How to Customize a Custom Rom: Adding/Removing Programs

[rstoyguy]

Originally Posted by spetrillo

I will say this over and over again as I embark on this ROM journey....thanks very much for being so open with the information you have provided and will provide. Alot of people wouldnt be so accomodating but I sincerely appreciate it all!

I'll try to answer within reason what I can. And appreciate the feedback!

Originally Posted by spetrillo

Now onto the questions. I took a step back in my quest for a Steve ROM using the leaked VZW ROM as my base. I noticed that alot of my OEMS just dumped right into the \Windows directory, and I want to have a much cleaner ROM than that. So I have gone back to the beginning and will be taking one OEM at a time and determining where it should be installed to, and then making the corresponding changes to reg and all. This is going to be a long process I know, but in the end the clutter in the \Windows directory will be minimized.

So on that note have you had a reason to want to copy the entire directory structure off of a device to your PC, and if so what tool have you used to do this. I hate having to browse through the device directory on the device. I have much better tools on my PC to do this and would rather dump it there for any manipulation.

Second I noticed a directory in the OEM directory of my VZW dump. Its called OEM_Lang_0409. I have come across several OEMs, like VC, which have OEMS that fit into this category. Would it be safe to say that anything like this should be in this directory rather than outside of it?

Onward and upward...thanks!

Steve

The only way to eliminate the \windows clutter is to not cook so much "stuff" into the rom and use an alternative like UserCustomization to do post-flash .cab installs.

Currently for most devices that I am aware of, this is the delivery method of WindowsMobile 5, 6, and 6.1. EVERYTHING you cook into your rom, get's dumped into \windows. Did I say EVERYTHING? \Windows is the starting point, then winmo copies stuff to where it is supposed to be using the initflashfiles.dat file and more recently people are using mxip provisinioning files to do some minor re-arranging of the files.

So, to eliminate clutter, Think Clean Rom....

And you should only add OEM's to the ..\Kitchen\OEM directory. This is where most of the "carrier stuff" resides.