Version Alpha 0.6.0 is now available
I'm back! Not dead yet, I promise. This is actually a relatively small update in terms of user-facing features, with only one really big new thing - support for file uploading - but that's a lot bigger than it might sound. It's the first write support I've implemented in the server, and it also required some fairly massive updates to the HttpServer component (support for binary requests, for POST parameters, for MIME multipart parsing). These will be built upon in forthcoming versions to add support for things like registry editing, in-browser file viewing (possibly editing), and so on. There are also a large number of small fixes and improvements that I've made over the last two-weeks-shy-of-a-year, which should make the server faster, more robust, better able to support concurrent connections, and lighter on device resources. Finally, while the app still targets WP8.0 and should run on 8.0, it now is designed for 8.1 compatibility (especially the AllCapabilities version).
Previous update (0.5.6): This version is mostly bug fixes and UI changes. The biggest changes are: clearer display of weird registry data types, the server now consumes fewer threads (it used to spawn them with wild abandon) and does faster string compares, the app version is now shown on the phone, error pages are now better, if you launch the app without a WiFi IP address it'll offer to take you to the WiFi settings page, connections are no longer closed as soon as the app starts sending a response, and the server now defaults to using the Connection: keep-alive header, with a two-minute timeout. The last change, combined with the second-to-last, should hopefully both do away with the tendency to have the app fail to display a page. However, I shouldn't have *needed* to switch it to "keep-alive" - using "close" should have worked - but it still veeeery occasionally would kill the connection early. Agh. Anyhow, this is better in the meantime.
DevDB offers me a support / Q&A thread. Please use that thread to ask questions; don't PM me unless it needs to be kept private for some reason!
ISSUES ON WP8.1:
It *should* work to deploy the app with "Application Deployment", but if you have a problem try deploying with "Windows Phone Application Deployment 8.1" instead.
Problems have been reported in the past when the app is installed to the SD card. It's small, though; putting it on internal storage shouldn't be a problem.
RESOLVED The AllCapabilities version included a few capabilities that were present in 8.0 but removed in 8.1. Those capabilities have been removed; the AllCapabilities version now deploys and runs on capability-unlocked WP8.1 phones.
IN CASE OF OTHER ISSUES: Please provide a *detailed* error report - what phone and OS version you have, what hacks you've installed, what Webserver version you're running, what you do to get the error to occur, and exactly *what* occurs - and I'll fix it as soon as I can! There's a DevDB section for posting bug reports, and you can also use CodePlex if you want.
I finally implemented file upload! I'll work on getting more stuff like that (file delete, possibly file rename/move/copy, various registry edits), hopefully soon! I also hope to add support for different areas, like an "Applications" path, a "Processes" path, a "Services" path... eventually. Many of those are really hard without good privileges. I'm also looking at moving the server to a background process and making the app just a control UI for it, adding support for authentication and/or HTTPS, adding some stylesheets to the web UI, adding caching, and much more. I did finally implement Connection header support.
Once again, the XAP is published twice. One is a fairly standard XAP that any phone can sideload, and the second has many exotic capabilities to enable viewing of (and writing to) slightly more of the file system and registry. The standard XAP has had its list of capabilities expanded to pretty much all of them that can be used without interop-unlock. The high-capability variant requires not just interop-unlock, but the additional capability-unlock hack available in the interop-unlock thread. The AllCapabilities version now works with WP8.1; sorry for the long delay on that!
An item of note: the AllCapabilities version (or either version, on WP8.1) can open other drives in the file system. On phones with an SD card, it is mounted at D: and you can browse it as normal. Credit to @hjc4869 for this discovery!
DESCRIPTION: This is a simple webserver app which can enumerate those files that are in folders readable from the sandbox, can download and upload (access permitting) files, can browse the registry, and can display the contents of registry values of any type. It runs on WP8.x (not yet tested on W10M). It is a spiritual successor to the Functional Webserver / WebServer (Mango) projects from WP7. This version is still missing a lot of functionality as I decided to implement it from scratch, but it is advancing swiftly. Note that there's no access controls implemented; use it on a public network only at your own risk!
Instructions are simple: sideload the XAP, connect to WiFi (required), run the app (called "WebServer Native Access"), point a web browser (on a PC or phone that is also on that local network) to the URL that the app displays. You should get a basic index page. Click on a Filesystem or Registry link to begin browsing the phone. There's a textbox near the top of all filesystem pages, type in a path there (for example, "C:windows" with no quotes) and hit Enter or click Get Files. You'll see a list of the contents of that folder. Click on a file to download it or a directory to open it. There's also a box for uploading files, one at a time, to the current directory. Navigating the registry is similar, except you'll need to specify the registry hive and then the path from that hive (or no path, to access the root of the hive).
As of v0.6.0, uploading files is finally supported! Other modifications (editing files, creating, deleting, or changing registry keys or values) are currently not supported. They will be "soon" although my personal testing suggests that basically the whole registry, and most of the file system, is off-limits for writing unless you use restricted capabilities.
You might see an error code (error 5 is "ACCESS_DENIED", you'll see it a lot; I should replace it with an appropriate 403 or whatever). Or you might see a status 500 message because of an exception in the server. Or the server may just crash (hopefully not so often anymore...). I'm making it more resilient, but there are still bugs. Please report any previously-unreported issues you find, including how to reproduce them, and I'll fix them if possible.
Also feel free to request features or changes; I'll implement them if reasonably possible. The app is a mixture of C++ and C# code; I could probably have done it all in one or the other but wanted to have a C++ component in case I ran into something that wasn't available in C#, and although it probably would have saved some time, I decided that hacking up a web server in C++ was maybe not the best idea.
The source code is on Codeplex, at the following projects: https://wp8webserver.codeplex.com/ for the server and the app (C#) and https://wp8nativeaccess.codeplex.com/ for the native access wrappers (C++). You may have to fix up the reference paths to get the C# component to see the C++ component correctly. The code is reasonably well documented, but let me know if you have any questions. Permission to re-use the code or components is granted under the MS-PL (Microsoft Permissive License) as posted on Codeplex.
Go forth and find cool stuff!
Version history (see the git commit logs for more detail:
07 July 2013 - 0.2.0: Initial release, FS only, 920 downloads (source: 652 downloads)
14 July 2013 - 0.3.2: initial registry, HTTP server and web app encapsulation, source on Codeplex, 225 downloads
0.3.3: bugfixes, 454 downloads
0.4.2: basic registry values display, 86 downloads
0.4.3: bugfixes, 326 downloads
0.4.6: multistring registry values, bugfixes, updated libraries, first AllCapabilities version (950 downloads), 453 downloads
25 Oct 2013 - 0.4.8: binary and long registry values, formatting and bugfixes, 451 downloads AllCaps, 201 normal
22 Dec 2013 - 0.4.9: all registry value types, better threading, proper resume, remembers port, 97 downloads AllCaps, 53 normal
24 Dec 2013 - 0.5.0: background operation using Location APIs. Downloads: 1011 AllCaps, 963 Normal
20 Jul 2014 - 0.5.1: More capabilities, better navigation. Downloads: 358 AllCaps, 352 normal
07 Aug 2014 - 0.5.3: .REG export, better traversal, bugfixes. Downloads as of 0.5.5 release: 260 AllCaps, 164 normal
10 Oct 2014 - 0.5.5: Bugfixes and back-end work. Downloads as of 0.6.0 release: 140 AllCaps, 113 normal
25 Oct 2014 - 0.5.6: Bugfixes and UI tweaks. Downloads as of 0.6.0 release: 1720 AllCaps, 1334 normal
12 Oct 2015 - 0.6.0: Binary requests, file uploads, bugfixes.
XDA:DevDB Information
WebServer Native Access, Tool/Utility for the Windows Phone 8 General
Contributors
GoodDayToDie
Source Code: https://wp8webserver.codeplex.com/
Version Information
Status: Alpha
Created 2014-10-17
Last Updated 2015-10-12
I'm going to use this space to mention something that's pretty cool:
J. Arturo of http://www.komodosoft.net is using a modified version of the HTTP server that powers this app in the ShareFolder app (http://www.windowsphone.com/s?appid=e2b9c82e-eaa1-4a3b-9d4a-8a2933a8bdb4) to support opening video files directly from Windows network shares! This was done to work around a limitation of the WP8 media control: it can only source from an isolated storage file or a HTTP URL. By running a server in the background and streaming the video file through it, and pointing the video player control at the localhost URL, it becomes possible to play the file on the phone without first copying it to the app's isolated storage. A very cool way to solve the problem! Also, reviewing the changes that were made to the network code of the server pointed me toward those threading fixes I made that have hopefully much improved version 0.4.9.
Please note that the updated version of ShareFolder with this feature may not yet be available, although it should be soon. It is a commercial (paid) app, but the author sought and received permission to use my code (although the license does not require such permission be received).
What exactly is the problem with sockets? I am battling myself with sockets atm too, maybe we can share knowledge?
Strictly speaking, the problem was with the phone's limited subset of the Sockets API forcing me to access it through functions I wouldn't normally use (asynchronous everything, SocketAsyncEventArgs and lambdas and AutoResetEvents and so on everywhere...) but I've got a pretty good handle on it now, at least for the System.Net.Sockets.Socket and its friends. The new .NET 4.x ones (using the async keyword and all) are in a different namespace; I didn't mess with them. They are more abstracted from the Bekeley sockets interface that I'm used to from C, but they are also (supposedly) more user-friendly, especially if you don't feel like writing all your own thread management code (and in fairness, I should re-write the webserver's threading to use threadpools; they're better for this type of work).
If you want to ask questions about the topic, I suggest starting a new thread (possibly in the Q&A subforum, although it's also dev related...) and I'll answer if I can.
GoodDayToDie, just an idea: how about sharing your source code via CodePlex or GitHub?
Oh man, this is pretty nice! GoodDayToDie does it again!
So far, I can read \Windows, the current install folder which you access just by typing "." with no quotes and the current application folder by typing ".." I can access the .dlls, .winmd and AppManifest.xml from the current install, but from everywhere else, it goes boom. This is a great step towards something awesome though!
EDIT:
I was wrong. For some reason, when you click on a folder it's trying to "download" it, rather than chdir. I can get pretty far into the Windows directory.
THAT's what you meant by "Click on a file (note: there's no current way to tell the difference between files and folders) to download it.
You might see an error code (error 5 is "ACCESS_DENIED", you'll see it a lot). Or you might see a status 500 message because of an exception in the server. It's getting a lot more resilient but there are surely still some bugs. ".
If you see a folder, just type the full path to it instead of clicking on it and you will be able to read the contents.
ANOTHER EDIT:
I just found a file inside of the \Windows\System32 directory named [guid].devicemetadata-ms (It's easier to just search for "devicemetadata-ms"). It's a cab file with some metadata about WP8 with a sign.cat and packagesign.cat file in the archive. I don't know what these files could potentially be useful for.
New version in a day or two (busy tonight). Features I plan to implement (not necessarily in the next version or at any particular time):
File upload (IsoStore and, of all crazy things, install directory are writable. I think I'll put a flag on each FS page that says whether the current dir is writable...).
File deletion (where possible, of course).
File and Directory distinction in the listing (clicking a dir should open it, not error out).
Filesystem index page with links to folders that can be accessed successfully (since the root isn't readable).
Some more file info (size, probably attributes, possibly permissions).
Possibly an option to preview a file (as plain text) without downloading it.
Some kind of background mode (the server uses minimal resources when not actively servicing a request, so I'll see if I can get it to work in the background, perhaps by abusing the music transfer agent...)
Some kind of offline mode (at least basic file browsing within the app, as an alternative to using the web interface, though I might just make a second app for that).
Source code changes: separate the server code from the webapp / phone app code (move it into its own project).
Source code changes: move to a hosted version control service, probably CodePlex (good suggestion sensboston).
Maybe add an icon and such...
Any other suggestions?
I also want to try experimenting with various non-standard capabilities and see if I can get access to more of the system . I've already added the ability to access removable storage, but I've also found a bunch of really weird and frequently undocumented capabilities in the OS's policy configuration files, and I need to look into those... The interesting (and possibly the uninteresting) ones are probably blocked for unsigned sideloaded apps, but it's worth checking on anyhow.
Yeah sorry, I should have been more explicit about clicking on dirs. not working in 0.2.0. Also, it's "unofficial" but if you check the URL bar you'll see a URL parameter called something like "pattern" (by default, it's *) and if you change that, you can filter the results. For example, "foo*.exe" (note: no quotes!) will search for EXE files whose names start with "foo". Among other uses, this makes it a lot faster to load large dirs like System32. This will be added to the UI at some point. Also note that URL decoding is applied correctly to querystring parameters (Probably already noticed with the path sometimes written using %5C for \) so you can add special characters that way if needed, though currently any of them but \ will probably just cause an exception.
...
Actually, does this filesystem support Alternate Data Streams? If so, you should be able to download them by appending a : and the ADS name to the filename in the download URL...
OK, so that was a new version in five days. Sorry, stuff takes time.
The source code is now on Codeplex. The native access portion is at https://wp8nativeaccess.codeplex.com/, and the web server portion is at https://wp8webserver.codeplex.com/. Both are licensed MS-PL and use Git for version control. The full XAP is also available for download from the Webserver project on Codeplex.
GoodDayToDie said:
OK, so that was a new version in five days. Sorry, stuff takes time.
The source code is now on Codeplex. The native access portion is at https://wp8nativeaccess.codeplex.com/, and the web server portion is at https://wp8webserver.codeplex.com/. Both are licensed MS-PL and use Git for version control. The full XAP is also available for download from the Webserver project on Codeplex.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You are a god. I'll be sure to post my findings .
Hmm. When I first load up WebServer File Access then access from my laptop, I get the main page then the program crashes on my phone. It seems to hold a lock on to the socket as i can no longer access port 9999 from any other device when re-opening the app. I can access it again when I reboot, but the same thing happens.
EDIT: I think it may be due to the WiFi at work... it's junky. I'll try again when I get home. I was just able to browse some directories.
Wow, that's completely unexpected... I can beef up the error chacking and handling around the listener port though. That part of the code is really straightforward, so I actually haven't hardened it very much. I can also put in a Finally block to close the socket and/or mark the socket as re-usable so that other apps (or the same one again) can listen on it in the future.
I also plan to add support for setting your own port, but that doesn't solve the underlying problem. I'll put in more error reporting as well, to enable better debugging. Thanks for the report! Always good to have users report problems so I know where to prioritize fixes.
GoodDayToDie said:
Wow, that's completely unexpected... I can beef up the error chacking and handling around the listener port though. That part of the code is really straightforward, so I actually haven't hardened it very much. I can also put in a Finally block to close the socket and/or mark the socket as re-usable so that other apps (or the same one again) can listen on it in the future.
I also plan to add support for setting your own port, but that doesn't solve the underlying problem. I'll put in more error reporting as well, to enable better debugging. Thanks for the report! Always good to have users report problems so I know where to prioritize fixes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried the app at home and it DOES crash on the first hit of the home page, but I'm able to open it up again and it works fine.
The new version 0.3.3 should be more rebust; try it and let me know if you still have issues. If you do, let me know what the exception message is (and any other info you can provide) and I'll try to track it down.
Downloading really big files should also work now. The app will read and push files in smaller chunks (the code to do this existed in the NativeAccess library before, but wasn't used).
a simple SDK?
Dear Sir
Will it be possible for you to make some sort of SDK from this so other developers can integrate this into their apps and enable browsing isolatedstorage?
Sorry if it is a stupid question.
Bruce_X_Lee said:
Dear Sir
Will it be possible for you to make some sort of SDK from this so other developers can integrate this into their apps and enable browsing isolatedstorage?
Sorry if it is a stupid question.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
With the restrictions in permissions, this app only allows browsing of the app's isolatedstorage locally. You are able to use the IsolatedStorage API within your app to browse files and directories already.
snickler said:
With the restrictions in permissions, this app only allows browsing of the app's isolatedstorage locally. You are able to use the IsolatedStorage API within your app to browse files and directories already.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's right. What I want is to allow the end user to be able to browse the isolatedstorage. Imagine I have a video download app, I want the user to be able to transfer those downloaded videos from the app's isolated storage to, say, a PC.
One can do this by integrating the webserver code into the said app.
Bruce_X_Lee said:
That's right. What I want is to allow the end user to be able to browse the isolatedstorage. Imagine I have a video download app, I want the user to be able to transfer those downloaded videos from the app's isolated storage to, say, a PC.
One can do this by integrating the webserver code into the said app.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ahh I see what you mean now. That sounds like a pretty nice idea. I think more research needs to be done to see whether it would even be allowed in the marketplace.
The webserver portion is stand-alone (builds to its own .NET DLL with no dependencies on the other parts) and has a pretty clean interface. You'd need to implement the web application portion of it yourself - the thing that generates the response pages for a given request - but the HttpResponse class in the server does a lot of the work of that for you; you basically just specify the content you want to send (as a String or byte array) and it sends it.
Related
Hi all, I have a major concern about privacy and all the 3rd party data collectors...
A lot of apps are uploading user info and stats to companies like Flurry, pinch media etc.
I'm about to make the move from iphone OS to android, and i'm looking for a opt out to keep my privacy intact.
Saurik creaded PrivaCy for the jailbreak community that enabled on\off toggles for the 4 major companies.
My issue on iphone was that Pinch Media alone gathered the following information without my knowledge :
* iPhone’s unique ID (imei)
* iPhone model
* OS version
* Application version (in this case, camera zoom 1.x)
* If the application is cracked/pirated
* If the iPhone is jailbroken
* Time & date I start the application
* Time & date I close the application
* My current latitude & longitude
* My gender (if Facebook enabled)
* My birth month (if Facebook enabled)
* My birth year (if Facebook enabled)
I want the option to chose weither or not this kind of info gets collected and distributed.
I've looked into this issue on the android platform, and it seems like there's no option other than not to install the app.
Take for instance Locale. To my knowledge it uploads my imei nr (+lot of other info) to Flurry, whilst i do see the developers need to gather info, and I do not see why my imei number should be uploaded at all.
When I get my android phone I can only chose NOT to install locale, but I just want to prevent it from uploading such info..
Can anybody create a toggle, preferably one that doesn't aquire root, or some guide as to hosts file editing, or a firewall app that will give me this control over my device?
regards
-e
just add a line in hosts file like the following for each website you want to block:
127.0.0.1 some.company.com
Fantastic, thanks mate.
Unfortunately I will have to have root permissions to edit the hosts file.
(it might take time before the htc desire gets root)
(edit: unless theres another way to get write permissions for that file..?)
If I do mess with the hosts file I'd be keen on adding a fair few entries to block ads too..
Since the hosts file gets loaded in ram at bootup, will there be any noticably difference in speed due to the size increase?
regards
-e
could you please post the host-file or the addresses/ip's of the companies your gonna block?
they should be of interest for everybody here
1. You will need root access.
2. The change shouldn't impact the performance in the least. Any local host lookup is always faster than DNS lookup. Meaning that it should increase performance in cases where it finds the match in hosts file, although I doubt if you will notice it.
3. I wouldn't worry about RAM. The host file, even if you add a hundred entries, given that each line consumes 100 bytes, should still be under 10kb.
Great to hear. Thanks for the replies.
@fabsn: I'll post my hosts file as soon as I get this working.. (gimme a few weeks to get my phone, move to android and root
Although: I'd be keen on using the adblock app in androidstore (the one that modifies the hosts file), but my manual changes will break every time I update the app.
I'll try to get hold of the dev to se if he/she might add these info collectors (like Flurry) in another version so that people can get "the best of both worlds"
By the way: I wish all devs that utilizes info collection in their apps could just provide users with an opt out, then my problem would be solved...
-e
http://textbin.com/x6430
Here is a complete "phone home" list for the iPhone. A lot of this will directly apply to android as well, so perhaps a nice soul here at the forum could compile the most useful adresses for me (I'm writing on my phone and it's a b**** to do this on)
the list is taken from: i-phone-home.blogspot(dot)com/
so credit goes to that community.
I really want to combine this with the hosts file that jamesisbored/droid has for adblock..
I will test this once desire hits my mailbox and someone finds root.
-e
This sounds like a great idea. Once a comprehensive list is compiled it should be passed on to "bigtincan". I know myself and a lot of other people use their "ad free" app to block ads using the same method mentioned by Ady above. Although they may be blocking them already and I don't know. I've never looked closely at the host file.
http://bigtincan.com/downloads/android.html
Any progress made on this end?
ady said:
1. You will need root access.
2. The change shouldn't impact the performance in the least. Any local host lookup is always faster than DNS lookup. Meaning that it should increase performance in cases where it finds the match in hosts file, although I doubt if you will notice it.
3. I wouldn't worry about RAM. The host file, even if you add a hundred entries, given that each line consumes 100 bytes, should still be under 10kb.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am new to modding my phone, would you be so kind as to go into more detail how to do this. Specifically, what is this "Hosts file" you speak of? I do have root access and searched my entire phone for a file like that with no joy.
Also, the links provided to possible host data do not work, can somebody update that?
Thanks!!!:laugh:
You may be interested in the MOAB (mother of all adblockers) thread here on xda. Best ad blocker out there, imo, if you haven't already. Sorry, I can't link it now.
Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk
I want to be able to set up a series of menu's, at the end of selections it then links to an image, like a jpg or pdf perhaps.
Let me put it in a context. Maybe as a playbook viewer (American Football). I start with 'Offence' and 'Defence' as my options, which ever I choose takes me to a list of formations, then to 'Pass' or 'Run' then a list of plays. When I select a play if shows an image of the play.
Another might be job descriptions. I select the level 'manager', 'assistant' etc, then the section and then it shows a job description as an image or I guess text.
I think there are probably quite a few uses for this. I know I could set this up with basically web pages stored locally on my phone, but it would be kinda cool to have some smooth swooshing animations and such.
I'm wondering if it should initially be a desktop application so you can link up the menu's and images and it then compiles an apk for you?
Is this possible?
More generically...
What you're describing is a hierarchical database.
You need a tree manager app - where all your 'menu items' and subordinates are simply nodes and leaves of the tree.
A generic app would allow nodes/leaves to be 'textual', iconified, or pictures.
I haven't done any searches... but given that iconified list views, and cursored SQL queries are part of the standard package.... I'd think this would be relatively straightforward to both develop (app to add nodes/subnodes, builf the tree, enter/import the content) ship (app to serialize the database config+data, as a psuedo-app) and deploy (load a serialized db, execute it)
I'm a noob at android & at Java - but I might take a crack at something if I ever find time (my job & family don't leave a lot of time for anything else)
Can't believe that it almost took me a day to implement a tiny rendering change in my Vexed/HTML5 port. A little backstory:
I know there's already a good Vexed port for Android, but since I needed a web version, making it compatible with Android seemed like a good idea. It's still missing a lot of details, like a menu, manual or win/lose messages, but if you want you can play it here:
http://www.tapper-ware.net/data/devel/web/games/JS.Vexed/
The buttons used to be rendered using CSS3 border-images, which work on Android (at least 2.3+, haven't tested any other versions yet), BUT they are slow as hell. Apparently it's hitting a fallback path that renders the element much like you'd do on legacy-IE with behaviors... meaning that there's also a lot of tearing since the element that you apply the border-image to basically becomes a set of 9 image elements as far as rendering is concerned.
So I decided to implement my own border-image using Canvas (you can find it at line 168 of the HTML file: HTMLImageElement.prototype.renderAsButton)... after all, drawing border-images isn't exactly rocket science.
So far so good: it was working beautifully, but somehow I couldn't get it into my CSS... after basically checking every part of the chain with manually created data urls it really didn't make any more sense, so out of pure desperation I decided to take a look at the data url returned by HTMLCanvasElement.prototype.toDataURL, which was a ... surprise. This thing is wrong on so many levels it never should have shown up in any code. Not only does it not throw and ERR_NOT_IMPLEMENTED, it even returns data to cover the fact that it's not implemented, namely "data:," which doesn't throw an error when used as an image source.
The general workaround seems to be that people use a custom toDataURL implementation that outputs a Windows BMP file... which would be great, if Android supported 32-bit RGBA BMP files. However they usually end up as if they were 24-bit RGB files.
So if I wanted RGBA, i had to create PNG files.
The PNG spec is really very readable and makes it easy to implement a PNG encoder... but there are two shortcomings:
1. The only filter method available requires a filter byte at the beginning of every row. So you can't use the return data of getImageData directly (Array.prototype.splice doesn't work on ImageData, you have to copy it first).
2. It doesn't support uncompressed data directly... and compressing in JS seems like a bad idea. Instead you are supposed to use and ZLIB stream with raw blocks
It also has CRC checks which are annoying for our purposes, but not that hard to implement (you can find my implementation at line 94: Array.prototype.crc32). Costs a bit of performance, but wouldn't be a major problem by itself.
But the reliance on ZLIB proved to be a major annoyance, because the documentation (RFC1950 & RFC1951) is lacking... to put it mildly (the relationship between those two documents is never really mentioned, meaning that you're always guessing if a header belongs to the stream or the block). The endianess is also switched from what PNG uses, meaning that you end up with two different types of integers in the same file. I ended up mostly analyzing THE GIMP's output for uncompressed PNGs (and could have finished everything much earlier if I hadn't tried to work my way through the spec first). The most important part from the spec is the definition of the ADLER32 checksum (line 85: Array.prototype.adler32), which sadly is required for each ZLIB block, meaning that creating a PNG involves calculating two different checksums for (mostly) identical data.
But my little PNG encoder is working now, and in difference to other implementations that I've found, there's no 64kb limit as my implementation splits every stream into 32k blocks correctly. However, it's not as fast as it could be and if there's interest I'll happily put the code in a project if other people want to help improve it or maybe even add proper compression.
EDIT: THE CODE IS NOW PART OF AN OSS PROJECT, SEE THE NEXT POST
I might not check this forum at the time, but you can always reach me at [email protected]
I've published the Javascript-PNG-encoder workaround over at http://code.google.com/p/todataurl-png-js/ under the GNU Affero General Public License, version 3 license in case anybody wants to join and add compression or just general optimization. Just drop me a line if you want to be added to the user directory.
according to developer.android.com/reference/java/lang/Process.html you can spawn a native executable from within your java application. This is not working for me as I had hoped....
I have an ARM Linux Forth that I have developed and this runs just fine from adb shell. I have placed this in my assets directory and copied it out to /data/data/blah.blah/ and tried to execute it there from my app. it runs but is instantly killed. dmesg tells me it was killed because it is an untrusted app.
How is one supposed to execute native binaries from within a security enhanced android? or has this functionality been buggered up by google now?
P.S. i click yes this is a question and am told im breaking the rules. I back out, i follow what LOOKS like the links to the Q/A forums which leads me right back to here so if im breaking the rules YOUR site is screwed up.
p.p.s the capcha that you have implemented for the registration with this site is PERFECT. the capcha you have chosen for posting is a HORRENDOUSLY BAD capcha, its almost completely and utterly unreadable by a human... i bet a bot could read it just fine though!
Plese delete this dumbass capcha and use only the one used for registering here.. i.e. the one that asks you to enter the numbers not totally butchered words that are so skewed as to be incomprehensible!
???
mark4th said:
according to developer.android.com/reference/java/lang/Process.html you can spawn a native executable from within your java application. This is not working for me as I had hoped....
I have an ARM Linux Forth that I have developed and this runs just fine from adb shell. I have placed this in my assets directory and copied it out to /data/data/blah.blah/ and tried to execute it there from my app. it runs but is instantly killed. dmesg tells me it was killed because it is an untrusted app.
How is one supposed to execute native binaries from within a security enhanced android? or has this functionality been buggered up by google now?
P.S. i click yes this is a question and am told im breaking the rules. I back out, i follow what LOOKS like the links to the Q/A forums which leads me right back to here so if im breaking the rules YOUR site is screwed up.
p.p.s the capcha that you have implemented for the registration with this site is PERFECT. the capcha you have chosen for posting is a HORRENDOUSLY BAD capcha, its almost completely and utterly unreadable by a human... i bet a bot could read it just fine though!
Plese delete this dumbass capcha and use only the one used for registering here.. i.e. the one that asks you to enter the numbers not totally butchered words that are so skewed as to be incomprehensible!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
nobody can tell me how to spawn native processes without them being instantly killed?
You didn't post any code or something...
Regards
1. Post your code.
2. Since more than half of your question was about complaints, go here.
www.xda-developers.com/contact/
Code.
EmptinessFiller said:
You didn't post any code or something...
Regards
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
would it be possible for you to private message me an email address, my code is not "secret" but it is not released yet and the site i host my projects on is currently down due to my domain name expiring. this will take a few days to resolve still.
Basically i have an ARM forth compiler that I developed on my BeagleBoard XM (in ARM assembler). This runs on the XM, the raspberry pi and of course android. Well, it runs in adb shell on a rooted device just fine, if my java launches it as a native process (not a native application) it is instantly killed due to being an untrusted executable. This does not happen on older androids but I would like this to run on any newer device too.
I would be MORE than happy to send you the entire sources to my ARM forth so you can observe the instant death first hand. I will also post the "java" code i use to launch it from my main android app - im not yet ready to release this arm forth to the general public yet so im not going to be posting it on any site like github etc.
Part of the problem is that on launch the Forths process resides within a contiguous 1 meg region (code and data) that I mprotect to +r +w +x. If i cannot have the entire process space readable, writeable AND executable then this forth will never run on a security enhanced android. I seriously hope this is not the case and that there is a fix.
I think it's better to post smallest part that is necessary for ur problem public in this forum, so that all the other great members can help u too. You needn't post everything.
Regards
code..
EmptinessFiller said:
I think it's better to post smallest part that is necessary for ur problem public in this forum, so that all the other great members can help u too. You needn't post everything.
Regards
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
create any native executable using the NDK or any other armv6/v7 compiler/assembler. put this in /data/data/com.somewhere/ then use the every so INCOMPLETE example snippet provided by google at developer.android.com/reference/java/lang/Process.html to run that executable from within some hello-world android app. I do this with my forth compiler (www dot isforth dot com/a4.tar.bz2) and the executable is instantlhy killed by the android security enhancement bs.
it only took about 200 ish tries on this stupid capcha to finally be able to HUMANY FREEKING READ IT!
hate this bull****
mark4th said:
create any native executable using the NDK or any other armv6/v7 compiler/assembler. put this in /data/data/com.somewhere/ then use the every so INCOMPLETE example snippet provided by google at developer.android.com/reference/java/lang/Process.html to run that executable from within some hello-world android app. I do this with my forth compiler (www dot isforth dot com/a4.tar.bz2) and the executable is instantlhy killed by the android security enhancement bs.
it only took about 200 ish tries on this stupid capcha to finally be able to HUMANY FREEKING READ IT!
hate this bull****
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
well nobody seems to be able to tell me why i cannot spawn a native process so i converted my native process into a native dynamic library. this instantly segfaults any time i try exeucte a swi 0 opcode. can someone please tell me why i am not able to make system calls in native code? please dont tell me to link to some external library, this IS the external library.
some code...
.section userData, "w" @Nobits
userList:
.space 0x00100000
this enlarges the resultant object module by 0x01000000 bytes so the android NDK seems to be ignoring the @Nobits
ldr r1, = userList
str r1, [r1]
this segfaults so the android NDK seems to be ignoring the "w" flag.
:/
any swi 0 anywhere inside my library, no matter what the system call instantly segfaults. is there some perms i need to set in my manifest to allow my library to make system calls?
I just got a Shield TV, and I love it. I'm probably going to root it tonight to tinker further.
One issue I have with it is how annoying it is to configure, side-load apps, upload files to, etc. I'd love to have a web console for it, and I'm willing to do most/all of the heavy lifting for the front-end and server-side web development perspective. I'm going to need help on other fronts, however.
I'm a full-stack web developer. Most of what I've done professionally is PHP, but I'm not married to that. I'm also pretty good at configuring apache/nginx/ha-proxy/etc. Though once upon a time, I wrote front-end applications in Java and C++, that's ancient history, and I don't really have time to re-learn those skills and the Android SDK. Also, I'm not much of a designer, so unless I'm just using a pretty stock framework like Bootstrap, I'll need someone else to provide the art.
What I'm envisioning is an app that we can have in the play store that has a very simple UI to:
- install an SSH server
- install bash
- install web server/app server
- install DDNS client
- launch server on boot
- check server for new versions of the software it installed
Stuff I want the web interface to do:
- install/uninstall apps (file submission, URLs, etc.)
- 1-click installs of common things people want (Kodi, Amazon Prime Video, etc.)
- start/stop sshd
- manage mounting/unmounting NFS/AFS/CIFS/etc. shares (is this even possible on Android?)
- restart the device
- configure most settings on the device, including some hidden stuff
- file management
So, what I can do:
- script the download/install/upgrade of stuff on already rooted box in bash
- write back-end web code in PHP, Python, or Go
- write HTML/CSS/JS for front-end
What I need help with:
- writing the Android TV app to trigger the install script
- some help understanding/bootstrapping the process (what's installed by default on Android? What's the minimum we can get away with? Do we need Python?)
- someone to design the app (honestly, this can wait until we've got a baseline functionality if we like)
Anyone interested in joining me?
I'm leaning towards Go for the web app, because the binary can (in theory) be deployed standalone, and can be its own web server, obviating the need for apache or nginx or whatever. Also, performance and memory utilization -- PHP and Python are fairly expensive to run, and this is a really minor background thing.
This would be open source on Github.
While I unfortunately don't have a machine to helpwith code, nor the time for the code, I thought I'd give you a dev/modders look on the possibility/dificulty of things. Please don't think that I am discredditing this idea, in fact, I like it. Just want to passibly help you consider dev order and dificulty oy each item as listed, and hopefully add my own as others may have interest.
- install/uninstall apps (file submission, URLs, etc.) <-- Would be pretty easy. Users should provide apks, or you'll need a site that stores a lot of them.
- 1-click installs of common things people want (Kodi, Amazon Prime Video, etc.) <-- Similar to last point. You'll have to have a mirror of updated apks, weather you or another host provides it. You'll probably need a web scraper if going to an external host.
- start/stop sshd <-- I suggest dropbear, even if it's not my cup of tea. It can be easily found in other apps and should find code in open source ones to get you started.
- manage mounting/unmounting NFS/AFS/CIFS/etc. shares (is this even possible on Android?) <-- can be done. Check Kodi or other open source apps for code, though there are usually caviats to each approach. Luckly Android has fuse in most kernels these days.
- restart the device <-- Very easy
- configure most settings on the device, including some hidden stuff <-- Gonna be a long process, but you can probably reverse engeneer the apks and parse the XML files for a shortcut.
- file management <-- Super easy. Use the ssh server, or adb connection.
Over all, I think a lot of this is possible. Luckly these machines have the beef for a web server, and several are ported last I checked, though they may be out of date. Even still, check their codebase for a massive head start as they are mostly required to keep open source by licence (Apache excluded, though some still are). I would also suggest these features as they would be somewhat easy to imprement once the base file management is started, and would broaden the scope to bring in more users, support and interest, and hopefully devs.
-Rom Manager for emulators.
Mass File Renamer based on Filebot (Both are java, so should not be TOO hard to port) as many buy this box for Kodi.
I'll think of more.
I'm not an app dev, though I do rom modding and sometimes porting, and I can offer insite to things, so if you have questions on specifics, please pm me. If I get some free time, and a dev machine, I'll let you know antd get things going in the right direction. May also want to, once this idea is flushed out, post something in a more general android TV/ App Development thread for cleanness and to get devs on board (don't post in dev till there is code to show on github though please.
Something like remix os would be nice, this x1 has a lots of power
Sent from my trltetmo using Tapatalk
This is a great idea. This device is in serious need of developer attention. Im not a dev at all but Ive gotten pretty familiar with this device and Android OS in general, especially after spending so much time digging around trying to make android things happen that apparently were not indended for Android TV. I will be more than happy to be a tester and keep up so as to offer any ideas and some of the ways Ive found to do stuff.
@kdb424 - Thanks for the info. I'm working on a prototype right now. First build is going to list a bunch of stuff from the setting status, and allow you to reboot the device. I'll post the Github repo when I have that.
Great ideas!
There is a tool sorta in development already that does a lot of this (I've mentioned it on the Shield Zone a couple of times)
https://sites.google.com/site/nvidiashieldtvutilityapp/home/
My main needs (personally) is a means to move files to and from and my current solution is a free FTP server that works even when the Shield TV is sleeping.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.theolivetree.ftpserver
... works very well despite having to side load, has a terrible interface, etc. Set and forget. What's great is, I can use my file-manager-on-steroids Directory Opus to manage files since it is a standard FTP connection.
@darkuni - Yeah, I saw that, but I've got no Windows PC's in the house -- 2 Macs, a Chromebook, a Linux server, phones and tablets. I'm an old-school UNIX guy, and Windows doesn't strike my fancy. Plus, it seems like the sort of thing a web app is best for. No need for a fat client.
darkuni said:
Great ideas!
My main needs (personally) is a means to move files to and from and my current solution is a free FTP server that works even when the Shield TV is sleeping.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.theolivetree.ftpserver
... works very well despite having to side load, has a terrible interface, etc. Set and forget. What's great is, I can use my file-manager-on-steroids Directory Opus to manage files since it is a standard FTP connection.
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Click to collapse
Thanks for that I'll give it a go. I use ES file manager currently but it closes the server when you exit the app. Will also try this on a couple of FireTV Sticks I have dotted around the house as Kodi boxes :good: