Hardwire your Android Phone using a USB cable to your Computer:
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This allows you to use Internet on your Android smart phone without wifi. It's commonly known as "reverse tethering".
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This can allow you to use get your phone online even if you can't get a signal. It can also allow you to use the apps on your phone without exposing yourself to high levels of wireless radiation. To reduce exposure to wireless radiation, it's best if your computer's Internet is hardwired through an Ethernet cable.
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All the links associated with this #tutorial can be found at the bottom of the post, including a link to a #video tutorial.
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Requirements:
* An Android phone.
* A USB cord.
* A computer with an internet connection.
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1. Enable Developer Options on your Android:
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Do this by navigating to the Settings menu, and finding the Build Number for your device. On my android I found this by going to "About Phone" > "Software Information". Tap on the Build Number over and over until it says something like "Developer Mode Enabled". It should only take about 8-12 taps, and I think it starts to say:
"5 clicks left to enable developer mode",
"4 clicks left to enable developer mode",
"3 clicks left to enable developer mode",
etc.
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2. Enable USB Debugging on your Android:
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Now you can find the Developer Options menu at the bottom of your Settings menu. Go there, and you should find an option toward the bottom to "Enable USB Debugging". For the security conscious, it is recommended that you DISABLE this when you're done using it. But it must be ENABLED to use the Internet through the USB cable. It could theoretically be a security risk to leave your USB port open to the outside world, in case your phone ends up in the wrong hands.
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3. Download "gnirehtet":
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This is the program which interfaces between the computer and the Android. Download it and unzip it into whatever folder you'll be keeping it in.
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Download link: https://github.com/Genymobile/gnirehtet/archive/master.zip
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4. Download "adb":
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This is a large chunk of data. This is what Android Developers use for "Android Debugging", and allows your phone and computer to communicate. You'll download it differently depending on your OS.
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On Windows or OS X you'll want to download it from: https://developer.android.com/studio - scroll down to find the download that suits your operating system. I think you can get away with just downloading the smaller download of "command line tools" instead of the whole thing.
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On Linux you can probably download it from your package manager. For instance, on any Debian-based Linux such as Ubuntu you would simply use the command "sudo apt install adb".
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If you're NOT on Linux, you'll want to unzip the downloaded file into the same folder where the "gnirehtet" program was unzipped into. That makes sure gnirehtet has direct access to "adb". If you ARE on Linux, "adb" will be available from everywhere, anyways, since you downloaded it via your package manager.
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Download link: https://developer.android.com/studio
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5. Connect the Android to the PC.
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Just connect it via the USB cord. For best results, you'll want the most modern USB cord, which has faster data transfer. I used the cord that came as a part of my wall outlet charger. I think any USB cord will work, though. Some are just faster than others.
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6. Install "gnirehtet" from PC onto Android.
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Open the command line and navigate to the folder with gnirehtet. Type the command "gnirehtet install" to install it on your phone. Linux users will probably know that they must include the path to the exact file. If you're in the folder with the gnirehtet script, that will look like simply adding "./" before the command. So Linux users will type "./gnirehtet install"
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Then your phone will pop the question: "Allow USB Debugging?" and display a bunch of random letters and numbers - that's an RSA key and it's just double-checking that you know who you're connecting to. Assuming it's your phone, and your computer, and you're just following all of these directions exactly, I doubt there's any reason to go check whether the RSA key is correct. I don't even know how you would do that, honestly. Just press "OK".
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7. Run "gnirehtet".
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Finally, just run the command "gnirehtet run" or on Linux "./gnirehtet run" and the command line will start spitting out a bunch of lines that look like stuff connecting and disconnecting, saying "open" and "closed". As far as I can tell, that's just the different apps on your phone connecting and disconnecting all the time. But, basically, you should have Internet on your phone now!
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8. A couple more tips...
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* "gnirehtet" seems to appear as if it's a VPN on the phone. Sometimes the connection drops, or you want to stop it and then start it up again later, and the "gnirehtet run" command seems to spit out some errors and won't work. For me, what seems to work is going to the "gnirehtet" VPN on the phone, and hitting "disconnect". On your PC go to the command line, and run "adb kill-server". This just clears everything out, so you can start anew.
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* I still haven't figured out if you only have to run "gnirehtet install" the very first time, or every time. Sometimes I've managed to skip that step and just run "gnirehtet run" but that might only be if I've recently run it. Other times it seems like I have to start over and type "gnirehtet install" again and then "gnirehtet run" after the install is successful (again...)
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I hope this works for you!
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Tutorial video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=220&v=EHooYfSWvkI
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Github:
https://github.com/Genymobile/gnirehtet
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The Article Introducing gnirehtet on Medium:
https://medium.com/genymobile/gnirehtet-reverse-tethering-android-2afacdbdaec7
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#emf #hardwire #android
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