Tech Tok

Handy for people jailbreaking with the Greenpois0n..

These are the Apple links to iOS 4.2.1 for each specific device.

• iPhone 4
• iPhone 3GS
• iPhone 3G
• iPad
• iPod touch 2G
• iPod touch 3G
• iPod touch 4G

If you wanted to upgrade to these, you would hold down the alt/option key when clicking on the “Upgrade” / “Restore” button in iTunes. This brings up a file dialog where you can choose the file to be used.

# in your dev directory..
mkdir grub; cd grub

mkdir objconv; cd objconv
# "objconv" is required by the grub build. Its home page is http://www.agner.org/optimize
wget http://www.agner.org/optimize/objconv.zip
unzip objconv.zip
unzip source.zip
g++ -o objconv -O2 *.cpp
sudo cp objconv /usr/local/bin

# rehash if you are running csh
cd ..

# you may want to pick a more recent release; release_1_97 was the latest as of this writing
# http://svn.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/tags/?root=grub&sortby=date#dirlist
svn co svn://svn.sv.gnu.org/grub/tags/release_1_97
cd release_1_97
./autogen.sh
./configure --with-platform=efi --target=x86_64

# edit kern/misc.c and add after line 53:
# void *memcpy (void *dest, const void *src, grub_size_t n);
# void *memmove (void *dest, const void *src, grub_size_t n);

# edit symlist.c and add after line 19:
# #include <string .h>
make -j `hwprefs cpu_count`
sudo make install

# This all results in:
# /usr/local/bin/x86_64-grub-editenv
# /usr/local/bin/x86_64-grub-fstest
# /usr/local/bin/x86_64-grub-mkelfimage
# /usr/local/bin/x86_64-grub-mkfont
# /usr/local/bin/x86_64-grub-mkimage

Wow, very cool.
Google is now in the navigation biz.
But only on Android phones, not on the iPhone.

Someone did point out in
the comments about a TechCrunch article that Google’s stuff needs an internet connection:

Not so fast. This has yet to work. My mobile (Android, iPhone) has a tough time keeping a connection when driving. All on-line navigation systems that I know have failed so far.

Cool features but high risk of unhappy users due to mobile data availability and roaming issues.

but then..

Google said that when you plan your route, it precaches map data for that route to help alleviate this problem.

Wow, that would be awesome if it is true.

Personally, I am very happy that the TomTom car kit for the iPhone
is available in Canada now.
I would hope that the enhanced GPS antenna would be of benefit to *any* GPS-using app and not just TomTom’s app.

Some apps that let you liberate your iPhone/iPod Touch from iTunes and Apple’s renaming obfuscation:
dTunes,
PwnPlayer,
and MPlayer
make a pretty potent combination.

MPlayer is probably the weakest of the bunch; playing video skips frames and sometimes has no audio.
I would expect it to get better over time though.

Just a few more reasons to JailBreak. :-)

ssh

Installing OpenSSH Allows you to login to your iPhone on the command line.
You can do all sorts of things like
using
your iPhone as an internet router.

AppleShare

ssh is a bit geeky, so you can AppleShare instead.
Browsing your WiFi will show the iPhone as plain as day.
It’s the next best thing to the “disk mode” that old iPods have.

video recording

Either live over the internet via Qik,
or locally using
Cycorder
or “VideoRecorder for iPhone”.

playing old arcade games

There are now both an NES (non-super Nintendo) and Gameboy Advance emulators for the iPhone.
I wonder why
MAME
hasn’t been ported yet?

On Saturday I successfully shared my iPhone’s 3G internet connection with two laptops we brought with us to Thorold.

It was a bit tricky, because the iPhone seemed to latch on to the WiFi connection provided by the peer-to-peer network created on the laptops.
The trick turned out to be running Safari on the iPhone, which would kick it into using the 3G network (since the peer-to-peer network had no route to the internet).

Once the iPhone was on the 3G network, I ran NetShare.
Both laptops set the iPhone’s IP address as their SOCKS proxy, and we were off to the races (although Firefox was a bit stubborn about it – I had to use Safari to browse).

So it’s good to know that should we ever need internet access in Thorold, we can use the iPhone.
We can probably also use it in Wasaga, but I suspect that we would only get EDGE networking there, which is 10x slower than 3G.

I should note that even if you don’t have the NetShare iPhone app, you can achieve the same thing (on a jailbroken iPhone)
using ssh.

 

I also found another major reason to jailbreak your iPhone: running AppleShare.
My iPhone now shows up under AppleShare over the WiFi network, which allows me to transfer files back and forth with ease.
(Sorry Mike!)

It’s pretty cool to bring up a network browser and see “Reid’s iPhone” in the list of available file servers. :-)

So they seem to have worked out the kinks with the beta Qik client for the iPhone.
Actually, the kinks were in their website’s handling of iPhone-originated video.

In any case, you can go to qik.com/rae
and see my short masterpieces.
Plus, if I happen to be recording at that moment, you can watch it live!
Ooooh, ahhh.

I will embed the video I just took at work for your edification and amusement. :-)

This is just a note about living with a jailbroken iPhone. I think I’ll update it over time.

Current jailbreak tool is PwnageTool_2.0.2.tbz,
which works with the first iPhone 2.0 update, 2.0.1.

If you find you can’t use WiFi after jailbreaking, try:

1. removing your WiFi network and adding it back again
2. use BossPrefs to “repair user dir permissions”

Interesting apps for jailbroken phones include:

NetShare

manually installed; it was pulled from the App store

NES emulator

play tons of old games!

Quake 1

BossPrefs

Lets you tweak lots of stuff, including jailbreak-specific things like “SSH Server” on/off

How to install a *.app file

cribbed from MacRumors forums.

Using an SFTP application (I use Cyberduck), drag the NetShare.app folder from the desktop into the iPhone’s /Applications folder.

Open a terminal window, and open an SSH session with the iPhone:

$ ssh root@192.168.0.5

(replace the IP address above with your iPhone’s IP Wi-Fi address.) The default root login password is “alpine”.

Next, go to the NetShare.app folder:

# cd /Applications/NetShare.app

and change the access file mask of the main application file:

# chmod 755 NetShare

Reboot (or re-spring if you know how) your iPhone.

You’re done!

My Installed Apps

Here are links to my 9 app screens:
[1]
[2]
[3]
[4]
[5]
[6]
[7]
[8]
[9]

Fun, eh?