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The Chinese Communist Party published an app called 'Study the Great Nation' earlier this year which it heavily advertises and even mandates many citizens to use. While it looks like a mere propaganda tool at first glance and seems to function as a news and factoid resource on Chinese President Xi Jinping and his party, it appears to be engineered to monitor its users and even sports a superuser backdoor which it could use to gather more data.
Magisk developer topjohnwu might be off serving compulsory military service, but he's still maintained a rapid release schedule for his popular root solution. Magisk v16.4 (and Magisk Manager v5.7.0) were released over the weekend, and they add a handful of technical fixes, app shortcuts, and Android P improvements, but it isn't all smooth sailing. The latest version also removes Magisk's 64-bit binaries, which may break root support for some apps, including the very popular Tasker.
Magisk is probably one of the most well-known and widely used root solutions these days, made famous for its root-detection mitigation strategies. Now both Magisk and the accompanying Magisk Manager have been updated to v15.3 and v5.4.4, respectively, this time bringing the convenience of fingerprint authorization to the dialog which grants root access.
While large displays can be beautiful, using them in everyday scenarios can be anything but. This is particularly the case if you're holding yourself steady on a bus or train with one hand while browsing your smartphone with the other on a daily basis. To address this potential hazard, Samsung, LG, Huawei, Motorola, and other manufacturers offer a one-handed mode on some of their phones, and now a new XDA app called (wait for it) "One-Handed Mode" is bringing the helpful feature to any smartphone running Android 4.3 or higher.
So, LineageOS has been out for a few days now. As promised, .zip packages for rooting the ROM have been put up on the community project's site, as it is not pre-rooted when flashed.
The SuperSU root permissions manager is probably one of the most widely-distributed power user tools on Android at this point, though it won't be breaking the Top Ten lists in the Play Store any time soon. Developer Chainfire has issued an update to version 2.13, which includes a huge list of additional and adjusted features. As far as usability is concerned, the biggest change is probably the fact that the app is now available on the Amazon Appstore. Kindle Fire modders, this means easy updates for you.
The latest version of the Play Store hit the scene a little over a week ago and introduced a tweak to the way permissions are displayed at install time, and it left some people feeling a little...uncertain. Gone is the ugly wall of poorly spaced, semi-specific permissions. The replacement is a short set of simplified categories, each with crisp-looking icons and buttons that reveal a brief description when tapped. Google filtered through roughly 145 permissions and narrowed them down to a dozen groups, plus one bucket for anything that remains. The list can be found here.
These days, it seems like everybody is trying to make Android more secure. As usual, rooting and modding are often casualties of this effort. Just over a month ago Android 4.3 broke the existing model for root, forcing updates to existing methods, and now Samsung is rolling out updated Android 4.2.2 firmwares for the Galaxy S 4 which fully enable the company's heavily secured KNOX environment. Fortunately, Chainfire is already on top of it and has updated his popular root software, SuperSU, to be compatible with the new system.
If you've already updated to Android 4.3, whether via an OTA or by flashing it manually, and rooted it, you're more than likely using Chainfire's SuperSU, which carefully works around the new restrictions Google put in place. Cody has a good write-up about why they did it and what's going on, so go read that if you're interested in the details.
It's no surprise that Google's latest update to our favorite operating system is in instant demand amongst power users and enthusiasts. Without fail, the people eagerly installing 4.3 are frequently the same ones who consider root privileges a necessity for a good Android experience. Unfortunately, it seems a wrench has been thrown into the works when it comes to exposing ultimate access, and people are experiencing more than a few hiccups because of it.
From time to time, we like to dive into the murky depths of the Play Store and see what cool root-only apps we can dredge up. If you went to the trouble of rooting your phone, you'll want the best root apps to take advantage of all that freedom. That's just what we have here, the best root apps carefully chosen as must-have additions to your arsenal.
The Play Store has been off to a great start in 2013 – January saw the introduction of some brilliant apps like Carbon Backup and Pushbullet, and February followed up with some great entries of its own. From widgets to root apps to content creation tools, February had something for just about everyone. As always, we'll take a quick look at five of the very best apps we saw in the past month.
A few days ago, Koush released his newly-updated Superuser app into the Play Store. At the time, he noted that it would be integrated into CyanogenMod nightlies in upcoming builds. As of the latest releases, the app is now the go-to for Su access on your device – but there's a kicker: if you go looking for it, you won't find it in the app tray.
In an almost superhero-like act, Koushik Dutta (a.k.a. Koush of ROM Manager fame) has pushed his completely rewritten Superuser app to the Play Store just 15 days after first announcing it on Google+. This version introduces several improvements upon the original Superuser. In the last two weeks, the feature list has grown to include fully functioning multi-user support, secure PIN protection, and support for the x86 and ARM architectures. Additionally, the interface has been revitalized with a clean looking Holo theme and a tablet UI.
Koushik Dutta, the author of ClockworkMod Recovery and such iconic Android apps as ROM Manager and, more recently, Carbon, has decided to tackle a new subject that is also very dear to the Android community - Superuser and root access control. Koush's latest app, now in beta and coming soon to the Play Store, is called simply ClockworkMod Superuser.
Those of you in the habit of rooting and/or flashing custom ROMs are likely familiar with SuperSU, one of the most popular Superuser options available. Developer Chainfire has just released the long-awaited 1.0 version of both the standard and Pro apps to the Play Store. In addition to the usual bug fixes (many of which affect newer HTC devices), there's a bevy of new appearance customization in the app settings. You can choose between five different app icons (or none at all), three different Holo themes, or a manufacturer-friendly system default.
Wow, big day for root things on the Nexus 4 and 10, eh? First off, official ClockworkMod Recovery is now available for the pair, either directly from the CWM site or through ROM Manager, which was also updated today to support Android 4.2. While the latter can handle flashing the updated recovery, Koush himself advised users to flash via fastboot to avoid any potential issues with the process.
[New App] Chainfire Brings Us SuperSU, A Souped-Up Version Of Superuser With Some Super New Features
"If it's not broken, don't fix it" is a wise and popular mantra among anyone who fixes anything. Developers, on the other hand, couldn't care less. Enter SuperSu. While Superuser has been a staple of root usage for a long time now, XDA developer Chainfire (who has also brought us many other fantastic apps), has taken what already works and made it even better.
Superuser, the preferred app to "hook into your phone's power," has at last been updated to version 3.0, bringing a huge overhaul both in terms of design and functionality.
It has been quite an exciting (and busy) night for Thrive owners and hackers. The community managed to root the device, enable Superuser Permissions, and flash ClockworkMod Recovery. Thus far only a handful of people have taken the plunge, so issues could still arise, but preliminary results are looking good. In their own words: