[Xposed Framework Modules] FoferX:
Great discussion mdamaged and trjlive, I really appreciate you explaining this so patiently. I'm learning a lot very quickly. It's one thing for an OTA update to fail in its attempt, but it's another if that failed attempt actually renders my device unbootable. I think I'd rather play it safe, and just do the update manually via WugFresh regardless. Otherwise, how could I possibly know ahead of time if it's "safe" or not? I'd like to keep things working in a way that isn't too complicated for me to have to fix.

All that said, part of me regrets not doing the Bootloader unlock ahead of time when I still had the chance. I have spent the better part of a 5 days setting up this new device just right with all my tweaks, customizations, apps installed and icon/folder/widget placement. As far as I understand, unlocking the bootloader wipes the device and I'd have to start over. So I guess I have two last questions before ending this sidetrack:

1) If I never intent to change my ROM from the stock Android that came with this Nexus, only adding root tweaks, is there any benefit to unlocking the bootloader? What else could I possibly do with that? Once it's done, are there any downsides to having it?

2) Even if I don't unlock the bootloader after all, I'd like to make a backup that is as thorough as what I've come to appreciate in iOS (via iCloud backup, and PKGBackup for Jailbreak tweaks.) Just in case this device dies or get lost, I'd want to be able to replicate its setup easily. So what would be the best way to take an efficient backup of my current setup, so I could restore in the event of a problem or replacement? Without having to re-do all of my setup, tweaks, icon placement, folders, etc.? I ask because when I installed Google Now Launcher on this replacement Nexus, it *offered* to restore from my backup, and it automatically downloaded most (but not all) apps I'd had before, but it didn't restore my icon/folder/widget placement and I basically had to set the whole thing up again. I really don't want to have to go through that again. My device is set up just the way I like it, after many hours over many days of work., so I want to save that configuration. Is the answer to use Titanium Backup? Or something else, like Helium? And can it backup just the list of apps, along with my prefs and settings, so it can re-download the apps and big magazines from the Store? I don't want to have a huge backup archive if that's not necessary. The Titanium Backup UI is confusing to me. Seems like that wants to save to a directory on the device and then sync that to Dropbox? Is there a way to save it straight to Dropbox? And even then, just save my user-specific preferences, documents, settings and customizations?

Hopefully I'm making sense, sorry for all the questions, and thank you again. :fingers-crossed:

---------- Post added at 08:40 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:28 PM ----------

Back on track discussing Gravity Box:

That's super cool! Now that I have the recovery reboot working, and I've learned the bootloader reboot works too, I'm happy to have those menu items, so I won't be making any changes to the open-source software ;)

I would like to have more than just two Quick App tiles in the QuickSettings panel though and the developer said that was an easy enough tweak. Fingers crossed that gets added in a future release (really, 3-5 available slots would be awesome, I don't really want to add a whole separate Application Launcher shortcut) but if not, it's good to know the option exists for me to add those additional Quick App tiles myself. I'd have to learn a LOT more before taking on that challenge, of course. :cool: