How I can reverse-tether my tablet using my phone’s mobile broadband with bluetooth DUN, without rooting?

So I was doing a bit of research on this.
TLDR; You will not be able to use your phone's GSM to connect your tablet to the internet.
In order for your Android device to be able to connect to another device, via bluetooth, to get an internet connection, you need an android device that supports DUN (Dial-up Networking) or PAN (Personal Area Networking). Which most android devices do support. You also need the "host" device to also support DUN. Your phone, on the other hand, does not support DUN nor does it support PAN.
Here are the bluetooth profiles that your phone supports:

Bluetooth Profiles:

A2DP
AVRCP
BPP
FTP
GAP
Handsfree
Headset
HFP
HSP
SAP

The reason that you are able to get your laptop to tether via bluetooth with your device is because Windows supports tethering via SPP.
From Wikipedia:

Note : The Windows XP/Vista Windows Vista/Windows 7 Bluetooth stack supports the following Bluetooth profiles natively: PANU, SPP, DUN, HID, HCRP.

While Android does have support for SPP, it does not support tethering via SPP. This is only supported via DUN/PAN. There is an active issue around this that is listed as assigned to a developer but has had no activity since June 23rd 2013.

I bought the Nexus 7 3G as a professional development tool to make bluetooth applications but from what I see, I'm stuck with an expensive paper weight. The SPP profile is used by many companies to connect there devices (robots, OBDII scanners, Microcontrollers, dataloggers.. e.t.c) to tablets. This protocol should have worked with the Nexus 7 but does not.
It did not work with android 4.2.1 and does not work with android 4.2.2. It used to work with android 4.1.2.
Not everyone can downgrade to 4.1.2 since it is not available to all devices.
Now we all have to wait until android 5 comes out, but I do not think this will be fixed since google does not take us seriously.
Don't you guys tests your products before you market them or do you just let the end user do the testing for you?


Factory reset protection (FRP) verification

According to Samsung support, FRP is automatically enabled when you set up at least one Google account. If you still want to check it's status manually, you will need to enter Download mode. To do this:

turn off your phone and wait about 10 seconds
hold Volume Down, Home and Power buttons simultaneously until you see a warning
press Volume Up to continue.

After doing these steps, some text should appear on the screen, including "FRP LOCK" or something like that. There you can check whether protection is enabled or not.

Important: to exit download mode, you will need to hold the power button for more than 10 seconds, or if that doesn't help just pull the battery.

Please note that FRP can be easily disabled by flashing new ROM without GApps, but if your bootloader is locked that's not an issue.


Can hangouts send text-only MMS to certain contacts?

To convert a long SMS into a MMS, Long press the attachment paperclip to add a subject line in the hangouts app


Samsung Galaxy S3 not booting up, keeps restarting showing ”Samsung Galaxy S3 GT-i9300” black screen

Enter recovery and delete dalvik/cache. To enter recovery you have to hold Volume up + Home + Power (The same with Volume down is download mode). Once in recovery, select the option to wipe cache/dalvik, then restart the phone.

If the phone keeps rebooting as it was doing before, try searching the log of the boot sequence to see if you can find where it fails. You will need a PC with Android SDK installed and the phone's USB cable.

With the phone off, open a CMD window in your PC, go to Android SDK directory and run adb logcat
Turn on your phone and connect the USB cable.
You should en seeing in your cmd window the log of the phone as it boots.
Once it enters a boot loop, you should be able to check the log and see what it tries to do and can't do (that triggers the boot loop).


What is trying to connect to the network?

It turns out that the issue was that Location Reporting was enabled. Disabling this misfeature increased my battery life almost three-fold, stopped the notification popups (which I've since learned are called toasts), and now the spooks will have only a slightly harder time to find out where I've been.


A TWRP backup would be useless if not for your model only.... You can't restore a backup of a different Model on a different one even thou it's the Same Make.. So I guess the only options are listed above... Titanium backup is really Good for backing up of apps and data...


How do I turn off my Samsung Galaxy a3 if my screen has stopped working?

Hold down the power button for 10 seconds or take out battery


You should just be able to connect your computer to wifi and then the emulator will use your computer's wifi connection. The AVD is just an emulation of an android device. The AVD uses your computer's hardware to simulate the hardware of a real device the best that it can.

The AVD will also be 'connected to 3G/4G' if you are connected through Ethernet.

Edit:

When I tried this myself on my own editor, it appears that you can't enable wifi on the emulator, it will always be set to '3G' or '4G'. If you want to enable Wifi for development purposes, you should just use a real device. There is no way to enable wifi on the android emulator. This question has been asked on StackOverflow:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/7876302/enabling-wifi-on-android-emulator


There is information under About phone->Status->SIM Status.

The relevant field is Cellular network type.

3g if:

UMTS
HSPA
W-CDMA

2g if:

EDGE
GPRS
GSM


bash - How can I check if a computer exists on my network WITHOUT IP (i.e. by device name only)?

Dynamic DNS service would work. Get your laptop to update your dynamic domain with it's local ip, and then whenever your phone connects to a new wifi network, resolve that domain, if you get a hit, you're either good or happened to find someone with the same local ip!

Similar to that, you could get your laptop to post it's ip to a server somewhere (web, email, w/e) that you can retrieve from a script on your phone.

Short of setting up a DNS server, I'm not sure there is any means for resolving host names that aren't named in your local configs.


Find out available mobile network bands in my area and disable scanning for unused bands

From personal experience messing with the bands on my HTC One M8 & M9, disabling CDMA and unused WCDMA bands no significant impact on battery life.

If you want to figure out which bands can be used, a quick search on "carrier" + "bands" will tell you.


Why my (unrooted) /data partition appears to be empty?

Without root Astro doesn't have permission to view the contents of the /data directory. It probably displays it as "empty" in an attempt to handle it gracefully, I would guess (but that's mostly a guess). It seems like a fairly sensible alternative to other solutions, though, aside from perhaps giving you a message that says "Permission Denied" or similar.


Yes.  Settings -> Wireless and network -> WiFi settings -> (menu button) Advanced -> Wifi sleep policy -> Never


Safestrap app won't run after installing recovery -- "Unfortunately, Safestrap has stopped"

Okay, it turned out to be something silly. The problem is that SE status reverts to Enforcing when you reboot. So, you have to set it to Permissive with setenforce 0 again before the first time you use Safestrap after a reboot.


Need to recover data from SD card as used Android Internal storage from PC

This is very device dependent.
The first option you should try when recovering your data from the external SD Card is to REMOVE the card, Place it into an adapter & put it into a computer.

Try to access the data that way,
From my personal experience a research on Android, I can not find any reference to the SD Card being encrypted as the comments suggest in your question.

Samsung device's do have SD Card encryption by default, However this is not say an " Android " thing to be expected, usually you need to manually encrypt your SD Card.

The SD Card is however Formatted in Fat32 or just Fat, and it usually has a Linux partition for speeding up transfers.

You need to place the card into a computer and use a data recovery software... Because I'm on Windows 10, I suggest Recuva by Piriform because it has a decent home version.

Another option to try if you do have encrypted data is to do a recovery anyway.. Often not all data is encrypted, only necessary data to read the drive is encrypted.


Android natively doesn't support the Bluetooth HID profile which would be required for this. So, your options are limited depending on whether you're rooted or not:

(If rooted): This YouTube video shows the Nexus One connected to a Microsoft Wireless Entertainment Keyboard 7000.
(If not rooted): Teksoft provide a Bluetooth HID driver (commercially, costs about 10 Euros), which is reportedly successful.

Note: Individual devices that run Android may have the HID profile added by their manufacturer -- for example, the Dell Streak supports Bluetooth keyboards.


How can I debug my application while USB tethering is enabled?

If you have root, once USB tethering is enabled, go to your terminal on Android and run

su (or su root)
adbd start (or sudo adbd start without previous su line)

That will start the daemon while your USB is in Ethernet mode and allow you to connect from your PC.


Why does Google Talk never appear on the "Recent Applications" list?

Google talk and Gmail each behave this way. I found this out by asking here actually. So when you drag down the notification bar, GMail and Google Talk will not appear in the recent apps list. However, you will see them in recent apps if you navigate to them using an application launcher.

I'm not certain if the same is true for Google Voice.


How to back up user data from recovery mode?

With the option for update via adb you can likely use adb commands while phone is in recovery and connected to a computer.

first you will need the adb files:
found here

unzip the contents to computer.  I recommend root of drive i.e. C:\adb.

next you will need USB drivers to connect phone to computer and be able to execute commands:
found here

Install drivers via usual windows methods.

got to folder where you extracted adb files
hold left shift key and right click mouse
select open command window here.
connect phone to computer and boot to recovery.
test connect:

    adb devices

you should get output for server starting and a line showing phones serial number if connection is possible.

Providing all is well:

    adb pull /sdcard/.

this should pull all contents on internal sdcard to current directory.

This will NOT retrieve data stored elsewhere such as phone logs or text messages or contacts.  Unfortunately those will be lost without the option to recover from boot loop.  It will only recover data saved on data partition in phone such as photos, music and other misc info saved there by apps.

Try wipe cache partition to see if that gets past boot loop.  only option I can think of.

Or simply flash custom recovery like twrp that allows access to external sdcard
forum.xda-developers.com/a310/orig-development/twrp-recovery-micromax-canvas-nitro-a311-t3066387


Revert to official Android from Cyanogenmod

Yes, you can use CWM to flash the official ROM. As Izzy linked, this question is our guide to finding ROMs for devices. In particular, you can find stock Samsung ROMs easily on SamMobile: there are different ROMs for each particular type of Note 2 and each country, so be sure to pick the right one for your device and location.

Also, it may be worth sticking with Cyanogenmod. Many new users don't appreciate how great the difference is between a nightly/snapshot build and a stable release. If you've been using a nightly or a beta, and a release candidate or stable release is available for your device, you might want to try that out before going back to stock. At the very least, you might consider filing a bug report for the boot loop you've observed. If nobody reports it, it may never be fixed.


Make a pop up message if about to call area codes excluding specified

Here's a working macro with explanation in comments
(Click to enlarge)

Note

Log events write to the log which can be accessed from the home screen of the app and are useful to check errors.

Screenshot shows the local variable value, which is also useful in troubleshooting.

Your macro had matching condition excludes which is wrong, it needs to be != (not equal to).

In the Text Manipulation action, the output should be saved to the variable A

Edit : The answer above is in response to the previous version of the question


MetroPCS ZTE cannot connect to the carrier data network

Try going into Settings -> Wireless & Networks -> Mobile Networks -> APNs and make sure the MetroPCS APN is selected.

Here is what mine looks like (I am on t-mobile, which is why I have that selected). Your list may be different.

If this doesn't work, give MetroPCS a call and have them re-add the device to the network on their end.


Check out this link that is what you want:HTC


How do I enable all the functions of an Apple EarPods?

An older question, Would Apple EarPods work on my Android phone?, says the EarPods do not work for Android phones.

However, a question on Apple's site, Will the EarPods work with other smartphones and audio devices?, says it works on some Android phones, especially on newer ones.

In Google Play, there is RemoteControl for Earphones, which might be useful, but I can't say for sure. I don't have an EarPod.


Android does not have the concept of trash bin or recycle (unlike windows).

When you delete a file, it is not actually deleted but the space it occupied is marked as free and therefore can be used to store data (that's why file recovery is possible using apps).

So, your storage being always full is not because of files in trash. It can be for a bunch of other reasons like remnants of uninstalled apps, system logs, duplicates etc. I would suggest you use this app SD Maid to clean your phone. Pro version allows you to schedule cleaning.

I have no affiliation with the app and recommend it strongly


Yes, the applications can be downloaded on each device as long as each device uses the same Google account in the Android Market. Your account's ownership of the app persists even if you have to delete it for some reason, such as running out of space.


extSDCard as internal Storage - how does Androied manage app & data location

The adopted SD card is actually mounted at /mnt/expand/$UUID

Instead of forcing the user to pick for EVERY file whether they want it stored in the device's internal storage or the adopted storage, they simply made the internal memory unavailable for storage. That is, /storage/emulated is mounted to point to your adopted SD card and your previous internal storage data that actually lived in /data/media is moved over to its new home on the SD card. This gives the added benefit that there is NO ambiguity where apps are storing user data. It always goes to the adopted SD card.

Go here for more info
reddit: Let's clear up the confusion regarding storage in Android once and for all, including adoptable storage in Marshmallow.


somehow newly saved contacts get disappeared

I have the same issue with my Moto G (3rd gen) with just one google account.

When new contact adding it will disappear. I resolved my problem by the following solution. The solution was to disable google contact sync. I fixed my problem. But I not sure what is exact cause for this issue. This is a workaround solution.

I hope this is a help if someone doesn't want to sync contact with google.


Is it possible to backup settings and apps for SGS with Samsung Kies?

Kies allows backups, but not the application settings, only limited content such as contacts, bookmarks, music, photo and videos. You can see the Kies tutorial on backup : Open Kies v2.0, "Help menu->Kies Tutorial->Backup & Restore mobile phone data" section for details and a movie. You can also try MyBackup free from market, which does not require root. Wish you luck!


Firmware definitely won't affect the quality of GPS reception (atleast in case of original ROMs, as homebrew ROMs might have some bugs - EVEN then it's either the fact that the GPS fix might take longer than usual or the GPS doesn't work at all. Not associated with accuracy.) What affects GPS reception is the quality of the signal. You tend to get a better and a faster GPS fix if you're in the open rather than in a closed building.

I've seen that Foursquare and Google Maps always point at the same location. (No brainer.)


Has TWRP been replaced by another custom recovery image?

No, TWRP has not been replaced by another project, the issue you see is references to naming conventions that resolve to the same actual website, different name, same project. The websites are one and the same... Both twrp.me and teamw.in resolve to 198.27.116.169, which is the website host for TeamWin, the development team of TWRP.


unable to mount /data, /system and /cache on Android phone (Asus Zenfone 5 (501cg , t00f)

Had same issue with my 3.5 year old Zenfone 5. Tried almost everything to save it but nothing worked. It would not update the recovery even when fastboot flash was successful. Figured out it was failed EMMC and many other users faced the same issue in the same time period. Asus might had planted a uesd time trigged failure tech or something (Just guessing by the amount of similar failure in same time period of a month). Well i fixed mine by getting a ZF5(free :p) from a friend (his phone was not uses much as it had a broken screen maybe thats why it didn't failed) and then replaced my Motherbord with his.


The partition you want to write to is called boot, not bootloader, so the correct command is

fastboot flash boot boot.img


Android tablet, user profiles, change owner?

I read from a forum that for security reasons, the only way to change the owner is to do a Factory Reset.


Flashing a firmware for SC-02H model on SM-G3950 model of Samsung Galaxy 7 Edge

Question #1 Answer: http://willmyphonework.net

Question #2 Answer: Since you are looking to flash firmware that did not come on the device by default you run the risk of bricking the device. Definitely ensure if you have a bootloader that can be unlocked, and I would advise flashing twrp to begin and follow it with a full backup in case something goes wrong. You will always have the option to return to stock (make sure OEM Unlocked is ENABLED so you don't accidentally FRP Lock your device if it bricks, as this will result in a much more difficult to save situation than just a bad flash!!). As far as if your device can receive OTA updates.... typically flashing anything other than the stock firmware will result in you not being able to take OTA updates, but in the context you have asked it almost sounds as if your carrier uses a similar system to US CDMA carriers, in that it requires the "activating" or "programming" of the device to enable service. If that's the case then you just need to flash the radio.img or modem.img of the correct carrier while in TWRP recovery (only after you have backed up your current radio.img!) and then see if the phone boots and receives signal.

Second answer is a bit rough around the edges, but let me know if anything goes wrong or if you need further help and I'll be happy to help where I can.


How to reset an LG STYLO without the volume buttons

Steps for factory reset from Settings :

From any home screen, tap Apps > Settings.

If in tab view, tap General.
Under PERSONAL, tap Backup & reset.
Select or clear the following check boxes:

Back up my data
Automatic restore

Tap Backup account and follow the steps to create Google backup account, if necessary.
Tap Factory data reset.

Review the warning message and select or clear Erase SD card.
Tap Reset phone > Next.
Tap Delete all.
Tap OK.


Cannot add some YouTube videos to offline mode

There is nothing you can do, since it seems not all videos can be taken offline. From an article on Techniqued,

Note: Remember not all videos can be taken offline and some videos might show this error "Sorry, this video can’t be taken offline" message. YouTube does not clearly mention what is the criteria for videos to be available offline. So in case you encounter this issue, you will not be able to view the video offline.

Based on research, there is a possibility that videos with copyrighted content (e.g. Vevo) can't be taken offline. A commenter wrote,

Most of the videos I tried, are giving error, ‘This video can’t be taken offline.’
Most of them are from vevo, however I tried for an old hindi song and that one worked.

Or, it might be related to YouTube Music Key.

Availability
You must be a Music Key subscriber to take music videos offline.

Other than that, there's almost no clue.


Rooting Galaxy S3: Entry in device manager not found when entering download mode

I managed to get it working using Windows 7 to root it. (Following the step-by-step guide without modifications).

The order of things I tried in windows 8.1, each time attempting the rooting process:

Swapped USB ports
enabled developer mode
enabled USB debugging mode
Reset everything to factory settings
Swapped USB ports
enabled developer mode
enabled USB debugging mode

And I had repeatedly re-installed device drivers using Samsung Kies 3 during the above. Nothing worked. So maybe it's just windows 8.1 that stopped things working.


How can I email large videos to someone else?

Best option would be to upload them to either YouTube (marked as Private or Unlisted if you don't want them searchable/viewable by others) or Dropbox. Should take the same amount of time to upload both. Once uploaded to dropbox you can share either the file or a link. I typically use YouTube as it doesn't require the other person to download the large video.

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.dropbox.android


Save the following in one of the init scripts in the ROM

ifconfig eth0 192.168.1.100 netmask 255.255.255.0
route add default gw 192.168.1.1 dev eth0
setprop net.dns1 192.168.1.1
ip addr show
ip route show

Where eth0 in this case, is an ethernet adapter attached via USB.


Phone asking "SIM network unlock PIN" after flashing new Stock ROM on Xperia S

Try this...

Link to LT26i firmware

You might have flashed different firmware that's the issue or Your phone might be factory locked... Try the solution in the link provided... :-)


The path you have included in your post is for Windows not Android.
General approach how to access app data without root
If there is an IndexedDb on Android it will be located on most devices somewhere below /data/data/com.android.chrome/ which is only accessible with root permissions.
However the Chrome app allows backup via adb, therefore you should be able to make an backup of the chrome app data and extract the file then from the backup. For doing so you need a device with activated developer options and enabled Android Debug Bridge (adb).
Backup Chrome data to the file backup.ab
adb backup com.android.chrome

Then you need to convert the backup using Android backup Extractor (abe):
java -jar abe-all.jar unpack backup.ab backup.tar

Now you can open the created backup.tar file using an archive tool like 7zip an extract everything or just search for the file IndexedDb file.
If you have found the file and you want to modify it the whole process works in the opposite direction, using "abe pack mode" and "adb resore".
Chrome and IndexedDB
Looking at the data structures created by the latest Chrome app on a rooted DB there is no IndexedDB file created by Chrome on Android.
Instead IndexedDB is a directory containing multiple database - one for every web site. Each database consists of multiple files.
Therefore if you expect that a certain site has created a very large IndexedDB storage it should be possible to reclaim that storage by deleting the IndexedDB storage of that site.
You can display details on the IndexedDB by opening the url chrome://indexeddb-internals/ in Chrome.


Huawei Ascend P1 U9200: upgrading (International to Chinese)

i just installed the official firmware.(B315, Jellybean) If you don't use the radio and MHL capabilities it is worth it, as those are not on there. Makes the phone faster, improves the camera. Battery icon shows exact percentage battery remaining making it at least feel if it last longer, still won't last the entire day if gaming on it. The volume up takes a photo and feels more responsive.


How to record videos with LG G2 Mini with a lower quality or resolution?

Note: This is a partial answer to address the issue using an alternative app.

  Is there an app that allows one to record videos at a lower resolution?

In my OnePlus One, I use Cinema FV-5. It shows me following recording resolutions:

4096x2160 8.8 MP 4K UHD
3840x2160 8.3 MP 16:9 4K UHD
1920x1080 2.1 MP 16:9 Full HD
1440x1080 1.6 MP 4:3
1280x720  0.9 MP 16:9 HD
864x480   0.4 MP SD
800x480   0.4 MP 15:9 SD
720x480   0.3 MP 3:2 NTSC SD
640x480   0.3 MP 4:3 SD
480x320   0.2 MP 3:2
384x288   0.1 MP 4:3
352x288   0.1 MP
320x240   0.1 MP 4:3
176x144   0 MP

Google Camera on the other hand allows my device to record at 4K, 1080p and 720p. I'll update my answer if I come to know any other app with varied resolutions capability.

Update 1: Suggested by @Mani, the app is Open Camera(Libre software, free, < 1MB in size). Resolutions are more or less same in variety as Cinema FV-5 has.


Do I need to (re-)partition my SD card for app2sd to work?

The CyanogenMod wiki has some info on this.

Basically, their old version of apps2sd (now called apps2ext) required an EXT partition on the SD card.

Their current version does not require partitioning, it's just a matter of overriding the preference of the app and moving it to the SD card anyways.

Since FroydVillain is based on CM6, you don't need to format your SD card; CM6+ uses the new apps2sd, not apps2ext.


Where to download new Google Play Game service from Google I/O 13

End users don't need to install anything from their side. Google Play Services APK in your device would have already been updated to support Gaming (You can manually install/update Google Play Services framework if something's wrong). Just find a game which uses Game Services API and enjoy!


Porting cloud account information from ES Explorer

What ended up working was to copy the *.cfg files from the data\data\com.estrong.android.pop\files folder, and the serverlistdb*.xml files from the shared_prefs folder. Then, after a reboot the accounts showed up.


First a little explanation on the storage (you might also check the tag wiki of the storage tag for a short introduction):
Why can't I use the free space available at /system?
The /system partition holds the often so-called "ROM", i.e. the Android core system (including the pre-installed apps, see bloatware). By default, it is mounted read-only for several reasons (including "security", so no app can tamper with anything here -- and the user cannot accidentally render the system unusable). This is also why a factory reset will present you with a "virgin system": it will not touch this read-only partition.
Being mounted read-only makes it clear you cannot write things onto this partition -- which answers the question why you cannot make use of the "free space" it has. You might wonder why a read-only partition then is not "sized appropriately" -- but it is: it just takes into consideration that additional space might be needed for a system update. Future Android versions might (and most likely will) need more space, also providers might want to add more bloatware...
Why is there so little space at /data?
To put it in simple words: 180MB is all that was left after taking away the ~200MB for /system. The Galaxy Mini S5570 isn't a high-end device. And before you ask: No there's nothing you can do to increase the amount of overall storage available to /data (at least nothing easy -- though some geeks might think of creating a bigger partition on the SDCard and mount it as /data, this is nothing simple and also not without side-effects).
What can be done?
Nothing much. If your device is rooted, you could think of using a bigger SDCard (your device supports up to 32GB), and moving stuff over there with things like link2sd or even Data2SD. You can regularly clear your apps' caches and do some other cleanup. Or you can simply go for a new device which offers more storage (and more RAM, and a faster CPU).
I know it's not very satisfying that a device, just being 2 years old (the S5570 was released to the market in February 2011) already is unable to keep up with daily needs. But unfortunately, 180MB storage (and 384MB RAM) really is not much to play around... So all that currently remains is to refer you to the most faqs of the "insufficient storage" tag to find a solution until you can get yourself a new device. See especially:

How can I get rid of the low disk space notification?
What can I do to manage my phone's internal storage?
How can I deal with “Low on Space” messages on my HTC Incredible?
How can I free up more space on my Android (2.2 Froyo) phone?
“Insufficient storage” when trying to install new app


AFAIK the default app drawer on the Nexus 5 always sorts the applications in alphabetical order only. So if you would want to order them in a different manner, you would have to use a 3rd Party launcher app(Go Launcher, Aviate etc.)

Here is a link to 3rd party launchers that are available on the Play Store:
3rd party Launchers


How to block ads in Android applications?

The most popular method is replacing the built-in hosts files with one that forces DNS queries to well-known ad servers to result in 127.0.0.1 (localhost).  This effectively blocks most common ads, and most of the Google Ads in applications.

The downside is that applications can tell that ads are being blocked, and can either refuse to run or otherwise degrade their usefulness while the ad blocking is in effect.

Also, root access is required to replace the hosts file.

Beyond that, I haven't seen anything that can selectively block web requests for arbitrary apps.  For some programs that only use internet access for ads, you could use a firewall app to prevent them from accessing the internet or -- if your ROM supports it (like the latest CyanogenMod) -- revoke the internet access permission from the app.

Again, root access is generally required to set up a system-wide app-level firewall or replace your ROM.


The primary technique to reject applications other than from Play Store to install is in the Settings for Security. Make sure the setting "Unknown Sources" is unchecked. This setting normally allows 3rd party installation to occur.


How can I exclude Sound Recorder files from Music library

I have found a solution to the first problem thanks to the reference by beeshyams.
MortPlayer Music allows you to choose which folders to draw your music from. Hence, in my case, I removed all the .nomedia files from Sound Recorder and only allowed music from my Music folder in MortMusic, thus leaving the SoundRecorder functionality as it was (i.e. recordings show up in the Recorder App) but not in MortMusic, where only my desired .mp3's show.


When will my device get the Android 6.0 update (Marshmallow)?

This community wiki will list all of the known and rumored dates for devices. If you have an update make sure to follow the format that's been established, and the following guidelines:

Keep devices in alphabetical order listing the manufacturer and model
Specify if the date is confirmed or rumored and link to the source
If there is an unofficial release, link to the site where it can be downloaded

Phones

HTC

Butterfly 3 - announced - (source)
Desire 816 - announced - (source)
Desire 820 - announced - (source)
Desire 826 - announced - (source)
One E8 - announced - (source)
One E9 - announced - (source)
One E9+ - announced - (source)
One M7: Never (confirmed)
One M8 - by the end of 2015 - (source)
One M8 EYE - announced - (source)
One M9 - by the end of 2015 - (source)
One M9+ - announced - (source)
One ME - announced - (source)

LG

Nexus 4: Never (confirmed)
Nexus 5: 2015-10-05 (confirmed)

Motorola

DROID Turbo - announced - (source)
Moto G and Moto G with 4G LTE (2nd generation) - announced - (source)
Moto G (3rd generation) - announced - (source)
Moto MAXX - announced - (source)
2014 Moto Turbo - announced - (source)
Moto X (2nd generation) - announced - (source)

Pure Edition in the US
in Latin America, Europe and Asia

Moto X (3rd generation) - announced - (source)

Pure Edition
Style
Play

Nexus 6: 2015-10-05 (confirmed)

OnePlus

OnePlus One

Cyanogen OS - in first quarter of 2016 - (Source)
OxygenOS - no fixed date confirmed, but not in 2015 - (Source)

OnePlus Two - in first quarter of 2016 - (Source)

Tablets

Asus

Nexus 7 (2012): Never (confirmed)
Nexus 7 (2013) - 2015-10-05 (confirmed)

HTC

Nexus 9: 2015-10-05 (confirmed)

Samsung

Nexus 10: Never (confirmed)

Other

Nexus Player: 2015-10-05 (confirmed)


How to set SD card as default storage on Android Marshmallow?

The applications need to support this in Marshmallow, and as of yet many applications do not support the changes that are needed in their code to allow this to occur in Marshmallow with the SD card setup as external storage.

The answer is that your app developers need to include this functionality in their apps, it is not a blanket Android setting. Unless the code is included in their apps, there is nothing you can do to change it in a stock device.


I use Jorte to add events to my Google Calendar linked accout without problems and without any specific setting tuning.


Uninstalling app from specific device only

Yes, they have separate lists - you can uninstall from the tablet or phone without affecting the other device.


How do I turn off Browser Messages in Moto G?

There will be an app called BrowserMessage in your phone. To disable that go to Settings > Apps > All > Select the BrowserMessage app and Disable it.

Hope this helps you and whoever facing this irritation :)


how to add Thai as system language Samsung J5

You need to go to Settings > Languages and Input > Languages and then select Thai as the language.


All the firmware are not Fully Stable. May be the firmware you installed doesn't have a sim support. You can simply change your custom firmware or get back your original firmware. You can have a stable Rom from Cyanogenmod. It really provides stable Rom's and mostly stable one's.


How can I manually download the Play Store APK from Google?

Google does not allow downloading the Play Store directly from the Play Store itself, unless its an update to an existing installation. What you can do however is:

1) Root your phone (Xiaomi warranty isn't voided by rooting)

2) Use an app like Flashify or fastboot to flash a custom recovery (CWM or TWRP) (Refer this guide).

3) Flash a compatible GAPPs package, which includes the Play Store APK. You can get it that way.


ADB backup restoration on an older Android version

You may be able to restore apps and data as far as they are no system apps. But be sure to fix permissions (Owner, Group and access) to what the system uses for all files (data and apps).

I already did this on my SIII LTE for an upgrade of Android 4.4.4 (CM11) to Android 5.0.1 (CM12) with no side effects (except some single apps that deleted and recreated their data for some reason).

  Also: Of course your device needs to be rooted to be able to write onto the /data partition.


That is because you have MMC inserted while booting. This issue is commonly seen on Android devices running Android 7 nogaut.
If you have AOSP for Android 7 then modify the below file:
/frameworks/base/core/java/android/os/storage/StorageManager.java

Interchange the position of mmc and sda storage path

Before

private static final String[] INTERNAL_STORAGE_SIZE_PATHS = {
"/sys/block/mmcblk0/size",
"/sys/block/sda/size"
};

After

private static final String[] INTERNAL_STORAGE_SIZE_PATHS = {
"/sys/block/sda/size",
"/sys/block/mmcblk0/size"
};


what will happen to built in apps in galaxy note 1 n7000 after hard reset such as s pen?

The types of problems you're describing are generally best solved by, indeed, factory resetting. If you can't find another solution, it's pretty much always the last resort. So if you're willing to do it, it's all but guaranteed to fix the problem, unless the problem is being caused by a hardware issue.

Built-in apps will all remain. Anything that shipped with the phone will still be there. Some may have updates that need to be reapplied, but you won't lose anything that was there when you first turned on your phone after buying it.


What will I lose if I manually upgrade Galaxy Tab 7" to Honeycomb 3/3.1?

I realized that I'm going on and on in comments for no real reason but perhaps this is better suited for an answer.

The only Honeycomb build I'm aware of for the Tab is this one on XDA (there are two versions, GSM and CDMA). It is, for all intents and purposes, a bleeding-edge attempt to get Honeycomb running on the Tab. The developer refers to it as an "Alpha" and essentially says to expect things to be buggy.

Since there is no public source code for the 3.x releases of Android yet, the build is based on an extracted image/filesystem from the Android SDK, meaning that it is not optimized for the Tab and probably lacks 3rd party drivers (excepting any official 2.2 drivers that happen to be compatible with 3.x).

The GSM thread lists the following as "not working" under the current build, meaning this is the minimum you should expect to lose:

*Gyro (no rotation, there is an app installed but rotates wrong way)
*Settings window not appearing when expanding from the Notifications menu
*3g data nor phone abilities
*BT,
*gyro,
*hardware acceleration
*SD card on boot
*headphone audio
*mic
*GPS

In general, builds like this show up on devices when a new major release appears in the SDK but they tend to be fairly unstable and also fairly slow. The videos I've seen of this ROM appear a bit more performant (in general) than other SDK ports I've encountered, but your experience may vary.

As for restoring, the "Factory Reset" option doesn't usually touch system files on most devices, from what I know. It's possible I'm mistaken on this and that the Tab does actually restore the firmware, but I'm not incredibly familiar with the Tab. You'll probably want to do a little digging to see what a "Factory Reset" actually means (might be in your manual, perhaps).

That being said, there are instructions for getting a Verizon Tab back to stock here, and there might be similar ones floating around for other carriers. If you can get a custom recovery on to your device then you can simply back up your system before trying Honeycomb and then restore from the backup. The easiest way to do it is probably just to install ROM Manager and flash ClockworkMod recovery from there. There appear to be manual instructions about but they vary by carrier.

Personally speaking: I would not use an SDK port for anything other than showing off to people (which can admittedly be a whole lot of fun). In a production environment I definitely wouldn't risk it, and I honestly never kept them installed for more than about 30 or 45 minutes at a time to play with before restoring to a stable ROM. They were fun sneak-peaks, but I've always found them highly unreliable (though "your mileage may vary" is probably a good catch phrase here).

Edit: A word of caution to Wifi Tab users, this post on one of the Honeycomb threads indicates that the current ROMs (as of 6/19/2011) WILL NOT WORK on a Wifi Tab. I personally can not verify the validity of this statement, but this would not surprise me as other devices (e.g. the Xoom) have similar incompatibility among ROMs.


Play music app doesn't find transferred mp3 file in library

Thank you for your reply. However immediately after posting question, I just tried rebooting the android phone. After re-booting, the mp3 file in question was seen and played by the "Play Music" app. So this worked for me. But I didn't understand what .no media file is.

Thank you anyway.
May God bless you
Shashidhar


Transferring Nandroid Backup between two devices

Restore only /data, /system, /boot (and optionally, /cache). Advanced Restore option in CWM recovery should allow you which partitions to  restore. Otherwise, Philz Touch Recovery (fork of CWM) has this option.

I'm choosing only selected partitions because if your device has concept of EFS then you may end up with IMEI trouble.

Note that while restoring make sure that the rest of firmware on both the identical models is same (modem, uboot and more). It should be same if they are running the same Android build. Otherwise, it is very likely that you may end up with a soft-bricked device at the least.

Also, make sure that the both  the devices are fully  backed up so that you don't end up with data loss at least.


Reflash gapps from recovery. This will install all the necessary google applications that have been deleted.

You can find all gapps on Goo.im, you just have to choose the ones relevant to your android version.


How to start an app from the command line?

TL:DR;
adb shell monkey -p de.avm.android.fritzapp 1

Long Answer

  How can I simply start the app as if it had been clicked on?

You can start the main activity of the app
am start -n com.package.name/.MainActivityName

Since you have decompiled the App and got the manifest file so you would have the name of the main activity. You can get this information from the App's AndroidManifest.xml by searching for the activity with intent-filterand also contains android.intent.action.MAIN under action

Check the activity element with skeleton as below

<activity android:name="this.is.main.activity.name you.are.looking.for">
    <intent-filter>
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
        <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER"/>
    </intent-filter>
</activity>

You can start this particular app by
am start -n app de.avm.android.fritzapp/.gui.FRITZApp

Alternatively if you do not have the source code (manifest file), you can try the more general method where knowing the package name is enough with the help of Monkey tool as below:

adb shell monkey -p package.name 1 (Simplified)

The above command works because Monkey takes a constraint -c <main-category> which if not specified will select activities listed with the category Intent.CATEGORY_LAUNCHER which in turn becomes

adb shell monkey -p package.name -c android.intent.category.LAUNCHER 1


Switch Live Wallpapers Automatically without Root

You can try smart wallpaper from playstore
I've tried on static wallpaper
But it's worth a try on live wallpaper


ADB failed to detect Nexus 5 running Android Marshmallow

I would highly advise to install Universal naked drivers on your Windows system as in windows only we encounter such driver issues.
Refer this link for Universal naked drivers: http://www.xda-developers.com/universal-naked-driver-solves-your-adb-driver-problems-on-windows/
Being a Nexus 5 user, I have encountered this problem and after great efforts, UND helped.
You can install the drivers by downloading zip file, unpacking it.
Connect your N5 to your PC, go to "Device Manager" in windows, uninstalling the already installed Nexus 5 Drivers. Install drivers by provided options and use the location of unzipped files when it asks for manual installation of drivers.


Can I share my Android's VPN connection over a Hotspot?

Unfortunately the stock Android tethering application does not work with VPNs. This limitation is an oversight in the software and not a system limitation.

However there is an application called ClockworkMod Tether that will allow you to tether and use a VPN at the same time. In fact it makes use of the standard tethering application and then fixes up the routing information to make it work.

This application does not require you to root your phone but you do need to run software on the computer that you wish to connect to your phone. Also this only works for USB tethering at the moment.

There are other alternatives to ClockworkMod Tether, if you wish to try them, including PDANet.

Hope it could help


You don't need Android running to do a factory reset. Try following the steps in this video to reset your tablet.


Grant permissions to a service launched with ADB?

I believe I figured it out.
I'll use Voice Access as the example app.
adb shell am startservice com.android.cts.apps.accessibility.voiceaccess/com.google.android.apps.accessibility.voiceaccess.JustSpeakService

Next
adb shell settings put secure enabled_accessibility_services com.android.cts.apps.accessibility.voiceaccess/com.google.android.apps.accessibility.voiceaccess.JustSpeakService

Then
adb shell settings put secure accessibility_enabled 1

Then finally delete the the readout app, to avoid the accessibility features from being overwritten
adb shell pm uninstall -k --user 0 com.lge.voicecommand

I don't think there should be any errors after that, leave a comment if there are though.


How do I include contacts when searching in Google Maps?

Aha! The trick is to enable Web History. After doing so, I now see addresses for my Contacts (my "People") in Maps when I search for them by name.


Is there a way/app to block outgoing international calls, without activating the network provider's International Call Barring?

there seems to be a range of apps that may do what you are trying to accomplish.

here are a couple that look like they have potential.

Root Call Blocker Pro
Call Guard
Call Blocker Gold
Outgoing Call Blocker


Prevent Accidental Reboots when holding down the power button

I was hoping some flexibility in long-press timeout using AutoInput but the apps slows down my OS considerably to do anything with it.

Anyhow, all I suggest is to use Xposed Additions (free/paid; requires Xposed Framework; if you've Android 5.x, you would need to flash some files from custom recovery. See this XDA thread by rovo89 for such case).

We need Tasker (paid, 7 day free trial) too.

Instructions

(Tested on Android 5.0.2 and 5.1.1)

Install both the apps → activate Xposed Additions's module → launch Xposed Additions
Tap Buttons →  set Long press delay slider to maximum (500ms) → Add new Key → press Power key to select it → Power
Tap Add new Condition → Screen Off → Screen Off → enable Long Press → Shortcut → Task Shortcut → New Task → name the task.

Note: You can try MacroDroid's MacroDroid Shortcut in place of Task Shortcut. The free version is restricted to one action per macro, so you wouldn't get any flexibility, but it is acceptable here.
For your task, action would be:

Alert → Vibrate → Time: select the vibration time (in milliseconds)

It is possible that vibration for 1000ms would not be enough for you. In that case, add combination of actions. For example, in addition to last Vibrate action, you can also do:

Task → Wait → select MS or/and Seconds slightly greater than milliseconds selected in last Vibrate action

Wait is important because if you add continuous Vibrate actions then you would end up skipping almost  of them except the first one. Tasker doesn't queue vibrate requests, as it seems to me.
Now, add another Vibrate action and copy-paste the whole cycle as much as you want.

Select an icon for your task and there you go.

You can now test your solution.

Experimental

For users having AutoInput satisfactorily running, you can emulate long-press of a key. I tested my solution on Volume Up key and it worked perfectly. Well almost!

For Tasker:

Profile 1: Event → Plugin → AutoInput → Key → Configuration:

select your key under Keys
select Key Action to Key Down

Task 1: Actions:

Variable → Variable Set → Variable: %Set → To: 0
Task → Wait → select MS or Seconds for your desired long-press timeout. Choose 1 Second for experimental purposes
Task → If → %Set eq 0
Alert → Vibrate → Time: 1000ms

Profile 2: Event → Plugin → AutoInput → Key → Configuration:

select your key under Keys
select Key Action to Key Up

Task 2: Actions:

Variable → Variable Set → Variable: %Set → To: 1

Use the action Key Suppress from Plugin → AutoInput → Modes, wherever feels necessary. Also, I didn't yet experiment with screen off state.

Now, the theory: The flow is in this manner:

When your selected key (say Key-X) would be pressed, profile 1 would activate.
When the key would be released, profile 2 would activate.
We know that for long-press the key needs to be continuously pressed for some time.
Now, if I long-press Key-X then for that time being profile 2 would not activate and so I can set %Set to 0 in profile 1 → wait for long-press timeout (slightly less) → check if %Set is still 0 (%Set would become 1 if key gets released) and then execute the Vibrate action.

Simple! Let me know if it works for Power key.


radio.img is the radio firmware.  It's a binary, not any kind of archive; you can't unpack it.

You could, of course, attempt to de-compile it — but manufacturers generally don't release the source code so you are not likely to get very far with that without extreme effort.


Will installing the Voodoo lagfix clear all my settings?

No, it shouldn't have any effect on your settings or apps. The FAQ from the Project Voodoo site notes:

  Will I lose any settings or App?

  None. But some sort of backup is
  recommended of course.


Few solutions:

Open Google Play Store. Goto Settings -> Auto-update apps, then select "Don't auto-update apps". (But Google Play Services and Google Play Store will be updated regardless of this settings).
You can install a firewall and block Google Play Services, Download, Download Manager and Google Play Store to block updates. Unblock them when you need to update apps.


Is it possible to get Tasker to play the next song in Spotify

Yes it is possible, but using Tasker's built in Media Control Next will not work.

For the action you need to use Script --> Run Shell, and as the command enter "input keyevent 87" without quotes. This is the Android API:

https://developer.android.com/reference/android/view/KeyEvent.html#KEYCODE_MEDIA_NEXT


Is there an official Google Apps package?

Official GApps package is never available publicly. Google only provides it to authenticated OEMs like Samsung and HTC. It'll be installed only on Google Play Verified devices, in their stock ROMs.

That's why individuals can only download and flash unofficial GApps packages.

You can, of course, extract Google Apps from an authenticated phone and install it elsewhere, but you'll surely do extra job in comparison to flashing well-prepared packages.


Removing app from download queue in Amazon App Store

Go to My apps-> cloud-> hold the app you want to remove (it is valid only for installed or downloaded apps not for paused ore ongoing download).

If you want to remove ongoing download, then you must cancel that. To cancel, you have to go to setting-> running apps-> amazon app store.

You will see 4-6 processes there. You have to stop download process from there. Note: the download process will only appear if that download is running at that time and it may take a few seconds to appear.

After stopping download process, when you will return to that app in app store's cloud section, you will see download cancelled. Now you can hold that entry and safely choose remove from upcoming box.


GPS is automatically turned-off when not in use by apps. That said, apps can use GPS even if they work in background. So, I guess that your concern should be checking the apps that use GPS in the background, rather than turning it off completely.


What's your Android version? I'll assume you're using 4.1 or newer.

The .swf extension is used by files played by Adobe Flash Player. Unfortunately, Flash is not supported on Android since 4.1.

You can try installing the Flash Player APK. The latest version is for 4.0/ICS, but some people say it works on 4.1+/JB as well. Remember: Your Mileage May Vary™.

Additionally, Chrome for Android never supported Flash - even with the APK installed. (Thanks to Compro01 for confirming that!) So you'll need to use a different browser.

If you are not using Android 4.1 or newer, please update your question with more information.


Forwarding all mail in Gmail using using android app.

Unfortunately, there is no option like this in the gmail app. You would have to log in on the website to change it, maybe the login is saved in the chrome app, so you can set up the automated forwarding there.
You can even set up another e-mail in the accounts settings of your google account, where you could recover the mails. Just go to accounts.google.com on the phone and there you can set up a lot.
But only, if the password is saved.

The only solution if the password is not saved would be:

forward every existing mail to the new mail account
create an automated answer for the old account with the new mailadress inside
keep the old account still in gmail in case of any important mails
transfer the accounts, which are linked to the old mail adress to the new by entering a new mailadress in the respective accounts (i.e. banking, news, amazon and so on)


Command or script to read a binary file and skip some bytes every X bytes

You should try to use this bash script I wrote for you (require busybox on your Android):

put the script in a file called script.bash (change  with your own path) :

#!/system/xbin/bash
# sputnick 20120928 http://android.stackexchange.com/posts/30069

binfile=<THE PATH OF YOUR BIN FILE>
bytes=$(wc -c < $binfile)
c=0 count=0

while ((count < bytes - (1024+512) )); do
    dd 2>/dev/null if=$binfile bs=512 count=2 skip=$c
    printf '\n\n'
    ((count += 1024+512 ))
    ((c+=3))
done

Now, in a terminal on your computer (this is for linux, adapt it if you use Windows)

adb push script.bash /mnt/sdcard/script.bash
adb shell
bash
chmod +x /mnt/sdcard/script.bash
/mnt/sdcard/script.bash

edit

This is what the script does in-fine :

dd 2>/dev/null if=/tmp/bin bs=512 count=2 skip=0
dd 2>/dev/null if=/tmp/bin bs=512 count=2 skip=3
dd 2>/dev/null if=/tmp/bin bs=512 count=2 skip=6
dd 2>/dev/null if=/tmp/bin bs=512 count=2 skip=9
(...)


Meaning of notification LED colour for Samsung Galaxy S III?

Red when plugged in - Charging

Green when plugged in - Charging complete.

Red when not plugged in - Low battery warning

Blue - Audio is recording or you have a notification waiting.


Corrupted files on internal storage (now readonly), how to repair internal storage?

This is an answer to my own question:

I managed to fix this problem (until now), by doing following:

(NOTE: Do this at your own risk!)

01.  boot into Android and enable USB-Debugging
 02.  backup data from SD
 03.  update busybox via PlayStore
 04.  reboot into recovery mode
 05.  mount system partition (via recovery tools like CWM)
 06.  connect to device via USB + ADB(-Shell)
 07.  get internal SD device name (via mount which is for me/dev/block/mmcblk0p11)
 08.  format internal SD (via mkfs.vfat -F 32 /dev/block/mmcblk0p11)
 09. check new formatted partition (via fsck_msdos -y /dev/block/mmcblk0p11)
 10. reboot into Android and check if internal SD is writable again

Until now, my internal SD became writable again!
Of course, all data is gone.

Cheers!


Device almost unusable after Google password change

From Settings, go to General:Accounts:Google: and then disable everything from being synced.  As soon as this is done, the password prompt will stop popping up.  After password is changed, sync can be enabled again.


Is there a universal way for a circuit to detect battery life and report it to the stock OS?

Short answer: I think not. You'll need to create/install the appropriate battery driver if you want to run it from battery (and be effective).

In Linux power management is done via APM/ACPI which is handled at the BIOS layer. So when you buy a motherboard/dev board the expectation is you'll be plugged in. If you go into any mobile shop, you'll see a variety of batteries even from the same manufacturer. As batteries pack a great deal of energy, every one of those batteries could either have a microchip which communicates the handset informing it about battery charge state or some read-only storage which contains the appropriate necessary parameters so that charging can be done in safe manner.

I'm going to point you to the slide deck where I found regarding Android Power Management:
http://www.slideshare.net/jerrinsg/android-power-management

While I'm not sure if you can immediately understand everything in it - it should give you some scope as to the complexity involved.


As the answer to Are Google Books DRM protected? explains, ACSM files are DRM-protected, so you can only read them in the Play Books app itself, not in another ebook app. Once you've "pinned" the book and it has downloaded, you can read it offline in the Play Books app.


When you just flashed the os, twrp will tell you sure you want to reboot with no os installed, even if you just installed it , i dont know why but reboot system after flashing the OS and your device should boot normally!


How do I disable notifications for a second Gmail account?

This is what I did in Android 4.1 and Gmail:

Open Gmail
Tap the Overflow menu (three vertical dots) and select Settings
Tap the account for which you don't want to get notifications
Uncheck the Notifications option

That should be all you need to do.


Why does Android require you to revert back to factory version in order to disable a system app?

No, no, no.
Reverting to the factory version is not required to disable an app.
It's simple. The dev team think that by disabling, you mean you don't need that app anymore so it's of no use to keep an updated version, so they decide that the 'Disable' button will take the same place as 'Uninstall Update', resulting in less buttons in the app info page.
In actuality, you of course can disable a system app without reverting to factory. However this requires command-line operations, like adb or a terminal emulator. Type in

pm disable com.example.foo

and hit carriage return, the app will be disabled without reverting.
To re-enable, type in

pm enable com.example.foo

and hit Enter.
That's all. Pay attention that you should replace com.example.foo with the actual package name.


Filesystem hierarchy, that defines the directory structure and directory contents of Android?

There's a big chapter on that in Andrew Hoog's Android Forensics book on that (see this Amazon list for available copies). Unfortunately, that book doesn't come for free (but from Elsevier; so prices range from ~USD 20 for the Kindle edition to ~USD 50 for the print, with some crazy offers for ~USD 170+ as well), but it explains a lot of background not only interesting for Forensik specialists. A German version of this book now is available for EUR 35, published by Franzis (which can be found e.g. on its German Amazon page as well as on the publishers site, see this link).

While the link to AndroidUserland given in a comment on the question contains a very rudimentary list, a better (though also incomplete) documentation can be found at robotz.com. As said, this is far from being complete, but better for understanding.

I remember having seen another documentation at android.com -- some hints can be found there e.g. in the Storage Options (check "Internal Storage" and "External Storage" here). But a complete documentation of the file system hierarchy is missing here as well.

So again, the most complete documentation known to me is Hoog's Forensics book. German speakers might also be interested in taking a look into the chapter Dateisysteme und Datenstrukturen of my book "Die Androiden-Toolbox", which (in this community edition) is freely available in HTML, MobiPocket and PDF versions here on my eBook Server (if you prefer a printed copy with a few more details, the (extended) Franzis edition Das inoffizielle Android-Systemhandbuch will be available end of this month, i.e. starting around the 26.11.2012).

Disclosure: As said, I'm the author of the second book mentioned. And, not yet mentioned, the translator for the German version of Andrew Hoog's book. But that does not mean I hold back other sources here, of course.


Can I use an English locale setting on a Polish EEE Pad Transformer?

You can change the language within settings -> Language & input.  There are options for English (Canada, United Kingdom, and United States) and Polish (Polski) as well as a variety of other languages.  If it's in Polish, tap the bottom right of the tablet (the clock area), tap the top box (where the time is), tap the bottom option (Ustawienia - Settings), tap the icon that has an A in it (Jezyk i wprowadzanie danych - Language and input) and tap the top option on the right (Wybierz jezyk - Select language).  From there, you can scroll to the English option you want and tap it.


Moto G5 Plus - will the US sim free version work with a UK sim card?

Unfortunately it would not work on 4G as O2 in the UK requires band 20 which the US version of the phone XT1687 does not support.


How to Make Light indicate No-VPN connection Active?

Izzy's idea about using Tasker for the task in chat

  A raw idea (not checked/verified) would be using an automation tool like Tasker and have it shutdown all network interfaces whenever VPN connection "got lost" (of course giving you a "manual backdoor", i.e. if you manually enable networking it shouldn't shut it down immediately again just because no VPN is active ;)

Solution

Create VPN profile in Settings > More > VPN
Attach it to Tasker

Feature-request: enable the front light configuration in the VPN menu


You can have some custom ROMs, but if you want just to remove the bloatware, I would just root my device, uninstall those bloatwares and if possible unroot again.

Some rooting methods does permit to unroot and some do not.  Even in latter case all that has happened is just you had rooted your device and still have your original ROM.


Yes,you need a custom recovery. Aroma runs within a custom recovery.
A custom recovery such as cwm or twrp can be installed without root on most phones, but you will most likely have to unlock the bootloader first.
Exact steps are dependant on what phone model you have.
Most phones are well covered on xda developers, google it.


The time issue seems to be a known bug has already been reported and fixed in Aug 2012:

SMS times bug - August 2012
Timestamp for text messages - May 2012

I suggest you update to the latest version, currently at 2.1.3.767 Beta. If that still doesn't work, I suggest you report it.


How do I block ads on YouTube in all WebKit based browsers?

You won't be able to block ads in the Youtube APP as long as you don't want to root your device. Blocking these ads requires changes to the DNS settings and you can't change these settings without root, nor can an app.

When you don't want to root your device the only option I see is just to use Firefox (or a similar Browser), install the Adblocker addon and watch your videos through the browser. Less comfort, but the only option remaining without root.


Nokia 6630 runs on Symbian, which is a totally different OS to Android. You can't install Android on Symbian - It's like trying to watch TV with your dishwasher.


Some sites which you recently visited are stored on your browser memory as cache and cookies, so when on slow speed data connection it comes up as a plus point because sites load in a second.

Try this: clear cookies and cache and now try to load the same site on edge. It will take long!


Cannot download an app on my Android tablet

I had deleted everything from the SD card, and it popped out asking me to mount the card and put a new one in. I just put in the old empty card and then I disabled play store and enabled it. After that I moved so many apps to the card I have a lot of space and the play store works perfect again – but this took me 4 hours to figure out! Hope this can help someone else oneday!


My Smartphone should automatically tweet that I got up when I use it in morning. How can I achieve that?

You could probably use On {x} for this. You should be able to configure it so that it sends a tweet the first time you unlock your phone each day. I've not used it much myself though so can't tell you exactly how.
Another possible option would be using Tasker.


My gmail is going to my boyfriends phone

Go to myaccount.google.com.

Scroll down to Recent Activity>Devices.
Click on any device your account should not be associated with and then click Remove.

Then scroll down to Connected Apps and Services>Account Permissions. Click View All. Select any app or device that should not be accessing your data and click Revoke Access.

It's a good idea to go ahead and run though the security check at the top of the accounts page. As others have mentioned, you may want to go ahead and reset your password, as well.


Can Android Device Manager remotely erase my stolen phone's data AFTER synced gmail account's password has already been changed by me?

1) The phone is still tied to your Google account, it just can't sync any data because the password is incorrect. ADM will still issues the Erase command, and if successful you will receive an email with a message noting it was received by the device and it's approximate location if available. The fact that you changed your password after the fact is not relevant. (I do not have a reference for this, it is from practical testing)

2) No, the service would have to be active otherwise the tower blocks communication to that IMEI, thus it cannot locate it. That said, even if the service is active the carrier likely would not reveal it's location even to law enforcement without a court order and that is almost impossible to obtain for just a stolen phone.

3) No, sorry... Once you no longer have the phone in your possession your options are pretty limited, what happens next depends on the phone and the Android version. You have pretty much done all you can do.

Most likely the thief performed a factory reset and all your data is gone anyway, the information on a device is rarely what a thief is after. Their primary concern is a quick turn-over of the device for a cash. Best case scenario at this point is you had a newer phone with Marshmallow and FRP will make it worthless, next worse would be they were able to bypass FRP or it was an older device and they got a few $$$ for it, and the worst case scenario (and least likely) is they were able to access your device and you have all your credit card information, etc on it locally and they hit pay dirt.

TBH, at this point there isn't much you can do except buy another phone and move on.


See this reddit post, where the OP has created this web site dedicated to known Google Now commands and their variations. There is no direct way of silencing, so here is a workaround

When Google is reading the results and you heard enough, say OK Google mute the volume

This silences Google by setting volume to zero. To revert to normal volume, say OK Google set the volume to x , x being a number from 1 to 15 (you will need to experiment to get to comfort level) or OK Google set the volume to full

Tested this on searches like OK Google define aerodynamics, where the rant (as you say ) was long enough . I haven't been able to configure to read out search results, say on Donald Trump :)


is it possible to get location via a cellular network if the device doesnt have a data plan?

Yes, that is possible without a data connection by e.g. using UnifiedNLP and a corresponding location provider. I e.g. use the LocalGsmNlpBackend, which downloads a selection of the OpenCellId database (for the area I need) to the device for local usage. That database contains the positions of cell towers. As you are booked into at least one of those, your coarse location can be estimated. Add another location provider which is e.g. WiFi based for more accuracy if you wish. Apart from downloading the data (preferably while connected to your home WiFi), this works completely without a data connection.

Make sure you pick the correct UnifiedNLP package, depending on whether your device has the Google framework installed (stock ROM usually has this, or if you use a custom ROM but have GApps installed) or use a custom ROM without GApps.

For a more detailed description, please see my article Android without Google: microG, which discusses the variant on a device without Google framework.


As of Android 6.0, the majority of the IPv6 protocol seems to be supported with significant parts missing such as DHCPv6.
Check Issue #36908577 Support IPv6 for more info, specifically the issues listed in comment #105:

Enhancement: Support for DHCPv6 (RFC 3315) Won't Fix (Intended behavior)
http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=32621
Enhancement: Support for Recursive DNS Server Option in ICMPv6 Router Advertisements (RFC 6106) Fixed
http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=32629
Enhancement: Support connecting to IPv6-only wireless networks Fixed
http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=32630
Defect: APN Protocol ignored when roaming Fixed
http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=32631
Enhancement: Automatic fallback from IPv4/IPv6 APN Protocol to parallel IPv4 + IPv6 Won't Fix (Obsolete)
http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=32632
Defect: Frequently ignores ICMPv6 RAs and other multicast traffic Won't Fix (Obsolete)
http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=32662

(Consider reading the issues and their comments carefully, because while some of them have their status updated to "fixed", some users were reporting they still have the same issues.)


Problem installing Facebook and other apps

Basically the error while retrieving information from server is due to the problem with the play store (settings might be invalid or some other issue with the play store) on your device. You can easily solve the problem with the following steps

Go to "Settings" > Applications
Tap Manage Applications > Select "All"
Scroll to Google Play Store and tap it.
Tap Force Stop > OK > Clear data > tap "OK".
Tap the Back button to get back to the applications list>tap Google Service Framework from the list
Tap Force Stop > OK > tap Clear data > tap "OK".
Now power off wait for few while and reboot the device. Try installing it. Now it should solve the problem.

Note: Please follow the correct sequence of force stop and then clear data in order to solve your problem


How is it that Rooting is always possible?

it's not really the "linux OS", it is the linux kernel. The vulnerability is not necessarily in the OS, or the kernel. There are different exploits that are used. I remember some device being able to load any zip file in the recovery if it was "pre-pended" by a signed zip file. So they used a signed zip and added an unsigned zip to the end of the file. I think this exploit was for the Original Droid.

No software is 100% bug free. if it was, then even a mature product like Windows would not have to do security patch releases every month.

No matter how smart the developer is, or thinks he is, more likely than not, there is probably someone smarter (or at least they may know more about exploiting code).

When exploits are discovered, Google (or the manufacturer) has (usually) patched them. But since a lot of the devices don't receive updates very often, the exploit remains available.


Is it possible to add 5GHz wifi capability to a Samsung A3 2016 through a dongle?

No. It's not possible

Your device doesn't support dual band (802.11 a or ac not supported) and adding OTG dongle that supports dual band isn't going to help. As an analogy, your service provider may provide WiFi but if your router ( like the older ones) doesn't support 5Ghz you can't use it in upper band


Google maps location working in app but not in browser

Google apps have a special setting of their own to enable location access.  Open the Google Settings app and change the Positioning Mode setting (under Location) to High Accuracy, and it should prompt you for permission.

In Chrome, go to Settings → Site Settings → Location and ensure nothing related to Google is being blocked.


How to prevent Android from automatically downloading System Updates from the cellular network?

on the settings of the system update there is the option for ability it automatically or no and there is a check for download mode (wifi or data)


How do I stop from getting notified twice when I get a text to my Google Voice number?

From Google Voice settings (on the web, not the phone app), under phones, select your mobile number, and Edit.  Uncheck "Receive SMS on this phone"


What's the perfect internal storage preserving technique? Does link2sd and data2sd interfere?

If you are using the Pro Version of Link2SD, then you will be able to move everything of the APP(Apk,Dex,Lib,Data and Cache) onto the second partition of the SD card.And thus you won't be using any internal memory. My Phone has 157mb internal memory and I have apps that would have allredy filled it installed on my phone without losing space.


Services Google Play and Shop Google Play why both?

Google Play Services is a library used by other Google and third-party apps. It allows apps to use:

Google Maps layers to show maps in other apps
Google+ sign-on and sharing
the new Google+ gaming functionality for match-making, leaderboards, and to store saved games "in the cloud"
Google Cloud Messaging to sync data from the Internet to your device efficiently
Location services to set up "geo-fences" so they can respond to locations and activities more efficiently than if they accessed your location directly

It's a lot of functionality that could have been made part of Android itself, but making it a separate library allows Google to update it directly, so app developers can rely on it being up-to-date on every device: unlike Android itself, which some manufacturers and carriers don't bother to update for older devices.

If you were to remove it, any apps that rely on it would stop working or behave unpredictably.


Can I Make One-side/Two-side Video Call To An Android Phone Using HotSpot Or Within A WiFi network (without internet charges)

After searching around on the internet I found two apps, one called WalkieTooth and another called Atasoy LANPhone.

WalkieTooth

WalkieTooth allows video and audio chat over WiFi, WiFi Hotspots, Bluetooth and WiFi Direct. To set it up:

Download from Google Play on both devices
Select the Camera icon on both devices
On the first device select 'Server', under 'WiFi'
On the second device select 'Client', under 'WiFi' and input the IP address displayed on the first.
You should now be in a video call, press the camera icon to turn on your camera

  Walkietooth allows to establish a full duplex communication channel between two Android devices, letting them to communicate for all the time needed, better than having two walkie talkies.

Atasoy LANPhone

Download the APK from the 'official' site
Install the APK by opening it (You may need to enable 'Unknown Sources' in Settings > Security first)
Open the app and press the menu button on the navigation bar
Select 'Settings' to open the settings page
Find the option named 'Camera' and choose which camera you want to use
Repeat process on other device and press Menu > Refresh List to scan for devices

Screenshots:

For just WiFi chat, files and audio calls, then these apps support it:

Wi-Fi Talkie FREE
BlueFi Phone


Why does my Android phone think it was in Japan?

One reason could be that that location was determined from a WiFi access point, which had been previously moved from Japan to somewhere near you.

Google registers the location of each WiFi access point Android devices are connected to (if allowed in settings) and uses these to obtain a location when GPS is slow or unavailable. Unfortunately it takes some time to update the location if the access point is moved, so this kind of error can happen.


How can I import bookmarks from Lightning into Firefox?

first you need to create a backup of your bookmarks in  Lightning Browser

Go to browser settings
Bookmark settings
Export Bookmarks to backup
it will create a backup of your all bookmarks in lighting browser. You can access it in File explorer.

For importing bookmarks in Firefox browser

1.menu button (either below the screen on some devices or at the top-right corner of the browser)
2.select Settings
3.Tap on Advanced and then Import from Android.
4. Browse and select that lighting bookmark backup file.
5. tap Import.


Cannot switch between users on Android 4.4 (CM11)

It turns out I forgot to disable rotation the lock in display settings. This was preventing lock screen from rotating.

(Still nothing in Power menu though.)


These are not files but invalid file entries, caused by a corrupted allocation table on the SD card, which in turn is caused by a bad sector. A bad sector on the card is a good sign that card is defective and should be replaced.

You can try recovering some files by running a disk check program on PC.


Taking high resolution pictures needs to process the image data. Based on GPU, it may take a while, like ~ 2-3 seconds for ~ 14-20 Megapixel camera phone.
Some phones camera software may take several pictures to increase picture quality or prevent blurry photos using software, which also increase processing time.
You can manually reduce the photo resolution from camera app settings, which may reduce overall processing time. Turn off HDR as well if not needed.
Also try some 3rd party camera app and try which suits your needs.


If I rarely turn off my phone, are there any benefits to encryption still?

As long as your phone is turned on, no matter if it is locked, in airplane mode, etc., the data partition remains indeed decrypted and therefore, as you say, you do not really take advantage of disk encryption.

Even worse: when I say that the partition is "decrypted", concretely this means that the data encryption key is present somewhere in your phone memory. If the data on your phone is valuable enough (eg. has any value for corporate or governmental adversaries), there are techniques allowing an advanced attacker to dump this memory, get this encryption key, and access your data no matter if your phone was locked in the first place.

The good news is that there are applications allowing you to shutdown or reboot the phone after a few unsuccessful unlock attempts. Concretely, this means that after let's say 5 wrong unlock attempts, the phone will shutdown/reboot, effectively dropping the encryption key from memory, leaving the attacker no way to access your data without finding your encryption key.

Moreover, I attract your attention the fact that Google put an arbitrary limitation in Android requiring the end-users to use the same password for decryption and unlocking. If you have rooted your device, there are ways to use a strong and complex password for disk encryption and a quick to input unlock PIN. Be aware that using short/easy passwords or a PIN for encryption essentially annihilates any advantage brought by encryption since they would be breakable using dictionary or brute-force attacks.


Find a Linux or Windows computer
Download and unzip http://gl07s.nakayuki.net/public/emobile-gl07s-root.zip
Install the Android SDK tools, in particular the commands adb and fastboot should be available (fastboot for Windows is provided in the ZIP).
Connect your GLS07S via a USB cable
Run sudo ./root.sh on Linux, or root.bat on Windows
Three lines of text in Japanese appear. Press Enter
White noise appears on the screen, just wait patiently
One more line of text in Japanese appears. Press Enter
When the command prompt returns, you're done

(Translated from the README in the ZIP above)

Before step 5 I had to add the following line as line 2 of root.sh because my Android SDK is installed at the user level on my Linux computer, you should not need it if you install the Android SDK as admin.

export PATH="${PATH}:/home/nico/android-sdk/tools:/home/nico/android-sdk/platform-tools"

Be patient. The execution lasts for a few minutes, with this output (press Enter when it says 続行するにはエンターを押してください):

$ sudo ./root.sh
adb,fastbootコマンドが実行できるようインストールしてください。このスクリプトはUSBにアクセスできる権限で実行してください。
電源を入れた状態で端末をUSBデバッグを有効にしてパソコンに接続してください。
上記の手順を行った後、続行するにはエンターを押してください。

< waiting for device >
sending 'cust' (233697 KB)...
OKAY [  7.333s]
writing 'cust'...
OKAY [ 15.655s]
finished. total time: 23.002s
sending 'boot' (5298 KB)...
OKAY [  0.165s]
writing 'boot'...
OKAY [  0.824s]
finished. total time: 0.989s
sending 'system' (900228 KB)...
OKAY [ 28.112s]
writing 'system'...
OKAY [ 63.860s]
finished. total time: 91.972s
続行するにはエンターを押してください

rebooting...

finished. total time: 0.201s
$


how to keep internet connection active when in sleep mode android marshmallow'

Go to Settings, then click on WiFi. A somewhat similar screen will be shown:

Click on More.

Select "Keep WiFi on during sleep". If any option comes after that, choose "Keep always on during sleep". That's it.

This only happens with WiFi. Mobile data is never switched off by default unless you specifically ask the phone to do so by changing settings to conserve data.


How to delete gReader stored RSS feeds from Phone memory manually

From your Home Screen go to Menu -> Settings -> Applications -> Manage Applications and find gReader.  Then click the Clear Cache and Clear Data button.  This may lead to you having to sign back in but it will synch with your feeds so you won't really lose anything.


Un-installing the App and Installing it back again, fixed it.


I found the answer in the video beeshyams posted in a comment. There's actually a much more concise video here. I've confirmed that it works correctly in Nox 3.8.1.1, so here are the instructions, which basically just involve disabling Nox Launcher by "removing" the app directly:

Make sure you have an alternate launcher installed first! I don't know what will happen if you try this without having another launcher installed. You're welcome to find out, but I didn't want to test it.
If not already set, enable root mode in Nox (Settings → General → Root) (note I mean the actual NoxPlayer settings in the title bar, the little gear, not the settings in Android), then restart Nox to apply the change.
Open File Manager then navigate to the folder /system/app.
Scroll down until you find one named launcher_1.7.1_en_signed.apk (version number / language code may be different in older or newer versions of Nox so your filename may vary slightly).
Rename it to launcher_1.7.1_en_signed.apk.bak (Long Press → Rename).
Now you're ready to go. Go to the Android Settings → Home and make sure your launcher is selected there just to be safe, and it should be good.
Disable root mode in Nox if you want then restart it.

To restore the Nox Launcher, just undo the filename change in the same way. If you'd rather see this all visually just watch the "concise" video linked above.


Can I use my android phone as finger print, webcam, and mic for my windows 10PC?

As for the camera and mic part,

If you simply search the web for phrases like "use Android camera/mic on PC", you will come across many apps; some of them actually do the job.

I have used an app called DroidCam in the past which had worked for me in Windows 7 after a litte bit of struggling. (I have never tried it in Windows 10, though; but I guess it should work)

As for the fingerprint reader part,

There is not a solution which can be assured to work flawlessly. But there are some things which might be helpful :-

Dynamic Lock by Microsoft — If you are simply looking for a solution to unlock your PC using your phone, then this might be the solution for you. Although it doesn't specifically use a fingerprint unlock, it allows you to keep your PC unlocked when your phone is close enough and reachable via Bluetooth.
Third-party solution — There is an app called Remote Fingerprint Unlock which is slightly complicated to set up but will do the job for you.
Samsung Flow — If you happen to have a Samsung Android phone, then this solution from Samsung should work for you.
This app has also been ported to non-Samsung devices by some developer(s) but the Fingerprint unlock functionality does not work on non-Samsung devices yet.

(Mentioning the below content just for the sake of completeness; doesn't answer this question)

Google Smart Lock for Chromebooks — This is a solution provided by Google to unlock your PC with a fingerprint scanner on your phone. However this only works on Chrome OS (v71+) and not on any other OS.


My phone keeps getting disconnected from the wifi

Get a reputable ethernet router (one which can run DD-WRT is a good bet), and connect the WAN interface from your Tim AG combo to it.   You may also need to change the LAN subnet on one of the devices to a different range so as not to have conflict).  Disable WIFI on the Tim AG combo if you can.

Your problem is most probably a combination of compatibility issues between devices - new routers, and routers with a greater number of users typically iron out most of these problems.   (I could be doing it a disservice, but my guess is your provider has rebranded a cheap-as modem/router to keep their prices down, and you are paying the cost - I could not find ANY English references to it, and the pictures don't inspire confidence of a well made product designed for WIFI - for example no decent external aerials)

Otherwise complain to your ISP that there router is not doing the job you are paying for !


Go into the app info by going into settings applications and finding your Ted app or dragging it from the launcher to the app info button. Disable and re-enable notifications with the "show notification" button.


Keep in mind that on the Battery Usage screen even though per-app breakdown always adds up to 100%, it does not represent the full capacity of your battery, but rather only the used portion.  In other words, if your phone is reporting current battery level of 65%, the breakdown is for the other 35%.

Since nothing really happens overnight, it's not unusual for the "Screen" to be shown as taking 90% (again, that's 90% of the used up 35%).  That just means you've used the screen for a little bit, and then nothing else consumed too much battery.

It's possible that you had too little charge left over from the day before and not having the phone plugged in overnight pushed it over the edge.


How to use Tasker broadcasts in Macrodroid?

My solution requires sending the intents with superuser (root) privilege and unfortunately, the Send Intent action in MacroDroid does not permit that. So I've used the Script action of MacroDroid as a workaround.

Sending a broadcast (it is universal, not Tasker specific) alone would not do anything here. Using the logcat, I noticed that the app starts the service named ForceDozeService and then issues the relevant broadcast.

Script (en.sh) to enable the ForceDoze:

#!/system/bin/sh

su -c 'am startservice com.suyashsrijan.forcedoze/.ForceDozeService'
su -c 'am broadcast -a com.suyashsrijan.forcedoze.ENABLE_FORCEDOZE -n com.suyashsrijan.forcedoze/.EnableForceDozeService'

Script (ds.sh) to disable the ForceDoze:

#!/system/bin/sh

su -c 'am stopservice com.suyashsrijan.forcedoze/.ForceDozeService'
su -c 'am broadcast -a com.suyashsrijan.forcedoze.DISABLE_FORCEDOZE -n com.suyashsrijan.forcedoze/.DisableForceDozeService'

Use the action Script in Macrodroid as:

sh FILE_PATH      // such as /sdcard/en.sh

That should work.


Change default storage location of Screenshots

You can achieve this using Foldersync app.

Add folderpair and select account: SD CARD.
Then you can select source by finding your screenshot dir and select target dir on your SD.

It also has full range of advanced options if you don't like how default options work so everything is covered.

Bonus tip: this app can also do backups of your SD (or internal) card to remote storages such as Dropbox, Google Drive, Owncloud, etc.


Will my tablet work with a device which says it must have Bluetooth 4.0?

The first answer that comes to my mind is NO. If it needs Bluetooth 4.0 and your tablet supports 2.1 then it won't work.

One of the advantages of Bluetooth 4.0 over 2.1 is its velocity (35 mbps vs 3), so if the device you are talking about relies on this data flow then it won't work properly.

Bluetooth is backwards compatible, so if your tablet would have Bluetooth 4.0 and your device is v2.1 then everything would work nicely.

It can happens that the device you're taking about is Bluetooth 4.0 just because it's new and doesn't make use of all its capabilities, so if you can you should try it personally. My answer is a NO, I insist, but if it's free you could try.


How to use an external USB keyboard with a Galaxy S II or a Huawei Y201 Pro

Maybe your mobile doesn't support OTG. It may also need to be connected via a powered USB hub in order to provide enough power.


Allow sending premium SMS on Samsung Galaxy J7

On one case, it is showing under Apps - Special Access - Use Premium text message service, and it can be set to "Always Allow".

However, there is also a case where the messaging service does not show.


Bypass T-Mobile Hotspot Tethering Limit by using the phone's unlimited plan?

You could make your phone to act as a VPN Gateway

Requirements:

root
vpn server (can obtain any free openVPN from playstore)

Using a VPN gateway will make tethered traffic to go through the VPN.

Steps

Turn on portable hotspot
Open terminal as root and enter the following codes (you can paste them)

iptables -t filter -F FORWARD
iptables -t nat -F POSTROUTING
iptables -t filter -I FORWARD -j ACCEPT
iptables -t nat -I POSTROUTING -j MASQUERADE
ip rule add from 192.168.43.0/24 lookup 61
ip route add default dev tun0 scope link table 61
ip route add 192.168.43.0/24 dev wlan0 scope link table 61
ip route add broadcast 255.255.255.255 dev wlan0 scope link table 61

Edit

If you are not rooted you can use PdaNet+.


Error trying to access my tablet from my PC

In most cases the communication might be blocked by the firewall, on router or on the PC, confirm if port 5544 is allowed in firewall settings.

Second check if your browser uses proxy settings, which allows traffic on a different port altogether (most VPN softwares usually set up proxy connections). In this case either add the server IP as a local address and allowing bypassing of proxy for local address.

Thirdly check if Network Discovery and file sharing  is enabled on both devices.

Ping and check if addresses are reachable, and set up DNS if needed.

In most cases this should resolve connection timed out or not reachable errors


You can grant or revoke only runtime permissions (introduced in Android 6 with protection level: dangerous) - either from CLI (adb shell) or GUI (Settings). From package manager help:

~$ pm
...
  grant [--user USER_ID] PACKAGE PERMISSION
  revoke [--user USER_ID] PACKAGE PERMISSION
    These commands either grant or revoke permissions to apps.  The permissions
    must be declared as used in the app's manifest, be runtime permissions
    (protection level dangerous), and the app targeting SDK greater than Lollipop MR1.
...

To get a list of all on-device dangerous permissions:

~$ pm list permissions -g -d | awk -F: '/permission:/ {print $2}'

Or get directly from Android source. This list excludes any dangerous permissions defined by non-AOSP packages e.g. those provided by Google Play Services. wget is a busybox applet, or get a static binary:

~$ wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/aosp-mirror/platform_frameworks_base/android-9.0.0_r52/core/res/AndroidManifest.xml | grep -E 'protectionLevel=|<permission android:name=' | grep -B1 'protectionLevel=.*dangerous' | awk -F'"' '/permission/ {print $2}'

Or to avoid any wrong results, pre-format .xml (you need to get xmllint or similar tool):

~$ wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/aosp-mirror/platform_frameworks_base/android-9.0.0_r52/core/res/AndroidManifest.xml | xmllint --format - | grep 'protectionLevel=.*dangerous' | grep -o 'permission android:name=[^ ]*' | cut -d'"' -f2

In addition to dangerous permissions, it's also possible to grant or deny or ignore some of the special permissions shown under:
Settings → Apps & Notifications → Advanced → Special App Access.
These are not managed directly by package manager, but appops - a secondary permissions control framework. These are signature level permissions which can be granted only to system apps otherwise. On Android 9:

~$ wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/aosp-mirror/platform_frameworks_base/android-9.0.0_r52/core/res/AndroidManifest.xml | grep -E 'protectionLevel=|<permission android:name=' | grep -B1 'protectionLevel=.*appop' | awk -F'"' '/permission/ {print $2}'
android.permission.MANAGE_IPSEC_TUNNELS
android.permission.SYSTEM_ALERT_WINDOW
android.permission.WRITE_SETTINGS
android.permission.REQUEST_INSTALL_PACKAGES
android.permission.PACKAGE_USAGE_STATS
android.permission.ACCESS_NOTIFICATIONS
android.permission.INSTANT_APP_FOREGROUND_SERVICE

Their corresponding appops operations have similar names with minor differences. Also some OPs depend on other OPs. To get a complete list of operations you can read or set through command-line:

~$ wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/aosp-mirror/platform_frameworks_base/android-9.0.0_r52/core/java/android/app/AppOpsManager.java | awk '/int OP_/ {print $5}'

For details on how to use appops see examples of VIBRATE, REQUEST_INSTALL_PACKAGES, COARSE_LOCATION/FINE_LOCATION and BOOT_COMPLETED/RUN_IN_BACKGROUND.


How to prevent an app's notification from updating while the screen is off?

The preferred way would be if your media player has an option in it's settings to disable notifications, do it that way.

The other method would be to use the embedded features of Android to disable the notifications, when a notification from your media player pops up, pull down the notification shade and long-press the notification tile, and select "Stop Notifications". This will disable the notifications by taking away the apps permissions to do so. To re-enable notifications, go to Settings - Apps and find the apps, and turn the notifications back on there.

Otherwise the device is working exactly as designed with the settings you have.


Understanding why an app-supported link opens in the browser first

I guess the NYT app registers itself as URL handler for https://nytimes.com URLs, but not for https://nl.nytimes.com. This is why only the browsers can be selected.
Then nl.nytimes.com page redirects to the main nytimes.com page, and the NYT app can take over.

And all this probably happens in the name of tracking, so that the NYT newsletter people see what content people like most.


App specific settings are usually stored in the internal storage folder accessible only to that app. While apps do have the ability to write to external storage and lose access to that data when you mount it, I doubt that is the case here.

When you install and move an app to the SD Card, you are not moving the entire app. Some core content of the app still stays on the internal storage. However, moving an app to the external storage has some interesting side effects. The app is completely disabled when you connect your device to the computer, on pre honeycomb devices. Android 3.0 onwards, the USB storage was switched to MTP, which allows the device and the computer to access the storage simultaneously.

In your case, when you connect to the computer, the apps on the SD Card are disabled, causing them to disappear temporarily. As for them not reappearing when you disconnect and restart your phone suggests that there is a bug in the launcher you're using. Try using a different third party launcher instead.


Important: Sync your old Google account data between your phone and Google before starting with the following instructions.

You should log in to your old Google account, and then go to Google Takeout, where there are tools to export your account information to an archive (and even you'll be able to transfer all your Google+ circles to your new account).

To move contacts and other info from the old account to the new one, follow the instructions from this article.

Also you can go to Data tools settings page, where you'll find how to delete your old account, in the section Account management. Good luck.


Can I restart Bluetooth from the terminal?

The following terminal command should enable Bluetooth via adb shell or Terminal Emulator app:

su
am start -a android.bluetooth.adapter.action.REQUEST_ENABLE

On most versions of Android, this command will present a pop-up window to the user asking to confirm request to enable BT.  I believe this was done for security purposes whenever an app that is not system is toggling BT.

I haven't found a way to disable BT via a shell command unfortunately.

With WiFi it's a lot easier, and does not prompt user for permission:

su
svc wifi enable

will turn it on, and

su
svc wifi disable

will turn it off.


How do I clear out some information recorded in Google accounts?

Unfortunately there's no way to delete this info. I have accounts that were added and deleted from my device more than 2 years ago but the controll panel still lists my device.


If they are the default apps that came along with device you can not move them to card nor uninstall them. Rooting is the only method to do so. Be careful rooting VOIDS warranty of the mobile. Use Clean Master app from Play Store to clear junk files in internal memory.


Disabling the clipboard history on Samsung devices

After a long while and more serious privacy flops I had, I found a solution to this security breach of Samsung (Credit).

Install adb on your computer (manual)
Setup adb access (e.g. USB Debugging) on your device (manual)
Launch adb shell and execute the following commands:

pm uninstall --user 0 com.samsung.clipboardsaveservice
pm uninstall --user 0 com.samsung.android.clipboarduiservice


Can anyone confirm updates to an application are what causes the notifications to turn back on?

This depends on whether or not the application is replaced, or simply updated. If you do it through the Play Store, it will likely reset the notification settings. If you were to install it through other means (such as adb install) then it depends on whether or not the original application was 'updated' or re-installed


The thing you are searching is known as daydream. You must have changed its setting while doing something in settings. It can be any place but generally found under display setting.


If you want to go the wireless route I'd recommend Wi-Fi File Explorer pro.
Just make a Tethered WiFi network(or be on the same router) use the app on your phone to get a local IP and transfer all files directly. It needs no installation on your computer; just install it on your phone and use it.