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Blog of Attomsoft Inc.
Failed at updating Kindle2(Int) firmware from 2.3.3 to 2.5.2
Aug 14th
A few guys complain the failure at updating their Kindles 2 International firmware from 2.3.3 to 2.5.2, mostly just get 2.3.4 result. Although not many cases reported, but looks like their Kindles all are K2I and produced in a specific term of 2010.
If you are not luck enough, maybe you got the same problem. Here are the solutions.
- be sure that you got the proper firmware update package, for K2I, here is the link from Amazon. Before download, make sure your Kindle is international version with serial no. prefix B003.DON’T USE FILES FROM OTHER SITES, THAT MAY BRICK YOUR KINDLE.
- uninstall all hacks installed on your Kindle before process the updating. Except the hacks are claimed no need to be uninstalled before update, like usbNetwork hack, in fact, if you want to keep usbNetwork working on 2.5.2, you MUST NOT uninstall it before update. And make sure you restore all files which you have modfied to its original.
- Backup anything on your kindle to make sure you would not lose it during the update process.
- OK, here is the classic update way: plug your kindle to your computer to enter the USB drive mode, copy the 2.5.2 update package to the root of your kindle, and then eject it from your computer. Click the menu button and enter the settings sub-menu, then select “update your software” by pressing the 5-way joystick, here it goes.
That’s just for non-us K2I users, if you got Whispernet you could wait for remote update automatically, if that failed, call Amazon.
Most reported failure of above update process is raised at first stage, normally with error code U006 at the left-bottom of the screen, that means md5 check-sum failure. Normally because some files are modified and not acceptable.
You can find out which files caused that by following below steps:
- Enable Kindle debug mode: click any visible alpha-number button on the QWETY keyboard to bring out the search field, then clear it by press DEL button, enter [;debugOn] and click Enter. ([;] could be entered by click SYM button). And then enter [;dumpmessages] and click Enter. You should see a new file appear on the top of the screen after a while, that’s the log file of your Kindle.
- Copy the log file from your Kindle to your computer, open it with any text editor. Search “checksum failure” in the file, check the line carefully, most guys got this:def:patch:patchinfo=”/opt/amazon/ebook/config/framework.mario.conf”:checksum failure OR this:def:patch:patchinfo=”/opt/amazon/ebook/config/browser_prefs”:checksum failure, whatever, that’s the problem.
- The md5 check-sum failure is caused by file modification, maybe you did it yourself, maybe some hacks did, you need to restore them to original. If your situation is the second one, you could restore the files by uninstall the hacks (better all than some). The first situation is up to your own, since you modified them yourself, get them back is your task too. If you could not restore the files caused md5 check-sum failure, you can’t update your Kindle, so try your best on it.
- If you had restored the files successfully, congratulations, you should have no problem now, try the update process again. If not, try restore them again.
That’s the solution for most unlucky guys with K2I, maybe the part of restoring files is most difficult to perform, uninstall hacks is easy, but some guys just can’t remember what they have done to their Kindles, then the easiest way to do this is just getting proper files from other users with untouched system.
OK, maybe you don’t know how to restore Kindle files manually, I will cover that in other post lately.
Original Kindle files on 2.3.3 system
Aug 14th
I will post some files dumped from Kindle 2(International) 2.3.3 system, in case you mess them up.
/opt/amazon/ebook/config/browser_prefs
Prevent Kindle console from sleep
Aug 14th
Have you ever found that your Kindle always disconnects from SSH or Telnet when you are coding in its console?
Here is the trick:
/etc/init.d/netwatchd stop
Kindle 2 unicode font hacks works great
Aug 14th
I just tested unicode font hacks on my K2I from MobileRead wiki, it works like charm.
The process is simple and straigtforward, step 1 is installing the jailbreak, step 2 is installing the font hack. Step 1 will raise a failure as its supposed to, just skip the failure; step 2 does need a manual reboot after the installation to trigger it on.
Detailed instructions could be found on MobileRead.com Wiki.
How to configure OpenVPN on Android CyanogenMod
Aug 14th
I just tested this on my old Google G1(Dream) with CyanogenMod 6.0.2(RC), and I think it could apply on other CyanogenMod rom with OpenVPN GUI.
Not like OpenVPN on Windows or Linux which needs a config folder holding separate keys and certificates, on CyanogenMod, the OpenVPN GUI needs a PKCS12 compressed file to perform importing actions.
Lets say you have got the three files: client.key, client.cert and ca.cert, then you could compress them into a single PKCS12 file by running the following command(Linux):
openssl pkcs12 -export -in [PathToClientCert] -inkey [PathToClientKey] -certfile [PathToCACert] -name [FriendlyName] -out certs.p12
Be sure to replace all the [PathTo**] with appropriate path to your files. On Windows, you could using “openssl.exe”.
Once you got the PKCS12 file, copy it to your Android SDCARD root, and go to “Settings › Security and location”, and then select “Import from SDCARD”.
After importing, you could go to “Wireless > VPN Settings”, and create a new OpenVPN connection and do your stuff.
BTW. You should configure OpenVPN on Android carefully according to the configuration file from Linux or Windows, something important like key-size and encryption method may result very differently, check them by tap “Menu > Advanced settings” in OpenVPN GUI.
First SMS Trojan detected for smartphones running Android
Aug 14th
Kaspersky Lab, a leading developer of secure content management solutions, announces that the first malicious program classified as a Trojan-SMS has been detected for smartphones running on Google’s Android operating system. Named Trojan-SMS.AndroidOS.FakePlayer.a, it has already infected a number of mobile devices.
The new malicious program penetrates smartphones running Android in the guise of a harmless media player application. Users are prompted to install a file of just over 13 KB with the standard Android extension .APK. Once installed on the phone, the Trojan uses the system to begin sending SMSs to premium rate numbers without the owner’s knowledge or consent, resulting in money passing from a user’s account to that of the cybercriminals.
The Trojan-SMS category is currently the most widespread class of malware for mobile phones, but Trojan-SMS.AndroidOS.FakePlayer.a is the first to specifically target the Android platform. It should be noted that there have already been isolated cases of devices running Android being infected with spyware. The first such program appeared in 2009.
“The IT market research and analysis organization IDC has noted that those selling devices running Android are experiencing the highest growth in sales among smartphone manufacturers. As a result, we can expect to see a corresponding rise in the amount of malware targeting that platform,” says Denis Maslennikov, Mobile Research Group Manager at Kaspersky Lab. “Kaspersky Lab is actively developing technologies and solutions to protect this operating system and plans to release Kaspersky Mobile Security for Android in early 2011.”
Kaspersky Lab recommends that users pay close attention to the services that an application requests access to when it is being installed. That includes access to premium rate services that charge to send SMSs and make calls. When a user agrees to these functions during the installation of an application, the smartphone may then be able to make calls and send SMSs without further authorization.
The signature for Trojan-SMS.AndroidOS.FakePlayer.a has already been added to Kaspersky Lab’s antivirus databases.
Check carefully before you install any application either from market or download site, something bad may hurt you.
How to build a stackoverflow or Yahoo! Answers like system using Drupal (Part2)
Apr 26th
We’ll create the two content types which will be used by our Q&A system in today’s part-2.
The Questions content-type fields:
- Question title(Module form [title])
- Question description(Module form [body])
- Disable comment option if you don’t want users comment on the question itself.
- Points: field_question_points, type[integer], default value[0], set as required, minimum value also as 0
- Answers: field_question_answers, type[nodereference count], set as required, the “nodereference field that can be counted” option should be set to the field name that we’ll create it in “Answers” content-type in step 2. (So you could just process #5 field)
- Best answer: field_question_best_answer, type[nodereference]. Save the content type here and we will refine it later.
The Answers content-type fields:
- Set “Automatic title generation” option to “Automatically generate the title and hide the title field”, you can set the automated title pattern using tokens available there.
- Disable the comment option if you don’t want user comment on answers themselves. Or leave it R/W just like Stackoverflow.
- Target Question field: type[nodereference][nodereference from url], select our previously created ‘Questions’ type for referring.
- Selected Answer field: type[integer][Single on/off checkbox], set allowed values as ’0|No’ and ’1|Yes’ (that’s separated lines)
Here, we’ll go back to the “Questions” type and re-configure it:
- The “nodereference field that can be counted” of the “Answers” field should be set to our just created “Target Question” field.
- The “Content types that can be referenced” of the “Best answer” field should be set to our just created “Answers” type.
If you want to allow free tagging feature, here’s how:
- Create new vocabulary named “Tags” or something you prefer.
- Select the content types we just created which will allow using terms below this vocabulary and its free tagging feature.
- Enable the “Tags” option for this vocabulary to allow users free tagging
That’s all basic content types we needed for our Q&A system, we’ll build the needed views and panels in our next part tutorial.
See ya.
How to build a stackoverflow or Yahoo! Answers like system using Drupal (Part1)
Apr 23rd
Do you believe that? Stackoverflow or Yahoo! Answers interactive sites will replace old forums. Because users on most interactive sites treat finding solutions or help people as their daily job, traditional forum style systems are good at entertaining users, but not solution oriented.
From this post start, I’ll tell you how to build a stackoverflow or Yahoo! Answers like system using Drupal only, on this topic completion, we will have a Question&Answer system with following features:
- Users can post and answer question with granted access; (ACL)
- Every question can be assigned “Points” by its author, and the points will be granted to the author of the best question which picked up by the author of question; (Awarding)
- On the questions list page, users can see how many answers have been posted to single question, and whether the best answer has been picked up;
- On the question detail page, users can see the question itself and information including tags, points, authors, posted date, and all answers following the question;
- On the question detail page, if the best answer has been picked up, the question will be marked as “Closed” and the best answer will be on the top of the answers list and marked as “Best Answer”;
- If the author of a question had picked up the best answer, other users will not be able to post answers anymore, and the author himself will not be able to pick another answer as the best;
The following modules will be used by this little project:
- Drupal (itself, of cause)
- CCK (with build-in plugins and additional nodereference and the nodereference_url widget)
- Nodereference Count module
- Automatic nodetitles
- Views
- Panels
- Userpoints
- Our custom Q&A module
We’ve set our gold and list tools we’ll need later, we’ll start the building this Q&A system from next part of this topic.
See ya.
Nodereference field from custom url in Panels pane
Apr 20th
Nodereference field is a powerful CCK field type for relationship handling for Drupal, the nodereference_url module is a plugin supplying it with referenced nid from url path. I use them a lot in daily Drupal based solutions.
Nodereference Url works under path like node/add/NODETYPE/NODE_ID situation by default, it’s sufficient for normal problem such as “Post reply”, “Add comment”, etc. You just need to build the link with proper NODE_ID.
One of our projects need to build a system like “StackOverflow” with simple Question&Answers workflow. I created “Question” type and “Answer” type which has a filed referring to the “Question” type, then I used Panels to integrate single “Question” node with its related “Answer”s node.
Everything works as will, until I tried to add a “Answer Add Form” below the created panel page, the form displayed but the field referring “Question” node gave out “Referenced content not found” error.
I could find out why, until I read the document of Nodereference URL module carefully.
The reason why above solution not worked is that, the Nodereference URL module supports /add/NODETYPE/NODE_ID by default, and that’s the only pattern it works on.
At last, the solution laid just in the README.txt file with the module itself. Silly me!
It said:
By default Node Reference URL Widget will only work with node form paths that
match the standard Drupal install: "node/add/%type", where %type is a node type
like "blog" or "story". If you want to use Node Reference URL Widget on
non-standard URLs, you may do so by informing Node Reference URL Widget of these
special paths.
To do so, add additional paths to your settings.php with the following code:
$conf['nodereference_url_paths'] = array(
'node/add/%type/%nid',
'node/%/add/%type/%nid',
);
So, remained work just as easy as put above lines of code to my settings.php. And then, magic happens.
Attomsoft main site will be re-constructed for new business strategy
Apr 17th
Attomsoft main site (www.attomsoft.com) will be reconstructed these days, because we have got new funds from investors and new refined strategy.
Since 2005, Attomsoft Inc. has been a leading company targeting mid-large business website architect and design in China mainland, we’ve served lots of great companies including Petro China, China Mobile, etc.
