So I used chevron labs to unlock... Now what?

[thed]

Ok then I am even more confused than I thought. I see, for example, an Advanced Configuration app is available, that modifies the Registry. It requires a "developer unlocked" phone to run. So how can it run? How was it developed, if the developer couldn't touch the Registry on the actual phone?

I could pay $100 a year to MS and still would not get an "interop" unlock?

You're right, the Advanced Configuration tool does modify the registry. But it requires more than a dev unlock. It requires the phone to be interop-unlocked to install properly. To interop-unlock your phone, you have to modify a value in the registry.

So basically, to interop-unlock your phone you have to have access to the registry. But to get access to the registry, your phone has to be interop-unlocked. It's kind of a conundrum. There are ways to do it but there is a bit of hackery involved.

The Advanced Configuration tool is not and never will be in the Marketplace, because MS does not officially support apps that modify the registry directly. That's why the $100 developer unlock does not interop-unlock your phone, because MS will not publish any apps that need it anyway.

This thread has a good explanation of things:
[GUIDE] INTEROP-UNLOCK for MANGO - No revert to NoDo - No 0x81030120 (Samsung/LG) - xda-developers

 

[jim_h]

thed, thanks for all that info. I knew that Advanced Configuration wasn't in the marketplace, because it needs a developer unlock. And what I've now learned is that a "developer unlock" isn't what I'd call a developer unlock.

I guess I started out on the wrong track - I saw the blog post on wpcentral announcing the ChevronWP7 "developer unlock" and thought that the door was now open to things like the Registry and the file system. The funny thing is, all I actually wanted to do was tweak my accent colors. And I see you still have to jump through crazy hoops to do that.

This is sort of OT but if you're writing an app the officially-sanctioned MS way, and you can't access the Registry or the file system, where do you put your persistent data?

 

[thed]

thed, thanks for all that info. I knew that Advanced Configuration wasn't in the marketplace, because it needs a developer unlock. And what I've now learned is that a "developer unlock" isn't what I'd call a developer unlock.

I guess I started out on the wrong track - I saw the blog post on wpcentral announcing the ChevronWP7 "developer unlock" and thought that the door was now open to things like the Registry and the file system. The funny thing is, all I actually wanted to do was tweak my accent colors. And I see you still have to jump through crazy hoops to do that.

This is sort of OT but if you're writing an app the officially-sanctioned MS way, and you can't access the Registry or the file system, where do you put your persistent data?

Each app gets its own isolated data store where you can save any files that you need. You just can't touch any other part of the file system. You can also use a local SQL database if you need it.

I feel ya on changing the colors though, it's really a pain to do something simple like that now. If you don't mind losing your data, you can always roll back to Nodo, make your color changes and then update to Mango and they will still be there. Not that that's any easier, but the interop-lock wasn't an issue before Mango.

 

[jim_h]

the interop-lock wasn't an issue before Mango.

Didn't know that either. So, MS is locking WP7 tighter rather than opening it up.

 

[jim_h]

This thread has a good explanation of things:
[GUIDE] INTEROP-UNLOCK for MANGO - No revert to NoDo - No 0x81030120 (Samsung/LG) - xda-developers

I looked at that thread, and now I understand what an interop unlock does - it lets you run native, compiled code. And I also see there's no way to get an interop unlock on an HTC phone so I'm totally out of luck - I'm stuck with these preschoolers' accent colors until I buy a new phone.

Someday I'll want a new phone, but I wonder if it will be WP7. Metro is nice but it's totally frozen and static, eventually you want to change things around and it's frustrating that you can't.

All they really need to do is add a gray theme; then you could have lots of variety via live tiles.

 

[trumpet116]

How do you install this homebrew stuff, though?

 

[weepatc]

To install Homebrew apps you need a XAP deployment tool. It is included in the Windowsphone 7.1 SDK or you can search for 3rd party deployment tools.

Sent from my HTC Titan using Board Express

 

[jalb]

If you can get Interop unlocked, Advanced Configuration Tools is really neat. Apart from the custom accent colours, you can force multitasking - this means all your NoDo apps will resume instantly.

I don't understand why MS doesn't deploy that anyway.