The Ignition Project: LG Vu (CU920) Hacks

LG Vu (CU920) Hacks

Keith Gable — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 17:02:00 -0500

I recently purchased an LG Vu, and I’m always into making phones operate like I want to, remove all of the built in crap, and so on. If you read the rest of this post, I’ve got tons of stuff that I’ve been working on. It all requires BitPim, which I just emerge‘ed in Gentoo. Install it however you need to. You have to tell BitPim that you have an LG VX-8700. I will leave it as an exercise to the reader to know to back up the files on their expensive piece of equipment before altering them…

1. LG Java Security Hack

This hack is the same on most every LG phone. Use BitPim to browse to /LGAPP/Media/Java/cert/. Save the .pol file in that directory. Open it in your favorite editor and find your provider’s “Trusted Root CA” in the list of domains. It’ll look like a LDAP distinguished name because that’s what it is. Copy and paste all of the lines in that section, and paste them on top of the lines in the “domain: untrusted” section. Put that file back on your phone and you will be able to use all new applications without constantly authorizing network access. Currently installed applications will have to be reinstalled!

2. Remove Demo Applications

Browse to /LGAPP/Media/Java/ams/. Delete all of the Mxxx directories (for me, I stopped at M0012) and _folder_db_. Then, reboot the phone. Thanks to this forum for this tip.

3. Edit System Menus

Since I had just deleted Mobile E-Mail, I needed to get it off of the main screen or it would bug me. This turned out to be easy. Browse to /LGAPP/Media/Flash/ and download T1_en-UK.xml and T2_en-UK.xml. Open them in your favorite editor and remove the “Mobile E-Mail” item. You can delete but not add menu items. You’ll have to reboot the phone to get it to reload the menu.

4. More

I’ll be updating this blog post as I figure more stuff out about my phone.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by BlaT

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 16:07:17 -0500

GUYS!!! The coolest hack is now out for the Vu! It is the Slide Theme. It fully works so don’t be discouraged by the amount of time and work it takes. How do i know it works? Because i have it. It completely changes the outlook of the phone. It DOES take time to get used to it but trust me - It’s worth it. Plus it is easy to change it back (make a backup in BitPim when doing any changes!!). Also, after you download the slide program from the site, the README tells you that are some complications when using BitPim. That is really not true because i used BitPim when doing this. So finally we can have as much fun as iphone users have with their themes. Also, before you start on the hacking process make sure you watch the video of the slide theme being used first so you know how to use it when you finish.

The website you can get all this is from: http://www.lg-vu.com/index.php/topic,944.0.html

In order to get the files you have to sign up as a member – which is free and fast. So GOOD LUCK

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by BlaT

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 14:04:27 -0500

Oh also, Pearl, you should probably go to getjar.com for more applications. You’ll probably find many many more e-mail client software there.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by BlaT

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 14:02:23 -0500

Hey Pearl if you want to get a better experience with Yahoo and other clients than you should probably get a Micro SD card and download loads of 3rd party programs. I personally use an application called Yamee for the yahoo client. It connects directly to the yahoo server and i think its better (a bit faster too) than the mobile e-mail thing on the Vu.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Drew Douthitt

Sun, 21 Sep 2008 13:40:05 -0500

thanks!

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Keith Gable

Fri, 19 Sep 2008 08:02:31 -0500

Drew: You probably don’t have the LG USB Modem drivers installed. I got mine by downloading a utility from LG Austrailia and entering my IMEI. To backup your phone, once it works, in Filesystem view, right click and find the option to save the entire tree. Then save it. But you still risk bricking it if you mess with things you don’t know.

Pearl: You probably can’t. Probably, the Yahoo client just sucks.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Pearl

Thu, 18 Sep 2008 08:09:16 -0500

Does anyone know how to make the Yahoo Messenger work better. it sucks compared to my last phone. Thats really my only complaint though.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Drew Douthitt

Thu, 18 Sep 2008 01:16:30 -0500

now i downloaded that driver from the link you gave me and i got into bitpim and i tried to send the phone data and this huge thing pops up and i pushed the help button to see what it was and it said it was some internal error and at the bottom of the page it said i could continue on, abort, or trouble shoot it so i dont know what happend or what is wrong with it… i would apreciate all the help you would be willing to give me… thanks!

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Drew Douthitt

Thu, 18 Sep 2008 00:39:06 -0500

now you said i need to back it up so i dont loose anything where would i back it up? because i downloaded bitpim but i am still tryin to get the driver and i am just tryin to figure out how to do this right so i dont ruin my phone…

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Keith Gable

Thu, 18 Sep 2008 00:13:03 -0500

BitPim doesn’t load to your phone; it’s a program you run on your PC. Using it you can modify system files on the phone and alter how it behaves. The “hacks” if you will are only useful if you:

Hate the built in applications or want to get them out of your sight.
Use the Internet on your phone a lot and dislike the crappy built-in browser and instead want to use Opera Mini or something.
Have a Gmail account and want to use your Vu and Gmail together without being annoyed by the stupid connection dialogs that AT&T forces on every non-AT&T application.

If you just want to get the “most” out of your Vu, but you don’t use the Internet features, hacking it isn’t really worth it until something comes out as a hack to allow functionality you don’t already have.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Drew Douthitt

Wed, 17 Sep 2008 21:58:55 -0500

thanks! but should i load it to my phone? would it be that beneficial?

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Keith Gable

Tue, 16 Sep 2008 21:41:01 -0500

Drew: BitPim is a personal information manager/sync program that has a debugging feature that allows you to access a phone’s file system. If the Vu were totally supported (I’m thinking about trying to sit down and make it sync contacts and stuff), you could use BitPim to sync contacts, music, etc. with your phone.

Terry: I’m not sure what you’re using to view e-mails… the phone doesn’t support Outlook/Exchange (neither did iPhone until 2.0). Personally, I use the Gmail application to access my mail. It doesn’t even support attachments.

Since this phone is really three platforms (BREW, J2ME, and FlashLite) and there’s no official developer community or anything, most likely you’re using a BREW/J2ME application and it has no idea what to do with an attachment. Opera Mini, for example, takes downloads and launches the phone’s built-in browser and has that browser download the file. If your mail client doesn’t offer the ability to save an attachment to the filesystem, you won’t be able to get any application to open them. And you might even have trouble opening them if you can because I doubt that there are readers for anything more than PDF files. (Crafty people could set up their mail server to convert all Microsoft Office attachments to PDF when going to your mobile account.. but I have no idea how to begin with that)

Simply put, the Vu is not a smart phone. If you need a smart phone, buy a smart phone.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by terry

Mon, 15 Sep 2008 16:51:15 -0500

I have an LGcu920 and I have get a lot of emails from work, with attachments. The phone won’t allow me to open them, even with the “Doc Viewer” I installed, How do I make it autostart when click on the attachment. Thanks in advance

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Drew Douthitt

Sun, 14 Sep 2008 02:47:21 -0500

hey i am new to all this stuff i am not very intelligent when it comes to this stuff but i want to get the most out of the vu as i can… so what exacty is bitpim and what does it do?

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Keith Gable

Wed, 10 Sep 2008 21:55:46 -0500

If you see the LG Vu unofficial forums, they’ve sort of cracked the whole theme thing… not well, and it’s not going to help unless you have Flash CS3 or something I think.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Anthony Mckire

Tue, 09 Sep 2008 14:04:32 -0500

Hey Keith Gable i just purschased the lg vu and im wondering is there anyway i can get more themes for my phone please get back to asap

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Keith Gable

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 19:26:19 -0500

All I know is that there are Viewty themes out there and the Viewty is very similar.. There’s actually a wiki out there with details on how the themes work. But there’s no guarantee the fscommand2 stuff from a Viewty theme is going to work on the Vu. “Dial 1234567890” on the Viewty might be the same command for “Factory Reset + Garbage”, and that would really suck. You can almost guarantee the menus will work totally differently.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by BlaT

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 18:36:33 -0500

Also Keith i am going to go into the themes topic because i REALLY want a different theme! So if would be very helpful if you can give me ALL the info you know on the topic thanks.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by BlaT

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 18:33:51 -0500

The Fuj: Just try to master reset the phone to its factory settings. maybe it might work. Or if you want the current info on your Vu and also want the Mxxx folders then make a back up of the entire filesystem> from BitPim> then try to master reset the phone. After you reset the phone you MIGHT (not sure) have the Mxxx folders back. Then you can copy (or backup) the Mxxx folders only> replace the entire filesystem with the backup you did before and then just overwrite and place the Mxxx folders in there. However, i agree with Keith that the applications were trash (unless you DID use them-which is kinda stupid because you can just go and download 3rd party applications such as opera which operate better (my opinion)).

And now i will give you the code i found online which might help you Fully Master Reset the phone. To get the menu just go to the number icon and type in this (the menu should appear as soon as the last digit or character is inserted): 277634#*#
then click on factory reset. Do this at your own risk since i am just guessing on this awswer. Also TRY not to mess around with the other settings on this menu since it messed up my phone before!

P.S. lol thanks Keith for suggesting the preview button. That stupid code thing was pissing me off!

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Keith Gable

Sun, 31 Aug 2008 21:39:46 -0500

Blat: The problem is that they are FlashLite or something like that… there’s a little bit of glue native code the menus call (it’s like, they call fscommand2 with some parameters that make the phone do things with the radio and so on), and the Viewty’s fscommand2 functions are probably different than the Vu’s.

You might also consider using the preview function before posting. Puttng spaces before a line makes my blogging software assume you’re pasting code.

The Fuj: Find a phone with those files still there and put them back (delete the folder db file again). All of the applications are trash anyway…

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by The Fuj

Sat, 30 Aug 2008 17:43:04 -0500

Need some help.

Deleted the Mxxx folders (including the mobile email folder) Was wondering how to put it back.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by BlaT

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 20:28:46 -0500

  Thanks Keith i got the phone to start working again (just found the at&t.pol file online and replaced it with the currently messed up one i had). Anyways i think there COULD be a way to get different themes for the Vu. I got a very complicated idea so read carefully and you will only understand the idea if you looked at the (4) .swf theme files that BitPim reveals when looked at the Vu's filesystem. Well here it is:
  I think if you could get a .swf (default theme files) file from the LG Prada/Viewty then chage the name to one of the .swf that the Vu has (what your plan was). However, in order for it to work i am pretty sure you have to delete one of the current themes from the Vu. That shouldn't be a problem since the ugly black theme sucks (and the butterfly too since i AM a guy). I don't know if this would work since the Prada/Viewty have a bit different menus and what not. 
 So what do you think? Maybe you should try it (lol) because i am definately not going to get my phone bricked...again.

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by Keith Gable

Thu, 21 Aug 2008 19:51:07 -0500

MikeD: Yeah, the drivers kind of suck to find. I use Gentoo Linux, but in Windows (I needed the phone to work in Windows for a presentation I did), I had to go to the LG Australia website to download the drivers for it… there’s a nifty utility that takes your IMEI number and downloads all the software for it.

BlaT: I didn’t make a backup either, but I did back up all of the files I changed. That said, I’m not sure if I did back everything up (i.e. a firmware backup) that it would help because it’s not just a flat (i.e. FAT32) filesystem.. there are attributes and such that BitPim can’t expose (because BREW can’t expose them to BitPim), so even if you were to replace all of your files, your phone probably wouldn’t boot. My suggestion would be to contact AT&T and tell them your phone suddenly stopped working and to request warranty repair. Don’t tell them you have a USB cable or that you hacked it or anything, just that you want warranty repair. You should get a new Vu, but blank obviously. Don’t forget to take out your SIM card and memory card.

As far as your other concern with it being slow, yes, it is. For some reason, it accesses the memory card slowly… I think it’s because it scans the entire card any time you view the card’s filesystem (so it’s reading the entire subtree of /mmc1/, which is where the memory card mounts as far as I remember, but only showing you /mmc1/Pictures/).

hondaboy/boprider: Themes exist for the LG Prada/Viewty, and it uses a very similar theme system involving Adobe Flash. It may be possible to take a basic LG Prada/Viewty theme and change the name and put it on your LG Vu, but it’s totally possible you’ll lose features and buttons, and these phones also have a different screen size I think. And I’m not sure how much of the firmware that AT&T modified, because the menus are done a bit differently than on the Viewty. Otherwise I would have attempted to make a slightly better theme (I think the menus being at, say, 80% opacity on top of the background photo would be a lot better than the ugly black background we have right now)

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by hondaboy

Thu, 21 Aug 2008 03:51:44 -0500

does anyone no were i could get lg vu themes i been trying to find some but i cant plz some one get back at me

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by MikeD

Tue, 19 Aug 2008 20:13:59 -0500

Hey anyone run into this… I’ve got an exception while trying to sync though I can view the filesystem (currently running Vista unfortunately):

Error Txt: http://www.mikeyd.net/stuff/bitpim.txt Error Report: http://www.mikeyd.net/stuff/bpbug.gz

"LG Vu (CU920) Hacks" by MikeD

Tue, 19 Aug 2008 19:49:12 -0500

Hm… I get an exception when I try to sync (running Vista64 right now unfortunately), anyone have this happen?:

Error Txt: http://www.mikeyd.net/stuff/bitpim.txt Bug-report: http://www.mikeyd.net/stuff/bpbug.gz

Thx