[Q] Replacing Contacts.apk removed my Contatcs and Phone apps from device - Galaxy S II Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hope i'm not "noobing" here but..
I use SGSII with Litening Rom 6.1
I found a Contacts.apk which fits all SGSII roms that adds Hebrew letters to the letters bar for fast searching a contact
Used Root explorer to replace the old Contacts.apk (did backup the old one to another folder of course) and perfomed a reboot
When the device started, I had no "Phone" and "Contacts" shortcuts at the bottom and everything related to Contacts app did FC
I guessed it was a faulty apk so I restored the old one and rebooted but got the same result: no "Phone" and "Contacts"
of course that before all that I did a full backup with the recovery console so everything's back to normal.. did the same procedure again and got the same result...
am I missing here something? Should I do anything else other then simply replace the apk and reboot? (most of the threads are not stating other steps )
Please help
Thank you

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No, you did not miss anything the usual step is to install the apk and reboot.
It might be the apk was not designed for the S2 because it corrupted your phone. Some apks on the market are not designed for all android phones but specific to a model because it contains code that is not on other phones.

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Cosmic Blue said:
No, you did not miss anything the usual step is to install the apk and reboot.
It might be the apk was not designed for the S2 because it corrupted your phone. Some apks on the market are not designed for all android phones but specific to a model because it contains code that is not on other phones.
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Click to collapse
I assume that i haven't did nothing wrong but why would restoring the original one did not fix it? that's my actual question

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As the download apk that may have been designed for different may have changed some values that were not only associated with the contacts and phone.
because not all the modifications the apk installed on your phone where erased when you tried to restore the old apk.
The only way pnly way to guarantee every thing is deteled is to to do a factory reset or in your case flash your back up which will wipe your phone and reset to stock for that firmware.

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This could be a good hint, although i DID notice "fits all S2 custom roms" and i use LR 6.1
So i would like to to a little experiment:
1. Backup Contacts.apk
2. Delete Contacts.apk
3. Reboot (Device will load without Contacts and Phone i guess)
4. Pasting Contacts.apk from backup again
5. Reboot
To your opinion, this will restore the Contacts and Phone right?
If it will, it will proof that the procedure i did was OK and the cooked Contacts.apk was invalid..
am I right?

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yes, it should work as long as you make no other changes.
As custom roms as always evolving due to upgrades and changes.
Cooked versions of apks unless they are also upgraded also may have invalid links that are no longer recognized and that why it failed.

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i will test it and post a result soon

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Cosmic Blue said:
yes, it should work as long as you make no other changes.
As custom roms as always evolving due to upgrades and changes.
Cooked versions of apks unless they are also upgraded also may have invalid links that are no longer recognized and that why it failed.
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Click to collapse
It appears that you and me both were wrong..
just tried the test.. no good, after removing the file, contacts is missing, even after putting it back
still waiting for someone to answer the 1st post and save me :\
EDIT: Iv'e noticed you mentioned: INSTALLING, what do you mean by that? actually running the apk? (have tried, it asks to replace, i say yes but in the end i get "application not installed"

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apparently the contact apk is not initializing properly.
I have one other suggestion.
from the recovery back up pull out the contact.apk that you know is working and try your experiment again and see if that solves the problem. do not use the back up you just made.
There maybe an issue with the backed up contacts in that the file maybe damaged.

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have you set the correct permissions for the contact.apk?

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viva.fidel said:
have you set the correct permissions for the contact.apk?
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Click to collapse
Well, I haven't touched the permissions
Lets try to solve it one step at a time
When everything is working properly and the original apk is I'm system/app.. I cut the apk and paste it elsewhere.. Contacts is removed..
Cutting it and pasting it back wont restore it.. why?
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA App

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rotemakerman said:
Well, I haven't touched the permissions
Lets try to solve it one step at a time
When everything is working properly and the original apk is I'm system/app.. I cut the apk and paste it elsewhere.. Contacts is removed..
Cutting it and pasting it back wont restore it.. why?
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well it depends where you are cutting and pasting it to. Your phone works on the ext4 filesystem, where files have built-in permissions setting, they'll keep these permissions as long as they stay on a linux filesystem.. however if you copy contacts.apk to the sdcard or to external_sd (which is fat/fat32), then these permissions are lost.. therefore you'll have issues when moving to sdcard and back
if you wanna test this then try renaming the original apk to contacts.bak (it'll get uninstalled and disappear from app drawer) without moving it out of system/app, then try renaming it back to contacts.apk, reboot phone and it'll be back and working

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viva.fidel said:
Well it depends where you are cutting and pasting it to. Your phone works on the ext4 filesystem, where files have built-in permissions setting, they'll keep these permissions as long as they stay on a linux filesystem.. however if you copy contacts.apk to the sdcard or to external_sd (which is fat/fat32), then these permissions are lost.. therefore you'll have issues when moving to sdcard and back
if you wanna test this then try renaming the original apk to contacts.bak (it'll get uninstalled and disappear from app drawer) without moving it out of system/app, then try renaming it back to contacts.apk, reboot phone and it'll be back and working
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the heads up!
Actually i did cut it to and paste it from the sdcard!
will try it and post the result here soon
If this will work.. what are the permissions i should set for the cooked apk?

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rotemakerman said:
Thanks for the heads up!
Actually i did cut it to and paste it from the sdcard!
will try it and post the result here soon
If this will work.. what are the permissions i should set for the cooked apk?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
no problem, app permissions should be rw-r--r--
just have a look at the permissions for any other app in system/app if you're unclear on how to set them

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appears that this wasn't the problem either
This try i just renamed contacts.apk to contacts.bak, the permissions remained the same
contacts was removed, renamed back, nothing happend

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no one?

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maybe you need to wipe Dalvik Cache or even a full wipe to factory

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Just to give an outside perspective, have you tried searching the app drawer for the phone and contact apps? The bar at the bottom on the homescreen is just a shortcut bar. If the phone and contact apps are in the app drawer, you need to add their shortcut back to the bar.

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It's definitely not just the shortcuts... trying to access contacts through other apps like WhatsApp causing a FC or something..
I'm trying to find a solution that doesn't involve switching rom or wiping anything
What else can I do?

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fixed
Found a solution!
Changed the kernel (speedmod t42) and wiped dalvik and cache (kernel is probably not related, but still, that's what I did)