I think you are conflating the issue of being a Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiter (research personnel) with that of receiving a PhD. It is possible to work in a "research" position for an extended period of time without being part of a PhD process, so such positions obviously would not count towards "two attempts."

In addition, it is entirely possible that people might have to move or change positions because of personal circumstances (health, parental leave, or the two-body problem, among other reasons). Restricting people to two "shots" in this manner would be unfair.

Instead, I believe what you are referring to is the rule that there are at most two attempts at the thesis defense. If you fail the first one, then you must wait for a prescribed period of time (but not longer than another period of time), and attempt again to defend your thesis. If the second attempt fails, then you are not allowed further attempts. (However, if you work with your advisor, there shouldn't be a problem here, as you shouldn't be allowed to hold a defense if there's a substantial risk of failure!)

After what period of time does a PhD position count towards the two possible attempts in Germany?
I just got a Samsung Galaxy S3 that runs Android ICS 4.0.8. When I connect the Galaxy S3 to my Mac laptop and use PDAnet to tether, I often get this popup on the Galaxy S3 screen:



Tethering via PDAnet works great, but the popup can get annoying. I can close the popup, but it comes back a few seconds later. 
How can I get rid of this popup permanently?
