WhatsApp - Auto Creates thumbnail images in DCIM Directory - Impossible to stop Hope someone can help with this.

Handset
Xiaomi Redmi Note 8 Pro

Precondition
Ensure that Internal Storage/DCIM it totally empty.
Or that the Internal Storage/DCIM/.thumbnails directory is totally empty.
Clear all other caches where possible including WhatsApp cache.

Description
Launch WhatsApp
Enter a conversation
Click the camera icon to launch the camera
Camera is launched and allows a picture to be take.
A gallery of recent pictures is displayed

Issue
A number of pictures appear in WhatsApp recent pictures that i do not want to appear.
In Internal Storage/DCIM/.thumbnails,  a set of thumbnails matching the pictures as displayed as recent by WhatsApp are now displayed. How do i prevent this?
When i take a new picture with the camera app. This image will appear under the automatically created ones from the .thumbnails directory.
I have deleted the DCIM and .thumbnails folder many times. When the camera is launched from within WhatsApp the folder and thumbnails is automatically reacreated

Questions
How do i control what pictures are displayed to me when i click on the camera icon in WhatsApp. Whats App call these “Recent”
    Can it point WhatsApp to only look at the DCIM directory on my SD Card?
How do i prevent the old thumbnails reappearing the in Internal Storage/DCIM/.thumbnails directory when the camera app is launched from WhatsApp?
Other suggestions.

Kind Reagrds

Richard

How do i control what pictures are displayed to me when i click on the camera icon in WhatsApp. Whats App call these “Recent” Can it point WhatsApp to only look at the DCIM directory on my SD Card?

After installing WhatsApp, you allow it the permissions to use the camera and your files. Pictures are usualy saved in the DCIM folder. Thus, when you want to take a picture with WhatsApp using the camera, WhatsApp, due to the access to your storage, displays pictures from the default folder where pictures are stored (even though that is not the folder where WhatsApp stores its pictures) plus other locations. What follows is the creation of thumbnails (if they were not already created) in case you would like to view/use other images.

Unless you deny both camera and storage permissions, you have no control. Plus denying the storage permission will also prevent you from using other files not just pictures.

  How do i prevent the old thumbnails reappearing the in Internal Storage/DCIM/.thumbnails directory when the camera app is launched from WhatsApp?

Whether it's WhatsApp or another app, as long as they have permissions to your storage and/or camera, you can't prevent it. I think MediaStorage will re-create them any way if not immediately at least during the next reboot or next time you use the camera.


Any way to have Location services turn itself off after a time limit? Can I have Location services turn itself off automatically after a certain time is reached (let's say 10 minutes)? I normally leave it off save for some applications (Maps, etc) but sometimes I forget to turn it off, and it's a big battery drain.

That might be solved using one of the many automation apps. I myself prefer tasker here, but YMMV (and Tasker doesn't come for free) – llama might be capable of the same.

What I do here is creating a profile like this:

Condition: App (select the apps you want to use GPS with)
Task: GPS On
optional exit task: GPS Off

That way GPS by default is off, but automatically gets turned on whenever you launch one of the selected apps and have them running in foreground. It would automatically be turned off once you exit that app, or have any other app running in foreground. The "exit task" is optional as Tasker restores the conditions from before the profile became active.

For other alternative automation apps, you're also welcome to take a look at my list here.


Resize /system partition of Galaxy S 2 I need to increase the size of my Galaxy S 2's /system partition from 503.4MB to... Well, anything possible.

The (main) reason why I want to do this is because I want to install GApps 20140606, which is not compatible with devices with small (under 500MB) /system partitions.

The Galaxy S 2's internal storage is 16GB but I mostly use my SD card, so I don't really care how much of this will be taken to use in the /system partition.

I've found a lot of pages explaining different methods to achieve this, like this one from TechoTV, and this one from XDA, but all of them were phone-specific and never gave the information if it would be compatible with other models or not, or they would resize to a specific set size.

There's also this question from Android SE, but the answer weren't satisfactory enough for me, as the author limited himself to only say that it is possible, but not saying how.

To add a few more information, the phone is rooted and with CyanogenMod 11 (20140806-NIGHTLY), which is Android 4.4.4.

It would be interesting if the information provided works under Linux. I have access to Windows but rather not have to use it.

Aren't there any simple way of resizing the partitions, like GParted (but for Android)?

Firstly and most important, the credits:

I made this following this great tutorial at XDA-Developers by user metalgearhathaway: http://forum.xda-developers.com/galaxy-s2/development-derivatives/mod-partition-internal-memory-app-t2538947

I used PIT files (I'll explain what they are, don't worry) made from user ElGamal from XDA also, located here (comment number 509).

And a little bit of help from user CrackDaddy, also from XDA.

Second, what you'll need:

A machine running Windows. I used Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bits;
Odin 3.07. Careful when installing, it is full of optional AdWares. There's also a Linux and Mac version available called JOdin3, but I didn't try it;
Flashable ClockWorkMod 6 for Galaxy S II (it is a .tar file with a file named zImage inside);
PIT file with desired partition table configuration;
Samsung drivers for Galaxy S2. Usually you can install Samsung Kies but there's also a installer just with drivers available;
Your original stock unrooted Samsung Jellybean firmware. You can find it at sammobile.com;
Any ROM of your choice. I highly recommend the last nightly build of Cyanogenmod 11;
Optionally: GApps 20140606 or newer.

I made most of those available in the following bundle file:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BxccpydIocBpd21FOE5MaGJiMkU&authuser=0

What is missing is GApps, CyanogenMod, and a stock Samsung JellyBean ROM (as it depends of country and carrier, and might not be legal to provide it here).

Third, the default warning:

  I am not responsible for anything that might go wrong with your
  device, neither any of the mentioned users nor anyone here at Stack
  Overflow or XDA-Developers. This procedure will root your phone if it
  isn't already and also void your warranty if it isn't already. If
  anything goes wrong, don't panic, it is most likely fixable by
  reflashing the stock ROM and starting over again.

Finally, how to:

This will only work with the 16GB International version (GT-I9100) of Samsung Galaxy S II

Firstly, copy CyanogenMod 11 .zip file (or your desired ROM) and optionally GApps .zip file to your external SD card;

Make a backup of everything inside your internal storage, copy it to your computer or somewhere else. It will be completelly erased. Don't worry about your external SD Card, it won't be touched.

Make a NAnd backup of your current ROM, you'll be able to restore it after the repartition. To do it, you must have ClockWorkMod recovery installed, then boot your phone into recovery mode (Volume UP + Home + Power), select backups and restore, then backup to /storage/sdcard1;

When backup finishes, reboot your phone into Download mode (Volume DOWN + Home + Power) and connect your phone to the computer. Let Windows install the drivers. If it fails, try to install Samsung Kies or just the drivers provided in the bundle I made available, and try again.

Open Odin3 as Administrator and connect the phone. It should detect your phone and show it under the label ID:COM, and also in the Message. If it didn't, try to restart your computer, phone, reinstall drivers, check your USB cable, etc., and try again.

Now you'll need to choose a PIT file. PIT means Partition Information Table and it is a Samsung-only thing. In the bundle file, I made available ElGamal's PIT file (I91001GB_6GB.pit) which also resizes /system partition to 1GB, /data to 6GB and the rest goes to internal storage. If you wish different sizes, check the thread at XDA-Developers as he made many different versions available. I also included a PIT file for the default configuration (I9100_2GB-STOCK.pit) if you wish to go back to as it was later.

When you have chosen your PIT file, go to Odin and tick the following checkboxes: Re-Partition, Auto Reboot and F. Reset Time.
In the Re-Partition section, click on the PIT button and select your chosen PIT file.
In the Files (Download) section, click on the AP button and select Samsung's stock JellyBean ROM.
Double check everything and click Start. This can take a while, go grab a coffee.

After everything finishes, your phone will reboot into the stock Samsung JellyBean ROM. Two things can happen now, or it will work normally and if so you can use it and check if everything is as you want. Or it can ask you for a password to access the "encrypted volume", which is nothing but your internal storage that is not formatted. In both ways, unplug your phone (it it's still plugged) and reboot it into Download mode again.

It is interesting to close and reopen Odin3 to reset the settings. Plug your phone again and wait until Odin3 detects it. This time, leave checked just Auto Reboot and F. Reset Time and make sure Re-Partition is NOT checked. Click on AP button and select the ClockWorkMod Recovery .tar file, then click Start. This one is faster, but if you feel sleepy, go for another coffee ;)

When it finishes, you should have ClockWorkMod Recovery 6 installed in your phone, so go ahead and reboot into Recovery mode. Go to mounts and storage, select format /storage/sdcard0 and format it as exfat (if for some reason you have write problems in your internal storage later, come back here and select another format until it works, but exfat should do the trick).

When it finishes, still in Recovery mode, Wipe data/factory reset, Wipe cache and Wipe Dalvik cache. Let's be sure nothing remains from the previous ROMs.

Now, install zip -> choose zip from /storage/sdcard1 and select the CyanogenMod 11 .zip file (or of your desired ROM) and flash it. Optionally also flash GApps afterwards. Reboot your phone and check if everything is right.

If everything is right, reboot your phone into Recovery mode again, do a new wipe data/factory reset, wipe cache and wipe Dalvik cache, and then recover your backed up ROM from the beginning. Reboot your phone.

Check again if everything works right. A few apps might need to be reinstalled (Spotify and Waze are examples) to work correctly again, but that's be only major issue.

Hope everything goes well.


How to root a Huawei G330D (U8825D) phone? The Huawei U8825D is on Android 4.0.4, and my computer is on Mac OS X 10.6.8.

There must be some Windows machine you could use for 10 minutes.
Follow this tutorial and you'll be good:http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=31986973&postcount=21
Unlocking Bootloader
1) download the following file
https://www.dropbox.com/s/pfhdbykms3imxr4/G330D%20a%20key%20to%20unlock.rar

2) go to Settings>Application>Fast boot and "click off"

3) power off the phone (to make sure pull out the battery about 5 seconds after switch off)

4) enter to the fastboot mode by pressing (Volume Down + Power Button) about 15 seconds and connect cable to the computer

5) double click and open >> G330D一键解锁.exe file form unlock folder that you downloaded

6) type the unlock code that you got form Huawei official website and press
if you didn't yet, here is Huawei official website to unlock bootloader (it is easy to follow in English version) >>>http://www.huaweidevice.com/worldwide/servicePolicy.do?method=toApplyUnlock

7) it will automatically restart and your bootloader successfully unlocked

Install CWM
1) download the following file -
https://www.dropbox.com/s/61a0e0553cu7wwt/recovery6.0.1.2_AscendG330D.rar

2) power off and pull out battery about 5 second

3) enter to the fastboot mode by pressing Volume Down + Power Button about 15 seconds and connect cable to the computer

4) run this recovery6.0.1.2_AscendG330D.exe file that you got from downloaded zip file.

5) there will be see in China Lungaue in cmd. Actually, I don't know what  but type 1 and press enter

6) enter again

7) it will be reboot automatically and successfully installed CWM

8) to go to the CWM recovery, press Volume Up + Power Button after power off

ROOT
1) download the following file
https://www.dropbox.com/s/2ytam587dakpdp9/Root%20Recovery.zip

2) copy the downloaded "Root Recovery.zip" file to the SD card

3) go to recovery and Install zip from SD card

4) after reboot system, successfully rooted your phone.


Disable password hiding globally With a touch screen keyboard, having passwords I am entering displayed hidden is more trouble than it's worth to me. Few applications like KeePassDroid allow you to disable this feature. Is there any way to disable this feature globally? Solutions that require root are perfectly fine.

Which version of Android and which phone are we talking about :D ?

On my HTC Desire running Android 4.0.4, in Settings -> Security -> Passwords, there is an option saying "Make passwords visible".

I don't use this but it might help you.


How can I mount my google nexus4 on linuxmint(nadia) computer via usb? Also is it any different than ubuntu?

UPDATE:

Using gmtp, I still get the error from the terminal and gmtp crashes when i click on "connect".

The gmtp says the following in the shell:

Device 0 (VID=18d1 and PID=4ee1) is UNKNOWN.
Please report this VID/PID and the device model to the libmtp development team
PTP_ERROR_IO: failed to open session, trying again after resetting USB interface
LIBMTP libusb: Attempt to reset device
Android device detected, assigning default bug flags
Error 1: Get Storage information failed.
Error 2: PTP Layer error 02fe: get_handles_recursively(): could not get object handles.
Error 2: Error 02fe: PTP: Protocol error, data expected

I'm sure that libtmp teams added nexus4 to their libraries because my nexus4 was being seen by ubuntu-11.04 easily. But my problem is still alive in linuxmint

This question gets asked a lot about Linux in general.  MTP from the default repos will work in Mint, no problem.  I've written a tutorial on how to get MTP devices recognized under Ubuntu, but it's the same for Mint:

Install MTP:

sudo apt-get install mtpfs

Create a directory to mount your device:

sudo mkdir /media/MTPdevice (call the directory whatever you like)
sudo chmod 775 /media/MTPdevice
sudo mtpfs -o allow_other /media/MTPdevice

Plug in you phone and use MTP tools to determine the VID and PID (or, if those don't appear in the output, idVendor and idProduct):

mtp-detect

Add a rule to udev to handle your phone:

gksu gedit /etc/udev/rules.d/51-android.rules

Text to add:  (substitue VID and PID for "" and "")

SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="<vendorId>", ATTR{idProduct}=="<productId>", MODE="0666"

Restart udev:

sudo service udev restart

You may also need to reboot, depending.

This works on my Linux Mint 15 + MATE box.

NOTE:  If you have your device locked (eg, which a swipe code or PIN), you’ll need to unlock it before your SD card(s) can be recognized by MTP and have it mount them for you to access locally.


Secondary memory storage of a mobile device If I want to do an analogous comparison of a hard disk of a desktop computer(or a laptop) with a android mobile device then I hear lot of terms which confuse me. Can someone help me understand if all of them are overlapping or different. Which one is exactly analogous to a hard disk? Or one is subset of other. I googled a bit but didn't get good summary of all of them at once place.

ROM Memory
Flash Memory
Internal Storage
Internal SD Card
External SD Card

I believe Random access memory (RAM) in a smart phone is a physically different electronic unit (installed on RAM slots on motherboard) just like it happens in desktop computers also and has absolutely nothing to do with above terms that I've mentioned?

ROM works somewhat like RAM. But instead of it emptying every time you turn off the device, defined as volatile, ROM withholds its data through power loss. Data on a ROM chip is less accessible than RAM.
Flash memory is a technology that is used a lot in SSD storage devices. NAND and NOR chips are forms of flash memory. Usually non-volatile, flash memory is a lot faster than a disc for long-term storage. Though both are solid-state, do not confuse this type of memory with RAM, they are not the same thing.
Internal storage is just your devices built-in storage device.
An internal SD card is a Secure Digital device that the manufacturer builds into the device. The internal SD card is most likely for extra space apart from the internal storage.
An external SD card is one that the user can install. This is for expansive storage. The user can go buy their own SD card, however big they want, and put it into their device. Some PCs are made with SD card slots. The specific format on mobile devices is micro SD.

RAM in a mobile device is usually soldered onto the motherboard, vs the modules that can be installed and removed from a PC motherboard.


Clash of Clan Google log-in fail I changed my device from Samsumg Galaxy S5 to S8+, and re-installed Clash of Clan, but failed to move the previous progress to the new device.
I can't log into my Google Play account.

When I click the red icon 'Google Play account log-in', nothing happens. Sometimes Google log-in window appears and asks me to choose appropriate Google account but nothing changes after that.

I tried several remedies.
Someone advises to delete Google Play Game app, but it does not work.
Someone advises to delete cache of Google Play Services. It doesn't work either.

What should I do?

Try clearing app data of Clash of Clans from Settings->Apps->Clash of Clans-> Clear data
Then open the game and follow the tutorial until a gear icon appears in the top left corner.  Press the gear icon and select "google sign-in" option from there. Then select your account and you'll be signed in to your account. If you're having difficulty changing accounts, that could be due to network issues , connect to a faster network and try again.


How to check Firefox/Chrome developer console/tools on Android without a computer? I am aware of these two questions

How can I access the browser console on Opera Mobile on Android?

Is it possible to open developer tools console in Chrome on Android phone?

However the first one is interested in Opera and that is not the browser I use for development.
As for the second one, there is some interesting answers, however my goal is to see the console only using a mobile Android device (Redmi Note 9S).

That feature seems to be unavailable for all major android browsers.
You could try Opera-mini instead.

Reset the console output by opening a new tab with the address debug:resetconsole

Open a tab on the page on which you want to do the inspection:

Run JavaScript code on the page by replacing the address in the address bar with the following address javascript:var%20n%3Ddocument.firstChild%3Bwhile%28n%20%26%26%20n.nodeType%21%3DNode.ELEMENT_NODE%29%20n%3Dn.nextSibling%3Bconsole.log%28n.outerHTML%29%3B
Retrieve the output by opening a new tab with the address debug:console


how to move application from internal storage to phone storage or sd card i am using HTC Desire SV and android version is 4.0.4. In it there are three types of storage- 1) internal storage 2) phone storage and 3) storage card. My internal storage is almost full and i am not able to do upgrade the apps or download new apps. I want to move few apps to other storage but not able to as it does not show the option to move to phone storage or sd card. Please help me as soon as possible.

You can't move apps to SD card if the option is not available (as per the new rules of Google). You need to Root (which voids warranty) the device to be able to move apps from device memory to SD card and to remove default apps.


Send an SMS from an Android 8.0 using adb A lot of docs are explaining how to send an SMS from an Android using adb command line, but none of these work for the newer Android version 8.

I am eager to know where are the docs for

service call isms [args...]

Thanks in advance.

Now, I finally can send SMS through the command line on an Android 8.0-oreo performing next steps:

Installing the ShellMS app on the phone (once for ever)
Going on the phone to Settings > Apps > ShellMS > Permissions > Enable all the permissions (once for ever). This step will no longer be necessary once an issue about permissions will be fixed
Connecting the phone to the computer with USB (and giving permission on the phone for accessing data, if asked)
Issuing next script on the computer:

#!/bin/bash
phonenumber="$1"
message="$2"
# escape double quotes
message=${message//\"/\\\"}
adb shell "am startservice --user 0 -n com.android.shellms/.sendSMS -e contact \"$phonenumber\" -e msg \"$message\""


GPS doesn't work offline on Samsung Galaxy S4 I have Samsung Galaxy S4. I am trying to get the GPS work on offline maps. I am for instance trying this on MAPS.ME app. If I have WiFi or 3G signal, the location works great. However if I turn on the airplane mode, and the location on, the application cannot find my location. I had the issue with Android 4.4 KitKat and recently upgraded to Android 5 Lollipop and the issue is still there.

I am pretty sure it is not an issue with the app because I also tried on Google Maps with a preloaded map and it is the same. I have also downloaded GPS apps such as GPS Test and GPS Status and they all manage to connect with satellites and find a location, even offline. I think that proves that it is not a hardware issue.

I think I might have unselected a Google option somewhere to block the GPS usage (I am usually very careful not to give Google too much data about me)

Any other ideas on fixing this issue?

If your GPS is set to use AGPS mode, it doesn't work at all when offline for some reason.

Go to Settings - General - Location - Mode - GPS only. I didn't notice at first that it was a selectable option.


Can't flash recovery via fastboot - tf300t I have a asus tablet TF300T and I am trying to flash CM11 rom. I am following procedure from official CM pages http://wiki.cyanogenmod.org/w/Install_CM_for_tf300t, but I am stuck with flashing custom recovery (TWRP or CWM) using fastboot

I have switched to bootloader using

  adb -d reboot-bootloader

I see RCK, android and wipe data icons but no USB icon which should be the one which I need to choose.

I tried to load custom recovery by following commands:

$ fastboot erase recovery
erasing 'recovery'...
OKAY [  1.905s]
finished. total time: 1.909s

$ fastboot flash recovery openrecovery-twrp-2.8.3.0-tf300t.blob
sending 'recovery' (6838 KB)...
OKAY [  2.617s]
writing 'recovery'...
FAILED (remote: (InvalidState))
finished. total time: 5.049s

or

$ fastboot flash recovery recovery-jb.img
sending 'recovery' (5644 KB)...
OKAY [  1.601s]
writing 'recovery'...
FAILED (remote: (InvalidState))
finished. total time: 4.488s

Tablet is running on 4.2.1 android with WW_epad-10.6.1.27.5-20130902 bootloader. It has been unlocked using official Unlock_v8.apk from asus pages.
Am I missing something? Is there any other way, how to flash own recovery?

I probably found the cause of this issue. It seems that device was not properly unlocked. Despite Unlocker_v8.log file which said that device has been unlocked it wasn't.

The unlock app v8 from official asus support pages did not work for me. I tried entire process (link is in my very first message) but tried unlocker v7 which is the second latest.

I passed password verification against my gmail account (it was blocked due to security reasons on gmail server) and device was properly unlocked.

Calling

fastboot flash recovery openrecovery-twrp-2.8.3.0-tf300t.blob

from fastboot mode was successful without any errors and the rest of procedure also.


How to track device locations in an office Possible Duplicate:
  How can I make my phone/tablet ring remotely without a SIM card?

There are many Android devices in our office which we use for application development and QA.  Finding a particular device is sometimes necessary, but requires walking around asking who has it.

Is there some way to track where a particular device might be in an office environment?  Either an app on the device or some way to listen on the computer it was most recently plugged in to (via ADB), for example.  Hopefully something with minimal user interaction, otherwise nobody would ever actually do it.

I haven't tried anything specific yet.  Just looking for ideas on which way to go.  I'm pretty sure GPS is not nearly accurate enough for such a setting, and that's the only real idea I've had.

Do you have Wi-Fi connections active on these devices? If so, you could create a service that allows a remote web application to cause the device to chirp/make a sound similar to a ring.  That web application could contain a list of phones and potentially even allow you to checkout devices etc through the same interface.  Not an entirely trivial solution, but you could probably whip something up in a day or two.


SMS to contacts with multiple numbers I use to forward SMS to many contacts, most of those contacts have multiple numbers with one number as default.

Handcent
When I select a group to send a message, handcent asks me to choose number for each contact with multiple numbers.
GO SMS
It does the same as handcent
Pansi SMS
It picks the number randomly

Is there anyway it can pick default number automatically, or select the 'home' or 'mobile' number automatically?

Or is there any alternate application, as good as handcent, which can do that?

New version of handcent  with its group sms plugin does the job perfectly.


How can I make my USB headset work correctly? My phone is an HTC One running Android 4.4.2, and the headset is a Logitech G35. I've tried connecting the headset to the phone with a USB OTG cable several times with mixed results:

The buttons on the headset (play/pause, skip, volume) always work.
Sound sometimes comes out of the phone, sometimes comes out of the headset, and sometimes doesn't come out at all.
When sound DOES come out of the headset, it's either at "full volume" (not as loud as I would expect it to be) or muted. The phone won't let me set it to anything in between.
Someone called once while I had sound coming out of it: the phone used the built-in speakers & mic for the call.

It works just fine with my laptop (running Linux Mint) so it shouldn't need any special drivers. I'd like to make it work properly because it sounds much better than my earbuds and is pretty good at blocking out noise. I haven't really tried the mic and I'm not too worried about it. What do I need to do to make it work? Am I just overlooking a setting or something?

Update: I found this question and ran the diagnostic. It looks like it should have full support for USB devices, so I don't know why it's not working.

Check for the otg to USB connector, some of the wire may be loose.
Your mobile software drives for USB headphone may get crashed, so you may get mixed result. Check for your system updates in your mobile. It may fix the issue.
Your headphone may have chipset that some time block the incoming otg signals.

I am using Lenovo K4 mobile and Zebronics iron head USB headset. Hearing audio and video through otg to USB female. I have few creeping sound for 2o Sec for every track for songs, but work great after that..


Save shared content to local filesystem The droidentify program allows to save a report of the information it gathers by using the send action intent. Source code extract:

    public static void shareReport(Context ctx) {
            Intent intent = new Intent(Intent.ACTION_SEND);
            intent.setType("text/html");
            ...

On my device this results in Android presenting four possible recipients, all of which I do not want because I just want to save it to the local file system (/mnt/sdcard or wherever).

Are there any system configuration to enable file system as share target? Or do I have to install some program to do this? I am looking for a free one, with source code available if so.

I found! There is an excellent program called Send to SD card which does exactly what I was looking for. Free program with source available, GPLv3.


Telegram shows contacts from different phone? Recently I installed Telegram on my SGS3 and surprisingly the Telegram contacts show me the contacts from my father's phone!!!! My father has an SGS2.

By the way, on my SGS3 the "Contacts to Display" option is set to show 'Gmail account', and none of my father's lists are there.

Who can explain this?

Probably you have both google accounts (yours and your father's) synched with your phone OR you are  running Telegram with the same phone numbers.


Device won't connect via USB I have a HTC G2 running Android 2.3.4 that I've recently tried to root using the guide at the XDA developer's site.  After step 3.3, the USB connection stopped working.  More precisely, when I plug the USB cable into the PC and the phone, the PC does not detect the phone (for instance, it is not in the devices manager) and the phone does not get a USB notification (though it does charge).  I've tried all the basic trouble shooting steps as outlined here, but I haven't had any luck fixing the problem.

As I see it, either one of two things has happened.  The phone's USB port needs to be replaced or I've introduced a glitch that prevents the phone from communicating with the computer.  Is there a way to find out which case I'm facing and if it's the second case, how to diagnose and fix the glitch?  Thanks

I understand your problem,Your device may not have supported  Drive and  check is it connect mass storage(memory card) or not .if you may change the setting in USB debugging,


understanding bootloader unlocking I am trying to understand the rooting procedure in general.
I see that 1st stage involves what it termed as
"unlock bootloader".

It is described as a method which makes the bootloader capable for using non-manufacture images.
If I understand correctly the bootloader, shall not boot non-manufacture kernel/ROM unless it is unlocked.

Yet, many rooting are done by just programming the recovery image.
But the bootloader is not the recovery image.

So, how can it be that root is gained with just the recover if 1st stage is unlocking bootrom ?

Thanks,
ranran

Unlocking the Bootloader is required in some process including unofficial ROM, Kernel,Recovery, etc to avoid Hardbrick or Softbrick caused by non-manufacturer file or data (not integrated with bootloader default information)

It is required if you want to Root your phone by unlocking the OEM in the Developer Settings


What happens if I ignore the warning: "If you deny this permission, basic features of your device may no longer function as intended"? If I go into the permissions settings for the Google app and change the Location permission from "Allow all the time" to "Allow only while using the app" or "Deny," I am presented with a warning: "If you deny this permission, basic features of your device may no longer function as intended."

I am inclined to give it a try anyway, but what might happen? It seems like "Allow only while using the app" should not be very impactful? What is Google trying to warn me about when they say that "basic features of your device may no longer function as intended." Or are they just trying to scare me into not changing the permission (so they can keep their watchful eyes on me)?

While revoking a runtime manifest permission requested by an app, the system warning: “If you deny this permission, basic features of your device may no longer function as intended.” is displayed by PackageInstaller if the permission was GRANTED_BY_DEFAULT:

~$ pm dump packages | grep -E 'Package |GRANTED_BY_DEFAULT' | grep -B1 android.permission

All runtime requested permissions are granted by default during grantDefaultPermissions on first boot or on new user/profile creation in three cases generally as referred in official documentation, so that “the device is usable out-of-the-box”:

If the app is a privileged system app (i.e. installed in /system/priv-app/) e.g. Settings and Google Play Services. Or the app is a system component (i.e. UID is less than 10000) e.g. SIM Toolkit and FM Radio. Some apps may fulfill both criteria e.g. Shell (com.android.shell, UID: 2000).
If the app provides some core OS functionality:

  Apps must prompt users to grant application permissions at runtime. Limited exceptions may be granted to default applications and handlers that provide basic device functionality fundamental to the expected operation of the device.

Some of these apps necessarily have to be privileged or system component apps e.g. Location Provider. Others can also be non-system apps (even installed in /system/app) e.g. stock Messaging and Calendar, or third-party apps (installed in /data/app) e.g. user installed SMS and dialer apps.
If ROM developer explicitly creates an exception for some app(s).

However SYSTEM_FIXED runtime permissions (set for privileged/system apps) cannot be revoked.

  What is Google trying to warn me about when they say that "basic features of your device may no longer function as intended."

Revoking location permission would not let the app (and its dependent apps if any) access location. Nothing else should happen.

  Or are they just trying to scare me into not changing the permission (so they can keep their watchful eyes on me)?

Play Services are privileged, they won't work if you try to completely stop them keeping eyes on you.

  It seems like "Allow only while using the app" should not be very impactful?

“Allow only while using the app” is not a normal manifest permission. It's appops which lets you set location operations to foreground so that Google app won't use location in background. You can also do that from commadline:

~$ appops set com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox COARSE_LOCATION foreground
~$ appops set com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox FINE_LOCATION foreground

RELATED:

Android Marshmallow, "dangerous" protection level and system components/apps


X3D format viewer for Android Is there any X3D format viewer for Android platform ?

Answer:
You can use FreeX3D: VRML, X3D, STL viewer by John Alexander Stewart available from Google Play Store:

FreeX3D is a 3D VRML/X3D and STL viewer for Android.
NEW - Anaglyph rendering option for 3D viewing of your 3D files!
FreeX3D allows the user to browse local STL, VRML 97 and X3D files, and to view these files on their Android GLES-2 capable device. You can rotate or zoom STL files; X3D files you can walk, or examine, as defined by the spec. Use one finger to rotate or walk, two to zoom or move in +-Z, depending on navigation mode set.
This version works on Android 2.2 and above. It requires OpenGL ES-2.0, which is available in all modern phones/tablets, and most released over the last couple of years.

Related curiosity:
There's also an interesting project that worth mentioning, called X3DOM for free on Android devices that support WebGL:

X3DOM (pronounced X-Freedom) is an experimental open source framework and runtime to support the ongoing discussion in the Web3D and W3C communities how an integration of HTML5 and declarative 3D content could look like. It tries to fulfill the current HTML5 specification for declarative 3D content and allows including X3D elements as part of any HTML5 DOM tree.


Forgot Android Password I've tried waiting for the reset via google account to show up, but it didn't. I've tried to use Android Device Manager, but when I try to reset the password, it says "Since Google has verified that a screen lock is already set, the password you entered won't be needed." and nothing happens to my phone.

This is with Android 5.0 lollipop.

Unfortunately Google removed the option to reset your password using your Google credentials or Android Device Manager in Android Lollipop. If you're rooted, you may be able to remove or reset your password using adb but this seems very hit and miss and the methods vary. Apart from that, a factory reset from recovery is your only option.


Unauthorized Network I recently configured my Samsung Galaxy Ace to provide internet access for my laptop. When friends visit and find the network, they get onto it and stream movies even though it is password protected. How can I identify the devices on the network  and disable other unauthorized devices from connecting to my network?

If you're using the Wifi tethering you can MAC filter it by only allowing certain devices to connect. Also make sure you have the password set and maybe even change it if you need to.


Get rid of Google Now Cards nag from Google Search It seems that Google recently updated Google Search on Android to set up "Now Cards".  I have no intention of enabling this.  I've disabled it in the Google Search settings, but it continues to nag me to set it up.  How do I disable it and get rid of this nag?

It looks like Google has mooted this question by removing the nag.


Swype keyboard dictionary migration How to migrate a swype keyboard dictionary to another device (a new one for instance)?
When I buy a new phablet I have to collect words over again.

From Swype documentation
Backup and Sync Demo: Register all Devices with Swype Connect • Download the latest build of Swype from the Google Play store

• Open messaging application and long press on the Swype key to open Swype Settings
• Select “My Words”, then select “Register Now” to activate Backup and Sync
•In messaging application input names of friends a few times and select “Add word to Dictionary”
• Long press Swype key to open Swype Settings, select “My Words” and then select “Edit My Dictionary” and you can view your dictionary
•Multi-Device Dictionary Sync •

If using a brand new device without Swype previously installed

• Go to “Android Settings”, “Applications”, “Swype”, and select “Clear Data”
• Open messaging application; walk through the Swype registration process with your device email
• Once activation is complete, go into “Swype Settings,” select “My Words,” and then select “Edit My Dictionary” and you will see that your dictionary has been completely restored
• Go through this process with all your Android devices if desired


What is "com.samsung.android.dqagent_SA_SDK" user certificate? Is it safe? My user certificates has the following: com.samsung.android.dqagent_SA_SDK.

It seems so strange, it looks like someone put it on there. Is that normal?

From the name com.samsung.android.dqagent_SA_SDK, looks like the certificate is installed and used by DQA (also known as Device Quality Agent), a Samsung system app.

From some reports (in German and Russian), the certificate will automatically be reinstalled if it's removed, presumably by the app itself, since it also contains the certificate (from the report of reverse.it)

While I cannot certainly determine if it's safe or not, at least it's related to Samsung's own system app, so the possibility of a rogue certificate is lower (though not 0%). However, looks like you can disable the app without any side effects.


Android's screen is rotated by 90 degrees So I saw this command:

adb shell wm size 1080x1920

and I wanted to try it, so I did but my screen is now flipped, and I can't even take a screen shot because it says "Prevented by security policy".
 I have tried already to run some screen rotating commands like this: adb shell settings put system user_rotation 3 , and similar commands but nothing works.

I have a Galaxy S5 not rooted and I don't want to factory reset it or root it. It boots fine (the Android and Samsung logos) but the home screen and apps are just rotated 90 degrees.

If you're just looking to turn it back to what it was, use the command adb shell wm size reset.


Android du and df very different: File System Corrupted? On an Android Nougat (7.1.1) set top box, du and df of my /data partition are very different:
$ adb shell du -sh /data
1.0G    /data
$ adb shell df -H /data
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/block/sda9  10G   10G  469M  96% /data

I don’t think that anything else is mounted under /data:
$ adb shell mount | grep "\/data"
/dev/block/sda9 on /data type ext4 (rw,seclabel,nosuid,nodev,relatime,discard,noauto_da_alloc,data=ordered)
$ adb shell mount | grep "sda9"
/dev/block/sda9 on /data type ext4 (rw,seclabel,nosuid,nodev,relatime,discard,noauto_da_alloc,data=ordered)

lsof indicates to me that there are dozens of processes holding hundreds of small deleted files of the sort
init          1       root    3w      CHR               1,11       0t0      14517 /dev/__kmsg__ (deleted)
ueventd     391       root    3w      CHR               1,11       0t0      14593 /dev/__kmsg__ (deleted)
  . . .
main        756       root  mem   unknown                                         /dev/ashmem/dalvik-large object space allocation (deleted)
main        756       root  mem   unknown                                         /dev/ashmem/dalvik-large object space allocation (deleted)
  . . .
omm.times  3934     system  mem   unknown                                         /dev/ashmem/dalvik-mark sweep sweep array free buffer (deleted)
omm.times  3934     system  mem   unknown                                         /dev/ashmem/dalvik-mark sweep sweep array free buffer (deleted)

Using busybox, results are different (df shows much less usage), but there is still a large discrepancy between du and df:
$ adb shell busybox du -sh /data
389.4M  /data
$ adb shell busybox df -h /data
Filesystem                Size      Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/block/bootdevice/by-name/userdata
                          9.7G      8.6G      1.1G  89% /data

And using toybox, the results are similar to busybox:
$ adb shell toybox du -sh /data
389M    /data
$ adb shell toybox df -h /data
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/block/sda9  10G  8.6G  1.1G  89% /data

It think that it's important to note that these numbers remain similar after a reboot.
Also, I wish to note that I cannot OTA update this device's Android due to running out of disk space, even though the OTA image is only about 1GB in size. This fact leads me to believe that the results of df are accurate in terms of actual available disk space.
All adb commands are run as root i.e., I did adb root before executing them. But at risk of making this question be too verbose, here's everything run at the adb prompt:
$ adb shell
Z:/ # whoami
root
Z:/ # du -sh /data
389M    /data
Z:/ # df -h /data
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/block/sda9  10G  8.6G  1.1G  89% /data
10.197.12.14:/ # busybox du -sh /data
389.4M  /data
Z:/ # busybox df -h /data
Filesystem                Size      Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/block/bootdevice/by-name/userdata
                          9.7G      8.6G      1.1G  89% /data
Z:/ # toybox du -sh /data
389M    /data
Z:/ # toybox df -h /data
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/block/sda9  10G  8.6G  1.1G  89% /data
Z:/ #

A user in comments has asked for the following:
Z:/ # while read num; do (( sum += num )); done <<< $(find /data -type f -exec stat -c%b {} +); expr $sum / 2048
393

I understand that du reports free space by scanning reachable nodes, and that this could therefore mean that my file system is corrupt. However, unfortunately, this is for devices in the field, and I don’t want to have to (and don’t think I can) run fsck or e2fsck.
What might be causing the huge difference between du and df on this device, and how might this problem be resolved? I’m happy to provide further logs.

df stands for "Disk Free". That means, it just needs to check with the "global file system information" about free space (accessible for all users). The size of the file system itself is also "globally available". The difference logically is the "used space". Done.
du works differently: not on file system level but on file level. It needs to look up each directory and file separately, gather it's size, and sum that up. So it can only take into account what it has access to.
Now you've run both commands as "normal user" – who has no permission to traverse e.g. /data/data (where all the apps' data is stored). So it can only sum up a portion of what space is occupied on /data. Would you run both commands as root user (as the screenshot in the comment by alecxs shows), numbers would be much closer together – as usually root can access all files. Though as again Alex correctly points out: there is still SELinux which might deny full access – which according to him is a known issue for mtk-su on the Amazon FireTV stick, and might be the culprit here, and isolated mount namespaces could be yet another reason for invisible files.
TL;DR: there's neither a file system corruption, nor a broken du binary necessarily causing the difference. All might work as designed. If you want to make sure, you can run fsck (if you prefer, in read-only mode) to rule out the former – and set up a test case on a different place for the latter.


What is the size of android Marshmallow source code? I have downloaded 26.8 gb but the repo tool is still going on and I am on a very slow connection in India.I used the standard instruction provided on the website to download.

Generally, the size of source code varies depending on if it is compressed or raw..

The full source code ranges around 20GB's as of now (slightly varies with ROM) and be downloaded using the repo tool..

The compressed source code varies around 2GB..

Here's an XDA Thread which provides compressed source code files (and updated quite frequently):
[INDEX] [SOURCES] [DevXchange] Android Sources Highly Compressed & Developer Exchange


Calling service intent fails with "not found" I want to start a service intent of an application (com.urbandroid.lux). According to the developer, there is a service intent "com.urbandroid.lux.TwilightService" which can be called with extra "toggle"/"toggle" (string).

But no matter what I do, I always get a "Not found" error. For example, using adb as root:

# am startservice -c "" --es toggle toggle com.urbandroid.lux com.urbandroid.lux.TwilightService
Starting service: Intent { act=android.intent.action.MAIN cat=[] pkg=com.urbandroid.lux (has extras) }
Error: Not found; no service started.
#

I also tried using Tasker. With "adb logcat" I get a similar error:

W/ActivityManager( 1402): Unable to start service Intent { act=com.urbandroid.lux.TwilightService pkg=com.urbandroid.lux (has extras) } U=0: not found

Now I used "aapt dump xmltree lux.apk AndroidManifest.xml" to verify the existence of the intent. As can be seen, it is indeed there (line 55-57):

http://pastebin.com/31NqrSuN

I tried any combinations (leading/trailing slashes/points, different calls, ...) I could possibly think. But the error is always the same.

Is there something in particular I am doing wrong?
WHAT exactly is not found here? The app? The process? The service? The entry point/method?

The component name is specified as the package name, then a slash, then the name of the class. So in this case, the command you want is:-

am startservice --es toggle toggle com.urbandroid.lux/.TwilightService

For future reference, and to help avoid confusion: the intent is the name of the message you're sending to start the service. The thing that you want to start is a service, not a "service intent", and the thing you found in the manifest is a service, not an intent.


What to make of my unused GT-I5800 I've never rooted android before, as I considered it too risky for the device I'm actually using, but I just realized I have an older android phone (a GT-I5800) sitting around, so I thought I might as well make use of it. So I have been searching around for what I could do with it, but most questions ask this from the perspective of actually having a phone you use for calling people, so I thought it might help me, if I asked what people would recommend for me.

My perspective: I'm a PhD student in physics, I work on Ubuntu on my laptop, and various linux distros on large university clusters, I have a Galaxy Note 10.1 tab and a Galaxy S advance beside the above mentioned gt I5800, I can code in python and c++.

What I would be interested in (and anything else that might come to the mind of those more at home in the subject):

being able to access it through wireless to run stuff from my other android and laptop (ssh?)
having on OS on it, that does the bare minimum needed to access all the devices on the phone (turning them on or off too) and to run code (if possibly retaining the ability to use it as phone, i.e. dualboot, or some thing that has a minimum running mode and an "I'm a phone now" mode)
using it as a mini server
anything that seems like fun from a geeky point of view:)

a media server, using e.g. BubbleUPnP
a machine for development/coding, using e.g. Terminal IDE
a "picture frame" (before mentioned BubbleUPnP should be able to do that along, but many gallery apps in slideshow-mode as well)
a web server, e.g. with AndroPHP / Bit Web Server (PHP,MySQL,PMA) / Ulti Server: PHP, MySQL, PMA – also see: Turn a Android Phone with broken screen into dedicated Web server
have it ready as emergency/backup phome with some prepaid card
use it as "modem"/router for devices without a SIM card (tablets etc.) or without a data-plan, utilizing its hotspot functionality (sure you could use your main device for it; but using the old one keeps the juice in your main device ;)
use it as "test device" for any apps you want to try. With no important/daily-use/private data on it, you could even use some "risky sounding" apps here, and easily factory-reset it afterwards. For this, a separate Google Account might prove useful as well.


Automatically un-mount SDCard safely when device is rebooted or turned off? How can I configure my Galaxy S II so every time my device is either rebooted or turned off the SDCard is safely un-mounted because at the moment if I don't un-mount it, the files on SDCard appear as duplicated for some reason.

My device is rooted with Ressurction Remix 2.6.1 with Siyah Kernel 3.2.7.2.

The Android OS is supposed to do this automatically for you unless the device is powered down or rebooted incorrectly (eg. removing the battery). Ive never heard of files being doubled on an SD card after rebooting before. I would suggest trying a different ROM since your phone is rooted.


How to sync all my Exchange files (including Notes and Tasks) to my Nexus S? I need to find a way to sync my Outlook notes and tasks to my Nexus S.

I would also like to have all the fields I use in my contacts in Outlook available in my Nexus S.

I rund on Exchange and the mail, contacts, and calendar syncronize OK with my Nexus S, though some fields are not available in Gingerbread and can't decide how long back I want my appointmens and emails to sync...

Try NitroNote - it offers syncing for Outlook Notes. You'll need to install apps on your desktop as well as the device.

There's also the more powerful TouchDown client which will sync email / contacts / tasks from an Exchange server.

Finally, lots of users claim to find gSyncit to work well for them, but YMMV.


Recovery Mode: Backup options not showing I want to put a custom ROM on my LG G2.

I have successfully applied root permissions using IORoot v25. However I am unable to create a backup of the stock ROM.

I have tried several ways using the ROM Manager app (v5.5.37):

Go to ROM Manager > Recovery Setup > [Install or Update] ClockwordModrecovery. Then tap Reboot into Recovery. The phone reboots into the recovery menu, but no options to back up are listed. (So I choose option to reboot).
With CWM Recovery still set, I tap  "Backup Current ROM" (underneath it says the backup directory will be /mnt/shell/emulated/clockworkmod/backup. Again, it boots into the recovery menu without any backup options so I select reboot. Yet nothing appears in the /mnt/shell directory.
Configure ROM Manager to use TWRP recovery. Then in ROM Manager, tap  option to go to recovery mode. Yet again, no backup options are listed, so yet again I choose option to reboot.
With TWRP Recovery still set, I tap  "Backup Current ROM" (underneath it says the backup directory will be /sdcard/TWRP/BACKUPS/0225b99d9a5159f0. Surprise surprise, no backup options, and no directory /sdcard/TWRP.

What am I doing wrong?

From what I understand, what I am seeing is the "stock" recovery [program/menu], and neither the TWRP nor the CWM recovery menus are showing. Perhaps they're failing to install, or failing to be run or something? The logs in the app SuperSU which handles root requests do not give any hints - I can find no mention of CWM or TWRP recovery.

I was correct - the stock recovery was not being substituted for a custom recovery.

I have since tried a number of things:

First I tried installing the "FreeGee" app. Trying to install a custom recovery resulted in the error "Your devices specific software version of D80220d is not currently supported".

Second, I tried following this guide resulted in the error:

Loki tool v2.1
[-] Loki aboot version does not match device.
1|root@g2:/data/local/tmp # exit
1|shell@g2:/ $

What eventually worked was downloading the AutoRec .apk for the LG G2 D802 and installing it using adb:

adb install D802_AutoRec.apk

I downloaded the .apk from here. TWRP recovery was installed successfully. More information on AutoRec is here.


What is the difference between the Linux Kernel and the Android Kernel? What are the modifications done in linux kernel to make it an android kernel ? By this question I mean what are the differences between linux kernel and android kernel ?

The differences change from version to version (both of Linux and of Android), and the exact kernel is different for each device. A kernel for Android is a mainstream Linux kernel, with additional drivers for the specific device, and other additional functionality, such as enhanced power management or faster graphics support.

Many features in the Android kernel are later added to upstream Linux after the open-source community has accepted (and perhaps modified) them, but others are never upstreamed, either because they're not acceptable to the Linux kernel developers, or because they're only applicable to Android or to specific hardware.


Starting an activity listed under "Settings" from terminal (or adb shell) I would like to start this activity from terminal: com.android.settings.Settings$PowerUsageSummaryActivity

I tried

am start -S com.android.settings/.Settings$PowerUsageSummaryActivity

and this is what I get:

Stopping: com.android.settings
Starting: Intent { act=android.intent.action.MAIN cat=[android.intent.category.LAUNCHER] cmp=com.android.settings/.Settings }

The problem is am start command omits the $PowerUsageSummaryActivity part, so basically I'm just getting standard "Settings" menu open.
how can I open that specific "power usage summary" page from terminal?

As I wrote in my comment, there are some special characters needing extra care when working at the shell prompt (or in shell scripts). One of them is the $ sign, which usually indicates a variable. If that should be taken literally, you need to escape it (or enclose the entire string by single quotes). Similar rules for quotation marks.

How your command should look like with an escaped $, you can already find in eldarerathis' answer:

shell@android:/ # am start -n com.android.settings/.Settings\$PowerUsageSummaryActivity

Note the "back-slash" in front of the $ -- that's the escape sign. Use the same for quotation marks or blanks, if your command includes some to be taken literally, e.g.

myscript.sh first\ parameter\!
myscript.sh "first parameter!"

both would do the same: Making the string a single parameter. In the example of your am start command, this is what happened on parsing:

command: am
parameter 1: start
parameter 2: -S
parameter 3: com.android.settings/.Settings$PowerUsageSummaryActivity

has a $, interpreting: variable $PowerUsageSummaryActivity is not set, so empty
conclusion: parameter 3 is com.android.settings/.Settings

Note also that if you run this directly via adb shell, the command goes through shell parsing twice, so you need to escape or quote the command again, like this:

user@desktop:~$ adb shell am start -n 'com.android.settings/.Settings\$PowerUsageSummaryActivity'


Where the driver for CDMA/GSM hardware? i.e. I have a phone in CDMA from HTC, who provides the CDMA hardware driver (radio-firmware ?),Google Android source tree or HTC?

If the driver is provided by Google Android source tree, then I can compile a custom version of Android for my phone, If from HTC, then I don't know how can I compile an Android and drive the HTC CDMA hardware.

The radio is closed source and provided by the manufacturer.


How to upgrade the HTC One X (with AT&T) from ICS to Jelly Bean from Indian telecome? I purchased HTC One X unlocked (with AT&T) with Android ICS. I am using this phone in India with Airtel SIM.

How can I upgrade the device to Jelly Bean?

If you have bought an unlocked phone then there's no issue of what kind of carrier you have and which country you are in. Just connect to the internet and get an OTA update from settings, provided they have rolled out the update to their customers in the country where you bought it from.


How can I disable the Samsung Galaxy s4 standard calendar? Please help. I've spent several hours on this and cannot figure it out. I see that the best answer to this issue is to go to the menu and change settings. If you see the screenshot, there is no menu option as far as I can tell. I have tried using the hidden menu button. Am I missing something?

I have also tried to disable the app in the app manager menu and continue getting double notifications. Any suggestions?

Thank you!

You can try deleting all data and cache related to the calendar app.

Go to Settings > Apps > All apps > Touch the app for which you want to clear data > Clear data

For disabling :

Activate USB Debugging in Settings > Developers Options. If you can't find it, go to Settings > About device > Tap 7 times to bring the Developers Options.
Download Debloater from here and install it
Connect the phone to the computer (need Samsung USB drivers installed)
Open Debloater, click on READ DEVICE PACKAGES
Find and select the email package (read carefully)
Click on block. Now the app will not be longer available.


How to upgrade Samsung Galaxy S2 to ICS? Possible Duplicate:
  Upgrade Samsung Galaxy II OS to android 4.0?

I want to know if there is any official documentation on how to upgrade Samsung's Android enabled devices?

I assume your device is not rooted since you did not mention it. For non-rooting device you just have to wait for the Over The Air (OTA) update from Samsung or your network provider.


Do phone manufacturers use AOSP as their base? Do phone manufacturers like Samsung use AOSP as their base and customize that, or does Google provide a special vanilla version of Android and they customize that?

I worked with a couple of OEMs and know for a fact that when the OEMs start off working on a new version of android the Software Configuration team picks the latest stable version of the AOSP and then various teams start work to put their customizations in place.
So say a Samsung will have the Touchwiz team start work to customize the UX. The Baseband team will route the Radio Interface layer to the proprietary RIL or vendor-Ril as it is sometimes called. It takes months of effort to roll out phones with the latest software. And contect with google minimal. Google does a compatibilty test suite (for new handset launches) upon failure of which Google proactively supports. Google also works very proactively with OEMs on the Nexus line of phones.


How to turn of Google Samsung Nexus Galaxy `3g`/`mobile data usage` warning? After turning data mobile usage warning on as described here

The exceeded-limit notification stay in my notification list which is very annoying. I cannot remove it - ie. I just need it to notify me then I can remove, later on if I start using and the limit exceeds again, notify me again :)

If you know how to, please share.

Click the notification which will open Data usage settings and move the orange warning bar above data usage level.

Next warning will appear when the warning level is exceeded again.


Looking for "full-size" on-screen keyboard layout for Honeycomb All on-screen keyboards available in the market seem to be designed for phones, and as such most of them follow the "37-key" layout. However, using this layout on large (10") android screen is painful and breaks all quick typing habits. Even keyboards that try to mimc desktop keyboard are limited to letters and move special characters to separate layout or to other row of keys.

So the question is whether there's a soft keyboard available which completely mimics the main part of the regular computer keyboard, with digits row and all extra keys right to letters?

Sounds like Hacker's Keyboard might be a good try for you. It doesn't have some of the rightmost keys (insert, end, page up/down, also F1-F12) visibly displayed on the main layout, but they are available by pressing the "Fn" key. Here's the layout on a tablet:


How to change country? I want to install this application

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.scoompa.callrecorder.open

but I can't, because I'm in a wrong country. I would like to change country. Do I need to travel to another country to install this application or can I somehow pick a right country ? what is the right country for this application?

To answer your question, see this previous question for options on changing the country that the Market think your phone is in: How can I circumvent regional restrictions in the Android Market?

For the second part of your question about which country to change to, from the app's description:

  Currently for U.S. and Canada based phones only.

But from this description:

  The application dials to our service, which dials to the other party,
  showing your phone number as the caller ID.
  The service then records
  the call at the telephony level, and sends a very high-quality
  recording straight to your email box.

I think that even if you get it to install, it will only work properly if you are currently in the US or Canada, as it seems to work by redirecting your call through a landline call forwarding service, which either won't work in other countries, or will be using a hideously expensive international rate call for that purpose.


How to add person to contacts from a message (person auto linked w/ facebook) I got a message from someone not in my contacts. The number was automatically recognized as one of my Facebook friends. How do I add this person to my Google Contacts without copying down the number and adding them manually? There is no "Add Contact" button...

Head over to Contacts -> Options Menu -> Display Options. Under choose contacts to display, expand facebook and put a checkbox against All Contacts. The contact will now be saved to your Google Contacts


Fail to install CM13 on Oppo Find 7a I would like to install Cyanogenmod 13 on my Oppo Find 7a.

I am following the instructions from CM wiki. I am using a laptop with Linux (LMDE2).

I fail to install a TWRP recovery. Fastboot seems to succeed (it does not print any error message). But then, when I try to boot in recovery mode, I still have the original recovery from ColorOS.
I also tried CM recovery, but then I can't even boot in recovery mode (I get stuck on the "Oppo" logo).

I tried anyway to install CM13 using the original recovery. But I get a message "Installation failed".

Do you have any idea of why it fails?

EDIT : I add details on what is happening.

When I run fastboot boot twrp.img, the fastboot screen gets brighter. But then nothing happens, it stays as is, with "fastboot" written on the screen. Then, I hard reboot my phone and hold the keys to get into recovery mode. I get the stock recovery.
When I run fastboot flash recovery twrp.img and then fastboot reboot (holding the key to get into recovery mode), the phone reboot, I get the screen with "Oppo" written, then the phone reboot a second time. For this second time, it boots in normal mode (although I was holding the special key for recovery mode).

Once I booted in normal mode, if I try to boot in recovery mode, I get the stock recovery. It seems to be expected, according to TWRP website, since some devices automatically replace the recovery mode by their own recovery mode.

I recently went through this on my Find 7 so hopefully I can help.  Here's what I've found to be foolproof.

Download the latest ColorOS software and copy it to the device's SD card (either internal or external is fine if your partitions are not unified; external otherwise).  You can also save CM13 there at this point.
Download and flash the latest stock recovery.

Extract that zip file to your current working directory on your PC, put the device into Fastboot mode (hold Power + Volume Up), and run:

fastboot flash recovery ./find7_recovery_4_4.img

Hold Power + Volume Down, releasing the former when the device vibrates and the latter after the recovery screen comes up, to boot the device straight into that recovery.
From recovery, flash ColorOS 2.1.5i and then select the option to reboot; let the device do so.
Download and flash the latest TWRP 3.x recovery: https://dl.twrp.me/find7/

Similar to (2), different filename.

Repeat (3), and you should be in TWRP and can flash CyanogenMod!


Gingerbread with ext4: will it burn my flash? 2.3 Gingerbread will use ext4 instead of YAFFS.

My question is: YAFFS is for flash based filesystem, but ext4 is not. Will it lead to premature death of the device due to wear leveling?

Not likely, the flash storage itself usually have built-in hardware wear leveling, YAFFS2 is only advantageous when the flash storage does not have hardware wear levelling.

However if you're reformatting a flash storage, do check that the flash storage have hardware wear leveling; most flash storage that originally ships with ext4 (e.g. Nexus S) should come with hardware wear leveling, but if the device originally ships with YAFFS2 or other file systems that does not do wear leveling, they might not have hardware wear leveling. On these file systems, you might need additional steps to ensure that a lower level driver do software wear leveling if you want to safely install ext4 (or other filesystems that does not do wear leveling).


Galaxy Note Jelly Bean update India Is there any Jelly Bean update available for Note N7000 in India?

Any one know when this update is coming?

Not yet available in India.
Here you can see most of the countries are in pending list for OTA update.
If you are impatient for the update, you can grab the Asia or Germany version and manually install using the Odin method.


Is it possible to restore apps/data from 4.2.1 to 4.4.4? I'm prepping to upgrade from PA 4.2.1 to CarbonROM 4.4.4 (VZW Galaxy Nexus). I'd prefer using TB to restore my selected apps + data I've had running on 4.2.1, but understand that this is a big jump between Android OSes.

Is there any way to do this? If not both, then what about just the apps?

Generally this shouldn't be a problem. The only problem with restoring between different Android versions is when you backup and restore the system apps' data from a different version. If you only restore the apps you installed and their data, you'll be OK in most cases.

A few apps might have different versions of the app for different Android versions, so those apps might not work properly because you've restored the data from a different version of the app. This is unusual, though, so you'll probably find that all your apps work just fine.


Share Links via Bluetooth without it being converted to HTML? I'm often browsing articles on my phone and when something piques my interest, I normally want to "share" it over to my computer to read it a little better or sometimes, just because the website wasn't optimized for mobile viewing.

What I've been doing as of late, is sharing the URL from the ICS browser via bluetooth. This would have worked well but I would like it NOT to create .html files for every link I send. Here's an example of an HTML file generated from the bluetooth transfer:

<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"/>http://www.androidauthority.com/jelly-bean-ics-market-share-june-99102/

What I would prefer is to have it instead, open up the URL on the default browser. My downloads folder is now filled with bluetooth_content_share.html files due to my transfers and I'd like to keep it clean now.

How do I go about doing this?

Same idea as roxan: Go to the market (oops, playstore) and look for an app named Pocket (formerly known as "ReadItLater"). This allows you to store URLs from many apps via the share menu to your free Pocket account.

As for your PC, there is e.g. a Firefox Addon available (for alternative choices, see the Pocket website. This is much more convenient than sharing via Bluetooth.


LG Optimus L70 Google Apps Gone I dropped my phone and the battery fell out. When I put it in and turned on my phone, all my Google apps were gone! Play Store, Chrome, etc.

My accounts won't sync; I get this play services error and when I hold the notification and touch "app info", Accounts Sync comes up. I checked my Google accounts in Settings and they're all not syncing due to some error.

I am rooted, by the way.

Did you tried a factory reset? I fear it could be the only way to solve the issue, hope you enabled the Google backup feature so that it could restore your apps and data as soon as you login in the next setup process.

If this doesn't work, your internal memory hardware could be seriously damaged and the only solution would be official repair, unfortunately!


M8 unlocked when picked up. I have an HTC m8. The other day I sat it flat on my desk. Every time I would pick it up, the screen would automatically unlock and light up. My thoughts were that's neat how have I never noticed this before, it knows when I pick up the phone. Today I cant get it to do it. I've tried all different positions on flat surfaces and it simply will not wake up upon being picked up. Any thoughts?

It could be those gestures .Try enabling the gestures on settings>Display & Gestures >Motion launch gesture >Enable it.


Installing fonts on android I used to have cyanogen os and it had this theme thing that I could change and install fonts to. But I upgraded to Lineage OS and it's not there anymore. I have some font apks but I dunno how to apply them after installation. Can I get some help?

Cyanogen OS stops at Marshmallow and is deprecated; LineageOS 14.1 (along with CM14.1 before it), being fresh on Nougat, has yet to implement a theme engine, so you need to rely on 3rd-party solutions, which usually uses TTF/OTF format fonts. If you still want to use the fonts in the APKs, extract them from the APK package.


Installing downloaded apks from external site I have just downloaded APK files of a software from a website to my laptop. My question is if I install this on my phone, will it be installed in the phone memory or in the SD card memory?

I couldn't find any related question, so asking here.

Any apk files installed in your device usually stay on its internal memory. The apk configuration defines whether the app should stay on the mobile's internal memory completely, or it may shift a few resource files (images, etc.) to the sd card. The main files (technically: the java class files and layout files) remain on the internal memory of the device.

This may be changed if your device is rooted, and you have partitioned your sd card to allow installations on it (technically: EXT4 extension replacing the FAT32 extension of a part of your sdcard, which won't be accessible to the user from the device as a Mass Storage).

Apps2SD is an app which eases the process of shifting apps capable of transferring resources from apk to sdcard, so as to free up some memory on the internal memory. The app does not help install apks on sd card.
Hope this helps.


What Is Using Up My Storage/Data on Android Phone? First, I appreciate that there are lots of similar questions to this online, but they are often so specific that I haven't been able to solve this question myself (through online forums/questions/etc).

I have a phone with 8GBs of internal storage, as can be seen from the first picture below. ~3GBs of this is used up by Android OS; ~5GBs remains, of which I am using ~4.5GBs. (This leads to issues with not being able to update, etc, due to lack of space.)

All reasonable so far. However, as the next picture shows, of that 4.5GBs used (separate to the 3GBs for Android OS), Apps uses ~2.1GBs and Cached data only ~33MBs.
Hopefully my question is clear now:

  where is the remaining 2.4GBs?

You can examine storage usage from terminal with du

in your "about phone" settings, tap "build number" 7x (seven) times to unhide the hidden developer settings, then enable USB-Debugging in developer settings
on PC download platform_tools and busybox binary for your phones cpu architecture (armv7l), rename file "busybox" and copy it to platform_tools folder (i realized toybox is buggy, du works best with busybox)
open cmd.exe and navigate with cd command to folder where adb.exe is. connect the phone to PC with USB cable, then type the following commands (each line for its own)

adb devices
adb push busybox /data/local/tmp/
adb shell
chmod a+x /data/local/tmp/busybox
/data/local/tmp/busybox du -acsxhd1 /storage/emulated/0

repeat the last command on different folder for your needs. the last digit in parameters controls the depth (see full list for usage)

du is a command line utility for disk usage

CUBOT_KING_KONG:/ $ du --help
BusyBox v1.29.2.YDS (2018-08-01 20:19:15 UTC) multi-call binary.

Usage: du [-aHLdclsxhmk] [FILE]...

Summarize disk space used for each FILE and/or directory

        -a      Show file sizes too
        -L      Follow all symlinks
        -H      Follow symlinks on command line
        -d N    Limit output to directories (and files with -a) of depth < N
        -c      Show grand total
        -l      Count sizes many times if hard linked
        -s      Display only a total for each argument
        -x      Skip directories on different filesystems
        -h      Sizes in human readable format (e.g., 1K 243M 2G)
        -m      Sizes in megabytes
        -k      Sizes in kilobytes (default)

if you don't know your phones cpu architecture you can check the SoC from terminal

adb shell
head /proc/cpuinfo

the busybox binary will remain at your phones temp folder until you delete it

adb shell
rm /data/local/tmp/busybox


Set Calendar default reminder to "none" for new appointments When I input a new appointment on my HTC Desire S (running Android 2.3) the meeting has a 10 minutes reminder by default. I can manually set it to none for each appointment.

However, as I rarely want a reminder, how can I change the default to be None?

Thanks all

Andrew

Open the calendar app then select:

Menu->More->Settings->Default Reminder Time

and set to none.


How to download OBB files without using the Chrome/Firefox Extension? First of all, let me emphasize that I AM NOT TRYING TO PIRATE ANYTHING.

My situation is that I have this game which needs to be updated, but I have been failing to finish the update every single time.

My guess is that the Internet connection got disrupted midway through downloading the OBB file, and Google Play app is not equipped to perform a resumable partial download.

It really gets tiresome after a while.

I tried installing the "APK Downloader Extension" but it either failed to login (on Chrome) or does nothing (on Firefox).

If there's a way to get the URL of the OBB file, I can use Firefox's DownThemAll, and manually transfer it to my phone.

So, to repeat the question: Is there a way to download the OBB file without using the Google Play app on the phone?

You aren't pirating anything if it's free in the first place. Google play does support resumable downloads. You can use sites like apk4fun or the amazon store, in case you are otherwise dissatisfied. They host all files for direct download.


Pros and cons of rooting using apps ("Soft Root") compared to other methods ("Hard Root") There are quite a few app based rooting methods. A recent review 9 free software apps to root Android devices, points to some of them and there may be more apps, paid or otherwise.

From what I understand,

Plus Points

Ease of rooting
Don't need a laptop or computer

Minuses

Based on exploits, so may not work if exploits are denied by OS updates
Difficulty in unrooting (as I see on some forums for my device Huawei Honor 6)

Questions:

What are the pros and cons apart from above?
If a device has both options - app based rooting and rooting by methods by developers, which one should I opt for?

Note: I am not seeking app suggestion or recommendation.

Thanks to AndrewT who posted a link on chat, having this research paper  as a refernce in one of the answers. This answer is entirely based on the this paper (May 2015) and highlights common user understandable aspects ( it has a lot of security related material for those interested)

  What are the pros and cons apart from above?
  If a device has both options - app based rooting and rooting by methods by developers, which one should I opt for?

Answer:  It's all about malware vulnerability. Using Root exploits is a HUGE security risk and that over-weighs any other advantages

What is Soft Root and Hard Root?

Soft Root :  Root is obtained directly by
running a piece of software (i.e., root exploits)- either by directly installing on the device or  requiring adb shell through a PC connection
Hard Root :  Root is obtained by flashing su binary externally via an update package or ROM

Malware Threat - in general

Even though legitimate, many convenient one-click root methods operate by exploiting vulnerabilities in the Android system. If not carefully controlled, such exploits can be abused by malware author to gain unauthorized root privilege.
As described in the Android Malware Genome Project  ,  36.7% ( of 1260 ) malware samples had embedded at least one root exploit.
These well-engineered exploits are not well protected, it is extremely dangerous if they fall in the wrong hands.

Who are major root providers  and broadly, how does it work?

What are the types of root expolits ?

The paper covers 78 exploits studied. In general , the order of impact ( from the highest to lowest) :

Kernel Exploits: Due to its privileged position, targeting Linux Kernel is natural to achieve full control over an Android device- example ,TowelRoot
Library Exploits: the exploits targeting libraries that are used by Android system processes, or external libraries used for supporting different applications, example ZergRush exploit , libsysutils used by Volume Manager daemon
Application and Application Framework Application layer root exploits : exploits targeting system applications or services, mostly include vulnerable logics introduced by setuid utilities, system applications, or services. example is a vulnerable setuid utility that is only present on XoomFE devices
that has a command injection vulnerability
Vendor-Specific Kernel or Drivers: Vendors either customize the kernel (e.g., Qualcomm’s custom Linux kernel branch) or provide vendor-specific device drivers for various peripherals (e.g., camera, sound). Such code runs inside the kernel space and the compromise of which can also lead to full control over the device.

Number wise , exploits are as in figure below

How difficult is it to lay your hands on Exploit (Source or Binary) ?

Very easy. Easily available from Google search, making it a cake walk  for malware authors to leverage such exploits. Googling for 73 exploits lead to 68 of them being available - 46 with source code and 22 with binaries

How do these exploits work?

Major requirements for exploits to work (ordered from most difficult  to least) ( malware tag has a lot of these instances)

Requiring user interactions: (6 out of 78 studied)

Asking the user to download an app and manually interrupt the installation
Asking the user to boot into recovery at least once .
Asking the user to manually put the device into “battery
saving” mode .
Asking  the user to open a vendor specific app and hit a button

Requiring adb shell through a PC connection: (17 out of 78 studied). For some exploits, adb shell connection is required because of the following most common reasons:

The exploit can successfully modify a setting in local.prop which enables root for adb shell only.
The exploit needs to write to a file owned by group shell and group-writable (not world-writable)
The exploit targets the adb daemon process that requires the attack process to run with shell user. For instance, the Rage Against the Cage exploit targets the vulnerability of adb daemon’s missing check on return value of setuid()

Reboot: (6 out of 78 studied)  Generally, many root exploits require at least one reboot. For instance, a symbolic link attack would allow an attacker to delete a file owned by system with weak permission, to setup a link at the same location to a protected file. After a reboot, the corresponding init scripts would attempt to change the permission of the original file  to world-writable, which in reality changes the permission of the linked file
None or permission:  (44 out of 78 studied) The exploits in this category have no hard requirements, however, some of them may require certain Android permissions like READ LOGS in order for the process owner to be placed in certain user group.

Can these exploits be detected by Anti-Virus ?

Since the root exploits are highly sensitive and may be leveraged by various Android malware, it is expected that anti-virus software on Android platform can identify most of them, including the ones implemented by root providers. Overall, the result shows that the state-of-the-art security products on Android platform still cannot address root exploits effectively

4 representative Android anti-virus products  were used to test the largest provider (name not revealed) having 167 exploits. Because originally downloaded exploits from the providers  database have packed the actual exploit code and employed a tamper-detection mechanism, study crafted 3 different versions for every exploit:

Original exploit fetched directly from providers servers, with
packing and tamper-detection on.
Unpacked exploit, which will expose all actual exploit logic to
    anti-virus products.
Re-packed exploit with tamper-detection disabled.

Exploit binaries engineered by large root providers are surprisingly “clean” as all major anti-virus software have difficulty detecting them as table below shows

Conclusion

Simple. Stay away from Soft Root methods unless you are capable of dealing with the consequences


Is there any way to send SMS to another device using internet? Is there any way to send SMS to another device using internet? I don't want to use phone native. I want to use internet to send messages.

I'm not talking about android applications like Viber, WhatsApp Messenger, etc. If we are using those services, other devices we need to send SMS must have installed the same application. But I don't want to do that. If at all, I want to install an app only on my Android device and send SMS to other devices using internet. (other devices means all other devices which can receive SMS -- not only smart phones but also devices like nokia 1100)

The only way to accomplish this is to use an online SMS gateway, which means you send the message to the service provider via the internet, and they forward it to the recipient over SMS. There are several service providers for this, but mostly they require a subscription, i.e. they're not free. Just google for "sms gateway" to find them.

Some service providers have Android app support, but this depends on your region and the selected service provider.

Note that most service providers don't allow you to use your own number as the sender, therefore the recipient may have a hard time replying to you.


Is there a way to log off from your Android 4.2 tablet user account? One of the nice features introduced in Android 4.2 Jelly Bean on tablet devices is the ability to create user accounts just like you do on desktop operating systems.  However, as far as I can see, there doesn't seem to be a log-off option available anywhere that would result in e.g. stopping all processes initiated by a user.

The only standard option in the multi-user environments world I can see is switching between user accounts.  In order to do that, all I need to do on my Google Nexus 7 tablet is lock the screen and then unlock it by hitting the hardware on/off button;  on the screen that shows up you can select what user account you'd like to log in to.

This is quite important as I am worried the processes started by other users might have an impact on the performance of the device.

In terminal emulator;

Become root

$ su

List users to get their ID. It's the first number listed, usually 11 for the first user. 0 is owner. Ie 11:user:10 & 0:owner:13

# pm list users

Stop the users execution instance (logoff)

# am stop-user <id>

Usually 'am stop-user 11'

You can't logoff the device owner, ID 0.


Disable an app from creating bookmarks Recently I have observed some of the apps (Photo editors) asking for permissions like 'creating bookmarks' at the time of installation from google play.

How can I disable a particular application from creating a bookmark on the home screen, like in disabling notifications on per app basis.

Thanks in advance

The Play Store does have an option in its central settings for controlling whether shortcuts on your home screen are automatically created for apps when you install them:

You can get here by opening the Play Store, pressing the Menu button on your phone (or the "three dots" menu icon if you don't have a hardware menu button) and select Settings, you should then see the "Auto-add widgets" setting that you can enable or disable.


Can't get past the pulsating boot screen after complete battery drain My phone ran out of charge this morning after I made a couple of phone calls in bed. I was too lazy to get out of bed to plug it in. When I plugged it in later, and pushed the power button, the phone is continously looping the pulsating X loading animation. The only way to switch it off at this point is to replace the battery.

I read about the hard reset and tried that too. It didn't help.

Update:
I also tried setting the battery aside for over 15 mins before replacing and trying it again.

I was able to get into recovery by holding down the POWER + VOL UP buttons. Tried the "wipe cache partition" option thinking that the phone refused to start due to some stale cache. It didn't help either.

What else can I do to revive the phone? I would like not to lose data, if I can. But it's more important to get the phone working.

The only option I had was to do a factory reset and reinstall all the apps using appbrain.


How to set up tablet to use a local DNS server thru VPN rather than Google's DNS? I have a Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise server running in our home network. It has VPN functionality installed and fully working.

If I connect with a computer, the computer will get right DNS servers. If I connect with Android tablet (Asus Transformer Prime), the tablet will still use Google's DNS servers.

The problem with this is that I can't resolve local website addresses such as intranet. Getting the access to that site is more than necessary.

I want the (non-rooted) Android tablet to use the DNS servers provided by the VPN server.

How can I fix this?

You can solve this issue either from the Android side or from the Windows side:
From the Android side

Tap your device "menu" button, and select "settings";
Tap "Wireless & networks";
Tap "Wi-Fi settings";
Tap your device "menu" to bring up extra options and select "advanced";
Tap "Use static IP";
Fill in your local network static IP details and dns server details;
Tap your device "menu" to bring up extra options and select "save".

From the Windows side

Open the DNS management;
Add a new Forward Lookup Zone for the Google DNS and set a Host A record to your local IP.


How to disable OTA update of some specific apps? My android device is 4.4.2 with no root access.

I would like to disable OTA updates of some specific apps like facebook and other apps.

Can it be possible?

Please let me know, how to do this?

Regards

InTech

If you are rooted, you can use Titanium Backup and Freeze the system app named "Software Update MUC". This prevents the phone from self checking for updates and the notifications will stop.


I can not screenshot on my samsung galaxymini s~3 How  do i screenshot on samsung galaxy s~3
Model number GT-S5280
Android Version4.1.2

Press Power and Home buttons at the same time.
You will see a white effect, and then, the screenshot is ready to share through a notification.


Xposed framework greyed out. Should I be concerned? Xposed framework (ver 85) on my device Moto X Play has options greyed out as shown - only soft reboot and reboot are not greyed out

This happened over last three days when I was trying out some modules , so can't pinpoint which caused it

Xposed framework and modules are working fine
Restoring Framework from earlier TiBu backup which didn't have this problem did not help - it remains greyed out
Clearing cache and data of installer also didn't help

I've come across cases on Internet where this is associated with framework not working properly or wrong framework installed, which clearly isn't the case here ( it was installed many months ago )

So my question is, should I be concerned about it ?

My feeling is that it's not causing any problems (Point 1) , so it's pointless going through uninstalling and installing it. But just to be sure, wanted a second opinion on this, maybe with reasons why this happened

I used Xposed some time ago and as far I can remember those buttons are grayed out because on marshmallow (possibly lollipop) you must flash framework files via .zip file. Maybe I'm wrong and forgot something.
Are you sure it happened recently, that it wasn't there all the time?
However I don't think you should be concerned because Xposed and it's modules work fine (right?).
It says "Xposed framework 85 is active"


How to reset allwinner kitkat 4.4 I have forgotten the lock code for my kitkat 4.4. Is there a way to hard reset it back to factory? I only have a power button and a volume button. Can someone please help me?

AllWinner devices (devices powered by a AllWinner CPU) don't have a recovery menu from which to perform a  factory reset.

In order to reset your device, you will need to know which CPU is inside. AllWinner CPU have number such as A10, A13, A23, A33, etc. Such information can be found out from the device's specifications from the internet or manually by opening the device and then locate the CPU.

So, when you get all the information about the CPU, you will need to find the ROM/firmware for that device then flash it to the device using a tool called PhoenixSuit or LiveSuit (both are similar).

The flashing process is quite simple. Go here for a tutorial on how to use PhoenixSuit for flashing a AllWinner device (A23 in the example).


Are all Note 7 phones to be returned? I have applied to court to return my Samsung Note 7 to the retailer who refused to take it back and return my money (a necessity in my country by law)

The court decided that an expert should decide if returning the phone is necessary or not.

Expert report said that my Note 7 is not up for recall by Samsung and therefore my demand was denied by the court.

I read it that all Note 7 phones should be returned but expert decided otherwise, stating that it only includes phones that are sold by Samsung and not retailers, and not all phones but only a subseries has this problem and my phone wasn't one of them.

Is he right? Not from the legal aspects but the tech part. I thought all Samsung Note 7s were possibly risky.

Samsung is pushing out Updates that disable the Charging ability of your phone so it becomes useless.

Samsung stated that every Note 7 should be returned regardless of the Place you bought it from. I would suggest that you contact Samsung about that problem and see if they can help.


Looking for android permission details I am looking for a list of android permissions and what can be done once a certain permission is granted.

Background: Many apps require permissions which at first sound very intimidating, like READ_PHONE_STATE.
Looking at http://developer.android.com/reference/android/Manifest.permission.html it states "Allows read only access to phone state." but this clarifies nearly nothing.

Do I need to dive into the code, presuming that part is available?

Cheers

You already figured it out: when you write an Android app, you can do operations which requires permissions. The complete list is the link you have given : http://developer.android.com/reference/android/Manifest.permission.html. Most of the permissions listed are very explicit for developpers, but for the user, some can sound mysterious.

To take your example, the READ_PHONE_STATE permission is mostly used to have access to the phone ID. It allows developpers to know how many users (phones) they have. But this permissions also let us know if you are receiving a call or not to react in consequence (if it is a music application: reduce the volume), and things like that.

But, for 2 different Android apps, you can see the same permissions with 2 different uses of it. For large permission as WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE (to write on SD card), one can just write its settings files, the other can put a malware script on it... The only way to know exactly what an app does with the permissions, is to see the code. But, in most case, if it is a non-open-source app, you can't...

I hope I answer your question. If not, I will try to give details with your more precise question.

Regards


How can I control the brightness from the notification bar? My friend has the Galaxy S and is able to control the brightness by sliding his finger over the notification-bar. He said he didn't install anything to have it (but he has a custom ROM, so that doesn't have to mean anything).

I have the HTC Desire running with the Cyanogen MOD. I tried finding a widget or something else that will allow me to control the brightness from the notification bar, but came up with nothing.

Can it be done?

This is an undocumented feature in certain Samsung devices. Hold your finger over the notification bar and then sliding it left and right can increase/decrease brightness.

It started with the Galaxy S, IIRC. Also, "auto-brightness" setting must be turned off.


Voice to text: How punctuation works in Dutch? I've seen a lot of post about the punctuation, but that was all about the English version of voice-to-text.
The Dutch version works pretty good, but it seems to be imposible to do things like 'new line', 'point' or 'comma'.
How to use the punctuation in Dutch?

It seems there is no support yet for punctuation marks in Dutch. Unless something has changed since this posting:

Spraakgestuurd typen met deze 10 tips en trucs

(Scroll down to "Tip 04: Leestekens")

I came across this while searching for Japanese punctuation in voice input. Try using Swype Keyboard app as a workaround.


Unable to move apps to the SD card I have certain apps, like Google Maps, on my phone which I am unable to move to my SD card from the internal memory. I tried moving it from the App management menu in Phone settings, but the move to SD card option isn't enabled. Is moving these apps going to affect the working of the device?

You are very ambiguous regarding which OS is in question. Judging from "Google Maps", I will assume it is an Android device.

Case 1:
Factory apps which are pre-installed with your system can never be moved to the SD Card, as they are hard wired in the ROM. The only solution in that case is rooting the phone and replacing your ROM software. I will not explain rooting / ROM swapping here since it is an entire subject.

Case 2:
Most apps installed from Play Store can be moved to the SD Card by navigating to:

Settings > Applications > Manage Applications > On SD card

(Android 2.3.6, menu may slightly vary on other versions)

You will be able to check / uncheck the apps that you'd like to move to the SD Card. Most apps will allow you to move them, but some apps will not. Once again, rooting resolves this.

Note: Pre-installed apps which have been updated through Google Play Store behave like in case 2, because the updated version does not reside in the ROM.


How to see pictures in your text messages I have done what was posted before. When I tape the download button it doesn't download

Ensure your mobile data is on and that roaming is switched on. As I do not know your operating system I will post instructions for marshmallow.

Settings > mobile networks > data roaming

EDIT:
based upon the newly supplied facts I viewed you need to change you apn login details as seen on this website.

Navigate to
Settings>More>Mobile networks>Access Point Names>Menu>

Once there delete any currently present apn profiles then restart (hold down the power button until the menu including a shut down button appears).

Once turned back on navigate back to the apn menu.

Enter these details in a new profile

APN: tfdata
MMSC: http://mms-tf.net
MMS proxy: mms3.tracfone.com
MMS port: 80

Save and restart once more.

Your MMS should now work.


Force to buy app with old version of Android I have two smartphones:

HTC Desire (unrooted / android 2.2 / normal-sim / operator1 / my account)
Nexus 4 (android 4.4.4 / micro-sim / operator2 / my account)

Both smartphone are regurarly  logged with the same account.

I need to buy some apps with normal-sim from operator1 but those app are available only for android 4.0 and newest.

I will use the apps on my Nexus 4 but I do not want to root any device by now.

How can I solve it?

EDIT after reading your comments:

AFAIK, It's not possible.