Skip to content

The Meta-Doctor is a Makefile which can modify a copy of the Palm webOS Doctor before it is flashed onto a webOS device. It accomplishes this by reaching into Palm's distributed Doctor JAR file and making changes to it.

Notifications You must be signed in to change notification settings

webos-internals/meta-doctor

Folders and files

NameName
Last commit message
Last commit date

Latest commit

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Repository files navigation

The Webos Internals Meta Doctor is a Makefile which can modify a copy
of the Palm webOS Doctor before it is flashed onto a webOS device. It
accomplishes this by reaching into Palm's distributed Doctor JAR file
and making changes to it.

The following features are available. To enable a feature, uncomment
the corresponding line in the Makefile.

BYPASS_ACTIVATION removes the Palm activation process that normally
runs on the first boot of the device. This allows users to use the
device even if they do not have access to cellular connectivity or
would prefer not to go through the activation process. This option
disables the cellular functionality until the next time you
doctor. Bypassing activation may prevent you from creating a Palm
profile. This is not a method to use a device on a different cellular
carrier. Note that this option is only for use on Phones, not
Tablets.

BYPASS_FIRST_USE_APP allows the device to start without running the
First Use application. This allows phone users to enable wifi service
first and use that for Palm profile creation and restoring of all the
profile data. Note that to create a Palm profile you may still need to
activate the cellular connection. This is not normally required on a
TouchPad, as it supports wifi in the First Use app. This is not a
method to use a device on a different cellular carrier.

ENABLE_DEVELOPER_MODE puts the phone in Developer Mode. This allows
installation and testing of applications on the device without needing
to type the developer mode activation code. There are no known
security implications of leaving a phone in developer mode.

ENABLE_BETA_FEEDS installs a flag file which tells Preware to
automatically install beta feeds for all WebOS Internals packages.
ENABLE_ALPHA_FEEDS installs the corresponding flag for the alpha
feeds. You must read http://testing.preware.org/ before enabling
either.

INSTALL_SSH_AUTH_KEYS imports the SSH authorized_keys file from the
user's home directory to the device. The user can then connect to the
device from their computer as soon as an SSH daemon is installed. You
must already have a valid openssh authorized_keys file in
~/.ssh/authorized_keys or in ./config/authorized_keys before enabling
this feature, or it will cause a fatal error. You then need to install
the OpenSSH SFTP Server application in Preware to actually access the
device using the openssh private key that matches the openssh public
key listed in your authorized_keys file.

INSTALL_WIFI_PROFILES imports a wifi preferences database file from
the user's home directory to the device. The device will then be set
up to use wifi immediately after the webOS Doctor has completed. You
must already have copied a correctly configured prefsDB.sl file from
the /var/preferences/com.palm.wifi/ directory on the device to
~/.ssh/com.palm.wifi.prefsDB.sl or to
./config/com.palm.wifi.prefsDB.sl on your host machine before enabling
this feature, or it will cause a fatal error.

DISABLE_UPLOAD_DAEMON disables a background process that automatically
uploads usage information to Palm on a daily basis. It uploads debug
information related to operating system or application crashes, users'
GPS information, along with data on every application used, and for
how long it was used. You may wish to disable this on privacy
grounds, or if you do not have an unlimited data plan and will be
paying exorbitant data charges.

DISABLE_UPDATE_DAEMON disables the Palm Over The Air update daemon.
It also disables provisioning support by cellular providers.

DISABLE_MODEM_UPDATE prevents the device from reflashing the modem
software. This saves some time during the webOS Doctor process.

ENABLE_USB_NETWORKING activates USB networking functionality. The
device can then be accessed via USB networking (usbnet drivers are
required on the host). This is not a tethering mechanism.

REMOVE_CARRIER_CHECK prevents the webOS Doctor from verifying that
it is installing a software version from the same provider through
which the device was distributed. It also removes any and all
carrier-specific applications and features. The webOS Doctor can
then be used to update the core software using a release from a
different provider (excluding any provider-specific functionality).
This is likely to break access to the App Catalog and Updates apps.
This is not a method to use a device on a different cellular carrier.

REMOVE_MODEL_CHECK prevents the webOS Doctor from verifying that it
is installing a software version for the intended device. The webOS
Doctor can then be used to update the core software using a release
from a different device (e.g. EU device vs US device).
This is not a method to use a device on a different cellular carrier.

CHANGE_KEYBOARD_TYPE permanently changes the keyboard layout using
the manufacturing software token area. You only need to do this
once.  Future uses of the webOS Doctor without this feature enabled
will not change the setting. You can use this feature again in the
future at any time to reverse this change.
('z' means QWERTY, 'y' & 'y1' mean QWERTZ, 'w1' means AZERTY).

ADD_EXTRA_CARRIERS adds extra carrier information from the files in
the ./patches/carriers directory (currently only for WebOS 2.0.0). 

VAR_PARTITION_SIZE allows you to increase the size of the /var partition.
The extra space is taken away from the USB drive. Note that as of
webOS 2.0, emails and attachments are no longer stored in /var.

SWAP_PARTITION_SIZE allows you to increase the size of the swap partition.
The extra space is taken away from the USB drive.

EXT3FS_PARTITION_SIZE adds a spare LVM partition formatted as ext3.
This allows space for experimentation that requires an additional
ext3 filesytem. The extra space is taken away from the USB drive.
Note that any existing ext3fs partition will be reformatted.

About

The Meta-Doctor is a Makefile which can modify a copy of the Palm webOS Doctor before it is flashed onto a webOS device. It accomplishes this by reaching into Palm's distributed Doctor JAR file and making changes to it.

Resources

Stars

Watchers

Forks

Releases

No releases published

Packages

No packages published