Cryptfs : unmounting /data failed: Device or resource busy I am trying to encrypt my rooted Nexus 5 (running CyanogenMod 13/Marshmallow).
Here is how I am doing:

With the phone running and connected to USB, make sure that /mnt/asec/ is empty
Long-press the power physical button, this makes the Power off dialog pop up
Long-press the "Power off" option of the pop up, confirm that you want to reboot in Safe Mode
Without starting any app, run adb shell on the computer then su to get root then pkill -KILL daemonsu to kill the SuperSU daemon
Settings > Security > Encrypt phone, confirm
The phone reboots, from the computer type adb logcat

Here is what I see:

I ServiceManager: service 'drm.drmManager' died
D libEGL  : loaded /vendor/lib/egl/libEGL_adreno.so
D libEGL  : loaded /vendor/lib/egl/libGLESv1_CM_adreno.so
D libEGL  : loaded /vendor/lib/egl/libGLESv2_adreno.so
I Adreno-EGL: <qeglDrvAPI_eglInitialize:379>: QUALCOMM Build: 09/02/15, 76f806e, Ibddc658e36
E BootAnimation: couldn't find audio_conf.txt
W BootAnimation: Audio service is not initiated.
D BootAnimation: Use save memory method, maybe small fps in actual.
D BootAnimation: Use save memory method, maybe small fps in actual.
E Cryptfs : unmounting /data failed: Device or resource busy
E Cryptfs : Bad magic for real block device /dev/block/platform/msm_sdcc.1/by-name/metadata
W vold    : type=1400 audit(0.0:19): avc: granted { read } for name="mmcblk0p28" dev="tmpfs" ino=6735 scontext=u:r:vold:s0 tcontext=u:object_r:userdata_block_device:s0 tclass=blk_file
W vold    : type=1400 audit(0.0:20): avc: granted { read open } for name="mmcblk0p28" dev="tmpfs" ino=6735 scontext=u:r:vold:s0 tcontext=u:object_r:userdata_block_device:s0 tclass=blk_file
W vold    : type=1400 audit(0.0:21): avc: granted { ioctl } for path="/dev/block/mmcblk0p28" dev="tmpfs" ino=6735 ioctlcmd=1260 scontext=u:r:vold:s0 tcontext=u:object_r:userdata_block_device:s0 tclass=blk_file
D Cryptfs : Just asked init to shut down class main
W vold    : emulated unmount requires state mounted
E Cryptfs : unmounting /data failed: Device or resource busy
W SocketClient: write error (Broken pipe)
W SocketClient: Unable to send msg '200 8 -

At that point the CyanogenMod loading screen keeps animating for 10+ hours and probably forever if I don't stop it. Pressing the Power physical button for 5 seconds makes it reboot and start normally this time. Obviously encryption has not been performed.

I tried the whole procedure twice.

What could be causing this Cryptfs : unmounting /data failed: Device or resource busy problem?

As I've found in this bug report, you can watch the current open files by running this command in a second shell:

while true; do lsof | grep /data; sleep 0.2; done

This checks every 0.2s which files are still in use on /data. In my case it was chainfire's SuperSU, which had a logfile opened.

Additionally, I've found out that a 2nd SDCard partition was mounted to /data/sdext2:

mount | grep "/data"

This was due to an app "Link2SD". With this command I was able to figure out, where the mounting happens:

adb shell
# make system partition writable
mount -o remount,rw /system
grep -R "/data/sdext2" /system

I've commented the "mount" commands out and restartet my phone. Now encryption works fine.


Can you setup android gmail to play a sound when an email from a certain email address comes in? I have my work emails forwarded to my phone and I'd like to be able to give them precedence over emails to my gmail. Is this possible? Or can I setup my work email using POP and then use a different tone for those?

Somewhat depends on what your work email server looks like, but I have a Gmail account, two Hotmail accounts, and an MS Exchange account on my Droid and there is an option within each Accounts settings to turn on/off "Email notifications" and to choose which ringtone is used for that notification.  So, by that token, you could have your Gmail emails sound off with the default notification and have your work email play any crazy sound you like.  Does that help or am I misunderstanding your question?


How to change default PDF viewer on Nook Color? I just upgraded my Nook Color to the
new 1.2 version that supports apps.
I purchased the ezPDF Reader app
which supports bookmarks and other
advanced features for PDFs which the
default Nook Color PDF viewer does
not support.

Is there a way to make the ezPDF Reader the default PDF Viewer?

(Currently when I click on a PDF the default viewer still opens)

To Clarify:
Currently I have to open the ezPDF Reader first and then open a PDF from within the app. If I simply click on a PDF on a book shelf or on the home screen then the default PDF viewer opens the PDF. I don't see any area in settings like on a regular Android phone to modify installed apps or app settings.

Find the app that took over the PDF intent in Menu -> Settings -> Applications -> Manage applications -> All, and then tap on Clear defaults button.  Next time you click on a PDF file, it should prompt you which app to use.  Check the Use by default for this action box, and tap on ezPDF Reader.

Alternatively, you can try uninstalling and re-installing the ezPDF Reader app.  It should re-register its own intent for handling PDFs, and prompt you for an app next time you try to view one.


Can I make the weather widget depend on wifi rather than location? I upgraded from Galaxy Mega to Galaxy S6 Edge +.

The weather widget seems to depend on me turning on 'location' (which I'm guessing is the renaming of GPS). In Mega, I need only Wifi. Now, I have to turn on location.

Is there a way I can still use the weather widget to see temperature without turning location? If not, what can I use to see temperature and time using a widget way without turning on location?

Check Settings->Privacy and Security->Location->Search method->Select WiFi and mobile networks.
It's there, just named differently because you don't need GPS for location and may choose to disable that feature completely.


How do you name a folder on the home screen (Gingerbread, HTC Incredible)? I added a folder to the home screen, but it's automatically labeled "folder." If I have multiple folders, it will get confusing. How can I change the name of the folder?

Tap to open the folder, then long-press the text making up the name. That should change it to an editable field.


Sync contacts and calendar from Outlook 2010 on my laptop with Android phone, avoid data in cloud? I'm looking to buy a new Android phone, but before I do, I need to know that there's a reliable way of keeping the contacts and calendar data on the phone in sync with the data in Outlook 2010 on my laptop.  For the past 8 years I've been using windows mobile phones, where Microsoft's ActiveSync etc worked well.  Simply connecting my windows phone to my laptop via USB meant that everything almost always sync'd fine without any issues.  I'm looking to get as close to that experience as possible.

I also need to avoid putting any of my data in the cloud (e.g. gmail), because my outlook data contains too much sensitive information.  Security breaches may be highly unlikely, but the potential consequences are too dire to imagine.  One answer to this sync question (Sync setup question: will Android, Outlook 2010, Gmail, calendar and contacts sync?) has a comment which says that Android phones will always sync with google, so I need to disable that.  Is that possible?

I'm aware of Samsung's Kies, but I've never tried it.  If anyone can assure me that Kies works well for what I need then I'd be quite happy to restrict myself to buying Samsung.

I've done other research and found a pcmag.com review from Feb 2012 that suggests in general this isn't an easy problem.  However, that link (and answers that I've found here) are all over a year old, so what's a good way of achieving all this in June 2013?

You can easily turn of Google Sync for any Android phone.  Just go to Account Settings, Sync.  One problem is that whenever you get a new ROM, or Google does an update, these settings get turned back on.  So you need to check periodically.

There are a number of 3rd party sync products, with free trial periods.  Just give them a try.  You can find them online.  The best for security may be DejaOffice which has an encrypted mode to really lock down your data.


How do Antivirus for Android detects a Malware application? While researching about malware analysis for Android, I found that there are few applications that were removed from the Google Play Store because they were found to be malware.

I guess Android Antivirus applications running on a smartphone detects that these applications are malware.

Two cases:

Case: My guess is right:

I am wondering how these antivirus applications can suspect an application whether that is a malware or not.

What are the parameters they use to justify that the suspected application is a malware?
How does a real-time antivirus like Avast or Avg (for Android) works on this?
(Any link regarding this would be helpful).

Case: My guess is wrong:

Now, if these antivirus applications don't detect any application as malware, then how come these applications are removed from the Play Store?

P.S. I was able to search only about the malware applications and I could not get the answer for my question as how they are detected. Any references would be much helpful.

Your guess is wrong. Anti-virus applications on Android are completely unrelated. There are two ways that Google finds and removes dodgy apps and malware from Google Play.

Reports by users

Every Play Store page has a "report" button. Google investigates apps that are reported, whether that's for copyright or trademark issues, violating their policy about content (e.g. pornography), for breaking their other policies (e.g. invasive ads, interfering with other apps), or for being malware or scams.

Automatic scans

Google Play now automatically scans apps that are added by developers, hoping to detect dodgy apps like these before they can hurt users or cause problems. For obvious reasons, Google doesn't disclose details of what kind of scans they perform or how the technology works.

If a user has a malware app and it's detected by an anti-virus program, the user might choose to report it to Google Play themselves (if the malware came from there), but that's the only part that anti-virus apps on smartphones play in the process.


How to voice command a music player? I would like to know if is that possible to voice command music actions, like next track, and even delete track would be very nice.

My sport, rowing, doesn't allow me to interact with smartphone through hands, so, these voice commands would be extremely helpful.

In my tries, I just found listen to, which is not that interesting.

I am using Android 2.3.7 - Cyanogenmod 7.2 for Defy

I don't think you can do this with your stock player.

After some digging I found a good app for you. It's called Voice Action Music Player

See if this suits for you.


What are the files in the phoneypot directory? I am running LineageOS 17.1 Lavender. Can anyone tell me the purpose of the files located in the /phoneypot directory in my Android device?

I had an app called Haven installed on my system, and it turns out that phoneypot directory is created and used by this app. Thanks to @beeshyams for the answer to my query.


Why are apps taking up more space? I have a micromax A300 and it comes with an internal memory of around 25 GB. The problem is that my memory dedicated to installing apk file which is around 1.2 gb seems to be showing 200MB more data than the amount being used by the apps.

According to the phone I have around 464 mb of apps...

Click image for larger version

but when I click on the "apps" icon it shows:

Click image for larger version

I don't understand why it shows an excess of 200MB being occupied. It has android 4.4.2 and my phone is not rooted. Any help on how I could delete these files would be great.

The extra space is taken up by system apps so you will always see this difference. Once you root your phone and install app like Titanium backup then you can delete some of the pre packaged apps which can't be deleted otherwise.

Caution: Don't go on deleting system apps as you may face random crashes while using your phone.


ADW Launcher crashing on home screen I installed the wrong theme for ADW and now it crashes every time the home screen displays.

Since the home screen keeps crashing, I can't seem to reach the settings pannel to disable the stupid theme.

I've also tried "Safe Mode" but so far it doesn't help.

Try installing another launcher. Then press the Home key and it will ask you which launcher to use. Select the "new one". Then try going in to Settings -> Applications -> Manage Applications -> ADW and Clear the data.

You will probably also want to delete the "settings backups" that are stored on the sdcard, if you created them.

Then you should be able to switch back to ADW.

If you can't get to the market to install another launcher, you will probably have to side load i using ADB.

Or as Lie Ryan suggests, use the Market Web interface to install another launcher.


How can I prevent my media library from disappearing when I unmount the SD card? I have a rooted stock HTC Rezound and frequently connect it to the computer as a USB mass storage device.   After each time I do this, once I'm disconnected and my SD card is mounted, my media library disappears and I have to rescan my card. This appears to be related to the mounting and unmounting of the card. This has never happened under the same circumstances with other phones. Having to rescan the card is not a big deal but I have several alarms set to use mp3s and I have to rest then every time and that is a pain.

Why is this happening and how can I fix it?

It doesn't know it's different - the scanning process is how it actually checks that.  I have to say on all the Android devices I have come across (Sony Ericsson Xperia X10i, HTC Explorer, Samsung Galaxy Tab, HTC Desire, HTC Desire S, T-Mobile Rapport, Acer E210 - all with either stock ROM or the T-Mobile UK one) this process is automatic - provided you use the handset to "Turn Off USB Storage" and don't just yank the USB cable.  As it's been used in USB mass storage mode potentially any, all, or no files on the card could have been changed.

For my alarms and notifications I have created some lower quality Ogg files (e.g. making sure they are mono and at low bit rate) and added those to internal storage so they are always available while using the minimal amount of storage space on the internal memory of the device.

The rescanning does annoy me a bit though as I listen to music on my handset, so I tend to use SWIFTP (in the Android Market) which runs an FTP server on my phone - this means I can transfer files to/from my handset without having to unmount and mount the storage card and wait ten minutes while it performs a rescan.  For most purposes this is fast enough.


How to awake my hard bricked phone? I have a ubislate 3g7x. It has processor MT:8312ca and 512mb ram. it gives no reaction to power button. but still whenever i connect it to my pc, COM port is detected. but i dont know what to do here? is it that my tablet is permanently dead?

Try to remember how You used to connect it before and touch the areas of touch screen that were used back when phone responded. Perhaps it is just display that went off. This might be cheked by charging - if during charging display is dead then it is dead (obv). But if it responds - problem might be in a touchscreen or the power button.

But for best solution try to take your device to a service centre.


How to use speech-to-text offline? When online

When I am connected to Wi-Fi, I am able to say "Okay Google" from any screen and it will automatically start a voice search for me and look up whatever I say. I am also able to manually start a voice search by tapping the microphone button at the top of my homescreen on the right side of the Google search bar, and my phone will search for anything I say. Lastly, when I am using the on-screen keyboard to type I can hit the small microphone button in the corner and speak whatever I want to type (which it will instantly change to text, but I have to hit the "x" with my finger to make it stop).

When offline

When I go offline (not connected to Wi-Fi or data), however, things start getting weird. I can bring down the white pull-down menu for voice search by saying "Okay Google," but after I am finished talking it will stay stuck loading on "Recognizing" for a while, until finally it will say "Can't Reach Google at the moment" (see image 2).

After messing around with things for a while, I finally got it so that when I am offline and hit the microphone button on the keyboard, I can speak my sentence and then after an absurdly long wait it will translate it into text (I don't know if this is normal or just my phone).

What I've tried/what my specs are

I have a Moto-X (second gen.). My OS is fully updated (as far as I'm aware – Android 5.1.1), and I have the most recent version of the Google app (version 5.7), the most recent Google Now Launcher app (version 1.3.large), and the most recent version of the Google+ app in case that matters (version 6.9).

In my Settings>Language & input>Google Keyboard, it is set to "English (US)."

Settings>Language & input>Google voice typing, it is set to "Automatic" and inside that the "Languages" is set to "Default language: English (US)."

Settings>Language & input>Google voice typing>Offline speech recognition, I have "English (US)" installed.

My Question

Why do the Google offline voice commands not work when I am offline and how do I make it work?

*Answers as to why the keyboard text-to-type takes forever when offline are appreciated to but they're not my main concern for this question. Thanks! :)

Screenshots - Click to enlarge

EDIT: As of October 2016, I got a new phone (the Moto G4 Plus) and it has the exact same problem. All the symptoms are identical and I cannot use the voice commands unless I have Internet connection, and the offline voice-to-text is really slow (still not my main concern). It has the most recent version of Marshmallow (Android 6) installed.

EDIT 2: Occurs on Android 7 now as well. But I found out it was the Google App, not the phone or OS specifically. (see answer below)

There are two apps involved in this case. First one is Voice-To-Text engine app. Other one is Google app.

The app you start by hitting the mic on keyboard is the former one. It normally relies on Internet to work, however, can be made to work offline too. I can't explain the reason of the long wait though. Maybe it tries to connect to internet first and then, when it fails, it switches back to working offline method.

The app that you start by saying Ok Google is the latter one in this case. It also uses Voice-To-Text engine in the background, however, it uses the input it receives from your microphone, directly to start a Google search. Which is impossible to perform when offline, and therefore, it fails.


Foreign phone, stuck on 2G I am currently working on a Coolpad 8150, a Chinese phone running Android 2.3.7. It is connected to T-Mobile (in the United States) and can place calls successfully. However, it is stuck on 2G. I have been lead to believe the phone supports 3G, though I may be mistaken. How may I further pursue this issue?

When I scan for networks, I only see networks marked 2G, like T-Mobile (2G).

In status, it appears I am still marked as using the China Mobile network operator.

Looking at this,

  GSM:900/1800/1900 Mhz,3G TD-SCDMA 2010-20250 MHZ

And scrolling on down a bit on that page under the 'Data Application Features'...

  Data Service  GPRS;EDGE;TD-SCDMA

That would explain it, no UMTS/HSPA/HSPA+ mentioned in the spec of that hardware, as that would be required to have T-Mobile operating to enable 3G data.

It may be basically a cheap and cheerful but crippled phone, but only for a certain market segment, if there is no supporting data protocol support such as UMTS/HSPA/HSPA+, it will fall back on 2G.


Connect to VPN without changing IP On my windows 7 laptop, when I connect to my work VPN, my IP stays the same as it was before connecting to the VPN.

However, on my android phone, when I connect to my university's VPN, my IP is different than the one provided by my carrier (I'm using a 3g connection by the way) .

Is there any way I can connect to my university's VPN and keep my carrier's IP address?

If more info is needed, let me know and I'll do my best to provide as much detail as possible.

Keeping your IP address and using a VPN is the complete opposite of what VPNs are invented for. VPNs make you part of a network through a tunnel connection so that your phone is on the same level as locally connected devices.
This means your IP address will be the one of the VPN. If you don't like this, then you should not use a VPN.
Also check your IP on your laptop. It is probably not the one you used to connect to the VPN.
One possible explanation could also be that your work's VPN transfers your IP address as HTTP_FORWARDED_FOR so the server knows you are using that server as a proxy server. This appears not to be configured in your university's VPN and therefore your IP address is not sent to the destination server, which is totally working by design.


I need to relock bootloader I was trying to unlock my phone, LG Aristo, so that I could sell it. I unlocked bootloader, and now I need to relock it. How do I do that?

The standard set of commands should work:

First of all make sure that your phone is all stock and there's no tampering or modification. Then:

fastboot oem lock-go


C105i tablet won't start up I have an off-the-shelf Chinese call-touch c105i android tablet with an all-winner a10 CPU.

Out of nowhere, it crashed and won't start up. When I turn it on, it just gets stuck in the logo screen.

When I enter the reset mode (you know by pressing the volume up and power button together) and choose the factory reset mode, it doesn't seem to affect anything.

Also, when I try to wipe the data, it says that it cannot open the log and install files.

What's the deal in here? I'd like you guys to know that there's no rooting involved in here. Thank you guys for your help

Download the firmware from this site: http://pan.baidu.com/s/1c06Hrck

et-86v2g-a23-v1.5
2014.10.13

Then download PhoenixSuit and use the .img file to flash the tablet.
Make sure you follow the instructions perfectly because entering into download mode can be hard.


How to enable guest user & multiple user mode I have an old Amazon Kindle Fire tablet (Tate) and have installed a custom Android Rom on it.

Most of the Kitkat Roms allow for guest user mode and multiple accounts (where multiple people can have their own account on the tablet).

However, this functions seems disabled in any ROM that is later than KitKat.

I have tried editing the build prop file to re-enable this functionality (as discussed here). But all that does is just put a shortcut to the "contacts" app where the guest/user switcher is supposed to be.

Is there anyway I can enable guest user & multiple user mode. I was under the impression that this functionality is built into Android.

The multi-user function is built into Android since KitKat 4.4, but as an optional feature, ROM developers may opt in to remove it thoroughly rather than simply disabling it.


S-On, No OS, UNLOCKED, No TWRP and want to install custom OS on HTC One M8 I have a HTC One M9 and would like to install the cRDroid ROM.
When going into the bootloader I see:

Software status: Modified
UNLOCKED
S-ON
(Now the options)

REBOOT
REBOOT TO BOOTLOADER
BOOT TO DOWNLOAD MODE
BOOT TO RECOVERY MODE
POWER DOWN

I have tried to flash the OS via fastboot fastboot flash boot boot.zip this returned:
FAILED (remote: cannot flash this partition in s-on state).
When I tried to boot with fastboot boot boot.zip I got:

creating boot image...
creating boot image - 381388800 bytes
downloading 'boot.img'...
OKAY [ 12.064s]
booting...
FAILED (remote: dtb not found)

Also booting to download mode got me Failed to boot to download mode

The Problems turned out to be dead NAND flash, which will need to be replaced


How can I install the Amazon MP3 app? I have a Motorola Backflip running on AT&T with Android 1.5. I previously had a G1 with which I used Amazon MP3 all the time to buy music. However, Amazon MP3 doesn't come on the Backflip and isn't in the Market. Where can I find it to install?

Also, is there a reason it isn't on the market? My guess was because AT&T wants me to use their proprietary app.

Xda-developers has a link in this thread, grabbed from a cc-May-2010 Froyo ROM.

Found it in AppBrain and CyrKet.

Also, it IS in the market as of Sept 14, 2010 on my Incredible. Good luck linking to that one.


Remotely disable Factory Reset Protection (FRP) for a damaged phone I have a brand new Samsung J6, worked without problems for a few days and suddenly got stuck on the Samsung logo when powering on. Managed to enter the recovery menu and delete the cache partition, after which the phone started, but the touchscreen wasn't working. I tried restarting in Safe Mode, but the problem persisted. After that, I went back to the recovery menu and did a factory reset. Touchscreen still not responding to any input.

I contacted my carrier to send the phone for service, but they require the phone to be unlinked from a Google account (basically, Factory Reset Protection). As far as I know, FRP won't trigger if you perform the factory reset from the settings app on the phone, but that's not an option due to the non functional touchscreen.

I've been looking at what the Google console offers, but there doesn't seem to be a way to decouple the phone from the account, it's mostly to deal with lost or stolen devices. I tried the remote wipe feature on another phone, but that still triggers FRP.

Linked account is part of G Suite, though I don't think there's any special phone management system in use.

Is there a page where I can tell Google to stop associating that particular phone to my account?

I've found nothing of the sort in the following pages:

https://myaccount.google.com/device-activity
https://myaccount.google.com/find-your-phone
https://www.google.com/android/find

You can log in to Gmail from other system. Go to Manage my account. Under security option you will find devices Activity. You can select your mobile and choose forget devices. This will remove your mobile from Gmail.
If you can use other working screen. Start mobile and use find my device to remove account.


How to disable virtual keyboard when in landscape mode? I have a Droid 2 (on Gingerbread); The device has a physical keyboard.

I use virtual keyboard in portrait mode sometimes, but never in landscape mode (since I have physical keyboard.)

Is there a way that would allow me to disable virtual keyboard when in landscape mode, but leave it available for portrait mode?

There is a way but not an easy way. You can use keyboards like Null keyboard.

  A keyboard that does nothing.
  Yes, really.
  This keyboard is useful if you have an external bluetooth keyboard paired with your phone and you want to stop the on-screen keyboard from popping up all the time.

The problem is every time you change mode you have to change the input method.


Unable to get in Recovery Mode in AllWinner A23 tablet I have a AllWinner A23 tablet with dual-core arm cortex-a7 1.5ghz + arm mali 400mp2 gpu.
The tablet has only 3 buttons (1 power button and 2 volume buttons).

I have tried by all sort of means to get into recovery mode with booting but there is no option to get there.

Even when trying through adb after boot (using command adb reboot
recovery), a strange recovery mode is launched which I have never
seen in any android device. The  recovery mode has only 3 options (1.
Reboot  2. sideload using adb   3. format).
And when I fastboot it using adb then it got hang at ROM image till
battery drain.

Now after rooting and applying a few tweaks I can't boot the device. Its stuck at ROM image.

Please tell me how to get in recovery mode in that device without booting the device.

I have tried holding down vol- then plugging in USB and then pressing power button multiple times while holding vol-.

If possible I would be glad to know a way to install clockworkmod recovery.

Repeatedly click the power button once you have done the long press to turn device on. This should give you boot options.


How does this dialer work? When I press certain numbers on the dialer of my phone, names are brought up which don't make any sense. I've used T9 dialer, but I can't understand this. For example le, typing 77 brings up names starting with Ap, and Dr. Typing 34 brings up names starting with He, and Ad. I just wanted to know if there's any reason for this.

The OS is Jelly Bean 4.1.1

EDIT: As some of the answers point out that it may be a part of a number of one of the contacts. I've checked it before, it only happens after I type three numbers. And if it is a part of a number, that string is highlighted.

But when I type just two numbers, the names come up with their first two letters highlighted.

The dialer will look for things that match the T9 query as well as search your contacts that have the string of numbers associated with their phone number.

For example if you have contact John Smith with phone number 123-456-7890 and you dialed "78" he would show up because that string matches part of his phone number. If you dialed dialed "56" he would also show up because that matches his name "Jo" as well as part of his phone number "56".

I hope that helps!


Grant notification access via ADB This might seem weird, but I installed a regular Android app using ADB to my Huawei Watch 2 and the app requires notification access which when attempting in app causes it to crash as it trys to open the settings to allow it's access which doesn't exist in the settings.

I just need to grant this one permission in order to get the app to work

For Android 9 or above use this:

adb shell cmd notification allow_listener com.mypackage.app/com.mypackage.app.mylistener

For any other Android version below 9 use this:

adb shell settings put secure enabled_notification_listeners %nlisteners: com.example.myapplication/com.example.myapplication.service.ServiceNotificationIntercept


How do I NOT install the apps that Google Play Store offeres for review? I have a new Nokia 3.1. It immediately wanted to download updates, which it did successfully. Now I have a notification that I can't get rid of to "Complete setup by installing apps". When I touch it, I get this

I can't seem to deselect these. How do I NOT download them, and not be bothered by the offer any more?

It happened in my Samsung A30s - Android 9.0.

I installed the recommended apps, the notification of Complete setup by installing apps gone, and I uninstalled them again.
I seems there is no easy way to get rid of that notification.


Update from external storage disabled I have a Samsung Galaxy Note 4 (N910a), and the WiFi doesn't work. I think it's because it has an old firmware version, so I tried to update it, but when in recovery and trying to update from the SD card, it says "Update from external storage is disabled." the same thing happens with adb.

Try flashing the stock firmware with Odin. This should work.
Stock firmware download here
Odin flasher download here

Open Odin
Unzip the firmware zip file
Click on APP and browse to where you extracted the firmware zip file
Boot the phone to Download mode (Volume down + Power button)
Connect the phone and click Start.


Nexus 4 Access Point details Where can I get details about access point opened by my Nexus 4?

I need them to describe network in wpa_supplicant.conf on other device that will be using this network.

network={
    ssid="example"
    proto=RSN
    key_mgmt=WPA-EAP
    pairwise=CCMP TKIP
    group=CCMP TKIP
    eap=TLS
    identity="user@example.com"
    ca_cert="/etc/cert/ca.pem"
    client_cert="/etc/cert/user.pem"
    private_key="/etc/cert/user.prv"
    private_key_passwd="password"
    priority=1
}

Do you mean where is the wpa_supplicant.conf file?

If so, you will need root access as it is in:

/data/misc/wifi/wpa_supplicant.conf


WhatsApp Archive Issue I'm running WhatsApp on Android 8.

I've archived all my chats on WhatsApp , and I have continuous automatic backups switched on. Will the archives and their media also be backed up on WhatsApp along with all other chats and all other media ?  Is there anything specific I should know ? This is the first time that I've archived anything on WhatsApp.

Any help and shedding some light on the question and related issues would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Yes. All contents of WhatsApp including archived chats media , messages, audio notes will be backed up to Google Drive

I have done backing up and restoring multiple times so can absolutely confirm


How to display balloon counter over application launcher icon? Is there a way display a "balloon counter" notification on top of an application launcher icon (like iOS)?

Go Launcher EX looks like you can turn that on, at least for some apps.

Related is the Next Notification plugin for Next Launcher 3D.


How to enable USB tethering on your Android phone to Mac OS X Lion I want to tether an unlimited data plan on a Nexus S (with 2.3.6) via USB cable to a MacBook Air (with OS X Lion).

The articles I read imply that given Apple's restrictions, that's imposible!
Found a question for Froyo and one tethering on a Snow Leopard, but they all rely on third party apps.

Is there any hack to make it work out of the box?

Easy Tether works for me for USB tethering on OS X Lion. android.stackexchange.com/q/15735/15, android.stackexchange.com/q/5168/15

To elaborate, here are the steps involved:

Open the Easy Tether application on your Android device and select USB (you will see the ET notification in the notification bar).
Plug your Android device into your machine via USB.
Open Network Preferences, select EasyTether and select Connect.

Also, if you do any Android dev, make sure to follow the Mobile Stream's  FAQ (although I just moved the .kext to the trash since kextunload was not working for me):

  ADB on Mac OS X stops recognizing the attached device after installing > EasyTether driver

  Do not follow this advice if you are not a software developer who uses
  the Android SDK on Mac. Otherwise run "sudo kextunload
  /System/Library/Extensions/EasyTetherUSBEthernet.kext" to unload the
  EasyTether driver manually. Load it again with kextload when/if
  necessary.


Galaxy S20: Access sdcard/Android/data I'm using apps e.g. Autoguard and others that record files to their directory (e.g. sdcard/Android/data/com.hovans.autoguard) and I'd like to back them up locally. Unfortunately due to the disastrous Android 11 update I no longer have access to that folder. Neither the phone explorers (also including Files by Google and the Shortcut app to Samsung's explorer) nor a USB connection helps to gain access to those files on the sd card. The Android/data folder on the internal storage can be viewed using USB or the Samsung explorer but NOT the one on the sd card. The only thing I can see is that the data folder is empty (because only root has the rwx rights).
How can I access those files nonetheless without rooting the phone? I'm getting frustrated after researching for hours with no solution.

@Peter and Everyone. I ran into this exact issue. After spending a few hours befuddled by the nonsense that Android 11 has created with all of this...I decided to take a step back, look at this from a different perspective and had a tada moment :) The best solution sometimes is the most simplistic and one that was right in front of me the whole time. Well, actually, sitting in my laptop bag that's been parked for about a year.
Long story short, I ejected my SD Card, placed it in my previous S9 which was running Android whatever...anything other than Android 11. As soon as I fired it up, checked my Android/Data folder...everything was there, I simply copied it to my Internal Drive, ejected it, returned to the S10 and was back up and running. Thus, I didn't need to Root my device, test over 10+ File Manager Apps, read article after article, etc...I just had to go back in time before Android 11 and I didn't even have to revert my current S10 back to Android 10 or earlier. I just had to take Android 11 out of the picture.
So, while I've seen all of these press releases, specifications, justifications and reasoning for what Android 11 was supposed to do...it just doesn't compute. Never in my 30+ career have I seen a supposedly new solution lead to a 100% non operative solution against a given. In other words, accessing your Android/Data directory was as easy as 1+1, after Android 11 the only number that matters is 0...the number of items you can access :(
I think the moral to the story here is that always having a contingency plan... in this case an older backup phone pays off. I will not bore you with old stories of how my previous phone(s) helped in other situations...but I think today's result sums things up :)
Take care and I hope this helps everyone with this waste of time nonsense. It's OUR data sitting right in front of us that we NEVER had an issue with prior to Android 11.


Gapp on Cyanogen 13 not working First of all, sorry about this question, there are loads already out there, but unfortunately none have fixed my issue, or at least I haven't been able to fix it.

So I have a Oppo find 7, I followed the theunlockr tutorial to root my phone, install a new rom (cyanogen) and gapp.
After struggling a lot (first time I did this kind of thing), I finally managed to back up my colorOs with my old data, wype data, flash the new rom. So far so good, but I don't have play store to install anything, or sync my account.

So I downloaded Gapp, followed the indication, flashed it, restarted, but always had loads on Unfortunately, Google ... has stopped

I have read quite a lot of options to fix this issue but none of them have worked so far. So here is what I have tried:

reformat everything, install cyanogen, install gapp, restart
reformat everything, install cyanogen, clear cache, install gapp, clear cache, restart
reformat everything, install cyaogen, restart, start android, turn off, install gapp from recovery mode, restart

(Tried for both nightly and latest release)

I have read somewhere that I needed to grant authorisation to com.android... from my pc, tried that with no success

According to the website I used (https://download.cyanogenmod.org/?device=find7 and https://devs-lab.com/android-gapps-download.html), I am using the latest versions of cyanogen and gapp. I also made sure I am using gapp for android 6 and 32 bit device.

Can anyone see anything obvious that I have missed ? I must have tried starting from scratch flashing cyanogen and gapp since yesterday, but maybe I am missing something obvious that I can't see !
Thanks a lot in advance !

LOL i went thru this few weeks ago put cyanogenmod and gapps on the sd wipe your system,data,boot . flash cm13 then gapps then in twrp if you have it if not flash itdo a factory reset. that will remove the gapps issues boot into cm13 and all should be good


Trying to install ADB USB Drivers, but Nexus is never appearing in Device Manager I'm trying to install the google-adb-drivers.zip file (obtained here) on a Windows 7 64-bit system. The phone is the Nexus S 9020T. USB connectivity works correctly for file transfer mode. When I enable debugging, I expect to see "Nexus" appear under "Other Devices" in Device Manager, but it doesn't. After checking USB Debugging under "Developer Options" in the phone, the computer makes the USB disconnected sound.

I was able to load the drivers on a different Windows 7 32-bit system, but that's not the system I want to use.

Why is the debugging port not being recognized on the 64 bit system?

I saw the other post with a link to download the SDK, but I also would like to avoid installing the entire SDK unless absolutely necessary.

You should get the proper USB driver via the SDK Manager (which is the the tool you will run when installing the SDK).

The first step in installing the SDK, is starting the 'SDK Manager", and downloading an Android API package (ie. the code to develop for a specific API)

In the list of options, is an 'Extras' section - that contains the official USB driver for Android developer devices (of which the Nexus S is one).  Download that driver for best results.

You won't need to install the whole SDK using this method, but will need to start down that path, in order to get the proper driver.

Good Luck.


4g icon always showing on my S6 (But my cellular network is not 4g) 4g icon always shows on my top right side with signals bar on my newly bought(second hand) samsung S6 mobile. problem is that my cellular network is not 4G. It only supports 3G.

Is my S6 software fake or something ?

Some countries/carriers, e.g. AT&T and T-Mobile call (DC-)HSPA+ "4G" (while HSPA+ is commonly referred to as "3.5G"), while they call real 4G "4G LTE" or simply "LTE". Using phones or such carrier origin with a HSPA+-capable SIM will display "4G".


Open source / trusted rooting app for Android / Motorola Defy? I found a lot of compiled rooting exploits for Android, but not a lot of source code.

So, how can I trust an exploit able to take SU rights on my mobile device? How can I be sure there is no root-kit/bot/spyware inside?

I'm maybe a little paranoid, but this is a very serious issue for me:

My PDA contain a lot of private/secret informations (personal and professional), so, is there a trusted/secure way to root an Android device? (A Motorola Defy in particular)

[EDIT]

I insist on this last point:

  is there a trusted/secure way to root an Android device? (A Motorola Defy in particular)

Does anybody know an open source or trusted rooting app for Android, and Motorola Defy in particular?

Perhaps a simple answer but if the author doesn't provide the sourcecode of the App und you know that it doesn't originate of a trusted source, you can't be sure that it's clean.

If it's a high risk for you you probably should not use it.


How to restore a Helium backup? I am transfering to a new phone, and I backed up my stuff using helium to Dropbox. Later I copied that folder to carbon folder on my sdcard, but helium doesnt seem to detect it. Any idea how I can restore that? It looks like the format is different.. Regular backup seems to be carbon/com.appname/files but in my dropbox backup, its only files, no folders at all.

There are multiple ways you can achieve this:

On the device

Start Helium
pick any "dummy app" to create a backup from
Exit Helium
Check where it placed the backup files, and which files those are (a backup consists of multiple files)
Copy your backup files to that location
Check if for each app there are all the files you've checked above1
Start Helium again, it now should find the backups
Restore whatever you wanted to restore

If the "old phone" is still up and running

The app is called "Helium App Sync and Backup". So when you go to its Restore and Sync tab, you should be able to transfer and restore the backups across the devices. I've never tried that, so I cannot give any details on it.

Using your computer

Helium Backup uses the same file format as ADB (in fact, it uses ADB locally to create and restore backups). So with the backup files on your computer, and the device connected via USB with usb-debugging enabled, you could simply restore the backups from the command line. Just pick the .ab files for that, and run

adb restore com.foobar.ab

(of course, you've got to replace com.foobar.ab by the real file names). See Is there a minimal installation of ADB? if you didn't set up your computer for use with ADB yet. The downloads mentioned there can also be found here.

1: I rawly remember from a while ago that Helium might "ignore" a backup when one of those files were missing


Sometimes My Phone Just Restarts Occasionally (maybe twice a month) my Milestone just reboots (goes black and then to the Android startup screen (but not all the way to the Motorola screen)).
I presume that such behaviour could be caused a poorly written app. I have uninstalled a few but to no avail. Is there any sort of log that I could pull which would shed some light on this or even a dump file?
Could this restarting issue be caused by something else?

I am currently running Android 2.1 (no OTA update available for me, yet) on a Milestone and have had this problem since I bought it in December (when it was 2.0).

I have uninstalled TaskKiller as I read that these types of applications can cause stability issues on Android 2.1 and 2.2. So far so good...


How to track down an app that shows ads on smartphone screen? I have a problem with malware apps. Looks like some app called "Native" installed itself, and created a shortcut for itself, all without my permission. After that happened, I have pop-up ads every time I unlock my screen.

I have 2 security apps: Avast and 360 security. Neither of them can find anything wrong on my phone.

Because this new app "Native" uses such a common word as its name, I cannot find anything about it on the Internet, and I don't see anything called "Native" when I browse in the "Settings"->"Applications" menus.

So I am stuck with ads popping up every time I unlock the screen. What may be the possible solution?

Android 4 & 5

When the advertisement shows up, press the app switch button to display the recents menu (if the advertisement is full-screen and cover your soft buttons, swiping down from the top of the screen will make it appear).
It will show the name of the app displaying the advertisement.
From there, long press on the app and chose "app info"
Uninstall the app.

Android 6
For Android 6 the process is similar, however the recents menu looks a bit different. In this step you now have to long press the app icon in the title bar:

Android 7
For Android 7 the process is similar, however the recents menu looks a bit different. In this step you now have to long press the app icon then an info icon appears in the title bar that opens the settigs dialog of the app the screen belongs to:


Real time events show up with a 4 minute delay So I just bought a Milestone 2 and installed CM 7.2 by Endless (based on the Defy CM ROM). Everything is working great, but there's one thing that annoys me.

Everytime I tweet something it never shows up as x secs ago, instead it shows 4 min ago.

This also happens on the Facebook app. The real time events always shows 4 minutes. It is like the OS is adding the time by itself. This really doesn't make much difference but I'm really curious as it why does it happens. Any help is much appreciated. :)

It sounds like your clock is 4 minutes fast.   Check to see if your phone is getting its time from the network (on Gingerbread, it's Settings/Date & Time, not sure about CM 7.2).

If you are getting time from the network, try disabling automatic updates and set the time manually to a source like time.gov or time.is.


Data still in storage after factory reset I am trying to sell my Note 3 and performed a factory reset both from the Home + Power + Volume Up menu, as well as the settings -> Factory reset menu.

Both approaches seem successful at resetting the device as nothing remains on the phone's interface and I go through all the screen like the first day I bought it.

The only issue is when I connect the device to the computer via USB, it appears all the data is still in storage, just not on the user interface of the phone. Any idea why this is?

I would like to completely wipe everything off the phone so the storage is as empty as it can be.

If it is an external storage try formatting the external SD card. You can do it in the computer or in Android it should be under Storage.


Both Sims are not detected after update Lenovo A390 with the latest ROW firmware I have format my Lenovo A390 and update to latest ROW firmware version A390_ROW_S316_130730.
Everything work fine but sim cards not detected. At down of the lock screen shows Invalid IMEI. In the status bar sim also not showing.

Model number     :- Lenovo A390_Row
Android version  :- 4.0.4
Baseband version :- A390_MB_PCB_V1.0
Build number     :- A390_ROW_S316_130730

IMEI are Unknown

Wifi also work fine. What should I do now. Please help

I have solved the problem myself. Reason of the problem was Invalid IMEI number. What I did is set the valied IMEI for Sim.

Steps to Change IMEI Number of Your Android

Write the following in your dialler – *#7465625# or *#*#3646633#*#*.
(*#*#3646633#*#* this work for me)
Click to Call pad or connectivity options. Find out CDS information
and tap on it. Check out for Radio information. If
you have dual SIM, there will be two options for you, select the one which you want to go with.
Now to change IMEI number follow
AT +EGMR=1,7,”IMEI_1”

Replace IMEI_1 with your IMIE. For example : AT+EGMR=1,7,”8600XXXXXXXXXXXX"

And click to send.

Changing IMEI number is illegal but it may help you to get your phone back. Make sure to use  "YOUR" phone IMIE number (15 digit code ) written in the backside of the phone (mostly Under the battery)

EDIT

For Sim 2 need this insert “AT +EGMR=1,10,"IMEI_2”


How to download gapps I flashed cyanogen mod 12 on my galaxy s3. Once I did that I flashed gapps but when I went to turn my phone on, every single app crashed and kept crashing literally over and over again. I couldn't do anything but press OK when they crashed because when I tried to, another one just popped up. Is there any way that I can just apk the Google play store or something.

The error occoured because the gapps version you installed didnot match the version of os installed. You can find the minimal gapps edition here.Since you are running cm12 you should download download the one meant for android 5.0.x


Do calls to Java native interface in android apps run within Dalvik VM? I read that apps sometimes access the native libraries for optimization purposes via the Java native interface.

As far as I understand, JNI just provides java wrappers around c/c++ libraries/binaries which are written closer to hardware hence faster and more efficient.

But how does it provide a performance boost, aren't JNI APIs called through Dalvik VM, so they do not run natively, they are still running inside a VM so there shouldn't be any difference.

I think I see the source of your confusion. Dalvik VM isn't a virtual machine the same way as VMware or Virtualbox. In that kind of VM, VMware (or whatever) is pretending to be the whole computer. Every operation has to go through the VM, it has to be prevented from accessing the real hardware, and if it does access the real hardware, VMware has to do some work to pretend to be the real hardware, give the result to the OS, and have the OS give the result to the application. There's a whole copy of the OS running inside the VM, so it's an application, on an OS, on VMware, which is itself an application running on an OS, which is then on the real hardware.

Java and (by extension) Dalvik VM isn't like that. It's more like an abstraction of the real machine. The real hardware isn't being hidden from the application, and there isn't an extra copy of the OS there.

A Java application is just a process on the phone like a non-Java application. When a Java application makes a function call via JNI, Dalvik has to do a small amount of book-keeping to pass the objects used in the function call to the native code, and then the native code just runs in the process, with no VM involved at all. Then there's a little more book-keeping to get the result back to the Java code.

The code within the JNI call is as fast as any native code in a process where there's no Java at all. The only overhead is the book-keeping on entry to and exit from the call.


Apps on memory card taking internal memory I noticed that many apps that are, according to Android, installed on the memory card are actually taking internal memory space, as when I delete their data or uninstall them I notice a change on the phone memory, and no on the SD. Why does this happens? I am moving my apps wrongly?.

I run Cyanogen Mod, and some of the apps are ones that should not be moved (according to the app App2SD) or that couldn't be moved (but moved them anyways via other apps).

Thanks.

App2SD doesn't move the entire app to SDcard, just parts of it. That's normal (or rather "works-as-designed"), and no error on your end.

Please also see our apps2sd tag-wiki, where alternatives are listed along. Note however that those alternatives require root access on the device. Methods like link2sd are able to move the entire app; Data2SD and Simple2Ext can even move its data.


I recently reset my Galaxy S5 to manufacture and lost all contacts, Can I retrieve my contacts back Can I retrieve my contacts back to my device .I recently reset my device to the manufacturers original.

It would be worth checking to see if google automatically synced your contacts to your gmail account. If so, they are recoverable if not they’re toast.


What privacy sensitive metadata does an APK package contain? What information possibly sensitive information is included in apk files?
The obvious metadata are of course the fields in the signing certificate. But what about (absolute) file paths, user names used on the machine where the apk was built and similar information?

APK files usually don't contain much of that data unless the developer explicitly has added them or used unusual third party programs to edit resources contained in the app e.g. images. You can simply check that by unzipping an APK file ready to be released. Use full text search tools on all unzipped files and search for data you consider sensitive.
If you want to minimize unnecessary data I would recommend to use a virtual machine with e.g. a minimal Linux installation you where the installation itself does not contain any sensitive data. As Android apps can be built easily using Gradle on command-line you don't even need a UI. Use it to build the final APK file and copy it to the host OS.
Examine the created file as described at the beginning and if you don't find anything it is ready for release.


Access an Android purely via VNC enabling Tablet resolutions I can currently access my Android via VNC on my iPad.  Can I set the screen resolution of the Android to be the same as the native iPad resolution, giving me a pseudo Android tablet?

Even if there is an answer which corrupts the screen on the phone itself is fine, seeing it will be accessed via the tablet.

No, you cannot change the resolution of Android in VNC in a standard way. However, some Android phones have additional functions to support HDMI (which results in running Android at a higher resolution). If you can somehow tap into that functionality in conjunction with VNC, then you might be able to get a 480p, 720p, and 1080p option. But this is something that would be highly customized to a single phone as all of the different HDMI implementations seem to vary tremendously. One other option that would be yet another one-off possibility (with some custom work) would be if your phone supports WebTop functionality. If so, perhaps you could tap into this.

However, there is no third-party app that does what you're wanting. To do this, you'll have to develop or find somebody to develop this highly-customized solution.

As other have suggested, you're probably not going to get much better than changing the LCD Density, which clearly isn't what you're after.


Will a CDMA carrier's LTE work on a GSM-only phone? More specifically, I'd like to know if a Sprint-based carrier (Tello) will work on a Xiaomi Redmi Note 8 (M1908C3JG).

No

Will my phone work says Redmi Note 7 does not work on Tello.

Readme Note 7 has more operating frequencies than Readme Note 8 (see Network section-
Note 8 frequencies are a sub set of Note 7 ) but Readme Note 7 doesn't work with Tello.

If you switch carriers, you have a 25 % coverage as indicated here, but that would need you to do homework to find out which carrier and if that frequency (s) are used where you operate


How to stop ads redirecting to Google Play store? I have a similar problem to
How can I stop being redirected to the App Store/Google Store by dodgy ad-scripts?
however the solution provided there doesn't work:

I'm opening in-app ads on purpose for in-app rewards (freemium game), and some of them open the Play store after they finish playing. I want to continue seeing these ads, so I can't just block them, and redirecting to a web browser changes virtually nothing on the problem. Can I prevent those ads from sending me to the store?

I'm using an older Samsung Android, 4.4.4 according to the device.

I think a redirect tag would fit this question as well, but it doesn't exist.

I ended up installing Firefox to use as my web browser and my problem was solved.
The phone started asking which app to open the links in instead of opening the store directly.


Call recording for Galaxy S2 with kitkat ROM I'm looking for a call recording app \ mod that works on Galaxy S2 with android 4.4 ROM.

I used several apps with previous versions (mainly on stock ROM's) but none of the apps I tried worked on KitKat ROM

Currently I use Resurrection Remix ROM but I don't mind changing to a different ROM (I understand that CM based ROMs don't have call recording support)

My suggestion is to go for Call Recorder - ACR, it works fine with my CM11


Dual booting linux on android galaxy note 10.1 I have a samsung galaxy note 10.1 and would like to be able to run a linux distribution. I would suspect that this is attainable, and that people have already done it. What I want to know is the specifics such as:

When I start my tablet, can I select which operating system I would like to run? I do not want to run both at the same time.
Which Linux distribution will give me the best performance?

I pretty much want to keep my Android functionality for the S pen, note-taking, and games (as it was made for that). I would also like to have the option to run an efficient Linux distribution so that I can run the standard UNIX tools/programs/compilers that are all familiar to me. Also, I do not really care about having all the features of my tablet working with the Linux distribution (such as camera and GPS). That being said I do care about the Bluetooth working as I have a Bluetooth keyboard!

I just want to start this answer off by saying that if you are not an expert computer user, this is probably not for you. You will need to know how to setup and edit partition tables, along with knowing how to resize, delete and add partitions. I of course accept no responsibility for any damage you cause to any device from reading this tutorial.

In theory here is what you need to do:

Repartition your device's SD card so that you can make room for all the the Operating Systems you want to run
Get a new boot loader that supports dual (or multi) booting
Flash the partition with a build that is compatible with your phone

Specifically for your device (the Galaxy Note 10.1), here is a GREAT link on dual booting:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2258867

The tutorial is on an Ubuntu machine, if you do not have Ubuntu it is pretty easy to install from their website:

http://www.ubuntu.com

You probably don't even need to install Ubuntu to do this tutorial, I think you would be fine just running off of the live CD. I am a little biased because I love Ubuntu, but I would recommend installing it when you have free time. It really is a life saver and it runs on top of a linux kernel so you get all of the benefits of linux when you use Ubuntu.

VERY IMPORTANT BEFORE YOU START THE TUTORIAL

  1) Backup your device every time before you make a change to the OS or to the boot loader. It is extremely easy to brick your device if you don't know what you're doing. If you brick your device and you have no backups to go from, then you are out of luck my friend.

  2) You need to have a CWM (Clockwork Mod) installed on your device before you start the tutorial along with Nandroid Backup. See Extra Stuff below for install information.

  3) I cannot stress this more: MAKE SURE THAT YOU ARE INSTALLING A MOD THAT FITS PERFECTLY WITH YOU DEVICE!! You will potentially render your device unusable if you do not check your ROMs thoroughly.

  4) This is not so important but will save you a lot of time in the future. Go get a bigger SD card, no 1GB or 2GB is not enough and 4GB is pushing it. Go out and buy a 16GB SD card, they are not that expensive and if you are going to be doing multiple booting, then you will want the extra space. It will be a huge pain to transfer all of your files onto a bigger SD card because you decided you wanted to triple boot Android, Arch Linux and Ubuntu all on one device. This is the voice of experience unfortunately.

Hopefully the tutorial works out well for you. When you get comfortable with installing OS partitions, then you can start trying out different flavors of Linux. My favorite is Ubuntu, followed closely behind by Arch Linux (ARM) (Which is great for server applications).

Extra Stuff

Installing CWM and NAndroid Backup on Galaxy Note 10.1

Here is a Video tutorial for installing the CWM on the Galaxy Note 10.1 if you need to do that. Again make sure you get the right ROM for your device.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIYiXzcW7xs

If YouTube is more your thing, then here is a pretty good video on doing the same thing in the other tutorial. This YouTube video requires you to already have CWM installed on your device.

Galaxy Note: How to dual boot 5 different ROMs

For those of you who do not have the Galaxy Note, here is something else I found that might be useful (or at least a starting point):

http://lifehacker.com/5826050/how-to-dual-boot-multiple-roms-on-your-android-phone

Please feel free to edit if you have something to add (Tutorials for specific devices etc.)

Also, if you need more info, just comment and I will help you out.


fastboot works, adb doesn't I picked up a second-hand Motorola Moto G (2nd gen) device. The model is technically XT1064 (Titan).

On my Windows machine, I'm sometimes able to see an error message when I power down the phone stating that the USB device was unrecognized (Device Descriptor Request Failed).

After days of trying, I've yet to have it show up in adb. But it works just fine if I boot into the bootloader and run fastboot commands!

I've tried all of the "easy" things people recommend:

enabling USB debugging under Developer Options
different USB cables (although since fastboot works fine, that implies the cable is also fine)
different computers (tried a Mac, a Windows 10 machine, and a Windows Vista laptop)
adb kill-server followed by adb devices
various adb versions (Android SDK platform tools and Universal ADB driver)
manually uninstalling Windows drivers
force installing drivers (doesn't work, since the device doesn't make it past the device descriptor request so Windows won't allow drivers to be installed)
installing the Universal ADB driver
re-flashing the device (tried stock Marshmallow, stock KitKat, and Lineage OS)

I'm frustrated by the process because fastboot works just fine. That's how I've flashed the separate ROMs on there.

If this were a hardware issue with USB, why would it be that fastboot operates correctly but adb does not?

Also, if it's a hardware issue, what physical part would be the problem? It seems unlikely to be the USB port itself (again, because fastboot works just fine). Is there some kind of USB controller in the phone that could be the issue? Since the device is pretty useless to me unless adb works, I'd entertain the idea of trying to solder in a new part to fix the problem if I could!

You may need to enable USB Debugging enabled

To enable follow these steps:

Open settings
Open Info
Find the Build Number and tap on it alot until it says You are now a developer!
Exit Info
Open Developer options
Tap on USB debugging
Tap on OK

Notes:

In 4.1.x and before skip steps 2-4
In 2.2.x and before goto Settings->Applications->Development->USB debugging


Stream audio from any app on phone to receiver I have an HTC One m7 phone and a Marantz NR1604 receiver (with a nice set of speakers).
Both are connected to my home WIFI network.

How do I stream audio from any app on the phone to the receiver over the WIFI network?

You can use XPosed Framework and BubbleUPnP's Audio Cast Feature.


Samsung Galaxy S heat up a lot, getting restarted and slow start up time I'm using Samsung galaxy S with O.S. 2.3.3. I'm having the following problems.
It is getting heated up a lot. Because of this the battery is drained so faster.
That too when it is getting charged if I place butter it melts down.
It is also getting restarted whenever there is an exception in the app.
I'm having a lot of applications so the start up time is very slow around 3 - 8 minutes to load.

Seems like you have a battery drainer App which also heats up the CPU by holding a wakelock and using the CPU the whole time. You need to identify and remove that App.

The Galaxy S has a pretty nice App called "program manager", also using Androids built-in "what caused the most battery consumption" feature should help you to find this App.


G1 - Can I Update to Newer Versions of Android? I'm considering getting a G1 from T-Mobile (in the US), and am wondering, can I can update to new versions of Android as they come out, even ones targeted towards newer Android phones? For example, would I be able to update my G1 to Android 2.0 when it is available?

If it's a T-mobile release, they will download it to your phone.  I've received two upgrades since getting my phone in April.  I believe Android is a platform on top of which the phone carriers build their specific release.


BackupManager causing my phone to reboot Every ~2 hours my phone reboots itself, it started doing this 2-3 days ago, I may have installed/uninstalled some apps around that time but I don't remember exactly.

I've gotten a screenshot of the logcat the instant after the phone reboots and 3/3 times it has been exactly after the BackupManagerService activates: http://i.imgur.com/HOXan.png

I can also cause the reboot by calling "adb shell bmgr run" as seen here: http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?q=lag&colspec=ID%20Type%20Status%20Owner%20Summary%20Stars&id=25780

Is there any way to manage or at least see what apps are 'queued' in the BackupManager? Is there a way to completely disable the BackupManager?

Phone:
-Galaxy Nexus 4.0.1
-Kernel 3.0.1-ga052f63

Edit: Well, I figured out how to disable the BackupManager (I think), in "Settings" -> "Backup & reset" -> uncheck "Back up my data". I would still like to figure out the cause of the problem though.

Googles Backup-API uses the directory /data/backup to queue outstanding backups (which are not yet transferred). So if your device is rooted, you could investigate this directory for any files contained, and probably remove them if they cause trouble (I'm not sure if/how it then will be handled to figure out which backups it has to repeat, though -- so it's your own risk).

But from your LogCat I'd say BackupManager already cleared that directory (the second black line reads clearing pending backups, followed by beginning backup of 3 targets) -- so I rather assume there's some faulty implementation with one of those 3 apps. I'm not a developer, though, so I cannot say.

You can check your history of installed apps (the App Appmonster IMHO offers to see the installation date; I'm not sure where to find this information with stock apps) to see, which ones you installed last, and "roll back" until the problem disappers (or you left the "probable time frame").

EDIT: Do you have some more lines of that LogCat? It stops just when it's becoming interesting. I'd follow those lines belonging to PID 181 here, so you probably can figure out which app is causing the problem. Fifth line from the bottom up e.g. shows a wallpaper being backed up, along with the wallpaper's API call (android.app.backup.WallpaperBackupHelper -- I guess that's rather some Android internal to backup wallpaper settings, but again: I'm not a developer, I can only make guesses). There might be more lines like this, giving clues.


Why is a calendar entry made for each call? I use a Samsung Galaxy Note.  I am noticing that each time I make, receive or miss a call, an entry is made in My Calendar, with the details of the call, incoming or outgoing, phone number etc.  Every call made / received in the phone log has one calendar entry, making the calendar totally unusable.

I am not able to find which application is doing this.  Is there any way I can stop this entry from being made for each call?

Alternatively, how do I identify which application is making this entry, by looking at the calendar entry?

The app SMS Backup+ has this functionality, where call log entries can be added automatically to a Google Calendar. The source code for SMS Backup+ is freely available on Github, so it may have been cloned and installed under a different name on your device.

Also if you go to your Google Account Permissions, you can see which apps have been authorized to access your Google calendars.


Wrong playlist order in Google Play Music app I use the Google Play Music app to play locally stored music on my Galaxy Nexus running Android 4.3. I have created some playlists in standard extended m3u format on my computer and transferred them to my phone.

The problem is that the app plays some of the songs in the wrong order.  Most songs are shown and played in the right order, but about ten percent are in no particular order.

Shuffle is off (the symbol is black rather than orange).

The playlist is constructed properly and works without issue on winamp on my phone and numerous apps on my computer. The music files are all properly tagged and stored in /sdcard/Music/artist/album/song.  Playlists are stored in /sdcard/Music.

I don't use any of the cloud features of the player.

I've tried deleting all music and rescanning, as well as clearing the media storage data, but that does not help.

BTW, according to Is Google Play Music the same as the stock Android Music App?, the Google Play Music app is not the same as the stock Android music app, but I can't find the 4.3 stock Android music app. Is that post still true?

Any ideas for getting the app to play playlists in the correct order?

EDIT: I used a Playlist backup app to export the Google Play Music version of a playlist and compared it to the text of the m3u file present on the phone that GPM purported to read. This confirmed that GPM messed up the order of the tracks on the playlist.

I believe this happens on very large playlists (>100 files). I use doubleTwist to sync and my large playlist is always out of order in GPM no matter what I try. Fortunately the dT music player doesn't appear to use the playlist after creating it; but instead uses its own database for the order.


Okay Google Everywhere options missing from Google Now My question is exactly the same as the question in Wizek's post, which went unanswered, namely that I woke up this morning and all but one of my "Okay Google" options had disappeared. I contacted Google via Project Fi's customer service and they told me they would put an engineer on it and see if they could figure out what went wrong. Very helpful. However, I'm wondering if anyone in the community has managed to solve this problem (I have a nexus 5X)?

One thought I have is to do a nandroid backup and then completely reset the device using {fastboot format userdata}, but if anyone has any less nuclear ideas I would love to hear them!

Just flash Nexus GApps again. That should fix permissions or add possibly missing files which are causing trouble.


How can I root the Micromax A110Q I am using ubuntu 12.04 LTS and want to root my micromax A110Q.

Note #1:

Rooting Mediatek devices isn't usually a clean area. Please remember that this solution is to help you out only and is not a mandate, which means the responsibility of recovering device (if required) lies upon the reader only.
Taking backup is very important. Consider the answers here to take backup. I can't stress this more. Please do not ignore this step.

Note #2: Keep you device's battery charged, possibly above 80%. Best is to keep it fully charged. Few folks sometimes report that low-battery during flashing resulted in soft/hard-bricking of their device.

I'm aware of two methods to root this device and both are tested by me on this very device.

Method #1

This method will sideload an app in your Android. You can see this answer to know how this kind of apps works. Also, I'm using this guide on AndroidXDA to corroborate my answer.

Instructions:

Go to Settings → Security and check Unknown sources -- in order to sideload apps.
Download and install Framaroot from any of the following links:

Framaroot's website
XDA thread
AndroidXDA

Launch the app and Install SuperSU will be shown selected. If not, do choose it.
Tap any of the following options(exploits):

Boromir
Faramir
Barahir

and wait for few seconds.
If the exploit you chose works fine then you would see the following or similar message:

Success :-)... Superuser and su binary installed. You have to reboot your device.

                                    OK

Otherwise, choose the rest of the two options. But eventually, it would work. (Worked on my A110Q).
Reboot your device and you would see a new app installed in your device named SuperSU.
You can use any of the root checker apps here on Play Store to see whether SuperSU is intercepting root access, or apps can detect su binary.

Congrats! Your device is now rooted.

Method #2

This method is a typical technique of flashing Recovery partition with a custom recovery and then flashing SuperSu zip file from the latter accompanied by installing an app from Play Store.

Note #3: The following instructions are platform dependent, tested and mostly works on Microsoft Windows 7 OS.

This method uses a tool named SP Flash Tool to flash Recovery partition of your device using a scatter(text) file. I've covered this tool in Method #1 of an answer here with links to some videos(to familiarize yourself). You can also see this guide as well.

About Scatter file : Scatter file has the index of location of partitions (including boundaries) your device has.

Instructions:

Download ADB drivers for your device, install them and verify that your device is getting detected. You can either query Google for them or download them from here.
Download a scatter-based ROM (Stock ROM preferred) for your device. Query Google for such with details like device model name, chipset, etc. You can download it from here as well. Note that the solution needs only a text file which is packed inside the ROM.

As an alternative of downloading this ROM, you can generate your own Scatter Based file. The instructions are mentioned here. I didn't try the instructions there so I can't cover them here. On a side note, I recommend downloading stock ROM since its always good to have this ROM ready for flashing in emergency.
Extract files from downloaded ROM and look for .txt file with name similar to MT6589_Android_scatter.txt. Note down the location of this file.

Download latest SP-Flash Tool.
Download a custom Recovery for your device. Alike step 1 querying Google is the option here. Mostly, the recovery you might get is either CWM or Philz Touch recovery. You can consider these links to download CWM recovery or Philz Touch Recovery.
Download SuperSU zip from here. The name might be similar to UPDATE-SuperSU-vX.YZ.zip. Put this .zip file into the root directory (Home folder) of your Internal SD card. You can do so by firing up your favorite File Manager.

Connect your phone via USB cable into PC.
Extract SP Flash Tool, look for Flash_tool.exe and execute it by doing  Right-click → Run as Administrator.
Once the interface comes up, click Scatter-Loading button, locate the scatter file (from Step 3) there and proceed with it -- this will list some partition names (unfamiliar names possibly) like MBR, UBOOT, BOOTIMG, etc.
Make sure that all the entries below name are unchecked except Recovery -- we do not want to replace the content of any existing partition other than of Recovery.
Click on Recovery, locate the Recovery file you downloaded in step 4 and proceed with it. Below the location you would see the file path of your Recovery file (like C:\Users\...).
Power off your phone (do not disconnect) and click the Download button in the tool.
If the flashing proceeds successfully you would see a small window with green circle. Otherwise, you would have to query Google for any troubleshooting. You can now unplug your phone and power on.
Power off your phone completely (it will vibrate after screen goes blank during this process). Press and hold "Volume Up" + "Volume Down" + "Power" button simultaneously. You'll see two options:

Recovery Mode: Volume Up
Factory Mode: Volume Down

Press "Volume Up" button then select the entry [Recovery Mode] using "Volume Up" button and press "Volume Down" button to proceed.
You'll now boot into your custom Recovery (CWM for me).

For CWM go to Install zip → choose zip from /sdcard/sdcard0 and use "Volume Up/Down" buttons to go up and down in the entries. Select your .zip file (from step 4) entry and press "Power" button to install. Choose Yes to install SuperSU zip -- this step will copy su binary et al. in your system which will be used by a Play Store app.
For Philz, look for similar options since most of the popular recoveries have similar options to flash a .zip.

If step 14 proceeds successfully, reboot your device and download SuperSU from Play Store.
Launch the app. Choose Continue and it will ask two options, choose TWRP/CWM. It might reboot your device but will eventually get installed.
For verification see whether SuperSU has been successfully installed and working, or not, by using any app that requests Root privileges. E.g. See these apps.

Congrats! Your device is now rooted.

About Framaroot

  Now you can root your android device without PC, just use framaroot. This app including several exploits named as the heroes of the book "The Lord of the Rings" Gandalf, Boromir, Pippin, Legolas, Sam, Frodo, Aragorn and Gimli. You can install Superuser and su binary on phone or tablet from android version 2.x to 4.x.

About SP Flash Tool

  Smart Phone Flash Tool (SP Flash Tool) allows you to Flash any Stock Rom or any Custom on the Android Smartphone.

 Note: I'm aware of MTK Droid Tools as well. Aforementioned methods should possibly work out easily for you. In case they don't or you wanna explicitly use this app for rooting (it has some other useful features as well), then consider this XDA link.


Music Manager(s) cannot find certain album I recently added a new album on my phone and my music manager (neither doubleTwist or the system music app) have indexed it.

(Failed) Attempts

I have tried deleting the whole album and re-uploading it
I have recently replaced my whole library and while they found every other album, it could not find this one
I have tried the "Reset doubleTwist" button.

Additional Information

The album is located at "HTC One\Internal storage\Music\Slipknot\The Grey Chapter".
It does have every other album in the HTC One\Internal storage\Music\Slipknot\ folder. and every other album I own
I can find it in my phones file manager and from there use it to play the song
It IS in MP3

Does anyone know why this is happening and/or how to fix it?

Try these:

If there is a hidden file named .nomedia in that particular album folder >>> (unhide the file and delete it).
Move the folder into some other directory and refresh library.
Check whether .mp3 files have proper tags (IDv3 tags) >>> (or else they go to unknown album category).


Remotely uninstall apps? I have tried through the Google Play store and it does not seem possible from there, but does anyone know if it is possible to remove an application remotely?

In other words, if I do not have direct access to my phone, can I make use of some website, app or service to uninstall an app without being able to interact with the phone directly.

If your phone is on the same local Wi-Fi network as your computer then you could use Airdroid for this. If it's not, then Remote Desktop offers a terminal emulator, so you could use that to uninstall the app from the command line:

pm uninstall app.package.name

Alternatively, you could set up an SSH server and then use the above pm command. Is there some SSH server for android? is a good place to start if you need SSH server software. Also note that using pm uninstall from outside adb shell - such as in a terminal emulator - will require root. I am unsure if Airdroid requires root for its uninstall feature.


Whatsapp, Keeping the number on the new phone but without the old sim card Whatsapp, Keeping the number on the new phone but without the old sim card.
Ok the situation is I love my old number and to be honest don't want to ask everybody to change my number again and again.
But I do not have the old sim card, and that bums me out. If there is any way to achieve this?

Whatsapp checks if there's a sim card installed at the time of boot.
So as long as you have a sim card installed, it shouldn't be a problem to your whatsapp account (The old one)

I've switched sim cards and it hasn't affected my whatsapp account.
The problem of verification arises when you boot your phone without a sim card.


Do any Android phones support 256GB of storage? I'd like a phone, preferably Android, with 256 GB of storage.

To the best of my knowledge, no 256 GB microSD cards exist (despite a few scammy Amazon listings).  Therefore, the phone would either need to have (1) a fullsize SD slot or (2) dual microSD slots.  I don't know of any android phones that have a fullsize SD slot, although there are of course tablets that do.  And the only Android phone I know that promised dual microSD cards is the vaporware Saygus V2.

Do any solutions exist that don't involve solder or external devices?

A quick search on Amazon gave a bunch of results.

SanDisk Ultra has a 256GB model (red and pale yellow)
Samsung EVO+ has a 256GB model (red)
Samsung EVO Select has a 256GB model (green)
Other manufacturers also have 256 GB models, e.g. Patriot LX and ADATA Premier
Lexar has 256GB models but I've heard they're ceasing producing storage products

Oh, there's one more thing that I'd like to note: The "maximum supported storage capacity" actually depends on the SoC (chip) and system. So as long as your phone is running on an SoC later than 2015 and Android 5+ (Lollipop) then it should have no problem supporting a 256GB microSD card.


is evolution app available for android I was trying to find android evolution app (originally gnome personal manager application). The only result google gave me was the monkey->man evolution. Does anybody know whether somebody has ported evolution to android?

Never heard it was, and I'm pretty sure if it were I had heard. (Originally "Ximian Evolution", by the way ;) Neither have I heard of something comparable. Mail, Calendar, Todo etc. are available as separate apps, sometimes also in combinations, but then mostly only combinations of calendar + todo, not with mail.

Closest coming is probably Pocket Informant (USD 10), joining calendar, tasks, and contacts:

Pocket Informant 3 (source: Google Play; click image for larger variant)

I personally favour a combination of Business Calendar (bought the Pro), Business Tasks (integrates neatly into their calendar app), and K-9 Mail instead on my Android devices (and yes, on my Computer I use Evolution).


Turn on bluetooth when USB is connected? Is there any app, or other method, that lets me automatically turn on Bluetooth if USB is also connected, and turn it off when USB is disconnected?

I'm not 100% sure because I've never used the app myself, but knowing that it has a million features I'm sure Tasker could handle this.

Tasker


Blocking messages from a particular contact Possible Duplicate:
  Good app for blocking incoming sms?

how can i temporarily block all messages in an ANDROID operated Dell Streak by a particular contact....

I don't think you can with the default SMS app.

The 2 best alternatives, HandCent SMS & GoSMS offer a feature called blacklisting - you can long-press hold a conversation and choose to add it to your blacklist. Such messages will be hidden (not deleted) and you won't receive notifications / popups.

You can also configure individual notification colour and ringtone for a particular user.


Is it possible to restore a ClockWorkMod backup to an emulator Is it possible to restore a ClockWorkMod backup to an Android emulator using a PC?

No. You can however, try to restore parts of it using Titanium Backup.
It allows you to select apps to restore - that way you can get back the data.


Can I remove silent mode from the volume rocker? I've got a Nexus 4.  I keep accidentally going into silent mode by hitting the volume down button.  My intention is to only put it into vibrate mode though.  Is there a way I can just get rid of silent mode from the volume rocker so that I don't do this by accident anymore?

I had the same problem. Download the app called "Vibrate mode by force" and enable the Never Silent option.

Hope it will help :)


What is this blue dot and circle on the lock screen? Under the slider, there is a blue dot/circle. What is this?

It was current data usage from Settings > Data Usage > Show on  lockscreen.


How to enter recovery/download mode with broken home button and broken bootloader I was trying to install NightOwl cm12.1 Android 5.1.1 Beta 5 build for my Galaxy Note 1 N7000. I followed all the installation instruction on that ROM's thread. I flashed philz CWM 5.15.0. And now I'm stuck at step 4 after flashing the new kernel (6.48.4) to get updated CWM recovery. Now, my phone is unbootable stuck in the n7000 screen. If I wait just a little longer, the phone would just turned off. The installation guide says that I could still enter recovery mode by pressing "home" and "volume+" and "power" buttons. But unfortunately, my hardware home button is broken.

I read somewhere that we could still enter recovery/download mode via ADB. I've tried it with no luck. It can't find the device (since it won't turned on). Is there any other way for me to at least enter download mode to reflash it back to the original stock rom via odin?

Samsung devices can usually be forced into download mode using a JIG. They are pretty simple and cheap to make. If your device has been soft-bricked this will almost always work.

http://www.xda-developers.com/need-a-samsung-usb-jig-build-your-own/


Is there an app for searching installed apps? (Dumb Search alternative) I have been a victim of the infamous "let's turn off anything that Apple might have a patent for" aka "dumb search" on the Galaxy S3, and looking for a simple way to return my phone to the 21st century

All I want is ability to find an App quickly and launch it by name, without visually finding the Icon

What I want is a set of features that existed in older versions of Android

In the Apps main screen, have ability to search (currently works only for widgets)
If I find an App, I can press and hold, and it will allow me to place it on any home screen

Use case #1 was removed and replaced by the Google search app, which was as mentioned above downgraded to stop including local search (only shows web results)

Use case #2 was removed and have no workaround, I need to visually find an app to add a shortcut to it

I have searched in the Android Play store for "App Search", but found nothing, should I start writing my own app?

(EDIT) New solution:

You can revert to your complete old behaviour. It needs some hacking though and might be illegal (decompile&recompile Google app)

Background:
If you don't have root, you cannot install the old version over the new one.
What you could do: Install an app with the functions of the old Search app.
Idea: If the old app had a different package name you could install it next to the new app.
How? Apktool!

Solution proposal:
Use apktool to decompile and change the whole namespace from com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox to com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox2  of a working old .apk (see .zip below, mind the 2 in the end), then recompile and install the newly crafted package. Result: Old and new (broken) provider can be installed next to each other at the same time because they have a different namespace (.*searchbox2 instead of .*searchbox). Just find out which one is the old one and use that.

Benefits: No root required, permanent (cannot be taken away)
Drawbacks: You get 2x the same widget offering (1x from the old, 1x from the new), so you have to find out which works and which not

My test so far ('apktool' is an alias to 'java -jar /usr/local/bin/apktool.jar' on my machine , FYI):

apktool decompile GoogleQuickSearchBox.apk appdir
#append every occurrence of the namespace with '2'
find appdir -type f | while read a; do sed -i 's,uicksearchbox,uicksearchbox2,g' $a; done
#rename the directory to reflect that too
mv appdir/smali/com/google/android/googlequicksearchbox smali/com/google/android/googlequicksearchbox2
apktool build /tmp/bla.apk appdir
#Any sort of signing (jarsigner, signapk.jar,...):
java -jar /tmp/signapk.jar /tmp/certificate.pem /tmp/key.pk8 /tmp/bla.apk /tmp/gsearch2.apk
adb install /tmp/gsearch2.apk

(EDIT: Old solution)
What would be nice to know: Does this only affect Samsunng and Google's US customers?
According to androidcentral, Samsung now deploys this update as a stability fix globally.

It's most probably this package, that got "updated":
com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox
 (located at /system/app/GoogleQuickSearchBox.apk)

Having root is definitely required to revert the situation.

I'd however decide to get rid of Samsungs firmware altogether and install CyanogenMod for example (This might even be easier than getting root in the first place on the orginal firmware).

You might want to "reinstall" the unaffected version from the last firmware or one of a Euro firmware (if they're not stripped). For example, this archive from the popular Goo.im hosting site will most probably have a working (older) .apk that has the functionality you miss. It's a generic installation package for the popular Cyanogenmod aftermarket firmware that holds all relevant proprietary packages from Google (they had to be stripped off Cyanogenmod by Google's request some time ago). You can open it with any unzip program and extract the /system/app/GoogleQuickSearchBox.apk package.

That's how I would do it (using the adb tool from the Google SDK:

adb push GoogleQuickSearchBox.apk /sdcard/
adb shell
su
mount -o remount,rw /system
cp /sdcard/GoogleQuickSearchBox.apk /system/data/
mount -o remount,ro /system
reboot
exit

I used Application Explorer to generate this listing and see where the .apk is located:

App Name: Google-Search
Package Name: com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox

[...]

Source Directory:
/system/app/GoogleQuickSearchBox.apk

You can get the version of 'Google-Search' by going to Settings->Apps->All->Google Search, which lists the current version. Mine (the same as in the above mentioned .zip is: 1.4.1.299849)


Put files from PC onto a Samsung Galaxy S7 via Wifi? I want to put files (images or pdfs) onto my phone as fast as possible using wifi (LAN over wifi). I don't care if it doesn't allow the files on the phone to be uploaded to the PC, I just want to put files onto the device from the PC.

PC is Windows 10 distro.
I don't want cables, over Wifi is wanted.
I don't want to use the Wifi as an internet connection, I want all data to be sent along the local network (fastest).
I don't want to pay if possible.

Is there anything I can do to solve this?

SSHDroid + WinSCP. I think it doesn't even require root if not using port 22 (you don't have to). Also allows resume transfer. Been using the combination on my own tablet whose USB MTP connection is not working.

Don't expect transmission speed to be high, though - 2MB/s at best and ~200KB/s at worst, far slower than USB.


Am having multiple issues with Android 4.4.2 tablet This is a fairly new tablet.   First, I couldn't  get  page reload to stop coming up while using Chrome and stock (google) keyboard.   The manufacturer,  Prestige,  advised me to use the stock browser because Google was having issues with its products working together.  I did,  but then the keyboard would not come up consistently,  especially in email or Web forms where multiple entries were required.   I was advised by the manufacturer to go to SwiftKey keyboard,  and all was basically working well,  until I started having some of the same problems.    I changed to Opera browser,  and am still having same problems.   I have been to the support and knowledge base sites for all problems,  but can't  find answers that apply  or even address some problems,  and I've  been looking through here for a couple of hours now.   At one point,  I did a hard factory reset,  and have cleared data multiple times on Chrome,  Google,  SwiftKey,  and stock browser.   Nothing works for long, if at all.   Thank you for any help.

It is probably an issue with the dictionary. It probably has a lot of words in it and is taking time to load before the keyboard is displayed. Clear the dictionary or back it up if possible.


Smart lock not working anymore with trusted places I have used smart lock with trusted places since it arrived and it has been working fine. Without any noticable changes, it has stopped working. My location shows in maps as exactly where I am, but being at one of my trusted places still makes me type my pass key.

I have tried toggling location, accuracy, rebooted phone etc but with no luck.

Any ideas on how to fix this?

It might have something to do with this issue: Issue #79735: Smart lock feature (trusted face/device) not working when screen is turned off using software screen off command (DevicePolicyManager.lockNow)

In short: Smart lock breaks when any app uses "soft power off", i.e. your screen is turned off by an app or in any way except the hardware button or a normal timeout.

Note that when this is the case the small pulsating circle around the lock symbol (at the bottom of the lock screen) is missing, since all smart lock variants are disabled (e.g. trusted faces also doesn't work anymore).


Convert Internal Storage to Phone Storage I have a Wiko Darkmoon running 4.2.2 (Wiko hasn't upgraded to 4.4 yet). The phone is advertised as having 4gb storage, which breaks down as

Cache: ~123MB, /cache
Internal: ~1008MB, /data
Protect:~9MB, /protect_s
Sdcard2: ~1749MB, /mnt/sdcard2
System:: ~690MB. /system

Total: ~3579MB ~ 3.5GB.

(info retrieved using FreeSpace https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=ru.krikun.freespace).

On top of this I have mounted a 32GB SD card (/storage/sdcard0). My options are to by default use the external sd card. Unfortunately the /data is full and it basically prevents me to install more programs.

Also, the Sdcard2 thingy is supposed to be internal and it's completely free.

My question is, can I convert Sdcard2 to mount with /data? Having +1GB in /data would alleviate my storage constraints a lot.

I googled and searched here and it seems this is not a common issue. Most of the things I've read are about mounting everything in the external SD card, which is not the same I want to do: I want to reuse the internal 1.7GB by joining it to Internal (/data) partition.

Cheers!

I'm not saying this for sure ! But as far as i had checked the partitioning topics and also in my own experience i'd dived into actions about that .

i do not recommend you delete a partition completely , Because first of all it may cause an error so you can safely reduce it's size to very low & keeping that tiny space for the system presentations and checks (android checks much much things that we can't even guess those are counted as an important thing for the system to run) .
I'm not a pro at all Just hoped to be usefull :)


Is the kernel flashed automatically from CWM? By this, I mean, while flashing a firmware (update.zip) from ClockworkMod recovery, is boot.img also flashed or do I need to use fastboot separately?

What does the developer say?

Seriously every single rom that I've ever seen contained detailed instructions and more often than not a faq of some sorts for this reason exactly.

Anyway, if the zip file contains a boot.img file than it's safe to assume that it will be flashed. The updater-script that handles the copying of files is generated automatically when the rom is compiled so unless someone removes it, the kernel will be flashed.


RAW camera and Lollipop One of the selling points of Lollipop was that it will now support shooting in "Raw" mode, so that you can get the raw sensor data and then process it on the computer.

I just installed CM12.1 on my Samsung S3.

Will my phone support "Raw" shots in the future (My camera app doesn't support it yet) or does it require specialized hardware and I shouldn't even count on it being supported in an old phone?

The good news is, it is not related to hardware (any devices that can run Lollipop should be okay). However, the bad (or also good?) news is, it depends on the Lollipop ROM (stock or custom); if the developers decided to implement this (optional) feature.
Regarding CyanogenMod ROM, it seems that starting from CM11S 38R, it fulfills the condition to take RAW image.
Otherwise, you can check if your device supports those features using Manual Camera Compatibility.

From Camera FV-5's FAQ,

[LOLLIPOP] I have Android 5 Lollipop, but I cannot see none of the cool features announced for Android 5 (manual focus, RAW, manual exposure time...).
Camera FV-5 requires that the phone actually implements those features. Android 5 Lollipop (the OS) brings the possibility for manufacturers to implement those features, and applications to implement those. However, Google left all these features optional for manufacturers, and most of them that are currently updating their existing phones to Lollipop are not implementing them in order to rush an update to the market. From the equation, Camera FV-5 implements everything needed to use those features, Android Lollipop brings developers the possibility implement those features, but if you are not able to use them is because your manufacturer didn't actually implement their part on their devices: RAW support requires the manufacturer to update the camera driver (for instance).
Currently the features described here are supported on the following devices at the beginning:

LG Nexus 5.
Motorola Nexus 6.