Can I unlink ringtone and notification volume on Android 6? I have installed this volume control app on my Android 6.0 phone in order to tune notification volume independently from ringtone volume. However, when I tried to do that, I got the following dialog:

Could someone tell me where the above-mentioned setting is located? I have searched through the Sound&Notifications section, but didn't find anything.

Could it mean that the app doesn't support Android 6, or that it doesn't work without rooting?

After having tried out several volume control apps without success, I think I can safely conclude that unlinking ringtone and notification volume controls is indeed impossible without rooting.


Flashing and re-flashing and HTC Hero with different versions of Andorid I want to try different versions of the Android OS on my HTC Hero (namely 2.2) but be able to revert back to the stock image.

What are the steps required to do this?
How can I extract the stock image from my handset?

I am on T-Mobile UK if that makes any difference.

Do a backup first with nandroid backup, it's included in most recovery images used to flash os roms


Bookmark a page to be accessed on both mobile and desktop Chrome easily It looks like that one bookmark instance can only exist on one of Chrome folders. Such that when I want to visit a site from both my phone and my laptop, I always have to change my bookmark folder back and forth depend on where I stored that bookmark page.

Can I bookmark a page and view it on both mobile folder and desktop folder?

Use slightly different URLs as bookmarks (e.g. add &dummy=1 at the end of one of them) so that they are "different bookmarks".


USB drivers on the xperia play I'm helping out a friend with rooting Xperia play, I spent 5 hours trying to root it yesterday with him and we couldn't. We tried gingerbreak and z4mod but they did not work, so we tried the fastboot way and I can't seem to get the drivers installed properly.

Whenever I try the command to check for the phone in cmd the phone shows no response as if he wasn't connected.

What am I doing wrong?

Steps I've used in the past for this kind of issue :

Check your USB cable - some are no good for data. (this is
frequently the issue when my computer can't see my phone)
reboot everything
you say the drivers aren't installing - what's the issue there? try manually installing the drivers.


Transferring videos from Android to iOS Camera Roll Trying to find the easiest method of getting home videos (up to 3 minutes long) taken on my Nexus 5 (Android) phone and sending it over the internet to the family to save to their iOS (iPhone/iPad) camera roll. Needs to be quite idiot proof on the receiving end (for the family)

Ideally it will compress the video so it doesnt take up too much space as well.

I tried uploading from my Nexus to Dropbox then sending a dropbox link via email so they can open in their Mail app however it will not let you save the video to the camera only view it in Safari.

Easiest way is via WhatsApp or any other social networking sites which can send video.


pictures takes too much storage despite saved on cloud I have a storage problem and that is because my pictures and videos takes too much space.
The thing is that all my pictures and videos are automatically loaded to Google plus. so why do they also take such a large storage on my device (Nexus 4)?
I want to enjoy both words: low storage and access to all my images and I am willing to pay by waiting for images to download if it is not viewed often (caching?).
what am I missing?

Answering my own question here.

Bottom line here is android users must manage their own pictures and videos storage.

It is important to understand that the "Gallery" application (and probably the new alternative "Photos") is not synced to Google Plus, they are merely backuped; This means that Gallery does not deletes (leave a thumbnail) least recent used pictures to save space (as i mistakenly assumed).

I, for one, will be using Google plus application from now on to be able to access all my pictures and videos and will be deleting images as soon as they are backuped.


How do I select a non-OEM charger for my device? My Nexus 5 D821 (2014)'s original charger started failing to charge the phone since last week. There are 1.8A & 1.2A LG OEM chargers available in ebay.com. Is it okay to use the 1.8A charger? or Should I go for 1.2A charger?

When you are switching to a different charger from What is OEM supplied, things to bear in mind:

Type of battery (not really relevant these days as most batteries are Li-Ion or Li-PO . Both have sane charging characteristics. Your battery is Li-PO). Battery type dictates charging / charger features
Voltage  This is critical and never use higher rated voltage than
what is specified for your device. For instance do not use 9V tablet charger for your mobile rated at 5V (vice versa is safe but charging will be slower )
Current  This does not matter much since the circuitry inside your phone / battery caters for this and draws as much current as required. Quoting from this

  Each device has a regulator or charge controller, known as a Power Management IC, or PMIC. This device protects the battery from charging too fast, or too slow.

Nexus 5 charging specifications listed at Charge your Nexus device  and as confirmed by OP in his comments as same for his device

  The input voltage range between the wall outlet and this travel adapter is AC 100V– 240V, and the travel adapter’s output voltage is DC 5V, 1.2A

The rating of LG chargers are 1.2 A and 1.8 A and  should be 5V (which is the standard USB charger rating

Having said that, it is playing safer by choosing current rating closest too original-which is 1.2A in your case.

So you can go in for either LG charger as long rated 5V, but given a choice go in for 1.2 A

Edit

See Complete Guide to Using the Correct Charger or Power Adapter (and What Happens If You Don’t) for similar explanation
To make it easier to understand how Voltage and Current affect charger selection and interpret it in layman terms , adding this example from Basic Electricity

  In some neighborhoods you'll see a water tank raised high above the ground on strong legs. The water in this tank has been raised up there to create pressure in the system. A series of pipes carry the water down from the tank, under ground, into your house, and then to each sink, bathtub, and toilet. The water in your pipes is under pressure because the water in the tank is pushing down on it. This pressure is similar to Voltage. Voltage is the pressure pushing on the electrons in a circuit.

  If all of the faucets in your house are closed, no water flows through the pipes. If you open one faucet, some water flows. If you open all of the faucets, a lot of water flows. This flow of water is similar to electrical Current. Current is the flow rate of electrons through the circuit.

Correlation of this example and charger selection criteria

Voltage:  If the voltage is too high, the pipes in your home (read device hardware) may burst since they just are not designed to handle
Current:   The flow of water (read Current handling hardware)- if it is too low, you will increase by opening the tap outlet to allow more water and vice versa. This doesn't harm the plumbing of the house


Push notification on Samsung Galaxy Note (GT-I717) Why is there no push notification or some notification for incoming messages in the screen when the phone is in locked state? I am using Samsung Galaxy Note. When my phone is in locked state, and when I click the power button I see the pattern unlocking screen. When new messages flow in, I just see a mail icon in the top status bar, but no other notifications in the screen. What needs to be done for that?

If you would like something on your screen in addition to the notification in your notification bar, I would suggest using something like GoSMS with WidgetLocker.

If I'm correct in your understanding, this will do what you want: Set up WidgetLocker to be your unlock screen and then place a GoSMS messaging widget on your lock screen, so you can read the messages immediately.

I don't know if this is what you are looking for, but I hope it helps!


HTC one m9 factory reset problem I need to do a factory reset on my HTC one M9. just for clarification, i have not rooted the phone ever. I'm trying to do a factory reset through the phone setting and once i do the reset it brings me to the bootloader. I'm not sure what to do from there. i try to boot it into recovery mode but it says "this build is only for development purposes only"

any help?

You can try this-- (for Hard Factory Reset)

1.Remove SD card and SIM card. Switch of your phone.

2.Press and hold volume down key along with power button, release power button when vibrates.

3.Navigate to reboot to bootloader with volume keys and select with power button.

4.Then select BOOT TO RECOVERY MODE.

5.Then select wipe data/factory reset.

6.Then Yes – delete all user data.

But as you mentioned that it says "this build is only for development purposes only". Then you can try resetting with setting menu.

The detailed process to reset M9 by setting menu and Hard Reset is given here

If none of the method works then you may need to visit the service center.


Network usage : How to monitor by time I'm looking for a way that tracks network usage by type. I'd like something that at the end of the day says "8h 20min on 3G, 3h under WiFi network".

I've searched a lot but didn't find anything (there are tons of apps that tracks megabytes exchanged, but this is not my interest).

Is there a technical problem behind (i.e. lack of system APIs)?

I don't think there is a technical difficulty in gathering such information. Lack of such apps is likely because of lack of demand. For an average user, it is not the time that is important but the data used while on a plan or roaming and hence an abundance of such apps

I am not aware if the information you seek can be pulled from Android OS requiring programming skill . There is an open source app Network Monitor, which can help you. It doesn't directly give you what you want, but information can easily be extracted.  App has been updated last month. Extract from app description:

  Network Monitor is a diagnostic tool which periodically tests your network connection and logs the results to a database on the phone....It also logs other information about your device and connection status, such as:
  The network type (WiFi, mobile/EDGE, mobile/HSPA, etc)

It offers a rich selection of features to log and display. This solution shows minimum settings required to achieve your goal :

Network Settings →  Enable Service ( Enable / disable as required per duration of monitoring)
Network Settings →  Log frequency can be varied from 1/2 sec to 1 hour , depending on the accuracy you need
Advanced Options → Fields to monitor - offers 50 + fields. Basic fields needed would be :

Timestamp
Network Type
Is connected

You can view the log file with these settings as shown in the screenshot below

Log file can be exported ( mail it yourself) in several formats (Excel, CSV, HTML, KML, Gnuplot the raw database) , for further analysis. Excel would be the obvious choice.

You can filter the Network Type and Is connected =1 ( to avoid disconnected times ), say for WiFi
Use the count function of Excel and multiply it with log frequency ( i.e, time) to arrive at total time and convert it to hh:mm format  - my Excel is rusty, there should be better ways :)
Repeat for mobile data


Insufficient phone memory When I bought this phone Sony Experia CC51, I have more than ten apps, and now I uninstalled them one by one until they were all gone because it always said "Insufficient phone memory". I hope someone can help me solve this it as the phone always has insufficient memory when i try to download apps.

Thank you

Try to download and install SD maid in your device and clear your phone cache and reboot your device that should work


Why i am not able to open my archieved chats? My archieved whatsApp messages not opening at all. I am not able to click it and open it(convert)

To open WhatsApp archived/exported chat, you need an app that is able to open .txt file, because WhatsApp archived/exported chat has that format. You can use this text viewer app from the Play Store.


Want to increase my utorrent android speed I am using Galaxy A7 . My downloading speed is very worse 2kbbs it takes several weeks for a movie download.I am fed up really. Now a movie with 0/101 peers and seed 5/8 is downloading in 2 kbbs with my wify which has the capacity of max 60kbbs around. Please  I need a solution for this ..

Your download speed is quite slow and the number of seeders are few.This is the main reason that it takes lot of time for you to download. Check the ratio, seeder should seed until at least 1.000 Ratio.

Along with those see whether this can help. Go to
Preferences --> Bandwidth --> "Disable the "Apply rate limit to uTP connections" option.


Bootloop using Sony Xperia Arc S (LT18i) Hey guys so I'm in boot loop. Yes I know there are many guides all over saying how to fix it but I have tried many of them and they didnt work.

What happens is I start the phone, it shows the boot image and then restarts after a time.

I can boot into the Recovery mode by spamming the back button when the Logo comes. And can install zip files from the SD card.
I also have tried flashtool to restore it to stock but when i try flashing it detects my device "Device connected in flash mode" but when i try toflash it, it gives an error "Error flashing. Aborted".

Any help?

I have just repaired the boot loop of my Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc (LT15i, boot loop caused by activating Bluetooth !!) just by unlocking the bootloader of my phone - by following these steps:

I retrieved the IMEI-Number of my phone. It's on the sticker under the battery - it's the 15-cypher-number beside the serial number.
I went to http://developer.sonymobile.com/unlockbootloader/ - selected my phone type, input an email address, and received a unique link from Sony by doing so.
Following this link I could type in my IMEI number (without the last cypher !! - that means only 14 cyphers - and without the hyphen).
The website emitted a code and a software line like this one:

fastboot -i 0x0fce oem unlock 0xTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

(All the T's stand for the code, the rest has to be typed in like this.)
I copied the above line in the program fastboot (check elsewhere to learn how to work with this program and your phone). I typed in the above line given from the Sony website. After a few seconds the bootloader was unlocked.
I restarted the phone, and then Android 4.0 was working again !!


Android Lollipop in MOTO G 2 The auto-rotate option is getting enabled by itself once I get back to home screen from settings menu even after disabling it.
How to disable the auto-rotate option other than in accessibility?

Use tasker in that case.

Create an application based profile and choose your launcher app in it.
Create a task followed by the  action Display → Display AutoRotate  → and Set → Off.

Now whenever you would come back to home screen or app drawer auto-rotation would turn off automatically.

If the approach noted above doesn't work, then either:

there is a specific setting overriding auto-rotate which you may need to search. I bet it doesn't exist.
your "Settings Storage" app's data has gotten corrupted. In that case do factory reset.


What is the format of Android's logs? I'm trying to gather data about my phone by analyzing the log files in /dev/log. I'm specifically looking at /dev/log/main. I always thought that any sane log format would be plain text, yet these files appear to be either binary or in some character set that neither I nor my Linux text editors can identify.

What is the format?

Here are a couple of screenshots:

First, here's a snippet of the log as interpreted by vim (^@ refers to the null byte; I'm not sure about the other colored control sequences):

Next, this is what the log looks like in a hex editor:

I'm using a Galaxy Nexus running Jelly Bean. The logs were collected using root and a terminal emulator, since aLogcat doesn't seem to use root and thus can't access all logging info.

If you want sane information, I recommend sane commands :) (no offense meant, just kidding). So the question should read:

How to obtain log information from an Android device?

And now we are on the better side. There are multiple approaches which can be used:

utilize apps to display (color-coded) log information
utilize ADB (part of the Android SDK) to remotely extract the very same information
use ssh from remote (or a local terminal app) to aquire the information directly from the device

To fully handle this topic it takes more than this simple answer (if interested, you can e.g. find more detailed information on many web sites, or in Andrew Hoog's book Android Forensics: Investigation, Analysis and Mobile Security for Google Android, which I had the honour to translate into German. There are probably many other sources as well.

So I will just give a few examples here to get you started:

Utilizing apps

The probably best known app in this context is aLogcat, available for free in the playstore (and the dev will happily accept your donation for the other variant of the same app). You'll find a screenshot below1. The app allows you to filter the logs, to start/stop recording log messages, and even to store the recorded snippets to your SD-Card -- of course in plain text, as you requested.

Another app in this section is Log Collector, which simply tries to grab the entire available log and send it via the share menu2.

The Android Debug Bridge (ADB)

The Android Software Development Kit (SDK) includes the adb command for various tasks. Amongst many others, it offers the adb shell to execute commands on the device. Using this, you can gather your desired log information as well: Just prefix below commands with adb shell.

Command prompt on the device

Using a terminal app (e.g. Android Terminal Emulator or Terminal IDE) you can access the logs directly at the command prompt, locally on your device. A little more comfortable, this can be done running a ssh server (e.g. DroidSSHd or DropBear SSH Server) on your device, and access it from your computer. This way you can work on a big screen, while investigating your logs.

Commands to access your log information

There are a lot of powerful commands you can use to access your log information from the command line, and I will only give a few examples here.

dmesg

The dmesg command extracts the kernel log:

$ dmesg
<6>[82839.126586] PM: Syncing filesystems ... done.
<7>[82839.189056] PM: Preparing system for mem sleep
<4>[82839.189361] Freezing user space processes ... (elapsed 0.05 seconds) done.
<4>[82839.240661] Freezing remaining freezable tasks ... (elapsed 0.00 seconds) done.
<7>[82839.242279] PM: Entering mem sleep
<4>[82839.242889] Suspending console(s) (use no_console_suspend to debug)
<7>[82839.252410] vfp_pm_save_context: saving vfp state
<6>[82839.252716] PM: Resume timer in 26 secs (864747 ticks at 32768 ticks/sec.)
<6>[82842.091369] Successfully put all powerdomains to target state
<6>[82842.092468] wakeup wake lock: wifi_wake

logcat

With logcat, you can access many logging information -- but most times, this will require root. It has some parameters to filter the information, e.g. by selecting the log buffer to read with -b. Please read the information provided on the developers page on logcat for details. To give you two examples: logcat -b events would list up events, or logcat -b radio information on your device's radio modul.

dumpsys and dumpstate

The two commands dumpsys and dumpstate give you detailed system information:

$ dumpsys
Currently running services:
    LocationProxyService
    SurfaceFlinger
    accessibility
    account
    activity
<snip>
DUMP OF SERVICE account:
Accounts: 1
    Account {name=xxxxxxx@googlemail.com, type=com.google}
<snip>
DUMP OF SERVICE alarm:

$ dumpstate
========================================================
== dumpstate: 2012-08-18 23:39:53
========================================================
Build: Gingerbread GWK74 - CyanogenMilestone2
Bootloader: 0x0000
Radio: unknown
<snip>
------ MEMORY INFO (/proc/meminfo) ------
MemTotal: 487344 kB
MemFree:   10436 kB
Buffers:   14136 kB
Cached:    145460 kB
<snip>

bugreport

And if you are too lazy to remember them all, simply use the bugreport command -- which calls all above and bundles it for a nice, humm, bug report to the developer...

Of course, you can redirect the output from all those commands to a file to copy to your computer, and in most cases you should do so -- as your screen buffer would be far too small to handle it all: bugreport > /mnt/sdcard/bugreport.txt would be one example for that part.


Why does Media Storage consume so much memory and how to clear it for good? Android is generaly horrible when it comes to managing or saving disk space. But recently, new problem appeared, which is the Media Storage system application which fills my internal memory (disk memory) with 350MB of data.

I deleted the data using Application manager, but the data reappears. Why does it happen and how to stop it? I saw no negative side effects of deleting Media storage data.

This file apparently controls/manages what apps and files are believed to be on the phone.  Here is why I think that.
1. The galaxy Prime (don't laugh) was constantly "full" where it couldn't update anything, couldnt accept texts, etc.. on and on.
Attempting to Uninstall Facebook? done daily, only to look again and see it still installed.
Try to delete or move Pictures?  nope - "Failed to move" "Failed to delete" file.  Pics and Videos remain no matter what you do.
Final attempt? "Clear data" on the Media Storage file and Boom!!
Finally, the pictures, videos, we had tried to move or delete, and Facebook uninstall FINALLY ARE REMOVED!!

And space is back, texts are flowing, no more complaining of space etc..
I am guessing this file gets to size and point where it cannot be efficiently managed by the phone/android.


No ADB driver for medion e4001 (MD 98500) for remote debugging For testing purposes I need to debug an older android device:
MEDION LIFE e4001 (MD 98500)

There are no drivers available online and I wrote to the MEDIUM guys receiving the following answer:

  Thanks for your feedback. We are gladly share the following information with you: There are currently no plans to develop debug drivers for the  Medion smartphone e4001. If you want to transfer data they are not necessary - when connected to a pc the phone will appear as a usb storage device.

So no official ADB driver for that device. Is there any chance to get a working ADB driver for that device somehow?

I found a solution (for windows):

Download the official MEDION ADB driver for some other tablets they offer
Unpack
Open the android_winusb.inf file in a texteditor
Add the following lines at the end of the two sections [Google.NTx86]up and [Google.NTamd64]
;
;MEDION Life E4001
%SingleAdbInterface%        = USB_Install, USB\VID_109B&PID_911E
%CompositeAdbInterface%     = USB_Install, USB\VID_109B&PID_911E&MI_01

Go to the device manager, select the unknown driver (called generic in my case), update driver and select the folder.

Off you go!


Sending & Receiving SMS via WiFi Is there a way to send and receive SMS when a cellular signal is not available, but WiFi is?  I'm often on-site at locations where the building has a strong WiFi (Internet) connection, but a simple cell signal is spotty at best.

SMS is tied in with GSM telephony standard, so the answer to your question is No.

But what you can do, is use Viber, Whatsapp to send something similar to SMS (not the GSM variety!) to each party provided they have the appropriate app installed.


lg v20 firmware update -now looking for any connection I powered off my V20 and 3 hours later went to turn it on and it says, "firmware update, now looking for any connection"  It appears stuck on this screen.  I can't do anything.  Any suggestions

I fixed it myself. I held the button down for a while to try to turn it on.  Finally, the screen changed where I could toggle and select power off to stop the cycle.  It worked and the phone powered down.  I turned it back on and good to go.


Automatically switching WiFi I have two wifi networks in my house. They are very far from each other.

When I go to the kitchen area I loose connection to my main one in my room and it connects to the second one.

When I go back to my room the kitchen one is still slightly available. But so slow I cannot load anything at all. My phone (Nexus 5x) however does not switch back to my main connection but just stays on this sluggish connection.

Anyway to force it to automatically choose the strongest available connection?

As of now, at least on the Nexus 6P which is a Nexus and all of this should apply, the only way I've been able to stop situations like that where my phone is trying to connect to a weak Wi-Fi signal is to go into the Settings, tap on the network, and click "FORGET".

However, as far as current features in Android go, there's no way to prioritize Wi-Fi networks without an app from the Google Play Store.


How can I use Google Latitude's Location History without a constant Internet connection? I find the Location History part of Google Latitude really useful. Is there any way to make the app (or another) store my location when an Internet connection is not available, and send it to the Latitude servers as soon as a connection is available?

Latify in the Play Store does the trick.


Video Player with support for audio channels? I have recorded a TV show with dual channels (left is dubbed, right is original voice) and then converted into a mp4 file. The movie plays fine in VLC where I can choose the audio channel I want to listen too.

On my Galaxy Tab the movie plays fine too (with several apps: the built in Video app, Rockplayer, Doubletwist and Vplayer), but I haven't found a Video app that lets me choose the audio channel; it's a little difficult to watch the movie with two difficult audio tracks in your left and right ear...

Are there other apps I could try? Or is there some utility that would let me redirect only the left or right channel to both ears?

I am using Dice player to play dual audio movies on my Sony Xperia Neo V mobile. I think you should try dice player.

When you are going to play dual audio movies on your device, you will see an option at the top right side bar resembles music icon.You will need to click on that icon and you will see the movies dubbed in different language.Choose your preferable language and you have done!!

Source: How To Play Dual Audio Movies On Any Android Device?


"My Places" in Google Maps I want to mark "My Places" from my Android tablet but can't find the option in Google Maps. Are there any alternative apps? If possible, how can I edit my earlier marked places and / or find their longitude and latitude?

Have you tried with google maps engine ?


Examples of mobile broadcasts being used I recently found this page of settings in on my phone under Cyanogenmod, I had never even heard of this system before.

mobile broadcast settings (click to enlarge)

Are there any examples of this system being used in the past?

Yes.  They're called Wireless Emergency Alerts, part of the Emergency Alerts System.

There was a thing in California earlier this year over the first use of the system giving utterly irreverent information (sending the alert to people hundreds of miles from the event), presumably due to poor implementation.


changing cyanogenmod dialer behavior: screen goes blank I updated my Samsung Galaxy S4 with Cyanogenmod 12.  Phone is Sprint SPH-L720 dual band.

When I make or receive a call, when I put the phone to my ear the screen correctly becomes blank.  When I move it away from my face, however, it stays dark.  This thwarts any attempt to hit buttons, such as speaker phone or "press 1" for a menu option.  The screen returns once the call completes.

As I recall, on the stock ROM with the phone, this sort of behavior could be configured with options, but being new to cyanogenmod, I have not found such options.

Regrettably, "cyanogenmod dialer" searches only find things to install new dialers.  So I must rely on your expertise.  Are there options I can change?  Do I just not know the trick to get the screen back?  Any advice?

Thank you

The answer is hitting the power button.  If the phone still does not wake up, a second press wakes it up.


How to recover from recovery boot loop in Galaxy A20? Everything was fine on my rooted device with magisk, until I flashed a custom recovery (TWRP) on RECOVERY partition.
That didn't work, resulting in a message "recovery error validating footer vbmeta" during boot into "download mode".

Perhaps the device was still ok after that.
However, trying to fix the message and put TWRP to work, I flashed a vbmeta.img on VBMETA partition.
This resulted in the current boot loop, I suppose because of some checksum regarding vbmeta and the (stock) root partition.

Is there any hope for this device?

I am still waiting for the battery to drain, but so far all the attempts with using the buttons/USB failed to be able to communicate with the device in any way.
I does anything other than just rebooting.

Following @alecxs advice, I managed to exit loop and enter download/odin mode:

1) Just drain the battery until it turns off.

2) Hold vol+ and vol- while connecting usb cable.

3) Press vol+ to enter download/odin mode.

ps. The fix of the system is subject of another question.


How to run android phone flawlessly ? Possible Duplicate:
  What are some general tips on improving overall performance of an Android phone?

I have been using android phone(Sony Xperia Tipo Dual) few months now .However I see that there are loads of things to learn as a new user .From rooting your device to effective memory management can seem quite intimidating .Also there are lot of good blogs explaining how to use memory effectively .

So what are tips/tricks you would give to first time android user so that he can use the phone effectively so that there is no dips in performance ?

Answer based on all the available android versions .

Memory management: do not use any task killer, Android takes care of it well. Killing apps only waste battery when they have to be respawned.

Rooting the phone does help - you can weed out all the useless carrier and OEM bloat. Also, after using a bunch of droids over the past few years, I'd say modified, cleaner versions of stock ROMs >>> custom ROMs in terms of stability and battery life, with the sole exception being Nexus devices.

Learning to tweak and perfect Android is like doing it with Linux distros on PCs and servers - there is always more, it is a never ending process and we are all learning. There is no definitive list or article, really.

And most important, don't accept others' advice without thinking about or questioning it.


Service code to get Xperia model I'd like to check the manufacturing date of an Xperia Ray. The easy way is by looking at the sticker under the battery, but I'm trying to convey this to a potential seller, and I would prefer something that doesn't involve taking apart the phone. I've read on Yahoo answers that *#9999# should do it, but it's normally a Nokia service code so I doubt the accuracy. I've also found *#*#4636#*#* (info) and *#*#7378423#*#* (service), which may have what I need inside of a menu. Can anyone give me a more reliable answer?

Xperia™ Function Tester App

I would suggest trying this official application to find out the information you needed.


Problem installing Google Chrome to Phone I installed Google Chrome to Phone via AppBrain. AppBrain displays the app as installed (both the website, and my AppBrain app). When I click 'open', I get "This app is not executable".
When I click 'uninstall', I get 'The application was not found in the list of installed applications.'

I indeed do not see it in the list. What should I do to install it? (BTW, I also can't find it on the Google Market)

(BTW, I also can't find it on the
  Google Market)

If you cannot find an application in the Market, this means the application is not compatible with your device. AppBrain cannot install applications that you cannot find from the Market, since in the AppBrain installation, you are brought to the Market to install your application (AppBrain is application discovery service, not alternative Market).

Are you possibly using Android 2.1, which does not have the Cloud-to-Device Messaging API, and therefore cannot use Chrome to Phone? Or possibly you have multiple phones linked to your AppBrain account?


How to transfer a file from my downloads folder to my media folder? (Nexus 4) I have downloaded an mp3 I want to use as a ringtone. I don't want to connect my phone (Nexus 4) to my computer, I just want to transfer the file from my downloads folder to the appropriate folder where it can be used as a ringtone. I'd rather not download an app for this. Any suggestions?

Either you can use a root browser like ES Explorer or even easier is to add a folder on SD denoting what you wish to use it for ie. Ringtone, alarm, ui, notification


Android ADB unable connect with IP address I have successfully installed Android OS in Oracle virtual box, but I have one problem: I cannot connect to ADB in the Android OS virtual box.

In my Network settings in virtual box:

When I select host-only Adapter option, I can connect with ADB, but I have no Internet connection.
When I select NAT, I cannot connect with ADB, but I have Internet connection.

How do I fix this?

If you use NAT you must add the right forwarding rule:
Go to your network configuration.
Select NAT, put PCnet-FAST III as adapter, and deny in mode.
Then click in the button to add the rules and add a rule for TCP where the host and guest ports are 5555.

Always the most sneaky part is the network configuration of the VM, try with this one. If you still have issues check this tutorials:
Speeding up Android development with Android-x86 and VirtualBox


Whatsapp doesn't work over 3G,everything else works fine A friend has a factory fresh, unrooted Samsung Galaxy S Duos, and except for Whatsapp every other internet accessing app works fine on a 3G or EDGE connection.

She has un/reinstalled Whatsapp several times. It works fine over Wifi. She's no power user, so any solution involving rooting the phone is not an option.

To clarify - there is nothing wrong with 3G or EDGE on her phone, since she can browse the internet and use other such apps perfectly fine.

Update - She's on Vodafone, as I and thousands of people in India are, and no, Vodafone is not blocking Whatsapp for any reason.

Searching for solutions on Google only leads to 'No shit, Sherlock!' type answers with genius level solutions like 'check whether your 3G connection is working' or 'get the latest version of Whatsapp'.

So is there a workaround?

I faced similar problem until recently I found the fix. I use Vodafone 3G Pack.

If you are an android user, check the network and settings -> Access Point names
In that check if APN is set to Vodafone Live.
If yes, change it to default settings and it should be changed to vodafone Mobile connect.
Also, then check the value of MCC and MNC. It should be as per country code and mobile operator.

I didnt understand, why this changed on its own, but after making this change and rebooting phone, it worked for me.

I hope this works for you too..


Email notifications for google calendar events I am trying to create a calendar event with email notification using my HTC desire, but I can't figure how to do it. I tried both the built-in calendar app as well as mobile Google calendar website. How can I make it work?

For the Google Calendar website, desktop version (the following doesn't apply to mobile version of the website, so you must request desktop version of the page from your mobile browser):

Edit or create your calendar event, under event color selection you'll see Reminders, by default you'll have an email sent 10 minutes before the event start time.

The following is for the Google Calendar app:

Open your calendar event, go to Reminders, then tap the triangle selector under Notification, you'll see there is an Email option too.

If there is no reminder set, tap Add reminder first, or edit your event (the pencil icon).


Galaxy A3 samsung can;t be read in my laptop I was always being able to transfer my photos from my Samsung A3 Galaxy to my laptop. But recently i am unable to do it. Please advise how do i fix this problem.
Thank you
Faribel

Connect device through usb:

Then permission to allow from mobile
If not popup visible then you can try from slide down to choose USB options. You can try all those options to visible mobile on your filemanager.

If still not availble then you can try through developer option then on option.

Which operating system you have used in your laptop.

You can also connect using xander or such app to laptop through brower you can access then mobile.


Samsung Galaxy S keeps resetting itself on shutting down. How can I stop this? I have a Samsung Galaxy S and it has worked smoothly for the last couple of years. A couple of days ago, the battery charge died and when I turned it on, it had done a factory reset. Now every time I turn off the phone and then turn it back on, it always resets itself, How do I stop this and what could be the cause?

The Flash memory in the device may have died. This would cause any data on the chip (the /data chip) to not be picked up by the system, so it assumes that it is coming fresh out of a box.

This means that the chip(s) in the device may have used all of their write cycles. This is the reason SSDs aren't used for their reliability.

All flash chips (thumbdrives, SSDs, anything with a size of two to the power of X (2,4,8,16...) that isn't RAM...) have a limited number of possible write-erase cycles.

In most cases, this is unfixable other than replacing the chip. And in your case (if this is indeed your problem) this essentially is terminal.

Limiting writes to the chip (don't update apps, install-remove apps etc...) is the only way to slow this process.

  ... for the last couple of years...

In your situation this can be caused by general usage, esp, over this time period.
My eeePC's SSD didn't last a year.

Although, this could be something completely different, I'm just going by inferences as I couldn't see anything on Google.


How to extend the timespan of Google's calendar widget? Or in other words: How to show more dates in Google's calender widget?

The next date I added to my Google calender is an appointment I have in eight days from now. The Google calender widget does not show this appointment. Right now there are no other dates added to this calendar.

So the problem is not, that there are to many dates. The problem is that the widget does not look into the future far enough. I want to see my next date, even if it is still a month to go.

How can I make the widget display dates that are scheduled farther in the future than it does now?
Is it possible to display all future dates?

Of course the display of regularly repeated dates must be limited, but I would like to see at least the next scheduled of each one.
What is the reason, that this is not already the case?

This seems really odd to me, because it does not look very complicated to find all the appointments in a database or sync them. To me it seems to be more work to limit those features this way.

P.S.: I just saw that the "date-list-view" of Google's calendar app (not the widget this time) does show dates, weeks ahead. I don't see any limitation. I would like the widget to behave the same way.

I just downloaded off widget from Google Apps called simple calendar. once you install the widget on to your home screen then you go to the apps area and single tap on the simple calendar icon. takes you into the settings for the simple calendar widget and you will be amazed to see how many different ways you can customize the calendar. you go into one area where you can select how many days to see on your calendar. you can even mix items from several gmail accounts.


Google play disappeared from my phone While uninstalling some app I may have accidentally uninstalled Google play app.

But even then I have updated Google play app before and while uninstalling it should remove only updates from my phone not the complete app. I should have been able to use default app.
But I am unable to do so.

Yesterday while clicking app's icon it was showed an error, that app isn't installed.
I tried to find it on my app library but it's not there.

What should I do?

I am using Samsung galaxy fit (GT-S5670)

Yes, downloading and installing the APK should work as long as you have the Google Framework Services -- basically if the Market worked before, then it will again unless you removed system services.  (Those can be replaced as well but it's more hassle).


Is there a way to estimate building movements? I wish to determine if, or how much, movement there is of the building in which I'm currently living. Is there any way for me to do this? Is it even possible at all based on phone hardware?

You cannot track your building's movements with the GPS. Its accuracy isn't better than ~10m. If your house does move that much, you won't need any hardware to detect it.


Android clearing recent applications list After exiting the applications on my Galaxy nexus, they appear on the recent applications list. Do they still use CPU/battery? Do I have to remove them from recent applications list in order to save battery?

The recent applications list show only what applications have been recently used, it doesn't check whether they're still running or using memory/CPU. Therefore, this list doesn't affect battery use one way or the other.

Instead, you might want to check Settings -> Apps -> [swipe to the right] to show running applications, processes and services. Here you can see the apps that are using your device and consuming battery, and kill unnecessary processes by tapping the app and then Stop.


Disable Mi5 Touchscreen Input via adb I've got a Xiaomi Mi5 (gemini) and I encounter the problem of ghost input. I guess my phone could be water-damaged even though I'm not sure. To backup my data I need to access the phone (not just it's flash memory, I need to backup using specific apps). The phone itself still works fine, except the abnormal touchscreen which is ghost touching the phone permanently. I need to disable specific parts of the touchscreen, or if not possible the touchscreen drivers themselves.

I've already tried this solution, but my init.rc does not include any /tsp.

I've found the solution myself.

To follow the steps check these requirements:

superuser permissions
debugging enabled
ability to accept debugging request on phone

Find and delete the file which proceeds touch input. In my case it was /dev/input/event2, but it can be another file in the dev/input directory as well. To delete execue the following commands (given adb-tools are installed):

adb shell
su (grant superuser permissions)
rm -rf /dev/input/event2 (replace event2 with your corresponding file if necessary)
touch /dev/input/event2 (to be able to use input commands such as input tap x y and input swipe x y x y, replace event2 with corresponding file if necessary)


What happened to my detailed battery stats on my Asus Transformer Pad? I have an Asus Transformer Pad tablet (TF300T). As with any other Android device I've owned, when I go to the settings menu and tap "battery", it gives me a detailed break down of which apps and processes are eating my battery power. Well, at least it used to do that.

Nowadays, when I visit the battery settings, only 3 power consumers are listed:

ScreenWi-fiTablet Idle

Here's a screenshot:

Why aren't any of the apps I've been using listed? And what about system processes?

One possibility that occurred to me is that nothing that is using less than 1-2% of the power is being listed, and all my apps are below the threshold. However, that seems unlikely to me as I've played dynamic 3D games and used other CPU-intensive apps at times, and after doing so I've checked the battery activity and they still don't show up.

Before taking this screenshot I was using Pocket, Feedly, Mantano Reader Premium, Chrome, and Words with Friends for hours, alternating between them. Surely some of that should be shown here, right?

When I check the battery activity on my cell phone (A Galaxy Nexus), I see Pocket has used 6% of my battery, and maps has used 3%. And I don't even use those apps on my cell phone nearly as much as I do on my tablet. Yet my tablet is completely silent about them.

It also occurred to me that this problem may have started when I upgraded my tablet to Android 4.1 Jelly Bean about 3 weeks ago. But I can't be sure, and I don't know what to do about it if that turns out to be true.

Can anyone tell me what happened to my battery usage data, and if there's any way to fix this going forward?

From what I recall, that report doesn't show anything that has used less than 1%. Considering how much of it is screen usage, I'll bet that that's the issue.


Do Not Disturb for specific duration in Samsung S8 Quick Settings I've just switched from a Sony Xperia Z3 (6.0) to the Samsung Galaxy S8. On the Sony I could set Do Not Disturb mode for a specific time (15 mins, 30 mins, an hour, 2 hours and so on) using the Quick Settings menu.

This was a really useful feature when going into meetings, presentations, movies etc. But I can't find this feature on the S8 - there's only the option to enable DND mode (and leave it on) or schedule it between specific times.

Is there anyway to get the great 'DND for 15/30/60 etc. minutes' feature in the Quick Settings on the S8?

I can see in Google's documentation for the Pixel that the feature that lets you set how long DND mode should last (15,30,60.. minutes) is there in the Pixel, just as it was in my old Sony Xperia:
https://support.google.com/pixelphone/answer/6111295?hl=en

Unfortunately it looks like Samsung removed this feature with their Touchwiz overlay, so you're only left with scheduling DND between specific times or enabling it forever.

To bring back this feature I ended up having to install an app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.cabooze.buzzoff&hl=en


Android cannot forward packets Target:
Perform IP forwarding for devices within the same local network. (The real target is transparent proxy but the IP forwarding is a prerequisite)
Network setup:
All devices are in the same local network 192.168.0.0/16.

main router 192.168.1.1
Android phone 192.168.2.1 (network interface wlan0)
computer 192.168.2.10 gateway set as 192.168.2.1
others like Raspberry Pi at 192.168.1.11

Android setup:

Data disabled, only WiFi connects.
rooted Android 10 (Pixel 2 XL)
enabled ip forwarding by sysctl -w net.ipv4.ip_forward=1
netfilter: on all tables of nat, mangle, filter and raw, run iptables -F -t <table_name> and iptables -X -t <table_name>
rp_filter: Disable by sysctl -w net.ipv4.conf.all.rp_filter=0 and sysctl -w net.ipv4.conf.wlan0.rp_filter=0

Result:

the computer cannot access to the Internet, ping, dig, browser, nothing works.
the computer connects to local devices without any problem (like ping router 192.168.1.1, SSH to the Raspberry Pi, or use FireFox through the SOCK5 proxy hosted on the Pi).
Android phone connects to the Internet perfectly.

Debug:

using iptables -t <table_name> -L -v to show packet count, all chains have some packets, *except the FORWARD chain of both raw, mangle tables shows Chain FORWARD (policy ACCEPT 0 packets, 0 bytes). After some googling, rp_filter is the suspect but I'm sure it's turned off.

Thanks to @Irfan Latif, I found the solution myself.
It's right that packets are sent to the last unreachable rule of ip rule, because they fail to match any previous rules:
# result of `ip rule`
... (no rules match)
22000:  from all fwmark 0x0/0xffff iif lo lookup wlan0
32000:  from all unreachable

So I added a rule to route incoming traffic from local network to route table wlan0 by:
ip rule add from 192.168.0.0/16 iif wlan0 table wlan0


which APK for Google play services? On my Sony Xperia Z1 Compact running CyanogenMod, I had the Google Play Services installed as an APK. At the time I must have thought that this was better than installing GApps - for being able to pick packages myself.

Since a recent update (of either Google play services or CyanogenMod) I get the error "unfortunately Google play services have stopped working".

Google play store also requires these services because it relies on these services. In the end I removed both the Services and the Store.

I have tried installing the a number of versions of the Services (from 7.3.xx to 8.3.xx) but they also report the same error message after a while.

Does the app need some sort of reset before it will work again? Each time an APK is uninstalled then its cache etc must be removed?

Or should I install a very specific version of the APK? my build is cm_amami_userdebug 5.1.1 LMY49J d8f66af955

EDIT:

For flashing GApps, I would choose Open GApps pico for Android 5.1 on ARM(32), does that sound right?

EDIT 2:

Flashing the GApps above worked. I would still like to know the answer to the first question - whether an APK could have solved it (and which)

The APKs for Google Play Services can be found on APK Mirror, along with explanations of the build numbers and how to determine the right build to install.


How do I consistently receive notifications from one app, and no others? This basic question has become increasingly difficult over the past two years.

I have a Samsung with Android 8.0. Amazing, I cannot rely on Calendar to make a tone before an event, and this state of affairs has existed for two phones (S7, S8). The layers of control I see:

Under "Notifications" in Settings everything is off but Calendar.
There is a do not disturb function which has a toggle to allow calendar
events at all times. That is on.
"Easy Mute" a samsung feature, is off.
In Accessibility "mute all sounds" is off.
I make sure calendar events have a notification, as is the default.

However, the notifications still intermittently fail to make a sound, although popups seem to always happen. They are especially likely to fail in the morning. There is a separate "notifications" volume, affected by some of the previous, but not others, which often (but not always) shows off when the issue occurs. The same problem has followed me through two phones (s7, s8). I have reset my entire phone in an attempt to get this working, but the issue remains. I have changed Google accounts in an attempt. No luck.

So, how can I consistently get my calendar audio notifications?

I had what seems like this problem in reverse i.e. I was getting notifications from too many apps. After searching for any and every possibility I could think of, it finally turned out to be with Google and Facebook settings for my problem.

If it has been 2 years and no joy, you have most likely tried all the suggested places to look below but if not I hope one of them helps lead you to the answer.

Regarding Calendar notifications with Google here is a link to the page on Google Calendar Help that might help: https://support.google.com/calendar/answer/37242?co=GENIE.Platform%3DAndroid&hl=en

This will take to a YouTube video for the Galaxy S7 on the Android side but not specific to the Calendar: https://youtu.be/Z0ZeJdRPTWk

Here is another link to a short article on changing notification sounds to help isolate it: https://www.greenbot.com/article/2688096/how-to-change-notification-sounds-on-your-android-phone.html

Third party apps such as "Greenify" that hibernate apps you have specified when the screen goes off would also keep notifications from getting through. Here are a few more links.

S7 Notification Reminder: https://youtu.be/tiEwnht-JWg

S8 Calendar Notification: https://youtu.be/hETYdfgK45Y

This worked for several users: Go to settings, applications, application manager, then message. If notifications is set to block. Unblock it.

Lastly the best resource I have found for Android phones is at XDA-Developers: https://www.xda-developers.com/ It is definitely worth searching the site for your exact model of phone.

This is where I learned how to root Android phones. I found that the number of variations in the same phone is mind boggling. The exact model number & where a specific model of phone was made could mean the difference between groups of people having the same problem while others do not.


How can I view which program wakes up my Android screen? From time to time, I see my Android screen turns on. How can I view which program wakes up my Android screen?

I use unrooted Android 6.0 on LG4. The screen is locked.

You should look into dumpsys. This works without root, using ADB.

First, enable developer mode on your phone (tap the build number in settings -> information/about this phone 7 times). Then go to settings -> developer settings and enable USB debugging there.

On your PC install ADB, there are many versions, minimal ADB and fastboot is quite nice.

Once you got all that you can execute adb dumpsys on your PC within ADB to get a f**kton of increible information, from detailed battery usage to SMS history, LCD debug information, wifi radio information and a ton more. All without root, so that's pretty cool.

The dumpsys utility is divided into multiple modules, which you can individually access by appending their names onto the adb dumpsys command.

The module you should be looking at would probably be usagestats, so give adb dumpsys usagestats a run. That should show you which app was active at the time your display turns on.


Can I manually focus the camera on my Android phone? Is there any way to manually focus the camera on my Android phone?

I know that you can tap on where to focus, but that's just assisted auto focus. What I want is to be able to manually adjust the focus.

I couldn't find a way to do it or an app that would do it.  There were a couple out there that claimed to have manual focus but basically just did what you described as "assisted auto focus."

I found this thread at XDA where some people have been looking through the code to find a way to add the manual focus.  From what they found it appears that it is possible but someone has to code it.  Its worth keeping an eye on it: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=630989


What is the "Android Sooner Single ADB Interface"? What is the "Android Sooner Single ADB Interface", what function does it serve, and why does it have that name?  Specifically, to what does the term "Sooner" refer?

It appears to be a driver written by Google that gets installed on desktop computers when some Android devices are attached, but the name is so odd that it's worthy of having a canonical answer providing a full explanation as to its function and name.

The model names of released mobile devices are created by marketing departments not that long before the release. Before that moment engineers use unofficial code names to refer to the products they are working on.

The Sooner was the code name of the 1st ever Android prototype device built by HTC for Google back in 2007.


Is it possible to Share Android phone 3G internet connection to multiple clients (tabs/computers) via bluetooth I want to share my android phone 3G internet connection (via bluetooth) so that multiple clients (other android phones/tabs/laptops) can access shared internet simultaneously.

Is it possible to have the above?

There's the bluetooth PAN profile which allows just that.
It is included with CM7+ and from Android 4.0 onwards (or already 3.0?). Bluetooth PAN's host (the device that provides the internet) acts as a router which does NAT + issue dhcp adresses for its clients.

There are also  Bluetooth DUN profile apps that allow this (they provide a virtual GSM modem and may also allow for more than 1 connection at a time):
See host+client BlueDUN apps from Mirko Solazzi


How to enter in TWRP/recover on Huawei P9 lite with keys? I have a p9 lite Huawei.
I can boot into twrp with this command

adb reboot recovery

But without adb, I cannot enter in recovery mode.
If I push Volume Down+Power, it goes into bootloader (I can see a green droid logo).
If I push Volume Up+Power, it opens the EMUI recovery.
How to get recovery mode with twrp?Is possible with fastboot?
I have installed the twrp with

fastboot flash recovery twrp.img

The basic process of installing TWRP on every phone is to boot into TWRP itself first so TWRP could overwite the recovery partition and replace the stock Android recovery with TWRP itself.

Step 1:
Boot into bootloader / fastboot mode

Step 2:
Make sure that your device's boot loader is unlocked. If not, please follow this tutorial on forum.xda-developers.com by user Mandrigan. https://forum.xda-developers.com/huawei-p9lite/how-to/guide-unlock-bootloader-twrp-root-t3405701

Step 3:
Boot into fastboot mode again. Type in the command
fastboot flash xxxxx.img

Where xxxxx.img is your TWRP image file name.

Step 4:
Immediately boot into recovery (make sure you don't boot into Android!!!)

Step 5:
While in TWRP, Press "Mount" and tick on "System" box. Then go to "Advanced" --> "File Manager" find a folder with the name "system". Go into that folder and scroll down until you find a file with something like "recovery-from-boot.xxx". Press on the file name and press on "Rename" and add ".bak" at the end of the file name and it should look like this "recovery-from-boot.xxx.bak"

Step 6:
It is recommended to flash either SuperSU or Magisk so TWRP stays and it doesn't get overwritten by stock Android recovery.

Installation is done and you should have TWRP as your permanent recovery!!


USB transfer speed ridiculously slow My Android connection to my computer is ridiculously slow. Just previous to this, I used Banshee to transfer some songs to my Android, and it took nearly two hours two transfer 23 songs. (The problem is not limited to Banshee, but any file transfer.)

I thought this might be a problem on the Ubuntu side of things, but I'm starting to think that the problem is either limited to, or more pronounced with, my Android device.

While I was doing variouos tests to try and diagnose the problem, by adding and removing various USB devices on my system and then testing file transfers, I saw speeds of up to 2MB/second, which I could live with.

However, no matter what I did, and regardless of what speed I have been able to achieve, after some amount of time, the problem returns. The speed becomes something more like 50KB/s or less.

Two hours to transfer 23 songs is practically unusuable.

Assuming for a moment that maybe my Ubuntu machine is not the problem, how can I determine if my Android phone is doing something to hold up the USB transfer speed?

Samsung Galaxy S2, Model number GT-I9100, Android version 4.0.4, Kernel version 3.0.34-Siyah-v3.3.2, Cyanogen 9-20120624.

This is a common problem with Android and Ubuntu. I got around this by using ADB to transfer the data.
Turn ADB on in your phones settings and make sure you have downloaded the ADB package on your computer (http://www.webupd8.org/2012/08/install-adb-and-fastboot-android-tools.html). Then run in terminal:
adb devices

to check that your device is recognized. Once you have done that you can transfer files using:
adb pull /sdcard/place_on_phone ~/place_on_computer

and
adb push ~/place_on_computer /sdcard/place_on_phone


How To Enable Debug Mode From ADB Shell or ADB Via Terminal In Linux so far I have put my android device in ftm mode
i have tried from adb sideload
now i am trying with busybox ash

I'm able to run  ls
but anything else says permission denied or error:closed.

/ $ ls
acct
cache
charger
config
d
data
default.prop
dev
etc
file_contexts
firmware
fstab.qcom
icon_ftm.png
init
init.class_main.sh
init.environ.rc
init.ftm.rc
init.mdm.sh
init.offcharge.rc
init.qcom.bms.sh
init.qcom.class_core.sh
init.qcom.early_boot.sh
init.qcom.factory.rc
init.qcom.ftm.rc
init.qcom.rc
init.qcom.sh
init.qcom.syspart_fixup.sh
init.qcom.usb.rc
init.qcom.usb.sh
init.rc
init.target.ftm.rc
init.target.rc
init.trace.rc
init.usb.rc
init.vendor.rc
init.zygote32.rc
mnt
persist
proc
property_contexts
res
root
sbin
sdcard
seapp_contexts
selinux_version
sepolicy
service_contexts
storage
sys
system
tombstones
ueventd.qcom.rc
ueventd.rc
vendor
verity_key

You can't make use of ADB without turning on the Debugging mode. There is one way to access partitions via ADB even if you don't have ADB turned on. If you want to run ls on restricted partitions, like cd data, you need to boot (not flash) into a custom recovery. Asssuming that you have an unlocked device, run fastboot boot <recovery.img>.
Now that you have successfully booted into a custom recovery, mount relevant partitions and run adb commands.


Phone dropped in water - Now screen won't turn off (Samsung Galaxy S2 (SII))? I currently have a Samsung Galaxy SII (S2)(I9100) that got dropped in water. I took the phone apart (removed the screws on the back and properly took the back off) and left it to dry in a warm place overnight.

The phone works absolutely fine as you'd expect it to, but it now has this weird issue where the screen won't turn off at all, whenever I press the power button to turn the screen off, it comes straight back on again. If I let it go to sleep with it's own "timout" it just comes back on straight away also.

It has been factory reset and still does it. It has stock Android that came with the device, never rooted or had custom ROMS installed.

Here's a video of the problem actually happening:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4UViRT64Ss

I assume it has to be a hardware issue from the water damage, but has anyone experienced this? Is it likely I'd be able to change any of the parts inside to try and fix it?

The water evaporating has left now undissolved mineral ions on your phone (ions conduct electricity).Now electricity doesn't go as designed.Also heat cycles will possibly change chemical and physical structure of your hardware.The more you use it the more likely something will get worse

Instead of drying to get rid of water and leave the ions on your phone you should have hoovered the water being cautious not to discharge static electricity to the phone (even though theoretically almost everyone should have damaged their hardware with static many times in their lives it somehow never happens)

Now maybe you should clean it properly (isopropyl alcohol should work the purer the better at least 99%)

The better way to clean it is with bathing it in the alcohol and use ultrasound at the same time which some more professional phonerepairers do with special machines.(You can find some good replacements of the machines for about 50usd)
It most often works without ultrasounding but the ultrasound method is much better and fixes the performance of water damaged phone more.


How can I see the full charge capacity of my battery? I have a Samsung Galaxy S running Android 2.2.

Is there any way for me to see the full charge capacity of the phone's battery, so that I can compare it to the spec?

What I have in mind is something like what Lenovo's Power Manager tells me about my laptop's battery:

Is there anything like this for Android?

Without special measuring equipment and some kind of a reference - no you can't (not in mAh). There is no app that would provide you with that kind of information, at least not accurate enough.


how can I randomize my MAC address every time my WiFi is turned on? Given the increased prevalence of systems which track people's movements by their Mac addresses I'd like to obscure mine.

I have a rooted galaxy note 2 with busybox installed.  I can change my MAC address like so:

busybox ifconfig wlan0 hw ether 11:22:33:44:55:66

however, if I disable and re-enable my wireless, or I reboot my phone, it gets forgotten.  is there somewhere I can put a script so it will be run every time my wireless turns on?

How about Chainfire's tool Pry-Fi which was announced over at XDA?
It works great and it is available via the official Google play-store at:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=eu.chainfire.pryfi

Here’s a screenshot showing the tool in action…


Transferring apps to new phone Applications
I updated my phone from Samsung s4 to Samsung a8. I transferred all my info with smart switch. Some app's  appeared and the rest are "in progress". It has been several days now, why are the apps still in progress please help. Btw I do not have WiFi

So I believe you used a USB cable with a USB/microUSB adapter ?

If so, you may want to check the quality of your cable and/or use a better one (USB cables are NOT "all the same" : some are excellent, some are utter sh*t).

Unfortunately, the only tool I know for that goal is the QooPow qualMeter : http://www.qoopow.com/. It's a physical tool (= not an app) and a bit pricey, but if you find yourself lost in your cables, it might be a good investment for the future (your friends may find it useful too. Why not pool some money to get one for the lot of you ?).


Music Search Lockscreen Widget History I have a Nexus 4 running 4.4 (Kitkat) and I use the Music Search widget while listening to the radio on my car.

I have discovered the name of that song or artist I wanted to know many times, but now I realize I can't seem to find my music "search history."

Can anyone point me in the right direction? Is this in the (Play) Music App or Settings? I've looked everywhere! Reading thru the Google Help led me no where...

UPDATE: I answered my own question and cleared up the issue, giving credit where due. BTW the picture above was from illustration purposes only, and apparently from a device that has the Sound Search widget history disabled. Sound Search History is not available is some countries.

My widget has the clock icon at far right which when pressed shows the history. Maybe your screen is not wide enough for it? Their is a music search sync option in your Google account settings in "Accounts & Sync", although I don't think that is the issue. Will keep researching.


YouTube app keeps pausing the video I am using a Nexus 5 D820 rooted stock Android 6.0.1 MOB30D.  The YouTube app version is 11.x and is the latest as I checked for the updates today.

The app pauses the video at random. I had to tap the play symbol at the center to start it to play.  This is not same as buffering as in buffering one would see a progress and the play symbol does not come up when the video is stopped.

I tried this with my headsets and without headsets to rule out the
press of headset button or something allied to cause the issue.
I also tried this in 3G and in WiFi, both in high res and low res.
I also tried this in offline mode.

In each and every case, the YouTube app pauses the video almost for once for every minute.  I do not want to switch over to another app and I cannot uninstall it as well.

Does anybody have any solutions? Thanks.

I figured out what the problem is, it's because the phone thinks you keep plugging/unplugging the headphones. Try using another set of headphones and that should fix it.

I used the headphone that came with my PS4 and it caused the problem, it kept restarting but YouTube was still pausing until i changed the headphones then it went back to normal.

Hope that helps.


Can't unlock bootloader I'm trying to unlock the bootloader of my tablet for hours now.. There's no solution out there that worked for me. I've already tried:

fastboot oem unlock (the tablet responses with a question screen where I can select "yes, unlock bootloader" and "no, don't unlock bootloader", but when I select yes it responses with an error "Unlock failed - Err:0x7000")
fastboot oem bootloader unlock (this command stucks at "...")

I also tried to flash custom recovery so I could get around this but now I'm stuck in a bootloop.. I have a backup of the stock recovery, but I can't flash it either..

fastboot flash recovery recovery_stock.img responses with:

sending 'recovery' (10240 KB)...
OKAY [ 0.417s]
writing 'recovery'...
FAILED (remote:
Security deny - Err:0x2017
)
finished. total time: 0.430s

I know that Security deny - Err:0x2017 is because of unlocked bootloader...

Tablet-Information:

Name: Medion Lifetab S8312

Processor: Mediatek MT8392

Generic answer: The errors in the unlocking process (and especially security errors like yours) generally mean that the device vendor does not allow unlocking. Some device vendors allow it by personally issuing unlock codes (through individual support requests), but it's getting rare nowadays.

Unfortunately the only way is the "old" way, which is to "break into" the device, which usually requires a specific bug on a specific version of Android ROM using a specific program. Since people hardly play with such exploits nowadays and your device seems to be a rather unpopular one your chances to unlock it are sadly very low.

You may try to contact the vendor, if they still exist.


Cannot connect to Internet via certain Wifi networks my LG G3 recently started acting up in that it will not be able to access the Internet via my home WiFi. I can connect to the Internet on other WiFi networks so I don't think it's necessarily an issue with the phone. However, I can connect other devices to my home WiFi and access the internet without any problems whatsoever which implies nothing is wrong with the network. My phone is connecting to the WiFi network, it just cannot get to the internet.

LG G3
Android 4.4.2

I was able to get this resolved, sorta. I used a static IP on my phone and am now able to get to the internet. I'm not sure what has changed on my device to force me down this path but it is what it is.


Android Wifi with same name I want to know if i add wifi network with say ssid="test" can i anyway add same ssid="test" with different configurations like ip and gateways?

EDIT :

Suppose wifi has been configured with below configuration :[Added manually]

SSID : "Test"
Security : None
and No Any advance settings provided.

Now can i add another wifi with settings below :

SSID : "Test"
Security : WEP
and No Any advance settings provided.

Adding  any number of duplicate SSID's is possible if you have a unique IP address.

In lay man's terms SSID is nothing but just an identification given to that particular network given to distinguish that network from others for simplicity. What defines that network is it's IP Address.If you have a conflict between an IP address then it may be a real problem.

For some devices(like Samsung) you need to check the to Display open Network connection if available in order to view open connections and for some devices it shows by default.

Ex:-Let's say you have two network's with SSID as Test.
Test1 has an open connection available for public use and Test2 is for personal use and is encrypted. Your mobile device will simply connect to a network whose signal strength is good. As the IP address is different there will not be any conflict and you can do your browsing.

In case there's any  conflict(same signal strength) then the device will ask the user to select the desired network or search for a new network.

Caution:-Browsing an open network for reasons related to finance leads to severe security threats browse at your own risk.

An IP address serves two principal functions: host or network interface identification and location addressing. Its role has been characterized as follows: "A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A route indicates how to get there.

The most simple definition for IP Address I could give is-

IP address act as you house address to which the shipment has to be delivered.If you have two same addresses then to whom will the shipment be delivered.
For further details about IP read this


Tap-to-wake anywhere without activating anything when the screen starts dimming I'm an iPhone user. Sorry for that.
But in my defense, I was given a recent Android phone and like it!

However, I noticed a difference in the Auto-Lock behavior that is, to me, utterly annoying.
Maybe people here used to the thing might enlighten the poor iPhone user that I am.

On an iPhone, about 10 seconds before entering auto-lock, the screen dims. Same on Android.
Then, tapping anywhere on the iPhone screen before the lock occurs, the dimming stops, the iPhone is ready to be used again and that's it. The location where the "tapping" took place is not activated. It's simply ignored.
However, on Android, while the screen is dimmed and one can barely see where the tapping takes place, the "tapped" location is activated! So whatever was tapped is run!

Most of the time, tapping the dimmed phone is just to wake it up. So, I tried to educate myself, and find an icon-less area to tap whenever I want to wake up the device. But sometimes it's within an app...Compared to the no-brainer action on an iPhone, that's really annoying.

Searched the settings, the iPhone behavior does not seem to be possible on an Android phone.

This is the reason I wouldn't switch to Android.
Most probably, Android users are used to that behavior and do not care (/ don't know that the behavior could be different).

Is there a way to set that iPhone behavior on Android?

You can try the sleep option. You can do this by going to settings>display>sleep and then choose an option according to your preference. Some phones(like Redmi or Mi phones) come with a never sleep option whereas others can stay awake for a maximum of 30 minutes.


Memory requirement (for HDD) for Android based tablet? Background: I'm currently considering buying a Acer Iconia A50x Tablet device that runs the Honeycomb OS. The device is available (or, well, not) in a variety of configurations (16GB / 32GB / 64 GB "HDD" and with/without 3G module). It seems the 3G version is only available with 16GB atm. and the non-3G version is available with 16 or 32GB atm.

Since I do not have experience with android devicesread: I've no clue whatsoever how much a "stock install" of android needs and how much space the apps take, and whether they can be installed on SDHC card etc. I have no clue how much memory for the "HDD" is a good choice for such a device: (apart from bigger is better)

My question now is wrt. the onboard "HDD" memory: Is 16GB enough or would it be better to try and get a 32GB version or wait for the 64GB version? (After all, I can just plug in a 64GB SDHC card for additional space.)

Wrt. to my expected usage: I plan to use this device to surf the web, read emails and maybe a PDF or two. I do not currently plan to play any specific games. My music collection on the PC is only 6GB, and I would only use a small part of this on the device. No films to speak of.

This is really an "it depends" answer. If you are only installing applications and streaming any media you consume, 16GB is sufficient. If you are copying media locally, 32GB should be a minimum.

By way of example, the tablet I was using on my last vacation only had 2GB used. My son's was full at 16GB with the movies and TV shows we'd copied on to last him a week and he ended up watching the same shows over and over.


How to download all my apps in google play when I have flashed a new ROM? When I have flashed a new ROM, I have to download all the apps I need in google play one by one, which is very inconvenient absolutely. Some of you may recommend "Titanium Backup", but it will lead to some errors with my device sometimes. So I want to download all my apps using google play in one time, instead of downloading my apps one by one. That is, I want google play to download and install all the apps in my previous ROM automatically after I have flashed a new ROM, Is that possible? Better if you have some more convenient methods. Thanks for any help!

You have two options.

Do a factory reset. Go to Settings > Backup & reset > Factory data reset.
When you are asked to log-in your Google account, it will ask you if you want to download the apps you installed before. Usually, your paid apps will be installed (and possibly some of the free apps). You may have to manually install the others.

Or, you can always use Titanium Backup. Make sure to back-up only user apps, not system apps. Then, restore those user apps after you have flashed a new ROM.


Apk file not installing in android says "You may not have proper app for viewing this content" I'm trying to install apk file in Samsung but it says "You may not have proper app for viewing this content". I've checked "allow installation from unknown source" option in security, but no luck. Please help me to sort this out.

Such Issues generally occur when you try to open the file from within an Application (Messenger, Whatsapp etc.) other than File Manager (any such application with similar privileges) or Play Store.

So, please make sure you are accessing it from File Manager.

  If you are not aware of the source of the APK and if it's not from a trusted source please don't install it directly.


system app not working I have a widget to turn data connection on and off. Since I upgraded my Nexus 4 to Lollipop, I get the message "widgetsoid needs to be installed as a system app"

So I rooted the phone, moved the apk file from /data/app to /system/app. I set the permission to 644. Rebooted the phone.
Still, I get the the same error message. Do I have to uninstall the app, and reinstall it from the apk?

What am I doing wrong? I use a custom launcher, if that matters.

How to install Widgetsoid in system/app folder?

With ADB connected to the phone:

Mount/system in read-write mode.
Run the command adb push Widgetsoid.apk /system/app/Widgetsoid.apk
Remount /system as read-only.
Reboot your phone.


How long are call logs stored and is this configurable? As far as I can tell, my OnePlus 3 has complete call logs for the past 6 months (last log 4-19-2018, today is 10-20-2018 which seems too much of a coincidence)

Logs are really useful but some calls I make only once a year so being able to keep (more) complete logs would be really useful.

Is this something that's configurable on Android? And, is there a way to sync this with my Google account so it's backed up even?

There is a limit of 500 entries for calls (incoming, outgoing and missed) in Android. How long will the call log last, go back in time or get filled depends on how often you call or are called.

If your device is rooted, you can install Unlimited CallLog for LP/MM/N, an Xposed module that extends the limit to an unlimited number like its name suggests for Android 5 to 7. For non rooted devices, a search via Google Play Store provides a list of apps that should also extend the limit.

Your device should have the ability to backup the call history; search for Backup in the Settings app. Some of the apps (see previous link) also provides for backup options.

Manage & restore your device backups in Google Drive


What causes dead zones on digitizer? I ordered a replacement digitizer after I cracked the old one. I installed the replacement, and it looks fine. But it has large horizontal bands across it that do not register touch, rendering the phone very difficult to use.

I was hoping someone has some experience in this area to share. Are there any tips or tricks that can resolve this problem, or is it likely I've gotten a defective digitizer?

I also had this issue recently. I only had one, vertical band, but it still affected use, mostly typing. I demonstrated the issue (seen below) and contacted the [ebay] seller. They promptly classified it as defective and sent me a new one. This will most likely be the solution to your problem as well. As I did, I would use a drawing program to verify, and inquire about a replacement screen and digitizer.


How to disable toasts (popups)? An example of grey and white note that I mean is, like when you copy something, a small grey background and white lettered bubble appears for a few moments saying 'copied to clipboard'. My phone has some sort of malfunction where it dispays that prompt for several minutes at a time. Very annoying.
How do I disable that?
I am using a Samsung Galaxy S9.

First of all...
What you refer to as grey and white notes are officially named Toasts.
Toasts are one of Android's built-in ways to output info/feedback to the user.
Toasts can be shown by:

The Android OS
System apps
User installed apps
Background services
etc..

Second...
You gave almost no information that is useful for troubleshooting your problem.
This is why I'll assume you just want all toasts disabled.

However...
Disabling Toasts on a system-wide basis is not easy. It may even be impossible  without rooting your phone (unlocking permissions) and subsequently changing part of the system software.

And last...
Improving your question to include more info would make more helpfull answers possible.
Useful info would be:

If all or only some toasts misbehave.
If not all, then which ones specifically.
What they say.
If this happens every time, randomly, at specific times, etc.
When did it start happening?
Did you install something fishy?
Do you know/can you guess which app they belong to?

Relevant info

Popups, dialogs, notifications, toasts: what's the difference?
Toasts overview | Android Developers


how do i add a shortcut to homescreen in #materinova launcher? I downloaded the latest nova launcher named #materinova.15 , in its previous versions I could add a shortcut by holding a blank space in the home screen and chose shortcuts, but in the latest release I can't find any options for adding shortcuts, though I can put apps  on the home screen by going to app drawer and holding and dragging the app to the home screen, but I can't find the shortcuts. Please help, this is my favorite app so don't want to leave it for this little bad thing?

That's because they are sorted alongside all the widgets. That's not very intuitive but at least they're here!


How to disable android applications from running back ground automatically My phone (Note3) has a large amount of ram, but there are always lots of applications that can run back ground which can easily consume  more than 90% of your memory.

It's really annoying to manually clean them time to time.

Can I set it up so that if I click home button then I will end current app completely?

No, there's no setting to fully close an application when you press the home. It depends on how the program is built. Some stay running, some stay in memory but are inactive (not eating CPU but wasting memory in case you restart the program), and some just close as desired. Additionally, there are plenty of Samsung or carrier applications that run in the background full time and don't have an onscreen program to open or close.

There are several applications on the Google Play Marketplace that will automatically close all applications for you either on a schedule or on demand, but that's as close as it gets unfortunately.

Perhaps there are more technical answers that involve custom ROM's, but that's not applicable within the confines of a SU question/answer.


is there a way to schedule a turn-on-wifi-sync-turn-off-wifi scheduled task for every day at 8am? I have no 3G.
I use my android phone mostly via wifi home network and read emails and podcasts later offline.

Is there a way to make a scheduled task which will turn on wifi, force sync (or wait for it) and turn off wifi after for example after 20 min?

Force sync is optional. I will just hope that during the 20 min it will occur somehow.
Is there an app which will do this or some smart hack?

Of course there are tons of it. Many of them just supports what you are asking but I'd recommend you llama or tasker. Tasker is paid app but llama is free and uses your cell tower to determine your location to make location based tasks as well. For eg, not only it can do what you have asked but also only when you are at your home.


Unbricking LG G3 stuck in fastboot using Qualcomm unbrick method I have an LG G3 which does not have recovery mode or download mode. The only available mode at the moment is the fastboot mode.

I installed the the fastboot tool using the "minimal fastboot and adb tool": http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2317790

And tried executing many fastboot commands as follows:

fastboot erase aboot
fastboot flash aboot aboot.img
fastboot erase boot
fastboot flash boot boot.img
fastboot erase laf
fastboot flash laf laf.img
fastboot erase rpm
fastboot flash rpm rpm.img
fastboot erase recovery
fastboot flash recovery recovery.img
fastboot erase modem
fastboot flash modem modem.img
fastboot erase misc
fastboot flash misc misc.img
fastboot erase sbl1
fastboot flash sbl1 sbl1.img
fastboot erase tz
fastboot flash tz tz.img
fastboot erase dbi
fastboot flash dbi dbi.img
fastboot reboot

However none of the commands executes successfully, I always receive:

  FAILED (remote: failed to erase partition)

What could be the reason for fastboot failing that way? Could it be that there is no partition on the phone at all? Or does the bootloader need to be unlocked for this to work in the first place? Maybe the driver is not correct, but on the other hand I see the commands showing up on the screen of the device -- so it receives them.

I will provide an answer covering all the steps that I had to go through in order to get that LG G3 working again.

Being stuck in fastboot mode

When that phone was given to me, the person owning it before had tried to flash some custom rom. After failing miserably the phone was stuck in fastboot mode.

Trying to get the phone out of the fastboot mode, I tried the following guides:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/android/general/unbrick-lg-model-download-recovery-t3060184 -- did everything preceding SOLUTION FOR ALL THE PROBLEM WITH NO DOWNLOAD MODE section.

Fixing the phone with the fastboot did not work for me.

Since I had nothing to use I decided to try the "Qualcomm unbrick" method

Qualcomm Unbrick:

There are 3 useful posts on how to get into the Qualcomm mode and how to unbrick the device: i) the reddit post ii) the open-freax post iii) the xda post
Start by following the reddit post
The tools to use: i) Qualcomm drivers: the drivers in the reddit link are legit ii) willcracker's tools: There are different versions of willcracker's tools (aka the BoardDiag tool). I used version 2.99a.

Edit: Here another post providing photos for getting into Qualcomm mode

Troubleshooting

If you follow carefully the reddit post (and if you are a bit lucky), you might get through this process without a problem. However I had 2 issues

"device not found in dload trying flash programmer" -- I got this message when running the initial step of BoardDiag. Turns out, this problem occurs if you release the shorting of the pins a bit too early:

here l33tlinuxh4x0rsays:

  once you have extracted the firmware and set up the program with the correct port you need to Check "AP" and "EMMC" then press start.
  Be sure not to select any partitions or change any other options than
  the firmware directory and comport. It should come back as PASS. If it
  throws an error about not being in dload mode you need to restart the
  shorting process. Hold the short for a bit longer this time.

FAIL on the EMMC test -- If you manage to get through the AP Chech test, and receive FAIL for the EMMC the solution is provided in the open-freax post:

  If you’re lucky enough (again) both of the tests will be OK. If, like
  me, you have nothing but a huge FAIL on the EMMC test, in the options
  list switch « Read/Write » to « Erase », unplug/plug your G3 (always
  with your metal wire to have 9008 mode, that’s pain in the a*s but
  it’s mandatory) and click START again. Internal memory will be
  entirely erased. Do a « read/Write » again, this time it should be a
  PASS

For the remaining of the steps regarding the BoardDiag tool I suggest you follow open-freax post.

Installing back the stock ROM

I was unlucky with the ROM and managed to install one with malware on it. So you might want to invest some time to find the correct rom for your device.

There are two methods (or maybe more) for flashing rom to you LG G3.

TOT + dll method: for this method follow this post from the section 2015 (updated with pictures) TOT Method, also this post is useful
KDZ: for this method follow this post again, starting from How to flash ROM KDZ Method

To find proper roms you might try the following pages:

http://lg-phone-firmware.com
http://devtester.ro/projects/lg-firmwares/download.php
http://storagecow.eu/index.php?dir=Xda%2F

Other method for the Qualcomm unbrick

There is also another method for unbricking Qualcomm devices, but I did not have to use that one.

references: http://www.leakite.com/2016/06/revised-how-to-unbrick-qualcomm-android.html http://www.droidsavvy.com/unbrick-qualcomm-mobiles/


Help with enabling USB Debugging My problem is that I need to enable USB Debugging on my Asus me301t. When I go to try and enable it in settings, all developer options are grayed out and I can't enable it using the slider at the top of the screen. I'm using Android JellyBean 4.2.1. Help?

If you have an enterprise device then it is likely disabled by your IT department to prevent unknown users from accessing the data on the phone. If you need access then you will have to go to the policy administrator to get it unlocked.


How do I find out which App changes the Alarm Volume? For some reason my alarm volumne sometimes goes to zero. I don't know which app is causing the behavior. Is there an app that can tell me the answer? An app that tells me when my volumne changes and which app is causing volumne changes?

From experience with my  zte zmax2 with Android, it is the built in music player labeled " music player ". Which is a bug needing a patch yet to my knowledge. When on external speakers in the headphones Jack and a song on loop, it has the alarm look all the way up, yet went off at the music volume level despite saying otherwise. Hope this helps.


Wi-Fi cannot turn on! Accidentally deleted /etc/wifi folder i was trying to enable ad hoc network connection on android and overwriting below folders

/etc/wifi

/etc/dhcpcd

and now my wifi could not turn on. The phone is ADINNO R8, a custom build phone.I could not find its ROM on the internet and most of software does not recognize it.

it runs on 4.2.1 Jelly bean.

tried:

USB internet

USB internet to upgrade firmware within OS(seems to use wifi driver as well which are corrupted, so there is no internet connection)

3rd party fixer

download WiFi fixer and not working

other version/wifi folders

downloaded some WiFi folders people upload on the internet and none of them are working.(maybe because this is a rare custom phone)

Recovery

tried recovery and wipe all data in setting, still no luck, wifi folder still corrupted.

i could think of three methods, both failed.

reflash its OS.(failed as could not find its ROM)
upgrade its OS.(failed as no internet access, WiFi not working)
Replace /etc/wifi found on internet (failed as no compatible version)

is there anyway i could fix it?

Try harder to find firmware images for your phone. A factory reset might not work, as it only wipes data and cache partition. The etc folder is in /system/etc, /etc usually just is a link to /system/etc. Therefore you would need an image of the system partiton.
Well, if you can't find such firmware, it might not be a device thats common used, and therefore - if you are lucky - there was not a lot of money around for software adaptations from the manufacturor. Try to get firmware for similar devices, watch out for the same android version, and second on similar hardware / components. Download these images, unpack them and try to find the needed files.
Maybe you can just grab another device, from a friend or so, and look for the files. You might also consider having a look on aosp and taking the files from there. Watch out for the correct android version.


How to get F-Droid to detect updates of itself - how to remove "ignored updates"? I'm using F-Droid and noticed that there are newer versions of the F-Droid app available that are not shown when F-Droid checks for updates.

I found that when looking at F-Droid's options > installed applications that F-Droid is listed there, but with a note "ignored updates" (maybe the wording is different, I'm using a translation).

On the App page, there is no "update" button, but just "start".

Is there a way to indicate that F-Droid also looks for updates of itself?

F-Droid came pre-installed with my Shift phone, so maybe, that's the reason why there is this setting.

The F-Droid App controls its own updating through an option within the app. When you start F-Droid, visit the internal settings in the "hamburger" menu ( the three dots). It can have its own updates restricted if the setting "Ignore All Updates" is checked. Uncheck this setting to allow F-Droid to maintain itself.


Virus alert in my android phone A message that my phone is infected by virus is displayed and a button appears to deactivate it now.Its not my antivirus anyway. Sometimes a countdown also begins. what is all this? is it really a virus?

Do not click the button, close the webpage instead.

Only your antivirus will alert you of viruses, this is obviously a scam to get you to click that button.

When you visit a website, your phone sends some information like which webbrowser it is using and the device model to the webserver, it is common that people abuse that by making a "personalized" message about virusses that is meant to trick you into going to a website of theirs or installing a malicious app.

They display the device model to make it look more real and to unknowing users this makes the people who made the message look trustworthy and allknowing, and the countdown is to put you under pressure.

I cannot tell you what happens when you do click the link because i never did that, but i can tell you that it is far more likely to install virusses than remove them.


Why can't person on other side hear music playing in my phone during a call? I always wonder why is it that while on call, the person on other side can hear my voice clearly but can't hear any music/video playing on my phone. Mic fairly picks up any other ambient sound playing on my laptop.

When we play music on phone ultimately it also becomes an ambient sound, why can't phone picks up that? I am pretty sure it has to do something with the sound card, or is it not?

I think your are misinterpreting ambient sound

You are in a crowded , noisy place and are talking to someone on phone. They can't hear you clearly because of the ambient noise around you. Why? Because the phone mic captures your voice and noise around you

In this case what you hear is what the other party hears = Ambient noise + your voice

In the case of music playing on your phone (media player running) and you talking at the same time, it is not ambient . Phone mic picks up only your voice (while what you are hearing is both streams media and your own voice) because voice is prioritised cutting out media. Once you establish a voice call

  From this point on the telephony service has the highest priority and won't let any other audio play in parallel.

In this case what you hear (media + voice) is not what the other party hears. He hears only your voice. Think of it as you can hear two channels or streams whereas other party can only hear one stream of your voice

Now, if you were to play the same media from your laptop speakers while you are talking that's the first case of Ambient noise

Related Direct Music Player audio to Caller


How do I upload multiple photos at once to Picasa (Web)? Is there a way to select several photos and upload them all to Picasa?

Solution found!

Open GALLERY Select My Library Open up the album that has the photos you want.
Press the MENU key ( the one that is left of the home key)
Push the 'SELECT MULTIPLES'
Then select the photos you want to upload (the pics selected will have a green box with a white checkmark displayed on it).
Press the MENU key again, choose QUICK UPLOAD to upload to Facebook Or choose SHARE to upload to Facebook, email, Picasso, print to retail, text messaging, etc.

Voila, your multiple pics are sent!


How do I remove pending/in-progress downloads A few days ago, I tried to save an attachment from official Gmail app and it could not finish download due to some connection errors.

Now, I'm seeing the notification every time without any progress. It just stays in the notification area and sliding the notification does not remove the download.

This file download was started from Gmail app and I see the same type of notification in other downloads from different apps so I'm guessing there is a central download progress going on.
I tried turning the phone off, removing the battery and SIM.

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How can I list and remove these downloads ?

Have you tried a file explorer like ES File Explorer or My Files, which comes with later versions of Android? If go to the Download folder is the half file present? A completely downloaded file will present a long list of options if you long press the file, allowing you to cut/copy/rename/delete. Possibly it will also appear on a halfway complete download to allow you to delete. Then revisit the gmail message to restart the download if you want.Remember that the target folder might have been specified other than the Download folder.Good Luck.


OnePlus 3: Disable hotspot turning off automatically After updating OnePlus 3 to OxygenOS 4.0.1 the option to keep hotspot on even no devices are connected seems to be missing. I need to keep hotspot on all the time and only manually to shut it down. How to enable this feature?

Nougat update for OnePlus 3 and 3t is extremely fresh (I managed to upgrade it only using a VPN to Canada). This must be one of the features which still needs to be polished. The checkbox is missing to keep the hotspot running even if noone is connected for more than 5 minutes.

Until OnePlus releases a new minor update to fix this, workaround can be either using USB tethering or Bluetooth tethering (reported by @MichaelPearson).

Got another update (01/17) over the air towards the end of January, that still doesn't have the checkbox.

The latest update (as of 2017 November) still doesn't have it