CyanogenMod Drops ROM Manager In Favor of OTA Updates

sfcrazy writes "There's some great news for CyanogenMod fans. The CM team has decided to drop ROM manager, which was the de facto standard of getting CyanogenMod updates." Instead, the CM team is building its own updating method, explained (with screenshots) at Android Police.

Comments

jargon decoding

[Trepidity]

For those who were as confused as I was:

CyanogenMod is a community-maintained, enhanced version of Android, which you can replace the regular Android operating system on tablet and smartphones with, by flashing the ROM.

ROM Manager is an app for, well, managing Android ROMs. Until now, CyanogenMod has relied on it for installation and updates. However, it is 3rd party and not open-source.

OTA, contrary to the implication, is not a CyanogenMod-specific technology, but a general way of manufacturers pushing updates to their smartphone/tablet ROMs. See here.

CyanogenMod will now be using OTA updates to update its ROMs, so it should look to users more like a "regular" phone, which updates itself through the normal mechanism, instead of relying on this third-party ROM manager. (At least, that's my attempted decoding of this story; corrections welcome.)

Re:jargon decoding

[Calos]

The trouble with CM or any AOSP (Android Open-Source Project - the code that is released publically) based ROM is that they don't have access to the binary blobs they need to make all of the hardware work, unless the companies upstream play along. This is why cameras frequently struggle. I don't know how much of this comes down to the phone manufacturer or the manufacturer of the specific part.

If it's something you care about, you know that going in and choose accordingly. As far as I know HTC tries to play ball; Samsung doesn't do bad; Motorola tries to make everyone's life hell. That isn't only driver support (or lack thereof), but locking down the bootloader and that kind of thing to specifically try to stop third party installs. HTC last I knew even had a "developer" program - all you had to do was sign up, give them some serial numbers and they emailed you a key to unlock everything.

If you need to be sure - buy one of the Google-branded models, the Nexus series. Made to be easily modded, necessary code and everything released. As such, they usually have the best and longest-lasting support from developers.

Re:Better Android

[s_p_oneil]

I don't know. I never had a working camera app with CM. It would take anywhere from 0 to 3 pictures before forcing me to reboot the phone, and when I tried to take video, the visual quality was so bad that you couldn't recognize the people in the videos. That kind of killed one of the major benefits of having a smartphone for me.

Maybe they've improved it since then, but the last thread I read on the subject (maybe 6-12 months back) was "Well, the camera still doesn't work, but..." Needless to say, when I upgraded my phone, I chose NOT to install CM.

Re:You Still Need Thr ROM Manager

[beano311]

That's not true at all. You need a custom recovery, like Clockwork Mod Recovery (same dev as ROM Manager, but not the same thing), Team Win Recovery Project, or 4EXT (etc.), but you don't need to have ROM Manager installed at all to use any of these (they can be flashed from the terminal or ADB). Also, you can revert to stock by placing an update.zip on the root of the SD card and booting into HBOOT on most phones, or by using Odin on Samsung phones as previously mentioned.

Re:Better Android

[puto]

Really, i am an escalation manager for ATT in a call center for ATT. My last few weeks since the Iphone 5 release has been about whiney bitches complaining that their phone does not have good battery life or connection to the network. God forbid Apple lied about a shoddy product. Yet I rarely get a call from a CM user bitching...

Re:A simpler method would be great

[busyqth]

As a non-supertechie Android user, I sure would welcome a more simplified way to root and install these files. I attempted it a month ago, following instructions laid out on Androidforums for my LG Virgin Mobile phone. Got it right up until the final step when it refused to accept the code that I know I was inputting exactly. Had to give up in frustration, glad it wasn't bricked, though. I'd love to have full control over permissions on my device, and to securely lock it down from any hack attempts. Thanks to /. for this heads up story.

Just disassemble the bootloader starting at breakpoint 0x10C08000 and look for the argument to CLD R0.
Once you've found that, you only have to patch the configuration file with the new value and reassemble the kernel userspace.
Then just flash the ROM with the resulting srecord file and you're good to go.
Anyone can do it.

Re:Better Android

[NemosomeN]

That's because stupid people don't put CM on their phones. Stupid people do, however, buy iPhones.

Re:Better Android

[Calos]

That's not fair. I know plenty of smart people with iPhones, and a quick look at forums will show you many people in far over their head trying to root and install ROMs.

But it's very apparent that what you do rooting etc. is not officially supported, and more than clear that official lines of support are useless if you have issues. Now, if people were calling AT&T to complain about their jailbreaking gone wrong or something, that would be different.

Re:Better Android

[gmhowell]

That's because stupid people don't put CM on their phones. Stupid people do, however, buy iPhones.

They also know to lie to the CSR about what they did when there is a problem.