Substratum Release 780 Brings Android O DP3 Support, Encrypted Assets for Anti-Piracy, and More!

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Substratum has been working on a few new features for the theming community, and they are giving themers and users a chance to try out the new goodies. The latest Substratum Release 780 brings new features such as Encrypted Assets and Android O DP3 Support along with a whole host of performance and bug fixes.

Encrypted Assets is the major new addition to this update, focusing on making it much more difficult for pirates to kang themes. Encrypted Assets is a result of the efforts of the Substratum theme working together with the SlimROMs team to put their recent issues with each other behind them. Substratum is also now open to having Slim on the development alliance with the introduction of the new Substratum Theme Template.

With Encrypted Assets, the assets/overlays folder on the device will be completely encrypted using an AES 128-bit algorithm. The encryption is restricted only to the overlays folder as the teams wanted to minimize platform changes for the time being. There is more work to be done on securing it better to achieve its objectives, but so far, they are ready for a release-preview iteration.

The encryption makes it difficult for pirates to simply “kang” or “recompile” themes, acting as a strong dissuasion against the whole piracy ordeal. This would then greatly motivate dedicated themers to put more work, both quantity and quality wise, into their themes. This also stands to benefit bonafide users as they can now look forward to healthier theme choices rather than deal with bland low-effort ‘reworks’ created with the intention of piracy.

As a side note, profile compilation for encrypted themes is not complete yet. Only OverlayUpdater and OverlayFound works right now.

The Substratum Theme Template also sees an update in the form of v10.0.0 release-preview. The theme template was rewritten in Kotlin, meaning that existing themers looking to upgrade to the new template will be needing to target a minimum API level of 24 (Android 7.0 Nougat). Themers will need the latest Android Studio Canary Preview 3 for Kotlin support, and they should be ready for a full rebase of their existing templates. The Substratum Theme Template readme is also ready with all the needed pointers for Kotlin to make it easier for themers to get started.

And finally, the latest Substratum update also brings Android O DP3 support (OMS). This will allow users to start theming for Android O again on the latest Developer Preview.

The full changelog for this update is given below:

Changelog Update travis.yml with changes for Android API 26

Merge pull request #110 from MSF-Jarvis/dev

Internal housekeeping build 780

EncryptedAssets: Suppress warnings for non encrypted themes

OverlayUpdater: Staticize and Reorganize

EncryptedAssets: Perform handshake with theme package to update overlays

Internal housekeeping build 770

EncryptedAssets: Disable for BootAnimations, Fonts and Sounds

Add adaptive icon support

Break free from hardcoded checker

References: Change how we detect OMS

only use checkOreo method and update for odp3

build: Update dependencies

build: Update build tools and SDK version

Full project refactor/optimize

EncryptedAssets: Key retrieval from template initial commit

References: Adapt to the newer template action detection algorithm

EncryptedAssets: Fix application of bootanimation on decrypted devices

OverlaysItem: Fix missing icon

EncryptedAssets: Invoke fragmentalized static objects after fast forward

EncryptedAssets: Add decryption method for fonts

EncryptedAssets: Add decryption method for sounds

EncryptedAssets: Add decryption method for boot animations

EncryptedAssets: Decrypt the bootanimation too

EncryptedAssets: Copy all the types as well

EncryptedAssets: Initial parsing and compilation support

EncryptedAssets: Add initial checking for encrypted assets

Reformat after fast forward

Center all TextViews on the previously simplified layout

MainActivity: Remove Library fragment animation for now

MainActivity: Change deprecated MenuItemCompat method

MainActivity: Remove all leaky statics

MainActivity: Move interfacer authorization receiver with another receiver

MainActivity: Do not hardcode fragment classes name

build: Rename odp flavor

Simplify TextView with images

Go castaway

Remove unused imports

Remove deprecated notification methods

build: update gradle plugin

build: Fix google-services plugin not detected

Use the new complicated notification channel

Properly register receivers for packages change

Use latest preview build tools and add odp flavor

Register broadcast receivers on application class instead

Fix string concatenation in loop lint warning

SubstratumUpdateReceiver: Check for intent action

Hopefully fix the type2 persistence on cache mode

Overlays: Make JobReceiver class non-static

Fix progress indicator position

Overlays: Fix lint warnings

Overlays: Dramatically reduce scrolling lag on first launch

build: Update dependencies and adjust

Fix compile error with Android Studio Canary 2

build: Update build tools

SubstratumRescue: Do not wipe /sdcard/substratum

SettingsFragment: Fix show template version default value

PackageModificationDetector: Use theme icon for notification



Substratum Release 780 and its new features are limited to Beta stream users for now. The update does mark a significant milestone for Substratum towards increased support and against piracy.

What are your thoughts on Substratum’s new measure to increase the difficulty in piracy? Let us know in the comments below!