text:
Disable new Android permission system
I really like the new permission system in Android from the end users point of view as I like to have control over what my phone does but I am really struggeling with it at work, here is why:
We are developing apps and I am responsible for the QA and we recently introduced automated tests. During the testing process, we install our app on an Android Emulator (Visual Studio Emulator for Android).
As our app needs access to location services, Android asks the user for permission. Since the user is "the king", the permission dialog is not exposed to our testing framework so we can't respond to it automatically and because the tests run at night, there is nobody to respond to that dialog manually.
So here is my question:
Is there any setting in Android to disable the new permission system? There is no need to set this setting automatically, I can set this one setting once by hand, the only thing I can't do is to respond to that permission dialog every time the app is installed.
Thanks for your help,
vat

Just for reference: Here is the answer that solved my problem (taken from https://stackoverflow.com/a/32798532/5736633):
You can grant and revoke permissions using:
adb shell pm grant com.package.myapp android.permission.<PERMISSION>
adb shell pm revoke com.package.myapp android.permission.<PERMISSION>

adb install -g package.apk
I had a similar issue in automated testing: when launching the app the permission dialog popped up. The adb shell pm grant … command did not help but there is the  -g option of adb install to grant all permissions upon install. This solved the problem for me.
From adb --help:

Android Debug Bridge version 1.0.41
Version 30.0.5-6877874
[…]
app installation (see also `adb shell cmd package help`):
 install [-lrtsdg] [--instant] PACKAGE
     push a single package to the device and install it
[…]
    -g: grant all runtime permissions
[…]

You can't disable it completely, and you wouldn't want to do it on your test machine even if you could, because then you wouldn't be able to test how your app interacts with the permission system (e.g. displaying the "permission rationale", handling rejected requests, handling loss of focus when the dialog shows).
This question on Stack Overflow, our sister site for programming questions explains a few ways you can manage Marshmallow's runtime permissions when running tests, and another question on the same site has some different answers. As you've said you're willing to do a one-time action to make it work, don't forget that you can check the "don't ask again" option when you get the permission dialog, to automatically accept future requests for the same permission from the same app.

Thanks, Dan, I came over from StackOverflow as I thought this question is more android specific. The answer in the first link helped me out.

Well, I thought, this would help me out... While following the instructions I linked in my answre, the Pop up "Do you want to grant ...App GPS access?" does not disappear on the phone


text:
How do I sign my SG4 out of google play?
I have tried several times to go to settings>accounts>google, however, when I touch google, my phone tells me repeatedly that "Unfortunately, settings has stopped".  Can someone help me please?  I really need to sign out of that old account.
Thanks!

Log into it from another device's Web browser, change the password on that account, and go to https://mail.google.com and scroll to the bottom and select Details then Sight out other sessions.
https://productforums.google.com/forum/m/#!topic/gmail/zIVuCmZ-tuA

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
Does data have priority over voice when making calls on 3G?
I'm not quite sure if this is the correct place to ask this, recently my phone service provider sent me a message saying that they had now begun compensating subscribers whose calls were dropped mid-call. They said their systems would decide if a call was dropped prematurely and if it was then we would be given bonus airtime. Prior to this, my calls never dropped and I didn't have much of a problem when calling. A few days after this I notice a lot of my calls keep dropping when I try and make them and after I make them. My signal is strong -full bars actually-but I assume 4G might be unstable so I switch my preferred network type to 3G only to prevent the phone from switching networks. This doesn't make much difference as my calls still keep dropping.
So I pass by their shop and one of their attendants informs me that the problem would most likely be attributed to the fact that when I make my calls, apparently data has preference over voice despite the fact that I'm not even using an app that requires heavy data/data at all when I'm making my voice calls. Before my service provider sent that message, I really didn't have much of a problem making calls but now it's become too much with literally 2 out of 3 calls getting dropped. So my question would be, when making voice calls, is data given preference over voice or did that attendant really not know what he was talking about.
For technical terms I have a galaxy s5(SM G900F) running android marshmallow. Never tampered with any of my settings.
Typical  4 bars on 3G has a signal strength of -81dBm 16asu

Voice and data are handled independently in 3G- voice uses circuit switching and data on packet switching. Hence, priority of one over another is not correct as claimed. For additional details see this
Frequent call drops could be due to other reasons like tower density, frequency used, congestion, Overloading etc, which can be addressed by your carrier. Your signal can be strong, yet you may face call drops or not being able to connect because of these issues

As far as I can see, the data is preferred on provider's side, so if they have high load by data, they drop calls.

But it has to be noted, this wasn't a problem I was experiencing before. I don't think network preference would be switched by the network provider in just a moment like that.

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


text:
When my Google account is deactivated/expires, will my phone delete/lock my apps?
Short version: I'm afraid my Android (HTC One M8) will freak out and delete/lock all the apps connected to my soon-to-be-deactivated Google account.
Long version: So my college email ("Account 1") is being deactivated next week (yay graduation!), and I want to make sure I'm taking all the right steps to save all my data (emails, Chrome stuff, Maps, apps, etc.). I created a new Gmail account ("Account 2") to transfer everything into. I've browsed the forums, and everyone says it's impossible to transfer Google Play Store data between accounts. However, I didn't find any discussions about what happens if my downloaded/purchased apps are connected to a DEACTIVATED account.
Most of the discussions I found talked about having multiple accounts on the same phone, and how Account 2 can still use apps downloaded/purchased by (still-active) Account 1 on the same phone. No problemo. However, I don't have this luxury, because my Account 1 will cease to exist next week.
My question is this: If I change my phone's primary account to Account 2 without removing Account 1, but then Account 1 ceases to exist in one week, will my phone freak out and automatically delete and/or lock all the apps that were purchased/downloaded by Account 1? Can I keep updating those apps after the expiration? And will it make any difference if I disable all of Account 1's syncing so that my phone "can't tell" that the account got deactivated?
Thanks for all your help!!


text:
Easier to root, Samsung or HTC?
I have had an HTC One M7 for a while, and I have wanted to root it but am afraid to brick it (I'm on Verizon). So I bought a Samsung galaxy s3. I would like to know which one is easier to root. I plan to use Cyanogenmod for either one. It is easy for me to change which phone is on the network, I just move the SIM card. They are both verizon phones. I dont really know what unlocking the bootloader is, so i cant say if either of them have the bootloader unlocked. Any help is appreciated.

Samsungs are generally easier to root in my experience. The samsungs do not require s-off compared to htc's and thus, it is much harder to brick. The popular models like the s3 usually get a lot of support from the developer community compared to something like the HTC m7.
Here are some guides:
S3 Root
HTC m7 Root


text:
This audio format (AC3) not supported in MX player
I am trying to play one video in hindi language in MX player. but it shows This audio format (AC3) is not supported.
Error shows in below picture:

Does anyone help me to solve this issue?

AFAIK because of licensing issues, MX Player dropped AC3 support. There is/was a plugin you could download, but I don't know if it works.

This is what you need.
Download the codec, place it in your internal storage, then Settings > decoder > Custom codec. This should fix your problem.


text:
How to Bypass a pattern lockscreen on a oneplusone phone
I have A one plus one phone and i forgot my password (pattern).
and i dont have a google recovery account and a recovery pin
and i need all my stuff from the phone.
what can i do to unlock it?

Possible duplicate of Can not unlock my Android device as have no internet connection?

I succeeded in removing the lock pattern on a rooted OnePlus One using the below.
On the OnePlus forums an employee suggested this:

You have to delete all your key files from system folder. Try this.
  Connect you device with usb and run following command. If you are not able to do so, i am afraid. You need a full wipe.
adb devices
adb shell
su
cd /data/system
rm *.key

Even if shows lock screen after reboot, try a easy random pattern.

In my case that worked, besides the tiny detail that the su would spawn an approval prompt, which I of course couldn't confirm because of the pattern lock.
However, because the device was rooted (and you might be able to do this after the fact, that I don't know) I could boot it into recovery (holding Power + Volume Down), in my case TWRP. In there I could rename the 3 *.key files and pronto, after a reboot the pattern lock was gone.
As a side note, this is a demonstration that any screen lock is pretty useless from a security perspective.

Try Hard Reset

Turn off the device (Not just the screen)
Hold power and home buttons
Then after the android logo appears use volume and power, to select "Factory data reset" (or similar words to do with resetting). Then your device will start from the beginning.

Hope this will work for you as it worked for me :D

if you have custom recovery like TWRP, they allow mounting your filesystem in recovery mode to allow file transfers in recovery mode.Then all you have to do is

boot into recovery mode
mount required filesystems
Select Mount USB Storage
connect you phone to your PC

Assuming you have installed you device manufacturer's drivers your device should show up on your PC.


text:
Nexus 5X no "Charging rapidly" on original (stock) charger
After 7 months LG Nexus 5X now doesn't show "Charging rapidly" but only "Charging".
Ampere app shows 1700 - 2100 mA max. Overall charging time now 50% longer than initially was.
In accordance to screenshots of Ampere I see the following wattage:
4.07V * 0.89A = 3.62W
or
4.26V * 1.79A = 7.62W
Both measurements are far from 15W declared by Nexus 5X specs.
I have checked my original 5X charger with Nexus 6P phone - it displays "Charging rapidly" on 6P from my charger. This makes me to believe the issue with the phone or its battery or QC IC (Quick Charge integrated circuit).
Update:

My charger is OK with Nexus 6P -> "Charging rapidly"
Nexus 6P charger doesn't detected on my 5X at all -> no charge, nothing
Switching cables on 6P charger with 6P phone -> 5X cable OK on 6P "Charging rapidly"

Conclusion: Phone Nexus 5X itself is suspected: battery or charger chip or system.

Somewhat related: Android phone “charging slowly”: How to make it faster

My question exactly about the issue with the stock (original) charger from LG and original cable for Nexus 5X. I did not play with any third party cables and chargers.

As Andrew clarified in his answer , it is the wattage that counts not just the current as measured by Ampere app (which appears to be fine).  You would need to measure the voltage also to see if the wattage (product of voltage and Ampere ) is fine.

In accordance to screenshots of Ampere I see the following wattage:
https://goo.gl/photos/EJSwT76mD3dmVDU9A
4.07V * 0.89A = 3.62W
or
4.26V * 1.79A = 7.62
Both are far from 15W declared by Nexus 5X spec.

So that means it could be a problem with charger and cable combo. One way to confirm this would be to try another original set if you can lay your hands on it or with different chargers. Alternatively, now that you know that wattage could be the issue take to service centre, device still being in warranty and post the outcome as a solution if it is solved, else edit question with inputs

Today a have checked my charger with Nexus 6P - it displays "Charging rapidly" from my charger. This makes me to believe the issue with the phone or its battery or QC IC.

The answer by @rajatpunkstaa seems to be correct by your own testing and summation. Did you try to reflash the firmware manually via fastboot?

@acejavelin not actually reflash with downloaded FW but full factory reset through recovery menu. Did you mean this one? Or should I download system image from Google and reflash it then?

@SergeySergeyev I would reflash image just to be sure

 I had the same issue with my Nexus 6P. Tried everything but nothing worked. Visited service centre and got it fixed. They told some hardware issues with the fast charging chip.
 I read somewhere that flashing the firmware again using Fastboot on the phone solves this issue for some users.I didn't worked for me. Might you wanna try. Good Luck!!


text:
Reason for chroot failure: tmp-mksh: chroot: not found
Introduction:
I formatted a SDCard in ext4 and copied an ArchVersion on it to run it from Android like in this guide (step 6). Of course my device is rooted and am running the following scripts and commands in the Terminal Emulator as superuser.
Device-info:

Phone: Sony Xperia Z1
Model number: C6903
Android version: 5.1.1
Build Number: 14.6.A.1.236

Issue:
When I execute sh chroot_bashonly.sh the error tmp-mksh: chroot: not found appears. Of course I looked in the script to figure it out myself:
chroot_bashonly.sh:
#!/bin/sh

export LINUXROOT=/data/local/mnt
export TMPDIR=/tmp
export HOME=/root
export USER=root
export PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin:/bin:/sbin:$PATH
export TERM=vt100

sh ./mount.sh

echo "******* Your chroot-environment is starting now ********"
chroot $LINUXROOT /bin/bash # tmp-mksh: chroot: not found
echo "******* You exited the chroot-environment, unmounting... ********"

sh ./umount.sh

echo " ## DONE"

mount.sh:
#!/bin/sh

export LINUXROOT=/data/local/mnt
export TMPDIR=/tmp
export HOME=/root
export USER=root
export PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin:/bin:/sbin:$PATH
export TERM=vt100

# mount /
mkdir $LINUXROOT #works
mount -t ext4 -o noatime,rw /dev/block/mmcblk1p2 $LINUXROOT #works

# mount other stuff
mkdir -p $LINUXROOT/proc
mkdir -p $LINUXROOT/sys
mkdir -p $LINUXROOT/dev
mkdir -p $LINUXROOT/dev/pts
mkdir -p $LINUXROOT/var/lib/dbus
mkdir -p $LINUXROOT/android_storage/sdcard0
mkdir -p $LINUXROOT/android_storage/sdcard1
mkdir -p $LINUXROOT/system
mount -t proc proc $LINUXROOT/proc
mount -t sysfs sysfs $LINUXROOT/sys
mount -o bind /dev $LINUXROOT/dev
mount -t devpts devpts $LINUXROOT/dev/pts
mount -o bind /system $LINUXROOT/system
mount -o bind /storage/sdcard0 $LINUXROOT/android_storage/sdcard0
mount -o bind /storage/sdcard1 $LINUXROOT/android_storage/sdcard1

echo "******* everything mounted ********"

I think the mount.sh part works, at least I get no error and the mkdir-created folders existing. So the next thing I tried was to run chroot outside the script in many forms with the same error.

chroot /data/local/mnt /bin/bash
chroot /data/local/mnt /system/bin/sh
chroot /data/local/mnt /bin/sh

All having the same issue: tmp-mksh: chroot: not found.
So what is wrong?
Is chroot even available on Android?

Try issuing type chroot or whence -v chroot, and tell us the result.

So I tried type chroot /data/local/mnt /bin/bash. Result (error): 1. chroot not found, 2. /data/local/mnt not found (but it exists), 3. /bin/bash not found.  I tried type chroot /data/local/mnt /system/bin/sh. Result (error): 1. same, 2. same, 3. /system/bin/sh is /system/bin/sh....      The  results for whence -v chroot are equivalent.

First and foremost, I said type, with one and only argument for it, which was chroot. Aside from that, you may need to install BusyBox, in order to be able to use chroot, since your device lacks it.

Thanks. I am a step forward. Now type chroot refers chroot is /system/xbin/chroot. But now I get the error chroot: cant execute '/bin/bash': No such file or directory or for /system/bin/sh chroot: cant execute '/system/bin/sh': No such file or directory. Well I checked the /system/bin/sh file. Like it is stated in this post it is exisiting

As before, issue type sh: this will tell you the location of the shell binary, which you'll need to replace any instance of /bin/bash with.

type sh refers sh is tracked alias for /system/bin/sh, but like I stated before it says No such file or directory

It appears that we're going outside the scope of your question, which concerned only chroot.

The Reason for this failure is that Android blocked chroot for som reason. Like Death Mask Salesman pointed out, it is possible to get information about the command type via type commandName e.g. in this case type chroot.
To solve the tmp-mksh: chroot: not found-error it is only required to install BusyBox.

i installed the busyBox but still the problem appear !!!

@user197885 With installed you mean that you installed busyBox out of the app store then started busyBox and installed a version of busyBox to /system/xbin ?


text:
Enableing unknown sources installation from 2nd user on android 6.0
I have a regular, Un changed Samsung Tab A running the unchanged version of marshmallow OS  (6.0). I have enabled installation from unknown sources in the "owner" user of the device, but still can't enable it in the second user (guest). I would like to install a .apk file which I have already tested in the owner user. In settings the "allow installation from unknown sources" is greyed out so I can't change it. Is there any way that I can install the APP?

I think you need to set a pattern or password for the second user then you will be able to enable unknown sources installation.

Enable USB debugging as the first user(owner) and run,
adb install -r filename.apk

This will install the app for all users.
Hope it helps


text:
Why can't this Asus tablet access anything over the internet though wifi is connected?
I just replaced all the networking infrastructure in my home do to a Frankenstein IP packet: this includes the Arris Residential Gateway, two Netgear switches, and a Netgear Model R7000 wifi router.
Various other devices connect just fine.
But a Asus TF700T running Android 4.2.1 is not working. What's strange is that it claims to have connected, and shows an IP address.  Web pages just (eventually) time out (which is different from the immediate error I get when wifi is disconnected) and apps just hang: a blank screen on Google Store, and an empty map on Maps.
Checking the gateway, I see that IP address is listed as a client along with two IPv6 addresses at the same MAC. It does't show any other status other than lease time.
Re this post with a similar title: I have no proxy. Other (albeit newer: next oldest is 4.4.2) android devices connected in the usual way with no other configuring needed.
I am at a complete loss as to how to proceed to troubleshoot this.

update: at benjaminS’s suggestion, I tried entering a local IP address, the gateway router’s admin page, and that works.
Then I verified that my web server (at a hosting company, with a dedicated IP address) serves my personal site by default when accessed by IP address (http://199.73.30.94). On this Asus tablet, it immediatly returns the “webpage not available” page.
(Now, the page I try are failing immediatly, and Google Store quickly shows “check your connection and try again”. That is different. Settings still shows connected with local IP address.
update ⚁: ping with an ip address (for google) gives “destination Net Unreachable”. ifconfig gives no output. But I suspect at this point that the gateway is not being configured properly with DHCP.  Why not? How do I tell what's happening?
I used my phone as a hotspot and verified that stuff works in general for that device. I'm only getting E service so that's not practical for doing much. At least I can use Google Store, but please don't make me surf through the store.

My first steps would be: Start by pinging your other local devices via their IP Address - then via their name. Then ping the public IP Adresses via their IP Addres (e.g. Google DNS: 8.8.8.8). Ping google.com. If it does not work, do a traceroute. Check if your Name-Resolution works from your android device. Then let us know what happens :)

No, it's not figured out. Just added more data.  It's not just DNS. It can't access outside the LAN.

Most likely some filtering on your router (based on the MAC). Can you check the router logs?

@benjaminS that terminal does not include traceroute and ifconfig just gives no output nor any error.  Is there an apk for network tools that would help?

The problem, it turns out, was an IP conflict, and is related to this question.
The wifi access point decided to bestow upon itself the same IPv4 address as the WAN gateway.  So, I suppose that packets were being routed to itself which had no way to continue.
(Why it was different for each device is a new mystery. Maybe newer devices use IPv6 or some other difference in the networking code?)


text:
How can I enable the dropdown notification bar on lockscreen on the Asus Zenfone 2?
On my old phone (Samsung I9305), I was able to enable the dropdown notification bar while the phone was locked by using this Xposed module.
However, it doesn't work on my Zenfone 2. (Running 5.0, rooted with Xposed Framework.) Yes, I have activated the module, rebooted, activated the setting and then rebooted again.
Several other Xposed modules do work.
Maybe it's because of incompatibility with 5.0 or x86?
In any case, is there any way to enable it on the lock screen?
By the way, the bounty notice says "credible sources." Obviously, that's not required. It just needs to work. Should probably have used to "draw attention" tag.

comments here indicate that it is x86 issue. Maybe you can try with Xposed Module x86 to see if the module works?

@beeshyams I misunderstand  your comment at first. I thought you were linking to some Xposed Module that would enhance compatability with x86 for other apps. To clarify, I have successfully installed Xposed Framework, as well as several other modules.

I am aware by your comment linking modules tried. Uninstalling that and installing framework using this is the option i was suggesting, since this appears to be specifically tailored for your chipset peculiarities. Of course, you don't know if all the modules you use now will work or not.  Reasons for believing that this framework is different from regular ones 1. My last device was Huawei, and because of heavily Tweaked UI, only  a modded framework would work or a very early version (2.5.1) of regular framework 2.  In the linked thread, do not see any updates to the OP to date // cont'd//

And that supports #1 .  I can't make out of it is modded or a early framework that is offered.  You can always take a Nandroid and try this after uninstalling regular framework. 3.Besides, it specifically claims Lollipop support for all devices running Intel processor

@beeshyams The framework I have now is already a special x86 build.

This version is ported for your device specially, as mentioned in the first line of OP. Unless i am wrong, you are meaning it is special because it is designed for your chipset. But being ported may have taken care of some peculiarities of your device and your desired mod is also not updated for long and may just work with this ported framework. Upto you to explore. I can't test

@beeshyams Right. I misunderstood your comments. Was a bit tired yesterday, sorry. I've tried it now. I uninstalled my previous Xposed, and tried installing the one you linked to. Unfortunately, flashing Xposed via adb doesn't work with my device (no idea why.) (I get this output, but the phone doesn't reboot or anything.) It was the same way with my previous Xposed. I had to flash via recovery. The thread you linked to doesn't supply any .zip for recovery flashing.

Sorry it didn't work

@beeshyams Thanks for trying! Do you think you could also take a look at this?

I wish i could but can't as i have no knowledge of Linux and just manage to get by using basic commands.  Suggest you ping for help in chat room for Linux pros to help you. All the best. Doesn't hurt to ask on XDA thread too

@beeshyams I actually managed to flash it via adb now, but it gave a bootloop. No big deal,  just restored the firmware.  Thanks for the suggestion anyway.


text:
Is there an app on Android that won't allow me to turn off the phone?
I have an alarm app that can be stopped only by turning off the phone. The problem is that I don't want this option ("to turn off the phone") because it's too tempting for me... So I was wondering if there's any app on Google Play that blocks the phone from turning off for a certain period of time.

No, you can't prevent turning off the device. Learn some self control and self discipline, technology can't "fix" everything.

No. As a protection against the OS going badly wrong and leaving the CPU running at full tilt until the battery runs down (or more likely, until the device overheats), you can always turn off the device by holding down the power button for several seconds. This isn't under the control of the OS, so there's no way an app can override it.


text:
Backing up important data from soft-bricked devices
I'm sorry if bricks-related and support-my-issues questions are off-topic on the site, but let me try.
Yesterday I've got a crash on my device causing an immediate reboot. After the very first boot splash screen the device rebooted again, and then once again just after the boot splash screen. After the last reboot, the device had loaded the "operational" mode, however the screen just got black. Fortunately, my device has the developer mode on and I can use adb. The very first attempt I was trying to do was some sort of screencasting just as follows:
:repeat
adb shell screencap -p /sdcard/screen.png
adb pull /sdcard/screen.png
adb shell rm /sdcard/screen.png
goto repeat

Ok, the device is not dead, and that's great (I'm using the USB connection to watch it). For some reason, the display simply gets black after the boot. All clicks/touches seem to be detected by the device, but I've got feeling that it was lagging -- maybe due to 1fps produced by the script above or due to monitoring the device screencasting at the laptop screen still trying to do anything at the device physically. Another important note is that the screenshot is always 640x480 no matter what the target device resolution/density is (probably it depends on screencap command line). Initially, after the very first try I've also noticed that the resolution was extremely small rendering huge widgets at the lock screen. I've managed to adjust the resolution and density using the adb shell wm commands family, however another issue is that the device screen is rotated by 90° visually at the screenshots, but accepting the touches at the device display as if it was still in the portrait orientation (something like vertically stretched pixels?).
I can't enter the recovery mode because it's interrupted with the reboots I mentioned above, however the download mode keeps the display always turned on (until the battery is pulled off). I suspect there is a software issue requiring to make a hardware reset or make a tiny configuration change, but I cannot do it until I take  all the necessary backups of the device. Here are the backup methods I used:

Direct copying important files from the sdcard
Trying to export/backup important data touching the black screen and watching the process at the laptop display in the applications that support backup/restore facilities (not that easy, much harder than using a touchpad, and really very annoying).
Copying some known to me files from some /data/data/package/ locations
TitaniumBackup (couldn't manage to make it work -- difficult to operate in the "blind" mode + it complains for having no enough space even for tiny applications)
adb backup for single packages

Unfortunately, the latest backup method for some reason does not work for some applications, and I observed the symptoms very similar described here and here. And, unfortunately, there are some medical applications I cannot ignore the backups from.
My questions are, hoping they are relevant enough:

Would this black-out be interpreted as a software issue caused with the crash? I mean: it does not seem to be a hardware issue (I believe it doesn't, but I'm not sure) or maybe there are just special display config settings causing the blackout?
Is there any other reliable method to take out the important information before I make any heavy changes?

Environment:

Device: Samsung Galaxy S5
Android: 5+, the stock firmware (Spr...), not re-flashed, rooted

Edit 1:
I've just noticed this question: Backup using adb on a phone with a dead screen - it describes not exactly the same case, since adb backup can't work for some applications + the recommendations in that questions not working for me, unfortunately.

Edit 2:
The app I want to backup DOES NOT allow backup via the application manifest. Oh f... I wasted two nights to take it out gently, and only a few backup tools report that the application backup is not possible. It's ridiculous: some sensitive data apps ALLOW to back up including messages, but not this one. How sensitive is taking pills log? Hilarious. So I took the application database SQLite files in order to try to restore them manually. I don't care if it succeeds or not just because of android:allowBackup. For those who would like to try to enable such an important feature here are some really easy (but time taking) steps described in

Android: Enable ADB Backup for Any App
Android: How to Decompile and Recompile APKs
Apktool build/install instructions

That's really straigh-forward to proceed with all of the above instructions, but I've got a few issues being not able to perform adb install -r ***:

The app I'm trying to take out uses a conflicting permission (C2D_MESSAGE or so, and it can be easily removed before building a new APK)
This probably won't ever work because I was trying to install an APK signed with another keys and I'm getting certificate errors.

Ok, I'm fine to take the SQLite files, and don't care the shared preferences. However I'm still wondering is there a way of resetting the user operating mode screen driver/adapter settings in order to make it enabled again and let the device not invert portrait and landscape orientation.
Edit 3:
I've managed to flash a custom recovery once, and then just reboot. The display in a portrait orientation renders as if it were in a landscape mode visually having two big black bars over and under the rendered scene! That's "awesome". :D Flashing it again now turned it into a brick so that I can't even enter the recovery anymore. I backed up what I wanted. Now unbricking.
Edit 4:
No unbricking -- the device turned into a brick freezing at reboot. Download mode is still available but flashing any firmware doesn't help unfortunately. Bad luck, but I'm really happy I was able to back up all important data (and even that non-backing-up one: I could register (!) touching the black screen and watching adb screenshots with 1-2 fps :D -- now my that app profile is in the cloud). The end.

Have you tried powering up via safe mode?
From POWER OFF...
Press & HOLD the power button.
When the "Galaxy S5" screen appears, release power and immediately press and HOLD the VolDown until it finishes booting up.
That should boot without any but the critical apps/threads.  Hopefully that will let you get into the device and pull backups.

Thank you for the suggestion. I tried to access the safe mode last night, but it just causes reboot loop. It simply waits for the "Galaxy S5" splash to disappear, and then just reboots with two vibrations (sorry can't pick a good English word here), unfortunately.

Without it being rooted Titanium backup is mostly useless.  Have you tried Helium Backup?  Assuming you can get anything to run.

Just installed it. The application I would like to back up the most is prohibited to be backed up as Helium says: "##### has disallowed backup for application data". :( I don't know if it's possible to backup the app data manually using simple adb shell cp ... as it might be unrestorable (or whatever why Helium complains for it)... It's also described http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/68209/what-is-the-purpose-of-an-app-disallowing-backups-androidallowbackup-false but I have no idea if I can simply copy that app's /data/data... directory and then put it back after hard reset.


text:
Android Tablet Won't Stay Off
I have a Cube U30GT Mini tablet with Android 4.1.1, kernel 3.0.8, Rockchip rk3066. This tablet won't stay off unless the battery is dead.
Doing a normal "Power Off" just reboots the tablet.
If the battery is dead and I plug in the charger it always boots.
I also tried removing the memory card, but that didn't help either.
Is there any setting or Linux kernel tweak which could be causing this issue, or any other ideas what could be the cause?

Is the device rooted. First thought is defective hardware

Although this sounds like defective hardware, possibly a power switch or moisture issue... Have you tried adb shell reboot --poweroff ?

Device is rooted. I tried reboot --poweroff and same problem. The switch is working, it almost seems like it's some sort of inherent feature of this tablet or some low-level boot loader problem. I just figured out that if I hold in the power button (hard reset) while it is booting, then it will shut off and remain off. But in order to turn it on again after that I have to connect the charger. I first thought I'd bricked it when it happened, but luckily connecting the charger woke it. Still a complete mystery why it doesn't normally stay off.

Why not try flashing original firmware? It will help rule out hardware issues

Developer Options were enabled in Settings. Disabling them fixed the issue.


text:
Restore whatsapp messages from one number to another

Current whatsapp is linked to a non-existent number.
I want to create a new whatsapp account for my new existing number
I do not want to migrate my old whatsapp account to the new number.
If I were to move the crypto backup files of the current whatsapp, will I be able to restore it on the new account?

Note -
Non existent whatsapp number is currently installed on a Moto G2, un-rooted, stock.
New number is on a Nexus 5X, rooted.

Whatsapp FAQ page states the following:

Restoring or transferring a backup
WhatsApp will ask you to restore your chats and media from a backup
  when you verify your number. Simply tap "Restore" when prompted to do
  so. If WhatsApp does not detect a backup, it could be that:

You are not logged into the same Google account.  2. You are not using the same phone number that was used to create the
  backup.
Your SD card and/or chat history is corrupted.
A backup file does not exist on the Google Drive account or locally
  on the phone.

The FAQ tends to imply that it might not be possible. I'm not sure if a google drive might do the needful. Has anyone had a swing with this?
Also, rooting the G2 might not be helpful as I'll need to unlock the bootloader first - which will wipe out the internal memory anyway!

As WhatsApp by default does not allow to transfer from a phone number to another, there's no way without root. Root would allow you to copy the encryption key and the conversation files located at /data/data/com.whatsapp folder to the target device.

Yes but the only problem is if i have to root the G2, then I'll first need to unlock the bootloader. And if I do that, it will trigger an instant wipe

I know, but there is no way you can do that otherwise

You can change your number in your first device i.e. Moto G2 by follwing this link.
After successfully doing it make a backup locally and also on google drive then install whatsapp on new device and log in with new number. You should be able to restore chat from google drive.


text:
Factory resetting repeatedly

I did the factory resetting of my galaxy grand repeatedly (2-3 times) due to hang- up problems.  Is it possible to recover the data which were in the phone memory before first resetting?

The short answer is no.
And the long answer is nooooooooooo.
But in a more serious tone, really, the answer is no. A factory reset resets the device to its factory state, as in before you owned the device and it still had that factory fresh smell. Unless you made backups of your files and applications, you will need to re-download/reacquire your information manually.


text:
Remounting system on android emulator lasts about 10 seconds and reverses until reboot
Found something odd with the Android 6.0 on x86_64 emulator (and possibly others) system images... is it something I'm doing wrong?
When I remount /system and push stuff to it, it's giving me a chance to push stuff at first but then after about 10 seconds it remounts itself automatically read only and stops me remounting it read/write, and just gives me:
# mount -orw,remount /system
mount: Read-only file system
until a reboot.
What gives? Has anyone come up against this before and solved it?
It doesn't appear to be the wrong error and I'm out of disk space - it looks OK:
/system                  1.2G   783.7M   456.2M   4096
Cheers

I saw the exact same puzzling behavior. To remedy this, use the -writable-system option when you start the Android emulator.
eg:
~/Library/Android/sdk/tools/emulator @<avd_device_name> -writable-system
Issuing adb remount afterward should then allow you to push to /system until you reboot or remount read-only again.


text:
Popup virus warning received from ninaxu.com
Recently started receiving a popup overlay screen from ninaxu.com - Google logo appears behind the overlay screen. Says my Android has 13 virus most likely received from visiting porn sites, however, I have never sought out porn sites (not judging others from visiting those sites, but I wouldn't introduce my phone to such a risk).  Anyway, a 2-min count down appears saying the SIM card would be damaged if Googles' antivirus isn't installed.  I can't back out when this popup occurs and have to reboot my phone.  The first instance of this popup occurred when I clicked on a link from my email subscription to "Mutts."  I ran and regularly run, AVG and no virus were detected.  Anyone else encounter this problem?  Suggestions? Thanks.

It's just a scareware popup by suspicious websites/ads. If you didn't follow the link on that popup, you're clean.

You can tell this is nothing but a fake (trying to make you take the bait) by just some basic rules:

a countdown: "If you don't act within 2 min, the virus will X". Interesting: How do they know that will happen in exactly 2 min? Nothing but panicking you.
the SIM card would be damaged: nonsense. Never heard any malware attacks the SIM card. Or the battery, which those messages often claim as well.
"Google's antivirus": Apart from the fact that there is no such app, Google definitely wouldn't chose an approach like that.
"13 virus": LOL Name a single Android virus (hint: there is none. Especially not 13. The term "virus" is completely mis-used on the Android platform, most obviously either as a "scare word" or because people are used to that kind of "software" from their Windows machine. True, there's malware – but no virus. Read the Wikipedia article on Computer Virus on this, and take a special close look at the end of the first paragraph: "the defining characteristic of viruses is that they are self-replicating computer programs which install themselves without user consent" (emphasis mine). Malware on Android is usually installed by the user himself)

So after explaining the background, I can only agree with Andrew:

It's just a scareware popup by suspicious websites/ads. If you didn't follow the link on that popup, you're clean.

And you usually get out of that by pressing the back button multiple times, closing the relevant browser tab, or closing the browser altogether.

Thanks for the explanation - anyway to keep that annoying popup from popping up?

Except for not visiting the website that opens it? Unfortunately not, @LittleRedShoes – unless rooting and an effective ad blocker count as options.

Yeah, get something like that at least once a month. Close the website whenever this appears and reload it. Today I've got the message that I've been selected to maybe win an iPhone or Samsung, if I take part in a Telekom survey. All with the typical magenta Telekom logo.

You can refer to my question and the answer for my question. It worked for me, and one more thing, I found out that sometimes if you request desktop site, the popup or redirect will not happen. (which means that those redirect will only happen if I was using mobile site, at least it was like this in my case)
Hope it helps =)


text:
Why phone performance decreases day by day?
I bought Lenovo A7000 10 months before. It worked fine until last month. But, after marshmallow update phone getting lag on sometimes for no reason. After update battery life is good. But performance is not up to the mark. What is the reason?


text:
Do Android apps store data in clear?
As in the title,
is there any chance someone with Android phone (5+) could access private app's data via USB storage?
In other words, **do apps encrypt data by default? **(e. g. Google Apps but also other ones)

It depends. First, if the developer is a good one with a brain he will make the app to do so, then you have to consider which kind of data that is.
Obviously you don't want your settings to be encrypted, it's just nonsensical, they will be stored in a xml file (or even json, again, it depends). But things like chat history, credentials, etc. they have to be encrypted.


text:
Android storage , where did my 2GB go?
I have an Android phone and trying to understand how it deals with disk space. When I connect my phone to my computer via USB, I can see that I have:
* internal storage space (1.8GB)
* SD card (16GB)
My android phone still complains often that I don't have enough free storage. So I installed the DiskUsage app (which was suggested on some blog). It visualizes perfectly how the data is organized. The app shows that I have roughly 700MB of total storage. Why is that? According to Windows I still have 1.7GB free.

How does this work? Does Android run on a partition which only is 700MB? How can I access the "other" 1.8 GB?? Is there a way to reclaim all that unavailable storage space?

While in that Disk Usage app, click the back button. You should get more options than just the Data partition?

Do you have a screenshot with 700MB of total storage?

@Alex.S that might not be relevant. The insufficient storage broadcast is triggered only for the /data partition (usually when free space falls below 10%).

@Fiksdal that's correct. I thought it shows my SD card as additional card (so not the same physical storage device with the remaining 1.7ishGB). I will check though, thx

@bas Alright, let us know what you find.

@Fiksdal, the two partitions shown are "storage card" (the 700MB one, and 2GB when I plug the phone in my computer) and "SDcard" (the sdcard, which has all available storage as it should. So it still seems I've lost 1,3GB of storage on my phone to something. Is it possible that the producer partitioned the storage card and reserved the 1.3GB? If so, is there a way to repartition the storage card to reclaim what's rightfully mine? :)

@bas First of all, what does this screen look like on your device?

@Fiksdal, I added a picture to the question. It's from my own phone though, (the quesetion/problem is on the phone of my father), but it's the exact same list of storage devices (except that my device is rooted, my fathers isn't). Two found storage devices, phone storage + SD card. On my phone I can see that the disk storage shown in Android is equal to the storage I see in Windows. On my fathers phone it remains the same issue I stated before: 750ish MB in Android, 2GB in Windows. I hope you can make sense out of this.

@bas SD card refers to a removable SD? The diagram below is of "storage card"?

@Fiksdal, yes that's correct. The storage card is the 750MB part, while its showing 2gb in windows connected through usb

@bas What happens if you try to copy a 1 GB file to the storage through Windows?

@Fiksdal I will give that a try, I will get back here when I visited my parents,might take a few days though

@bas Alright, sure :)

@Fiksdal, Aha, you couldn't have been more right. I lied, the overview of partitions is not equal to what I have. There in fact are three partitions listed in DiskUsage start screen: 1) apps memory, 2) phone memory, 3) SD card. The confusing part was that windows only shown 2 and 3, which pushed me on the wrong track. So the problem is the default partitioning of the phone. I guess the only way forward is rooting it and repartitioning it (or throw the old piece of junk in the garbage can and buy something new :). Any way, thx a bunch for your time and advise!!

@bas Sure, happy to help :) I typed it into a proper answer for the benefit of other people with the same problem.

Maybe you should remove the one screenshot from OP? It's from another device, right?

@Fiksdal yeah good one! Thx again!

The internal SD-card of the device is probably partitioned.
Check out this screen in the app you mention in OP:

Since my SD-card is not partitioned, I only see one partition. In your case, you should see more than one. The combined sum of all the partitions should equal the total size of the SD-card.
You could root the device and attempt to change the partition table and merge the partitions. It may be a bit risky, though. But it's certainly worth trying if you're open to the risk of rooting, tinkering, etc.
You may also try apps such as this one to move apps to the storage partition. You can free up space on the app partition that way.
If you want to root, you can also use this app to remove bloatware system apps that you don't need. This can also free up space. However, this may also be risky. If you try this, you should be prepared that something might potentially go wrong, and you might have to re-flash stock firmware. That said, removing preloaded bloatware is often easy and trouble-free.


text:
How to route audio from bluetooth headset's mic to android speakers
I have an android app which routes mic audio to speakers in realtime. What I want it to do is instead of routing built in mic audio, it route audio from mic of a bluetooth headset.
Background: I just wanna use my bluetooth headset as mic and connect the phone to loud speakers so that whatever I speak comes through loud speakers wirelessly.

Old question, what app was this?


text:
At 2016-oct-16, calendar goes back to 1970 (or, "cannot disable Tardis")
So... How do I disable time traveling?
I have Cyanogenmod 13 on a Redmi 2 Pro (a snapshot version), with opengapps 6.0-pico-20160704. I recently noticed that, when I get from 2016-oct-15 on the calendar to the next day (for example, by choosing "day" view and scrolling to the right), it goes back to 01-jan-1970 (Unix zero time).
In month view, if I click on any day of that week, it also goes back in time.
It's funny: I can schedule events on a date within that week, but the calendar won't display them (that weeks stays empty). This happens with two different calendar frontends (Etar and AOSP Calendar), so it must be related to the internal Android Calendar.
Is this a known bug? What should I update in order to try to fix it?
And what will happen if I don't fix the bug before that week? Do I go back to the 70's?

I'm having the same issue and I saw another post saying that it's happening due to the beginning of summer time in Brasil, in October 16, so if you change your timezone it should stop...
Obviously won't work for me because I live here and changing the timezone is not an option, but it's worth giving a try :) (even because the person that figured it out didn't say a thing about fixing it).
Cheers!

Change your time zone for one that have actually the same old time you had. For instant, I live in Brazil GNT Brasília - 3:00. I'd faced the same bug at  2016-oct-16 due to the beginning of summer time in Brasil.  To figure out just changed to Uruguay timezone


text:
How to show screen recording permission prompt again?
Android asks for permission before an app records screen as following (a standard Android feature, not a part of the app):

After I select "Don't show again", this prompt will not show up as expected.  How can I bring it back for this app without uninstalling and reinstalling it?
I have checked App permissions, but it is not there. I have also deleted the app's cache to no avail.
[Edit] 2016-07-08
The following screenshot shows all the permissions (no screen record/capture permission):

The following screenshot shows the permissions of the app:

Don't have enough rep to answer this, but "appops set PACKAGE_NAME_HERE PROJECT_MEDIA ignore" removes the permission

it seems there is no way to do that without uninstalling app or restarting permissions Android Developer
but if you want to restart the permissions
Go to Application Manager -> App Permissions -> Requested Permission -> turn it off / on for your program .

Thank you for trying to help.  I could not find Application Manager.  The Android device (Android 5.1) has "App permissions". It has a list of permissions requested by apps. I do not see the request for screen recording.

are you sure screen Recording isn't listed under additional permissions ?

I have just added screenshots to show no "screen recording".

Clear app data to remove granted permissions of the screen recording app.

Where does it say that clearing app data removes granted permissions? Can you back that by a source? I very much doubt this.

@Izzy It does so, since clearing data == using the app from scratch and so Android does revoke the permissions. In Marshmallow, you can see it for yourself in the permission tab of the app.

@Firelord That restriction (MM and up) wasn't mentioned – it was phrased "generic" :) Plus, while at splitting hair: it would remove other things as well even before MM – e.g. all the settings adjusted. So Koorosh's answer is a much better approach. And, seeing the first comment on it, OP states being on LP (5.1) – a comment made almost a year before this answer was posted.

MM and up is implied since MM added the ability to control specific permissions. Prior to MM an app just got all the permissions that were presented to the user at install time.

click image for larger variant
On the bottom right is where you go to Show System Processes. I came here looking for the answer and ended up figuring it out so figured I'd post the right way since I had the same problem and was initially getting the same results until doing this.

And what does this have to do with "showing permissions dialog again"? I'm a bit confused. Maybe the confusion is you're talking about the "Screen recording" app (which is a pre-installed system app with Android 6+ AFAIK) – while OP asked about the screen recording permission of some user-installed app?

You need to reinstall this app after uninstalling it from your device and you will start seeing this permission prompt again. I tried this on my Android device running Marshmallow 6.0.1 and it did the job.

Thank you for your response.  My original post asked specifically for how to remedy this "without uninstalling and reinstalling it".

I Found the screen recorder permissions after tapping on the menu icon at the bottom of each function's Permission page. In other words, I opened the permissions list for Storage, tapped on the menu icon, tapped on the show system link that came up and found the video clip recorder app towards the bottom of the list, then finally disabled it for Storage. I then repeated the same process for Microphone and Phone. Cheers. Marco


text:
Is Galaxy S5 capable to receive IR signals
I'm thinking to buy a Galaxy S5, I have a question.
The Galaxy S4 can transmit IR signals, but not receive them.
I want to make my own remotes. Does Galaxy S5 (NOT mini) have an IR blaster (receiver, not transmitter)? I cannot find info, I wait for answers to this.

Maybe this is the answer to your question. I'm not sure but according to this link it can't. http://www.tamatalk.com/IB/topic/190144-a-way-to-get-galaxy-s5-to-send-files-via-ir/

I have a galaxy s5 g900f variant. It comes with a stock app peel smart remote which can basically be used to control most devices that are IR enabled. The IR blaster is located at the top left of the phone as a small black dot like shape which is easily noticeable.

I know Galaxy S5 has an IR Blaster, my question is "Is Galaxy S5 CAPABLE to RECEIVE IR signals?"

The IR Blaster can only send signals not receive any. Of which it can mostly control IR remote controlled devices like TV Audio systems and small scale Entertainment Systems.


text:
Android phone images are not the correct resolution
My android phone has an 8 megapixel camera meaning the resolution of the images should be 3,264 x 2,448. However when i plug my phone into my computer and view the details of the pictures, some are 1920 x 1080 but most of them are 1280 x 720. If someone could explain why this is happening that would be great.

There is a tradeoff between image resolution and filesize (you can store more pictures if they're smaller).  There is likely a setting to select what resolution to save the images at.

wow I feel so stupid it was right there in the settings. post that as an answer so i can give you credit.

The question is off-topic, so I'd rather not post an answer.  But glad we were able to solve your problem.


text:
How do I set a different notifications sounds for different contacts?
If it matters I have an HTC Desire 626s and just want to know if it's possible to set different notification sounds for different contacts and if yes, how?

It seems that maybe this would work for you.
http://cellphoneforums.net/htc/t380910-htc-desire-626s-transfer-set-custom-ringtones-notification-sounds.html#axzz4DmQpMeQH


text:
Lg stylo2 moving apps to sd card problem
I have an lg stylo2 from virgin mobile running android 6.0.1. I'm trying to free up some internal space by moving some apps to the sd card. Everything i have seen says that you go to apps, storage and click change. There's a problem. There is no change button on my phone, for any app.

Is this something that virgin mobile turns off or what? If i have to root the phone, which i am not opposed to, does anyone know how for this particular phone? I haven't been able to find a tutorial yet.
Thanks

According to this it was a feature removed in Marshmallow update.
Quoting user tommytm75 from the android central forum:

There is no solution yet. I have the same issue. After going back and
forth with LG, finally someone answered my question.  This is the last
email I got from LG.
Hi Tom,
Thank you for contacting LG!
We regret any inconvenience you’re having.  Upon checking, I’m afraid
that the Adoptable Storage feature  has been removed on the
Marshmallow update of the LG G Stylo  and this means you may not be
able to fully use the SD card as internal storage of the device. I’m
so sorry to disappoint you in this matter.
Should you have any other questions,  please feel free to contact us
again via Email, Live Chat, or Phone by calling 1-800-793-8896.
Thank you and we wish you all the best.
Sincerely,
Edrian
--- LG Customer Service

Source: LG G STYLO - not enough memory on sd card?

Shoot. That sucks.

It does tried to look if there was maybe a root but couldn't find one for that specific phone.

I think its a fairly new phone so the lack of a root method doesn't surprise me. Thanks for the info anyway

HOW TO CREATE ADOPTABLE STORAGE FOR LG G STYLO (MOVING APPS TO SD CARD)
I have the Lg g Stylo from Boost Mobile (Model# LGLS770) running on 6.0 and spent the last 3 days on figuring out how to make my 32gb SD card my default storage now when I download stuff it goes directly to the SD Card and not to the internal storage (mostly games)
Here we go,
NOTE: You don't have to root your phone to do this I did this from my PC (I used  Windows 10).
1st "Download Java" -it is necessary.
You can find out where on the internet and then watch this video from Youtube if you need help installing it:
"How to install Java JDK on Windows 10 ( with JAVA_HOME )".
NOTE: pay close attention to the part of the video when you get to around 5:53 in the minutes BECAUSE YOU MUST COPY AND PASTE THE PATH EXACTLY WHERE IT IS SHOWN and not at the end of the file path which he says. It actually goes right after the 1.0\; (one point zero backslash semicolon) don't worry it will all make sense when you see the Java installation video.
Next download the “Android SDK Software” from the  developer.android.com/studio   website.
Get the zipped version/file... when you unzip it you will eventually find the “platform-tools“ which holds the "adb and fastboot”  files you will need to install on your PC.
This Youtube video will help It’s what I used,
“How to Install FASTBOOT and ADB using Android Studio on Windows PC”
(The one Published on Jan 16, 2016 by  Dawson, Jim)
Once all that is installed connect USB Cable from PC to your phone (Make sure to turn your phone USB Debugging on)
Open your computer Command Prompt (cmd.exe)
Then enter all five (5) codes separately  type the first code then hit enter, the second code then hit enter, third code then hit enter  ect… until all five have been entered and your done !

Code:
adb shell
Code:
sm set-force-adoptable true
Code:
sm partition disk:179,64 private
Code:
sm set-force-adoptable false
Code:
sm list-volumes all

You don't need to watch any YouTube videos to install fastboot and adb on your machine: we have step-by-step instructions on this site.

From my point of view, the only solution is to root phone and install App2SD ROOT PRO from Play Store. I had similar problem. Do not use Link2SD because it does not work properly with MM.

Right, but i cant do that because, as far as i know, it doesn't look like a root exists for this phone just yet.

So, try to use any App2SD app without necessity of root (there is a lot of such app in Play Store for free). It moves part of Your applications to SD (not all) but You will have more space in internal memory.


text:
How do I change the phone number for incoming calls to international format on the mobile
My contacts have their phone number in the international format.  It needs to be this way, otheriwse I can't call them from another country.  As an example
+64 21 1234567

But the incoming calls have the local number, so the software can not correlate them with the contacts.  That is, I can't tell who is calling.  Example
021 1234567

Points to note (all phone models are Samsung)

On my previous phone, S6, things worked just fine as they did on S4 before
that.
Now that I have migrated to S7, I have the above problem (with the same contacts that were migrated across).
My wife had this issue with her S5 and I managed to fix with some setting.
My wife migrated to Note 5 and all still works fine for her.
I have gone through all the settings I can think of, several times but have not found any that will fix this.
I can fix it by adding the local number to the contact as well the international format.  WIth several hundred contacts, this is a lot of work and will still give problems when I am outside the country.
The SMS system works fine, its just the voice calls.
I am still with the same provider.

Where is the setting to fix this ?

Exactly that's working on all devices I've seen (still have to see the S7). Phone number identification usually bases on the last N digits only (with N ~ 8 AFAIK), exactly for these reasons. I'm not aware of any related setting, or where one might "adjust N".

As far as I know there is no settings for that on your side. The Caller-ID comes from your provider and you cannot change its format.


text:
Pokémon Go without Google at all
I bought an android phone recently and tried to use it without any Google account and so far that was alright.
But I wanted to try Pokémon Go today and I cannot play without signing up with a Google account.
I heard that you could create a Pokémon club account instead of Google but I don't even have the option, only the button to sign up with google appears.
Does anybody have a solution for that?

You could ask this on our sister site for gaming Q&A (http://arqade.stackexchange.com). Possibly. Refer their on-topic guidelines to see if this question would be acceptable there. It probably would be, and since they have a community of users around Pokemon Go, you would probably find more help there than here.

Maybe Lucky Patcher?

Unfortunately Creating a Google Account is currently your only option, It's not hard to create a new account and it will probably be beneficial for many other applications you might download.  It's annoying to create a whole new account just to keep things separated but it's necessary to gain access to Google's location features on Android.

As far as I know, Pokémon GO relies on Google positioning and map frameworks, so theoretically you are required to have Google Apps, or at least (?) Google Play, Google Maps and Google Play Services. Without them, even if you managed to log in without Google, you will not be able to get GPS position.

Revoke Pokémon GO’s Access to Your Google Account
You must login to the Google account permissions page and look for the entry “Pokemon Go Release”. Click on it for a detailed view and then, click the giant “REMOVE” button.
But i have to tell you that this may lead to your Pokemon Game STOP.
Use a Burner Google Account
Okay, we get it. You want to keep playing, but are (rightfully) dubious about handing over your account. Here’s a little workaround: create another free Google account, with nothing in it, and use that to sign into Pokémon GO.
I think sooner or later, Pokemon Go won't require Google Play Acc anymore. This is a ridiculous thing about this game. I heard that Pokemon Go on Itunes no longer requires this account.

Revoking access isn't applicable to the question, because the questioner doesn't have a Google account to start with.

Its only in certain countrys as part of a limit release for the beta but thankfully apkmirror uploaded it , they're a very safe site enjoy.
http://www.apkmirror.com/apk/niantic-inc/pokemon-go/pokemon-go-0-29-0-release/pokemon-go-0-29-0-android-apk-download/

The problem is not about downloading and installing it, but the problem seems to be requiring to sign in to Google account just before you can play it (after installing it, of course).

then youd create a pokemon account

If you do not see the "login with google" option you probably specified a too young age on the start screen when asked about you birthdate.
At least this was the problem when I had it, too.
You would only have to enter your birthdate once at the very first start of the app, but you have to enter it again if you clear the cache, apparently.

The questioner does see the "login with google" option. They want to use another login option.


text:
Transfer information to SD card (apps)
I have a problem transfering information to SD card on my Lenovo Vibe C. I had Lenovo A319 in the past and I bought Vibe C (Cause I broke the screen).It was much easier then and low time-consuming. I transfered the apps and other documents I needed from the old phone to the internal memory of my new one and then tried to put them on the SD card, but it takes too loong. Any ideas how to fix it?


text:
I have 32 GB external, but my internal is only 4GB!
My mom bought me a phone. It's Samsung Galaxy J1. And It says that it has only 4GB in my internal storage. But I have 32 GB external storage.
So, I downloaded all apps that I wanted then I  moved it all (that can moved)to the external storage.
But when I tried to download a new app, it says that my internal storage is full! And now, I can't download some apps nor pictures and music.
Yes, I do have a lot of space left in my external memory. But it looks like nothing because it's useless now.
So please, help me from my problem. And w/o rooting my phone. Thanks in advance.

It's not unusual to have more external than internal memory. I once had a 2Gb tablet with 64Gb SD card. I By what means did you "move" them to external storage? Can you be sure you didn't actually "copy" them? How much internal space did you free up in performing this move? 4Gb is a LOT of internal storage! It really should be plenty on its own, unless you're downloading the whole Google play store!

Please check with our insufficient-memory tag-wiki to get started on the topic. It feels like this question is asked at least once per day, so additionally there should be plenty other questions using that tag.

Check the installed apps how many space they consume. As you have a cheap phone with small memory you have to manage your apps: only install apps you really need.

How disk space is used on Android device?

From my point of view, the best solution is to root Your phone and install Links2SD or App2SD ROOT PRO form Play Store. If rooting is not avaliable (lost of guarantee) please use App2SD for non-root users. There is a lot of such apps in Play Store. It moves parts of apps to SD card and frees space in internal memory.
But if You root Your device, all app parts can be moved to SD, even part of system apps.


text:
What does "restricted" mean in Data Usage
When I go to Settings - Data Usage, next to some of the apps it says "restricted." The only thing I can restrict is background data, which I've done for all the apps. But only some of them say restricted. What does this mean?

@beeshyams Sure that's a dupe? OP asks for restricting mobile data for apps – while your link points to declaring some WiFi hotspots to be counted as "mobile connection". // Kathleen: A screenshot might help for clarification :)

@izzy that's why added the comment after marking it dupe, since there is ambiguity . You did right by asking for screen shot

Hopefully there will be one soon, @beeshyams – but the answer by UglyBlueCat sounds convincing to me :)

Retracted close vote

It is referring to the restriction of background data.
This list only shows apps that have used, or attempted to use, mobile data in the current cycle period, which is shown underneath 'Set mobile data limit' and should be set to match your billing period.

Thanks for the response @UglyBlueCat. From what you and my husband said, my interpretation is that an app that says "restricted" tried to access background data, but was blocked by my having turned it off. The other apps (where I also turned off background data) may have accessed foreground data. I wish Android allowed you to restrict foreground data also.


text:
Is wiping the data partition totally unnecessary after this adb fail and stock restore?
I uninstalled this version of Xposed, because I wanted to try this one. Note: Thanks to this comment I was actually able to flash the latter too, but it gave me a bootloop. So I would caution others against that package.
So the procedure for the latter was adb, but it turns out adb doesn't work for flashing Xposed on my device. (Zenfone 2) I had only managed to install my previous version of Xposed using recovery flashing.
But when I tried the adb script, though, I got this output. However, the phone didn't reboot or anything. Just like last time. (Even though I waited a fair amount of time.)
Even though there is no evidence of it, I figured there may be a small chance that this failed adb script had done some sort of damage to my firmware. So I decided to flash the stock firmware again "just because". Why not? Anyway, that's already done.

Is there any potential use to also wipe the data partition?
Was there any potential benefit to restore the firmware like I did?

(I'm gonna root again and install the same Xposed Framework I initially had.)

@DeathMaskSalesman Is this the case for the adb scripts in both the XDA threads I linked to in OP? The same thing happened for both of them. (Which is why I've had to flash through recovery.)

@DeathMaskSalesman Yeah, it looks like both scripts lack such quotes. In the the scripts, the shell command is used twice. Should I add the quotes to both lines?

@DeathMaskSalesman I see. I will try. By the way, why would they have left such a weird error in the scripts? And why did the scripts, containing these errors, work for other people?

@DeathMaskSalesman I see. I will try. By the way, why would they have left such a weird error in the scripts? And why did the scripts, containing these errors, still work for other people?

@DeathMaskSalesman Alright, will test it when I get back to my laptop.

@DeathMaskSalesman I put the quote marks in there, and the process continued. Waiting for the phone to boot now! Thanks for the tip!

@DeathMaskSalesman Meh, it gave a bootloop. Oh well. I don't think that was related to this fix, probably some other issue Better just restore the firmware and go with the previous Xposed package.

Analyzing the InstallXposedFramework.bat script tells us the reason behind the script failure. The content of the script follows:
@echo off

set adb=files\adb.exe

echo '
echo '
echo ' Connecting ZenFone ..
echo '
echo '
%adb% wait-for-devices

echo '
echo '
echo ' Pushing files ..
echo '
echo '
%adb% push assets\xposed-sdk21-x86\system /data/local/tmp/system
%adb% push files\installer /data/local/tmp
%adb% shell "su -c chmod 755 /data/local/tmp/installer"

echo '
echo '
echo ' Installing Xposed Framework ..
echo '
echo '
%adb% shell "su -c /data/local/tmp/installer"

echo '
echo '
echo ' Done, rebooting ..
echo '
echo '
%adb% reboot

Reason behind the failure
Above, the script proceeds flawlessly until it hits:
%adb% shell "su -c chmod 755 /data/local/tmp/installer"

, whose arguments haven't been formatted correctly. Specifically, chmod, 755 and /data/local/tmp/installer are intended as three separate arguments to be supplied to su -c, which accepts one mandatory argument (that is, the command to be executed), an optional login id and an optional and arbitrary number of arguments at the end.

Patch for the script
To make the script work, the line:
%adb% shell "su -c chmod 755 /data/local/tmp/installer"

has to be edited to resemble:
%adb% shell "su -c 'chmod 755 /data/local/tmp/installer'"

, since chmod 755 /data/local/tmp/installer is an unique command (chmod) with two arguments of its own (755 /data/tmp/installer). The whole of it will then be supplied as the only argument to su -c and be executed with root permissions, allowing the script to proceed its execution.

If the phone bootloops
Then the Xposed version supplied alongside the script is somehow incompatible. The bootloop is independent from the installer script.

Should I wipe the Data partition and reflash the firmware, if I execute the original InstallXposedFramework.bat?
Absolutely not, and there's why: the commands that push Xposed to your device are the following:
%adb% push assets\xposed-sdk21-x86\system /data/local/tmp/system
%adb% push files\installer /data/local/tmp

. Since, as explained before, the command:
%adb% shell "su -c chmod 755 /data/local/tmp/installer"

is buggy and therefore makes the script hang, nothing is in fact installed. The only thing to do, is to check if the folder /data/local/tmp is empty, and delete anything inside it if it's not.

Thanks! By the way, does this mean that the script would have hung for everyone who tried it? (I'm referring to the script itself, not the bootloop that happened due to the incompatible Xposed.)

@Fiksdal Unless one has a weird su binary, then yes, this script won't work for anyone.

That is so weird. Although I agree with your observation, since I have edited the script and experienced the difference first hand. What I don't understand is that I encountered exactly the same situation with this one (for which I ended up using the recovery option.) I'm just curious, how could they possibly both release this with such a serious bug? (I'm not disagreeing with your answer, I'm just dumbfounded.) Also, why is nobody in the XDA comments mentioning it?

@Fiksdal This cannot really be answered, since an eventual answer would be mere speculation. My guess is that most people uses the recovery method, than the adb one. As for the .bat scripts being the same, I reckon that the authors may have shared them with each other.

Yeah, that sounds plausible. Although the latter didn't supply any recovery option at all.


text:
Problem with Samsung Galaxy calls
I have a Samsung Galaxy S4 Active mobile phone and for the past year suddenly I couldn't make a call. Whenever I was trying to answer or call someone I couldn't hear them and they couldn't hear me. I tried fixing it alone but I didn't make it. So I went to someone more expert. He changed the microphone and the speaker but still. The problem is still there. Now sometimes it works but suddenly stops. The weird thing is that on Viber I can hear and they can hear me.
Also, tried to change the sim card but still. No solution.
Has anyone had a problem like that ?


text:
How to adjust the threshold for the "storage low" event?
There's almost no Android user (and certainly no regular visitor of our site) who hasn't heard of the "insufficient storage" error – or even experienced it him/herself. That there must be at least 10% of storage free on /data sounds ridiculous at least when the total space on that partition goes at or beyond 8 GB. Thus we quite frequently have questions on this topic here.
On one of the latest I've done some investigation of the relevant code, and discussed that in my answer. Let me quote the relevant code-block (taken from the latest code) here again:
 * This class implements a service to monitor the amount of disk
 * storage space on the device.  If the free storage on device is less
 * than a tunable threshold value (a secure settings parameter;
 * default 10%) a low memory notification is displayed to alert the
 * user. If the user clicks on the low memory notification the
 * Application Manager application gets launched to let the user free
 * storage space.

Now please focus on lines 2+3:

If the free storage on device is less than a tunable threshold value (a secure settings parameter; default 10%)

(emphasis mine). So here comes my question:

TL;DR: If that threshold is tunable, how to tune it?

Is it something in settings we overlooked all those years? Is this supposed to be "tuned" by the "ROM bakers" only? Or, taking the hint of a "secure settings parameter", is there some app utilizing the WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS permission to take care of that? By which means are we supposed to address this (if at all)?

According to https://developer.android.com/reference/android/provider/Settings.Secure.html: "Secure system settings, containing system preferences that applications can read but are not allowed to write. These are for preferences that the user must explicitly modify through the system UI or specialized APIs for those values, not modified directly by applications."

So looks like it should be "something in settings we overlooked all those years", right?

Seems like – or they forgot to implement that for user-control. The WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS has protection level "development" – so not sure whether that would be granted to a "normal app" – but "system or signature" (i.e. the ROM baker) still could use it.

I'm always wondered by so many "forgettings" that contribute to planned obsolescence.

Low storage threshold is the minimum value of the two:

sys_storage_threshold_percentage (default is 5%, was 10% on Android 7 and older). It's multiplied with the total storage size to get threshold value in bytes. This setting is there since the early days of Android.
sys_storage_threshold_max_bytes (default is 500 MiB). This setting was added in Android 4.

In JellyBean both settings were moved from secure namespace to global. And the logic to calculate low threshold was moved from DeviceStorageMonitorService to StorageManager.
If the 5% of total space on /data is greater than 500 MiB, the threshold is always 500 MiB. In order to set the threshold to even smaller value, e.g. to 100 MB:
~$ settings put global sys_storage_threshold_max_bytes 100000000

That there must be at least 10% of storage free on /data sounds
ridiculous at least when the total space on that partition goes at or
beyond 8 GB

Forcing the user to have 10% free space is not ridiculous, or stupid. It helps wear levelling, and is highly recommended for european users due to the continental 2y waranty law. Some manufacturers like Crosscall even provide 3y waranty (no restriction).
Spending long time using a disk with less than 5% can damage it. A friend used to own a large Flash disk, and after 14 months with 1% free space, the disk died. Yes, 1% free was between 1GB and 10GB free space; but the system needs to write loads of cache and temp files; and always rewriting the same cells killed the disk.
That's why phone manufacturers are very happy in europe with the Android 10% limit. This limitation is very frustrating when it triggers; I suffered from it this week; but it's preventing the Flash dieing before the 2y waranty.

Are they basically designing these things to die shortly after the warranty expires?  If so, after the warranty expires, society has to deal with tons of electronics waste and/or expensive repairs.

Leaving space for over-provisioning and wear-leveling is manufacturer's duty. And good manufacturers do spare enough space already. Sparing space from within partitions and filesystems doesn't make much sense. Though usually it's beneficial for filesystem's performance depending on its fragmentation handling and other factors. But these factors are more prominent on HDDs, almost negligible on flash media.

No, for both comments, to RockPaper and Irfan : it's exactly like when you buy a 4TB rotating disk, and complaint that after 15 years the head is dead. Product has limits, and to not burn the device, you need to either shutdown it to save MTBF, or use heavy RAID to protect your data. You are freee to play with limits; but people who care about their storage keep far away. All FLASH storages already include hidden spare sectors; but keeping free space helps a lot. Also, playing with sys_storage_threshold_* implies root which had previously void waranty.

Leaving the rest being opinion-based, just a correction: writing to global namespace of Android's settings database using settings put global command does not require root privileges. You can simply execute the command from adb shell.

You need to build your own kernel with preferrable settings, this option not writable by "normal_apps".

not writable by "normal_apps" does not necessarily imply building an own kernel. Can you back that with a reliable source? A system app could have access to that. The requirement of building a specific kernel somehow contradicts the statement "tunable threshold value".

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


text:
How to enable "double tap to wake up" in any android device?
I've heard about the feature "double tap to wake up". How to enable this option on my device
My device details:
Gionee P3 Lollipop Cyanogenmod 12.1
Kernel Version 3.4.67

It can be enabled only if your ROM/ kernel support that feature. To check if it is enabled download 3C Toolbox from Play Store , go to System Manager → Miscellaneous  and you will have an option that shows up to enable double tap feature, IF it is supported. Figure shows it is not supported on my device
I am not aware if CM supports enabling this feature using the inbuilt settings


text:
battery charge stops at 99%
My phone is Kyocera Hydro Icon, running Android 4.4
After using it for almost a year, recently charging its battery stops at 99%, indicated by the battery icon and the corresponding LED staying red instead of turning green.
Is it normal or there might be some problem?
Thanks.

Did you try leaving it on charge for a while, say 10 minutes after hitting 99% , to see if it charges fully?

I left it charging over night, for several nights.

Is it normal or there might be some problem?

It is not normal but it is not a cause for concern as long as the battery performance is not visibly degraded

Li Ion batteries have different stages of charging as shown in Fig.1. What is probably happening in your case is that the required voltage levels to fully charge the battery are not being attained despite prolonged charging. As a result the LED and battery levels are not reflecting fully charged condition. This is probably due to the charger/ cable combo not delivering voltage/ current as required. This can be verified by changing them.
It is not a cause for concern, since it is not a good practice to fully charge . Quoting from same source

Li-ion does not need to be fully charged as is the case with lead acid, nor is it desirable to do so. In fact, it is better not to fully charge because a high voltage stresses the battery

Both at home and in office, charging stops at 99%.

Ok. Another possibility is that the battery has lost capacity to hold full charge, i have experienced that but don't have any sources to quote. But having full charge is not advised as mentioned

Bump charging- discharge for a few minutes at 99%,  charge again and repeat this process few times. By this battery is said to hold maximum charge possible. Not advised for regular use


text:
Samsung tablet hangs a lot
My Samsung Galaxy Tablet 2 10.1 model no.P7500 is giving me a lot of hanging problems. Most of the times, the touch is unresponsive and touch operates automatically and makes me land in unwanted places. The device is not rooted and I had done a factory reset and also flashed stock ROM but the problem continues.

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


text:
Samsung galaxy s5 battery Drainig fast
My device is the Samsung Galaxy S5 SM-9000H. Its battery drains very fast, even when the screen is off. It drains 70% overnight. The battery level becomes only 10% in the next morning, although the phone would've done nothing overnight!
Does anyone have a solution for this?

Have you checked in Settings › Battery Usage what app might be responsible for it?

+1 to @Izzy, this is key. It could be a misbehaving app that you downloaded, or a misbehaving system app, in which case Norman's answer may be your best bet.

@Kaizerwolf in both cases you mention it may be sufficient to simply reset that app (Settings › Apps, tap the app's entry, "clear cache" might already cure it, or with less luck "delete data" at the same place). Following Norman's advice, OP would lose all data including user-installed apps and device configuration. And if the issue pops up again afterwards, there's no comparison possible as the facts haven't been collected in the first place.

I have smart manager installed in my phone. daily at night i cleaned all in it. but after that battery drains fast

My Battery Draining Problem is also Solved by upgrading Android lollipop 5.0.1 to marshmallow 6.0.1.

First, check if one app is draining a lot of battery in the settings (like someone already mentioned). If there is an app that does that, uninstall it or turn it off completely when you don't need it.
If there's no such app or the battery is still draining fast, you also might need a new battery, depending on how old your current one is. A normal battery has an average lifetime of 2-3 years, after that it sometimes starts to malfunction, like draining very fast or just loosing all the energy all the sudden. If that's the case, you're gonna need to go out and buy a new battery - it doesn't cost much, ~25€. Also a good tip for having your battery live longer: Use only chargers which are specifically for your phone/battery. Other chargers might work as well, but if they give nit enough energy, your phone will charge slowly, and, even worse, if they give too much energy, it will charge very quickly but because the battery isn't made for that much energy, it'll break much sooner.

I got one too, 100% at 11pm, 0% at 6am
Just replace it with 13$ OEM battery. Everything is fine.

I don't think so, it is battery problem.

I notice that my battery drains faster if i forget to turn off bluetooth when i'm not using it.
Like the advice above says, check your battery usage to find out whats draining it so much.

Several things could be causing this. For example:
1.) The battery being too old. (These things do have a shelf life - ~2-3 years.)
2.) When you first got the phone, you may have had the phone plugged too frequently. Your exuberance can shorten the life expectancy of the battery. (Understandably, you don't want to run out of power when you need it, but you need to give the phone charging a break.)
3.) You may have applications that needlessly run all the time. Some apps continually ping servers for the latest information / updates / messages / location / etc. Take a look at those unnecessary programs and either shut them down or control them. If you did find some apps that could be a problem, determine whether you need to be updated all the time even while you're asleep. If you've found some of those apps, then I would check your wireless phone bill to see if your "data usage" is running high. I have found that those offending apps might be pickpocketing you. On the upside, your wireless carrier is always willing to sell you more "data".   ;-)
For example, any application that requires your phone's "Location" setting to be set to "on." (e.g. Facebook, MapQuest, GoogleMaps, etc.)
4.) I am sure there are more...
I hope this helps.

Backup your information and do a factory reset.  That should clear up any issues you are having with the software.
S5 hard reset guide
If the battery is still draining quickly, then you should try and replace the battery.  If this does not solve the issue, then their may be an issue with the device itself and will require you to take it to a repair shop for inspection.
Good luck!

Norman, that's drawing conclusions without having facts. Sure it might cure the issue – but at high costs (you should at least have mentioned this deletes all user settings, apps and data). But it might be simply enough to reset a single misbehaving app. You throw a bomb where a swatter might have been sufficient.


text:
how do I get stable connection of WiFi on my Samsung tablet A
My Samsung tablet A, gets disconnected immediately after connecting to router WiFi at my home. But at my office I do not face this problem with the router over there. Can you help me?

Do you know if your router is wireless n and if there is a switch to change it to wireless g. Try to change channel in router also.


text:
Error when flashing recovery to Moto G4 Plus Xt1640 - Image not signed or corrupt
I recently bought a new android phone (Moto g4 plus). Coming from the iPhone, I was eager to root it and take advantage of all the features.
The problem is that whenever I try to flash a recovery image, I get this error:
C:\Users\myuser\adb>fastboot flash recovery recovery.img
target reported max download size of 536870912 bytes
sending 'recovery' (12496 KB)...
OKAY [  0.400s]
writing 'recovery'...
(bootloader) Image not signed or corrupt

OKAY [  0.197s]
finished. total time: 0.601s

Keep in mind that the bootloader IS unlocked, I even get the warning when restarting the phone. Also this does not happen with just one image file. Every single image file gets this error. I have tried many different versions of TWRP, CLW, etc and all of them get this same error. Does anyone know how to solve this?

Yeah, I had the same error. The US XT1644 variant can't use the boot.img for the XT1643 and below. I was able to root by installing SuperSU. Run this command:
fastboot boot twrp-3.0.2-0-athene.img
Make sure you copy the SuperSU zip file in the /sdcard/TWRP folder on your device. Then when twrp loads, you can just pick the zip file and install.


text:
Basic question about flashing nandroid backups
I want to know that when we flash specific partition images (say system.img, data.img, cache.img, etc.), then how does the software know where exactly to put those partition bytes? For example, if I flash system.img, which CHS/LBA sector will it consider as beginning of that block? If it is based on the MBR/EBR1 tables, what will happen if I'm flashing the MBR/EBR1 too?
The reason I'm asking is that I want to change the partitioning in EBR1 slightly, so that more space is allocated to /data partition instead of /sdcard. I've got an old but good conditioned MediaTek (MTK-6577) based smart-phone called Karbonn-A30 which is great in build quality and almost every other aspect, but it only has 500MB of Internal Storage (/data partition in Linux lingo) which is not good enough for apps. Presently, the MBR and EBR1 partitions are thus:
$disktype MBR
--- MBR
Regular file, size 512 bytes
DOS/MBR partition map
Partition 1: 2.000 TiB (2199023255040 bytes, 4294967295 sectors from 1024)
  Type 0x05 (Extended)
Partition 2: 10 MiB (10485760 bytes, 20480 sectors from 18432)
  Type 0x83 (Linux)
Partition 3: 10 MiB (10485760 bytes, 20480 sectors from 38912)
  Type 0x83 (Linux)
Partition 4: 650 MiB (681574400 bytes, 1331200 sectors from 113152)
  Type 0x83 (Linux)

$disktype EBR1
--- EBR1
Regular file, size 512 bytes
DOS/MBR partition map
Partition 1: 376 MiB (394264576 bytes, 770048 sectors from 1443328)
  Type 0x83 (Linux)
Partition 2: 1.293 GiB (1388314624 bytes, 2711552 sectors from 2213376)
  Type 0x83 (Linux)
Partition 3: 1.998 TiB (2196501691904 bytes, 4290042367 sectors from 4924928)
  Type 0x83 (Linux)

Why this last partition which corresponds to /sdcard is left so large (1.998 TiB) is beyond my understanding! Since there is a good 2.5GB of space available on my actual /sdcard partition, I was thinking if I can alter the EBS1 and change the LBA addressing so that the third partition starts from 2097152 additional sectors (which comes to 1024MB or 1GB which is good enough for me), will it automatically increase my /data partition by 1GB and decrease the /sdcard by 1GB correspondingly? On XDA and other forums, I've read that people have successfully done this mod and achieved the change in partition sizes, but I first want to understand how it happens.

Since I have a MTK-6577 based phone and had to delve into repairing a broken partition table recently I thought I'd take a stab at answering this.

I want to know that when we flash specific partition images (say
  system.img, data.img, cache.img, etc.), then how does the software
  know where exactly to put those partition bytes?

If you flash to known mount points /system, /data, /cache you not need to know about the underlying structure, simply is there enough space and it's in the correct format (e.g. ext4). The mount points are specified in vold.fstab.
However if you use a low level flashing tool such as SP Flash you will need to also modify the associated scatter file to the new layout of the partitions as it will access the memory addresses for the partitions directly.
An example filesystem mount points for the MT-6577 (copied from /tmp/recovery.log):
CWM-based Recovery v6.0.2.8
recovery filesystem table
=========================
  0 /tmp ramdisk (null) (null) 0
  1 /boot emmc /dev/bootimg (null) 0
  2 /cache ext4 /dev/block/mmcblk0p4 (null) 0
  3 /data ext4 /dev/block/mmcblk0p5 (null) 0
  4 /misc emmc /dev/misc (null) 0
  5 /recovery emmc /dev/recovery (null) 0
  6 /emmc vfat /dev/block/mmcblk0p6 (null) 0
  7 /system ext4 /dev/block/mmcblk0p3 (null) 0
  8 /sdcard vfat /dev/block/mmcblk1p1 /dev/block/mmcblk1 0
  9 /sd-ext auto /dev/block/mmcblk1p2 (null) 0

Why this last partition which corresponds to /sdcard is left so large
  (1.998 TiB) is beyond my understanding

This is a result of using GPT vs older MBR partition tables. It is a special extended partition that is the maximum 32-bit address range (2TB). It allows loading the MBR to any device regardless of it's internal memory size. Then you have custom EBR1 (and EBR2) tailored for each model.

I was thinking if I can alter the EBS1 and change the LBA addressing so that the third partition starts from 2097152 additional sectors (which comes to 1024MB or 1GB which is good enough for me), will it automatically increase my /data partition by 1GB and decrease the /sdcard by 1GB correspondingly

I am not entirely sure about the details of that.
Instead I used swapped the partition sizes of /data and /emmc with a EBR1 provided on xda-developers.com. Then in Android use Link2SD app which utilises a 2GB ext4 partition on the external sdcard and move large apps over.
Just thought I'd add that if things go spectacularly wrong, like it did originally for me, you can recover by using backups of the original MBR and ERB1 files for adb shell connecting to your phone in recovery mode.
Restore partition details:
dd if=/tmp/MBR of=/dev/block/mmcblk0
dd if=/tmp/EBR1 of=/dev/block/mmcblk0p1

Oh and to manually create a backup in the first place:
dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0 of=/tmp/MBR bs=512 count=1
dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p1 of=/tmp/ERB1 bs=512 count=1

Mount an external sdcard from CWM and you can copy the file to/from /sdcard.


text:
How to backup my rom without pc?
I have a symphony v50 mobile. I can not go to recovery mod when my phone was switched off. When I go to make a backup of my current rom with rom manager i did not get the backup option. May I change the cwm recovery? If the ans is yes please tell me how. Else how I can make a backup of my current rom?

I was trying to go recovery mood by hold click volume up+power  buttons.  but not go to recovery. it goes to phone test function

Additional information pertinent to the question should be edited into the question. Comments are not guaranteed to persist, so the additive information can be lost.

Try to install TWRP recovery and full (or partial) backup can be done to additional SD card plugged to Your phone.


text:
How to recover bloatware
I root my panasonic eluga A and delete some bloatware now my google map has stopped navigating my location.
My google map search location and everything is working but gps not working.
Please help me what to do now.

Try to flash your's device again. And you can try Osmand navigation app.

download factory firmware and refalsh it it will restore the system apps you have deleted which will bring back the bloat

Unroot your phone.
Do a factory reset.

If Step 2 does not work:

Flash your device's Original Stock rom.
(You can find it from your device's website)

A friendly suggestion:
Don't Delete any system app, that you don't know about.
It might be an important one.


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My Samsung Galaxy S6 is bricked
I recently bricked my Samsung Galaxy S6 SM-S906l while trying to flash TWRP recovery.
Apparently, it was an unsupported recovery and I need to reflash the original recover with Odin, but it says it needs the PIT file.
How do you obtain the PIT file?

Tightly related post, if not duplicate. The problem is the same, making this a dual-prong appeal to action.

but i need help! My phone is bricked

The SM-S906L is the same device as the SM-G920V [source]. You should be able to use the PIT for the SM-G920V. You can get the PIT here.
I also found it here (and it is labeled as the SM-S906L, but has the same file name as the one that is specified for the SM-G920V).


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How To Get Files app
I do not have a "MyFiles" or "Files" app on my Samsung Galaxy Note 2 smartphone. How do I find this app? I have tried sobbing into my handkerchief. I have tried looking in the index.

Welcome to the Android Enthusiasts! Please note that asking to find an app is off-topic on this site. As Djd080 pointed out, you can use any 3rd party File Manager if your device doesn't ship with one.

If you are just looking to get into whatever is saved on your phone and do not have a "file explorer" app. There are plenty of 3rd party apps such as astro (doesn't have to be this one) that will do the job for you.


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How do I delete an incorrectly auto-completed word with backspace?
I use Samsung's default keyboard for typing. Specifically, I use the Swype-like part of it, SwiftKey Flow.
I recently updated my Samsung Galaxy S5 to Android Marshmallow, and I noticed that a feature I liked about SwiftKey was changed/removed. Previously, when I would swipe across the keyboard to "type" words, if the predicted word was incorrect, I could hit backspace once and that would delete the word.
That is also how my Galaxy S3 worked before I got the S5. When I type on a computer, I hardly ever delete things a character at a time. I delete the entire word with Ctrl+Backspace, and I really liked this type of thing on my phone too.
Following the Marshmallow update, if I mis-swipe a word and hit backspace, it only deletes one letter. This causes me some grief because then I have to hit backspace many times if the word was long, or hold the backspace key and risk deleting more than intended. In addition, I am so used to the previous behavior that I don't realize the word is incorrect, and I keep typing a gibberish word.
Is there a way to reintroduce this feature? Note that this is not the same as this question, and is in fact the opposite thing entirely.
I have tried looking in Samsung keyboard settings under Predictive text, Auto replace, and Keyboard swipe (all that does is let you select SwiftKey Flow, but not change anything about it), but I didn't see anything that lets me change this.


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Control Camera with Pro settings like in Lumia camera
Are there any apps that would let us change ISO(preferably upto 3200), shutter speed upto 4 seconds , etc? Because , i really wanna try some long exposure photography on an android device.
following images are shot using lumia 520 at 4 seconds shutter speed.
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