Root

This is just a basic tutorial about the Android file system and some basic commands you may need.All of this is available on net .I am just compiling the stuff here at one place.

 

I do not guarantee the working .I do not take any responsibility if your phone bricks,house burns, computer crashes ,you are fired from your job or your girlfriend/wife runs away with neighbor while doing this stuff.

 

This is to facilitate people before they do any monkey business.

 

The basic requirements for this small tutorial is
A.)Rooted phone,Use SOC from shortfuse.org
B.)Android SDK in PC
C.)Java Runtime Environment installed in PC
D.)Terminal Emulator in phone
E.)USB debugging enabled on phone
F.)Use cmd aka command prompt with administrator privileges

 

A.)Rewritable Mode : –

 

The internal memory is by default in Read-only mode .In layman’s terms “locked or inaccessible ” .You cant modify any folders in the read only mode .
To access the internal memory ,we have to mount the folder in which we have to edit (/system ,/etc  …) in Rewritable mode
Usually Rooted app managers can do with single click .But there are stability issues .
e.g to make /system folder in rw mode we have to
Using Terminal Emulator app we can do it by
$su
#busybox mount -o rw,remount /system

 

B.)Some places of interest :-

 

/system :-  The place where everything cool happens .Can make your phone Shweet .Can also destroy your phone , make you homeless and start a intergalactic war.Thats why it’s in RO mode .
/system/framework :- Place where framework is present .The pair of framework files framework-res.apk and twframework-re.apk lie here.
/system/media :- This folder is where the ringtones,notifications and bootanimations lie
  • /system/media/audio :- can modify/remove ringtones/notifications from here
  • /system/media/video : It just has the shutdown.qmg .renaming it removes the boot video
Now samsung stock uses samsungani.qmg as boot animation.qmg is propitiatory format and cant be modified.
Whereas Arkas 0.4 uses bootanimation.zip files allowing users for a wide range of animations .
/etc :- location of poweron.snd which is the boot sound .Will post an indepth tutorial since it involves sound editing .
/system/app :- The place where all system apps are stored .
/system/lib :- This is the place where app/system libraries are stored
/data/app :- This is where installed apps are present.
/sdcard :- This is the directory of SD card.

 

ADB  commands :-

 

ADB commands are executed from the adb folder
SO the path in cmd should look like
C:\android\ platform-tools>
before you execute anything
  • adb push :-Basically you can push any file from PC to the Internal memory/SD card.For pushing in /system folders you will need root privileges and /system should be in RW mode. e.g I use adb push frequently to test my frameworks . The cmd should look like
  •  C:\android\platform-tools>adb push D:\framework-res.apk /system/framework/framework-res.apk
  • adb pull :- The reverse of adb push .You can extract an apk/file from the phone .I used it to backup  original stock apps if the mod goes haywire. e.g
  • C:\android\platform-tools>adb pull /system/framework/framework-res.apk D:\framework-res.apk
  • adb logcat :- creates a log .Used to identify and troubleshoot errors and help the devs
  • C:\android\platform-tools>adb logcat
adb shell : executes shell prompt .It acts as terminal emulator.SU is preferred .
Some commands :-
  • su :-gains  super user access
  • mkdir :- makes a directory (mkdir /sdcard/abc)
  • cp :- copies files (cp /sdcard/1.zip /sdcard/abc/1.zip)
  • rm :- removes files(rm /sdcard/abc/1.zip)
  • mv :- moves files ,can also be used to renam in same folder (mv /sdcard/1.zip /sdcard/abc/1.zip)
  • ls : list files in a directory
  • reboot : reboots phone
  • reboot recovery : reboots phone in recovery mode
  • reboot download :reboots phone in download mode
  • mount :- used to toggle between rw and ro modes .
  • busybox mount -o rw,remount /system :- For rw mode
  • busybox mount -o ro,remount /system :- to revert to ro mode
ADB tools

 

The one tool which I use is ddms.bat in tools folder of SDK .It is the Dalvik Debug monitor
Run it with administrator privileges.

It gives you a way to take screenshots of the state of phone .
It can be used monitor apps/processes .
The adb push,pull,logcat is present in a GUI format
All this stuff also comes in GUI.The application know is Droid Explorer .
However it never worked for me.It worked for some folks .But those guys never gave a straight reply of it’s working.
So I cant guarantee it’s success rate .

 

If the phone bricks :—-

 

Before rushing to care centre and increasing Blood pressure try this stuff home.

 

The Recovery modes :-

 

T+power :- Recovery mode .Used to factory reset ,wipe data partition or update using update.zip files.

.

Q+power :- Gives you access to download mode.Download mode doesnt require internet connection.It is Used for flashing firmwares in the phone .Odin is used as the software used for flashing.From samfirmware.com keep the Odin guide and atleast one complete stock firmware handy.

This is the basic android root stuff a root beginner should know ,before jumping into Firmware install and Framework replacement .Will update as my knowledge updates .Please fell free  to add/comment .