- Aug 4, 2010
- 1,505
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Update on 19 October 2010:
Exciting news. Reported being able to run Android Mate and the standard Launcher as his home screen. That mean's the Black PDN is officially hacked. Now, we just have to fine tune things and figure out what will run on this guy and optimize it. And some of you said it couldn't be done. Alpha 5 has two launchers removed that crashed. I believe ADB access is enabled now but I need someone to confirm this. I am hacking the firmware but don't have my own Black PDN to test builds on. If I did things would be moving along at a much faster pace.
Edited on 17 October 2010:
We are very close the getting the Black PDN hacked. It would go faster if I had one myself for testing. I have to wait for people to download it and try it out. We have achieved installing an alternate launcher but it forced closed. The new version has the stock launcher from the Android 1.5 OS from the SDK's emulator. Hopefully, this one should work. I also included an older version of PandaHome (not sure if it will work or not), Dropbox and appInsaller. Soon the Black PDN will be another toy for us to mod to our hearts' content.
Original Post from 14 October 2010:
Okay, I have an idea. I used 7-Zip to go inside the polaris_update.dat ROM update. I added a Cupcake compatible launcher to the /system/app/ directory. The /data/ folder was empty so I added an /app/ folder and put the apk files for appInstaller and Dropbox (I don't know if they will work on Cupcake but worth a try). I then modified the MD5 checksum for the tar.gz package that contains these files. So if this works, you run this like a regular Black PDN update and when it reboots you will have an alternate launcher and you should be asked which launcher you want to use. Also, if appInstaller and Dropbox work there will be two additional pathways to install programs. If this works this will be the real beginning of hacking the Black PDN. Once someone confirms we can get to an alternate launcher screen everything opens up. If needed, I can make another file that adds a different browser. The build already has a native package installer so hopefully this works.
I don't think this file will hurt your BPDN. I just added some programs and updated the checksum to validate the file. I didn't touch the boot, recovery or kernel images in any way. I hope someone with a Black PDN will try to flash this update and see if it works. If I had one I would definitely try it myself.
Newest firmware attempt released on 19 October 2010.
Download link: Black PDN Modified Firmware v. 0.5 (Alpha)
MD5: f93ed1e60ae6a964ec3154f50fbf9460
Note: After rebooting when selecting the launcher do not make it the default launcher until trying it first to make sure it will run without force closing. Once you have confirmed the launcher will run you can make it default the next time you reboot, or install HomeSwitcher and select it as default. If you make it the default and it forces closes you will have no way to undo without reflashing the device.
