RTFM - More So If You Wrote It

03-08-2011

I've been using an Android phone for the last few months. It has to be said I really like it. I was never one for "smart" phones until I got a Nokia 5800 and it had wifi and gps inside. Suddenly these two things that I had never used before with other phones became a requirement for phones going forward.

One thing that I am known for is "tinkering" with anything that I can "tinker" with. An Android phone has untold levels of "tinkering" options, which is nice. Particularly when there is an issue with the phone software, or even if you just want to install a different brand of OS onto it.

This is nice for a number of reasons. Not least of which is when my service provider delays an update for the phone for months because they are "testing that it works" on the device.

The update was released by the people that make the device, don't try and tell me they didn't do some testing on it. Don't even try and say that your testing will catch something there testing didn't. The truth is that the delays are part laziness, part lack of understanding, part trying to pad the update with crap nobody wants.

So being able to download an update and apply it to the phone without waiting on my service provider is a bonus amount of "tinkering".

I've done it once before, when they delay between the official release of Gingerbread for Android and my service provider stretched to an entire season. A few weeks you can understand, three months you can't.

The update went smoothly. Very smoothly in fact. I took time, I read the sites, I documented the steps. Once I applied it everything went swimmingly. I didn't even hose the phone and it kept all the information, such as previously installed applications, on it.

So I figured last night I would go again. A newer version of Gingerbread has been released, one that has a fix for a battery issue in the previous version (the version that my service provider still haven't rolled out yet), so I figured what the hell.

I got the firmware, opened up my guide, went about applying the update. Only thing is I didn't RTFM my own manual. I forgot to uncheck one box, one tiny little box, right before I committed to updating the phone.

End result: my phone was completely wiped during the update.

So yippee, phone update. But damn, applications all gone. Along with a few other bits and bobs such as birthdays in the calendar and notes I had taken in a notepad on various projects and ideas and the likes.

Plus I can't fully remember what things I had installed on the phone to begin with :)

Ah well, fresh slate I guess. Can't be all that bad. Phone is still working at least and not a very nice looking brick. I've been down that road before in my previous job, not fun times trying to explain how something so small broke something so expensive.

Lesson learned: Next time read everything before doing anything.

Blue_jester




Leave a comment...

Name (required)