What does it mean by letter 'g' in a kernel version string such as 3.4.0-gd59db4e?

It stands for git, the name of the version control system used for the Linux kernel. Git itself isn't an abbreviation, it's just the name of the system. The git describe command is what's used to generate these version identifiers, and its manpage describes the format:

  The hash suffix is "-g" + 7-char
         abbreviation for the tip commit of parent ... The "g" prefix stands for "git" and is
         used to allow describing the version of a software depending on the SCM the
         software is managed with. This is useful in an environment where people may use
         different SCMs.


Google Play website doesn't show all previously installed apps

It stops for me as well, so I am lead to believe that it only stores so many in the database.

Looking at it, it seems to be limited to 20 pages (it doesn't even get to 'C' for me).


Can connect to hotel wifi but Google Chrome says I am offline

Try this:

Make sure if it is a DNS resolution issue, Just use the IP of Google to check if we can connect. 74.125.24.94
We can see the IP configuration of the network in our mobile. In Android, (I don't know what is yours, only in mine),Open settings-> wireless network-> click the ! of the wireless you connect-> network information, we will see DNS, Gateway, IP address, mask, and so on. Check if they are all correct.
Then you can check if you have static settings in the static IP in the ! as well as network information.
We can also try to set up a static IP to see if it works.
Finally, we can also try to clear the network and re-connect again.


This is a common issue on Note 4s running Android L. The most common suggestion seems to be a replacement, as the issue is not software based but actually a loose sensor within the phone itself. I suggest contacting your phone service provider.


"Incompatible with other applications(s) using the same shared user ID" when installing Google Play service?

What is get my phone from local production?

Since you mentioned about custom system are you referring to a modded ROM like Cyanogenmod, Paranoid Android etc?

You have custom recovery in place? If so, grab the latest Google Apps from here appropriately for Android 4.0.4 aka ICS, more than likely, this version of gapps.

Reboot into Recovery, select:

Wipe Cache
Install from zip, select the gapps you downloaded
Then when install is done, reboot.


I tried this on my Nexus 6P and Android 6.0.1 version

Under "Sound & notification" -> "Notification" tab

Set "When Device is locked" to "Hide sensitive notification content"
App Notifications ->

Select "Messenger" (or the app which you want to hide notification).
Disable the option "Allow Peeking".

This worked for me.


Go to WhatsApp settings> Chat Settings> Delete All conversations


Cannot play .mp4 videos with the default video player

You habe 2 choices:

Download another media player such as VLC, MX Player, etc, then test the videos with them to know for certain if the problem is isolated to only the native video player or not. These apps are better than the phone native video player, come loaded with more codecs and can play more formats. However, you said you didn't want this solution.
Convert the videos to the appropriate codecs, resolutions, bit rate and other parameters recognized by the phone's video player. You will have to 'duplicate' the playing video parameters to the non-playing videos by checking the differences between them. Then, you can convert them on your PC before transferring them to the phone.


Stuck at "Installing update..." in recovery mode

I had suspected that formatting additional partitions like /firmware and /persist might be somehow related my boot loop - but I have no educated confirmation of this! Any CM aftermarket firmware that I tried would get stuck at the boot though.

The following solved my problem:

Install the (latest) Google Stock Android - this is just as easy as installing Cyanogenmod
Install ClockworkMod Recovery
Install Cyanogenmod Rom


Accessing windows shares from android device

Barring mounting the share as a filesystem on a rooted device, I don't believe this is possible without a third-party app. You can use ES File Explorer to connect to the remote directory. There is a detailed how-to on the XDA Developers forum, which also includes the steps for sharing the directories from various versions of windows.

Since you already have the Windows shared folders working, here are the steps for ES File Explorer from the afforementioned XDA Developers thread and detailed in these screenshots from the thread.

Open ES File Explorer
Tap "LAN" option (Assuming you're connecting to a server on your LAN) to enter the "LAN Shares" section of ESFE.
Tap the "New" button to add a server.
Tap the "Server" option.
Enter your server's information, including the username and password you intend to use (Make sure you use an account that has the access you need).
Tap the newly created server in the LAN Shares area to get to the shared folders on that server.

Editing files on your Android device will be a little tricky. ES File Explorer is the only app which can actually manipulate files over the network. If you open the file in another app, then ESFE will export the file to the app and another file will be created. You will need to move the file back to the share, using ES File Explorer, in order to update it on the server.

I use ES File Explorer as an example. There are probably other apps with similar functionality.


Checking your pics again: that device seems to have a weird mounting set up, which I've never seen before on an Android device. /storage/sdcard0 indeed is your internal SD. But as soon as the external card is mounted, some kind of "overlay file system" seems to be initialized, blending it in with the internal card as if it were a single device. You can see that by the fact that, when unmounting, some entries from pic#3 disappear (pic#4; of course the files from the external card) while some remain (those on the internal card).

To find out where the external card is mounted physically, you can use the mount or df command at a terminal prompt: no root required for that, a simple terminal app will do or, alternatively, access via adb shell (see: adb and its tag-wiki).

Edit: After having collected df output with and without the external card mounted, the situation looks a bit more confusing. Here's what's happening in your case:

the internal SD card gets mounted to /storage/sdcard0, as it should be.
when the external card is inserted,

the internal one gets unmounted
the external card gets mounted to /storage/sdcard0
the internal card gets mounted to /storage/sdcard0/internalSD

when the external card is unmounted, things reverse again

So /storage/sdcard0 never shows "empty", but the content "changes". Relevant parts of df output to confirm this:

# df run with the external card mounted:
/storage/sdcard0              1.9G …
/storage/sdcard0/internalSD   1023.7M …
# df run after unmounting the external card:
/storage/sdcard0              1023.7M …

Check with the sizes to confirm. Another proof is the mount output:

# mount with both cards mounted:
/dev/block/vold/179:65 /storage/sdcard0 vfat
/dev/block/vold/179:30 /storage/sdcard0/internalSD vfat
# after unmounting the external card:
/dev/block/vold/179:30 /storage/sdcard0 vfat

Here you clearly see the device (first column) mounted to /storage/sdcard0 changes (which explains why I wanted the mount output in the first place). So no UnionFS: the output also clearly shows both cards using VFAT. Changing contents in the /storage/sdcard0 directory are easily explained by the SD cards being "interchanged".


Facebook and Office suite preinstalled on new Gingerbread device?

This depends on

the manufacturer of the device
the provider where you bought your device.

The manufacturer pre-installs some applications. Also the provider may pre-install some applications.

So this does not depend on the Android version but on the manufacturer and/or provider.


You're not going to be able to achieve this using just userland tools, like what you describe -- at least not while Android is running.

The reason is because the RIL opens the radio device (generally some device node under /dev/*) as a low-level linux service, and while that has an exclusive lock on the device, nothing else can read from or write to the radio.  The RIL then communicates to the Android platform for all radio-related events.

It could be done with some extensive modifications to the underlying Linux kernel (it's open source, so definitely a possibility if you don't mind getting your hands dirty in C), or by replacing the RIL daemon (not as easy, because the rild is not required to be open source, therefore you don't know what the underlying implementation is without reverse engineering).  Doing the latter will break Android's ability to use it properly, unless you somehow come up with a compatibility channel to proxy communication between the new RIL and the existing RIL - and even then, there's a good chance that Android will become confused when it tries to make a call (knowing that the modem should not currently be in use, but getting a response from the radio saying that it is in use).

Failing that, you might also be able to achieve it by replacing the Phone app and using all-native platform APIs.  But I'm kind of thinking that it won't work (at least based on my knowledge of how HTC radios work).  In an HTC device, when you place a call, Android notifies rild, which places the call, and then rild tells the radio that it should route all call audio through the handset speaker and route all sound picked up from the microphone into the phone call.  The Android platform does not handle call audio routing itself.

All of the above requires rooting the device and installing a custom-built ROM at a minimum.


What Android version can I install on Samsung Galaxy S3 safely?

Looks like Android 7 can be installed on S3:
http://wccftech.com/update-galaxy-s3-to-android-7-1


Lenovo PHAB 2 automatically activate user data when wifi is switched off

Go to Settings → Apps settings → Storage → Clear Data. This worked for me.


How can I watch videos from the BBC web site on a device with an ARMv6 processor?

According to BBC's site: "Your device needs to run Android 2.2 (or higher) and have a minimum ARMv7 processor" to play programmes (download requires 4.0+).

reference: http://iplayerhelp.external.bbc.co.uk/tv/android_iplayerapp


Galaxy Nexus: Disable screen lock during call

This issue was solved under Jelly Beans.


ES File Explorer Pro: root access error on Android 6

I found a solution:

Install Busybox and Android Terminal Emulator.
Open the terminal app and write these commands "enter" separated: su, mount -o remount,rw /system, touch /sbin/su /system/bin/su /system/xbin/su, mount -o remount,ro /system, exit.
Reboot

Now you can enable the Root Explorer feature in ES File Explorer without any error!


I would seriously consider rooting and installing a custom ROM.  I've installed custom ROMs which gave me the SOD issue - my point is that I believe SOD is in fact tied to what ROM (whether stock or custom) you are running. This question details various things on rooting.  For specific directions on rooting and custom ROM for your phone model, you'll have to do a search here for that or on Google.


My phone just notified me that Kickback and Soundback were updated, what are they?

These are accessibility apps. One of Motorola's FAQ questions summarizes their purposes well:

  KickBack - Check to vibrate the phone briefly as feedback as you navigate the phone’s user interface, press buttons, and so on.

  TalkBack - Check to cause an installed speech synthesizer to speak the labels or names of items as you navigate the phone’s user interface.

  SoundBack - Check to play a sound as you navigate the phone’s user interface.


In that case you have to configure two interface in the device. Basically the wifi and the hotspot use the same resource, I did using my data mobile but using wifi you have to look how to configure an access point. With my PC using Windows you can do it but using your device please check if you have this Settings available:

Settings > Wifi Setting > Mobile AP


Speaker and Mic stoped working on MotoG (1st Gen) after upgrade

Surprisingly I was able to fix this issue in my phone by changing following wi-fi settings:

Go to advanced wi-fi setting. You will find a toggle option "Scanning always available". Disable this option.

Worked for me.


Custom ringtone not working on Nexus 5 since OTA Lollipop

A friend suggested clearing cached data (via Settings > Storage > Cached data) and then rebooting, and it seems to have resolved the issue.


The easiest way to get all your pictures from you iPhone to your LG is to use Google Photos. This does requires a gmail account. If you don't have one, its free to set up.

On your iPhone:

Download Google photos (if not installed already)
In the Google photos app, tap Menu (3 horizontal lines)
Select Settings then Backup and Sync
Switch it on
Allow permissions, if required

On your LG:

Download Google photos (if not installed already)
Repeat steps 2, 3 and 4 for iPhone
Your pictures should be on your LG

Hope this helps!


How to insert 2 sim cards on ulefone armor 9

a hybrid dual SIM slot is a technology that offers both features of a SIM card and a MicroSD card.
The hybrid dual SIM slot also means the OEM provided just two spaces instead of the traditional three slots for dual SIM cards and a MicroSD card. In other words, either two SIM cards are used or one SIM card slot is sacrificed to serve the role of a MicroSD slot.
Simply put, you have the two options:

Dual SIM (one micro/nano SIM + one micro/nano SIM)
One micro / nano SIM + MicroSD card


Cpu frequency keep going down by it's own

Changing governors has never really worked for me. Basically one of the issues with clocking at higher speeds is that this draws more power, which causes the CPU temperature to spike. The systems recognises it, and automatically throttles the clock speeds down so the CPU doesn't cook itself.

I have exactly your setup, a Note 2 with DN4 v2.1 running AGNI kernel, and was facing this issue. In my experience the best performance i got was with the stock Pegasus governor, a 1.8ghz cpu ceiling @ a voltage of 1225mv (was 1350mv). The lower voltage meant that the CPU could sit at this higher clock speed for longer, so my benchmarks went up pretty dramatically. My Antutu went from 25307 to 30541, because it was able to stay at the higher clock speed before thermal throttling set in. Unfortunately you cannot set the voltages manually using the AGNI kernel, so i had to download an app called 'System Tuner'.

Slapping the CPU up to 2ghz is fine, but it can only run at this speed for a few seconds before the temperature goes through the roof. Better to sit at a slightly lower clock speed IMO.

Good luck!


Zoom factor of offline maps on Google Maps

Yes, it's possible (why don't you just try it?). It was even possible before the latest update. Go to Menu - > Offline areas - > "Plus" button.
Map of Berlin takes about 300 megabytes.


Can you set the colour for contacts in Android 5 Lollipop?

Go to google messenger app. (The new SMS app from Google) -> go into a conversation with the contact you want to change colors -> press the three dots on top -> pick People & options -> around the end you'll see a small color palette where you can go in and change the color.

It seems that it currently works ONLY for people you texted (only through the messenger app).


Mount external sdcard after upgrade to Jelly Bean 4.2.2

A lot of sdcards are formatted as ExFAT (extended FAT32 - which is better than FAT32 in a number of aspects for flash media, including support for larger than 4GB files). Unfortunately, this is a licensed and proprietary technology and custom ROMs can't legally include support. If you have a card reader for your computer, you can use that to back up the contents of your sdcard. Then you can right click on the drive in My Computer and select format. Select FAT32 and let it do its thing. When it is finished, copy the contents back to the drive and put it back in your phone.

If you don't have access to a card reader, then you will either need to use another phone to back up your content on the card, or possibly, see if you can still enable USB Mass Storage in recovery (most likely under the Mounts and Storage menu depending on the recovery used). If you can't do either, then you can just format the sdcard from within recovery, which will put the filesystem to standard FAT32 and make it readable in your custom ROM, although, this will erase all the content on the card.


You can perform updates on installed APP's accessing the Play Store:

Find the Play Store icon on your home screen or in your app drawer and tap it to open it up.
Once the Play Store loads, tap the menu button on your device and choose the "My Apps" option.
Wait until the list gets filled. If there are available updates you'll see::

A text that says "Update" to the right of the app's name, you can long press it to update that APP;
Additionally, you can press "update" on the top of the list to update all APP's.

Usually a number is present to the right, that refers to the total number of updates available.


set another CDMA operator in a verizon wireless galaxy tab

Generally speaking, rooting is completely unrelated to unlocking.

CDMA unlocking is also more difficult than SIM unlocking a GSM phone, and CDMA phones need to be activated on the network, unlike sticking a SIM in an unlocked GSM phone and doing whatever you want.  You'll need help from both carriers (Verizon to unlock, your carrier to activate) in order to do this.


Automatically connect to Wi-Fi nodes, but route everything through encryption

Lifehacker suggests an app called SSH Tunnel:

  SSH Tunnel is an app that allows an
  Android phone to connect to the
  internet using an ssh tunnel for a
  completely secure connection. It's
  great for those times when you've got
  no data signal, stuck at work or a
  coffee shop that only has public Wi-Fi
  available, and you need to be sure
  that nobody is snooping your sensitive
  personal information as you connect to
  sites.


Will Rooting through Kingo Brick the device?

Welcome to AE,

Please ask your questions after searching through the internet.

Root

Rooting wont brick your device unless you did in a wrong away,

Keep the battery full (greater than 75)
Install appropriate drivers
Make sure you use offical USB driver
Follow the procedure.

Kingo Root

As per documentation

  Kingo Android Root has already rooted more than 100,000 devices，and we never met a bricking situation.

Refer this link.


I totally doubt if the kernel is for MTK devices because as per my knowledge goes (I too own a MT6582 device) MTK is a partially closed-source SoC manufacturer who gives out the source code by purchasing.
MTK makes a standard ROM based on AOSP and gives it out to companies but no companies are allowed to edit the ROM unless they buy the license for it.
This means that non-MTK associates can not make any part of the ROM as they don't have  the source-code

My Suggestion: Don't try this stunt because you may end up with a kernel with miss matching drivers and also a boot-looped device as a bonus :)


Stop old posts from reappearing in Facebook News Feed

The problem is that Facebook wants to be smart and recommend posts for you.

If you just want the most recent posts you can press the button top left of the app (some stripes on top of each other), this will open the menu for you. To the right of the 'News Feed' button, there is a gear wheel button, click on it and choose 'Most Recent'.

PS: could be that this is not completely the same in older android versions, I'm talking about 4+


Move everything to SD card on Android Virtual Device (Emulator)

To move some of system folders (/system or /data), to external emulated SD card, you need to do following:

Firstly, /data contents (for example) should be placed on sdcard. Initially they are loaded by emulator from userdata.img file.
So you need to copy userdata.img ($EMUPATH/system-images/android-19/armeabi-v7a/userdata.img) contents to sdcard.iso. $> dd if=userdata.img of=sdcard.iso
I assume, that android virtual device is created. To change boot configuration, you will need to change fstab.goldfish file on ramdisk.img. If it is Android 4.4 AVD, then ramdisk.img could also be find at $EMUPATH/system-images/android-19/armeabi-v7a/

Create a temporary folder, say ramdisk-ext $ mkdir ramdisk-ext
Change directory to ramdisk-ext $ cd ramdisk-ext
Extract the ramdisk.cpio in the ramdisk-ext folder $ gunzip -dcv ../ramdisk.img | cpio -idm
Modify fstab.goldfish $ gedit fstab.goldfish in such way:

String #6 from "/dev/block/mtdblock1    /data ..." to "/dev/block/mmcblk0    /data ..."

Create new ramdisk $ find . | cpio -H newc -o | gzip -9 >../ramdisk_new.img

Everything is done, now you need to start the emulator, with your new ramdisk and custom sdcard:$ ./emulator -avd $AVDNAME -sdcard sdcard.iso -ramdisk $EMUPATH/system-images/android-19/armeabi-v7a/ramdisk_new.img

P.S. Notice that in this example you can move only one of such folders (/system or /data). Maybe it could be changed, by creating sdcard image with several partitions.


Does enabling sideloading allow applications to be installed or run on the device without consent?

No. Installing packages is still a privilege reserved to the package manager, which is a system app (i.e. it's inside the ROM), and the package manager doesn't offer an interface to avoid the confirmation dialog. This is by design.

That said, if USB debugging is enabled (in the developer options), you can use adb to install an APK file from a PC, with no user interaction. This possibility exists regardless of whether installing apps from "unknown sources" is enabled. USB debugging is a so-called secure option: only system apps can change it.


Can non-HD Android devices output full HD over HDMI?

There aren't any rules for this, so it's entirely up to the tablet in each particular case. I can give an example: the original Asus Eee Pad Transformer TF101 has a < 720p screen, and its HDMI output is a pixel-for-pixel mirror of the screen (i.e. the HDMI output is the same pixel size as the screen).


u can use some apps such as
Move app to SD card
App Memory SD Card Transfer

and you can follow this url
http://techgage.com/article/moving_your_non-movable_android_apps_to_an_sd_card/


Disable calendar to sync events to exchange server

Your "local and private" Android calendar is your Google calendar. When you've created that personal event it defaulted to your Exchange calendar. In order to avoid this is the future make sure that you create events in the calendar you want  to. Usually it defaults to the last calendar you've created an event in.


Batty drain issue on CM10.2.1-yuga / Sony Xperia Z - NFC Service using over 50%

You can try the following:

1.Try Calibrating your battery ( few says it is necessary to calibrate your phone after rom installation)

Charge phone to 100%
Boot in to recovery
Wipe battery stats
Reboot and drain the battery completely ( by playing or media or
normal usage)
After complete drain recharge the phone again to 100%

2.Try freezing or renaming or removing nfc.apk and tag.apk (Instead of removing the apk just try renaming them like nfc.apk.bak)


Moving WhatsApp to new phone without changing number

Bro, it's actually easy! You don't need to remove your old sim and fit into your new phone. I have added the steps for you
First Backup all the data and chat history to google drive from the chats section in settings in whatsapp.

Whatsapp>>:>>Settings>>Chats>>Chat Backup

Second After backing up all the data install whatsapp on the new phone. Then verify your old phone number by getting the otp on your old phone and you will get a option for restoring your data from Google drive.
=>After restoring the data you will get most of the messages back on your new phone!
Yes, I have written "most of the" not "all of the". It's because not all your data gets backed-up. The data which you have downloaded on the old phone will normally gets backed-up with the chat.
To back up all the data I will recommend first downloading all the things and stuffs which you have received from others and then start backing up in your old phone!
(Or) alternatively there are many applications which can do all these things without any sort of manual uploading and downloading. You can search for them on the web and playstore (or appstore)!


Came across this when I had the same issue. A bit late for the OP, but another thing to look out for.

If you go in to:
Settings> Sim Cards> Preferred SIM for SMS messages> Select SIM card> Ask every time


okay, what about the pictures on my SD card?

For the first part of the question -- if your SD card is encrypted, then it won't be readable on a computer, print kiosk, or other device unless that device has compatible encryption capability and you supply the key (not going to happen at the print kiosk at Target, sorry to say).

As far as I know, there's no feature given to decrypt an entire storage volume (like your SD card); the most practical way to get the images decrypted would be to copy then to an unencrypted storage device.  One way to do that would be to install a cloud storage app (like Dropbox) on your phone.  Don't encrypt the cloud storage, and anything you copy to the cloud will be accessible to any device that has access to that cloud storage.  Dropbox has an application for Windows, Mac, and Linux, as well as both Android and iOS, which makes it a good choice (and it's free, with a fairly large storage limit, at least as of September 2017).  Some printing services will allow you to print from Dropbox storage, at least via their web page (Staples and Office Max/Office Depot allow this, as I recall).

Unless you also shoot porn on your phone or have a high enough profile to be concerned about blackmail, I don't see a lot of reason to encrypt storage of family photos anyway -- you might consider backing up your SD card (connecting the phone to a computer via USB cable may allow doing this without requiring the computer to deal with the encryption) and reformatting the SD storage without encryption.

Depending on your Android version, it may not be possible to store data (pictures, music, documents, etc.) on the SD card without adopting it, which encrypts it for unique access only by the adopting device.  If you're running Android 6 (Marshmallow) or newer, this might be the case (I can't check on my own device, as I have a Pixel which doesn't have an SD card slot).


Can't change input language for Samsung Note 2 keyboard after a software update

I have a galaxy note 2 (Android 4.4.2) with build number KOT49H.N7100XXUFNL1 and it is still working the same way it used to work previously.

Check that other languages are downloaded or not.

Here is screenshot highlighted in red showing scrollable languages.


Playing VLC streams directly from web page?

If you inspect the object (right-click -> Inspect (Q)) with the VLC plugin, it shows the HTML markup of that object. Looking further into the HTML, you'll notice a target="*" tag. Open the URL inside this tag (in your case IP:PORT/directory) with the "Open Stream" option of VLC and you are good to go.


Can Google's Voice Actions be started by voice?

if your phone has hard keys you can start void by holding down the search key (don't have to touch the screen).


This is a limitation of the Tags app that is included in Android by default. The Tags app will display at most 5 lines of text for any text-type NDEF record. You can't get around this limit as it is hard-coded into the Tags app. Consequently, you won't get around using a customized app for that purpose.


XDA is the go-to site for you

This link at XDA Samsung Firmware Naming Convention would give you an insight into the conventions followed for PDA,CSC and Phone, Region Codes,
Year, Month, Revision codes and other useful references

Depending upon the models you repair, you could search XDA for modem related info including collection of modems for different regions
Guide on repackaging firmware
Samsung Firmware Version Number
Samsung Firmware Code Reference
Editing CSC file
Phone Info Samsung is a great tool to help you with many things related to Samsung phones. Quoting from the developers thread it would help you with

  SAMSUNG SPECIFIC:

Phone Colour (Samsung specific)
CSC Product Code (Samsung specific)
CSC Sales Code (Samsung specific)
Country Region (Samsung specific)
RIL Serial Number (Samsung specific)
PDA Version (Samsung specific)
CSC Version (Samsung specific)
Changelist (Samsung specific)
Country of Origin ★ (Samsung specific)
Phone Manufacturing Date ★ (Samsung specific)
Knox Warranty Void ★ (Samsung specific)

  OTHER INFO:

Manufacturer
Phone Model
Device Name
Product Name
IMEI
Serial No
Bootloader Version
Baseband Version
Kernel Version
Build Number
Build Description
Fingerprint
Build Date
Android Version
Mobile Operator Name/Mobile Network Code
Total RAM, Screen size and resolution, Battery capacity and health


Where does android store the missed/incoming/outgoing calls?

It's stored in /data/data/com.android.providers.contacts/databases/calllog.db, under the "calls" table, in reverse time order (i.e. the last item in the table is the latest call in the log as displayed in the dialer).


Just go to Settings > Apps >Google Play Music and  click disable. Or if you can root your phone you can permanently delete it.


New Samsung S6 tablet stuck on Samsung logo?

If they're new, I'd return them for an exchange.  (And make sure you're not getting cheap fake copies of Samsungs.)


Change Settings.Global.AUTO_TIME to always be 1

Since the phone is rooted, it would be possible for an Xposed module to achieve this by intercepting the call to Settings.Global.getInt and returning 1 regardless of the real value, but I don't know of a module that does this, so you'd have to write it yourself. You should consult the Xposed documentation to learn how; I'm afraid we can't help with programming problems on this site.


Such an error can occur because of several different reasons and all these reasons come into existence due to one reason:

System or CPU failed to handle that app properly.

Messenger is a heavy application that will use a huge portion of your RAM and CPU while running and sometimes, to run system apps, the phone has to abandon these processes. That is why your apps keeps stopping (also, you are using a Samsung phone, so the UI uses more memory then the standard Android UI).

For a better experience, you have to keep your device clean by installing a cleaner app. You then have to remove cache and data of such apps regularly to have a smooth experience.


You have lost data connectivity because you left your home network with data roaming turned off

I solved this by going into settings, SIM and network, and selecting SIM 1 (the phone carrier SIM in my case Giffgaff). This showed me another setting for mobile data which was switched off. Once I switched it on it found a nearby 4g source.


Assuming you already have the Exchange account added on your phone, if you go to Contacts, and search for a name, it should bring up directory results. Make sure you hit the search or enter button on the keyboard.


How can I make an Android app "forget" that it installed on my phone before?

tl:dr; addressing OP's question - sorry, no way AFAIK. From Android 10 onwards normal apps can't access IMEI number.
Revised answer with additional inputs from Izzy (thanks)
How do apps (Google or third party) identify you?
Apps identify a device using:

Some or all of device identifiers, mainly Android ID, GSF Android ID, build serial number, and advertising ID. I know of one paid app which tracks IMEI too (before Android 10). It depends on the developer as to how badly they want to identify you and prevent installation of apps. See this excellent write up by Izzy (a moderator here) for more details Android Identifiers: How Android devices and their users are identified. It is rare that an app depends only on one type of identification. I have observed over the last three years that shopping , banking, social media & social media related apps are particularly nasty and use every trick in the book.

In addition to this apps come packaged with trackers and loggers (all utilities which are used to log user activity on an app or logcat in general), which identify the user and their browsing patterns , in addition to fingerprinting user by device identification. These can be used for benign purposes in theory but in practice can extend to key logging features that can track what you type. Have a look at Staggering variety of clandestine trackers found in popular Android apps.

What happens to this data?
Those identifiers are stored on third-party servers (analytics companies and other "big data collectors" such as Facebook, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, etc.) – so once collected, there's no chance you can delete that. Some offer an opportunity to sign out, but there is no way you can have that data deleted. Even if it is legally possible under GDPR (which I doubt), it is not a trivial task to get this implemented across hundreds of trackers/loggers.
How can I prevent from being tracked/ identified?
Root is a must for full control over this menace (see rooting) That's the unfortunate part. Without root you can only choose apps with care and probably try some hacks which in the long run aren't effective or at best partially useful.

Choose the apps you want to install with care: Up to a degree, apps like TrackerControl or Warden can help. Ideally, you avoid apps including trackers; Exodus Privacy is a good helper for that – and Izzy's app listings use such services to "mark" apps, making it easier for you to sort the wheat from the chaff.

Feed them faked information: This approach is better than denying permissions because it doesn't result in malfunctioning apps or apps that crash. Highly recommend you to use XPrivacyLua being the most effective broad spectrum measure. This requires EdXposed to be installed from Android 8 and above (see the restrictions section to see what can be faked). If you are on earlier versions Xprivacy by the same developer does the job with Xposed. Even XPrivacyLua can't help in instances when the app code is obfuscated.
The Warden app mentioned above can also "nuke" your device, making it free
from trackers and loggers. It also gives you flexibility to tackle apps on individual basis. The Warden App Manager uses a static list of trackers and loggers compiled by French non-profit Exodus Privacy.

While Android has been showing greater concern for privacy and PII information over the last few versions, this problem is not significantly mitigated even in Android 11 (no prizes for guessing why. Google is probably the biggest data aggregator).


Maps not pointing in the right direction

I've had devices get their compasses screwed up. Just re-calibrate and see if that fixes it: How can I calibrate the compass on my phone? If you have done that and its still incorrect do try it again in a different location, perhaps outside away from any metal just to be sure.


No. You can not delete the system while it is running. If you have root access, you could "program" the stock recovery to flash your custom ROM on the next reboot by using a specific command line in a terminal.

There is LG Flash Tool for your device, but it is not official.


Why doesn't my phone support Google + hangouts?

As Chahk mentioned: It's the lack of a front facing camera.

But there are ways to fake a front facing camera, so that you can join hangouts.


I got the app send to SD when I had my MYTouch and I transferred my photos, apps, notes to my note3. Everything was on my SD card as long as you don't have an emulated file you are fine.  once I got an emulated file on my note3 nothing transferred to the next one. You can open a dropbox account and an evernote account. Once you do the reset you download the apps and you sign into those apps and you have your photos and your notes.. another photo saving place is myphotos.com.. good luck with the reset :/


Accidentally deleted Bluetooth from Android

Your AV shouldn't be able to delete system apps (assuming it's not using root). At worst it can disable them and you can restore it from either app management in system settings or you can check if your AV has a restore option.


Does Android put wifi and other data networks to sleep when the display is turned off?

It depends, some Android devices have an advanced setting WiFi Sleep Policy under

Settings -> Wireless -> Wi-Fi Settings -> [Menu Button] Advanced -> Wi-Fi Sleep Policy

But I am not sure if this is a vanilla Android feature or an manufacturer modification. At least the Galaxy S series has this setting.

Data networks are usually fully active. But Apps like Tasker allow you to define certain profiles to improve battery life. For example: Only allow 2G when the display is off, because 2G requires less battery then 3G (UMTS).


Is there a way to automate data toggle on Galaxy S7 (Edge)

30 hours probably isn't too bad, especially if you use your phone a lot.

If you're in an area where reception is poor, this will also have a negative effect on battery.

There are apps on the Play Store ('Tasker' is one, 'Macrodroid' is another) that you can use to setup macros which perform certain tasks/functions based on the conditions you provide.

There may be a condition within one of those apps that state when the phone is locked, disable data. When unlock, enable it.


While trying to explain where to find that "4th tab", I just see where your problem is:

You use the %WIFI variable to check for a) On/Off and b) the connection mode. Either it is On/Off, or it holds connection info. The first is %WIFI, the other %WIFII:

  WiFi Info
  %WIFII
  When connected to an Access Point (AP), shows human-readable data about the AP. When not connected, show details of the most recent Wifi scan results for nearby APs.

  WiFi Status (dynamic)
  %WIFI
  Whether WiFi is on or off. Note: if WiFi is enabling or disabled, in fact anything but enabled, it's classed as off.

Source: Tasker UserGuide

Now back to the original explanation about that "4th tab":

You see some tabs in both pictures. In the first, "Profiles" is selected, in the second "Tasks". In both pictures you see another tab "Scenes". Right to that is one more, "Variables":

But regardless of that: For debugging, you can always to add another item to your task, "Notify", and have it either popup the %WIFI (or whatever variables) content or add it to your notification bar. This is good for debugging.


Force close message for every single application on Easypad Junior

It may be because of permission issue.
If you are rooted and installed Custom Recovery(CWM recovery,TWRP Recovery) there is an option in advanced.

1: Boot into recovery
2: Advanced (CWM Recovery)
3: Fix permissions

It will fix permissions for all apps installed.
try it.. or else provide more details like ROM,Root status,recovery etc.


How to save the Home Cover Photo of a LINE profile?

Home Cover Photos are cached in the following directory:

/sdcard/Android/data/jp.naver.line.android/storage/toyboximg/line

Rename the extension of files to .jpg to view them.


How to upgrade my HTC desire 816 with lollipop

HTC is planning to release an OTA for the Desire 816 sometime in the future, but if you can't wait, there is a port of CM12 for your device.
Prerequisites

WinDroid Universal Android Toolkit
Your phone (duh)
Windows XP or higher
USB Cable

Unlock Bootloader

Open the WinDroid Universal Android Toolkit.

Download and install the ADB drivers if it prompts you to.

Choose your device from the list. Wait a few moments while it downloads the correct recoveries.

Turn on your device, go to Settings > Developer Options and Enable USB Debugging and plug it in. If the toolkit does not recognize your device immediately, click on the Refresh button in the bottom right corner. Note: If you are on Android 4.2.2 or above, and you do not see a button for Developer Options, you will need to go to Settings > About > Software Information > More and quickly tap on Build number multiple times until it tells you that Developer Options has been unlocked.

Click the button labeled Get Token ID in the Unlock Bootloader box. This will reboot your device into bootloader, retrieve your Token ID, and open a text file that contains your Token ID and further instructions.

Now that you have your Token ID, you can now submit it to HTCDev, which should have opened in the background when the text file opened previously. If it did not open, you can open the link here. Please login to your account or create and activate one with a valid email address. Once you have done that, go back to the HTCDev link, scroll to the bottom of the page, and paste the Token ID you were given in the previous step. Click Submit, and wait for the email from HTC on the email you created the HTCDev account with.

Once you have received the email from HTCDev, download the attached file in the email named unlock_code.bin. This is the unlock token that can unlock your specific device's bootloader. Once it has successfully downloaded, click on the button named Unlock Bootloader in the bottom left corner. If your device is not already in bootloader, this will reboot your device into bootloader, and flash the unlock_code.bin file. A prompt will appear on your device confirming if you would like to unlock your bootloader. READ THE WARNING COMPLETELY! THIS WILL WIPE ALL OF THE DATA ON YOUR DEVICE!

Press the Volume Up button once, and press the Power button once to confirm the unlock. Your device will now restart.

Your device is now unlocked! You can now proceed to flash a custom recovery and gain permanent root in the next steps.
Flash Custom Recovery

Move to the next box on the right named Recovery and Root.
Download this custom recovery and put it into the folder named Recoveries within the Data folder created by the toolkit. (The file should be named recovery.img.) Now click on the TWRP button. Your device will then reboot into bootloader and flash your chosen recovery.

You are now rocking a custom recovery!
Gain Permanent Root

To gain root access, click the Gain Root button from the tool.

Flash Custom ROM

Download the latest version of CM12
Once you have fully downloaded the ROM you want to flash, find the boot.img file. It should be in the main directory. Copy it and save it somewhere else for later use. Do not extract or unpack the ROM folder, and ensure that you didn't delete the boot.img in the ROM folder itself.
Navigate to the box in top right named Flash. Click on Flash ROM, choose Yes if you are ready, and choose the ROM .zip file you previously downloaded. The ROM you chose will be pushed to your phone. It may take a few minutes depending on the size of the ROM, so please wait until the loading icon has stopped spinning. Once it has finished pushing the ROM, your phone will boot into Recovery. Once you have booted into Recovery, choose Install. Scroll down until you see the ROM .zip file you chose previously. Choose it, and flash it. Once it has finished flashing, go to the Reboot options within the Recovery, and reboot to Bootloader.

You now have CM12, Android 5.0 on your HTC Desire 816!

Adapted from this post


Out of memory errors on S2. Safe to delete all dumpstate files?

Data in "log directories" should generally be safe to delete, as they are mainly intended for debugging purposes. The files having an .tar.gz extension simply means they are archived (see: tar (computing) at Wikipedia); if you copy them to your computer for investigation (e.g. using Winzip on a Windows machine, or the command-line tar xzf <filename>) will probably show those files contain *.log files.

If you want to be on the safe side, make a backup first. But I very much doubt you'll ever need those files again.


Photos received from SHAREit are not displayed in gallery

(Click image to enlarge)

Just Cut(or Copy) the Files from Shareit Folder and Paste it to your SDcard/Phone Memory.


Check for a security notification under the notifications. I missed it at first on my tablet.


android 5.1.x security settings missing after upgrade

Based on on description, I think you might be referring to Samsung's Smart Manger. Smart manager gives an overview of the device's RAM, Battery, Clean up as well as Security (contains sn anti-malware engine).

  Smart Manager's functions are to manage storage and RAM, scan and
  optimize data usage to preserve battery levels, and protect from
  security threats, close all apps running in the background that
  significantly drain the battery, uninstall unneeded applications, and
  run malware scans.

See below:

It is most likely the OS update didn't have Smart Manager. However the good thing is Smart Manager has been renamed Device Maintenance and is available from Google Playstore as long the device is compatible


Get original xperia play content back on device after removing it

You can use their official update software, it has been called "PC Companion" the last time I used it:

Boot your phone to flashmode (See also  How do I turn on flashmode in Sony Ericsson Ray?)
Update/restore it with PC Companion

This is mostly for modding, so it won't be that useful to you:
You can also flash a .ftf file of your choice (official or a custom mod) with FlashTool, note however that you need to unlock the bootloader before your phone will boot a mod with an unoriginal kernel. I have however no idea where to find an original firmware image for your Xperia Play/R800i, you might need to google for that yourself.


How do i make a new album in the HTC Photos application?

It's actually quite simple just hard to figure out.

Install a file manager app (Astro, inKa File Manager)
Using a file manager app navigate to sdcard > media folder
Create a new folder

Place all your photos into that newly created folder. It may take some time but eventually the new photo album will appear inside HTC's Gallery app.


How to update all your apps from the Android market over web?

You'd have to go through your library, find each app that had an update, and then select to install it from the website. There is no way to batch update your apps from the web Market.


Set different default browsers for 3G and Wifi

Actually, Tasker is the key here. You can find a tutorial here: Control which app is the default for an action.

In addition to Tasker, you will need the Secure Settings plug-in. The action involved which can be found there is called Package State, where you can select between disable, enable, and toggle. So basically it is a work-around: You disable Firefox when switching to 3G, so only Opera is available then and will be used. As soon as you switch to WiFi (Tasker condition: WIFI connected), you toggle both package states, so Firefox becomes the default browser as it's the only one available.


Ran :(){ :|: & };: on my android device!

Modern Android Kernels are smart enough to shut down the entire system before any hardware damage occurs. Even when you're testing the limits of your CPU when overclocking, it will shut down as soon as incompatible frequency/voltage combination is set. So you're far from any real hardware damage cause by the infinite loop command.


Can't use chmod to alter permissions on emulated phone

Figured it out - seems like you just can't change permissions for files on sdcard. Moved it to data/local and chmod worked like a charm.


How to auto-restart media playback when connecting the headphones

The best solution for you would be to use Smart Connect Liveware™ Mgr.

As you can see, you can set actions to start when you plug a device (headset, HDMI, charger, etc.) and actions to start when you unplug the device. I have a setting to start playing music when I connect my headphones and stop playing when I remove it. There are many things you can do with this.

The best part is that you can manage your music with your own music app! Simply create an event for actions to be done upon the connection pf a headphone and forget this app!

This was originally developed for Sony Xperia Handsets. But should work with any, which has a good hardware configuration (src) and an OS higher that ICS (which you already have).


Is this "Boost" / File Manager app a true system app or malware?

This is a system app update from Alcatel. Recently they started updating some of their apps. I'm assuming you have an Idol 4 or 4S.

Although you can't uninstall or even fully disable this app, you can uninstall updates and stop automatic updates. Go to Settings - Apps - File manager. In the upper right-hand corner, push the three dots and click "Uninstall updates". Then go to Google Play - Your apps, click the file manager. Then in the right corner, click the three dots. Uncheck "Automatic updates". This will keep it from updating. You can do this with all of Alcatel apps.

I don't know why they thought having a purple octopus on the main screen a good idea but I and others have sent several emails regarding it and have been ignored.


Where are IP addresses stored on Android?

Under Settings, Wi-Fi, , Modify Network, Advanced Options, IP Settings, you should have a choice of Static or DHCP.  Choosing Static adds input boxes for IP address, Gateway, Network prefix, and DNS.

If you don't have this, I suggest trying a third-party app such as WiFi Manager.

Finally, if you're really talking about where in the filesystem this is stored, it's in /data/misc/wifi/ipconfig.txt, and is managed by the WifiConfigStore class. This is not a public API and is only used from class WifiStateMachine.  However, you can find out the format of this file by viewing the source: WifiConfigStore.java.


Download DU Speed Booster. It has some handy features such as move to SD and Safe Uninstall and will help you out.


Hiding all apps from default launcher except mxplayer did the trick.


Enable USB Debugger on a phone with a broken screen

I don't think this will help, but anyway. If you could somehow execute following command on the phone, you should be able to just make it work:

setprop persist.service.adb.enable 1

This will enable USB debugging on the device and persist across reboots. The phone might need to be rooted.

Maybe connect a wireless keyboard and do some key combinations to reach command input. I have no idea how to do that though.


Switch Phones same sim card, missing contacts

They are not gone, they're just left on the old device. Contacts are no longer stored on the SIM card by default for years already. If you've synchronized them (e.g. with Google), you should be able to synchronize them back with the same service on your new device.

Otherwise, you'll have to export them on your old device, transfer the export to your new device, and import it again:

On the old device:

open Contacts
hit the Menu button (the 3 "stapled dots" in the upper right corner), and chose Import/Export
select to export them to your storage (SD card)
copy the exported file (usually /sdcard/0001.vcf) to the SD card of your new device

On the new device

open Contacts
hit the Menu button (the 3 "stapled dots" in the upper right corner), and chose Import/Export
select to import from storage (SD card)
select the file

Now your contacts should be there again.


how to get my android to boot up and shutdown automatically

Automateit can do that (of course, rooting is required!). Here is the link for the free version: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=AutomateIt.mainPackage


Insufficient storage availalable when there is plenty

I have found the solution that might help lots of people. I was able to install rom toolbox pro, I tried to fix the permissions but that didn't help then I changed the setting under app2sd that was set to save everything to extSD regardless of what it is TO auto as it should be by default i think and now i can install anything from the playstore without getting any errors. I think Droidsail super app2sd changed that setting behind the scene. Anyone who played around an app like APP2SD and has the same issue as I did will probably be able to solve it using my method. Good luck!


How to install any app as a parallel app in OnePlus 6?

The solution is quite simple. Setup adb and issue this command:

adb shell pm install --user UID PKG

where:

UID: the uid of the "Parallel apps" user. To get the UID, you would have to create the user first. Find Parallel apps setting in your Settings app, enable any of the eligible apps (as that would create the user in the background), then disable that app you just enabled.

Ordinarily, the UID might be 999, but OnePlus can change the UID in future. So to ensure the UID of Parallel apps user, run the command:

adb shell pm list users
adb shell cmd user list      # alternative command

Example output:

Users:
    UserInfo{0:Owner :13} running
    UserInfo{999:Parallel Apps:4000030} running

The numeric string before ":Parallel Apps" is the UID of that user.
PKG: the package/app you are trying to install

Lo and behold, you have an app running under Parallel Apps.

Tip: you can install any app, regardless that the app is installed under the primary user or not. You can also install a third-party client for Play Store or an altogether different market app to install/remove apps from Parallel apps user conveniently. See this XDA thread for more details.

Issues:

The "Parallel apps" setting under Settings app would not list these apps.
If your parallel app is indeed a clone/duplicate of an app running under primary user, than removing the primary user's app would automatically remove your sideloaded parallel app too. So, if Firefox is installed as both primary and parallel app and you happen to remove primary Firefox app, the other one would be nuked too.
User beeshyams mentioned that TWRP backup/restore functionality breaks if "Parallel Apps" user exists.


There might be several approaches you could try. No guarantees whatsoever, and I didn't try any of those. Still mentioning them, so you can investigate for yourself. Note further that these solutions will require root access on your device.

First, there's an app called SwitchMe, which already was available before the multi-user feature was released with Android 4.2. SwitchMe works with Android 2.1 and higher.

Second, our friends at XDA have a thread on Porting Multi Users JB to ICS (but it seems that approach died before producing a workable solution).


What app can I use to take pictures and add a searchable comment to them?

You can use Google Photos. It will provide you 15GB of online storage to backup your photo. Once you backup your photos, you can search with the term 'ID card', 'flowers'.
You can write comments in each photo but that is not needed. This app will also segregate people with face identification ML-models


Bootloop and inaccessible to fastboot /adb

Please attach your phone to adb installed pc using usb cable. Find terminal or command prompt. And run the following command 'adb reboot recovery'


Why is Android 5 corrupting my SD card (moving files to LOST.DIR or losing them)?

You should probably mount the SD card with a USB reader in the PC, to see if the SD card or filesystem is damaged.

I had that issue a couple of times and it was that the SD card was actually corrupted or broken. So, a filesystem check might fix it or you will know that it needs to be replaced.

In Linux, you could check the filesystem with fsck.vfat. It works ok for a fat32 filesystem (not so for ntfs), so you could try that. Or use some other GUI utility like Gparted, Disks or whatever you like.

In Windows you should right click your SD drive (in my computer), select properties, the tools tab and check now. You can leave the auto fix errors checked if you don't mind losing files. (Disclaimer: I don't use windows, so the way to get to this might have changed in the last few versions).

If the card has corrupt sectors, the wisest thing to do is to format it (in vfat/fat32) and fill it with files (like mp3 or movies), then run another filesystem check. If it fails again, you should replace the SD.

ps1. Even if you don't have corrupt sectors, re-formatting the filesystem may fix the underlying issues. And if the problem persists, you should replace the SD.

ps2. Regarding ext4, it's not supported by default Android, you could use it with a partition if you have rooted the phone and Link2SD installed, but it's not recommended. ext4 has a journal system which would read & write more often to the SD and diminish the cards life. ext2 is recommended instead (is the last ext filesystem without journal).

Update after re-reading:

Android 4 (kitkat), 5 (lollipop) and 6 (marshmallow) use all different methods to handle external storage (sd cards).

I didn't quite understand at first read that you were moving the SD card from one phone to the other.

As the access method to external storage changed between versions, this might be a permissions issue and you might be breaking some internal android settings.

You should try sharing the file with another peer to peer (email, telegram, syncthing, bluetooth or bittorrent sync) android utility or cloud based storage (dropbox, mega, wetransfer, etc.).


App Web Links asking for Chrome TOS despite Firefox being default browser

You can either uninstall chrome or, if this device came with chrome pre installed you can go to settings>apps, search for chrome and disable it.


How do I *really* disable autocorrection?

From the Android 2.2 Froyo Users Manual, specifically on pages 329 and 330, is mentioned the following settings about auto correction features:
To access:
Press "Home" > Press "Menu" > Touch Settings.

Android Keyboard settings screen
The Android Keyboard settings apply to the onscreen keyboard that is included with
your phone. The correction and capitalization features affect only the English version
of the keyboard.

Auto-capitalization

Check to have the onscreen keyboard automatically capitalize the first letter of the first word after a period, the first word in a text field, and each word in name fields.

Quick fixes

Check to automatically correct some common misspellings as you type.

Show suggestions

Check to show suggested words in a strip above the onscreen keyboard as you type. See “Using the onscreen keyboard” on page 29.

Auto-complete

Check to automatically enter a suggested word, highlighted in orange in the strip above the keyboard, when you enter a space or punctuation. See “Using the onscreen keyboard” on page 29.

Device Keyboard settings screen
This settings screen is available only if your phone has a physical keyboard.

Auto-replace

Check to correct misspelled words as you type.

Auto-cap

Check to capitalize the first letter of the first word in sentences.

Auto-punctuate

Check to insert a period ( . ) when you press the Space key twice in a row

Depending on what exactly you wish to disable, you need to analyse all the above options to match your criteria.


What is the list of commands to dictate punctuation, capitalization and line breaks?

Commands

"New Line" or "Next Line"               Press the enter key once, capitalize next word
"New Paragraph" or "Next Paragraph"     Press the enter key twice, capitalize next word
"Caps <word>"                           Type with an initial capital
"All Caps <word>"                       Type in all uppercase
"Caps On"                               Start typing words with initial capitals
"Caps Off"                              Stop typing words with initial capitals

Punctuations

&                                       "ampersand" or "and sign"
.                                       "period" or "dot"
:                                       "colon"
?                                       "question mark"
!                                       "exclamation point"
,                                       "comma"
=                                       "equal sign"
@                                       "at sign"
/                                       "forward slash" or "slash"
-                                       "hyphen"
'                                       "begin single quote" or "open single quote"
'                                       "end single quote" or "close single quote"
"                                       "begin quote" or "open quote"
"                                       "close quote" or "end quote"
(                                       "left parenthesis" or "open parenthesis"
)                                       "right parenthesis" or "close parenthesis"
%                                       "percent sign"
$                                        "dollar sign"
#                                       "pound sign"
°                                       "degree sign"
:-)                                     "smiley face"
:-(                                     "sad face"


How decrease font or make text readable in Android Chrome?

Options inherent to Chrome

By Scaling the text size to make it readable

Menu (upper right corner) → Settings →Accessibility option → Text Scaling

Of course, you may need to resize the text for other sites of text is too small for comfort

By enabling Force Zoom -  useful if zoom by pinching is disabled

Enabling Desk Top mode may also help pinch to zoom from Settings → Request desktop site. Related How to make Google Chrome definitely remain as the desktop version?


Unable to click Next button when sideloading an APK

Ok I got the answer. Looks like any screen color filter apps mess up this thing. Use CF.Luman to use installation feature or if you want to use the current application, disable that app for a minute to install apk to your device.

For complete info look at this thread: Why can't I press the Install button when installing applications from unknown sources?


Where are TWRP backups stored on SD card? Had to un-root

Flashing the stock image may have erased your backup. However, since the G2 supports an External SD card, I don't think it would have.

From the SD Card's root, it should be at ./TWRP/BACKUPS/. Restoring a backup from here using TWRP will re-root your device (If your device was rooted when you made the backup). You can also use apps like Titanium Backup to selectively restore parts of it... but Titanium Backup requires root.

You may, however, be able to selectively pull files from the backups - a full backup of your phone's filesystems.


Drivers are usually not device-specific - manufacturers package drivers for most if not all their devices in one package for installation. In Samsung's case, it's called Samsung USB Drivers for Mobile Phones. It's up to you to Google and find the latest version, although someone has some hosted at OdinDrivers (external site - safety not guaranteed).


It's not so convenient to do on a daily basis but you can export all your data from Samsung galaxy health.

In the top right corner click on the three dots
Choose settings
In the "Data" section choose "Download Personal data"
Click "Download" at the bottom of the screen
Verify your Samsung account password

It will download a bunch of csv files to My Files > Internal Storage > Samsung Health > Download > Samsunghealth_[your username]_[download date and time stamp].

One of them will be "com.samsung.health.sleep.[download date and time stamp].csv

Some of the information is useful, some is not.


Chrome and Chrome Beta suddenly won't fill up the entire screen on launch

This is happening in any custom ROM that supports floating windows. It is there, for example, in SlimKat, Spirit ROM, CM based ROMs etc. In my case I can move and size the window, and there is a maximize button available. It resizes the window with pinch to zoom automatically rendering it almost unusable.

This is an app issue ultimately, but it is specific to custom ROMs with this functionality.

The only thing you can do it, open the Chrome window then bring up the task manager and select Chrome and it will fill the screen as normal. This is obviously an awkward work around.

Alternatively if you have Xposed installed you can try to Blacklist Chrome from xFloatingWindow and see if it will work. Some, but not all have had success with this.


Samsung sending SMS automatically on Idea Cellular (although no charge)

First check Settings → for any app called Idea Power or Idea Portal or anything that you suspect is closely related to the cellular operator.

Mostly in Android devices with Idea SIM lock (CDMA) they install Idea Power system app. It is not visible in app manager especially for postpaid subscribers.

Not only Idea even other operators also do the same thing, but in Uninor and Airtel it will be too much.

2 of the most common signs are reduced battery life and while browsing sites too much of pay links and worst ads and operator ads, etc.

See when this operator app is installed it accesses your:

Phone information
Contacts
Rootkit
Send email without consent of host (user)
Read and write logs
Read memos
Directly call numbers and send msgs

THE LIST HAS SO MUCH MORE.

Finally in android 99.99% apps can be turned off except these operator injected secret code or app.

So I hope user only has to decide:

If its a second hand phone check if it is secured with mobile tracker of factory default or any tracking app preinstalled.

In AVG antivirus there are mobile tracking installs in hidden form and send email hidden even root format can't erase it which I once also used and got fed up with samsung galaxy young star pro, I guess its model no. is gt5372.


What is the range of my wifi tethering network?

32 dBm equates to 1584.89mW according to this calculator:
http://www.radiolabs.com/stations/wifi_calc.html
Assuming a 12 DBi Antenna Gain from the comments above, that gives us 44 dB of antenna power.
The signal loss for 2400 MHz/Km is 100.03dB, citing the same site.

At the assumed 44dB of power, we'll round and say .044Km which is ~144 feet.
Since throughput is inversely related, You're going to have a pretty poor download speed at 144 feet, barring there's nothing between the phone and the computer, on a clear day.

This is half guesswork, but hopefully it helps.


I use Rom Toolbox for this. Swipe left twice to get to the Interface section and chose Font Installer. If you're rooted, you'll see the new font after a reboot/hot restart.


What information is more reliable -- battery capacity or stand-by time?

In my view, battery capacity i.e. the mAh value is best the way to compare.  The reason why I say this is that the battery drain includes so many factors that even a small software glitch can show a remarkable difference.  Hence the standby time is a combination of several factors which are not reliable for comparison, unless they are from from same manufacturer (with a hope that there will not be variations in test situation).  The guide from GSMArena explains this clearly as:

  Manufacturers measure talk time in controlled conditions and the quoted numbers are rarely reached in real-life scenarios. These numbers are best used as reference when comparing phones from the same manufacturer because battery life measurement methodology will probably vary from manufacturer to manufacturer.

With battery rating at least you know your how much capacity the battery has and how it gets used or wasted is simply a temporary situation (i.e. by changing ROM, updates, platform upgrades etc).


Android 6.0.1 parse error while attempting to install Pokemon go apk 0.29.0

By looking in the apk site I can see it is supported until 6.0 version only.
Which is not the same as the google play version.
seems like I'm going to look into downgrading my android version now.
hopefully, this will make things clear for those who got into the same situation as me.


Can bricking my GT - I9100 damage my antennas?

You shouldn't be able to damage your hardware through software.  It's obviously not impossible, there are things that control voltages and so on, but in general it's not even worth considering.

The Note and the SGS II have different hardware and software; there's no reason to believe that the difference in bars you see is anything other than normal.  If your connection has a problem, you'll notice when you try to use it.  Don't rely on the bars.


To expand on Andrew's comment, Settings is a core system app that is tightly integrated into the ROM.  There is no way to replace it without flashing a custom ROM, and modifications like enabling or adding features would require building the Android source for your device.

If you are rooted or can use ADB, etc., there are a number of other ways to manage applications and settings — for example, uninstalling apps.  Feel free to search the site and ask another question if you want to do something specific that hasn't already been covered.


Bulk manage Google Contacts with dual SIM card

Accidentally stumbled upon a useable solution. In the Settings menu on the top is a menu item 'Manage SIM". This is meant for setting up names and defaults for the SIM cards. At te very bottom there is a menu item 'Link contacts' (translated from the dutch 'Contact verbinden'.
Next step is to select the SIM card and then you can select contacts to link to the selected SIM card. (Don't forget to press the 'Add contact' icon at the top-right after selecting the correct contacts, instead of the checkmark at the top-left.......)


How to full root a stock-root only Android device?

You can push super su APK to /system/app and run the boot patching script manually but please make sure bootloader isn't locked and make a backup.


Well there is a way.. but even if you have your keyboard always open, you'll have to press on the text box of the other app after using youtube to bring it in focus.
If you still want to have it opened always then you can use "Automate" app..
Just set a gesture(quick tiles or button combination) to trigger the "always on keyboard" and set the action..
Comment if you have any doubt..


Bootloader/BIOS, flashing ROM and correlated risks. Why Android devices are more brickable than PCs?

SHORT ANSWER:

Android phones are more brickable than PCs because they can hardly communicate with us if the bootloader is erased. And bootloader(s) live on Flash memory (eMMC) partitions which are prone to deletion quite easily (even during an update process). If you unluckily damage these partitions or they are worn out, there is a great chance you won't be able to communicate with device ever afterwards.
See Boot Process: Android vs. Linux and Android Device Partitions and Filesystems for details.

LONG ANSWER:

A device is considered bricked if we are unable to communicate with it. Now let's see how we communicate with devices at very lower level - say - when there is no Operating System installed or it gets corrupted/erased accidentally.

PERSONAL COMPUTERS:

There is a standardization in PC world. BIOS is a mature firmware that provides a well developed platform to communicate with the system. It has ability to enumerate the hardware i.e. load basic hardware including motherboard, CMOS/NVRAM, RAM, hard drive, optical drive, graphics card and screen, keyboard, mouse, network card, and other peripherals connected to USB.
During Power On Self Test (POST), BIOS identifies all above said hardware by communicating at all internal and external buses whose paths are hard-coded with BIOS, sending them a signal like who is where?
UEFI - an evolution of BIOS - overcomes the limitations of 16-bit operation mode and maximum 1MB RAM usage. It's a minimal OS in itself which can even recognize and use filesystems, providing a better user interface, more configurable boot options and support for larger disk drives.

After this initialization of system, BIOS/UEFI reads bootsectors/bootloaders from bootable media like hard drives, USB storage or even network. It means that a PC is able to communicate with us even if there is no hard drive installed; it'll inform us: No bootable media detected. It's because BIOS/UEFI is stored on Electrically Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory (EEPROM that evolved from ROM, PROM and EPROM) connected to motherboard. If you somehow manage to erase or damage this EEPROM, yes your PC will also be bricked but that's rare.

ANDROID DEVICES:

Now coming to Android devices, hardware components are not connected to motherboard through buses, instead the core components that include CPUs, GPU, RAM, Flash/eMMC (equivalent of HDD or SSD), WiFi and bluetooth module, USB connectivity, UART (serial ports), JTAG (a very lower level serial communication protocol), GPS, modems (for cellular connectivity) are all built on a single System on Chip (SoC). Most of these components are not discoverable by SoC firmware (roughly equivalent of BIOS/UEFI) unless a Device Tree is loaded by final bootloader (e.g. ABOOT) into device memory i.e. just before kernel (OS) is loaded. And if you have no OS on the device, you are just depending on the minimal communication protocols provided by bootloader(s). At this stage only a few hardware components (usually graphics, NAND and some way of serial communication) are working, and that too with limited functionality.

Manufacturers may provide protocols at pre-bootloader or bootloader level e.g. Download Mode (QFIL / QPST / Qualcomm HS-USB QDloader 9006 and 9008 modes; PS: I don't know much about MTK or other SoC vendors), Fastboot, Odin etc. But these - Service Modes; what they call it - are disabled by OEMs for security reasons and as a part of their business strategies. Some manufacturers allow unlocking these service modes at user's risk after special approvals. Some hacks may also be used e.g. finding some test points on main board, shortening USB wires, using JIGs etc.
Lower level communication protocols e.g. JTAG are for development purpose only and those are almost impossible to be discovered and used for repairing purpose, though the same would have been possibly used for initial writing of firmware (including bootloaders) to flash memory. Some hacking tools like eMMC Flasher boxes/adapters may also use similar protocols for IMEI unlocking and other "black" stuff ;)
Also there have been successful attempts to boot Android from USB / UART ports but that's very rare now a days and requires a lot of technical knowledge and hacking skills.

All of these methods used to unbrick devices are not officially supported by most of the vendors, vary from vendor to vendor (not standardized) and are poorly documented for end user's usage.
That's why Android devices (or generally saying devices with embedded components) are more brickable than PCs.

RELATED:

Can I flash Android on device with overwritten mmcblk0?

SOURCES:

Device trees I: Are we having fun yet?
Android vs. PC

See Also:

Why mobile phone manufacturers lock their devices?


Need to upgrade from Android ver. 4.4.4 to Android ver. 5.0 with unlocked bootloader

Actually it's possible to relock the bootloader, using Flashtool. The process can be found on this XDA Forum post.

Download Flashtool from www.flashtool.net
Start Flashtool and click on BLU button
You will be asked to connect device in flash mode
Once you connect the device you will get a prompt to "Relock"
Click on it and when prompted disconnect the device


HTC update.zip is encrypted and does not respect the standard file layout. META-INF is missing, content is:
info.bin
zip_0.zip
zip_1.zip
zip_2.zip
zip_3.zip
zip_4.zip
zip_5.zip
zip_6.zip

Therefore this file can only flashed from stock recovery.


Google Maps timeline feature not working - says "Can't connect to Maps, try again"

Sometimes it gets disconnected internally.
So the app is non-functional.

You can always uninstall then reinstall the app.
That will reconnect it internally.

I see chatter in the comments about locations and time zones but that is not in the question, so my answer stands as written.


Setting the Alarm Clock's Bluetooth volume

You need to adjust the volume of the alarm once you connect your BT speakers. In Android, the volume of audio is determined by two mostly orthogonal things: the first is the type of the audio (it's called stream type), so you have separate volume settings for media, ringtones, alarms, etc; the second is the kind of the output device: built-in speaker, headphones, BT headset, USB, etc.

You might have noticed that media volume for the phone speaker and headphones is controlled separately. The same thing is for BT sound output.


Is it possible to run android without a screen on plain phone mainboard?

If you can prepare the phone before removing the screen with Tasker (or similar tool) and plugins like Autoinput and test it well, I think you can obtain the results you are looking for.

Run and install android from USB it is going to be (if possible) a very tricky mess.

Nonetheless, if you are able to put the phone in download mode you could be able to work on this topic too.


No, you can't.

Knox creates a secure and encrypted container  for your work profile. Once created it separates the information stored in your working profile and encrypts it.

The working profile is not accessible from outside its container, unless you enter a given key

The Knox flag is set because

You or someone else rooted the device previously or
Something went wrong while OTA


Based on quick research of the package name com.mgoogle.android.gms, looks like it is a MicroG package used by YouTube Vanced.
The installation of this package is suggested by the official YouTube Vanced for non-root users if they want to add and login with a Google account.

Download & Install MicroG!
Download and install MicroG for YouTube Vanced in order to be able to connect your google account with YouTube.
If you don't install MicroG package, "add account" button will not work.

The renaming of the package is to prevent any conflicts with existing Google services.


Conclusion

This is a programming error within the HTC Music app (based on the package id). The best option is to report this error to the developers using the force close dialog.

More details

As a programmer I recognize the nullpointer exception thrown in the HtcMusicFragment at line 8905. The package (and class name) indicate that this is an app from HTC for Music playing.

Since this code is closed there is no reason to look further into this yourself, even if you had the knowledge. Let's say it would be perfectly possible to decompile the app (it isn't) and fix the nullpointer even then you wouldn't be able to replace the app on your phone since this is a vendor app. That is without root.

If you want to read about the nullpointer exception try this link https://stackoverflow.com/questions/218384/what-is-a-null-pointer-exception In short there is a method called on an object that hasn't been initialized properly. It's up to the programmer to check for these kind of issues.

My advice

Go get a better music app on the google play store.


Is it possible to determine whether a purchased phone has a new battery?

If the battery is user replaceable, you can check the production number on that and try to decode battery date. I don't know if the manufacturer numbering scheme is standardised or if the app can be trusted to decipher, so I would suggest the alternative below.
Edit  Accubattery Pro gives you an indication of estimated Vs actual capacity . I have no idea how accurate it is but surely can be indicative
A reliable indicator is the battery capacity, since capacity reduces with age. A battery, even if not used loses it's capacity to hold charge, significantly, over a period of time. You can refer to question for details
How to determine maximum capacity of a battery in mAh? - received fake battery
If device is rooted, you can check if information here helps  /sys/class/power_supply/battery/


Unable to copy certain backed-up folders from PC to new microSD card

If your Windows ask you for admin permissions something is wrong - this should never happen as you just copied it from the other SD card.

Anyway copying and SD card file by files is IMHO not a good idea because the Windows Explorer does usually hide certain files.

Therefore I recommend to use a backup tool or alternatively use a compression program like 7Zip/WinZip/WinRAR and zip the whole source SD card to one file on your hard disk.

Then switch to the new SD-Card and restore the backup respectively decompress the created archive to the new SD card.

Edit: Note that a lot of SD cards on the market are "fake SD cards": Their controller has been manipulated to make the SD card look larger than it is (e.g. the card has 16GB flash memory but tells the Smartphone/PC it has 128GB). Writing to such a card will earlier or later end in a total disaster. Therefore I strongly recommend you to test any new SD card before using it. One of the best tools I know for doing so is a small Windows tool named h2testw (Language German and English). It writes files with a special pattern to the SD card until it is full and then reads it and tests if the pattern of every file is correct.


recent change to messages app for emoji and birthday cake icons

Root your phone.
No need to worry
And change these fonts from another device where they show well

/system/fonts/NotoColorEmoji.ttf
/system/fonts/AndroidEmoji.ttf

Set their permissions to chmod 0644 -rw-r--r-
They will be back to normal or if you can install twrp or any other custom recovery i can send you a whole Fonts.zip flashable via recovery to fix this issue


Galaxy alpha strange touchscreen "feature" in file explorer

It is calle Touch Screen Hoverings or Air View.
This is a feature in new Samsung Phones. For more infor you can look at the documentation on the Samsung Website here.

Hope my answer helps!


Determine what APPS are Android Auto Compatible

There is a special category in Google Play Store that lists apps ready for Android Auto:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/collection/promotion_3001303_android_auto_all
If you have an APK and want to check if it is ready for Android Auto you can look at it's AndroidManifest.xml file inside the APK. It should contain an entry like this:
<meta-data android:name="com.google.android.gms.car.application" android:resource="...."/>

For more details see Add support for Android Auto to your media app.


How can I determine USB host controller type

I was told i would not have permissions to comment here?!? Therefore here my comment.

Perhaps you could have a look on what additional cables are available for your device. If you want it to be usb master there's a universal cable that works well. But if you want hdmi connection, make sure you take a samsung adapter for your samsung device, the standardized version won't work, samsung has it's own protocol there.


How can I rename a removable SD card, or create a folder on it. Permission Denied

It sounds like you formatted the card using your computer, or another device. It seems like now your Android device doesn't have proper permissions to write to the card. You can fix this by formatting the card. If you don't want to format the card, just run this on Ubuntu or another linux based system:

sudo chmod -r o+w /path/to/sdcard

This will recursively give everyone permission to write to the card. If the card is empty, you probably just need to apply this to the root directory, with no recursion:

sudo chmod o+w /sdcard/root


Are modified boot images for rooting OS specific?

Boot.img has the kernel
 and ramdisk
 in it (linked answers explain what they do). They are the  first components that boot your device and subsequently OS comes into picture

Some reasons not to flash the boot.img meant for one OS on to another OS:

Hardware is usually different and so are the drivers for it. Which means hardware components may fail to function in the absence of drivers. Worst case, your device may be unusable (say your display drivers don't work)
Security Kernels are updated with latest security patches and flashing older kernel would make you vulnerable
Encryption In the instant case you are talking of Marshmallow and Oreo. They have major differences in the way OS boots and in the way encryption is done. Marshmallow has Full Disk Encryption which has been replaced by File encryption from Nougat onwards. See this for details. So your device likely would fail boot

These are few things that are on top of the mind. In short don't


Apps stay in background even after turning the phone off

That is the default behavior of Android from Lollipop onwards. See this blog which talks of that ( Recents (or Overview)). It is only a list of apps that you used is shown and it doesn't mean that these are running after reboot, so it shouldn't be a concern (unless you want to hide some app or web page that you visited). You can check running apps from settings and you would see that these are fewer than what you see in the overview

Only on earlier versions they would be cleared on reboot


They are included in Android. The correct settings are determined by your SIM MCC and MNC (Mobile Country Code and Mobile Network Code). If you want, you can view the list of preset APNs by looking at the source code, for example at android-source-browsing.

The file name in this case is /etc/apns-full-conf.xml, but apparently it varies.


"Avoided poor Internet connection" even though signal strength, speed is great

Figured it out...go to the WiFi settings, hit the menu key and choose "Advanced", and uncheck "Avoid poor connections".


How do I unlock an Optimus T? Is there a "vanilla" firmware I can use?

Unfortunately it appears your only option is an unlock code, I've just done a search.  This XDA thread has a couple ways to get into the unlock screen so you can enter the code.

Your options for get the unlock code are to ask the carrier the phone is locked to -- they might give it to you if they're feeling nice -- or to buy it online.  There are no reputable sellers of unlock codes online, of course, but you could search around and find someone whose experience seems reliable and use the same service that they did.


Looking for an app to update/sync all services on demand

Settings -> Accounts and sync -> Sync All (bottom left). This will sync every app that register there, like Facebook, Twitter, Gmail and Google+, but not all the apps.


You have to go to the store where you bought it so they can have it checked. Maybe the battery must not be totally drained. Have them checked your phone since it still has warranty if you just bought it few months ago.


Yes, there is. The first one coming to mind (forgive me, it looks like this is one of my standard answers here meanwhile) is Tasker, the most complete automation tool for Android. It lets you define actions based on events; so for your case, you could let the event Hardware -> Camera button pressed trigger the action "Display off".

You want to turn it on again the same way -- so simply make it two "profiles", and combine two events: "Camera button pressed" & "State -> Display: On" (with the "task" to turn the display off), and with "Display: Off" the other way round.

Remark: There's a 7 day trial version available on the developers website, so you don't need to buy Tasker straight away without being able to test it. As soon as you've got everything configured, export your configuration. So if after those 7 days you still cannot decide whether to buy, simply uninstall Tasker, install it again, and import your configuration. Before you hit me: That's what the developer himself wrote, so nothing illegal.


I can only hear Music and Blurry voices while listening songs with headphones

Based on your comment, I think you have to use the same type of headphones that came with your phone for perfect operation, or keep on trying different ones until you're lucky. This problem occurs in some phones of brands like Xiaomi etc.


How to smart read PDF files in android on a mobile screen?

You can use @Voice Read Aloud app from the Play Store. Using @Voice Read Aloud app you can read aloud the text displayed in Android apps, e.g. web pages, news articles, long emails, TXT, PDF, DOC, DOCX, RTF, OpenOffice document files and more.

Note: You need Text-To-Speech engine and voices installed on your device to use this app. You may use more than one if you want.


Assuming you are not doing Android development, you do not need to worry about Android version.

Any serious security-minded application like Chrome on Android will use TLS 1.2. You can verify this for yourself by going to a secure website (make sure it supports TLS 1.2!) and inspecting the certificate and protocol used on the client. I have checked this on Chrome on a 4.4 Android device, and it uses TLS 1.2.

A security policy should basically rely on the TLS version, and not pay attention to what kind of client is running it. It's not worthwhile to determine the Android OS version, because the Android OS version is not what finally determines the security used.

Let's be pedantic about enumerating the possibilities.

Android API 20+: All browsers and applications should work with TLS 1.2
Android API 16-19: Some browsers and applications will work with TLS 1.2.
Android API 15-: I think we are not discussing these because no version supports TLS 1.2

Here are the server choices I think we are discussing:

You allow only TLS 1.2 and do not check Android version. All Android API 20+ clients, and those Android API 16-19 clients using TLS 1.2 applications are expected to work.
You allow TLS 1.2, 1.1, 1.0 and do not check Android version. All Android clients are expected to work. System is less secure.
You allow only TLS 1.2 and check the Android version. Only Android API 20+ clients can work because you are excluding API 16-19. This is fewer supported clients than in option 1, with no increase in TLS security. So this option does not make sense.
You allow TLS 1.2, 1.1, 1.0 and check the Android version. Only Android API 20+ clients are expected to work because you are excluding API 16-19. This option does not make sense because you are making the system both less usable and less secure than other options. Fewer clients will work than under option 1, and those clients will be less secure.

Checking the Android version makes your system support fewer clients, at no increase in security. Therefore, do not bother checking the Android version.

The basic security tradeoff is always how usable a system is versus how secure the system is. This applies to physical security measures, cipher suites, TLS versions, and more. TLS 1.1 and 1.0 are not as secure as TLS 1.2. You have to answer the following questions for yourself:

Do the vulnerabilities in present in TLS 1.1 and 1.0 make them unsuitable for your system?
Would using only TLS 1.2 be worth the tradeoff in some people not being able to use your system?


Is it possible to implement Android N (Preview Version) on new Lenovo Moto G4 Plus?

You can't install a firmware on a device that it isn't made for. This will (permanently) brick the device.

However, there is an Xposed module called Android N-ify that will make your phone look like Android N. Root access is required.


It looks to me like your device has had encryption enabled on it. If that's the case, you'll have to have the encryption password before you can root it. Was this device issued by your work? I doubt it came encrypted by default, since it adds overhead. I could be wrong though- this is a bit out of my depth too.


There are a some apps available which would answer your question. The probably best ones include...

NoSignalAlert, which not only alerts you when you lost the signal, but also provides a log1 of those events, and lets you even browse those "dead zones" on a map and display the collected log information along2

OpenSignalMaps, offering similar features, and giving you the ability to show nearby cells3 (so if your signal is low, and you want to have a conversation, you can move in the right direction4 for a stronger signal)

If you are primarily interested in mapping signal quality, Antennas might be worth a look as well5. It can export collected data to KML, so you can display it in Google Maps / Google Earth on your computer as well.

Then there also is already mentioned RF Signal Tracker, again rather interesting for mapping6, which additionally tracks Wifi signal

Last but not least: G-NetTrack is also good for mapping8 of daily routes and the like.

What might be of even more interest to you is how to automatically react on a weak signal in order to save some juice. If so, I recommend you taking a look at the question What is Cell standby and how can I keep it from eating my battery? (and of course its answer).


So there are many different threads and posts all over the internet trying to solve this issue for various Android devices. It seems that sometimes these work, but not always. I think I've finally found a step that works most of the time (it excludes hardware issues for example). Start off with your device connected.

Essentially, there is an issue with the driver on Windows. To fix this open the device manager (see here for how to do this on Windows 7 or Vista, here for XP and here for Windows 8). Now, at this point most posts and threads advocate finding anything mentioning your device (in my case the nexus 7) and uninstalling the driver. This seems to be the right thing to do, but first there is a very important step. At the top, click "View" and then select "Show hidden devices". Now, you can find all mentions of your device. Right click, and select "Uninstall driver". If there is a tick box for deleting the driver as well you should select this.

After completion, disconnect your device. The device manager will flash. Give it a few seconds and then plug your device back in. Windows will now reinstall the driver. At this point, it should work correctly.

Note that if you use ADB, you will have uninstalled this in a previous step and will have to reinstall it using your preferred method.


After doing some more research specially on Xposed itself, found out this way of booting is a fail-safe option to disable Xposed Framework at boot time which seems to be a feature of the framework itself and have nothing to do with Android core. As mentioned in this thread:

  Xposed for the most part is STABLE and SAFE. However, installing an
  experimental module or an old module can cause a boot-loop. If this
  occurs, there is a fail-safe switch to disable Xposed and exit the
  boot-loop. To disable Xposed, tap one of the hardware buttons (the
  Power button or a Volume button) on your device, SEVERAL TIMES, during
  startup. This means that pressing the Volume Up button, for example,
  multiple times (during startup) will eventually disable Xposed and
  cause your device to boot.

It says to press ANY of hardware buttons several times, so i was pressing power button several times! That's it!

Note that you might need to reinstall the framework after disabling it using this method. Rebooting might not reload the framework again.


How to disable hidden trackers, in google play store applications

Root access needed

Both of these apps are likely using built in pm disable command in Android, which lets you to disable app's services, activities, receivers and providers (all of these can be done from command line too). Significant part of ads and tracking stuff can be disabled this way. Of course developer can hide whatever they want, so it won't be accessible through pm disable. Afaik it can disable only things mentioned in app's manifest. Also apps can reenable all of these back (I think I noticed such behavior only in system apps)

1) MyAndroidTools Pro  (which I use)
It has free and paid versions. Author was banned in Play Store, but you can still buy outdated version (1.5.1 instead of 1.6.0) on Amazon or find apk somewhere else..
App has convenient option to display component info after new app is installed/updated.
Developer made Xposed module to prevent apps reenabling components, but it was abandoned long time ago, so you'll have to check if it works for you.

(Click on image to enlarge it)

2) Lucky Patcher
Free app, also not in Play Store. Downside: developer started embedding ads (removed in current version) and analytics recently, which require excessive permissions.
To disable components:
Long tap on app in the list -> Change The App's Components -> Disable components 'pm disable' method (may be enabled by the application) -> Select components -> Apply


install MySQL or any other lite weight database?

Android comes with SQLite. That should be adequate for most applications.


Try just busybox ip link. Also, netcfg is capable of showing your MAC address.


Archiving old photos to Google Plus (off the phone, but accessible)

If you have a built in gallery app or file explorer delete the photos (locally) on the device via one of these apps (if not install an app to-do so) and then they should stay in the cloud if auto-backup is enabled and ran before deleting them.
This "should" work as it's worked with my phone... But I don't have a lot of experience with smart cameras...


Will a Factory Reset lock my phone (Samsung Galaxy S2) if it is unlocked, but factory locked?

A factory reset will not change the status of the phone with regards to "device lock" (Can I connect to other networks?) or to "bootloader lock" (Can I use custom ROMs?).


Can not receive WhatsApp messages unless I open the app

I just had this issue here with P10 - WhatsApp would not receive until opened or at least running in the background. Now it receives even if closed. I solved it by:
Settings > Search for setting > Ignore battery optimisation
If by 'Allowed' apps you don't see Whatsapp, click on the corner triangle for 'All apps', search for Whatsapp and 'Allow'


How can I remove myself as an admin of a group?

Long press the group chat and hit "Delete and exit group" - your chat will be deleted and you will be out of the group. Someone else will be auto-selected as the group-admin in your place.


No, flashing a ROM on your unlocked phone will not re-lock your device.  I have several unlocked phones which I flash ROMs on to without any issues.  The SIM code which operators use to limit what SIM cards will work in your device has nothing to do with the software running on that device.


Google assistant triggers in hindi language

Could this problem be solved by going into keyboard settings and update the language feature? Android keyboard that came with the phone vs. app keyboards can vary greatly.Google assistant is in the input method of Android settings....it depends on your phone model but i would check there .hope it helps