# Question
Title: Is it possible to make tasker events conditional on whether I'm roaming?
Using 'Tasker', I have a task set up to dial my mobile phone balance enquiry number at 7pm each night, put in the right options, then hang up. That results in a text being sent to me each evening with my remaining minutes - great!

However - I'm about to go abroad for three weeks and, left in its present state, it will rack up quite a bill if it does manage to dial. How can I make this action conditional on roaming? I considered using the location context but it crashes above certain ranges and isn't that reliable.

# Answer
> 3 votes
If you are usually home at 7pm, you could make it conditional on the presence of your home Wifi network (using "Wifi Near") or a cell tower near you (using "Cell near"); if you use a dock at home, you could make it only fire when docked instead.

You could also make it dependent on a calendar and just set the dates for your trip now.

# Answer
> 3 votes
There's a Locale plugin (that you can use in Tasker) that might handle your needs.

And here is another plugin for Locale.

# Answer
> 2 votes
Try this:

1. Profile context triggers on set variable CELLID with task check if ROAM matches off.
2. Set a variable ROAMING accordingly. Now you can have other profiles use the ROAMING variable to change settings like calls to accept or limiting data.

Tasker may not update CELLID instantly so you nasty be roaming a little while before it fires. Maybe a minute.

Try and let me know. Here is an export:

```
 <class cl="TaskerData" sr="">
    <tv>1.2u2m</tv>
    <class cl="Profile" sr="prof5">
        <cdate>1328389747604</cdate>
        <id>5</id>
        <mid0>25</mid0>
        <nme>Roaming Monitor</nme>
        <class cl="EventContext" sr="con0" ve="2">
            <code>3050</code>
            <pri>0</pri>
            <class cl="StringArg" sr="arg0" ve="3">
                <val>%CELLID</val>
            </class>
            <class cl="StringArg" sr="arg1" ve="3">
                <val></val>
            </class>
        </class>
    </class>
    <class cl="Task" sr="task25">
        <id>25</id>
        <pri>10</pri>
        <class cl="Action" sr="act0" ve="3">
            <code>37</code>
            <lhs>%ROAM</lhs>
            <op>2</op>
            <rhs>off</rhs>
        </class>
        <class cl="Action" sr="act1" ve="3">
            <code>547</code>
            <lhs>%ROAMING</lhs>
            <op>10</op>
            <rhs></rhs>
            <class cl="StringArg" sr="arg0" ve="3">
                <val>%ROAMING</val>
            </class>
            <class cl="StringArg" sr="arg1" ve="3">
                <val>1</val>
            </class>
            <class cl="IntArg" sr="arg2">
                <val>0</val>
            </class>
            <class cl="IntArg" sr="arg3">
                <val>0</val>
            </class>
        </class>
        <class cl="Action" sr="act2" ve="3">
            <code>43</code>
        </class>
        <class cl="Action" sr="act3" ve="3">
            <code>549</code>
            <lhs>%ROAMING</lhs>
            <op>9</op>
            <rhs></rhs>
            <class cl="StringArg" sr="arg0" ve="3">
                <val>%ROAMING</val>
            </class>
            <class cl="IntArg" sr="arg1">
                <val>0</val>
            </class>
        </class>
        <class cl="Action" sr="act4" ve="3">
            <code>38</code>
        </class>
    </class>
</class>

```

---
Tags: tasker
---


# Question
Title: Phone is finding every wireless access point except mine!
I have a Samsung Galaxy S using the default firmware (version 2.2).

Unfortunately, it can't seem to find the wireless at work. When I click "Scan" on the list of WAPs, it continues to appear as a "Remembered" access point rather than connecting.

The laptop is finding the SSID with full bars, so it's just the phone being tetchy.

I've tried rebooting the phone and the router with no change.

# Answer
> 4 votes
It was indeed Wifi channels (as per phunehehe's comment) - setting the router to use band 11 suddenly brought the access point back into being detectable. Excellent.

---
Tags: samsung-galaxy-s, wi-fi, networking
---


title: Swype delete key problem

text:
# Question
Title: Swype delete key problem
I have a Samsung Galaxy S2 with the latest firmware an a preinstalled Swype on it.

The problem I have, is in the standard email application when using swype keyboard and trying to delete a character, it will append the word again and so it's impossible to delete a word. For example: I type `Test`, then hit the backspace button and it results in `TesTest`.

My question is now, can I solve this problem without having to root the phone in order to reinstall swype?

---

Addition: My android version is 2.3.5, my firware version I9100BOKJ1.

# Answer
Do you have an ICS rom installed? I have that same issue with T9 keyboard on the Galaxy Nexus. I reported the issue to Nuance but they claimed the T9 doesn't support ICS.

You can fix it by holding down the backspace key until the whole field is cleared, then switch to a non-sliding keyboard to enter the info in the `To:` field.
> 0 votes

---
Tags: email, swype
---


# Question
Title: Home screens maxed out (oops)... now I can't edit?
Someone was playing with my coworker's Samsung Galaxy Gio (Froyo), and added an eighth home screen. Now hitting Settings-\>Edit makes the phone crash, as does minimizing (pinching) on any home screen - in other words, there is no way to jump between home screens or delete the four or five screens she has no use for.

I'm thinking a home screen launcher app would be a workaround, but is there any way to actually recover her original home screen setup?

# Answer
Adding additional home screens is not a stock Android feature so I can't comment specifically, but clearing data for the launcher application should work.

Settings → Applications → Manage applications → Launcher (might be named differently) → Clear data

You will lose your current home screen configuration, of course, but this should take care of the crashes and allow rebuilding it.

Any method for fixing the actual problem without losing the data will necessarily be specific to that particular launcher application, and it sounds like you've tried to find that sort of thing already.
> 3 votes

---
Tags: home-screen, bugs, samsung-touchwiz
---


title: Improving Galaxy Nexus's audio quality

text:
# Question
Title: Improving Galaxy Nexus's audio quality
I found out about this website through androidguys.com and I'm giving it a first shot. :)

I remember when I had my Fascinate which is Samsung Galaxy S, I had Voodoo Sound Control app which helped to improve the sound quality tremendously. So you can imagine my surprise that when I got my Galaxy Nexus(Verizon), the app wasn't supporting it.

My question is, will we ever get Voodoo Control support? It's been awhile since the phone came out but the app didn't get updated yet. This led me to assume that it's either impossible or the developer dropped its support. If it will not get Voodoo Control, what other choices are there?

I'm currently using Volume+ and have tried PowerAMP, Neutron, and PlayerPro. All these do are some EQ and volume increase. They have nothing to do with hardware level sound modification.

# Answer
It seems that Voodoo Sound Control on your Fascinate/SGS worked because of three different pieces - the preinstalled Voodoo Control app, a specific digital to audio controller, and a kernel that can allow the two to communicate. As best I can tell the Galaxy Nexus doesn't have the correct DAC nor a kernal that would allow the controller app to work. Sorry, it seems you're stuck with EQ apps for sound quality.

My suggestion at this point, if you're needing more volume from your phone, would be to look into external powered amps.
> 4 votes

---
Tags: audio, samsung-galaxy-nexus
---


title: How can I root my Android on my Mac?

text:
# Question
Title: How can I root my Android on my Mac?
I've been looking into rooting my Android phone, which is a ZTE Score. The only way I've found so far is to use the ZergRush tool (Or something like that..)
But I believe it can only be used on a Windows based computer.. Anyway, I have a MacBook Pro which runs an Intel cpu, and I'm running Snow Leopard. Is there a way to root my phone using my Mac?

# Answer
> 2 votes
I searched for that one click root tool and found a post in XDA's Amaze 4G forum that has a Mac version. I would expect it to be the same as for the ZTE Score, you can try it out anyways: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1310115

# Answer
> 0 votes
It's not a one click solution, but there are solutions depending on what you want to achieve:

---
Tags: rooting, macos
---


# Question
Title: Is it possible to permanently supress app updates?
> **Possible Duplicate:**
> How to hide updates from market?

I've been using a certain app for some time now, but according to the many 1-star reviews the latest "update" has got, it breaks compatibility with Tasker, which is not something I want.

Is there a way to at least temporarily remove the regular update notifications I receive, or stop the app appearing at the top of my update list every time?

Using Nexus S with official 4.0.3.

# Answer
You can use Titanium backup for this purpose.

However you'll need root access for this to work.

From this Titanium backup wiki:

> **Can I tell the Market that I do not want to update a specific app?**
>
> Yes. Just long-click on an app in the Titanium Backup list and hit "Detach from Market".
> 2 votes

---
Tags: applications, google-play-store, updates, notifications
---


title: Android audio input

text:
# Question
Title: Android audio input
I know that on the iPhone you can plug in your guitar and other audio devices but can you do this on Android? Can any recording application do this?

# Answer
> 3 votes
The headphone jack of many android devices will accept audio input. A few caveats:

1. Audio input using this method is **mono only**.
2. This will vary by device as some may not accept audio input, and others simply don't have headphone jacks. If a particular device came with a headset with a built-in mic, odds are it will accept audio input.
3. This method does not support the use of an external mic while recording video.
4. You'll need to use a special adapter that will split the input/output of the jack. Something like this or the adapter mentioned here would probably work.

It seems like audio input through USB would be possible, but this feature request suggests it isn't yet implemented.

---
Tags: audio, input-methods
---


# Question
Title: Can you install custom kernels on DroidX running CyanogenMod?
Can you install custom kernels on DroidX running CyanogenMod?

Or does the locked bootloader prevent that?

# Answer
> 5 votes
No, The DroidX can not run custom kernels.

"It is still impossible to flash custom kernels on the Droid X, but the ROM developer community has matured to a point where they’re able to make great things happen on this phone without having to rely on changes to the kernel."

---
Tags: cyanogenmod, motorola-droid-x, kernel
---


# Question
Title: Are there good resources for comparing performance of Stock Motorola ROMs vs. CM7.1?
I'm looking for a good resource for which shows performance comparison - for Droid X - of Froyo 2.2 (stock ROM), Gingerbread 2.3 (Stock Verizon ROM) and any sort of Cyanogen ROM running on Droid X (presumably 2.3 based - 7.1?)

I'm NOT looking for first-person subjective accounts like these.

I'm looking for benchmarks - either as a direct single benchmark using identical set of installed apps; or better yet a set of collated averaged statistics.

I'm mainly interested in "normal business use" performance, not intensive graphics games one - I don't play anything heavier than Angry Birds. So if there is data from different benchmarks, whichever one approximates everyday business use would be preferred.

I would ideally like something which covers all 3 ROMs listed above (stock 2.2, stock 2.3 and CM7) but will be happy with any answers that only show pairwise comparisons of any 2.

**NOTE:** While the question is specifically about Droid X, I will accept an answer which shows a very good comparison of performance that illustrates a clear difference between ROMs across ALL comparable hardware (e.g. 1Ghz single-core, 512Mb memory, PowerVR SGX530 or comparable GPU) and makes a case that the difference should be easily carried over to DX.

---

*Background:* I am considering upgrading my Droid X from Froyo 2.2 (stock, rooted) to Gingerbread. I need to choose to either spend the time figuring out how to load the not-officially-supported CM7 from nightlies, or simply loading Verizon's stock Gingerbread ROM.

The 3 main things I'm concerned about as far as choosing ROM are (1) Stability, (2) Memory footprint, (3) Performance. This question only covers #3.

# Answer
> 3 votes
One baseline for measuring phone performance is the Quadrant Score.

Here is the quadrant score for Droid X with FroYo and Gingerbread.

This site shows various quadrant scores for the Droid X with CM7, as well as unofficial versions of Gingerbread and FroYo.

There are some debates about the usefulness of the Quadrant Score - hopefully since these are comparisons with the same model of phone, they would be useful.

---
Tags: 2.2-froyo, 2.3-gingerbread, cyanogenmod, motorola-droid-x, performance
---


# Question
Title: Are there specific cases in which a task-killer or "fast reboot" program is helpful?
I know there have been previous questions regarding task killers, but I wanted to ask about two specific cases.

I've heard a debate raging here and on several forums about Android's way of managing apps and the use of task killers, (examples hereenter link description here and here and here), in which one side says that Android manages tasks just fine but the other side insists that their phone does indeed slow down and a task killer helps.

So my questions are these.

1) Could task killers or "reboot apps" conceivably help for a program that has high CPU usage and simply needs to be restarted? I'm not necessarily talking about malicious apps, but reputable apps that tend toward higher CPU usage the longer they run? I'm assuming that if an app always has high CPU usage a task killer will not help as it will likely restart, and should just probably be uninstalled altogether.

2) In the case of a launcher that slows down over time, would a task killer or reboot app be helpful, simply in restarting it (similar to case 2, but I'm not sure lag in a specific app is directly correlated with its CPU usage). I know that when I used third-party launchers, I had more lag issues as opposed to using the basic AOSP launcher (Android's own default launcher, often replaced by phone vendors own version).

Any other specific cases?

# Answer
Honestly, I don't believe so. If you need to stop an app, you can always go to Settings \> Applications \> Manage Applications, click on the app and force stop. It does the same thing and the only time I find myself clicking on it, is when an app is acting up.
> 3 votes

---
Tags: performance, ram, task-management
---


# Question
Title: Google Voice missing from app drawer after upgrading to ICS
I upgraded from 2.3 a few months ago, but didn't notice that Google Voice was missing from the app drawer. The market lists the application as installed, but does not give me an option to open the app.

How do I get it back?

# Answer
> 1 votes
If you to Settings --\> Apps --\> All, is it in the list of applications? If so, click on it, click Uninstall, and then try to reinstall it from the market.

It's also possible that the market is incorrectly showing it as installed. If this is the case, try going to Settings --\> Apps --\> All --\> Market, click Force Stop, then Clear data. The open the market again and see if Google Voice is still listed as installed, and if not, install it.

# Answer
> 0 votes
Check the app drawer again -- it's listed (alphabetically) under "Voice", not "Google Voice".

---
Tags: samsung-nexus-s, google-voice
---


# Question
Title: Is there a concern as far as memory when running ICS ROM on 512MB device (DroidX)
Based on available evidence so far, are there legitimate concerns that people with older phones that have 512MB memory (e.g. Droid X) would experience memory issues when running 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) based ROMs?

To be more specific:

If my stock Froyo 2.2 ROM boots up with ~170MB memory free, and during my day to day use I end up with ~50-70MB memory free (this is with ALL my actively used apps loaded, and Android not killing any of them to make room for others), what would the expected memory footprint be on an AOSP based ICS ROM?

# Answer
If there is a ICS ROM available for the Droid X, it should run on a device with 512MB. The minimum requirements for ICS specified by CyanogenMod team is 256MB and a "decent GPU". I am not sure what kind of GPU the Droid X has, but you will probably have a better experience with Gingerbread then ICS on that device if the GPU isn't that great. My brother had that device and complained constantly about lag and lock up. If you have the "stock" MOTOBLUR, you will probably have a better experience just by installing any AOSP based ROM.

You can expect the footprint to be about the same, maybe a bit less, then what you see now. This is because the android OS will always try to use as much memory as possible in order to try and keep your experience better. If the application is in memory you can switch back to it faster then if it has to reload the entire application, plus it can "remember where you were".

As a side note, I don't currently see any CyanogenMod 9 builds available on the CM forums for the Droid X, but that doesn't mean that there aren't any, I just don't see them.
> 4 votes

# Answer
There shouldn't be any problems, since my Bravo (HTC Desire) runs ICS insanely quick (also 512Mb).

After a day on AOSP ICS (everluv), without any task-killing (but with a 6 background-task limitation), I still have 176Mb free, and that's roughly what you can expect in these conditions. Without background-task limitation, there is still 90Mb free.\*

btw: http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=691

This is the first place to look for ICS roms. However, don't expect to much, because drivers and hardware acceleration are not optimized for hardware like yours/mine.

* checked with *htop* command
> 1 votes

---
Tags: 2.2-froyo, 4.0-ice-cream-sandwich, ram
---


# Question
Title: Does Chrome Mobile on ICS support extensions?
I saw Google just released the beta for a mobile Chrome browser. They say they brought all the features over from the full browser, or at least they want to. Does anyone have an ICS device with the beta Chrome on it and can confirm if they support the extensions?

# Answer
> 11 votes
It does not, and Flash is also not supported as of now. Information Week reports (and I can personally corroborate):

> Web apps and extensions, including Adobe Flash Player, are not supported in the initial release of Chrome for Android Beta.

Trying to visit the extensions Web Store page on my Xoom results in a page which simply says the following:

> Sorry, your operating system is not supported just yet. The Chrome Web Store is available on Windows, Mac and Linux. Why don't you send a reminder to yourself to try it out later?

---
Tags: 4.0-ice-cream-sandwich, browser, chrome-for-android
---


# Question
Title: Is there a way to lower GPU load from Ice Cream Sandwich?
I have seen some mentions (including here on Android SE) that Ice Cream Sandwich may not necessarily run optimally (e.g. will be slow/lag) on devices with slower/older GPUs.

I assume that's due to GUI elements in the 4.0 being more graphics intensive, same way Windows XP had more graphics intensive GUI as well as Vista/Windows 7 had Aero.

However, on Windows, you always had an option to explicitly downgrade the OS's graphics effects, to improve performance (especially on older hardware) - e.g. you could turn off various GUI element transitions - see screenshot below. As far as I know, you can also turn off Aero on Windows Vista/7 (though I don't use them so not certain).

**QUESTION: Is it possible to similarly tune Ice Cream Sandwich to downgrade GUI graphics frills to improve performance on older GPUs?**

I'm only interested in regular OS/app performance, NOT game graphics performance.

# Answer
I'm not sure if it's part of a truly vanilla ICS build (though I think it may be), but the early CM9 and vanilla ICS builds I've played with all have a "Developer Options" entry in the main system settings. This contains several options which relate to overall graphics effects such as:

* Window animation scale: can be set to "off" to disable window animations
* Transition animation scale: can also be set to "off"
* Force GPU rendering: apparently tries to force GPU rendering of 2D textures/effects. May improve performance according to some (this generally caused my EVO to overheat, though)

It also has an option named "Background process limit". Setting a lower number should help improve performance overall, in theory.
> 2 votes

---
Tags: 4.0-ice-cream-sandwich, performance, hardware-acceleration, graphics, gpu
---


# Question
Title: is AT&T network possible on the Droid a855?
Is it possible to use AT&Ts network on the Droid a855? At all possible? Tough to find a direct answer on the web for some reason.

Thanks!

# Answer
No, the Droid is a CDMA phone. In general you can assume that phones on Verizon and Sprint won't work on AT&T or T-Mobile, and vice-versa.
> 6 votes

---
Tags: motorola-droid, verizon, mobile-network, att
---


title: Why do all my MMSes show up as videos?

text:
# Question
Title: Why do all my MMSes show up as videos?
Long text messages, photos - all show up as a five second long "video" (still image). Happens with received MMSes and the ones from me that I've sent. Using a galaxy s2. This is *really* annoying, my shoddy old nokia brick just opened them up how they were meant to be and then offered 'save to gallery' when I left the text. Why would such a better phone use such a worse approach? At first I thought it was that for some stupid reason it couldn't read normal pictures, but it does the same with my sent messages so unless it converts pictures out of readable format and back into a still video, that's not it (and that was also the only answer I could find on google).

# Answer
I agree with Onik's comment linking to his answer to a previous similar question; this very well may be up to your carrier and something you'll have to take up with them.

SMS/MMS delivery is a ballet involving the sending and receiving carriers' interest in cooperating, the network technology your phone uses, and how the SMS app on your phone interprets the messages you receive. An unfortunate number of these factors are out of your control, but have you tried another SMS app like Go SMS or Handcent? These may help your issue.
> 1 votes

---
Tags: samsung-galaxy-s-2, video, images, mms
---


title: No notifications during the night hours

text:
# Question
Title: No notifications during the night hours
I had juice defender installed on my phone for a few weeks but then I decided to remove it. One of the settings that I set up was to disable the vibration and sound notifications during the night (from 0:30 to 6:30 or something like that). Anyway, now that the juice defender is removed from my phone this settings still remain. I am not completely sure it's like that because of JD, but I don't see any other reason for such behavior.

I tried installing juice defender again, disabled all these options, but the settings are still there and I still don't get any sound or vibration during the night hours. Did anyone else had such a problem? How could I fix this and restore these settings to the "default behavior"?

I am using CM 7.1.0 stable (Android 2.3.7) if that helps anyhow.

# Answer
Be sure to check `Settings->CyanogenMod Settings->Sound->Quiet Hours` and make sure that it's disabled. That's been an unknowing culprit for me in the past.
> 1 votes

---
Tags: notifications, vibration, silent-mode
---


title: Defragmenting my Android Phone

text:
# Question
Title: Defragmenting my Android Phone
I just received an email from the vendor of a well known de-fragmentation software package suggesting I can make my phone go faster by plugging it into my PC and using the packages "consolidate free space option" on the drive that shows up from the phone.

What do people feel about this? Is this a good idea or are there risks?

Edit: I see they have blogged about it now: http://blog.raxco.com/2012/02/07/fix-your-slow-android-smartphone/

# Answer
Defragging a normal Windows machine with a normal "spinning disk" hard disk drive rarely produces a noticeable speed improvement, certainly nothing like a lot of the 3rd party companies advertise, and even in edge cases where people are regularly creating and deleting extremely large (yet irregularly sized) files, you'll rarely notice any improvement from running it any more often than every 6 months or so. It's more of a psychological placebo benefit in most cases. SuperUser:Does Defragmenting really help?

Phones don't have spinning hard disks, they use a variety of flash memory, this has massively faster random read speeds than a disk that needs to rotate until the right piece of data is under the read head. Also the controller circuitry in flash memory arranges the data itself as the data is written, allowing it to "write-level" across all of the flash disk and avoid problem parts of memory. See these SuperUser questions on that topic for more info Do I need to run defrag on an SSD?, Is it bad to defragment a USB Flash Drive?

In addition from Honeycomb (Android 3.x) onwards, the Android OS by default doesn't give an attached PC full access to the internal file-system, instead of mounting as a USB drive it uses MTP to control how the PC can access the memory, and only the SD card is allowed to be mounted as a normal USB drive. As far as I'm aware there's no way for a PC to get enough access to the file-system to do a defrag over MTP.

---

Tl;dr the way that flash memory works means that a defrag actually does almost nothing, and may have a slight side-effect of slightly reducing the life-span of your phone's storage.
> 17 votes

# Answer
in my understanding since there is no "rotating disk" but only solid memory like internal ROM and SD card, access time to every single location in the storage is the same regardless the actual position of the data you want to load so defragmentation is unnecessary.
> 13 votes

---
Tags: performance
---


title: How can I free up RAM automatically?

text:
# Question
Title: How can I free up RAM automatically?
I'm very tired of seeing my RAM used up by unwanted apps which I don't launch regularly, but they continue to appear in the taskbar. Every time I closed them and free the memory. After I restart my phone I have 200 mb of free RAM but after I start closing apps the free memory decreases. I used a task killer but it works the same way. Is there any way to automatically clear out my RAM periodically?

# Answer
See also: How can I stop applications and services from running?

When you free the memory you're just killing the apps using it or that Android has stopped and put in the background. The only real solution is to not use apps, or to accept that every time you switch apps your position in the old one will be forgotten. You'd probably need a custom-built ROM that entirely altered the way Android does memory management in order to get around this; having something auto-clear the RAM would end up killing the app you're currently using. Another alternative is creating a swap partition, though how to do so is a different question.
> 3 votes

---
Tags: 2.3-gingerbread, ram
---


# Question
Title: Open source app for remote wiping Android phone?
I recently lost my android phone, and regretted not having a remote wipe app installed. However, I do not trust 3rd party compiled apps with such power (too many weak links).

Does anyone know of an existing open source app to do a remote wipe?

# Answer
**For non-rooted phones.** Up until 2.1 it is not possible. Regular apps do not have the permission to perform full wipes or factory restores. I believe there are apps that erase your call/sms records and your contacts.
Starting with 2.2, it seems Google is granting limited root powers to apps that use Device Administration. It is supposedly a way for enterprises to policy their employee's phones, and requires an extra confirmation by the owner. But I believe it could be used by anyone writing an app. In fact, the code for wiping seems so simple that I think you could write an open-source app yourself if you have some programming background. ;-)

**For rooted phones.** There are remote wipe apps, but I don't believe any of them is open source (that I've heard of). Remote Wipe for root users is possibly the simplest one, and it's in the market, but I've never tried it myself. *This app is no longer on the market.*
> 12 votes

# Answer
One open-source remote security app is Prey, although I don't think it does remote wipe.
> 6 votes

# Answer
Without question the security best app that also does remote wiping is Cerberus. I reviewed Cerberus and a bunch of other security apps some little while ago, and haven't seen anything to change my opinion yet.

Short answer as to why Cerberus is better: it is controllable both by SMS and by a web dashboard, can be integrated into the kernel so that a reset doesn't wipe it, and has a boatload of well implemented features. Well worth the $5 it costs.

@nicolas-raoul asked me to post my thoughts about the open source app Prey, so here they are my review:

> Some redditors asked about Prey as a phone security app. I just tried it out, and it’s missing most features I would consider important. The most vital was that while you can trigger it via a text message, I didn’t see any way to trigger a “report” from the website. In fact, you have to subscribe to the Pro version at US$5.oo/month in order to be able to request the geolocation whenever you want it as opposed to whenever the Prey app runs at some unspecified interval, which pretty much kills the utility of the app as an anti-theft utility.
>
> The only features I could find were obtaining the current location (but no real time tracking, and it doesn’t specify whether it gets the info from GPS or by cell tower triangulation so it may not resolve very far), getting phone network info, triggering an audio alarm, triggering a message box alert, and locking the phone. While it’s great that it’s open source and that it supports so many mobile computing platforms and so might be good for protecting laptops or tablets, I wouldn’t recommend it as a phone anti-theft device.
> 2 votes

# Answer
If the need for an open source app is purely down to your lack of trust in opaque, pre-compiled apps, then there are remote wipe apps that you don't need to keep permanently installed on your phone, but you can just push-install from the Market when needed. This way you would only need to have the app installed on the phone for seconds before it's wiped.

Some options for that are in this previous question Is there any way to erase personal information from my phone that has already been stolen?
> 2 votes

---
Tags: applications, security, lost-phone, remote-wipe
---


# Question
Title: How do I connect my Samsung Galaxy 10.1 tab to a hard wired broadband point (no wifi available)?
I have moved into student accommodation which only has hard wired broadband. Please can anyone tell me how I can connect my Galaxy 10.1 tablet to the internet via the wall point provided?

# Answer
> 4 votes
You can't. The Tab doesn't have an ethernet jack and doesn't support it anyways.

If you don't want to get yourself a wireless router, you can set up a WiFi network through a computer with a WiFi card. There's a guide on LifeHacker on this for Windows 7. The basics:

1. Connect your PC to the wired network
2. Create an ad-hoc network on the PC (you'll want to encrypt it)
3. Enable ICS (Internet Connection Sharing)
4. Connect the Tab to the WiFi network broadcast by the PC

If you have trouble getting the PC portion to work, you should ask how to get it working on Super User since they handle PC stuff like this.

# Answer
> 1 votes
Similar to what Matthew said I'd also suggest a wifi router but use it as a repeater, any cheap wifi router will do just turn off DHCP, use as AP, change the gateway to something other than 192.168.x.x and probably check the option to use as a LAN extension.

# Answer
> 0 votes
There are some adapters that will provide yu with a USB port, where you could connect a USB-based network adapter. however, I had no chance with the one I had. I installed an access point in my wired setup, and it worked fine. Mine is a D-LINK DAP-1350.

---
Tags: samsung-galaxy-tab-10
---


title: Nexus S 'flashes' screen when locking

text:
# Question
Title: Nexus S 'flashes' screen when locking
When I lock my Nexus S, the screen flashes once:

It turns black, then the home screen appears again very shortly, then it's black again.

Do you have this aswell with a **Nexus S on ICS 4.0.3**? Is there a fix?

# Answer
It's a software issue with Ice Cream Sandwich as far as I know, so no fix. It may only be present on certain models however, I only have anecdotal evidence for this but I have the issue on my Nexus S model IML74K but know someone with a different model of Nexus S and they don't seem to have the issue...
> 1 votes

---
Tags: samsung-nexus-s, lock-screens, 4.0-ice-cream-sandwich
---


title: NFC functionality in Google Nexus S?

text:
# Question
Title: NFC functionality in Google Nexus S?
How physically close will a tag need to be for the phone to detect a NFC card? (10cm or can it greater)

Also can the phone present itself as a NFC tag to other phones? If this is possible is the range greater as the NFC transmitter is powered?

# Answer
> 5 votes
*How physically close will a tag need to be for the phone to detect a NFC card? (10cm or can it greater)*

NFC is intentionally very low ranged since it is meant to be difficult to accidentally connect to the wrong NFC readers. One of its possible applications is to aid in initiating longer-ranged connection (e.g. Bluetooth or Wifi) with zero configuration.

*Also can the phone present itself as a NFC tag to other phones? If this is possible is the range greater as the NFC transmitter is powered?*

There are plans for future Android releases to support NFC card emulation, but Nexus S won't be getting it since it lacks the necessary hardware. I can think of several ways to hack around this, with some limitations, since static NFC tag can be made as a sticker, but full NFC card emulation will not be available in Nexus S.

# Answer
> 8 votes
The specs on the NFC Controller chip in the Nexus S are the following: http://www.nxp.com/acrobat\_download2/literature/9397/75016890.pdf

To *answer* your first question, as advertised in the above PDF, the NFC Controller chip inside the Nexus S has an operating distance of about 10 centimeters. However, in practice (specific to the NFC controller in the Nexus S that is), it's limited to about 4 centimeters. You practically have to hold the card to the back of the phone in order for it to be able to read the card. 10 centimeters is massively over-exaggerated, 4 centimeters is the farthest I could go with any card. Distance is greatly dependant on the quality of the RF transmitter, and receiver on the other end, so this distance may very well increase under different conditions. If you have specialized equipment, it's possible to pick up any NFC RF communication up to a distance of about 10 meters, but don't expect NFC implementations in phones to go any farther then 10 centimeters.

For your second question. Again, as advertised in the above PDF, card emulation (the ability to present oneself as a NFC tag) is supported for the following standards: ISO 14443 –A-B-B’, MIFARE, FeliCa RF. To my knowledge, these are all the standards one should (currently) care about.

However, card emulation is **not** supported by the Android SDK, and I'm not sure whether or not it will be supported in future versions, or even if Android Devs are working on such functionality. It would, however, be the logical next step for the Android SDK to support.

# Answer
> 2 votes
I know this already has an accepted answer and is quite old but the answer is wrong.

> "How physically close will a tag need to be for the phone to detect a NFC card? (10cm or can it greater)"

The answer quotes \< 0.2m but that's from the NFC standard, the actual distance depends on the radius of the NFC chip's antennae, in the case of the Nexus S is can detect a tag from about 4cm or less, as the other non-accepted answer says.

> "Also can the phone present itself as a NFC tag to other phones? If this is possible is the range greater as the NFC transmitter is powered?"

Yes it can, kind of. It can 'push' an NDEF message containing information (plain text/URL/others) and if you put another Nexus S next to it then you can read it with NXPs NFC application, or other ones. I'm not aware of any applications currently on the market than can push an arbitrary NDEF message but if you have ICS then this has the Android 'Beam' feature which utilises NDEF messages. http://www.engadget.com/2011/12/01/android-4-0-ice-cream-sandwich-review/#beam

It can also do card emulation as is used in Google Wallet but this isn't supported in the public API. However have a look at this for a Gingerbread ROM with emulation features: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1281946

---
Tags: samsung-nexus-s, nfc
---


title: How to change my device's country?

text:
# Question
Title: How to change my device's country?
> **Possible Duplicate:**
> How can I circumvent regional restrictions in the Android Market?

Google just released Chrome for Android and I want to use it. But, for some (pretty irrational) reason, it is only available to certain countries. I therefore need to change mine. How do I do that?

Thanks

# Answer
Factory reset. However if you set up your phone to avoid roaming. Then it wouldn't matter. Had to ask this when I got my phone rushed it on the dealer and it was set on US even though I am in Canada, and I had to call customer service.
> -1 votes

# Answer
You can try this: -Use an android cook rom (Cyanogen), try Rom Manager to simplify the process.

-Use Market enabler to fake some other providers (Verizon/ AT&T etc, but change to those two makes Google Market thinks your phone is in US).

Or you can try installing the beta version of Chrome that is already leaked on xda

Remember ICS only, lower version of Android OS will lead to apk parse error.
> 0 votes

---
Tags: google-play-store, settings, languages
---


# Question
Title: Problem with unlocking the HTC Wildfire bootloader with HTC unlocker
I tried to unlock HTC bootloader by the official tool but I get to the stage when I issue the command:

```
fastboot oem get_identifier_token

```

Unfortunatly I get error

```
...
(bootloader) [ERR] Command error !!!
OKAY [  0.007s]
finished. total time: 0.007s

```

Version of firmware matches the one listed for H3G UK. The HBoot is 1.01.0002.

# Answer
> 2 votes
I think your HBoot needs to be upgraded, and it sounds like perhaps you didn't run the RUU to do so. The HTCdev site notes that phones with an asterisk (`*`) next to them in the list **must** run an RUU before unlocking because the bootloader on the device did not originally ship with unlocking capabilities. So *first* you need to make sure your firmware is up to date (which it sounds like it is), and then you *also* need to download and run the RUU:

> BEFORE beginning the Unlock Bootloader process your product requires that you update the ROM to the version listed in the table below first, then download the RUU next to it to enable the unlocking capability.

The RUU's filename itself also seems to confirm this. It is listed as `PC4910000_Buzz_Froyo_hboot_1.02.0000_R3.exe`, indicating (to me, anyway) that you need HBoot v1.02.0000 in order to perform the unlock.

---
Tags: htc-wildfire, fastboot, bootloader, bootloader-lock
---


# Question
Title: What Port Does Android Use For VPN Connections?
I'm trying to set up a VPN so that I can have a connection to my LAN from my phone (HTC Droid Incredible, Stock ROM, Not rooted) wherever I am.

AFAICT, everything is set up correctly. The Domain Name resolves correctly, I forwarded the ports required by the how-to I was following, yet I still can't connect.

I have no idea what's wrong or how to get to any debug information. The only thing I can think of that I haven't verified yet is the port, but I couldn't find a way to select one.

What Port Does Android Use For VPN Connections?

P.S. I would *really* like to do this without rooting.

# Answer
If you have access to a computer that

1. is on the same Wi-Fi network; and
2. runs Wireshark (http://www.wireshark.org/)

you can probably find out the port that way.
> 5 votes

# Answer
If you are trying to VPN from your phone to publicly accessible computer that is also part of your LAN, it really doesn't matter what port the VPN client on your phone uses.
> 3 votes

# Answer
I don't think so that you need to have to port if you are willing to use a VPN on Android. You simply need to add the server name in the settings which will be given to you by your VPN provider. However, I will advise you to configure the setting again on VPN Android. It will surely work out as one of my friends has also faced such issues while connecting to VPN but he tried the configuration steps and then able to use the VPN service on his Android phone.

Follow these simple steps.

**Add a new VPN connection:**

1. Press the Home icon, press Menu, and tap Settings
2. Tap Wireless & networks
3. Tap VPN settings
4. Tap Add VPN
5. Select the type of VPN to add (PPTP, L2TP, L2TP/IPSec PSK VPN, L2TP/IPsec CRT VPN)
6. Fill in VPN details such as VPN name, VPN server, etc (the required settings will depend on the type of VPN selected and will be provided to you by your VPN Provider or network admin)
7. Click Save or Done.

**Connecting to the VPN:**

1. Press Home icon, press Menu, and tap Settings
2. Tap Wireless & networks
3. Tap VPN settings.
4. The VPN connections you have added are now listed.
5. Tap the VPN you wish to connect to.
6. A dialog box will open asking for your credentials, enter them and touch connect
> 2 votes

# Answer
Here are the ports used by VPNs

**PPTP**

```
To allow PPTP tunnel maintenance traffic, open TCP 1723.
To allow PPTP tunneled data to pass through router, open Protocol ID 47.

```

**L2TP over IPSec**

```
To allow Internet Key Exchange (IKE), open UDP 500.
To allow IPSec Network Address Translation (NAT-T) open UDP 5500.
To allow L2TP traffic, open UDP 1701.

```
> 2 votes

---
Tags: htc-droid-incredible, vpn
---


title: OpenVPN browser tunneling

text:
# Question
Title: OpenVPN browser tunneling
I hope I do not say silly things, or discounted, but I'm a newbie, at least for vpn.

I want use my browser to connect on my corporate intranet via VPN connection, but I'm not able to do it.

Someone can help me?

Some information: I tried 2 way to confgure OpenVPN:

---

I've configured OpenVPN via openvpn-settings apps (using pre-created cert files located on /openvpn ). The .ovpn config files sound like

```
 port yyyy
dev tun
\#dev-node ovpn
proto tcp-client
remote xxx1.xxxx.it yyyy
remote xxx2.xxxx.it yyyy
remote xxx3.xxxx.it jjj
remote xxx4.xxxx.it jjj
ping 30

persist-tun persist-key

tls-client
ca xxx.ca.crt
cert xxx.aaaa.bbbb.crt
key xxx.aaaa.bbbb.key

ns-cert-type server
comp-lzo
pull
verb 5

```

I connect to VPN with no problems, and I can use for example ssh to connect on my corporate Linux server.

---

I've created a VPN from Menu-\>Settings-\> Wireless & network-\> VPN settings -\> add VPN-\> add VPN OpenVPN and set parameters according with the previous .ovpn config file I connect also to VPN with no problems, and I can use for example ssh to connect on my corporate linux server.

---

On both cases I'm not able to browse intranet. So I checked the IP address I go out with, pointing to http://m.showip.net/, and it displayed my provider IP, not the assigned VPN IP! Is it possible that VPN don't tunnel all traffic? Maybe I need to change the default gateway somehow?

My O.S. is

```
Android 2.3.7
kernel 2.6.35.14-nFinity
ROM Cyanogenmod 7.1.0.1 stable
Phone HTC Wildfire (Buzz)

```

# Answer
> 2 votes
Make sure you have this `--redirect-gateway` in your configuration file.

That option is documented on the OpenVPN man page

> ```
>  --redirect-gateway
>
> Automatically execute routing commands to cause all outgoing IP traffic to be redirected over the VPN.
>
> This option performs three steps:
>
>     Create a static route for the --remote address which forwards to the pre-existing default gateway. This is done so that (3) will not create a routing loop.
>
>     Delete the default gateway route.
>
>     Set the new default gateway to be the VPN endpoint address (derived either from --route-gateway or the second parameter to --ifconfig when --dev tun is specified).
>
> When the tunnel is torn down, all of the above steps are reversed so that the original default route is restored.
>
> ```

---
Tags: cyanogenmod, browser, openvpn
---


# Question
Title: tun.ko for Samsung Intercept/Stock Froyo
I have a Samsung Intercept, running the VM stock image of Froyo. I'm trying to get OpenVpn running on it. The phone is rooted, and I have OpenVpn and the gui from the marketplace running on it, and running openvpn from the command line shows its connecting up, authenticating, but there IS no tun.ko. The several I've found on the net that *claim* to work on an Intercept but *don't*.. When trying to insmod all of these I get an error indicating kernel module was built for an "ARMv7" vs "ARMv6".. Anyone have an tun.ko for an Intercept OR alternatively a link to a howto on building Android kernels/kernel modules on Linux? I'm quite familiar with how to do that on Linux, but clueless on doing a crossplatform build on Linux..

Thanks Dave

# Answer
> 1 votes
CyanogenMod 6 is Froyo, and ships with OpenVPN support for ARMv6 phones, such as my HTC Magic.

If nothing else you can unpack the update.zip they supply, find the tun.ko driver, and push it to your phone via adb.

# Answer
> 1 votes
You might want to take a look at this website: Tun.ko Repository

They got a long database of tun.ko for android phones. If you can see your phone model, kernel and build number on the list, Just download their app which lets you load the module from their database to your phone. After that you can then use a vpn for your android.

---
Tags: 2.2-froyo, samsung-intercept, openvpn
---


# Question
Title: On Android can I write scripts (similar to Win .bat files) to combine several command line commands?
On Windows, I can run two commands using a .bat file. How can I achieve the same thing on Android

For example:

1. update my podcasts by calling pcastclient /updateALL
2. force sync of my pictures sugarsync /forceupdate

# Answer
Android's shell will support a limited amount of Unix-style shell scripting. It specifically should have a shell at `/system/bin/sh` that you can use, however:

1. The shell provided with Android has a severely restricted set of commands available to it. If you want to do anything even remotely complex you'll need a busybox install (or another shell).
2. It's generally pretty rare for Android apps to provide any kind of command line interface or binaries. I very much doubt that Sugarsync, for example, allows you to perform a sync from the command line.

If you want a bit of a GUI you may want to look at something like GScript.
> 11 votes

# Answer
There are a few Android apps that are able to control other Android apps, and can chain several commands together using their GUI in a similar way to a script, they both have plugins to extend their support to many popular Android apps and functions.

Tasker and Locale are probably the most famous of these (see here for some comparison) but there are also other similar (free) apps that you could look at.
> 6 votes

---
Tags: automation, command-line, scripts
---


# Question
Title: ABNT2 keyboard for Android x86 2.2 r2 sparta "distro"
I'm using Oracle Virtual Box to emulate an Android-x86 device. I installed android-x86-2.2-r2-sparta.iso to a virtual HD. Then I changed config to put it in Portuguese (Brazil) language. It is ok until that point.

But in keyboard options there isn't ABNT2 keyboard layout, so some keys are missmatch the machine keyboard (e.g. "ç", "{", "}"...).

How can I solve that?

# Answer
> 1 votes
I would suggest looking at alternative input methods (keyboard apps) that specifically support Portuguese language.

I personally used AnySoftKeyboard, which does have a Portuguese language pack. There are many other similar keyboard apps on the Market as well. You might need to get them elsewhere though, since your build most likely doesn't have the Android Market access.

---
Tags: keyboard
---


title: Arabic text is detached

text:
# Question
Title: Arabic text is detached
I have these two issues. The text is detached in tweetcaster. Along with being detached, in the browser, the reading order is wrong.

I hope upgrading the current pre installed browser or installing a separate one would solve browser trouble. But how about tweetcaster? What is the fix for that? If there is no fix except wait for upgrade, could you please suggest a Twitter client that displays Arabic text properly?

I have HTC desire running android 2.1.

# Answer
> 3 votes
You can try the browsers that don't use the internal WebKit rendering engine, i.e. Opera Mobile, Firefox, Opera Mini or SkyFire. For Android 2.2 there's also Persian Browser which uses WebKit and connects the letters after loading the page.

# Answer
> 1 votes
Android doesn't have great Arabic support, although this has supposedly been improved in the latest version of Android. This is currently the number one most-requested Android issue.

An upgrade to Android 2.3 probably wouldn't make a difference, but as Power-Inside mentioned, Cyanogenmod does have improved Arabic support.

Because the support isn't built into Android, improved Arabic support must be built into the apps using libraries such as the Better Arabic Reshaper.

Arabic Text Reader is an app that claims to support twitter in Arabic. You could also contact the developer of tweetcaster and ask them about improving their Arabic support.

Here's an overview of Arabic support in Android by version:

the evolution of android arabic support

---
Tags: languages, localization, fonts, tweetcaster
---


# Question
Title: Upgrading my phone - what happens to the apps?
I've got an HTC Incredible 1, going to be upgrading to a Rezound. How do I get the apps (both free & purchased, some on the SD some on the phone) from my Incredible to the Rezound? Free isn't that big a deal, I can re-download them, but I don't want to re-purchase anything.

Thanks!

# Answer
As long as you log in to the new device with the same google account that you use on the Incredible you will have access to all the apps that you purchased / downloaded. You will not have to purchase them again. The android market is tied to your google account, not the device.
> 2 votes

---
Tags: applications, updates
---


# Question
Title: How to Disable File Verification while installing Cyanogen in Nexus One
When I try to install CyanogenMod through ClockworkMod Recovery process I get the following error, ‘failed to verify whole-file signature’.

I followed WikiLink for Cyanogen for carrying out the installation.

Is there any way to disable file verification or any other way through which I can overcome this error.

I am using Nexus One phone with,

```
Kernel Version   - 2.6.35.7.
Build number     - GRK39F.
Android version - 2.3.6

```

# Answer
In current versions of Clockworkmod Recovery, go into the "Install zip from sdcard" menu and chose "toggle signature verification".

---

Previous answer:

You're in stock recovery, not CWM recovery. CWM recovery doesn't verify signatures. You either failed to install the recovery properly, or you need to hit "install packages" or similar from the stock recovery in order to get into CWM.
> 5 votes

---
Tags: cyanogenmod, nexus-one, recovery-mode
---


# Question
Title:  LG Optimus P690 - how to launch silently
Is there a way (*without* rooting) to skip the startup sound on LG Optimus P690 if sound was not disabled before turning the phone off?

# Answer
> 2 votes
Lars Aronsson over at Androinica seems to think you can using an app called Silent Boot (though others disagree). Also suggested is Android Assistant which is supposed to automatically turning down the system volume before the phone power cycles. I haven't tried any of them personally - give 'em a try, YMMV.

---
Tags: audio, boot
---


# Question
Title: Restrictions of a Kindle Fire in Canada?
I wanted to order a Kindle Fire in Canada but I saw that it wasn't available. Now I really wanted one and I could always just cross the border and get one. What I want to know is how restricted will it be in Canada. I hear it's probably only the Amazon content distribution system that won't work, meaning I still get a full-featured Android tablet with the Android market. I should be able to get any apps and any books from the Android market that I can normally with my phone in Canada.

Is that how it's looking?

# Answer
> 4 votes
Just got a Kindle Fire as a gift.

So far I've been more than disappointed.

* No apps
* No Amazon Prime membership.
* No Cloud.
* No MP3's
* No storage.

Yes Facebook works. Yes I can check my email. Yes I can browse the web.

Bottom line is, if you're in Canada, spend a few more bucks and get a tablet that you CAN use...

# Answer
> 5 votes
I have a kindle Fire I received as a gift and live in Canada. The Amazon App Store is visible but you cannot download anything. It says "this service is unavailable in your region" The web browser works fine, as does downloading books from Amazon .ca You can see the content for sale or borrowing in Amazon Prime, but get the same message.

---
Tags: localization, amazon-kindle-fire
---


# Question
Title: Watching Android Tablet app on connected TV
I was looking into whether a vanilla Android app running on a tablet can have the tablet screen output to TV via an AVI or HDMI output jack? The intent is NOT to view video content but just the app screen on a large TV. An example of how this would be useful would be a 'low-tech' training session for a bunch of people on how to use the app.

# Answer
> 5 votes
This may depend on the tablet, but as far as I know anything with Honeycomb and an HDMI output will simply mirror the screen when plugged in. My Motorola Xoom, for example, will mirror everything on the screen to a TV when my HDMI cable is plugged in. I can use it for app demos and the like at work just fine, so what you're looking for is (from a purely *technical* standpoint) possible.

Saying that it will work on every device would a very broad and presumably incorrect generalization on my part, though, so I would assume that I cannot accurately apply this rule to every device out there. You'll probably want to look at the specs for specific devices before you purchase one, and ask a retailer (or a manufacturer, if necessary) about it's video output capabilities.

On top of that, there are also some devices like the Galaxy Tab 7 which support composite output via a special connector cable. This also mirrors the screen, as I recall, but I don't know of any other devices that support composite hookups offhand.

---
Tags: hdmi, screen-sharing, video-out
---


# Question
Title: Permission denied when I run insmod in terminal emulator
I want to install a module (bcm4329.ko) in my nexus one phone. I have rooted the phone and installed Cyanogenmod too.

In Terminal emulator, I tried various commands but everything resulted in failure

```
$ insmod /system/lib/modules/bcm4329.ko //[Operation Not Permitted]
$ su insmod /system/lib/modules/bcm4329.ko //[throw the syntax/man page of su]
$ cd /system/lib/modules
$ chmod 777 bcm4329.ko //[Read only file system]

```

The error messages I received are enclosed within '\[ \]' after every command. How can I install this module in my android phone. Any help please.

# Answer
You need to remount the system partition as read-write, it's read-only by default.

```
mount -o remount,rw /dev/block/mtdblock3 /system

```
> 3 votes

---
Tags: nexus-one, root-access, terminal, file-permissions
---


# Question
Title: Cannot connect Samsung Galaxy S2 to computer in storage mode via USB
I am trying to install an application (developed using Eclipse) onto the computer (I am using Windows XP). When I try to connect the USB cable with the phone, it starts to charge or starts the MTP application, but it does not go into mass storage mode. Here is what I have tried so far:

1. Turned on `USB Debugging` and then plugged in the USB cable. Result: Phone goes into charging mode.
2. With `USB Debugging` switched off, `USB Utilities -> Connect to Mass Storage` button pressed and the USB cable plugged in. Result: Plugging in the USB cable results in MTP application starting. Switching that off by pressing the home key and then pressing that `Connect to Mass Storage` button again results in the message: `USB is connected. Remove the cable`
3. Tried the `*#7284` routine described in thread on this forum. That did not work either. My default settings were `USB -> PDA` (just the way that thread said it should be).
4. Checked if the Google USB drivers are all installed. Yes, they are. Other drives also mount from the same USB slot without any problems.
5. Switched off and then back on the phone.
6. Used different cables (one from Samsung and the other from Nokia) to see if there could be anything wrong with the cable. The same situation as above. And the Nokia cable is brand new.

After having done all of this and spent a grand total of five hours, I am at my wits' end trying to figure out how I can get the phone to mount as a USB storage device. I have mounted it successfully before.

**UPDATE:** I plugged my phone in to a Linux machine and a Windows machine using both cables today. It worked for the both of them!!! So now I know that USB storage mode on my phone works. The problem has to be with my laptop, or to be more specific, with the USB drive on my laptop. My questions now are:

1. How do I know what USB drive make is present on my computer. I would like to re-install the USB drivers on my laptop, all the while hoping that it does not screw up my machine.

# Answer
I highly recommend checking out QTadb. It is a very useful program with a file manager; you can just drag and drop across. If you have an APK on your local machine, you can install it right in the file manager. Plus there is an ADB shell built in, an app list with back up options, and a ton of other stuff.

I would say this is a must-have for an Android developer. It's just extremely useful.

I hope that helps you out.
> -3 votes

---
Tags: samsung-galaxy-s-2, usb-connection-mode, usb-mass-storage
---


# Question
Title: How can I arrange the applications on each page of my app drawer?
I have recently bought a Samsung ACE S5830 smartphone and downloaded several applications like astrology, live wallpapers, games, and some daily usage applications.

When I open my application drawer, I see all these applications mixed up and are spread across 5 pages. This is very confusing and makes it cumbersome to find an application I want to use.

How can I arrange the applications on each page? For example, I want astrology related applications on page 1 of the applications page, games on page 2 and the default applications (like Internet, calculator, clock, etc) on page 3.

Is this possible? I have tried folder organizers and app organizers from the Android market but none of them meets my requirement.

# Answer
You can press the Menu button while in the app drawer and change the view type the "Customizable grid". Then hit Menu again and "Edit" to rearrange the icons. It won't let you leave empty spots on a page, though.

Probably the best way to do this is simply to drag the icons onto your home screens, and then you can have a home screen for each type of app. If you don't have enough home screens then there are probably custom launchers where you can set the number of screens. Another alternative is folders, as you mentioned; I don't see why they wouldn't work.
> 3 votes

---
Tags: applications, launcher, app-drawer
---


# Question
Title: Is Google Chrome for Android Beta compatible with the 4.0.3 emulator in the Android SDK?
Is Google Chrome for Android Beta compatible with the Android SDK (Android 4.0.3 system image)?

I tried installing the Chrome .apk file and it installed fine. When running the application I can see the introductory screens, but when I try to navigate to a webpage, all I see is a blank screen. The page appears to be loading indefinitely.

I also tried the stock Android browser and it works fine, so that rules out a network connectivity issue.

The image appears to be stripped of a bunch of packages - Google Login Service/Market, etc. Could that be the cause of Chrome for Android not working correctly or am I not doing something the right way?

# Answer
> 1 votes
No im sorry, but Chrome for Android needs hardware acceleration, so until Google change that (i dont think thats gonna happen sorry) you can't do that. But maybe in the future.

Sorry, i know it wasn't the answer you really wants to hear...

---
Tags: chrome-for-android, android-emulator
---


# Question
Title: Call settings missing in settings after updating to Ice Cream Sandwich
I updated my Google Nexus S to Android 4.0.3. Now the call settings seems to be missing and video calling is not working. When I hard boot the device it shows "LOCK STATE -LOCKED".

# Answer
> 2 votes
Though I'm responding late, I too faced this problem today and could figure the call setting by following procedure below:

---

1. Press the Phone symbol from the Home screen
2. Settings button & select 'Settings'.
3. Under Other Call Settings select 'Additional Settings'
4. Caller ID

Is that what you're looking for? HTH

---
Tags: samsung-nexus-s, settings, 4.0-ice-cream-sandwich
---


# Question
Title: Stolen phone: is changing your GMail password enough?
My Galaxy phone got stolen today. Of course I blocked my SIM card and changed my password for GMail (and went to the police) but is this enough? Could the person that stole my phone still log in to my market and download stuff? Not sure what the deal is for that and I'm really freaking out about how much this person could possibly do with my phone.

Also about the payment: I never bought any apps (I only downloaded free ones). How does this payment work? Is that also blocked if your SIM card is blocked?

And is there a way to delete "My Market" account?

# Answer
You should check out Lookout's Plan B app. It lets you find your phone after it is lost.

I would recommend using Seekdroid or Where's my Droid in the future.
> 4 votes

# Answer
In addition to changing the password, you should go to the market on the web and "deactivate the device."
> 0 votes

---
Tags: google-play-store, samsung-galaxy-s, security, lost-phone, google-account
---


title: Difference in GPS hardware

text:
# Question
Title: Difference in GPS hardware
I'm currently coding a gps location application, and I have found out, that there is huge difference between hardware and units.

Having tried on the Wildfire S, Galaxy S2, GalaxyTab 10,1, and others, I find that the GPS position update frequency seems to vary from about half a second to half a minute (after getting the initial fix, and having free sight up). The Wildfire S performing worst, and the tablet performing best.

Does there exist a table somewhere that compares the GPS hardware/chipset and CPU, with possible times?

I would be grateful to hear about your experiences.

# Answer
> 5 votes
It is actually not the hardware at all.

There is a special file in the android system called gps.conf. This file specifies the GPS servers that the device will use. Each manufacturer wants to use their own special GPS servers instead of the main ones from Google (some have different values for different devices). This means that different devices connect to different servers for the same goal: GPS tracking.

This means 2 things for lockon time:

1. The speed and hardware of the GPS servers the manufacturer has specified will determine the lockon time.
2. The amount of traffic going to those servers will also significantly affect lockon time.

This is why many Samsung phones have notoriously slow GPS lockon times. Additionally, some manufacturers specify gps servers that arent even on the same continent (they specify one set of general servers for everybody). This means that if the servers are in europe, the lockon times will be better for people in europe due to low latency and the people in the US wont be so lucky.

The fix for this is simple (editing the file and replacing them with more region specific gps servers) but this requires root access.

---
Tags: gps, hardware, gps-tracking
---


# Question
Title: Galaxy SII not reporting Signal Strength
I recently bought a Samsung Galaxy SII which in general has worked perfectly for me. My only issue is that the phone won't report the signal strength. If I get to the phone information (using the * # * # 4636 # * # code) the system reports the signal strength as zero which is impossible (since I have loads of reception issues in my home). My guess is that the information is being blocked, but I don't know why or how to unblock it.

The phone is running in GSM/WCDMA (Auto Mode) with the stock ROM

# Answer
> 2 votes
I believe it is related to this issue: onSignalStrengthsChanged returns unknown signal strength where android return wrong strength on Galaxy S2.

---
Tags: samsung-galaxy-s-2, network-signal
---


# Question
Title: How to rate an app in Android Market on a tablet?
I know this question sounds dead stupid but I can't figure out how to rate an app in Android Market on my Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. Honestly I've looked everywhere. Am I blind or what?

Thanks in advance...

# Answer
> 6 votes
The first versions of the Android Market on Tablets didn't have an option to rate an App. Rumors are that Google wanted to prevent bad ratings on Apps, because they weren't optimized for tables (yet).

Some say that they received an Market Update that enabled the rate function. My Lenovo Thinkpad Market hasn't got it yet. But it seems just a matter of time.

Until then, you can rate Apps on the web version of the Market.

# Answer
> 1 votes
There are an update on the way from google which gives you the option, many have received it already, so just be use the web version of android market until then :)

---
Tags: google-play-store, tablet
---


# Question
Title: Is it possible to reorganize the SD card? Because it is a mess in there
One of the things I hate about Android is the folder organization. Each app creates its own folder, usually in the root of the SD card. When I'm trying to find something, I have to search it through long lists of app-specific folders.

Is it possible to reorganize these? For example, this is how I would like my SD card to look like:

* Android: OS specific data
* AppData: Application specific data. This is where every app puts its settings and data, not where they want
* Documents
* Downloads
* Pictures
* Music
* Video etc.

So in other words, can I restrict where apps put their data?

# Answer
> 4 votes
You cannot restrict where the applications write the data on the sdcard. You can go and delete what ever you want on the sdcard, but it may be data for an application. If you move it, the application will think it has been deleted or doesn't exist, and it will just create the data in the same place again.

Google recommends applications use the /sdcard/Android/data/ folder, but if the application has permissions to write to the sdcard, they can write where ever they want on it. Some applications were created before the recommendations, others may not know the recommendation, and others may not care for what ever reason.

The "standard" is the following for non-application specific data:

Music/
Podcasts/
Ringtones/
Alarms/
Notifications/
Pictures/
Movies/
Download/

and then application specific is:
`Android/data/<application>`

# Answer
> 0 votes
The fact is that Android is open enough for every dev to do whatever they want. There are some specific places certain stuff goes like the media folder and the .android\_secure folder, as an example. The good news is that you can do a lot of cleaning up yourself by just browsing in there but be careful you don't delete data files and db's for apps still installed.

hth

---
Tags: sd-card, file-system, file-management
---


# Question
Title: How to revert back to stock rom for Galaxy S 2?
> **Possible Duplicate:**
> Where can I find stock or custom ROMs for my Android device?

I did the whole exercise and rooted my Swiss Sunrise 2.3.4 Galaxy S II ending up installing CM9 and the ICS 4.0.3 preview without TouchWiz shown and described here:

http://devsrom4android.blogspot.com/2012/02/samsung-galaxy-s-ii-android-ice-cream.html

I do not have a backup of the original stock rom from Sunrise for Switzerland and with this new version I cannot install home banking application (it's restricted for swiss devices and for OS version) neither can I install the new Chrome Beta for ICS because it tells me country is wrong.

where can I find a step-by-step guide on where/how to find the original rom and put it back possibly also unrooting so to bring the phone to its original state/configuration? Thanks!!

# Answer
You can find the stock ROM for the SGS2 on XDA here, and there is also a list of branded carrier ROMs here.

You will then need to use a tool like ODIN (maybe even Kies) to flash the ROM to the device. The first link also is a good tutorial on how to flash via ODIN.

I recommend you read everything before you attempt to restore, then when you understand it all, read it again. If there is any reference to specific versions of things, or radios versions or anything like that, make sure you do the research and look in to that stuff and make sure everything is "correct" before you continue. Then follow it step-by-step when you are ready to restore.
> 1 votes

---
Tags: samsung-galaxy-s-2, stock-android, unrooting
---


title: Minicom app for Android?

text:
# Question
Title: Minicom app for Android?
Is there a comm app similar to minicom, hyperterminal or zterm for Android? I would prefer a port of minicom, if it exits. BTW, I'm running Android ICS on a Galaxy Nexus.

# Answer
I found one. There is an app called microcom that is part of some newer busybox packages. I used the latest busybox (1.9.3) that could be installed by BusyBox Pro (Steven Stericson) from the Android Market. I replaced busybox 1.9.3CM that came with my ROM and which did not have microcom.

With that busybox you just have to open a terminal (I used BTEP) and type microcom. The short help file will be displayed. Using it can be as simple as:

```
microcom -s 115200 /dev/ttyUSB0

```

I am still interested in a more full-featured version -- something more like minicom. But at least microcom gets the minimal job done for now.

If no one offers a more full featured app than microcom, I'll accept my answer in a few days.
> 5 votes

---
Tags: applications, 4.0-ice-cream-sandwich, command-line
---


# Question
Title: is Android single task or multitasking and multithreading?
I am trying to understand why I cannot keep listening the audio of a YouTube video on my Galaxy S 2 while moving to another application for example reading a wikipedia article on the browser.

is there any architectural limitation which prevents this in Gingerbread (hopefully will be removed in ICS) or is only the way Google made the YouTube application?

**Edit**: tried out YouTube application in ICS 4.0.3 today and behaves the same as in Gingerbread :(((

# Answer
> 17 votes
Video rendering, which would have to happen even if the application is not "active" but still playing, is going to use a lot more battery then "normal usage". So if you are not "watching" the video, it stops in order to not waste precious battery power.

# Answer
> 19 votes
It's not a limitation of Android, but a "feature" of the Youtube app to conserver resources.

If you want to use Youtube as a music player, I think you should be able to find an application that allows you to do exactly that in the market.

TubeMate lets you listen to only the audio of a Youtube file (you have to download it in advance, though), and that should work in the background.

# Answer
> 3 votes
If you want an android app that would allow flexible management of the Youtube streaming protocols in a way that would support selection of just the audio portion of the media stream while discarding the video track, keep an eye on VLC for android. It is still 'under developement' but would probably address the 'audio only' feature.

From a more technical perspective, it helps to break the issue down into available Youtube network protocols for media streaming RTSP. RTSP specs allow a client to make a request using the DESCRIBE command to which the server responds with an SDP data segment (see details below). Youtube servers can respond in a variety of protocols , sending underlying streams that in turn use a variety of encodings -one for audio, one for video- to transfer the media bits across the network to the client. Over the mobile networks, a feature that goes to youtube in order to receive both audio and video tracks before discarding video while playing only audio is not a good practice because of the heavy network requirement for the unused video stream. You can get around the network inefficiency with some further technical drill-down.

RTSP and SDP standards observed by Youtube would allow a streaming client (android device) to request ONLY the Audio during the Client/Server handshake steps and negotiation steps around the network connection setup that will do the media streaming. In this case, no video would be sent and the android player would be configured on an audio only stream. Some CLI command details and some protocol details on this ‘youtube audio only’ scenario follow.

A youtube, format 1 audio only track for a particular video is available at the following RTSP URI:

```
rtsp://v8.cache8.c.youtube.com/CigLENy73wIaHwlcw_gs85OUchMYDSANFEgGUgx1c2VyX3VwbG9hZHMM/0/0/0/video.3gp

```

From the RTSP URI for the entire video (audio track plus video track) , the following CLI expression makes use of 2 media clients openRTSP and mPlayer going to Youtube where it then GETS/PLAYS just the Youtube audio track by requesting only **channel=1**.

```
./openRTSP -a rtsp://v8.cache8.c.youtube.com/CigLENy73wIaHwlcw_gs85OUchMYDSANFEgGUgx1c2VyX3VwbG9hZHMM/0/0/0/video.3gp | ./mplayer -cache 8092 - -rawaudio channels=1:rate=8000:samplesize=2:format=0x73616D72

```

This CLI expression is further described in a link at the bottom.

Youtube ‘feeds’ describe the available stream formats for any Youtube video, including the RTSP URI’s mentioned above. For a Tech explanation of Youtube streaming formats see the entry for **‘format’** 1,5,6 in the long table.

The following request gets a feed from Youtube that includes the variously formatted RTSP URI’s that are available for that particular video:

```
http://gdata.youtube.com/feeds/api/users/rowntreerob/uploads?vq=cpST8yz4w1w&prettyprint='true'

```

The gory details of a connnected RTSP SESSION in which the full SDP description is requested for a particular youtube video so that just the audio track could be streamed/played are here.

Key to numbered lines in above link:

```
82 – the RTSP DESCRIBE request
101 – the SDP response
103 – video track’s format
116 – the attributes describing the audio track
line 165 – the audio track setup by the player
184 – the audio-only playback
201 – using a separate CLI expression this is playback of a previous download on just the audio track

```

---
Tags: 4.0-ice-cream-sandwich, youtube, multitasking
---


title: OneNote Options

text:
# Question
Title: OneNote Options
So I have these OneNote notebooks up on office.live.com. From there I sync a few laptops and, when on a PC without OneNote installed, I can work directly with my notebooks in a browser.

I'd LOVE to be able to work with my notebooks from my Android browser or in some other fashion.

I'm aware of MobilNoter. As near as I can tell, it doesn't leverage the live.com storage that I'm already syncing to. If that's true then it isn't the answer I'm after.

Anyone else using OneNote with or on Android? If so, how?

*(Please don't suggest I switch to Evernote. It is nice, but it ain't OneNote!)*

# Answer
> 6 votes
Microsoft OneNote now has an official app for Android. You can edit and sync up to 500 notes.

# Answer
> 2 votes
Mobilenoter SE will sync with Skydrive (office.live.com) but is currently read only. For a couple of weeks in early April, Firefox on Android worked on Office.live.com directly, but M$ changed something and now you can not edit your OneNote files online in any Android browser I have tried (and I have tried almost all of them).

Very frustrating.

Alan

# Answer
> 1 votes
I've followed this issue, and I'm quite sure Mobilnoter is the best that can be done until MS comes out with an Android version of OneNote. Unlike a Mac version, that move seems inevitable, since many Windows users are on Android.

---
Tags: microsoft-onenote
---


# Question
Title: How can I use an app purchased from the Market on a Kindle Fire?
I bought "Cut the Rope" on my Nexus One cellphone from the Android Market. When I open this game on my Kindle Fire it asks me to buy it but I expected it to be "Purchased".

How can I add my Google account to Kindle Fire's Amazon appstore account list?

# Answer
The Amazon Kindle Store and the Google Android Market are different stores. Apps you buy in one store are not honored in the other store.

You can install the Amazon Store on your Nexus One pretty easily, so you'll be able to use Apps you buy on your Fire on your Nexus One. But going the other way is more trouble (it currently requires you've rooted your Kindle Fire). See How can I get the Android Market installed on my Kindle Fire?
> 10 votes

---
Tags: google-play-store, amazon-kindle-fire, accounts
---


# Question
Title: How to change google account without wiping?
> **Possible Duplicate:**
> How-to unlink the main Google account from android device without a factory reset

I'd like to change the google account an unrooted Nexus One is linked to without wiping. If I try to remove the current account it says it can't do it without a factory reset...

# Answer
That is correct, you can't change the primary account without a wipe.

However, you can use Titanium Backup to back up your apps and settings so that putting your phone's environment back together after is a snap.
> 1 votes

---
Tags: nexus-one, google-account, factory-reset
---


# Question
Title: Accessing Calculation History on HTC Calculator App
On my HTC Thunderbolt, it comes with a Calculator app. If you hold down the `Clear` button, you get toast that says:

> Calculation history cleared

I was wondering how to view the calculation history. I know you can clear it, I just don't have a clue how to get to it. `menu` button does nothing.

# Answer
> 1 votes
Definitely, the most unusual timing to anwser my own question!

When I picked up the phone. I accidentally held down the `menu` button and the on screen keyboard came up.

The up and down buttons there will do the trick!

---
Tags: htc-thunderbolt, calculator
---


# Question
Title: Samsung Galaxy S2 Problems - Possibly Hardware Related?
I've had my Galaxy S2 SGH-I777 (AT&T) for about 2 months now and everything has been great up until yesterday. I started experiencing some freezing and strange behavior. The phone is unrooted and using the stock ROM.

The problems include but are not limited to:

* Random freezing when the phone is locked (by pressing the power button). Always have to do a hard reset.
* Random notifications about MTP initialization when no USB cable has been plugged into the phone.
* Vlingo Voice command (come preloaded on the phone) randomly popping up/starting without anything being pressed.
* Sometimes when I power off the phone it doesn't actually turn off completely but just restarts.
* Plugging in the USB cable while the phone is off turns it on (I don't think this is default behavior).
* And just recently I've had some strange touchscreen issues. Random letters being typed that I haven't touched etc.

These issues are not constant but occur intermittently. I've already performed a factory reset, but the problems persist. Since I have yet to read about anyone else having similar problems with their phones, this leads me to believe that it's not actually an issue with the stock ROM but an issue with the phone itself and the hardware. But before I take it back to AT&T I wanted to get some input from you guys. Any ideas on what could be causing this?

Thanks in advance.

# Answer
I am also a user of Samsung Galaxy S2. Mine is rooted but all the indicators of your phone are pointing to a hardware problem. There is most probably a short-circuit like instantaneous electric jumps inside the motherboard. Most of your problems can be answered rationally by uncontrolled electric jumps.

For instance plugging the USB cable (namely a power source) directly starts the phone, indicating that there is a short circuit which transfers the USB power to the power button of the phone whereas they should be insulated.

When you power-off the phone, it restarts. This may be explained with a short-circuit of the phone's battery with the power button.

So on and so forth...
> 3 votes

# Answer
I am experiencing the same exact issues here with an AT&T Galaxy S2 bought Oct 26 at Best Buy. I did root and have tried various ROMs along with returning to bone stock with no help. I have called AT&T for replacement but I have found 2 possible solutions in my research on the internet:

1. I saw a random post somewhere about a user who tried CM7 (Cyanogen Mod 7) ROM and for whatever reason. It has rendered my phone very usable with none of the above issues for a few days now. For curiosity, I switched back to another ROM I had used before, and the problems came back immediately. Needless to say, I'm not sure why CM7 did any good.
2. I also came across a post suggesting to use a small paintbrush and rubbing alcohol to swab out the USB port area. Several users reported success from this. I have not tried this yet but plan to.
> 1 votes

# Answer
I have had this issue for a couple of months now with the whole MTP connection when I have not plugged it in. Turns out I just needed to clean the USB port on my S2. It had its little fit of unplugged/plugged in while I was cleaning and stopped once cleaned.
> 1 votes

# Answer
I had this problem recently and found out that I just have to clean my USB port.
> 1 votes

---
Tags: samsung-galaxy-s-2, hardware, system-freeze
---


# Question
Title: How to merge multiple contacts of same person?
An Android newbie here --- I've recently got my first Android phone (HTC Desire S) and I'm trying to clean up a mess of my contacts from a SIM card (three of them, in fact). For example, a certain Edward Bloggs might have several entries:

* Edward Bloggs @london, mob
* Eddie B @london, home \[it's his nickname, we all call him Eddie B\]
* Eddie @hawaii \[he's got a vacation home in there, and... er... who likes paying roaming charges anyway\]

All these are in the 'first name' field or split randomly by the phone into the first, middle, and last names.

* There are, of course, Google entries from me sending emails to both his work and personal emails.

Now, the question is --- is there a way to merge these contacts? Preferably something where one could select which ones to merge. Anything short of exporting all contacts onto a PC and manually editing the VCF files would be great.

# Answer
> 4 votes
One thing you can do is open the Contacts application, press the menu button, and go to "Import/Export". From there, you import from your SIM card and import them to your Google account. Once you have imported all the contacts, open the Google Contacts manager and click on "More", then select "Find & Merge Duplicates".

You may have to go through and edit some manually if they have really different names. But then you can merge again if needed.

---
Tags: contacts
---


# Question
Title: Asus Transformer - Show Virtual Keyboard When Docked
Asus Transformer tablet provides a dock with a hardware keyboard. I can not find information on showing the virtual (on-screen) keyboard while being docked. Is it possible? It is Android 3.2.1.

# Answer
> 6 votes
It's simple: when the hardware keyboard is attached, the tray (lower right of screen) has a keyboard icon. Click it and the top option is use hardware keyboard on/off.

---
Tags: keyboard, asus-eee-pad-transformer, docking-station
---


# Question
Title: "sendmsg: Connection refused" trying to root a Nexus One
Following the link taken from this question, I got the following error.

```
$ ./freenexus
[*] Android local root exploid (C) The Android Exploid Crew
[*] Modified by ak for HTC Nexus One
[+] Using basedir=/data/local/tmp, path=/data/local/tmp/freenexus
[+] opening NETLINK_KOBJECT_UEVENT socket
[+] sending add message ...
[-] sendmsg: Connection refused

```

Does this mean that method is now outdated?

# Answer
As far as I know, a fully updated N1 won't have any exploitable vulnerabilities to allow you to root the device. Most of the older "one click" and similar methods used things like Gingerbreak, which were holes in Android that eventually got patched. I have not seen a root exploit on vanilla Android since Gingerbreak.

XDA's wiki has a couple of different options regarding the N1 which work but require unlocking the bootloader, and unlocking will perform a factory reset automatically. They can be found here and basically amount to:

1. Unlock the bootloader from fastboot mode with `fastboot oem unlock`
2. Flash a custom recovery (usually ClockworkMod)
3. Flash a zip file from recovery that will install `su` and Superuser for you
4. Reboot
> 1 votes

---
Tags: rooting, nexus-one
---


# Question
Title: How to and from where install ClockworkMod Recovery (CWM) on GT-P1000?
Currently I am trying to upgrade my Android OS from 2.3.3 to Cyanogenmod 9 not with "Odin" but via the bootloader and SD-card. Now I had a problem with "Signature verification failed" described here which is highly likely due to the fact that I failed to install a custom bootloader. Now as it is mentioned everywhere **as a pre-requisite**, I want to install "ClockworkMod Recovery", but I cannot find it anywhere! More so in articles around the www from bloggers and journalists (who actually never tried what they wrote about) it is assumed that you already have installed CWM. It seems to be needed also for other ROM's for the **EU Samsung Galaxy Tab 7"inch (GT-P1000)**, not only the one that I want to install.

The actual problem is:

When I try to install CWM **with ROM Manager** (5.0.0.6) **it *only* shows** the **two** models "Samsung Epic4G" and "Samsung GalaxyS i9000" in the list and not my model (Galaxy Tab EU) or any other model.

When I researched I only found **outdated** YouTube videos and XDA-developer threads that don't provide a link to a newer / the most current solution. Most of all, **I had a hard time coming up with *any* Google search results that provide a *current* solution** for my issue.

I am willing to try anything to get CWM up and running, as long as the process is outlined somewhere more or less understandable.

Finally: I am aware that I void the warranty I never had. I did win my Galaxy Tab, thus never paid for it and never got a receipt and now live in another country anyways.

# Answer
You cannot install CWM recovery onto the Samsung Galaxy Tab P1000 via ROM Manager app. You will need to flash it via Odin or Heimdal utilities.

XDA-Developers forums are a good start. I suggest reading up on the Galaxy Tab Android Development section. This thread seems to have good instructions for flashing ClockWorkMod v3 along with a Euro-specific kernel. This should be a good start that will allow you to format the Tab to Ext4 file system, and allow for flashing other ROMs such as CM9 alpha/beta.

> What's in the package:
>
> * Galaxy TAB (euro) kernel
> * 1.4Ghz clockspeed (stock voltage)
> * Voodoo Sound patch V6 (search the market for the Voodoo Control App)
> * 100 % MCR EXT4 compatible & separate Overcome version
> * UV control by sysfs or app (thanks to xan)
> * Camera/key-backlight working
> * UV LCD (3.3v to 2.6v) thanks to koxudaxi
> * UV RAM(1.8v to 1.6v) thanks to koxudaxi
> * LED Flash for flash light apps thanks to koxudaxi
> * Filesystem support - EXT2/EXT3/EXT4
> * frequencies 100/200/400/800/1000/1200/1400
> * rooted adb shell
> * ClockworkMod 3 (thanks to Paul Obrien)
>
> Always BACKUP your stuff before flashing anything.
>
> Extract the zip and use Heimdall to flash the zImage (kernel directory). Heimdall must be version 1.1.0 or greater. You MUST have the libusb drivers WORKING in download mode before you can flash using Heimdall.
>
> Use the command line:
> `heimdall flash --kernel zImage`
> where zImage is the name of the kernel, full path names are allowed.
>
> Downloadlink:
>
> Galaxy Tab 1.4Ghz V16 - MCR version
>
> If you have a problem with the sensors just push this file to /system/lib/hw: http://xda.richardtrip.org/tab/sensors.default.so
> 2 votes

---
Tags: cyanogenmod, samsung-galaxy-tab, clockworkmod-recovery, bootloader, rom-manager
---


# Question
Title: How to uninstall preinstalled apps on Gingerbread?
> **Possible Duplicate:**
> How can I uninstall applications that are locked by phone vendor?

I have Samsung Galaxy Note running Android Gingerbread. I have several apps like Crayon Physics that don't show up in the list of installed apps in the market.

How to get rid of them?

# Answer
If Crayon Physics was a pre-installed bloatware application then you must root to delete it. Ice Cream Sandwich lets you "freeze" the app though that may not be what you are looking for.

If you side-loaded the application then I have seen times when an application won't show under the Market application because it doesn't have a signature the Market recognizes; that is, you didn't get it from the Market.

If you installed the application go to Settings-\>Applications-\>Manage Applications. Under the 'Downloaded' tab you should be able to find it. Again, if it was pre-installed then you didn't 'download' it so it won't show up here but you should see it here even if you side-loaded it.

Good luck (:
> 4 votes

---
Tags: applications, uninstallation
---


# Question
Title: Is there any way to make free skype calls from HTC Desire?
Well Fring is blocked. I'm located in China. I neeeeed to make free skype calls to my family around the world. Skype Lite is not an option, has anybody cracked this cookie?

# Answer
You could try out Nimbuzz.
> 2 votes

# Answer
At the time this question was originally asked, Skype Lite was the only official Skype client and it was locked into the Verizon Network and it locked voice calling to wifi only (so as not to compete with their cell minute plans). As of early October, Skype released it to the Market for phones on other carriers. It was still crippled from making SkypeOut calls over the 3G connection, until a Hacker over at Droid Forums came up with a solution and as I was typing this I realize that it was only for phones in the US, so it looks like it's still a no go. **Sebastiaan's answer, Nimbuzz is your best bet.**
> 2 votes

# Answer
What you could do is uninstall the latest version of Skype and install an older version. I recently had to do this as I found the most recent versions of Skype were just bloatware and couldn't even do basic stuff (like voice chat) anymore.

Now I have to warn you that you are taking a risk installing a non-Market app, but I believe that Freewarelovers is a reputable site.

1. Uninstall your current version of Skype. Just go to Market, My Apps, Skype, Uninstall.
2. Switch on Settings, Applications, Unknown Sources.
3. Download version 1.0.0.984 from this link http://www.freewarelovers.com/android/app/skype#old\_versions
4. When the download is finished, just install it.
5. Remember to turn off Unknown Sources afterwards.

Try version 1.0.0.984 for starters. If that doesn't work keep trying earlier versions!
> 0 votes

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Tags: htc-desire, voip, skype
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# Question
Title: How can I increase the maximum speaker volume?
**Is there a way, maybe even with root, to increase the maximum speaker volume?**

I own a Lenovo Thinkpad Tablet, which are known for their crappy and quiet speaker. There are ways to replace the speaker with another one. But I'd like to know a generic, not device related, software based method to increase the maximum volume on Android (if there is one).

# Answer
There is an app which can do it for you... Try the free one first, and if it works, then buy the full version :)

Free: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.FREE.android.lvh&feature=search\_result

Payed: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.TEST.android.lvh&feature=search\_result#?t=W251bGwsMSwxLDEsImNvbS5URVNULmFuZHJvaWQubHZoIl0.

Have a great day :)
> 4 votes

# Answer
Try the 'DSP manager' application from cyanogen community.

Download application heredsp manager for stock ROM's
> 2 votes

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Tags: audio, volume-control
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# Question
Title: HTC Incredible says SMS storage is full, but it isn't
My HTC Incredible refuses to let me view my SMS messages. It will show the list of SMS senders, but when I click one to see their messages I get blocked by this popup:

> Unable to manage your messages because your storage is full. Please delete content from other applications to make more space.

Of course I checked right away to see if I was using too much memory. I went to Menu-\>Settings-\>SD & Phone Storage and saw I have plenty of space:

SD card - Available space: 5.72GB

Internal phone storage - Available space: 6.25GB

Phone memory - Available space: 571MB

I have more free memory than used memory so that can't be the problem. I tried restarting my phone as well but no change in message. I also Googled the problem and among all the "me too" responses found that other have this problem where SMS is blocked even though they have plenty of memory.

I couldn't get a clear resolution and I'm worried the answers are now out of date. ZDNet published a couple of articles on the issue:

Have I solved my Droid Incredible storage problem?

Is your Droid Incredible low on disk space?

Both suggest this is HTC's fault and that there is no fix. They say you can try clearing the cache on HTC's apps like Peep, Messages and Mail and also advise clearing the cache on your browsers.

I've tried these techniques, but they didn't work.

Does anyone know what causes this and what solutions exist?

# Answer
The Droid Incredible's available space for apps to store their data is only 150 MB, but it's impossible to view the amount of free app space on the stock ROM. So the error message is correct, but you have no way to view the available free space.

In technical terms: `/data/data` is mounted on a different partition than `/data`, and all your free space views show you the amount of free space in the 750 MB `/data` partition.

What you need to do is start clearing data for spps that are taking up lots of space and that you don't use often. One possibility is clearing the web browser's cache. Facebook is another big data hog. Check your other installed apps to see how much space they are using on data.

Here's a dump of the `df -h` output on my Inc:

```
Filesystem                Size      Used Available Use% Mounted on
tmpfs                   206.5M     32.0K    206.4M   0% /dev
tmpfs                   206.5M         0    206.5M   0% /mnt/asec
tmpfs                   206.5M         0    206.5M   0% /mnt/obb
/dev/block/mtdblock3    248.0M    121.8M    126.2M  49% /system
/dev/block/mmcblk0p1    748.0M    237.7M    472.3M  33% /data
/dev/block/mtdblock6    149.0M     79.7M     69.3M  54% /data/data
/dev/block/mmcblk0p2    193.7M     37.1M    146.5M  20% /cache
tmpfs                     8.0M         0      8.0M   0% /app-cache
/dev/block/vold/179:3     6.6G      1.2G      5.4G  18% /mnt/sdcard
/dev/block/vold/179:3     6.6G      1.2G      5.4G  18% /mnt/secure/asec
/dev/block/vold/179:9     1.8G    951.8M    930.1M  51% /mnt/emmc

```

(Note: I'm running a recent Cyanogenmod build that allows for swapping the SD Card and internal storage mount points -- that's why `/mnt/sdcard` is showing up as 6.6G while `/mnt/emmc` is only 1.8G.)

You can see how `/data` is a 750MB partition with plenty of free space, while `/data/data` is a teensy 150MB partition that's over half full.

This XDA Thread has a flashable mod that will make `/data/data` a subfolder of `/data` rather than a separate mount point, unlocking all that 750MB for app storage and allowing all your free space views to be accurate. You'll need to root your phone in order for this to work since it also converts the filesystems to ext4 and that's going to require a replacement kernel. (Recent Cyanogenmod builds already have this support, but if you're running the stock ROM you'll need to flash a different kernel.)
> 5 votes

# Answer
To wipe the cache partition (this will not delete your data or apps):

1. Boot into recovery
2. Press and hold Power, Choose "Restart" option
3. When screen turns off, press and hold Volume Down and Power
4. When the white HBOOT screen appears, use the volume button to move down to “RECOVERY.”
5. Press the Power button to select “RECOVERY.”
6. When the Green Arrows and\or triangle and exclamation appears, hold the Volume Up and Power button at the same time.
7. Using the volume button, scroll down to “Wipe cache partition” and select it (power button).
8. Select "Reboot system now"

Now you have enough space to download and install the additional update. Verizon released 2 updates for the HTC Incredible, I'm guessing you only got one. Go to Settings\> About Phone\> Software\> Build - 4.06 right? there is a 4.08 that seems to resolve this Low on Space problem. To get that update immediately (recommend connecting to WiFi first for the download): Go to Settings\> Date\Time\> Uncheck Automatic and manually set your clock ahead 1 month Then go to Settings\> About Phone\> System Updates and it should be there waiting for you. follow the prompts, it'll take about 10 minutes.
> 0 votes

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Tags: sms, htc-droid-incredible, insufficient-memory
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