown

Retired Forum Mod
re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

bricking has no clear meaning. its a term coined by DEVs & cellphone manufacturers. i have semi bricked my mobile twice (once for each of my mobiles) when even PC won't recognize the mobile. but reflashing the firmware solved it. though making the PC recognize it was the hardest part.
 

krishnandu.sarkar

Simply a DIGITian
Staff member
re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

Came across a Note on FB about some terms which every Android enthusiast must know! Sharing in the interest of spreading knowledge! :)

Here is a well organized post providing abbreviations and terminology so that any one, Droid master or droid newb, can have a quick reference guide to all things droid.

adb: Android Debug Bridge, a versatile tool lets you manage the state of an emulator instance or Android-powered device

ADK: Android Development Kit, What people use to develop anything for the droid such as ROM's

Baseband: In communications and signal processing, the baseband describes signals and systems whose range of the frequencies measured from close to 0 hertz to a cut-off frequency, a maximum bandwidth or highest signal frequency; it is sometimes used to describe frequencies starting close to zero

Boot Loader: State in which the droid can be flashed from RSD with an appropriate .sdk file that reprograms the phone into a specific ROM or update. This is typically a last resort when the recovery screen cannot be reached to make a much simpler and less risky solution

Boot Loop: simply means something is preventing the phone from completing it's boot cycle and is stuck between the boot animation and the unlock screen, creating a looped animation. This is often fixed by either reloading a Nandroid, or Reflashing a rom from the Boot Loader.

Brick or Bricked: Jargon for a completely unrecoverable device, (no more than a brick or paperweight)

Bug or Software Bug: an Error or flaw in software that produces a failure or unexpected/unwanted result. Typically created from incorrect code, this is why some ROMs are better and smoother running than others because certain developers have taken the time to input "perfect" code

Busybox: BusyBox is a single multicall binary that packages the functionality of most widely used standard Unix tools, BusyBox provides a fairly complete environment for any small or embedded system.

ClockworkMod: A recovery program that is often used to apply updates, ROMs, or create a back up or restore a backup file

De-odex: Apk files have respective odexes that devs use to supposedly save space. Deodexing means you convert it back to a .dex file and put it back inside the apk. This allows you to easily replace files (not having to worry about odexes), but the main point was to deodex services.jar so that you can change all text to different colors (such as the clock color to white) and to deodex services.jar, you need to deodex everything.

Dev. or Developer: An individual that creates, or alters a file in such a manner as to advance the program

Flash or Flash Memory: a program technology that can be electrically erased and reprogrammed

Froyo: Short for Frozen Yogurt, is the latest iteration (2.2) of Android, Google's mobile operating system.

Kernel: The governor of the CPU usage and Battery output, one can upload certain Kernels to achieve greater performance speed of their device at the cost of some battery life

Root: Common word associated with giving a user "super user" access to their phones programming and other various aspects that would normally not be possible, also known as "Jailbroken" for iPhone's

Nandroid or Nandroid Backup: A file typically created in the custom recovery program, such as SPRecovery, that is a carbon copy of whatever state your phone is in before a drastic change is made. the file then can be moved onto or off of the SD card for later use in case something should go wrong in the ROM or Update, or a Boot Loop occurs

OS: Operating system, I.E. Windows Vista or MAC or ANDROID

OTA: Over the air...

Overclocking: Speeding up the CPU past the factory presets to achieve a faster and more responsive device

ROM: Read Only Memory, a program used to make changes to anything from the look of the home screen, to icons to custom boot animation

RSD or RSD lite: Remote Software Download, Motorola's own tool in flashing virtualy any type of program, (so long as its in .sbf form) to the Android OS

Shell or SSH: secure shell or ssh is a network protocol that allows data to be exchanged using a secure channel between two networked devices

SPR or SPRecovery: A recovery program that is often used to apply updates, ROMs, or create a back up or restore a backup file

Stock: Simply means an unaltered state, such as when you first purchase your phone from Verizon, or when you do a factory reset

SU: "Super user", or root permissions

Theme: A set of icons, backgrounds and app trays that change the ascthetics of the overall look of the droid and its applications

TUN/TAP: Refers to a network Tunnel, operates within layer 3 packets, or ip packets. Packets sent by a system via a TUN/TAP device are delivered to a user-space program that attaches itself to the device. A user space program may also pass packets into a TUN/TAP device. In this case TUN/TAP device delivers (or "injects") these packets to the operating system's network stack thus emulating their reception from an external source.

Underclocking: Slowing down the CPU mainly to limit battery usage

.sbf: Summation Briefcase File

.apk or APK's: An .apk file extension denotes an Android Package (APK) file, an .apk file can be opened and inspected using common archive tools

.tar: Similar to a zip file, a tar file archives multiple files into one file

.tgz: TGZ files are commonly used as install packages for Slackware Linux.

More Glossary @ Glossary | Android Developers


Source: *www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=364390993576575

Ok, I think that's awesome and this post needs to be moved to first page or linked to first post for newbies.
 
OP
coderunknown

coderunknown

Retired Forum Mod
Re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

added :smile: i'll try to write a detailed list based on same sources with more terms.
 

Vyom

The Power of x480
Staff member
Admin
Re: Noobs Guide to rooting and installing custom rom

Source: Glossary 1 & Glossary 2. Thanks a lot to Vyom for the link :)

Glad to have helped. Btw, thanks for linking the FB page, which is partly run by me. :)
And more terminologies in newb friendly language would be more then welcome!
 

choudang

Padawan
Re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

mosti post re dosti, matha ghurai goise porhi kine :lol:

indeed a good thread to have an idea on rooting to nobs like me :mrgreen: my brother has a motorola (don't know the model, sorry) with dual boot, ICS and GB. and he has also lots of applications which are ad free (games mostly). i asked him about that and it was a full-toss bouncer to me when he said "i have root access and load ICS virtualy" :shock:
 
OP
coderunknown

coderunknown

Retired Forum Mod
Re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

guide't bohut kotha kai kintu basic terms skip kore. thats why made an FAQ instead of a guide. can be applied to almost all mobiles. else peoples keep asking a ton of questions about how to root, how will it affect, what is custom recovery, etc. explaining each & everything to them takes a lot of time. so tried a one stop solution. written in simple terms so that non-technical ppls understand it too.

i have root access and load ICS virtualy :shock:

not virtually i think. more like ICS from memory card.
 

choudang

Padawan
Re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

yeah, may be. will try by myself once a got one, thinking for SE Ray but xperia u is also in my mind, lets see.

going off-topic, where do you stay, going during bohag bihu.

by the way, any chance for VC in near future on droids? skype is good but sometimes vc is much better
 
OP
coderunknown

coderunknown

Retired Forum Mod
Re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

U have less internal memory (4Gb as mass storage). so if you click a lot of pics, you'll have way less space to store other multimedia files.

i live in AIDC, near Chandmari.

i think video calling is possible. Android naively doesn't support it. or say, there is no built in apps to use front cam other than face unlock thing in Android 4.0 but Skype or such apps can use it.
 

choudang

Padawan
Re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

i do not use my phone very often to click pictures, and habituated to transfer my pics to ext hdd. lived with SE for music but had to move myself towards BB for official use. i will use that for music and as a personal use. so 4 GB is not a big deal but you know "yeh dil mange more".

another question, my wife uses xperia mini, and when i tried to install few games it shows less memory space [< 100 MB and few games that i have which needs to downloaded to complete the installation], how do i get rid of that annoying msg. is there any settings where i can set the mem card as default location for storage.

anyway, me from near AEC, jalukbari. might reach on 14th. let you know.
 
OP
coderunknown

coderunknown

Retired Forum Mod
Re: [FAQ] Rooting, Custom Recovery, Custom Rom and Android Glossary

it has 8Gb internal memory but around 1Gb is used by rom. 2Gb for apps & 4Gb for other use.

try app2sd. moving apps (just a part will be moved) will free a lot internal memory.

i pass through jalukbari everyday. on way to college.
 
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