[wplug] OT cell phone help -- other more on-topic cellphone question

Justin Smith justin at adminix.net
Fri May 16 23:59:32 EDT 2014


Have you looked through the Galaxy S4 forums on XDA-Developers? If 
you've already gone through there, check out Rootzwiki. It occasionally has 
stuff that XDA doesn't.

If you're that interested in tinkering with your phone, you shouldn't be on 
Verizon. Big Red is the worst company in the industry when it comes to 
locking down phones, and as a CDMA-based carrier, you can't just pick up 
an out-of-the-box unlocked phone the way you can with AT&T or T-Mobile, 
which are GSM-based carriers. Samsung's "Knox" features, from what I've 
heard, further complicate third-party development.

The best solution would be to switch to T-Mobile - have them pay your 
early termination fees, if you've got any - and pick up an unlocked Nexus 
device straight from Google Play. T-Mobile's new plans are awesome, and 
there is nothing, and I mean /nothing/, that compares to the Nexus 
development community.

If you're still having trouble sorting through all the S4 information out 
there, let me know, and I'll see what I can do what I can to help.

-- 
*Justin Smith*
GNU/Linux System Administrator

/"Any fool can use a computer. Many do."/


> Along the lines of cellphones, I have a moe applicable question.  Does
> anyone have a safe, (sourcecode available) root hack for the Verizon
> version of the Galaxy S4 running the kitkat 4.4.2 android release?
> 
> I got my Galaxy S4 expecting that it would be unlocked and that I could 
swap
> the sim card and use it on competitors networks.  I find that Verizon has
> locked down the bootloader and I'm not able to find any legitimate root
> exploits for the latest android OS release.
> 
> This crap of not being able to have root access on android phones is
> unnacceptable.  I need to be able to selectively manage permissions of
> installed apps, and to rip the guts out of the bloatware that verizon
> installs on the phones.  All owners of these phones SHOULD have that 
right!
> 
> Since android uses the linux kernel it's somewhat on-topic.


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