What do these screen mean black background yellow or blue with date and time?

Believe it is the flip cover, due to faulty hall sensor. Disable in settings (after reboot) seems to be the answer. According to this post, the setting can be disabled by going

Settings
Connected Devices
Smart cover
Off


Toggle between dark and light theme in Google Maps

You can change it from settings (to access settings, tap on the icon with user initial/user profile icon, next to microphone), then theme, wherein the same dialogue pops up, that you had initially to choose a theme.

Tested on Android 10 & 11, Maps version 10.62.1


Install WhatsApp on Android x86 virtual machine

There is no direct way for installing WhatsApp for virtual device from Google Playstore.

Android x86 doesn't come with all features (core features e.g play services, services framework etc) and SIM functionality is also missing.
The virtual device being treated as as "tablet" is incompatible, as WhatsApp states:

  Tablet devices are not supported

There are workarounds however to install it on the virtual device.


On my Samsung S5 how do i get my emails to stay in my in box until i delete them

Make sure your Email account is set up as IMAP (not POP3).

In theory POP3 downloads a single copy of the email to the device that requests it. In practive, i've noticed the same issue you described whereby Emails seem to disappear.

IMAP syncs a copy of the Email from the server to your device to ensure you can view the same mail on multiple devices.


How do I know if Odin is hang/error/stuck?

Don't EVER unplug your device while Odin is doing stuff. If it failed it will display an error after a little while


The default browser is being replaced by Chrome as of Android 4.1 for stock Android, so I doubt it will see any updates in the future.  If you want to use sites that have HTML5 features, you should install Chrome and use that (and by extension if you're targeting Android devices with a web app, you should be targeting Chrome).


What are important things to look for when choosing firmware?

Stability
Battery life

You should be able to get an idea from reviews/comments/etc. about how well each ROM performs in those areas.  For an eReader that's really all you need.


Wi-Fi cannot turn on! Accidentally deleted /etc/wifi folder

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


Cyanogenmod 10.1 becomes unstable with usage?

I wouldn't run the "Addon Apps" like "RAM Manager" or the "Seeder" script. I am not sure if you are using those, but the RAM manager could cause instability because it forces applications to close to "free ram".

The need to free RAM is a myth, if an application kills other apps, to free up some RAM, the OS will find something else to fill that RAM. Android does not want free RAM, it sees free RAM as wasted RAM.

As for "Seeder", if you are running that, I would either try updating, if you don't have the latest, or fresh install official CM without this script. Even the developer of this is acknowledging that it has been causing instability, like locking and reboots.

The biggest issue, really, that I see is that you are trying CM 10.1 on a device that has not been supported by CM for some time. This device's last official build was CM 7.2. So another reason you are seeing instability is because you are trying to run a version of Android on hardware that really doesn't support it. The CM team usually only drops support for a device when they can no longer get the latest builds to run on the device.


Is there a way to tell my phone to prefer some SSIDs above others?

I don't believe there is anything built-in for this, although some manufacturers may have added such a feature.  There appear to be several apps that will do this.

I've always just manually edited /data/misc/wifi/wpa_supplicant.conf myself (root required).  (Note that there are different files/locations for different devices.)


Applications not installed but still taking up phone memory

If an installation fails, the downloaded .apk might still be left in /data/local (where the Playstore app downloads it to). In that case, a simple boot should clear it up.

As your device is rooted, you also could use a file manager to check that location, and manually delete the corresponding file.

One more hint: To avoid the "insufficient memory" / "insufficient storage" error (see: insufficient-memory, hover you mouse over the tag and select the "info" link for more details), which also might be responsible for failed installations, you will need at least 25MB free space on "internal storage" / "phone storage" (that is, this amount should be available when the installation has finished).


Samsung s-planner as interface to google calendar, miss 3-day layout

If you have saved the previous version's .apk, you can re-instate it. That's why I have AppMonster Pro Backup Restore installed and running: it captures each and every .apk installed, so I can always revert to a previous version.

If you don't have the old .apk available, and you are talking about a free app, you can check Android Drawer for a previous version's .apk. Download it, make sure you have unknown-sources enabled in your settings, and launch the .apk e.g. from a file explorer. This should install the (old version of the) app without you losing any data.


Phone seems to have WiFi connection, but loses connection to internet

A couple of days ago, Cat came out with a system update for my phone. One of the items was something about fixing WiFi issues. It seems to be working!


What difference does it make that I have two SD cards

By the sound of it, its like as if the handset is in fact a 16GB model variant, if so, then the so-called sdcard is treated as internal storage i.e. sdcard, and the external SDCard is symbolically linked to extSdCard.

That is the way Google are doing it now, and doing away with having external SDCard's... :)

No its not true that one is "more" important than the other, its just a way of increasing internal storage capacity for apps and media etc, the external SDCard acts as a "overflow" bucket once the storage space on the internal sdcard gets maxed out.


Samsung Galaxy S3 WiFi authentication error with A&TT U-Verse router

Easy fix.  Don't use your wi-fi password.  Use the Wireless Key #.  I have been trying over and over with my personal password and kept getting the same authentication errors everyone has been discussing with u-verse.  I pulled the paperwork that the installation guy gave me and just taking a last resort shot at it, I tried the Wireless Key # written on the paperwork.  It connected immediatley...

This reportedly also works with the Verizon branded Samsung Galaxy S III. Their 2nd level support only suggests factory resetting which won't help. Only the above mentioned technique does


Android SDK ( Software Development Kit )
According to the vague documentation on the link you provided, it requires the Android SDK because this will install a system-wide ADB.exe program that can be accessed via the command adb ...

Using ADB ( Android Debug Bridge ) you can run your software on any supported Android device that has USB Debugging enabled.

You must install a system-wide ADB, many custom built installers have been made for this, so many that Android ( Google ) - ( NASA ) Has released an ADB installer of their own, so I'm sure that using the official installer would be the recommended way of installing ADB.

After installing ADB on your development machine, you can now connect to Android device's using USB Debugging ( Testing and debugging your apps in Android Studio or another IDE like Unity via USB - { Universal Serial Bus } )

To accept ADB connections on your test device, you'll need to enable USB Debugging in Development Options.

To do that,

Open Settings
Open About ( or More -> About )
Find Build Number ( Sometimes in a sub directory )
Tap ( Build Number ) 7 times - You should see it confirm the process to enable Development Options.
Navigate Back to Settings
Navigate to Development Options
Find & Enable USB Debugging

P.S, if you don't have a correct installation you'll get ( Device Not Found - or Similar )

After enabling USB Debugging open a command window on your development computer and test the ADB install by running adb devices

Windows
Hold Shift and right click on a blank space in any folder or on the desktop, it should say "Open a command window here", click on that.

( Search CMD and open it, Right click start, etc.... )

Mac - Not sure, I use PC.

After you have run adb devices you should see either a found device, or a message to indicate otherwise.

If your device returns ( offline ) you'll need a different ADB installation that has the configuration files alongside it, it'll ask for authentication and you'll have to accept it on the device screen, after you have an Authorised connection to the device via ADB you can test the remote software in Unity.

SO THAT'S A.D.B INSTALLED
If you don't find your device after you are sure you have a successful installation ( the ADB files might be accessed from a specific location or subdirectory of the Android SDK installation, and might not be system wide.. You need to place the ADB files inside the correct installation directory of the Android SDK, as-if it was installed by the Android SDK installer.

If not, install the entire Android SDK ( 1-2GB  )

After you've completed the Android SDK installation you need to be sure that you have installed the ADB driver for your device, to handle USB Debugging via a USB Cable or ( Network ADB is another option ) .

Usually you can select the option to install your driver on Windows by setting the connection method on the Android

It should load as a CD-ROM and have the software you need to install ADB Driver's on your machine.

...

After installing the ADB driver once, it seems to work on nearly all Android device's when they're connecting via USB Debugging ( so I'll call it a universal driver for all Android device's )

Once you've successfully installed ADB Drivers and ADB . .

Enable USB Debugging in Development Options
Connect your device via MTP or USB Storage, charge only will not use ADB, neither will PTP... Test a few.
Authorise the computer to connect
Open Unity
Test the Remote Software


I managed to minimize the problem by using the "do not disturb" feature.
By "minimize" I mean that if I am using the phone the popup will still show up, otherwise it wont mess it's battery (neither show up).
I can allow all exceptions least "reminders" apparently.
Obs.: "do not disturb" is not 100%, I think about 10% of the times it will still allow that abusive popup to keep the screen ON for many hours!

The simToolkit app package "com.android.stk" (which I found out using Brevent), is called "Serviços TIM" and seems to be a mirroed/dup (???) package from the default simToolkit.

My next step (as soon that popup annoys me enough) is to try to uninstall that package by using this tip by @Izzy, thx!
How to remove the SIM Toolkit from my phone? (Without root or flashing any ROM)

adb uninstall failed
Uninstall via adb without root
How to disable Google Apps in Mi Phones
Did it finally:

adb shell pm list packages |grep stk

adb shell pm path com.android.stk
adb pull /system/app/Stk/Stk.apk # to backup it just in case

adb shell pm path com.android.stk2
adb pull /system/app/Stk2/Stk2.apk # ...

adb shell pm uninstall -k --user 0 com.android.stk
adb shell pm uninstall -k --user 0 com.android.stk2


Turn down app volume in Lollipop while not in app?

The only way I'm aware of to set media volume outside of an app is to go into the Settings. Specifically, Settings → Sound & notification should give you separate sliders for each of the available volume channels. You'll want to turn down the top one ("Media volume").

On some custom ROMs it may be possible to do this slightly differently. Older versions of CyanogenMod had an option to expand the volume slider overlay, so you could hit the volume button and then manually adjust the appropriate slider from the overlay without having to go into your settings. Other ROMs may include something similar, but I cannot state definitively any that do.

As an aside: I'm not sure that this is unique to Lollipop. I believe it's been like this for a while (as long as I can remember, anyway).


If you're talking about Audio here (e.g. having notifications, alarms, etc. sent to your (Bluetooth) headset), you might wish to take a look at SoundAbout:

SoundAbout settings screens (source: Google Play; click images for larger variants)

This app allows you to define which audio signal is routed where (even on certain conditions). I'm not sure how far the free version goes concerning Bluetooth, as the app description says Bluetooth behavior - (Pro version). To my understanding, those "behavior settings" only include specifics like "force to mono", but I don't use the app myself, and thus cannot tell for sure.


Can somebody explain how multi-user is implemented in android 4.4

It works in a very similar way to how one user's apps are isolated from each other. Whereas apps' private data used to be stored in /data/data, now it's stored in /data/users/n, where n is the ID of the user profile. Each user gets their own directory, and each app that user uses gets a directory within that. POSIX file system permissions protect the data directories, not only from other apps, but also from other users.

Because Android uses the existing POSIX process, UID, and file system security mechanism, the same way it does for different apps, the implementation is already secure without needing anything special at the OS level, or a more complicated (and thus battery-hungry) solution such as virtualization. Virtualization would work poorly for this anyway: providing virtualized access to the network, Bluetooth, NFC hardware, etc. such that all users could control it would add a lot of unnecessary complexity to the driver stacks.

When both users run the same app (such as the launcher), there are actually two instances of that app. They share one APK file, but they have two separate processes running under different POSIX user IDs, and they each look in their own data directory. This way, nothing they might write to is shared between the two users, but read-only parts (such as the app's executable code from the APK file) are shared, reducing RAM and storage use. Both instances might be running at once, and switching users just changes which one is the foreground app on the screen. Nothing needs to be reloaded or restarted.

This works the same way whether the app is a built-in one, or one installed by the user. There's an awkward side-effect of that: when one user upgrades an app, the upgrade affects all users, even if the new version needs more permissions.

Only apps with the INTERACT_ACROSS_USERS permission are special. Such apps get access to APIs within the Android framework to look at all the users' data directories at once. The lock screen is an example of such an app: in one instance, it needs to be able to read each user's settings and profile picture, in order to show the "switch users" GUI.


All my research tells me mainly **No**. There are ways of doing this on older Windows Mobile Phones, and on full-fat x86 Windows tablets (not 'RT'), but there seem to be no ways of doing so on Windows 7/8 phones for levels early-adopter or higher. The reason for the unusual wording of the previous sentence is that I am almost positive that this is doable, but would require some serious, pioneer-level hardware/software chops, as very few people have a motivation to make this work.

For Google and Microsoft, the conflict is obvious. Each would rather you buy a phone from their partners, and then use their services. Android phone geeks would likely consider it not worth the effort, as they would have to illegally hack the Windows phone to figure it out (their internal bits are proprietary), and Android devices of almost any category can now be had for less than $200. Windows phone geeks face the proprietary thing, plus they would rather you use Windows Phone OS.

The last time I saw a real effort to port Android to a device less popular than IOS and Windows Desktop was the HP Touchpad running WebOS. This was a 10' tablet selling for $99 in a fire sale, when most/all other tablets cost $400+. So there was a real value motive involved.

If your phone is "Windows Mobile", (read: several years old), there likely are ways of installing older versions of Android on it. But most of them are device-specific, so I would need to know more to help you out.

Bottom line: probably not worth the effort, even on the outside chance that I could send you a list of instructions that a non-professional could understand and carry out.


How to delete gmail contacts from contacts app in Gingerbread

Depends on the firmware, but try this:

While viewing contacts select menu button and then More
Display Options
Under "Select contacts to display" uncheck the Gmail contacts.


Short answer
No, because WhatsApp doesn't officially support multiple accounts.
Longer Answer
It's technically possible, but you'll need two different versions of WhatsApp. Customised ('modded') versions of WhatsApp exist, and if you install both the official version and a reliable unofficial version, you can in fact have two WhatsApp numbers on the same phone.
However, you shouldn't do this if you're concerned about privacy because the unofficial versions of WhatsApp aren't vetted by any authority and might compromise your device.
Furthermore, there always remains a possibility the unofficial version will simply stop working, because WhatsApp doesn't like them and has begun cracking down on them. There are even (unsubstantiated, and later refuted) rumours that WhatsApp will permanently ban users of unofficial clients.
Instead of installing an unofficial version, you can edit the build.prop file to make it appear as if two copies of WhatsApp are completely different applications but you will definitely run into issues later on as both will try to save messages and media to the /sdcard/WhatsApp folder, resulting in conflicts and confusion.


Install multiple user accounts on kitkat 4.4.2

Some phones and tablets do not have the multiple user feature, which means that this feature is disabled by manufacturer. The feature can be enabled by installing "Multi Users for Phone" module on Xposed Framework, which needs root. This works for Tablets too, and works for Android 4.4.2 KitKat (I am not sure if it works on other versions).

Steps on how to do this:

Root device (Required)
Backup data (Recommended)
Download Xposed Installer
Install Xposed Framework
Go to Modules and search "Multiuser"
It listes "Multi Users for phone" in "Not Installed" Category, click that
Swipe left to Versions and download the latest version
Install the Module, Activate and Reboot

Tada! To edit Users, go to Settings and Users.


"Low on space" warning with over 50% free

Alright, finally got it after spending a while digging through Android forums.

This thread explains how to clear the /cache partition. After doing that, this thread explains several ways to get the update to trigger again. The one that worked for me was to temporarily set the date one year in the past.


GPS and icons on the Android notification bar

To see what the device thinks is your current location, you can simply open the pre-installed maps/navigation app (if there is any; usually Google Maps comes pre-installed). If there is none pre-installed, simply install one from the playstore. Or check another GPS tool like e.g. GPS Status & Toolbox if you don't need a full-fledged "maps & navigation" app.

As for the status icon: this will only show when GPS is used (and not only "available"), i.e. when some app is accessing GPS to determine your current location. It has nothing to do with reception quality -- which, in case of GPS, is rarely location-dependent, but rather depends on other conditions such as clouds, trees, high buildings (all things which hinder the free view to the satellites).


I own a Moto X and I know that it has "two modes" of voice recognition: one activated at any time by the command "OK Google now", which appears on a black screen, and the other activated by the voice search button on search/Google now app.

Every voice command recognized on the black screen is done offline, but on the white screen it needs to reach Google to recognize the command. In this case download the offline language pack will save you some data and result in a faster command recognition, but you still need to be connected on the internet in order to do so.


How to charge the HTC One X with power-off / display-off

Sorry, Min, but that is a built in feature that I believe one cannot change. Could you cover up the screen with something at night or just turn it over?


How to re-install EAP 802.1x authentication methods?

I had a similar problem with the phone. The EAP method is greyed out with the sim option selected. I did however manage to change it after playing with it for some time. For reasons unknown, the option did eventually become available to me by just trying to modify the settings then exiting and repeating that process. Once the option becomes available it did not remain available for long. As far as I looked there is no current fix, I hope this works for you too.

Hope you come right with you problem.
Cheers


Google account was hacked: how do I get my phone working with my new account?

The hindsight version:

Factory reset protection is supposed to prevent thieves from stealing your phone and using it. To do this, the phone requires you to login with a Google account that was on the phone before the factory reset. Add the new account to the phone before the factory reset. Or, alternately, remove all accounts before the factory reset.


Bootloop and random restart issues in android (Gionee A1 plus)

Did it suddenly started to do weird things? Can you specify the cause.
As per the mentioned details, you need to flash stock firmware from SPFlash Tool(as you have a MTK device). You can google for your firmware. And flash it while your phone is in download mode.
I too have faced many bootlops while flashing roms. So I flash stock firmware and all good.


Add "scp" to "share via" or "send via" menu

Shareing is a feature the application needs to explicitly code for and then advertise to the system that it accepts share requests.  If you have an SCP app that you like but it is not offering the share feature try checking if the developer has a website with more information.  If you still have no luck try emailing the developer and asking for the feature.


Determining the cause of a strange "the other side can't hear me" issue

This doesn't really answer the question, so just for the record if anybody else has the same issue:

I don't know about other phones, but small Sony Ericssons have an interesting feature. They have small buttons in the corners of the screen. One of them is muting the microphone. And... as the user rises the phone to his ear, the screen that was turned off for the call turns on because the phone is moving, and the ear hits the mute button with an 50% chance. The other side swears and hangs the phone, so when I finally see the screen turning on again, the button and the mute sign isn't there yet.


Danger of increasing the vibration strength of phone

The problem is not the strength, but the direction. At least my Nexus 4 makes no noise if it vibrates while lying flat on the table. Lay it on the side, and it will wake the dead.

The axis of rotation should be paralell to the screen, not perpendicular. No amount of software will fix this hardware/design error.


Getting "???" and no permissions when using 'adb devices' on Linux

On your device, Go to Settings > About Device and repeatedly tap "Build Number" until it says you're a developer. Then go back to Settings and into Developer Options. Turn it on and check the box for USB debugging. Then Revoke USB debugging authorisations.
Now, connect your device, install its drivers if you haven't and type any ADB command. A message will popup on your device asking for authorization. Click Allow. Once you have done that, when you type adb devices it should say <device_id> device


Android Wear - Developed by Google Inc., an official adaptation of the pre-existing Android ecosystem for wearable devices.

Pros :

Developed by the same company that owns and contributes to Android,
therefore underlying compatibility and the promise of future updates.
More apps, due to the Google Play app store.
Deeper linkage with the Android ecosystem.

Cons :

Requires the usage of proprietary applications that aren't open sourced.
Alternatives don't (as of now) offer comparatively equal services as the proprietary apps.1

Pebble OS - Developed by Pebble Inc. for sole usage in their products

Pros :

Not limited to a single phone ecosystem
Doesn't require GApps to function properly.2

Cons :

Requires the usage of Pebble proprietary apps.3
No underlying compatibility baked into Android, therefore less capability and integration at a lesser level.
Lesser apps as compared to Android Wear.

Nucleus RTOS - Developed by Mentor Graphics.

Pros :

Supports various target CPU architectures.
Uses the FAT file system.
Doesn't require GApps to function properly.

Cons :

Closed source (source released only to customers)
No underlying compatibility baked into Android
No generalized app store for usage of various applications4
Limited in interaction with Android devices5

Android for watches - Unofficial modifications of Android for usage on smartphones6

Pros :

Access to the entire Google Play app store.
Gives most (if not all) features of Android on a smartphone.
Doesn't require GApps functionality

Cons :

No guaranteed updates.
Modifications aren't open source.
Less or no support/warranty from OEMs.

1: Wear support is baked into Google Play Services, and additionally requires the Android Wear app. With microG there's an open-source alternative to Play Services (see Android without Google: microG), but Wear support is not yet implemented as of 4/2016. It's in-the-works, though, so it might become available in the second half of 2016. Which would mean that currently "Android Wear" smartwatches are not an option for those preferring "Google-free systems" (without GApps). (note by Izzy)

2: According to Pebble support, their proprietary app relies on functionality of GApps. Quoting: *"Yes, the Pebble does use Google services." Nevertheless, I'm successfully using a Pebble Time Steel without GApps, having the FOSS replacement microG installed. (note by Izzy)

3: The pebble app is only available via Google Play Store. But even if you can side-load it from another source, in order to initialize and use your Pebble you are forced to create a Pebble account – via which, according to their TOS, again a lot of data are collected about your usage etc. No opt-out. (Quoting Pebble service: You will need to make a Pebble account using an email address. After you make the account, you can opt-out of sending analytics/diagnostics. ) This will be a show-stopper for the privacy aware, which for exactly that reason maybe even got rid of the GApps on their devices.  (note by Izzy)
As pointed out by Pebble service, you can alternatively use the open-source Gadgetbridge. Using that, you won't need a Pebble account, no data is sent to Pebble – but also no support for it by Pebble itself: *Please note, that if you go this route, we do not have support for it. I successfully initialized my Pebble Time Steel with Gadgetbridge, and also was able to upgrade the firmware and install a watchface. (note by Izzy)*

4: Most of the Nucleus watches don't even support installing apps. They come with a set of pre-installed apps and watch faces, which you rarely can modify. (note by Izzy)

5: Often only support a subset of notifications, e.g. missing to show those coming in via GCM. Some allow to control the Android devices camera – but usually that's all to expect. (note by Izzy)

6: Unofficial modifications are not licensed or recommended by Google, and such watches are now slowly deprecating in favor of Android Wear.


If you've tried to clear it from the apps settings for Dropbox and Google Drive, you'll find there are no defaults set, because the default is set with the app that opens the file, not the app you open it from. From Apps in the device settings, go to Office Suite Pro's settings, and click Clear defaults there.


Sim card not detected after installing CM13 (unofficial) on xperia l

Your baseband was messed up. Try to flash the stock ROM and don't flash CM13.

This happened on my Samsung Galaxy A3, when its baseband was messed up when I try to install it.


How to lock touchscreen without turning it off?

There is an application which does it pretty well.

Check out at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.argotronic.touchblocker


please help me in recovering my lost contacts on WhatsApp

The contacts would be safe if you have saved them either in your SIM or have backed up them in your Google Account. The main thing is whether you have a chat backup or not. If not, then I don't think there's any way you can get the chat back on your phone. If it is there (assuming that you have not deleted that backup) then you will get a prompt to install it when you are again logging in with your number.
A same instance happened with me and luckily I had a backup in My Drive account.


Stop Chrome auto closing when no tabs are left

I finally found a solution for removing this behavior. For me, turning off the toggle in Settings >> Home Page worked. It also removed another new behavior: showing Google home page when you start the browser. (it used to show the new tab page) It has a positive effect for me, but maybe not for anyone else, so be wary of that.


I would talk to FOMA.  I once got a data-only SIM from T-Mobile and my phone worked for a couple days, but then they disabled the SIM because they don't allow Android phones to be used without voice.  It's pretty stupid, but that might be the situation in your case as well.


How to fix Dead or Stuck pixels on my android phone using PC?

You asked how to fix it using your PC, so here's the steps to follow:

Load up Google Maps on your PC.
Search for phone repair shops.
Find a result that's easy to get to and take your phone there.
Tell them your phone screen is broken and needs replacing.

If this started with a new phone, you should instead take it back to where you bought it, tell them they sold you a faulty phone, and ask them to replace it for you. Your PC isn't involved in this case.


Xiaomi Poco F1 (with Pixel Experience) potentially bricked, this is all it can see. Any help?

if you're able to get into recovery mode then you'll be able to reset your device (if you're fine with losing your data). to do that, shut off your phone and hold power and volume up keys at the same time until you see the xiaomi or poco logo. once you're there, there will be an option to wipe data or reset. if resetting doesn't work, you can connect to ADB using a computer, and i assume if you have pixel experience installed you already have twrp or another custom recovery that lets you flash zip files, so you can either reflash or flash a different rom. good luck!


Samsung s7 edge message "previous setting restored"

This message was caused by the 'locations' edge panel. Disabling said panel stopped the message appearances.


How can I access my SanDisk sdcard from Linux Deploy

properties - Allow to mount the Android resources
properties - Edit the mount points list

$ANDROID_ROOT
/cache
$ANDROID_DATA
/su
$ANDROID_STORAGE/emulated
$ANDROID_STORAGE/4D47-9860

this result in
ubuntu@localhost:~$ df -a
Filesystem                                                     1K-blocks     Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/block/loop1                                                 3030800  1858236    998896  66% /
proc                                                                   0        0         0    - /proc
sys                                                                    0        0         0    - /sys
tmpfs                                                            1010636      740   1009896   1% /dev
tmpfs                                                            1010636        0   1010636   0% /dev/shm
devpts                                                                 0        0         0    - /dev/pts
/dev/block/platform/mtk-msdc.0/11120000.msdc0/by-name/system     2483744  2045332    422028  83% /system
/dev/block/platform/mtk-msdc.0/11120000.msdc0/by-name/cache       245679     2165    226311   1% /cache
/dev/block/platform/mtk-msdc.0/11120000.msdc0/by-name/userdata  11608792  8786360   2789664  76% /data
/dev/block/loop0                                                   92656     8064     82628   9% /su
/data/media                                                     11608792  8786360   2789664  76% /storage/emulated
/mnt/media_rw/4D47-9860                                         31150720 25943968   5206752  84% /storage/4D47-9860
ubuntu@localhost:~$

on android 4.2.2 the paths differ
$ANDROID_ROOT
/cache
$ANDROID_DATA
$EXTERNAL_STORAGE
$SECONDARY_STORAGE

this will bind mount all android partitions into linux chroot container
(the latter one is your external MicroSD card)
/system
/cache
/data
/storage/sdcard0
/storage/sdcard1


Whatsapp - last time seen online - what does it mean?

A single green tick mark indicates the Whatsapp servers have got your message.
A double green tick mark indicates that the recipient's device has got your message.

However, it doesn't automatically mean that the user has read or seen the message.

The last seen online may merely indicate that the user may have been talking to someone on the contact list or been in the Whatsapp application for any reason like adjusting settings etc.

No guarantee that the user has read your message.

Taken from http://www.whatsapp.com/faq/en/general/20951546


Getting signature error while installing a different version of the app

Ultimately found an answer to the query and how to solve it.

The first is how to delete a system application completely?
These are the following steps

$ adb root  - To start adbd with root privileges.

$ adb shell - To interact with the phone system directly.

$ pm uninstall --user 0 <package>.apk - To uninstall the package from the root    user  is any package you want to remove from the system.

These few steps may remove the whole package but in my case it was different as it  left behind few files from the previous built app. So these were the steps that I followed :

$ adb shell mount -o rw,remount /system - This would remount the system as read-write. Originally /system is a read-only folder so you can't edit directly.

$ adb shell rm -r /system/<package>.apk - This would remove the apk and there won't be anything left from the previous built.
Why I couldn't edit the /data/system/packages.xml file?

The answer to this is that though I can edit it with vim but it kept reverting back to the previous unedited form. This was happening because it was updating the information from /system/app files. Thus, editing it went in vain.

Refer to the following links that actually helped me out

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/6066030/read-only-file-system-on-android

https://www.besttechie.com/remove-preloaded-software-from-android/


Disable or change audio ducking (lowering)?

Not sure on 8.1 .. but on 5.1 it's the following.

1 - Sound & Notification Settings > Interruptions

2 - Disable Interruptions on specific apps or all together


Root Terminal command to kill or stop a service?

Your suggested approach would have the same result: a few seconds later, the app would be back. Tasker kills it again. Start at the beginning. This vicious circle will certainly help you drain your battery faster -- but nothing else.

Two possible solutions would include either to uninstrall the app, or to disable the "listener" it established to get started on certain events. The latter can be done by e.g. Autorun Manager PRO (yes, this requires the Pro version):

Though there are similar solutions available, and I tested some of them, AutoRun Manager seemed to be the best: It's faster than most of the others, and finds more intents than many others. But as the app also warns: if you disable too many (or the wrong) listeners, the (disabled) app may start misbehaving. To get around that, a new version of this app (coming soon) will implement profiles to switch between (so you could e.g. have one "disabled" profile, and one "enabled"), and also allows for the third option below. (Before anybody asks: No, I'm not the developer -- I just happened to suggest this feature to him, and he approved it).

A third option, which will soon be available with AutoRun Manager, already is available with Titanium Backup Pro: Freeze the app in question when not needing it, and unfreeze it when you want it. Titanium Backup even offers to create a widget to switch between both states -- but you need one widget per app.


How can I view the contents of an .srt file on my Android?

.srt is just text. So, I'm sure you can edit it using any text editor like Jota+.

Give it a try, and let me know if it works.


This is likely to be caused by one (or both) of two things.

1: Your phone does not have TRIM support - something that was only recently added in 4.3. This makes some devices slow down significantly over time - notably the 2012 Nexus 7 - and they stay slow even after a factory reset.

2: Aging flash. Depending on the quality, type and age of your device's flash memory, it may be deteriorating and you could be losing performance because of this. Note that you won't usually lose any noticeable speed or storage over the life of most flash products, but that depends on a lot of factors.

These are two likely culprits, but it really could be other things as well. We would need to know more about your device, more about the software you're running, things like the brand and model of your SD Card, phone, etc. Your question gives almost no information about any of this.


2-Step Verification code not automatically detected on Android

I found a partial solution to my question:

I was unable to use the 2-step verification using SMS message. I went to my google account settings and changed to Voice Call instead of SMS

Instructions:

Go to https://myaccount.google.com/ (make sure it's logged in to your desired account)
Select "Sign-in and security"
Edit the 2-Step Verification (pencil symbol)
Click on "Text message" in "Codes sent via:   Text message"
Change to "Voice Call"
Save

Then try signing in to the app again. This time it'll ask for you to enter the code manually which should arrive after a few seconds (or minutes) via a phone call. You can then change the settings back to "Text message (SMS)" if you like.

Hope this helps others.


How to replace Android's Download Manager by an other default app?

If you happen to have Android version above 5.1 and familiar with command line interfaces, then you could use termux. It has a built in binary wget to basically download anything. Just put wget https://whateverlink.exe and it will start downloading it. All you'll be needing is the link to download the file you want to download. The built in download manager being a system app, is actually a system wide download manager for all the gui interfaces on the device. If you happen to have root privilege, and try doing pm -k uninstall 0 com.android.providers.download and pm uninstall -k --user 0 com.android.providers.download.ui(you can also do this with adb). What this will do is, uninstall download manager, but will be availbale like before if phone is disabled, (also if you like to play it safe and have root, better to perform pm disable com.android.providers.download, in this way you can enable it anytime with pm enable com.android.providers.download).Now with uninstalled/disabled, if you try downloading something on your browser, you'll see that download fails. Even with a third party download manager, because everything downloadable on gui apps uses the built in Download manager. However, termux uses binaries wget to download stuffs, hence doesn't need a download manager becuase it has its own libraries and binaries writen to download. Yep, there you go. You can find termux on Google Play Store. To download wget, just type in pkg install wget on the command line, and it'll download wget for you. From then on you could use wget https://pastelinktodownload to download. Although termux is way more than just a simple download manager. Enjoy! Hope this helps (:


As per my comment in the above, I would gauge a guess, its some sort of a F irm W are D ow n load

A specialized mode particular to that device to enable updating - think of OTA firmware update but using some proprietary software to download the firmware - possibly radio baseband, or a ROM update...


Why are superuser permissions needed to acess /data partition?

First to clarify only root (UID 0) isn't enough to get access to /data at least since Android 5. Discretionary Access Control  based on traditional UNIX UIDs/GIDs alone doesn't fulfill the needs of modern complex OSes like Android. DAC is supplemented by Mandatory Access Control (MAC); SELinux in case of Android. So to access /data your process/user must have an allowed policy explicitly defined.

  Google Play Store was opened under my current user permission

This isn't correct. Concept of “users” is different on Android than on normal Linuxes. On Android every app is assigned a unique UID (from range 10000 to 19999) and it runs under its own user. Privileges are then controlled through Android's permission framework. At filesystem level every app is bound to a few directories (private and shared), that too subject to some permissions. For details see Where Android apps store data?

So there is no human user which could run its all programs under current user/UID.

  it downloaded and installed other APKs to /data. That means I have full access to the /data partition.

Play Store doesn't install apk files, it just performs a few verifications and downloads the file using Download Manager (com.android.providers.downloads) which runs under its own UID. App installation to /data/app and other relevant directories is mainly handled by Package Manager service running under UID 1000 (system_server process) in Java stack and installd running under UID 0 in native stack. Package Installer (com.android.packageinstaller) is the system app - running under its own UID - which provides user interface to (un)install apps manually. See more details here. Similarly all apps and processes have their own SELinux contexts to allow access to required processes and files. There are a number of APIs and IPCs involved in this whole process.

  Why superuser permission is needed for accessing /data partition?

Simply put, it's protection. As you need root access to change /etc directory on Linux OSes and as you need Administrator rights to open Registry Editor on Windows. This restriction is to isolate and protect every app's process in a confined environment. Other than DAC and MAC, other phenomena like Linux capabilities, namespaces, cgroups and seccomp filters are also used for this sandboxing. It also enforces apps' limited access to resources and makes auditing easy.

A few common reasons from my answer to How do I access $HOME/storage outside of Termux?:

/data partition also contains system settings including sensitive data like password databases (though not saved as plain text), contacts, call logs and apps statistics. So /data isn't accessible without root in order to:

Protect apps' private data from other apps
Protect system data and settings from bad apps and malware
Isolate users/profiles from other users/profiles
Not let apps access shared storage without Storage permission granted
Enforce APIs by Android framework so that apps can't use system resources and read/manipulate device information and settings without proper permissions

And possibly there are other reasons. For more details see Are multiple-users protected from each other differently than apps?


Can I use my android as a wifi bridge via USB?

Setup the phone as a modem. Still most android phones can be setup as a WiFi hotspot.

Following URLs may help you

http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=658&Itemid=38
http://blogs.computerworld.com/smartphones/20726/android-wifi-hotspot


is there any official froyo upgrade from samsung for galaxy 5 in India?

There is an Asia Froyo firmware released by Samsung. It's available on the http://www.samfirmware.com repository. You'll need to register and login.

You can then flash this official un-modified firmware by using the ODIN software.

I5508ZCKP2 is the Jan 2011 released Froyo firmware update for the Galaxy I5500 or Galaxy 5 as it's known otherwise.


How can I get my Android Phone to use its SD card by default?

The sad but inevitable answer is that you can't. There is as of yet no way to tell Android to use the spacious SD card instead of the precious internal memory when installing new applications or saving messages.

One workaround that I've taken advantage of is installing an Android ROM and running it from the SD card using magldr. My SD card isn't of particularly fine quality so the OS runs quite sluggish, but it beats deleting all my SMS every day


The problem is with your phone Accelerometer(not Gyroscopre). If it is not a hardware problem then Try Restart your phone.
Go to "Settings"-> "Motion" -> "Sensitivity Settings" -> Calibration ->calibrate.
 It automatically calibrates the screen and the gyro sensor.

IF the problem exist, backup all your things & Restore your phone to factory settings.

NOTE : Make sure you keep the device on a flat surface and phone screen facing upwards when calibrating the sensor as it gives better results.


unblock device with voice control command

Yeah you can do it it's Known as trusted voice, it can unlock a phone simply by hearing its owner say 'OK, Google'.

'A warning advises that trusted voice unlocking is less secure than other options, but just a couple taps and you'll be able to unlock and execute commands on your secured device by simply uttering 'OK Google.''

Source


Can I unlink ringtone and notification volume on Android 6?

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


How do I record slow motion video on the LG G5?

It does actually record in Slow motion but you need to go to the inbuilt LG video player to play back in slow speed. It is here that you can modify the speed when you edit the video. You can also set sections of the video to work in certain speeds which is pretty cool.


I can't retrieve my contacts from Google

Clear app data of Contacts, restart. If that doesn't work, remove Google account from phone, clear data of Google Play Services, restart, sign in.


I'm afraid there may not be any easy way to get your phone back without losing data. After all, that's the point of password-protecting it.

However, you might be able to mitigate the damage (= retrieve some data before wipe) by doing the following :

1- If you had activated USB debugging in the Developers options prior to forgetting your password, you can connect your phone to a computer with a USB cable and access your internal storage using the Android Debug Bridge (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_software_development#ADB). More precisely, the adb pull command would be helpful.

2- If you had installed an alternative recovery, such as Team Win Recovey Projet/TWRP (http://twrp.me/), you can boot to the recovery by holding the "volume up" + "home" + "power" buttons at the same time while the phone is off, the release the power button while still holding the other two.
From the recovery, you can make a backup of your data. Doing so will allow you to try other, more advanced recovery procedures withou fear of losing your data.

Please note that :

Wiping your data may not delete your internal storage, so those above
options may not be needed at all.
Both those options require that you took some actions before losing your password.


Can access Fastboot, but it isn't working. Software issue?

Since you can start the device and able to enter the Fastboot recovery mode, you can easily flash the stock MotoG ROM. That's all you need to do to factory-reset your device (however, if there is data on your device that needs to be backed-up, that's a different story and perhaps deserves a different post:-))

This is the relevant MotoG forum post for your reference. Summarily, you need two things: The stock MotoG ROM to flash to your device and of course, the MotoG drivers (since you say that your PC is able to detect the MotoG, I guess you already have the drivers installed).

As mentioned in that forum, just download and extract the stock ROM and run the flashall.bat. Your MotoG phone will be as good as new!


Can you broadcast to a Shoutcast server from Android?

There is an app called BroadcastMySelf, but I will admit so far I have failed to broadcast. However it is the only app I have found so far so I am gonna keep trying.


I was frustrated for a long time with the same problem. An app called Wifi Fixer seems to have fixed it. Hope that helps you too.


How to make an app behave the same way with screen off, as with screen on?

So, the only way I have found yet, to stream music to a DLNA device with screen off, using these apps, is to disable Doze mode by using this command in terminal:

dumpsys deviceidle disable

followed by dumpsys deviceidle enable when I no longer need streaming.

Now just need to find the way to automate this with tasker.


Certain Wi-Fi network not available on Motorola Milestone with Cyanogenmod

There are two possibilities:

If your WLAN is running in 2.4GHz mode you should chekc the used channel. Not all channels are allowed in all countries - especiall in the US the channels higher than 13 are AFAIK forbidden. Therefore some devices do not even scan the frequencies that belong to those channels. What frequencies/channels are used is specified by the driver/firmware - therefore using CM7 my be the problem. Try to cache your WLAN access point config to use a lower WLAN chennel.
Your WLAN is running in 5GHz mode only. Only devices with 5GHz capable WLAN hardware can use a WLAn that is operating in 5GHz only mode. Unfortunately the number of smartphones that are 5GHz capable is very short. Therefore you should check your WLAN access point config if it is in 5GHz only mode and if so change it to dual frequency mode 2.4GHz + 5Ghz running at the same time.


How do I mirror my screen to the TV (cast screen) using Chromecast

Casting your Android device to Chromecast is not officially supported. The Cast Screen tile shows up in certain conditions but at the moment it is not possible to cast your screen.
From the original article:

The Cast Screen tile seems to pop up for users of Nexus and newer Motorola devices when certain Chromecast apps have been used, for example AllCast. It's triggering something in Android related to an incomplete casting feature – that's all we can say for sure.
No one has, to our knowledge, gotten this native screen casting feature to work on a stock device – it just crashes when trying to connect to a Chromecast.  (...) Presumably Google will fix this and expose it to users eventually, but right now all you're seeing is a stub of a future feature.

UPDATE - At Google I/O 2014 they announced that screen mirroring is coming in a future update of Google Play Services. It is expected that this will roll out in the next few weeks.


How do I downgrade from Lollipop back to KitKat on htc desire 816

You would want to look for official stock firmware(Kitkat) provided by HTC, if you find one, you can flash it and get back to Kitkat. At least that's what I did on my Nexus 5.


How to create a url link file in Android?

It depends on what you would like to achieve.

If you want to just send a link from your computer to your Android device you have several possibilities:

Send an email to yourself containing the URL. Of course you need to have that email account synched on your Android phone. Then open the mail there and click on the link. Admittedly, this is a not very elegant approach
Another approach is to use Chrome2Phone. It consists of a mobile app and a Google Chrome extension that adds a button to your Chrome browser. By clicking on that button, a link of the currently open tab will be sent to your mobile phone and directly opened there on the browser. Here's a Youtube video that explains how to set it up: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQb243niMlg

If you want to have links on your Android homescreen, you may create bookmarks in your Android Browser and then add them by long-pressing on the homescreen, then choosing "Shortcuts" followed by "Bookmark"


termux: running termux via adb without *any* direct interaction with the device?

Per the comment by Ifran Latif, above, the following works ...

(1) launch termux

(2) do the following:

echo 'sv up sshd
sshd started' >.profile

(3) run this whenever I want to start sshd via adb:

adb shell am start -n com.termux/.HomeActivity


connection between spell correction, language selection, predictive text, and keyboard

In most android keyboards, the keyboard app has its own dictionary and language packs. It records the language in the keyboard's data base. Spelling correction and predictive text depends on the language data, the script of the language that was selected and your most used words and sentences. It remembers your sentences or any new words that you type and try to help you complete your sentence by using the previous record of your conversation or anything.


Revert back to factory defaults after rooting and installing CM7

The Galaxy S II doesn't have a locked bootloader, so DavidAP's (deleted) post doesn't really apply in this case.  It's also theoretically possible to exploit a flaw in a bootloader or something and re-lock it, though I don't know of such a method.  But anyways.

As noted here, it may be possible to fully back up a Samsung device through Odin, though we haven't been able to get it working.  Doing so would allow you to backup your stock ROM and restore it in perfect condition.  Via Odin you can also flash a stock firmware image, completely obliterating any trace of rooting.  This also might not be perfect, depending on where you get the firmware image — some of them are re-packed OTA updates and so on, and different from any "real" Odin package Samsung might use internally.

The problem is not with the real data on your phone, though; as noted it's easy to go back to stock and leave no trace of rooting.  There's a counter that gets incremented when you flash your phone with Odin.  It's possible to reset this counter, but that increments another counter.  Samsung does check this counter sometimes so you should flash with ClockworkMOD or Mobile Odin to avoid that.

If you brick your phone, that's certainly your fault and I wouldn't expect help from the carrier/manufacturer.  If you need them to fix a cracked screen or something I wouldn't expect them to care about any flashing you may have done, though who knows.  That said, I of course am not encouraging you to void your warranty; that's up to you.


You can use ChatSecure (formerly known as “Gibberbot”) with Facebook added as an XMPP account. Just enter username@facebook.com and your Facebook password to connect.

For even more protection of your details you can use the "Connect via Tor" option with Orbot (the Android port of Tor) to hide your location from Facebook as well.


Do you have an app cleaner, like 360 security or cleaner app? If so, uninstall it because some cleaner apps delete the apps. I have same issue: no app in home screen, but the apps data is in the folder Android/obb or data.

Uninstall Cleaner apps
Delete the .obb file in Android folder and reinstall again.


This, at least for me, happens when my device connects to Wi-Fi, but with wrong parameters. I fix this by entering the Wi-Fi settings, choosing "Static IP" instead of "DHCP", and then editing the network parameters manually, like this:

These settings may be different on your router, so check that if it isn't working.

IP adress: 192.168.1.xx (replace xx with any number, avoid 2, 3 or 4, because there may be devices already connected with that adress)
Gateway: 192.168.1.1
Prefix lenght: 24
DNS1: 8.8.8.8
DNS2:8.8.4.4


Voice command when switching pages on home screen

A bit late I know, but I've just been having a similar problem with a Samsung Galaxy S3 Mini.

This is how I got rid of it. I tried other ways, but found that if I turned the phone on and off again, the speech would come alive again. This was the only way I could kill it off for good.

Go to Settings -> Accessibility -> Text to Speech and there will be a list of current text to speech providers (I had 2, Google and Samsung)

Go to Application Manager -> All
Find Google Text to Speech and disable it
If there is no disable button, you will have to click Uninstall All Updates first, then go back, and the button should now read Disable

You'll want to do the above step for each Text to Speech option you had in your list. I had 2, so I did it again for Samsung TTS.

Now if you go back to Settings -> Accessibility -> Text to Speech there should be nothing left in the list and your home screen will finally be silent. Hooray!

I also have driving mode and TalkBack disabled. I already had them turned off, but they didn't help.

Hope this helps.


One specific game/app refuses to install

Possibly the error is because you have got a dead data directory corpse somewhere from that one specific app from a previous install of the app. Once you uninstalled it it did not clean up after its self properly. You can try adb to get the remnants of the app with the command:

adb uninstall (package_name)

Looking like:

adb uninstall com.one.specificAPK

If that does not work and you have rooted privledges then use a root explorer and navigate to /data/data/ once there look for that one specific apps corpse. It should be a white file delete it.

If that is unsuccessful then there is an app called SdMaid (no affiliation) that has a corpse cleaner that should do the trick.

If that does not work then try Google's suggestion of one of the following:

METHOD 1:

  Go to Setting >> Go to Application Setting (In some devices application setting is named as apps).
  Go to, All the apps > >Find the Google Play Store >> Clear Data and Cache
  Once you have clear everything, Next you need to Force Stop the application.
  Similarly, Find the Google Play Service >> Clear Data and Cache
  Also, Find Google Services Framework >> Open Google Services Framework >> Clear cache and data
  Now, Restart your device and try to download the app.
  It has worked for many users and hopefully it will work for you also. If it didn’t worked for you, go to next method.

METHOD 2:

  Go to Setting >> Storage >> Scroll down and select “Unmount SD card”
  Open Google Play Store >> Download the app again that was giving you the error message
  After successful installation, Go back to Settings >> Storage  >> tap on “mount SD card”
  If above steps didn’t work, also try removing your SD card before installing.

METHOD 3:

  Go to Setting >> Accounts >> Google
  Remove all your Google accounts
  Go back to Google play store and Sign–in your account information
  Accept all the Google terms and setup Google settings then Run Google Play Store and download the app.
  Removing and adding the Google Account has solved the issue for many users as there was problem with the Google account. If this help you to fix the error then the job is done otherwise head to next method.

METHOD 4:

  Most of the users have found this solution to be working fine. After changing the storage setting users were able to download the app without any error message displaying on-screen.
  Steps to change the Storage Setting:

  Go to Setting >> Storage >> Preferred install location
  Tap on Preferred install location, a box will pop-up with different option
  Select “Let the system decide” option
  Open Google Play Store >> Download the app again that was giving you the error.


very slow performance of Galaxy Grand 4.2.2

I was facing the same issue after the 4.2.2 Feb 6, 2014 update. Did a factory reset and I'm able to run applications now. The dialing and answering the call problem is resolved, but on the whole, the mobile still lags.


How can I stop music apps from playing when my Android connects via Bluetooth to my car?

There's a Bluetooth connect & Play app that can intercept the incoming "play" command. While it was originally designed to let you start a specific music app playing when a specific Bluetooth device connects, you can instead select "STOP music from playing" to keep any app from starting when the car connects.


App installing takes a long time in a Work Profile

There won't be any real damage when you  turn off MIUI optimisation.

This post describes the effects of having MIUI optimisation turned on/off as reported by MIUIers.

The optimisation offers some MIUI based settings & optimizations set by developers with aim of giving a fast user experience but of late has offered more disadvantages especially in new ROMs.

It has been reported to cause some some incompatibility issues with Google based apps and sync services and also non functionality of Greenify hibernate feature in non-root mode (MIUI 9.xx) althought it doesn't affect MIUI 8.

Therefore, you can safely turn it off, if it is causing lag issues With work Profile, as much as it is recommended to be off when using Greenify (MIUI 9). Besides the changes described in the linked post (as a MIUI user) I don't see any detrimental effects when you disable it.


You could delete your APN settings on your phone's configuration, or use airplane mode.


There are a couple of good samba network music players available on market. For starters you can take a look at Soumi: Network Music Player

Its keys features include..

  Plays music from shared folders on local SMB/CIFS network, e.g Windows share, WiFi drive, NAS, USB drive attached to router, etc.
  Plays music from FTP, FTPS, SFTP, and WebDAV servers
  Browsing and instant searching by artist, album, genre, and title
  Find, browse and play music by folder

Note; It offers In-app purchases for certain features

Other potential candidates include Kodi (which I personally use but is a bit tricky to setup and consumes a bit more battery power) or BSPlayer  which also allow playback of media files  directly via Wi-Fi from your network shared drives/folders.

Another option is using DNLA or UPnP (only downloadside is you need to setup a media server at the other end. In that case you can use DLNA players like Bubble uPnP or Plex.


Galaxy Nexus does not charge when turned on

Do you happen to be using a 3rd party charger?

500mAh chargers cannot charge the Nexus while on, 1Ah chargers can but might struggle. I recommend chargers with 1.5Ah for charging high-end devices

Alternatively, the problem might lie with the power management of your ROM. Have you also installed an app recently before this happened?


While there is an accepted answer, it is worth pointing out that this behaviour is only observed by OP in one particular charging point and is fine otherwise

This is probably because that point has grounding or other electrical issues, which is leading to this behaviour also called ghost touches. Googling for that would lead you to similar conclusions. I have often experienced this traveling in Indian trains, where the charging points are apparently not well regulated. Andrew (thanks) has located a proper electrical reasoning for this in comments


Is it possible to clear the 'program installed' icons at the top notification bar?

Towards the top of your notification bar there should be a Clear button. Click this to clear your notifications (this will clear all pending notifications, not just application installed/updated ones).


CM11 com.android.themes.provider and com.android.settings crash

A dirty upgrade is never 100% error free. You have to either fix permissions (worked out for me) or wipe data and reinstall everything. Also check the owner and group of all the files and folders, they tend to be different even on the same Android version.


AnkiDroid doesn't detect apkg file in the requested location

Strange, it should be seen in the Import dialog. Please fill a bug report at https://github.com/ankidroid/Anki-Android/issues thanks!

Meanwhile, you can use the second method for importing a .apk file:
https://ankidroid.org/docs/manual.html#_open_the_file_using_android
Just install any file explorer (like File Manager), and tap your .apkg file. It will open in AnkiDroid.


Is it possible to increase Samsung's limit on contact merging?

It is, if you have root Access.

Found the following solution on l0uy blog:

Open /system/csc/others.xml and add the following child to the <FeatureSet> parant:

<CscFeature_Contact_SetLinkCountMaxAs>30</CscFeature_Contact_SetLinkCountMaxAs>

The 30 is the limit, how much contacts you will merge. choose what you want.

Works fine on 4.1.2.


Is there "select all" functionality in the GMail app?

I'm not sure exactly how you use the select all feature, but I think an effective way to mitigate your need for this is to go crazy with filters, labels, and the priority inbox.

Having your Gmail account sort your E-mail into highly specific labels for you and carefully tagging everything as either "important" or "not important" will keep the number of E-mails you see at any one time to a reasonable amount most of the time.

There are a ton of great tips in this article from LifeHacker that I've used both on the web interface and on my Gmail app.

Oh, and submit a feature request to Google. ;-)


How to launch this Xiaomi Font Settings activity?

You can try with monkey commands.

monkey -p package_name -v 500

An alternative way is to install Nova Launcher. Run it then touch and hold an empty space in the home screen > choose Widget > Activities. Scroll down to the settings icon touch it to expend its activities then touch and hold the one you want to launch.

And from your command: adb shell "am start -a com.android.settings -n com.android.settings/com.android.settings.Settings$FontSettingsActivity" you should just put /.FontSettingsActivity after the slash.


Use an Android tablet as a Wacom drawing tablet for a PC?

The GfxTablet project should allow you to do this.  It's network-based rather than USB though.


Restore "loud volume, long periods" notification in Lollipop

The volume warning was removed with Android Lollipop. It
  appears that this is in lollipop, but it is either very buggy
  or extremely passive.

Read the comments. Many users found it to be more of an annoyance than a useful feature. If you still want this feature, there are plenty of apps you can download that will limit the max volume of your device as KitKat did.


Whatsapp is installed on the /system partition on your device. Which means, your device manufacturer decided to include the app in the device firmware. A factory reset can only remove the apps which you installed yourself which are present on the /data partition. To remove system apps you need to need to root your device and delete the app from the /system/app/ directory.


How do I connect to 802.1x EAP Wi-Fi network from an Android 10 device?

Before the client (aka supplicant) can talk to the authenticator it must first establish a TLS connection.  The failure might be occurring in the EAPOL START before a user authentication (TLS auth) can occur.  This might be why you do not see any authentication attempts on the Radius server.

Yes you must select WPA/WPA2/WPA3-Enterprise in order to do EAP-TLS.  You need to specify both the CA Certificate and Client certificate in order to complete the EAP TLS Flow.

Are you familiar with Android Logcat?  You could start looking there and filtering on wpa_supplicant or EAPOL to see if there are any certificate validation or related errors.

Guessing why here but, it's possible your older devices will work with the same CA/Client certificate depending how old they are.  Certificate validation has improved (strengthened) in android over the years and it might be why its failing on new devices and not older.


Absolutely. Well...almost. Just make sure you set the partition from rewritable to read-only once you're "unrooted". However, once you are unrooted, binaries like su and the SuperUser apk will in all probability removed, so you will in effect be dropped to a lower privilege level. This will have the side-effect of having the apps installed in the system partition as being uninstallable.

A workaround is to remove/uninstall apps from the system partition, remove root and then add the apps as user apps - this will ensure that they can be updated in the future without the need for root.


touch screen and usb not working: any way to remotely control my phone?

You said that the phone is rooted. Does it has a custom recovery? If you have a custom recovery you can boot to that by using the hardware buttons and you can operate most custom recoveries with the hardware keys. If you are able to do this you can make a Nandroid backup to an external SD card and after that you can extract your data from the Nandroid backup to another phone. I didn't tried yet but with https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.h3r3t1c.bkrestore&hl=nl, maybe you can extract the data to another phone.


How do I get offline voice detection on my tablet running JB (4.1.1)?

There's a tutorial on How to Activate Offline Voice Typing on Jelly Bean which you could follow. Here's an excerpt:

Open the system settings of the device.
Go to language and placing.
Make a tap on voice search.
Now do a tap on Download ricon. VOC. offline.
With a swype moved All tab and select your language, it will begin the download of the package.
Eventually the card INSTALLED will appear.

Now you should be able to use voice input in offline mode.

Just in case, here are several additional howtos:

How To: Enable Offline Voice Typing in All Jelly Bean Android Devices
Download and Install Google Now with Voice Search (Stable Version) On Galaxy S3

.

From the first "additional link", the description looks a bit different:

Go to Settings
Go to Languages and Input
Check if the language is selected as English(US). If not, then set it.
In the Inputs, look if the option Google Voice Typing is checked. If not, then check it.
Select the gear icon beside the Google Voice Typing. This will take you to the voice typing settings.
In the Choose Input Language, uncheck automatic and select English(US).
Below, in the Download Offline Speech Recognition option, select English(US).
After the download completes, close the settings.
Go anywhere for typing, like Messaging.
Select the little gear icon in the bottom left area. This will give the option of selecting Voice Typing.
Speak out your words clearly and the device will type it out even if Internet Connection is Inactive.

You should be able to do this with other languages as well (e.g. English(UK)) -- just make sure they match in all places.


If your old device is with you

Delete WhatsApp backup from Google Drive. See steps from WhatsApp FAQ
Redo Google drive backup manually (Settings → chats → chat backup → Google drive) and restore

That will create a fresh backup  so corruption is ruled out, though would take longer

Old device not with you but you have copy of database file

Uninstall WhatsApp
Install Whatsapp and  on successfully activating it, immediately disconnect from Internet
Copy the database file into the same folder location from which you copied and restore


mount in /data/local/userinit.sh is not working

Found a workaround:
init.d script invocation by app

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ryosoftware.initd


This doesnt seem normal. If your date/time-settings in the Android System-Settings-Menu are correct (maybe change it by hand to the current day & year to test it) there should be no issues like this.

If after this there is still this issue please go into your App-settings (Settings > Apps) and search for google calendar. Here please delete data and cache and maybe also installed updates. Then make a device-restart and re-download the update and check again. This should solve issues if they are caused by the problem-app itself.

In case you have other Calendar apps installed, or other apps that interact with systems time-settings you should try to disable (Settings > Apps > AppThatHasProblem > Disable) it to test if this was the error.

If all that doesnt help (also not the data & cache-cleaning etc) and you absolutley want to use this calendar (maybe try Sunrise, its really very good) i can only suggest a factory-reset, sorry.


Picture converted to very low quality while sending MMS

My understanding is that its operator defined per all the discussion I have seen around this, and does seem to be correct when I consider that on TMobile in the UK I can send a picture file around 258KB - with 640*480 dimension JPEG without any issue - which is plenty big enough for phones.

I have checked to see if its working on a standard algorithm by using a much smaller picture file and size, however it still created a MMS around 200KB (around half the file size of the original picture), suggestion the algorithm is dynamic when it compresses the photo. Further suggesting it really is operator defined.


How to setup K9 Mail properly for free email services offering multiple aliases for same email box?

In K-9, when in your Inbox, hit the Menu key and chose Settings→Account→Compose→Identities. You should see a "Standard Identity" already in place. Hit Menu again, and chose to add a new identity. Think of "identity" as a synonym to your "alias".

I've not used this feature myself, but reports say K-9 also automatically choses the correct alias when replying to a mail.


Why is CyanogenMod zip not being found when I try to install it?

It was necessary to completely wipe all system data before flashing the ROM. Once I did that, the file was found as normal.


Newbie needs help: Not sure how to get Google Play apps on CyanogenMod

You simply download the relevant Gapps package (it's a zip file, not an apk) for your version of Cyanogenmod, copy to your SD card like you did with cyanogenmod, and then go into recovery and install (flash) it, again just like you did with Cyanogenmod.


Increasing vibration intensity in pixel XL

Unfortunately, Android does not provide a stock setting that will control global vibration intensity because not all phone hardware supports the ability to control vibration amplitude.

Instead, Android has released updates to the Vibrator control as of Android API level 26 (aka: Android Oreo).

Developers can check if the hardware supports adjusting haptic feedback intensity by calling Vibrator#hasAmplitudeControl.

If so, they can create their own haptic feedback by calling Vibrator#vibrate and passing in a desired VibrationEffect, which is the object definition of a vibration pattern, including amplitude.

In summary, vibration control is up to the phone hardware capabilities and developers now as of Android Oreo.

Note: there may be third party apps on the Play Store that allow for more fine grained or global vibration control, but I am unsure which is viable and whether or not root permissions are required - so YMMV.


Can I use my phone as a bluetooth game controller for my computer?

You haven't mentioned which types of games you need this for but there are several possible options:

Gmote 2.0, which is a client/server type system which would let you use your Android tablet to control your computer.

RemoteDroid, which is similar to Gmote, it also uses a client/server system.

GRemotePro may be the right choice for you as it is but you need to pay for the server software. It is specifically advertised as being for game control.


Suddenly no data connection with S3 4.3 Jelly Bean

Try to backup your data and perform a factory reset while keeping in mind to take out the micro sd card as it will be erased too.


How to save an image inlined into an email using the stock Email app?

This isn't a way to save it in a traditonal manner, but it's a good last resort. You could take a screenshot (usually Power+Volume Down) and then crop it in the Photos app (in the Google version there is a pencil icon at the bottom of the picture).


Samsung Galaxy Y won't connect to the computer

2 places to check:

Settings -> Wireless and Network -> USB Settings, and select "Ask on connection".
Settings -> Applications -> Development -> USB debugging [disable USB debugging]


Short: Yes. You can send your photos as email attachments and delete them from your phone. It will free up your phone memory. But there are other options which are better than this.

You can use cloud storage facilities to back-up your data and access them anytime and anywhere you want. More details about widely used cloud services can be found in this answer.


Why can't music players find my audio files?

Seeing a file name like Computer\Nexus 4\Internal storage\Music\Christina St眉rmer\Freier Fall\1 Geh nicht wenn du kommst.mp3 points to a special problem with "special characters" (such as German Umlauts) which got messed up on data transfer: While Windoze uses its own character set (MS-ANSI or wone of the WIN-12xx, depending on configuration), Android expects UTF-8 -- which is why it's a good custom to use only 7-bit ASCII characters in file names.
Due to this mismatch and the "unidentifyable character", the media scanner most likely has crashed. Which resulted in the media database not being populated, from which follows: The players think "no media files there".
Proposed actions
I'd suggest to either temporarily delete or at least rename all affected files, so that no file with "special characters" in its name remains. Then have the media scanner run again (e.g. triggering it with Rescan SD). Once that's finished, I'm pretty sure your media player(s) will find something to play (with).
That being approved, you know what to look for in the future. As said before, I strongly recommend to restict characters in file names to 7-bit ASCII -- that avoids a lot of problems, though some names might look a little strange ;)


Running adb logcat and rebooting my phone worked for me. Requires the Android SDK though.


Nexus devices will receive updates at least 18 months after their initial release. There are some minor releases 5.0.1 or 5.0.2, which are not distributed to every Nexus device because those releases may only fix bugs associated with specific devices.

Also, some devices will receive updates past the initial 18 months of its release. For example, the Nexus 4 was released in November 2012, but has still been receiving updates more than 2 years later.

It is also possible that a device will get no more than 18 months of updates. A famous example is the Galaxy Nexus, which included hardware made by Texas Instruments who moved away from phone processors. As a result, Google decided not to upgrade the device beyond Android 4.3, which means it only received 20 months of official updates. Despite this, it is still possible to upgrade to KitKat and Lollipop if you don't mind using community-created ROMs.

For an official resource directly from Google, they explain the Nexus update process as the following:

  Nexus 4, Nexus 5, Nexus 6, Nexus 7, Nexus 9, and Nexus 10 devices receive the latest version of Android directly from Google. Once an update is available, it can take up to two weeks for it to reach your device. Based on your carrier, it may take longer than two weeks after release to get an update.

  Nexus devices may not receive the latest version of Android if they fall outside of the update window, which is usually around 18 months after a device has been released.

Considering Google's recent emphasis on Android One, the system requirements for Android are likely to remain pretty lean for a while to accommodate the lower-end hardware Google seems eager to support. Since you tagged your question as "Nexus 6", it is unlikely you'll need to worry about Google upgrading your phone to the latest version of Android for a long time since the reasons of the past (lack of hardware capability) won't be an issue for you.


Is sideloading same as flashing via custom recovery?

ROM Flashing refers to flashing the OS ROM. Usually involves installing a new image of the OS.

Side-loading usually refers to installing a single app that is not delivered from the Google Play Store (or whatever the app store your device is setup to use.) It can still flash ROMS, but it requires the process of using adb. Good for devices with limited storage, since the ROM can be on the PC with adb rather than the device, but sorta identical to Flashing otherwise.


How to check an application's checksum or hash on Google Play?

The  Guardian Project's free and open-source app Checkey does much of what you're looking to do.

via F-Droid:
"Checkey is a utility for getting information about the APKs that are installed on your device. Starting with a list of all of the apps that you have installed on your device, it will show you the APK signature with a single touch, and provides links to virustotal.com and androidobservatory.org to easily access the profiles of that APK. It will also let you export the signing certificate and generate ApkSignaturePin pin files for use with the TrustedIntents library."


How to create a separate secondary phonebook / contact list

I have saved separate phone contact lists as vCard files-one for business and another for private use. another for frequently dialed numbers (hybrid of both pvt+biz). It is tedious but depending on my need i load(import) one from my collections above. Hope this method helps.


Transferring continuous Android camera feed to PC through USB (in a background app/service)

IP Webcam(see revisions) does allow the access on USB but it will not show you the option to access in its help section. All you've to do is activate USB-tethering on your device, start server on the said app,and access the server by entering 192.168.42.129:8080 in a browser on PC.

I tested this app on my device running Android 4.2.1.


How join an existing Google Meet meeting from the home screen, with an URL?

Found the solution.
You turn off internet on your phone, open the meet url in chrome, now the url stays in the adress bar and you can save it to home screen the usual way.


This sounds a lot to me like a sort of push notification system. The way I have implement this into my own foot print is to use growl/libnotify on the desktop and notify my android which allows me to have a central cloud based datastore for my alerts.

There is also the option of just emailing all your devices/contacts instead. One can find a Email To SMS Email Address List which lists the domains you would need to send a message to for your SMS/MMS communication to be transmitted.


What is needed to run ELF binaries compiled from android APKs? (understanding android internals)

What is needed to run ELF binaries compiled from Android APKs?

A simple hello world app which does nothing except printing Hello World! (no animations, no sounds, no menus), running on Android 9 device:

Opens 30+ files, anonymous inodes and UNIX sockets explicitly.
Shares 500+ memory-mapped files from /data, /system, /vendor and /dev.
Communicates, at least, to Surface Flinger (through Window Manager in system_server) to display something on screen. There can possibly be more IPCs (Binders or others).
Needs Activity Manager, Package Manager and possibly other services running in system_server which manage app's classes related to activity creation and permissions.
Needs zygote process running to fork VMs for system_server and the app itself.

So all of these requirements must be fulfilled to run ELF binary (shared object: /data/app/com.ravipatel.helloworld.test-*/oat/arm64/base.odex) compiled from APK.

As a comparison, a hello world Java program compiled with GCJ dynamically links to less than 5 libraries. While a similar C program (statically linked) has no runtime dependencies except the required architecture.

  I guess it created a Dalkiv process in 'Linux' kernel which was simply a VM that ran the dex bytecode.

No. Dalvik wasn't a Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM; if that's what you mean). Both Dalvik and ART are Process VMs which run in userspace.

  For ART, the dex bytecode is compiled into instructions in the processor's architecture (happens during the installation process).

It's profile-guided, rarely happens during the installation process.

  What is /runtime? Is it a program, a library?

Runtime is an environment in which programs written in a specific language run. ART is a runtime for Java. It mainly consists of native executable binaries / shared libraries (including a VM / interpreter / JIT compiler and OAT compiler) and standard Java class libraries (mostly in the from of .jar files) saved in /system.

Other well-known example is Java Runtime Environment (JRE) by Oracle/Sun which is found on mostly PCs.

  Is Android Runtime something that is linked together with the ELF binary generated from dex bytecode?

Correct.

  Is this ELF binary simply launched as a Linux process?

No. The ELF binary compiled from .dex file in APK is not an executable but a shared object. So it needs to be loaded in memory along with other dependencies by some other process, which is ART (VM).

  So suppose I wanted to run this ELF binary on Linux. Besides ashmem and binder kernel modules, what more would I need? Which libraries do this ELF binary require?

First of all you cannot run the ELF binary on a non-Android Linux system because the binary is not a statically linked executable. But even if it is, there are even bigger constraints, particularly Android's hardware abstraction. binders and ashmem are IPC mechanisms. They make sense only if the processes to whom the app wants to communicate also exist, which is not the case. With Linux based Java SDKs it's relatively easy to achieve.

RELATED:

Android apps for “armeabi-v7a” and “x86” architecture: SoC vs. Processor vs. ABI
AOT Compilation in HotSpot (jaotc)
JIT vs. AOT: Unity And Conflict of Dynamic and Static Compilers


How can I always get desktop version of web sites using Firefox for Android?

about:config is disabled in Firefox for Android, but if you switch to the Firefox Android Nightly version, about:config is currently working.
If a new key is added general.useragent.orverride and a desktop user agent string is used (for instance Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; Win64; x64; rv:85.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/85.0), then all web sites will receive that as your user agent.
This may not be desirable, since many web sites are difficult to navigate on the smaller mobile screen, but until there are user agent switcher add-ons that are allowed by the powers at GoogZilla, this is the best you can do.


Searching and filtering Android Market app reviews

The comments are not searchable from the market app, nor are they searchable from the site, but you can search google using site:market.android.com my search terms here and it does include the comments when searching.

All the comments are also visible on the market site under the "user comments" tab for the application.


Android 8.1 Keyboard on Galaxy Tab A doesn't display word choices

Let it be set to default keyboard(Samsung Keyboard).

Follow steps to turn on word's suggestions:

For Galaxy tab:

Follow the steps:

Open Settings - Scroll down to System - Language and input-Choose Samsung keyboard.
Under Smart typing choose Predictive text and enable it.

For Handsets:

Open Settings-General Managment-Language and Input-On screen keyboard-Samsung Keyboard.
Now turn on 'Predictive text' option and again in this option turn of 'Auto replace'.

Note: Auto Replace will enable the keyboard to replace predicted words by itself and this could create problem while typing.


That should be the correct approach. As you noted, time sync needs a source -- so setting up a NTP Server on the PC will provide this source. Now you need to have some NTP client on your Android device. Searching Google Play for "ntp" brings up two of them right on the first page: ClockSync (I use this one, and am quite happy with it; still running it with the default NTP server configured -- but in your case, you will have to change this: as you can edit the time server used, this should be no issue), and NTPSync - Time Synchronization are two examples running in the background. If you prefer something permanently visible, Atomic Clock Wallpaper seems to be a candidate. Just follow the search link for more candidates :)


How do I make my device dial my phone via Bluetooth?

Samsung Galaxy Player 4.0 isn't actually a phone Per se, so it's hard to use it as such (without some help at least):
Any of the following solutions answers your question the way you intended it to be answered, but this is the result of a deep investigation and testing that might help you or help others in the future.
1) Just like a Bluetooth Handset:
With a fair amount of limitations, you can Pair the Galaxy Player to your smartphone just like pairing a Bluetooth headset:

Turn on Bluetooth on both devices, make the Galaxy Player discoverable, and scan with the phone.

Once the devices recognized each other and got paired, the Player shows up connected to the phone.

When a call gets to the smartphone, the Galaxy Player will ring as well.

The screen does look just like the incoming call screen on a smartphone, providing an option to answer or decline the call.
Initiating a call from the smartphone, will automatically activate the Galaxy Player, just like it would with a Bluetooth headset.
If the Galaxy Player and your smartphone are close together, lets say it the same room, the call has a good quality, just like if you were talking on your phone.
The power consumption for this solution is very low, so its a thumbs up as well.
Sadly, the contacts list on the Galaxy Player will do you no good, since it actually can't initialize any calls.

2) Using WiFi:
One tested alternative with a very lost cost can be signing up with a service that directs texts and/or calls to the Galaxy Player.
e.g., Google Voice, see the International calling rates
The only drawback using any service like Google Voice on the Galaxy Player is that you can only receive/send text messages and calls when connected to Wi-Fi, unlike a normal phone.
Google Voice is a feature-rich call forwarding service. You get one phone number that will ring all of your phones (cell or landline).
With it, you can receive voicemails and text messages (no multimedia messages/MMS, though).
Being a part of your Google account, you have access to all of your messages; call logs and more.
Google Voice @ Google Play

3) Using VoIP
Signing up with a service with a VoIP solution, it is possible to make actual calls from the Galaxy Player (or any device with speaker and microphone).
e.g., Line2, see the Plans Comparison
This service doesn't get you stuck to a contract, extra fees or a period of time. So, if a better solution appear in the future, you can stop using it immediately.


Samsung Galaxy Note does not boot after ICS update

I would suggest flashing the stock ICS (or Gingerbread, if you prefer) ROM via Odin.  Full instructions here.

Get the official image from http://www.sammobile.com/firmware/ (search for "N7000" and select the download for the appropriate region.)
Download and install the USB drivers (for 32 bit or 64 bit Windows)
Download the Odin tool.
Extract the contents of the downloaded ROM and place it somewhere on your PC.
Reboot the phone into Download mode (Volume Down+Home+Power buttons.)
Run Odin and connect the phone to the PC via USB.  Odin should recognize the phone by showing a yellow [0:COMX] sign in one of the "ID:COM" boxes.
Select the "PDA" button and browse to the extracted TAR file.
Make sure that only two boxes are checked in odin - Auto Reboot and F.Reset Time.
Click "Start".

This should refresh the phone with a brand new OS and all prerequisites.


Sources of facial detection, on a phone that detects face rests at:

/system/vendor/pittpatt/models
/system/vendor/pittpatt/recognition

I'm using CM13 for my case. They are located there. Maybe facial detection might do that


Is there a way to input a specific language with keyboard that is not supported by the android

Try External Keyboard Helper Demo from Apedroid (full version here). It says in the description it supports Thai keyboards.

Also, check out this thread


OMG

I figured it out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Step 1
First normally boot up.
Sign into a network.
Allow it to check connection.
Then when it askes u to verify your account, press the back button until you get back to networking.
Choose a different network, type a bunch of random letters/numbers then press show password select it, press assist.
Then google will open.
Search for settings.
From settings go to backup/reset.
Reset the device.
Boot normally once again.

Step 2
You will be asked to verify again. Turn your device off.
Reboot into safe-mode.
Then re-bypass into settings.
Head to device info.
Enable developer mode. (press build number 7 times)
You cant enable dev mode unless your in safe mode as there is protection for it.
Once you have dev mode enabled you need to turn on usb debugging and OEM unlock.
WHATEVER U DO DONT PRESS THE HOME BUTTON, IF IT WORKS ALL OF THE SETTINGS WILL BE UNAPPLIED AND SETUP WILL RESTART

Step 3
Now reboot to recovery. (Poweroff, then hold the volume up button while turning the device back on)
Next we need to scroll to
Press the power button to select it.
You will boot into fastboot.
Now you will need a pc...
First lets check if OEM unlocking is enabled.
Run fastboot flashing get_unlock_ability
From CMD/TERMINAL (You have to have adb/fastboot installed)
You will get (bootloader) unlock_ability = 0 If it isn't enabled

BUT if it is you will get (bootloader) unlock_ability = 1XXXXXXX

If it's enabled we have to unlock the bootloader.
THIS WILL VOID YOUR WARRANTY
We have to do this as, OEM unlock isn't really enabled.
What we've done is made it so the the system see that it's both enabled and disabled.
This means the only command that will work is
fastboot oem unlock
Were going to run this command.
When you do, spam the volume up button to select yes.
Now we're almost done.
We have to unlock it from flashing too, and unlock system critical (In the security update from 2016 the FRP partition was marked as critical and unless we unlock critical partitions the FRP lock won't ever go away)

First Flashing Unlock
Run fastboot flashing unlock
Spam the volume up again
Then run fastboot flashing unlock_critical
Spam volume up again
Now close adb/fastboot on your pc.
And unplug your device.
Since security is still enabled fastboot reboot doesn't work.
So we have to wait for the device to drain completely.
Then charge it a bit and turn it back on.
It will wipe the FRP partiton alone with all the other ones, except for the /boot partition.

FRP is disabled.

This will work on any android device.
Did this from a RCA tablet, so it does XD
Good Luck and Happy adb'ing :)

EDIT:
Works on device with fastboot.... got a bit to excited that i found a bypass for FRP, which has been a issue of mine for a while.


This method seems to work for me: Try deleting Google+ data/cache, then start Google+ app. It will log you in and then you can choose Auto Backup setting. You can then go to Sync settings, untick "Sync Google+ Auto Backup" and then tick it again. You can also go to the Google+ app settings and get it to upload all your photos/videos to start the sync.


Play Store keep crashing while updating apps on Nexus 5

For some reason Nexus devices have an ongoing problem with playstore funny thing is Google are aware of it but dont seem to be able to fix the issues. I've had an similar issue with a Nexus 4 but I just downloaded an app called Aptoide to get my apps from and avoided the Play store altogether. Hope this helps.


How to find the creation date and time (aka timestamp) for a file or folder in Android?

Unfortunately, this is not possible when using Android's emulated filesystem.  Android's emulated filesystem does not store the creation date of files or folders, so there is no way to retrieve this data, as it does not exist.
(Many thanks to Irfan Latif for confirming this, and to Izzy for clarifications.)


How do I install, update, and remove apps for multiple devices in the Google Play online store?

Unfortunately Google play Web app doesn't allow you to the following things:

Update your current apps (It can only be done from your devices)
See a list of apps install in a specific devices (It only tallies all of the apps you ever downloaded into one list)
Remove any devices which were previously added to your Google account

Hopefully we can raise awareness through this question so that Google finds that enough people will like a lot more functionality from the web app. It is sometimes very functional specially if you work in a computer all day.


help me out making my transition from iphone please

To put Android into "listening mode", do your Long press, then click on the Google logo at the bottom of the screen. That's Google Now, your Siri counterpart.

For Samsung devices with S-Voice, double-pressing quickly on the Home button will trigger S-Voice.


ADB Shell In Recovery Mode - Error:Closed

You're not doing anything wrong. You're most likely using a stock recovery. Access to shell can prove to be  potentially dangerous when it comes to userdata so a lot of OEMs or vendors (I don't know the correct term) prefer to ship a locked-down stock recovery which would do what OEM wants them to do, such as flashing OTA updates, sideloading updates from OEM, doing factory reset and in some cases, some hardware testing options. That's the scope they follow.

If you want unconditional shell access, you would've to flash a custom recovery.