text:
How can I manage contacts on my SIM card with an Android phone?
How can I add and manage contacts on a SIM card with an Android phone (HTC Magic)? I'm aware of 1 application which is capable of doing this but it cost 4€ for SIMPLY managing SIM contacts o_O

The default (well, default on my Samsung Galaxy S - I guess default in Android doesn't mean much) contact manager can do a part of this. When creating a new contact, it gives the option of storing it on the SIM, Phone memory, or a linked account (like Google).
There's the option of copying contacts from SIM to Phone or Phone to SIM (Contacts->Menu->more -> Copy contacts). Import/Export is in the same spot.
I know these suggestions aren't quite what you're looking for. I don't know if contacts can be stored on a SIM card in different ways depending on the Phone. From what I've seen the software that comes with Android phones might (depending on manufacturer) let you move contacts around.

on the T-Mobile G2, you can only "Import from SIM card". You cannot, apparently, put contact data into the SIM card.

@benc HTC models some of them marketed as t-mobile gX (x for version) do not have option to back to sim, but you can use free application like contact2sim to work around

@cofiem update for Android 10: SIM and phone memory are not a storage option anymore -- it lets you save contacts only on an email (like gmail) account (I am on Xiaomi A2)

I wanted to delete some contacts on my SIM card on my HTC Sensation. I tried and tried and it didn't work. So I took out my old Nokia phone and it can read and write to the SIM card. Deleted the contacts I didn't want. It worked.

In general, don't store your contacts on the SIM card. There is no advantage in doing so. Modern smartphones are usually only able to import/export contacts stored on the SIM card.
The contact App from Android 4.0 on provides a feature which lets you import your contacts form SIM card to either Google contacts (which I highly recommend) or simply local phone contacts.
Open Contacts > Menu > Import/export > Import from SIM card
Furthermore the "Messaging" app of Android 4.0 is able to mange the text messages stored on the SIM card.
There are only a few very narrow reasons for storing contacts on a SIM. Some like to be able to swap the SIM card into a small feature phone when performing certain activities (like trail running).
However, note that contacts stored on the SIM card are unprotected. Everyone who has access to the SIM card can read your contacts. This impacts your and your contacts privacy.

Later Android versions’ messaging app seem to have long lost this option. Now there are a bunch of crappy SIM card apps that constantly show ads and do not work, but SIM contacts by Mitali Parekh seems promising. I’ll comment after testing it.

SIM Phonebook is better, and allows multiple selection and mass deletion.

The SIM contacts app did not have copying, importing or exporting.

@peterhil Thanks for the link. An app that does what the OP is asking for without ads, in-apps purchases or abusive permissions. Why don't you add as an answer? For me this is the answer.

New (manual) contacts should get backed up if your gmail account is linked, and they should show up in your gmail contacts.
But my old ones (on sim and phone before email was linked) did not. I had to copy the ones from my sim and phone to my SDcard by going into contacts (people) then menu -> export to SD (as for example SIM.vcf).
And after that menu -> import to (my email) linked gmail address. And i just told it to import all vcf files on the SD.
And that was it, they were now all in my gmail contacts.

I have Android 10 on a SmartE11 phone.
I tried to delete contacts that are stored on the sim using the phone app. I get a message 'Could not delete contact' with no explanation why. I also got a 'silent notification': Problem deleting contact from SIM, with the body: This phone may not be able to delete contacts from a SIM.
At the top of the contact display, for contacts on my sim, it shows "Saved to SIM - view-only'. So, I guess it is because the contact is view-only.
The pre-installed Contacts app has an option 'Fix & manage'. This has an option 'Manage SIM'. This lets me import or delete the contacts on the sim. I wanted to delete some obsolete contacts added on my old phone. I selected the contacts to be deleted (actually, I unselected the contacts I didn't want deleted, because they were all selected by default and there was no option to unselect all) and clicked the trash can icon then clicked Delete on the 'Remove contacts from SIM?' pop-up.
This deleted the contacts from the sim but didn't remove them from the contacts list on my phone app. To achieve that, I had to shut down my phone then start it again. The contacts from the sim were then gone from the phone app: All of them were gone, even those I hadn't deleted from the sim. But a little while later, those that were on the sim reappeared in the phone contact list.
It's a bit roundabout and hardly obvious, but it worked.


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How can I install Voice Search on Cyanogen 6 RC3
Whenever I try to install Voice Search I get "install failed" error in the notification bar. Supposedly it has something to do with signatures but I know better than to ask Cyanogen about it. Any ideas?

I spotted this advice on the post on the Google Mobile Blog announcing the new Voice Actions. At least one person in the comments claimed success.

Just run the following commands to
  uninstall the old system apps if you
  use a custom rom.
adb remount
adb shell rm /system/app/GoogleQuickSearchBox.apk
adb uninstall com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox
adb shell rm /system/app/VoiceSearch.apk
adb uninstall com.google.android.voicesearch
Then they will install just fine from
  Market (from the US Market).
  MarketAccess set to TMO US will allow
  you to find them.

I was afraid of that . . . not a big fan of commands like "adb shell rm /system/app/VoiceSearch.apk" but I'll try it. Worst case is I have to wipe and start over, right?!

Okay, that worked. Had to install "Voice Search" and "Google Search" from the market after deleting and uninstalling per the directions above. For those that don't know you need to get the SDK, install the Android USB Driver, and turn on "Debug Mode" on your phone so you can run ADB commands from the command prompt in the tools directory. I guess if you have Cyanogen you know all that already. Nevermind. But I did have to delete the search gadget and then re-add it to my home screen. BAM! Voice Search heaven. Can't wait for it to fail when I show my iPhone friends!

Well, that is the risk when you root and install custom ROMs, innit? I'm glad it worked out, though.

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Is it possible to completely brick your Android phone by using a Custom ROM?
I understand that you can completely "brick" (render unusuable) your iPhone by attempting to Jailbreak incorrectly.
Whether or not this is actually the case, is it possible to do the same with your Android phone?  Or is the nature of that operating system and the handsets such that you can always install a new ROM on it if everything goes pear-shaped?
I assume there could be a difference due to how closely the iPhone is tied to iTunes, compared to how independent Android phones seem.

Yes, happened to me. Now I have a useless $500 Galaxy S3. Be very careful when flashing a new ROM. Make sure it's the specific one for your device.

Yes it is possible to brick and that is why all root methods and custom roms give warnings on their threads. But that said, it is very hard for someone without much knowledge to "brick" a device as long as you follow the directions given. HTC does a great job on their devices and makes it difficult to brick them. Almost always there is a fail safe of some kind.
Most people that claim they bricked their device are mis-using the term and just throwing it around. Even someone that completely cracked their screen and could not use the screen of the phone was still able to successfully root and pull off needed files. The brick cries are no different now then they were with Windows Mobile devices that people tried to unlock. Every time someone saw the bootloader screen they cried brick, but just didn't understand that screen was normal.
If you want more reading on the topic, check out XDA Forums. Also I wrote a guide on XDA forums for rooting and backing up information, tips, etc. While the article was specifically written for the Evo 4g, most of the information still applies to any Android phone. I recommend checking it out for more info.

To get specific: Bricking your phone generally requires damaging the bootloader, called a "hard brick".  Webs is correct that most bricks are actually "soft bricks", where the phone won't boot up past the bootloader but can still be fixed.  If you can get into the bootloader, you can normally re-partition the phone and flash good software.
In some cases of hard bricks, you can use a USB jig to force the device into a mode where new software can be loaded when the normal methods for getting into the bootloader fail.

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Using VoIP from Android via GPRS?
Is it possible to use VoIP over gprs from an Android phone? Either using a SIP client or Skype?

Do you consider Google Voice a VoIP client? It is currently open to join

There are a number of sip clients available such as Sipdroid, CSipSimple, and Linphone.  Sipdroid includes an option to create a pbxes.org account linked to your Google Voice account, allowing you to make and receive calls to and from PSTN numbers for free, assuming you are in the US.  (After the account is created, any sip client can be used with the pbxes.org account.)
If you want to setup your own Asterisk server, you can configure the trunking with Google Voice yourself.  Or you can use any other VOIP service that provides SIP/PSTN trunking.
An alternative option is GrooVe IP, which is a Google Talk client with voice support.  This uses XMPP/Jingle directly between your android device and Google Talk/Voice.  The free version only supports WLAN networking; the paid version works over mobile networks.

There a quite a few SIP clients last time I looked, but you need some sort of ID you have to purchase elsewhere to make use of them. Skype is supposedly coming soon and I think is available right now for Verizon Android phones.
Ditto Fring. Its a great app and probably one of the easier ones to use. Plus you can do video conferencing with Fring.

it is available for verizon, but they have some weird deal where you can only use the voice stuff over the 3G network, no wifi.

Oh thats right, I forgot about that. Yea, I would be surprised if someone didn't come out with a root app that allows voice over wifi, or if the carriers opened up Skype.

Try Fring  it is all in one, Unfortunately they do not support Skype anymore, But ther is SIP, Gmail, MSN and many others.

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text:
How can I determine if a device is really running Android?
In our area there is gadget called "IRobot" which the supplier claims has Android 1.4 inside. I am afraid that it might be a "fake" version of the Android OS. I do not have experience with Android so are there any guidelines I can use to check that a device is really running Android? Also, is there a way to check if a version of Android can be updated?

As far as I'm aware there was never a 1.4 version of Android with any wide release. Major versions were 1.0, 1.1, 1.5, 1.6, 2.0, 2.1 & 2.2 so that already looks suspicious.

You can go to Settings to see Android version in About. If the option doesn't exist, the device needs serious inspection because it's possible that the device isn't running Android at all. Share more in in information so that we could detect. Probably, some screenshots of different parts of system can help.

You could try entering *#*#4636#*#* into the phone's Dialer application. This should open up a menu with all kinds of data about the phone.

Before you enter any dailer codes you should make sure you know what they do!

@Amanda Is there an overview of all dialer codes?

@Amanda you said it like that combination hides a self-destruction subroutine :)

It doesn't give Android version information...

I've never heard of Android 1.4, but it could exist. It could be a dev release or something but just was never widely used.
Go to your wireless carrier store and see what OS the phones should be running. Then make a purchase.

True, and as Android is an open source OS that any manufacturer can download and then modify to work with their device, there's no real point in anyone creating a fake version of Android when they can get the real thing for free.

I doubt that someone has created a fake Android OS version. But someone could claim they have a device and purposely or accidentally mis-represent the version on said device. I'm not sure what the advantage would be to do it on purpose though.

Android 1.4 doesn't exist. Instead, 1.1 went directly to 1.5; and each release were alphabetically named:

Android / Alpha (1.0)
Beta (1.1)
Cupcake (1.5)
Donut (1.6)
Eclair (2.0)
Froyo (2.2)
Gingerbread (2.3.x)
Honeycomb (3.x)
Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0.x)
Jelly Bean (4.1.x - 4.3.x)
KitKat (4.4.x / 4.4W.x)
Lollipop (5.x)
Marshmallow (6.x)

Go to setting and check for device version located at the end.

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Are there any video players with commercial skip for Android?
I have a TiVo Series 3 and the TiVo Desktop Plus software, which I use to convert shows for playback on my iPod Touch.  I'd love to find a video player that would have 30 second/commercial skip for an Android phone (future purchase).  It's hard for me to adjust the slider on the video player with that degree of precision.

It's not an actual 30 second button, but MX Player has a feature to slowly adjust forward and backward (a full screen swipe typically does ~45-60 seconds), making it very easy to precisely navigate a video.


text:
How do I use the US Android Market from Europe?

Possible Duplicate:
Circumvent the regional limitation in the market
How can I buy apps from unsupported countries?

I am in Europe and I have an Android phone, but I cannot buy apps on the Android market? How can I overcome this limitation? I am thinking somehow registering with a US address. Is this possible?


text:
Alarm about Internet usage?

Possible Duplicate:
Monitor wifi usage?

Is there a way to have an alarm warn me every time I spent another 100MB and telling me the total I've spent on the last billing period to avoid going over my limit and into debt in Android?

It looks like NetCounter will do what you need

I'm using Network Monitor. With this free app you can track 2G/3G and WiFi traffic as separate stats. Also you can set up warning message for each stat.


text:
Renaming a contact group on Android
Is there any way to rename a contact group on the HTC Desire?
Via "Edit Group" in People you can add and remove members, but the title doesn't seem to be editable.
I could add a new group of course and move contacts over, but unless there's an easy way to do this en-mass this would be inconvenient.

Go to www.google.com and sign in. Click settings in the top right corner. Then click on "Dashboard      View data stored with this account". This will take you to your dashboard. Scroll down and you can manage contacts. The only group names you can edit are the ones you created yourself. The default Google ones are not editable.

Ah, this works though as it happens it looks like the group I was trying to edit is a default one, and thus isn't editable.  Normal user - created groups are actually rename-able on the phone, I was just confused.

Thats good to know that it is also editable on the phone.


text:
How do I limit 3g speed on my Nexus One
I have 1gb of traffic per month. Internet speed is 2.2mbits, so it's pretty easy to waste all gb in a few days. I don't usually watch youtube from my phone, and 500-700 kbits would be pretty enough for me. Is there an application or way I can manually limit 3g speed manually, without rooting the phone?

If all else fails, you could set the “Use only 2G networks” option...

Well that's too slow and doesn't worth it. But thanks)

3G Watchdog is capable, when coupled with APNdroid or JuiceDefender, to automatically disable mobile internet connections when you reach a configurable % of your quota.

Try NetSentry or 3G Watchdog.

I use 3g watchdog and NetCounter, but these only collect data about traffic, don't limit it in any way.

Did you try Netsentry? It doesn't limit traffic but can notify when limits are reached.

Apps which I use have this function too and much more. Thanks anyway)


text:
Geo-tagging DSLR photos with Android
Is there any app for Android that would assist me on tagging the pictures I take with my non-GPS DSLR camera by using a log of the phone GPS that Android can store?

GPS Essentials app will let you set waypoints of you location, so you could set a waypoint when you take a picture.
You could then use software like GeoTag to tag your images on your computer when you get home.

So, I have to manually take the current geolocation. Won't it constantly store it with a timestamp, like My Tracks?

I was looking for a similar solution. Does this help?
Update:
In short, use MyTrack app on android to generate a GPX log and then use GPicSync to use that log to geotag your pics.

Just make sure you sync the time on phone and camera. You can edit time in your .gpx files later, if needed, but it can take some time.
In case you have had different time on your camera and GPS, you can use command line utility ExifTool for time shifting. For your convienience, there is also a GUI frontend for that tool.

GUI frontend can be found here: http://freeweb.siol.net/hrastni3/

This application would solve your problem
Geo tag photos
This system uses the phone to track the time and location and then you upload your photos from the DSLR to a website and the site will help you geo tag your photos based on your phone's information.  Basically the phone keeps track of where you are and sends the info to the site and then when you upload the photos the site matches the timestamps on the photos with locations.


text:
Moving Nokia content to an Android phone
What is the easiest way to move Nokia (Symbian E series) content, such as contacts, inbox, photos, etc. to an Android phone? I can extract a backup from the Nokia but it's in .nbu format

By far the easiest way to transfer anything contacts related to an Android phone is via GMail.
When I moved from an old Nokia phone to my Android HTC Magic about a year ago, I downloaded and installed the Nokia Suite of tools for my phone from the Nokia website, installed them, copied my contacts into the Nokia Suite app on the PC, then did an export from the Nokia Suite contacts app to a CSV file. I remember seeing the Noklia-only NBU format as an optin, but if you're in the Contacts-only part of the suite it should also allow the CSV export (as this is also the easiest way to do a one-off import to other apps like Outlook).
At that point you can go into GMail, click the Contacts link, then at the top you should see an "Import" option, use that to upload your CSV file. All that you should lose from this is the contact's photos, but you can easily back up your contact's photos from the Nokia suite, and then just upload them to GMail one by one, or alternatively let Android on the phone sync with Facebook, etc and pull the Contacts photos from there itself.
You might find that if you already had some people in your GMail address book that you'll have a few duplicates now, just tick the relevant Contacts in Gmail and select "Merge these contacts".
For content, such as photos or music, which are probably just files on the Nokia's SD memory card, the easiest way is to attach the phone to a PC, select Data Storage/Transfer Mode on the phone, then open the SD card drive on the PC, drag all the relevant files onto the PC, then attach Android phone, mount SD card and drag all the content into the relevant folders on the Android's SD card.
As for messages, do you mean SMS/MMS text messages? As far as I know there aren't easy ways to transfer those between phone OS's at all (unless you're already doing something like sync'ing them to GMail).

yup, I mean sms'es

See this answer to another question http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/9357/sms-backup-in-android/9434#9434 where it mentions that VeryAndroid SMS backup can be used to transfer SMS's from Nokia to Android.

I have to agree with GAThrawn, that using GMail to transfer your contacts and calender items is probably the best way. But there is an IMHO easier solution to get your data from the Nokia phone to GMail: Nokia's Mail for Exchange together with Google Sync. Google provides a couple of help topics to get you going.

Samsung create an app called Samsung Smart Switch Mobile, it support transfer data from Nokia to Samsung mobiles. You can have a try although your phone is not Samsung.
Wondershare software named MobileTrans also can transfer data from Nokia to Android.

They can both transfer contacts, messages, photos and videos to Android.

Neither Smart Switch or MobileTrans worked here. Smart Switch could not see the Nokia back up, & mobileTrans only saw about 20% of the SMS, & none of the contacts, photos or other data

There is a easy way that transfer contacts from Nokia to android phone.
Android Devices: Samsung Galaxy S7 edge/S7 /Note 5/S6 edge/S5 | Huawei | Sony | LG | Nexus | HTC | Moto
Nokia: Windows phone/ Symbian/ android
Transfer File: Contacts, Music, Videos, Photos.
Transfer contacts from Nokia to android phone

What is your connection to this product? If any, you should declare it.

Here's how I moved content from a Nokia 808 PureView (Belle FP2) to a Samsung Galaxy S8 (Android 7.0 (Nougat)).
Contacts and calendar
To transfer contacts and calendar, I synced via Gmail (see other answers for details).
Photos and videos
To transfer photos and videos:

Connect the Symbian phone to a computer via USB in mass storage mode and copy the contents of the DCIM folder from the mass storage and memory card
To copy to Android

from Windows: connect via USB in mass storage mode and copy to the DCIM folder on Android
from Mac: install and open Android File Transfer then connect via USB and copy to the DCIM folder on Android

SMS messages
To transfer SMS messages:

Open Nokia Suite (I used 3.8.54)
Connect your Symbian phone
Go to the Messages tab (fourth icon along the top)
Click "Sync messages" at the bottom
Wait for sync to finish
Select File > "Export text messages..." and save as csv
Copy CSV to Android phone
On Android, install Anything With Sms from Google Play
Open Anything With Sms
From the import tab choose the CSV file

The format switched from Nokia Csv to Nokia Suite 3.8

Toggle "Default App" for Anything With Sms to be the default app for SMS. This is only temporary for when importing the messages and we'll turn it off later.
Click the blue import button in the bottom-right corner
Click OK at the info screen about "Change messaging app"
Wait for import to finish
When finished, click Great! and toggle to turn off default app
Close Anything With Sms
Finally, open your Android messaging app and select the menu > "Mark all as read"


text:
Voice-to-text on keyboard in HTC Sense
I've just got my phone upgraded to Android 2.1. It's a HTC Hero running HTC Sense. One of the features I was really looking forward to in Android 2.1 was the microphone button on the keyboard which you can use to dictate into any text field.
However, this button doesn't seem to be there on the HTC Sense keyboard. Is there any way to enable this?

So did you try anything?

Go to Settings, Language and Keyboard and see if there is another keyboard you can enable and use. If there is one, check the box to enable it. Then go out and open something that requires text input like an text message. Long click on the text field and choose Input Method. Then change to the keyboard you just enabled. See if it has the microphone.
If you only have one keyboard to enable you could try a third party one like Swiftkey Beta. I use it and it has a microphone option for speech input. Plus the keyboard rocks with all kinds of great features.

Thank you. I managed to download this keyboard, and it has a microphone button.

Would you mind voting?

The new OTA update of Android version 2.10.405.2 included a voice-to-text option on the keyboard. The microphone key is located on the left of the comma key.

NB: I believe this update has only so far been released to unlocked HTC phone users only... if your phone is locked to a network you must wait for your network to push the update.


text:
'Car Home' in HTC Hero, Android 2.1
I've just had my HTC Hero upgraded to Android 2.1, and I have heard about the Car Home function, which sounds great for when I use the new Google Maps Navigation in my car. However, this doesn't seem to be on my phone. Is that because of HTC installing HTC Sense? If so, can I get Car Home back again?

That app might not be available for the Hero, it is up to HTC and Sprint if they are going to include it in a release. What was the function of Car Home, what does it do? There might be something you can download or do to get the same functionality.

Check out the marketplace have a look at 'CarUI' similar but not identical.  Might have to root our Heros to get it, as it probably only compatible with 2.2 sigh

Take a look at some alternatives, such as Car Dashboard, which is a Car Home replacement app.
Discalimer: I am the developer of this application

You may want to try the following link:
http://androidforums.com/htc-desire/177579-froyo-car-panel-desire-htc-navigation-panel.html
The first post should have links to three different "Car Home" applications: Google Car Home, Google Car Launcher, and HTC Navigation Panel.  You will need to either go to this site on your phone and click the links or download the .apk and transfer it to your phone.  After reading a little more down the page it seems if you choose the Google one then you need to install both not just one of them.
I haven't tried these on my Hero yet (I will tonight after work) but in my experience trying to install apks either works or it doesn't - so give these a shot and see if any of them work.  If anyone has had different experience installing non-market apk's please sound off in the comments.
I also just found this page:
http://geekfor.me/hero/downloads/fresh21removedapks/
These are apps that are removed from the fresh ROM 2.1 for the Hero.  As you can see from the list the HTC Navigation Panel is in there.  However I don't know if you need to be on fresh ROM for these to work.
All that said, Byran's Car Dashboard look like a pretty cool replacement if you don't need the official Google or HTC car app.


text:
On an HTC Evo, is there any way to sync only 'my contacts' from gmail (not 'all contacts')?
I've seen references to this posted elsewhere, but never a solution. I'd like to only sync the "my contacts" group of contacts from my gmail (really google apps, but should work the same) account, rather than "all contacts". I can not find an option to change this. Any suggestions?

I like to sync all contacts and then in contact list I choose to only show the ones with phone numbers. To do this open Contacts > menu > View > select "Contacts with phone numbers". Not sure if that is what you are looking for but is the only thing I could find for a solution on Evo.
Strange, the directions below will work on other Android devices, but not an HTC Sense devices.
Open contacts > menu > Settings > Edit sync groups. Select "Sync all contacts", "My Contacts" or "Starred in Android".
For HTC sense do the following, contacts (people) > Groups tab > menu > Sync Groups.
Note, on my Evo neither option worked for me. I'm running 2.2 and suspect that is part of the reason.

I am using the option to only sync contacts with phone numbers, but I'd still like to prevent it from syncing all of my gmail contacts.  I like having peoples' contact information available in gmail, but don't want everyone I correspond with to be synced to my phone. This is a pretty frustrating shortcoming, especially considering it's just a matter of a Google product interacting correctly with another Google product.

Are you rooted?

It is possible to do if rooted by either running an ASOP ROM or by installing the ASOP contacts apk. But it looks like that is the only way to accomplish this.

So this is a complete workaround, but worked for me and I'll keep it this way until there's a better solution.  It's a real pain to have contacts updating each time you send an email to someone.  I for instance, sell items on craigslist occasionally and in a 5 day period got and replied to over 60 people, most of them offering some sort of offshore job offer scam.....yet they all go in my EVO 4G contacts!  Irritating for sure.
What I did was this, it took me a half an hour:
Set up a New Account Group in Google called Temporary (name is irrelevant)
Moved all of the contacts that I didn't want on my phone into this group
Deleted all of them
Deleted the group altogether
Then I set my Auto-Sync settings on my handset for contact-syncs to Manual.
So now, I have only the contacts I want on my phone.  Not sure how this will play out once I want to add contacts, but for now my contact book is very clean and tidy.

With Gmail, at least, you can turn off the setting whereby every person you send an e-mail message to ends up in your contacts.

I don't know if the Evo uses the vanilla contacts and dialing app, but if it does, it's a two step process.  First, you have to organize your contacts into groups in GMail.  Adding a star to any contact on your phone will add it to the "Stared in Android" contact group in GMail.  This will be principally for contacts that you wish to sync, but don't feel like putting into another group.  For me, these are mainly the phone numbers of local taxi companies.  Now, on your phone, open your contacts, hit the menu button, and select Display Options, expand the google contacts, and then start deselecting groups, especially All Other Contacts.  All Other Contacts include all the contacts that are in My Contacts (added liberally by GMail) but aren't in any groups.


text:
Update to version 2.2 on my HTC Hero Android 1.5 phone
Currently I am using HTC Hero with Android 1.5 and as we know right now Android 2.2 (Froyo) has been released, so i am planning to upgrade from 1.5 to 2.2.
Regarding updating, I have the following questions:

How do I update it?
Is there any selection options provided to update? For example I want to update my 1.5 to 2.1 instead of 2.2, 2.0 or anything else.
Are there any issues that have already occurred with Android 2.2?
What if I want to down-grade to lower version, is it possible? (i.e. rollback to older version)

Please clarify, are you referring to the SDK, Android development environment, or are you referring to the OS running on your phone? Two entirely different things.

@Webs i am talking about updation of my Android phone's OS (i.e. SDK) from 1.5 to 2.2

Ah yes, well the Hero cannot be updated past 2.1. That is as far as Sprint and HTC have gone. Just go to HTC's website and download the update, plug your phone in and have at it. Keep in mind you might lose settings and apps you downloaded. But updating is a good idea. The only way to get 2.2 on a Hero would be to root it. But most 2.2 roms are not fully functioning with everything in the Hero.

@webs i dont know anything about "root" the phone , what is the meaning of "root" and what are the probable advantages of "Root" phone ?

@Paresh, If you do not know anything about rooting your phone you may want to take some time to read about it before attempting. A lot of new people have trouble understanding some of the concepts so make sure you read a lot before diving in. Check out XDA Forums (http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=643) for more info.

Unfortunately, if you were running SDK 1.6 or later you could just update without installing a new SDK. But for 1.5 you need to install a new SDK. Per this link from Google http://developer.android.com/sdk/installing.html (see quoted text below)...
How ever, you can backup your projects and move them into the new SDK environment. So it looks like all may not be lost. Just read that link above pretty thoroughly.

Updating?
If you are currently using the Android
  1.6 SDK or later and want to update to the latest tools or platforms, you do
  not need to install a new SDK.
  Instead, you can simply update the
  individual components in your SDK
  using the Android SDK and AVD Manager
  tool. For information about how to do
  that, see Updating SDK Components
If you are using Android 1.5 SDK or
  earlier, you should install a new SDK
  as described in this document and move
  your application projects to the new
  SDK environment.

@Webs i am talking about update sdk on my HTC Hero phone ...is this information helpful ??

@Paresh: the SDK is "Software Development Kit". I think you've confused that with the version of Android running on your phone.

Ah yes, we need some more clarification.


text:
Can I convert Samsung Omnia WinMobile to Android OS phone

Possible Duplicate:
Can I install Android on my non-Android device?

I have Samsung Omnia I900 one of first line Omnia devices on WinMobile 6 OS,
Since phone is now near end of its life, Ill like to try BOOT Android on it.
Is that possible, Does exists any tutorial for that.
I once fund one site which was on way to boot android on Omnia, but they in that time did not have all drivers for Omnia.

is there a new update on the android version of omnia as of 2010

your discussion appears to be interesting to me, I am trying to reboot my Omnia I900 with andriod, But how can I do this I am having andromnia with me but not sure whether it will work or not, can any body provide me proper guidance as i do not want to destroy my omnia

i have the omnia i900, and i likee to convert my mobile os to andorid =) how can i do it?
plz help me

The answer appears to be a yes. But we need more information about your phone. Exact model number, carrier, CDMA or GSM, etc. The more specific you can be about the phone you have the better.
Typically the process for getting Android on a WinMo phone is this, unlock with a custom bootloader, install a newer radio (not always required, depends), install a custom ROM, and then install Android using your preferred method. You mileage will vary as the process for installing a custom ROM differs for each phone manufacturer.
There are 2 main methods. 1 install HBOOT and run Android from the SD card and memory. This is preferred by me and many others because it doesn't disrupt the actual phone itself, rather it runs on top of your WinMo phone. This means you can keep your WinMo phone in tact and can easily go back to it any time.
2 flash Android ROM over WinMo and go full Android. This method is more risky because you are flashing a completely different OS over whatever WinMo ROM you had installed. So there is no easy way to go back to WinMo. You would have to flash a WinMo ROM and start over to go back to it. This method is a more permanent Android running on a WinMo phone solution.
I would recommend the 1st method first. Then go from there. But personally I never flashed Android on a WinMo phone. The other method was way too convenient for me.
I have some links below that should help, but your version of your phone is going to be key. DO NOT start downloading files and running them until you understand that your phone version is supported by the tools you are using.
http://forum.ppcgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=103190&highlight=install+custom+rom
http://www.modaco.com/content/i9x0-omnia-http-omnia-modaco-com/289028/project-andromnia-android-on-omnia/
http://andromnia.net/
It looks likes the i900 and i910 are well supported, so if you have one of those you should be good to go.


text:
What is the right way to close apps in Android?
I'm new to the Android platform, and this is probably a dumb question, but...
How do you close an app?
When I'm in an app, and I want to get out, I just click on "Home" and move on, but I just installed a Task Manager app, and I noticed everything is left running.
Is there a way to exit apps? Or do I need to use the Task Manager every time I exit something?

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

If you exit the app using the BACK button then it will call onDestroy() on the current Activity, If you press HOME it only calls onPause()
Don't be too worried about it though, Activities won't drain battery they are just left in memory so they can be opened faster in the future.
I wouldn't recommend using one of those task killer apps Android is designed to keep that stuff in memory for a reason, using a task killer is only one more extra service tugging away at your battery..  What you need to watch out for is apps that run services in the background like twitter or email clients pulling their servers, any good app that has a service like that will have an option to turn it off.

I have noticed a couple apps that do eat through a lot of battery in this paused state.  Namely, the latest version of Google Maps and a game I've got called GalaxIR.  So keep an eye out for bad offenders and be sure to close those ones properly.

you are mistaken, if it is eating your batter that is a background service.

It is indeed possible to have an application that is not well developed and does not follow the Android application life cycle. For instance, a thread can be left active in an activity even after it was paused by the OS (by pressing Home), in this case the app will continue using battery.

I wouldn't keep anything like that installed on my phone :-)

@schwiz Are you sure that the Back button will call onDestroy()? I have not noticed this mentioned in activity lifecycle. AFAIK the Back button does just pop the Activity's view from the stack. Can you show us a reference where this is stated?

@Flow just make a simple activity that prints to the console when onDestroy is called and you will see that the back button destroys the activity.

@schwiz You are right, this is documented here. Maybe you want to put this as link into your answer.

I have found that many apps do not exit when I hit the Back button. For example:Pandora, G

(my edit time expired)....other apps that don't close on Back button:  Pandora (which even continues to play after pressing Back), Google Play Store, FaceBook, Podkicker. The way I'm testing is to click the Back button until the app disappears (usually that puts me back on Home) and then running Easy Task Killer.

I'm pretty sure that everything I've ever read says that the Back button is the right way to exit out of apps.
Pressing Home leaves them running in the background until Android decides that they're not needed any more, which can be handy if you just need to switch between apps to check something (holding Home for a couple of seconds gives you the list of recently running apps you can switch back to on most phones) but coming out using the back button tells the app that you want it to close.

Holding the Home button just list the last 6 opened apps, not the running one.

@Loïc: it shows 8 for me.

@LoicWolff, AlEverett It depends on the launcher in question that is used and the ROM itself.

That's not quite true. Activities don't run in the background on Android.

Some apps have an "Exit" option in their menus. Most don't.
You don't really need to worry about it. You can just go to whatever app you need next. Android does a pretty good job freeing up resources when required.
Update: AndroidSpin did some real-world research.

Nice link, ty :)

Activities don't run in the background
In Android, activities (that is, the part of the app you can see) never run in the background. They can only run (and use battery power) while they're on the screen. The activity stops running regardless of whether you use home or back to leave it. The only difference is what data Android asks the app to save, so neither option is "the right way". It just depends on what you want to do.
Home
If you use home, Android leaves the app in the same state, so that if you come back to it later (e.g. through the recent apps list), it'll still be in the same state you left it: on the same screen, with the same stuff shown. For example, if it's an email app, and you were looking at one email, then it'll remember which email that was, and show you the same one.
Eventually (after about half an hour), Android concludes that you're not coming back to the app, so it resets this state: next time you start the app, it'll start from the front/main screen. To continue the example, the email app will forget which email and folder you were looking at, and show you the inbox.
Back
If you use back, you're telling Android that you don't want to come back to this view. It'll destroy the information about what you were looking at right away. Next time you start the app, it'll show the front screen (e.g. the inbox).
As others have said, apps can control the behaviour of the back button: for example, web browsers use it to go back in the browser history. What I've described is the default behaviour of the back button, and developers are urged to keep the behaviour like that to avoid being confusing.
Cached background processes
Whichever method you use, Android will leave the app in memory (but not running) for as long as it can. This is to be more efficient. When you come back to the app, if it's still in memory, Android can run it again right away; if it isn't still in memory, then Android has to spend time and energy loading the app from storage again.
In old Android versions, apps left in memory in the background this way were included in the list of "running apps". This is a little confusing for users - it makes people think the app is really still running - so newer versions call these apps "cached background processes", to make it clear they're only cached, not running.
What about background apps?
Earlier on, I said that activities don't run in the background. So how does your email client check for mail? As well as activities, apps can have services. Services don't have any GUI for you to see or interact with, but they do run in the background. Usually, a service will only run infrequently, such as to check mail once an hour, but it's possible for the app developer to run the service all the time, draining your battery.
Leaving an activity with back or home doesn't change how Android treats any services from the same app: the service can continue to run, or be triggered later at a given time (next time the mail check is due).
Summary
In summary, it doesn't really matter whether you use back or home: it only changes what the app shows you next time you run it. It doesn't have an effect on battery use. Neither of them corresponds to "exiting" a program on your PC.

I'm so glad someone covered this!  I'm a developer, but I used to work for Verizon Wireless and I can't tell you how many  people were concerned about this when there wasn't any need to be.

In Android, applications never need to be closed and the OS is taking care of cleaning the memory of any remaining applications when the resources are needed elsewhere. Using a task killer will just break the normal operation of the OS and could even slow down the device because the applications will always have to be reloaded from the start.
Android application life cycle is working in a way that applications that are not on top are moved in a paused state that doesn't use any cpu anymore; only the memory content is kept in case the application is opened again; and the memory will be freed if needed.
This being said, the application developer has the responsibility to follow the application life cycle when he creates his application so some bugs or mistakes can happen that will result in an application that never really stops or pause. If you encounter such application and what to close it you can do it through the "Settings" -> "applications" -> "Manage applications" by selecting "Force stop" on the application.
But I would really not recommend using a task killer that is constantly running on the device.

Just want to add in schwiz's answer that it's just few lines of code needed to override the functionality of the back button. So it's not always reliable to close the app. So if the app developer doesn't want to close the app on pressing the back button, it won't get closed.
Although most good app developers popup an alert dialog on pressing back button on home menu of the app, asking if the user intends to exit the app or not, if you click on exit, it does close the app.
The correct answer could be this, the closure of the app is completely upon the app developer, if they wants the app to close on pressing the home button, they'll put the exit code in onPause(). If they want it on back button, they'll put it in the onBackKeyPressed. So it's not really in hand of the user.
The user can just avoid using the apps which doesn't provide the proper closing functionality, when not needed. The task managers are not a good way to close the app, since it can crash the app and doesn't give them a chance to save their state.
The OS does close the app whenever necessary, so you should not worry too much about it.
Edit:
There's an option to destroy the applications, as soon as you leave the app i.e. when you click the home key. You can go to Settings->Developer Options->Don't keep Activities. Although it's a developer option, but if you're too concerned about the apps running in background, you can use this option. But keep in mind that it's not recommended to be used by non-developers.


text:
Where to find Android benchmarks results?
I am looking for a site where to find Android benchmark results for the different smartphones and android builds.

http://smartphonebenchmarks.com/
That link is unverified nor do I know how scientific any of it is. But it was about all I could fine for multiple devices.


text:
How do I create a Favorite Contacts shortcut on Droid X?
On the motorola Droid X there is a favorite contacts shortcut. I'd like to add this on another screen but I can't figure out how to create a new one. Any ideas?

while all of the above is true, you can simply click menu -> add -> shortcut -> dialer -> favorites to recreate the shortcut if you accidenatlly delete it.  that is if you are talking about the little red icon with the star that takes you to the favorites tab in the dialer.

"long touch" on the screen (the wallpaper) so the Add to Home screen option opens.
touch Motorola widgets
touch Contact quick tasks
choose the contact you want to add
choose the contact method(s)
done!

Some widgets might only be able to be placed once. If you only want one instance of it, but on another screen, just long click (click on the widget and keep your click/pressure on it or keep your finger pressed to the screen) till you have control of it. On my Android device I feel a vibrate and the widget shakes on the screen. Then just move it where ever you want. To go to another screen hold the widget to the edge of that screen and you should be on the the next screen.
Another tip that might be easier than moving apps and widgets on homescreens, just long click on them till you have control and remove them by dragging to the bottom of the screen. Then go to the screen you want and add it. Long click on an empty space of the homescreen and choose "widgets" then find your widget and add it.
Update:
So at the very top of my widget list is something that says, "Get more HTC widgets". You could see if you have that. Not sure if Motorola has their own option there or not.
Also try looking at your widget list and then see if you have "Contacts" or "People". On my phone I have "People" and that allows me to add one of those favorite listings for my contacts.

I know how to add widget and manage widgets. My question is how to add the favorite contacts shortcut/widget/whatever it is.

Have you ever had that widget on your phone before? I know HTC has a favorite contact widget, but it is a sense widget and would not work on a Droid of any kind without some modification. If so, if Motorola has there own version, I would think you could just follow the directions I wrote in my answer for adding a widget. It should show up in the listing of widgets.

The widget is already on the screen and it doesn't show up in any of the lists.

So at the very top of my widget list is something that says, "Get more HTC widgets". You could see if you have that. Also try looking at your widget list and then see if you have "Contacts" or "People". On my phone I have "People and that allows me to add one of those favorite listings.


text:
Better keyboard on Nexus One?
is there some easy way to get a better keyboard on the Nexus One? The default keyboard has way to small buttons and it's hard to use.

possible duplicate of Alternative keyboards

see also: phones with built-in QWERTY keyboards http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/187/what-are-some-good-android-phones-with-built-in-qwerty-keyboard

There are a ton of keyboard apps out there -- check out the market for both free and paid.
I hate tapping and tapping, and there are at least two slide-the-finger virtual keyboards available:
Swype is my favorite -- but that's only been out in a limited beta for Android, so far. Maybe again....
ShapeWriter is a good substitute... but that's off the market due to a post-merger company re-org  (kids, THIS is why FLOS is a Good Idea). Hit up google, and you'll find a few people that have the .apk available, though. Here's one (as of Sept 2, 2010).
JetKeys is one of the weirdest that I've seen. Not a glider -- touch in the center of key, then slide in a direction to select alternate characters. Great idea, weird to use.

I have some more notes in a blog post.

Can't really get Swype because of the beta. Would like to try shapewriter, but I really don't like downloading software that is not on the marketplace. So this question is still unsolved imho.

There is another slide-the-finger virtual keyboard called SlideIT.

Getting the Swype beta isn't difficult, but you do have to sign up. Then just download & install the Swipe Installer .apk and let it do its thing.

The just-announced Android 2.3 has a much-improved keyboard. The Nexus One will almost certainly get Gingerbread, and sooner than most.
However, you can get the Gingerbread keyboard on your phone now. https://market.android.com/details?id=com.moo.android.inputmethod.latin.free

Video of the Gingerbread keyboard here, for those that like to see before they try: http://www.androidguys.com/2010/12/07/hands-gingerbread-keyboard/

it is now no longer necessary to be rooted to install Gingerbread keyboard on pre-Gingerbread phones: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.moo.android.inputmethod.latin.free

Cool. Thanks @Lie. I've updated my answer accordingly.

There should be some stuff on XDA Developers (http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=560) just do some searching at that link. I've seen droid keyboards floating around and I bet someone has one ported for the Nexus.
I would also check out Swype (have to go to their website to get it http://www.swypeinc.com/) and Swiftkey Beta (can be downloaded from marketplace. Both of these are the best keyboards I have used because they both allow quick typing and aren't overly annoying with suggestions.

You can try SlideIt from the Android Market : - https://market.android.com/details?id=com.dasur.slideit.vt.lite&feature=search_result
Its much better than swype in my experience !

I recommend ThickButtons keyboard which I have been using for years. Free tool, and it uses predictive text algorithm to enlarge the most-probable keys for the next character. Really good for my fat fingers and thumbs.


text:
What is the easiest way I can send one contact's phone number to another on my Android?
I have to send two contacts in my phone book to another contact, on my Nexus One Android 2.2. How can I do this easiest?
On my old SonyEricsson this function was on a nearby menu, but I can't find it on Android.
I have also tried to copy the phone number when in edit mode of the contacts, but I can not paste it when composing the SMS to my contact. Is there really no way to transfer a contact via SMS or MMS on Android other than writing the numbers down on paper and then write them in the SMS message later as in the stone age?

Failing the answers below, copy and paste from Contacts app to Messaging app should just work without any problem, I've used it a few times before to copy lines from addresses, emails and that sort of thing into a SMS. Are you sure you long-pressed long enough in the SMS message to get the input menu up with the Paste option on it?

Copy and paste from Contacts app to Messaging app should just work without any problem, I've used it a few times before to copy lines from addresses, emails and that sort of thing into an SMS.
Are you sure you long-pressed long enough in the SMS message to get the input menu up with the Paste option on it? Or that you copied it properly in the first place? Copying data from a Contact is most easily done by Editing the Contact, then long-pressing on the field you're interested until the input menu comes up with the Copy All option.

On my HTC Evo I can open contacts, then long click on the contact I want, and then choose "Send contact as vCard". This opens another menu that allows me to choose what portions of the contact to send along and how to send, via text, email, bluetooth.
Also you can try the app "Shacts" which allows you to create QR codes of contacts very easily and then share them or scan them right from the screen.
[Update]
Another app to try for older Android releases is QR Contact 1.6.

Very similar option on my Samsung Galaxy "Send Namecard via -> Messaging" which creates an MMS message with the VCF file attached. Though I do know that on my old HTC Magic running stock Android 1.6 there was no easy way to do this other than copy/paste, so I wonder if we're seeing additions that our manufacturers have added on with their custom GUIs.

Yup, that is basically the same thing HTC Sense phones do. Pretty nifty feature. On 1.6 you should be able to download an app to convert the contact to a QR code. If the one I mentioned doesn't work, QR Contacts 1.6 should work.

authors: Andrei Андрей Листочкин


text:
Where are log files located on Android?

Possible Duplicate:
How can I view and examine the Android log?

My android (2.1) phone (a HTC Wildfire, if that matters) sometimes reboots without an apparent reason. Not extremely frequently, but too much to simply ignore it.
I'd say once every couple of days.
It always happens when I'm not using the phone, I take it out of my pocket and am greeted by the SIM unlock screen, so it's hard to pinpoint the app or service that is causing it.
I browsed the filesystem a bit but couldn't immediately find anything like /var/log, so I wonder if anyone knows where logfiles are located, if they exist at all?
Or any other way to easily pinpoint the offending process on my phone?

Related: http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/14430/how-can-i-view-and-examine-the-android-log

If you want to examine the log outside the environment of your phone, there is the application LogCollector.
It's free and it allows you to send/upload the log to/with the program of your choice. I just send the log via gmail to my home email account.
It is always easier to read such log files on your pc screen, compared to reading it with whatever application on your (small) Android screen.

How do you know your phone has rebooted? Just because the lockscreen appears doesn't mean it rebooted. Check your battery stats, Settings > About Phone > Batter and look at the up and awake time. If the phone has been up for a long time its unlikely your phone is rebooting on you. Just check this after a time when you think the phone has rebooted.
I think you are going to have to use logcat to get logs from an Android phone. If your phone is rebooting on you, you could attempt to run logcat, but you would have to have logcat running continuously to capture what is going on and making it reboot. This is not very practical. But look below for info on logcat.
Instead of using logcat I would try just starting from a fresh install of Android. If you are rooted I would backup, wipe, and install a ROM from scratch. If you are not rooted, I would download the latest version of Android for your phone from HTC and install it. This will wipe your phone, but running from a clean slate should fix the reboot issue.
Once on your fresh Android install open Market place and install your apps starting with essentials only. DO NOT INSTALL any task killer of any kind. Reboot and see how the phone runs for a few days. If things seem fine then move on and install your other apps a few at a time. Give it a few days and continue on to the next few apps until you find the app that is giving you problems or maybe all you needed was a fresh start.
Logcat:
Install the Android SDK on a computer and then open a terminal shell (cmd.exe in Windows) and run adb logcat. On windows it looks like:

adb logcat

Sometimes I have to specify the whole path for that command to work. For me it would be:

C:\Downloads\evo\android-sdk-windows\tools\adb.exe logcat

You mileage will vary depending on where you install the SDK...
After running that command you will only be able to view what the terminal shell can contain or hold in memory. My recommendation would be to increase the buffer size of the terminal shell so that you can capture more information. More advanced shells might be able to output a text file, I would try that too. If you do not have this option just copy and paste everything in the screen to a text file yourself. In cmd you do this by right clicking, mark, highlight what you want, and then go to the text file and paste.
Also this is not always the best route unless you know what you are looking for because logcat will essentially show output of everything your phone is doing. So there will be a ton of data generated.

I'm pretty sure it's rebooting, as I end up at the sim unlock screen (probably should have made that a little clearer...), and battery times are reset.
Keeping it connected to my computer for several days and hoping I'm close when it crashes doesn't seem like a very viable option :)
I'll start removing all apps / adding them again one by one... was hoping there would be some logs somewhere, would probably pinpoint the problem in a second, now I'm in for weeks of trouble :(
thanks a lot though

I would try updating first. That would give you a fresh install to work with then add the apps back. It sounds like a pain but it should help your phone run much smoother. Also never use task killers of any kind.

The best you can do if you want to examine the log files is to install the free Android market app called aLogCat (just search for it on the market).
It allows you to inspect, filter for different levels of log categories and also to send you a log to your email or save it. For sure the easiest way to inspect the logs.

Forgot about that app. Not a bad idea. The app still uses logcat though so its a question of how much time the OP wants to spend troubleshooting this issue.

I couldn't find that one (maybe it's a paying app? Can't buy apps over here..), but I found an, I think, similar one catlog, it showed a whole lot of RunTimeExceptions from gtalk. Didn't even know that was running in the background, never use google talk, so killed the service... let's hope that fixes it... fingers crossed :)


text:
Droid Incredible - Gmail Push - Can I add my hosted Email address to Gmail on my Droid?
I have an Adroid phone and want to set it up to sync with my business email account.  My account is hosted on my own domain, but we use email "provided by gmail" (gmail interface, connected to my domain).
Question: can I just add this as a normal gmail account on my Droid?  I tried this and my username and password don't work (which makes sense, b/c I don't have a real gmail/google account).
Or, do I need to add it as a generic POP or IMAP account?  If so, will push still work?

When you add your email account through the Gmail app (Menu → Accounts → Add account), you'll usually need to use your full email address for the "username", rather than just your internal username.
In addition, if your company uses single sign-on for Google Apps (that is, if the login page for your business Gmail is not on google.com and doesn't look like the Gmail login page), you may need to set up a separate password for accessing Gmail from a non-web interface.  For this you'll need to talk to your IT department.

@crosstalk The interesting thing is, with the Gmail app in iOS I'm able to access both my company email (powered by Gmail) as well as my personal Gmail account. My company uses Single Sign-on. With the Gmail app in Android 4.0 I'm not able to setup my company email account at all. Really frustrating.

Google apps has special setup (expand the "hidden" section for Android) -- not hard at all, though. I've set it up in more than one app as I try them out:

To configure the 'Email' app on an
  Android device for access to Google
  Apps email, just follow the steps
  below:

Enable IMAP in your Mail settings.
On your phone, press < Home >, then open the Email application.
On the 'Your accounts' page, select Next to get started with setup.
Enter your full Google Apps email address and password, then
  select Next.
Select IMAP account and then select Next.
On the 'Incoming server settings' page, some fields may be
  pre-populated. Make sure to change the
  following:
For 'Username,' enter your full Google Apps email address
For 'IMAP server,' enter 'imap.gmail.com'
For 'Port,' enter '993'
For 'Security type,' select 'SSL (always)''

Select Next.
On the 'Outgoing server settings' page, some fields may be
  pre-populated. Make sure to change the
  following:
For 'SMTP server' enter 'smtp.gmail.com'
For 'Port,' enter '465'
For 'Security type,' select 'SSL (always)''
Select Next and continue through the setup options.

I can verify that this works with my two domains hosted on Google Apps.

Try opening the Gmail app, then hit menu and click "Accounts". Try to add your account this way. If that doesn't work then you will need to use the Mail app and add the account as pop or imap.

You should be able to add your business email (and calendar) as an additional Google account (I have with mine) - obviously making sure you enter your full email address including your company domain. If this is not working then speak to your domain admin in case they have locked down mobile access somehow :o/


text:
How can I watch TED videos offline on Android?
I'm looking for a way of subscribing to and watching TED talk videos on the HTC Desire, but I want support for off-line viewing.
The Mother TED app seems to require an active network connection, which isn't suitable since I want to be able to watch videos on the underground.
There's an RSS feed of the mp4 videos here - is there anything like Google Listen that supports mp4 video?

I use BeyondPod (the full version) to watch TED Talks all the time.  It pulls in a list of the videos from the feed and you can choose to download which ever ones you want and then play them right in BeyondPod.  There is no data connection required.

The official app for TED Conferences is what I use. It has saving and sharing capabilities.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ted.android

I would suggest using doubleTwist.  doubleTwist will re-encode any video to be suitable for your device, simply by dragging the video onto your device listed in the program.
doubleTwist has built-in functionality for subscribing to podcasts, but I use iTunes to organize podcasts, then use doubleTwist to send the content to, and play the content on, my HTC Hero.

As of this date, simply download the official TED app and select the talk you like to view offline. Then tap the download icon to the top-right corner to download. You can then play the downloaded videos offline from My Talks tab.
If you are a kind of person who like to play the videos at higher speed, you can get apps that support fast playback such as VLC for Android or Dice Player. Since all the downloaded files are stored in /sdcard/Android/data/com.ted.android/files/, you can point the video player to that path.
Hope this helps someone.


text:
Hero update lead to deletion of widgets
I have an HTC Hero (Europe) with Sense with used to run 2.1. A few days ago it said it wanted to update.
I allowed it and now the SMS widget is missing. The widget on the startscreen that also has weather information is missing as well.
How do I get those back?

Just got the same issue today. Reboot the phone once more, and you should be able to re-add the widgets back manually. Unfortunately there seems to be no other way to do this. Some widgets (bookmarks for example) were not even available for adding without additional phone reboot.


text:
Kindle Android - Refresh a book cover?
I use the Kindle app for Android. I had 'bought' one of the classic titles which they have - War and Peace, which, like many of the classics, had no cover image.
They have since updated the title on the Kindle store with a picture for the cover. I would like to update the title on my device so that it shows the cover art. How can I do this?
I tried "deleting" the title (it then goes to "archived items") and then redownloading it but this did not work. I also checked in Quick App Clean Cache to see if there was a cache I could clean, but Kindle is not listed. I also tried doing a 'sync' from within Kindle. None of these steps has helped.
My device is a Samsung Galaxy S Captivate, running Eclair yet (I think I'm getting my Froyo sometime this month).
If possible, I would certainly prefer to do this in such a way as to not lose my positions in the books I'm reading.

Did you try restarting the device without all the extra stuff? I have no idea why this would work, but I can confirm it did in my case, and has been recommended by the guys at StoryBundle

You could try deleting the app cache. Go to Settings > Applications > Manage Applications and find the Kindle app. Click on it and then hit the button that says "Clear Data". This will clear cache and start you off at square one again with the app. Then see what happens.

Hmm, I don't seem to have a "Delete Data" button; there's one that says "Clear cache", but it is disabled. It does show it as using 384KB of data though. Is the "Delete Data" button a Froyo thing? I haven't received the Froyo update yet.

You don't have a button that says "Clear Data"? Maybe it is a Froyo thing. You could try clearing the cache, uninstalling the app, reboot the phone, and then try reinstalling.

I recently "bought" a selection of the classic, free books for Kindle a few days ago. On Amazon (UK)'s webpage they were showing with full colour book covers, when they downloaded to my Android's Kindle app a few minutes later they came down with blank, default covers.
Have tried a lot of playing with it too, and can't see a way to get the covers for these books to download. Maybe they just don't send covers for free books to the Android app?

Nah, that's not it. I have numerous free books which brought down their cover art... e.g. Bram Stoker's Dracula, the Star Wars: Lost Tribe of the Sith series and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Once I'm done with the book I'm currently reading, I'll have to try doing an all-out uninstall/reinstall and see if that updates the ones that didn't get their covers. sigh


text:
How can I get Google Navigation (navigation in Maps) on Android to navigate walking directions?
I know how to get walking/public transportation/biking directions, but driving directions are the only ones I can navigate (tracks the location, shows turns coming up, compensates for wrong turns, etc.).  How can I navigate on the walking directions?
And yeah, I know that I can show the walking directions on the map, and try to follow them myself, but then it's always north up instead of track up and it doesn't make any attempts to snap the GPS location to the street.

I've looked for this myself — I don't think it's possible. A similar missing feature is that on the Google Maps web site, you can't save a bicycle route to My Maps. I think the non-car navigation is just generally not-fully-integrated.

@Kevin That's what I was afraid of.  It's too bad.  The two different services both function really well.  I wish they worked together just as well.

Walking Navigation was just released today [Sept 9] as an update to Google Maps 4.5.0

Here's the official Google announcement: http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2010/09/walk-this-way.html

Sweet, thanks for letting me know!  Used it a couple times today; it works great!


text:
 Samsung Galaxy S : Why can't I set cursor position in text boxes in browser?
When using the default browser on my Galaxy S, I can't see a cursor in text boxes that have focus. With no cursor I don't know where letters I type will appear. This seems to occur on all sites I have tested. Can someone with this phone confirm there is something wrong? Note that the address bar at the top is fine and behaves as I would expect.
Input method is the Samsung keyboard. No third party apps or firmware installed. Feel free to ask questions if you need more info. Thanks

Can't reproduce on my T-Mobile Vibrant (I tried all three keyboards).

Press and hold the ?123 key at the bottom, left corner of the standard Samsung Galaxy S keyboard. The keyboard switches to a four arrow cursor pad that you can use to move around a text field. There's also a delete key, select, cut, copy, and paste; click the Text key to switch back into keyboard mode.
This works with just about all text fields in all applications that I use.

+1 I didn't know that ! Just received mhy Galaxy S last week and learning something new every day. This site certainly helps.

Great tip, Erik. And from the Swype keyboard you activate the arrow keys layout by swyping from the special "(i)" key, in the lower left, to the SYM key - SEE http://www.androidpolice.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/snap20100701_000448_thumb.png from http://www.androidpolice.com/2010/07/02/tip-how-to-get-arrowcursor-keys-on-the-swype-keyboard/

I'm happy to help!

I've had this phone for months, and had no idea it had arrow keys.  LIFESAVER.

Just tried on my Samsung Galaxy S with the search box at the top of this page in the built-in browser and I get a flashing cursor all the time I'm not typing (it disappears while I'm typing but comes back if I pause for a moment) I'm using the built-in Swype keyboard.
Also tried switching back to the Samsung Keyboard (by long-pressing on a text field, then selecting Input Method and selecting Samsung Keyboard) and still see a cursor in the search box on this web site.
My Galaxy's running the standard Samsung version of Android 2.1, pretty sure I don't have any apps installed that affect the keyboard or browser.

Try using a different browser. Also you could try going into settings, apllications, manage applications, find the browser you are using and clear data, if that option isn't there, try cache. Reboot and see what happens.

I switched the phone off and on again and the problem seems to have gone away for the moment. I keep an eye on it for a few days to see if it comes back.

Glad to hear things are back to normal. Most quirks are fixed by a reboot. I should of suggested that as option 1.


text:
Why does my Samsung Galaxy S crash ("Not enough space in music database") when sorting by artist?
Had my Samsung Galaxy S for a week or so, and my new micro-SD card arrived a few days ago, loaded all my music onto it, listened to various albums no problem.
Now when I go into the built-in Music Player app and select the "Artists" tab at the top, Music Player closes with a "Not enough space in music database" error in the notification bar with a red warning triangle sign.
All the other tabs (All, Playlists, Albums & Genres) work with no problem, but as soon as I hit the Artists tab it crashes out. It's a 32GB SD-card with about 25GB of music on it, the internal SD card is almost empty with no music on it at all. On the PC I'm a SqueezePlayer and Last.Fm user, so I'm pretty sure all my tags are setup right (Last.FM lets you know in your feed if you've got incorrect artist/track info, and SqueezePlayer lives or dies by the quality of your tagging).
Searching for this on the web, all I can find is other people with various sized music collections and SD-cards (8, 16 & 32GB) all having this problem and the only suggestions are to download different music apps from the Market. No one seems to have a real solution. That can't be right can it? I previously had an HTC Magic Android phone with a full 8GB micro-SD and much of the same music with no problems playing.
There must be some way to get the built-in music player app working properly? Does anyone know what file/where is this database and whether wiping/clearing it would help?

Found this thread on the Vibrant section of the XDA Devs forum: Not Enough Space in Music Database? (pretty sure the Vibrant is a US carrier-specific version of the Galaxy, with this weird obsession US networks seem to have for making up alternative names for devices).

Maybe it has something to do with how
  the app handles various artists and/or
  unknown artists.
I added all my music, then deleted
  tracks from various artist albums
  until it worked again. I then put back
  the various artist album track and it
  didn't work, as expected.
I thought this was artist based, but
  when I got it working again--by
  deleting the track mentioned
  above--and then added a track for a
  various artist album by an artist that
  already existed, the app crashed too.
I then thought it might be song based.
  So I removed that song and then added
  a set of songs. However, it
  unexpectantly worked.
The difference with the set of songs
  added above is that they weren't part
  of a various artist album. They were a
  new artist, but the main album artist
  wasn't Various with a Contributing
  artist of the actual artist name.
  Instead, the Album Artist was the
  artist name and the contributing
  artist was left blank (or had the same
  name).
So, it is that the music app doesn't
  understand how to handle various
  artist albums?

Plugged SD card into my PC, did a search for files named *.mp3 with "various" in the artist tag, moved all of them off the card. Plugged card back into Galaxy again, waiting for media indexing to finish, I can now view the Artists column without the app crashing. Still can't Search in the app without crashing, but I have a few more compilation type albums so will try spotting and removing all of them to see if it helps.
Update Nov 2010: The Music player included in the official Samsung Froyo (Android 2.2) update, seems to have fixed this problem, or at least made it so that I can have the majority of my tracks on the phone without this problem showing up.


text:
On the android Incredible, is there any way to make a shortcut to the "All Photos" view?
The HTC photo-album takes up an entire screen; is there a way to make a shortcut, or is there a smaller widget or app, that would open up the all-photos view?
The easiest method I've found is to go in via a camera, view the albums, and select "All photos"
Surely there must be a better way?
I'm on the HTC Incredible running Froyo (2.2)

Do you have an app called Gallery? I have it in my list. I would say just drag that on your homescreen and you should be good to go.

that's...... I'm speechless. That should have been obvious. But I kept looking for something called "album" or "photos" or making a shortcut. HAH! Thanks!

No worries man. Glad it worked for you!

This should probably be marked as the correct answer then, right?


text:
How to copy a file into Micro SD via USB in Android?
How can I copy a file into micro SD of an Android phone connected via USB to a PC with Windows?

Related: http://gadgets.stackexchange.com/q/642/87

This is phone specific.  Please edit question to include phone make and model

Settings >> Connect to PC >> USB Connection Type

should be set to "Disk drive" (you can set this as a default connection type, but I prefer to do it manually when I need it).
Also, you can set it via the notifcations bar by clicking on the USB connection type as it appears; a selection box of the various options should appear.
Once mounted, you can open on your PC, and drag-n-drop, or what-have-you.
NOTE (from the Incredible manual, p29):

Disk drive
This mode is available only when you
  have installed a microSD card on your
  phone. Select  this mode when you want
  to use your storage card as a USB
  thumb drive, and copy files  between
  your phone’s storage card and your
  computer.
When Disk Drive mode is
  enabled while your phone is connected
  to the computer, you will  not be able
  to run applications that use the
  storage card, such as Music or Photos.
  For more  information, see “Copying
  files to and from the storage card” in
  this chapter.

Also looks like apps installed to the SD card are also deactivated while mounted/connected.

You don't mention which Android phone you've got, depending on which phone (and how much your manufacturer's customised) you've got, it may be slightly different from OtherMichael's instructions.
With stock Android (as on the Nexus One, HTC Magic, G1, etc), when you plug your phone into the PC's USB you should see a USB icon appear in the notification area. Pull the notification area down and you should see "USB connected: Select to copy files to/from your computer." Press this and you get the option to "Mount". Pressing this connects your phone's SD to the PC.
Other manufacturers customize things slightly with their custom UIs, for instance if you have a phone with Samsung's TouchWiz UI on it, you get a menu up as soon as you plug into USB, with options to select USB Mode, on the you'd pick Mass Storage, and then do as above. I think HTC's Sense UI also customizes things slightly, but I can't remember exactly how that works.

Some apps will automatically mount the phone for you when you plug it in. Note that some functionality on the phone is disabled while it is so mounted.


text:
Programmable MP3 player with audio recording capability
I'm looking for a device that:

Is programmable like the iTouch, Android, devices.
I'd rather not go Apple, but the iTouch is a nice device.
I want a line-in jack or at least the ability to connect a real mic

What I 'really' want is this:

I want to set it to record, put it on the table and whenever something interesting is said, be able to hit a marker button.
I want to be able to have a menu of movie quotes, "it goes to 11", "what is your name!?", "How you gonna lose your job,... on your day off?!", "Groovy baby!".... as well as the ability to record my own quotes. Then I can just hit a button and boom, it plays the quote.

That must exist, but if not, I can program it myself.
Web browser/wi-fi would be a bonus.
The Archos devices look nice, but it's not clear that they've got line-in's.

Just buy any Android phone and you can easily have all of the features of an iTouch and more. I'm sure you could find one on Ebay now for $100 or less. Maybe an old G1 or something like that. You can use cell phones just fine without activating them, including Android phones. But you will want an Android that has WiFi in it if you won't be activating it. That way you can still use the marketplace and such.
Update:
I forgot that you could also look at devices supported by Rockbox. You won't likely get anywhere near the functionality of Android or IOS, but might be enough for you depending on the device.


text:
Are there any devices that are like an iPod Touch, but run Android?
A lot of people like iPod Touches because they're almost identical to iPhones, but without cell service (and the monthly fees that go along with it), while still being able to connect to a wireless network. Are there any alternative devices that run Android?
Bonus points if it has at least 24 GB of storage.

see also http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/152/is-there-an-android-pmp-equivalent-of-the-ipod-touch (this question was asked on and migrated from gadgets.SE prior to the start of AE)

Nothing of quality yet (at least IMO).  Archos has just announced a new product line of Android tablets and smaller devices.  Also Samsung has announced the Galaxy tablet (http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20015395-1.html) that looks impressive.
I think you'll have a ton of options around the Christmas shopping season.. Keep an eye on Engadget, not a day goes by they're not showing another "leaked" Android tablet.
ETA:
here's a link to the Archos 101 tablet.. Looks pretty impressive:
http://www.archos.com/products/ta/archos_101it/index.html?country=us&lang=en

Perfect! This is exactly the sort of thing that I'm looking for. Unfortunately the Archos 4.3 (the highest capacity pocket-sized Archos tablet), which isn't even out yet, has a max capacity of 16GB. But I'm sure it's only a matter of time before it hits 32GB. Thanks!

Also: I realize that there is a micro-sd slot available on it. I have one on my Sansa Clip+, but having the available space split in 2 means I can't automatically sync it with Banshee. I have to manage it manually.

Funny, lets see if the price is going to be worth it, because if it is the same price as the iPad it will be a hard sale (except you can add more storage vs having to buy a new iPad)

@Dmitriy Likhten The prices are roughly half of Apple for many of the Archos products. http://archos.com/

The recently announced Samsung Galaxy Player SD is Samsung's go at an Android based PMP (Personal Media Player) in a similar vein to the iPod Touch.
It has Wifi connectivity and no phone voice or data capability built-in, but other than that, from the recently released offcial video, it appears to be running exactly the same software with the same Samsung apps and Samsung TouchWiz interface add-ons as the full Galaxy S, albeit in a smaller form factor with a lower spec camera.

Wow, what an anemic device.  Why couldn't they just release a Galaxy S without a cellular radio?

@Matt presumably from the "Player SD" name, there's going to be a "Player HD" model announced in a while...

Just buy an Android phone. The newer ones are supporting 32gb of storage. You don't have to activate the phone if you don't want to and you will get all the functionality. Or just upgrade to an Android phone and then have the best of both worlds. The way Android handles music works beautifully.

The problem is that most Android phones seem to be in the ~$500-600 range without a contract. I'm looking for something closer to ~$200-300.

You're not looking in the right places. Ebay has a TON of Android phones for sub $300. Just type in "Android cell phone" and search. Then scroll down and on the left side type in your price range. There are new Samsung Galaxy S phones going for just under $350 if you can spend it. I would get one of those for sure. Point being if you look hard enough you can find them.

Disagree that android handles music well.  Which app are you using?  The native music app is very poor quality compared to iPod touch.

You can purchase a G1 for about ~$100 on ebay.  See my answer here: http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/2182/cheapest-android-to-buy-on-line-south-europe/2185#2185

Have you tried dx.com shop? They have Android-based devices for even below $100. True, these are Chinese craps, but should be great for just an audio player.

I own an Archos 43 (16GB internal with an microSD card slot), and I really like it.  Keep in mind with the Generation 8 Archos tablets (Archos 28, Archos 32, Archos 43, Archos 70, and Archos 101), only the Archos 70 and Archos 101 have capacitive touchscreens, so they are the only multi-touch capable devices in the product line.
UPDATE:
Since posting my answer, some new products have been announced.  Check out the Amazon Kindle Fire and Samsung Galaxy Player 50, although both of those are larger than an iPod Touch.
Also, Archos has announced some new ninth generation tablets, the Archos 80 G9 and the Archos 101 G9.

As Don says, Archos are releasing a range of "tablets" (most are really PMPs, like the iPod touch) during September and October.
The register have a good breakdown of the full range here: http://www.reghardware.com/2010/09/01/archos_android_tablets/

The Archos tablets have not generally received good reviews to this point.  The Dell Streak has also received bad reviews.  Further, Google has said the current version of Android is not optimized for tablets.  I would personally wait for Android 3.  By then, the first gen tablets will be passed and the lessons learned will drive a much better second generation of tablets with an Android OS designed for them.


text:
Why do some processes block when my Android phone is connected?
I've been trying to reboot (WinXP) all evening, and Emacs (Win32, v23.something, not important) isn't starting... sometimes... it's locked on mount.exe (loads up some CygWin things during launch), I finally notice. Can't kill mount.exe via ProcessExplorer, either. Killing Emacs kills emacs, and leaves the child process still hanging around, unable to be task-killed.
Running mount.exe manually in a shell gives the same behavior -- the app is just locked up, no CPU activity, but can't kill it.
After several reboots, I realize that my Android Incredible is plugged in for charging (default connection type is "Charge Only"), [the connection is ALSO set to USB debugging].
I unplug the phone... and every instance mount.exe suddenly exits (completes what it was doing, I presume).
UPDATE: noticed blocking occurring for a few other apps, as well: TortoiseSVN and GoogleTalk, Firefox launch/close; Calibre; FogBugz Screenshot Save-As.

The behavior can be replicated by having the phone connected and USB debugging enabled OR disabled, and launching mount.exe in a standard shell. It goes through a couple of drives, then "hangs"
When USB debugging is toggled, mount.exe will finish (I'm presuming it's a standard exit, as no error messages are thrown).
Using ProcessExplorer I don't see any other apps that are running that appear/disappear with the toggling.
To change the status of USB Debugging:
Home >> Menu >> Setting >> Applications >> Development >> [(un)check "USB Debugging"]

mount.exe can be replaced above with any of the number of blocking processes.
USB debugging may be on or off initially -- it's not one state that blocks; it is EITHER state, and switching to the other state unblocks.
Any pointers, people? Since this is Android related, I put it in here... but it's also PC related ... so... I can see this question getting bounced from every StackExchange forum on some technicality.... Cross-posted at StackOverflow.

oh, cool -- this migrated over from gadgets.SE !!!

Could also be a good question for http://superuser.com/ if it's a PC thing.

Did you set the phone to charge only after plugging it in? If not go into settings and there should be an option like "Connet to PC". Click that and change the default setting to charge only. See if that helps. If not power off the phone and computer and disconnect cable. Then power both back up and wait for both to fully boot. Then plug in phone. See if that helps.

I edited the question to make it more clear -- "Charge only" is the default type; boot is a red herring - it's the execution of mount.exe that is blocking.

Yes but you unplug the phone and mount.exe goes away. So that is why I was guessing that your SD card was either improperly mounting or it was mounted at some point and was never properly unmounted. Have you rebooted the phone and computer to see if the problem goes away?

rebooted each a bunch of times.

So now my best guess is mount.exe is expecting a drive to mount and isn't presented one so it hangs. It is getting confused. So somehow you need to tell CygWin not to automount (which may not necessarily be the issue) or you need to tell CygWin not to take over devices plugged in. If you plug in other USB devices does CygWin automatically look for drivers/modules and attempt to connect to them? Can you configure it not to do that and test and see if mount.exe still hangs?

I tried to make it clear that the setting is "charge only" -- there is no mounting of phone volumes involved. see updates that indicate that other processes, non-drive-related, also block.


text:
Android and sim-lock
I'd like to know if android phones are sim-locked. Given that they are open-source and have community images it should be 'tricky' to sim-lock one but I prefere to ask.
Also - do I need to unlock if I use dual-sim adapter with one legal card in it?

This differs from carrier to carrier. Some will be sim-locked, some aren't. You'll have to ask your carrier. It has nothing to do with the OS.

Short of inserting a SIM card from another carrier, how can one tell whether an Android phone is SIM locked?

@Derek: Call your carrier. But if you got the phone subsidized, it's probably locked. Wikipedia has some information about relevant laws.


text:
How many times can I install an application I've purchased on the Market?
I have just bought an HTC HD2 and I immediately installed a custom Android ROM. I will probably change ROMs often.
If I buy an application from the Android Market how many times can I download and install it?

As long as you are using the same Google account, you should be able to download it as many times as you need to.  The Android Market keeps track of who has bought which applications and allows them to be re-downloaded.

Is that "should" that worries me. I do not want to risk that Google decides to block me from downloading applications that I bought.

@ Drake, Why do you have that concern? Did you read something where this has happened? Or did you read anywhere that Google has limits? As far as I know they could care less how many times you download. But keep in mind to download you need to have uninstalled the app first, or wiped your phone. So another questions might be why all the uninstalling and reinstalling of the same app? Unless you are rooting, in which case there is still no concern there. Google's marketplace is open and they have given no indication to change.

Can you share apps across the same account on different phones? e.g. my wife and I share a google account for app purchases so can we install the app on both of our phones?

@goap I think so, but I haven't tried it.  You can certainly transfer your apps to a new handset so I can't see any reason why it wouldn't work.

@GusPaul: Yes, you can share apps across different android devices so long as the primary account used to set up the device is the same.  I do this across two phones and a tablet myself.


text:
audio player ala winamp on android?
is there any audio player that works similar to winamp? so it can play

most importantly files from within a folder (whole folder or one file)
playlists
streams

Yes! It's Winamp for Android :)
See Winamp for Android for QRCode

unfortunately no streams yet :(

Any HTC Android phone should have two music players by default, Android's and the one made by HTC. Both should be able to do what you want. If you don't like them there are at least 4 or 5 others you can download from the marketplace that should have the features that you like. A few popular ones are MixZing and Meridian.

As Webs said, there are any number of decent Android audio players out there.
The one I use is MixZing -- however, streaming support is not yet supported, and still listed as "And even better to come..."

For audio streams XiiaLive Lite is perfect.