Database Develop

Bloatware Program / game Demo Removal

Good day all. I have spent three days reading this forum, great stuff. I bought the SK Tooks program and have deleted the PTT button per another thread. I have also set up the internet sharing like my 8525 per another post, many thanks for all the above.
One I did not find. I want to delete unneeded programs and games. I am on the AT&T ROM. When I go to Settings|Programs|remove Programs, only a few are shown. I would like to delete the following:
Programs|
Media Net Home
AT&T Mall
AT&T Music
Cellular Video
Push To Talk
Programs|Games & Apps
Get TelNav
MobilTV
Plus a few others probably. Am I out of luck?

From what I understand those things are on the ROM and can't be removed unless you flash the ROM with something else.

Actually, all the bloatware programs are in the menu you accessed. But, you apparently overlooked the sub-menus. Go back to the Window directory and with a little searching, you will find them and be able to delete.
Also, for the sample games, open the Java folder and there is an option under menu to remove all of the files.

Some people have gotten around this by doing a hard reset, then before the AT&T customization starts, do a soft reset. I used this method, however, I still found all the .exe's still in the file system, so I still had to do some deleting. Until I get situated with flashing a ROM, this is probably still the best way to go, but I feel the dark side pullin me in slowly but surely. Too bad MS (and hardware manufacturers in kind) have yet to figure out that the way to sell something is not to stick a bunch of annoying trial crap in your face, but to actually offer some compelling features. It irks me that I have to spend hours cleaning up the mess that they made. Don't we get enough junk mail/ spam/ TV Ads/ web popups, etc, etc, etc?

Trial ware is easy money for most hardware manufacturers. They get paid for loading that crap on your device and try to spin in to their users like they are trying to help them.

prubin said:
Actually, all the bloatware programs are in the menu you accessed. But, you apparently overlooked the sub-menus.
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Click to collapse
I do not see any sub-menus on the AT&T ROM. I deleted those in Java, thanks. But thy re still in the menus, now with broken links.
jgermuga said:
Some people have gotten around this by doing a hard reset, then before the AT&T customization starts, do a soft reset.
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Did that. I lost MS-Office which is an important program to me.
Okay, a different angle, is there a way I can remove the icons in the menus to clean up the way the menus look nd keep scrolling to a minimum. Then I could just leave the programs.
Any ideas. I have SK Tools to edit the resistry.

I did the soft reset after hard reset trick, and I did not loose Mobile Office. Try again.

removal instructions...
if you did a soft reset before the customazition starts..i recommend that you do another hard reset and don't stop the regular projess. the customazitions has important files that we need as well...so just do a hard reset and follow the instruction belove.. I got the solution for you to stop showing the broken links.
I am on att as well..so on my tilt. here is what i did..
first to gain at least 10mb I deleted the files under documents/myringtones..and the trial games are under java ..programs/tools/java and delete them on options..
here is the big trick you are asking..if you wanna delete them from the programs menu..you don't need the registry edit programs..
just go to windows/start menu/programs//// and delete any program you don't want to show on programs folder...it will look much cleaners...after all the processes i gained 15mb of storage memory..
good luck

When I tried to delete unwanted bloatware, I was unable to. I even check properties using Total Commander and tried unsetting the read-only attribute, no go. How do you guys do this?

to delete unwanted icons from the program menu go to
/windows/start menu/programs
then just delete whichever icons are associated with the demo games you deleted.

Can somebody explain why would you suggest manually deleting the files and applications as opposed to doing the "reset" method after doing a hard reset?
Am I missing something by doing the "reset" method?

O2 Stellar and HTC X button

I'd be grateful if anyone could offer any help with this issue.
I have an O2 branded version of the Kaiser. I have installed various of the cabs for HTC software available on this forum - which is excellent, by the way - and was very glad to find an "X" button solution.
Unfortunately, the device then started to crash whenever I closed a program for the first time and had to soft reset. I got a message saying that there was a problem with the shell.
As it stopped when I uninstalled HTC X Button, I am 99% certain that it was source of my problem. O2 stick a program manager in the system bar. It does not add X button functionality, but it does allow manual closure of a program. It does not appear ion any program list, and cannot be removed or closed itself, so I assume that it is part of the rom (not that I am an expert!)
Can anyone confirm this problem, and/or suggest a (preferably freely available) X button program that does not cause any issues? Alternatively, can the (fairly useless) O2 program be removed or closed without replacing the rom?

you are probably correct that the 2 apps are causing the issue. Have you looked in the \windows\startup folder for the O2 app? Also, there is a registry entry called INIT that does startup of services for the device. I can't remember right now where it's located in the registry. Let me know if you find anything in the startup folder and if not, I'll look up the key for you.

There is a file called O2 Custom in the Startup folder which has the same icon as the manager program I want rid of, but it is only 21b in size, so I assume that it is a shortcut.
Thanks for the suggestion. I would be grateful for some guidance on thew registry, since I am too inexperienced with this stuff to go poking around without very specific instructions!

spider_j said:
There is a file called O2 Custom in the Startup folder which has the same icon as the manager program I want rid of, but it is only 21b in size, so I assume that it is a shortcut.
Thanks for the suggestion. I would be grateful for some guidance on thew registry, since I am too inexperienced with this stuff to go poking around without very specific instructions!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that startup is probably it. you can try to cut&paste the shortcut to your 'my documents' folder, then reboot, then see if that o2 app is started after reboot. if not, then you found the solution.

I wonder if we are able to do a "corporate" install after hard reset like I used to be able to do with my Universal so it doesn't load all the 02 rubbish

Works like a charm, thanks smittyofdhs. The o2 program manager is gone, and HTC XButton 1.51 has not caused any soft resets so far.
You know, I feel really stupid not realising that removing the shortcut from startup would have done the job. I would have done the equivalent on my desktop or laptop without even thinking about it.

HTC has a new version of their Task Manager (V2.0) that can be found pretty easily by searching this website. The only problem I have with HTC's Task Manager(s) is that while the "X" functionality works in every application, the Task Manager feature seems to work only on the Today screen. Therefore, I have found WkTask to be a very good free task manager which also combines a program launcher.

Starting to cook my own...missing some basics with packages

Hi Folks,
I'm sure the answers to my questions are somewhere on XDA, but I've not been able to find them. I've been trying to get some basic things working for a good few evenings now and I’m stuck
Using Erviuskitchen, packages creator 5.4 and EXT_PAckages_rebuilder I've been able to dump the HTC 6.5 base ROM to work from. Then put it all back together, pull some bits out, cook it and flash it to my phone....all went surprisingly well, my phone's still running and a bit more bloat-free!
What I'm stumped on though is adding things to my ROM, I'm good with packages found elsewhere, but nothing of my own.
I've got a bunch of .CABs which I'd like to 'cook in'... but when I create a package from the CAB file using packages creator 5.4 and EXT_PAckages_rebuilder and then flash it, I get no start menu icons. The app seems to be installed correctly, but without icons for it.
(my goal's to cook in a pre-configured copy of GuardMobile for if my phone's evey lost/stolen, but I'd like to be able to include other apps too).
What am I missing?
On a slightly different note: during my travels around here, I've seen various cooked ROMs which give you the option of uninstalling cooked-in apps as if they'd been installed using a .CAB file - how's this bit done?
Like I mentioned, I’m sure the these are pretty basic questions and the answers are around here somewhere, but I'm afraid my search-powers are failing me! (tbh, there's just too much info and I'm struggling to filter it down to what I need).
Any links or quick pointers would be greatly appreciated. Hey if my ROM turns out to be any good, I’ll put it up for others to use.
Thanks in anticipation!
'tunes

Most times when creating a package the shortcut created in the CAB is added to some .DAT file which you can edit using Notepad++ or any other text editor.
There should be some lines in this file like this:
Code:
Directory("\Windows"):-Directory("Start Menu\Programs")
Directory("\Windows\Start Menu\Programs"):-File("PROGRAMNAME.lnk","\Windows\SOURCESHORTCUT.lnk")
At least this is one way to do it. Con about this methode is that you need shortcuts (lnk) in your Windows folder to point to. Should be other ways. I use Mortscript in my ROM (not ready for release ) this allows me to create shortcuts without having shortcuts in my Windows folder.
EDIT:
Just did a quick search for you. THIS might help you (and us) out

Thanks mccune, I'll get reading...

[Q] Extended ROM and paneldefault.exe

Hello All,
I use an Xperia X1a (Other device details mentioned in my signature below) Could someone please point me to someplace where I can get the Paneldefault.exe file. The one I have seems to be buggy and returns an error message everytime I soft reset my device (Every morning). It does not impact performance in any way, however I can do without the additional hassle of pressing "Quit" everytime I soft reset. I could replace the file with a regular working copy, if I can download one.
Secondly, I would like to get rid of the Handango in hand executable from the embedded rom, in addition to a couple of other media files, that seem to be hardwired into the system.
I would not mind if the files reappear after a hard reset, the files are needlessly taking up memory, which I can put to better use.
I've seen a couple of posts for EXTrom modification/viewing in these forums and for the Paneldefault file, however they have not been answered.
Could someone please reply to my post.
Rgds
Kalyan

[Q] WP8, Phone>Documents & Text files

Hi all, just a quick question regarding the functionality of Wp8 that I am fighting with, that I need to resolve or another WP phone is going back to the supplier [I did the same with WP7].
First off, apologies if there's an answer that I haven't managed to find.
I currently have an HTC HD2 running very nicely on WM6.5, however, it's been creaking a bit recently & I'd decided with a favourable review of WP8 that I read the other day suggesting that finally the device can be plugged into a PC & seen as a USB drive, that the time was right to move forwards.
Now that I have the Nokia Lumia 820 & WP8 however, I still don't think I can get it to do what I need it to do.
ALL I would like to do, is be able to copy text files from PC to WP8, & then display them on the phone with text wrap switched off.
Easy hey? Well if so, I haven't worked out how to do it yet!
I plug the phone into my PC, & an Explorer window fires up on the PC [XP] showing 'SD card' & 'Phone'. Drilling down one level on the latter gives Documents, Music, Pictures, Videos etc.
The only way I can get to see the Documents folder on my Phone appears to be via Office Mobile, under 'places' > phone. It appears to be very fussy about what it allows to be displayed there - I can see .PDF, .DOC, .XLS & .TXT files [but not .LOG. .ONE, .ZIP etc (which remain 'hidden')].
When I tap a .TXT file, I have no choice of how to open it, Office Mobile pounces & that's that. Having got this far, all I would now like to do is switch off text wrap [so that it'll view in a usable manner] because there doesn't appear to be such an option.
I have scoured the Store, & the best I've found is 'Text Reader', though this requires that I load it via email [upload a file to Hotmail or wherever with a .LOG (or similar) suffix & away you go, which it then downloads & stores in its own sandbox]. Ok, but faffy.
I believe that other progs might enable transfer via the cloud [Skydrive or whatever], but because of the nature of the data [& the fact that I don't want my data in anyone else's hands], this is out too.
I've spotted a couple of other quirks.
Office Mobile also does not allow you to display the folder hierarchy that may exist in Phone>Documents, just giving a flat filesystem, which makes finding a file in thousands, say, horrible. All I'd like to do is exactly duplicate the hierarchy that exists on the PC [& then I am always looking for things in the same place on either device].
I have also noticed that Office Mobile Word sometime hangs part way through a file. e.g. on loading a 1mb file, & searching for a text sequence I know to be on the last line, it hangs on a line part way through the file [say a 1/3 of the way in]. Not great, & I have the odd file that's c.10mb so I dread to think with that.
Words fail me, & once again I am hugely disappointed with MS. Please, please get the odd decision right & maybe WP will be at the top of the pile again as it was with [the sometimes awful, but very functional] WM.
I am hoping that someone will explain an easy way to do this, & that I can finally move forwards from WM6.5. Android concerns me re privacy & I don't like iPhones, so not much choice really! Stuck waiting for MS to provide basic functionality or [worse] a potential need for a future jailbreak to make the thing work properly!
Here's hoping. Many thanks for reading.

First of all, nobody who knew what the hell they were talking about said that WP8 displays as a USB drive (properly called USB Mass Storage). It's an MTP device, like most media players (or indeed WP7, though that had an extra layer of encryption around it). MTP doesn't display the actual filesystem; although the hierarchical display that it presents *may* mirror a real filesystem, it's under no obligation to do so.
The dearth of supported file types in WP7 was a real pain, but it could be fixed by tweaking the registry. In WP8 it's still a pain, but now third-party apps can (officially) register to handle file types. However, as you point out, there's no real way to browse the phone, and the Office hub only shows the filetypes it recognizes. We *might* be able to fix that, if we could get registry write permission, but that's not possible right now. With that said, I don't know if it would be possible for another app to register the (for example) .txt extension; the phone does offer the ability to choose what app opens a given file type.
For what it's worth, Bluetooth file transfer to the phone works fine, and the files will open in whatever app is registered to the file's extension. You can then save them into the app's storage (Documents, for Office apps). This may be a better way to transfer your data.

In WP8 you can build Apps that associate themselves with certain filetypes (identified by the ending). If your App is associated with a certain file type the App can also open files of that type from anywhere on the SD Card.
So for example if you put a *.log file onto the SD Card any App that is associated with the ".log" ending can read it (the Explorer functionality for the SD Card would have to be implemented by the App itself but it is supported). This does not work with the integrated storage though. With integrated storage you would still have to receive it via E-Mail, SkyDrive, etc.
Now for the caveats:
- Apps can't be dynamically associated with File Types. If you want to open "*.log" files the App developer has to associate his App with the filetype in it's manifest. If several Apps exist for a given filetype the user will be asked which one to use.
- There is a quite extensive list of file types that are reserved for the OS or built in Apps. Any file type that is reserved in that way can't be associated with third Party Apps. This contains Office documents (except PDF, TXT files and lots of media file types). The complete list can be seen here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsphone/develop/jj207065(v=vs.105).aspx
- Apps can only read from the SD Card but they can't Change data there.
Now as for your Problem: someone could build an App that supports e.g. Log-Files and you could use your Lumia 820 with an SD Card to pretty much work the way you intend to with those files. It's not really trivial though, given that 10 MB big plain Text-Files regularly lead to Trouble even on PC text Editors (the developer has to be smart on how to handle These "huge" files, so just some midnight hack job won't do).
What are your further requirements? Search pretty obviously. But what are all the filetypes you would need? Would you need editing capability?
Just trying to understand the compelete picture of your requirements. Perhaps you can tell us what kinds of files you use and for what purposes.

Thanks for taking the time to reply.
@GoodDayToDie
Re 'seen as a USB drive' - That's me being careless with words, what I meant to say was the ability to local sync over a USB cable, & then access the copied files on the device. I didn't think that you could do this with WP7 [without frigs], & had high[er] hopes for WP8.
I might have a look at Bluetooth FT as a method for getting the [bulk] data over locally, as I won't be doing it via the cloud [email or Skydrive]. Thanks for the advice.
@StevieBallz
Thanks for the MSDN reference - Very interesting.
Ok, so the apps can potentially access the data on the SD card but not write to it - As an aside, I thought I read something the other day that said data on the SD card was limited to Pictures, Videos, Music etc, as a security measure. That's interesting too then, though anything I want to be 'secure' I'd keep in the internal storage anyway.
Re the comment re 'Trouble even on PC text Editors'. Yes, I tried way back on WM2003 to get a file displayer going, but immediately hit problems with [I think] a 32KB limit on the textbox display. I've just made do with WM6.5's Word displayer since, which offers basic functionality.I keep meaning to go back to the coding, but haven't managed it yet [I think Visual Basic was missing for a while with WP, if indeed it's there yet (I thought I'd read it was with VS2012?)].
Re my 'requirements'. Just to be able to search [large-ish] text files & have the o/p displayed in a manner that's readable [no word-wrapping]. I realise editing is a whole new ball game, so read-only would be good enough. Longer term, I'd like the ability to have many text files open at once - On the desktop I use "Programmer's File Editor", & something like that [if only as a viewer] I'd find invaluable on the smartphone/PDA. I also have many thousands of files on my desktop [PDF, DOC, RTF, HTM, TXT etc] & ideally I'd like access to those on the go as & when needed, via a hierarchical file system on the mobile device, with the structure exactly mirroring the PC's file system, so that I'd search for & find data in the same places regardless of which device I was using [Why thousands? Might be 100s+ actually, & these could be electricity bills, sales receipts, insurance documents - anything - the stuff of life really].
I'll continue with my testing of Office Mobile Word's displaying & searching of text files. I've found it patchy & not consistent so far, but am going to have to move from WM6.5 eventually [more's the pity], & don't really want the hassle of sending the device back again.
Many thanks for your advice so far.

Device returned, many thanks for your help. Maybe WP9 then?

5v17 said:
Device returned, many thanks for your help. Maybe WP9 then?
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Click to collapse
Judging by the ideas picked up for review on dev user voice, situation may drastically improve with the next SDK update.