Have you ever heard of rooting your android smartphone? It’s something really to give a chance at. Rooting literally means clearing access to root of android’s file system. By default all phone manufacturers have to sell unrooted device in the market, which implies that the system contents cannot be edited by the user. But once the phone is rooted we can obtain SuperUser or Administrator permissions.
Core Android operating system in a smartphone is located at /system partition. The data of applications that a user installs is located at /data partition while the temporary files generated during operation of a phone are stored in /cache. In an unrooted device these partitions cannot be accessed for modifying contents. But once the device is rooted the access to these partitions is cleared and a user can try various performance tweaks and customization options. User can even change the operating system installed by device manufactures (known as Stock ROM) and install another one developed by android community around the world. As Android is based on a Open Source Linux OS, any tech geek can alter or modify it for free distribution. These modified Android systems are known as Custom ROM in Android world.
Once root access is cleared user has to be cautious since now the phone is more vulnerable to external influences. We may end up in messing up the OS instead of modifying it for our use. Thanks to the apps like SuperSU or KingUser which act like a broker between OS and apps. Using any of these apps user can control the root privileges and grant root access to the apps and processes he desires.
What do we gain from rooting?
1. Access & modify system contents to improve efficiency, more customization etc.
2. Install custom fonts (Fonts those are not pre-installed in android.)
3. Install scripts for RAM management, extending internal memory and many other things.
4. Take a full backup of apps’ data (eg. levels completed in a game) and restore the same in case of any accident.
What we may loose?
1. Phone’s warranty, if it’s in warranty period. But in many cases it can be regained by unrooting.
2. In some phone models bootloader needs to be unlocked, in which case warranty is lost permanently.
androidquest 