T68 Screen lock PIN

[JohnWW]

I'm looking for a way to PIN protect my T68. Trying to set the Screen Lock in the Android settings, but it seems to have no effect at all. Running the Update date 2014-07-02 from Booxtor's post.

[afainber]

I believe that Onyx are using a modified locking mechanism, standard Android lock configuration and apps will not work correctly (just like the standard apps that deal with power management don't work on the T68).

[DoctorWkt]

Has anybody found a way to set up some sort of screen lock when the T68 is awakened? I don't want to set up my e-mail and other accounts if someone can access them easily.

[zoidberg]

I actually stumbled across a way to do this recently. It's a little complicated, I'm not sure how safe/stable the procedure is and it may well void your warranty! I have an M96, but according to the wiki it's OS setup is pretty similar to the T68 so in theory the same procedure could work.

I had to take the boot image from the latest update.zip I applied, unpack it, edit a settings file, then repack it and flash it back to the device using fastboot. The file was init.freescale.rc, and the setting, I commented out this setting: `setprop ro.ONYX_DISABLE_KEYGUARD 1` and now the pin screen shows.

Here's a site with a very good guide on editing boot images:http://android-dls.com/wiki/index.ph...ck_Boot_Images. I did things slightly differently, using a program called abootimg which I found in the ubuntu repo instead of the one mentioned on that site, but the process is the same.

Should get you started!

I should say again that I'm not an expert in any of this and can't rule out the possibility of bricking your device if it goes horribly wrong. Someone more knowledgable might come along and tell me I did a really dumb thing and was lucky to get away with it, or just that there's a much simpler way of doing it!

[DoctorWkt]

Thanks for the information, zoidberg. How do you get into fastboot mode on the M96? How did you reflash the update.zip file, and does this cause a factory reset?

If I can avoid the factory reset, I'll give it a go.

Cheers, Warren

[zoidberg]

Hi Warren, there's info about fastboot on the M96 wiki page, you just need to power off and start up again, holding down power+next buttons.

I didn't re-flash the whole update.zip just the boot partition, so it's not like a factory reset, your data wouldn't be affected unless the whole thing does somehow go horribly wrong. Still, I'd take a backup anyway, just in case!! The command would be something like

fastboot flash boot {FILE}

Have fun!

[DoctorWkt]

zoidberg, can you give me your command lines for abootimg to extract and repack the boot.img? I'm trying mkbootimg on Linux, and every new boot.img I create doesn't work. I've even repacked with no changes. So I'd like to try abootimg instead. Thanks.

[DoctorWkt]

OK, I managed to get it to work. I now have a T68 with a PIN number on the sleep screen. On my Linux box I wrote a Makefile to make it easy to unpack and repack the boot.img file:

all: echo unpack pack

unpack:
        rm -rf fs
        abootimg -x boot.img
        mkdir fs
        (cd fs; zcat ../initrd.img | cpio -i)

repack:
        (cd fs; find . | cpio -o -H newc | gzip > ../newinitrd.img)
        abootimg --create newboot.img -f bootimg.cfg -k zImage -r newinitrd

clean:
        rm -rf bootimg.cfg fs initrd.img newboot.img newinitrd.img zImage

I do make unpack to extract the files from boot.img. I then edit fs/init.freescale.rc to comment out the line:

    # Disable KEYGUARD
    # setprop ro.ONYX_DISABLE_KEYGUARD 1

I then do a make repack to create the newboot.img file. Then I run fastboot flash boot newboot.img to prepare my PC to install the newboot.img file.

I plug my powered off T68 into a USB port on my PC. I hold down next page and the power button (and keep both held down). On my PC, I see:

< waiting for device >
sending 'boot' (3468 KB)... OKAY
writing 'boot'... OKAY

Then I let go of both buttons, then hold down only the power button for a long time to turn the T68 off. Finally, I can turn it on again as per usual.

So far, the lock screen seems a bit dodgy. For the first few reboots, the capacitive screen showed the PIN screen but it was unresponsive. Now there's a screen light issue. Sometimes when I put it to sleep, the screen light stays on, but not always.

I will try the PIN screen for a while and report back on any issues that I've seen. Thanks to all for your help. Warren

[zoidberg]

Originally Posted by DoctorWkt

So far, the lock screen seems a bit dodgy. For the first few reboots, the capacitive screen showed the PIN screen but it was unresponsive. Now there's a screen light issue. Sometimes when I put it to sleep, the screen light stays on, but not always.

I should have mentioned that, sorry. Yeah, the pin screen isn't very responsive. On mine, though the buttons work, the screen and especially the actual keys are slow to respond. Didn't know about and light issues either, since there's no light on the M96.

Great instructions btw!

[DoctorWkt]

I've had the PIN lock on the sleep screen for about a day now. Here's how it works on the T68. When the device is asleep, I press the power button to wake it up. The screen flashes and the front light lights up, then it goes back to sleep. Pressing the power button a second time brings up the PIN screen but no front light. Once I enter my PIN I get the desktop, but still the front light is off. I have to use the power widget to toggle the front light back on.

It seems to be stable, i.e. the PIN screen always works. It's just that the front light stays off is a bit annoying.

Edit: if I press the power button a few times to sleep/unsleep, then I can usually get it into a situation where the front light is on. That's a sort of solution :-)

[cicabum]

Originally Posted by DoctorWkt

I've had the PIN lock on the sleep screen for about a day now. Here's how it works on the T68. When the device is asleep, I press the power button to wake it up. The screen flashes and the front light lights up, then it goes back to sleep. Pressing the power button a second time brings up the PIN screen but no front light. Once I enter my PIN I get the desktop, but still the front light is off. I have to use the power widget to toggle the front light back on.

It seems to be stable, i.e. the PIN screen always works. It's just that the front light stays off is a bit annoying.

Edit: if I press the power button a few times to sleep/unsleep, then I can usually get it into a situation where the front light is on. That's a sort of solution :-)

It works Just a question: how can I change the background of the screen lock?

[JNT]

I just want to say thanks for the information in this thread. Very useful!

and also:

Originally Posted by DoctorWkt

... It's just that the front light stays off is a bit annoying.

Edit: if I press the power button a few times to sleep/unsleep, then I can usually get it into a situation where the front light is on. That's a sort of solution :-)

Does long-pressing the BACK button not turn on and off the front-light for you? On my T68 it does...

[cicabum]

Originally Posted by JNT

I just want to say thanks for the information in this thread. Very useful!

and also:



Does long-pressing the BACK button not turn on and off the front-light for you? On my T68 it does...

Yes, T68 works in that way, even if DoctorWkt was talking about the power button in his last comment :-)

[DoctorWkt]

Over on YouTube, cicabum wrote: I've actived lock screen how you described here. Lock screen works on my T68, but now Power Manager can not power off automatically the device... Could you give me please some tips?

cicabum, by automatically do you mean that you cannot power down
the T68 by holding the power button down and choosing Power Off?

It all works fine for me. One thing I would suggest is that you try removing the changes, and see if the Power Manager functions work again. At least we will know that it is these changes which are causing the problem.

Cheers, Warren

[cicabum]

Originally Posted by DoctorWkt

Over on YouTube, cicabum wrote: I've actived lock screen how you described here. Lock screen works on my T68, but now Power Manager can not power off automatically the device... Could you give me please some tips?

cicabum, by automatically do you mean that you cannot power down
the T68 by holding the power button down and choosing Power Off?

It all works fine for me. One thing I would suggest is that you try removing the changes, and see if the Power Manager functions work again. At least we will know that it is these changes which are causing the problem.

Cheers, Warren

Now it works fine for me as well: I've upgraded simply on the last firmware. Now I'm looking for the file of the lock screen, because I want to make it black and white. I've edited the file keyguard_screen_tab_unlock (framework-res\res\layout) but nothing changes: do you know maybe what file I should edit? Thank you anyway for your interest!