LG VM510 filesystem innards, tricks, and treats

[Renate]

Hmm, looking at the file it doesn't really seem to show the same data that you get by directly querying the NV.
I can look at my NVS file and it doesn't show the data for attributes that I can see otherwise.

[bigsupersquid]

I've verified that the following codes work on my handset. Software version PV7.
##virgin# (##847446#) activation menu (given in manual and freely by tech support)
##port# (##7678#) developer mode selection (found here posted by crogon and on HoFo)
##debug# (##33284#) debug menu, lots of info including latitude and longitude (regardless of location on or off) but can't seem to change anything.
##rtn# (##786#) RTN menu, more system info and reset default (hard reset) menu.
for most of this stuff you need your SPC code, but if you've unlocked your handset (I assume so or you'd probably not be reading this thread ) you should have that already. if not, instructions are [Only registered and activated users can see links. ]
anybody else got some codes that work? feel free to post 'em here.

[bigsupersquid]

This process took me long enough to post, considering that it's the first thing I did to my new toy after unlocking it on delivery to my house (well, the first thing after having to hard reset my phone to restore the filesystem to factory, after trying with partial success to delete said bloatware; deleted 'em alright, but phone would lock up or reboot when trying to run the missing programs from their persistent menu entries)
You'll need to install the java program you want to use as a replacement, from the memory card to the phone, first. This gives you a completely installed directory to copy-modify-and-paste to the target (bloatware) directory.
So, back to bitpim.
Open bitpim, connect your phone to the USB cable in DM mode, select the lg-vx9200 on the port eventually found as 'other cdma' and expand the filesystem (works faster if your memory card is removed) to view it.
First step is to find your newly installed app and the bloatware you want to replace. Click on the /ams/xx folders one at a time and right-click and select 'hexdump' on the .jad file in each /ams/xx folder to see what the midlet-name is. make a note of the xx number of both the new app and the old bloatware. Don't mix 'em up! For this example we'll copy the contents of directory /ams/27 (scribpad freeware) into /ams/11 (twitter bloatware) after fixing the filenames. This assumes you're using a filesystem just like mine (root.zip from the first post in this thread,)- you'll have to decode my instructions to get your own folder numbers.
Select the new app's /ams/xx folder (/ams/27 for this example.) Right click the folder and select 'backup directory'. save it to your hard drive. If you're paranoid or whatever, you can also back up the /ams/11 directory, but it can be recovered by a hard reset.
Unzip the xx.zip (27.zip) file as a new folder and manually rename the leading 2 characters of all the files inside it with 11. DOS junkies can do 'em all at once by navigating to the new 27 directory and typing <rename 27*.* 11*.*> (don't type the <> )
Rename the 27 directory as 11
zip the new 11 directory as 11.zip (you may have to rename the existing 11.zip as something like 11_.zip first if you backed up the bloatware)
click the /ams/11 folder in the center panel to view its contents.
in the right panel, right-click each file one at a time and select 'delete'
Once they're all gone, right-click the /ams/11 folder, and select 'restore'. browse to your new 11.zip file and select it. This should load your modified files.
right click your /ams/11 folder and select 'reboot phone' . Unplug from USB and enjoy.
that should take care of it! Brave souls could try to re-order their menu items with a variant of this method, but some of those apps are supposed to open in more than the 'my stuff/applications' menu, and the replacements only seem to run from that particular (applications) menu. but, they just don't seem do anything at all (after replacement) in the other menu folders, like 'social neckworking' or 'maps', which is a great improvement in my opinion!
<edit>by the way, while this little trick does replace the app itself, it does not change the name of the bloatware app you are replacing on the menu list. You can change the icon if you need to know what you are looking at in the menu...</edit>
hope this works for you, too! have fun, y'all.

[bigsupersquid]

The Rumor Touch allows selection of user wallpaper, but it only rotates and crops when in landscape mode...
heres how

Ok, I've successfully used this tool and method for my VM510. The only problem I had was that I had to assign a photo as wallpaper before overwriting the files to get the new wallpaper to show up (it didn't need a power cycle to see it.) When I set a factory wallpaper, overwriting the files in /setas didn't have any effect, even after rebooting the phone. I tried both methods several times.
Thanks again, renate, for this useful software and info.

[El Schisne]

@bigsupersquid: Have you tried this with, say, replacing the stock browser with Opera Mini? The reason I ask is that there are certain "proprietary" VM pages that are apparently meant to open in the stock browser, such as "Main Menu -> My Account -> Balance + Usage." That page opens up "http://homepage/bal," which changes to "http://wap2.vmobl.com:7501/wap/acc/cr/main.do" after a moment. Neither URL works in Opera Mini; it thinks the first is a search query and gives a server timeout error for the second. The same goes for all the account-related functions in the phone: will they attempt to be opened in Opera Mini if I replace the stock browser with it? If so, does anyone know of a workaround to make Opera Mini the default browser for everything except account-related things?

Edit: Re-reading your post, I'm not even sure that would properly change the "default browser" as such. If it affects only the Applications menu, I take that to mean that (for example) links in text messages wouldn't open at all, and the account-related menu items would do absolutely nothing. Is that a reasonable guess?

[bigsupersquid]

@bigsupersquid: Have you tried this with, say, replacing the stock browser with Opera Mini? The reason I ask is that there are certain "proprietary" VM pages that are apparently meant to open in the stock browser, such as "Main Menu -> My Account -> Balance + Usage." That page opens up "http://homepage/bal," which changes to "http://wap2.vmobl.com:7501/wap/acc/cr/main.do" after a moment. Neither URL works in Opera Mini; it thinks the first is a search query and gives a server timeout error for the second. The same goes for all the account-related functions in the phone: will they attempt to be opened in Opera Mini if I replace the stock browser with it? If so, does anyone know of a workaround to make Opera Mini the default browser for everything except account-related things?

Edit: Re-reading your post, I'm not even sure that would properly change the "default browser" as such. If it affects only the Applications menu, I take that to mean that (for example) links in text messages wouldn't open at all, and the account-related menu items would do absolutely nothing. Is that a reasonable guess?

haven't located the browser at this time. I bet it's written in BREW. I'll go digging... my priority was to write a J2ME downloader app, the only freeware I've gotten to work pulls down 64k of a file and stops there. Assume they haven't accounted for page limits or it's written for midp 1.0...I hate the lousey-browsers which come with all the mobiles I've used.