Messages

1

Astro Slide - Android / Re: Cryptomator doesn't recognize fingerprint support

« on: December 19, 2022, 04:57:53 am »

Yeah, some apps work with fingerprint support (e.g. Postbank banking app) and some other don't (keepass2android, Paypal).

2

Astro Slide - Android / Re: Mobile connection flipping

« on: December 19, 2022, 04:56:33 am »

I have (almost) the same bug, also on "Telekom.de". I've contacted support at hello@planetcom.co.uk (which you definitely should do as well) and they've asked me to set "preferred network type" to 4G to see if it helps and it didn't make a difference at all.

Also I see no difference between first and second sim card slot. I'm waiting for the next instructions from support right now.

3

Astro Slide - Android / Re: Deejoy-Dota

« on: December 13, 2022, 02:57:22 am »

The permanent notification goes away after a while.

There's a deejoy-dota app accessible from settings -> about phone If you scroll down you can tap on "Deejoy-Dota" (above the build number).

Tapping on it shows "current version: Astro-11.0-Planet-05182022-V01.<20220518_0840> and you have a "test and update" button below it which does some kind of network request proabably.

Might provide screenshot if I find the time but an analysis of the network requests would be more interesting and I won't have time for that.

Lets hope the backdoor isn't as bad as the last time. 

(Edit: Zarhan on the chat found a japanese tweet about it: https://twitter.com/kana_fai/status/1539603725287051265 but it's only a user wondering (according to automatic translation).)

4

Astro Slide - Android / Re: Deejoy-Dota

« on: December 12, 2022, 08:50:04 am »

I just got my Astro (german keyboard) and got exactly the same... Pre-Installed in chinese and a deejay-dota notification after I've set the language to german and rebooted.

Also done a factory reset, but after that the "Deejoy-Dota" App is still installed.

It looks like it's related to system updates, but it's annoying that the notification can't be muted or turned off.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

5

Cosmo Communicator - Hardware / Re: Rooting the Cosmo Communicator

« on: January 15, 2022, 11:21:41 am »

I've just stopped following this topic since I've been using the official planet procedure for rooting and I suggest everybody to do the same.

Instructions for upgrading magisk are in a different thread, which I'm still following.

6

General Discussion / Re: gdisk2scatter.py - A python program to generate a scatter file from gdisk -l

« on: July 17, 2021, 05:10:16 am »

Ok, now I've tried to read back the data from my beat up Cosmo and trying to flash it to the spare device turned up a couple of bugs:

 - The preloader length is too short. I took that from the wrong example scatter file. It must be doubled. After flashing that, I got a recoverable brick. Recoverable by reading back the preloader with the correct length and flashing that.
 - The order of partitions is wrong. SP Flash tool orders them by start address, and the tool uses the order of partitions in the GPT partition table. This is relevant because after read back, you will end up with a bunch of files called ROM_0, ROM_1... the numbers will not match the partition index in the scatter file but the order of start addresses.
- the  preloader file name suggests a certain version number, but there are clearly some very different preloader versions around and I don't know how to figure out the version. Maybe with a hexdump...
- The otp and flashinfo can't be flashed the way they are dumped, SP Flashtool complains they are incorrect. Maybe the length is too short here as well. I also don't know what purpose they serve and if they should be flashed at all.
- sgpt will not be read back from the scatter file, SP Flashtool ignores it.

In order to use the scatter file for reading back, a value in options.ini needs to be changed, read back from scatter true or something. (Need to recheck once my laptop is available again, as it's currently busy trying to flash the spare device.)

And of course flashing is only possible with an unlocked bootloader.

I'll possibly continue with a post in the Cosmo forum about how to do a complete backup for restoring on a different device, if I am successful (currently flashing my userdata, which takes quite a while with a 128G dumpfile)...

7

General Discussion / gdisk2scatter.py - A python program to generate a scatter file from gdisk -l

« on: July 05, 2021, 02:26:59 pm »

Hi!

The attached file

gdisk2scatter.py

will convert the output of gdisk -l (which you can get in termux via `tsu; gdisk -l /dev/block/mmcblk0` into a scatter file which can be used in SP Flashtool for MTK based chipsets (Planet Computers devices).

It comes with absolutely no warranty of any kind.

There are some partitions which are not listed in gdisk -l which I copied verbatim from my Cosmo Communicator.

I'd be interested how this compares with a known good scatter file, e.g. as generated by the scatter file generator for the Gemini PDA.

My intended usage is to use this to take a complete dump of my Cosmo and restore it on a spare device,  however you'd be mad to attempt this with a different device without thoroughly checking the file and actually knowing what you're doing. (If you're lucky, SP flashtool might refuse to flash the data.)

It's not my fault if you brick your device.

All partitions are marked as "is_download: true" so you can dump them, but that doesn't mean that they should be flashed ("Download tab").

I'd be interested in your feedback.

P.S.: I forgot: It works like your regular unix command... If you don't give any arguments, it reads from stdin and writes to stdout, otherwise the first argument is the file to be read and the second will be the file to write (which will be truncated).

Edit: I got the terminology wrong, read back pulls the data from the device and "Download" means to flash. More in my reply.

8

Cosmo Communicator - Hardware / Re: squeeky hinges

« on: November 13, 2020, 01:22:54 pm »

No squeeking here, even after a couple of months of use. But I know WD-40 usually helps against squeeking, so you might want to try a little bit of that.

Yes! A very little drop of WD-40, put into middle hinges with a tip of a small screwdriver. Squeeking is history.

  I would rather recommend CRC 5-56. Just as long as you don't use silicone spray.

Thanks for the tip with the oil. I just got rid of a very bad squeak with Caramba (a silione free oil).

9

Cosmo Communicator - Android / Re: How to update Magisk on rooted Android from Planet

« on: October 04, 2020, 07:52:18 am »

Is there some specific reason why I'd want to upgrade? Any new killer feature?

I mean, Magisk is a component that is somewhere very deep in the OS. As such, I'd prefer to run the most stable possible version available. For a daily driver, running beta stuff on OS level sounds like asking for trouble...

Sure. The procedure I outlined will work for the next stable release as well.

As for your question: I guess not. See changelog: https://topjohnwu.github.io/Magisk/changes.html

10

Cosmo Communicator - Android / How to update Magisk on rooted Android from Planet

« on: October 04, 2020, 05:55:42 am »

Yesterday a new version of Magisk became available on the Beta Channel (21.0).

As with the Gemini the direct update method will fail, but fortunately the custom os installer on the sd card from planet gives us a method to upgrade on the device.

I had success with the following steps yesterday:

1.) I started termux and got root with tsu. Obviously this requires that you are booted into rooted android. Then I checked the partition table with gdisk -l /dev/block/mmcblkp0 and noted that the boot partition is number 30. I think this is identical if you partioned in the custom os installer. So the command to dump the unrooted boot partition is:

dd if= /dev/block/mmcblk0p30 of=boot-original.img

2.) Start magisk, Tap on "Install" for the new magisk version, and under "method" choose "patch file".

3.) Create a backup of the rooted boot image from planet, if something fails you can use that to restore the old version.

4.) copy the magisk-patched.img file to the original filename of the rooted boot image from planet. The filename is "root-boot.img".

5.) Boot to recovery and launch the custom os installer then install "rooted android" to the correct partition.

After the next reboot to the rooted android you should see the updated version in magisk manager. (I would post a screenshot, but attachments are disabled at the moment.)

Have fun!

11

Cosmo Communicator - General Discussion / Re: Camera

« on: September 20, 2020, 05:52:47 am »

Hi!

I've tried to download your gcam mod but a new browser tab opens (chrome on android) and closes again and nothing is downloaded.

It's a strange browser issue. I had the same issue with Vivaldi, but not with Yandex. Not sure where the problem lies.

Ah, thanks for that hint. It works if I copy the url, open  a new tab and then paste.

12

Cosmo Communicator - General Discussion / Re: Camera

« on: September 19, 2020, 01:51:06 pm »

Hi!

I've tried to download your gcam mod but a new browser tab opens (chrome on android) and closes again and nothing is downloaded.

This was intended for use with Termux from the Play Store.  However, this step is no longer required, as I released an updated .apk on September 7th that solves the crop and overexposure problems: https://www.oesf.org/forum/index.php?topic=35912.msg296708#msg296708

Saving as RAW in GCam is now purely optional since the JPEGs are fully usable.

13

Cosmo Communicator - General Discussion / Observation about SP Flash Tool scatter files

« on: September 16, 2020, 08:50:20 am »

I don't know if it's plain obvious but I just noticed today that scatter files can be simply parsed as yaml (e.g. from python).

Code: [Select]

>>> import yaml
>>> with open('Cosmo_MT6771_Android_full_stock_edited_scatter.txt') as f:
...   obj = yaml.load(f)
...
>>> type(obj)
<class 'list'>
>>> obj[0]
{'general': 'MTK_PLATFORM_CFG', 'info': [{'block_size': 131072, 'platform': 'MT6771', 'project': 'k71v1_64_bsp', 'storage': 'EMMC', 'config_version': 'V1.1.2', 'boot_channel': 'MSDC_0'}]}                                           
>>> obj[1]                                                                                                                                                                                                                             
{'type': 'SV5_BL_BIN', 'boundary_check': True, 'partition_index': 'SYS0', 'storage': 'HW_STORAGE_EMMC', 'is_upgradable': True, 'physical_start_addr': 0, 'linear_start_addr': 0, 'reserve': 0, 'region': 'EMMC_BOOT_1', 'partition_size': 1048576, 'partition_name': 'preloader', 'is_download': True, 'operation_type': 'BOOTLOADERS', 'empty_boot_needed': False, 'is_reserved': False, 'file_name': 'preloader_k71v1_64_bsp.bin'}

As you can see, the return value is a list and the order is identical to the order in the file. I don't know if the general section is always first and followed by the partitions.

I've been meaning to write a small python script that can rename the readback dumps automatically (by matching the `partition_index` to the last part of the `ROM_<nn>` filename). Maybe I'll get around to that at some point.

This is probably valid for all MTK devices, not just from Planet Computers.

14

Cosmo Communicator - Hardware / Rooting the Cosmo Communicator

« on: February 07, 2020, 04:25:22 am »

I'd like to add that it's possible to do a full backup (make sure to include *every* partition from my scatter file) unlock the bootloader, backup seccfg again and then flash your complete backup and replace the boot img with the rooted one and the seccfg with the unlocked file. This way you can unlock and root without losing any data.

In theory it should even be possible to reflash your userdate after repartitioning this way, but I'm not sure which partitions beside userdata you need to reflash in order to be able to decrypt your userdata successfully. (Can't test at the moment, my Cosmo is in London since December for repairs.)

- When starting to root the phone you need to unlock the bootloader. This will wipe all data. However, this is the only situation where data wipe is required - afterwards my data will stay even if I change to different firmwares.  Correct?

Correct.  You need to unlock the bootloader only once, and that is the only action that will wipe your data.  Best to do it early!  

- One thing that troubles me is that how can I get the system to remain rooted when new firmware versions arrive. The problem is that I don't want to unroot, relock bootloader (wipe data), upgrade, lock bootloader (wipe data), and root.

OTA updates don't care if your bootloader is unlocked.  If the OTA requires the untouched boot.img, you can flash the unrooted image back, apply the OTA, flash the new rooted boot.img, and be back to rooted.  You won't be touching the bootloader at all in this process, and your data are safe.

=> If there are prebuilt rooted images (either by the Community or planet), I can just apply a new FW directly. E.g. if I had a rooted V16, I could just install Ninji's rooted V19 and device would stay rooted, no data loss?

Correct, as long as you started with your bootloader already unlocked.

Essentially: If I don't want to lose my data at every OTA upgrade, do I need to always wait for community or Planet to publish pre-rooted images?

Nope, you can certainly follow the method of using SP Flash Tool or equivalent to extract the new boot.img, patch it in unrooted Cosmo userland with Magisk Manager, and then flash it back with SP Flash Tool.  Again, as long as you've got your bootloader unlocked, your data are fine.  (Although obviously when doing any of this stuff, it's a good idea to have backups.)

15

Cosmo Communicator - Android / TWRP in boot 2 partition ( empty_recovery_boot_2 )

« on: January 30, 2020, 03:24:24 pm »

I was talking about the android boot image, which must go in the first boot partition. I understand the confusion, because the thread is about twrp. I don't know where that should be flashed.