text:
Why do Seidio's battery charging instructions say to leave it charging after it's full?
I have an HTC Droid Incredible. I bought the "Seidio Innocell 1750 mAh Battery for HTC Droid Eris/Droid Incredible", and the instructions that come with it say...

In order to obtain the full capacity of your Seidio battery, we highly recommend that you leave the battery/your phone on the charger for an additional 2-3 hours after the charging indicator turns green or the battery status shows full.

Does this advice apply to the Incredible or is the phone smart enough to charge the battery to full (or at least near full) without any extra charge time? If not, does the battery keep getting charged up after the light turns green?

This is for battery calibration. Basically there's a sensor in your phone that is used by your phone to tell how full/empty the battery is.
This sensor doesn't actually know how full your battery is, all it knows is how much power is coming from your battery at the time. The problem it has is that all batteries are slightly different, and their capacity goes down over time and usage (a three year old battery will not be able to hold as much charge as a brand new battery).
Your phone keeps a record of the maximum power it's ever had from the battery, as well as knowing the minimum power that it can safely work with before it has to turn itself off. It uses the difference between those two numbers, and the current power at any time to calculate how much percentage of your battery you have left at that time. So with a new battery, the phone might be telling you that the battery is fully charged because it's charged to the highest level the phone's ever seen, but if you leave it charging a bit longer then it might charge more, and then the phone can recalibrate itself and use this new value as the most it's ever seen.
You should only need to do this "over-charging" with a brand new phone/battery, after that the phone know the maximum values, and can more accurately tell you when it's full.

Thanks for your answer. I've noticed that if I charge it until the light turns green, then unplug and replug, the light is orange again for several minutes. This makes me wonder if the phone discontinues battery charging after the light turns green, but replugging somehow "tricks" the phone into charging a little more. I'm still pretty unclear what the green light really means.

yes, the charging process is halted when you keep the device on the charger, because a constant tiny trickle would wear off the battery unnecessarily


text:
Check if call is coming from a fixed or mobile phone with tasker
I'm setting up a profile in tasker that sends a text message to everyone who calls me during a meeting. However, I don't want to waste my my credit by sending messages to fixed phones. How can I check if the call came from a mobile phone before sending the message?
Where I live, all mobile numbers start with 9 or 8, so I thought I might be able to use that. But I haven't be able to find a way to check what is the first digit in a number with tasker. Is there another way to do this? My objective is for tasker to know if the call came from a mobile or fixed phone.

Depending on the set up of your profile use the following:
In the Task step add the If statement: %CNUM ~ 9*/8*
This means that the step will be executed only for number starting with 9 or 8.
Alternatively, set up the whole profile to only activate if the caller's number starts with 8 or 9.
In Event (like Incoming Call) settings: Caller (normally says Optional) specify 9*/8*
This means the profile will be only activated if the number starts with 9 or 8.
Hopefully, this will work for you.
For more info see: http://tasker.dinglisch.net/userguide/en/matching.html

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text:
Can't write an SMS for some of my contacts
I'm using an LGP500 Android Phone (Android 2.2). In the default SMS application, when I select a discussion, I see the previous SMS (both sent and received), and there's a text area at the bottom of the screen to write a new message.
For most of my contacts, this behavior is working correctly, but for a few of them (which I use quite often), the text area is not shown. Those contact have a mobile phone number, and I can send SMS using the long way (create a new sms, search the contact ...).
Does anybody have an idea of the cause or the solution ?
Edit I tried a few things to fix this : clearing the data, deleting any previous sms history, changing the phone number from the local (06xxxxxxxx) to international (+336xxxxxxxx) format (french phone numbers), changing the mobile phone number as default phone for the contact, in vain.

Is their number formatted differently from your other contacts?

Does the problem exist if you use a SMS app replacement such as Handcent?

Nope... Some contacts use the classic french format (06########), some others use the international format (+336########). I already tried to switch the number format, but in any case some contacts have the text area, others don't.

It's working correctly with Handcent, but I want to use the default SMS app if possible.

@XGouchet: Really?  You prefer the default SMS over Handcent?  You're the first person I know that's said that.  Everyone I know that's tried Handcent loves it.

@MBraedley Well i just need a simple SMS with no fancy features, so yeah I really prefer the default SMS app.

Is there anything different about these contacts? Stored on the SIM, perhaps? Or their phone number is not marked as "Mobile"?

@Al Everett nope, nothing different, the phone number is marked as mobile, and all my contacts are saved on my Google account.

I have related issue so would be interested to see answers: sometimes I am able to write the text of the SMS reply but when I hit send it gives me "Invalid number" error. If I save it to Drafts and then try to send it from there, it works... Not the same problem but may be similar in a way of fixing. Let's hope for good answers.

This is a problem i face with few contacts on my P500 too! Try merging contacts with their FB account or twitter account or just create a Buffer account and join them. It works after that. Not a great solution but been working that way now!

I don't know why this is happening but you may be able to fix it by clearing the data from your messaging app.  From the home screen you go to settings >  Applications > Manage Applications then choose the Messaging app (or whatever your sms app is called).  If the option to clear the cache is there try that first but most likely you'll have to choose to "Clear Data".  I believe this will delete all the messages you have saved so keep this in mind.

This is not working, in fact event after clearing data, I still see my messages. I guess they are stored in another application or service but I don't know which one.

How about deleting and re-adding the contact?

My experience with this has been with non-mobile type numbers. If you happen to have multiple numbers for a contact, and for some reason it happens to select the Home or Work number rather than the Mobile, it will disallow you to send text messages to these numbers. Have you checked to make sure the number you're sending it to is classified as mobile?

Yyes the phone number I send to is classified as mobile (I also made it the default number for thosr contacts).

It may because the Messaging app "Only Mobile Numbers" setting enabled, try to disable it.
On Messaging App:
Menu > Settings > Extra Settings > Only Mobile Numbers

I do not have this extra settings in the sms app settings.

Are you absolutely sure you are using the stock messaging app of android 2.2? (maybe you could be using a modified version by your manufacturer which may be buggy). Anyways try the following (which is for froyo's default messaging app)

Go to Text Message Settings > "Manage SIM card messages" (check if any messages are there and try to move it back from it).
Go to your conversation, Long press the "menu options" softkey on your android to get the keyboards and start typing to see if the field pops back.

I don't know if the manufacturer changed something but it looks a lot like the stock app. I tried what you suggested, there was no sms ln the sim card at all, and a long press on the menu button does not make pop up the soft keyboard on my phone.

Perhaps some contact information got corrupted.  Try re-syncing the contacts on the phone.
Menu -> Settings -> Applications -> Manage applications -> All, scroll down to "Contacts" app and tap on it, select "Clear data".  Do the same for the "Contacts Storage" app.  This should clear all contacts data.  Now go to Menu -> Settings -> Accounts & sync, go into every account you have and toggle the "Sync Contacts" option off and back on.  This should force an immediate re-sync.

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text:
Whats the core difference between Kies, New PC Studio, PC Studio 3.1 from Samsung?
The web site doesn't specifically say...but I assume that Kies is for Android based devices, NPS and PCStudio are for W7p and other Phone OSs?

Kies is also for Bada based systems - maybe even primarly, because the built in "Samsung Apps" store only carries Bada apps.

New PC Studio is for Samsung's proprietary OS1.  I believe PC Studio 3.1 is just an older or region-specific version of NPS.
RoToRa is correct that Kies is for both Bada and Android.  It appears they are transitioning to using "Kies Mini" for Android, which is really just a means of updating the device software.  Media management, sync, etc. is intended to be done through the "cloud" on Android devices.
After looking at the Samsing website, I believe they do not have management software for their Windows Phone 7 devices.


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Is Samsung's Media Hub only available to new customers?
Are old donkeys not allowed to eat carrots?!

Appears to currently be US only, and only added in the latest Epic 4G update. However the marketing materials keep mentioning Galaxy S devices, rather than any specific models, so it could well roll out to the rest of the Galaxy S range in future updates, or possibly even via the on-device Samsung Apps store that most Galaxy S's have (assuming your phone company hasn't removed it).
However it's worth bearing in mind that this is a transparent attempt to lock you into Samsung for future phone and TV purchases, as once you've built up a large library of paid content on their media store, you're probably not going to want to move to hardware where you can't watch that content. If you're happy with that then ok, personally I'll stick to more hardware independant media vendors.

To be honest I was more after the free copy of Inception! - I was sure I'd seen TV ads for SGS's with Inception free in the UK...perhaps I dreamed it!

@Adrian I've seen posters on the side of buses for that around London, but assumed the film was pre-loaded onto the SD card, or something along those lines.

From some searches I've done, I got the impression that you had to have Media Hub to play the bundled Inception movie...

No, I've had Media Hub since I was running 2.1 in August 2010 (on my Vibrant).  I'm sure you could get it from somewhere and side-load it.

What's your zip code (if you don't mind sharing)?  I've tried numerous zip codes and it keeps telling me that I'm not in a supported location.

It was 60661 when I got the phone.


text:
Can I stream video from PC to an android device over USB?
I'd like to be able to stream video to my android phone (Samsung Galaxy S rooted 2.2) from a PC running Windows XP (I'm at work!).
There's no wireless network here, VLC and similar marketplace apps seem to only offer this service over wifi/3G; can I over USB?

Are you looking for a way to share your PC's internet connection over USB, rather than streaming video files stored locally on your PC?

Nope, I'm specifically looking to be able to show video files/dvd/streams on my phone, freeing up space on my desktop monitor while working.

I think the answer here is "in all practicability, no."
One hypothetical alternative would be USB host support, and to mount an external hard drive or thumb drive onto your phone. This would mean doing something like this, How To Mount External Hard Drive to Your XOOM. This seems impractical and potentially dangerous (who knows if that OTG cable might cause a short). The SGS may not even recognize the cable, or the drive, and the apk may not work with your phone.
That's the best answer I have on actually connecting via usb to a storage location.
Actual streaming from a PC via the USB port, though? Even if there were a way, it'd probably require extensive work on both the phone and the computer. Wouldn't a better (and way easier) solution be to buy a wireless USB adapter and set it to ad-hoc mode and SSID non-broadcast? Just a thought.

+1 interesting idea. Didn't know you could use a wifi USB adaptor to create an ad-hoc network. Will try it out!

You could turn on "USB Tethering", then run some media server like VLC carefully configured with RTSP streaming on your local server. Then open up the stock browser on android, type in your local ip (prefixed with rtsp:// protocol instead of http) of the pc followed by the port number as set in VLC or equivalent. The Android media player should launch if all is set and should start to play the video.
The local ip must be the ip of the PC running VLC or equivalent media server. You'll need to find it through right clicking the active LAN connection (of usb tether) > status > "IP address : "..
Do disable firewalls or add exclusions appropriately for this to work, also, set the VLC with proper video transcoding format that your android can play.
Warning: you might want to disable data pack when enabling the usb tether to avoid incurring unwanted costs.

+1 for the idea! Will be a while 'til I get a chance to try this out, seems good though. Will accept if it works!


text:
Play music from PC on Android
If I have shared a folder on my computer that has all my music in it, is it possible, when connected to the same Wifi network with my phone (Nexus One, Gingerbread), to play this music on my phone?
In case I need to use an application that mounts the shared folder on my phone, it would be extra awesome if it would mount automatically when connecting to that network.

I assume this is a Windows shared folder (that is, an "SMB share") that you're talking about?

@Ilari yes, it is.

One option would be something like the VLC app. You actually don't even need the music to be on a shared drive for that one to work, you just need VLC installed on the PC and a wifi LAN to share (or 3G and some network security know-how).
There are also some third-party apps that are designed specifically for the streaming aspect of VLC, without the local playback features, such as VLC Streamer.

ES File Explorer will let you play media files...but I think you have to pick them one at a time to play them...not sure if you can play a list of songs....

Linux has an file system wrapper thingy called cifs that allows it to mount an SMB share (Windows shared folder) transparently as a standard folder to the file system.
Looks like there's an android app for creating and managing cifs mounts - CifsManager. Using it, I assume you could make your Android device see all the files in the shares just like they would be on your memory card. The app does list "playing music" as an example use case in it's description, so I expect it could be used for this purpose.
I haven't looked at how it works yet, but intend to now that you made me interested in the use case. :) I'll edit the answer when I've had time to test this.
Note that the app requires root. Also, don't know if it can automatically reconnect the shares when they become available. And I'm not sure if it messes up the Android music player or file management system or whatever if the mounted files it was accessing suddenly become disconnected (I would expect that Android can handle it, though).

Please update the link for the app. The current one doesn't work.

Hey man you could try Samba Network Music Player - it was specifically designed for this purpose. Still in development but it works.

You can use Winamp to sync your music wirelessly between your phone and that share.  You can find a guide on how to do it here.

Won't syncing using Winamp merely transfer the music from PC to the device? OR does syncing imply streaming?

Yes, it will copy the music over, but it'll do it automatically when Winamp is launch and on that wifi network.  The op does not specify that he was wanting streaming, but "when connected to the same Wifi network with my phone, to play this music on my phone?" This solution should meet those guidelines

I'm sorry, I should have been more specific. The music folder is like 70GB, so copying it is not an option. Thanks for the reply though!

@Aistina, you were specific enough.  "when connected"... pretty obviously means "I don't want to copy it, I just want to play it".

Can we have an updated link for the app? The current one seems to be dead.

Still works for me? You mean to the market/play store? https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.nullsoft.winamp&feature=search_result I'll update the answer

I just tried an online proxy server and the link still seemsto be broken: http://i.stack.imgur.com/8MFuQ.png , http://i.stack.imgur.com/Mn2rG.png I don't know why though.

@Firelord Not sure, are you located outside the US?

Yes. But I thought Play Store imposed geo-restriction only when you're browsing apps using Google Play app. Edit: I now tried two proxy servers claiming to be from USA and the result is still same. Anyway, I'll not stress it further. If another user complains then you can take action based on that.

A Squeezebox server (download) running on the Pc will allow any device on the network to connect to the MP3 stream it broadcasts. You can add songs to the playlist via the web interface from the PC or your phone's browser, or install one of the Android Squeezebox controller apps like Squeeze Commander.
See also this previous question Client-Server Android audio remote

Subsonic is also a great way to share music with you Android device over WiFi or even the Internet. There is also an Subsonic Android App.
Or you could use Google Music, which is currently US only.

You may try the preview version of 'Soumi Music Player' at the following link for playing MP3 files from your network shared folder.
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/Soumi-music-player-preview


text:
Can I connect Android device (Galaxy Tab) to my iPhone to use its 3G data plan?
I have two devices:

iPhone with sim card, including data option
Galaxy tab without sim card

As the iPhone always has an internet connection, I want to use it for the Galaxy Tab as well. Of course I could just swap the sim card, but I'm looking for a more elegant solution.
Beginning with IOS 4.3, the IPhone also has an option to create a personal hotspot to allow other devices to use its internet connection.
Unfortunately, this only seems to work over Bluetooth or USB.
As USB is out of question, it looks like Bluetooth is my only hope. Therefore my question:
Is there any way to convince my Galaxy Tab to use a Bluetooth as "Internet connection" ? If not, is there any other way to achieve what I'm trying to do here?

Of course I could also turn it around and put the sim card in my galaxy tab and then connect the iPhone via wireless to Android. But the iPhone is really the main device and I don't need the internet connection on my tab too often when I'm not home.

note that strictly speaking, hotspot strictly refers to a Wifi access point. Bluetooth "access point" or USB tethering usually are not called hotspots.

MyWi for iphone will do it but may need to install wpa_supplicant.adhocfix on galaxy to accept adhoc network.  I did this on my nook color and it works really well.

Thanks for the suggestion, but I need to jailbreak my iPhone for MyWi. If this is the only solution, I might consider jailbreaking.

@socken23 AFAIK, you have to jailbreak or pay up for tethering on the iPhone (similarly to rooting on Android or pay up for tethering)

I tested PDANet now which works quite similar to MyWi but is free (didn't know that MyWi is $20). The Galaxy Tab doesn't see the wireless network yet. Suppose thats what you meant with wpa_supplicant.adhocfix, will check that!

There is no need to root to use tethering on android. It has been a part of the basic OS since 2.1 or 2.2. It is up to your carrier to disable it if they want to. At least T mobile does not disable it. Though they do offer a plan addon if you'd like to pay them for a feature that you can already use.

@Tim is right, wireless hotspot is a standard part of Froyo, no need for root (unless your device doesn't have a compatible WiFi chipset, or your phone company disables it). Anyway this is beside the point and not helping the OP so I'll leave it here.

You dont need to connect via BT. You can do it via wifi. Turn on tethering on the iPhone. Go to wifi settings and ensure the iPhone is not connected to a wifi device. Then go to your tab and open wifi connection settings. Do a wifi search and it'll find the iPhone. Connect the tab wifi to the hotspot which is the iPhone.

Actually, you got me confused there. I checked with a friends phone and you are correct! However, it doesn't work on my phone. The reason is visible on this page: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3574, Sharing the connection over WiFi only works on IPhone 4, unfortunately I still have 3GS so I'm out of luck. Thanks for the hint though!

[comment by anonymous] Dont forget the password, a friend of mine said it didn't work but she neglected to put in the password given on the Iphone, in the personal hotspot section in settings. (sorry but some things have to be made fool proof!)


text:
Weather Calendar No Longer Syncing
I have the standard Weather calendar added to Google Calendar, and I can see the weather for today on goocal in my desktop browser just fine.
I noticed that the weather was no longer showing up on my calendar.  It was showing the weather for last week - Mon-Tue-Wed, but there was no entries for this week.
So I deleted the weather calendar completely.  Verified it was no longer showing up on my Android.  Then I added it back again.  Now I can (still) see it on my desktop in the browser, but in Android the calendar no longer shows up at all.  The Weather calendar is quite definitely selected as "Synce, Visible" in the calendar settings.  I also tried another calendar app that uses the Google Calendar database (Business Calendar); again, the Weather calendar is selected to be shown, but it does not show up.
Before you ask why I don't just use the weather widget, to be honest I don't particularly care about the weather, I just like having something on my calendar every day - it makes it more obvious in "Agenda" view that I have nothing going on today
UPDATE: I just tried the "Day of the Year" calendar and that shows up just fine.  My speculation is that the weather calendar requires your current location, and that's the source of the problem.  I'd rather see the weather, which is at least marginally useful, than the day of the year though.

Well the answer seems to be to use Weather Underground's iCal subscription.  It shows up and it gives you more complete weather info.  Only downside- it doesn't automatically pick up your location, it's hardcoded to a specific location.

Having precisely the same issue on HTC evo v Virgin load and current updates
Also seems ""google contacts and events" works on neither calendar app or widget.  And  "google US holidays" works on both (right now?)
Got the answer.
 I went to: Home, Menu, Settings, Apps, All Apps, Calendar Storage. Clear Data in Calendar Storage. This should erase the Exchange Calendar from your phone.  Weather reappeared.
But there's more.  It quit again.  Seems to be some conflict between the exchange calendar and the pop calendar.   Deleted the.calendar memory and settings again, Disabled the pop calendar, deleted and recreated the exchange calendar.  Now its stable.


text:
Tegrak lagfix: how do I install it?
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=920711
I've seen the above thread but I have no idea how to install the kernel. I've got a Galaxy S running Froyo 2.2 "JPO".
Since removing the OCLF lagfix the phone has been really slow, so I need to find out what I need to do to get Tegrak working.
I have Odin 1.3 which I used to install Froyo, but that was following a detailed step by step list of instructions!
It says in the thread I need the latest stock firmware before trying to install Tegrak, but it doesn't state what that is or where to get it. It also doesn't really go into detail beyond saying "use Odin to install it".
Additionally, how do I go about making sure the apps I have bought from the market are saved so I don't have to buy them again?
I'm a web developer, so it's not as if the tech stuff is alien to me, but the Android specific stuff is!

Load the kernel .zip file into the PDA field of Odin, and (if you have it, should have come with Odin) load the 512 .pit file into the PIT field of Odin.  Then flash it just like you did for the Froyo ROM.
A stock ROM is just a ROM that's not modified by anyone, it came straight from Samsung.  If you aren't using a lagfix already, you probably don't need a stock ROM however.  You should be able to find one easily enough in the XDA subforum for your device, if you want it; use JS5, since that's what the kernel is based on.
Your paid apps are recorded in your Google account.  You will never lose your purchase rights to them (barring any service suspensions and that sort of thing).  You can, however, use something like Titanium backup to back them up (requires root).  You can back up the entire device using ClockworkMod / Nandroid; look for ROM Manager in the Market (requires root).
One question: Why are you using that over straight Voodoo?  Voodoo's perfect, and I believe Supercurio has taken stock kernels and added only Voodoo so you don't get any other random stuff.

Thanks for the answer. In answer to your question, I thought this was Voodoo, because when I searched in the market for Voodoo this is all that came up... perhaps an error on my part there. Is Voodoo on XDA?

No problem.  Here is supercurio's Voodo thread for the i9000 on XDA and here is the stock ROM thread, you probably want I9000XWJS8 if you're using supercurio's (JS5 for the other, as mentioned).

Cheers, going to go for JS8 & use Supercurio's Voodoo. I suspect there may have been issues with JPO, for example it's never let me apply any update.zip...


text:
Odin not allowing firmware to be flashed
I'm following the instructions here to try and upgrade the firmware to I9000XWJS8:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=846913
As soon as I hit start it does nothing, as you can see in the message window it says it's failed. It does this with JS8 or with the Gingerbread download, in Odin 1.7 and 1.3.
What's going wrong? Also, should the phone be in USB debugging mode or regular? I've tried both to no effect.

What phone model?

The phone should be in Download mode:

Take out the battery
Plug into USB (apparently skip this if you have an i9000 -- see comments)
While holding both volume buttons (Note, you may need to hold Home+VolDown instead)

Insert the battery
Click the power button

Phone should go into Download mode after a few seconds:

You may need to disconnect from and reconnect it to the computer after this for Odin to see it.

Additionally, I've heard the phone should be in USB Debugging mode but I don't see how that could affect Download mode since the OS is not running in that mode.

According to: http://www.prlog.org/10807241-how-to-root-samsung-galaxy-i9000part.html to enter Download mode in I9000 you press "Home key and power key and volume down key" (which I can confirm on a slightly different model, on Samsung Galaxy Spica i5700). And on my model, the phone must be unplugged to enter download mode, otherwise it boots to Android. Also, this is probably a better tutorial than xda-developer, as it has photo of how download mode looks like: http://androidadvices.com/update-samsung-galaxy-s-gt-i9000-to-froyo-xwjs5-2-2-1/

@Lie Interesting ... I recall now about the Home key, but I've always heard that without USB it won't go into download mode.  I guess it's just another random difference between the international version and the US versions.


text:
Getting latest update of certificate/credential/SSL store
I realize sometimes when browsing with HTTPS, it shows the certificate is not valid, "This certificate is not from a trusted authority". Clicking "continue" will just pop up the same warning. That time, I start thinking the certificate store is not updated. I try to compare with Windows trusted CA which will be updated automatically.
I think the certificate must be updated in a period of time since the validity of trusted CA is about 1 to a few years.
I cannot find this thing mention in Android anywhere. Does the way it manages certificates is different? How can I make sure I get the latest update?

Many years later, this will finally be addressed. Android 14 will update the trust store via Google Play Store. Earlier versions required the device manufacturer to push an over-the-air update with new certificates, which wasn't always provided quickly or at all for older devices.
https://www.xda-developers.com/android-14-root-certificates-updatable/

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text:
Is there a zoom and timer functionality on Nexus S camera?
If not, is there another app that gives this functionality?

I don't think that any of the Android phones on the market at the moment (including the Nexus S) have a proper optical zoom, so the best you're going to get is a digital zoom that you could just do yourself in Photoshop later.

What GAThrawn said - digital zoom is essentially the same as cropping the image afterwards which you can do within the standard gallery app after taking your picture.

There is no timer built in, but you can crop images in the standard gallery app which is essentially the same as digital zoom.
There are a number of apps which list timer functionality (I haven't tried them myself so can't verify first hand how well they work):

Vignette
Camera ZOOM FX ~ also lists zoom and "clap to snap" features
Camera Self-Timer
Camera Advance Lite

Plus a load of others.

You can definitely zoom.  I don't believe there's a timer, but an app like PRO Zoom Camera 5x should work for that (note, it doesn't say whether it works for the NS).  Additionally, you could use an app like Tasker to time the shot; its website mentions that specifically.


text:
How to keep the Car Home app from opening automatically on my Droid?
Hey all, this is something that's been bugging me for a while now and I just found this wonderful, glorious place so I thought I'd pick your collective brains.
I'm running CM 6.2.1 on my original Motorola Droid.  I don't want to uninstall the Car Home app, but I don't want it to open automatically when I put my phone in my car dock either.  Aside from ripping apart my dock and pulling out the magnet, is there any way I can accomplish this?

You can use an app like Autostarts (requires root) to manage which apps can listen to which events.  You just need to remove Car Home from the docking event.

@Matthew Read - Very cool, I'm going to hang on to that link but are there any other options?  It seems like overkill to download an app for this.

@JonnyP Theoretically you could learn just what it is that Autostarts is editing and do the same thing manually, but I'm not sure how myself.  By the way, note that Autostarts requires root.

@Matthew Read - I think what Autostarts does is prevent the OS from announcing that it's been placed in the car dock (in my case).  I'm pretty sure the Car Home app listens for the "placed in car dock" intent and runs when it that intent runs.  I am rooted (have to be to load a custom ROM), so I suppose I could try to figure out which file runs the intent I'd like to suppress, back it up and then modify it, but that seems mighty dangerous.  Makes me wish Cyanogen would include this as an option in Dock Settings.

@JonnyP Actually the OS will still announce it, but Autostarts will remove Car Home from the OS's lsit of apps to announce it to (intents aren't broadcast to every app, they must register with the OS to receive specific ones).  I don't think it should be too dangerous if you're only editing the entry for the docking event, but making a backup is always a good idea.  You could backup with ClockworkMOD / Nandroid if your phone supports it to be worry-free.

@Matthew Read - I do use ClockworkMod, and that reminds me that I need to make a new backup since I just reflashed last night.  I didn't realize that was how the intents worked; I keep meaning to dig into Android app development and start writing my own stuff but I can never find the time.  :)  Thanks for all your help!

I'm the dev of a Car Home replacement app (Car Dashboard).  Basically the app declares that it acknowledges car mode intents.  So whenever the phone enters car mode, it automatically launches an app that handles that intent.  If you have multiple apps that handle that intent, you get a list of them to choose from (and can set one of them as a default). I guess they never thought about someone wanting for an intent to never be handled.

@Bryan Denny - I've seen your app, it looks pretty slick.  If I didn't prefer to have my PowerAmp open while on the road I'd definitely be using Car Dashboard.  The speed alerts thing is genius.

@JonnyP thanks :D at some point in the future I plan on having media controls via headset emulation, but have been doing other feature requests first


text:
Data Recovery - How to Restore Deleted / Formatted Files on HD Micro SD Card
Background:
I put in a friend's SD Card to format it because it was having problems. Then I put mine back in and I think my phone formatted my SD Card. I had a ton of pictures on there that are now gone! I put the card into the computer and there's only 2mb of cache files on there and none of the original directories.
I already tried the following freeware recovery applications:

Undelete 360
Recuva

Neither of them were able to retrieve any files.
Undelete took 1minute to scan for files and came up with 0 files.
Recuva took 10 minutes for their "deep scan" which doesn't seem thorough enough at all for this 8GB SD Card. I need something that's a lot more heavy duty.
I don't mind paying for an application to get the data back if necessary...
Questions:

Which application can I use to recover my deleted picture files from my 8GB HD Micro SD Card?
Why did Anroid format my SD card?
How can I tell if it's a phone problem, data problem, or SD Card problem?

I think this probably belongs on SuperUser since it's not really about Android.  There's already a question there about recovery software: http://superuser.com/questions/6810/best-undelete-tool-for-ntfs-fat

Undelete 360 does not work without drive letter, nothing to select to recover (SD card showed in the Windows snapin only as drive volumes). * Recuva (with deep scan in ~5min) didn't found anything.

Take a look at PhotoRec.
There are also similar question on Super User that may help:

Recover data from SD card
How do I recover files from an USB flash drive?

Here's the full list of Data Recovery Program links:

Easeus Pro
Data Recovery Tool a nice tool but it's not free
PhotoRec and TestDisk from CGSecurity
NTFS Undelete (works also with FAT32 unlike the name suggests)
WinHex
Active File Recovery
Scalpel

thanks for your response.  I visited all the pages on here and added the Data Recovery links to make your answer stronger.  Recuva is garbage freeware and only took 10minutes to search for their "Deep Recovery". I asked one of the IT guys at work and he found the files right away with •Easeus Pro - http://www.easeus.com/datarecoverywizardpro/download.htm and says it will take over an hour for 8gb's so it's pretty thorough :))))

+1 for PhotoRec.  Picasa used to have a "feature" of deleting files off my camera even if I didn't export them.  PhotoRec isn't the easiest to use, but it worked, and I recovered photos of my daughter's first 2 months of life.

@Chance, thanks for the input. I edited the answer to highly recommend photorec and Easeus Pro :)

@Chance, any idea Why did Anroid format my sd card? How can I tell if it's a phone problem, Data problem, or SD Card problem?

@Brian, not sure. I've only had my Android phone for a couple weeks.  Did you shut your phone off between swapping SD cards?

Before going to PhotoRec, try TestDisk first (they are part of the same package). It was able to repair the FAT boot block and get the SD card usable enough to copy all my photos off immediately, without having to use the nuclear option. I still reformatted it afterward, just to be sure, and copied my stuff back onto it.

Easeus is a pretty garbage. Trial version hangs and does nothing. Tested twice in 2 months.

Here are a few more to the list:
Pandora Recovery: It is very specifically recovers deleted files on drives formatted with the NTFS file system, not the older FAT or FAT32 file systems.
Puran File Recovery: It is a free file recovery program. The interface is simple and straightforward, simply select the drive letter or physical drive you want to recover from and start the scanning process.
Android Data Recovery: This program used to only retrieve deleted files from rooted Android devices and now it adds a new feature for SD card recovery.

Pandora Recovery (Disk Drill) failed to install with message Error 0x80070643: Process returned error: 0x643. * Puran File Recovery long deep scan (3 hours) and didn't found anything. Android Data Recovery (dr.fone) does not work without drive letter, so the next button is disabled (SD card showed in the Windows snapin only as drive volumes). Seems installs Wondershare crapware like Wondershare Application Framework Service and Wondershare Driver Install Service which does not uninstall on application uninstall.


text:
Looking for app that provides different screen timeout and lock timeout

Possible Duplicate:
How can I set a Screen Lock Timeout?

I would like to extend the lock timeout for my phone so that it is about 10 to 20 minutes till a password/pattern/pin is needed.  However, I don't want the screen to stay on that long.  Is there an application that either allows different timeouts, or provides it's own timeout for the screen, so that I can set it to a time less than the native timeout?
I have Froyo (2.2) on a Samsung Captivate (or Galaxy S).

Note that (as per that question) phones like the HTC Desire apparently have the ability to set two different timeouts, but the Galaxy S does not.  Of course there might be an app workaround, but I don't know of one.

You really shouldn't be asking for an app; app recommendations are off-topic here. If you can rephrase your question to be about the problem you're having and ways to resolve it, your question can probably avoid being closed.

@Al, I can see your point.  However, I do see a qualitative difference between "hey, what's a good app for looking up restaurant ratings" vs. "is there an app that can do such and such?"  that being said, I suppose I can rephrase the question, but it will probably be deleted for being a duplicate.

@Matthew Read, with your link I see that this question is indeed probably a duplicate.  How do I get rid of it?

@Chance You don't need to delete it.  Now that the question is closed, it will remain here to help users search -- their search might pull up this question but not the other, so this will act to point them in the right direction.

@Matthew, thanks. I realized my mistake after I deleted it.


text:
How Can I get Google Natives apps in Samsung Galaxy S?
As you know Samsung Galaxy S comes with yahoo apps (mail, chat, etc). My First Android Phone was a G1 and I really love the google natives apps like gtalk, search widget, etc..  The problem is that these apps are not in the market and I dont know Where to find them.
I know That I could install another Rom that brings theses apps, but I really like How works my samsung with Eclair. I just need back my google apps.
Some help?

What happens if you try installing from Android Web Market? https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.gm&feature=search_result You need to be logged in to the same Google account as the one you associate with your phone to use Web Market.

I had no idea the SGS came with Yahoo instead of Google apps in Nicaragua.  That's crazy.

@Lie Ryan I already did that but in market.android.com when I want to install tell me that this item is not aviable for my operator. Probably because detects the country of my google account u_u

Have you searched in the market using "Google" as the publisher?
Gmail / Maps / Search are available there.
Also found this link - http://handheld.softpedia.com/get/Internet-Utilities/Instant-Messenger/GTalk-106808.shtml

Probably I have restriction for my country in the market, If I search "Google" I just see Google Translate, google reader, google goggles, But Still missing, gtalk, gmail, and search widget

Which country are you in?

Nicaragua. Yep thanks for the link gtalk apk Works :)

Installing from Market is preferrable, but you probably can sideload them if you exhausted all other avenues.
Download the apk: http://forum.samdroid.net/f10/google-updates-3468/
If you have adb, then you can install the apk using adb install.
If you don't have adb, then save those apks to the SD card and use a file manager (e.g. Astro, Estrongs, etc) to install them.
You need to enable non-Market installation: Settings > Applications > Unknown sources


text:
Are the apps safe? How can I make my Android more secure?
Are the apps on the Android Market checked or audited?
If I search Google for "hardening Android", the best hit I can find is Google Android Hardening Checklist.
What's your opinion regarding this? Is there a way to make Android safer or more secure?

Google added a new security layer to the Android market in February 2012.

Adding a new layer to Android security
  Today we’re revealing a service
  we’ve developed, codenamed Bouncer, which provides automated scanning
  of Android Market for potentially malicious software without
  disrupting the user experience of Android Market or requiring
  developers to go through an application approval process.

For further information read here: http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2012/02/android-and-security.html
Android 4.2 has added extra security with a setting that allows Google's security scanner to (optionally) scan all of your non-Market (ie side-loaded) apps for malware too.

The feature is an extension of the security technology Google
  introduced for the Play Store this past February. While that
  technology worked exclusively on the server side, analyzing apps that
  were uploaded to the Play Store, the new system works with your device
  and scans any apps you install from third-party sources (a process
  known as "sideloading").

(ComputerWorld: Inside Android 4.2's powerful new security system)

It only takes a one time fee of $25 for a developer to start putting apps on the market.  No hoops to jump through.  $25 and you can publish as many applications as you want, instantly.  No waiting, no queues, no approval process, nada.
However, there have been a few cases of malicious applications. When these problems arise, Google usually pulls them from the Market (and from user's phones).  It doesn't happen very often.
Android was designed to to keep yourself protected: all applications have to ask for "permissions" to do certain things: make calls, read contact data, access the internet, etc.  Read the permissions before you install an application.  Make sure you know and understand what it is going to be doing.  Does it seem to have a dubious "permission" that it asks for access to?  However, at the same time: don't berate the developer because of certain permissions.  Some ads ran in apps require at least the internet permission and sometimes some other ones (about the phone state, I believe). Be sure to have a thorough understanding of why a developer would need certain permissions.  Most importantly, read what other people are saying about the application in the market.  Read some of the comments (although beware that the comments on the Android market are the same level as Youtube in terms of quality) and see what the app's rating is.  Have you heard of the app before?  Has a blog mentioned or reviewed it?
Worse case scenario: if you aren't rooted, then no single application should be able to damage your phone as every application is sandboxed from each other (technically, each developer's set of applications are sandboxed from each other. Apps signed by the same developer key can have access to other apps signed by the same developer). They could potentially steal your data, depending on the amount of permissions the application is given. The rarest scenario I can think of is if an application uses an exploit to enable root access on your phone and then does something malicious (e.g., delete everything).

They designed it badly: the system is crippled by the inability to deny a privilege (still beats desktops though...)

I do not believe anyone from Google explicitly audits Market apps.  They probably run some checks now to look for known malware (edit: yes, see Leandros' answer) and that sort of thing, but Android apps do not have an approval process like iOS apps.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_Market#Application_security
The best way to keep your device secure is to make sure others never have access to it, and to make sure you only download apps you trust.  Android uses a Linux-style kernel and has a tightly sandboxed security model, so as an OS it's very safe in and of itself.  You mostly need to protect against user error :)

No platform is 100% user-proof, so exercise caution and common sense in the same way as you do on your desktop -- you probably wouldn't install some random program on your computer that you heard about on a website without some prior research, even with an antivirus program/latest updates installed.
Same rules here -- do yourself a favour and find more information about the program you are interested in and its developers. Market comments are usually a good place to start, but perusing other Android-related sites won't hurt either,

Assuming you're in the US, the new, just launched Amazon Android Appstore does check and audit the apps before they're put up on the store, so should be a safer place to get your apps from.
From their Developer FAQ:

Our goal is for Amazon Appstore
  customers to have a good experience
  with every app they buy from the
  Appstore. As a result, we will be
  testing the apps you submit prior to
  making them available in our store to
  verify that each app works as outlined
  in your product description, does not
  impair the functionality of the mobile
  device or put customer data at risk
  once installed, and complies with the
  terms of the Distribution Agreement
  and our Content Guidelines.

However, as they've only just launched this week, they don't have any long term record that we can look at to see how effective their screening is, and what they do if an app does slip through their process somehow.

If you are worried about people getting a hold of your device and using it, you can add a passphrase, code, or swipe gesture to keep people out. If you are worried about the data within individual apps once the phone is unlocked, Protector does a nice job of blocking access to a list of apps you specify, enter a PIN to unlock.

There are antivirus products like AVG and Lookout, but I don't think they detect spyware. Google Market itself is really risky, since anyone in your account can remotely add any app, and some security holes have been found and patched. Best thing to do is check an app's permissions when installing, and use antivirus and firewall such as droidwall for privacy.


text:
Are there any "iptables like" firewall for Android?

Possible Duplicate:
Are there any good firewalls available?

How can i make my Android more secure with a firewall? Are there any legal/offical ways to do it?
Thank you!

That quest has an answer which discusses iptables.

DroidWall is an Android front end for iptables. Root is required though.


text:
Not all images showing up in gallery
Some photos do not show up in the gallery app. I can find those particular shots trough the camera app for some reason, and using a file-browser I can find them too. But they will not show up in the gallery.
I found this topic about thumbnail problems. I did what the answer suggested, although it was not exactly the same problem. Sadly it didn't help.
Another topic talks about latency. I don't think "use a quicker phone" is a solution (desire-z is quick enough), and we're talking about a different problem: I have pictures from yesterday not shown, but from today are in there, so the scanner has been running.
Why don't all my photos show in the gallery?
edit: the images do not seem any different. They are all saved in
/mnt/sdcard/DCIM/100MEDIA

called
IMAG0402  //visible
IMAG0403  //invis
IMAG0404  //invis
IMAG0405  //invis
IMAG0406  //visible

(I checked this trough ASTRO browser)

I assume the missing ones are stored in the same place as ones that show up, and are named similarly?

yes, i'll add an example with filesnames

I'm getting the exact same problem!!! Sometimes my photos don't show up at all till I connect to a computer. THey all show with a file manager though :/

simple check - make sure how device connecting mode - is it like a camera or media mode. In media mode you could do file operations(cut,copy) properly

Try deleting the /mnt/sdcard/DCIM/.thumbnails folder and rebooting your phone.  You may need to clear data for Media Storage and possibly the Gallery app/anything related as well.

That did help for the old pictures, but it doesn't for some new shots. That might be the latency one of the other questions talks about, so I'll give it a moment :)

it DID fix my picasaweb problem by the way. 0_o    http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/7013/picasa-in-gallery-not-linked-cant-open-picasa-folders/7092#7092

Yeah, I think it's more Android OS latency than device slowness.  It doesn't seem to scan for new media files very well.  The camera should really trigger something to add the new photo to Android's "scanned media" list, or something like that.

But how long is latency? It's been over an hour, and although al the deleting and rebooting has made the older shots come up, but my testshot is still gone (over an hour). That's something else than latency maybe?

Yeah I think it's just bad terminology.  I think the OS hasn't scanned for media since you took that photo, and so it only "knows about" the older photos.  One thing you could try is going to Settings -> SD card and phone storage and hitting Unmount SD card, then immediately re-mounting it.  The re-mount should trigger a media scan.

Hmm. Now it did show up, but somewhere random, so I couldn't find it at first. But it should have scanned, I mean, I can understand slowness, but an hour must be something else. The scan must be triggered allready. This morning I had some not show up, but newer ones that did. Anyway, this answer looks like the best I'll get :)

@Nanne: though I don't know about the specifics of media scanner, I doubt that the media scanning is triggered at fixed time intervals, it is more likely to be triggered when a possibly relevant file are added to SD card (e.g. if you download something, etc).

I had the same issue. Turns out my .thumbnails folder was not inside my /DCIM folder. I moved it back inside, restarted the phone and it's been fine since.

SDrescan is small and easy to use.
If you happen to have a custom ROM with dev tools installed, use that:
Launch "Dev Tools" => Media Provider => Scan SDcard
Both ways hide the manual steps from you and you can't delete stuff by mistake this way.

For me, it was enough to just open /mnt/sdcard/DCIM/.thumbnails folder using Astro File Manager. I scrolled down and up through all files within this folder and I've seen system showing message "Creating thumbnails". Once I returned to Gallery, even without restarting phone, all camera pictures and videos displayed properly.
You could also try opening a few of the photos in the DCIM folder using Astro in order to trigger a refresh.

Hmm, doesn't seem to work for me. Wouldn't that 'creating thumbnails' be for the thumbnails-of-the-thumbnails that astro needs, not the thumbnails self (the files allready in that directory, that are thumbs of your photos?)


text:
Android 2.1 - MyTouch 3G Slide - Preparing SD Card mal-function - Formatted SD Card after taking out and putting back in :(
Operating System: Android 2.2
Device: HTC MyTouch 3G Slide
SD Card: Micro SD 8GB Sandisk card that is less than 1 year old
Background:
This feature formatted my working SD Card w/ all my pictures on it after i took it out and put it back into the same phone. I didn't add or delete any data from the device when i took it out... I checked the sd card on the computer and it only had 2mb of cache files on it while before it had 6gb of music and photos. I already tried mounting and unmounting the card. That doesn't help. The phone has recently been factory restored.
Questions:
1) Why is Android / MyTouch3G Slide formatting my sd card?
2) How do I know if it's an sd card problem or a phone problem?
3) How do I get the card to work w/ the pictures and mp3s on there?
I'm thinking maybe I should prepare the card for android somehow- with a sd card formatter
Update:  I recovered the files w Easeus Data Recovery, put them back on the card, and it formatted the files again. I'm thinking I should format my card for android 2.2 or mytouch3g so it accepts the pictures or put the card in while the phone is off to prevent this from happening again?

For trying to get back data try http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec

did you check the card on a PC to see if the files were still there? or did you just try to access the photos from the phone. I haven't experienced this before but if the sd card wasn't mounted maybe the photos appeared to be missing but weren't. or did you actually get a message that said the card was formatted? just a thought...

@Daniel, thanks for the response! Yes, I checked for files on pc and nothing. I tried mounting and unmounting card. I added more info to my question so it's more clear. Check it out and let me know... thanks!

@AdoPilot, thanks, I recovered the files w Easeus Data Recovery. The question is once I recovered the files, is there a file system structure I have to keep on there or other way to prepare the sd card so the phone doesnt have to "prepare"/ format it?

My buddy with a HTC Evo 4G w/ Android 2.2 put the SD Card in his phone and had no problem reading the files on the SD Card. The files were on a seperate partition that wasn't recognized w/ my myTouchSlide using 2.1. He was unable to format the card with his Evo but had a card adapter and put it in his computer and formatted the card on his computer. :)
He said Best Practices are:

Un-mounting the SD card before you remove it from the phone
Putting the card back in when the phone is off
Backing up your SD card data regularly just in case

Android has to mount your SD card; that's all that "Preparing SD Card" does.  If that doesn't happen, then the device can't use the SD card.  Hopefully the format was just a fluke.  You should put test files on it (unimportant / already backed up) and see if it happens again.

thanks for your response. Yes, I recovered the files w Easeus Data Recovery, put them back on the card, and it formatted it again. I'm thinking I should format my card for android 2.2 or mytouch3g so it accepts the pictures or put the card in while the phone is off to prevent this from happening again?

That's very strange.  Maybe try a different card and see if the same thing happens.  And I agree that removing/inserting the card while the phone is off is good to try.


text:
Corporate Exchange Email Won't Send (stuck in outbox)
I have a corporate sync account set up to sync my work calendar, contacts and email. I had some trouble setting it up, but once I got it set up it worked just fine for a couple of months. Then about a week ago it stopped sending emails. I can still receive emails. Also, the internet still works on the phone. Gmail still works. Sending and receiving calls and texts still works. But when I send an email it gets stuck in the outbox.
I have tried removing the corporate sync account and adding it back. I have tried restarting the phone multiple times and doing a manual refresh each time. I have tried various combinations of security settings (Use secure connection and Verify Certificate). Nothing helps.
I can't believe no one has asked this yet! Based on the forum posts I have read, it seems like a common problem. Is there some solution waiting in the wings?
[Droid 2 w/ Froyo]

The first thing I'd suspect is that a database used by the Email app is corrupted.  To fix this, you need to go to Settings -> Applications -> Manage applications, find the Email app, and clear the data for it.  (If you see anything like "Email Storage" be sure to clear the data for that as well).  Then re-add your account and see if that helps.
If that doesn't work, I recommend asking your company's IT department if they have changed any settings for the Exchange server recently.

Indeed the IT department had changed the settings.

I was seeing the same problem items get stacked in the outbox when you either aren't connected to WIFI or don't have cell coverage. Once you have access to a WIFI network the outbox will not empty out or sync either on its own or by going to settings and accounts and synching all.
All I did was compose a new message and sent it -- and all of the messages in the outbox seem to follow. ;-) Sounds too simple to work, but try it.

Probably you are using Exchange 2003, though there are some reports these things happen also with Exchange 2007.
Try to edit the messages stuck in the outbox and remove the check from the checkbox "Include quoted text". It will then send your message.
In the future, when you answer messages, choose the option "respond inline", and then it won't happen.

Weird, I had this problem, tried to send a message with no signal and when I got signal back, I kept getting "unable to send mail". I moved the messages to another folder and re-sent them and they went. Looks like a bug with the client.

I went to Settings, Application Management then INBOX - I forced stop the application and rebooted the device.  All 23 of the emails in the OUTBOX are now going thru.
(I was not in a position to delete the account as Mathew Read suggested as the corporate IT group was not available today and they must be contacted when setting up this application before it will work.)

I just had this issue and it turned out I was over-quota. I didn't notice at first because I was still able to send email from Thunderbird, but once I logged into OWA it told me I was being prevented from sending due to quota issues.

Just to add on to the answers already mentioned here. From personal experience, I can tell you that it often depends on the file type or size.
I once had a difficulty with a pdf file, which I then had to convert and send as an image.

It's a sync problem and possibly an authentication problem, but those options are no longer available in advanced settings. Seems Microsoft deleted that option in settings.
Gmail works fine, so I've switched to it. All emails are working and setup is fast & easy. It happened on my Samsung Galaxy S21 and Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.

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


text:
Gmail app on LG Optimus U doesn't get email anymore
I have an LG Optimus U from US Cellular and I use the stock Gmail app. A few days ago, it stopped receiving any new emails. When I click on refresh it doesn't do anything, just fails silently. Also, it shows that my account has 4 new emails but when I list the emails, I don't see any.
Has anyone had this problem, or can anyone recommend a better email app?

Have you recently changed passwords or opted for Google's 2-factor authentication?

Have you tried clearing the cache and/or data for the app?

Do you have Auto-Sync on for your accounts?

I've had this problem before.  Sometimes the "unread" count goes up as well, but the emails never show in the Inbox.
The best thing to do to fix it is to go to Settings -> Applications -> Manage applications and clear the data for Gmail and for Gmail Storage, then to try syncing your Gmail account again.  If this doesn't work I recommend clearing the data for all Google apps -- Gmail, Talk, Voice, Google Framework Services, etc. -- then rebooting and trying to sync your account again.

My phone showed the same Gmail synching error after failing to install a new, relatively large application. Some applications worked, but others did not. The phone couldn't synch Gmail and also reported a stubborn and mysterious low memory warning that rebooting and clearing application caches multiple times didn't resolve.
I ultimately returned the phone to its normal state by uninstalling the most recent application from its listing in Settings -> Applications -> Manage Applications. This uninstall likely removed extra files that were both taking up space and interfering with Gmail. (I assume this is just one problem a failed or crashed install can cause.)
Once the uninstall finished, my phone dropped its low memory warning and started synching properly again. I was then able to reinstall the uninstalled program successfully, without further memory or Gmail problems.


text:
Move paid apps between devices?
I have an android phone(1) on 2.3.3 and a tablet(2) on preorder that will be on 3. (And a bad gadget habit.)
Can I, when the tablet arrives, uninstall paid apps on the phone and install them on the tablet? It feels like I should be able to since I've paid for a copy of the app linked to that Google account it shouldn't matter which linked device it's on. (Why? Some stuff I've paid for will look better/be more useful on the tablet.)
I've looked online, but most people are asking about moving paid apps from broken phones (ie when they can't uninstall from the first device) or trying to run the same paid app on multiple devices which is piracy/cheap.
(1) nexus one
(2) xoom

As per Edelcom's answer, I believe google does allow you to run the same paid app on multiple devices.  So it's not piracy/cheap in this case :)

@sparx I don't believe so since this is about installing on two devices at once, the q you linked to appears to be about installing twice on the same device.

@syntheticbrain: part of the standard Android Market terms is that application are tied to the Google Account and not the devices. The Market terms is deliberately formulated to allow user to install a single paid app in as many devices that they own that uses the same Google Account. It is not necessary to uninstall the app in your other devices.

I bought an Anchor tabled last week , and using my Google account, was able to download the application I bought on my Samsung Galaxy S phone, without any problems.
So I think, from my experience, you can download the same software again, as long as it's coupled with the same Google account.

Correct, your apps are tied your Google account, not your phone

This works for me with a droid x and a xoom.

After flashing CyanogenMod 6.2.1 to my phone I visited Play Store and logged in and it showed all of my apps still "installed" on my phone before the flash (I didn't use any app backup software).  I clicked on each of my apps and clicked the install button and they all came over to my phone properly, including the few paid apps I have.
This leads me to believe that Android doesn't prevent the same apps (including paid apps) from being installed on more than one device so long as they are both associated with the same Google account.

So long as you use the same Google mail account, you will find that on the market place the app will display as purchased. Therefore, allowing a free download of your paid for app.

It depends on how you set up your devices and your version of the market.
If both devices are set up using the same gmail address - no problems you have can download anything you have purchased to all devices (as its linked to your account).
Market versions v3 and older allow the use of multiple accounts. i.e. you can set up one account on one device i.e. phone, another gmail account on another device i.e. tablet. As long as you have linked these accounts in your google profile, then you can switch between accounts in the market and download from either account to your device.
(Quick easy way to know if you have this market is its look - its the one that looks like tiles i.e. the WinMobile look).


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Updating application from Android Market
I have downloaded and installed an app from Android Market. Now I want to know how to update this apk installed in my device. Is this app updated by Android Market? Will it update automatically or do I need to update it manually?

Market > My App > (an app) > [check] allow automatic updating

Yes , I got it .

@Nandlal Virani, so.... give a check.... XD

That's fine if you want automatic updates. For the vast majority of apps, you probably don't.

@Dante: Nandlal will not be able to accept this as an answer unless and until he/she creates an account here on Android Enthusiasts and "associates" it with the Stack Overflow account that originally wrote this question.

@Al Everett, I see. It's OK. All the conversation before you happened on Stack Overflow.

Android Market APKs are monitored, and you'll be notified when an update is available.  There should also be a checkbox on the Market page for each of them allowing you to specify automatic updating; the developer has a case-by-case override for that for when it might lead to loss of data.

Thanks Geekosaur ,Now I have got all information regarding Android Market .

Additionally, apps will not auto-update when their permissions have changed.  This is to prevent you from being harmed by an app that was previously safe and suddenly the new version has access to everything on your phone.

Open the Play Store App and select "Update All" to do it manually should you so desire.

There are 3 ways to update from the app store :
1. Update Manually
You can just search your app and if there is an update, there will be an Update button to click. It will download your file and install it automatically.
2. Automatic Update
This option will update all app that doesn't need extra permissions.
To simply turn on automatic update, just tap the three bars on the left of the search box, scroll down and hit the Setting button.
You'll see a lot of option that you can enable / disable. To enable the automatic update, select Auto-update apps and select what criteria the phone must reach when the update begins.
3. Update all apps at the same time
This option will update all the app in one time. This option will ask you about extra permission that your apps need.
To update all, just slide your finger from the very left of the screen to the middle and hit My apps. From there, you should see Update all button if there is 2 or more update available for download.


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Is there a way to get a "zoom balloon" (like on the iphone) when sliding over a text input field?
Is there any way to show a zoom balloon (like on the iphone), whenever sliding over a text field to show us where the marker is, and allow us to move it correctly.

What phone and version of Android are you running?  Some alternative methods are available, but it's dependent on the hardware and software.

My Motorola Defy has this capability.  My phone is running Android 2.1.  When you hold your finger over the text field, it will pop up a zoomed in window that allows you to move the cursor with your finger to edit text.

Does anyone know if this is a Motorola added feature?

I have pop-up zoom when selecting text, and nice cursor "handles" for both selecting text and moving the cursor when I type.  This is on my Samsung phone (using the stock Android keyboard).

@Matthew - what phone / ver?

@Sparx Vibrant / 2.2 (Bionix 1.3).  2.3 keyboard


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Wifi tethering unavailable HTC Magic

Possible Duplicate:
Wifi tethering with HTC Magic

Hi,
Got a HTC Magic (the black one) with official froyo 2.2.1 in it, but when I went to check there is no WiFi tethering available in the menu (although, there is usb tethering).
Is there any way I could put this old phone to work as a portable hotspot? I mean, are there any apps I could download to enable the wifi tether?
I'd just prefer not to have it rooted, custom ROM, if possible...
thanks.

I only tinkered with it a little, but I'm pretty sure that you can only create a WiFi tether with an Android 2.2.x device if the manufacturer allows for it or if you root your phone and install something like Barnacle.
I found this thread over at Android Forums in which the first reply specifies that the Magic doesn't support WiFi tether.
If you can handle having a USB cable connected between your laptop and phone PdaNet seems to work well for people without root.

I agree, you probably have to be rooted to do this via WiFi.

Meh.. I was afraid of that... but seems to be the case. That would be so cool though if such a cheap phone could make it all -_-

You should look into rooting your phone.  So long as you're careful and make sure you understand the whole process before you begin it really isn't that scary.  I would double-check that unrooting is at least as easy as rooting for your particular device as well in case you ever need to send it in for warranty reasons, but rooting affords you a lot of additional flexibility with your device.  And don't forget: step one is always make a backup!


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Dropped wireless on Android?
I currently have a Droid Incredible (Froyo with ROM: Skyraider 3.5 w/ Sense)
For a while now, my wireless connection on my Droid Inc just drops and switches over to 3G  even though wireless, on both the router and phone, are still on. All my other devices connected wirelessly are still connected and functioning. I had this problem on pre and post rooting and ROMing.
What could be the root cause of this?  Has any other Android smartphone experienced this?
Is there a feature/app that could warn you that your wireless has dropped and is switching over to mobile network and vise versa.  I only ask because the switch over either way is seamless and can be annoying when browsing or downloading apps.

Have you tried on multiple WiFi networks?  It could be your router if not.

This happens to my Moto Flipside all the time! The only hack I could find was this app that made it easier to toggle the wifi on and off: http://www.appbrain.com/app/wi-fi-status-bar-switch/com.friedflow.statusswitch (and FWIW it happens on wifi at home, work, and pretty much everywhere else I've used wifi, and it doesn't happen on the wife's iPhone or our laptops)

To add to Matthew's suggestion - are any other devices connected to the router having the same issue?

@travis - Is your Flipside running Skyraider or Sense?  Could one of these things be the common factor between both of your problems?

@JonnyP I'm not sure what either of those are, so I'll guess no.

@travis - Unless I'm mistaken Skyraider is a custom ROM that uses Sense UI (Sense UI was developed by HTC).  Since you have a Motorola phone the only way you'd be running Sense UI is if you flashed a custom ROM, whether that would be Skyraider or another that includes Sense.

@Matthew - Yes this does happen on other WiFi networks, though it is more noticeable on mine since I'm on my network most of the time

@JonnyP ah gotcha, then my answer is a definitive no then. :-) No custom ROMs support the Flipside (yet... that I know of).

@Daniel - All my other devices are fine when the WiFi drops on my phone.  I've been online on my laptop when my phone dropped the wireless, and my gf's touch iPod has never dropped its wireless

After reading a bit this seems to be a pretty common issue with folks who are running Skyraider on their devices.  I don't know exactly what they're talking about, but apparently your radio needs to be the right version in order for your WiFi to act properly.  This thread over at IncredibleForum looks like it might be where you need to start.

Thx JonnyP! I'll check this out, give it try and if it works I'll accept your answer :)

@A.Donahue - How's it going?  I've been a little curious about this radio thing ever since I read your question and have been thinking of looking into what my phone uses.

@A. Donahue - Still no dice?


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I want to password lock my "Applications" settings, but no other settings
I have an AppLock program that locks certain apps with a PIN.  In order for the app to have any effectiveness, I include Settings as an App to lock.  Otherwise, I could go to Settings -> Applications and simply kill the task.  The disadvantage to this is that if I lock Settings I cannot do simple tasks like Calling Settings and Display.  I would like the ability to fine tune exactly what settings I lock.  Is this possible?
I'm running Froyo on a Samsung Captivate.

You'd also want to protect the market so a user with access to your phone, doesn't download and install a task killer from the market app. And you'd also want some way to restrict access to the mounting of the SD card so a user can't install apps from the SD card to accomplish the same. And you'd also need to.......the list continues.
Figure out what your most likely threat(s) will be and then try to have a policy that most effectively balances security with productivity.

I believe the basic answer is no.  Obviously it can't be done with AppLock since all the settings are accessed through the same app, but further than that you would have to somehow determine what the Settings app was doing and prevent it.  This would be very difficult, and impossible without root.
I think the Settings app must be open-source, however, given that manufacturers can customize it.  You could possibly modify it to lock out the application settings unless you enter a password, or something.  That's beyond the scope of this site, however.
Another alternative is widgets that alter the settings directly.  I'm sure you can get a widget that would allow you to edit the brightness and that sort of thing without going through the Settings app.  I'm not exactly sure how widgets like this work, however; it's possible they might call into the Settings app, which would prevent this.
In that last case, it might also be possible to set up something like AppLocker that allows Settings to run if it is triggered by a "privileged" application.  You could make the brightness widget privileged, so that the Settings app can make the brightness change when requested to, but everything else would still be protected.  I assume AppLocker can't do this, but it might not be hard to develop (again, out of the scope of this site).
I know this is kind of vague, but hopefully it provides some sort of help.

Thanks.  The widget is actually a pretty good idea, but no luck.  I tried adding Shortcuts to the Desktop, but they are guarded by the AppLock as well when I access settings this way.  I think the best answer is just to use a variety of apps.  For instance, WiFinder will manage Wifi.  Tone Picker will manage my ringtones.  And I can access Wallpaper settings from a variety of avenues.


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How can I get apps from the Amazon app store from an unsupported region?
Currently, the Amazon app store appears to be US-only.  Similar to How do I use the US Android Market from Europe?, I want to know: How can I use the US Amazon Appstore?
Market Enabler doesn't seem to work, and it's not IP-based like I previously thought.  Any suggestions?

Just curious: what can you do in the Amazon store that you can't using the regular Android market ?

Not much but they give one paid app away for free every day.  Today is Angry Birds Rio. Edit: Turns out there's more.

As far as I can tell, it's not Amazon who's giving away the app, it's just the developer who doesn't get paid. With Angry Birds Rio, that will be different because want to attract people and therefore will certainly have invested in this game, but other developers may not be so lucky.

Note that bypassing regional limitations is actually more serious offense then just pirating the app straight up. At least in EU.

@Let_Me_Be Can you provide any reference to support your statement?

You have to "prove" to be a US resident by accessing the store with a US based IP once. It's sufficient to use a US proxy.
Additionally, you need a US credit card with a US billing address to buy apps; to download free apps, you can fake the number (all 0's will work) and address.  Then ensure 1-click ordering is turned on in your Amazon.com account (the Appstore will prompt you to do this and provide a link).  A prepaid credit card in USD might be a good way to do this for people outside the US, I'm not sure.
Some users seem to be reporting that Amazon is now blocking non-US IP addresses.  This isn't 100% accurate, since I access the app every day from Canada with no issues.  It may block specific countries though, in which case you'll need a US-based proxy/VPN.  Make sure you trust it, so that your account credentials aren't compromised; don't use Tor / Orbot!

I was just typing this up as an answer when you posted it.  One way to make the transactions more secure would be to get a prepaid credit card and only charge it up with funds when you need to.  If you just put $10 in at a time the most the thieves will get is a couple cups of coffee worth.

Actually, I managed to activate 1-click with a dummy credit card (0000-0000-0000-0000) and a completely fake postal address. I think amazon doesn't check the credit card number until you actually buy something...

Yeah, it's fine if you only want free apps.  The issue is if you try to buy apps with a fake address; Amazon and your credit card company are sure to be unhappy.  Interesting that all 0's worked though!

"Simply connect to the Internet via your smartphone an American proxy and already Amazon are satisfied. After a single authentication as "American" users we were able to use, even without the IP-US Amazon Appstore future. " Here's a Google Translate link to original article.

This from MoDaCo worked for me:
Using the Amazon Appstore from outside the US (including paid apps)
The gist is you need..

An account with amazon.com (rather than .co.uk or whatever)
A valid US address and phone number to attach to this account
A US registered credit/debit card number for the account attached to account's 1-Click settings

Legal and 'non-illegal' methods given in the link.
Update
This method no longer works as Amazon seem to have started checking your region (IP address presumably). So looks like you'd need to use a US based VPN now.

I'd just like to let everyone know that initially I registered my Fire with an account that had a US address and a fake AMEX credit card, and then I added my (Australian) bank account number and it works just fine. I haven't bought anything on my Fire yet, but I did successfully purchase Quickoffice Pro from the Amazon website. =D


text:
Are there any specific advantages to using the Amazon Android App Store over the Google Android Market?
Is the new Amazon Android App Store just another marketplace or are there any specific features or benefits that the Google Android Market doesn't have?

There are a number of differences between the two marketplaces and while "Advantages" may be somewhat subjective there are a few specific features that the Amazon App Store has that the Market place does not.

Amazon claims to test each app before making them available for download to ensure that "each app works as outlined in [the] product description, does not impair the functionality of the mobile device or put customer data at risk once installed."
They offer one "paid" app for free each day.
Some apps have a "Test Drive" feature on their website that allows you to try the app in a virtualized Android interface in your browser (although I can't seen to find an app that has this feature yet ).
Amazon is employing their recommendation engine to suggest apps you may like based on your purchase history.

It should be noted that at the moment the Amazon App Store only works in the US (unless you are able to use a US Proxy in another country) and the service is blocked on AT&T devices.

Test Drive has been temporarily disabled, I believe.  Does Amazon's testing mean manual testing?  I assume Google does automatic scans now, though I'm not sure.

In their Dev FAQ that say "...As a result, we will be testing the apps you submit prior to making them available in our store to verify that each app works as outlined in your product description, does not impair the functionality of the mobile device or put customer data at risk once installed, and complies with the terms of the Distribution Agreement and our Content Guidelines."

I'm going to experiment with publishing my app on Amazon. The other thing is that they control the price. You give it a "list" price, but they could have a "sale" or give the app away for free for a day.

Another advantage: gift cards http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=amb_link_354382502_3?docId=1000619631

The pricing model is nice. You can set a list price. They will sell the app for (almost any) price. You will either get 70% of list price or 20% of sell price , whichever is higher.
So occasionally they might give it for free and that increases your sales (without losing revenue) or they might sell for a high price (which is good if people ready to pay for it).

A nice feature of the Amazon App store is that it is tied to your Amazon account, not your google account.    This means if you have two phones with different gmail accounts in the same house, you can share apps if they both log into the amazon app store with the same login.   On Android Market, I've had to buy apps twice in that case.

Angry Birds (Paid/Ad-Free), Angry Birds Seasons (Paid/Ad-free), Angry Birds Rio. That's it, if you like Angry Birds, that is. These are currently exclusive to Amazon's Appstore, for the time being. There are probably other apps that are exclusive as well, I don't have a list.
The Amazon Appstore is be taking advantage of its recommendation engine and the one-click purchasing it is known for. In that regard it is leaps and bounds better than the current Android Market/Google Checkout system, must faster, however the recommendations will only take into account apps you've purchased through Amazon's system, so it might not be super useful at first.
The main advantage of the Amazon Appstore is that you don't need Google's blessing, meaning you can install this on any device (above a certain Android OS version) that doesn't come with the official Android Market, say one of those cheap Chinese tablets. You have access to many of the same apps, so long as the developer has uploaded them to both places, without the need for Google to okay the device.
Update: If you like to play games on your phone Gameloft's commitment to use the Amazon Appstore exclusively is significant.


text:
Long boot time in Honeycomb
I just got a motorola xoom, love it so far, but it surprises me that the initial boot of the device takes so long (approx 1 minute).  I figured with less RAM than my PC, a less "hoggy" OS (honeycomb vs win 7), and the benefit of a solid state hard drive, that the xoom should be able to boot from off to on-and-functional in like 20 seconds.
does anyone know of a way to decrease the boot time in Honeycomb?  Thanks!

It may be worth noting that the boot time for the nexus one is about a minute.
I think the expected use pattern of Android devices is 'always on', so it's been optimized for everything but boot time.

Just to add to syntheticbrain's comment: My EVO running cyanogenmod takes just under 2 minutes to get from power-on to home screen.

Just in case you're not aware. Hope this is relatedly helpful.
Be sure to NOT press and hold when finishing a session. Just a quick press and it will go into suspend. To resume, another quick press and the screen comes back in about 1 second.

Unless they're something physically defective with your device your options are pretty limited:

Install a ROM designed to boot quickly (not sure that any exist)
Install a ROM based on a less resource-intensive version of Android (but there's no point in getting a Xoom if you don't run 3.0 IMO)
Use an app like Autostarts to prevent some apps from loading upon boot (this probably won't help your boot time before you see the initial lock screen, however)

All three of these options require root access, so if you don't want to root your Xoom then I can't think of anything you can do to decrease your boot time.


text:
App that can import google maps saved route to use as turn-by-turn navigation
I built a driving path containing several destination points using google maps and would like to use it in a turn-by-turn GPS navigation app such as iGo.
Any existing app/s that can achieve that?
Thanks.

How did you build this path?  What format is it saved in?  I assume you're not using Google Maps Navigation because you're outside the US.

Correct, Google Maps Navigation indeed doesn't work in my area, and I didn't know it's only available in the states (I'll be driving in France and thought it might work there). I used Google Maps: added couple of destinations and moved part of the path so it'll go though several specific roads.

You could try this hacked version of maps: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=630887

I didn't know there's a hacked version to work in my area nice, thanks for that. It seems though it won't let me use my own route, nor can it work offline. I'm going to try MapQuest now.

Osmand Is available on Google Play that allows navigating along a saved GPS log (in .gpx format).
You can export your Google Maps route (from maps.google.com) using http://www.elsewhere.org/journal/gmaptogpx/ to .gpx format. Push the .gpx to your phone (via bluetooth, email or USB) to /sdcard/osmand/tracks/ folder (important! Osmand only searches for .gpx files in this folder).
This is however not very straightforward and requires some steps... but I have used it for preparing motorcycle routes offline in advance for example.
In Osmand then:
Download your desired offline maps (the basic version allows 3 free downloads) and in the map view do: menu button -> navigate -> GPX -> choose your exported .gpx
Osmand is free software it's also possible to get it free of charge from f-droid.org's app store, but please support the author if you like it.

Have you heard of openstreetmap?
Openstreetmap is a croudsource map database where users create a free service to use for navigation purposes.  There are many android apps available that allow you to use openstreetmap maps to display many different things.  You can import a variety of different map types, as well as use different programs, such as josm, to create these maps and routes to import to your choice of android application.
You can even help by contributing new roads and updating existing information.


text:
Good source for genuine batteries
I'm looking to source a genuine original size battery for my HTC Desire. I'd rather not fork out the RRP of ~£35 but lots of the cheaper ones have bad reviews. Will anything much less than the RRP be fake? Does anybody know of any reputable sources in the UK?

I always buy batteries on eBay.  "But that's not reputable at all," you might say.  Indeed.  However, I find that as long as you search for the specific part number (e.g. BB99100 for the Nexus One / Desire battery) and ensure the posting contains pictures and guarantees it's genuine, then you'll be OK.  EBay sellers avoid lying about that sort of thing because their reputation will quickly be damaged.  Also ensure the seller has a good feedback rating (97%+).
Here's the cheapest new battery from a very reliable-looking seller that I could find.

"The battery ships without cover". eBay and batteries are always a lottery even if it costs just slightly lower than the real original one. Cheap price is good indication that the battery is not genuine. High price indicates nothing.


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Can I connect to a shell from a PC to my Android using bluetooth or USB?
I want to run some commands on my rooted android phone. It is not very practical to interact with a shell using the touch screen, therefore I wanted to run a daemon on it and connect to it from a PC. I can't use the wifi connection for that because it is not working properly. I figured that it should be possible to do it via bluetooth or USB, but I could not find information on how to do it.
Is there any ready-to-use solution?

Yes, just use ADB over USB and run adb shell.  See http://developer.android.com/guide/developing/tools/adb.html#shellcommands

Before you run adb you have to install the developer kit and set up your SDK environment to detect your phone (instructions). Then you'll be able to use the android debug bridge, or adb, as @Matthew_Read suggests.
Connect your USB cables, check for a dialog on your phone to allow it to be mounted, and then run adb devices from your computer to confirm that your phone really is talking to adb. From there you can use adb shell to launch a shell environment.

There is a app called Android Shell https://play.google.com/store/search?q=androidshell.io in Google Play. You can install it on your device and use the web UI (http://androidshell.io) to connect to the device and execute commands.
Disclaimer
- I am the author of this app

How would this work in the situation the OP describes, where WiFi is not a working option?


text:
How do I prod my Droid 2 into resync'ing Facebook profile pictures?
The Motorola Droid 2 supports, from out-of-the-box, the notion of logging in with not only a Google account, but also a Facebook and Twitter account, and maintains three separate groups of contacts for each of those. It also supports the notion of both manually and automatically linking, say, a Facebook contact to a Google contact. This merges all of the information into a single contact. As this is my first Android phone, I cannot be sure how much of this is basic Android functionality, but I am under the impression a lot of it is from Motorola's MOTOBLUR, and is specific to Motorola handsets.
One problem with it, however, is that a Facebook contact's profile portrait never changes once it's set! When someone changes their Facebook profile portrait, I even get a notification in my timeline that they changed their portrait, with a clickable thumbnail of the new portrait, but their contact image in my phone doesn't ever actually change!
Is there a way to prod MOTOBLUR into resync'ing Facebook profile portraits? I am not looking for a basic Android application that will try to manually download images and manually match Google names to Facebook names, which would cause more problems than it would solve. I am looking to leverage the functionality already inherent in my MOTOBLUR contacts, and just prod the phone into realizing all of it's images are grossly out of date.

From what I understand, Contacts is actually fairly decoupled from Facebook because Google doesn't like their API and Facebook doesn't want to let their users export data.  I believe this means that if you remove your Facebook account from the phone, those photos will disappear from the contacts.  Then you can re-add the account to get them back.
Unfortunately the contacts are not likely to relink automatically after that, and you'd have to do it manually every time.  I don't know of a better way.

Note, I don't have a Motorola phone, and my phone's just doing the standard Android contact linking, but it may also help you. I did this because my previous phone was an HTC Magic running Android 1.6, which had no Contact linking (as that only came with Android 2) so I used one of the apps that downloads the Facebook picture and applies it to the contacts, the picture was then stuck there until I manually got it to update again. Here's what I did to get them updating properly once I moved onto a phone with Froyo:
If you go into your Google Contacts on the web, do you see the old Facebook picture on your contacts there? If so, select the contact. Hover your mouse over their picture until you see the Change Picture link, click that and select No Picture. Save the change.
After a bit the change should sync down to your phone and it should then use the only picture it has - the current Facebook picture.


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Disable Missed Call Notifications
Is there a way to disable missed call notifications? I haven't found it in any settings on the device, but I'm wondering if anyone knows a trick to disable them. Possibly an app that someone knows of?
Background: I use Google Voice, which also tells me about missed calls. When I miss a call that the phone itself gets, I get a duplicate notification that sticks around until I go into the call log. I don't want to lose the Google Voice notifications, because they also tell me if I missed calls outside of signal range or when the phone is off.
EDIT: I don't think there is a real solution to this, so I have submitted an Android feature request. If you are interested in this feature, please go star the issue or post your thoughts.

Your question just made me realize how bad I want to know how to solve this as well.  I use Voice also, and the duplicate notifications are a total waste of time.

Yeah, I've done a good amount of searching for it, and haven't really found anything in either settings or apps. I actually kind of doubt there is an easy way to kill them, but I'm hoping someone has a clever way around it.

What phone are you using?  I never got duplicate missed call notifications on my Moto Droid 1.  Google voice only notified me of Txt messages and voicemails.

It's something I've enabled in Google Voice. I could turn them off, but the Google Voice notifications are better than the default ones, because it notifies me of calls I miss while off the network.

Tasker is a pretty awesome app that basically lets you write little apps/functionality, yourself.
A simple solution, using Tasker, is as follows:

Create a new tasked called 'MissedCall'
For the '1st context' choose State>Missed Call. Click OK
Click Done
Task selection, choose New Task
Name it 'GetRidOfMissedCalls'. OK
Click Add, choose Phone > Call Log. Click Done
Click the + button to add another task
Choose App > Go Home. Click Done
Click Done, again
Your task is now setup and you should be in the Tasker profile list, click Apply.

Basically what happens is that when you have a missed call Tasker will open up the Call Log list, which will get rid of the notification, Tasker will then return you to your home screen.
I assume that most of you missed calls occur when the phone is in your pocket etc. so hopefully the behaviour of returning to the home screen is ok.
There will be a system flag for missed calls, and if I could find out what it is then we could just get Tasker to switch the flag to false (or missed call count =0), which would be a more elegant solution to the problem.

Very interesting...  Please do keep looking into the missed call flag because I would prefer that functionality in case I intentionally miss a call while I'm in the middle of doing something else on my phone.

I've just checked the list of available system parameters, and missed call is not one of them. There is a parameter that records the last app in use, I could therefore modify the above task to return you to your original app, if that would suffice?

@ninjaPixel - That would be better, but it would still end up interrupting whatever action the user was performing which isn't ideal.

That definitely gets me part of the way to a solution, although as JonnyP said, sometimes missed calls happen while I'm actively on the phone. I'm beginning to think a complete disabling like I want may not be possible on Android. I might submit a feature request for it.

@Jake Basile - You should.  We both should.  There really ought to be a native system option to turn off these notifications rather than forcing people like us to turn to a paid option to work around them.

@JonnyP - done. I made the request after not finding one already, and edited the question to link to it.

@ninjaPixel - Can you list the steps you'd use if you wanted Tasker to do this only if the phone is on the home screen or is locked?  In these cases it would be fine to have it return to the home screen after visiting the call log.  I'll award you the full bounty if you can get those steps up in your answer.

@JonnyP Pretty sure that would just be extra States (step 2). Should be simple to figure out.

Marking this as answer because I think it's the only real option at the moment, even if it doesn't get all the way there. If you want a full solution, please star the Android issue in the question!

I think it's in the responsibility of the Google Voice application. If it gives its own notifications, it should clear their copies from the system notifications. Should be given a bug report or enhancement request.

Can this app be used to suppress the notifications from other scheduled apps?