Huawei device "ptrace" implementation issue - Huawei MediaPad M5 Questions & Answers

Being a no good dirty cheater, I'm a big fan of Game Guardian and I use it with great success on my HTC U11 phone. I recently discovered that it can be used without root, by using a virtualization environment such as Parallel Space or VirtualXposed. As I haven't rooted my M5 (SHT-09), I downloaded Parallel Space and GG and got it all running. However, I've found that I cannot make any edits to game memory space from within GG.
The are a number of posts on the GG forum suggesting that there is a bug (or security feature) in many Huawei device cores / firmware that relates to the implementation of the ptrace system function call. Something in the firmware seems to prevent the GG process from modifying the child process memory space using PTRACE_POKETEXT or PTRACE_POKEDATA.
The suggestion of the developer of GG is to "change the firmware so that there the ptrace system call works normally".
Anyone aware of this "feature" of Huawei device firmwares? Is there / could there be a solution to modify the firmware to "fix" this behaviour?

---

I saw you posted on my thread. Thanks for that. I wanted to see whether flashing a different kernel like Serenity would help. But i doubt it. Might be worth a try. Would have loved to know that beforehand. :/ Any other ideas? What I am seeing is that it needs a competent developer to recode the Kernel. I would then flash that patch. Other than that it is defined as unfixable. That we'd have to change the device. :/

---

It's the main reason that I haven't rooted / unlocked the bootloader, as running GG is pretty much all I use root for on other devicxes. And the fact that rooting / boot unlock kills Widevine level 1 support, which is madness on a 2k device like the M5. Wouldn't want Netflix streaming SD content only.
From what I understand, which isn't much, the issue is buried deep down in the kernel. Not sure if a custom kernel would solve the problem or not. Knowing XDA, I'm sure someone will be crazy enough to try it at some point in the future!

---

mroshaw said:
It's the main reason that I haven't rooted / unlocked the bootloader, as running GG is pretty much all I use root for on other devicxes. And the fact that rooting / boot unlock kills Widevine level 1 support, which is madness on a 2k device like the M5. Wouldn't want Netflix streaming SD content only.
From what I understand, which isn't much, the issue is buried deep down in the kernel. Not sure if a custom kernel would solve the problem or not. Knowing XDA, I'm sure someone will be crazy enough to try it at some point in the future!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah I get that, but some games dont have a cloud feature. Making parallel space useless. Plus I appreciate some other root features. I have a note 8 which should work GG without root, but I'll see how it goes. Oh really, I'm a big time stream fan. I havent tried Netflix with root yet . Should still work tho. I think. Hmm well, problem is all kernels are made for devices like the mate 10 or the P20. Not sure if they will work with the M5, wouldn't want to brick after all the trouble. [Edit, found the nextflix module apk. Can flash that with Magisk. Makes it work again ]

---

mroshaw said:
Being a no good dirty cheater, I'm a big fan of Game Guardian and I use it with great success on my HTC U11 phone. I recently discovered that it can be used without root, by using a virtualization environment such as Parallel Space or VirtualXposed. As I haven't rooted my M5 (SHT-09), I downloaded Parallel Space and GG and got it all running. However, I've found that I cannot make any edits to game memory space from within GG.
The are a number of posts on the GG forum suggesting that there is a bug (or security feature) in many Huawei device cores / firmware that relates to the implementation of the ptrace system function call. Something in the firmware seems to prevent the GG process from modifying the child process memory space using PTRACE_POKETEXT or PTRACE_POKEDATA.
The suggestion of the developer of GG is to "change the firmware so that there the ptrace system call works normally".
Anyone aware of this "feature" of Huawei device firmwares? Is there / could there be a solution to modify the firmware to "fix" this behaviour?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Alright guys, I found this out today (I'm also Kr1msonReaper on GG forums);
Huawei kernel prevents GG from working in Android Oreo HOWEVER-- If you downgrade to Android Nougat, I find that it works perfectly. Hope this helps!
Just a note, when you are, of course, debloating Nougat, make sure to disable Huawei system update app so you don't find yourself in Oreo the next day.

---

Kr1msonReaper said:
Alright guys, I found this out today (I'm also Kr1msonReaper on GG forums);
Huawei kernel prevents GG from working in Android Oreo HOWEVER-- If you downgrade to Android Nougat, I find that it works perfectly. Hope this helps!
Just a note, when you are, of course, debloating Nougat, make sure to disable Huawei system update app so you don't find yourself in Oreo the next day.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How do you downgrade to nougat? Any reason not to do it? And will I retain root ?

---

I actually like Nougat more than Oreo as it fixes issues such as the ptrace error and seems to have more battery optimization. It's been a long time since I downgraded to Nougat and since then I got a new phone but here's the tutorial I followed. @mrmazak has helped me out of se sticky situations and his tutorials have never failed me. https://forum.xda-developers.com/honor-7x/how-to/guide-honor-7x-flash-oreo-update-t3781649/amp/
I believe you will lose root but you can easily flash magisk again after installing the downgrade package.
Hope this helped!

---

Kr1msonReaper said:
I actually like Nougat more than Oreo as it fixes issues such as the ptrace error and seems to have more battery optimization. It's been a long time since I downgraded to Nougat and since then I got a new phone but here's the tutorial I followed. @mrmazak has helped me out of se sticky situations and his tutorials have never failed me. https://forum.xda-developers.com/honor-7x/how-to/guide-honor-7x-flash-oreo-update-t3781649/amp/
I believe you will lose root but you can easily flash magisk again after installing the downgrade package.
Hope this helped!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am not sure this would work on the Huawei mediapad m5 tablet. As far as I can tell it never had a nougat firmware to rollback too. I looked for sht-w09 and the all the files appear to be for Android 8 and none for 7 nougat. Unless I am missing something??
Other than they locked out ptrace stuff and that it appears unlikely to get Android 9 in the US for my mode l its a pretty good tablet. Maybe I should just sell it and move on to a tab s6 that can be rooted.

---

paths said:
I am not sure this would work on the Huawei mediapad m5 tablet. As far as I can tell it never had a nougat firmware to rollback too. I looked for sht-w09 and the all the files appear to be for Android 8 and none for 7 nougat. Unless I am missing something??
Other than they locked out ptrace stuff and that it appears unlikely to get Android 9 in the US for my mode l its a pretty good tablet. Maybe I should just sell it and move on to a tab s6 that can be rooted.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey! You're right I couldn't seem to find a nougat downgrade. On the bright side, I did find a Pie update for your model. Who knows, maybe ptrace will be fixed in that version?
https://www.getdroidtips.com/mediapad-m5-8-android-9-0-pie/
Good luck!