Here it is people, as promised, MarketPlaceRegionSwitch. What does it do? It allows you to switch MarketPlace to USA, Germany, France, Netherlands, etc. Whatever you want - without mucking with regional settings, soft-resetting, etc. "because I can"
I DEMAND you read the entire post before using it, because there are definitely things you should know before using it.
This app actually fools Marketplace into thinking you are from somewhere else. This method is not foolproof, and may be circumvented by Microsoft in the near future. It is not for the faint of heart either.
Why?
Because developers have been left in the cold for manually verifying their apps are in the correct markets. Microsoft have dropped the ball a few times with "published" apps seemingly not being published at all, or incorrectly. While I'm sure Microsoft will fix these issues in due time (and indeed provide the functionality this program offers) for now developers need to check this for themselves. So no, this app is not meant for end-users, but for developers. If you still want to use it, that's fine by me, but it's on your own conscience
Keep in mind this is a developer tool, for verification of Marketplace presence. I would strongly advise against using this to download apps from market regions that are not your own, and especially not buying them through this app. In fact it is likely the Marketplace will not allow you to purchase from another country than your CC's billing address in either case.
How to use
Now here come the important bits. When you start the application, you will see two text boxes in front of you. MCC (mobile country code), and Lang (language ID). By default they have settings for the USA entered.
You will want to fill these values with the correct values for the market you want to visit. You should have matching country codes and language ID's, but see the note below about that. In 1.1 I have also added a select box with presets that mostly work.
Now, how to find the values you need to enter here:
MCC Go to this page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_Country_Code. You want to enter the numeric, 3-digit code.
Lang Go to this page: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/goglobal/bb964664.aspx. You want the values from the LCID hex column.
Hit go, wait a few seconds, and you should be in the market of your choice.
Please note that unlike the other region switching tricks, this one is supposed to work through your CELLULAR connection specifically! Please make sure you do NOT have USB/ActiveSync or Wi-Fi connected!
Notes about the "preset" selection box
While many of these presets work, I have noticed some strange behavior. Often the 'expected' codes do not work if a region is combined with a language, but that language is not from that region.
Take for example, Luxembourg. The preset uses the correct LangID and MCC for French/Luxembourg, but it usually wont work. If you keep the Lang from French/Luxembourg but use the code for France in the MCC box, it usually will work and you will end up in the Marketplace for Luxembourg, not the one for France. You will have to play with it if you want to test for these less common markets. If you have specific notes about which codes work for which specific Markets, please do post them here.
If you are having trouble connecting to the USA marketplace, try using 311, 312, 313 or 314 instead of 310 in the MCC box.
How it was done
The entire thing is done by runtime patching. Functions used to figure out which locale you are in are patched by the app, returning the value you entered in Lang. Accompanied with that, the IMSI is patched and the MCC part is replaced by the value you entered in MCC. This all is a lot more complicated than it sounds
Obviously the app does it's best to restore original behaviour on exit, though I would still advise soft-resetting when you're done with it.
Random notes
The UI sucks, deal with it. I spent less than 5 minutes on it. I did spend many hours on the actual functionality, though.
The app should remain running while running Marketplace! It will (should) automatically exit once you exit Marketplace. Be sure to use the menu->exit function, instead of the X (the latter will usually just hide Marketplace, not close it).
The method used to patch may cause issues that will not disappear until you soft-reset, chances are slim but things can go wrong.
Changelog
29.10.2009 - v1.1
Presets added
Having to restart Marketplace twice without this app to get back to your "home" market should be fixed
If you are a developer for Marketplace and you make use of this app, it would be much appreciated if you would DONATE to me for my time (the link to donate is at the bottom of my signature)
Download: (+24)
--Reserved--
Great job bro!
Thanks for the great util. Much appreciated bro!
nice, thx, finally a marketplace with more then 5 items and in a language i understand
Nice work!
Now to find me some US applications!
Figures, trying to add presets to this, and just as I want to start testing the whole data network craps out... *taps foot and waits for T-Mobile to fix things*
Chainfire said:
Figures, trying to add presets to this, and just as I want to start testing the whole data network craps out... *taps foot and waits for T-Mobile to fix things*
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll test it if you want.
(Drop me a PM or something if you want)
Kudos, Chainfire.
1.1 released... most importantly it adds presets. Not all of them work right, see the notes.
Also, some mod please add an empty post at the top please (I always forget to do that, hah!)
sweeeeet.. going to try it straight away
Update : Cold beer coming your way
Great work, wish I had a data plan...
Chainfire said:
Also, some mod please add an empty post at the top please (I always forget to do that, hah!)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice one, post #2 is your's .
Dave
Hi,
Great tool, but it doesn't work for me. After hitting the go button the app closes completely down.
Chainfire, you are a god!
I have to say, a great app, but it doesn't work for me.
I applied the standard settings (being the US one) but after this when I start Windows Marketplace I still get the dutch one.
I have Wi-Fi turned off, so what am I doing wrong? (I have the Marketplace version where you can select the location to save your app)
For those of you it doesn't work for, I'm not sure what the cause of this is. I actually had the same problem on one of my phones, it wouldn't switch away from Dutch (my "home" marketplace), and then suddenly it did - and I have been unable to reproduce the problem since.
All I can say is try uninstalling Marketplace, deleting HKCU\Security\Software\Microsoft\Marketplace, soft-reset, reinstall Marketplace. That might do the trick - or it might not.
@Sanderjohan: device/rom ?
Chainfire said:
For those of you it doesn't work for, I'm not sure what the cause of this is. I actually had the same problem on one of my phones, it wouldn't switch away from Dutch (my "home" marketplace), and then suddenly it did - and I have been unable to reproduce the problem since.
All I can say is try uninstalling Marketplace, deleting HKCU\Security\Software\Microsoft\Marketplace, soft-reset, reinstall Marketplace. That might do the trick - or it might not.
@Sanderjohan: device/rom ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll try it when I get home!
Congrats on your thread at Tweakers.net
Also, it seems to work more reliable if you make sure you have a cellular connection before you run the app.. Also make sure you are NOT signed in with your LiveID
Thanks for this great app, it works flawlessly.
I have already tried to buy a product but it did not accept my credit card information at the last step. May be there could be a work around for this also.
Regards,
Chainfire said:
For those of you it doesn't work for, I'm not sure what the cause of this is. I actually had the same problem on one of my phones, it wouldn't switch away from Dutch (my "home" marketplace), and then suddenly it did - and I have been unable to reproduce the problem since.
All I can say is try uninstalling Marketplace, deleting HKCU\Security\Software\Microsoft\Marketplace, soft-reset, reinstall Marketplace. That might do the trick - or it might not.
@Sanderjohan: device/rom ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi Chainfire,
My device is a HTC Tytn II with the following ROM Kaiser_HyperDragon_IV_Mega_6.5_WWE.
I already had Marketplace installed so I will try the thing you suggested by uninstalling and reinstalling Marketplace. I let you know if this works.
Hi all,
i have a general problem with android: how can i set up a locale that's different from the UI language?
in other systems (windows on PC, or symbian on phones), you can set up a locale (which determines how time, date, currency, etc. is displayed) and a language. in android it seems that the two settings are connected, so language also determines the locale. i live in slovakia, so obviously i want a slovak locale, but i also want an english ui. if i set the english language, i have weeks starting with sunday in calendar, and dates separated by slash instead of a dot.
i find this really annoying. is there any way to overcome this limitation? i was using the stock Sony Ericcson firmware as well as Cyanogenmod, so i assume the issue is not rom connected.
Thanks
Good question. I am also interested in the answer.
Not my normal wont to buy such a new machine, but circumstances led to my purchase of a first-day-in-the-store Toshiba AT 700 Regza tablet running Android 3.2. After a couple of days of use, I have encountered one particularly annoying problem:
Voice input works quite well, though still on the basis of a few sentences at a time. However, when I do voice input in Gmail, it switches from English (the current language setting) to Japanese (Toshiba's initial market for the new box).
I'm almost sure this is really a problem with the implementation of FSKAREN, the Japanese conversion system. It's possible that it involves the keyboard selector, however. (Sorry, Dorothy, but the Toshiba website is clearly not ready yet, though I may telephone them later...) This behavior is different from my prior experience with voice input in Android (both versions 2 and 3). However, for whatever it is worth, the Japanese recognition is surprisingly good since my Japanese pronunciation is certainly not native-like.
Any ideas or diagnostic suggestions? I was tweaking around in the keyboard settings and actually got it to accept one sentence in English from within Gmail, but that is obviously not a solution. I'm loathe to disable FSKAREN or even to poke at it too hard, but I'm thinking that one solution might be to use an alternative keyboard and enable the input system selector...
Not sure if the background will help, but most of the applications are running in Japanese, though the main applications (as in those from the Google) and including Gmail do run in English mode with English menus. I can usually get along well enough in Japanese, but most of my correspondents read English, not Japanese...
I posted the same question in the Google forums, but I'm almost certain the increasingly evil Google will evade involvement and my prior experience with those help forums has been distinctly unhelpful. So I decided to be optimistic and try over here, too.
My granddad recently purchased a 9" android tablet from china, for him it really hasn't paid off. He loved being able to sit down anywhere and just browse the web, play some little games, check emails and view documents for his various charity groups. But the device was slow, poor screen resolution and backlighting and awful at locking onto a WiFi signal.
So this week he bought a galaxy tab 10. He has been much happier with this device and decided to buy a Bluetooth keyboard at the same time.
However he didn't check the layout before purchasing and has accidently bought a US layout keyboard in the UK. Otherwise the keyboard is fine. It doesn't look flash and is made of plastic but it works and you can actually type quite nicely on it, does the job.
Our problem is that when we set the system language on the galaxy tab to English UK shift 2 returns a " symbol as is normal for UK keyboards but the keyboard is a US keyboard and it is marked as @. Setting the system language to English US fixes that. But we're British and use UK English. So far he has been using it this way anyway but it has been annoying him, setting the system language to English US annoyed him more.
Is there a way to set android to use a US layout keyboard but still use a UK system language?
He doesn't want to buy a new keyboard and seems happy enough to live with the US one but would still like the symbols to match up.
I think your solution is External Keybord Helper.
EDIT: It can setup different layout for your external keyboard including different language. And most probably you can manually set up the keyboard layout. First try the demo version if it works than get the pro one.
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Does anyone know how to get the list of set top boxes for non Chinese providers ?
I ve been looking for a way for months and I cant find any, its always Chinese regions only in custom ROMs, only EUI has other countries, its doing my head in.
There is a thread that claims to have non Chinese TV provides list but I tried it and its still all Chinese ones.
Its like the remote app thinks the phone is in China, I dont know why cos its not set to China, its set to the UK, I ve tried adding a line in the build.prop but it makes no difference.