LocalBar: Install signed BAR files directly from PlayBook

I’ve reverse engineered the protocol used by blackberry-deploy to install apps file (BAR file) into the playbook. Then I made an app to Install signed BAR files directly from the playbook itself. You can find my work here:

http://yohan.es/playbook/localbar/

  • I am using https://localhost method. To put it simply: it works like other desktop installers that connect via network or USB, it sends commands to an HTTP service in the playbook. The only difference is that it works through the playbook itself.
  • It is possible that in the future RIM may block requests from localhost
  • I don’t have time to develop nice GUI for this, so I just use the basic GUI API that is accessible using NDK. For example: in the NDK there is a “login dialog” but no “password dialog”, so for the password dialog I use the “login dialog” that shows the “user” field (which I don’t need).
  • This works on OS 1.0.7 and on 2.0 (developer beta)
  • With this you can sort of OTA install through the playbook. From your PlayBook Just go to a website that has some bar files (for example this forum) , download it using the built in playbook browser, then run LocalBar to install the downloaded bar files.

11 thoughts on “LocalBar: Install signed BAR files directly from PlayBook”

    1. You don’t see the list of any bar files? This is the second report that I got today about not finding bar files. It seems that you are using non english version of playbook, I don’t know if that is the cause of it.

  1. I cannot get any bar files to launch. It seems like they are installing because the icon in there, but when you click on the it does nothing.Any ideas? Im running OS 1.0.7.

  2. @joe
    most likely you have installed bar files that are converted from APK files.

    Those kind of bar files will install fine, but it wont run unless you are using OS 2.0.

  3. yes that makes sense. So this only installs native bar files? Is there are good place to find those. I know there are many places to get the converted files. Also do you have a contact email? Thanks

  4. hello, i have tried to install localbar onto my Playbook (BETA version. 2.0.0.6149) and its not working please help 🙂

  5. hello, i try installing a bar file but forgot to turn on development mode, now some storage space has been taken by the unsuccessful install. how do i clear off the failed install? Thanks

  6. my playbook is 2.0.0.4869 rooted and installed the localbar . After the localbar runned 3 days ,it could not find bar.file anymore,please help me,thanks

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