WebOS Homebrew and Android root comparison?

[dodgerblue]

I'm a newish Android user....switched over from WebOS. I'm enjoying my EVO 4G, but lately I'm getting the itch to tinker.

If any of you have used WebOS, I'm sure you're like me and know that using Homebrew/Preware is honestly the ONLY way to use WebOS. It allows you to do soooo much more than the stock OS does. I had a lot of fun modding and tweaking my Pre and I'm hoping for the same with Android. So my question is:

Is rooting an Android similar in concept to tweaking WebOS with homebrew? Does it allow me to get rid of stupid forced apps I don't want, and tweak things I want to tweak?

On the rooting fence....trying to decide.

 

[igotsanevo4g]

I'm a newish Android user....switched over from WebOS. I'm enjoying my EVO 4G, but lately I'm getting the itch to tinker.

If any of you have used WebOS, I'm sure you're like me and know that using Homebrew/Preware is honestly the ONLY way to use WebOS. It allows you to do soooo much more than the stock OS does. I had a lot of fun modding and tweaking my Pre and I'm hoping for the same with Android. So my question is:

Is rooting an Android similar in concept to tweaking WebOS with homebrew? Does it allow me to get rid of stupid forced apps I don't want, and tweak things I want to tweak?

On the rooting fence....trying to decide.

This thread is pretty sweet.
http://forum.androidcentral.com/general-help-how/33254-palm-webos-homebrewers-guide-android.html

Android is even more tweakable than webOS, yet also more involved. Read up on rooting here on AC, and when your ready head over to the rooting sticky.

Oh, and the link in my sig is pretty sweet, just sayin

 

[Kedar]

Homebrew was nice on the Pre, I admit.



But Android hacking is... well, ridiculous to say the least.
I still don't understand how people have redone the Android OS to make my battery last all day and more on moderate/heavy use.

With Android... once you root, you're golden. You'll learn the process fairly quickly after doing it a couple times.

The major difference is the speed in which things come to you. With the
Pre you would add a patch and it would take ages to apply it. Reboots were like 2-5 minutes...
I don't know... things are just more stable for me on the Evo. My Pre would have 4 hours of battery life sometimes... other times it wouldn't wake up for 30 minutes and I'd think it was dead completely.


Just much better if you root your phone.


Anyway... there are custom ROMS (different builds of the OS... or something) that you install (flash) and it just brings a whole string of new features your way. From custom roms that are good with battery, have great performance, both, Sense, no-sense, etc.
Some are clean in the sense that they get rid of every sprint app and useless apps that come with the phone and give you a clean install with all the space in the world.


My current favorite rom (and many others included) is MIUI... gives me insane battery life and speed. It's a new XDA favorite right now.
XDA is a developers forum.
Here's evo page:
HTC Supersonic: EVO 4G - xda-developers

The amount of change you can make to your Evo...
YouTube - Android 2.2 ROM MIUI for Desire and Nexus One

 

[dodgerblue]

Thanks to both of you, for real. I'm getting excited about rooting it up, just trying to get my head around it first. I suppose it won't make perfect sense until I get going with it, right? Maybe its time to give it a shot!

 

[rapmaster0#AC]

Hey Dodgerblue, I'm on the same page as you. I used Preware, and it was pretty straight forward once you used it.

On the Evo there is so much much more that you can do when compared to the Pre.

I still have to wrap my head around it too! IT JUST SO MUCH! I've actually been thinking about giving it a go soon too...hit me up on gchat. Sanjeevoudit@gmail.com

 

[mordbane]

You can read up on Preware in a night and be good to go. Once you start in on rooting your going to loose some sleep for a week. It's like "gotta flash one more ROM".

One advantage of Preware is that patches are like ala carte, you can pick and choose and remove separately. In android you can add patches but you can't remove them separately, you have to flash the ROM again and start over. But you get use to it.

Sent from my grubby hand

 

[Bigfire]

Main thing I found in just taking the leap a couple weeks ago is that rooting is more complicated for devices because there are so many android phones and even different hardware for the same phone. If u have the latest sprint update for Evo,u will have to follow ' directions on the sticky at the top. Read through the steps about backing up apps and date w/ 'titanium backup' carefully as it requires root access to work. This can b done easily with an app called z4root, but it's the part that really tripped me up, and there's so many threads, it's makes getting an answer difficult.

Happy Rooting!