Installing Jelly bean 4.3 on Micro digit tablet I just bought this China made tablet(Micro digit M7502). Jelly bean 4.2.2 is installed on it. But I want to upgrade it in to 4.3. Do any one know here? I think this is the right place to ask. Thank you.

Unfortunately, the manufacturer has not provided any OTA updates for your device.

Any chance of getting Android 4.3 would be by rooting it and installing a custom ROM.

After some searching, I found that there are no custom ROMs for your device. So you can proceed by submitting a request to the developers at XDA to build one specifically for your device. Remember that flashing a ROM not meant for your device can result in bricking.


How can I force version 5.0.1 on Note 4 to only connect to 4G LTE when available? My Note 4 running 5.0.1 will often connect to 4G rather than 4G LTE when both are available.  When this happens I can turn airplane mode on and off it will then reconnect to 4G LTE, sometimes with 5 bars.

How can I either make it:

Only connect to 4G LTE
Never connect to 4G
Only connect to 4G LTE when both are available
Strongly prefer the 4g LTE connection over the 4G even when LTE has less bars

One or any combination of the above points would be great. I have an unlimited data plan and I think AT&T likes to slow me down because of it. Any ideas?

It seems that this answer (by Void) worked well for OP. You can setup your device to connect to "4G LTE" only by using the following steps:

In dialer, press *#*#4636#*#*
Go to Phone Information
Scroll down to Set preferred network type: and tap the entry below it.
Choose LTE only.
Optionally: Tap Turn off radio → Turn on radio

Or,
If you cannot access that menu using the code in dialer, then install and launch Elixir 2 → information
→ tap Telephony → Turn WiMAX (4G) on → repeat aforesaid steps 3-5.
An important note by OP

This disabled my incoming calls and they were going straight to voicemail. Not sure if this is a [New York City (high volume - stressed network)] thing or if voice just generally never goes over LTE but [I] had to switch it back.


Tablet and old Nexus don't appear in device manager I have three devices, a nexus 5 that I use daily and a Nexus 7 and 4. The last time I used Android Device Manager I could see all three. Now I looked but I can only see the N5. The other two (N7 and N5) don't show up. Tried both on the app on the N5 and in Chrome on the PC.

I want to see when my N7 was last seen because it bricked a while back (probably within the warranty period) and I just sent it in for repairs (outside warranty period). If I have a screenshot I can prove it broke within the warranty.

Does anyone here know how I can get the N7 to show up in Device Manager again? Or any other trick how I can prove  when it last worked?

Thanks GJ

If anyone has a similar problem, I was able to see the last seen date for all my devices here:
https://play.google.com/settings


Google play store: set language to the local language I am in Germany, I want to set up Play Store to display and search/install apps in German language.

My phone's default language is French. I do not want another language.

I did set up my Google account language to German as the main and only language

Still Play store will display all in French. I cannot find how to switch languages.

What to do to get it into German?

You have to set your System display language to German, not your Google account language to German:

Paramètres -> Paramètres Avancés -> Langues & Saisie -> Langue -> Allemand (Deutsch)
Einstellungen -> Erweiterte Einstellungen -> Sparche & Eingabe -> Sparche -> Deutsch


Android uninstall app before boot completion A strange one this. I have got myself into a situation where I think that a single apk is causing boot to fail. I have the same situation on a Nexus 4 and Nexus 7 running 4.4.

Running adb install <com.myapp.package> would hang - then the device would reboot - then would get stuck on Android is upgrading...Optimising app 1 of 1.

I can list packages through adb shell at this point - but uninstalling with

pm uninstall <com.myapp.package>

will just hang - presumably as the current process is doing something with that apk already.

If i try to boot into recovery at this point i get a dead android with a "no command" message.

Fastboot is locked on the device and its not rooted.

My only option at this point i think is to unlock fastboot but was wondering if im missing something.

EDIT: I just wiped via fastboot on one device and it works again - dont really want to do this on other device if poss

Thanks!

The application apk will be stored in /data/app/ or system/app/ you can navigate there and rm .apk, then reboot


Access Windows admin share from Android? I have tested several Android apps and none of them seem to be able to do what I want.

How do I access admin shares such as \\host\c$ from Android?

Note that admin share access is enabled on the host and I can in fact access it from another Windows machine. Last time I checked it even works from Debian Linux. Now, Android either has some deeply rooted issues with this or it lacks the proper tools/apps.

Try ES File Explorer. It can access user shared folders + administrative shares.


Why are there 2 boot partition on mediatek devices, both of which contain the same preloader? On Mediatek devices, the same preloader.bin is in mmcblk0boot0 and mmcblk0boot1, why does it need to be in both partitions?

Both the preloader BIN files in the mmcblk0boot0 and mmcblk0boot1 partitions are identical. The reason for this is in case the mmcblk0boot0 becomes corrupt, the device is still able to boot up.


Autodownload apps that installed on another tablet? Is there a solution without any extra app or software for the following:

I have here an old Acer A510 Tablet with my account, also a new Xperia Z2 Tablet - I would like to force the play store on the Z2 Tablet to download every app that I already installed on the old tablet. Is there a way without a backup app?

Yes, there is, both from the device, or using Google Play on a 'regular computer'.
Using your mobile device

Open the  Google Play Store app
Touch the  Play Store icon and select My Apps.
Visit the All category.
Select an app you’d like to install, then touch the Install button on the app’s detail page.

Using your computer

Visit your My Apps page on Google Play.
Select an app to view its detail page.
Click the button that says Install or Installed and select the device where you’d like to install the app.
Note: When an app shows an "Installed" button on its detail page, it means that the app is installed on one of the devices associated with your Google Account.
Click Install.


My sd card is not connecting to my Android phone My brother purchased a new sd card for my Android phone (it's an alcatel onetouch yh I know it's old) to increase memory. Its a 8 gb card, but my phone still says low on space when I try to download any apps.There was no notification telling me that an sd caed was inserted either. I tried selecting sd card and it shows 8 gb available but I still can't download apps. Then I switched to internal memory just to see if that would help but nothing happened. Plz someone help!

The information provided is less.. so I'm assuming that the sd card is detected and is working and.. you're trying to download apps from google play store..
Lemme explain... The apps downloaded are automatically stored in your internal storage so even if you sd card has space available it won't be used.
What you can do for this..
try to delete useless stuffs and free up space from your internal storage (I'd recommend you to download Files by Google for this)
and copy all the videos from your internal storage to the sd card..
HOPE IT HELPS.. (^_^)


Every album has the same icon I downloaded Shuttle(free version) to listen to music on my Xiaomi Redmi 3 Pro.

I downloaded a lot of music albums(only mp3 files), but the last one created a problem.

When I downloaded this album, its main icon(so the image of the album) has took the place of every other album's icon in the app and I don't know the reason.

Is this a problem of the 'download' directory? Or is this a problem of Shuttle?

Problably in the song property there isn't the album tag. You can modify it and add the name of the album using a Music tag editor. You can also change the pick of the album.
I use the app "Star Music Tag Editor"


What is the exact difference between user and eng binaries? What is the exact difference between user and eng binaries for a phone (mobile device)? These are two of the build variants. I want to know the exact difference between them.

"Eng" is short for engineering AKA developer build. Those builds have various logging facilities enabled which you do not see on regular "production" builds. Normally you do not want to flash such builds on to your phone.


mobile network and Wi-Fi are blocking The problem of my phone is, mobile network and also Wi-Fi connection are sometimes blocking. it happens randomly. On the screen, it shows everything is regular and there are connections, however, if I try to connect to network/Wi-Fi, it fails. The only solution is to restart the phone. Do you know what is the problem? I guess old rom....

My phone is Samsung Galaxy s II lite (AKA Samsung I9070 Galaxy S Advance).

Model number: GT-I9070

Baseband version: I9070BULK1

Android ver: 2.3.6

Kernel: 2.6.35.7-1211698

Build number: GINGERBREAD.BULK1

This issue happens for many models.

Let me say a simple scenario

You are in a call, suddenly the signal has gone and call drops. Then even waiting for a long time, the signal is not coming.

This is because, the phone didn't attempt to connect to a network anymore.

The solutions

Turn on airplane mode and after 5-10 seconds, turn off it.
Go to operator selection -> manual -> search and choose the operator, later change to automatic.
As you said, restart the phone.


How can I root the Posh Mobile Orion Pro x500A? I recently bought a Posh Mobile Orion Pro (x500A running 4.4.2) as a new phone. It has good bones and I've been looking for methods of rooting to remove bloatware and to optimize some of the performance (battery and internal storage partition, in particular).

I've looked and looked but I can't seem to find a specific rooting method for this phone. One Click Root says there's no root available for this phone, but I don't know if that means it can't be rooted at all, or if there's no specific method for this particular device.

I'm interested in CWM or Cyanogenmod. Any help or pointers would be appreciated.

I used kingroot to root my orion pro. Haven't found a custom recovery or ROM Yet. I used kingroot V 4.5.0.1 it roots your phone automatically by finding weaknesses and exploiting them. I'm also working on finding/making a custom recovery for the x500a.


Making an app into a full screen widget (no source code) Is there any way to convert or declare in the main activity of an app without having access to the source code or using smali? I'd like to have an app as a full-screen widget in nova launcher.

No, you can't convert an activity into a widget from outside the app. They work in completely different ways. With an activity, the app's process is running and controls all of the GUI controls in the activity. For a widget, the app sends a description of the widget layout (including all the images) to the launcher, and then the launcher's process is responsible for drawing that layout on the screen. The app doesn't run all the time: it only runs when it wants to update the widget layout (e.g. to change the "new mail" count after getting a push notification) or when you interact with the widget.

It works this way because keeping a process running for every widget would use a lot of memory and battery.

With the new multi-window changes in Nougat, it would be possible for a launcher to embed an app's activity as if it were a widget, but the launcher would have to be written to support this, the app would have to support multi-window, and it would still use a lot of memory and battery, and the unusual configuration could well trigger some latent bugs in apps.


Access Google Now launcher Google closed their Google now launcher and all devices shows incompatible on Google play store. But I can find its apk on internet. After installing app it won't show up in my settings for default launcher. Is there any way I can enjoy Google now launcher?

If you have a rooted device this might help Setting Default applications through ADB
If you still have issues....  You can ask


What kind of applications use internet on the background? Viewed the list of applications that use Wi-FI and came across what is shown on the image below.

What it is? Virus? Instead of Google I use F-Droid. Root is there, but only Total Commander and Titanium Backup are available.
Phone - Samsung Galaxy J1 Mini.
Rooted, twrp.
In applications "10005" does not exist.
Titanium Backup was deleted 2 month ago.

After installing Dr.Web 10005 disappeared. But from 15.11.2018 to 12.12.2018  "10074" exist.

Every Android app (including system apps) is a *NIX user and is assigned a unique UID within range 10000-19999 at the time of installation or during first boot (for pre-installed apps). That's how Android enforces Discretionary Access Control on apps.

The number you showed looks like UID of some app which has been removed now. You can check UIDs of installed apps from file /data/system/packages.list. UIDs near to 10000 are usually system apps or builtin Google/OEM/vendor apps.

If you have root, you can track/control apps' internet access based on their UIDs using Linux kernel's built-in firewall netfilter, which is controlled by userspace tool iptables. AFWall+ makes use of the same.


OS 2.2 on the Samsung Moment Possible Duplicate:
  When will my phone get Android 2.2 (FroYo)?

I currently have a Samsung Moment which has OS 2.1. Will I ever be able to upgrade to 2.2?

Is the hardware capable of handling 2.2?
If so, when will this happen?
What's the best way to be informed of any announcements related to this upgrade?

As of right now there will not be an official 2.2 release for the Moment.  Here's a thread to keep updated.


One M9 flash system image Situation
Device: HTC One M9
Recovery: TWRP
Custom ROM: Android Revolution HD (Android 6.0)

Problem
I want to flash the stock rom without wiping anything (I don't want to lose anything). I can flash the stock recovery. I have extracted the system.img and boot.img from the official RUU in order to flash the system image to get rid of the Custom ROM.
When I use fastboot to flash the boot image everything seems fine.
However, when I flash the system image which is about 4.5 gigs big, it again says OK but it only takes around 30 seconds to flash.
When I try to boot after flashing the images, the htc logo appears but nothing more happens. Trying to install an OTA with the stock recovery fails with
"system partition has unexpected contents".
I assume that the flashing process wasn't really successful.

How can I correctly flash the system partition?
Or is there any other way to get back to the stock rom without wiping userdata?
And NO, it's not acceptable in any way to wipe (I know that aprox. 98% of android enthusiasts would answer: "Just wipe".)

Btw. the reason for all of this is that the custom rom might not be updated to android 7 so i want to install the ota.

[edit]:
I use htc's fastboot version since the system image is 4.5g big and it cannot be flashed with normal fastboot.

Usually large images are flashed in sparse (parts). To flash a full image that large, consider using the dd command in a shell to directly write the image to /system - that's the only approach I can think of that doesn't seem to have size issues.

[edit]:
dd worked (booted to twrp and opened adb shell):
dd if=/external_sd/system.img of=/dev/block/mmcblk0p66
where mmcblk0p66 is the system partition (in /dev/block/platform/<something>.sdhci/by-name you can find a list of all partitions)


Monitor Outbound Connections I just got a new LG G4, and connected it to my office wifi.
The network IT guy asked what I had running on my phone because it was making a lot of network connection calls.
He said he saw 3 in about a minute in his log, which was abnormal.

So I'm looking for something similar to this: Looking for a network monitor that can enumerate outbound connections , but without needing root.

I'm a little worried that it may be using mobile data without me knowing, and would like to stay on top of it.

Most android devices now have monitors built within their software. I'm not familiar with the G4 so I can't say for certain it has the feature but my Samsung S5 does so I can lead you to it based off of that.

If you go to Settings there may be an item labeled "Data Usage". If not, look for "Mobile Data" and see if its in there. Within there it will show what apps are using data and how much data they're using. It's a great way to monitor your device.


Transfer Frozen: Free Fall progress between devices How can I transfer my progress in Frozen: Free Fall from my Samsung Galaxy S2 (Android 2.3.3) to my Samsung Galaxy S5?

In SD card android->data folder copy the folder name of the game and paste it in the new device


How to disable "logd" logging? The /data/misc/logd/ directory is filled with 256 MB log files. Currently I don't need debug log files, so I would like to turn off logging.

Partial solution:
It seems I can turn off with the following command from terminal:

stop logd

But I think this will work until you restart the device.

stop logd or setprop ctl.stop logd makes logcat completely unavailable (which may break some apps/daemons) and isn't persistent across reboots. For permanently removing logd you need to delete /system/etc/init/logd.rc file which defines this init service. But it's not recommended.

The /data/misc/logd/ directory is filled by logcatd which is a sub-service of main logd service. 256 MB is the default size but can be changed if required (1).

logd mainly covers the functionality of its desktop counterpart syslogd, but also includes klogd and partially auditd to get logs from SELinux subsystem of kernel. However logd just reads from (RAM) memory buffers and doesn't save to persistent memory (files) by default. Reason is evident, these saved logs are of no use to a majority of users (as you), but too many write requests for these logs reduce flash memory (eMMC) life unnecessarily.

If one needs these logs as files, a separate service named logcatd (logcat daemon  which itself reads from logd) can save them to filesystem (on userdebug and eng builds only since Oreo (2)). Going through the resources (3, 4), it's easy to control this service permanently (persistent across reboots) by setting property persist.logd.logpersistd (to logcatd or clear) or by using shell scripts /system/bin/logpersist.[start|stop].


How to shred deleted files to prevent data recovery? Is there a good way for shredding my Android's free space to ensure data cannot be recovered? I want to permanently shred my deleted files in free space. I have heard of secure eraser and ishredder.

Managed flash memory
Most smartphones use managed eMMC memory which means the flash chip itself is performing the flash wear leveling (the eMMC chip has a small CPU integrated which performs the wear leveling). Effectively this means that you can not shred anything on such flash chips. If you try to overwrite a the data blocks that belongs to a file the newly written data is simply redirected to a new position in flash memory. Therefore the original data still exists but can no longer be accessed through the file-system.
The only way to erase at least large parts of the data with a high probability is to totally use-up all free space by writing one or more large files that use up all free space. But be careful - some devices "don't like it" if all flash memory is used (device crash, does not boot, ...). Therefore it is better to spare some KB and leave it unused.
The only safe way to totally erase data on a modern Android smartphone is to perform a factory reset. As modern Android devices are encrypted by default by performing a factory reset you erase and regenerate the encryption key (at least this is the way it should work).
Unmanaged flash memory
On some simple/cheap Android system it may happen that the flash wear leveling is not implemented inside the eMMC memory itself. Instead those devices use unmanaged flash memory and implement wear leveling in software inside the file-system driver. This require special file-systems that include the wear leveling such as YAFFS/YAFFS2/JFFS2. On such systems it would be possible with root permissions to really overwrite and therefore erase data of one specific file.


Add DuckDuckGo to search engines list in Chrome I am using a Samsung S3 Rooted phone. I want to customise Google Chrome to add DuckDuckGo in the list of search engines, and maybe make it my default one.

It is not possible to do this in chrome by default. I have Googled this question and have not found any way to do this.

This is now possible in Chrome 57. Just visit DuckDuckGo, perform a search (search for anything), then visit Settings > Search engine and DuckDuckGo should be listed at the bottom of the page.

After doing the DuckDuckGo search, if you still don't find DDG on Chrome's Search Engine page, you may (as I did, using Chrome 61) have to go to DuckDuckGo.com and then do the following:

Tap DDG's three-line symbol (≡) in the upper-right corner of the webpage.
Tap Other Settings.
Scroll down to the Install DuckDuckGo section, and make sure "Show links to instructions . . ." is set to On.
Tap Save and Exit.
Back on DuckDuckGo.com, tap the Add to Chrome button if you see it; if you don't see it, scroll down to find the Add DuckDuckGo to Chrome button, and tap that.
A "Take Back Your Privacy!" message should pop up. Follow its instructions:

) Tap the Google app's three-dot symbol () in the upper-right corner of the browser window.
) Tap Settings, then tap Search engine.
) Now, DuckDuckGo should be there at the bottom for you to select; at least, it was for me.

I hope this works for you too!


DroidWall and Wireless Tethering I have a very simple problem: when I run Wifi Tether on my Galaxy S3 the computer won't get the IP address unless I disable DroidWall firewall.

DW runs in whitelist mode, but I ran across its menu to enable all wireless related applications it found. Nothing. I have to stop it at all to make DHCP server work.

What application in Android 4.1, or at least in the stock GS3 ROM, governs DHCP in wireless tethering and should be enabled with DroidWall?

Or else, how do I find it out without try-and-fail across a large number of applications.

As of version 1.2.5, tethering has been included in AFWall+, you should only need to enable

(Tethering) -  DHCP+DNS services


Problem playing large MP4 (500 MB) video files in Android 2.1 When I try to play a large MP4 video file (500 MB), say a film on my phone, it plays the audio but not the video.

I have checked running a smaller MP4 file (5 MB), and it plays fine.

Even when the video is listed in the video gallery, the video thumbnail is not displayed. LogCat shows that video frame cannot be obtained with a status -24.

What changes are needed to fix this problem?

Does the .mp4 play as a video on a desktop OS? Can you 'vouch' for the source?

.mp4 is a container format and may well only contain audio, or is corrupt and the player can only salvage the audio...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-4_Part_14


rooted phone su user changes Is there a way, once rooting is done, and i have customized my phone a bit (a change in one of the config files of linux), to change the user accounts and permissions? To create a new user account and change the user that is used by the phone to be a non-root, non-sudo, standard user. And all apps to use this or another standard user account.

And my app (that i installed after rooting) use another account. Only this account will have permission to read and write my app's directory.

Finally change the su user password, so that others cannot get into it unless they have that password.

So in effect protect my apps directory and allow the phone to work with a non sudo user from then on?

Next time phone re boots it uses another user say A (non sudo); without access to my apps directory. And when my app runs it uses user B (also non sudo) which has access to its dir. Others cannot read or list files in it or change permissions. So in effect my apps directory cannot be read by the user of the phone, in this new set up. I understand there will be ways around this.

But is this possible and how?

Rooted using https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/general/root-samsung-galaxy-on5-t3435457 but i can do systemless root if that is the way.

Phone model : Samsung On 5 Pro SM-G5550FY. Thank you much.

On Android stock from Lollipop/Marshmallow there is the multiuser. You can create a guest account completely divided from the owner. I don't know if this function is present in touchwiz, search it in settings.


What is preventing my phone from staying locked? Normally, when I press the power button on my phone, the screen turns off and when I press it again, I'm presented with the lock screen.  (I don't have a password or pattern, so it's just the "Swipe up to unlock" screen.)

In the last month or so, my phone has started exhibiting the symptom that I press the power button and the screen turns off, but when I press the power button again, it's not at the lock screen, but whatever the front application happens to be.  Sometimes I'll note that about 20 seconds after I press the power button to lock the screen, the phone will emit another sound from the speakers that sounds a lot like the "I've just locked" click.

This doesn't happen all of the time.  At a guess, I'd say that about a third of the times that I wake from a black screen, I get no lock screen.  Also, I'm not sure if pressing the power button to lock vs. a timeout makes any difference.

It seems to me that there must be some application that's keeping the phone from locking, but I think I've uninstalled all the applications that I installed shortly before this started happening.  I'm guessing that it's an application that had been recently updated, but I don't know how to track that down.

I don't really want to uninstall apps one-by-one, as I can't reproduce the problem.  It never happens when I want it to.

Does anyone have any ideas how to track down this problem?

This is on a Nexus 5 running 6.0.1, rooted.  (I never do anything with root, though, and it's preventing me from upgrading, so I should really undo it.)

Since you suspect this to be app related, install wakelock detector which should help you identify the wakelocks that are holding the screen awake. Read the Screen Wakelock section

Once the culprit is identified, Googling for that would lead you to the app, if the app name is not evident ( You may need to monitor over a few hours repeatedly, since the behaviour reported is not consistent)

Edit: Remember to monitor when the phone is not being used. Charging the phone to a fixed percentage like 90% before retiring for bed would be ideal monitoring time


Can I run Windows Phone apps on Android devices? I need to run a Windows Phone 7 app developed for our company but no one has a Windows phone. Is there any way I can run it on my Android, perhaps a simulator or something?

There is currently no way to run Windows Phone 7 apps on Android devices.


Batch download web links on Android? I have plenty of web links to some images and I want to download all of them on my Android device in queue.

I have searched words download manager on Play Store but those applications seem to support adding single link only; rather than importing multiple links from a file or clipboard.

I also tried to install Firefox and its extension DownThemAll! But no matter what version of Firefox for Android I installed, the application always show "extension is not compatible"

Can anybody tell me is there any way for me to batch download web links on my Android device?

Wget should work, and can be installed to Android if it's not already there.
http://www.gnu.org/software/wget/manual/wget.html

Just use it in a terminal emulator.


Missing icons at the bottom of the home screen with TouchWiz My son has recently got a Samsung Galaxy Ace android phone. Somehow he has managed to remove three of the four icons that are normally at the bottom of the screen ( typically the green icon for making a call, the contacts icons etc ).

The bottom screen has now only one button a blue box with four small white squares in it.

How do I get the missing buttons back?

To be specific the buttons that have gone are "Phone", "Contacts" and "Messaging". Instead of being on the bar at the bottom of the screen they are now on the wallpaper with all the other icons.

That's a little bit tricky with Touchwiz.

In order to move app links in and out of the icon bar at the bottom on phones with Touchwiz, you have to enter the app list (App Drawer) via the blue menu icon. This is the only icon that can't be removed. Then press the left hardware key and choose edit, but make sure that you are in the "Customizable Grid" view type. You should now be able to reorganize all icons in the app menu and on the space where the lower 4 buttons are, by using drag and drop. Simply long press an icon and move it where you want.


How to identify installed apps where I participate as beta tester On my Moto G (peregrine) with Android 4.4.4 I installed some apps where I joined beta tester programs long time ago (via log-in from a googlegroup etc.), and also just some weeks ago where no more group joining was necessary.

As I lost overview of the apps where I am beta tester:

How can I identify all apps where I a take part in beta testing?

(looking on my device intensively, also in GooglePlay settings and a general internet search were without success for my to find this out)

Maybe I finally found a (cumbersome?) way to find out whetre I have an app as a beta tester:

Have ideally a desktop PC with a browser and go to https://play.google.com and be sure to have logged in there with your google account.

There you can list all apps (in a kind of gallery) that are connected to your account, and even what apps are installed right now to any of your android devices that uses your google account.

Hover over one app there and you have a link for each app that leads to the indiviual item on play.google.com for each app.

For example:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.generalmagic.magicearth

Since summer 2015 you can take part in app beta testing (when supported by the developer) by visiting a special link for each app, like
https://play.google.com/apps/testing/com.generalmagic.magicearth

So you just need to take the first link for the "official" app,
and replace the part of the URL

/store/apps/details?id=

with

/apps/testing/

Then you can have at least three cases:

You are not allowed to take part in beta testing for this app.
You can become a beta tester for this app, when invited or it is a public beta test.
or you can see that you are already a beta tester for this app.

Anybody knows a more simple way?


Duplicate screen lag on Android Each time I turn on my LG G3 after some pause (30 sec + ) when the display is turned off I get this weird lag. Like the screen is duplicated on half the screen. Then After 2 seconds it get normal.

Also, when I call someone and the screen turns black while i hold it to my ear, if it takes more than 20-30 seconds, when I pull it from my ear to close the call it happens again(lasting 2-4 seconds). It looks something like this:

I tried turning off animations and it seems to work a bit better but still have this problem. Not sure if it's software problem or my device is faulted.

Since a factory image flash hasn't helped you, and with the information provided in the comments, the problem is at the hardware level. It may be in the screen or the input processing hardware on the motherboard. You could try getting the device repaired. Note that the device does not need to look broken to be broken.


Delete a specific web page from history in Firefox Aurora for Android? Is there a way to delete a specific site visited from the browsing history without needing to clear it completely?

The file places.sqlite stores history information. I suppose that if you manage to delete the entries you want from there and then sync your changes then these entries won't show up in your history. Here is some info about editing this file


How do I quickly change the default action of a contact in the favorites widget? I see no obvious way to change the default action of a contact that's added to the Favorites widget. I have to remove that contact from the Favorites group, and re-add that contact (which then prompts me for the default action, like View Contact, or Send Mail). Is there an easier way?

Finally tried this, it's quicker to do the following:

Select the contact name from the Favorites widget (the icon performs the action, the name shows you their details).
Select Menu > More.
Select Set widget action.
Select call, text, etc.


How do Gmail (desktop) and Talk (Android) chats interact? The interaction between Google Talk via Gmail and Google Talk via the Android client seems confusing. Here's my understanding of how things work:

If a chat is started in Gmail, it will sync in (near) real-time to Talk.
If a chat is started in Talk, it will show up in the chat history in Gmail, but will not spawn a new chat in Gmail (so the chat is confined to Talk).
If a chat is started in Gmail, and continued in Talk, messages will stop being sent to the chat in Gmail, and new messages will be sent to Talk (as well as the chat history in Gmail). In my (short) experience, this transition can be a bit flaky.

Is this basically how it works? What I'd love to see is a perfect 1:1 sync between Gmail and Talk. That is, if I start a chat in Talk, it will create a new chat tab in Gmail, and everything will get pushed to both, and vice-versa.

Anyone know if that's in the pipeline, or even possible now? How does everyone else handle moving as seamlessly as possible between Gmail and Talk?

Thanks!

To provide some background on this question, google talk uses xmpp (aka Jabber) which is an open Instant Messaging standard.  As a part of this standard, every instant messaging client (chat in gmail and the android talk app) is assigned a Resource.  The server then uses the resource to know which client is communicating.

This is how the interaction works:
Say your gmail account is bob@gmail.com.  Then gmail chat might be bob@gmail.com/gchat and
the talk app bob@gmail.com/talk

When your friend Sue (sue@gmail.com) wants to send you a message, she simply sends it to bob@gmail.com.  At this point, the server either sends the message to whichever client you used last, or sends the message to all currently connected clients (google does the latter).

When you reply to Sue using the talk app, she receives the message from bob@gmail.com/talk.  Now, instead of sending further messages to bob@gmail.com, Sue's client now sends messages directly to bob@gmail.com/talk and will continue doing so until a message is received from some other client.

This means that what Saiboogu said should work.  That is, to switch between clients, send a message to the person you are chatting with from the desired client.

tl;dr: This happens by design, Saiboogu's workaround works.


How to create TWRP's data.info file by hand/after the backup? I have a device with a dead screen, and a partially dead eMMC (poor contact, sometimes reboots. Sometimes reboots very often.). I managed to create a 12gb backup of the data partition somehow, but after generating two of the eight backup archives' .sha2 hashes my phone rebooted. So I have the backups in full, but the data.info is unfinished and there aren't enough .sha2. The latter are simple in syntax, so I can create them with HashMyFiles (SHA256). But deciphering the data.info, or forcing TWRP to make it after the fact is beyond my skillset. Is there any way to accomplish this?

EDIT:
I solved my problem, and also understood that this question was incomplete. It seems that the data.info is complete (and likely was one of the first files made after the backup archives themselves) and making the .sha2 by hand is sufficient. My real problem, which I didn't elaborate, was that Titanium Backup wouldn't work with this backup using the "Extract from Nandroid backup" function, so I decided that the data.info file was the problem, because it was the only different file, when compared to older, successful backups of the data partition. But the real problem was that I messed up the path (I added the backup folder, which is named as a date, directly to /TWRP/BACKUPS , when I should've added the backup folder in literally any folder one folder deeper, say /TWRP/BACKUPS/I_just_spent_10_hours_fixing_a_5_second_problem/), and Titanium Backup was too unsophisticated to check for PEBCAKs. That's about it.

to answer the headline, there exist a little shell script twrp_sign.sh for generating data.info and sha2 digest. you can open it with text editor and see how it works

data.info is just a string containing
archive_name
backup_size
file_count
backup_type

Note: only the .win* files are important, all other files can be safely deleted without data loss


Is there any way to stop Android from changing "I want $5.00" into "I want$ 5.00"? I don't even know why it does this, tbh, since pretty much everyone writes $xx.xx and not anything else, such as xx.xxUS$ or anything like that.

Note: Turning off Auto-Punctuate does not fix this problem, so this is my hail mary attempt to get rid of this "feature."  :P

(Edit: My phone is a Motorola Droid 2 Global.  The problem exists no matter if the physical or on-screen keyboard is used.)

The problem is with Stock keyboard app/service. It can't be fixed by normal means. Simply, use third-party soft keyboard apps viz. SwiftKey, Go Keyboard EX, A.I. Type Keyboard, Hacker's Keyboard etc.


Is there a flash lite installation package for smartphones of android 2.1? I don't know whether installation package for different smartphones of the same OS/version is the same.

But if that's not the case,mine is HTC g3.

Note: I've already tried to install flash player 10.1 but failed,so I'm targeting flash lite now.

Flash is only available for Android 2.2+.   You won't be able to install it on any older version of Android.


mp4 video will no longer play I have an mp4 video on my Dropbox. I was able to watch it earlier with the Dropbox app, but now it asks me whether I want to view it with the Photos app or Video Player... and neither appear to work.

I have tried saving the video to my device but still no luck. I am able to watch the video through VLC player with no issues but I am trying to post the video to Instagram, and Instagram can't understand it either.

I can also view the video on my iPad... and I've tried force stopping my Android apps and restarting my phone but still no luck

Try using VLC, it plays most videos other players cannot and has a good interface. However, if this still doesn't work, try using Video Converter, Compressor and select the file then change it to an MP4 (I know it's already MP4, but this may fix any issues).

VLC: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.videolan.vlc&hl=en

Video Converter, Compressor: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.xvideostudio.videocompress


Why are the rooting apps not working anymore? A couple years ago, it was easy to root any device: Install KingRoot, KingoRoot, or a similar app, hit the large ROOT button, and let it do the rest. After 5 minutes or so, a green "Root Succeeded!" prompt will pop up, and we can choose to keep the root app, or uninstall it and install a clean root manager app like SuperSU/Superuser.

How do they work? Why aren't they working anymore? And if they work, should I use them or not?

I had this question a few months ago, and I found this answer through some research, so I thought to share my research in this site by answering my question, considering the fake information online. (For example, the official KingoRoot site says that it can root Android Oreo which is completely wrong information)

How do the rooting apps work?

There are quite a lot of rooting apps, KingRoot, KingoRoot, Z4Root, Root Genius, Universal Androot to name a few popular/used to be popular apps. All of them use exploits/vulnerabilities/loopholes in the Android OS to give themselves privileges reserved to the system apps or even the Android OS itself. And then they mount as read/write the directory named /system which houses the processes required to get the system running and the system apps, and place a binary named su in a place of the directory, namely /system/bin/su. If some app requires root, the app executes that binary, and you see a prompt whether to allow or decline root access.

The exploits/vulnerabilities that get discovered are given an CVEID, and then detailed in the CVE website, and fixed in the Android Security Bulletins. An example is the infamous DirtyC0W vulnerability which was given the CVEID CVE-2016-5195, which plagued and still plague the older Linux kernels. Almost all of the apps mentioned above exploit this vulnerability.

Why are the rooting apps not working anymore?

As referenced in the Bulletins above, Google fixes a series of issues in Android every month. So the scope of the vulnerabilities is highly decreasing. All the vulnerabilities the rooting apps uses to date were fixed in the security patches somewhere around 2018 January.

But there can be issues some manufacturers forgot to patch! What about them?

On Android 6.0.0 or newer, that will just cause the device to not boot anymore. To understand the reason for this, we have to look at a concept named Chain of Trust.

Chain of Trust, abbreviated CoT, is a security mechanism that was introduced to protect the Android OS from viruses and unauthorized modifications. It works like a chain of hardware and software, where each part verifies the next part. On a step-by-step basis:

When you power on the device, a hardware function (sometimes called Boot ROM) starts. The Boot ROM is burned into the hardware and cannot be changed.
The Boot ROM verifies the first software in the CoT, the bootloader which is a raw binary blob, sometimes called the preloader. (Also the Boot ROM sometimes loads and uses special custom partitions/binaries depending on the vendor) If the bootloader does not pass the verifications, the device shuts down. If it passes, the Boot ROM runs the bootloader.
The bootloader checks the options passed to it by the Boot ROM, and selects the appropriate boot mode. The usual boot modes which exist on almost every device are the normal Android boot, Recovery and Fastboot/Download.

If the bootloader is locked it verifies if the next part of CoT to run is intact, and if it is, the bootloader runs it. If it is not, it can shut down, reboot, or get stuck in a special bootloader mode depending on the device model.

If the bootloader is unlocked it does not verify the next part of CoT but directly loads it.

The next part is called the boot partition. It handles the way to boot the system itself. In Android versions on/newer than 6.0.0 (Lollipop), it also verifies if the system is intact, and if it is modified, it shuts down.

As mentioned first, these root apps exploit the vulnerabilities to modify /system, which is verified by the boot partition as mentioned in Stage 4 above. So any modification will cause the device not to boot. This state is commonly referred to as a "soft-brick", which can only be fixed by a re-flash.

So the newer devices require the bootloader to be unlocked if you want to root your device. These devices are rooted by flashing a recovery with more options than the normal recovery (like TWRP, ClockWorkMod), usually referred to as a custom recovery, and using that to modify the boot partition (and disable the system verification). It is also possible to directly modify the boot partition without a custom recovery.

Some manufacturers give a way to unlock the bootloader, and some of them don't. The popular devices with locked bootloades (for an example US carrier locked Samsung S devices) tends to be exploited by the Android modding community.

My device is still Android 5.1.1 or older! Should I use these to root?

Most of those older devices are possible to root by the rooting apps. So, you could. Should you? That depends on your preferences. Root access grants the power over everything in the OS, and with root access, it usually doesn't take even a microsecond to make sure that your device won't ever boot again. It is very probable that the rooting apps ever won't do that, but, they could. Also, with root an app could access everything your device does, and everything it holds in its memory including your credit card information, passwords, etc. If that sounds like a serious privacy threat to you, maybe don't use the root apps. If you don't care about that, you can try them.

If you are savvy enough, there are the sources of almost all the exploits those root apps uses. You can try to search them up by CVEID, look for them in Git, compile and run them and try to get a root shell, and you will be able to install the su binary and the other dependencies yourself.

Also, KingoRoot has been known for sending highly sensitive data like IMEI and Serial Number to their servers. The chances are they will never use them, but, that's your decision in the end. And KingRoot is known for installing a backdoor in its SDK which allowed some apps to get root access unauthorized by the user.

Conclusion

The era of the rooting apps is long gone. The rooting apps doesn't work anymore and if you use them on newer Android versions you risk soft-bricking your device and probably losing all your data. If you use them on supported Android versions they would work most of the time, but there are privacy and security concerns you should consider before going on.

I hope my research would help someone in the future who gets the same problem as me. :)


Installing new firmware: PDA,CSC I bricked my phone, and wanted to reinstall the firmware, but I'm not sure if it is enough that the build number matches or do the PDA and CSC numbers also have to much at all costs?
I'm asking this because my firmware is branded, and I wanted the one without brands, but that doesn't have the PDA and CSC that I have (I saved them earlier).

PDA/CSC explained in one of my previous answers here. As for your situation, there are 2 factors to consider:

Generally, the release date and version of what you're going to flash should be equal to or newer than what you had on the phone right now, so that it will flash at all. Downgrading is not entirely impossible - on newer devices, bootloader level determines how far you can go back; see part of another answer here.
If you need certain languages to be present, look into the CSC string and make sure it's from your general region.


Kyocera Hydro doubling in status bar My Kyocera Hydro has a weird doubling effect on status bar; I would send a screen shot I have if I knew how. I looked at everything in the settings and just can't figure it out.

Volume down and power button work for screenshot


Whatsapp restore error on new phone, stucks at %24 I got error while transfering whatapp from old phone to new phone.
My old phone is mi5s plus xiaomi
New phone is red mi note 9 pro xiaomi.
I uploaded to drive and put to local. So, I have backup both place, drive and local. Then I put local file backup to pc and get from pc to red mi note 9 pro. And put to whatsapp/databases folder
I tried everything here:
https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/help/whatsapp-restore-stuck-24-restoration-t3816605/page3
I enter my number, I got verification code. THen it asks to restore from drive or skip. I tried both. I have problem at %31 while restoring from drive.
If i disable and click skip for drive restoration, it finds local but this time it stucks at %24 and then it goes to application settings, profile photo. But i immediately force stop and open again but again comes as I would start application so i clear data and it again asks verification code . But i have to wait hours when i want a code. Now, I have to wait 12 hours for example. It increases for every try.
There is only crypt file. Please help me to fix.
Size is 1.25 gb but whatsapp show 3.9 gb to restore. in whatsapp folder, there is 3.9 gb data.
I tried lots of things but it keeps failing.
For old phone, I still could not enable internet so whatsapp is still there logged. I can do backups, it makes again 1.25 gb. I think if i enable wifi, it will logout.

I fixed. I tried for days. Every time I requested a new verification code, the time I had to wait increased every time. Last time, it was 49 hours. Luckily, I fixed and did not wait so much.
I tried lots of time but i will tell what i did for latest try.
Firstly, I deleted drive backup. I did not disable sycn or google accounts.
I had 2 local backups. Deleted one.
And maybe those are important: I gave all permissions from settings to whatsapp. I gave also autostart permission and I gave no battery restriction.
Sim card is on different phone. This is not important i think.
I started to restore. It restored local backup. When it came to %24, i was worried. So, I switched to screens once a second, to settings screen.
Normally it was showing 3.9 gb at first. But when it reached %24, it was 3.18 gb when I was switching to settings screen, i saw it. And 2.5 millions messages are restored and it is 3.18 gb.
I waited it to be 3.9 gb when it was at %24. So that is why i was switching to check but it did not stuck this time. Maybe because i was switching.
Maybe because i removed from drive. This was the first time i tried after removing from drive.
So, switching a lot of times between settings of whatsapp and restoring screen, showed succesfull screen at last. IT said "restored 2.5 millions messaged"
I was shocked. I went to check. 5 days ago, i wrote last message and that 5 days messages also came.
If it was stuck again, i would force stop and continue without waiting restore. I read it from somewhere. But i fixed, i am happy :)


Any way to find the list of webpages I added to homescreen from Chrome Android? I had to disable Chrome Android on my phone today due to an unrelated software install issue. In the process, all the webpages I had added to my homescreen on my S8 phone from Chrome Android disappeared.

Is there somewhere I can find a history of all the pages I added to my homescreen? There were like 18 pages and I can't remember them.

Unfortunately, the information you are looking for is simply lost. The shortcuts that a user adds to the homescreen are saved inside the default home launcher's data directory. Typically, it is a database (named launcher.db or similar to it), usually within a table often named "favorites".

I checked the relevant database (for Nova Launcher) after adding some Chrome shortcuts to the homescreen, and then disabled Chrome, and then checked again. The relevant entries were no longer there, and they were also not restored when I enabled the app again.

Unless your default launcher was provisioned to be backed up by Google and was indeed backed up recently, or if you manually backed it up (highly unlikely), it would be futile to proceed in this direction any further.


How to get rid of update notifications for a given app in Google Play Store? General question
I have an app X installed on my device in version Y. I don't want to update it to any newer version (Y+z) for some reason. Still, the Google Play Store app always lists updates for X, which keeps me from a simple "update all". My question, put to a single sentence:

How to hide updates for X permanently from the "available updates" list?

Specific examples
First, I know there are alternatives as e.g. the AppBrain Market App, which can handle this quite well (skip this update, skip all future updates). I prefer a "generic solution", which does not depend on a 3rd party's market app.
Second, I know that Titanium Backup includes a "Market doctor", which can be used to disconnect an app from Google Play.1 However, in my specific case that only worked for a few hours: I disconnected GTalk, as I don't want it replaced by Hangouts. The update notification disappeared for a few hours, then it was back. No idea what restored the "link".
Third, just to make sure: I'm not talking about the "auto update" feature as discussed e.g. in How to enable Play Store auto-update for just a few apps?. I was rather hoping for something close to Does the google play store not provide updates for frozen apps?, but without the need to "freeze" the app in question (which I still want to use, but in the version installed, not in a "future version" available).
Fourth: No, uninstalling the app in question is no option here, though it would perfectly hide any future updates from being displayed :) Nor is "freezing", as the app is used regularly.
Fifth: There is a related question for my GTalk example: Do apps included in the gApps zip get updated via Google Play? However, I want the opposite: No update.

It might very well be that "Google Apps" (and other pre-installed apps) are handled in some specific way, and restore their "market links" themselves somehow. For this case, my question includes: How to prevent that from happening?

Update
There's a thread at XDA discussing the very same issue. Until recently, a work-around for "user installed apps" was to uninstall them and then sideload the .apk – but even that stopped working. Well, re-signing the .apk with a different key might work for user-apps. But both would fail for pre-installed apps (can't sideload them to override; different signature would refuse that install completely).
Moreover, there's an issue filed on this by some "joel.bou..". Not hard to guess, though blanked out: that would be Joël Bourquard. If it's really him, then that's really an issue (for those who don't know: Joël is the dev behind Titanium Backup). Let me quote from the issue:

For the record: in the Android Market days it was possible to "Attach" or "Detach" apps (on rooted devices) with a system tool such as Titanium Backup. But nowadays (with the Google Play Store app) this has become nearly impossible to do, because the complete app list seems to sync from Google's servers and the user has no control over that.

Which explains why detaching with apps like Titanium Backup is no longer permanent. And I'm afraid I've asked the impossible. But I thought the same in the past with other questions, and surprisingly got solutions here. So I do not yet give up hope on this one!

1: what that does is explained by eldarerathis in this post (thanks to Firelord for digging that up!)

Notes:

OP already know the details, but I've elaborated things considering other readers in mind.
I've assumed that the device is rooted, and my solution is tested on Android 4.2, 4.4 and 5.0, all running Play Store v5.6.8. (Sorry! couldn't test it on Kitkat but no reason to believe that it wouldn't work.)

The solution by Craig is actually quite good, and if it somehow can be executed (the custom widget) with Tasker, then things would  go very smoothly.

The answer by Anan can also do the job by using pm disable <PKG> in Tasker, but one can't use that favorite app as long as the Play Store is updating the list, which some users wouldn't prefer.

And I've never tried Changelog Droid, so can't comment.

But I've another way to get the things done, not so clean in GUI but good. Here we go:

Play Store has its databases under /data/data/com.android.vending/databases/. There are three databases worth considering viz. library.db, localappstate.db, package_verification.db.

library.db -- it has a table named ownership which would list  the apps that you've ever installed from Play Store with all the Google Play Store accounts associated to them. Note that ever includes those apps too which you once installed from Play Store long time ago and  uninstalled later.
localappstate.db -- this has a table named appstate which would list all the user apps now currently installed in your device. Those installed from Play Store would show title of the app too, but sideloaded ones won't.
package_verification.db -- this database would show up if you've enabled "Verify Apps" under "Settings" of Android. It has a table named verification_cache having list of apps for verification.
suggestions.db -- not relevant here but it has a table named suggestions having a list of all the searches (keywords) you've made using Play Store search bar.

Note that I've no source to back my claim, it's all personal experience here. You're encouraged to disagree (with evidence), so that quality of this answer can be further enhanced.

Now, back to the question. On my Lollipop, I was able to remove 37 apps from the update list and left only one app for which I used "Update all" to further test the solution. It worked perfectly!

The required steps:

Force close the Play Store to avoid any data corruption since we need to edit its database.
Remove the ownership of your app from library.db: I've used sqlite3 (use SQLite installer for Root if you don't have it). I've used a very simple query which would delete a record(row) from the database by identifying the row using a value. To know further usage of sqlite3 use this resource.

The general command to remove the ownership would be:

sqlite3 /data/data/com.android.vending/databases/library.db "DELETE from ownership where doc_id='<PKG_NAME>'"

Replace <PKG_name> with package name of your app. E.g. for Chrome browser the package name is com.android.chrome.

You can find your app's package name using App Browser, or OS Monitor, or simply refer to the question: View app's full package name?
Remove app's further details from localappstate.db and package_verification.db: Note that the above two steps did the job in my devices. Since I don't want the app to show up by any reason in the update list, I've purged all the details from all the aforesaid databases.

The general command to remove the information from localappstate.db would be:

sqlite3 /data/data/com.android.vending/databases/localappstate.db "DELETE from appstate where package_name='<PKG_NAME>'"

And, for package_verification.db, it would be:

sqlite3 /data/data/com.android.vending/databases/package_verification.db "DELETE from verification_cache where package_name='PKG_NAME'"

The core is covered. Now, as for the execution:

You can make a script
Use adb shell, or adb pull the databases, and do editing on PC using an SQLite software (like DB Browser for SQLite)
You can use apps like SQLite Editor or aSQLite Manager to manually delete the app records
Use any terminal app, like Terminal Emulator for Android -- it allows widgets which you can use as a shortcut for a command or a script. See my answer to know how to make such shortcut
Use Tasker to create profiles based on time, application, or any profile that would suit you
Plug your script into start-up, though I've not tried it, so ask OP

The app though won't show in the installed apps or update list, but it will definitely show up in "All" under "My apps" in Play Store. I don't use this store much, so I didn't test other settings of it further anymore.

Additionally, you may note that if you've had earlier unchecked "App updates available" under Play Store settings, and you check it after executing the said commands, it will trigger a sync and your changes, as obvious, would be lost.

Also, be aware that Google holds all the info on their servers. So sooner or later, the databases are going to be updated. In my Lollipop device, I waited for around 24 hours and saw no changes in the databases, but YMMV.

For non-rooted devices

It's a theory and I won't claim that it would work but you can try:

Force close and take adb backup of Play Store.
Extract backup and make required changes into the databases.
Pack the changed files into a new backup file and restore them into the device.

If you're unaware of unpacking and packing an ADB backup on PC, then take a look at Android Backup Extractor (ABE) (it needs Java Runtime Environment, and has README.txt for usage) which would unpack the .ab file into a .tar which you can then extract using an archiver like Ark, 7zip, WinRAR, and more.

 You can use DB Browser for SQLite to make changes into the databases found inside the extracted content (probably) apps/com.android.vending/db/.

Also, you may take a look at Android backup related posts such as this, this and Adebar -- all suggested by Izzy.
See if the app is gone from the update list.
If you succeed in step 4, then run ADB wirelessly to execute steps 1-4 on the Android device itself (somehow) rather than using a PC -- this could be very helpful in Tasker if you succeed.
Well, if you succeed all the way down to step 4 or 5 then you perhaps can also answer: How Do I Get Rid of Apps from Play Store Update List? :)

Edit:

Well, I'm not the only one who figured it out this way:

Android: Stop Wanting to Update Skype -- very close with script part added, but with no reasoning of course
(Requires Root) For future reference how to update Ingress without waiting on the rollout. -- not good enough because library.db is the main culprit
Getting the package name for an app
[WIP] No Call Sound, block Auto-Update Play Services


Always require PIN to unlock device Is there any way to always require the user to enter the PIN (instead of fingerprint) to unlock the device?

It seems that as soon as you add a fingerprint to the phone, now it no longer requires the PIN to unlock, just the fingerprint.

You can try Next Lock Screen.
During the initial settings, give the app the required permissions. Open the app, make sure that "Enable Next Screen Lock" is on. Click on Screen Lock, then "Next screen lock". Set a Pin for the app (preferably different from the PIN of your phone). Go back then, click on "Fingerprint lock" and turn it off.

Important: Don't disable the phone fingerprints that you set in Settings -> Security.

The app will work the following manner. If you enter your fingerprint first, then you will be required to enter the app's PIN.If you enter the app's PIN first, then you will be required to enter either the phone's PIN or your fingerprint.

Note: The app is no longer on the Play Store. I don't know if Microsoft will bring it back in the future.


How to turn my android to a wacom tablet? I want to try drawing digital but I don't think I'm ready for something like wacom tablet and it's kinda expensive so I don't want to waste my money for something I can't use well. I have a samsung galaxy tab and when I search for a way to avoid buying it, I found that I can turn my tablet to something like it but when I try to download the programs that they recommend in the playstore it said that I have to root my tablet but I don't want to root it.

I was wondering if it is possible to use a tablet (i.e. my samsung galaxy tab) as a Wacom-esque drawing tablet when connected to a hp laptop (without rooting my tablet)?

There’s “GfxTablet“, an Android application that…

  makes it possible to use your device (especially tablets) like a graphics tablet, sending touch data (including pressure!) to any compatible (e.g. GNU/Linux) computer. Requires running the uinput driver on your PC (see website for details).

Resources:

F-Droid page
repository on GitHub
website


SOLVED - How to call or dial from my head unit throught bluetooth? I just upgraded my head unit to one with Android. I'm not finding a good way to dial out someone from the head unit. I am connected to my mobile through bluetooth.

I spent some time today exploring my head unit and found that the bluetooth app has the option for downloading the contacts from the phone. Also it has a nice dialer.

For others looking at similar issue, here is some more detail on the head unit:

Head Unit: Woodman Big B
Android: 8.1


Where did Wikipedia Pro app disappear to? There was this Wikipedia Pro app (paid app; official app by Wikimedia Foundation) coexisitng with the free Wikipedia since long ago app that I purchased. Suddenly, it just seems to vanish from the surface of the earth. Googling hasn't helped me yet.

Anyone with any ideas?

A few bucks is not a big deal but I don't feel like getting fooled.

The sneaky part about his act is that the Wiki Encyclopedia Pro app disappeared from Google search results as well. I understand if some nobody contributes a free app and decide to pull out for whatever reason but big names doing things in secrecy behind their paying customers' back is different.

Updates

I've doubled-checked and the app was not made by Wikimedia Foundation so apologies. It appears Excelentia did it and their account got shut down by Google. So apparently 9 million users don't matter to Google.

If an app you've been using isn't offered on the Play Store for some reason (other than being removed for legal reasons, or if it's malware), you can usually still find and install it from your install history.

From the web version of the Play Store, click on Apps, then click on My Apps on the left which should take you to https://play.google.com/apps which should show a list of all of the apps you've ever installed, including ones which have been discontinued, and you can click through to install them:

Alternatively you can do the same thing on your phone, open the Play Store app, go to My Apps, and then change from the "Installed" tab to the "All" tab and scroll down until you find your app (I think they're listed in the order that you first installed them):

(I'd advise using the web page, as you can normally find what you're after quicker than when doing a lot of scrolling down in the app)


how to keep the time on screen I've got a Samsung Galaxy 3 tablet (the 10 inch one) running android 4.4.2.
My wife would like to be able to see the time on it while playing her apps. Is there a way to do this? I couldn't see anything to do it in the settings. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Go to Play store and search for 'Float Clock'. You'll find something for sure.

I'll try to post a link of certain application when I get to my computer :-)


Problem upgrading N1 to Android 2.3 I have a once-rooted Nexus one. Since then I unrooted it to enable automatic upgrades, and currently have a stock 2.2.

I got the notification to upgrade my OS (to 2.3 I assume), but after my phone restarts, I am presented with the following text in the recovery screen:

Build : RA-nexus-v1.5.3
Finding update package...
Opening update package...
Verifying update package...
E:No signature (8 files)
E:Verification failed
Installation aborted.

How do I fix this?

Sounds like a bad download.  I'd delete it if you can and try again, or download and upgrade manually.  For 2.2.1, try following this post at androidandme.  If it was 2.3 you might want to wait, Google has said it wouldn't be released for the N1 till after the holidays (example) so it might have been a mistake.


How do I end a voicemail call? Apologies if this is an elementary question.

I have called up the voicemail service and I listen to the first message; I'm then invited to press a key to save, delete, and so forth, but the screen has gone blank and there is no key to press. How do I recover the keyboard so that I can select an option?

A second problem then presented itself; that not only is there no key to select an option, there is no key to end the call either. The only way I could do this was to take the battery out of the back.

This can't be what the designer intended, but there is no guidance given any of the manuals I have been able to find.

Can anyone give me a pointer to an idiot's guide?

Edit: It is a Samsung Galaxy (can't say what model number), and it has no protective devices attached to it.

By what you describe, this is more likely to be related with the proximity sensor.

It is located at the top right corner of your screen, outside of the touch area.

If anything is blocking that sensor, the screen goes black. This happens to prevent the users face from touching anything on the screen during a call.

What works for me, is either using the home button or the power button to bring the screen back on.


Need to be able to use UTF-8 playlists DISCLAIMER
I am aware that asking after an app to accomplish a task is generally off-topic here. If the solution to this question involves an app that's great, but this is mostly about unicode-aware playlists on Android.
Without further ado...
I regularly use OS X (iTunes) at home, linux at work, and an android phone. I would like to be able to share playlists across devices, and even wrote a little command line utility to convert iTunes XML playlists to m3u8/xspf and correct the file paths depending on the target machine.
But there's a couple of catches:

My music collection is fairly large (~27 GB) and I have yet to find any syncing software (e.g. doubletwist) that doesn't keel over and die. So I need to keep this stuff in sync manually, no automagic (unless it actually works).

I have a number of files who's names contain Spanish characters, Norwegian characters, or Japanese kanji, so the playlist has to be in a format that recognizes UTF characters (i.e. m3u8 over m3u).

I could care less about what format gets used, assuming it has a spec I am more than willing to write code to convert to it.

My stuff I've already done works fine for linux (VLC media player does fine), but VLC android doesn't seem to deal with unicode-aware playlists, nor does doubletwist cloud player.
Searching around the internet has found things mostly related to streaming lists (I don't care about streaming at all), usually pertain to video (I only care about music), or are about libraries one would use writing an android music player (which I'd prefer to avoid). I also see alot of questions here on android SE about timestamps, play counts, and other bells and whistles I don't really care about, I just want my playlists to work.
Does anyone know any way (player, syncher, whatever) to get unicode-aware music playlists working on android reading the local filesystem (which AFAIK is unicode-aware)?
*PS if it matters, HTC M8 running Marshmellow.

It turns out that vlc and doubletwist cloud player can read unicode in .m3u file extensions just fine (even though they theoretically shouldn't), but only if the strings have been normalized to not use the combining character codes for inflections.


Uninstall programs that are not visible in Application manager I have an Asus Nexus 7 that is full of games that take up all 29 GB of memory. The kids installed these games, and they are not visible in the Application Manager. Perhaps they were installed in a different way. I found an OBB directory that contains a lot of gigantic files with the extension obb and names that are related to games, but I'm not sure whether I can delete them without damaging the system. Where I should start to find and remove games?

You can use alternative application managers available from the Play store, or even Titanium Backup if you are rooted.

secondly if you are rooted,

Download any root explorer,
Navigate to /system/app/ or sometimes /system/priv-app/ and manually
uninstall by deleting the packages (you may need to delete files
from android folder manually eg. obb files)
Reboot and you are done (optional)

If none of the above works,

Do a backup of apps and data using a backup manager (Recommended:
Helium for non root users, Titanium Backup for root users)
factory reset the phone, and delete '.androidsecure' and 'Android'
folder from external memory if exists.

Voila! you are done!


Deleted my stock phone application from android phone after rooting as a result can't call for now I recently rooted my HTC desire 728 and by mistake deleted the stock phone app and as a result, now I can't make calls ... the phone is not showing any sim signals too and when I go to sim settings it shows  process.com.android.phone stopped  ... what can I do now? I had factory reset the phone already a couple of times but the after root deleted apps are not showing up ... please help me out

It seems you have taken no backup, which implies that you have to flash the stock firmware. Since you have rooted your phone, I believe you already have a custom recovery like TWRP installed (if not, go ahead and flash one. Search google for the exact instructions for your phone). Then search Google for the stock firmware, and you should be able to find a version of the stock ROM. Download and move this to the phone storage, and flash it with the custom recovery. You might have to clear all internal storage data and/or Dalvik cache and system partitions before/after the flash. Check Google and XDA Developers for the exact instructions.

Note that this will delete all the data of your internal storage, so make sure to take a backup before proceeding. You will lose root access as well, and the custom recovery might be overwritten with the stock recovery.


How can I find the last Synced location for my phone (which is now dead/off)? I'm using Google's [Device Manager][1] to find my phone. It shows the last sync time as yesterday but won't show me WHERE that was.

(I'm sure my phone battery got too low and it turned off)

Device Manager shows:

Location unavailable

Last online January 29, 2017 (yesterday)

Seems like I should be able to find the last place it sync'd but I see no option for that.

Google's Device Manager does not store location. It will send a location request to your device, which if turned on with a network connection and location services enabled, will respond with its current location.

If you have location history enabled, your location should show up in the Google Maps timeline.


Why I can't see Viber Videos folder in Windows Explorer (on Huawei P9) When I connect my Huawei P9 to a PC and browse folders I can see viber/media folders on both Internal Storage and SD Card. In this folder I can see Viber Images and some dot folders, but no Viber Videos or User Images.

When I browse folders on the phone itself it shows these folders.

How can I see them in Windows Explorer?

I think that folder has some kind of system protection.

However, there is a way to see images and videos (at least on Huawei P8): Open Files app (Huawei's default file explorer) and go to /viber/media and rename it's child folders (Viber Images and Viber Videos) and you'll be able to see them in Windows 10 Explorer.


What precisely is CloudAgent process? Its files eats space like crazy I have bunch of usual stuff going on in my phone (Samsung Grand, Android 4.1.2) like app auto-updates, Twitter, Dropbox, etc. Most of the time it's clear what the network-related settings for them are (wifi-only all the things) and they are clearly reflected in data stats.

The one exception is "CloudAgent" process, which:

does not really make it obvious what it belongs to (is this part of Android? Samsung custom stuff?)
eats space like crazy (its folder was well over 1GB out of 4GB system space)
eats network, even when not on wifi

While it doesn't really cause any serious issues, it is highly confusing - what it is, what it does and which settings control it?

It's Samsung software, built into the system in certain Samsung phones. Like the Dropbox app, it's a service to automatically upload photos you take on your phone; it connects to your "Samsung account" if you create one. It also integrates with Dropbox to sync photos to the device Gallery; if you have "Camera upload" turned on in Dropbox as well, this probably results in your phone having two copies of each photo: the usual one, and one in CloudAgent's storage.

You can change its settings by going into the main Settings app and choosing Cloud from the Applications manager list (in the Device section). You can clear its data and disable it, or "freeze" the app if your device is rooted, and the only consequence is that photos from Dropbox won't show up in Gallery. If you have the Dropbox app installed as well, Dropbox can still sync (and automatically upload photos) without CloudAgent running.


Nexus 7 Incredibly Slow Over the past few weeks, my Nexus 7 running 4.2 Jelly Bean has gotten incredibly slow at times. Sometimes I can count off a full five (or more) seconds for an app to open or even for something as simple as scrolling from one home screen to another. I've had the device for three or four months and it just recently started giving me problems. I hadn't installed anything new prior to noticing the problem and everything that I have installed came from the Play store, so it should all be safe. Rebooting the device does not seem to help.

What can I do to diagnose and hopefully fix this problem? This is my first Android device so I don't even really know where to start.

I have noticed the same issue on my Nexus 7 running stock Jelly Bean 4.2. I also noticed reboots. Do you happen to have HD Widgets installed? That seemed to be the cause of many of my slow downs, but unfortunately not all. Apps that use location services seem to be the issue with my slowdowns. Are you noticing the same thing?

This article goes into some of the issues seen on 4.2 that I experienced.


Vibrations or not depending on phone position Is there any chance to disable phone vibrations when phone is in straight horizontal position? (eg. on the table).

I want to have vibrations turned on only when I have it in my pocket, close to the body, in other situations turned off.

Is there any app for this? Maybe there is some profile switcher based on the phone position?

You could do that with Tasker. This app matches defined conditions with tasks -- i.e. you can tell it to execute a task (which is a set of actions) whenever a (set of) condition(s) is met.

Under conditions it lists "Orientation".

As actions, it e.g. describes:

  Vibrate On Notify: Whether to vibrate with a system notification.
  Vibrate On Ringer: Whether to vibrate on an incoming call.

So you could create a task named, say, NoVibrate, which says:

Vibrate on Notify: Off
Vibrate on Ringer: Off

Then create two profiles FaceUp and FaceDown (there's no "OR" connection possible with conditions, hence you need two profiles), each with the respective orientation, and have them execute the NoVibrate task.

What happens then? As soon as the phone is FaceUp or FaceDown (where "face" is the display), vibration is turned off. And as soon the orientation changes, the prior setting gets re-activated.

Problem solved with the 6-letter-solver of (almost) all Android problems: Tasker :)


Internet & Play Store problem on Micromax Yureka on Lollipop Yesterday, I got an update to upgrade my Micromax Yureka mobile to Cyanogenmod 12 which upgrades the Android version to Lollipop.

After this upgrade, following issues came into existence:

Internet is not working
Play store is not working
Apps are not downloading

These issues didn't occur on KitKat. Please give me a solution.

You have to remove your google account and add it again. I did it today with my Yureka and now it is working seamlessly. :)


Making Phone Calls from a Different Device Let's assume that I know my device will fall in the ocean in 6 months, I'm not allowed to buy insurance, and my contract expires in 18 months. I'm also a terrible swimmer, and Michael Phelps won't get it for me.

I would think that you could reverse engineer the code and make your own phone calls from a different device, even without the sim card. You just need to be able to program it.

I'm mostly curious if this has been done before and if it has a name. Are there any similar tricks/ideas?

If something like that should happen, you can just get your carrier to "port" your phone number to a new SIM card, and use that in the replacement/spare device. This is more or less the same process you use to transfer your number to a different carrier, but a lot simpler in this case. After all, they're the ones in control of what phone number goes with what SIM. Ask the carrier for a replacement SIM and they should be happy to oblige.


Common messenger app for phone and PC Is there a way to do messaging on my PC and my Android? In other words, using either has the same contacts and you can see the same messages in both places?

Google Hangouts. Does text chat, video chat, and can even send and receive SMS messages.


Blu Dash JR K locked-out; "Yes" confirmation option to reset is not present in recovery mode I have my sister's Blu Dash JR K at the moment. She forgot her lock screen pattern, and there is not an option to recover via Gmail.

Phone comes with stock recovery. when I go there and try to apply factory wipe/data, all I get are a bunch of:

   -- no --
   -- no --
   -- no --
   -- no --

There is no yes option.

Second attempt, I tried to reset the phone using ADB, as I don't have the phone with debugging mode active. when I type adb devices, no device is detected.

Phone is not rooted so I'm not sure if I can install any custom recovery. What should I do now?

EDIT

I'm not able to use "official" recovery modes (Gmail Based) since she never synced with a Google account.

If your sister has access to Google account, she can try the Android Device Manager and do a "Lock and Erase". You may need to enable Lock and Erase first.

https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/6160500


odin twrp install hangs galaxy s7 edge G935 I have a new Verizon S7 Edge.  I want to flash twrp using odin.

I am using

Windows 10
Odin 3.10.1
twrp-3.0.0-1-hero2lte.tar.md5

My phone settings are:

USB debugging on
OEM Unlock on
Android 6.0.1
Build number APB1
Phone model SM-G935V

When I run odin it hangs when flashing the image.  Here is the output:

<OSM> Enter CS for MD5..
<OSM> Check MD5.. Do not unplug the cable..
<OSM> Please wait..
<OSM> twrp-3.0.0-1-hero2lte.tar.md5 is valid.
<OSM> Checking MD5 finished Sucessfully..
<OSM> Leave CS..
<ID:0/003> Added!!
<ID:0/003> Odin v.3 engine (ID:3)..
<ID:0/003> File analysis..
<ID:0/003> SetupConnection..
<ID:0/003> Initialzation..
<ID:0/003> Get PIT for mapping..
<ID:0/003> Firmware update start..
<ID:0/003> SingleDownload.
<ID:0/003> recovery.img
<ID:0/003> NAND Write Start!!

After waiting for a few minutes I unplug the phone and odin dutifully complete with these three lines:

<ID:0/003> Complete(Write) operation failed.
<OSM> All threads completed. (succeed 0 / failed 1)
<ID:0/003> Removed!!

As far as I can tell, all of the other threads about this type of problem are not specific to my model phone.

In the past, I have used odin to flash twrp onto various phones including a Samsung Note 4 with no problems.

What am I missing?

It's because your s7 edge from Verizon has locked bootloader and you cannot flash a customer recovery via Odin due to twrp not being an official samsung signed tar or md5 file and your phone rejects it.. also because your not rooted either and may never be unfortunately..  I'm in the same boat and recommend disabling verizon ota updates with package disabler pro apk to stay on the build apb1 to heighten your chances of possibly getting rooted because security patches are added to every update..


Shutdown animation sound I have an issue, when I shutdown the phone, it gives a custom sound. I want to remove it. The phone is LG G3 (Rooted).

I tried to delete the sound using root explorer.

To mute them, Simply do the Following :

In System > Sound and Display > System volume you can set it, unfortunately the power on/off sound is also tied to the touch feedback sound.

You can also use Silent Boot.

  Note:Disable annoying startup sounds! Silent Boot mutes your phone on
  shutdown to keep it silent on boot and restores previous volume
  settings after startup is complete. Please note: This workaround does
  not apply to all phones

Lastly, Here the one which I followed :

1) First off all download the Root browser from play store.

2) Open it, the app will ask you to install some additional data, don’t cancel it – otherwise the app may not work properly.

3) Now when the additional download complete, search for the System folder & open it, followed by Media or sound folder.

4) Here you will get two  files namely PowerOn.mp3 & PowerOff.mp3

5) So long press the PowerON.mp3 file > choose Rename > rename the file to PowerON.mp3.bak. Same with the PowerOff.mp3 file, rename it to PowerOff.mp3.bak.

That’s it, now reboot your phone and there should be no shut down and start up sound.

So if you’re happy with permanently turning off the sound, then your steps end here. You can leave this guide now. But if you want to replace the default android boot sound with any mild music then follow this steps.

6) Now download the soft sound which you would like to set as boot sound.

7) Copy that to System / Media folder & rename it to PowerON.mp3 & power Off.mp3

8) Now long press on new sound file, select permission from popup.

9) Tick all the boxes that appears after selecting permission, then press OK

10) Now every time your reboot your phone you will be welcomed with your new boot sound.

Note :- Make sure to keep the new boot sound file length with in 10 sec. Otherwise you will feel double irritating.


How Google Play programs family is updated? In my previous question I asked about how Google Play Store is updated. And this question is sort of an extension to the previous one. What updates what? I know that Google Play Store updates other Google Services (like Google Games, Kiosk, Music itp.). Does Google Play Store update Google Play Services or does Google Play Services updates Google Play Store or do both of them updates themselves?

Google Play Store is the only one capable of downloading and installing apps. All apps including Store itself are updated via Store. As I've already answered, the update is automatically downloaded and installed as soon as it's detected by Store.


Disable upside down rotation My phone should have rotation completely disabled - i.e. "Auto-Rotate" icon in fast settings pulldown is grey, "Settings->Display->When device is rotated" says "Stay in portrait view", "Settings->Accessibility->Auto-rotate screen" is off. Actually they seem like shortcut to a same single setting, because they all change simultaneously when I change any of them.

Despite all that, when I turn the phone upside down or when vibration makes it think that it was turned upside down, image rotates upside down too.

It is extremely distracting, as I never actually do it myself - it would be uncomfortable to use hardware buttons - but pretty much any vibration in application makes phone think that it was turned for a moment. I always have to shake it a few times to make it turn back afterwards. Disabling vibration is not an option because it is used for important alerts and I often use have volume down or use phone in noisy environment.

Is there a way to completely disable this rotation?

Use apps like Ultimate Rotation Control - with proper settings, it seamlessly integrates with system rotation toggle, and on top of that you can disable any rotation direction you don't want (most phones don't have upside-down rotation, have to be enabled this way), force apps that don't usually rotate to rotate, and set per-app rotation behavior. In your case, just select "Forced 3/4 Auto" and "Lock Current" in rotation choices.


Mp3 not showing in library I spent an hour trying to get this to work so I could get some sleep in my noisy hospital bed last night.

I wanted to listen to some noise on loop. I downloaded some waves lapping type music.

It's on my internal SD and is an mp3.

Clicking the file in Astro browser doesn't open the file in a player fully but only a popup preview window. It's in the foreground, doesn't offer many controls and stops playing when the focus is removed.

Searching for the file in all 3 of my players doesn't result in anything, even after a restart. I have also tried a SD card rescan utility from the play store.

Music apps I tried were Fusion, Bubble UPNP and the Samsung Music App. All of which seem to rely on some internal media index. Frustratingly I can't simply browse to the file from inside the apps, I have to search the library.

It should not take an hour and a post to here to figure out how to manually play a simple file, added to my phone in such a way.

It would be great if it were like Windows or osx and allow the user to "Open with... ",  and then select the app.
 I know you can dig in and change this, but it's a more permanent solution for a temporary requirement.

Anyway I must be loosing my mind:)

How can I add this file to my library from within Android or otherwise open this file in a full player to make use of controls like loop etc?

Update from a comment on an answer:

It's mp3, and plays in the popup player just fine. Perhaps the tags are corrupted and somehow blocking it from appearing in the library. I tried an mp3 tag utility and it can't see the file in the folder. So perhaps it is corrupt in some way.

If it doesn't turn up in the library even after a reboot (which should definitely have triggered the media scanner to add it to the library), the only reason I can think of is some .nomedia file being in the path. You can try to analyze that (finding whether there is one), or...

There are media players not using the library, mainly for FolderPlay & AudioBooks. Using one of those, you can navigate to that folder from within the app, and play the files. If that doesn't work either, the files might be corrupted or using an unsupported format.


change phone properties so I can download an item from Google play? I have a Huawei u8160(A.K.A Vodafone 858 Smart) which had an original Froyo ROM , Now it's upgraded to CyanogenMod7.2(Gingerbread) and even after upgrading Google play apps are the same exactly.

I was wondering if I can change the properties of my phone so that Google play would understand that I'm running Gingerbread?

The apps will not just change when your version changes. All Apps have a minimum API Version which is required to use the App. So if your apps all have a minimum API version of e.g. Froyo and there is no special version for gingerbread all will stay the same.

The Properties of the android version cannot be changed, only if you compile your own system and write a different version number in there. But this will not solve the problem of the API Versions: If you Fake an Android 4.0.3 with 2.3.6 Real System Version, some Apps will probably not run because they need to have API Version 15 and not 8.


Why am I getting an 'Invalid Server Certificate' error when retrieving email even though I have the 'Verify Certificate' setting disabled? I'm trying to configure my phone to sync with my work email account.  I'm accessing it through OWA (Outlook Web Access).  With the default settings, when the phone attempts to retrieve incoming mail, I get an error stating that there is an 'Invalid Server Certificate'.  This persists even if I disable the Verify Certificate setting.  Why is that?  How do I avoid the 'Invalid Server Certificate' error?

I do not receive the error if I set 'Use secure password' to Never.  But, that doesn't seem too safe.  Would that mean my password is sent in plain text?

I'm running Android 2.3.3 on a Droid X.

This seems like an issue that has been reported to the android development team. I am not sure if it is specific to the droid x, but even the work item relates to the droid x. If that is the case, I don't know if that is technically an android issue, but a MotoBLUR issue, as the Droid X runs the MotoBLUR version of android.

Also, Yes, that is what "Never use secure password" means.


Restore WhatsApp Data from Internal Storage on Moving to a New Phone I have WhatsApp installed on my old Phone.
WhatsApp is backup both to Google Drive and to the local storage.
The Google Drive backup is for text chat and images only (The default).
The local backup includes everything (Audio, Video, Documents, etc...).

I want to move all my WhatsApp data to my new phone.
Usually it will be done as following:

Copy all files of the WhatsApp folder from the old phone to the new phone.
Install WhatsApp on the new phone.
Start WhatsApp on the new phone and when asked for restoring data click restore.

The Problem

The restoration process of WhatsApp will restore information from Google Drive and not from the local storage.

How can one force WhatsApp to restore all data from the local storage?

Assuming you have your local files all, databases and images.
First deactivate google drive.

Open google drive.
Top left menu, backups, deactivate Google Drive WhatsApp backup

(option to delete also, not necessary)
Copy all files over to WhatsApp folder on phone

Re-do the login procedure as usual.

In theory that's it.


Droid Charge SCH-I510 Memory Dump Crash I am a Android developer who has been noticing horrible performance and memory dumps that are crashing my Droid Charge SCH-i510. Besides the lack of roadmap for the phone ( because obviously they are targeting newer models) I know it will never really be updated again.

But I would like to see if any one else is having these issues and if they were able to pin point it. Does anyone know how to solve this issue or overcome it? Obviously not everyone will have the exact same issues.
But I notice the issue when processing images as well when a specific thread is chewing resources.

I reached out to Samsung and I was told to "Not have a lot of apps installed on the phone" or to "Not use so many apps on the phone" I tried to explain to them that Android when not using an app has a lifecycle that will free up resources from apps not being used so that it will not run out of resources. They just responded to that as "We are sorry you are mad"

Great job helping your dev's pin point an issue.

Search the logcats for stack traceback. Try uninstalling apps one at a time, to see if the problem disappears when you uninstalled a certain app.

If the issue come from an installed application, then you should uninstall that app and/or contact the developer to fix the crash.

If the issue is system level, then there is not much you can do. You can either downgrade to a version that crashes less, or try upgrading to custom ROM, although with custom ROMs the crashes could also get worse.

It should be noted that newer Android versions have better application management than older versions. I recalled that there is an improvement that comes either in 2.1 or 2.2 or 2.3 that significantly improves the way the out-of-memory killer works.


Brightness level stuck at minimum after upgrading to Android 5.1.1 I have Sony Xperia Z (C6603, 10.7.A.0.222) and the brightness level is stuck at minimum after update to 5.1.1.

I have tried:

sensor test - light sensor is OK.
set brightness via ADB (settings put system screen_brightness 200) - didn't work.
using brightness control apps (like LUX for example) - didn't work.

Using stock ROM without root, any apps or functions that could set brightness to low for saving battery are either uninstalled or turned off? Any suggestions?

This happened to me on my galaxy note20 3 weeks ago.  My screen went pretty dark.  After a hour or so i saw on settings blue light filter was on.  I did not turn it on. I had to shut it off then reset the phone.


how can i backup wifi profiles without root? this option isn't available in my default backup app ( huawei backup )
android 5.1

that's what Available in the default  backup app

note: the managers category doesn't contain any wifi info

If your backup app doesn't have such a category, then you cannot back it up. Even in cases where it is synced to your Google account (via the Settings > Google > Backup option) , it is restored only to the phone when you restore the backup while setting up as a new phone. But that will not show you the raw credentials if you're looking to use them. Do note that Google 's backup has its own flaws and this restore may not always work.
If you need the raw credentials, then you will need to ask the owner of that WiFi network.


How to receive Whatsapp notification without vibration? I am using Sony Xperia X, Android 6.0.1.

I have only managed to turn off the vibration of single and group chat messages by selecting "Off" under Vibrate and "Silent" under Notification tone.

The phone will still vibrate if I choose off under vibrate, and other than silent options under notification tone.

However, now without vibration, there isn't notification either whenever someone sends me a message. I am trying to receive message notification without vibration.

Such a simple permutation and I can't believe that I am still having trouble doing it.... OMG

Just tried on my Windows phone, same situation. Have to switch off whatsapp notification and vibration. Switching off vibration alone won't stop the phone from vibrating.

You can use Android's built-in permission framework appops. From adb shell execute command:

~$ appops set com.whatsapp VIBRATE deny


Android boot architecture compared to desktop boot process After reading this answer and pointing article: Can somebody explain the boot process of an Android device?

My Samsung S3 have CyanogenMod installed. There is probability while installing custom recovery via Odin to brick your phone.

How does boot process relate to installing custom recovery? Is custom recovery stored in device's BIOS (CPU ASIC??)?

I'm looking for information, about how bricking works (in analogy to PC).
On PC you "brick" computer when your BIOS flash fails rest is handled by bootloader. It could be recovered by dismounting and reflashing bios chip.

So I assume Android devices must have some kind of BIOS also and switch at some point to start booting from media. Is it correct?

On PC if you do not have any OS or it is corrupted you can use different media (floppy, CD) to boot.
Why is it not possible (from what I know) to do such a boot from Memory card?

By my undersanding, as long as BIOS is not corrupted it should be of no problem to boot/reinstall system?

Person installing my recovery told me to ONLY clear cache folders while chaning OS using recovery. So that would mean I cannot touch any core OS functions? Why is that. On normal PC I could just insert CD with new software and install OS from scratch.

The only explanation comes to my head is that BIOS and System is same thing?

To put it simply, it is not designed for users to "boot from Memory card" as you put it.  It is an embedded device and is designed as such.  Android devices are typically not meant for the end user to install software via external media.  They are specifically designed for additional software (not new OSes) to be loaded via some network connection.  The initial boot parameters are really going to be dependent on the product.