Tip: Missing or Hidden Icons
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Download the latest version of VistaMizer for Windows. Give your XP an amazing Vista look. If you love the Windows Vista look but you don’t think it will run. Manage your Mac Photos albums and get rid of duplicates and similar in. So, without further ado, let’s take a look at the best bunch of Duplicate Photos.
I am still getting a lot of emails asking one or two of the same questions:
“I hid my poof icon and now I cant unpoof it” (or same with bossprefs or such). or “I just restored my iPhone and all my icons are gone“.
“I hid my poof icon and now I cant unpoof it” (or same with bossprefs or such). or “I just restored my iPhone and all my icons are gone“.
I have written two articles on this. There is the upgrade guide and also the other post that explains why it occurs.
A quick summary of solutions:
A quick summary of solutions:
1) If you have Cydia still visible you can install Quickgold and simply launch the hidden apps. You can launch bossprefs, poof, or such and unhide it.
2) You can install SBSettings and unhide any apps that are hidden.
3) You can launch settings app and disable / reenable restrictions which should unhide most of everything. (You will then need to use poof, bossprefs, or sbsettings and rehide what you want hidden).
4) If you cannot install anything because Cydia is hidden, you can use apt-get install quickgold from the SSH prompt
5) In the most drastic case where you also do not have SSH, you can use iphone browser and delete the file located at /var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SpringBoard.plist. Then reboot.
BigBoss Authors: Mark Bruce & Kory Lee
Tags: bossprefs, hidden icons, i hid bossprefs, i hide poof, missing icons, poof, SBSettings
Related posts
- trailman73 Says: I really love this app, great job on creating it! I wanted to ask if there are any plans to add the GPS to the toggle?Thanks.
- HandyRandy Says: handy tips here. I will come back for reference if i have a problem.Just goes to show you its damn near impossible to brick your iphone. Thats one thing apple got right. :)
- Nighthawk441 Says: bigboss is awesome i just found out 3 more ways to do stuff.
- Awayze Says: I had loads of icons hidden with poof. After I’ve restored the icons are always on the Springboard, I set up as new phone.
- GGA Says: I did the numbers 4 and 5 and it didn’t work.
I’m desperate to fix this and I don’t know how!!
Please help me! - BigBoss Says: I need more than “it didn’t work” to help you.
- abbzilla Says: I NEED MAJOR HELP!!IM SUCH AN IDIOT I HID EVERY SINGLE THING SO NOW MY IPNONE IS ALL BLANK THERES NO ICONS LEFT UNHID I CANT DO ANYTHING TO IT I CAN ONLY RECIEVE PHONE CALL AND SUCH. PLEASE HELP ME HOW TO UNHIDE ALL MY STUFF=[[THX
- Wasabi Says: Could really use a suggest or two as to how to get back my Touch’s “IPOD” icon instead of these two horrible “Music” and “Video” ones that come by default. Something caused it to revert back to those two and I can’t for the life of me figure out how to get back just the single “IPOD” icon that appears during the jailbreak process. Any ideas?
- Anonymous Says: how about you put your phone in recovery more and re-hack your phone
- the doctor Says: I let someone play with my iphone – they set the home button to double click to favorites… problem is my home button was set to double click to bossprefs, where I also have settings stored & poof, etc. Is there a way to reset this home button?
thanks - - boomie Says: After I turned “off” some of the icons that i want to hide using the POOF apps, the POOF ICON itself was gone from my Springboard. What happened? I’m a bit confused. =(
- BigBoss Says: You hid poof too. You can unhide it with bossprefs or sbsettings.
- RpR Says: /var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SpringBoard.plist
Under the parental control array, you can remove any app that’s hidden using SBsettings. In my case it was Cydia, and getting it back without being able to install sbsettings took some fiddling :P - abc1 Says: there are a couple of apps on my springboard i would like to put into a categories folder, but when i go into the folder and click add, the icons i want to add do not show up in the list of apps.what can i do?thanks.
- abc1 Says: i have the solution to why an app was not visible in the list of apps to add to a categories folder.the problem was that the app’s application folder had the same name as another already in the categories folder (someApplication.app and someApplication.app). categories only wanted to recognize one of them.using your computer:change the name of one app’s folder to someApplication2.appthen open up the folder and you find a file with no extension with the same name. change that to someApplication2also in the folder, open up info.plist and everywhere you see someApplication, change it to someApplication2repack your ipa, drag and drop into itunes, and synch. now you can add both apps into same categories folder.rock on
- Kel Says: I’m looking to hid all my apps (icons) and have a clean spring board. i have hidden all but one app (icon) because if i hid the last app the iphone will go in to the forever loop. any ideals on how to hide the last icon?
- Tyler Says: I have just updated my iphone 2G to version 2.2. After I updated it, I realized that I forgot to unhide a few of my apps. I now have a iphone with version 2.2 but cydia, settings, and installer are hidden. I also can’t ssh into it because my wifi is off and I can’t turn it on unless I unhide (which I can’t do) settings. I need help!!! Can someone (bigboss) help me unhide my hidden icons!! ThanksTyler
- T Webb Says: Use iPhoneBrowser to connect to your device. Wi-Fi is not needed to use iPhoneBrowser.5) In the most drastic case where you also do not have SSH, you can use iphone browser and delete the file located at /var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SpringBoard.plist. Then reboot.
- Tyler Says: I have just found a solution to my own question. I found a program called iphonebrowser on the internet (http://code.google.com/p/iphonebrowser/downloads/list). It lets you change around files on your iphone without ssh. I used iphonebrowser and deleted /var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SpringBoard.plist. Everything worked! I now have all my icons!Source: http://www.iphonedownloadblog.com/2008/09/28/iphonebrowser/
- Tyler Says: Thanks T Webb. I should have refreshed this page before I typed my response. Thanks for you help!
- Federico Says: I really like this app but I’m still using BossPrefs because there are a few missing things, named:1. able to turn on/off mail accounts
2. auto correct toggle
3. autolock togleAlthough number 2 and 3 are not very important, I found 1 a lot.
Is there any plan to include it?
Thanks. - L Cooper Says: hi, i recently got iphone 3G 16Gb and had it unlocked and jailbreaked in a shop. I hit the cydia icon on the screen and it started downlaoding stuff. The guy told not to download stuff as it cause it to lock. I restarted my phone and now some of the icons are missing, ipod, notes, calculator etc.I tried all the steps listed above, including downloading iphonebrowser and deleting /var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SpringBoard.plisti really need help sorting this out, please anyone?
- joe619 Says: I’m having a problem with a few things. I downloaded the categories app and put that app inside a folder i created which i named “customize”. Later on, i downloaded an app also called “customize” from cydia. When i downloaded that app, it actually erased/replaced the “customize” app i created and replaced it with the one i tried to download from cydia. I removed the customize app i downloaded from cydia but the “customize” app i created from categories will no longer show up on the home screen. On top of that, i put all my games in a “games” app i created from categories and they’re all stuck in that folder now that i can’t access the categories app to take them off. i tried to go back to cydia (featured packages) and it wouldn’t let me reinstall the categories app and it won’t let me download bossprefs or sbsettings(no install button). How can i get the “customize” app i created back so i can fix all of this? PLEASE HELP!
- BigHicks Says: I hid every app I had except my Internet with poof I mean every single one an even bossprefs app too so how do u get them back yea umma idiot help me out
- BigHicks Says: plz help me cause I can’t text I can’t call no YouTube,citia,iTunes,I mean every app I had is gone do I can’t go to nuthin but safari
- BigHicks Says: If u are going to give an answer my email is [email protected]
- piano tuning wrench Says: Если ты попадаешь во все, кроме противника, значит, все в порядке.
- jrod Says: I had a similar problem where I updated to 2.2.1 using a 2G iphone and was using an app from cydia called categories and forgot to take all the icons/apps from in there and after updating all my icons were gone and couldn’t be accesed.All I did was go into the Settings > General > Reset > Reset Home Screen Layout. That did the trick and brought all of the icons that were gone back into the springboard.
- Jason Says: Can you give us a step-by-step walk through for us noobs on how to find and delete /var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SpringBoard.plist
in Safari.My poof, Quickgold, bossprefs, sbsetttings and Apple’s General Settings are all hidden.Much thanks. - Jason Says: Never mind. I found it. BigBoss, can you guys change Step 5. I got confused about iphone browser. I literally thought you meant use Safari on the iphone and go through the directory.Or at least let the laymans, i.e. (me) know that’s a software app for your computer.Much Thanks again.
- VV Says: exact same problem.I turned my phone off a few seconds after i clicked cydia (thinking it was going to lock my phone).Can receive calls but the only thing on the springboard is youtube. Tried deleting “/var…plist” but it did not work.In dire need of help!!
- ES Says: Thank you so much for this post, i was freaking out that nothing I tried was working to get my icons back (cydia, bossprefs, sbsettings and settings were all hidden as i accessed them through docks) I ended up having to take the 5th option and now everything is right as rain. Thanks!
- Ken Says: I’m the layman idiot. Please help. I have the exact problem Jason did in 25, but don’t understand what to do. Can you be more specific about /var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SpringBoard.plistthanks
- Ken Says: OK, I got that I need to SSH into phone and delete the file in the Preferences directory.Now the only way I know how to SSH is through Terminal by ssh [email protected] but its not connecting. I’m 95% confident that is the correct IP since that was the one last night but since I can’t get into settings I can’t verify.Any suggestions for my dumb ass would be greatly appreciated.
- Ken Says: Iphone browser worked great. Thanks! Dummy me thought you meant Safari as well. Only took me 12 hours :(
- littleboss Says: I did 5 and it works fine!! Great help here boss.
- iphone Says: plz plz help! i didnt get anything of all your solutions! before deleting poof, by mistake, i couldnt unhide some applications, and then by mistake i hid poof! what do i do?! what is SSH and everything else! plz help me!
- whozbad Says: i love being a part of this iphone community, almost makes me want to be a programmer,(in school for Networking) thank you all for all your hard work…well now, te problem i have is a few ppl tend to use my pc and itunes library for their phones. IDK what happened but after a sync to my pc i have to use someone else’s itunes account info to DL from appstore, also after 2.2.1 upgrade lost all cydia content and apps, i have cydia now but winterboard is MIA but from what i understand all my DL stuff is still in my phone? Oh and where can i DL te iphone browser software for my pc, any help is appreciated, thanks.
- iphone Says: thank u very much for replying! i hate you and your application! i am gonna have to pay 50$ for someone else to fix my iphone and return all the applications that went missing! and this i could have avoided if i didnt download your lame application!
i didnt understand ure technical words in your advice, me being a common person, and now there is nothing i can do!
i know hiding poof was my mistake but i wouldnt have done so if it was working properly! i couldnt hide nor make visible any application anymore so i hid it by mistake!
thank you very much anyways! - nitaboo Says: um ok just like the rest i am a complete idiot when it come to this programing stuff loli do need to take step number 5 but the problem is i do not know where to start….please can i have step by step instructions please, im n desperate need of help to get all my cons back
- jack Says: you delete the file com.apple.SpringBoard.plist itself?
- ootter Says: Amazing post. I had an app off Cydia called ‘Categories’, and I foolishly put my settings AND cydia inside of it. When I updated firmware, I jailbroke it, but to my surprise, the file structure remained the same before the update, and I couldn’t access any settings, nor cydia, nor SSH. Thanks a lot guys.
- Synthezoid Says: I’m having the opposite problem. Every now and again I’ll get a springboard crash or other unexpected event, and suddenly all my hidden applications are back… since I have fiveIrows and Five Column Springboard installed, that’s almost 225 apps I have to manually re-hide, which is no easy task because Poof crashes every virtually every time I hide a single app. It’s happened twice in the last month. Any ideas?What would be nice is an option in poof to only show the hidden, unhidden or all apps – or even better, a search box to only show apps matching a particular string – so the displayed list could be shorter and not consume so much memory.By the way, the “Hide Icons” in BossPrefs seems to crash a bit less often than the standalone Poof app – if you add this option, please add it there too! Thanks.
- Synthezoid Says: By the way, I don’t think anybody has mentioned that if you accidentally hide your Poof, Cydia, or BossPrefs, you can just SSH in as root and use “apt-cache search ” (without the quotes) to get the package name, then “apt-get remove ” to remove it, then “apt-get install ” to reinstall, and the icon will be back on your springboard.Also I think someone should make it clear to a few of these people that if you don’t understand the advice in this post or these comments, you *really* shouldn’t be using poof at all. In fact, because fixing these mistakes requires command line knowledge, Poof should be classified as a “Hacker” app by Cydia’s user/hacker/developer filters, if it isn’t already. (And if it is, well, those people who don’t understand SSH or simple command line stuff shouldn’t be calling themselves “Hackers”.)
- Synthezoid Says: Damn, the posting script filtered out my bracketed phrases about. It should read ““apt-cache search [app name]”, “apt-get remove [package name]“, and “apt-get install [package name]”.
- Synthezoid Says: Hey, you know what I would loooooooooove? An app like Cydelete, but instead of just allowing you to delete any app, it would give you and option to hide that app’s icon. Then we could easily hide apps from the springboard, and would only need Poof to unhide them.
- Ryan Says: I used categories to hide all my settings, now there gone so i tried to use your #1 option by installing quickgold because i still have cydia visible. however quickgold wont show up after install and respring? do you have any recommendations?
- James Says: Ryan, I’ve got quickgold just by pressing ‘home’. Foxit phantom v2.However, I’m finding that apps are still absent from springboard despite taking these steps – 2.2.1 firmware on a 16gb 3g.Trying the slow process of removing some cydia apps to see if one of them has messed with the iphone’s fragile sensibilities….
- James Says: And miraculously, this appears to have worked!Removed a couple of themes and a couple of apps – nothing that looked too offensive, so i’m not sure quite what caused it.JAT!
- lydia Says: i have the same problem hidden icons do i need to delete the file named var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SpringBoard.plist or the missing files help!!
- Shaad Says: i cant unpoof the icons
i hid all the icons for fun nd now i cant get them back
i cant even access the recovery mode
nd all the iphone browser softwares start giving errors when i connect the iphoneP.S. im using an unlocked iphone with a 1.1.4 firmware - LENAA3 Says: I REEEEAALLLY need help….i hid my cydia, installor installous and the bosspref app itself does that mean its officially OFF my iTouch?I need help in restoring my apps.any suggestions?
- Shaad Says: i did the same thing except i did on the iphone
- LENA' Says: I think this will work for some who hid their iconsbut goo to your settings then turn restrictions off then all icons should show on springboard except poof bosspref or what ever you hid the icons with wont shooww.
- Chav Says: Hey all! Im running OS 3.0 on 3G with Bossprefs to hide my apps. I have been trying to install a particular app from instalous but am unable to get it to load . BUT i can see it in the Poof section of Bossprefs. How can I delete it or get it to load?
- Unhappy Says: Every time I download an app from installous it doessnt work it just hides the apps so I get on my sb settings and I unhide it but it doesn’t work please tell me what to do
- Chav Says: Yo Unhappy, switch your settings in Instalous from clean to dirty. That worked for me…
- Paul Says: Easy fix for those who cannot unhide their apps. Go to settings. Then go to General. Then go to Reset. Then click “Reset Home Screen Layout.” Accept the pop-p. All of you icons will be unhiden.
- NMystic Says: Have followed all the available options in your list here:Disabled/Enabled restrictions.Even resorted to the deletion of the springboard.plistMost apps came back, but the one I need most, Cydia, is
nowhere to be found.I actually had Cydia in the SBSettings Dock. Not sure if that
somehow is causing problems with it not reappearing.Without it I can’t reinstall Poof, SBSettings etc.Don’t have wi-fi on my older imac so SSH is out, though
I was able to use PhoneView to access the var/mobile/library/prefs
directory.Is there any other way to get an app on to the phone which
will allow me to unhide Cydia? (all of the hidden default apps
are still M.I.A. as well… Mail, Stocks, Weather, etc.)Do I have any other options available other than starting
from scratch and re-installing everything after a fresh
jailbreak???Thanks for any insight or advice you can offer. - NMystic Says: Cydia was still nowhere to be found, even after disabling/enabling restrictions, and trashing the sprinboard.plist and rebooting.On advice from BigBoss himself, I just ran redsn0w again and that did the trick.Hopefully this will help some others that are still stuck.
- samay Says: Man…… u rock…… i can’t explain how happy i am now…… i was stuck with tht problem, and i got the solution from u……. u rock mannn…. :)
- davec Says: Okay i think i’m totally screwed. I was using categories to hide lots of icons. but then my phone got messed up in some other way (sync problems) and i got into a situation where i was in the “stuck” DFU mode, (fail halfway thru a restore) so the ONLY way out was to do a full restore to 3.1 on my 3GS. Which IRRC means NO jailbreak for me. which means i have no way to install cydia or delete the springboard prefs or SSH or anything.the big Q: am I SOL?
- Anonymous Says: what is settings is hidden too?
- nxb807 Says: I followed BB’s steps listed in #5 (delete the file located at /var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SpringBoard.plist. Then reboot.), but my home icons are still missing. after i reboot the phone, i receive a message telling how to rearrange the icons, etc…but they are nowhere to be found.i’ve tried this step 3 times now, and every time i reconnect the phone to iphonebrowser, the “.com.apple.springboard.plist” is still there. is this why it’s not working? why is it still there? what else should i do?
- nxb807 Says: here’s some background on how i got into this mess…
have a jailbroken/unlocked iPhone 3G, and I have a serious problem. I downloaded the NES app from Cydia yesterday. The app wasn’t working, so I went into Cydia to remove the app, and now ALL of my original iPhone apps/icons are gone – maps, settings, text, camera, photos, calendar, calculator, safari, phone, email, iPod, app store, you tube, stocks, weather, and the jailbreak apps for 3.0 (cydia & icy)…do not appear!I tried syncing the phone again, hoping this would help, but the original features did not come back. When you call my phone it still rings, and when you perform searches in Spotlight, all the emails, address contacts still come up…but the applications itself are not found.None of the missing icons come up when i perform a search in spotlight. what’s strange though is that all the content in my calendar, address book, emails, etc are still searchable in spotlight.to give you an example, i just typed in the name of someone in my address book. when i try to select them however, i get the following message:“Unsupported URL – this URL wasn’t loaded: search://com.apple.mobileaddressbook/1/3325As mentioned, the cydia and icy apps no longer show up. i know they are working in the background b/c i can still get phone calls. i have a US iphone with a dutch SIM card.Someone else told me that the icons may be hidden and advised that I install SBSettings via Cydia. Trouble is, without the Cydia app, i don’t think i have this option.…so, i decided to follow BB’s advise…but it doesn’t seem to be working. HELP! - Frodo Says: My Poof icon disappear and trying to restore to previous setting didn’t work but I was able to do a search and find it, open and turn on again
- Paul Says: Coming from a 3.0.1 jailbroken with categories. Now on 3.1 with a bunch of hidden apps. Tried everything… I can launch any app I want of course through the first page flick thing alas quicksilver but when I launch poof or bosspref or SBsettings all my “hidden” icons show as unhidden (ON). I tried everything written here and nothing works. I’m left with the original homescreen look and no other icons showing. Can someone help me out here ? ;-)
- Paul Says: I originally pwaned with 3.1.3 and tried re jailbreaking. I get the same look.
I also did 1, 2, 3, 4,5 ,6 ,7 steps above… and the resets tricks, both of them… - SuperSuctionEars Says: I have a somewhat different problem with the Categories App. My problem is that I created a category in the app and it does not display in the app, so I cannot edit it or add icons to it. The category DOES display in Springboard, so I know that the category was at least partially created. How can I get this phantom category to show up in the Categories app so I can use it or remove it?
- KHN Says: hello nxb807
could you please send me a mail [email protected] - KHN Says:
- aissa Says: This is what happened.
I categorized my ipod into a music folder along with Pandora, last.fm etc. Categories was being finicky so I decided to uninstall it. All of my apps are present, and I have already gone into SB Settings and none of my icons, including my ipod, are supposed to be hidden. My ipod is still missing. I have tried restoring the home screen layout and even restoring all settings. Still no ipod icon. I can access it by typing ipod on my search bar but I just can’t see the icon. I know it shouldn’t matter if I can see the icon, but it really is gnawing at my sanity. I tried to install quickgold but it says I am missing required dependencies…help??:) thanks. - aissa Says: maybe you can reinstall or remove Categories from Cydia.that might help.
- rob Says: +1 to aissa’s problem. I’m having the exact sample problem where my iPod app is now missing after placing it and removing it from a category in categories.I’ve noticed in SBSettings that the icon now has a question mark (?) on it. I’ve searched all over the net and haven’t found a solution. It may be that the icon file is corrupted?Any help would be appreciated!
- playa700b Says: i only hav 1 stupid app, no settings, no cydia, no safari, nuthin, but everything else is n categories. HELP I WILL NOT RESTORE AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!
- ravi Says: same thing happened to me, if anyone has anything please help us out
- RAMIRO Says: i have a problem my iphone 1 g is missing all of the icons or apps the only thing that appears on the screen is the names of the apps or icons i dont know what to do can somebody help please
- Rob K Says: Hi, can you please help with the following. I have iphone version 2.2 jail broken. Boss, sbsettings & categories were working perfectly one minute then the next nothing. All missing, in cydia no reference of them being installed in packages. I did a new install of categories but once opened it does not reference / show my previously created folders with apps inside? When I create a new folder only the first one is visible all other folders do not show up. Previous working install named folders as appname.app & new install names folders as category000.app & the others that are not visible are category001.app, category002 etc. I also tried to install sbsettings again but with no luck? it does not show up any place. Would appreciate any suggestions.
- AnalFarts Says: Or you can just search poof with your iPod and get into poof and unpoof it.
- Ricardo Says: Hi, can you please help with the following:
i have some old categories icons which i created present in my iphone but they were not anymore
present in the categorie app.
when i open these icons i get a black empty screen!!!
can i delete these icons?
thanks - Syther Says: I accidently deleted something I needed for installous and I tried to download instullous again but it said I needed the thing tht I erased to download it again what do I do
- caress Says: ok well i have a jailbroken 3gs, FW 3.1.2 and i recently had a problem with a safe mode loop. eventually i rectified it by getting rid of an expired anyring app but since then ive had the oddest thing happen. it seems that i can now only have one app per home screen page and there is a max of 11 pages so only 11 apps are visible. the rest are accessible by the search function but not visible. i tried moving the apps together both manually and via itunes to no effect. i tried some of the above fixes such as BBtools, restrictions removal etc but nothing works…
any HELP would be appreciated…especially since i dont want to restore with the new firmware problem - TiDDyBoii Says: i had the same problem but what i done was gone crazy on ssh just screwin around with the files for like a hour and it fixed (i dont recommend it lol) i have ipod touch 3rd gen 3.1.3 firmware cracked by my best freindy 3.1.3 crack came so quick. anyway probly dont try what i said, if you have settings try general settings (i think) restore all data and hopefully you have your gamez saved, hope this helpz!
- TiDDyBoii Says: get to ssh find installer.app delete it and re install using cydia rock :) worth a try :)
- TiDDyBoii Says: whats tht app… nvm :’( if 3.1.2 — 3.1.3 slide <— from the home screen search it if that doesnt work sb settings if u have go on it press more press hide icons then turn em on!@! hope it helpz!
- TiDDyBoii Says: ooh yea just called my freind he had a 90 second jailbreak for 3.1.3 ill try get him to share unless his keeping it for 3.1.4 i donno if he gives to me u guyz 1st 2 no :) by the way his name is harry if u hear it lata
- caress Says: well until the 3.1.3 jailbreak is a sure thing im not gonna restore…anyonone else has any ideas.?
- caress Says: ok well i have a jailbroken 3gs, FW 3.1.2 and i recently had a problem with a safe mode loop. eventually i rectified it by getting rid of an expired anyring app but since then ive had the oddest thing happen. it seems that i can now only have one app per home screen page and there is a max of 11 pages so only 11 apps are visible. the rest are accessible by the search function but not visible. i tried moving the apps together both manually and via itunes to no effect. i tried some of the above fixes such as BBtools, restrictions removal etc but nothing works…
any HELP would be appreciated…especially since i dont want to restore with the new firmware problem - JonB Says: Running jailbroken with blackra1n iPhone 3GS 3.1.2.
Have SBSettings, Categories, CategoriesSB and Infinidock.I have no icons on my homepage screen, and made folders along the bottom dock to house all of my apps.
My “home” folder contains the “Mail” icon (along with all the other default iPhone apps). While under the “home” folder, SBSettings reports the “Mail” icon as hidden – which makes sense because it’s in the “home” folder and not on the main page. The problem is, there is a bug in Safari, where if the “Mail” icon is hidden (in SBSettings, Categories, or otherwise) you CANNOT save bookmarks, and will only be able to make a home icon bookmark (weird right?). So in order to eliminate that bug in Safari, I have to un-hide the “Mail” icon in SBSettings. The only solution that worked was to unhide the Mail icon manually and now it’s sitting in my dock AND in the “home” folder (duplicate).My question is:How do I hide the Mail icon from my desktop/main page, not have this safari bug, and keep the “Mail” icon in my “home” folder???I mean, I don’t really mind having the duplicate Mail icon, it’s just kinda lame to have to have it twice. - Jocelyn Says: BigBoss ! I got an interesting problem for you !First, Hi! I got a strange problem on my 3Gs where after adding a freshly installed app (with Rock), adding in Categories and respringing, most of the apps icons (including legit appstore, cracked appstore and cydia/rock ones) disapeared from the springboard and from categories folders. When I go to a folder there is 1 or 2 app remaining and when I go into manage into categories, I see a list of black question mark for icons without their names. Into SBSettings and BossPrefs I see that the icons that should be hidden are hidden. When I switch them to ON, nothing changes after the respring.(Even apps that were already ON and supposed to be on the springboard and not in a folder vanished). As you may have already guessed, any help would be greatly appreciated. If possible, I would like to avoid restore, but if needed I would at least like to know what has done this thing so I won’t do the mistake again (if there is a mistake and yes I read the few available instructions) because restoring and tweaking your phone knowing you could possibly restore again is not very encouraging.Also I have CategoriesSB and icon packs installed.Thank you.
- Jocelyn Says: Also: I am since 3 days on 3.1.2 restored with the help of saurik’s server. My 3Gs has not the new iBoot, I bought it this summer (which I jailbreaked using purplera1n). It is now jailbreaked/unlocked with blackra1n/blacksnow.
- FallingRain4ever Says: I need help!!!!For some reason my SSH icon will not show up on the drop down screen. I’ve turned it on and off and reset my phone and done everything i can to try to make it show up and it has not shown up.Help please! What is going on???
- Anonymous Says: I had the same problem recently after ios4.0.1 update and jailbreak. Finally realized I had not re-installed openSSH from Cydia. SBSettings will still show the switch to turn the toggle on the dropdown box on or off even if the SSH utility is not installed. May not be your problem, but it’s an idea. Probably too little too late considering it’s over a month later. Hope you found a fix already.
- Veeru Says: Bump!!
Same scenario here – help needed - Sruthi Says: Thank you so much its almost years that i wanted to unhide my safari and other hidden icon, but couldn’t since I forgot the code. It worked by deleting the com.apple.SpringBoard.plist file. Thanks a ton
- Anonymous Says: just in case anyone else can’t find icons after a simple multi icon move and has infiniscroll, try enabling vertical scrolling then in turn vertit again and the icons might be there.
- kay Says: hi my iphone 2g had a dead strip at the bottom where the phone, ipod, safari and mail icons were. i stupidly searched the net and people sed u can change the touch sensitivity and fix it. so i downloaded diskaid and i think i accidently tried to replace a general plist file and all of a sudden my settings icon has jst got deleted. when i go into diskaid now click on root, and then applications, theres NO preferences folder! what do i do :(
- FallingRain4ever Says: thanks for the help, but yeah i tried re-instaling Open SSH like twice, and for some reason i’m still not getting it, I go into toggels and its there and is switch on but its not in the drop down menu, its frustrating meeee lol.
If anyone else can help that would be awesome cuz i wanna change my text sounds agan but i just cant get to it. - Anonymous Says: Hi there. I hope you can help!!! For some reason the ‘settings’ icon is not showing up on the home screen on my husbands iphone 4g however, if you search for it by typing in ‘settings’, you can get to it. how do we get this icon back? No other apps or icons are missing. Thanks so much.
- Ser Says: I have jailbreak my phone and change the theme, but my PHONE app went missing … it is inside (when i double press the home button, the phone app is there) but how do i make it appear in the main screen?Help me please!
- Ser Says: I can’t even find it in my setting . the phone folder totally disappear after i change my theme . but when i remove the theme, my phone icon came back . but i love the theme very much. So please advice how can actually allow the “phone” app to appear in my main screen
- dessie10 Says: Hi, I have a similar problem on my iphone4. I read the earlier posts but was not able to find SBSettings or quickgold in the app store. or is it somethign else that i am not aware of?I was re-arranging my icons and suddenly one of my apps disappeared. It is still in the phone and when i search i can find it, but the icon is nowhere to be found. HOw do i get it back? Please help!! Thank you!!
- msj Says: Hye Guys,Yesterday, I jailbreak my Ipod Touch 2 version 3.1.3 firmware ( save SHSH in Cydia ) with Spirit.
The JB was success but many of default apps like Music, Video and Appstore missing!
I have try many times to fix it like :
1) Reset Home Setting Layout – not work!
2) Install Poof apps in cydia & try to unhide the apps – not work!
3) Try to restore again the ipod with IOS3.1.3 & error of 21 appear after I add the latest host number of 74.208.10.249 gs.apple.com
but still not work.
Currently, my Ipod still can ON & working with cydia. but icon for Video & Music missing.
Kindly, your advised & help really appreciated.
Thanks! - Stan Says: I really like to thank this website! I used Poof! THANK YOU SO MUCH. I escaped from being scolded! =D
- Bia1986 Says: I have tried everything and still my cydia icon is missing.Please help me! I have an iphone 3g jailbroken with redsn0w and unlocked with ultrasn0w.
- plimp Says: I have SBSetting and cydia installed on my JB iphone 4.
I managed to hide some of the apps on the springboard but I noticed some of the apps’icons still appear in places like “Settings” and “Settings->Locations”. How to I hide all these as well? - Anonymous Says: your simply brilliant. thank u
- Anonymous Says: use search?
- anonymous Says: i was doing something in cydia then i pressed something and it re-sprung and when it came back on cydia dissapeared i re started re sprung and every thing iv also tried re jailbreaking it but that wont work
ps when it was there my winterboard themes wornt working properly only the backrounds were working
PLS HELP MEEEE - Anand Says: I’ve delete the file /var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SpringBoard.plist.But cant see my application icons please help
- Anonymous Says: hi. i’ve got a similar problem. i think i’ve deleted something (file path or something) from my iPad 2 using iphone explorer. now all the default icons are gone –safari, settings, ipod, facetime, etc. all of them have disappeared. how am i able to bring them back without having to restore? i don’t wana update my firmware yet coz if then i wouldn’t be able to have it jailbroken.pls help. thanks a lot
- Sam Says: I was on my iPod touch 3rd generation when I was moving a game, my screen crashed and now I dont have the “photos” app, how do I bring it back…?
- alex Says: how to do like you said “If you cannot install anything because Cydia is hidden, you can use apt-get install quickgold from the SSH prompt” how exactly i can doo this? idunno what apt get??
- Anon Says: I have also been having problems with Categories/CategoriesSBAfter uninstalling it, my springboard was empty and even a respring/reboot didn’t help.Go to SBSettings –> More –> Hide Icons –> Switch Categories (or anything else) to OnRespring and you should see all your icons again.hope this helped guys good luck!
- Maggie Says: Hi,I accidentally turned all the apps off in Poof. The Iphone doesn’t have any of the things downloaded (such as Cydia etc.) The Iphone is not able to connect to the internet because everything is gone, and it can’t use 3G or anything like that because it no longer works as a phone. I’ve tried restarting it, but that doesn’t work. Please help!
- john Says: all of my icons are invisible including cydia. the only thing i can see is the name of the app. any answers for this?
- giyos Says: the calculator app on my ipod touch is missing.,I dont know what happened.,its totally missing.,I even checked the Hide Icons option in SBsettings but theres no calculation app in the selection.,HELP PLEASE!!!.,
- Fate Says: Hi, maybe this is a stupid question but i have searched all day long and still find an answer. May someone kindly teach me how to set the sbsetting screen to show weather, notification, stock etc.? No matter how i tried, my sbsetting only show toggle buttons. Please kindly help.
- Vikrant Says: restart !!!
- ipod touch 32gb 4g Says: Usually I do not learn article on blogs, but I wish to say that this write-up very forced me to try and do it! Your writing style has been amazed me. Thank you, very great post.
- ebenvios Says: Magnificent website. A lot of helpful information here. I am sending it to some friends ans additionally sharing in delicious. And of course, thanks on your effort!
- Susan royal Says: I have lost my settings icon on my iPhone screen. How do I put it back?
- Robbie dock Says: UMM. yOU mIGHT WANT TO FIX THIS. YOUR SEMITHETHERED SAFARI PATCH WONT WORK ON 5.1 TETHERED CAN YOU FIX THIS ITS REALLY ANNOYING
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WMI is extremely powerful and provides you with a wealth of information about computer systems and software. Unnoticed by many, the PowerShell team has introduced an exciting technology called Cmdlet Definition XML (CDXML) in PowerShell 3. It can auto-magically turn WMI classes into full-featured PowerShell cmdlets.
Quick Intro
WMI is much older than PowerShell and has always been an excellent and fairly easy-to-use source of information. When PowerShell initially surfaced, the team did two things to leverage the assets in WMI:
- Simple WMI Access: the cmdlet
Get-WmiObject
was added to simplify querying WMI for information, and up to today this single cmdlet is still among the most popular and widely used cmdlets. - Wrapping WMI Queries: some cmdlets were added that internally just wrapped WMI queries in an effort to make things even easier and more discoverable. For example, these two calls produce identical results:
Then, in PowerShell 3, the team did a lot of re-thinking:
- Better Standardization:
Get-WmiObject
was hard-coded to use the old DCOM network protocol. With the advent of WsMan and other remoting standards, it became important to query and access WMI in a flexible yet standardized manner. So the PowerShell team introducedCIM Cmdlets (read more). - Automatic Cmdlet Generation: Of course cmdlets like
Get-Hotfix
helped not having to remember awkward class names like Win32_QuickFixEngineering, but manually producing cmdlets for every single WMI class was no option. Instead, the PowerShell team added Cmdlet Definition XML (CDXML) to wrap WMI classes and produce cmdlets in an automated way.
CDXML enables you to auto-magically turn WMI classes and WMI methods into easy-to-use cmdlets, and you’re probably working with CDXML-generated cmdlets all the time without even knowing. CDXML is the reason why we have seen such a steep increase in cmdlets shipping with the Windows operating system.
In this article, I’d like to take you on a tour to discover CDXML. You’ll see how it can tremendously simplify your work with WMI, and you’ll find a lot of example code, including how to enable and disable your webcam (so you don’t accidentally leave your webcam on when the video conference is over).
Discovering CIM Cmdlets
A normal PowerShell module ships the code for new commands. A PowerShell module based on CDXML in contrast does not contain source code. Instead, it uses a .cdxml file to describe how cmdlets can queryWMI classes and call WMI methods.
Finding CDXML-Based Modules
To find PowerShell modules based on CDXML, search for files with extension .cdxml in one of your module locations:
On a typical Windows 10 machine, the result looks similar to this and exposes 50 PowerShell modules that in reality just wrap WMI calls:
Don’t worry about the v1.0 subfolder. The PowerShell team planned on having different PowerShell versions side-by-side in version-specific subfolders and added the folder v1.0. This idea was abandoned, but the folder remained. All versions of Windows PowerShell reside in the subfolder v1.0.
Understanding .CDXML Files
At the core of each of these modules, you find one or more .cdxml files. These xml files use this structure:
- Class: the attribute ClassName specifies the WMI namespace and WMI class name that it targets.
- DefaultNoun: defines the noun name for the cmdlets that are produced by this file
- InstanceCmdlets: defines the cmdlets that target the instances of the WMI class. If the WMI class was Win32_Share, for example, representing network shares, then the cmdlets defined in this section would apply to each individual share that exists.
- StaticCmdlets: defines the cmdlets that target the WMI class itself. Many WMI classes provide methods that are independent of actual instances.
Discovering “Managed” WMI Classes
In a next step, let’s read the .cdxml files of all PowerShell modules to discover the names of the WMI classes they manage:
When you run this code, it produces a long list of WMI classes. All of these classes are “managed”:
Using “Managed” WMI Classes
While you can still use the raw native WMI cmdlets like
Get-CimInstance
, it is much easier to use the managed cmdlets provided by the CDXML-based PowerShell modules.Raw WMI Access…
Yosemite vs high sierra. For example, to get a list of Plug&Play devices, you may have figured out that these are represented by the WMI class Win32_PnPEntity:
This works well, and you can use WMI queries to further refine your search, and for example find all of your webcams:
Buildbox 1 3 4 – drag and drop game builder. Obviously, this line of code yields results only if there is at least one camera device present in your system.
If you wanted to actually disable your webcam, things would become a lot more complex. You’d now need to know that the class Win32_PnpEntity has methods called Enable() and Disable(), and you’d need to know how to invoke these methods.
You’d also need to know that the methods Enable() and Disable() have been added in Windows 10 and Server 2016 and aren’t available in older versions of Windows, and that you need to have Administrator privileges to invoke them.
With all of this knowledge, you could come up with a script that can disable webcams:
…Versus Managed CDXML Cmdlets
Fortunately, the WMI class Win32_PnPEntity has been turned into managed cmdlets by the PowerShell module PnPDevice as you have discovered earlier:
The module comes with four auto-generated cmdlets:
These four cmdlets represent querying Win32_PnPEntity and calling the three methods the class instances support. So now your code becomes much easier:
When you run this code, you’ll discover even more goodness:
- Better Formatting: the gridview displays the Plug&Play devices in a much more readable format: you just see the four important properties Status (which shows Error when the device is not operational, i.e. because you disabled it), Class, FriendlyName, and InstanceId. When you ran
Get-CimInstance
, PowerShell showed all properties, and it was much harder and involved more scrolling to identify the right camera in the gridview. - Better Security: since disabling a device can be a harmful action, PowerShell automatically pops up a confirmation dialog when you call
Disable-PnPDevice
. - Silent Output: while calling WMI methods via
Invoke-CimMethod
always returns information,Disable-PnPDevice
by default just disables the device and does not return anything. If you want to know the results, which of course can be useful, add the parameter -PassThru.
To not show the confirmation box and return method results, run this instead:
Identifying Managed WMI Classes
You’ve just seen how much easier it is to use the CDXML-based managed cmdlets over the raw WMI access. If you regularly work with WMI classes directly, you might want to check whether the classes you typically use are available via managed cmdlets as well.
Now you can look up the WMI classes that provide managed cmdlets:
As you see, most CDXML-based modules come with their own new WMI classes. Win32_PnPEntity in fact is the only “classic” WMI class that has been turned into a managed module.
Example: Enabling And Disabling Hardware
Thanks to the simple-to-use CDXML-based cmdlets with their filter parameters and the better formatting, you can now easily create two PowerShell functions: one to enable cameras (or any other device you query), and one to disable:
Dependencies
The script requires the cmdlets
Get-PnpDevice
, Enable-PnPDevice
and Disable-PnPDevice
provided by the module PnpDevice. It also requires Administrator privileges. That’s what the #requires statements are for: they ensure that these prerequisites are met. Else, PowerShell won’t run the script.The module PnPDevice is listed as a separate dependency. Isn’t this module part of PowerShell 3? No, it isn’t, and it’s important to understand this:
PowerShell 3 (and better) ship with the Cim Cmdlets and CDXML technology. The module PnpDevice however was added to the operating system and introduced in Windows 10 and Server 2016. So when you are running an older Windows version and upgrade to PowerShell 3 or better, you are still missing the module PnpDevice. You’d have to upgrade your operating system, not PowerShell.
WMI Dependencies
In fact, this is the reason why you can’t just copy modules based on CDXML. These modules reference WMI classes and their methods, so to run them, your WMI classes must support this. As it turns out, the WMI instance methods Enable() and Disable() used by
Enable-PnPDevice
and Disable-PnpDevice
where also added only in Windows 10 and Server 2016.If you wanted to enable and disable devices in Windows versions prior to Windows 10 and Server 2016, you’d have to write code yourself to access the SetupAPI directly - or use a PowerShell module that does:
The free module DeviceManagement comes with methods to enable and disable devices that work independent of WMI and are available in older Windows versions as well:
Snapselect 1 3 0 – Discover Best Photos Eliminate Duplicates In Iphone
Beginning with Windows 10 and Server 2016, though, this module is no longer needed as you have seen.
How Improved Formatting Works
Aside from easier discoverability, managed CDXML-based cmdlets also provide much better output. Let’s see how this works, and what your benefits are.
Raw WMI Output: Hard To Read
Open a fresh PowerShell and run this to see what the raw WMI content typically looks like:
This dumps the first available Plug&Play device instance, and you get back a lot of raw WMI information:
This includes properties that use numeric codes, for example ConfigManagerErrorCode. You can only guess that 0 represents “no error”, and if you find other values, it isn’t evident what they might stand for:
In my example, since I just disabled my webcam above, I get this:
So with raw WMI content, there are two problems:
- Too much: you get back too much information and need to invest time to find the useful properties.
- Too cryptic: some of the information is coded and uses numeric values that are hard to understand
CDXML: Friendly Output
When you run this code, you get back a much easier to read representation of a Win32_PnPEntity instance:
PowerShell now only shows the four most important properties:
You can still see all the other information by using
Select-Object
, and when you do, you also see that most numeric values have been replaced by friendly text. This line dumps all Plug&Play devices in error state, and returns the error reason (instead of a code number):If all of your Plug&Play devices work properly, you won’t get back anything. You may want to disable a device to test this.
Snapselect 1 3 0 – Discover Best Photos Eliminate Duplicates In Word
The result looks like this:
In fact, CDXML has added a number of additional properties. To get a full status report, try this:
This produces a sophisticated report. Problem is an alias for ConfigManagerErrorCode, yet ProblemDescription is new and provides you with a human-readable description of the problem.
Only, ProblemDescription is empty in most cases due to a bug. The module reads the problem descriptions from a local resource file which resides inside the module. Since the resource file uses relative paths, you need to change the current path to the module base folder to see the problem descriptions:
Now the report looks good, and ProblemDescription has content:
Formatting Improvements For All Instances
Once you have loaded the module PnPDevice, this auto-magically prettifies the output of Win32_PnPEntity instances, regardless of how you produced them. So even raw WMI queries now show friendly texts.
The line below, which previously produced a raw numeric ConfigManagerErrorCode, now displays the same friendly result:
That’s important to understand because this way, you can combine the best of both worlds:
Get-PnPDevice
is perfect for most routine tasks but it won’t let you do sophisticated server-sided queries. For those, you can still use Get-CimInstance
. Just make sure you imported the module to get the sophisticated formatting.Here is an example:
Get-PnPDevice
supports the parameter -Status so you can actively search for a given status. You cannot, however, negate this and search for any device not in that status. Here comes Get-CimInstance
to the rescue:Custom Formats And Types
Take a look into the PnPDevice module folder to understand how the module improved the output:
You’ll discover two files: PnPDevice.Format.ps1xml and PnPDevice.Types.ps1xml.
Formats Prettify WMI Instances
The first file defines the properties that PowerShell displays by default:
This format is applied to all objects of these types:
That’s why all instances of Win32_PnPDevice appeared prettified as soon as the module PnPDevice was loaded (and added these formats) - regardless of whether you used
Get-PnPDevice
or Get-CimInstance -ClassName Win32_PnPDevice
to produce these instances.Type Extensions Prettify Property Content
The second file adds new properties to the WMI instances and can turn code numbers into friendly text:
The type extension applies to all instances of this class which again explains why the benefits apply regardless of how you produced the instances:
New alias properties like Problem are added like this:
Numeric Values Become Enumerations
Conversions from numerics to friendly text are implemented like this:
The raw numeric value is converted into an enumeration type, in this example [Microsoft.PowerShell.Cmdletization.GeneratedTypes.PnpDevice.Problem]. For this to work, the script property needs to read the raw value directly from the CimInstanceProperties, effectively bypassing the PowerShell type system. Else, you’d produce an endless loop.
The type [Microsoft.PowerShell.Cmdletization.GeneratedTypes.PnpDevice.Problem] is defined directly in the .cdxml file:
At the end, there is an (optional) <Enums//> section that translates the numeric values to friendly text:
Buggy: Using Text Resources
Finally, let’s take a look at how the module PnPDevice implemented the new property ProblemDescription, and why this property only works when the current directory is set to the module base.
Problem Description
As you have seen, ProblemDescription is always empty unless you set your current folder path to the module base folder:
Problem Cause
Let’s investigate the cause of this problem. Take a look at the types definition again:
ProblemDescription is implemented like this:
In essence, the problem descriptions are read from a local resource file located in the module folder:
Import-LocalizedData
reads the content from the .psd1 file into the variable $LocalizedData
. then the remainder of the code produces the problem descriptions.Unfortunately, all of this code is executed in the caller context, not the module context. So
Import-LocalizedData
uses the current path to load the file PnpDevice.Resource.psd1 and can only succeed if you happen to have set your current folder to the module base folder.We have had an interesting discussion on this on Twitter about this with great suggestions from community members. In the end, we came up with a simple fix (see below). Many thanks to all who participated!
Fixing Problem
To fix the problem, you need to submit the module root folder to the parameter -BaseDirectory so PowerShell knows where to find the resource file. Fortunately, you can safely assume that the module PnPDevice is already loaded into memory when PowerShell processes the type extension.
So to fix the problem, replace this line in PnpDevice.Types.ps1xml:
…with this line:
But wait: since all PowerShell modules shipping with Windows are installed (and protected) by the TrustedInstaller, you don’t have permission to alter the files. So for the time being, the best workaround is to temporarily change the current path as described above using
Push-Location
and Pop-Location
. Hopefully, Microsoft will fix the issue eventually.If you want to test-drive the fix, simply copy the entire module folder PnPDevice to a place where you do have write permissions, and apply the fix. Next, use
Import-Module -Name <path_to_copied_module_folder>
to manually load the fixed module into memory.Now this line works without a flaw regardless of your current location:
I have reported this issue, and hopefully we soon see an official fix. It’s worth it: ProblemDescription provides useful extra-information for your Plug&Play devices.
If you come across PowerShell issues that repro in PowerShell 7, or if you’d like to provide feature requests or other feedback to PowerShell 7, this is the official starting page for your submissions to the PowerShell team.
Before you go ahead, make sure your submission applies to PowerShell 7. There are many issues in Windows PowerShell that have long been fixed in PowerShell 7 (if you haven’t looked at PowerShell 7 yet, you might want to now)