I tried a couple searches on here, couldn't really figure out the best way to phrase it.

I was tweaking the transitions.ini file located in /usr/share/hildon-desktop (I think that's the right path?), and with the Maemo CSSU adding some new options, my old, tweaked file ended up missing a couple things, and I unfortunately didn't back up the one with the new options.

So, foolishly, I hoped that hildon-desktop would remake that file if I deleted it. I was wrong! Instead, the phone shut down, tried rebooting, and shuts down after a minute.

I'm curious about the easiest method to restore that file, and just that file. With the transitions.ini file gone, I can't just boot the phone, open xterm and copy it back into place. What would I have to reflash, if anything? Is there a way to boot the phone into some godly, 'ssh over usb so I can just copy the file back into place' thing that I don't know about?

Someone posted a vanilla transitions.ini file in some thread. Just have to do some more searching Or ask someone to post it to this thread.

thing is, I believe the OP can't even boot his phone no more

If you have an SD card, install MeeGo and boot it, mount your Maemo stuff and add the file

The only problem is I can't boot the device and use it, yeah. hildon-desktop keeps crashing, so the phone shuts down.

So far, I'm finding that the easiest method is to just flash rootfs all over again. It's something that I wanted to avoid a little bit, but eh. Maemo's backup feature makes it a little easier to handle, at the least.

I'm curious what other people do, though, when they run into some kind of issue like this. Do they just commit to a reflash as well, or if there actually is some method of getting into the N900 when problems like this arise.

Like stlpaul said, when **** breaks like that, if you know what you're doing, you use the above to boot into another OS, and go from there. It's not convenient - but it is doable. But yes, when people don't know how to do that, and don't have Backup menu installed, the easiest thing to do is break out the reflashing.

Yeah install Backupmenu and have USB networking setup then when problems arises you can ssh into your N900 and try and fix things.

Ah, so I have to do this BEFORE I break anything.

I'll probably end up installing that immediately, to prevent this from ever happening again!

Don't worry! With WP7 this sort of thing won't be an issue. All your system errors will be remotely caused by MSFT updates, so there is no need to waste valuable time breaking the phone yourself.