[HD2 Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting and Genera] joshwake:
This forum desperately needs a glossary and FAQ. I am willing to maintain it if people would like to submit entries. As a noob to these forums I would have liked descriptions/definitions of things like HSPL, SOD, etc. Please post definitions etc with pertinent links for additional info and downloads etc. I will post them word for word and organize them in the first few posts here. Try to keep it fairly basic, I don't want a huge post that people wont want to go through. Thanks in advance.

Thanks to Huggs for so much input.

Glossary

BSOD- Black Screen of Death. Unresponsive operating system gui, but often bootloader can still be accessed

Bootloader- This is the screen you will see when you hold down your volume down button while booting.

It is characterized by a few colored bands filling up your screen, and the basic information about your phone such as ROM version, Radio, SPL version. This screen is the graphical part of your SPL.

Cold Boot- Turning your phone on when it is all the way off (not sleep mode)

GUI- Graphical User Interface (as opposed to controlling the Operating System and its programs from the command line)

Hard Reset- Resetting your phone back to factory settings. Sometimes, when you modify the operating system and interface of your device, it messes things up and the only way to set things right is to do a hard reset (HR).

To do a hard reset, turn your phone all the way off, and then turn it back on while holding down both volume buttons.

Then instructions will appear on your phone's screen to either complete the hard reset, or not to.

HSPL- Hard SPL, A custom SPL/bootloader which allows the flashing of custom built (AWESOME!!!) ROMS

Kernel- You will see this term a lot in the Android sub-forum, the kernel is like a middle-man between the operating system and your phone's hardware. When you open an application, your phone requires hardware resources such as RAM, processor to process your request to open the app, screen to display it, audio circuitry for sound, etc.

The kernel is responsible for processing these hardware needs, and deciding how to allocate them to certain apps/functions of your phone in order to make it run as smoothly as possible. The kernel is responsible for much more than what I have mentioned here, such as power management, but for all intents and purposes, just think of it as a middle man between hardware and software, like a gatekeeper of resources.

NAND- The portion of your phone's internal memory where the ROM is flashed to and stored i.e 'flash memory', 'ROM memory'

Radio- This is the software that controls how your phone communicates with the cel towers in your area. It is stored in your phone's NAND memory, but in a separate part from where your ROM is stored, this is why Radio and ROM can be flashed separately. The reason that different radios work well for some folks and other radios work well for other folks, is because the we are all accessing different cell towers from different distances, strengths etc, and some people do not have 3g available all the time, or at all. Radios affect battery usage for the same reason, if you are 5 miles from the tower, then a radio optimized for better long-distance reception will be better for you than one that is made for fastest 3g data transfer, like for someone who lives in a big city as compared to a rural farm dweller. So DON'T ASK WHICH RADIO WILL BE BEST FOR YOU!!! Sorry folks, it's just a matter of trial and error, and preference.

RAM- R.andom A.ccess M.emory, also known as 'volatile memory'. This type of memory is what your phone uses as a 'workspace' to temporarily store and process data. Think of storage memory as a bookshelf. When you click an icon, or type something, or change wallpapers, whatever you do, the phone takes information from storage memory and loads it to RAM and processes it in whatever way it needs to. If storage memory is a bookshelf, then RAM memory is like a workbench. Your phone could live without it, but its work would be much much slower, like if you tried to rebuild the carburetor from your Harley without a workbench. You could do it, but it would take you 10 years

ROM- 'R.ead O.nly M.emory is what the three letters stand for, but for all intents and purposes on this website, a ROM is what you flash to your ROM (NAND) memory. A ROM contains all the files that make up your operating system which loads/runs from the phone's internal memory (for now Android only loads from the SD card, this is why the Android builds are referred to as 'builds', and not ROMs, though some folks mistakenly call them ROMs from time to time)

Registry- The registry is like a set of 'switches' and settings within Windows. The Windows mobile operating system is built to run on a number of different phones. And not even just phones. A lot of the satellite communication devices (nicknamed quallcomm's by truckers) in semi trucks actually run on Windows CE for example. So you can see how you would need one set of settings for one device, a different set for another. In order to not have to re-write Windows CE every time it needs to be installed in a different device, some of the most common behind-the-scenes settings changes are thrown together in the registry, and then the registry is set up for the device it is to be used in before the operating system is loaded onto the device. That's why it's so popular to tweak registry settings, you can change things like how much memory is allocated to certain apps, or how loud the speakers are able to go, etc. Just be careful changing registry settings, it may result in you having to perform a hard reset if you mess some certain things up.

SOD- Sleep of Death, a somewhat common problem in the older Android builds, much less common in the new builds using the newer kernels. Requires hard reset. Fixes that may work include updating to a different radio or changing/formatting your SD card.

Soft Reset- A soft reset simply means turning your phone all the way off (not sleep mode) and then turning it back on.

There are many apps available which will soft reset your phone for you, which is simpler and faster than holding the power button, choosing 'power off', then turning your phone back on.

Soft resetting is an important and necessary part of modding your phone, alot of the things you do to your phone (like registry changes) will not take effect until you soft reset (SR) your phone.

SPL- S.econd P.rogram L.oader, This is what it stands for, also known as the phone's bootloader. This is what loads the phone's operating system into RAM memory and initialises the phone's operating system upon a cold boot.

TMOUS- T-Mobile United States

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FAQ

I have a HD2 on T-mobile US that I recently got, do I need to put on HSPL before loading one of the Android builds?

It seems that many with some of the more recent HD2s in the U.S. are able to load Android builds without loading HSPL and updating the Radio (including myself!). If your radio version is 2.8 or higher you should be good to go. Just load the Android files to the root of your SD card and run CLRCAD then HARET while in Windows mobile.

It wont allow me to install _______ application in Android (common with Angry Birds), What's wrong?

Try un-mounting your SD card, install the app, then remount your SD card. This usually works. To unmount/remount go into settings/SD card and phone storage/unmount SD card.