Root and Airwatch

[fury]

I ran into some issues today with a Tasker plugin that needed root access and failed to obtain it. I thought this was strange and double checked Voodoo to confirm that I still had root, which it said I did. I installed two different root checker apps and they both said I DO NOT have root. I used an app that typically requires root (Quickboot) and it worked fine.

I remembered that I recently added my corporate email to my phone which requires the Airwatch MDM app, and imposes many controls on my device (lock screen, remote wipe, etc). It appears that it messes with root, but I'm not sure to what extent.

Does anyone have any experience with it and how to work around it? I am uninstalling Airwatch right now and removing my work email to see if I can get root to work to add permission to this app and see if it does what I need, and will then add Airwatch back in to see if it sticks...

Anyone know why Voodoo would say I have root when I don't? I have it backed up in my phone, so hopefully I can restore it, but the restore button isn't there since it thinks I still have root...

[fury]

I did a temp unroot with Voodoo and restored it, which did apparently did nothing. I did press menu in Voodoo and picked "refresh status", which still says I have root.

I installed Root Explorer to see if I could poke around in folders that would need root and it let me see stuff, but I couldn't actually change anything. I tried to go rename camera_click.ogg.bak that I changed to disable camera sounds to camera_click.ogg.bak2 and it said operation failed.

Is there a way to reroot 4.1.2?

[GoCliffGo05]

The newest OTA or the 4.1.2 before it? Are you unlocked?

[fury]

I tried to reroot with Razr Blade and it didn’t work. It said it did, but didn’t. I backed a bunch of stuff up and did onboard FDR, but I needed it anyways, there were other nagging issues that had started to come up.

After FDR Voodoo was showing that I had root backed up but the device was not rooted and I couldn’t seem to restore. I ran Razr Blade and obtained root, and now I have root access again. I have not put Airwatch back on my phone yet because I want to see if there is a way to have root and Airwatch run side by side, but I’m not sure it’s possible.

The things I needed root for were AdAway/Ad Free (ad blockers), Quick Boot (not necessary, just allows for one click reboots or power downs), and a root file manager from time to time. My concern is that I did use root to modify the camera click sound, which I would need to change back if I ever wanted to take an OTA again. However, I don’t foresee the Razr Maxx getting any further OTA releases as it’s already ~18 months old.

I’m going to do some research today to see if I can get Airwatch running without root, otherwise I might just bite the bullet and lose root access. I don’t really need it for anything, but it’s nice to have just in case. What I was trying to install it for yesterday was a Tasker plugin to kill apps. I guess the Tasker Kill App command stopped working sometime in Android 2.x. I have a task that I want to start Pandora in my car, and then kill it when I get out of the car, but when using the Tasker method Pandora just restarts itself after being closed. I’ve read that this is due to the Pandora service running and detecting it as a crash, so it restarts itself.

I value my work access (calendar more than email) more than the root access that I hardly use, so that might be what it comes down to, unfortunately.

[fury]

As it turns out… for some reason I am able to add my work email to my work email to my phone through the stock corporate email client on my phone without Airwatch installed… The official company instructions call for you to install and enroll with Airwatch, then use Touchdown email for Moto devices (different device makers have different steps in this guide..). I initially installed Touchdown but it’s not free (all options are unlocked for 30 days, after which some (not sure what) gets locked down if you don’t pay), so I tried the stock onboard email app that came on the Razr Maxx. It worked and was MUCH nicer than Touchdown. Since I don’t typically reply to emails from my phone (I use it to monitor my calendar and see what the emails are, and go to a PC if it’s urgent enough to need a reply, as well as just deleting the garbage that comes in so I’m not flooded when returning to work the next day), I don’t need many of the options in Touchdown.

It works fine so far, but I’m curious how long it will. Not sure when they started using Airwatch, but I believe it was quite a while ago (>1yr). Not sure if this has to do with my device being previously authorized with Airwatch or not. It showed a “device ID” that said android### where the ### was a seemingly unique string of 10-12 numbers when I added my account as corporate email, and I think (didn’t write the old number down) that it was the same number as before and I thought I remembered seeing it within Airwatch.

It’s also possible that email works outside of Airwatch and they don’t advertise that. There are other apps available through a custom “app store” that our company has for some stuff that actually uses other network resources aside from just email. It would make more sense for that to need Airwatch, but they might imply that you need it for both, when you really don’t for just email…

It did still enforce security settings (PIN lock with a >4 digiit PIN that locks no greater than 15 minutes after screen off, etc), but I don’t have Airwatch added so I don’t know that the email policy can detect/remove root…

Guess I’ll need to find a root checker or try to add a new app that requires root and see if SuperSU prompts for it or not…

[fury]

Sorry to keep replying to my own thread... I just realized I had Razr Bootstrap installed but hadn't run it or authorized it with root yet after adding my work email back in. I just hit the icon and it prompted for root from SuperSU, and rebooted, but did not enter recovery. Tried twice and got the same result both times.

Not sure if this is a root issue or a problem from the way I installed root. Does Razr Blade maybe not install the CWM rocovery that I'm used to seeing?

[fury]

I installed a root checker and it prompted for root access, which I allowed, and it said I have root. So I think I'm in business.

Until something else stops working :P

[hillmom]

I has no idea what AirWatch was, so I looked it up. Ya, it is possible that "root access" is against company policy and it was removed viva AirWatch.

[fury]

Ok so I did find a new issue. After the FDR my phone isn't seeing all the pictures in the stock gallery. It shows my "camera" folder and the "screenshot" folder (this only came back after taking the first screenshot after the FDR), but that's it. Before I had 5-10 folders of pictures from various sources.

The photos are still there, because I didn't remove them from the SD card, and I can see them if I go in to the file browser, but the gallery can't see them and I can't figure out why...

Going to try an app to force a rescan of media..

[fury]

Media rescan didn't work. Anyone have any ideas why I can see them in file browser (and view them), but can't see them in gallery?