The Android experience II

After being upset a while, I’ve started to play with the 551 and I started to like it more and more.
I decided to start the fight against the preinstalled useless apps.

I’ve asked google and found a bunch of “useful” tips how to uninstall apps, followed by apps which could do this easily for me.

All crap!

Deleting the apk-files seems the best way to me. Apk-files are stored (in android) under /system/app. But how to get there, the “my files” app does not work properly. No problem as an (advanced) linux user I thought … aren’t there any apps like a shell, a prompt, a terminal? Of course there are some, the best seems to be the Android Terminal Emulator. Installed, started … boom! Let’s start with some stuff. The QWERTZ slider works like a charm. The first thing I did was a

$ cd /system/app

followed by a

$ ls

I’ve found the apk-file for the app called “Mobilbox” which is in fact an app provided by Telekom, for Telekom customers. I’m not a Telekom customer, so I’ve tried to delete it:

$ rm Mobilbox* permission denied

AWWW … crap, but for sure, I’m not logged in as root, so:

$ su permission denied

DAMN, but I AM ROOT, I said to myself and tried to find a way into MY system. I’ve read a lot of tips, hacks and so on. This was all cool stuff, made by sick brains, but all that stuff didn’t fit to my system. I’ve stumbled over a page called xda-developers. They have a great forum and an even better thread. The SuperOneClick [developers page] application written in .NET. If you ask me, an application which is called SuperOneClick sounds like SuperOneCrap. But I was wrong. This awesome app provides a “Jailbreak” for nearly every Android build and nearly ever Android based device family.

You just need to install kies (WTF is kies I’ve asked myself) to get the USB-drivers for the 551. Kies is a windows application, SuperOneClick itself can be run under mono. I don’t like mono and was a little bit lazy to look for 551 drivers for linux. So I’ve just installed Kies and the SuperOneClick.

SuperOneClick is a simple form with 5 buttons, the most important is “root”. The device will be accessable within some minutes. Prior to this, nearly every AV software will warn you. This is not that big surprise. SimpleOneClick uses methods used by malware. A comment on the forum says:

Mod Edit: this app will set off some anti virus software…here’s a small explanation by pulser_g2:

rageagainstthecage is a root exploit via a fork bomb.

It IS a potentially malicious payload, BUT it is being used with owner’s consent to root the phone.

The DreamDroid malware use exactly same payload – they are trojans, but this is a helpful tool.

It IS a dangerous tool in the wrong hands, but this is a root exploit, so you should exercise common sense and a little understanding of what it does and how it works.

If you follow the instructions provided by this post, the device will be open within some minutes and the warranty is voided

One of the results is the opened system and an app called SuperUser. This app will watch the behaviour of other apps and asks the user if an app requests super user rights.

back on the terminal:

$ su

(SuperUser will interrupt this, get to the foreground and asks for confirmation. If you say yes, you will finally get a root-shell… YEAH!)

But first of all, we need to remount the /system mountpoint as RW, by typing this

# busybox mount -o rw,remount /system #

on our console.

# rm /system/app/Mobilbox* #

And the app is gone. Burn in hell!

Let me give you some advice: deleting the wrong app will harm your system. I guess only a reset to defaults will help … but might not. You have been warned.

Part III will deal with the remote access to the device using SSHDroid.