TWRP+Magisk status?

[Chad Joan 8]

In the "Team Win Recovery Project [TWRP]" thread it sounds like TWRP can maybe-work sometimes, but can't be used for flashing Magisk.

In the "Got my Pro1, any ideas on root access?" thread it sounds like flashing magisk is possible without TWRP.

So, is it possible to have TWRP and Magisk on an Fxtec Pro1 at the same time? Has anyone done this?

(And I'm mostly looking for a situation where this is done on stock Android, but I'll grit my teeth and install another OS if it is 100% compatibile with the apps/games/utilities/Google-Fi/etc that I can use on Android.)

TWRP is important for being able to take backups, even if it isn't used to install Magisk.

Magisk is important for hiding root status (and perhaps other system tweaks) from certain applications. For instance, `Fate/GO` wouldn't run on my rooted Pixel until I used Magisk to make it think it was on a more "normal" system. Meanwhile, root is still useful, so I don't want to simply turn root access off.
...

I'm hoping to get these installs over with soon. I'm used to the whole install-recovery-and-flash experience typically involving a data wipe. That, combined with the fact that I have absolutely no backup strategy for this phone right now, means that I am currently afraid to put any unique data on to my Fxtec Pro1 or change it very much. Thus no system updates, minimal customization/personalization, no using WeChat (it stores history locally), and so on. That then forces me to have another phone around and experience some pretty awkward workflows. I... really hope there is some way to get ahead of this stuff.

[Rob. S. 1,647]

I'm in not quite the same but remotely similar kind of a situation, with a device I got second-hand that had already been flashed with LineageOS, but without root, and sooner or later I'm going to want Magisk and hide-root and Xposed to pass SafetyNet and enable Google Pay and the security token app for my employer's VPN.

From what I've read, I'd say we need forget about TWRP for the time being, though, because there's no official version yet that would handle decryption, so it's no use for backups. Also, I don't know whether someone is working on getting such a fully-functional TWRP for the Pro1 at all right now (I don't think so). There is a backup tool being worked on, though, by @tdm, but I don't know about the state of the project (haven't followed that specific subject too closely myself).

 

Edited April 1, 2021 by Rob. S.

[Chad Joan 8]

Thank you Rob.

I noticed the decryption was a problem. It sounds like that's an issue for backups, whether TWRP or not.

I'm still wondering... why is decryption not handled? Is there a private key that Google/Fxtec isn't revealing, or is this just "a small matter of coding"?

[VaZso 1,997]

16 minutes ago, Chad Joan said:

I'm still wondering... why is decryption not handled? Is there a private key that Google/Fxtec isn't revealing, or is this just "a small matter of coding"?

It is definitively not just "a small matter of coding".

I think (but unsure) it is all about a specific private key and if I rememben well, not even F(x)tec has that key, but their partner.
I don't know if there is a workaround however.

[Chad Joan 8]

Thank you for that info!

That's interesting... and unfortunate. I hope someone figures it out, though in that case, I probably won't wait for TWRP.

It's looking like I should just put Magisk and get on with life.

It also looks like the Fxtec community (maybe Fxtec themselves, too?) has me covered in terms of stock ROMs, should I ever need to reverse the process. I'm still not sure how anyone got those or if Fxtec is providing the stock ROM images, but at least such things seem to exist out in the open and are easy to obtain.

It's awkward that I can't get everything to be the way I want and back up the whole thing, but if I can at least find a way to back up my own data (maybe root + Titanium Backup?), then putting the whole setup onto a hypothetical Pro1 replacement unit would just mean repeating the root+Magisk install and then restoring user data. That maybe isn't ideal, but (assuming the root+Magisk isn't too hard) it's not too bad, either.