How does the Ubuntu Phone OS relate to the Android OS? I've read that the new announced Ubuntu Phone OS was heavily inspired by Android, while not using Java and the Dalvik VM for its apps.

However, it was also not clear whether it's a fork of the AOSP or a custom ROM (I doubt it) or just if it's conceptually inspired by Android or some part of it was forked from Android (i.e. kernel, etc.).

Would Android apps possibly be able to work on Ubuntu Phone OS?

Both Ubuntu Phone (which is based on the same Linux distro as full Ubuntu) and Android run on a Linux kernel. However they differ above the kernel level, whereas Ubuntu runs a full GNU/Linux OS with most of the standard Linux libraries, and a GUI based on Qt, Android runs a custom Android and Dalvik platform instead.

It looks like one of the big benefits of them both being based on the same Linux kernel is driver support. This means that for any Android phone that has open-sourced drivers available (either officially from the manufacturer's source, or where a 3rd party ROM developer has written them), it should be a much easier to task to get Ubuntu Phone running on it. (notably pretty much every picture on the Ubuntu Phone site at the moment looks like it's of a Galaxy Nexus running Ubuntu Phone).

  Ubuntu has already been adapted to run on chipsets using the ARM and
  Intel x86 architectures relevant for mobile devices, with the core
  system based around a typical Android Board Support Package (BSP). So
  chipset vendors and hardware manufacturers do not need to invest in or
  maintain new hardware support packages for Ubuntu on smartphones. In
  short, if you already make handsets that run Android, the work needed
  to adopt Ubuntu will be trivial.

(from http://www.ubuntu.com/devices/phone/operators-and-oems - my emphasis)

This means that, initially at least, it's phone manufacturers and Ubuntu enthusiasts who are going to see the biggest benefit - that it should be fairly easy to get Ubuntu Phone working on a handset that was designed for Android (and fairly easy to sell the same hardware with a choice of OS).

As the vast majority of Android apps are written using Java for the Dalvik VM, neither of which are guaranteed to be on an Ubuntu Phone (though enthusiasts may port them later) most of those apps won't work without a large amount of porting effort. Ubuntu themselves are unlikely to be in a hurry to port Java and Dalvik to Ubuntu Phone after the legal problems that Google have had with Oracle.

Also the Ubuntu Phone has it's own QML toolkit and Ubuntu SDK, neither of which are the same as (or compatible with) the Android SDK or NDK APIs, so again that's going to be a large amount of porting effort that will prevent Android apps from being run on Ubuntu straight away.

On the other hand, if your app is primarily a web app with an Android wrapper around it,  then porting should be much easier as both heavily support HTML5 and Javascript.

  Web apps are first class citizens on Ubuntu, with APIs that provide
  deep integration into the interface. HTML5 apps written for other
  platforms can be adapted to Ubuntu with ease, and we’re targeting
  standard cross-platform web app development frameworks like PhoneGap
  to make Ubuntu ‘just work’ for apps that use them.

(from http://www.ubuntu.com/devices/phone/app-ecosystem)

Despite all of those differences, history in the mobile space has shown us that if a mobile platform takes off in a big way, then no matter how big the time and effort needed to port apps between platforms, all the big apps and games will make their way to the new platform eventually and companies will come out with toolkits and software that makes it easy to write an app once that can then be compiled to run on any of the major platforms (that allow it).

It seems that most of Ubuntu's app-portability is concentrating on making it easy to convert web apps into Ubuntu Phone apps, and to make it easy to run exactly the same app on any Ubuntu device - desktop, laptop or phone:

  With the arrival of the Ubuntu SDK, apps can be written to work on all
  Ubuntu form-factors: it’s the same Ubuntu OS on the desktop and on the
  phone, so a single native application can work on both. Which means
  you re-use most of the app when you add support for a new form-factor.

(from http://www.ubuntu.com/devices/phone/app-ecosystem)

tl;dr

Ubuntu Phone and Android are both based on a Linux kernel but are different above that - they can share drivers (this is good for manufacturers and hobbyists), but can't share apps. Ubuntu Phone shares apps with desktop Ubuntu, not with Android. They both have good web browsers and can view the same web pages.


Why phone sometimes (often) goes crazy and constantly lightens up its locked screen? In general, from time to time, my phone (Galaxy SII) lightens up its locked screen for 4-5 seconds.

I thought: the reason behind can be to show if some messages or calls are awaiting to be noticed (but, with screen locked, it is pointless anyway, because nothing is shown besides symbol entry screen).

But sometimes it lightens up the screen like 3 times in a minute, over 15 minutes.

Why it does that?

Try uninstalling some applications. The same thing happened to me and I fixed it by uninstalling my most recently installed app.


My phone keeps restarting after factory reset Recently my Xperia L running Android 4.2.2 started restarting every 30 seconds following a factory reset.

I have rooted my phone using the iroot app and I reset it. I still have the kinguser app installed, I cannot uninstall it. Every time it boots, after 20-30 seconds it restarts. I'm using a stock ROM and I've never installed a custom one.

How can I stop my phone from restarting?

I have been in the same situation. I rooted my phone Sony Xperia and it kept restarting. I reset it via the recovery menu and Kinguser was still there and I finally got rid of it. Do these steps and you will have your phone working again:

Go to Google
Search for Kingoroot
Install Kingoroot for Android
Click "root" at the bottom
Your phone will reboot and Kinguser is gone
Android 4.2.2 is working again


Restart unresponsive phone without power button My huawei y9 prime became unresponsive and i cant connect it to my pc to reboot it with adb since i cannot press "use usb to transfer files" so adb doesnt see my device and as title says, power button is broken.
Can i force connect it using SN?
edit: forgot to say that phone was unlocked when it froze

update : only solutions i found is to either try to use a microusb mouse or to wait till phone is dead, download fastboot plug phone into pc, boot into fastboot mode (on huawei long press down volume key) till you get a screen, then enter command fastboot devices , if you see a number then use fastboot reboot


Should I re-lock bootloader after flashing developer preview on nexus 5? I have flashed the Android M developer preview 3 on my Nexus 5 phone, for which I was required to unlock the bootloader. Now that the flashing has completed successfully, should I re-lock my bootloader? I had seen threads on xda siting that phones could get into boot-loop if bootloader is locked after flashing. I have no custom recoveries installed or the system is "as is" received from google. So do I relock or will it soft brick my phone? I am only a noob. Please be detailed.

Don't take a risk until stable version of android M is released. And you also want to recover it to your original firmware. locking-bootloader will make it difficult for you!


how do I view files on micro sd? I just saved the files from my flip phone to a micro sd card, and put that micro sd card in my android tablet. I went to the file manager, but I didn’t see anything for mounting the sd device, or that it was accessible. where should I look to access files from sd cards?

using Android lollipop

I don't think there is a standard location for the sd card directory but look for a folder called external_sd. It will depend on your tablet model.
Perversely, it will not be your /sdcard directory, this folder is your embedded storage.


How to install Android from scratch So I bought a phone from Aliexpress.  It's a J5 Mini phone with Android 4.2.2.  Problem is that it doesn't have Google Play services installed on it.  When I open settings and try to Add Account, nothing happens. I click on the Add Account and it flashes, but that's it.  It looks like I may have to do a clean install of Android on this phone.  Any thoughts how I can do this?

I've downloaded the Android Update.zip file, saved it on a micro SD card to try to side load it, but no luck.  I unzipped the Android update.zip file and tried to install individual apps but the errors I get state that "this installation doesn't support Google Play Services.  I'm assuming because Google Play Services aren't installed.

First of all, that you shouldn't unzip the file.. cause it is a flashable zip.. next, since you said its cause of google play store..

1) go to settings>apps see if any google product is installed already.. If it does, you need to remove it.. If its installed as a user app.. you can uninstall right away in settings.. If it's system app.. Then you need to root your mobile first and download and install any system apps remover..

Note: If you root mobile, your warrenty will be void.. Since you are using samsung, rooting is against their mobile laws..

2) if the google apps are not installed, search google as "4.2.2 gapps" you will get lot of links.. download anyone you want and flash it in recovery..

Note: it is highly recommended to use custom recovery like clockwork mod, philz touch recovery or twrp to flash files.. google it, you will find one if someone ported it for your device..!


Connecting android device with PC using HDMI (video recording) I am android game developer, really wanted to capture nice quality video preview of my game for promotion purposes. And my question is, If I would connect by android device (Samsung Galaxy S3 or Nexus 7 tablet: using micro USB HDMI adapter with my PC, like this one for example:

I know I would be able to see what on my PC what I do on my device, but the point is, would I be able to turn on software responsible for capturing my desktop like Camtasia studio meanwhile to be able to record it?

Thank you.

This is only any use to you if your PC has an HDMI input, which is very unusual. You'll only have such a thing if you deliberately bought video capture hardware and attached it to your PC. If you have such hardware, you should use the video capture software that came with it. Trying to use Camtasia to capture it would be like trying to use Camtasia to capture from a webcam.

In addition, depending on what adaptor you use, your video capture hardware may also need to support MHL (the wire protocol used to send video data over the micro-USB and HDMI connectors). See my answer on How does MHL work? for more details.


How to restrict an app to make changes in a folder? There is an app that sucks my tablet and i don't won't to delete it. This app causes a huge trouble for me. I have granted it Storage Permission. But the apps also deletes some other folders, I want to restrict it from happening.

Restricting an app from writing storage in modern Android is just impossible. In specially Android 4.4.4 it was possible by the Application Permissions option that was in Settings. In the modern Android, when you install an app it assumes you explicitly agreed it's permissions before the actual app installation


How to automatically launch android Acess Point on startup? My Galaxy S with the Samsung Android built on it offers me the option the run the phone as a W-LAN acess point that connects to the internet via mobile data.

I would like to configure  the access point to start working immediately after booting the phone.

How to do that?

Bonus points if the setting can be achieved via adb and/or if I can set the wifi-password from adb as well.

The WiFi password IMHO is only setup once, when you configure your device's hotspot. Lateron, you simply activate/deactivate it.

To automate the latter, you could e.g. use Tasker:

Profile "AutoHotspot":

Condition: "Device Boot"
Task: "WiFi Tether" → set On

With this profile activated, your Hotspot would be automatically be enabled as soon as the device has completed booting up.

For the "bonus point" you mentioned: There's a free 7-day trial available on the Tasker Homepage. You can download the .apk to your computer, and use ADB to install it on your device (adb pm install)...


Will Android be able to install OS updates without Google account? I am working with android phones at work, we want to remove all google accounts from the phones before we give it to our customers.

I know that the phones are not able to receive app updates, but what about os update from android?

OS updates are provided by the device manufacturer. They are retrieved directly by the device and don't require any user account.

The only requirement for an OS update is a working Internet connection and enough free space on the device.


8-digit password prompt only when SIM is in device (it's not the PUK) My HTC A9 phone is asking me for an 8-digits password only when a SIM is in the device. I already tried it with the PUK of the SIM what does not work. If there is no SIM in the device, there is no password prompt and I can use the phone normally. With no SIM in the device, I did a factory reset of the phone, but nothing changed.

The password prompt says: "Network locked". Is this a SIM-locked phone?

What is going on here?

Since the PUK does not work (which usually would only be asked if the PIN has been entered wrong three times) and the prompt says "Network locked" this is most likely a SIM-Lock of the phone by the carrier.

Using a SIM from the carrier the phone is branded with you should not get this prompt and it should simply work, to use a SIM card from another carrier you will need the unlock code.

You can get this code from the carrier, most carriers charge only a very small amount or nothing at all after some period of time.


Android shell script permissions? I have a rooted phone, and I was playing around with Terminal Emulator. I tried writing a simple shell script (test.sh) :

#!/bin/sh
echo "Hello, World!"

Then I opened terminal emulator, cd'd to the directory my script was in, and typed:

./test.sh

and I got a  "permission denied"  error. So I tried:

su
./test.sh

Somehow, still permission denied. So I tried (still as root) :

chmod 775 test.sh
busybox chmod 775 test.sh
busybox chmod +X test.sh

None of the 3 gave errors, but ./test.sh still gave permission denied!  As a last resort I tried

sh test.sh

That ended up working. Finally.

I'm curious why permission was denied for my own shell script chmodded to 775 when run as root. How can permission be denied for anything as root? How can I fix this and make ./test.sh work?

Execute permissions on the SDCard is blocked for that reason.
See this:
/dev/block/vold/179:1 /mnt/sdcard vfat rw,dirsync,nosuid,nodev,**noexec**,relatime,uid=1000,gid=1015,fmask=0602,dmask=0602,allow_utime=0020,codepage=cp437,iocharset=iso8859-1,shortname=mixed,utf8,errors=remount-ro 0 0

The noexec part of this line emphasized with two asterisks is the key to prevent any execution of scripts/binaries from the SDCard.
Have a funny feeling this was answered before...deja-vu
Edit
Yup @Izzy has answered this before and here as well.


Battery for Samsung Galaxy S8 I am looking to replace the battery in my samsung galaxy s8.  Amazon shows many available batteries, ranging in capacity from 3000mAh to 4350mAh, all about $20 or less.  The one and only authorized Samsung technician in my neighborhood tells me that none of those batteries is optimized to work with the phone, that any of them would result in very poor battery life, and that I need an OEM battery, capacity 3000mAh, for $99 (plus labor of course).  Should I believe him?

Samsung technician is telling you what he has been trained to say (like a call center operator). It does not make any sense:

Think of the bigger battery as an extended battery and it will work as long as it fits in the battery compartment and the battery terminals are identical (if it is advertised for your model by a reputed seller, it should). This is not a unusual situation as after market battery manufacturers make a large capacity battery that serves for several device models as long as the battery dimensions and terminal connections are same.

It's no secret that accessories such as batteries, cables and other accessories are far more expensive from OEM compared to after market manufacturers (added revenue for them). Therefore standard refrain of buy OEM products only.

But, you would face a problem of correct battery reading in your status bar  When you change your battery and replace with an extended battery, the ROM information pertaining to battery is not updated ( battery capacity is hard coded - for more details see Where are the battery capacity files located?).
So, your battery readings in status bar would be wrong. To overcome this problem, use 3C Toolbox and adjust the capacity of the battery manually in the app (from Battery Manager → Tap the 4 small square icon → Adjust Capacity or use Configuration Wizard) and create a shortcut on your home screen for the Battery Mgr widget and use that to measure (not the status bar battery status)


How can I stop Google Play Music from automatically downloading my library? I listened to some of my music library on Google Play for the first time, and unbeknownst to me, it started to download the whole library (12,00 plus tracks) to my phone, completely using up my storage. I can't find ANYTHING that allows me to stop it or limit it's downloading. Has anyone else had similar problems?

If you are using the Google Play Music app Touch Menu on your device and see if Keep on device is checked. If yes uncheck it. You can also touch the blue pin to stop making it available offline. For more information on this go to https://support.google.com/googleplay/answer/1250232?hl=en


Does Google Galaxy Nexus has Visual Voicemail? I just realised that I cannot find any button or option in my Google Galaxy Nexus for Visual Voicemail, whereas iPhone and many other Android phones do have such feature.

Is there no visual voicemail in Google's Galaxy Nexus?

Usually on android phones this is a carrier supplied feature.  You can get some visual voicemail app from the play store, or you can move your voicemail from the carrier's system to Google Voice, which provides it.


Sony Xperia Ray contacts lost after deleting the contents of /data/log I have an Xperia Ray.

It showed low internal memory. So, I freed up memory by removing the contents of /data/log/. Unfortunately, my contacts got deleted. To add to my misery, my laptop crashed. I lost the backup file for contacts.

How do I recover these contacts?

If you syncronised yor contacts with google then turn sychro on in settings you will get back all your contacts

 or

Just log in to your gmail adress and press contacts on the left side pane then show all contacts.


Howto Install Gapps on Galaxy J3 Pro Plus j3119s? I Have reset my phone and lost gapps
Does anyone know how to install gapps on  j3119s ?

I've tried everything but seems it doesn't work in this device

open gapps (flash from twrp)
gapps-5.1.x-20150404-minimal-edition-signed from XDA (flash from twrp)
google installer (ussualy work on xioami china  ROM)
etc

I'm really frustated, help really appreciated...

One of my friend had the same issue in past, and ii resolved this issue by flashing new Firmware (The reliable and trusted solution). I have made a rough search for you and found following link with detailed instructions:

https://4frp.blogspot.com/2017/09/sm-j3119511-lollipopandroid-august-08-17.html

in case you have nay difficulty in process, let me know.

Before proceeding with the solution, download Samsung drivers from their official website from here and install.

http://developer.samsung.com/galaxy/others/android-usb-driver-for-windows

Thanks


Why is my WIFI always on? I have turned off WIFI in the settings, but it's still always running. Doesn't this graph indicate that WIFI is really on all the time? How can this be when it's definitely "off" in Settings?

I'm worried that this constant WIFI use drains my battery and I want to avoid this.

This is a Nexus 4 running Kitkat 4.4.4.

I have also installed the Llama automation app which can optionally turn on WIFI every x minutes, but I have made sure that option is definitely turned off. This behavior continues even when Llama is not running.
I don't think there's any other app on my phone that would have the capability to turn on WIFI on its own.

Is there some way I could find out whether one of the installed apps is responsible for this?

Android is automatically keeping Wi-Fi on while the phone is sleeping (Keep Wi-Fi on during sleep) and always scans for available networks (Scanning always available). They must be keeping it on. Try disabling them from Settings > Wi-Fi > Advanced.


How To Selectively Update Applications On Google Play? I would like to know how to update manually only apps that I want and not all apps at once when every other day they get updated again. How to checkmark only specific apps I want to manually update?

You could check-mark for automatic updates those apps which you care about or just update each application individually.


Is there any shortcut for closing a tab in Chrome? I find it very annoying opening the tabs list and swiping over or hitting the little X for closing a tab (an action which I do a lot...)

Is there any shortcut for closing the front tab using some single gesture? If not, is there some way to create such a custom functionality using some add-on/hack?

It seems the method you describe is currently the only true way of doing this. However, if you press the back key, it will close the current tab once you've gone back through the history of THAT tab. So if you open up lots of tabs but then close each one after reading, this is a very quick method for you (1 click). If you do extensive browsing in each tab, it's not as good but still easy in that you just press one button

There are many other browsers out there (Firefox, Dolphin HD / Mini, Boat Browser / Mini, Opera, Maxathon, SkyFire) which are all great applications (as you can tell by their app star ratings), albeit with different levels of integration with you Google account.  Several support addons or plugins to provide additional functionality.


How to export data usage stats? I am able to see the stats generated by Android at Settings>Data Usage for cellular data and wifi both. Is there any way to export these stats?

I don't think android has any option for the extraction. I know apps which track data, but they wont give me historical data.

Where is this data stored, maybe, I can extract it from there.

My phone is Moto G5S, running 7.1.1, not rooted.

You can save data usage recordings using an ADB command like the following:

adb shell dumpsys netstats detail full > data_usage.txt

If you are interested in the data usage of a specific application, you can find its identifier (which is used in the above recordings) using a command like the following:

adb shell dumpsys package com.example.application | grep userId


Is there any benefit to wiping Dalvik Cache after rooting my phone? Every time I do an OS update, it removes the root so I need to re-root my phone using TWRP. TWRP gives me the option to wipe the Dalvik Cache after flashing any sort of item. I understand that there is a good reason to wipe Dalvik after flashing a ROM. However, if all I did was an OTA update to my OS and flashed Magisk to root my phone, is there any benefit to wiping Dalvik cache?

As you mentioned you're using Magisk for root, I'm assuming you're running on Android 5 or up.

The answer would be no. You can safely ignore the "Wipe Dalvik Cache" after OTA updating and re-rooting.

Dalvik cache is compiled binary code (optimized DEX) for your installed applications, so it usually makes sense to wipe them if you removed/replaced your apps in recovery, or modified the ART runtime (like installing Xposed Framework). The odex files for system apps usually come with the system image and does not reside in the user dalvik-cache directory. Therefore there's no need to wipe cache if you root your phone or flash a new recovery, but recommended if anything related to application runtime has changed (e.g. Xposed).


What can I expect if I unroot my Droid? I am thinking about rooting my Moto Droid but I don't know much about the subject, I've been doing some reading, but I'd like to know:

If I were to root and then wanted to unroot later on for some reason would my phone return to the state that it was before I rooted?
Also, if I were to "brick" my Droid is there any means of bringing it back to life?

Check out Are there any risks to rooting a device?

and Unroot a device without wiping

and How easy is it to return to stock after rooting with unrevoked

  Also, if i were to "brick" my droid is there any means of bringing it back to life?

It depends. There's bricking, and then there's really bricking.

  If i were to root and then wanted to unroot later on for some reason would my phone return to the state that it was before i rooted?

Not completely -- but you can unroot it -- that is, revoke root permissions. If you used root to uninstall OEM apps -- those are still gone. If you installed apps that require root, those will not function w/o root permissions.


Persistently or aggressively enabling Battery Saver I love the Battery Saver feature. When I'm travelling or in other situations where reliable communication is more important than user experience, I want to always have it enabled, sometimes for days at a time.

However, Android automatically turns it off after the phone has been charged, requiring me to remember to go in and re-enable it after unplugging my phone. I occasionally forget.

Is there any way (including via third-party apps, excluding via rooting or jailbreaking the device) for me to automatically or persistently enable the Battery Saver, aside from the system's built-in options to enable it at 15% or 5% charge remaining? Alternatively, is there a way to leave it on indefinitely, or a way to have it automatically activate earlier (such as at 50% charge), or a way to activate it based on a schedule?

If there's no user-accessible way to do this yet, I would also be interested in knowing if there are any mechanisms in the operating system (URL schemes, framework APIs, relevant permission settings) that could potentially be used to control Battery Saver.

automation is the preferred option. Many apps are available. I prefer using MacroDroid , since it is free (upto 5 macros) and easy to learn.
Macrodroid along with other applications like Wakelock Detector have made this possible for non rooted device using adb to grant WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS permission to the app
Following actions are possible (quoting developer's post in the forums, accessible from within the app (10/01/17)

Battery Saver
Location Mode
NFC Enable/Disable

You need to set up adb on your laptop
Once you have a working adb connection, you need to run the following command from the command line/terminal on your computer:
adb shell pm grant com.arlosoft.macrodroid android.permission.WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS

Your macro would look like this
Macro : Toggle Battery Saver (name of macro as example)
Trigger: Empty Trigger
Action: Battery Saver  → Toggle
Constraints: Leave blank
Once you save the macro, go to widget drawer of Macrodroid and drag the shortcut widget to your home screen, and assign to the widget the macro you have created. Press  widget to toggle Battery Saver manually
Coming to your other requirement of activating Battery Saver at user defined percentage or on full charge, create another macro
Macro :  Battery Saver on full charge or when I want (name of macro as example)
Trigger:

Battery Level → increases to 100 % ( full charge )

Battery Level → decreases to 50 % ( user defined limit )

Action: Battery Saver → on
Constraints: Leave blank
My device is rooted, so can't verify adb command but from user response it works and I had used similar command for Wake Lock Detector when my device was not rooted


How do I force the 'showing' of an onscreen keyboard (soft-keyboard) when already 'paired' with a bluetooth keyboard? My question is the exact inverse of this question.

Motivating use-case. I've paired and am using my Bluetooth apple keyboard. Just happy. I'm running ICS, on an HTC- Evo 4G LTE. Then, 7-8 mins later (timeout not yet engaged by default of course), I'm downstairs, and a call comes in. I need to type 2-3 letters to look up something (an email address, etc). and huh?!

How the heck do I in the moment on-the-call type?

At that moment don't remember where I exactly left that apple keyboard (which I could  go back to power off, and only then get a keyboard to show)  Or if I turn off Bluetooth entirely: 'Fail' as that often means I can't then continue to use the darn headset I've got on, or if driving, I'd be illegal (in CA need to have a headset).

If I unpair, seems to get that keyboard (the external Bluetooth apple one) working, I have to re-pair (which, in reality, is really futzy annoying, compared to, e.g. if ignored and the time-out engages, when I then, say a day, or two later, type on that apple keyboard it works instantly instead? not paired).

Regarding the app: "null keyboard" I tried it, and close, but no cigar, meaning: when I'm in a 'text field', in the notifications list, there will appear an 'input method notification' clicking on that and you get a list, and while that list should include something that offers a 'show on-screen keyboard' override, it does not.

The closest thing I've been able to find is developer-centric code examples showing an (apparent) workaround to force this.. but seems to be no app ( yet?!?) that exposes that functionality into the 'inputs methods' drop-down menu. Example.

Update:
 it looks like Tomas's answer is 'the answer', though I'm currently unable to test to be sure. This does strongly suggest that there is no answer available without a rooted phone.

You can use Secure Settings Hardware Keyboard Action to toggle the hardware keyboard. Interestingly, you can still use the hardware keyboard, but the on-screen keyboard still appears.

This is especially useful when you connect a mouse (and no keyboard) and it causes the keyboard to go into hardware keyboard mode.

The simplest way to do this is to create a shortcut on your homescreen. Select the Secure Settings shortcut/widget. Then it will prompt you to select the action. Select Actions > Hardware Keyboard. Then it brings you to a screen with three options: On, Off, Toggle.

On means you go into hardware keyboard mode and no on-screen keyboard will appear. Note, this only works if you actually have physical keyboard connected. It will simply give you an error toast if you don't.

Off means turn off hardware keyboard mode, and an on-screen keyboard will appear when you select text boxes.

Toggle means it will switch from whichever hardware keyboard mode it's currently on.

There are other ways to hook up to Secure Settings Hardware Keyboard Action, which you can learn about in the documentation, and using your imagination and research.


Insufficient storage message when attempting to install app I am using a Samsung Galaxy S2. I have been trying to download apps, but get the insufficient storage message even though I have enough space free. However, the internal storage is almost full (200 MB remaining). Below is the amount of storage space which is used on my phone:

Internal Storage: Used: 1.8GB/2.0GB
Device Storage:   Used: 3.9GB/11.5GB
SD Card Storage:  Used: 4.0GB/7.4GB

This happened to me sometimes when I uninstall any apk, and try to reinstall it. I use to search for some residual files of the prior apk, and android said you that you don't have space but actually is that it can't install the apk, it can't overwrite the residual files.

Maybe this is your case. It always fix this situation for me.


Google assistant custom commands Is there anyway I can have custom commands for google assistant, which will show results how I want it to be?

IFTTT now supports Google Assistant. You can create your own commands that interact with any of the IFTTT connected platforms. For an instance you can have a digest where you give notes to GOogle, and at a custom time every day you get those notes sent to you on email. Direct link to Google Assistant account with a lot of applets

As IFTTT interacts with all kinds of platforms, you have a large world of opportunities when it comes to creating your own commands. There are a lot of pre-made applets, including things like turning off lights, there is even one where you say "good morning" to the assistant, and it turns on a coffee machine


Encryption of offline mail, calendar, contacts data on Android I'm very new to Android and I wonder what I can do in terms of encryption.

As I read it seems that only Android >= 2.3.3 supports encryption but my new device will be running Android 2.3.1. So I think there's no native solution to encrypt offline mail, calendar and contact data.

What solutions are there to protect my offline data?

Is it possible to encrypt the folders belonging to mail, calendar, contact? Decrypting should always happen when the screen is not lcoked.

Any ideas?

Encryption of saved data (the data on flash storage) is a feature of Android 4.0 and higher. The only non-4.0-device I am aware of that allows full flash storage encryption is the Lenovo Thinkpad Tablet.

Encryption of connection data (data that goes over the wire) was a big security concern in some Android versions. Google has released some updated versions of the affected Apps, but it's unkown if they where dispatched on every device. IIRC most fixes got into 2.3.5, but I can't find the source ATM - Googles disclosure policy is not so good. Here are some good resources about this topic:

The Insecurity of Google's ClientLogin Protocol
What Android sync'd data is encrypted?
Ungesicherte Einsichten (german) ("Unsecure Insights")


What's the reason Android Reverse Tethering require root? From what i know:

Android Tethering, share internet from Android to laptop via USB cable works without root.
Android Reverse Tethering, share internet from laptop Ethernet to Android via USB cable require root.

So I'm curious what's the technical reason/limitation of Non-root Android Tethering is allow but not vice versa.

ReverseTethering does not require root. If your device runs ICS or newer.

A few months ago, I was wondering the very same thing and started to investigate. Eventually, I started to develop my own solution. The result is an app that works on devices running Android 4.0 or higher on client side, and all major desktop OSs on the host side.

The app is available on Google Play: ReverseTethering NoRoot


Can read books in Amazon Kindle on LG 4G Tablet When I tried to read a book that I downloaded onto my tablet in Amazon Kindle, I can see the book, but when I go to the pages of the book, there is nothing.  I see the title of the book across the top of the page, but nothing is showing on the page itself.  Can read the book on my phone under Kindle so need to know what the problem is with tablet.  I have tried rebooting the tablet, but that did not solve the problem.

Have you gone into your account on Amazon and registered the Kindle for Android app that you downloaded to your account. You need to do that before you will be able to view Amazon content on your Kindle for Android App. Try going to your account on Amazon. Then go to Digital Content. Then under Digital Management, go to Manage Your Kindle. Then, on the left side go to Manage Your Kindle and choose Manage Your Devices. You should see a list of REGISTERED KINDLES. Your Kindle for Android app should be listed as one of the 'registered devices'. All the ebooks you get from Amazon are coded to work with a specific device on your account. Yes, they can work on more than one BUT your Kindle for Android app must be registered on your account (where the book was purchased from) in order for it to be read on that device.


WhatsApp can't be installed I seem to be encountering problems installing WhatsApp on my Huawei Y511-U10 model.
I factory resetted my phone yesterday, and downloaded apps a fresh. But whatsapp seems to be the only app that won't get installed successfully. When I try to install it it keeps on showing me "Whatsapp Messenger can't be installed. (Error code -24).
 I contacted Google Play Store and Whatsapp support for help but haven't yet gotten any solution for my problem. If there is some genious mind out there kindly assist me and I'll be greatful

Reading all the questions associated with this type error, you get the impression it will require root to enable you to delete the app from the /system partition if it remains.

Previous to doing that, I would suggest trying this, just to be sure it is not a file or folder remnant getting in the way:

  Some apps leave remainders during uninstalls that aid in the
  restoration of state or level information upon re-installing a later
  version. Usually these remains are unimportant to a user who does not
  intend to re-install or to any other user where consistent state or
  level data is unimportant. These remains have a particular name in an
  app that can clean them up: "corpse files".

  SDMaid
  is a disk cleaner that can locate, and delete, files related to
  corpses. Install the app, and select CorpseFinder from the menu to
  locate, and, optionally delete them.

DISCLAIMER: I am not the developer, just a satisfied user.

If this is not the solution, see the answers for more intensive actions through other questions here.


Is there a minimal installation of ADB? When it comes to troubleshooting, I often read recommendations like "Use adb logcat to find some more details". Looking for a good way to backup all my apps including their data, Full Backup of non-rooted devices refers to adb backup and adb restore. In several places one can find ways to remotely do on an Android device with the use of ADB, such as transferring files using adb push or adb pull, accessing the command-line via adb shell, and more. So ADB seems to be a good thing to have for an Android user.

But how to get this "ADB thingy" on my computer? Not being a developer, installing the entire Android SDK seems a bit overkill. Is there a more minimalistic approach available?

I do not really understand why anyone would prefer downloading an old version of unknown origin from a malware-ridden website to downloading the latest official version directly from Google itself. I guess to each its own.

Here are the links to the Google repository:

The latest version of the platform tools (contains just a few binaries - less than 10Mb in size each):

Windows
Linux
Mac

For users of Ubuntu and Debian (distributions I personally use) I have put together a small bash script which finds and installs the latest version of the platform tools - Installing Android platform tools (ADB) on Ubuntu


"No emoji found" in Google Japanese Input I am using Google Japanese Input keyboard, and I often want to post a rare emoji such as  or .

The search bar looks like the perfect place to search for an emoji, but unfortunately it fails every time:

It fails even on the simplest requests, such as "smile" or "sad".
It does not work in Japanese either:

I have changed phones, and changed OS (Nexus default, CyanogenMod, LineageOS, Samsung default) many times: The problem has always been present. So I guess it is not a bug, but rather a problem of me not using it correctly.

How to use that feature correctly?

I found the answer 10 minutes after posting the question, that's silly.

The trick is, you must search in hiragana. Even if your locale is English (like in my case).

For instance, search for ねこ instead of cat or 猫:

Most users type the hiragana before getting the kanji anyway, so it kind of makes sense if you think about it afterwards.


Does syncing more Google accounts decrease a phone's battery life? I recently got a Motorola Moto G (4.3 upgraded to 4.4.2), and I wasn't getting the battery life that my vendor claimed I would get (Through mixed usage: 2-3 hours of music, some web browsing, a lot of Whatsapp, a little bit of gaming, and Wifi/mobile network completely turned off in the night (for some 8-9 hours), I barely touch 20 hours of battery life)

I was wondering whether this has got to do with the 3 google accounts that I've kept in sync for GMail and some other Google services.

I may be a bit paranoid because my previous Android phone suffered from woeful battery near the end of its life, but still I would like to know if syncing more accounts drains the battery more or not.

Short answer: yes and no.

Using three accounts won't run the battery down in itself: by far the bigger factor is how much activity there is. To take an example, Gmail uses push messages (via Google Cloud Messaging, GCM) to notify your phone of new mail, so the phone doesn't have to repeatedly poll the server for new messages for each account.

Because of this, adding a new account that never gets any email will have hardly any effect on battery use. OTOH, doubling the amount of email you get will have a much bigger effect, because GCM is waking up your phone twice as often. While adding a new account makes little difference on its own, you're probably adding the account because it's going to get mail, so you will end up using the battery more.

The same applies to other services too. Even for anything that does poll instead of using GCM, Android is clever enough to do all the polling tasks at the same time, to avoid repeatedly waking up your phone. This means that checking two accounts uses a little more battery than checking one, but less than twice as much: again, the amount of work it's doing each update (how much data it's fetching) is a bigger factor.

To address your particular situation, I'd guess that the background updates on your phone aren't using nearly as much battery as the foreground things you're doing. Don't forget you check the battery use of each app in the device settings.


I cannot Write or move any apps to my SD card I bought a 16GB SD card for my cheap android phone a few days ago and have been trying everything to get apps onto it with no success.
The phone is model is a ZTE Fit 4G running KitKat 4.4.4, and yes, I have already rooted the device to allow write access to SD card with kingroot. Any suggestions?

The default install location can be changed using the adb shell pm command. The command is: adb shell pm set-install-location 2. The three options for set-install-location are 0 (auto), 1 (internal), and 2 (external). This can cause applications to break or other behavior that is undesirable. You can view this information by typing adb shell pm at the terminal. Side note: you can check what the current default install location is by typing adb shell pm get-install-location.


Nexus 6P adapter confusion I just received a new Google Nexus 6P, and the included power adapter is something I have never seen. It has diagonal pins, so I am unable to plug into any outlets (I am in the US). Is this some kind of international adapter? Or am I missing something obvious?

Thank you.

Direct Answer

You got an ac adapter meant for a different part of the globe as wbogacz stated, but if you still have the adapter from the Nexus or well any device just about you should be able to use it with no problems.  You may be able to look in the packaging and many ac adapters sent these days can be converted (usually the plug face slides away and you can grab another plug face (meant for that charger not another) and slide the US plug face on to it if they shipped it with your device and it just has a different plug adapter connected to it.

Possible Immediate Solution

I use my Nexus 7 tablet ac adapters to charge my Battery backup pack, my phone, my ps4 controller and a good number of other USB devices.  If you look at the label of an adapter you have as long as it says it does an Output of no more than 2 amps than the vast majority of devices will be OK with using it (some newer devices have fast charge and their chargers may read up to 5v while devices and the charger should be able to handle that if you want to be safer I do not use USB AC Adapters on devices that do not fast charge (when plugged in the lock screen will read charging, charging rapidly, or charging slowly (rare)) that have outputs above 2A.

Easiest solution (though slower charge)

If totally unsure you can always connect the USB cable to a computer USB port and that will almost never cause any issues (though it will only slowly charge most devices).

Tech Notes

I can plug my fast charging phone in to a 2amp charger and it will still read charging quickly this does not mean the charger is unsafe for use with other devices just that the device is still capable of fast charging when connected to it.

How to be absolutely sure a charger is safe for a bettery

You can also be detailed and look at your physical battery (or documentation if it is sealed and you can not see the actual battery) and there will be a label mentioning input Volts if the charger label OUTPUT voltage is equal to or less than the stated INPUT voltage on the battery label you are definitely SAFE to use that charger with that device


Reverting refurbished devices to previous versions I just purchased a few refurbished Samsung (S3, S4, S5) devices from Gazelle for a testing lab I'm organizing. The product listings for each said they had Android 4.2, 4.3, and 4.4 respectively. However, when they arrived and booted up, they all appear to have 4.4.2 installed. Factory reset seems to only reset to version 4.4.2. Is there a way to (without rooting) revert the devices back to previous versions of Android?

Yes. There's a very easy way using Odin.

First, download odin from above link and also download whatever android version firmware you want from Sammobile, also download samsung drivers.
Then extract the odin archive.

Now, enable USB Debugging mode from developer options on your phone

Backup everything from phones. Data will be erased.

Now run odin and click on PDA button and point it to firmware file downloaded in earlier step.

Switch off your device completely. After that, turn your device on in download or Odin mode. This can be done by simultaneously holding the power button+volume down+home button on your phone. You should now be in download mode (it should say Downloading.... Do not turn off Target!).

Connect phone to pc using usb now. Once connected, the ID:COM section in Odin should turn to light blue. This means that the device has been connected and is ready for flashing. If it doesn't show any response, you may need to reinstall drivers.

Make sure "Auto Reboot" and "F.Reset Time" are enabled and disable every other option.

Click on Start in odin and wait a while, it may take sometime. Once done, it should say Success.

Finally boot the phone, first boot may take a while so wait atleast for 20mins by watch.

Perform these steps separately for every phone one by one.
Good luck, and hope it helps :)


How can I take and email a picture (to the same address every time) in as few clicks as possible? The best I can achieve so far is to use AutoShare (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.dngames.autoshareg). I take the photo, share to autoshare, and it's done. It would be great to be able to snap the picture and have it automatically sent via email, avoiding the share step. Is there any way to do this?

Do you really need it to go through email? If you have a recent enough version of Android and Google+, you can enable Instant Upload to automatically sync all the photos and videos you take to Google+, they will initially be set to private but you can of course set to share them with specific people(s) or make them public easily.

There are also some apps that can sync the photos and videos you take to Google Drive or Dropbox or other cloud storage provider. The official Dropbox app provides Camera Upload feature, and I'm sure there are other cloud storage providers that have similar feature either by using their official app or third party app.


My bluetooth headphone is paired however sound is still from my phone? I paired my bluetooth to my phone. Then I pair it also to my computer.

I turned on my headphone. I wonder where it will pair too? To my computer or to my headphone?

In any case both my computer and my smartphone say that the bluetooth is paired.

Screenshot (click to enlarge)

So it's paired. However, no sound would show up on my headphone.

Usually I turned on my headphone and I will be listening to my smartphone sound right away. Now it isn't.

Can Bluetooth device connect to several devices at once? Is that where the confusion is?

Can Bluetooth device connect to several devices at once? Is that where
  the confusion is?

Yes, but you can play sound from only one of the connected devices at a point in time, not both.

For example, my SBH80 headphone from Sony supports connecting two or three devices to it. But there's a catch. You could only listen to sound coming from the device that connected to the headphone first. In other cases, none will play through the headphone. Some headphones are kinda designed to play sound in a first-come-first-serve approach. Others get confused, and don't play anything at all.

To get your music playing, ensure only one device is connected to the headset.

  Usually I turned on my headphone and I will be listening to my
  smartphone sound right away. Now it isn't.

This is happening because your computer probably connected to headphone first. Disconnect PC and sound should resume automatically. If it doesn't automatically, re-pair (not take to the repair shop!) the headphone with the phone.


MediaTek K80 is stuck , computer store tells me the firmware chip is corrupted To start with I did a factory reset to wipe out my files and apps before giving my tablet to my niece.
After the reset the tablet is stuck at the screen with the android guy in the corner and MEDIATEK across the screen. it will not boot any further. I took the tablet to a repair store and 3 days later he tells me the chip is corrupted and he cant(be bothered?) do anything because its a Chinese clone?
I have researched many sites but cannot find a scatter file or rom image etc.. the following is  what I have found inside my tablet:
On a stickered chip:
E960 V1.2 YK18091021
6580A/WA/1+16/3G/B15
GXQ 2018/09/26
DL_BT_MM_QC_

ALSO, TAKEN FROM "ABOUT TABLET" :
Android Version:7.0
Android Security Patch level: 1Feb.2016
Baseband version:  MOLY.WR8.W1449.MD.WG.MP.V23, 2017/05/16  17:00
Kernel version:
3.18.19
c@c-S2600JF #2
ThuOct11 17:29:47 cst 2018
Build Number:
MRA58K test-keys
Custom Build version:
E960v1.1_HJC_03_3G_HBOE_FL_WXGA_bigbattery_4_64

I am completely lost and would really appreciate any help possible.
Thank you in advance,
John Sweeney

The kernel version 3.18.19 is correlative with Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow, which also correlates with Security Patch level. The ROM is built userdebug test-keys so this is most likely (ported) custom ROM.
Looking for baseband version there are lot of different 'brands' for several phones or tablets, which is unusual.
What they have in common these are low-budget devices running entry-level MT6580 processor with serial number 0123456789ABCDEF in fastboot mode.
Indeed this looks like a typical chinese clone device often with fake android version and/or fake hardware specs (see #40386).
Nevertheless factory reset will not have such negative impact, only cache + userdata partition is formatted which does not harm the firmware/ROM.
The best source for 'stock' ROM is your device itself. Do a read back with SP Flash Tool and create your own scatter file with WwR MTK

check that device has unlocked bootloader and/or adb root access in recovery mode. download platform-tools and enter recovery/bootloader mode with volume keys
in bootloader mode factory reset by formatting cache + userdata from fastboot
fastboot devices
fastboot oem unlock
fastboot format cache
fastboot format userdata

in recovery mode formatting cache + userdata from adb shell with mke2fs (where mmcblkp1p99 is placeholder for partition number of the block device)
adb devices
adb shell ls -l /dev/block/*/*/*/by-name
adb shell mke2fs -t ext4 /dev/block/mmcblkp1p99

Reboot your device and wait a long time. device is encrypted on first boot, that might take up to 15 minutes


Too old to custom-rom? So I got the notion to install cyanogen mod on my old samsung galaxy tab 2 10.1. To speed it up, get it running nougat, and get back into the swing of dabbling with Android software.

The rooting process was simple, but it doesn't seem like I'm able to find what I need in order to get Lineage OS on my Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 I can't find the proper tools.

Is it possible for a device to simply be too old to flash a custom rom? Or am I missing an important resource?

If anyone could shed some light, I'd appreciate it.

XDA is the de facto "standard" for roms, especially on common devices like this, but it seems they are struggling to bring Nougat to this device in reading some of these threads. I would suggest watching them and in the mean time find a stable Marshmallow ROM, there seems to be several for this device at the same link I mentioned earlier.

It's not about being "too old" per se, but more if the binary blobs and drivers available from the manufacturer can be incorporated into a new ROM and specifically it's kernel. After a while they just become incompatible and unsupported and outside of the realm of developers to effectively adjust the base source to work.


Firefox 48 for Android Disabled "Add to Reading List" on Long Press In Firefox on Android prior to version 48.0, I used to be able to long press on a link and select "Add to reading list" from the pop-up menu. In version 48.0, the option has been removed? Why?

I sure hope the answer isn't that Mozilla was getting flack from advertisers who were upset that people could bypass the real page and just read the article content (imagine that!).

go to reading page
look for book icon in address bar
switch to reader view
press add to bookmarks

It will be placed in the reading list.


"Select All" from Contacts in WhatsApp In WhasApp, is there any button for "Select All" from Contacts; in order that one single message goes to all?

Well, nope there isn't any select all option available over the WhatsApp, rather than it has the feature called Broadcast messages !

To Broadcast the message:

  Open up WhatsApp.
  Tap over the three dots available on top right side of the screen.
  Now Select the option "BroadCast Message".
  Tap over the + button to add recipient name over the Broadcast list.
  Next thing to do is tap over the continue button.

Like, the above user said that, presently it has a limit of 256 broadcast limit.

You can also refer to the WhatsApp Support Section for the same.


How to boot the Mele A1000 in recovery mode I installed CWM on my Mele A1000 and I was able to reboot into recovery mode
using adb.

At which point I got the CWM menu where I was able to install files from SD, wipe cache etc...
After installing all the files (Cyanogen) I rebooted, now when the device starts all I see is the Cyanogen splash screen for a few minutes and then a message indicating:

  Encryption Unsuccessful. Encryption was interrupted and can't
  complete. As a result the data on your tablet is no longer accessible.

  To resume using your tablet, you must perform a factory reset. When
  you set up your tablet after the reset ....

This message looks like it's part of the standard Android system.

Since CWM is installed I should be able to access it in order to install something
else,but I cannot figure out how to reboot in recovery/cwm mode. There is no hardware button other than the power button on the Mele A1000

Once the encryption screen comes up, Android may have gotten far enough in the bootprocess for the adb server to start. If you have adb set up on the computer, check and see if the computer can recognize the phone by typing adb devices. If you see device with a serial number, then just simply type adb reboot recovery. (If you don't have adb, there are several guides that can be found via Google that explain how to get it set up.)


How to change the default contact saving location for HTC Desire HD 2.2.1? How to set HTC Desire HD Android 2.2.1 to save new contacts to Exchange? With Samsung Galaxy S 2.2.1 it's super easy: Contacts > Menu > More > Settings > Save new contacts to...

But with HTC Desire HD 2.2.1?

According to the manual of your phone, you can't set a default save location, but on page 49, it's mentioned that if you use "People", you are prompted to select the desired location for the new contact:

From the Home screen, tap "menu" > "People".

On the "All" tab, tap "Add contact".

Select the "Contact type", for example Google or Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync.
This determines which account the contact will sync with. For more information,
see “Ways of getting contacts into your phone” in this chapter.

In the Name field, enter the first and last name of the contact, then tap OK.

Enter the contact information in the fields provided.
Press "BACK" if you want to close the onscreen keyboard first and easily scroll
through the other fields.

Tap "Save".


Phone app: what does the blue forbidden sign (with optional blue "A" in front) mean in the call log? I have the following question concerning the Samsung Galaxy SIII:

When one taps Phone -> Logs it is possible to see the following icons:

Incoming calls which were answered and received text messages
(icon displays a green arrow pointing to the left)
(clicking entry displays date and time call was received
or text message was received and call duration for calls)
Incoming calls which were not answered
(icon displays a white arrow bouncing to the left off a red phone receiver)
(clicking entry displays date and time call was received
and displays the text "Missed")
Outgoing calls
(icon displays an orange arrow pointing to the right)
(android phone app does not differentiate outgoing calls which were answered
from outgoing calls which were not answered, but clicking on the entry displays
call duration for calls which were answered or the text "Canceled" for calls
which were not answered)

However, I am not sure what the following mean in the Phone application:

icon displays blue circle with diagonal line through it
(clicking on this entry displays a date and time and the text "Canceled")
icon displays blue circle with diagonal line through it
with blue uppercase "A" in front of it
(clicking on this entry displays a date and time and the text "Canceled")

What is the difference between these two icons?

Thanks.

The five different possible icons I mentioned appear in the following screenshot (contact names and phone numbers scribbled-out, click to enlarge):

The icon that displays a blue circle with diagonal line through it in the Phone app's Log tab appears when the user receives a call and manually rejects it with a swipe when the phone rings. As soon as the user swipes to reject the call, the caller will hear the tone of the phone call change from a ringing signal to a busy signal.
The icon that displays a blue circle with diagonal line through it and a blue "A" in front of it in the Phone app's Log tab appears when the user receives a call but the caller has been added to the reject list from the Contacts app. In this case the caller will never hear a ringing signal and will hear a busy signal as soon as the call is made, and the receiving party will not hear the phone ringing since the contact was added to the reject list of course. The blue A in front of the blue circle with a diagonal line through it is most likely understood to be the first letter of the word autorejected.

Regards.


Call settings will pop-up when I open a pdf So dear clever IT friends here is the thing. I am helping a nice old grandma. She has a Huawei tablet, android in it. The silly device asked when she opened a pdf file "which program would you like to use to open it". She is a nice 80 years old granny and thought she has to go with settings. So she went for it. Now when you try open any pdf file the "call settings will" pop-up instead the pdf file itself.
Any idea how I can find the path to add adobe to pdf files?

Easier solution:

Hi, the easiest solution is to uninstall and re-install the PDF viewer app from that tablet. Android starts prompting how to open that file as soon as it notices that there are new apps which can handle that file type.

Since you mentioned Adobe Reader, please uninstall it and then install it again from the Play Store. The prompt to select which app to open the PDF with will return. There you can set Adobe as the default to avoid problems in the future.

Appropriate solution:

I am keeping this as a second choice because the Android version is unknown and different OEMs can have a slightly different settings page and slightly different names for each setting item. Still, here we go:

Open Settings app.
Open Apps and Notifications (Or Apps, or something similar which conveys the same meaning).
Tap on All Apps (Can also be See all apps or not exist at all, just choose the option which takes you to the full list of apps)
Scroll down and locate the Settings app. Tap on it.
Scroll and select Advanced > Open by Default.
Finally tap on the Clear all defaults button.

This will remove the default handler for PDF files and Android should once again start offering the choice.


Is there any camera application that can save photos on internal storage? So my SD card reader is broke, and my only possibility of ever taking photos again is to use the internal memory.

The default camera option, says that no SD card was detected and if you press anything it closes. So I can't change path from there..

I have already tried camera360, but when I try to change the saving path, it doesn't do anything.

Other apps I've tried crash instantly.

If relevant, my device is a HTC Desire HD, rooted, with android 4.1 I think.

On the home screen, go to System Settings/Storage and change Default write disk to phone storage instead of SD Card.  This will solve your problem!


Screen turns off after a certain time I have a weird issue on my Samsung Galaxy Ace S5830 with baseband s5830XXKPP (bought in Mexico), whenever I'm doing anything (playing a game, using a web browser, etc), after a certain time (like a minute or so), the screen turns off, but whatever app I was using at the time stays there (sometimes I have to lock and unlock the phone to see whatever is on the screen again, and some other times, after blacking out it shows again, but brighter), it's really annoying and I'm not sure what happened (I recently upgraded from 2.3.4 to 2.3.6 and I didn't have that problem before). My brightness is set to the minimum and I've set the Screen timeout to 10 minutes. Does anybody know why this happens and how to fix it?

Ok, I found out the reason for this problem is the band differences on the 3G:

S5830: HSDPA 900 / 2100
S5830B: HSDPA 850 / 2100
S5830L: HSDPA 850 / 1900

And the incompatibility with the current firmware I had (I updated to CyanogenMod 7.2.0 and still had the same issue), so for a quick fix, I went to:

Settings > Wireless & networks > Mobile networks > Use only 2G networks

And that took care of the issue, however, for a full solution, flashing a latin (like the Brazilian one) with a Modem file like the kp7 or kpl should take care of the problem.


Is the Samsung Galaxy S9 encrypted by default or can it be encrypted? Basically, I travel a lot with my phone and having it encrypted would be very useful in knowing that a crook wouldn't be able to gain access to my data should my phone be stolen.

I heard from one source stating that all devices running Android 6.0+ must be encrypted by default in order to be certified.

However, I also heard from a Samsung representative that they removed the option to encrypt the internal storage after Android 7.0.

What's the actual case?

I believe you are seeing correct sources on both accounts.

Android 6.0 made it compulsory if you are using Google Play Protect, this will show Certified Device in Google Play, You open the Play Store and go to settings, then scroll to the bottom, it will show you the certified status - therefore the encryption status.

It makes sense to remove the obsolete option past that point.. Android 7.0.

It may have been an unintentional oversight or the developers still required the option to automatically return true.


What is the No Sim card icon for? On Android 7, when you pull down the top bar drop-down window (Quick Settings) a grid of 3x3 icons appears with tiles like Wifi, screen rotation on/off, Aeroplane mode etc.

On my new phone with a new SIM there is an icon called "No SIM card". What is this for?

I have a dual SIM phone with only one SIM card inserted, is it there to allow me to swap them? Is there anyway to get rid of it when I only have 1 card installed?
Here is a screenshot:

Since you have pointed out that you have dual SIM phone with only one SIM card inserted, so it is obvious that given icon is a Quick Setting tile for another SIM slot, which is empty in your case, hence No SIM card.
That tile works same as another tile shown there for your inserted SIM. It takes you to SIM cards menu in Settings
If you will insert another SIM card then it will be enabled.
You can remove that icon by enabling System UI Tuner and then hide that tile by drag and drop Quick Settings tiles.


Should I redownload apps for 64bit version? I had a 32bit mobile(Snapdron 400) now i have a 64bit(625).
I have apks from the old phone.
Can I install the apks (converted downloaded apps to apk using “Es_file_explorer”) from old phone.Or I need to re-download all apps again for 64bit version?

q2 : When I download a app from google play store does it download app for “specific device”(or something) or the apk contains all the stuff?
q2.1 “Specific device”(above) - it only depends on cpu arch?

Most Andriod apps contain all the platform dependent parts (if they have such) for multiple platforms: ARM 32 (ARMv7) and 64 bit (ARMv8), x86 and sometimes even MIPS.
Therefore most likely all APK files you already have will work even on the new phone.

However the Google PlayStore allows to specify special version for certain groups of devices. But as an end user you don't know what groups the app developer has defined. You can identify such apps in the PlayStore by the download size "varies by device" (additional information section at the end).

On common example that exists in multiple versions for different devices is  Google Maps.


App updates automatically even after uninstall? I recently uninstalled an app called All in one toolbox from Nexus 7 tablet, but this morning after I finished updating the Chrome browser, in the notifications panel I can see that somehow All in one toolbox got updates, but I can't find it anywhere on the installed apps list

How did
this happen?
Or is this app still present on the tablet somewhere, and if it is, how and where do I find it?

--- EDIT ---
This app was uninstalled by long pressing on it's icon  in the main menu, and then dragging it to uninstall, if that makes any difference.

This seems to be a bug. Try this:

Open Play Store.
Navigate to My Apps, then go to the All section.
Delete the app from your account (usually by a small X in the top right corner of the list entry).

See diagram below:

If it does not give you the X to delete the app from your account, click on the app in that list and uninstall it from the app's Play Store screen.


Samsung Galaxy Nexus 4.1.2 Unable to connect to mobile network I recently purchased the handset from the US and currently using it in Vodafone (India) . I upgraded the firmware to 4.1.2 it was working fine and then all of a sudden I am not able to connect to any mobile network.

My IMEI number / Baseband version all say unknown

Is there anybody facing the same problem? Any tips to troubleshoot this problem?

Thanks

(Per originator in comments:)

Pulled battery and also did factory reset. All now works.


CamScanner: Trojan detected by ESET I usually use CamScanner to scan my documents. After updating to the last version, ESET told me I have to remove it, because this app has Trojan and it can provide remote access to the infected device. That was strange for me, and I think it's not correct. Anyway, I'm not sure. Shall I really remove CamScanner?

Uninstall the app. Google Play Store has removed it, and the company behind the app itself has accepted that an ad module was acting as a trojan. The latter claims that their new version available from their website is free from that trojan though.


Does SIM-less tablet device supports internet modem? I have SAMSUNG GALAXY TAB 3 (GT-P5210). It does not have a SIM slot and so I can't call to anyone without using VoIP software and Internet data. Does this device support external modem (eg: Huawei)?

I'm just trying to understand what your question is and give you an answer to it...

The GT-P5210 has the Wi-Fi module so it can connect to devices that create a wireless network. If the "external internet modem" you're talking about has the capability to create a wireless network then you're good to go.
If your question was something like "can I make phone call with my wifi-only tablet?" then the answer is: theoretically no. And when I say THEORETICALLY I mean that the tablet itself cannot make phone calls but there are various way to sort the thing out (voip apps just to make an example)...


How can I restore my Moto G from a bootloop caused by updating to Lollipop? I updated my Moto G (XT1032) to the new Lollipop (5.0.1, I think).  I left the phone plugged in to let it download and install, and when I came back to it after about a half hour, the phone was displaying the screen with 'Google' and an unlocked padlock on it.  I left it for another 20 minutes or so, but it stayed on the same screen.  I couldn't power it off at all, every time I tried to, the screen would turn off, but then come back on and vibrated once, only to go back to the padlock.

I ended up going through the Flashboot menu and cleared the Cache Partition, but that made no difference.  Also tried a factory reset, but that seemed to make no difference.  Currently, the phone is still sitting at the padlock screen.

The Flashboot menu says that the phone is unlocked, but I have no memory of doing this.  Maybe it's something to do with the update failing?

Just wondering if anyone has some advice on how to proceed with this.

Well, there are two ways to fix this one out:
Requirements:

You need to have a custom recovery (CWM/TWRP) installed
You are going to require Stock firmware zip file for Moto G XT1028, XT1031, XT1032, XT1033 and XT1034 which can be downloaded over here
ADB and Fastboot

Method 1:

Boot your phone into custom recovery mode. Recovery will have adb on by default, so leave recovery as it is.
Connect your phone to your PC and open command prompt and issue the command: cd directory-with-adb.exe-and-fastboot.exe
Now, issue the command: adb devices. If Moto G drivers have installed properly, the phone will show up. If not, get it over here and install it over your device
Now, from recovery wipe /data and media
Open command prompt and execute: adb push rom.zip /sdcard/rom.zip
It will take some time to install the ROM. If you face a not working SIM or WiFi, extract the downloaded ROM zip file and navigate to extracted firmware folder using cmd and issue:

fastboot flash modem NON-HLOS.bin
fastboot erase modemst1
fastboot erase modemst2
fastboot flash fsg fsg.mbn

Method 2:

Extract the downloaded firmware file to a folder.
Download and extract mfastboot and copy its content to the same folder where the extracted firmware files.
Reboot your Moto G into the Bootloader Mode. To do so, turn off your phone and then press and hold the Volume (-) and Power buttons simultaneously for a few seconds.
Connect your phone to your PC via USB cable.
Now, launch a command window from inside the firmware folder (click shift key, right click and select open command window here option).
In the command window, issue the following commands one by one:

mfastboot flash boot boot.img
mfastboot flash recovery recovery.img
mfastboot flash system system.img_sparsechunk.0
mfastboot flash system system.img_sparsechunk.1
mfastboot flash system system.img_sparsechunk.2
mfastboot flash modem NON-HLOS.bin
mfastboot erase modemst1
mfastboot erase modemst2
mfastboot flash fsg fsg.mbn
mfastboot erase cache
mfastboot erase userdata
mfastboot reboot

Note: If firmware includes four system.img_sparsechunk or you do not want to erase the userdata, you can modify the command.
You have now successfully installed a fresh ROM on your Moto G and the phone the phone should work as usual.
Also, depending on which version you are going to and from, you may need to try using the standard fastboot rather than mfastboot.
Source: [GUIDE] Restore softbricked phone after Lollipop update over on the XDA Developers forum, specifically post 1 and post 14.


Why `fastboot devices` fails in USB debugging mode and Downloading... -mode? I enable developer mode in the phone, usb debugging and smart bootloader.
I do where successfully boot to bootloader such that I see Android mascot with the text Downloading... target Do not turn off!! but I cannot get any ID from fastboot devices

root@masi:/home/masi# fastboot devices
root@masi:/home/masi# adb reboot bootloader
* daemon not running. starting it now on port 5037 *
* daemon started successfully *
root@masi:/home/masi# fastboot devices
root@masi:/home/masi# fastboot devices

I have successfully completed the stages before in Windows 10, but Ubuntu 16.04 and Debian 8.x cause problems.

Phone: Samsung Galaxy S4 gt-i9506
OS: CyanogenMod Temasek february/2016
Recovery: TWRP 2.8.x

PC: Asus Zenbook UX303UA
OS: Debian 8.5

The part of the Android bootloader that usually features the fastboot server is called aboot.

As explained in this article, the standard aboot derives from the Little Kernel (LK) project. Almost any phone manufacturer then customized it and created its own bootloader. Follows an excerpt from the abovementioned article:

  All Bootloaders I've checked (including Samsung's and Amazon's) seem
  to derive from LK (in fact printing out the "welcome to lk\n\n" from
  its kmain), though Amazon's take steps to disable fastboot, as does
  Samsung, which then uses their own custom App, called Odin.

In short, there's no way to use fastboot with Samsung devices. Only Odin is recognized (by the Loke component).


How to browse Internet in Samsung Galaxy Fit using Broadband in Windows 7? I have a Samsung Galaxy Fit smartphone and want to browse the web on it using BroadBand connection (the one i use for my pc connection to Internet) in Windows 7.

From everything I have read about this topic, it is possible to do on a linux machine, but not with a windows machine. this could be because of something with ADB on windows, or the USB drivers for windows.

Here is the info (note that this reference was done with a Nexus One):

Requirements:

Android 2.2 (or an older version with a root tethering app)
ADB from Android SDK, or a rooted Android 2.2 with terminal in root mode

STEP 1:
Device: Connect USB cable and activate USB Tethering. You should see on linux new network interface.

STEP 2:
On Linux Computer, setup a bridge:

usb0 is the new network intreface
eth0 is the main interface connected to internet (or a gateway)

$ sudo ifconfig eth0 0.0.0.0
$ sudo ifconfig usb0 0.0.0.0
$ sudo brctl addbr br0
$ sudo brctl addif br0 eth0
$ sudo brctl addif br0 usb0
$ sudo ifconfig br0 up
$ sudo dhclient br0

See Network Connection Bridge Help to setup bridges

STEP 3:
Setup usb0 interface of your phone. You have to options:

From your computer, execute:

./adb shell netcfg usb0 dhcp
Or in a root terminal on your phone, type:

su
netcfg usb0 dhcp

You should now be able to connect to Internet on your phone using your computer's Internet connection.

Try to do a ping www.google.com to be sure

STEP 4:

To shut down the reverse-tethering, first unbridge interfaces on your computer:

$ sudo ifconfig eth0 down
$ sudo ifconfig usb0 down
$ sudo ifconfig br0 down
$ sudo brctl delbr br0
$ sudo ifconfig eth0 up
$ sudo dhclient eth0

Then on your phone, uncheck the USB Tethering option


Can't set Android emulator date - stuck on 1/1/1970 I am having trouble manually setting the date on my android emulator.

I am using an ARM AVD which is running on a Windows 10 Virtual Machine (no Intel HAXM available), and the emulator is being run with the "-gpu swiftshader" option.

I tried setting the date both from the Android UI (the settings menu) and from the shell (adb date -s command with root privileges) with no success. The date keeps beeing stuck on 1/1/1970.

I Also tried changing my AVD's and the Android versions. I tried it on Android versions 2.3, 4.2, and 4.4. None of them worked.

What might be the problem? Any ideas?

I use Eclipse Oxygen.3a Release (4.7.3a)
I had the same problem.
I resolved checking "Snapshot" in Emulator Options (in Android Virtual Device Manager).
When you launch the Emulator you'll see your current date and time.


Can I leave it plugged in for charge all the time? -Samsung Galaxy 3 I5801 In short my question is -
What is the battery level at which it starts charging again Samsung Galaxy 3 I5801 device when kept plugged in for charge all the time?

If you want to know background and why I ask this, read whole question below.

This question is based on below answer
Do I have to charge my phone before I use it the first time?

  Can I leave it plugged in all the
  time? Yes, and no. This is very
  dependent on whom makes your device.
  For example, my Lenovo laptop will not
  apply a charge to the battery unless
  it is under 97%. When it does charge
  the battery it charges directly to
  100%, then stops until the battery
  sags below 97%. Many laptops did not
  do this, on most just applying charge
  if it is not 100%. This would put the
  battery through thousands of charge
  cycles in a week when you are not
  using the battery. This ages a battery
  quickly.

  If your phone maker took the time and
  paid the extra cash then your phone
  will stop charging once it reaches
  full charge and just power the system
  from the wall outlet. It is
  significantly more likely that your
  phone is charging your battery on a
  short cycle and aging it thoroughly.

The answerer mentions that it depends on manufacturer. What's the answer for Android phone? Or if it depends on the Manufacturer what is the battery level at which it starts charging again Samsung Galaxy 3 I5801 device?

So this question is specific to the device - Samsung Galaxy 3 I5801.

I don't know about your specific device/battery but here is a rather detailed article on the battery in android phones and the app used in the article to log battery information is called CurrentWidget

If the article is representative of most smart phones, which I suspect it is, to maximize your battery life your phone does an initial charge to 100% and then maintains the battery at about 93%.

My takeaway is that it is good to leave your phone plugged in and charging when you can but it is not good to frequently plug and unplug your phone.


Customising a custom rom I want to know is it possible to edit a custom rom from zip and then zipping it again (flashable) to a device.  Will it brick the device?
Thanx

Depends on how the ROM is packaged and what you change in it before repacking. You should be able to unpack and make edits using suitable tools for unpacking the ROM.

A better option is to first flash it, then root and make your changes in the files as needed :-)

And yeah it can brick the device if you flash bad code


Why does my phone consume megabytes of traffic when idle? I have installed Traffic Monitor to check how much data is transferred between my phone and the rest of the world. The traffic is categorized by application, but there is also the category "system traffic", to which all uncategorizable traffic belongs. Strangely enough, the "system traffic" consumes the lion share: 2 of 2.8 MB within several hours of idling (over wireless LAN).

Skype is off, only E-mail (K-9 + standard client), the news+weather widget and the browser are running. For these apps, a consumption of 0.8 MB is shown. Still a lot, but I can handle these. Apart from these: Traffic Monitor, Settings, Google Services (what's that for precisely?) and the Android keyboard.

What is responsible for the rather heavy traffic here? What are typical "traffic eaters" that could fall into the "system traffic" category? Is there a way to disallow communication while the phone is not used (blank display)?

Purpose: Estimate the required data volume or enable a pay-per-data connection. This question on monitoring is related, too.

Just a guess, but: I imagine the built-in Google apps (gmail, contacts, calendar) are the culprits.  Try turning off "Account Sync" in settings.


8GB Nextbook8 only showing .98GB internal storage Running 4.4.2 KitKat. Does the OS really take up 7GB? I've only got like 5 games downloaded and already running out of space for apps. :(

and welcome to the Android Enthusiasts Stack Exchange.

Android partitions are an odd subject, especially when you're used to Windows-esque devices.  Android runs on a version of Linux, and it's root directories are split up into partitions on your device.  When a manufacturer says their device is 8GB, they mean exactly that - in total, you have 8GB.

All the Linux partitions on your device each have their own allotment of storage space.  For example, /recovery may take 200MB, /cache may take 1GB, etc etc.  Long story short is this: with an 8GB tablet, yes, the OS will take up a substantial amount of storage space.  I'm guessing you have around 1GB free to install applications.


How to avoid silent app installations I have gone through this post Silent app installation wherein it clearly mentions it's highly impossible to self install the application without going through the whole installer proceedure.But when i read this one
Remotely Installing Unwanted Apps on Devices
i didn't understand how this is even possible

I am aware of the android applications run in a sand box environment so one application cannot install/interfere another until and unless it has an process Id or something/referencing and also should have the user permissions to do so but with the recent silent app installation  by some OEM is making me doubt about this security issue.

When one app can then why can't other apps follow suit .

Please avoid answers like don't use Internet at all/root the phone/stop purchasing the devices of that particular make ,company.
The above link might help in some clear understanding

The only way to be sure is using an firewall or manually read every permission for every app installed on your phone and use an permission revoker app both requires root.

You will search for any app that have the permission "download files without notification" and either revoke that permission (it might cause some bugs) or either just block them out of the internet using an firewall like AFWall+


Android - “SIM card doesn't allow a connection to this network” ERROR I have a problem with my Xperia X10 (U20i). I purchased it new. It worked fine for a week or so, then I switched to another network operator. When I try to connect automatically it says "Registered on network" but there is no signal. I changed 3 sim cards so far. Still the same. When I put the sim card in another phone that also works, the other phone manages to find the signal. I put back the sim card in my Xperia, it works fine until for some reason I have no signal and the circle continues. I love my phone, I want it to work, with this provider.

I am very annoyed. The network provider doesn't know what could it be, they blame the phone. But the phone works with other providers with no problem so I assume it is something else.

I did a factory settings restore, I checked for updates.

I want to fix it, this issue drives me crazy and I don't want to let it go, I want to FIX it.

I think I am answering little late, but I feel my pointers might solve the issue. But still not sure.

Please check in what mode you are ? I mean are you in WCDMA only, GSM only or GSM / WCDMA preferred mode ? The best for both 3G and 2G could be GSM / WCDMA preferred mode which can switch the signal based on the 2G or 3G network. So try to change to other modes also(GSM only(For 2G only signals) or WCDMA only(For 3G only signals)).

If still no help then follow the next step.

Backup all your data to SDCard or PC and try Factory data reset. Don't do the Settings reset. Because it will do a reset of other things(Like display, Volume, etc). Factory data reset option do a reset of all the things in your phone. So make sure that all the data in your phone(Contacts, Call Log, SMS, MMS, Market Applications, etc) backed up properly.

If still no help take the phone to a nearest Sony Ericsson Customer Care center.


Galaxy S3 high RAM consumption even on idle I have a Galaxy S3 International Version, without any modification whatsoever-- no rooting, no nothing. It is as good as a stock phone with a few Play Store apps.
However, of late, I have begun experiencing problems

I do not have background processes (of my own) running and even then all I have left free in the RAM is usually only 300MB of the 800MB that is there. Task killers cannot free more than that.

I experience lag when opening settings. What I mean is this: Say I click on the Battery option under Settings. There is a visible lag between the time I press the option and when the battery information is actually displayed on the screen.

Android Version: 4.1.2
Build Number: JZO54K.I9300XXEMF6

First a few things on the symptoms:

On Unix/Linux/Android, "free RAM" is considered a "wasted resource". If RAM is not occupied by running processes themselves, the system uses it to buffer and cache other things, like the file system. This should speed things up, as usually RAM allows faster access.
For more details, please check out ram tag-wiki.
"task killers" are discussed controversely. While most (if not all) people agree they are fine to stop "rogue processes", it's certainly not their job to "free up RAM" or even "save battery". In these terms, they are rather contra-productive, as most killed processes simply restart themselves (which costs more battery than if they'd kept running, and fills up the "freed RAM" again as well).
For details on this, closer information can be found in the answers on e.g. Do I really need to install a task manager?, Do task killers actually work? and Is it advisable to run a task killer app on Android.

And finally, to the issue itself (experiencing lags). As you describe it as a problem "growing with the time" (i.e. it was not there in the beginning, but slowly became more and more visible), you will probably find some help in the answers to My device is getting slow, apps start misbehaving/crashing. What can I do?


Historical data usage on Android Pie I'm trying to check my historical data usage on my OnePlus 6 (OxygenOS 9.0.6).

I used to be able to go to the Data Usage settings and use a drop-down list at the top to select different time periods, but trying this just now it only shows me the usage since the start of my current billing cycle, with no option to show any other period.

This is not the behaviour I was expecting, so I wonder if this specific to Android Pie on my OnePlus 7, or has Android Pie (or earlier) removed the ability to display data usage history.

Noticing that my billing cycle start date was wrong, I corrected it and found that the usage data shown now goes back to the start of the new billing cycle start date, so obviously it stores more data than is displays.

If more history is still recorded somewhere, how can I get access to it, and how far back would the history go? I'm comfortable with using adb if necessary.

My device is not rooted, nor can it be, but I'm comfortable with using ADB if necessary.

I use this apps to monitor my data usage I found it useful. You should try if you want.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.internet.speed.meter.lite&hl=en&referrer=utm_source%3Dgoogle%26utm_medium%3Dorganic%26utm_term%3Dinternet+monitor+android&pcampaignid=APPU_1_6egZXfunKIv6wAP8_ovoCA

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.glasswire.android&hl=en&referrer=utm_source%3Dgoogle%26utm_medium%3Dorganic%26utm_term%3Dglasswire&pcampaignid=APPU_1_segZXchYxdb5BvHunLAF


Some applications won't connect to the internet via 3G after rooting my phone I have initially a Motorola moto g xt1039 with Android 4.4.4

I have rooted the phone by following this guide.

The phone works normal, I am able to connect to the internet via Wi-Fi.

Some applications such as Google Play and Twitter are able to connect since I can install apps and refresh my Twitter feed by using the 3G connection.

I've been also able to ping to 8.8.8.8 and to www.google.com by using the terminal emulator.

Furthermore, sharing the 3G connection through Wi-Fi works as well, I've been able to use the shared connection from my Laptop PC.

The very confusing problem is that some applications such as chrome, firefox, Gmail, and Youtube are unable to connect when using the 3G connection.

These applications start, keep loading for a while and then show an error message, usually "unable to load" or "connection timeout".

What is going on here, how to troubleshoot this issue?

The problem was that a bogus proxy was set for the Mobile Data Connection I was using.

Removing the bogus proxy configuration solved the issue!

Here is a guide to Mobile data connection proxy setting.


Google Now accessing Exchange Contacts I just migrated to Android (kitkat 4.4.2) from an iPhone and need to set up Exchange Email on it for work.  On the iPhone, I simply use Siri and it can dial numbers from my contacts.  However, Google Now does not seem to be able to access these contacts in Exchange.  Is there a reasons for it?  Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks

Have you synchronized the contacts ? I mean can you see your contacts in your dial ? Also make sure you enable the "recognize contacts"( it may be a little different option) in google now


how to really permanently delete everything on samsung s4 active? I will give my phone to technical service due to a problem on battery. I am a little paranoid about technical service employee and don't trust them in terms of personal privacy.

I read that factory reset does not permanently remove everything on phone:
http://blog.avast.com/2014/07/09/android-foreniscs-pt-2-how-we-recovered-erased-data/.

I would like to delete everything on phone in a way that in which even high level forensic recovery softwares can't recover anything.

By the way, i am not an expert user on android so please describe the solution in detailed form.

Here are the steps -

1) Power off your device completely.

2) Press and hold Volume Up, Home and Power buttons simultaneously.

3) Select wipe data/factory reset and Wipe cache

Here's a Video for further help - www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNfRb13i7vI


1.5 GB in space used for system without installing any apps after using super su-me Hello everyone I used to have kingroot installed on my device and for some reason I thought it will be better to have super su so I downloaded super su-me and as promised it did remove king root and installed super su but after that I found the available storage for my device going from 1.2 GB to 18mb and I found that space was used in system as I found that the space used for system files increased from 3.3 to 5 GB so what happened and how I can undo this and. Any solution will be appreciated

Things I have tried:
1-Factory reset(it removed super su and king root so I installed king root again and space of system remain bigger)

Did you completely wipe everything with TWRP yet?

Also, what type of phone do you have?

I suggest XDA for all of your questions, sounds like you may not have discovered it yet, since you are using Kingo Root.


How can I set a custom screen resolution for my Android TV box? I am trying to use a new-ish Android TV box with an old projector. The devices in question are an M8 Android media player and an Optoma EP719 projector.

https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B00KNL4GLK
http://www.projectorcentral.com/Optoma-EP719.htm

The media player is connected to the projector through an HDMI to DVI adapter. The media player is rooted and I have adb access to it over the network. It is running Android 4.4.

The problem I am having is this:

Part of the image is repeated on the right side. This does not appear in screenshots. I believe this is due to the 16:9 aspect ratio of the resolution. Technically this resolution should work, but in any case my preferred solution (and I hope the easier one) is to set the resolution to 1280x1024. I know this works with my raspberry pi already, though I have a similar distortion when trying to set it to 720p resolution.

The problem is, I can't seem to set the resolution to this value. I am able to select resolutions by going to Settings > Display, toggling HDMI auto-detect off, and picking from a list of HDMI resolutions but neither 1280x1024 nor any other resolutions commonly available for monitors but not televisions are listed. I can choose, e.g., 480p, 720p, and 1080i all of which should work with this projector, but all cause some manner of distortion (usually stretching one side of the screen way out instead of duplicating it).

I've tried to manually set the resolution with a few different apps and via the CLI with wm size as in the related question Change the screen resolution to 1024x768 on Samsung Galaxy S3. This causes the screen to become much smaller than it should be, occupying only a small portion of the screen (e.g. the top left quarter).

I've also tried setprop hw.hdmi.resolution 133 (with 133 being the code for the 1280x1024 resolution, I think) then disconnecting and reconnecting the adapter as suggested in the other related question How to change external screen resolution?. That didn't work either.

Is this possible and, if so, how can I do it? Getting the projector to handle 1280x720 resolution would also be acceptable but I am not sure whether that's a problem on the projector end or the device end.

EDIT: I tried flashing the media player with an OpenELEC image. The same issue occurred even with Kodi's resolution changer. For some reason, it insists on detecting the device as 16:9 even though it reports itself as 4:3.

I had found a similar situation using a TVbox, a was trying to change the resolution to full HD (1920x1080), the solution was:

Activate the Android as developer mode on TVBOX, via USB to USB cable execute the following command via command prompt:

adb shell wm size 1920x1080 #To change resolution into FullHD

or

adb shell wm size 1280x720 #To change resolution into HD

Reboot the device (adb reboot)


Why file managers badly recognizes SD cards If I am understanding well...file managers mostly title some part of file system as "SD card" despite the fact that it is not SD card, or even sometimes when the phone doesn't have a slot for SD card at all (this happens for example on Nexus 5x). It's not just one or two file manager, but lots, so I think it is more Android like "problem".
So I am asking: What is the reason?

This is done so that on a device without a removable SD Card 1 - you'd still be able to copy files to and from the device, and 2 - user's data can be stored separately from system and app data.

Regardless if a specific device has a removable SD Card, Android sets aside part of its internal memory that is reserved for user's media such as photos, music, movies, books etc.  That is the area that becomes visible to a computer when you connect the device via USB cable, and is commonly referred to as "internal SD Card" for the sake of simplicity.  If a device has a removable SD Card, you will have another area that is visible to a computer, and that is referred to as "external SD Card."

On older versions of Android internal SD Card was set up as a separate partition, and formatted as a variation of Fat/Fat32 type so that it could be accessible as a UMS device.  On newer Android versions there's some behind-the-scenes logic happening to expose internal SD Card to computers via MTP protocol instead.

Most Android file managers will show both internal memory, and the external card if one is present.


How to put checkmarks on a checklist in Google Docs Note: This question is specifically about Google Docs on Android, not Google spreadsheet on Android.

Instructions from this page shows how to insert a checklist using the Android app or Google Docs. I was able to follow those instructions on the Google Docs Android app, however, I need to then quickly and easily check off each item. The instructions on that webpage are given for a desktop web interface, because it refers to clicking the right mouse button and selecting an operation, but how do I do that within the Google Docs Android app? Is this impossible?

I currently believe the answer is "no", but I hope someone will prove me wrong about that.

As you know, the checkmark bullet list is not available on Google Docs's Android version.
A not elegant workaround is to insert the checkmark character yourself then realign it.

Use one of the many keyboard apps that provide unicode characters (I used this). Search for checkmark, copy and then paste it on your document. Then realign it to be on the same column than the real bullets as shown on the image.

Disclaimer: I am just a use of the linked app.