George Zhu’s BLOG

Apple has officially supported the customized carrier bundles since 1.1.3 (check This Article). However I’ve got a weird problem after upgrading to 1.1.3, the problem happened ever since days ago when I first tried to upgrade to 1.1.3 using leaked method, later I noticed same problem happened on dev team’s upgrade as well, and it still exists in real jailbreak 1.1.3.

The problem is: iPhone can’t detect my local operator, and it happened in the following combinations:

Natetrue Jailbreak 1.1.3 + Baseband 04.02.13_G
Dev Team Jailbreak 1.1.3 + Baseband 04.02.13_G
Dev Team Jailbreak 1.1.3 + Baseband 04.03.13_G
Zibri Jailbreak/Activation 1.1.3 + Baseband 04.03.13_G

I know this is abnormal and I have received success report that other operators don’t have this issue, but I do have this problem. I noticed this because I couldn’t let iPhone use my customized carrier logo by feeding it a new carrier bundle. So I fired up the following script to check what was wrong:

#!/bin/bash -x
Framework AppSupport CPPhoneNumberCopyActiveCountryCode
Framework AppSupport CPPhoneNumberCopyNetworkCountryCode
Framework CoreTelephony CTRegistrationCopyOperatorName
Framework CoreTelephony CTRegistrationCopyServiceProviderName
Framework CoreTelephony CTRegistrationGetStatus
Framework CoreTelephony CTSIMSupportCopyMobileSubscriberNetworkCode
Framework CoreTelephony CTSIMSupportCopyMobileSubscriberCountryCode

The returned information revealed that my iPhone couldn’t detect my local operator (CTRegistrationCopyServiceProviderName returns NULL) for some unknown reason:

root@n000b ~ # ./CheckCarrier.sh
+ Framework AppSupport CPPhoneNumberCopyActiveCountryCode
cn
+ Framework AppSupport CPPhoneNumberCopyNetworkCountryCode
cn
+ Framework CoreTelephony CTRegistrationCopyOperatorName
CHINA  MOBILE
+ Framework CoreTelephony CTRegistrationCopyServiceProviderName
  <-- Here's the problem
+ Framework CoreTelephony CTRegistrationGetStatus
kCTRegistrationStatusRegisteredHome
+ Framework CoreTelephony CTSIMSupportCopyMobileSubscriberNetworkCode
00
+ Framework CoreTelephony CTSIMSupportCopyMobileSubscriberCountryCode
460

Then I checked the /var/mobile/Library and the /var/mobile/Library/Preferences folders, there was only 1 symbolic link created in each folder while there should be 2 in normal cases, one is for carrier and the other is for operator:

/var/mobile/Library/Carrier Bundle.bundle
/var/mobile/Library/Operator Bundle.bundle <-- this was missing
/var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.carrier.plist
/var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.operator.plist <-- this was missing

UPDATE: I’ve repeated the above test on 1.0.2, 1.1.1, 1.1.2, and 1.1.3, none of which could detect my operator.

I’ve been fighting with this problem for days, my friend Arnaldo (Thank you!) is also trying to locate this for me, we still didn’t find out where the problem is.

A Temporary Workaround

Before the real reason which caused this weird operator detection failure is found, there’s a temporary workaround. This workaround is introduced by Arnaldo (known as aviegas at Hackint0sh forum) Thank you, you are a genius! The basic idea is:

If you feed SpringBoard the correct symbolic links, it’ll display the correct carrier logo.

Okay, here’s the workaround.

Step 1: Prepare bundle

1. Create the carrier bundle for your local carrier/operator. I’m using China Mobile, so I creat the following bundle:

/System/Library/Carrier Bundles/CHINA_MOBILE.bundle

The contents of the bundle is here: China Mobile Carrier/Operator Bundle
In the bundle, I used two customized logo: Default_CARRIER_MobileOSX.png and FSO_CARRIER_MobileOSX.png.

2. Create a symbolic link for MCC/MNC:

cd /System/Library/Carrier\ Bundles
ln -s CHINA_MOBILE.bundle 46000

Step 2: Trigger SIM-based reconfiguration

1. Put the AT&T SIM into iPhone and reboot

2. Put local SIM into iPhone and reboot

Now check your /var/mobile/Library and /var/mobile/Library/Preferences, there will be one symbolic link in each folder:

Carrier Bundle.bundle -> /System/Library/Carrier Bundles/46000
com.apple.carrier.plist -> /System/Library/Carrier Bundles/46000/carrier.plist

Step 3: Add missing symbolic links

Now add the missing symbolic links for operator:

cd /var/mobile/Library
ln -s /System/Library/Carrier\ Bundles/46000 Operator\ Bundle.bundle
cd Preferences
ln -s /System/Library/Carrier\ Bundles/46000/carrier.plist com.apple.operator.plist

Reboot, voila! Customized logo! The following is my customized carrier logo:

NOTICE: This customized logo will stay effective after reboot. It’ll stay unless you switch SIM.