text:
Quickly switch input methods (swype->other)
I'd like to be able to switch from Swype to Hacker Keyboard from within programs, especially ConnectBot and TerminalEmulator.  Hacker Keyboard comes with a shortcut to switch to others, but Swype doesn't.  If there are workarounds to reduce the number of clicks needed to switch input methods, those would also be welcome.

Long-pressing an input field generally prompts you for the Input method.

I am looking at Swype right now, and it's got a cogweel in the bottom left corner, which if pressed for more than 1 second gives you a choice of the input methods (Swype, Android Keyboard, others...)
https://i.stack.imgur.com/3Jg4v.png

Mine doesn't have a cogwheel... is this a version issue?

Could be. I downloaded the latest version, to be able to type in 3 different languages. I currently run 3.23.

http://www.apktop.com/swype-3-23-multi-language.html as seen in the first screenshot, the same button that has the cogweel on my app, is situated in the upper left corner, and has the (i) sign. Could be related to anything. Swype version/Firmware/Resolution...

I'm apparently on 3.25, though it looks like that's not the problem, since the screenshot you pointed to also has the (i) instead of a cogwheel.


text:
Where are the settings for stock swype?
I have a Samsung Galaxy S from Sprint that has Swype pre installed. The latest OS update included some changes to Swype that are making me completely insane. The biggest issue is that it auto-corrects words when I'm finger tapping accurately. So a message to my sister that meant to say "Pfft. Just come." got auto corrected to "Orgy. Just come." I'm totally exasperated!
I can't find Swype settings on my phone. I looked at http://www.swype.com/tips/swype-basics/ but the only thing I get when I longpress the Swype key is the option to toggle between input methods. I can't access any further settings.

Seems "language and keyboard" is "locale and text"

Settings > Language and keyboard > Swype on a Galaxy S2

They're under Settings > Locale and Text > Swype for me.

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

sort: votes


text:
Where is this Twitter App hiding?
I changed my twitter password a while ago, and periodically, when my phone has been off or totally offline, I'll get an alert: "Twitter sign in failed" but the Icon looks like a twitter icon, not Seesmic or Tweetdeck, the two apps I use. I'm assuming the problem from the app perspective is that my password isn't working. From my perspective, the problem is that I can't even figure out what app is sending these prompts. Seesmic and Tweetdeck have my new password, and I don't see a "Twitter" app in my applications anywhere.
How do I even begin to figure out where this alert is coming from?

What phone? OS? Carrier? Some have it pre-installed. Did you check under Accounts & sync?

It's probably the Social Networking Service (SNS) or a similar application, rather than a Twitter-specific app.  I have this service on my Samsung phone and there's a widget that can display social networking posts on the home screen.  You can manage it via Settings -> Accounts and sync, as Al said.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
How to make Google Maps Navigation show forward as up?
It used to be that Google Maps Navigation on my phone would show the direction of travel = as "up" on the screen. However, ever since my phone upgraded to Gingerbread, navigation is displayed with North as "up" on the screen.
How do I revert to the old behavior?

It turns out that the solution to this is rather easy, but scarcely documented.
To switch between forward-is-up and north-is-up, simply tap the red/white compass needle in the upper left hand corner of the screen.
On the updated maps, where the red/white compass icon is no longer there, goto settings and turn off "North is always up'

tapping on it did not change anything. It still points to north. Any ideas how to get it back to the direction of travel orientation. It started when offline maps were downloaded an used.

As of 7/2019 it's in "Navigation Settings" near the bottom.  "Keep map north up"

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
Why is the SSH server not working on Android 4, are the ports being blocked?
I am having difficulty ssh'ing into my new Android 4 (Samsung Nexus) phone.
I have installed various SSH Servers but in in all cases the ssh connection just hangs (i.e. I don't get as far as username/password).
As an example, using SSHDroid:
Verbose SSH log from my linux box :
joel@pepper ~ $ ssh  -p 2222 root@192.168.1.65 -vvv
OpenSSH_5.8p1 Debian-1ubuntu3, OpenSSL 0.9.8o 01 Jun 2010
debug1: Reading configuration data /etc/ssh/ssh_config
debug1: Applying options for *
debug2: ssh_connect: needpriv 0
debug1: Connecting to 192.168.1.65 [192.168.1.65] port 2222.

The output from nmap does not look right. A status of filtered on the port implies a firewall is blocking it:
joel@pepper ~ $ sudo nmap -sS  192.168.1.65

Starting Nmap 5.21 ( http://nmap.org ) at 2011-11-20 21:29 GMT
Nmap scan report for android-63731d6ebec9e01.lan (192.168.1.65)
Host is up (0.019s latency).
Not shown: 999 closed ports
PORT     STATE    SERVICE
2222/tcp filtered unknown
MAC Address: A0:0B:BA:B4:5F:59 (Unknown)

This really locks like blocked ports. You could also try a ping, followed by an telnet <ip> <ssh_port> and you could confirm that the socket is opened on OS level via netstat -ltnp.

As far as I know, the default ssh port IS 22 on Ubuntu, just as "Lie Ryan" pointed out.  You might want to check your sshd_config files on your PC, if you want to take a look at this article, it specifies on how to change the default ssh configuration on Ubuntu--as well as the official documentation.  Beyond that, check your current firewall settings, you might be able to open that specific port temporarily to ssh-type service if you want to confirm that it's not something else.
Aside from that, it seems to me that this question was asked more than 6 months ago; if the OP hasn't figured it out by now, I doubt he'll be interested to pursue it further.  I suggest either accept an answer, provide update on the situation since, or perhaps close the question.
EDIT: depending on your android ssh-server app, and whether or not you're running it with su privileges, this is from the "QuickSSHD" website:

non-root users are limited to ports < 1024 and the QuickSSHd application user, which CAN read and write to the SD Card.

Don't you mean > 1024?

that is the exact thing that's on the website...copied and pasted. Here you go, take a look for yourself

That's probably a typo. Generally ports < 1024 are reserved to root user, and other ports can be accessed by anyone. http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/16564/why-are-the-first-1024-ports-restricted-to-the-root-user-only

I don't know...but, as I said, generally there's a reason why most android-based SSH-servers require root permission; and if the OP is having trouble accessing it from PC, it may explain it, since SSHDroid and QuickSSHD are very similar and based on the same "core parts"

Oh sure, I'm just talking about communicating on ports in question. I know that SSHD on android runs on 2222, usually.

yea, as I said, it's been a number of months now since the OP; If he hasn't at least tried to switch APPs, or found out more on his own, chances are he wouldn't care to find out now either...so, I'm not sure where this question stands as of now, but I would look into closing it if there are no updates from the OP on the matter.

also...check out the line that starts with debug2 in the first log output: ssh_connect: needpriv 0 ; isn't "zero" the uid for the root user on android? Based on that as well, I would say that the SSHD app DOES need a rooted device with su privileges during initiation for port 2222 as suggested by the "QuickSSHD" website.  Or he could try connecting to port 22 from Ubuntu as root user.

The default ssh port is 22 not 2222, perhaps that's the root cause of the issue? Try connecting on port 22.

Actually, all the SSH servers on the market that I know of use the port 2222.

Ports below 1024 are only available to root users on Linux, that's why SSH servers on Android don't use port 22 as the default.


text:
Samsung Galaxy S2 - sound notification does not always work
my samsung galaxy s2 (android 2.3.4, kernel 2.6.35.7, build gingerbread.xwki4) does not always beeps when I get google talk messages (I'am not using social hub, just native Talk app) also it does not display message on the top of the screen
I can't figure out when the notification works and when it doesn't work, is it that because I already answered to the person? but I would like to be still notified if I don't have gtalk opened
if a notification does not work for a certain contact it still works for new people starting conversation, however it is not clear for me when it should beep and when it is intentional that it does not beep
is there a way to configure notification to always beep when a certain application isn't opened?

Are you sure that you receive the message?
If you don't get a beep nor a top screen message but you get the message once you re-enter on the talk application (after a small delay) maybe the problem is that you lose the connection with the server.


text:
How can I update the Market app on my device?
I have an HTC Desire S with Android 2.3. After I purchased my phone Google released an update for the Android Market, but I haven't receive this update. How can I update to the new version of the Market?

New versions of the Market are rolled-out by Google automatically (and there is a slight chance that you never see the new Market, but I don't think that this is true for the Desire S). So the best thing is to wait.
If you really can't wait you could try this market.apk, but I am not sure if it's the latest. Make sure that you have "Unknown sources" enabled. Source


text:
Why are my SMS messages being sent automatically?
When I start composing an SMS message on my Samsung Galaxy S2, if I pause for a couple of minutes  the SMS gets sent automatically, even though the message hasn't been finished (and I haven't hit the "send" button). Is there some way I can stop this happening, please?

You could start off by checking if this is a problem with the Messaging app itself. Install an alternative SMS app (I use GO SMS Pro myself).
If all's fine with the alternative app, and you don't mind using it (they're much more powerful anyway), problem solved. Otherwise, you could try out what patchie is suggesting.

I would re install Android to the newest version. Either do it yourself, or go to a phone shop and pay 10$ or so for them to reinstall your phone.
If this solves your problem, it was a cheap fix. If it didn't work, you can go back to the phone shop where you bought the phone and make them fix it in guarantee.
If you want to try to download and install an awesome rom for your phone, you should read this: http://www.cyanogenmod.com/devices/samsung-galaxy-s2

Prior to that, you could try a factory reset first.

Good idea Flow, here is how this is done: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLYkMk16la8

You should also do a backup of your phone to save data, but DONT restore the backup before you have tested if it works without the restore. Use "MyBackup Pro" to backup everything on your phone: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.rerware.android.MyBackupPro&feature=search_result#?t=W251bGwsMSwxLDEsImNvbS5yZXJ3YXJlLmFuZHJvaWQuTXlCYWNrdXBQcm8iXQ..


text:
How can I recover a deleted file on Android?
I just deleted a file on my Nexus S that I really need back. (It was actually part of an app using a sqlite database that did a drop table when upgrading to a new version.)
Presumably I need to root the phone first (which I hear is easy on Nexus phones) but am I in a catch-22 here? Namely, does rooting the phone mean wiping/overwriting the partition where the data lives?
If not, what do you recommend for data recovery tools? Presumably the file was just unlinked and not actively overwritten (per usual when "deleting" a file) so technically the data must be there...

I cannot post an answer, the system goes against me. Worse for them... The most easy way when you have Linux system and your device with TWRP recovery is.
0. First of all! Stop creating new files, close all apps. If you will need to run something, better DELETE first some needless files as much as possible to free more space and get more chances to keep your deleted files intact. Of course you will have to know what partition you need to free. High chances its the one that is mounted as /data (your local and deleted files are in /data/media or something like that).

In TWRP recovery copy your partition with dd to micro SD card by 4Gb pieces:

dd if=/dev/dm-0 of=/sdcard/x1...n bs=1048576 count=4095 skip=...

Well, you have an option to mount external OTG drive (find some external power source though). But mine didn't work, so I had to put pieces to micro-SD. In skip parameter you will put: 0, 4095, 8190, 16380, etc.

Move all pieces to linux system, concatenate with cat.

Use testdisk to recover. This is most versatile tool for extfs undelete. It allows to undel from specific directory and undeletes even broken files and works really fast (apart from heuristic scanners). So you will be sure that everything that is possible is undeleted or overwritten.

Or: always install testdisk as part of busybox bundle and keep it on your phone.

Even if you don't plan to run anything: immediately do delete some more, because high chances you have a lot of processes that write to /data in background. So there is a lot of time to get your data lost before you turn your phone off. In past you could get your battery out, now even this is impossible.

Manual way
Luckily data recovery on Android isn't different from any other PC/Linux with a flash storage device. You first need root and the dd binary on your device to make a full backup of the block storage device your deleted file was on. dd is sometimes already installed in your system.
Then it's just 3-steps to find out if the file could be recovered:

Find out on which block device the file was on. Via mount
Acquire and image of that block device with dd: dd if=/dev/<blockdevice> of=/sdcard/image bs=4096
Get a data recovery forensics tool and let it search /sdcard/image for the lost file. You can of course try to run multiple tools on the image. Foremost and Scalpel are a good start.

"Undelete" App
There is a new App called "Undelete Beta" which can recover files on the internal storage and the SD card. The App is beta and has some restrictions.
If the file is really important, I would always choose the "Manual Way".

For rooting see this question. I have no Nexus S, but I would say: No, no and sometimes.

@Flow: a) I really wouldn't touch the affected partition any further but unlock the Nexus and 'fastboot boot cwm.img' for a tmp recovery. b) Preferably use adb on the fly to transmit the partition data off the phone (no intermittent storing on /sdcard) using stdout+gzip+uuencode c) carving: sqlite3 has no footer, but a header "SQLite format 3". Using foremost it's best to define a max-size and maybe 'NEXT' (indicating EOF if any other new header is found). OK if I edit?

+1 for 'scalpel'! Haven't known before. BTW: Testdisk's photorec is also quite useful (for standard file types like .jpg ans such)

what if the device to backup is bigger than 4gb ?

@ce4 the manual method won't work in my case. My android tablet is mounted via mtp So, there isn't any block device on which my android is mounted, rather it's a folder. I can't run dd command then. How to proceed ahead please!

mtp is a high level access protocol which is not sufficient. You need root access on your device in order to access the underlying block device in raw mode using dd (e.g. via custom recovery).

As of Android 4.3+ and the implementation of TRIM it is now incredibly difficult to recover deleted files on the internal memory.
Some of the suggested solutions probably will not be worthwhile unless you are able to scan the memory for the deleted file(s) very rapidly after deletion.
Moreover, in the case of recovery after a factory reset, as of Android 4.0+ a factory reset now ends up doing a secure erase (or similar operation) so that all data is irrevocably gone.
Reference:

TRIM on Wikipedia
Android bug report
Android Security Team security best practices

I assume this is the correct answer in 2019?

The new Undelete Beta may be helpful here if you don't want to involve a PC.  Any time you write to storage you risk overwriting the deleted file, but rooting shouldn't wipe.


text:
Why does controlling CPU frequency require root access?
According to this answer one of the programs that requires root access is SetCPU that can lower the CPU frequency when the phone is not used thus prolong battery life.
I don't get one thing - why does that require root? What could be the harm in reducing the CPU frequency?

1) Because only the root user can change the system's frequency/governor. It's a system level function call and only root can do that.
2) Under clocking really isn't the problem...  It's over clocking.  You can't really damage the device, but you could end up in an infinite boot loop and an average user may not know how to get out of that.
3) Also: you usually want to replace the kernel when over/under clocking to get new frequencies and possibly under volting to save power (but at the same time, you're going out of the parameters of the CPU and it may end up boot looping because no two CPUs are made exactly alike when you are doing things outside their normal operating parameters).

If have to disagree with Sparx, if you change the CPU frequency via the supported methods that every modern CPU provides, changing it, even in a fast sequence, doesn't affect stability. I would even rule out hardware damage, because of the sophisticated security mechanisms in modern CPUs (overheat protection, etc.).
Why can only root set the frequency and the frequency governor? Well, first because it's Linux that only allows root to do so. Second, I think that it's because the average user shouldn't care about. It's the system that decides which frequency is the best in the current situation. It does so automatically, without user intervention and it does the job good under Android (IMHO). While thinks like SetCPU can prolong battery life, it also can shorten it, if it's done wrong. The question here is: Do you believe that a 3rd party App does better battery management than the one that the manufacturer of the device? In certain cases sure, but not always.

If I set my freq too low, my device doesn't wake from deep sleep. That renders it unusable, until I pull the battery and reboot. Constant overclocking adds heat which is bad for any electronic component. The odds of a hardware failure are much higher. Oh, and if you want setCPU allows a user to use different governers - these tell the CPU how and when to scale up/down to improve either performance or battery life as a user may see fit.

I get your point. But it seems that setCPU uses some internal quirks to under-/overclock. Thats why I added "via the supported methods that every modern CPU provides", which should be safe on every CPU.

But it would require "root", correct? I'm assuming you're talking about init scripts?

It would require "root", right. I am talking about everything the cpu freq governor is able to do and th e cpufred-set binary. Both are using the same system calls and won't be able to damage and/or make your system unstable.

Mucking about with CPU frequencies can lead to instabilities in your system and might also lead to hardware damage. Such a critical function is best left out of the hands of normal users who don't really need to make such changes.
Since this most certainly a core (important) function, one needs root access.

Allowing cpu frequency to be set directly by user level process is a security issue. It's a hardware functionality that could affect other processes running on the system. On an ideal system, no user level process should be able to affect the execution of another user's processes, except through explicit interprocess communication (e.g. pipes, signals, files, etc).
Examples of damages that could be done:

Battery life: a malicious or poorly written could set cpu at a constantly high level, draining more battery than is necessary, without attracting suspicion because it uses little cpu for itself.
Poor performance: a malicious or poorly written app could set the cpu frequency at constantly low level, resulting in poor performance. This could then be used to trick user into purchasing our downloading unnecessary optimizer apps, among others.
Conflicting cpu frequency set by multiple apps could lead to really unstable system performance and general havoc as they keep overriding each other. This reason alone could make the whole cpu frequency setting useless.

The solution to this? Any single process should not be able to directly set cpu frequency. Instead non root process should only be able to give hints, and the system could then pick the best frequency setting, taking into account the hints from all processes, system policy, and process accounting information. This is what cpufreq "governers" are. One of the job of operating system is to moderate access to shared resources.
Also, it should be noted that lowering cpu frequency does not always lead to better battery life, depending on the work load, lower frequency could also mean it takes longer time to finish the task, and this could easily negate the savings.


text:
Google Calendar is installed, How do I open it?
I have recently purchased a Spice MI 350 Handset which is loaded with Android 2.3.3, the phone also has some preinstalled apps.. When I go to application manager -> installed I see Google calendar there but I don't know from where I can open it.. I have tried almost all the options.
I have tried finding "Google Calendar" at android market place but there is no such app (or at least I couldn't find one)... I need a calendar which gets sync with my Google Calendar account..
Since the phone is not rooted I can neither open nor use nor re install it from the market (disappointing) ..How do I get Google Calendar working for me...

Usually it's called Calendar. Ask your provider if it still isn't showing on your phone.
Alternatively, trying seeing if long-pressing an empty area of your screen and then choosing Widgets - shows the Calendar Widget in the list.
I am assuming of course, that you've already set up your Google Account to sync with your device.

I tried long pressing the home screen... Unfortunately calendar option is not present in the add widget section... However Google calendar app is visible in the installed section of Application manager...

Try using an alternative app like Jorte.

I asked the Customer care of Spice mobiles. They say it is already their. After trying few times I finally started using "Business Calendar" app it is good and automatically synchronizes with my Google account.

Does the app here work for you?
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1317804&page=9

I have downloaded the .apk file provided there... will it be safe to install it in phone.... How can I verify it is not a spam ?

It will be safe. It's not spam, because it's been verified by users in XDA forum.

I tried copying that in the downloads folder of SD card... and since than the phone is showing msg "Preparing SD Card" and notification "Checking SD card for errors...", what to do nxt..? is everything messed up now ? If there is almost a 1GB data how much time it will take to check...? reply fast..

Have you copied the file to the phone already? Did you install it?


text:
Get rid of duplicate songs on phone when using Google Music
I've uploaded my mp3s to Google Music. I also physically have the files on my phone. But now when I use the Google Music app it shows the songs on my sd card and the songs I've uploaded to the cloud.
Apart from deleting the files on my phone, is there a way to tell Google not to sync songs I already have?

I think that there is no other way as to simply delete the files on your Android device. Make sure you have a copy of the files on your PC or an external HD. I am not sure if one can download the mp3s easily from the Google music cloud. You have the files in Google musics cloud, why do you need them on the device too? The music App will cache the files on the device for fast/offline access.

If I want songs offline that I haven't cached yet then I can't get them.  I did notice however that if you long click a song/artist/album you can tick a box that says "Available offline" so I guess that's how to "sync" files physically with their cloud.

You can also mark whole playlists as offline available

The Music Manager now has a tool to download "purchased" music from the cloud.


text:
How to fix Sync Browser not working on ICS
I just got a Galaxy Nexus and all is good apart from that my Sync Browser doesn't work.  When I run logcat against it it gives me the error of :
BookmarksSync  I  Sync failed due to soft error: Skipping any commits.

I've seen some pages online which describe this issue and suggest fixing by removing all your bookmarks and starting again, but I'd rather not do this. *see edit below
Does anyone know how I can fix this without removing all my existing browser setup?  or if this is the only way, can someone point me to a page with clear instructions.
** EDIT **
I tried removing all my bookmarks and syncing and it's still giving me an error with no bookmarks present.

Have added a bug report to the Android issue tracker.  If you are experiencing the same, could you please star it : http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=22407

Disable syncing in Google Chrome.
Remove stored sync data on your Google Dashboard.
Enable sync again in Google Chrome making sure that only the passwords are encrypted.
Disable and enable sync browser in ICS.

There is a more detailed howto with photos on my blog if you need it.

Yup from the comments on the Android issue tracker it seems that encrypting everything is the issue here - in order to have browser sync, you need to have unencrypted data in chrome sync.

I had a similar issue.
Eventually, I disabled the following:
auto fill forms; sync via USB an developer tools. It worked!
Oh also I cleared data (settings..content settings) for Google sites.


text:
Better way to connect Galaxy Nexus (ICS) to Linux
I can connect my Galaxy Nexus to my Kubuntu machine using the PTP protocol, but it's really slow.  I've read this interview about why Galaxy Nexus doesn't support USB Mass storage, and I've gone to http://www.android.com/filetransfer/ as instructed but there's no way I can see which will allow me to connect to the device using a linux machine and MTP.
Does anyone know how to get MTP, or any other protocol, working?

You could also try mtpfs or gMTP. mtpfs allows to mount the MTP device as a filesystem, while gMTP is a standalone program.
Over at AskUbuntu there's an answer that shows how to use mtpfs.

gMTP seems to work very nicely for me to copy photos over from my old phone. Trying to copy over PTP was painful.

gMTP is unsatisfactory for me. It is VERY slow and it gives errors with music files (it tries to create albums for every file transferred). gMTP also crashes frequently in Ubuntu. I like the ADB method better. I also use SSHFS over WiFi and a few other methods.

I'll expand idea of Ryan Conrad:
adb from android-tools is the way.
I prefer to follow this guide to install Eclipse with android-sdk:
http://developer.android.com/sdk/installing.html
Installation depends only on JDK. No installing of new packages. I personally do the same few steps (=extracting two folders anywhere and configuring eclipse) in the same manner on Ubuntu, Mint or Debian distributions and all is just working.
After completing this classical guide I have two new folders: eclipse and android-sdks. In the android-sdks folder ./platform-tools/adb is the path to adb tool, which can be used to push (upload) and pull (get) files from android device—without mtpfs or additional mounts.
As adb is command-line program, it can be automated in a jiffy. Moreover, you have Eclipse's File Explorer view, which provides nice graphical tree filestructure and basic drag-and-drop interface (do not forget to select your device in the Devices view first!).
The big shortcoming of this method is that only adb tool sees the device and can access it. The rest of my system, including Nautilus for example, still not sees the device. But after getting used to stability and robustness of adb that's not the issue for me.

adb is a security problem if you keep it enabled constantly. Keep in mind that there's no passphrase dialogue or anything. One can bypass screen locks and even full device encryption. Especially if you happen to charge it at unknown locations (PC in internet cafe, etc.)

thanks for notice, ce4. Let me ask then: what means to access android storage should we use in unknown locations?

added own answer about bluetooth :-)

You can use bluetooth.
Bluetooth FTP (file transfer profile) is supported by Linux and there's the Bluetooth File Transfer app that adds this functionality to android. It's however not that fast (<200kb/s) depending on your bluetooth versions. –
There's a fuse module called obexfs, here's my Nexus S mounted:
root@local:/tmp# obexfs -b f0:08:f1:xx:xx:xx -- /media/bla
root@local:/tmp# cd /media/bla
root@leo61326:/media/bla# ls -lh /media/bla/DCIM/
total 5,5K
drwxr-xr-x 1 root root    0 2012-05-25 16:09 100ANDRO
drwxr-xr-x 1 root root    0 2012-07-05 17:31 2012-06-09_Rafting
drwxr-xr-x 1 root root    0 2012-07-09 22:30 Camera

Some file explorers support it via plugins directly (nautilus/gnome/kde/...)
Here are some Ubuntu related obex questions.

This answer deserves more upvotes - I couldn't get either MTP or PTP to work well with my Kubuntu install.

It'll hopefully get better with newer Ubuntu releases. I'm really confident about this. I mostly use ADB on the commandline (which I use a lot), so this is the fastest path for me right now. I also use "bluetooth-sendto some-file" sometimes.

You could use adb and transfer using the adb pull/push commands.
Not sure of what distro of linux you are using, but I found this that says MTP is packaged and available for ubuntu though a package called mtp-tools.
Also note that this is not specific to android 3.x/4.x, this is true for any devices that run 3.x/4.x that lack an external sdcard. If the device has an sdcard slot, you will be able to mount the device like in previous versions of android.

mpfs is a FUSE based file-system that can mount the Nexus on your system.
mtpfs -o allow_other /media/MOUNTPOINT

Will mount it for you. To unmount simply umount /media/MOUNTPOINT

Another option is WebDAV.
Setting up an Android WebDAV server
On my stock Nexus 7, I installed WebDAV Server, opened it, clicked on the start button and was immediately able to see my /storage/sdcard folder in my web browser at the URL displayed by the application, i.e. http://192.168.x.y:8080
Note that with WebDAV Server, you also have the option of selecting Root (/) or DCIM as well as SdCard as the WebDAV root.
Using the WebDAV server via Nautilus
In Nautilus I selected "Connect to server..." from the File menu, selected "WebDAV (HTTP)", entered 192.168.x.y as the server and 8080 as the port and clicked on Connect.
Navigating through the directory hierarchy is slower than accessing other network shares, but not unreasnable. Copying a single 42MB file via Nautilus took around 12 seconds, so 3.6MB/s.
Mounting a WebDAV drive from the command line
I installed davfs2 and mounted my share as /mnt using the command:
sudo mount -t davfs http://192.168.x.y:8080 /mnt

Copying the same 42MB file but with more precise timing, took 12.88s or 3.24MB/s.
$ time cp music.fsb /tmp

real    0m12.880s
user    0m0.002s
sys     0m0.143s

Caveats

WebDAV access is not secure. Even if you set a password on the WebDAV share, the connection is still http not https, so it is not encrypted. Only use WebDAV on a secure wifi network and certainly don't enable the WebDAV server while you are in an internet cafe or other unsecured wifi.

You can use the FTP protocol at usb cable speed with this app (not that it requires having adb, but after you've set up adb connecting/transferring is quick and painless, and you can even view the files in your favorite file manager.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.theolivetree.ftpserver
instructions are in the play store description.

Working MTP on Ubuntu for Galaxy Nexus, Nexus 7 and Acer A500
Where to start.
I found some instructions for the Nexus 7 (which I had just brought) on this site Ubuntu 12.04 - Automount Nexus 7 in MTP mode. All credit to the author of that page for figuring it out.
The instructions i have below come from this site, are trimmed to the commands, if you want more explanation see the above site.
I used Ubuntu 12.10, and have configured for my Nexus 7, Galaxy Nexus and Acer A500.
Instructions
Configure FUSE
Change /etc/fuse.conf so its read by all..
# sudo chmod a+r /etc/fuse.conf

Edit /etc/fuse.conf to remove the comment # from user_allow_other so the default fuse.conf will look like
# Set the maximum number of FUSE mounts allowed to non-root users.
# The default is 1000.
#
#mount_max = 1000

# Allow non-root users to specify the 'allow_other' or 'allow_root'
# mount options.
#
user_allow_other

Compile and install go_mtp
# sudo apt-get install libmtp-dev golang
# mkdir /tmp/go
# export GOPATH=/tmp/go
# go get github.com/hanwen/go-mtpfs
# sudo mv /tmp/go/bin/go-mtpfs /usr/local/sbin/go-mtpfs
# sudo chmod a+x /usr/local/sbin/go-mtpfs

Create Mount Point(s)
Use the following as you need..
# sudo mkdir /media/Nexus7
# sudo chmod 777 /media/Nexus7
# sudo mkdir /media/GalaxyNexus
# sudo chmod 777 /media/GalaxyNexus
# sudo mkdir /media/A500
# sudo chmod 777 /media/A500

Setup udev rules
Use your favourite editor and create the following file (remove any other android udev rules you might have experimented with first).
# sudo vi /etc/udev/rules.d/99-android.rules

Paste in the following contents. you can remove rules you don't need, The two nexus devices appear to have the same ids for the bootloader and recovery.
NOTE: you need to replace #YOURLOGIN# with your username/login.
# Google Nexus 7 & Galaxy Nexus 16 Gb Bootloader & recovery mode
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="18d1", ATTR{idProduct}=="4e40", MODE="0666" # Bootloader
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="18d1", ATTR{idProduct}=="d001", MODE="0666" # Recovery

# Google Nexus 7 16 Gb PTP mode (camera)
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="18d1", ATTR{idProduct}=="4e43", MODE="0666" # PTP media
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="18d1", ATTR{idProduct}=="4e44", MODE="0666" # PTP media with USB debug on

# Google Nexus 7 16 Gb MTP mode (multimedia device)
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="18d1", ATTR{idProduct}=="4e41", MODE="0666" # MTP media
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="18d1", ATTR{idProduct}=="4e42", MODE="0666" # MTP media with USB debug on

# Google Nexus 7 MTP mode : automatic mount when plugged
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Nexus_7", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="4e41", ACTION=="add", RUN+="/usr/bin/sudo -u #YOURLOGIN# /usr/local/sbin/go-mtpfs -allow-other=true /media/Nexus7"
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Nexus_7", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="4e42", ACTION=="add", RUN+="/usr/bin/sudo -u #YOURLOGIN# /usr/local/sbin/go-mtpfs -allow-other=true /media/Nexus7"

# Google Nexus 7 MTP mode : automatic unmount when unplugged
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Nexus_7", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="4e41", ACTION=="remove", RUN+="/bin/umount /media/Nexus7"
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Nexus_7", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="4e42", ACTION=="remove", RUN+="/bin/umount /media/Nexus7"

# Google Galaxy Nexus 16 Gb Bootloader & recovery mode
#SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="18d1", ATTR{idProduct}=="4e40", MODE="0666" # Bootloader
#SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="18d1", ATTR{idProduct}=="d001", MODE="0666" # Recovery

# Google Galaxy Nexus 16 Gb PTP mode (camera)
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="04e8", ATTR{idProduct}=="6865", MODE="0666" # PTP media
#SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="04e8", ATTR{idProduct}=="4e44", MODE="0666" # PTP media with USB debug on

# Google Galaxy Nexus 16 Gb MTP mode (multimedia device)
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="04e8", ATTR{idProduct}=="685c", MODE="0666" # MTP media
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="04e8", ATTR{idProduct}=="6860", MODE="0666" # MTP media with USB debug on

# Google Nexus 7 MTP mode : automatic mount when plugged
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Galaxy_Nexus", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="685c", ACTION=="add", RUN+="/usr/bin/sudo -u #YOURLOGIN# /usr/local/sbin/go-mtpfs -allow-other=true /media/GalaxyNexus"
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Galaxy_Nexus", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="6860", ACTION=="add", RUN+="/usr/bin/sudo -u #YOURLOGIN# /usr/local/sbin/go-mtpfs -allow-other=true /media/GalaxyNexus"

# Google Nexus 7 MTP mode : automatic unmount when unplugged
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Galaxy_Nexus", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="685c", ACTION=="remove", RUN+="/bin/umount /media/GalaxyNexus"
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Galaxy_Nexus", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="6860", ACTION=="remove", RUN+="/bin/umount /media/GalaxyNexus"

# Acer A500 16 Gb Bootloader & recovery mode
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="0502", ATTR{idProduct}=="3201", MODE="0666" # Bootloader
#SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="0502", ATTR{idProduct}=="d001", MODE="0666" # Recovery

# Acer A500 16 Gb PTP mode (camera)
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="0502", ATTR{idProduct}=="33b2", MODE="0666" # PTP media
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="0502", ATTR{idProduct}=="33b1", MODE="0666" # PTP media with USB debug on

# Acer A500 16 Gb MTP mode (multimedia device)
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="0502", ATTR{idProduct}=="3341", MODE="0666" # MTP media
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="0502", ATTR{idProduct}=="3325", MODE="0666" # MTP media with USB debug on

# Acer A500 MTP mode : automatic mount when plugged
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Acer_Iconia_Tab_A500", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="3341", ACTION=="add", RUN+="/usr/bin/sudo -u #YOURLOGIN# /usr/local/sbin/go-mtpfs -allow-other=true /media/A500"
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Acer_Iconia_Tab_A500", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="3325", ACTION=="add", RUN+="/usr/bin/sudo -u #YOURLOGIN# /usr/local/sbin/go-mtpfs -allow-other=true /media/A500"

# Acer A500 MTP mode : automatic unmount when unplugged
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Acer_Iconia_Tab_A500", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="3341", ACTION=="remove", RUN+="/bin/umount /media/Nexus7"
ENV{ID_MODEL}=="Acer_Iconia_Tab_A500", ENV{ID_MODEL_ID}=="3325", ACTION=="remove", RUN+="/bin/umount /media/A500"

NOTE: if you used gedit and you have edited the file, you need to remove 99-android.rules~ as udev will get upset..
Next, restart udev
# sudo service udev restart

Edit /etc/fstab
Add the following to /etc/fstab
DeviceFs(Nexus\0407)        /media/Nexus7         fuse.DeviceFs(Nexus\0407)      allow_other,rw,user,noauto    0    0
DeviceFs(Galaxy\040Nexu)    /media/GalaxyNexus    fuse.DeviceFs(Galaxy\040Nexu)  allow_other,rw,user,noauto    0    0
DeviceFs(A500)              /media/A500           fuse.DeviceFs(A500)            allow_other,rw,user,noauto    0    0

Finished.
You can now connect your devices and the internal storage will be available for use, you should remember to un-mount before disconnecting though it doesn't seem to do any harm..
Note: it seems that the ENV{ID_MODEL} for the nexus 7 changed to Nexus_7 at some point (I think with the android 4.2 update)..
From http://www.winters.org.nz/android-hints-tips-stuff/working-mtp-on-ubuntu

Well, There's a very useful tool, its name is "Wifi File Transfer". Just download it from Play Store on your Android device and install it. It turns your android mobile on a mini server that allows you to download and upload files from and to your phone.


text:
Galaxy S II GT-I9100G USB connectivity problem
I bought a Galaxy S II GT-I9100G two weeks back from Malaysia and it was running on Android ver. 2.3.5. But three days back I saw a 2.3.6 update available and updated my phone using the update option available in the phone. But now when I connect phone to PC via USB it shows unknown device and Windows cant find the driver suitable for it. And so I can't transfer files to or from my PC. Could anyone please help me out here?
My PC is running on Win7 x64.

Worked for me:

Unplug the USB cable
On the cell phone, dial the following number: *#7284# Once the last # is hit, the PhoneUtil application is launched. Choose USB -> Modem and then USB -> PDA mode. The good mode should be PDA. Even if the mode is PDA, switch to Modem and then back to PDA.
Plug the USB cable.

Note:

Repair USB connection for any Samsung Android phone

Reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KV2h5O_qDPE

Try installing Kies (check the "Software" subtab under "Downloads").  It should install the drivers automatically but if not it has a menu option to install them.

Do a Factory Reset through Privacy menu of Settings. It will solve your problems

it worked for me

On your phone got one software call "Kies" try to using wifi to connect to the computer and the phone where in the computer you key in the IP address shown on your S2 and after that the driver will automatic installed its work fine for me after i use KIES to connect to the computer and again the computer USB can recognized my phone =)

"Just make sure you use a USB port on the back of your computer. Front ones can be less than perfect as there is cables, noise etc." This fixed my USB connectivity and transfer problems.

the OP's problem started with updating to 2.3.6 only. This is obviously not hardware (USB) related.


text:
Is it possible to delete my Facebook account and not lose the info synced to my Evo?
Last weekend I turned off the automatic sync feature on my phone and deleted my Facebook account. It appeared that all of the info on in my calendar was still there so I thought I did all that I needed to do. By this weekend all of my birthdays and events were deleted from my calendar - except 3 that were linked to Facebook - and all the ones that I manually entered (not linked to Facebook) were gone! I tried to reactivate my Facebook account, and re-sync everything to get the info back, but its not working.
How do I get the info back into my calendar, and delete my Facebook account/remove the Facebook app and sync stuff from my phone? Is it possible?

Assuming your phones calendar is syncing with a Google Calendar, then the easiest way to do this may be to export your friends' birthday info from Facebook and import it into Google Calendar.
Our sister-site Web Applications has more info on doing this:

How do you extract friends' birthday and contact information from Facebook?
Import birthdays of friends from Facebook into Google Calendar?


text:
com.android.phone force closes constantly after a clean install of CM7.1 in SGS1
I installed a CM7.1 over a custom 2.3.5 installation on my Samsung Galaxy S I9000.  I did a full wipe through CWM as well as wiping the cache, as explained in the SGS installation instructions.  The installation completed without any errors, but when the phone booted the process com.android.phone force-closed.  When I dismissed the error, it force-closed again within less than a second, and continued doing so.
I rebooted into recovery and made sure to wipe everything, but nothing helped.  I finally reverted to my previous ROM in disappointment.
What could be the causing these force-closes?  How can I install CM7.1 successfully?  Is there any specific kernel I should install?  Any specific modem?

FCs are often caused by an Java exception. Those exceptions get loged in the system log. It sure would be helpfull if you could show us that system log.

I had more serious problems the first time I flashed CM7.1, and flashing it again after I had cleared the data worked.  (Make sure you wipe data and not just cache.)  That said, I had other problems with CM later and went back to my old ROM.

@Matthew: What serious problems did you have?  Was this with the stable version?

Partition issues and resets.  Then a few days after the successful install most of my apps started crashing :P and yes, it was the "stable" release.

@NathanFellman did you solve your problem? If so, could you add your solution as an answer (and accept it), so it may help others encountering the same issue?

After researching this in local forums, it turned out to a SIM card issue.  My carrier had a series of yellow SIM cards that for some reason caused this problem.  I had my carrier replace it, and I've been on CM ever since (with a short break for AOKP).


text:
Samsung Epic Touch 4G - ROM Listing

Possible Duplicate:
Where can I find stock or custom ROMs for my Android device?

http://forum.xda-developers.com/wiki/index.php?title=HTC_Supersonic/ROMs is a great page for ROM listings for HTC. Is there a similar page out there somewhere listing details on custom ROM's compatible with my Samsung?  Thanks.

A quick search of XDA-Dev gives this page: Rom List Epic 4G Touch last updated yesterday, so it should be up to date.

Found this one too... much like the one for the HTC:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/wiki/Samsung_Epic_4G_Touch/ROMs


text:
How can I copy files onto an SD card with a Honeycomb tablet?
It seems like copying a file onto the SD card ought to be easy, but for the life of me I can't figure out how to do it. I have an (International) Motorola Xoom Wifi running stock Moto Android 3.2.
If I insert an SD card with content on it, I can see the contents of the card show up in the tablet's Gallery app. I can also go into the built-in Files app and browse the contents of the SD card. Using the Files app I can select files and copy them from the SD card to the internal storage.
However when I browse the tablet's internal storage with the Files app and select and Copy a file, if I then navigate to the SD card the Paste Here option is grayed out.
Using File Manager HD, I can't even find the SD card. It looks (from the Files app) like the SD card is at /mnt/external1/ but I can't see any way to get there. Is there something I'm missing in File Manager HD to find the SD card, or is there a deficiency in File Manager HD that another file manager could solve?
Also strangely I can delete files from the SD card using the gallery app, but not using the Files file manager app!

Which filesystem is on the SD card?

@flow (unlike earlier today) I'm now home with a proper laptop available which says the card is FAT32

Well that's strange timing!
Just received an update notification on the tablet, installed the update and suddenly I can copy files to the SD card, delete files from the SD Card and create folders on the SD Card with no problem! This was using the built-in Files app.
It's still saying my Android Version is 3.2, but the build number has updated to H.6.6-23, so can only assume this is an update to the drivers or Motorola's software rather than the OS itself.
Found a thread on the Xoom Owner's forum mentioning it Another UK update?

I just received another update to my UK wi-fi xoom. I already had the
  original 3.2 update.
I didn't really catch the update number, but the release notes
  appeared looked to be the same as the previous big update.
It was very small (only 1 or 2 k!).
I could only really think of one reason this might have been sent out,
  so tried copying from the internal memory to /mnt/external1 (a 32 Gb
  sd card) and it worked!

So it looks like this was probably a fault that they've pushed out a fix for, rather than any design problem.

Getting to your external in File Manager HD is...not very obvious. The only way I'm aware of to get to it is to hit the Home button at the top right on the action bar (not the Android OS button in the bottom left) and then hit Up. This should put you at /mnt, so you can get to the external at /mnt/external1. The "Storage" shortcut on the left pane also takes me there, but I don't think it's always operated like that in the past. I might be mis-remembering there, though. If "Storage" takes you to /mnt/sdcard then you can hit "Up" from there to get back to /mnt.
As for copying, the external card was originally read-only by default. Now it seems to exist in some kind of weird limbo (at least for me) and I'm not entirely sure how the permissions are designed. File Manager HD shows its permissions as dr- (that is, read-only directory) but it lets me paste files there anyway. Nonetheless, if you're rooted you can use something like MicroSD Mounter as an easy way to remount it RW (it works fine for me).
I should probably also note that the above is on Android 3.2.2, after getting Verizon's LTE upgrade. The permissions may still be read-only for Xooms in other regions, but I'm not sure. Mine could also just be read/write because I'm using a custom kernel and boot image (don't remember if it was in there).

Wow never would've thought to press Up when I'm already at what looks like the top level. So now I can browse to /mnt/external1 but FMHD won't let me edit anything either?

@GAThrawn: Yeah, it's probably still mounting read-only by default. I don't think you can modify the contents of the external card via your Xoom without rooting and remounting it read/write. I have no idea why Moto designed it that way.

@elder Well that's annoying, and is a point against this as a laptop replacement. I know ICS has further changes to the way internal/external storage work, wonder if it makes SD card file management a bit saner for cases like this where I just want to sort photos on the card?


text:
Alternative way of setting the debug mode
I'm having a problem with my android phone: whichever phone application (contacts, settings, messaging...) I try to run, I get the dialog "The process stopped unexpectedly" and I have to force it to close.
So I want to install a ROM. Problem: I have the debug mode off and there is no way of accessing the phone settings.
Is there any alternative way to set the debug mode on? A market application for example? If it is of any help I have a LG GT540 with Android 2.1.
Thanks.

Did you try to reboot into recovery mode and wiping the device?

The rom I have is the official from LG and they have disabled all modes. I want to set the debug mode on in order to be able to enable the fastboot mode.

I wrote a widget to toggle USB debugging , problem is you do need to be rooted to install the widget.

You can try setprop persist.service.adb.enable 1 in a terminal. This works on the HTC Dream; can't say I've needed to do it on other phones, and I can't say if it needs root or not (the exploit on the Dream runs that command as root, so it's completely possible you need root first.)
See this question here for other ideas: Broken screen while debug mode was disabled. How can I re-enable adb?

One question, in order to do this, doesn't my phone need to be recognised by adb? And to do so don't I have to have debug mode on? If so, my problem remains. If not, could you explain a bit further?
Btw, my phone doesn't have a physical keyboard.

Having your computer recognize your phone (drivers) and having USB debugging enabled on your phone are two separate issues. I was assuming you needed help with the SECOND one.

My computer recognises the phone when the debug mode is on. If not it doesn't. Any way, it was still under warranty and so I took it to the store and they solved the problem. Thanks anyway.

Good, glad the problem is solved. You should answer your own question & accept that answer.

Recovery mode is not available on the stock LG GT540.
In order to flash a different ROM, you will need to first flash a ROM that has "fastboot" enabled via software updater utility KDZ, as described in this guide:

Download and install LG's Windows drivers for your phone, and make sure your computer recognizes the phone when you connect it via USB.
Download the KDZ updater and fastboot binary from here and extract them.
Latest MSXML package is required for KDZ to work, so download it directly from Microsoft and install it on your PC.
Download the ROM with fastboot enabled from here.  Save the ".kdz" files somewhere on your PC (e.g. on the C:\ drive.)
On your phone enable USB Debugging by going to Menu -> Settings -> Applications -> Development and make sure the USB Debugging option is checked.
Connect the phone to PC via USB cable.  When prompted, do NOT activate the Mass Storage.
Launch the KDZ updater, change “Type” a “3GQCT” and “PhoneMode” “DIAG”. Click the "Browse icon next to "KDZ file" option, browse to wherever you saved the V20A_00.kdz, and click Open.
Click the Launch software update button and (patiently) wait for the process to complete.  This can take up to 15 minutes.  The phone will reboot when the update is completed.
Repeat steps 5 through 8, but this time around select the romfastboot.kdz file.
Turn off your phone, press and hold the Camera and Power buttons together, and release when the screen's backlight turns on.
Connect the phone to your PC.

You can now use the fastboot module to install a different recovery image (e.g. ClockworkMod Recovery) and a different ROM (e.g. CyanogenMod 7.)

don't I need to have debug mode on to do this? If I do, my problem is that I'm unable to do so by going to the Settings application as it crashes every time.


text:
Problems with SetCPU on Sidekick 4G
I installed SetCPU on my SK4G today, and for the most part things are running fine and I haven't had any problems.
At first I was getting a lot of lag and my phone kept freezing, so I checked this post and it helped me out a lot.
But I ran into one more problem. My phone keeps shutting off and I have to take out the battery and put it back in order to turn it on again. It's happened twice.
Could SetCPU be the cause of the problem?
Profiles:
Main / 816max - 312min (ondemand)
Temp > 35.6 C / 608max - 216min (ondemand / priority: 100)
Charging / 760max - 456min (ondemand / priority: 75)
Screen Off / 456max - 312min (ondemand / priority: 50)
I should also mention that I don't have a custom ROM or Kernel on my phone. It's just rooted.

Absolutely yes. I have a SK4G as well, and tried SetCPU out too.  It force closed regularly; whether it's due to overheating I can't say for sure, but it seems the most likely cause.
FYI, all the SK4G ROMs are based on the stock ROM as no one's reverse-engineered the hardware requirements to build custom kernels for it yet :(

Ah, that's good to know. I thought there were some custom Kernel's available for it, but I guess I read wrong on xda. I wish I'd gone with one of the Galaxy S phones. It seems like people have put more work into making ROMs and custom kernels for it.
Also, it looks like the Galaxy S phones either come with Gingerbread or are getting an update for it, and of course newer models will probably come with ICS as the default OS.

Yah, there are a few lightly customized ROMs (they just theme the stock ROM and add/remove some apps) but none of the XDA/cyanogenmod big boys see the SK as a good target for a kernel project, alas.
That being said, I don't regret buying mine as the physical keyboard absolutely rocks and for me that's a huge consideration.

I just flashed a ROM on mine today, and it looks and runs a better! No SetCPU needed. It does look like it has a custom kernel as well. 2.6.32.9-Platypus_Egg_v1

You don't say what ROM you're using, but looks like it's from sduvick's Platypus Dev Team.  I know Domination 1.5 came out recently, perhaps that's it?  Generally they're based off of the KJ2 stock ROM with a boatload of tweaks.

Yep, it's Domination 2.0. He just updated it a few days ago. It looks great, and it's pretty nice not having all that T-Mobile software taking up space.


text:
Will android market work (update app) after I install a new mod in my phone
I am going to root and install cyanogen mod 7 on my samsung I5801 (Having froyo).
Will the android market work in cyanogen mod i.e. will I be able to use and update all the applications (whenever updates are released) that I installed from android market as I would do previously?

CyanogenMod is not permitted to redistribute Google's proprietary apps packaged with the ROM, but they make them available separately. As long as you download and flash the latest Google Apps package from your recovery system, you can continue to use the Market as you normally would.
The newest versions of CM are (according to the wiki, anyway) designed to actually backup your Google Apps during the install and then re-install them for you, but I've had mixed results with this so I typically just install them manually after installing CM.

Can I install the android market and related google apps (gmail, maps etc. etc.) with a backup apk file of it and update them accordingly using the market just the way I have been doing in past?

@GauravSharma: I think that can sometimes cause some weird force close issues, but you can try it and see if it works, certainly. I do think there are a few underlying Google frameworks that aren't present in CyanogenMod and are also installed by their Google Apps package, but I've never tried that myself so it's entirely possible that it would work.


text:
Samsung galaxy tab upgrade with android 3.0 honeycomb

Possible Duplicate:
When will my device get the Android 3.x update (Honeycomb)?

I want to upgrade my samsung galaxy tab from android 2.2 froyo version to 3.0 honeycomb. Please provide me the steps to upgrade version of OS. Any help will be appreciated. thanks.

Android 3.x (Honeycomb) is not officially available for the original 7" Samsung Galaxy Tab tablet.  Furthermore, since the source code for Honeycomb was not made available by Google until very recently (as part of 4.0/"Ice Cream Sandwich" release,) any currently existing 3rd-party custom ROMs were built against the SDK (Software Development Kit,) and are therefore missing critical features such as GPU acceleration, for example.
You can still try Honeycomb SDK-based custom ROMs that are available on sites such as XDA-Developers or Rootzwiki, although most ROMs will be based on Gingerbread (Android 2.3.x) since it actually was open-sourced by Google for a while now, and some Galaxy Tab variants actually received an official 2.3 upgrade from Samsung.


text:
Can I remove the "USB Configuration\KIES\UMS" splash-screen?
Everytime that I plug my Android smartphone on my USB PC port to recharge the batteries a splash-screen popup telling me to choose between "KIES and UMS-only configuration" and I need to chose "Cancel" to make the screen extinguish it light. There is some configuration to set one of these modes and cancel this choose process?
My smartphone is a Galaxy 551 with 2.2 Froyo Android.
Thank you.

On my Galaxy S, turning on USB debug mode in Settings -> Applications -> Development turns off this notification.

Hmmm i will take a try then post the results here. Thank you

Glad to help :)


text:
Sync contacts to more than one google accounts
I have two gmail accounts on my android. When I first use it, I synced all the contacts to the one account. Now I want to sync all the contacts again(I have added many contacts since then) to the other account. But I cant, although the gmails contacts have synced to my phone. Sounds dummy but I am confused.
Any help appreciated...

You cannot do this on the phone.  Any contacts created on the phone that were added to one Gmail account, cannot easily be "copied" to the other Gmail account, especially not in-bulk.
You can however, do this quite easily on Gmail's web site:

On your computer log into your Gmail account that has your latest contacts, and click on "Contacts" link.
On the upper-right side click the "Export" link, select "Everyone (All Contacts)" and "Google CSV format" options, and click the "Export" button.
When prompted, save the "google.csv" file somewhere on your computer (e.g. C:\ drive.)
Log off your Gmail account, and log into your second Gmail account.
Go to Contacts, click on the "Import" link, click on "Choose File" button, browse to your C:\ drive (or wherever you saved the file in step 3,) select the "google.csv" file, click Open, and finally click the "Import" button.  You may also choose to add these new contacts to an existing group, or create a new one.

After a few minutes, these contacts should sync to your phone under the 2nd Gmail account.

But I want permanently to store my contacts on the second account. should I do the same procedure every time?

@peraueb8921: after you perform this manual transfer once - your second account will properly sync all existing contacts.  When creating new a contact on the phone, the Contacts app will give you an option to select an account, so choose the 2nd one.

Hmm...interesting, I will try it :)


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HTC Thunderbolt Killing the home app?
Something that has been extremely aggravating me recently is that my HTC Thunderbolt seems to be automatically killing the home app whenever it needs space in it's ram.
I notice that this happens when I do something processor intensive like downloading a new app. When I press the home button, it will just display a white screen that says "HTC" on it, and then go to the home and open up a toast saying "loading" just like when the phone first boots up.
At first, I thought it was some of my other apps that were causing it, such as "advanced task killer" and "juice defender ultimate", but I uninstalled Advanced Task Killer, and disabled Juice Defender, and it is still happening.
Is there a way to stop this?

If your home screen is dying like this, check your debug logs (if you have adb installed). My guess? You're running out of RAM and Android is killing the home screen process to get more RAM.
You might want to stop some services (or root & remove stupid carrier bloatware).
CyanogenMOD and some other custom Android builds will allow you to "lock" the application in RAM, but honestly that can cause as many problems as it solves.
On my older phones (HTC Dream / HTC Magic) the culprit at the time was K-9 mail.


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Apps' update status in Market app not always reliable?
So this is kind of a two fold question but it all falls under the same umbrella of update status reliability and might even be caused by the same factor.
First, this morning I saw that my Logitech Revue remote App had an update, as indicated by the 'Update' label when viewing list of apps. However when I clicked it, the only options were 'Open' and 'Uninstall'
I attempted to clear Market's cache and force close it, but still the same thing. 4 Hours later. it worked normally (i.e., providing the update button).
What causes this and how can I fix it immediately, rather than just checking back every few hours to see if it was fixed.
Second part/example:
A couple weeks ago the same issue happened with the system app 'Youtube.' Under my main google app that I use on my phone and all my non-system apps are associated to,  I saw the update label, but again same issue as above. When I switched to my other account that I only use for email, I could update Youtube just fine.
There seems to be some sort of synchronization problem. The Youtube example lasted for days (with the daily update notifications) before I thought to switch accounts and try it on my secondary google account. The exact same thing happened with Google Maps.
I have a stock Droid 3 using stock Market.

I've experienced both issues myself.  I think the app updates are being rolled out in batches as to not overload Google's servers, while notifications go out immediately.  I don't know for sure that this is the cause, just pure speculation on my part

I've never experienced this myself, but I do think Google has some sync problems with the Market. When I push an update for my app, I can generally open the Market on my phone in ~10min and will see the update. But it can take hours for the info (new description, version number etc) to appear

This no longer seem to happen? Market ver 3.4..

@Power-Inside not that I've noticed. knocks on wood

@Power-Inside Go figure, yesterday this issue did occur with Tasker, but resolved itself when I checked my app list again about 12 hours later.

As with @Jonathan, this issue still exists. I use Market 3.4.4.

I have noticed that I sometimes get a notification that an update is available, but when I go in there, I am unable to update. I, at first, thought that it was some type of syncing issue like you describe, but I have realized ( at least in my situation ) that I have the apps set to update automatically. So I get the notification, but the market actually has already updated the application in the background.
Based on your comments, and if you eventually go in to the market and there is actually an update available for an app that you previously were notified about, then I would say it has to do with how google rolls out the updates. As Chahk discussed, the notifications seem to go before the apps, in some cases. Google does this with just about everything they roll out. Updated in batches.

I specifically turn off all the auto-updates on those apps. I generally don't like it when things change without me telling them to, just as a matter of preference.

I have updated my answer.


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Package Install via Market sometimes fails and gives seemingly random error message
Some times when I install an application, the installation will fail.
However, the errors it throws are not only incorrect, but seemingly... random.
An example is, it'll fail and throw 'Insufficient storage space.' Blatant lie, I have plenty of space on the phone.
Another example is 'Package file is invalid.'
When I go to redownload the app, it usually installs just fine. On rarer occasions, it'll throw another (can't remember if it's the same) error, but then it'll install just fine.
I'm using stock market, on a stock Droid 3.

The logs will shed some light into these errors. If at all possible, try to get the logcat from the phone during the update, when you get the error message.  You can use ADB from your computer, or an app like aLogcat, for example.

Problem is random when it does it and I don't install apps too often, but next time I see it, I'll check out LogCat

You can get 'Insufficient storage space' messages if you don't have enough space on the internal SD card for the market to be able to download the APK into a temp or data directory.  When you reboot your phone or exit from certain apps various caches/data directories are cleared, freeing up space on the internal SD card.  This is why this error appears 'randomnly' - because as you use and close apps, the amount of disk space changes.  There are several apps on the market that can force cache clean ups for you.
'Package file is invalid' can occur if you have disk errors or networking errors that corrupt the downloaded file.  This is why this error appears 'randomnly', as SD card file system issues or dropped/bad packets corrupting the file won't occur every time.  FYI, SD card file system errors are often a result of not unmounting the phone properly when connecting it via USB or by yanking the SD card from a reader without unmounting it first ("safely remove hardware" in Windows parlance)

I rarely mount via PC and I don't think I've even ever removed the SD card.


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Restoring HTC EVO 4G to stock
I bought an HTC Evo off someone and they had it rooted, but for some reason 4G isn't working. I'm not sure if it's because they rooted the phone and it now has wifi tether (I don't know too much about rooting and ROMs) but could that be the reason why 4G isn't working? If there's a way to fix it I'd appreciate it.

Root access is unlikely the problem, but you can go back to stock and see what happens. Best and surest way back to stock is flashing a .sbf. The .sbf is the stock image provided by the retailer. If you're on Windows, you'll need RSD Lite to flash I believe. If on Linux or OS X use sbf_flash. You'll also need the .sbf for your particular device, but I'm not sure where the Evo images are; Google can probably help.
But again, I'd blame the network before an issue from root.

HTC devices don't use RSD Lite or .sbf files. That's a Motorola only utility, AFAIK.

This walkthrough is the best I've seen on restoring an EVO 4G and removing root. It walks you through, step by step, and gives you everything you need.
And yes, rooting or ROMs could have caused the problem. If the rooting done in a way that manipulates the Wimax partition and source, you may be in for trouble. Also, some ROMs simply do not support the EVO's 4G radios, such as the AOKP ICS ROMs.

authors: سلطان العتيبي


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How can I play an .flv file on Android 2.1?
I would like to play an .flv movie file on Android 2.1. How can I do this?

Did you have a problem with the apps found with an Android Market search for "flv" or similar?  If I don't see a real problem here (required as per the [FAQ]), this is just an off-topic recommendation question.

There are a few FLV players available on Android, try among these: 13 Great Video Players for Android. The Mobo Player seems promising among them.
Here's a link for Mobo Player as well, just in case. :)


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How to work bluetooth with asus eeepad?
Odd question.. How do I get my bluetooth headset to handle the audio/mic for my tablet?

You should tell as what you tried already. Didn't pairing work?

I paired it then audio wasnt playing through the headset, it was still playing through the tablet. And I tried an sip handling program and the audio/mic was still going through the tablet and not the headset..


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Configuring DHCP client on my Android board
I am running Android on my development board and want to configure DHCP client on it. Can anyone tell the details of what steps to be followed to configure DHCP client on Android?

Possible duplicate: http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/6404/how-to-change-dhcp-config

This does not help. I have tried running dhclient on linux pc and it works fine there. But there is no dhclient for android what I have is dhcpcd. which fails always.

enable the ethernet port and then use setprop command to enable dhcp. Then start dhcp client.

Could you [edit] and clarify which properties should be set to enable DHCP?

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


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Can I safely uninstall Flash and Facebook apps?
From this question I known how to remove vendor installed apps.
However is it safe to uninstall Flash and Facebook? I guess that the Android browser depends somehow on Flash and might brake after I remove Flash package.
I simply want to have more space for other apps and don't want to be reminded every time about updates for Flash and Facebook.
Update:
From my point of view both answers are correct. In general it is not safe to uninstall vendor installed apps. However my HTC Desire won't have any new OTA updates so in my case is it safe to delete them.
I just found out that latest ROM update (with Android 2.3) for HTC Desire isn't available as OTA update, you have to install it manually. And Facebook app is already removed from the ROM.
Unfortunately I cannot mark both answers as correct therefore I choose the answer with higher number of votes as correct one.

FYI, uninstalling vendor/system apps will prevent both OTA and manual updates.  My answer (thanks for marking it as correct!) doesn't specify the delivery mechanism, it just says "any future updates from your carrier/manufacturer will not install."

@roxan is incorrect, it is NOT safe to remove stock ROM apps.  If you do so, any future updates from your carrier/manufacturer will not install.
A much safer method is to use an app like Titanium Backup to 'freeze' the apps, preventing them from being seen by the system and running/being updated.  If you really feel the need to uninstall them, you can use Titanium Backup to back them up first (requires root).  That way you can restore them from backup in the future if you need to apply a ROM update.

That's not going to help if the goal is to free up memory.

I've never said its safe to remove all/any stock ROM apps. I've only said its safe to remove Flash and Facebook. And about not being able to update the apps, that's exactly what OP wants. And finally by removing doesn't mean you have to delete the file, you can back it up to SD card and install it again when required.

In addition to what @AlEverett mentioned, this also seems like a bit of a strange situation. If you're using Ti to freeze apps then you need root, which could (in some cases) break OTAs anyway. Further, if you want to retain root, then installing an OTA is generally a very bad idea. Not only will you lose root, it's always possible that you might not be able to get it back.

@roxan: It's not safe, as many phones have FB & Flash installed as systems apps, and  the OP makes it clear his phone is one of those.  Plus, the OP was talking about stopping updates to these types of apps, not Android updates - which your answer would wind up blocking.

@eldarerathis: I've never seen updates that block rooting - what phones have done that?  I'd like to know so I can avoid those manufacturers going forward, as that seems a nasty iPhone-esque kind of trick to play :P
As for a frozen app blocking OTA updates, if you freeze it you can at least unfreeze it again, apply the update, then freeze it again. Not so if you uninstall without a backup.

@AlEverett: actually, freezing an app can help with memory - most system apps also store their data on the internal SD, so if you clear out the app data and then freeze the app you'll at least regain that.  Also, I do go on to say that he can regain space by backing up and then uninstalling the app.

@Logos: Almost every major manufacturer (and Google in some instances) has patched a root exploit with an update at some point. Pretty much the only phones that are exempted are the ones with unlockable bootloaders. Examples: here, here, and here.

Also relevant is the last paragraph of this section from the Wikipedia article on rooting.

@eldarerathis: ah, that explains my ignorance. I don't buy/recommend phones that have locked bootloaders ;)

I've never heard that removing system apps can prevent OTAs.  Do you know why?  If it's something like verifying that the system partition contains everything in the backup system image, couldn't you just edit the system image to match?

@MatthewRead: I don't know the mechanism that it uses to check to make sure the update being applied is targeted to the existing system, but I'm sure XDA could tell you.  As for editing the system image, methinks that's beyond a casual user's abilities ;)

@MatthewRead: Some OTAs will do a hash check on system apps before applying the patches. Example here.

See this page on the CyanogenMod wiki which gives a pretty detailed analysis of what apps are "safe to remove" from the OS.

You can safely remove Flash and Facebook. Android browser won't be able to play flash content after you remove it. That's the only downside of it, no breaking or anything else.
Most of the vendor installed apps are installed in system partition. Even if you delete those apps you can't use that freed up space for installing regular program from market.

It is not safe to uninstall system/vendor apps if your phone still gets Android updates. See my answer for details.

@Logos: It's perfectly safe if you don't intend to install OTA updates direct from your manufacturer, though (provided it's non-essential; obviously removing e.g. the "Phone" app would likely be a bad idea).

I feel that it's an extremely important caveat that you didn't mention in your answer and as such worth making a fuss about.  I've fielded a lot of questions about "why won't my phone update anymore" after people have uninstalled bloatware and they wind up having to do a complete reset on their phone as they don't have the apps backed up.


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Always seeing "No connection: Retry" in Android Market
I have an HTC Touch with Froyo installed that I use for app development. I haven't used it for a couple of months, and when I fired it up today I'm seeing the same error every time I launch the Market app: No connection and a Retry button. It doesn't matter how many times I hit Retry, I just end up back in the same place. The phone definitely has a solid Wi-Fi connection though and all other online apps (browser, Twitter, etc.) are working well.
I've tried force stopping the Market and restarting, clearing its data and uninstalling updates, all to no avail. What can be causing this error?

The answer is that the date/time settings were incorrect. The device had been off for so long that the clock had reset. Once I set the correct date and time the Market app ran normally.

Found the answer in an Amazon forum after a lot of searching. Just thought I'd contribute it here too. :)

I don't believe it!!!! time/ date worked! hahaha what an odd little fix! Android is a strange little thing

I have had the same issure, but correct date / time. My solution has been to Turn Off/On the WIFI, works every time!

I had this problem once and it was because I was running DroidWall and I forgot to whitelist the Market app.

just clear your data and restart your phone

You might like to give more information on what data exactly you think Mark should clear, and how.

Try clearing cache and data for the Market app. You can do this by going to menu>settings>applications>manage applications>all and scrolling down to the Market app then using the "clear data" and "clear cache" buttons.

Yep, did that as I said in the question: it didn't make any difference unfortunately.


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How to make sure I have no sms virus?
I'm using a non-rooted, non-hacked Samsung GT-I5700 device which runs Android 2.1.
Today I've received an MMS from an unknown phone with something which looked like a spam for Mastercard. I've immediately deleted this message, but it seems my phone has automatically sent this same MMS to one of my contacts.
According to the Messages app there was no other outgoing SMS/MMS to anyone else.
I've installed AVG from the Market and it said that my phone is clean. Still I would like to understand how this incident could happen since I haven't installed anything even remotely suspicious to my phone and didn't even browse the internet except for using Google Translate and Google Maps from time to time.
I'd like to know if it is possible for an app to delete or modify the history of sent messages. Can it clean up its tracks? Can it be possible that my phone has sent more than one SMS to my contacts only they aren't visible somehow?
I'd also like to know if it is possible to somehow deny outgoing phone calls and messages to apps so this could never happen again.

Is it possible that your contact just received the same MMS from the spammer with your number spoofed as the sender?

@Al Everett: I don't think so since according to my phone there is an empty MMS with an attachment sent to this friend of mine.

Worth reading: Wikipedia: "Mobile virus" Seems there's been only one discovered Android SMS "virus" (actually a small trojan app), but even that requires user to accept installing a fake "media player" application.

I doubt that something like an SMS/MMS Virus exists or is "in the wild".
If this MMS was really originating from your phone, than this could only be caused by an malicious App. Now, there are two ways how any App can send/receive SMS/MMS:
By having the appropriate permissions
You can easily find out which App has requested, and since you installed it, granted, which permissions that App got granted. See this question for tools.
By exploiting the Android System
If there is an root exploit within the Android System and within the Dalvik VM, any App could use it to do anything. AFAIK as of Android 2.3.5 there are no public known exploits. Not sure what's the state in case of Android 2.1
SMS history
Editing the SMS history is not necessary. The history is part of the (stock) SMS client. If an Android App uses to API to send an SMS/MMS the history is not involved.

All I know is (1) I've received an SMS from an unknown number and (2) an SMS with the same contents was also sent from my phone to one of my contacts. Actually I'm mainly interested in learning whether it is possible for an app to edit the SMS history.

@Wabbitseason I have updated my answer

So in other words it would be entirely possible for an app to send out countless SMSes without my knowledge and I wouldn't know about it until my huge bill arrives from my phone service provider?

@Wabbitseason If you gave an (malicous) App that permission or there is an security issue witin Android, yes. But Android, especially 2.3, is realtivly secure and mature. You should always check which permission(s) an App requests before installing it. App that request the "send SMS" permission are possible "dangerous". That's why I didn't update facebook since they request this permission.

Thank you, I have accepted your answer. Unfortunately my current phone can't be upgraded so I guess that's the end of the story for now.

I have a phone running 2.2.1 and have had a similar thing happen to me. http://android.stackexchange.com/q/48970/1204 Although my question is slightly different. Can simply opening a MMS be an attack vector with no other user action?

Yes that would be possible

Actually there is an MMS bug known as "stagefright" that basically gets sent to you from somebody on your contact list and auto-extracts spyware on your android. This happened to me and the person who sent me the MMS was actually my "friend". I would recommend doing a factory reset and turning off the auto-retrieval option of your mms to off (as it is turned on by default). Then change all of the passwords for the accounts you have used on your phone, particularly your google account as any spyware may have been pushed onto any of the google services (drive, offline docs, etc.) and make sure no compromised files are reloaded onto your factory reset phone.


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All non stock apps are crashing
Suddely without any previous event my application has started crashing. Only stock applications work? Cleared cache of some of them but nothing happened. Do you have any ideas, or I will have to make a factory reset?:S
EDIT!!!!
I have a great hint...I trie to reinstall an app and I got an error telling that there is insufficient space in my phone. Any ideas?:)

Did you try rebooting?

Yeap, many times...

Sounds like you'd need a factory reset then :(

Have you tried clearing the cache (or data) for the Launcher?

Also: What device? OS? Rooted?

You should take a look at the system log. Maybe there is a hint in it about this strange behavior.

Samsung Galaxy, Froyo. Not rooted.
How do I clean the Launcher's cach? There is no such application :S
I cannot view system log, because I cannot run any applications:(

@peraueb8921 You can view the system log without an Android App via the adb utility.

I have this happen from time to time. My issue is usually just about any application, not just "non-stock".
To fix it I have to reboot in to the recovery and clear the cache. I believe that it has to do with the number of applications that I have installed, ~105 total, and the amount of data they store in the cache.
Clearing the cache usually fixes it, but only for a short time, unless I remove some applications. I am now down to about 80 and I haven't had the issue in a couple weeks.

How can I reboot in recovery and clean the cache? I removed may apps and it seems a little better...

I can't answer that if you have an unrooted phone, I rooted my device as I was walking out of the t-mobile store. It also depends on the device you have, and I don't even remember if the stock recovery has the option to clear the cache, I think it does, but it's been a while since I've seen it.

So I cant avoid factory reset if I am not root?

No, you can factory reset. but I dont know how to tell you to get in to recovery. My Galaxy S, for example, I hold down the volume down + power while the device is off, then when the "vibrant screen" pops up, I release the power, and continue to hold the volume down and I get in to recovery. But I don't know if the option to clear the cache is in the stock recovery, factory reset is.

I have made an edit, please check it out :)
I have Galaxy S, too. I will give it a try

I booted in recovery mode, cleared the cache partition but the problems are still there.


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Remove all contacts in phone that don't have a phone number
My mother just upgraded from a simple flip phone to a android motorola atrix 2.  It's her first smart phone and she is having a very hard time adjusting.  She added her email and Facebook accounts onto the phone, as soon as she did so, however, it added all the contact information from both into her phone contacts.  She already had the contacts imported in from her last phone and is now dealing with duplicate contacts (such as "Mike Smith and "Micheal Smith").  The worst problem is, she is having a hard time finding a contact that actually has a phone number.  She'll search for "Jane Doe" in the phone when trying to call her and only find her email there.
My Questions:

Why does the phone (app?) show contacts that don't contain a phone number?
How can I delete the duplicates (or merge them)?
What is the best way to make this work as smoothly as possible?

Is she linking the contacts to a Gmail account? The Gmail Contacts web app makes it really easy to deal with duplicates.

Also check out SIM contacts manager. I used this to remove the imported contacts from the SIM card that kept showing up in my Phone/Contacts app as duplicates along with Gmail contacts.

Most Phone/Contacts apps list all contacts, from all added accounts by default. There are several system and application options that could resolve this confusion:

From the Home screen, press the Menu key and go to Settings -> Accounts & Sync.
Under the Manage account section go through each account (by tapping on them,) and verify that the Sync Contacts option is only checked for accounts that you really want to have synchronized with the phone.
Open the Phone app and go to the "Contacts" tab. press the Menu button and tap the Display options button.
Check the box next to Only contacts with phones option to hide any contacts that don't have a phone number associated with them.
Under the Choose contacts to display section, expand any accounts that you've chosen to keep in sync in step 2, and select the groups you wish displayed in the Phone app by marking their check-box.

Keep in mind that some manufacturers have their own versions of Phone and Contacts apps, so the menu choices might be slightly different (or even missing altogether.)

I do remember the option to only display contacts with phone numbers on my previous phone, the HTC Rezound. However, that menu option is missing on the OnePlus X, though I don't know if it's the phone or the new version of the app.

I second Chahk's answer. Also, if you sync your contacts with your Google account, you can easily manage them online, including merging duplicates.

For the original "Questions", I would have added...
4. How do I either HIDE or GET RID OF contacts without phone numbers in the phone app?
Regardless, since this thread was asked and answered, Android Phone app now has different settings. In order to HIDE contacts without phone numbers...
Go to the Phone app
Click on the menu
Select "Settings"
Go to "Other call settings"
Turn on "Hide contacts without numbers"
Voila

This option is not available on the Google Phone app, so this might be an added feature done by the manufacturer/ROM maker. It might help to also mention the device model, Android version, and if not troublesome, the app's package name.


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To enable mobile broadband in ZTE Light
My Sim -card works in a HTC smartphone out of the box. So the problem must be in the ZTE Light -tablet. I can call with the tablet, but not surf the internet. I get Web page not available when trying to use the browser. I have no terminal in the device so I cannot try ping.
My current location is Sweden so network mode GSM. The device is not sim-locked.
I have the following settings in Wireless & network settings > Mobile network settings:
Data roaming: off
Network mode: Preferred network mode GSM/WCDMA
Use only 2G networks: off
Network operators: selected my operator's name
Data Connection: On
APNs: nothing selected by me

My android version 2.1-update1, kernel 2.6.29.
How can you enable the mobile broadband to ZTE Light?

You should select your operator's internet APN from the APN list to enable the mobile data network. If you don't see it, check the settings from your operator and insert it manually from that menu.

Thank you! I needed to press the middle button in my APNs -list such that add a new entry. I thought first that the list is empty or there is an error going on, since there was no button visible on the screen to go forward - a design bug in my opinion.


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Disable Pairwise Master Key Caching
I asked this question some time ago on another forum but never received an answer. I'm hoping that I may get a better answer here.
The wireless network at my university is a bit shaky and I was wondering if there is a way to disable Pairwise Master Key Caching under 2.3.3. This seems to have fixed the problem on my laptop. I am rooted and can edit configuration files if needed. Thanks!

Not sure which OS runs on your Laptop, but Android uses the wpa_supplicant for WiFi authentication. If wpa_supplicant provides a way to disable the cache, you will have to configure it in the /data/misc/wifi/wpa_supplicant.conf configuration file.

Thanks Flow. My laptop is running Windows 7. I checked the wpa_supplicant on my phone and that network is currently set for PEAP. Should I try something else?


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Some questions about Thinkpad Tablet
I need to purchase a tablet for on the move access to web, video, book reading etc. I am a Thinkpad fan so I would like to go for Lenovo Thinkpad. However I have some questions regarding it, which seems to be related more with Android itself than the hardware.

Thinkpad tablet has USB port, so can we use external USB modem (e.g. MTS MBlaze, Tata Photon in India) with it to connect to internet. On some forums it is said that Android does not have drivers of USB modem, so we can use USB modems with any Android tablet in the market even if they contain full USB port. What is the current state of Android on this?
A bit on hardware side, Thinkpad contains SIM slot and it is only yesterday when Lenovo has added Gobi chip for 3G capability. So, what was the use of that SIM card slot before that chip?

AFAIK Android has no support for UMTS/LTE/mobile-connectivity USB-Sticks.
The SIM slot was always used for mobile connectivity. The Gobi chip supports more technology for mobile connectivity, allowing the Thinkpad to establish mobile connectivity in various countries. With a normal chip you are restricted to your region.

Very said. :( Is there any plan in near future versions of Android for this support.
If there is mobile connectivity without Gobi chip, what is the use of introducing Gobi chip now with 130$ more than normal version.

@vikas I have updated my answer

I am still unable to understand the difference because if with normal chip we were able to access internet via mobile networks, even only in our region, it would have been great for many users. They can at least use the tablet to access internet on move in their region.


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Touchpal keyboard keeps disabling itself on HTC Desire
I have an HTC Desire (2.2) which I have installed TouchPal Keyboard. The problem is though it seems to keep disabling itself and reverting to the default keyboard layout.
I then have to go through the rigmarole of setting it back to TouchPal as the preferred input method.
Does anyone have any ideas?

Make sure the application is installed internally, and not on to your sd card.
from http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2010/07/apps-on-sd-card-details.html:

When not to install on SD card?
The advantage of installing on SD card is easy to understand: contention for storage space is reduced. There are costs, the most obvious being that your app is disabled when the SD card is either removed or in USB Mass Storage mode; this includes running Services, not just interactive Activities. Aside from this, device removal disables an application’s Widgets, Input methods, Account Managers, Device administrators, Live wallpapers, and Live folders, and may require explicit user action to re-enable them.

You can try the following troubleshooting options:-

Uninstall and then re install TouchPal. Be sure to restart your
phone after you uninstalled it.
Install any other IME and see if the problem is repeated there. This
will make sure that the problem is with TouchPal or with your
device.

I have TouchPal keyboard installed in 2 phones of mine - Galaxy SL and Galaxy S. It seems to work pretty fine there.

Do you use any kind of app-killer?  My thought is that somehow the TouchPal application is being killed, not necessarily manually, but somehow automatically through the app-killer. If not that, then you can maybe use an app-killer or another app in the reverse sense - that is, somehow prevent the app from being killed.
The reason I say this is that I use the Go Keyboard and sometimes I would accidentally kill it via a task killer, and next time I use the keyboard it would go to Swype.

I would re install Android to the newest version. Either do it yourself, or go to a phone shop and pay 10$ or so for them to reinstall your phone.
If this solves your problem, it was a cheap fix. If it didn't work, you can go back to the phone shop where you bought the phone and make them fix it in guarantee.
If you want to try to download and install an awesome rom for your phone, you should read this: http://www.cyanogenmod.com/devices


text:
How to remove TouchWiz and revert to a vanilla Android UI?
Is it possible to remove the TouchWiz UI and have the phone behave like the vanilla Android UI?

There's a somewhat similar question about replacing HTC's Sense UI here that may be informative since the concepts are similar. Do you want to remove TouchWiz completely (all its apps, widgets, etc) or just replace the launcher/homescreen application?

I want to replace the launcher/homescreen but also dialer, notification widget, apps and so on. By "stock-ui" I mean "nexus" phone. I am aware that it may not be completely possible atm.

it will really depend on your device. If there is a 3rd party custom ROM out that is stock and works for your device. For example, I run CyanogenMod on my Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant, which is the stock UI. I no longer have any of the touchwiz ui.

What specific phone?  There's several ROMs for captivate that have the android launcher.

I'm interested on the Galaxy S Plus (GT-i9001)

"My understanding is that newer versions of android should allow this without root."
Removing all TouchWiz? No, still not possible.
You can change: the launcher, the messaging app, the dialer, find alternatives to Samsung services (e.g.: S-Voice -> Google Now), but not much more.

It's impossible to root out TouchWiz without modifying the Samsung source code to remove and replace it; it's heavily embedded in the OS.  This would be a massive effort and I don't believe anyone's done it.  The only alternative is a ROM built from stock in the first place, such as Cyanogen as Ryan mentioned.

@MBraedley this answer, and all the comments are not at all out of date. Manufacturers take the android source code, modify it to be unique for their liking, and include the drivers needed for their specific hardware. They change core components of android, so the only real way to have a truly stock UI is to use a ROM that is built specifically for the device, or build it yourself. This is why even variants of the same device can't usually run a ROM for a different version. Even the most minor change in the hardware will cause problems.

@RyanConrad I thought Google was basically forcing device makers to make their "enhancements" available as apps, and not as deeply integrated changes to the OS, hence the bounty.  Essentially, device makers would only be allowed to make necessary changes to the OS is they still want to access the Play Store (with TouchWiz being an unnecessary change).

@MBraedley all I have found that restricts what manufacturers put on the devices is this. Which doesn't restrict their changes to the OS, it is more on requiring the Google suite of apps. If there are restrictions to Android L, very few devices even have it, but looking at what was leaked for the LG G3, LG still heavily modified the OS. Google will not completely restrict manufacturers from changing it, or they will stop using Android.

@MBraedley just my opinion, but if device makers were forced to make their "enhancements" available as apps, then I'd see there was no value to buy their devices if they could buy the cheaper one and install the customization, which is certainly a loss to most of companies. Even until now, HTC is still using SenseUI, and Samsung is still using TouchWiz, and they are close-sourced.

You can try installing Google Now Launcher.
The Google now Laucher will give a complete stock experience. You can check out the video here.
If the play store says that your device is not compatible, you can download the '.apk' from this article by phonearena.com
Note: This does not customize the phone application. You will need Android 4.4 if you expect the launcher to work perfectly, but it will work with earlier versions, at least partially. You probably want at least version 4.1.
References :-

http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/google-now-launcher-android-how-to/
http://www.phonearena.com/news/Install-the-Google-Now-launcher-on-any-Android-device_id52393