yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[HD2 General] oldmanofskye:
Fair point about WM7 not being as mature as iOS, but the simple fact is, that it's not 2007 anymore. MS doesn't have 4 years to bring its system up to date, coz Apple and Google are not going to stand still and wait for them. And looking at the speed MS is relasing the updates - it might be not 4 years, but unfortunately a lot longer.

As for your question about the need for customization, just listen to this: I've bought myself a Htc Desire HD, and as you probably know it takes quite a while for the manufactures to update its handsets to the latest versions of Android. But thanks to Rom developers my phone is running the latest system, with a lot customizations and tweaks, minus all the bloatware. In effect battery life is exceptionally better, the mobile is so much faster, and everything just works.

Never the less, the best thing out of all of that, is the choice we got from competition - so lets hope Android, iOS and WM7 will all prevail, because at the end of the day, as we're all different, the more choice we've got - the better for all of us.
[HD2 General] An0n1mUs:
I have 2 reasons why WP7 isnt good for me.

1. Battery life. I havent tested the NoDo update, but the ROM I tested could barely hold one day of moderate usage.

2. Live services. Microsoft doesnt have a good partner in my country, so i cant get an activation code for the Marketplace, so the phone is mostly useless to me.

However, if any of you is willing to call MS in their country and get me and activation code, I would give a shot to this OS and eternal gratitude to the person which gets me the code. :D
[HD2 General] lolkoz:
+1 I got your point. But the thing is, that WP is just good out of the box, with this OS there is no need to tweak or customize anything, coz it works perfectly fast and looks beautiful. Maybe my requirements for a good OS are kinda low, but this OS has everything I was looking for. I use my phone primarily for calling/texting and occasionally music/movies while traveling. All I am saying is, that WP7 is perfectly suited for an average user. Every OS has its own spell and every OS is suited for somebody else. Thank god for our HD2s that are giving us ability to use which one we like the most.
[HD2 General] lude219:
Yea, things simply work when there's not much there in the first place. It's like saying how a toddler's tricycle "simply works" compare to an advanced automobile with powerful computers/ECU and a crapload of mechanical parts. Both is a viable mode of transportation, but guess which one I'm favoring for?
[HD2 General] Kailkti:
As said some people want something more than something that just works. Even if it works great. People want to explore, try out, maybe do the impossible. Look at it like this, if it weren't for the tweaking/customizing/hacking, WP7, let alone android, would never have reached our HD2's. But as said again you only want something that works, and its your opinion, and that's good. But cuz of the hacking and modding you found the next type of phone you want to get next, a WP7 phone.

I'm not saying you should go on tweaking or customizing or whatever, just don't go around and say, "But seriously, what is all the tweaking and customizing for? If you want to play, just go out and buy a PSP or something, this is a phone which is supposed to work fast, and do what you need it to." cuz it makes you sound as if you aren't grateful at all, and that you're sounding like verizon/motorola, use it as it is, which we tweakers object to.

Note, again, hacking mobile phones/devices came long before the PSP even came out., and that time, people enjoyed it also.
[HD2 General] treo...not!:
Hey OP, have you done alot of web browsing on WP7? It is absolutely painful: poor rendering, sloooow, and no flash! This reason alone is enough for many non-tech users to avoid WP7 for now. On Android we get almost the entire web rendered as it should be. In addition, Android just works, even ported on an HD2. Plus, you can use the OS as is or you can explore multiple layers of customization and hacking. It's the best of both worlds.
[HD2 General] jonny68:
Android is better in every respect than Windows 7 and iPhone, the facts speak for themselves people are turning to Android int he droves.
[HD2 General] Richy99:
2 days? it didnt last 30 minutes before i got rid of it off my phone
[HD2 General] reeg420:
I totally agree. Somewhere along the line windows mobile phones stopped being called pocket PC's. My first windows mobile phone was the PPC-6700 and had wm5... I remember being excited to be running wm6 on it.
[HD2 General] vicene:
in my opinion, the advantage of wp7 is not smoothness, stability, simpleness or anything else

It's the social networking. and this is the only reason I choose wp7

as a phone, what i need is communication. wp7 is trying to bring us back to 10 years ago when mobile phone is only mobile phone

for hacking, tweaking, I got my android tablet
[HD2 General] stevedebi:
I don't agree with you there. While I personally have no desire to use WP7, one of the biggest points it has is that is is very good at web browsing - which wasn't even possible 10 years ago (except for WAP). Also, social networking did not work on phones in 2001.
[HD2 General] Product F(RED):
I disagree with you also. If communication was at the top of your list, you need a Blackberry Bold, not WP7. Windows Phone 7, to me, is very nice, but it just seems like an iPhone for people who don't like iPhones.
[HD2 General] T-Macgnolia:
+100 here I totally agree with you.
[HD2 General] eenbox:
Bud, I am not trying to undermine what you wrote, but I think that excitement should be lowered down until you fully test the device. HD2 is not native Android nor WM7 and it runs both it seems good enough for daily use - BUT there are things that WM7 simply cannot go up to pair with Android...

Therefore I encourage that you keep us posted on how your WM7 is going along. I am currently on Android and not changing it until I see 2GHz CPU in devices :) with nice batteries... been using HD2 last year or so - and will continue until they provide me replacements under my warranty :)
[HD2 General] orangekid:
so for social networking you like the one OS with the absolute worst facebook app?
[HD2 General] vicene:
in WP7, we don't really need a facebook app

it's all in the people hub and picture hub.
[HD2 General] vicene:
I'm a guy who will never use iPhone

and the small screen and ugly design make me keep away from blackberry

that's why I choose wp7

what I mean by "trying to bring us back to 10 years ago" is the concept, which is " phone is only a phone, a tool for communication".

things like iPhone and android phone are try to make our mobile phone become a hand held computer.

one more thing, the browser in wp7 really sucks

worse than the android's one
[XPERIA X10 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] JohnnyBlack10:
Please for a little help! Can you tell me where is the text file on both the 'unlock' and 'sound on / off' sliders. On behalf of want to change the color of the text or remove it because it is poorly seen. Thank you very much!

I use cyanogen 6.1.3 on X10.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] nerozehl:
DISCLAIMER:

This is totally academic, and I only pose the question as that of mere curiosity.

In no way do I mean to accuse any developer here or elsewhere of intentionally or otherwise installing malicious software in our ROMs. Not trying to start a flame war or anything. :)

What is the possibility that a rogue ROM creator would or could install malicious content on one of our devices? What kind of things would we look for to indicate that our device may be compromised? Perhaps packet sniffing for the extra paranoid.

I am the type that, when I see something that doesn't look normal, I question it. That said, I am a very experience Linux, *BSD, and Solaris administrator; but my experience with Android is just blooming. So I might not know where to look in the Android filesystem, or know which processes may be irregular.

I did some Googling but haven't found anything to indicate this has happened before (thank God). Are there self-checks in Android to prevent this from happening? Call me paranoid, but I just like to know what's going on. :)

Do the "anti-virus" softwares in the App market actually help with this?

Again just curious. I heard about some apps on the Market that Google had to remotely erase. And I believe I am correct in understanding that Google isn't as restrictive with its applications as Apple.

Any takes on this?
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] ScoobarSTI:
Antivirus and Task killers all that are garbage and slow your phone down. You won't have to worry about that happening on this site.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] g00s3y:
It depends if he/she is an asshole...

The first "viruses" for android were because people were downloading paid apps on the internet, from some site in china, that had viri put into those apps that people were downloading.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] adrynalyne:
Just dont get on the bad side of a dev.

;)
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] nerozehl:
LOL! I'll make sure not to do that!

I know that task-killers are BS. I figured the anti-virus was a gimmick, too. As far as for self-replicating viruses on the phones I doubt that will occur.

I'm more worried about malware in the form of a sleeper-trojan that calls home with my personal phone information, or gets added to some jack-asses botnet for DDoSing.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] jmiller98:
That was a worry of mine when I first came to this site, but the dev's I download from I find quit professional. I have since just started to dig into roms trying to port them to the tb, and compare the contents and begin to see what is normally packed in the zip. I have never found a dev on this site attempt to introduce malware. I have seen some intro warz but the site immediately banned them. The site has banned devs for not giving credit were credit is due, and opening multiple accounts in a way to circumvent the system.

This site is great for all, and they do their best to keep everyone honest.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] 1454:
I've been here and ppcgeeks for nearly 3 and 1/2 years, both with winmo and android, and I have never had an issue. It seems that these sites really do the best they can to catch things before they happen. Personally, I can't say enough about our devs. They're great, and they do a good bit of work for people who are honestly not thankful enough to them. I personally don't think you will ever have an issue, as I haven't. And I download tons of stuff from here and other places.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] funkybside:
I think everyone is missing the OP's point. OP isn't asking if it's happning now or whether it's happening here.

Instead, the question concerns whether or not it's physicsally possible for malicious code to get executed after installing a custom ROM and/or kernel, assuming the developer of that ROM or Kernel was inclined to put some in there. Assuming it *is* possible, which I certainly believe it is, what if anything can be done by an experienced *NIX adminsitrator to be aware of it?

Is your only option to 'trust' the developer of the ROM or Kernel, or are there things we can do with a runnning android system to know how well the live code is behaving?
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] tekonus:
I've always been curious of this myself. I am no advanced Linux administrator (yet), just an aspiring IT student. I would think the best people to ask would be the developers themselves, though.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] g00s3y:
No one is missing the point, the op asked if it can happen in roms/kernels/etc. Roms/kernels/etc for the phone are distributed here, therefore he is asking if it can happen here or anywhere that devs create these things for our phones.

BTW an experienced Linux admin should already know how to check for these things ;)
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Morkai Almandragon:
Actually I believe it has happened at least twice. Once by accident, and once there may have been malicious code put into a rom that was set as bate for code thieves.

The first one was stupid, an update agent was left in the rom, and an update got pushed that loaded the phone browser to a certain site (it was not a bad site either). This effected a VERY minor few, as you had to have a certain version of a rom, and have rebooted over a very specific point in time.

The latter I will not go into as I do not know the specifics, or the validity of any of what happened.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] funkybside:
Sorry if my post offended you and no disrespect intended, but I think you are mistaken. The question of whether or not something "can happen" is fundamentally different from the question of whether or not anyone is actually doing it. Also, saying that any "experienced Linux admin should already know how to check for these things" is in poor taste; it's a personal attack that adds no value to the discussion. The idea here is to address the OPs question as a purely acedemic thought experiment; there is no implict reference to the morality of the developers here...

Perhaps we should ask the same question in a differnet way:

If net-sec researcher working at SANS wanted to test expolitation vectors against their own personal HTC Thunderbolt. Is it physically possible for them to build a custom ROM and/or Kernel such that this custom module includes malicious code that executes automatically after installed on the device?

I'd be highly surprised if anyone claims the answer is no. If the kernel itself is custom, anything the hardware can do is fair game...

Concerning the question of how to know if anything is happening, since we're talking about the firmware itself, it would be difficult to do anything in userspace with confidence. To be really sure, you'd likely need to sniff traffic (both mobile and wifi) as well as physically monitor the hardware's debug output (and perhaps even the circuit traces themselves). With a comprimized kernel, you can't trust anything running throuh the operating system's APIs.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] rajuabju:
It's very doubtful that any reputable developer on XDA would do this. Impossible? No. But XDA is the kind of place where something like this would be discovered very quickly and spread like wildfire.

Now, some unknown developer, on a random website? While I havent come across this yet, I'd say: More likely.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] funkybside:
The question isn't concerning the likelihood of it occuring on XDA or elsewhere, it's specifcally about whether or not it is technically possible to do it.

I think we can infrer from everyone who is answering the unrelated question, i.e. Is it happening on XDA or anywhere else?, that yes, it is possible to insert malicious code into a ROM or kernel.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Dnakaman:
I think you are right. As long as there is superuser access, then basically anyone with su can pretty much to anything to your phone.

At least that's my take on it.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] funkybside:
I'm new to android in general and XDA in particular, so please forgive my ignroance (and yes I will try searching), but this makes me wonder: Do the established developers of custom ROMs and Kernels release their source code? I'd imagine the same terms of the GPL that require HTC to release their source would also require anyone building custom Kernels to do the same. Is this also true for ROMs?
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] nerozehl:
I am an experienced *NIX administrator, and that's what makes me so paranoid. This kernel source isn't coming from a CVS tree that is being scrutinized by hundreds of developers, at least not to my knowledge.

I know how code can be injected into a kernel, into a module, pretty much anywhere. Should I run a diff on the kernel source tree to see what was changed? Could do that, but that may be time consuming. I've seen innocuous kernel modules altered to allow a gateway for elevating to UID 0 (and in fact, more often in Linux than in others.)

I'm pretty confident that the folks here on XDA aren't doing anything malicious: the following of these ROMs are too popular and very fluid, and I would expect something malicious to be found quickly.

Again this is just purely academic.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] funkybside:
Agreed that the liklihood of stuff here being questionable is low, but the simple fact that there is a non-zero risk certainly makes me think a little bit. You summed it up well and the examples are spot on - this is why I immediately wonderd if developers here are publishing the source code on their customized versions. Ignoring the GPL angle, its just good to know it's out there if it is, and by the same token, also good to know if it's not out there.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] gregdalfonso:
I have another question to add. I love miui, and to my understanding miui is made by Chinese developers and it is not open source, it is just translated and ported to our devices. If it is not open source, is there anyway to know for sure?

I am a little bit wary of the security, although I love the rom. I trust all of the credible devs on xda, however I don't know anything about the Chinese devs developing miui. Would the devs porting miui be able to see the malware if it isn't open source
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] javawolfpack:
It is definitely possible. I read a paper a while back that I've been referencing in my own research where some researchers compiled some kernel modules to do malicious tasks in the background without knowledge of the user, mind you this was on an open source linux based phone system similar to android. Basically compiled in root kits, which replacing your kernel/rom w/ a community developed system would result in possibilities of this occurring. The primary solution to preventing these things from ending up on your phone as well as keeping the Trojans and other malware on the android market come down to the same thing knowing your publisher and being careful what permissions you allow. Like stick to kernels/roms from reputable developers on XDA, and make sure your "movie player" doesn't have access to your SMS system and you'll be fine :)

Mind you my own research currently is in detection of malware/malicous code & anomalous behavior. As well as hopefully prevention techniques eventually.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] craighwk:
I too have wondered about this. I'd imagine there are enough devs who cross-check other devs work that if someone did try to do this, we'd find out about it pretty quickly.
[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Harryortho:
It has happened to my phone

Regarding being careful of ROMs that are bad- (NOT ONES HERE BUT through MALWARE- please place this reply in another thread if I have placed it in the wrong place, I have not seen any phone issues that I have been experiencing since searching google for this problem)

I unfortunately allowed my phone to install apps from unknown sources thinking the app was ok and then got root to work and then allowed more malicious code into my phone.... i disabled it and force stopped it, but the problem was i then logged on to an open wifi, this person then gave me an option to thank or not and then i did not realise and pressed back, not sure if this was why but then all porn and games and other rubbish started coming on my phone, when one app was being removed it began to shut the phone down to retry, I managed eventually after several failed attempts to catch the bugs with virus scans and remove some disable the ones buried in the system and remove cache where I could and force stop them. Unfortunately while trying to download more software to handle this with the bugged roots and being lazy by not charging my phone my anti-virus app on my phone requested to stop and uninstall an apk malicious trojan but at 1% my finger pressed the uninstall all too late and smack I get my phone charged up and it is loaded with a ROM or the text on the ROM has been completely deleted and there is not a way to observe any text from the android system, all apps that use this are just black, the buttons are in distorted shapes, the whole system is almost unusuable, I can take videos and pics and I cannot go online, many anti-virus programs do not recognise there is something wrong and even there they use the text in the phone so I don't know what I am typing, message me if you need pictures of what my phone screens look like.

Harry
[Android Software/Hacking General [Developers Only]] Horizonspace:
Hello there.

i have a nexus one from vodaphone and im sure you all know (ive only just found out) that the ROM on these devices has a problem installing updates to android and does not recieve OTA updates. i believe this is to do with vodaphone actually releasing these?

any who, i used the superoneclick Root application, worked like a charm.

so then i procede to download gingerbread rom but it does teh whole E: verification error.

so i search the internet a little and come across a post with a person with teh same problem, Fantastic i thought! i follow the steops but am cut at my first hurdle as it says i need to revert from teh Vodaphoen Rom to teh original google shipping rom, the problem is that i cant seem to download it, it never works and i dont know why the D/l is incredibly slow and sometimes never connects. this is from Shipped-roms.com

if any1 could assist me in reverting to the original shipping rom i can do teh rest and update to 2.3.3

Thanks for reading.

Horizon.
[Android Software/Hacking General [Developers Only]] SalsaForte:
Root your phone, then install rom manager recovery. With this, you will be able to flash any rom you want.
[Android Software/Hacking General [Developers Only]] Horizonspace:
ive installed the rom manager and installed the cyanogen room, how ever im still on 2.2.1 and the OTA wont update it just downloads then nothing happens. any idea?
[Android Software/Hacking General [Developers Only]] SalsaForte:
The OTA won't update automatically, you have to manually flash it. OTA will auto-update only from official version and authorized version. Anyway, why don't you flash CM7 RC4?
[Atrix 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] grncivic2001:
trying to root my phone everything is up to date no anti virus this is where it stops and doesnt go on:

SuperOneClick v1.7.0.0

Killing ADB Server...

OK

Starting ADB Server...

* daemon not running. starting it now on port 5037 *

* daemon started successfully *

OK

Waiting for device...

OK

Pushing psneuter...

851 KB/s (585731 bytes in 0.671s)

OK

chmod psneuter...

OK

Running psneuter...

this is where it stops tried different versions of super one click updated everything usb debugging on im confused? windows xp 32 bit
[Atrix 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Pirateghost:
stop using superoneclick for the ATRIX!

use aRoot. it can be found in the dev section.
[Atrix 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] grncivic2001:
thanks but aroot isnt working either
[Atrix 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dingleberry1:
Does your phone have the 1.5.7 update? It is not possible at this time to get root directly on this version. It is necessary to flash to the original version, root, take steps to retain, and re-apply the update. There is a thread in the developer forum with instructions.
[Atrix 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] hiteshkaushik:
i am having same problem with the samsung galaxy s2 can u help me?
[Atrix 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] mpalatsi:
Please go to your own Sub-Forum Samsung Galaxy S II 19100
[Atrix 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] deziguy420:
don't use Superoneclick...use gingerbreak..

here is a link..http://briefmobile.com/motorola-atrix-4g-root

or use this method...

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1046626
[Droid Incredible Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] KB3MMX:
NooB question here..

My Nandroid backup of the stock ROM has my ringtones for my contacts all mixed up when I restored it, what might have caused this ??

Is there a way to keep it from happening again?

I'm using CWM 3.0.0.7 recovery currently ..

Thanks !