text:
A non-cloud local calendar for Android?
Is there any way to have and use a local calendar on Android?
I would like to use it on the Android phone and open the file (vcs, ics, anything) on my laptop sometimes.
I have not found any applications that deal with local calendar files stored on the SD-card of the phone. I have found only numerous cloud applications so far.
Is there any app that can open and edit local calendar files on Android?

You can use the stock calendar and load the ICSSync sync provider app. Disable Google and any other cloud service providers, enable this one, and set it to a path on your SD card. So long as you've disabled the cloud providers correctly, a sync operation will just sync calendar data to your local ICS repository, rather than sending it to a remote service. (It's free for 20 days, then requires an inexpensive purchase - the free version seemed to work for me).

Etar - Open source calendar app is what we needed.
See its source at GitHub.

Note to readers. The answer when it was written and accepted had suggested a different solution which was valid for than available Android versions. That solution later on was superseded by the currently mentioned solution and it does not work for Android versions from 2012 year.

https://market.android.com/details?id=de.mgsimon.android.andtidwiki
and a tiddlywiki.html + calendar plugin

Okay. Why? How does this help?

because you have a non cloud calendar then? or did you vote it down because it is no native app? a app is a app, either native or html5 ;)

I was recently recommended ColorNote, which keeps its calendar data separate from the stock calendar storage, and so (presumably) is less likely to accidentally send your private data to cloud services you do not wish to use.
It has a very clean month-view, but the day view is quite limited - you can only see the first ten characters of each item (at least on my tiny Samsung Galaxy Europa) and appointment times cannot be set, only appointment reminders. So for me - a substantial calendar user - it's not sufficient.
I've tried a lot of calendar applications, and I am seeing that the vast majority of these interface with the stock calendar - the UI is very good, and I should think it saves developers a ton of work. Hence, you need to be careful to keep the Google account sync options disabled - turn it on and your data will be send to the cloud in short order - i.e. game over if you are opposed to this. (The google account cannot be removed from the phone, as other applications "require" it).
Personally, I am considering a good calendar app that works with the stock Calendar, then rooting the phone and installing a firewall. My guess is that I can limit the applications that use Google services to a minimum (i.e. Market/Play) so I can have reasonable confidence I am not going to accidentally use their Calendar cloud. I appreciate this faffing isn't of interest to everyone - but I'd argue the process of not using the cloud really ought to be easier!

Please check my Android App called Calendar Manager.
It creates a local calendar database which does not sync to any cloud storage. You can use other calendar apps to manage your appointments, since the databse integrates nicely into the Android system.
However, you can synchronize the database with your PC using software like MyPhoneExplorer.
NOTE: It only works on Android 4.x+

You could try CalApp.
CalApp is a iCal file browser and Calendar application. It allows you to import events,todos,journal entries from iCal,iCalendar, ics, vcs formatted files to your smartphone and browse them selectively.
It has a built-in Calendar to store your notes, appointments, todo list etc.

I think Business Calendar may fit your needs. Although it has cloud sync, you can choose to use local only.

Can you give more info on this? I'm trying the free version of Business Calendar, and the UI is very good, but it seems to me that it requires a calendar attached to a sync provider of some kind. Of course there are local sync provider apps available (e.g. ICSSync), but I can't see any option in Business Calendar that specifically offers a local calendar.

I believe user's zoks.net application is exactly what is required to answer the question.
If you also want the new local calendars synced between your phone and other locations (your own http/webdav/caldav/ftp server for example) you might want to consider CalendarSync. It has a hefty price tag, imho. But it does what it says it does. And is still being developed as of today. (I'm not affiliated with the app's developers at all).
CalendarSync can also create local, standard android calendars. And all such calendars can always be accessed by other, normal calendar applications such as aCalendar or Digical.
If you don't want any sync functionality zoks.net Calendar Manager is an easy to use solution.

My android 2.2 (samsung galaxy fit) has two installed calendar provider.
When i create a new calender-entry i can choose to put it into my own lcal calender or into the "xxx@googlemail.com-calender" in the cloud.
I am not shure whether this is samsung specific or android standard.

It appears there is a setting in menu-calendars, where it will let you tap on the calendar to set sync and visibility on/off. Is this what your phone has?

In the calendar app and in the android-settings i havent found such a menue.

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


text:
How to exclude a program from being presented as program to update
I have an Archos 101 tablet which has Google maps installed.
I cannot uninstall Google maps but since I don't need it on my tablet I don't update it.
However, it is constantly being presented in the list of apps with 'new update available.
Can I somehow exclude this app ?
I have not rooted my device and are running Android 2.2

Related question, rooted solution: http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/14421/how-to-hide-updates-from-market

@onik: I don't want to root my device simply bacause my knowledge of it is not large enough to make sure I don't do anything wrong.

@Edelcom Out of curiosity: Why don't you want the Maps update?

@Flow: It is a tablet without SIM car which I only use at home. I don't need to look up addresses or the likes on my tablet (I use my phone or the PC to do that). It is a rather large program ( which U unfortunately cannot uninstall ). I don't want to make it even larger with updates I don't use. Memory in my Archos is not that large to waste it.

The only way I see around this is to uninstall Google Maps and the only way to remove built in apps is to be rooted and either use a 3rd part app or use ADB and uninstall the app yourself. There's no way of "excluding" an app from updates unless you simply uninstall it.

I don't want to root my devices until I know enough of the system to make sure I don't screw things up.

If you meanwhile changed your mind concerning rooting your device (you had a full year to get to know enough of the system to make sure [you] don't screw things up. ;), next to un-installation there're some more options available using e.g. Titanium Backup:

freeze (i.e. disable) Maps. This way it becomes "unavailable" on the device (and thus would no longer be updated, if you have a recent version of the Google Playstore on the device) -- but could be "unfrozen/re-enabled" any time.
detach it from "market" (yeah, old term). This would leave the app available and useable, while telling Google Play it's not installed. Not installed → no updates.

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
ROM Toolbox claims backups are blocked; how can I work around this?
I was looking for a way to backup my phone's ROM (Samsung Exhibit II SGH T679 (android 2.3.5)); android market had ROM Manager; reviews were great, my phone was listed as compartible, everything looked perfect
While trying to actually backup ROM, ROM Manager needed to have ClockworkMod Recovery installed first; my phone was not on the list of supported devices and I had to cancel ClockworkMod Recovery installation
Ok, no sweat, I'll try something else - so I uninstalled ROM Manager and installed another app (ROM Toolbox)
And here came the big surprise!
With ROM Toolbox, when trying to backup ROM I get the message:
ROM Manager blocked other apps from creating backups in recovery unless ROM Manager Premium is installed. Once you install ROM Manager Premium you can use ROM Toolbox to backup your ROM.
(mind you, ROM Manager was uninstalled by that time)
I would have no problem spending a few bucks and getting ROM Manager Premium, but the problem is even worse: someone did try this already and it did not help (ROM Manager Premium still doesn't support the device -> we are back to square 1)
Here is the question:
would it be possible to remove the lock placed by ROM Manager? If not, are there any other ways to backup the ROM?

Update: According to Koush, "other applications are not "blocked" from creating backups. They are just being lazy, and not actually building/flashing their own recovery image. "

Something doesn't sound right. What recovery are you using? Are you still about to nandroid manually from recovery?

I am not sure I do understand the question ...
The idea is to be able to backup (and restore) the whole phone - just like using Norton Ghost for pc.  I haven't done it before.
ClockworkMod Recovery is required by ROM Manager (at least what the program was saying) but it could not be installed (the phone is not supported).

I would suspect ROM Toolbox is not quite being honest here.  It appears to use ROM Manager for flashing in the first place, so the error is kind of bizarre.  I've asked the dev of ROM Manager about this.  As far as I can tell this is the only working recovery for the Galaxy W, don't know if it works on the Exhibit II variant.

I got this response from Koush, the developer of ROM Manager:

ClockworkMod recovery is open source. However, the hooks that ROM Manager uses to automate backups by hooking into ClockworkMod Recovery are proprietary.
I have told other developers, if they wish to use the ClockworkMod Recovery hooks, they can do it in the following ways:
1) Build, distribute, and support their own version of ClockworkMod Recovery, so that I am not responsible for the maintenance of it.
2) Use the ROM Manager API, which requires a ROM Manager Premium License.
The user can ALWAYS make backups manually in recovery, without a Premium license.
Basically, the issue here is that developers are relying on me and my open source work, which I maintain, to build a competing product to my paid applications. Essentially undercutting me by relying on me developing 90% of the product for them.
  It seems pretty silly for me to continue maintaining and distributing something that directly competes with my income, so I put a stop to it.
  If they want to build a competing product, they will have to go through all the hassles involved with building, distributing, and supporting recovery images.
So, no, those other applications are not "blocked" from creating backups. They are just being lazy, and not actually building/flashing their own recovery image. Nothing is preventing them from building a ROM Manager clone, if they really wanted to. They are just avoiding doing the hard part.

So for now, I think you're best off finding out if rzrecovery supports your device variant, and if so, using it until there is a version of ClockworkMod for it.  I own ROM Manager Premium and have no complaints, and I really respect Koush for the work he does.

Thanks a lot! That explains everything; I wish the author of ROM Toolbox would be more truthful;
I did look at rzrecovery and (for now) it looks the way too experimental to me; I guess I'll have to wait until there is an easy way to backup/restore ROM for lamers like myself.
Thanks again!

@SteveV No problem.  Best of luck!

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


text:
How to create a symlink after I rooted my Samsung galaxy w GT-i8150?
How do I create a symlink from my /sdcard/NaviSEA to point to /sdcard/external_sd/SD/NaviSEA?
Even after rooting my device I still get "Operation not permitted" error and I did allow with su in my script :
$ su
# ln -s /sdcard/external_sd/SD/NaviSEA /sdcard/NaviSEA

Why doesn't my script work?

Your external SD card is presumably (in pretty much every case) formatted as a FAT32 filesystem. FAT32 does not support symbolic links. Linking from a ext2/3/4 filesystem to a FAT32 filesystem would work, IIRC, but linking from FAT32 isn't possible.

It seems like /sdcard is FUSE fs "link" for /data/media.
Try this:
ln -s /data/media/external_sd/SD/NaviSEA /data/media/NaviSEA

(I don't know what "external_sd" means on your device, but if this an external SD card you still can get errors.)


text:
Contact images cropped and downsampled when syncing with google contacts
When Syncing with google contacts the photos I chose for my contacts are cropped to a square, and are downsampled to a very low resolution.
Is there a way to sync my phone contacts (without facebook), and keep the hi-res photos?

I've found that contact picture quality varies widely with the dialer/contact app used. Consider trying a replacement like GO Contacts EX or any of the other replacements in the market.

Thanks for the suggestion, but I tried GO Contact EX and also other dialer, but the problem remains - once my contacts are synced with google contacts, the resolution drops and the image crops :(


text:
Have I erased my songs? Samsung galaxy S2

Possible Duplicate:
Data Recovery - How to Restore Deleted / Formatted Files on HD Micro SD Card

I removed everything by entering code in phone field. I deleted my all apps. What about my photos and songs? Have I erased it too?

What code? Your photos and songs are probably still there. Have you connected your phone to a PC via USB and looked?

@AlEverett: I don't actually remember. Storage shows that I have 14gb free space out of ~14.6gb. So everything's gone...? :( I don't have USB too...

Then you need to install some sort of file manager like ASTRO and see if your data's gone. It sounds like it might be. You weren't backing up to the cloud?

@AlEverett: I will have apps back as I have google account with it (when I will have wifi). Omg, I can't believe how stupid I am...

If you don't know what code it was I think it's impossible to tell you exactly what happened.  As for recovering your data I think the linked duplicate should help.

If your lucky, you might find some files back with Recuva. Plug your phone in your PC. Start Recuva. Select the drive representing your phone and execute the scan. It will show anything it finds. Though I doubt it will find anything back, phones usually use Flash memory, and once you delete something on a Flash drive, it's completely gone.


text:
Rooted phone - sending SMS message via command line
I have a rooted Droid (Sholes), with ConnectBot installed.  I can ssh into it via dropbear copied to /system/xbin, and/or also the instance of Debian installed on it via the "Linux Installer" application.  I'm in portable Linux bliss.  But...
I would like to send an SMS message via the shell.  Something like
 sendsms 8005551234 "This is a text."

Anything like this out there?

You should be able to call the messaging intent with
am start -a android.intent.action.VIEW "sms:numberhere" -e "sms_body" "hello"

Using the intent command as described here:
http://learnandroid.blogspot.com/2008/01/run-android-application-from-command.html
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/4967448/send-sms-in-android

An alternative approach is to install Termux and Termux-api
Then ssh in the phone by following this link
Now you can send SMS and access many other useful options mainly:

Camera
Battery Status
Clipboard
Contacts
SMS and Inbox

Full list and syntax can be found here
As it is linux emulator you can use it for many other purposes also.

Seding sms is no longer permitted by google for termux: https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Termux-sms-send


text:
Reply to an SMS and send it to someone else
Sometimes when I reply to an SMS, I also want to send that same SMS to another person. On my previous non-android phones this was easy, every SMS was a single message, as opposed to the threads in Android. I could just add another receiver there.
When I answer an SMS in Android, I do not have the option to add another receiver. Is there any workaround?
(Android 2.3 on a Samsung Galaxy Gio)

You could long-tap the message, select "Copy message text", then paste that into the input field of a thread with the new recipient.

Works in 2.3.6
I have 2.3.6 version (galaxy y). I am not sure if this works in 2.3 alone but this answer could help others as this (text forwarding) is tricky in android which you won't find any menu options directly.
Even I had trouble forwarding initially but I found the actual answer from Hedgeterimmer's answer.
Long tap the message text (message options menu appears)
Scroll down the menu and look for forward option (button) and that's what you wanted


text:
Why are Android games so much smaller than iPhone games?
I compared the size of some Android games with the size of iPhone games and I was quite surprised. For example Asphalt 6 is 6.1mb large on Android and 515mb on the iPhone according to the store websites.
Did I miss something? How is it possible that this game is only 6.1mb large on Andoid but 515mb big large on the iPhone?

The maximum size allowable for an Android app on the Android Market is 50MB. [1]
The maximum size allowable for an iPhone app on the App Store is approximately 2GB. [2]
To answer your question, when you download the Android version of this game, you are downloading an application that will download all of the data files either to your phones internal memory or SD card. Due to the nature of the game, this is likely to account for the majority of the size difference unless different compression methods are used for resources such as the sound, textures and 3D models.
The iPhone's App Store has a much bigger file size limit which in this case means that all of the resources can be bundled into the initial download. The phone will not have to fetch any additional resources.
[1] http://support.google.com/androidmarket/developer/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=113469
[2] https://stackoverflow.com/questions/6659627/iphone-app-size-limit

Just to add specifics, Asphalt 6 downloads additional ~580 MB upon first launch.


text:
How can I get Tasker to set my Google Chat Status?
I'd like my Google Chat status to update by task; specifically '@Work' and '@Home', on the obvious criteria. Is there a plugin or script that will allow me to set the status in a task? With additional work, could I do it via something like SL4A and trigger it from Tasker? I'd prefer to avoid a graft like this as a plugin would be more efficient, but it's better than nothing.

I found a plugin! When I first looked, I didn't realize Locale plugins were compatible with Tasker. The plugin is called "Locale GTalk Plug-in" by Billy Francisco. I have a Galaxy Nexus with ICS, and it appears to be working fine; my status was set properly by a Task.
There is a nearly identically named app, "Locale GTalk Plug-in Free" by Willem Stoker; reviews warned it includes Air Push advertising, so I did not install or test it.

Billy updated his plug in; you can now use %Variables in the text box for setting your status!


text:
Is there music player that supports both AAC and MIDI files on Android 2.3?
Update from 2.1 to 2.3 broken playing from aac files in most players.
The only music player that is more or less usable is PowerAMP (and also video players like MoboPlayer and MX Player). But it won't play midi files.
The only player that can play both aac and mid files I tried is MoboPlayer. But it is video player (so no useful widget/play queue).
Player:   Support AAC on 2.3   Support mid    have widget
PowerAMP          +                  -            +
Most players      -                  +            -
MoboPlayer        +                  +            -

I want            +                  +            +

How to fix aac in android 2.3 in SE Xperia X10? Alternatively, is there a player that can play both aac and mid files and have widget?

Workaround found: wrap all aac files into matroska containers and usual music players start recognising them.
mkvmerge some_music.aac -o some_music.mka

Looks like Android 4.4 doesn't like Matroska files (especially ones that doesn't contain video track). Need m4a instead of mkv for it.


text:
How can I read large QRs in Android?
I have used the Zxing app here but I cannot read large QRs with it, how can I do that? By Large, I mean that I want read a content with a lot of text (I am able to make them as large as possible by dimension but not in content).
Now I am not meaning the technical specs as given by one answer (certainly they reveal somethnig), I am looking for ways to read large-amount of content in QRs without too much lag. Is this a pipe dream, just better device or better software?

It might be worth trying "Google Goggles" (https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.apps.unveil); it reads QR codes too.

There are a number of QR readers in Android Market, if none of them fit your needs, you will need to have a developer write one for you which will.

QR codes have limitations on the amount of data that can be stored within them. If you are hitting these limitations then you may need to find workarounds such as making the QR code text a hyperlink to the long text you wish to display.
For more information on the limitations of QR codes, see the "Storage" section of the Wikipedia article and its citations.
This citation in particular will be very useful to you. Look at version 40 of the standard in that table, as it has the highest capacity and will give you the absolute length limits.

...sorry you are not understanding my question fully, I read those wikipedias but I meant that it does not take many minutes for your camera to get the nice shot, ie lag. How can I read large QRs and minimize lag? Possible?


text:
How to use adb over Mobile AP (Portable wifi hotspot)
First : I know about abdWireless app. But my problem is different.
I am using my Android mobile as Mobile AP (Portable WiFi hotspot) for using internet on my computer. I want to use adb in wireless mode but the problem is - when i enable Mobile AP on my android mobile WiFi gets turned off and i am unable to use abdWireless app.
I want to use both wireless ADB and Portable WiFi hotspot at the same time. Is there any way to do it ???

On Android Device:

Make sure USB Debugging is enabled in Developer Options.
Set adb port prop:

If rooted: Open a terminal emulator (like termux) and run the following commands:
su
setprop service.adb.tcp.port 5555

If not rooted: Connect your device to PC using usb and run on PC terminal/cmd:
adb tcpip 5555

You can disconnect after this and continue on WiFi.

Note: This step needs to be performed only once, but the prop is reset on boot, so you need to repeat this step after a reboot.

Get IP address:

If using mobile hotspot, the IP address of the device would be 192.168.43.1 by default.
If using an external WiFi, you can get the device's IP address by running in terminal emulator:
ifconfig

This will print a list, one of those would start with something like wlan0, with IP in the second line (mentioned as inet addr):
wlan0     Link encap:UNSPEC  HWaddr ...
          inet addr:192.168.43.1  Bcast:192.168.43.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          ....

On PC:

Make sure you're connected to the mobile hotspot or the same WiFi as the Android Device. (You might wanna ensure that you aren't simultaneously connected to another network, like ethernet.)
In the terminal/cmd, run:
adb connect 192.168.43.1:5555 # The IP address of android device
adb devices

Actually, 192.168.43.1 is hardcoded into Android, so it remains universal across all devices which can start a hotspot, so ifconfig is not necessary.

@Firelord Thanks for the info, didn't know that! Still, ifconfig will help if, say, you want to connect over an external wifi, to which both PC and Smartphone are connected.

but, this connects via the router? This doesn't connect via the mobile's hotspot, right?

@juztcode The instructions should work in both scenarios as long as both devices are connected to the same wireless network, be it router or hotspot.

You might need to restart adbd on the android device after setprop by invoking stop adbd, start adbd.

Enable adb over USB in settings of your Android device. With this, you can already use most of the apps from Market.
In terminal in Android device, type setprop service.adb.tcp.port 5555

Most programs from Market do only second. For first, they need root (like ADB over Wifi Widget).

On newer android versions (around 4.0 or so, do not know exactly), you can do this without the need for a 3rd part app.
First, enable WiFi tethering, and connect your computer to the hotspot.
Next, go to Settings->Developer Options and check ADB over TCP/IP.
Now, you have to get your device's local IP. All you have to do is open up terminal emulator, and enter the netcfg command.
Look for the line that has 'wifi' in it, and look to the far right - you should see an IP address. This is your device's local IP.
Now just go to your computer, and type:
adb connect <devices local IP>
into a terminal.

Since Android 6, netcfg has been replaced with ifconfig.  But otherwise the step still applies


text:
Can the Galaxy S2 be rooted without increasing the custom flash counter using adb?
Normally, rooting guides for the S2 involve flashing a kernel to the device to install busybox and su. This xda post suggests a method for doing so via adb (found approximately in the middle of the first post):
adb shell mount -o rw,remount /dev/block/mmcblk0p9 /system
adb push busybox /system/xbin/
adb push su /system/xbin/
adb shell chown root.shell /system/xbin/busybox
adb shell chown root.shell /system/xbin/su
adb shell chmod 755 /system/xbin/busybox
adb shell chmod 4755 /system/xbin/su
adb shell /system/xbin/busybox --install -s /system/xbin
adb shell mount -o ro,remount /dev/block/mmcblk0p9 /system

This also seems to be the method tools like SuperOneClick use. Now I recently found this blog post indicating the above method does not increment the hardware counter in the S2 that counts flashes of custom firmware. More than that, it can also be used to install ROMs via Mobile Odin, also without increasing the counter, because they come form the device itself and not from a computer via the USB cable.
I fear to try out myself and lose my precious counter value of still 0. Has anyone tried out a method like this before and can confirm that it really does not affect the counter?

You can make or buy a USB Jig for Samsung Galaxy S2 i9100. It’s a really simple circuit that involves putting 300K Ohms of resistors between pin 4 and 5 of the microUSB connector.
With a USB Jig you can reset the custom binary counter to zero and also remove the yellow triangle on start up if you have rooted your device.

Turn off your phone completely and remove the battery for 10-15
seconds
Put the battery back but don't switch on the device
Plug the USB Jig into Micro USB port of your phone Wait for around 2-3 seconds
You phone screen will show "ERASING DOWNLOAD INFORMATION SUCCEEDED" in ODIN mode and Custom Binary Download : No
Now you can remove the battery and restart the phone.You will also notice that the yellow triangle which comes at start-up is gone now.

A little information for people that may not be aware. The counter in the SGS2 is there for Samsung to tell if you have flashed custom kernel / ROM on your SGS2. Samsung ships these devices with unlocked bootloaders, but being a company and need to protect themselves, if your counter is not 0 and you try to return your device under warranty, they will not honor the warranty.
Even if you can't flash without increasing the counter, there are ways that the counter can be reset. With that said, there is no guarantee that you will be able to reset the counter. Samsung may identify the way that people are using to reset it, and they may "change" it.

Although the counter can be reset, it is suspected that there could also be a way to determine if the counter was reset. That is why my question does not aim for a way to get the counter to 0 when it was once increased, but for a way to flash without counting up to begin with.


text:
Why does Wake On Wireless (WoW) wake Android only once?

Android is connected to a WiFi network

The device sleeps:
 <6>[ 7917.653293] PM: Syncing filesystems ... done.
 <4>[ 7917.660344] Freezing user space processes ... (elapsed 0.02 seconds) done.
 <4>[ 7917.681675] Freezing remaining freezable tasks ... (elapsed 0.00 seconds) done.
 <4>[ 7917.683022] Suspending console(s) (use no_console_suspend to debug)
 ...
 <4>[ 7917.701339] Suspend for wow mode
 ...
 <4>[ 7917.855690] Wow enabled. Not allow to send tx data
 <4>[ 7917.957487] Setup WoW suc<6>[ 7917.653293] PM: Syncing filesystems ... done.
 <4>[ 7917.660344] Freezing user space processes ... (elapsed 0.02 seconds) done.
 <4>[ 7917.681675] Freezing remaining freezable tasks ... (elapsed 0.00 seconds) done.
 <4>[ 7917.683022] Suspending console(s) (use no_console_suspend to debug)
 ...
 <4>[ 7917.701339] Suspend for wow mode
 ...
 <4>[ 7917.855690] Wow enabled. Not allow to send tx data
 <4>[ 7917.957487] Setup WoW successfully
 ...cessfully
 ...

I ping it from remote:
 <4>[ 7917.958113] ar6000_pm_resume: enter status 3
 <4>[ 7917.959225] android_ar6k_check_wow_status: WoW resume from irq thread status 0
 <4>[ 7917.959377] Resume WoW successfully
 <4>[ 7917.960300] WoW does not invoked. skip resume<6>ES209RA Audio Jack Driver : es209ra_audio_jack_resume START
 ...
 <4>[ 7918.144031] Restarting tasks ... done.

The device wakes up (without turning the screen on) and responds on the network.

But then (after about 2-3 seconds) it suspends again:
 <6>[ 7918.240298] suspend: exit suspend, ret = 0 (2012-01-15 11:48:35.684507919 UTC)
 <4>[ 7918.967615] save exit: isCheckpointed 1
 <6>[ 7918.972936] PM: Syncing filesystems ... done.

Now it does not resume on wireless.

When I press some hardware button, the phone resumes, sleeps and I have one more opportunity to resume it from WiFi. But only once.
Why does it fail to resume from WiFi every time?

WoW has to be set every time you go in suspend mode.
After it wakes up the first time your WoW configuration will not be set unless you set it again.

How to make it auto-set WoW every time it goes in suspend mode when Wi-Fi is on?

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


text:
GO Launcher apps in HTC Sense
i want to use Go switch widget in htc sense launcher. But widget list doesn't show me this one. why is that so ??

Do not GO widgets require the GO launcher?

If you start GOWidget, there are 2 lists. Installed and not installed widgets. You can install widgets from there. If you installed the Switch widget, you can add it to your homescreen tapping on a blank space and selecting GOWidget from the list. Switch should now be listed in the Installed list. Obviously Go Launcher EX has to be installed, it cannot just be used with HTC Sense. You have to replace HTC Sense (at least the launcher) through Go Launcher EX.

i mean in sense launcher

@WebDeveloper: Then please edit your question to be more accurate.


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How to make Android play music reliably, without chopping?
When I try to play music on Android 2.3 (using various players, including PowerAmp) on Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 I get not reliable sound. Music pauses for a short time, for example, when:

I press the power button (especially repeatedly) (request_suspend_state: sleep;request_suspend_state: wakeup in dmesg)
When I see messages like send sigkill to 15497 (ndroid.settings), adj 8, size 6428 in dmesg
When some program reacts to changed screen orientation.
When wifi connection gets established, when I force it to "reassociate"
When I go to/from application from home screen (AWDLauncher), except of to/from WidgetLocker screen.
When I enable/disable Airplane Mode.
When the display is off (the most annoying)

When only really stable way to play music is to use StayAwake to force display on, turn off Wi-Fi, turn on Airplane Mode and don't switch applications. Starting CPU hogs like while true; do true; done does not affect chopping.
And it was playing more or less fine on Android 2.1.
"mediaserv" process (that writes to /dev/msm_pcm_out) has realtime io and scheduling priority, but sound is choppy anyway. If I start playing from console with mplayer  -ao pcm:file=/dev/msm_pcm_out the sound chop less (notably it does not get interrupted by power button / loading bunches of heavy processes), but still behave not normally when screen is off (even ionice -c1 -p4 cat /dev/urandom > /dev/msm_pcm_out is choppy)
When I start music A by usual way and music B using mplayer to /dev/msm_pcm_out (getting them mixed) music A chops more than usual and I usually hear B when A is in chop. When I turn off screen, both A and B chops in sync (stopping B leads to relatively more fluent playback of A this way).
How to play music on Android reliably in presence of background load? Should I report a bug somewhere?
Update Found a way of playing music. Inconvenient, but without chopping:

Start WakeLock in "CPU on, Screen Off, Keyboard off" mode
Use mplayer to play music bypassing Android:

ionice -c1 -n4  \
  schedtool -R -p 3 -e \
  mplayer -really-quiet \
        -af volume=-26 -quiet \
        -ao pcm:file=/dev/msm_pcm_out,nowaveheader \
    /mnt/sdcard/music/something.ogg
# (created script to start it easily, of course)

Plays without chopping no matter how much applications I start, what do with Wifi, orientation and airplane modes. Even with "powersave" cpufreq governor (everything very slow, but music plays fine). So the hardware have enough resources to play it.
Update 2
Looks like doing
for i in `pgrep ''`; do schedtool -D $i; done

i.e. "Set Idle priority for all processes" makes music play fine even when I {start programs,lock screen,rotate screen;it reconnects to other mobile network stations} at expense of some input lag in games. Don't know exactly why it happens.

What device do you have? Sounds like it's very resource constrained. Maybe a fast and light custom ROM would improve the performance.

Sony Ericsson Xperia X10. What does mean "resource constrained"? It should prioritise media over usual activities, allowing fluent playback independently on how much background load present. Also trying to cause load by explicitly using heavy applications hogging CPU and memory does not lead to choppy audio while just reassociating Wifi always produces chop. Also it played more or less fine on Android 2.1

Music plays the same even I force powersave cpufreq governor (and CPU non-nice load is about 20% in this case). What resources can be short?

From what I can read from your additional comments: none. And I also have never heard that the X10 has a general problem with audio playback.

Including after update to Android 2.3?

Maybe the issues you're experiencing are localized to your device model. I'm running Android 2.3.6 on a Samsung YP-G70 and I experience no interruptions or chopping whatsoever no matter what I'm doing.

I have a very similar issue to this on a Nexus S running Jelly Bean 4.1.2. In my case the cause seems to be any background network access.

I feel that this it too localized, as its only affecting the OP's handset, what the OP failed to provide is what background apps are there running? Sound is not exactly fluid enough for the latency in Android versions < Gingerbread... and that is acknowledged and known.

There are many background programs, but I don't feel that any of them are high priority enough to disrupt sound. Low-prio fuss with starting and stopping BG processes just should not bother high-prio music playing.

Also the main question is that updating from 2.1 to 2.3 broke the sound (with approximately the same programs). /* Actually I've begun getting used to stoically ignoring the music choppiness... */

Try turning off any applications or hardware that uses a lot of the phone's resources.  Turn off GPS, WIFI, Network Service, and dim the backlight.  Also shut down any other running applications than the ones you need for playing music.  If this still doesn't work your device may not have enough memory.

Looks like a general advice, not a solution/workaround to the bug. I tried various modes (described in question). OOM killer is only one of things that trigger the bug.

Increase your Audio Buffer size.
I use PlayerPro Music Player with its DSP pack. DSP pack allows me to adjust audio buffer size. I never needed to use this feature, but it will help you.
You can also find other music players to support this feature. The key is Audio Buffer.
Alternatively, you can reduce music quality as well as system load.

At least setting maximum buffer size in Mixzing player does not help.

"reduce music quality as well as system load" -> workaround, not fix. I already have hacky workarounds (see "Updates")


text:
Video Streamer that can connect via proxy
Hello I connect my phone to the internet via wifi, using connectify, my internet is via a proxy. I've managed to set wifi proxy, but this works for only the Internet app, my video players fail to stream, probably because they're going direct and not passing through the proxy.
My question is ; Is there a video player that works via proxy?
I'm not rooted.

Is rooting an option for you?

@MichaelK I've used a lot of tutorials to attempt rooting, but Wildfire S seems it can't be rooted.

Make sure your proxy server is not blocking video streaming. If connectify is broadcasting an internet connection which is already established thru proxy, Android has got system-wide proxy connection. So, there's no need to setup proxy in particular player.
Sometimes, proxy servers limit the speed of video streaming & even block it. So, get this info first if proxy server is not managed by you.
Then, try using Real Player & let me know..

had the same problem, seems like the app tries to use ports other than HTTP specific ones, so your proxy server might be blocking them, that's why you probably might get connection errors, so simple way, try using Firefox browser it directs video stream via HTTP proxy. so how it works out for you Mob.


text:
Application in Market that Open click returns you back to the market
I had NetFlix installed on ASUS Eee Transformer and since I am not using it, I uninstalled it.
But now Android Market tells me there are updates, which I do not wish to do, and it acts as though it is still installed. Ok, I went to open it to see the app, and Open just takes me back to the Android Market page.
I see the same behavior on Mobo Video player. I installed it, it said to go get the codecs, so I did, then when I open it, I get sent back to the Android Market page.  Tried uninstalling, same basic behavior.
How do I clean these up?  They seem to be in some kind of installed/uninstalled limbo.
Running the latest update from ASUS, so Android 3.2.1 and latest firmware.

Sounds like ASUS has installed stubs as system apps.  You'd need root to remove them or unlink them from the Market.

I can buy that for the Netflix app, and I can probably live with that one.  The Mobo Player one is a bit annoying.  I seem to missing something obvious about this one.

I wonder if you uninstalled via some method other than the market and things got out of sync? Settings / Manage Applications or a launcher shortcut, for instance.
I would suggest re-installing both apps, then uninstalling via their market pages.

I used Market for both.  Though maybe Netflix, now I do not recall...  Hmm... Something to think about, thanks.

Can you once try by clearing the "Market" and "Download Manager" cache and data?
To do so go to Settings -> Manage Applications -> Select "Market" from "All" tab and click clear cache and clear data.
Do the same for "Download Manager"

No joy, same behavior on both problem apps.

You need a cache clean up apps to get rid of all those nasty hanging apps. There you will find that your cache has alot in it. Cleaning it once a day helps with performance also so try to make it a habbit of cleaning it once a day!!

He already tried it to no avail. Also please don't spread false information that cleaning cache speeds up your phone. It doesn't.


text:
Samsung Galaxy S2 on Sprint sudden Drop in Battery Life
Since I got this device in mid November to now, I have had great battery life usually lasting almost two full days and never having a problem for one day unless I'd been using it excessively. Suddenly yesterday I started losing power and the device is dead in just about 8 hours, with the graph of battery loss showing only Skype and Android OS. I haven't used Skype at all and don't know why it would even show up on this graph, but Android OS usually hadn't been showing up as more than about 5-15% of my total battery usage, much less overshadowing everything else. I uninstalled Skype thinking it may have updated and have noticed no difference at all.
I've started looking for solutions online, and found forums for "android OS bug fixes" but nothing that detailed anything similar to this situation. http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1135033
I have had Gingerbread 2.3.3 since I got this phone (annoyingly.. where is ICS Samsung??) I'm pretty sure and have had no battery drain problems such as this at all until just recently. I had not made any changes to the system nor any applications or widgets and see no reason why suddenly the OS would start to consume my battery erroneously.
I don't have WiFi on typically unless I'm in a zone where I do have it and sketchy service such as at work sometimes (I am a student and only work about 15 hours a week on top of classes) and at home if I'm updating apps or using my phone a lot and want the quicker service. GPS and Bluetooth are always off, along with 4G unless I will be currently using it a lot in a 4G zone.
Basically, I see no reason why my battery life should suddenly become awful when I had been having such a wonderful experience with this phone for months. What could have caused this and how can I reverse it?? Thanks!

Have you tried recalibrating your battery?

Are any apps showing suspiciously high cpu use? You can check with Seepu, or with 'top' command at the terminal or adb-shell.

THE SOLUTION:
OK here is the deal...I researched this as it happened to me just that way a few days ago....but first, some background.
I bought the Samsung Galaxy 3 from radio Shack-My carrier is Sprint. The device has NOT been rooted.  Had pretty good luck with the Samsung Epic (Galaxy S).
Installed: Juice Defender Pro-Almost DOUBLED my battery life until....
4 days ago, I awoke at about 6 am to see that the battery had been charged, so i disconnected the charger.  Went back to sleep, and about 8am, was horrified to see that the battery had SOMEHOW drained to 23%...It had drained 3/4 of its capacity in just under 2 hours!
Well that aint happening.  After some very tedious research, I was left with a few possibilities: 1) bad battery or device (no kidding) (2) Make some setting changes (i did that...I set my display to minimum and NOT to auto, and made a few other changes) But the thing that did the trick was uninstalling some apps that I just installed.  Once that was done, the phone ran fine.
The problem is that some applications, especially third party ones, will not always work properly, and/or can drain the battery.  The only way to know for sure is to uninstall  them...wait to see if it helps, and if it does, then install them again, and see if the problem returns.  i elected to NOT reinstall the applications.  I figure that i can try others, and today, I only install one app at a time, and if the phone behaves properly, then it stays.
There are MANY things one can do to extend battery life.  I LOVE Juice Defender Pro.  It does what it says it will do, and was worth every dime I paid.  There are other things you can do like Use airplane mode when listening to mp3's.  I went on a motorcycle ride, listened to music for 3 hours, and only used about 8% of my battery life to do it.
Anyway, I hope this helps.  Try getting rid of apps that were most recently installed before the issue occurred.  It was the solution's for me.

Your Galaxy  3 (GT-I5800) still runs Android 2.1. Recent Android versions play a more active role against battery consuming apps. E.g. Google describes in Android 2.3's changelog: Improved power management. The Android system takes a more active role in managing apps that are keeping the device awake for too long or that are consuming CPU while running in the background. By managing such apps — closing them if appropriate — the system helps ensure best possible performance and maximum battery life.

I'm having precisely the same issue.  I was comfortably getting 18ish hours, and now roughly 9.  Android OS was at somewhere around 75% usage, where normally it rests cozily below display usage.
I have swapped in my spare battery and things appear marginally better, but I'm not so sure just yet.  I'm pondering the possibility that a hard power off might have helped also (vs. a regular reboot)
Check out this article also, it seems very familiar and his was a faulty antenna.

This answer isn't of much help without that link. What happens when that link stops working?


text:
A data forensic tools for android
I have recently taken interest in digital forensics.  What is the best tool, or set of tools to obtain and analyze images of android phones?

I would imagine the same tools could be used as those for hard drives, assuming you can mount the microsd in a card reader? What specific tools are you looking to replace?

Related: http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/15869/how-can-i-recover-a-deleted-file-on-android

"What is the best" questions are generally off-topic for this site. Please review the [FAQ].


text:
How to enable a disabled app
I recently disabled a default app (Google+, using Settings -> Apps -> Google+ -> Disable) on my phone. Is there a way to enable it again?

The same way.
Settings | Apps | (app) | Enable
Disabled apps automatically sort to the bottom of the app list.


text:
AC-USB Charging Device Makes Sounds when Device Fully Charged
This might not be the right place to ask this question, as it falls under the purview of electronics, however that SE is not about consumer electronics. And this phenomena has only happened with Android devices, at least with the Droid 1 and Droid 3. So Android is where I stuck it. Sorry if that's wrong :(
This has happened with both the MicroUSB-to-USB (with AC adapter attachment) OEM wall charger and MicroUSB-to-AC-only wall charger.
Basically, when my phone is charging, the AC plug is completely quiet, but once my phone hits 100%, sporadically the plug portion of the charging apparatus will begin to make squealing noises. It stops once I unplug the phone and will begin again if I were to re-plug it in immediately.
Here's the thing, two other people I've asked cannot hear it. I promise you I am not going crazy and imagining things -- but I have been known to have very sensitive hearing -- hearing buzzing from old TVs and monitors and so forth.
My question, mostly out of curiosity, why is this happening and how can I get it to stop, as it is rather irritating.
This issue seems unique to my old Droid 1 and Droid 3. My laptop or similar high-power chargable device does not suffer from this issue.

See this very good answer on Electronics SE for details. Basically it's a side effect of the charger circuitry operation - it's by design, you can't change it. If that disturbs you - either find another charger, or bring this one further from you, don't try to silence it with an enclosure - that may lead to overheating.

Very interesting! Thanks for the info! Sadly the charger is right by my bed and the only other place is on the opposite side of the room.. which is like not even 10 feet away, so I'd hear it anyway. And I need the phone in this room as it's my alarm. But at least I know it's not preparing to explode due to bad electronics, haha.

I had this same problem and switched to an old Blackberry charger that I had laying around. It then stopped. My wife couldn't hear the noise either and thought I was going crazy.


text:
Using an Archos 3G modem with an Acer Iconia tab (Android Honeycomb)
I've recently purchased an Acer Iconia tablet with Android 3.1. Then I adquired an Archos G9 3G USB modem, with the intention of having internet connection on my tablet when not around a wifi (90% of the time for me, sadly). I thought using it would be simple, like with a PC: insert the USB modem on the tablet, it recognises it, asks me some questions to configure it and so on.
But no, when I insert the USB modem on my tablet it does absolutely nothing. I've searched on the net for instructions about this but haven't found any. Is this USB modem intended for using only with Archos tablets? Anyone on my situation?

It's plug-and-play on your PC because the industry has an established standard for driver infrastructure in Windows & OSX. Android isn't as friendly to 3rd party drivers. There's some limited success reported with specific models of 3g dongle - you may need to switch devices. Here's a partial list from XDA:

ZTE MF 639 (might need roaming enabled to get data working)
Vodafone K3765-H
Vodafone K3715
Vodafone K3565 / Huawei E160
Huawei E169
Huawai E170
Huawai E171
Huawei E173
Huawei E1550
Huawei E1692
Huawei E1750
Huawei E1752
Huawei E1820
HUAWEI K3520
HUAWEI K3565 -Rev 2


text:
Galaxy Nexus ringtones and notifications too quiet
I've recently ditched an iPhone in favour of an Android, Galaxy Nexus.  Now I am missing calls and texts all the time because I simply don't hear the ring!  I have maxed all the volume sliders in settings and the volume rocker on the side, and tried the more obnoxious ringtones included stock, but it is still fairly quiet.
I'm not hard of hearing but if I'm on a tram and the phone is in my suit pocket or bag, it's just not loud enough to be heard over the ambiant noise.
Is this a common problem or it might be specific to my phone?  How can I boost the volume of ringtone and text notifications?

I don't think it's just you. I've noticed the same thing, except I'm coming from a Motorola Droid which was really loud.

This is a common problem with Galaxy Nexus, and most of the custom firmwares out there have this fixed, but not the official ones.

@onik what is a custom firmware where this is fixed?

@wim this one, for example: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1361108&highlight=volume+bug

You might want to give Volume+ a try (scroll down for download link).

The default ringtones are fairly quiet. Install some standalone ringtones or else grab a copy from your device and run them through a program to increase their volume before placing back onto the phone.


text:
2.3.6 update for Samsung Galaxy S 2 GT-I9100
does anybody know how to download the officially released rom from Samsung? I can't see it in the web site and kies does not donwload anything, currently I am using the 2.3.4 updated a while ago. I have the phone in Switzerland (Zurich) and my Phone operator is Sunrise. Thanks!

See also: When will my phone get the Android 2.3 update (Gingerbread)?

Samsung's Kies software is the official way to download and install updates. These updates are released on different dates for different countries and networks and some countries/networks don't have all updates. It may be that your network hasn't tested and certified the update yet, or they might not be releasing this version at all.
This page lists most of the official updates available via Kies for the Galaxy S2 I9100 phone:
Samsung Galaxy S2 Firmware Updates via Kies Official Releases compiled list (2012) | Android Stock ROM BlogPost


text:
Stop automaticaly switching to 3g if wi-fi drops
I have an android 2.2 phone.  The other day, I was using a wi-fi connection on my phone and had it tethered to my laptop.  For whatever reason, the wi-fi connection dropped and my phone starting using my phones 3g connection to continue the internet connection tethered to my laptop...
Is it possible to stop this from happening? i.e. if the wireless connection drops, don't use the 3g connection automatically?

If you have no reason to why the wifi drops, you might try changing the wifi sleep policy. The wifi sleep policy handles when or if the wifi connection shall switch to mobile data. If this option is set to the default value, When screen turns off, wifi connection automatically switches off when the phone has been idle for a while. You can try setting this to Never, which will keep the connection on, even when the phone is not used.
To change this setting, navigate to Settings -> Wireless & networks -> Wi-Fi settings -> [Menu] -> Advanced -> Wi-Fi sleep policy.

What does Never when plugged in mean?

It means that the default policy (When screen turns off) is used when the device is on battery, and when the device is plugged into power Wi-Fi never go to sleep.

So if I have the phone plugged into a usb powered port, where the phone gets charged.  If I then enable wifi on the phone, and tethering to the laptop via the same usb port.  Will this work?  i.e. will wifi never turn off if I have the never when plugged in selected?  I'll give it a try asap anyway.

Yes, I think this will work! Give it a try!

Turn off mobile data usage. Go to Settings->Wireless and networks->Mobile network(you should uncheck this). Some manufacturers may have a widget for this, such as HTC did for my Incredible(v1).

Try enabling airplane mode. It will shut down all the radios on your device - cell, wifi, bluetooth. Then try explicitly turning the wifi back on. Not all devices support this - driver issues, I think - but in many you will wind up with the cell radio disabled and the wifi on.


text:
Samsung apps cannot be run. Please try again later
I'm using Kies to connect my 'Samsung Galaxy Ace' in my PC. All the options like Music,Photos,Videos and Podcasts working fine. But when I click on Samsung Apps under Store option, its showing an error "Samsung apps cannot be run. Please try again later". Could you help me to resolve this problem...?

Do you have a Samsung Apps icon on your phone? Have you tried using that one?

It's been a little while since I've used Kies, but it is used for all of Samsung's phones, not just the Android ones. The Samsung Apps icon in Kies only used to list Bada compatible apps, not Android ones, you needed to use the Samsung Apps icon on your phone to get the Android ones.
Edit: Just realised that this question has come up before, for the Galaxy S: Why do Samsung Apps not support the Galaxy S? though that question is from a year ago, so things may have changed since then

Try to re-install the Kies on your PC.And try it once again because i had the same problem and i got it back by this way.


text:
How can I have a separate birthday calendar without shoving all those contacts onto GMail?
I have the HTC Sensation XL if that has any significance on the issue.
I'd like to have the birthdays of my contacts show up as appointments in my calendar automagically.
What I don't want is to put all those contacts on Gmail. I don't use gmail and I don't want Google to have them.
I would also prefer if they would not go into my default local calendar so I can toggle them on and off to reduce clutter. But this is optional.
Is there any way to do this?

Install my new open source app Birthday Adapter.

Cool. If I ever get Android 4.0 I'll be sure to check it out...

Great, thanks and +1! Also glad to see it is available on F-Droid: https://f-droid.org/repository/browse/?fdfilter=birthday+adapter&fdid=org.birthdayadapter

I'm not certain whether the link I updated with is Dominik's app or not, but the old link was dead, so either this answer is supposed to be get deleted or should be updated. I chose the latter. // Anyone who is reading this comment, feel free to take action.

Is this the same as that one on the Play Store?

I know you don't want to add the birthdatr into your Google Address book, and that's fine.
The method I use still require to put that info online, but what I did is I created a birthday calendar on GCal. I creates an entry for each birthday in that calendar and set a yearly recurrence. You can also set a reminder for each of them if you want to. And since it is a separate calendar, you can toggle it off or on at will.
Hope that helped or gave you an idea of what you actually want to implement. Good luck :)

You might want to try EboBirthday. You can enter the dates manually. It can also import from Facebook.

The only way is, to create a new unsynced calendar in your calendar app on android. But you have to create each birthday on your own.

You're sure there's no possible way to automate the event creation?


text:
Can't transfer file from Ubuntu to Samsung Galaxy tab 10.1
when connecting my Samsung Galaxy tab 10.1 (USB debugging off) to my PC running Ubuntu 10.10 the device seems to be mounted properly, but I can't transfer any file (I always get "Error creating directory: -1: Unspecified error").
I googled the issue, installed mtp-tools and mtpfs, tried several recommended methods, but I still can't use my tab as a mass storage device.
Anybody can help?

I think i have read that you have to have usb debugging on for it to work.

Several devices are like that, unfortunately.

No fix? I won't be able to transfer file from Ubuntu? It sounds like a joke...

Did you try turning on USB debugging?

I think you'll get better help at http://askubuntu.com/

Install SSHDroid on your phone and mount it on your Linux box using sshfs. Even if a wifi network is unavailable, you can still manage a transfer just by setting up wifi tethering on your phone (this will even work without a data connection, say when you're travelling).
Connect your laptop to the wifi tether and then turn on SSHDroid. After that it's just like copying to a server.  You can use a command like:
scp /home/daniel/Music/* 192.168.48.1:/mnt/sdcard/Music/

Or even mount that remote sftp server to a local path.  Just google for sshfs fstab.  Just note that the ip mentioned here will likely be different for you.
Note that data will move between your laptop and your phone on the local network, not using up your mobile data connection (if you even have access to one), so there's no need to worry about data fees.

I have a Galaxy S2 and I resolved a similar problem using the phone just as a mass storage device (and not using MTP), following this tutorial from askubuntu (it worked nicely):

go to the settings
under Wireless and network click on "More"
select USB utilities
click the "Connect storage to PC"

Now you can plug in the USB cable and use USB mass storage.
On more modern versions of Android, you may need to click the "More…" item in settings. This contains the "USB Utilities" item, mentioned above.

Answers where there is no useful information except what can be found by following a link are not really answers; answers should be able to stand on their own. Please copy the relevant information into your answer (but by all means give credit to the source).

Is it ok now? :)

Absolutely. On behalf of future readers: Thanks.

That's the way to do it, but the real problem with Galaxy Tab seems to that this option is absent in the settings -- very confusing! According to the answers above, USB debugging should be turned on for it to appear.

Just bought a Galaxy Note 10.1, and ran through same problem to transfer file through USB with my Ubuntu 12.04 PC.
Now, it seems that using 'connect as a camera' is smoother... No need of any other software.
Go to Settings / Developer options, and check 'USB debugging'
Then open the main menu (where you get the notifications) and tap on "Connected as..." to open the 'Storage settings/USB PC connection' menu (can figure out how to access it another way): 2 options 'Media device (MTP)' and 'Camera (PTP)'. I checked the Camera(PTP).
Then connect the device to the PC, cancel all messages that may appear on the PC, and normally the device should mount automatically: 2 icons should appear on the desktop: 1 is the main card, the other the extension card.
Now you can copy and past files from the PC to the device cards via Nuatilus like for any other device.
BUT...

you do not have access to the files on the cards: ie,the directories appear empty (if they appear at all). So you may need to shuffle the files around afterwards on the device directly to re-arrange the locations etc... Appart from that, drag and drop files on the extSD card does work: the files are copied, no pb.
You do have access to the files and directories you just copied though.
Some characters seems to be forbidden in the names of files and directories that you copy. Do not use:  "  or  :  or  ?  and perhaps some others. the . - _ and ' are ok. But having a forbidden character in the file or directory name causes an error as reported in the original post :"Error creating directory: -1: Unspecified error" if pb is in the name of the directory you want to copy, or "Error copying file xxxx: -1: Unspecified error" if it's in the file name.

The best hassle free way to transfer files between Ubuntu and your device is by using and ftp client like FileZilla on Ubuntu and Software Data Cable for your android device. You can then transfer files via FTP. Works for me. Hope it helps.

I did what @Logos suggested. If you are looking for solution for your Galaxy Tab (tablet, not Galaxy phone), then upon plugging usb data cable to your linux computer you will see a usb connection icon. Tap on notification aera, then on usb connection, then tap on check-box that is non-MTP connection option.
Then you will see your Galaxy tab's SD card mounted on your desktop. If you browse folders - you will find them empty, content is not shown. Just transfer your files where you want them to be. The opposite direction is not working, I guess.

Speed of transfer is... wow... blazing slow ((

Ubuntu 10 requires manual editing of your udev config in order to recognize an Android device's SD card.
As root create the text file "/etc/udev/rules.d/51-android.rules” and add this line for a Samsung device:
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", SYSFS{idVendor}=="04e8", MODE="0666"

Save the file and exit the editor, then set the permissions of the file and restart the udev system:
$ sudo chmod a+rx /etc/udev/rules.d/51-android.rules
$ sudo restart udev
udev start/running, process xxxx

If that doesn't work, you can also install an app for file xfring as other answers have recommended.  Personally I favour Samba Filesharing.


text:
Message application deleted
A friend just rooted (don't know if it is the correct word) my Galaxy 551 and some of the applications he deleted, Orkut, some games, etc, he also deleted the Message application.
I can't send or receive messages, the icon com menu has disappeared.
How can I get it back? Samsung Galaxy 551 with Android 2.2
Thanks in advance

See if your friend created a backup of your phone - that's a suggested step in lots of root instructions, and it is possible he did this so you can just re-add the missing application.
Assuming this wasn't done though, you may want to just start over. The following webpage has information on using ODIN (Samsung service application) to restore the original software to your phone. It looks like it covers all the regional variants, you'll need to read carefully to find the applicable software and process for your region. If you provide more regional information, I'll see if I can find more precise steps.
https://galaxy551.wordpress.com/2012/01/08/the-stock-rom-and-odin-thread/
UPDATE:
I don't speak the language and the Google translate is very sloppy - so I may be misunderstanding this thread. Hopefully you speak the language.
For a Brazilian phone, this forum thread has steps for installing a rooted stock 2.3.4 update (sounds like a prerelease leak of an official ROM, which are common to Samsung devices) and reply #8 in the thread also gives steps for installing the 2.2 version that you have installed right now.
Update #2:
Since I started replying, that forum stopped responding. Hopefully just a temporary glitch, but just in case, here's another page I found that includes links to download the Brazilian software.

I'm from Brazil and couldn't find on the link a way to download

If possible, I want to restore it completely, like the way i bought it =) Root again and try to make the right thing ;)


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After wipe Apps are still shown as installed on Android's Web Market. How can I install them?
I accidentally formatted my phone. Now, when I login to my google account it doesn't install my new apps. When I login through internet, it shows in "My Library" that those apps are installed, but they are not. What should I do?

Simplest thing is to open each app (even if it says "Installed") and install each one.

Is it the simplest way?

It's what I did when I did a factory reset. It gave me an opportunity to decide which apps I really wanted back.


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htc wildfire s after update to 2.3.5 - cannot install any app
After updating my wildfire s phone to android version 2.3.5 I cannot install any application or update existing ones. Downloading icon appears for 1 sec and instantly disappears - for some reason apps wont download.
Friend of mine has very same problem with his wildfire s, so it looks like not an accident with my phone but real reproducable issue.
Does anyone managed to fix it without factory data reset?
Thanks

I had the same problem, tried cleaning cache and data with no result.
So I went in settings > applications > manage apps > all, picked the download manager and "uninstalled the updates". It told me the app would reset to factory settings, and when I started the phone again, it was running marketplace 3.4.4 and I managed to update and install apps normally after that.
Disclaimer: I only tried that because I planed to do a factory reset if I broke everything. I don't guarantee the results.

Thanks, Meri. Your solution works! It's a pity new Download Manager is so buggy, because I also have issues with old one - very ofter it downloads application but they won't install, have to redownload several times to get app installed.

Glad I could help. As for the apps not installing, I wish I knew how to fix that, it's a problem I encountered too.


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Create a Gmail address for a Google account but use another email as the login
I want to add a Gmail address to my account (that I will not use) but I don't want that address to be my main address (i.e. my login) for Google, because I already use me@example.com everywhere.
I don't have Gmail, but do have a Google account on a personal mail address (me@example.com) where I read emails from. When I got an Android phone, I tried to add my Google account, it keeps asking me to create a Gmail address. Without that account, I basically can't do anything with it.
As the Gmail creation form tells me that the Gmail address will become the main address, I'd like to know if/how it's possible to set me@example.com the main address afterwards.
Or, if you know a way to use my Android with my Google Account without Gmail.

Why do you need your other email to be the "main" account?  You can use secondary accounts for the Market and so on.

I've read that emails from Android market and other google apps will go to the unused gmail address, which I don't want (I won't read it).

@Matthieu In my experience the emails go to whichever account you've set the Market and Google Wallet up on. AFAIK the only thing you need an actual GMail account for is GMail, any Google Account will work for settings backup, calendar/contacts sync, Market access, etc. You can then use the normal Email app (or any other from the Market) for your emails.

@GAThrawn If I can still log in using my own email, and configure it to send Market and Wallet emails on my own address, then that's fine. However without a GMail account, I can't add my Google Account to Android, use contacts and calendar sync, Market, etc... I'm not the only one complaining about this apparently :(.


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How do you remove a custom word from SlideIT?
How do you remove a custom word from SlideIT?
(hint: the User dictionary list in Language & keyboard settings, is, quite obviously, not the answer)

Check this video.

To remove a word press on - sign.


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Are there any custom ROM's for the Pantech Crossover?

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

I can't find any ROM's that support the Pantech Crossover, since it's not a very popular phone. Are there any?


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Use Transformer Prime instead of virtual emulator
I am thinking about buying the Asus Transformer Prime, to start developing on android. Currently I am borrowing a Motorola Xoom to develop, and that has a Micro USB port, that I can plug into, and use it to debug my apps. From what I can tell the Asus Transformer Prime does not have such a port. Can I even use this as my debugging device, or would I be making a $500 mistake?

Shopping recs are off-topic, so I removed that bit.

The Prime uses a proprietary cable, but it supports a USB connection to a computer via that cable (which you can see in this image from Engadget which I posted in another question). The fact that the connector isn't a micro USB port has no bearing on whether or not you can connect over USB (see: every Samsung tablet).

Great answer, and thank you! Do you know if the cable comes with the prime?

@ReidKersey: As far as I know it does. That picture was everything that comes in the box, as I recall, and the wall charger is basically just an AC adapter that the USB cable plugs into.

I do development using the TF-101 and it works fine, and several times faster than the emulator.


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How do I remove an account for a phone I sold but did not factory reset first?
I had an HTC Wildfire phone which I stood on and broke the screen. I then sold it as spares because it wouldn't turn on and bought another one. When I went onto my Market account I noticed my new one is there and so is the one I sold, both registered to my Google mail address, and there is recent activity on both of them. I could not reset the old one to factory settings before I sold it because it wouldn't turn on. Is there a way I can unlink the old one from my account? Its beginning to worry me that someone else is using it through my Google mail account .

Possible duplicate of http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/16520/remove-google-account-from-older-smartphone

@roxan I agree there's overlap but not sure it is a duplicate as that question covers the situation where the phone is still accessible, in this case it's been sold and the OP can't get hold of it anymore. Also that question involves not disrupting the new owner any more than necessary, and this one the OP wants to unlink the account for worry that someone else may be spending their money, and presumably doesn't care about the other person.

If you go to the Market Account settings part of the Android Market webpage at https://market.android.com/account and click on the Settings tab, you should see a list of the devices registered on that Market account, clicking the Edit button lets you hide that old phone from the web interface. That's what you'd normally use to remove an old device from showing.
If you're worried about whoever renovated your phone using your account, then you need to go a step further than that. The easiest way to block the other phone out will be to change your Google Account password. Then your phone will prompt for the new password next time it connects to a Google service, as will your old one, but as only you know the new password it should stop them from using your account on the old phone.
To stop this sort of thing happening in the future you ought to think about setting up two-step authentication on your Google account, once you've got that set up you can log into your Google account's settings and revoke the access password for any phone or device one at a time once you don't want them accessing your details any more.

For what it's worth, every time I hide an old phone from Market's web interface, it comes back a few weeks later.

Change your password then revoke it's access.

Also, start using application specific passwords and 2-step verification if you aren't already.

This makes it easier to control what gets access where.
This should prompt who ever is using the phone to reauthorize your account (via password or 2-step), which they won't be able to.


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Change own phone number in ICS
I've change the SIM in my Galaxy-Nexus-S. Under Settings -> About phone -> Status there still is the old phone number and I cannot manage to change it.
I've seen this answer which is outdated. The menu option Own numbers discribed in the answer is not there in ICS.
The navigation terms might be called differently, as I manually translated the names from German.

The way I had to do it in Gingerbread was to put the SIM into a Blackberry, change the number there, and then it updated when I put the SIM back into my Nexus S. (The number isn't always stored on the SIM, so if it isn't then Android won't update - you need to manually story it, which AFAIK you can't do on ICS/Gingerbread, hence the Blackberry method)

In previous versions of Android (mine is 2.3.7) you can set this setting in the Additional call settings. In Android 4.0 the Additional call settings screen is located here:
Open the Phone app -> [Menu] -> Settings -> Additional settings.
I have not verified this on a physical device yet.

Thanks for the answer. Unfortunately there is no option to change the phone number here.

@gentmatt It's there for me.

You need to reprogram the phone.  Dial ##786# on the dial pad and then hit view.  You may need your MSL to be able to change the phone number.

"Connection problem or invalid MMI code."

@Mr. Monkey "UNKNOWN APPLICATION" is what i get. Are you sure there is not supposed to be additiona # at the end?

Have you tried just a factory reset?  Sounds like you got a new phone, right?  Any opposition to just wiping and starting fresh?  I would think that would do it.

Ever since I got ICS 4.0.3 on my Nexus S, I had to wipe it twice already :)


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Isn't Firefox mobile able to save tabs when switching to another app and back to Firefox?
Besides its slowness, one big problem of Firefox to me is whenever I leave the app (e.g. looking up a translation in a dictionary) and switch back via ALT-TAB or long press HOME, Firefox reloads all tabs, they are already empty when reopening Firefox (so Ff seems to lose the tabs and only saves the URL's).
Is this due to low memory of Smartphone (500 MB RAM) or does Ff show the same behaviour on Tablets and high-specs smartphones? I also need Ff for Tiddlywiki and switch between apps and reopen Ff quite a lot. So a solution/explanation for this problem would be fine.

I guess that's about the way FF is implemented, I don't think it's about your device configuration, besides, 500Mb of RAM is pretty good for a phone, isn't is?

@mdelolmo it's true, but 500mb is also min. required RAM for ff to run on any phone. All the high class phones have 1GB RAM

I guess that's one of the reasons I'm giving up with FireFox step by step. I didn't even tried the Android version, maybe I should... But, my guess as an Android developer is that they don't check any device property of that kind in runtime, in fact, I don't think that is possible, at least with the API.

Someone with more clout than me (who knows the ins and outs of how to do this) should file a bug report on this.  It is annoying to the point of making Firefox useless when I have a web page that takes 30-45 seconds to load and Firefox decides it needs to be reloaded just because I switched to another app that was already loaded and did not exert any more memory pressure!

Android never removes applications from its memory, unless it has no memory left, then it initiates a low memory warning to unused applications and kills them when needed...
Android WebViews (The default android implementation of web browser) consume lots of memory, and so is Firefox's implementation of their web browser. Actually, Gecko (Firefox's rendering engine) is much slower and a bigger memory consumer than Android's default Webkit rendering engine.
So when you exit Firefox on your Android, the memory is probably nearly full, the system kills it, but Firefox has a mechanism that saves the URLs of the previously opened tabs, and though it starts the application again (and not resuming it) it loads everything you left open again...
And no,512MB are no enough, Android 2.3 takes approx 300MB to run.


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Cyanogenmod 7.1 doesn't send MMS
Not sure when this started to happen, most likely after I upgraded to cyanogenmod 7.1. I was able to send/receive MMS before without any problem.
Now I can

receive MMS at any time
send MMS when connected to wi-fi

my settings

HTC Desire
Testra
cyanogenmod 7.1

Any suggestions how make sending MMS possible again?

UPDATE
I compared my MMS APN settings with below one and I had to change Authentication and I cannot find MMS Protocol in my settings thouh.
• Name: Telstra MMS
• APN: telstra.mms
• MMSC: http://mmsc.telstra.com:8002
• MMS proxy: 10.1.1.180
• MMS port: 80
• MMS Protocol: WAP 2.0
• MCC: 505
• MNC: 01
• Authentication: CHAP
• APN type: mms

I also tried all other sort of advices found on the Inet like wiping SMS/MMS settings, fixing permissions. Nothing helped.
I wonder if upgrading radio would help?
I also noticed that I have troubles to log into my sip account using CSipSimple after upgrading to 7.1.

Are youre APN Settings alright?

How can I check? I can access internet when I am not able to send MMS. At the same time I can receive MMS.

Go to "Settings > Mobile > APN (Access Point Name)". Now you see your APN. Compare it with these, add new if neccesary: http://androidforums.com/hero-support-troubleshooting/45005-mobile-network-apn-settings.html | http://blog.mobilebroadbanduser.eu/page/Worldwide-Access-Point-Name-%28APN%29-list.aspx#403 | http://www.netcomm.com.au/solutions/3g-mobile-broadband/why-use-3g-hspa/3g-carriers

The APN name is different but the values look the same to me.

Updated my question with new findings ....


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Where is the wallpaper image saved?
I had an image from a website which I set as my wallpaper inside the browser. I am wondering now where I can find the image in the file system, because I can't find it online anymore. I am rooted.

I'm not sure if it's there, but did you check /sdcard/downloads/?

No. It's not in there.

There may be a change on Jellybean: http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/27692/where-is-current-wallpaper-stored-on-jellybean

I found mine by searching for "wallpaper" in the stock browser.

I'm not sure if it's the same on older systems, but on ICS it appears to save directly to /data/data/com.android.settings/files/wallpaper. I set mine from the browser, pulled that file, then changed it to a .png extension and voilà - it was the image I had set.
It also appears that this file simply gets overwritten when you change your wallpaper, so I don't see a way to recover one once it's changed unless you have a copy of the image somewhere else.
This also appears to be where it's saved on CyanogenMod 7, so it's possible that this is the "standard" location (certainly a good place to check, at least).

And now, good luck finding the same on an iPhone ! My father has the same problem, he wants to get back and transfer his wallpaper image somewhere else, and it’s nowhere to be seen in his picture library… unfortunately for him he has an iPhone, and after spending some time I’ve come to the conclusion that he’s toast. Thanks Steve, thanks Tim.

I was annoyed by the exact same problem, so I have programmed an app that automatically saves your wallpapers and your live wallpapers too. It makes it easy to revert to a previous wallpaper. It is called Wallpaper Saver, by Appdictive, and it's free in the Play Store. (It does not require root access.)

Works, but does not find wallpapers muzei app sets each day. It finds only the default muzei background

In Android 7.0, it's located in /data/system/users/0. You'll have to use a file explorer to rename it to a jpg or whatever it is. The folder also contains your lockscreen wallpaper so that's a plus.

This is a slight twist on the original question's context but may be useful to some who land here...
The location of the stock wallpapers is in an apk file that you should find on your device at /system/framework/framework-res.apk. Pull that file to your computer and then browse its internals. A search for a file with wallpaper in its name should prove fruitful.
The apk also contains other goodies such as stock icons.

I have checked in my Android 9 and that file has many instances of the stringwallpaper in it which seems irrelevant. Would you mind being more specific as to how that string should look like / where / so on

In my case, I have found the default_wallpaper.png file in the res\drawable-xxxhdpi-v4 folder (inside framework-res.apk).

You can use Root Browser, ES File Explorer, or other root folder browsers for this. Go to the root path using Root Browser (or ES File Explorer), and then:
data/data/com.cmcm.locker/cache/Volley/dat

When you try to open it, it won't open. To open it:

Copy the images with high size (maybe more than 80 KB since they got a quality) and paste them into a folder that is not in a root directory. (Just copy it to your "Downloads" folder or to your SD card)

Rename it. But when you do this, don't forget the ".jpg" at the end of the name you type. E.g. If I rename it to, "Sukkoth.jpg"

Open it using Gallery or any image viewer app.

In Android 7.1.2, I found them here, but they do not have an extension:
/data/data/com.android.wallpaperbackup/files
    wallpaper-lock-stage
    wallpaper-stage

and here too as suggested on SiriusXM's answer:
/data/system/users/0
   wallpaper
   wallpaper_lock
   wallpaper_lock_orig
   wallpaper_orig

Image extension can simply be added to those files.

in Android 9 (my S10+), wallpapers (lock & regular) are stored in:
/storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.android.systemui/files/backupwallpapers/

This is correct for me. Also using an S10.

I found my wallpaper in the location \Internal Storage\WhatsApp\Media\WallPaper after a search for "wallpaper" in Windows Explorer after connecting the phone to the computer.

Try here: Internal Storage/Android/data/com.android.systemui under internal storage.


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vCard sent to my Android shows up as text
A friend sent me a couple of contacts via vCard mms.  I received them as text messages, with for example the contact avatar rendered as plain text and some of the characters replaced with android emoticons.  I could dig the relevant info out of the text message, but I would like to simply import it as a contact to save doing that tedious process.  If I press and hold on the text, I get option to save the email or the phone but it is just scraping the text - not properly importing the vcard format.
Is there an easy way to import the contact?  (note: for something so simple as this, I would not really be interested in a paid app)
My friend was using iPhone 4.  I am on Galaxy Nexus.

I found some encoding issues when dealing with vCards, but generally, I was able to open any vCard file with the native contact manager application, have you tried to open the file with your computer?
The vCard is a text format file, so the image is encoded in Base64 (characters) if you open any vCard with a notepad, you will be able to see the contact picture encoded with characters.
This is a sample vCard:
BEGIN:VCARD
VERSION:2.1
N:Anders;Maria
FN:Maria Anders
ORG:Alfreds Futterkiste
TEL;TYPE=WORK:030-0074321
NOTE:Very Funny!
END:VCARD

So... To give you an answer, Android should handle vCards natively, without any special configuration. I'm running Android 4.x as well, and it works as expected.
In my opinion, the issue is about how iPhone encodes the vCard.
You can try downloading this vCard file: I's been tested on many Android devices

This finally worked for me: I was texted a vcf card from an Iphone to my Galaxy S4. Downloaded it, went to device storage. Where is that? Open apps, click on MY Files, Downloads. Voila! Check which file you want, or just tap it. Opens a screen cancel or save. Save to device. Search contacts for name, there it is in contacts!

Even nowdays (2015) there are many devices that have MMS/SMS vCard builtin, but there are quite a lot of them that does not support this feature. When I switched from Nokia to Android (Galaxy Nexus) I was quite surprised that I was not able to receive even SMS vCards...
So I've been working on this topic for few years since 2012 and I've created an app that solves the problem. Even though you are not interested in paid app, you can give it a try. Here is a link to FREE version, that has some limitations, but maybe you'll find it worth the paid version upgrade.
bizCard Manager FREE/vCard


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Show when roaming Ice Cream Sandwich
Gingerbread showed a little R in the "signal strength bars" when roaming.
Ice cream sandwich  does not notify me when my phone is roaming (it just shows number of bars, but no R).  I want the phone to notify me when I'm roaming.

On which Phone are you using ICS?
I'am using ICS on an Galaxy S GT-I9000 (Teamhacksung Rom) and it showed me the R in the Signal Strength Bars.

Are you possibly using "domestic" roaming, i.e. using another network in the same country as your home provider?
Android changed the behavior of the roaming indicator somewhat, so that it doesn't count domestic roaming as real roaming anymore.


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Which version of Active sync does every Android version use?
I discovered, that Google changed some things in the actual Active Sync / Exchange protocol on Ice Cream Sandwich, because I wasn't able to use the Lotus Notes Traveler as Exchange account on 2.3.7.
So does anyone has a list which versions of Active Sync the Android versions use?

As with most Exchange ActiveSync clients Android implements a sub-set of features from various versions of ActiveSync.
According to the Android 4 (Ice Cream Sandwich) Platform Highlights, the Email client supports EAS v14 (scroll down to the "Improved email" section), in a comparison with Gingerbread (Android 2.3.x) though you also need to take into account the Android 3 (Honeycomb) changes which while they don't specify EAS changes did add support for policies for encrypted storage, password expiration, password history, and password complexity, all of which are EAS features.
There are probably more differences between versions than it's practical to keep up to date here, the Wikipedia page Comparison of Exchange ActiveSync clients has a pretty good table comparing feature support.

Also found this table, but wasn't that helpful by finding the exact change. But thanks for the information about the encryption. This could be the point.


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How do I speed up media scanning?
When putting new music files or images onto the sd card of my android phone, android needs to scan for new files. Is there any way to speed up this process? E.g. putting all files in one directory? Currently I organized my music this way: music/artists/albums/files.mp3 Any suggestions?

I also have this problem. I am using Musicolet player and there is an option to use Musicolet scanner or system scanner; also there is an option to choose which folders to scan. However scanning is slow. If I have huge audio files, scanning a single file can take minutes. So I wonder does the scanner have to scan each file byte by byte or what takes so long time?

One method is to put a file called .noMedia in the root of every folder that you don't want to be scanned.  It won't improve the scanning of actual media, but it will prevent wasted time searching elsewhere (or indexing things that you don't want indexed, such as app assets).

Just a notice. It won't speed up scanning by a lot. Files with a .nomedia will still be indexed, but not categorized. You may wish to open Media Provider's database and see the table entries.

some of the slowness may be due to the speed of your storage media.
If it's built in storage than there's not much you can do (apart from what Matthew Read suggested)
if it's an SD Card, maybe check that it's not a class 2 or something. perhaps try and get a class 10 to speed things up.
beyond those changes it's down to the device CPU speed

There's no need to organize your files in any other theme. Android is indexing the media file and since api 1.0 player should query the Media Store which is using this index.

I guess you got me wrong. Building up the index is too slow, and I aimed on asking how it can be speed up.


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Adding direct contact to the "Share via" menu
The Share via menu is awesome.
But in more than half of the cases I use the menu to share something with my wife, and the question is not what to "share it via" but who to "share it with".
I simply wish there was a setting where I could predefine a contact from address book and preferred way of "sharing via" per action (email in most of the cases) that will appear in the "share via" menu.
Is there any way to do this?

Some easy way to share with your starred contacts would make a lot of sense. Would be nice if GMail had a quick way to select a Starred contact without having to go type them out or go through Contacts.

I added this Android enhancement request


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Keep the home launcher from being killed
I have a Motorola Milestone, and I've come to learn that it has a relatively low memory (runtime memory, not storage capacity). The problem that comes with this is that whenever too many apps want to run in the background, the android system starts killing stuff, and with my Milestone that happens very easily.
That wouldn't be so bad, if it weren't for the fact that android seems to think the home launcher is the least important app of all (which is absurdly wrong). For instance, right now I have a series of apps poluting the background, some important (like Swype) and some pointless (like Facebook). If I open up even a simple app like Messages or Contacts or Settings the homelauncher gets killed in the background. Once I press the Home button, I am greeted with an empty home screen, and have to wait around 1 or 2 minutes for everything to load again.
This happens with all home launchers I tried, though it happens more easily with the heavier ones. So far, I managed to live with this behavior by religiously avoiding apps that run in the background (as well as widgets).  But this solution is not perfect. It still happens more often than I'd like.
Is there a way to change android's priorities when it comes to killing background apps?  But why does the home launcher rank lower than Google Maps' location service and Facebook's (inactive) uploader  and everything else? I want the home launcher to be last thing that gets killed when memory is low, or as close to last as possible (e.g. it obviously can't rank higher than the currently active app, but you get my point).
I currently have Cyanogen mod 6 installed, but it also happened on the stock android OS, and I am willing to install absolutely ANY custom ROM to solve this issue.

I think ADW Launcher has a setting that should keep the application in memory. Also, CM has a setting to force the OS to keep the launcher in memory. I dont remember where it is at in CM6, but in CM7 it is in Settings -> CyanogenMod Settings -> Performance and it is called "Lock Home in Memory". I don't remember if it was in the same place or if it was called the same in CM6.

This option is helpful but not ideal. It is what I'm using right now (and thanks for pointing it out), but sometimes it causes instabilities and sometimes it crashes the current foreground app.

Any app that stays in memory like you want is going to cause the instabilities you mention. You are forcing the device to keep memory in use for your launcher when it may need to use it for the currently running application.

I understand. That's why I mentioned in the question that the launcher shouldn't have higher priority than the currently running app, but should be higher than the background apps. It's perfectly ok for the launcher to be killed if the active app needs the memory, I just wanted it to be killed after the other background apps have been killed (instead of being the first in line). But it's understandable that such an option just isn't there yet =). Can't have everything.

@BruceConnor, this is probably the one point against the argument that "Android handles memory just fine on its own". I think it does for the most part, it just kills the launcher repeatedly in the process.  Not that a task killer would really help.

Try the v6 Supercharger.
It can make your Homescreen Launcher "Hard To Kill" or "Bulletproof". If you have ICS/JB, be sure to get the ICS/JB version.
Also, be sure to disable the Lock Home in Memory of your launcher (if it has it) before using v6.

Try adding:
ro.HOME_APP_ADJ=1 to /system/build.prop file and reboot (will require root).
Source: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=860023


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Galaxy Tab - How to keep alerts visible until the screen is unlocked?
I've noticed that when I get an alert (an incoming email, or a notification from an app (cough Words with Friends cough) and the screen is locked, I'll hear the alert sound but, when I wake up the tablet, I won't see the alert.
Is there any way of having the tablet leave those alerts on the screen until I wake it up?
I'm using a Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 wifi-only, running Honeycomb 3.2.

So... nothing? Not even that this isn't possible?

The Samsung flavor of Android (and possibly others?) keeps the alerts accesible, but very well-hidden. Click on the section of the bottom menu bar with the time, then slide up where it reads "Settings". The alerts are visible there.


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Troubleshooting my WiFi - can't get an IP-address
I'm using a Samsung Galaxy Gio (Android 2.3). And I can't get a WiFi connection. My brother has the exact some phone and can get a connection.
When I enable WiFi, it tries to connect to the router. It then says it's trying to get an IP-address. But fails to do so and closes the connection.
When going to *#*#4636#*#* and into the WiFi Status menu it tells me the following:
WiFi state: On
Network State: connection lost
Supplicant State: DISCONNECTED
RSSI: -200
BSSID:
SSID:
Hidden SSID: False
IP-adress: 0.0.0.0
Mac-Address: /censored/
Network ID: -1
Link Speed: 1 Mbps

What should I try to fix my WiFi connection?

What troubleshooting steps have you already tried so far?  Can you install ADB (from Android SDK) and try to get the log?

Make sure the Wi-Fi router is not banning you. Wi-Fi routers have a setting to allow/deny specific MAC Addresses which could be used by your brother (to tease you).
If you are allowed to connect with router, this means DHCP is not working for you. DHCP service automatically assign IPs to devices in network. DHCP server on router could be corrected after reboot. It has assigned IP to your brother's device, after all.
If rebooting router doesn't work, it means that DHCP client in your device is not working properly to obtain IP. Try turning off - on Wi-Fi, restart device. If its not a big matter, you may do factory reset, too.
If it's also not working or you don't want to do factory reset, Fix IP of device. On Wi-Fi settings screen, hit menu button and tap Advanced. From here, you can fix IP to device after ticking Use Static IP address. If you don't know IP addressing, grab your brother's IP and change digit after last dot. Make sure, no other device in network has that IP.

"DHCP not working" could also mean it has been running out of leases (i.e. it has no free IP it could assign). Besides, I encounter a similiar problem with my HTC Buzz running CM7 from time to time: Wifi goes on, it sees the network(s), tries to connect and obtain an IP -- and suddenly all networks are "out of reach" (according to the Wifi setting's network list; you might want to check that as well). While it's not helping to turn Wifi off/on or airplane on/off, just leaving it alone for 10..30min, it finally connects.

@Izzy That rarely happens in home networks where router is under own control.

"rarely" does not mean "never" -- one never knows...