[AT&T, Rogers, Bell, Telus Samsung Galaxy S III] PeterGuru:
I really want to scream ...

Okay, this whole decompiling and re-compiling is driving me crazy. Oh, how I loved the days before when all you needed to do was modify an image, drop it back in the directory, rename the zip to apk, then reflash. It always worked before, but now it doesn’t. True, it still works reasonably well with the SystemUI file, but not at all with the framework-res file.

I’ve tried two programs now, apkTool and just recently, APK Manager. APK Manager appears to be an easier program, but I’m still getting error messages. I really don’t want to go back to apkTool because I had hoards of error messages, many of which I didn’t understand. I just got too frustrated and gave up.

Here’s what I’ve been doing with APK Manager. Along with a number of folders, there’s also the main script.bat file. I double-click on script.bat and it opens what appears to be a type of Command screen with an array of selections. Here’s that screen:

First, I put the SystemUI.apk file from the latest release of DIET ICS, into a folder called place-apk-here-for-modding. Then I select Option 9 from the list (Decompile apk).

Here’s an image of the screen after I make that selection:

As you can see, there’s already an error message, telling me to check the log (Option 21), so I press any key to have a look. Here’s the error:

I continue anyway.

At this point, within the projects folder, there’s now a sub-folder called SystemUI.apk. Inside SystemUI.apk are two folders. One is called res (this one I understand), and one is called smali.

I can go into the res folder and modify images within several of the sub-folders, where applicable to the new theme.

If I want to remove the AM/PM from the status bar clock, I go into smali/com/android/systemui/statusbar/policy/clock.smali and change line 38 to const/4 v0, 0x2

To change the colour of the status bar clock, I go into res/values/styles.xml and change line 22 to FF31B6E7 (ICS Blue or approximate)

All this is well and good. I change the icons, where appropriate, and make the changes to the two clock files.

However, now the problem begins.

Now, if I want to compile the new SystemUI.apk, I go back to APK Manager and select Option 11. Here’s an image:

As you can see, another error message pops up.

If I press any key and continue, here’s what I get:

It asks me if it’s a system file, so I press “y” for yes. It then tells me, “Aside from the signatures, would you like to copy over any additional files that you didn’t modify from the original apk in order to ensure least # of errors (y/n).” I press “y” because, when I press “n”, everything stops.

So, after I press “y,” the program goes through a very large list of files, performing whatever it is that it does, and then I get the following screen:

First it says that everything is OK

Then it says, “In the apk manager folder u’ll find a keep folder. Within it, delete everything you have modified and leave files that you haven’t. If you have modified any xml, then delete resources.arsc from that folder as well. Once done then press enter on this script.”

So, I do what it says. I go into the keep folder and delete the four image directories where I made changes in the projects/systemui directory. I also delete resources.arsc because, in the projects/systemui directory, I did make changes to two xml files.

Once I’ve deleted all this stuff from the keep folder, I then press any key. I end up with a file called unsignedSystemUI.apk in the same place where I first placed the original SystemUI.apk. I’m assuming this new file is the modified version, but it’s not.

If I extract files from the unsigned version, all four of the folders I deleted from the file within the keep folder are not there, and there’s no resource.arsc file … and I know this file is needed.

What on earth am I doing wrong? I’ve tried various ways to amend the unsigned version to include the missing folders, etc, and then flashed, but none work. When I can get it to flash, the clock is still in grey, and the AM/PM indicators are still there. True, many of the image files are now correct, but not all.

HELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLP!

Peter

P.S. If I could only get this to work, my goodness, I could churn out themes by the dozens. :)