Arcady Genkin

Restoring SMS messages using mmssms.db file

My Nexus 5x phone died from the “bootloop” syndrome. I had unlocked bootloader on it and TWRP recovery image was installed, so I was trying hard to get at least some data off the phone. Most of the time it would not boot at all, but I managed to boot into TWRP recovery after leaving the phone in the freezer for a few hours.

Once in TWRP, I was able to pull some data using “adb pull”. This included a file that contains the SMS and MMS messages. On my Nexus 5x the path to that file was /data/user_de/0/com.android.providers.telephony/databases/mmssms.db. My plan was to restore that file onto my temporary phone running LineageOS (CyanogenMod 14). I was going to overwrite the file using “adb push” while booted into TWRP recovery.

Installing Salomon Pilot SNS bindings

There is no shortage of articles and videos about installing SNS bindings onto skis. I watched a few such videos, and all of them were missing precision. Some said that the binding needs to be aligned at the ski’s balance point, others – 1 cm behind it. Most instructions don’t specify the drill bit diameter, and those that do, disagree with each other. It took me a while to locate the official word on installing the bindings.What you are looking for is a PDF file called Salomon Technical Manual Nordic. I only found the 2011 edition in a downloadable form, but there is a 2014 edition that can only be viewed in the browser. I am sure that the main concepts stay constant year to year. For example, all bindings in the 2011 edition are specified to have screw diameters of 6.3mm.

I am not going to duplicate the information found in many other online instructions, but will concentrate on what I thought was missing from them. My takeaway from reading the PDF were two points below.

Atomic Pro Skintec skis review

The mohair base of the Atomic Pro Skintec.

I needed to replace my cross country skis, and decided to try the new technology with the mohair grip zone (skintec). Atomic skintec skis have really come down in price in the last couple of years, and there are now budget skintec models availabe, both under the Atomic and Salomon brands. I decided to get the Atomic Pro Skintec, but my local store did not have them in stock, and I ordered them online.

I felt pretty safe ordering these skis online because my weight (82kg) falls right in the middle of the weight range for the 202cm length (70-95 kg).

Cherry and Maple Hanukkah Menorah

Front view with candles.

I have designed and built a Hanukkah Menorah. The materials are cherry for the bulk of it and maple for the base. The design goal was to marry the traditional and the modern forms. I wanted the design to look contemporary and fresh, for something as traditional as a menorah.

Making SafetyNet happy with Cyanogenmod 14

I bought a couple of second-hand Moto X (XT1096) phones and discovered that I cannot sign into the Play Store using the stock firmware. Something must have become incompatible since the latest firmware was released, and I was left in a vicious circle when Google Play Store and services could not be updated because I am not signed in, and I could not add a Google account because Google Play services were crashing.

I figured that I would install Cyanogenmod 14 on the phones, which was pretty straight forward to do after unlocking the bootloader (and, from the first looks at it, seems to be pretty responsive on these older phones). However, CM comes rooted by default, and applications using SafetyNet check refuse to run. I don’t really need root on these phones, so here is a quick procedure I figured out to unroot CM to a condition that SafetyNet validation passes.

Storing 3.5″ hard drives in a Pelican case

Pelican 1525 Air can store 32 hard drives.

I was looking for a watertight case to store a bunch of 3.5″ hard drives. The idea was to protect the off-line backups from water damge in case sprinklers get activated in the building. It was decided that water or dust damage was a more likely threat than fire, so the solution did not have to be fire safe.

An improvement on Sheldon’s fixed cup removal tool

I had a really hard time trying to remove the bottom bracket fixed cup from my friend’s Elvish French bike. I replicated Sheldon Brown’s fixed cup removal tool, although my local hardware store did not carry any 5/8″ bolts, so I had to resort to a 1/2″ threaded bolt. I believe that I have made two improvements to the tool, which I’ll detail below.

The peril of over-analysing yourself

Last Saturday I was riding in the rain. I had my helmet rain cover on, like I usually do when it’s cold and raining. At some point the rain intensified, and I noted that I was feeling rain drops on my skull. “How funny”, thought I, “I am feeling phantom rain drops on my head even though I’m wearing a helmet cover.”

When I arrived at the destination and took the helmet off…

FSA BB-4000 MegaExo 19 bottom bracket review

My 2014 Specialized AWOL came with an FSA Omega MegaExo 19 triple crank and an FSA BB-4000 bottom bracket. I bought the bike in October and in March I started thinking about doing some post-winter maintenance. One of the things that I wanted to do was remove and examine the bottom bracket. Since I was not familiar with outboard bearing bottom brackets, I did some research about the BB-4000 bottom bracket, and here is what I found out.

Mystery of the Specialized “RCC” hub bearings, or Specialized Twitter support confusion

I could not decipher what was written about the wheel hubs in the official spec sheet for the Specialized AWOL. For both front and rear hubs, the specs say:

Specialized Hi Lo disc, alloy, RCC bearing system, QR, 32h

What exactly is RCC bearing system? I could not find anything related to this term anywhere. So I figured I’d ask Specialized through their dedicated Twitter support account. The dialogue that ensued was quite comic.