text:
Android execute script at logout
I would like to execute a script at logout with my GS7 android 9 (Resurrection Remix). I see that it is advised to use tasker. I guess it is possible to do that without installing a graphical application.
I connect to the smartphone through adb and have a shell. Where can I write a file in the file system with bash or python commands that will be executed at logout ? Also, how should I manage the bash or python environment in order to have it working ?
Thanks for your time.

On a rooted device you can make use of init's on shutdown trigger:
# /etc/init/custom.rc

on shutdown
    exec - -- /path/to/executable

For more details on how to run an executable from init's .rc file, and what factors need to be taken care of, see my answer to How to run an executable on boot and keep it running?

I tried the solution and was able to do things. I created a shutdown.sh script, make it executable and put it under /bin/
#!/bin/bash

/data/data/com.termux/files/usr/bin/mosquitto_pub MOSQUITTO_COMMAND

And it works from adb shell.
Then I created the /etc/init/custom.rc file with
on shutdown
       exec - -- /system/bin/shutdown.sh

And when I shut it down that doesn't work. I think the files permissions are good. However, I am confused with the android file system. Should I make everything under /system or not ?

How to make code blocks in comments ?

I tried different things about custom.rc. Can not get it doing anything at shutdown. I don't find anything online. Any suggestion ?

@yoarch the usual troubleshooting steps. Set proper mode, owner, context on files. Apply dos2unix if needed. Start with something simple like exec - -- /bin/echo Hello. Then replace - with u:r:magisk:s0 or some other super context. Or set SELinux permissive. Check dmesg for init log.

Thanks for the answer.
Could you give me a concrete example with /bin/echo Hello please ? As the partition seems to be read only, I can not do something like exec - -- /bin/echo Hello > /some/file.
I checked the dmesg logs with dmesg | grep init. But I don't see anything related to the custom.rc script.
The path should be "/bin/echo Hello" or "/system/bin/echo Hello" ?
I guess I need magisk to be installed in order to use the u:r:magisk:s0 context ? That is my case.

Any one ?
I can not get that script be run while shutting down my android phone. This is the only part I can not get working ..


text:
How do I exclude songs from being ring-tones/notification tones?
So, I have amassed quite a collection of music on my phone, which runs Android 4.1 (yes, I know this is old… the phone works better than many newer devices)… about 3300 odd tracks.
I also have 3 files that have been on the SD card (actually, on a previous card, and they've been migrated from card to card for the past 8 years or so) which I actually wish to use as ringtones.  They're in MP3 format (in contrast to my music which is in Ogg/Vorbis format).

/sdcard0/music is where my music is being kept.
/sdcard0/ringtones is where my ringtones are being kept.

How do I exclude /sdcard0/music from being "seen" by the ring-tone selection screens, whilst still permitting the files therein to be "seen" by media players?  (Using features native to Android 4.1 please, NO THIRD PARTY APPLICATIONS.  Due to this device's age, I do not have Google Play Store available.  So this solution won't work for me as I can't install software from Google Play store.)

Reply to the comments:

The solution there in the link, have you tried it?

No, because I specifically stated NO THIRD PARTY APPLICATIONS.  I'm looking for a solution that uses the features shipped with Android 4.1.

Create a folder and place those files in it. In the same folder create .nomedia…

Kindly read the question again.  That excludes the files from everything, media players included.  I only want to exclude these files from notifications/ringtones.  I have a media program that excludes the ring-tones from the playlist, that's a solved problem, and NOT what I asked about.

The solution there in the link, have you tried it? You can download the Apk using APKMirror or Racoon software. None of them require Google Play.

Create a folder and place those files in it. In the same folder create . nomedia  file using file explorer. This will hide the folder from media scanning. Use a media player that allows you to select the folders from which music can be played. Power amp is one which does that, though haven't used that in last couple of years

@beeshyams Poweramp needs Android 5+. But your suggestion to use alike apps is valid of course. :)

If limiting to the in-built features of Android 4.1, then the option might be very limited, not to mention additional feature customization/restriction by the vendor (we don't know the device model, so we also don't know the limitation). The problem is, there's nothing differentiating a ringtone from a song, both are audio files, except, one is stored on /ringtones folder, and the other is on /music. Android by default should only consider those in the /ringtones as ringtones, but I don't know if it behaves like that for external storage (e.g. SD card)

@firelord, No, because I do not have APKMirror or Racoon on my device.

@beeshyams Please read the question.  You've just answered how to exclude ring-tones from media players.  I wish to exclude songs from the ring-tones selection menu.  I already use a media player that restricts media to a specific directory.

@AndrewT. The device is a ZTE T83, using what looks to be a fairly vanilla Android 4.1 installation.  Ring tones were originally on the SD card under /ringtones and have been moved to the on-device storage with no change in behaviour for the ring-tone selection.  Music has always been on /music on the SD card since they won't fit on on-device storage (and it's a pain to load).  Ring-tones are a bult-in feature of Android 4.1, so controlling what directory they are stored in should be configurable that way too.

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
How can I enable Android Debugging from a root shell on the phone?
I have a root shell on the phone.
However, no adb service seems running, i.e. the port 5555 is on the device not open1:
$ telnet 1.2.3.4 5555
Trying 1.2.3.4...
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host: Connection refused

I.e. something what should listen on adb connections, does not run on my Android.
Can I somehow start it from a root shell (on the Android)?
I have Android 10.
1Telnet only serves here port testing purpose, obviously adbd will be connected by adb.

Run:
settings put global adb_enabled 1

You can also start adbd service by executing start adbd or setprop ctl.start adbd. But I prefer the settings way because it properly goes through Android framework.
PS:
For clarification, adbd listens on port 5555 only if ADB over Network is enabled (from Developer Options, or by running setprop service.adb.tcp.port 5555 on device, or by running adb tcpip 5555 on PC). In USB mode (which can be switched to by running adb usb on PC) adbd is not listening on any network port. Some more related details in this answer.

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


text:
Screen not registering all inputs (touchscreen isnt broken)
So i recently got a new phone, its good but ive noticed an issue with it. For whatever reason the screen isnt registering inputs but it like is at the same time (hard to explain)
So if i go into developer options and turn on the show touch coordinates, it will show all of my inputs im doing on the screen fully accurately. The issue is that the game im playing isnt being told about these inputs at all and acting like they arent there. (not an issue with the game itself, this happens everywhere, even on the home screen.)
So the physical screen itself is fully fune but there is some kind of artificial limitation in the software or whatever.. and im wondering if i could fix it somehow, like flash a rom or change some setting or some screen repair app
here is a few demonstration videos: https://youtu.be/pJLiaXRxzWA (the display showing the inputs are happening but thing no work work)
https://youtu.be/I8RUbMgNnGM (press finger on screen screen no do thing bla bla bla..)
The phone is Poco x3 nfc by xiaomi, running android 10, MIUI global 12.0.4 stable
and if anyone knows a better place to post this to get better answers please tell me

Use a screen test app (e.g. this to check if you have dead regions.

watched the videos and all i can see is touch is working fine - so what's the problem?

the problem is that inputs are being dropped. idk how you watched those 2 videos and came to that conclusion

I had the same issue for few days, on the same phone. First try enabling 'show pointer' in developer options. If touches are detected but not registered or occassionally omitted, switch off device for 5 mins, and turn back on. Worked for me!


text:
ADB Device Unauthorized - Locked out Samsung S9 - USB Debugging is On, but locked out of the verification pop-up
I locked myself out of my Samsung Galaxy S9.  I genuinely just forgot my gesture swipe lock, and my phone must have restarted overnight, so I couldn't use my fingerprint.

USB Debugging is On
I have ADB up and running on my PC
/adb devices brings back my phone as 'unauthorized'
I cannot get through my lock screen, so I am unable to allow access on the pop-up on my phone.
Phone is not rooted, no custom recovery

Hopefully someone can help, I really don't want to have to factory reset.

Not gonna happen that way, you're pretty much out of luck on the ADB side of things. Do you know the Google account on the phone? If so you should be able to recover it fairly easily., either through the device via the "forgot password" option, or from Google's Find My Phone (Lock the device via the web interface, then unlock with that PIN).

@acejavelin
Yes the google account is mine, however, there is no option to unlock my phone with "Forgot Password" after I fail swipe. There is no option other than Emergency Call.
Google's Find My Device gives me 3 options, Play Sound, Secure Device, Erase Device.
Secure Device only Locks and Signs me out of my Device.  I have no option to send a temporary code or PIN.
And sadly, I did not know about Samsung's Unlock Remotely setting, so I can't unlock it through Samsung's Find My Phone
Is there something I'm doing incorrectly to not have the Google options available?

@acejavelin it wouldn't let me tag you, hopefully this works?

I think it's "Secure Device" option now... I haven't tried it in a long time, it's changed a lot. Seems to be less options than before. But once you enter your passcode wrong enough times, doesn't give an option to recover with Google Account?

and tagging works fine, it just doesn't highlight it like other forums. I got two notifications, was just working and couldn't get to it right away. :)

@acejavelin I used "Secure Device" before posting my question, I never got an option to put in a new or temporary Pin/Password.  All I was able to do was add an optional recovery message, and a phone number (which showed up on my phone as a button to call that number directly)
And no, I only have swipe and fingerprint turned on in my settings (prefer it over PIN, tho I'm regretting that now).  When I keep failing my swipe code, I just get locked out on a timer before I can try again.  Time started at 15 seconds, and then climbed to 30s, 1m, 2m, 4m, 8m, and now I'm at 16m between tries.

i am afraid google removed that feature, stupid


text:
Reboot loop for Moto Z2
Recently my moto z2 play stuck in "reboot loop".
I couldn't able to move further due to "Developer option" was not enabled. I've tried the following methods, but no luck 0 still the restart is persistence

Tried "Restart Bootloader", and from PC done fastboot to wipe the User Data / Cache
Tried to enter "Recovery mode", no luck

Do we've any work around to get it fixed, as I don't want to waste the hardware resource

you have wiped userdata / cache from fastboot, does it mean your bootloader is unlocked?

for locked bootloader there is EDL mode. i have recently linked some collection, there are three prog_emmc_firehose_8953_moto.mbn you can try https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/231754/any-way-to-root-a-crushed-phone-and-get-encryption-file-from-it#comment305554_231754

nothing much working


text:
How to insert a recovery and root in HTC Desire 820 Dual Sim?
I want to insert a custom ROM in HTC Desire 820 dual sim. I have unlocked the bootloader and tried to insert a TWRP recovery. I have tried multiple recoveries namely:

HTC_A51_TWRP_Recovery_3.0.2-0_htcui
HTC_D820_TWRP-Recovery-2.8.7.0-en
HTC_TWRP_Recovery_All
recovery.iso
twrp-3.0.2-0-a32e
twrp-3.1.1-0-a5
twrp-3.2.2-0-a51cml_tuhl

While trying to flash these Unfortunately I Corrupted the OS. The first four of the above TWRP either won't get flashed due to
target reported max download size of 16777216 bytes
Invalid sparse file format at header magi
error: write_sparse_skip_chunk: don't care size 5736448 is not a multiple of the block size 4096
sending sparse 'recovery' (16382 KB)...
error: write_sparse_skip_chunk: don't care size 5736448 is not a multiple of the block size 4096
error: write_sparse_skip_chunk: don't care size 5736448 is not a multiple of the block size 4096
OKAY [  1.673s]
writing 'recovery'...
FAILED (remote: image error! (BootMagic check fail))
finished. total time: 1.689s

The other 2 flashed but when Executed the command fasboot boot twrp-3.0.2-0-a32e.img or the one with a5 the error is
downloading 'boot.img'...
OKAY [  1.356s]
booting...
FAILED (remote: dtb not found)
finished. total time: 1.356s

the last didn't give any error but doesn't work either( possibly because its a Desire 830 .img but its the only one not giving the error
the phone is (or was) android 6.0.1
A51_DTUL PVT SHIP S-ON
HBOOT-3.19.0.0000
RADIO-01.01.010_U10305041_08.01.51015
OS-3.17.720.3
eMMC-boot 2048MB
Apr 11 2016,21:16:51.0

It doesn't have an OEM unlock and I'm pretty much new to recovery and root stuff. Please suggest me how can I root this device too, so I don't fall into further problems. Thanks in advance :)

Have you checked https://www.htcdev.com/bootloader/ for instructions to unlock the bootloader?

@Robert I have unlocked the bootloader from the official site and it is successfully unlocked.

@beeshyam i think it is not the official recovery as it mentions it for desire 620 and mine is 820 dual sim. I gave it a try though dosen't work.

Sorry, my bad. Very strange situation. I had up voted your question. Hope you get a solution


text:
Google's Messages app says text message sent by SMS
Pixel 4a, Android 11
As in the title, why does Google's Messages
app says sent by SMS? (Text messages are sent by SMS anyway, why emphasize?).
See below OK in the screenshot.

This is a self answered question, to share a new feature. Also, to answer questions that may be asked about this in the future (mark them duplicates).

Today morning, I got a prompt asking me if I wanted to enable chat features on messages app. I did that and saw the info on the SMS sent yesterday. Dug, to know more, and here's the summary from the Google FAQ on chat features :

You need the messages app as default SMS app.

Chat features are support is region/country/carrier specific.

When using chat features, your messages are sent using the Rich Communication Services (RCS) protocol over Wi-Fi and mobile data.

Show you when someone is typing
Offer read receipts (show when someone has read or received your message, as well as showing your contact when you read their message)
Send messages over mobile data and Wi-Fi
Lets you share files and high-resolution photos

Sending over Wi-Fi doesn't cost, over mobile data will be as per mobile data plan.

To answer the question, recipient doesn't have this feature enabled on their app and therefore SMS was not sent over Wi-Fi or mobile data and sent as normal SMS. It is only highlighting this aspect. Similarly, if you were to send MMS content in the same situation (feature not enabled, data not used), it would show as

If chat feature is enabled and sent by data, it would show mobile or Wi-Fi as the case may be.


text:
How secure is your data in Android when an app is given access to storage, camera, contacts
I am just trying to understand that, these days most of the apps require access to things like camera, storage, contacts.
Is there any data privacy link to read through for an app consumer to know what is all that an app is doing in your background, in simple English so that a non-tech person can also understand the effects
I see some apps, like a fitness apps, asking for camera access, and allow access to make calls, cannot join the dots like why does it require camera access and asking for permission to make calls. I'm sure there must be scan/check when an app is uploaded to Playstore, but is this point checked like why a fitness app is asking permission to make calls or camera access.
I am sure given an app, the app devs know exactly what all does the app does with all access permission in hand. Isn't it creepy sometimes from a consumer point of view.
A little I know is some apps collect our data and just sell it
Any online document link on privacy policy, data collection given an app, could help understand in detail. Could anyone throw some light or thoughts on app consumers data security in Android

Asking for on line resources and references is off topic here. Besides, the question looks pretty broad. //Consider editing by not asking for references, and narrowing the scope to the Android version you are using.  Examples of some specific apps, you have in mind may also be  additional  inputs

this and this may help

Also see the tag wiki of permissions and the linked questions

Are multiple-users protected from each other differently than apps?


text:
How can I see which (system) apps are installed with which account?
I have three different Google accounts on my phone, with one the default one. I want all apps to be installed on that account. I've just noticed that one app was installed with an account that is not under my control. Strangely enough this is a system app.
How can I see which apps are installed with which account?

"one app was installed with an account that is not under my control." -> can you elaborate on this? If it is a system app, it would have already been installed in the phone before you got the phone. What is your reasoning for deducing that this particular app was "installed with an account that is not under my control"?

It's very simple, just like I said. The Google account is not under my control. It belongs to an organisation and they can decide to take over the account. It won't happen, but it's a possibility.

I think there may be a miscommunication. What I meant is, you observed something (A), then had a reasoning process (B) to deduce that "one app was installed with an account that is not under my control". Could you share about the A and B? Then we could try to answer more accurately.

System apps come with OS before even adding accounts. They have nothing to do with which account you use.
Google accounts matter only for user installed apps either if it is a paid app or if auto backup is enabled for that app and you backup your apps.
Only exception I can think of is that your device is rooted and you installed an app that can be made into a system app, and you are now assuming that this system app is associated with Google account.

OK thanks. I see that for system apps it doesn't matter. However, in the past I've had my personal Whatsapp account linked to a work account. I discovered this just in time, could recover a backup and move it to my personal account. Now this happens, and it made me wonder how I can see which apps are linked to which account.

This ideally should be a separate question. I am not sure how to do this


text:
upgrading to android 10 on RedMi Note 5
I have made system update on my Redmi Note 5. Before system update it has Android version 7.2. Now after I do system update it is showing MIUI version 11.0.5.0 and Android Version 9PKQ1.180904.001. I do not understand what is this android version indicates, is it android version 7 or 8 or 9 or 10? I did not understand. Now I want to update my android version on RedMi Note 5 to Android 10, is it possible?

It's Android 9

The Redmi Note 5 was launched back in 2017, running Snapdragon 625 with MIUI 9.5 based Android 8.1 Oreo. It has since picked the Android 9 Pie. However, in the last couple of months, the device has not received any form of support, and amid the arrival of MIUI 12 update on the device, Xiaomi has now released a new global stable update for the Redmi Note 5.

The update is based on MIUI 11. It brings the August security patch to the device in a 523MB size package, and with a version number, MIUI 11.0.5.0 PEIMIXM

It was launched with Oreo according to this blog, not Android 7
From what I read, your device does not have stock upgrade to Android 10. You can look for custom ROMs on XDA.


text:
WiFi Error: “Failed to connect to network” - Google Pixel 3xl, Android 11
My Google Pixel 3XL was working perfectly fine and now it refuses to connect to wifi. It just says "Failed to connect to network" whenever and however I try.
I'm not running a custom ROM.
I have not installed anything new since it was working - it was working fine and then it wasn't
I haven't physically damaged my phone, wifi seems to be the only thing effected, all other functions are normal as far as I can see
Here is everything I've tried:
I've checked that the wifi router works by testing it with other devices.
I've tried connecting to new SSIDs that the phone has never met before
I've tried conneting in safe mode
I've installed the latest updates to my phone and tried again
This old question suggests that I delete a wifi config file: WiFi Error: "Failed to connect to network" I cant access that file, probably because I'm not root. So that is probably not going to happen.
The next thing to try is a factory reset. But I really really want to avoid that.
Do any of you have anything else I can try?

Put it on airplane mode, wait for a little while and then try to connect // go to settings, delete saved networks. Sometimes this helps

Have you done a Network Settings Reset? Go to Settings, System, Reset Options, and select "Reset Wi-Fi, mobile & Bluetooth" and do that. Then reboot and test again. This does NOT effect any of your data like contacts, pictures, or apps.

@acejavelin thanks, but it didn't work. I even tried again in safe mode

@beeshyams thanks. But it didn't work

Sheena, looks like a hardware issue (considering it didn't work in safe mode). If you take it to service center, they will ask you to do a factory reset. Might as well try flashing the full stock image before going the repair route

I reset to factory settings and it worked. That's what I wanted to avoid but it is what it is. At least the phone still works

The Problem for me was that I set up my Wi-Fi with WPA3 + WPA2 which caused this failure and series of disconnects on other phones


text:
How to close Android recovery mode
I want to wipe cache partition on android recovery mode. But I dont know how to close it. In my phone the screen is seems like this photo

After eipe cache partition what should I type to turn it off and go to my home screen

please note the cache partition is not used for apps cache. reason why one will wipe cache partition is to cancel already scheduled OTA installation or delete recovery logs

Simply click on "Reboot system now".


text:
Moisture detection when connecting external hard-drive to tablet
I have a Fire HD 10 Tablet with android in it and i'm trying to use external USB (like storage or mouse) but when i plug the tablet to an USB-Hub connected to a SD Card it reads it for about 10 seconds and then throws the message "Moisture/Water detected, please unplug the USB".
The thing is i tried this with another tablet and it's the same.
However, i tried with my PC and it works fine, so the problem can't come from the USB-Hub or the SD Card.
Any suggestions how i can solve this?
(I know it's more a hardware topic here, but maybe the problem can come from software too?)

Keep your test set-up as simple as possible. I would start with a direct connection without USB hub (just a mouse or an USB stick). And try different USB cables.

Sounds like a Comm error. I would try PE ground to 0V on Android


text:
Android Navigation Buttons Not Touchable On Top
My navigation buttons are not touchable at the top of them, just above their icons. I recorded a video of this issue, but it's too large to upload here, so I put it on YouTube. (https://youtu.be/q43QheBsSnI) I have the Show Pointer Location setting on so if you maximize the video, you can see where I'm tapping at the bottom. Does anyone know how I can fix this issue? I've tried restarting, searching the internet for people experiencing similar issues, and digging through my phone's settings.

Can be a displacement problem between screen and digitizer. Or your screen has dead zones where it does not detect touches. Use a screen test program to check.

I thought that as well at first, but if you check out the video, the cursor appears in the correct place, which means the digitizer is correct and there are no dead zones. It's as if the button height is too short.

Or there is an invisible overlay that partially covers the button bar and does not pass through the touches.

Second what @Robert said. Go to your settings and see which apps have screen overlay permission and  check//If you are using some screen related app, disable that! //Try a different launcher

I tried a new launched and tried disabling a number of the apps with the "appear on top" permission, to no avail.


text:
How to activate internal mic during phone calls when using headphones with a USB-C to audio dongle?
I would like to use my Samsung Galaxy S20 phone with my quality studio headphones for phone calls. Since the device does not have a 3.5 mm audio socket, I am using a USB-C to 3.5 mm dongle. The problem is that when the dongle is plugged in, the phone expects the audio recording to come from the headset's inline microphone, while disabling the built-in microphone.
Is there a way to set the phone to use the internal mic while using external headphones through the dongle?
I tried a couple of dongles and all have the same issue.
Update: Phone is Samsung Galaxy S20, Android version 11, not rooted.

Mmmm... what? I am not sure my question was understood - I want to use stereo headphones. They don't have a mic. But when plugged into the phone using the USB-C dongle, I cannot make phone calls, b/c it disables the phone's built-in mic. I don't need to record the call. Just to enable the microphone.


text:
WhatsApp icon randomly changes its association and starts the camera
The phone is Google Pixel 4a. I created the shortcut for WhatsApp by dragging the application icon to the home screen in the normal way, but the icon randomly changes its association and it starts the camera instead.
The correct association is restored by shutting down the phone and rebooting. But this has happened 3 times in as many days. Never did it until this last week. No new apps installed or setting changed.
Why and how to prevent this from happening again?

I have the same device and it only happened once with me. I went to Whatsapp posted an image using camera from Whatsapp to a contact. Exited Whatsapp.. After that no issues


text:
How to update Android on Samsung Tab 8.9 - GT-P7300
I have a tablet Samsung Tab 8.9
Model number: GT-P7300
It has Android 3.2 and it should be upgradable to Android 4.0.4
I downloaded a big zip file named "XSG-P7300JPLP7-20121217--www.SamSony.net--.zip" - 419 MB
It contains various .md5 files and a file named
"P7300JPLP7_P7300OJPLP4_P7300XXLQ6_HOME.tar"
I also downloaded latest Odin - v3.14
But I have no idea how to tell Odin to make use of those files.

Does this answer your question? What do the terms "BL", "AP", "CP", and "CSC" mean in Odin?

Does this answer your question? Where are the download images for Android?

https://www.xda-developers.com/update-firmware-any-samsung-phone

https://android.stackexchange.com/a/141474/131553

Thanks, so I should use AP. What version of Odin though? I posted the question on XDA forum too - https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/what-version-of-odin-i-need-for-samsung-tab-8-9-gt-p7300.4205497/

I was reading somewhere that the Odin version should correspond to the year in which the update you plan to flash is released// No idea how to go about finding that


text:
Is it reliable to save some app files in /storage/emulated/0/?
I already read that /sdcard/ is a symlink to the actual path of /storage/emulated/0/.
I'm an Android app developer using Apache Cordova, wherein cordova.file.externalRootDirectory is indeed file:///storage/emulated/0/.
Is it always fully reliable to save some app internal files at /storage/emulated/0/path/to/app, considering that the user might not have an external physical memory card on their phone?

As for the question title, the answer is "No": emulated is not physical but what's sometimes called the "internal SD card". The physical one usually shows up in /storage by its label, e.g. /storage/DF8C-A1B1. Besides, emulated/0/ is what shows up at /sdcard if the device owner is "logged in". If there are other accounts, their "internal SD card" shows up as emulated/1/ and so on.

@Izzy external SD cards are also emulated using FUSE/sdcardfs the way /data/media is. Additionally /sdcard (/storage/emulated/0) may point to a physically external SD card at least in two situations: 1) User formatted the SD card as Adoptable storage and migrated complete data to it. 2) On a device with physical primary only storage configuration (which isn't very common).

@IrfanLatif never heard of those, thanks for the pointer! But if you read the page behind the link, it doesn't say a word on "emulated" for this rare case – but it says for all others: "Primary shared storage (/sdcard) is emulated on top of internal storage." And that's not the "physical card" – especially not with the Nexus 6 being named an example (except for the Nexus 1, no Nexus has a slot for SD cards). You may have a point with adoptable storage, though, which I never used (why should I; that's just an emergency last resort anyhow).

@Izzy SD cards are always emulated whether using as Portable Storage or Adoptable Storage or with the Physical Primary Only configuration. Apps are never accessing the undelying filesystem directly in shared storage. And I haven't used any device with the Physical Primary Only configuration either, nor I've ever used Adoptable storage except for making experiments. But from a developer's perspective all possible situations have to be considered.

Is it always fully reliable to save some app internal files at /storage/emulated/0/path/to/app?

No. External shared storage isn't reliable, as documented under getExternalFilesDir() and other related documentation, because of multiple possible reasons:

User or any other app with full storage access can read, modify or delete the files.
App's private directories in external storage get deleted when the app is uninstalled.
User might be using physically external SD card as the only primary shared external storage. So the data is lost when the card is removed.

Better use internal storage (getFilesDir() and sisters) for data security and reliability. For more details:

Android's Storage Journey
Where Android apps store data?
What is /storage/emulated/0/?

thanks a lot, but when the user never had a physically external card in the first place, does /storage/emulated/0/path/to/app still exist?

@JoãoPimentelFerreira yes. /storage/emulated/0 always exists. It's an emulated filesystem, the actual underlying directory is /data/media/0. You can please go through my answers to the linked questions for detailed explanation on this.


text:
Is there a way to make a folder you CAN'T share images from?
I'm constantly scared I might accidentally "butt-dial" share my girlfriend's sensitive images, is there any way to make a folder for images that won't include a share function?

Creating a .nomedia file with any file explorer hides the folder, in which images are stored . Try that and see if your "share" apps can access it or not (I guess they shouldn't but to be sure) pr use one of the many apps on Play Store that  hide photos and test


text:
Boot loop after messing with the smallest width option in developer options. (Redmi 5 plus)
so I was bored and I decided to check some developer options to see what they can do...
I found this option called 'smallest width', at first I set it from 392 to 100 and it automatically set itself to two hundred something I believe. So I did the same thing but this time I set it to 1000 thinking that it would automatically set itself to the max value possible... But it didn't. Right after pressing 'Ok', my screen became soo small and a message pooped up saying "System is not responding", then my phone restarted to recovery. Unlike many people who were facing this problem on the internet, My phone's bootloader is unlocked, I have TWRP recovery installed, my phone is rooted and I had USB debugging on. I rebooted to bootloader and tried "adb devices" but my phone wasn't there. After that, I booted to TWRP and clicked Mount then checked all boxes (I couldn't check storage) and clicked Mount USB Storage. This time my phone showed up in the list. Check the image below.
I don't know if it's okay that it's saying recovery instead of device, but I ran "adb shell wm density reset", it didn't work and same with "adb shell wm size reset".
As you can see in the image below, there was no error but the phone still didn't want to boot. After that I tried to check my current screen size and density using "adb shell wm size" and "adb shell wm density", but there was no response.
I also checked the build.prop file in /system and found this line "persist.miui.density_v2=440", I changed it to 220, nothing happened.
https://i.stack.imgur.com/zalow.png
Now my question is, why is there no response when I run "adb shell wm size/density"? It doesn't work in the TWRP terminal as well. Is this command supposed to be in the /sbin directory? Because I couldn't find it there. How can I add it if it is not there? And lastly, if you can suggest any other way to fix my phone that would help me a lot. Thank you so much.

When booted into TWRP, find your relevant density property in /data/property/persistent_properties and change it there. Use VIM or nano to edit that file. Do not pull it into PC and than push it back.

Wipe all data and restart. That's what I did after I made the same mistake of changing the width drastically from 392 to 1000.
It messes with the UI and goes into a loop.

adb reset  commands worked for me.
I had USB debugging on. And  a few seconds after reboot(after MIUI animation) my device showed in adb devices. Then I used adb shell wm density reset


text:
can't enter recovery mode after flashing resurrection remix v5.8.5 android 7.1 in Lenovo vibe k4 note
recently I have been trying out new roms. When I flashed resurrection remix v5.8.5 on my device (Lenovo vibe k4 note) via TWRP recovery, after that the room was working fine, but magisk came pre-installed, which, when I open, gives an error: "magisk manager has stopped working". So I decided to change to another rom. but I can't boot into recovery menu after flashing resurrection remix os. when I try to boot into recovery, it directly boots the system. And when I power it off, after an hour or two, it automatically powers on and boots the system. I would be grateful if someone helps me. Thank you

uninstall + re-install Magisk Manager apk

I can uninstall magisk, but can't reinstall cuz I can't enter recovery mode

i am talking about Magisk Manager apk only (not about Magisk zip)


text:
USB Tethering only SOMETIMES working
Hello unlike all the problems here which is related to their USB Tethering in android being grayed out or not working at all when connected, mine is an odd case
I use usb tethering with my android Xiaomi Mi9 since my PC doesn't have LAN and the wifi dongle reads my wifi as "Hidden Network" and inputting SSID still doesn't work
I can toggle on and off USB Tethering but the tethering doesn't work all the time. There are times where I tether and it gives my PC internet. There are also times where nothing happens even though my tethering is turned on and i have to turn it on and off multiple times until it does.
Now It's even worse because i have to on-off it multiple times like 5-10 times already.
I didn't use USB debugging and I don't have any VPN applications
I tried using a different wire and it's still the same.
Can anyone give me insight on what the problem might be?

Need to narrow it down a bit, potentially three items assuming that your phone network operator is not at fault
Phone itself
Data cable
The PC
Can you if possible try your phone and cable on a different PC.
Do you have any data transfer issues with the phone on the PC ? such as backups etc,  worth trying another cable if possible.
Daft one but try the cable in a different USB port too.
Finally if you are able to try a different phone on your PC to test if tethering works.
It may not matter but others could need to know what OS your PC is running.


text:
Is it possible to get assistant voice on Android Auto sounding good without data?
I don't use data to use AA (I have offline Spotify and offline Maps) for the most part.
As a result the assistant voice sounds like a robot from the 1970s.
Anyway to "download" the good assistant voices or force Android Auto to sound good?
I have tried to set the voice sampling in Android Auto up to 48kHz.

Google's text-to-speech engine is an AI based cloud system: https://cloud.google.com/text-to-speech Typically such systems make use of special AI hardware chips. Without them speech generation would require a high-end computer. Some recent high-end smartphones also have AI chips, but I don't know if Google's offline speech generator can make use of them.

Still, why does it sound so so much better on bluetooth with using Android Auto? That is all I want.

1.It's an old Google issue with no solution here 2. Re: Your comment above . Some people in link above complained about the same thing (sounding fine on Bluetooth) 3.  Asking why it sounds better on Bluetooth is off topic IMO, because it is Android independent


text:
Change "add to home screen" image
Is there an easy way to change the add to home screen image on Android devices?
I know how to change the HTML manually but for example I would like to change it for the YouTube web app for example.

Nova Launcher let's you edit the image (by long-press on the shortcut icon) and change it with other app icons or icons provided by icon packs.
Example below shows the original shortcut icon of this question on left, followed by app icon (in middle) and using icon pack on the right.

I upvoted this but I am hopeful that there is a way to do this with a modified Javascript bookmarklet or something similar.  If nothing else I should be able to create custom HTML pages that redirect but is slopey.

Thanks, that's beyond me and likely the site scope too?

I think a self contained answer would be okay and on the site guidelines.


text:
Is there anyway to make any other keyboard quick prediction insert like Swift Key?
I love swiftkey I use it as my main keyboard typing layout.
It autocorrects words like rhe->the automatically when you hit space.
It is called quick prediction insert.
Is there any way to get this effect in GBoard or effectively any other keyboard? iOS works this way.

Why not just use Swiftkey if it does what you want?

2 words budget phones

Open Gboard settings > Text Correction
In the Correction section, enable Auto-Correction. Word like rhe will automatically be corrected to the when you press the Space bar.

When using Gboard version 10.0.02.338070508, an indication of the auto-correction  for the word rhe by the being bolded among the suggested words. When it is not in bold, it won't be auto-corrected.

You have not used swift key if you think these are equivalent.  Alternatively there is something wrong with my play store or installation.

You wrote "It autocorrects words like rhe->the automatically when you hit space". And my answer shows that Gboard can accomplish it. So what is the complain? "Alternatively there is something wrong with my play store or installation", what has that have to do with your question?

"Is there any way to get this effect in GBoard or effectively any other keyboard?". I wrote an answer showing that Gboard can also auto-correct when pressing the space bar. What I don't understand is your complaint about what the feature is called in swiftkey, and not in gboard? Is your question about how the feature is named in other apps? Does your gboard not auto correct words after following the steps mentioned in the answer?

I have determined what is wrong there is a 2nd option under the settings. I have added a picture.

That feature is practically useless because you can always tap the word on the suggestion strip easily.
No (after considering possible scenarios) it is not possible in gboard because even if you somehow get it to write words on tapping spacebar (with Automate app.. i can suggest method for that if you want.. but it will be pointless in my opinion) then you won't get it to be "intelligent" (I mean when you don't want the suggest word and just willing to hit a simple space)

iOS works this way also so not useless.  I rarely have a word that is not in the default dictionary.  Automate app sounds interesting.

If you post the automate app I'll post the bounty.

This solution is going to be complex and will consume additional battery (less tho) But if you want it I'll post it. So what the automate app will do is check the keystrokes. If first key pressed is space then check the second key, if that too is space then insert the middle word from the suggestion strip(explained later) but if the second key is not spacebar then don't do anything. We will need an "interact with UI" block to select the middle word. Yeah.. that's it.. I'll say again it's gonna consume battery and is useless cause you can tap the word on the suggestion strip.

Ping me if you agree with the suggestion above =)

I don't agree... I just use SwiftKey then.

Yeah, that's what you should do.. =)


text:
My notification panel and home button not working. It's saying developer options not available for this use when i checked the developer options
My android device(Asus max pro m2) is running on havoc(3.2) suddenly rebooted and I cannot use my notification panel, home button, or literally anything else. This issue will be solved if I delete the data partition using TWRP but. I have to literally install every application again and again. Nova launcher method not working for me. I tried everything regarding that nova launcher thing but no use. if I check the developer options it says developer options not available for this user. This isn't the first time this issue happened. but earlier I had to reset the things. but now I would like to know if there is any other solution to this. Anyone, please respond asap. cause I couldn't use my phone if I cant get a solution.
Thank you in advance

For the time being use https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.treydev.micontrolcenter&hl=en&gl=US and https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=nu.nav.bar&hl=en&gl=US until you get a solution. Don't reset that's a very tedious and annoying thing to do

Is there any permanent solution to this issue..?

Give these a try.. https://www.digitbin.com/cant-pull-notification-not-working/ And what do you mean by when i checked the developer options? What is it saying and what did you check.. please clarify

BEFORE THOSE try this.. Go to settings - users - switch to "guest" - switch back to "owner".

Developer options means settings>system>developer options. If I click that developer options it says Developer options are not available for this user. And regarding that guest mode, u suggested. I cant click that multiple user options. When I click the multiple users option nothing happens.

There is something weird with the users on your device. Can you see in which user you are somewhere? Developer options are only available for the Owner (the main user). And do you have any work profile active in Settings>Accounts? Which os are you on? and android version?


text:
Removed apps and users, Android OS uses too much data
I've noticed that Removed apps and Users uses too much data on the background. But dont know the reason.

In this photo I can see that Removed apps and users, and Android OS uses too much data. How to reduce this usage?

I know that Removed apps and users are use by my uninstall apps, disabled apps in the session. But if I use the uninstall apps then why this photo shows the the data used in foreground not in background .? Then how to reduce usage of Removed apps and users,  and Android OS

looks like normal youtube data to me. if the apps are uninstalled how can they use data (how can you know it)? if apps not uninstalled, enable it, check the usage again (and see the apps names)

I believe it's showing the history of removed apps and users' data usage. Did you uninstall some apps this month? For Android OS, related question: https://android.stackexchange.com/q/40446/44325, https://android.stackexchange.com/q/140155/44325, https://android.stackexchange.com/q/195368/44325

Ok I have uninstall some app but Didn't disable app. But see the 2nd photo it shows that the Removed apps and users uses data on the background. Do you know what is background. It allow a app to use data without opening the app

@Andrew T. is right. This is showing the history. To see today's data usage you will have to select the range as Todays date -  Same date one month later from the dropdown menu
The range of one month is default
I know this question is old but just to remove it from the "Unanswered Questions Section"


text:
Find what's crashing my phone
I have a Galaxy M51. At times, when I wake up in the morning, the phone is dead - No response to any of the buttons, when I call it from another phone, it says "the number is switched off", no response on connecting charger. Only when I press power button and vol. down together (hard restart), does the phone turn on and then starts working perfectly normal, only to show a similar behaviour in a few days

It is difficult to guess if it is a hardware or a software problem. The only safe way to get an answer is to perform a factory reset and not installing all your commonly used apps. Instead use the phone plain for some days and check if the problem occurs again. If not re-install your apps one-by-one to find the app that causes this problem.

Is there no way to find the culprit other than factory data reset of the phone?


text:
Instagram stories and local videos play in slow motion but sound is fine
A friend of mine started facing this problem yesterday night: when she browses through her Instagram stories, the video plays at a slower rate than normal, however the sound is totally fine. She went ahead and checked the gallery as well - same problem there. In TikTok though, there are no issues at all.
As she did not provide any more information (she is not tech savvy at all) here is the info that I know about her phone: it's a Huawei Y5 2018, with Android 8.
I searched online about this, but I didn't come up with anything related to Android. Any help is appreciated.

The latest version(s) of Instagram app seems to be very buggy. We have a large numbers of users complaining about different problems. May be the video problem is just another bug of the recent version.

@Robert Yes, IG might be buggy. But it also happens in the Gallery app. How is this explained?

@Robert Nevermind, she just messaged me saying it's OK now (she maybe deleted the cache). Should I delete the question to avoid a reputation drop?


text:
App not being loaded in the emulator
I am trying to run this project in the emulator through Android Studio (4.1.1) on Ubuntu 18.04. Everything seems to be set up properly in Android Studio, I have a device called Pixel XL API 29 and the emulator starts up but it doesn't open the app and I can't find the app in all apps.
At first, I had a couple of issues with the emulator not starting up at all but I managed to fix those - something to do with kvm - had to change some user settings and then restart my laptop.
I've tried googling but no solution yet, mostly I find issues with installing apps from the Google Play Store.
Any ideas appreciated!

Did you install the app in emulator using adb install? What message it shows? Did you check apps list in Settings?

If you don't want to make changes to the app I would recommend to you to just download the APK file from FDroid (there is a direct APK download link for each version of the FDroid app's page) and the install it using adb install.

@Robert I need to make changes to the app. Irfan, I found it in the Settings app lists of apps, even managed to run it from there. Any idea why it won't run by default and I can't see it in the app list?

Works for me without problems after I added a fake google-services.json to the project. Runs in emulator and app is directly opened.

Very strange. I'll try it on my other computer.

@PetarVasilev you can use a different home/launcher app. There are abundant.

@IrfanLatif what do you mean by that?

Aaaa you mean an app that handles the UI of the home screen and all apps sections?

@PetarVasilev yes.


text:
Default applications budget phone?
Is there a reason budget phones for android contain so many default applications?  Maybe this is required by Google?
I find YouTube, play books,play games, etc. to not be needed and redundant when you have a web browser especially on 16 gb phones.

I am not sure if it is a hard requirements to provide all the Google apps by default, may be it is just the cheapest was for a device manufacturer (less apps may lead to a higher price the manufacturer has to pay for the Google Android certification?). Unfortunately it seems like those details are not public (at least I wasn't able to find something on that topic on the net). Therefore I am not sure if your question can be answered.

Android Compatibility Definition Document lays down both hardware and software requirements for every Android version //If you see section 2.2.3 (software) for Android 11,it does not list all those apps. It mentions only a few things like launcher, browser etc//IMO,they are not mandatory //Why included is opinion based answer

@Robert you are correct that less apps lead to a higher price the manufacturer has to pay. Also the manufacturers shipping only base GMS with their devices are treated as third class citizens by Google. Details are revealed when you apply for a contract.

@IrfanLatif do you have a source for that because that combined with beeshyams source answers the question.

@William sorry no source. Just a little exposure through someone else's experience. But anyway, your question is off-topic here in my opinion.

@beeshyams You have referenced the "Android Compatibility Definition Document", which from my understanding deals with AOSP. However the vendors do not install AOSP, instead the install Google Android which is AOSP+Google apps (and an own certification on top). It is similar to the emulators: The default images are plain Android, but there are also Google-API images.

@William helpful links from my answer: https://www.androidauthority.com/google-oem-licensing-345806, https://www.cetrixtablets.com/new-device-certification/

As Irfan Latif mentioned, this only applies to Google-certified devices, one reason is to include Play Store and Play Services for user convenience. On the contrary, non-Google-certified devices cannot have Google apps preinstalled, and they don't have Play Store and Play Services installed, among other Google apps. Compare to Chinese brands non-certified budget devices instead, they mostly don't have Google apps because Google is blocked.


text:
How can I find the exact factory image version that my Pixel is using?
I have a Pixel 3XL on android 10 and a Pixel 3a on android 11. I had previously installed magisk on the Pixel 3a when android 11 was in beta. Recently I found that it had lost root, presumably because android 11 is out of beta and the phone had upgraded to the latest android 11 and was not using the magisk-patched boot image anymore. So, I patched the corresponding boot image for the latest android 11 factory image for pixel 3a, and fastboot flashed it, and it worked.
Unfortunately, I had mixed up my two phones in the fastboot flash step at first, and so then I ended up with the Pixel 3a with android 11 rooted again, but also with the Pixel 3XL stuck on boot, I guess because it had a wrong boot image (for pixel 3a actually) flashed into it. I tried to fix the Pixel 3XL by getting the latest android 10 factory image for it and patching the boot image with magisk. However, after fastboot flash of that patched boot image, it only worked partially. Namely, it could boot, adb shell works, etc., but it no longer responds to touch, so can't be used except for adb shell.
I'm guessing the problem is that I didn't know what was the factory image actually installed on my Pixel 3L, so I just guessed it was the latest, but the boot image from the latest might have some incompatibility with the actual factory image in the phone. I would like to find out what is the actual factory image installed on the Pixel 3L, so I can try to patch the matching boot image.
Hence, my question, how can I know what is the exact version of the android 10 factory image installed on my Pixel 3L? Googling doesn't seem to help, as most pages talk about how to install factory images, not how to find out what is the version installed. In answering my question, please note that I can't interact with the phone now through touch, so cannot check anything under "Settings" with the touch GUI, but can only see the fastboot info (see screenshot below) as well as anything I can access with adb shell (for example, any file in the phone I can check to find out the factory image version installed on the phone?)

I didn't want to return the device to the factory state, just hoping to flash the appropriate patched boot image (for magisk) without touching the rest of the files. Boot image is only one part of the factory image, if it can be matching with the other files, I don't have to do a full factory reset

Check the Android security settings for the "Android security patch level". As your system automatically installs updates you should have installed the latest version (Dec 2020). https://developers.google.com/android/images#crosshatch

@beeshyams Thanks, but I don't quite remember, so was wondering if somebody knew some other way to obtain the info from something like a file I could inspect on the phone. Yes, once I can get the right factory image, I know how to extract the boot image and flash it.

@Robert This phone was not on auto updates; I was keeping it on android 10 on purpose, as the other phone is on android 11.

In that case, I would flash latest OTA (full) //If this works your data is safe //Else factory image with data loss //I don't think it is possible with the limited info you have but then hope you get a solution

Thinking more about it - 1.since you already flashed a boot img and that's not working and you can't access any internals of device, finding out what the version was before is tough if not impossible 2. Why not flash boot images starting (from the time you remember you updated or when you bought the device) and and ending at the version you flashed? . At least one of them has to match //I know it's a tedious and clumsy process but better try than losing data//actually it may be more efficient to go backwards, that is, starting from version you flashed and going one month back at a time

Thanks @beeshyams , it turns out that the bootloader and baseband versions for the factory image I had tried, were different from the ones for the phone (as seen in the screenshot of the fastboot screen). Got another factory image where these versions matched, and it works!

Glad you got that right +1

Problem solved, my android 10 phone is working again!
The first crucial observation was that there are something like 18 different different versions of the factory images for Pixel 3 XL for Android 10. However, there is an interesting difference in the naming convention for the first 5 of these factory images, compared to the rest. The first 5 begin with "QP1A" where the rest begin with "QQ1A". See snapshot below for what I mean ..

Originally, I had just tried with the most recent factory image, which is QQ3A.200805.001, dated August 2020. Now, the most recent QP.. image, QP1A.191105.003, dated Nov 2019, was emerging as a candidate to try.
The second crucial observation was, looking at the factory image for QQ3A.200805.001, in the same zip file inside it that contains the boot.img, there is also an android-info.txt file, highlighted in blue in the screenshot below. So I was like, "duh .. why don't I see what it says?"

Here is what the android-info.txt says:

require board=crosshatch|blueline
require partition-exists=product
require version-bootloader=b1c1-0.2-6374987
require version-baseband=g845-00107-200409-B-6382632

Now, compare the bootloader and baseband versions here with the versions shown in my fastboot screen (the screenshot posted in my question above). So for this phone, I have bootloader=b1c1-0.2-5672671 and baseband=g845-00048-190722-B-5745561
Unless I misunderstand what "require" means, then "require version-bootloader=b1c1-0.2-6374987" and "require version-baseband=g845-00107-200409-B-6382632" clearly explain why the boot image from QQ3A.200805.001 didn't work as desired. It requires different versions of the bootloader and baseband than I had on my phone.
Excitedly, I checked the android-info.txt from the factory image of QP1A.191105.003, and the versions matched!

require board=crosshatch|blueline
require partition-exists=product
require version-bootloader=b1c1-0.2-5672671
require version-baseband=g845-00048-190722-B-5745561

By the way, I also checked another of the QP.. factory images (QP1A.191005.007, Oct 2019), and the bootloader and baseband versions also matched. Whereas even the earliest of the QQ.. factory images, (QQ1A.191205.008, Dec 2019), didn't match.
Anyway, happy to report that after patching the boot image from QP1A.191105.003, Nov 2019, and flashing it to the phone, touch has been restored and everything appears to be working properly again.

My download for Pixel 4XL doesn't contain a boot.img.  Instead it contains bootloader-coral-c2f2-0.4-8351033.img

That's interesting, I'm not aware of this happening in Pixel 4XL. Perhaps you could post a question to ask about it? Then it could get more visibility and somebody who knows more about Pixel 4XL could answer?


text:
What is this pop-in from the bottom of Chrome for Android?
I'm suffering from a pop-in, coming in from the bottom of the screen, in Chrome for Android.

It seems to be doing a Google search with whatever text I may have tapped. There's no button to close, and it's much more of a nuisance than a help.
What is it, and how do I turn it off?

This is Chrome for Android's feature known as Touch to Search.
The user can tap a word to let Google search quickly without leaving the current page.
From Google Chrome Help - Search the web on Chrome,

Search for words
You can find more info about a specific word or phrase on a page with Touch to Search.
Important: To use Touch to Search, Google must be set as your default search engine.

On your Android device, open the Chrome app.
Open a page.
To highlight a word on a page, tap it or touch and hold it.
To show search results for the highlighted word, tap the panel that opens at the bottom of the page.

Turn Touch to Search on or off

On your Android device, open the Chrome app.
Tap More > Settings > Google services.
Tap Touch to Search.
Turn Touch to Search on or off.


text:
Restricted profile can't unlock tablet in android 10
On a Samsung SM-T290 (Galaxy Tab A 8.0") with Android 10, there is regular user account and also a restricted profile for users to use in order to restrict what apps can be used.
In previous versions of android, the restricted profile could unlock the tablet. However, in android 10, I can't seem to switch to the restricted profile user on the lock screen, unless the regular user account unlocks it first.
Is there a way to allow the restricted user account to unlock the tablet, so the main user doesn't have to login/unlock it first?

As far as I know there is no other way. The primary user have to log in to unlock the encrypted files. On previous Android versions Full Disc Encryption was used and entering the password as part of the boot process was mandatory. Now the decryption is bound to the primary user first login.

Ah, bingo--that was it. Once I disabled encryption, the restricted user could unlock the tablet. In this case, file encryption isn't necessary. Settings > security > other security settings, turn off "strong protection". Thanks!

Yes! Thank you!


text:
/bin/sh: dumpsys: not found
I am working on an 845 uSOM (Linux sda845 4.9.103) and want to modify USB charging/battery behavior. I'm not the most knowledgeable when it comes to working with adb, and I am not sure how to move forward. It seems that I can neither use 'dumpsys' or 'service call'. My ultimate goal is for things like:
adb shell dumpsys battery unplug
adb shell dumpsys battery set

I am told online that in order to find the name of the service I need in place of 'battery' I need to use:
adb shell service list

However, this isn't found either. Am I supposed to use systemctl at this point?
systemctl list-unit-files

yields a service called 'charger_monitor.service' but at this point I don't know if I've found something useful or I am completely off the scent. Do I need to get dumpsys on this system? I thought that if I could use adb on a device then dumpsys came along with it but maybe it is not applicable on this uSOM?


text:
MT8163 MediaTek chip with SPFT gives this error no matter what I try - BROM ERROR: S_DL_GET_DRAM_SETTING_FAIL
I have a non-brand tablet built with locked bootloader, and I'm trying to flash it with spflashtool. Since it is a proprietary tablet built to be secure, there is no firmware available publicly. I'm trying to do a read back first in order to generate a scatter file by following the tutorial here at hovatek.
Chip type is MT8163v
When I try to do the readback, or anything else for that matter, I always get this error:
BROM ERROR: S_DL_GET_DRAM_SETTING_FAIL

This error typically occurs when trying to flash incorrect firmware. However, I'm not trying to flash yet. I'm just trying to accomplish a read back, in order to flash later with correct firmware.
According to hovatek, I should just be able to use the generic scatter file that they offer on their site., or create a generic scatter file using WWR MTK. However, I tried the scatter file using both methods and I still get the same error.
Is there any other reason I may be getting this error? Could different versions of spflashtool possibly work?
Any ideas greatly appreciated... I'm really at a loss here.

disable windows driver signature verification and install again vcom preloader driver. use proper download agent for your device https://blog.hovatek.com/so-whats-all-this-talk-about-meditek-secure-boot-and-da-files

be aware flashing on locked bootloader is possible with signed images only


text:
Can't access phone as forgotten work profile password
A while back I set a password for my work profile. For the life of me I cannot remember it (tried so many different combos).
I want to access my phone but it's asking for the password, which I don't know. I tried quite a few times and it eventually said if I input the wrong password again my work profile would be deleted. This would be fine as I could gain access to my personal account and set up my work profile again.... but no, after inputting another incorrect password, it just says try again in 30 seconds.
I can't even access my personal account as it's just asking for the password.
I don't want to go "nuclear" option to factory reset my phone as not all my data is backed up.
Is there anything else I can do to gain access to my phone?

https://android.stackexchange.com/q/232182


text:
Can we consider Huawei phones as unrootable?
Huawei unlocking happened until 2018/05 by getting an unlock code on the manufacturer's website page1 and giving it as an argument to a fastboot oem unlock.
In 05/2018, Huawei simply stopped this service with a hardly believable "explanation" citing "customer experience":

Today, two years later, I did not even find any trace on the Huawei's website that this service ever existed.
My google searches shown that probably there is no way more to unlock (= to root) Huawei phones.
I think, some way still remains: the flash chip could be soldered out from the phone motherboard, and modified/rewritten externally. But it requires a well-equipped electronics lab and the company still has various ways to harden it (like building various signature checking in their SoC, which can be disabled only on un-documented ways).
The situation remembers me to the Apple mobile devices, where iOS is sold while users have no way to modify/remove it or gain root access. Thus, Apple can do with their devices as they want to - they can only do what Apple allows.
What is the case now? Is there any known opion to unlock (root) Huawei devices, or we can consider them in the future as an Apple with an Android?
1Reference

Does this answer your question? How to root Honor 9 lite

Only if they work. If they do not work, we have a list of scams. My doubts are raising from the fact that the first link already says "first universal rooting solution", which is impossible, and from the fact that the developers of these paid apps have no more way to unlock the bootloader than us.

there is no general solution, the service has listed some devices where unlock codes available. if your device is not listed your device is not unlockable

related https://chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/112709/2020/9/6

Ok, now I see some chance that the developers found some way by reverse engineering and maybe by other sources. If it is so, they deserve the reward for their results.

Rooting itself does not necessarily require an unlocked bootloader. On XDA you can find a lot of examples for devices that can't be bootloader unlocked but rooted via exploit. Even custom ROMS may be possible (I remember my first HTC Desire which was not unlockable but you could even run custom ROMs, except from the kernel which could not be changed). Therefore I would say Huawei devices are not easily rootable, but they aren't 100% unrootable.

@Robert Some public db could exist from all android manufacturers, ordered by their rooting-friendliness.

flashing magisk_patched ramdisk.img via edl.py on locked bootloader worked, but even it is AVB signed the boot chain was broken. will buy unlock code for ATU-L21 and report

someone claimed that dc-unlocker is driven by huawei. if true that explains :) forum.xda-developers.com (be aware the first one is teamviewer scam)

some more links for collection https://twizzyindy.github.io/2019/01/26/Sneaking-into-Huawei-Bootloader-And-ATCMDSERVER https://github.com/SkyEmie/huawei-honor-unlock-bootloader

I readout bootloader code with HCU-Client
15.08.2021 21:24:20
HCU Client   v1.0.0.0378
Account: alecxs

Before detection connect cable to usb and enable Manufacture mode !

Qualcomm and HiSilicon: *#*#2846579#*#*
MTK: *#*#14789632#*#*
Windows: ##2846579#

ProjectMenu
1.Background setting
2.USB ports setting
Select Manufacture mode

Read Bootloader code

2021-08-15 21:24:20.419 Autodetect COM port and phone type start!
2021-08-15 21:24:21.489 Found COM port: COM25
2021-08-15 21:24:21.499 Found phone type: Huawei Android phone (Qualcomm CPU)
2021-08-15 21:24:21.599 Open COM port COM25 (DBAdapter Reserved Interface (COM25))...
2021-08-15 21:24:21.719 Connecting to server...
2021-08-15 21:24:21.849 Connected!
2021-08-15 21:24:25.391 Read phone secure info...
2021-08-15 21:24:25.611 Read phone basic info...

2021-08-15 21:24:25.671 Phone info data backup saved to file C:\Android\HCU_378\Backup\20210815_212425_866248042878049.BAK

2021-08-15 21:24:27.041 Read bootloader code success!

Bootloader code: POIXF6OJK4QQME0D

I was able to unlock bootloader Huawei Y6 2018 ATU-L21
fastboot oem unlock POIXF6OJK4QQME0D

I dumped ramdisk.bin from edl.py and patched with Magisk
- Device platform: arm64-v8a
- Installing: 23.0 (23000)
- Copying image to cache
- Unpacking boot image
- Checking ramdisk status
- Stock boot image detected
- Patching ramdisk
- Repacking boot image

****************************
 Output file is written to
 /storage/emulated/0/Download/magisk_patched-23000_4A2bd.img
****************************
- All done!

Finally flashed from fastboot and got device rooted.
(had to adb pull file from device because it was invisible from MTP)
fastboot flash ramdisk magisk_patched-23000_4A2bd.img

paid 4 credits (4 €) with paypal

https://forum.gsmhosting.com/vbb/f1004/hcu-error-meta_dll-dll-2756015/#post13961222


text:
How to disable toasts (popups)?
An example of grey and white note that I mean is, like when you copy something, a small grey background and white lettered bubble appears for a few moments saying 'copied to clipboard'. My phone has some sort of malfunction where it dispays that prompt for several minutes at a time. Very annoying.
How do I disable that?
I am using a Samsung Galaxy S9.

Considering that "it dispays that prompt for several minutes at a time", possible dupe: Android 11: how to disable persistent notification

For disabling those particular toasts (when clipboard is accessed), turn off Alert when clipboard accessed from
Settings app > Privacy > Alert when clipboard accessed


text:
Samsung s7 is on dead mode, buttons are also not working, usb debugging is also off.. Please help me to recover my phone
my phone is Samsung Galaxy S7. Suddenly while using the phone, it stuck on black screen with lights on both navigation n back button.  Then after 1-2 minutes,  it stuck on restart on loop mode. After few minutes the screen again got black with blue led notification light on & no button was working till whole night it was like this. Then in morning, the led light turned off automatically but the phone condition was same, black screen with no button working. Even when i connected charger then also charging red light was not on. It wasn't charging at all.
USB debugging is also off on my phone so couldn't connect it to the computer to fix it.
Please help me to recover my phone or to let me know how tk turn on debugging when phone & buttons are not working.

https://youtu.be/qfSJmwUGATA


text:
Why I'm unable to set a WIFI static IP address?
On my Android mobile phone (a recent Huawey MAR-LX1B), I would like to permanently set a static IP address on a specific WIFI LAN router connection.

The reason is that, on an application backend server, I want to "identify" connecting devices (specific
unique mobile devices). A simple way to identify clients, on the web application, is to use caller IP addresses (debatable, I admit).

On Android (version 10) I would be able to change the local IP address to static, setting an IP of my choice, but on my phone, when I fulfill configuration data in the WIFI advanced section, the save button is disabled.
Any idea?

BTW, do you think maybe ste MAC address - IP address setting on the DHCP server, here suggested: https://android.stackexchange.com/a/15827/338630 could be a better
approach (to identify clients assigning them static IP addresses)?

thx @beeshyams I read the forum thread I tried the workaround. I didn't work. BTW the MAC randomization link is broken. BuT I read this

Sorry for the broken link. Try this https://source.android.com/devices/tech/connect/wifi-mac-randomization


text:
Accessing the antenna of an Android system
I am asking a similar question to this
Tap off raw RF data from antenna
but would like further explanation.
First off, I'm an electrical engineer, so I have no experience with android systems besides the average phone user experience.
What I am trying to do is use a mobile device that can read RFID data at 2.4 GHz. This is as low-level as you can get, but I know we don't have access to raw RF data. Is there a way I can collect the RFID data without needing any external peripherals?

Maybe search on [SO]? From a user perspective, I I am not sure if it can be done for the same reason in linked question

NFC in android device operates at 13.56 MHz.


text:
Androd device performance degradation with age
How does the performance of an android device degrade ?

Does not exiting the app age the device? Like not closing a browser tab but exiting internet app by swiping the app window from the one of the navigation Butt it because it is using ram?

If too many apps start when powering on  bad for phone,does it cause it to slow time overtime or only the part when you power on.

Over a time how does a device performance slow down,is it old hardware?

Does this answer your question? Is it possible, that old smartphone becomes slow simply because it is old?

See [Why is my phone slow?] (https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/32734/why-is-my-phone-slow)

This site is best suited for single question and answer format. Multiple questions are discouraged


text:
What is the difference between Calendar and Google Calendar in Account sync settings
In Settings > Accounts > Select Google Account > Account sync. There are switches for synchronizing various content of the account, such as Contacts, Drive, etc. I also have Calendar and Google Calendar in there. What is the difference, why is there two?
Phone models:
Google Pixel 5
Motorola Moto G8

It is a Motorola Moto G8 and it has no OEM calendar app that I can find.

As per this Moto ships with it's own calendar app. Can you recheck in your apps// Uninstall Google calendar and see if you can find calendar app

Thanks, I have rechecked the app drawer. I have gone into Settings > Apps & notifications > See all 71 apps and manually scrolled through them all to see if there is any preinstalled calendar app which I might have disabled in the past. I couldn't find any. The app for calendar from Google is simply called Calendar. I only have 1 Google account added in the phone at the moment.

Same question. Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 lite, Android 11. These are clearly two different services from Google Workspace. Disabling Google Calendar sync from settings makes itself visible in both the Calendar app and Outlook. Disabling Calendar sync does not appear to affect anything, from what I can see.

Same question here. Getting an old Samsung Ace 3 out of the drawer, rooted and "upgraded" to LineageOS 14.1 / Android 7.1.2.
Settings / Accounts / Google account shows Calendar and Google calendar, both with switches.
As far as I know, this is not related to any other calendar app that may be installed on the phone, since this settings allow to sync different google services/functionalities.

This does not really answer the question. If you have a different question, you can ask it by clicking Ask Question. To get notified when this question gets new answers, you can follow this question. Once you have enough reputation, you can also add a bounty to draw more attention to this question. - From Review


text:
whatsapp not connecting to network until opened
The problem is only with whatsapp app, only in my android device and only when connected to my WiFi.
Background data is turned on.
Battery optimization is off.
Account sync is enabled.
Proxy is none.
DNS is 8.8.8.8 or 8.8.4.4.
Could anyone please help. Thankyou

Whatsapp uses Google Push notifications, therefore battery optimization has to be disabled not only for Whatsapp itself but also for GooglePlayServices.

battery optimization is totally disabled. Still the problem exist.  Only sometimes i'm facing the problem. Tried many ways. Its not when the battery is low and not when whatsApp is removed from recent tasks. I couldn't figure out when and what's causing it .


text:
Locking bootloader after vendor build change
So, I have a Mi 10 Lite with the MIUI 12 EEA, and it's not the stock ROM but the Vodafone build (QJIEUVF).
As there's the new Android 11 update coming, I'd like to have that and not wait for Vodafone to release its build, as that's notoriously slow.
I tried the official Updater app, to install the XM (non branded) build, but it says the network carrier is different. Seems like the only way is to unlock the bootloader. However, I read that means losing Netflix and Google Pay support?
Now, can I unlock the bootloader, flash the QJIEUXM with XiaoMiToolV2, and then relock the bootloader with Clean and Lock? Would that lead to a softbrick? Any other downside to doing that, such as losing OTA updates?
I tried to find info, but it's really hard to find any reliable information anywhere

try to flash fastboot ROM on locked bootloader via EDL mode https://xiaomifirmwareupdater.com/miui/monet


text:
FBE encryption bootloader state in keys
I want to unlock bootloader on Android 8.0 FBE encrypted with PIN
I don't wanna lose my data, therefore i made backup of userdata partition before
According to CCC the bootloader state is part of encryption. The video neither explain how bootloader state is involved in KDF KEK DEK chain nor this concerns FBE
After unlocking bootloader + factory reset + restoring userdata partition,
encryption probably won't work. does this concern twrp too, is there any method to overcome this?
I cannot test that as i don't want to unlock bootloader without backup at moment

Let's discuss this in chat.

tried today. dumped userdata, unlocked bootloader, restored userdata. did not work, probably because of deleteKey

Thanks for this important information. Can you also try wiping /data from TWRP and restore it again? I believe as long as you are not reinitializing the OS, you can restore data after wipe because reinitialization triggers untrusted enrollment in TEE which generates new SID and FBE keys on first boot of OS.

@defalt cannot try it was not my mobile. my own phone is not encrypted

From android enterprise security whitepaper (pdf), The Verifed Boot state is used as an input in the process to derive disk encryption keys. If the Verifed Boot state changes (e.g. the user unlocks the bootloader), then the secure hardware
prevents access to data used to derive the disk encryption keys that were used when the bootloader was locked.

Where should I put it here?

Confirmed answer to What is the cryptographic relationship between verified boot state and FBE keys?.

some people claim it's possible to unlock bootloader without data wipe (for example with mtkclient) it's no real unlocking then?

I don't think it's possible anymore with phones that fully complies with AVB2.0 and FBE specification. The Verified Boot State is cryptographically tied to Key Encryption Key that decrypts FBE keys inside TEE. Even if you somehow manage to prevent data wipe just after unlocking (let's say by cutting the power of SoC), that data cannot be decrypted because the KEK output will be different.


text:
Is it possible to boot from the SD card on the HDK8150 board?
I recently acquired the HDK8150 board. I am pretty interested in running a non-Android Linux OS there. After some hours of going through I found some interesting stuff:

I found that from Linux kernel 5.4, is supporting Snapdragon 855, so far so good!

There is one Ubuntu distribution named Ubuntu Core. It seems it fully supports Snapdragon, but it is pretty bound to the DragonBoard-410C.

I found that there is an Ubuntu's parallel project named Linaro  that looks pretty nice.

My point is that I would like to check out any of them, but I prefer not to flash the eMMC memory, but run the system from the SD card. I found it better, since I am pretty sure I am gonna mess up with something, and I am just starting with this. Is there anybody that has experience on this topic with this specific board? Is there any way to boot from the SD card? (It can be seen on the back that there are 8-switches labeled as "boot". There is no much documentation out there apart from the Quickstart guide.)
Any suggestions on which OS to use?

Apologize for the early closure, I just realized the board is "a highly integrated and optimized Android development platform". However, my advice still stands that you might be interested in our sister site [ubuntu.se], [unix.se], or [iot.se].

Okay, thanks Andrew :)

Booting from the sd card is not so hard, the hard thing is that you likely need to modify the bootloader for that. Possibly you can use the recovery partition as a chain-bootloader, but even so you need to unlock the device. Thus, you can not avoid the risk of bricking. But I think this is like a holy grail to me, hence the up.

In my this question I got also a lot of useful info, how drivers work differently in Android. The goal would be likely to have an X server, but graphic drivers work very differently. Possibly you can import the "X server of Android", namely "Surface Flinger" and run an X over it. If you have luck, then the graphic display of your device has a kernel driver and so you can use it (like as a /dev/fb0 device).

Currently, Linux GUI works so: apps -> X server -> kernel KMS. On Android: apps -> surface flinger -> HAL -> kernel.

just linking here for future reference. are you talking about dip switches (like in the link on the first question)?
https://android.stackexchange.com/q/215573
https://android.stackexchange.com/q/210156
https://android.stackexchange.com/q/220677
https://android.stackexchange.com/q/213910
https://android.stackexchange.com/q/47712


text:
Why "adb remount" retruns "remount failed" on Android emulator?
I'm using Android Studio. I was trying to set up dev environment and it requires to modify hosts file. So,

I created new devices in ADM (Nexus 4, Android 10 x86_64 without Google API and without Google Play).
I lunched the emulator
Then I tried following instructions from stackoverflow. I'm using Linux Mint so:

$ ~/Android/Sdk/platform-tools/.adb root

output:
restarting adbd as root

Okay, I got root:
$ ~/Android/Sdk/platform-tools/.adb shell whoami

output:
root

Then I suppose to remount and this is where I stuck:
 ~/Android/Sdk/platform-tools/.adb remount

output:
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
avb_ops_user.cpp:217: ERROR: Error writing data.
avb_user_verity.c:205: ERROR: Error writing to partition 'vbmeta'
E Skipping /system
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
W DM_DEV_STATUS failed for scratch: No such device or address
E [liblp]No device named scratch
[liblp]Partition scratch will resize from 0 bytes to 814587904 bytes
E [liblp]bool android::fs_mgr::WritePrimaryMetadata(int, const android::fs_mgr::LpMetadata &, uint32_t, const std::string &, const std::function<bool (int, const std::string &)> &) write 540 bytes failed: Operation not permitted
E [libfs_mgr]add partition scratch
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
W DM_DEV_STATUS failed for scratch: No such device or address
E Can not mount overlayfs for partitions: No such file or directory
Skip mounting partition: /product
Skip mounting partition: /product_services
E failed to remount partition dev:/dev/block/dm-1 mnt:/vendor: Read-only file system
E Consider providing all the dependencies to enable overlayfs
/system/bin/remount exited with status 10
remount failed

I don't know if remount is the critical issue, but i guess so. At the moment I don't have permission to modify /etc/. For example:
$ ~/Android/Sdk/platform-tools./adb shell "cp /etc/hosts /etc/hosts.bak"

output:
cp: /etc/hosts.bak: Read-only file system

Run Android Emulator with --writable-system commandline option in order to temporarily disable dm-verity. Then you can run adb remount.

... like the answer Yevgen has linked in question already does

@alecxs yes. And the question is off-topic here in my opinion.

It's -writable-system https://developer.android.com/studio/run/emulator-commandline#startup-options


text:
How to automatically force stop a user-specified application after every reboot
One of my phones is a Samsung Galaxy Edge S7. One of the apps, Samsung Pay, is uninstallable bloatware. The problem is that when Samsung Pay is running it takes up the bottom edge of the home screen such that it interferes with the upward swipe operation when opening the home screen after the screen is locked. I discovered that I can get rid of that problem temporarily by force stopping Samsung Pay. However, at some point in time either via a reboot or a system update or something else, the Samsung Pay app gets restarted. Then, I have to hunt through the menus every time and force stop Samsung Pay again, manually, which is a hassle.
So, how do I arrange it so that Samsung Pay is forced stopped at some point after each reboot, or better yet, every time that Samsung Pay is running? I searched the Google Play Store for app killers, and none of the ones I examined explicitly state that they provide a way to kill a user-specified application after each reboot. Or, if there is such an app, it would force me to try hundreds of ad-infested apps before I found the right one, which is also a even more annoying hassle.
I would be happy if I could install an app on the home screen that, when clicked upon, would force-stop only the Samsung Pay app. That would not be fully automatic, but it would suffice.
Buying a new phone is not an option.
Rooting the phone is not an option.
Any method that requires signing into Samsung Pay which requires creating an account which is tied to the phone is not an option. For example: https://www.androidcentral.com/how-disable-samsung-pay probably would disable it, but my experimentation shows that it is requiring an account just to get to the screen that allows you to disable it:
thus is a email harvesting scam.

Have you tried https://www.androidcentral.com/how-disable-samsung-pay

Disable autostart on boot and restrict background execution

@Robert Your helpful comment revealed a gross omission in my question that I've since updated to correct: procedures similar to https://www.androidcentral.com/how-disable-samsung-pay are not an option, because it gives Samsung exactly what it wants in the first place: to harvest the phone owners email address and tie it back to their phone for tracking and upselling additional unwanted services. So, that is unfortunately a "no". Granted, had Samsung NOT required an account to make that simple change, then it would have been perfectly viable.

@IrfanLatif that was very helpful comment as it ultimately led me to the adb shell. I managed to uninstall all of what seem to be the Samsung Pay related apps except for com.samsung.android.spayfw as  adb uninstall --user 0 com.samsung.android.spayfw hangs the adb command with no output whatsoever explaning why it hung up, nor is there any promptings on the phone's screen which was unlocked.  Reference those apps at https://technastic.com/remove-samsung-bloatware-safe-to-remove-apps/


text:
WhatsApp on Android 11: getting rid of all notifications except for receiving messages?
I have recently installed WhatsApp on a new phone with Android 11. For some reason, WhatsApp keeps bothering me with tons and tons of notifications. 'Backing up' or 'Checking new messages' or 'WhatsApp Web is active' and whatever.
I've never seen this behaviour before on my previous installment (which was on Android 8 or 9) but it's quite annoying.
I can of course disable WhatsApp notifications entirely. However I do want to receive notifications in case of actual messages. I just want to disable to other ones.
I've been looking in WhatsApp Settings > Notifications but I can't seem to find any way to do so.
Is this possible, and how?

Starting from Android 8.0, all notifications are assigned to "channels". You can access these notification channel settings from Android settings (not the settings within WhatsApp itself) and turn individual channels' notifications on or off. It is up to the developer of the app to decide which notification goes to which channel.
Go to: Settings -> Apps & notifications. Select the app in question, then select Notifications to access the notification settings.


text:
Find history of entering and exiting apps on Android
I have a Samsung Galaxy A3 2016 running Android. I would like to know whether there is a way to recover the exact history of when one entered and exited an app  during one day.
I have tried this trick, but it does not work.
Do you know any other solution?
Many thanks!

I don't think there is anyway to get this info from Android (at least, I am not aware of it, if it exists).
You have an app alternative, Usage Analyzer: Apps, Data & History, which gives this information and much more information.
It does not give you explicitly exit time but it gives you start time and usage time, and you can add both to get exit time. Chrome usage highlighted in screenshot below

(click to enlarge )
It also gives you day/week app usage details.


text:
How can I remove from “previously installed apps” list in the PlayStore the applications that are already installed on my phone?
How can I remove from "previously installed apps" list in the PlayStore the applications that are already installed on my phone?
For example, the application anyconnect shows up in the "previously installed apps" list:

Even though it is already installed on my phone:

I use Android 9  on Samsung Galaxy S9 with PlayStore 17.8.14.

Also see: Is there a way to clear your Google Play App history? (Not the search history) // How to remove apps from “all downloaded” in Play Store


text:
How can I install keyboard for android 4.0.4 on android 5.1.1?
My phone with android 4.0.4 is rooted and I got the SamsungIME apk and odex files, moved them to the phone with android 5.1.1, but when I try to install, it simply says "App not installed". I didn't expect it to be so simple...
I've searched everywhere, but I know both phones are too old and any forum or link I found was dead. But hey, I'm old school
I can see the apk's information but I guess it's in "machine language" because it just looks like letters and symbols. I wouldn't know what to do with it anyway
Here's some info if it's of any help:

The phone from which I want to get the keyboard is a Galaxy Pocket, android version 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich, kernel version 3.0.15-1222370, keyboard version 1.0
The phone to where I want to move the keyboard is a Galaxy J1 Ace, android version 5.1.1 Lollipop, kernel version 3.10.65-12300964, keyboard version 4.0

If you need any more information, of course let me know, and thanks in avance, if you can figure it out I'll buy you an ice cream

you need to deodex it

https://theground.jimdofree.com/android/was-ist-odex-deodex-erklärung


text:
How does factory reset work?
I have 2 Samsung tablets, one serves as my main device, and I would like to factory reset the other one. I don't want to lose any of my data.
What happens if I reset one of them? Do they both lose their data? How can I prevent that from happening? What can get lost?

Factory reset only affects the device you execute it on. Factory reset is not bound to any account or is send to any other device.

You have luck, you can safely factory reset the secondary tablet. All the data on it will be deleted, but your main tablet will remain unaffected.
Factory reset is a device-only thing.
Androids are no different than ordinary computers, only the most important apps have the habit that they automatically backup everything to the network (typically into the cloud service of the developer company). They also like to make cloudy the border between the files on your device, and the files backed up to them.
Backup all the important data on your secondary tablet and you can make the factory reset safely.
In general, it is very useful to have backup all of your important data. Most apps does it (for example, most androids automatically uploads the photos into the google cloud), but not all of them.


text:
Why is the FrameBuffer missing on some Android devices?
I'm curious about the display device on Android. I know that on Linux, device devices are represented as /dev/fbX, which "fb" stands for FrameBuffer. I also heard that Android uses FrameBuffer as well

in Android it’s /dev/graphics/fbX, usually /dev/graphics/fb0
Kaustav - Introduction to the Android framebuffer

and

Android relies on the standard frame buffer device (/dev/fb0 or /dev/graphics/fb0) and driver as described in the linux/fb.h kernel header file.
Display Drivers | Android Open Source

However, on my device, which is OnePlus 7 Pro running Lineage OS, I could not find anything related to that. I even cannot find any device nodes called *fb* under /dev. However, I heard that someone has some devices with fb, and their other devices don't.
I'm just curious, why? Where is the display device on Android?

Android's hardware implementation is totally vendor specific. There's no standardization. Many OEMs don't expose standard Linux interfaces in /dev, /sys, /proc, /config etc. Many syscalls don't work either. Instead OEM's closed-source HALs interact with hardware through different IPC's particularly Binders.

@IrfanLatif Thanks! This helped a lot.

I had a lot of similar questions until I asked them here. The essence of the infos you get over this post is these:

No android app handles directly /dev/fb0, does it exist or not. Instead, they are communicating with the system process named "Surface Flinger", which is the analogy of the X server on the Linuxes.
This communication happens with Binder, which is an android-specific localhost-only RPC protocol similar to the unix pipes.
Not even the Surface Flinger can see the /dev/fb0 directly. Instead, it talks to the HAL (hardware abstraction layer). Until Android 8, the HAL was a set of shared libraries in /lib/hw. Since Android8, also the HAL is a set of system services talking over binder with the Surface Flinger (although legacy shared lib HALs are still possible).
Direct display access happens in the HAL library (service) responsible for that.

HAL libs (services) are developed by the phone vendor. Ha can develop a /dev/fb0 driver and use a hal capable to handle it, but he can also develop any custom method. In the second case, you won't have a /dev/fb0 in the kernel.

Furthermore, and it is already a linux-specific thing: /dev does not need to have all the device files existing on your system. Commonly it is so, but it is not a requirement. (On most Linux distros, the software named udev automatizes this task, but Android does not use it.) /dev has device files, on a Linux you can see that they start by a c (character device file) or b (block device file) in the ls -l output, and also on Android:
crw-rw---- 1 root video 29, 0   Dec 10 09:08 /dev/fb0
brw-rw---- 1 root disk   8, 0   Dec 11 07:21 /dev/sda
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root  1302248 Apr 18  2019 /bin/bash

/dev/fb0 is a character device file, /dev/sda is a block device file, while /bin/bash is an ordinary file and not a device.
You can create device files with the mknod tool, but note: it requires root.
It is quite possible that /dev/fb0 is created elsewhere on your system, maybe on a location which is hidden behind same userspace-only mounts or so. It is also possible that fb0 is not created at all, despite that its driver is compiled into the kernel.
We can check, which device files are compiled into the kernel, in the procfs file /proc/devices. It should contain the line
Character devices:
...
29 fb
...

This procfs file is practically always readable also as a user. If it does not exist, then your HAL responsible for the display communicates over some other way with the kernel.
If it exists, then you can create the framebuffer device by a command
mknod /dev/fb0 c 29 0

as root. (Actually you can always create it as root, but if the line above does not exist in /proc/devices, then it won't be usable.)
P.s. in LineageOS, my experiences are far the best by compiling an userdebug image. It did not slow my system at all, but all the rooting, adb things worked in it very correctly.

Hmm, I tried to mknod and it successfully created the device node, but when I tried to access it using cat or whatever tools, it shows like No such device.

Is the char dev 29 in /proc/devices?

Yes. cat /proc/devices | grep fb outputs 29 fb

Then the device exists, so the open/read/write/close calls are handled by the driver. This driver returns -ENODEV, this can have many reasons and I think none of them is fair. You should get somewhere the kernel configuration of the vendor and check, which driver is it.

Some options: 1. the driver supports only mmap() but no read()/write() 2. there is no fb0, but fb1, fb2, or fb163 3. the driver gives intentionally misleading error, and only the relevant HAL knows, how to handle it correctly. 4. while there is an fb driver compiled into the kernel, it is actually an unused remnant, and the real display handling happens on other ways.

@YuutaW Find somehow the HAL and debug it. It will be probably hard. | Btw, afaik X11 on Linux does not use fb0 generally, it uses only the KMS (kernel mode setting) API.

Yes. It uses the KMS API. Anyways, thanks for helping.