text:
Certain apps fail to update from Play, while others work
I have been having this issue between ROMs, as well as between connections. I am currently running ParanoidAndroid 3.94 (Android 4.3) with franco.kernel 3.0.89. Other apps consistently update fine. The error I get is

Update for "application-name" could not be downloaded due to an error. (403)

I have eliminated the following factors:

Network issues (issue persists with two separate Wi-Fi points, as well as mobile data)
Google Play cache issues (I have cleared cache and restarted the Play app)

If I "sacrifice" one of the apps that do not work and uninstall "TuneIn Radio Pro" from Play store — I am then also locked out of actually getting the app back on my phone. The button in the Play store says "Install" (note: not "Purchase", so my existing ownership is recognized), I click it and "Accept", and the app even starts downloading! However, after the installation starts, I get the following error message:

Error: Package file is invalid

Now, I am able to get all of these apps just fine on another device I have (Nexus 7), so I appreciate the fact that there is something up with my phone that causes this. However, I am not certain that it has to be something with the phone as it can also be something on Google's end not handling my dual accounts very well and therefore throwing the 403 (Forbidden) error when I try to download an app I actually own.

This was solved by going into /data/data/ and finding the appropriate folder belonging to the failing app. I found one with "swiftkey" in the name, deleted it, and following that the update worked just fine. Most likely, the app installation was failing in the background with INSTALL_FAILED_UID_CHANGED due to the app being restored with TitaniumBackup, as detailed in this answer.
So, in short, this seems to be an error caused by the UID changing between installs and Google Play throwing a fit, and it's solved by making sure app data is removed.

Delete the Application from your Device
You are installed the same application in your device, after that you are trying to install the same application from Android market

Please delete the pre-installed application from your device, then try to download from playstore, it will work 100%

Alternate scenario is: Please change the package name of the application, Your application will work fine.

Firstly, the app was not "pre-installed" (although I installed it with TB). Secondly, just removing (uninstalling) the app did not solve the issue, you need to use a file explorer to remove the corresponding folder in /data/data.


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How to change the subnet mask for Wi-Fi hotspot without root access?
If I start a Wi-Fi hotspot, devices connect with IP addresses in the range 192.168.43.xxx. How do I change that to the range 192.168.1.xxx  ?
I have read the answer to How to change the default DHCP IP address range on Android 7.1.2? but it requires a rooted device and I want to do this without root access.

Possible duplicate of How to change the default DHCP IP address range on Android 7.1.2?

That would certainly do it (upvote), BUT It requires root, which I do not have on my 'phone :-(

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
CamScanner: Trojan detected by ESET
I usually use CamScanner to scan my documents. After updating to the last version, ESET told me I have to remove it, because this app has Trojan and it can provide remote access to the infected device. That was strange for me, and I think it's not correct. Anyway, I'm not sure. Shall I really remove CamScanner?

Did you download it from the official website, or from Play Store? (Just a slight curious why they hosted their APK instead of linking it to Play Store...) Anyway, VirusTotal for their latest APK from their site only mentioned ESET, but looks like the bundled ad might contain trojan.

Uninstall the app. Google Play Store has removed it, and the company behind the app itself has accepted that an ad module was acting as a trojan. The latter claims that their new version available from their website is free from that trojan though.

It seems that if you use version 5.12.5, that would be fine and there is no need to uninstall the app. Otherwise, you can update it to the latest version from here.

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


text:
How to launch intent with app shortcut id?
I want to run the NordVPN app by using am start automatically connects to vpn, on my home screen I have a working shortcut. The shortcut code is:
Intent;action=android.intent.action.MAIN;category=com.miui.home.launcher.DEEP_SHORTCUT;launchFlags=0x10200000;package=com.nordvpn.android;component=com.nordvpn.android/.MainActivity;S.shortcut_id=shortcut-germany-515;end
I am trying to the same via adb:
am start -a android.intent.action.MAIN -c com.miui.home.launcher.DEEP_SHORTCUT -n com.nordvpn.android/.MainActivity -e S.shortcut_id shortcut-germany-515
But that does not work, apps start but don't connect to vpn

Did you find a solution? S. is a string as -e than you should use -e shortcut_id shortcut-germany-515 but it still doesn't work for me. Skipping launcher (-c) has the same effect, runs an application without extra variable :-/


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How do I unlock bootloader when OEM unlock setting is missing in Developer options?
I have a HTC 816G Dual SIM. As you can see in the image below of Developer options there is no "OEM unlock" option. What can I do to unlock bootloader?

The "Allow OEM unlock" option is not standardized. Every manufacturer can implement an own mechanism. Therefore just use your favorite search engine and search for "htc 816g bootloader unlock". You will get some pages that show you how to unlock your device.

Android 4.x don't have this option, this option was first seen in lollipop (5.0).
This I've found on XDA if you don't find a guide to unlock your bootloader ask in the help thread.


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How to fix "signatures do not match previously installed version" error?
I'm using a Moto G6. With the latest update to android 9, they removed the capability of using the built-in Dolby Audio equalizer for some stupid reason.
I found this Reddit post that had a way to modify the APK to make this work. I followed all the steps. I decided to try the 20 band equalizer steps and made a backup of the previous work before starting. However, when I finally got to the ADB install DaxUI2.apk, it didn't work. I got this error:

adb: failed to install DaxUI2.apk: Failure [INSTALL_FAILED_UPDATE_INCOMPATIBLE: Package com.dolby.dax2appUI signatures do not match previously installed version; ignoring!]

This was saddening, but no biggie, right? Because I already had a backup. I renamed the DaxUI2 folder to DaxUI2broken, renamed my backup to DaxUI2, and I tried again, with just the first part (minus the appendix). Once I did this, though, I got the exact same error.
I'd like to be able to fix this, so if anyone knows how, please tell me!

I made sure I had removed com.dolby.dax2appUI though. I ran pm list packages | grep dolby, and I had just com.dolby.daxservice. I can post a screenshot if needed.

here is the link:https://imgur.com/a/5G84ZUU

just uninstall the current app and then run it again.

connect device to PC. Turn USB Debugging on
Execute these command
adb shell
pm list packages|grep <Package Name>

You'll get a package name for it which would look like com.xyz.example
adb shell pm uninstall <package name>

those days adb has unstall cmd: adb uninstall <package name>


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What Is Using Up My Storage/Data on Android Phone?
First, I appreciate that there are lots of similar questions to this online, but they are often so specific that I haven't been able to solve this question myself (through online forums/questions/etc).
I have a phone with 8GBs of internal storage, as can be seen from the first picture below. ~3GBs of this is used up by Android OS; ~5GBs remains, of which I am using ~4.5GBs. (This leads to issues with not being able to update, etc, due to lack of space.)

All reasonable so far. However, as the next picture shows, of that 4.5GBs used (separate to the 3GBs for Android OS), Apps uses ~2.1GBs and Cached data only ~33MBs.
Hopefully my question is clear now:

where is the remaining 2.4GBs?

Internal storage includes all your pictures and downloads, especially WhatsApp Media is wasting space. connect PC via USB (MTP) and move DCIM/Camera folder to your external MicroSD Card

These are actually all stored on my SD card, so this isn't taking up Internal Storage. (Also, WhatsApp Media only had a couple of pictures in it)

You can examine storage usage from terminal with du

in your "about phone" settings, tap "build number" 7x (seven) times to unhide the hidden developer settings, then enable USB-Debugging in developer settings

on PC download platform_tools and busybox binary for your phones cpu architecture (armv7l), rename file "busybox" and copy it to platform_tools folder (i realized toybox is buggy, du works best with busybox)

open cmd.exe and navigate with cd command to folder where adb.exe is. connect the phone to PC with USB cable, then type the following commands (each line for its own)
 adb devices
 adb push busybox /data/local/tmp/
 adb shell
 chmod a+x /data/local/tmp/busybox
 /data/local/tmp/busybox du -acxhd1 /storage/emulated/0

repeat the last command on different folder for your needs. the last digit in parameters controls the depth (see full list for usage)

du is a command line utility for disk usage
CUBOT_KING_KONG:/ $ du --help
BusyBox v1.29.2.YDS (2018-08-01 20:19:15 UTC) multi-call binary.

Usage: du [-aHLdclsxhmk] [FILE]...

Summarize disk space used for each FILE and/or directory

        -a      Show file sizes too
        -L      Follow all symlinks
        -H      Follow symlinks on command line
        -d N    Limit output to directories (and files with -a) of depth < N
        -c      Show grand total
        -l      Count sizes many times if hard linked
        -s      Display only a total for each argument
        -x      Skip directories on different filesystems
        -h      Sizes in human readable format (e.g., 1K 243M 2G)
        -m      Sizes in megabytes
        -k      Sizes in kilobytes (default)

if you don't know your phones cpu architecture you can check the SoC from terminal
adb shell
head /proc/cpuinfo

the busybox binary will remain at your phones temp folder until you delete it
adb shell
rm /data/local/tmp/busybox

Thanks very much @alecxs! How do you know that my cpu architecture is armv7l? And is the architecture for my phone or the computer I am using?

Just a guess. You can check the SoC with adb shell head /proc/cpuinfo

I'm sorry, I've been busy with moving and then being away. I should get to trying this mid September. Sorry for the delay!

It's not clear what Android means by "Apps", which is 2.10 GB. Total size of an app includes its apk file + extra native libraries (if any) + Dalvik cache + obb files + app's data + cache. Data and cache can be on internal (/data) as well as shared private storage (/sdcard/Android). I think the missing 2.4 GB could be apps data if not included in "Apps", or it could be your personal files in /sdcard.
For more details: How disk space is used on Android device?

When I try to update apps, or install apps, it often tells me that I don't have sufficient space, and I have to remove something. This doesn't seem to go with your last sentence about being in /sdcard/. I only have a few apps on the sd card; I'd move more, but they won't allow me (I tried, unsuccessfully, to root my phone)

@SamT on most of the recent devices, /sdcard isn't physically external SD card. /sdcard points to just a directory in internal storage i.e. /data/media/0. Android calls it external storage and divides it into public shared storage and private shared storage. If you read the given link, things will be clarified. Do you have physically external SD card at /sdcard? Which Android version you are on? Which device is yours?

Thanks, but I'm not sure how to find out if I have a physically external SD card at /sdcard. I certainly have a physical SD card in my phone! It's a Motorola MotoE 2nd Generation, running on Android 6.0 -- it's not rooted (I tried, multiple times, but haven't managed)

@SamT output of mount or df is enough to know what's mounted where. Root is not required.

For the du command mentioned by alecxs, if you want a better interactive gui, you can use ncdu or gdu. They all have compiled arm static binaries.
https://dev.yorhel.nl/download/ncdu-2.3-linux-aarch64.tar.gz
https://github.com/dundee/gdu/releases/download/v5.27.0/gdu_android_arm64.tgz
adb push .\gdu_android_arm64 /data/local/tmp/
adb shell
chmod a+x /data/local/tmp/gdu_android_arm64
/data/local/tmp/gdu_android_arm64 /storage/emulated/0


text:
Settings keep resetting after restart Oppo ColorOS
I have an Oppo R17 (Model CPH1879) running ColorOS V5.2.1 based on Android 8.1.0.
The problem is that every time I restart my device or if its battery runs out, some of my settings are reset to default. Not all my settings, I'll make it clear.
I realized that it is mainly

The Auto-lock setting; keeps resetting to 15 seconds and I have to change it back to 2 minutes as it was,
My alarm ringtone is reset to the default ringtone whereas I keep changing it to a custom file.

As of now I am not even sure if anything else changes besides these 2.
Since the ColorOS is still relatively new, searching on Google got me absolutely nowhere. Anyone come across this before or know how to fix this?


text:
Does installing, deleting and reinstalling an app make your phone slower?
I recently bought my oneplus 7 pro and I was wondering if installing a certain app, deleting it, and reinstalling it again makes my phone slower. I was forced to do this to a certain application today.

Reinstalling an app is no different than installing a new app. App performance is a function of the device's hardware (ageing affects performance because of new apps developed for better hardware in mind) and code optimization AFAIK. None of this seems to be the case with your app and the device so it should not affect the performance.

The only possible way I see to make your phone slower by re-installing an app would be that the flash memory degrades a very tiny bit - but that is pure theory. In reality before that effect would be recognizable to you, you would have to re-install an 100MB app a thousand times every day for may be a year or more.


text:
How to install Vim text editor in Android?
How do I install Vim text editor in Android?

See https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Text_Editors

DroidVim is a Vim clone text editor ported for Android. Vim 8 (huge version, multi language), grep, diff and ctags are ready to use.

Type "pkg install vim" in any Android emulator like termux.

pkg command is a shell script - a wrapper around apt. And it's specifically a part of only Termux, not other terminal emulators. Termux provides a minimal Linux environment and .deb package repositories, others don't.


text:
Restricting access to a single app and preventing access to wifi settings
I'm looking to configure some Android tablets for shared use in a work environment so they can be used as mobile terminals for an ERP system. In case it matters the test device right now is the Samsung Galaxy Tab A 2019 running Android 9 but I'm open to deploying other devices if there's options that work on other models.
The tablets will need to connect to our restricted wifi network which is authenticated individually normally (we don't have shared devices currently) so I was thinking of connecting to the network with a shared/generic user on the admin account and then trying to restrict access to the wifi settings so that shared users of the device can't access the password.
Unfortunately after creating a restricted user I couldn't see a way to restrict access to the wifi settings which has an option to present a QR code for others to be able to access the same wifi network with those same credentials and configuration.
If I use the guest user they don't seem to have any way to open the application that we need and also once they log out all their session data is thrown away which would require a painful setup process on the business application we need to use each time and require a privileged user to intervene.
I also explored pinning the application which does prevent users from directly accessing the wifi settings (and is probably what we'd want anyway as these would only be used for this application) but anyone with knowledge of the unlock credentials (eg swipe pattern/pin/password) for the user would still be able to unpin and access the wifi settings. Because these devices are being deployed across multiple sites this would cause issues as we'd need to expand the group of trusted people with knowledge of these credentials and thus access to the wifi password that would need rotating when any of those people left.
Ideally, I'd like a way to be able to just use restricted profiles without access to the wifi settings/being able to read the wifi password because then we can leave that restricted profile as just swipe to unlock and there's nothing else sensitive on the device. Is there a way to do this? Am I missing a better option for shared Android devices?

Applying restrictions on corporate Android devices is usually done using an MDM system. There are dozens of MDM systems available - you can check what restrictions those MDM systems support.

I'm equally open to suggestions around applying MDM systems if the answer can show a minimally useful how to get started with them or point to other useful resources that will achieve the same goals.

Try some of the kiosk applications from Play Store. Some of them  not only has the feature of limiting the apps a user can access (see actually) but also limit access to Settings including quick settings, status bar and notification bar. Try them!

@Firelord thanks. That sounds like it could be fleshed out into a proper answer if you have time to do that? Particularly if you can recommend a specific one and show how to configure it etc.

@ydaetskcoR sorry, if I could find time I would have recommended one for sure.


text:
How to map keys in Genymotion?
I am using Genymotion to play Android games on Linux. But I can not play some games, as they have special control layout.
Do you know how to add keyboard mapping feature to Genymotion, like in other Android emulators for Windows such as Nox, Memu, BlueStack?


text:
How can I remove system apps on my amazon fire 7 9th gen tablet using adb commands?
I'm tired of bloatware on my amazon fire 7 tablet (9th gen)

https://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=3922213

1. Find out the package names
In order to uninstall the apps, you need their package names. Within an adb shell, execute:
pm list packages

Take note of all the package names that you want to uninstall. (PLEASE be careful. DO a backup first. Many if not all sources say it's oh so easy to re-install apps because you don't really fully delete them and only uninstall them for the current user but I did have issues with re-installing it on some devices in the past! Also removing crucial system applications can cause bootloops.)
2. Uninstall the package
pm uninstall -k --user 0 PACKAGE

Replace PACKAGE with the name of the package (e.g. com.confetti.app).
-k is to keep the data and cache directories around after package removal, this might be neccessary without root. It worked without it on an LG device for me in the past though.
--user 0 uninstalls the app just for the current user, so basically the app is still there, but since uninstalled for the main user, it won't bother you in any kind of way. Without root or RW access to the system partition, this is your best bet.
Done.

Alternative method (requires a recovery with RW access to the /system partition):
On some devices you can use a custom recovery to do this, slightly more efficiently, aswell. You won't need root within the phone (e.g. no superuser app.) but you will need a custom recovery and the ability to mount the /system partition as RW. Then you can use this, within an adb shell in recovery:
mount /system
ls /system/app

This will list your system apps. Take note of what you want to delete. For example if you want to delete confetti.apk, run this command:
rm /system/app/confetti.apk

Do this command for every app you want to remove, then restart your device.

In any case: BACKUP FIRST


text:
How can I hide the info panel on YouTube app?
How can I hide the info panels such as the following "WHO covid-19 banner" on YouTube app?

Link to the video: click here
Information about the info panel giving topical context: click here

I may be wrong but I don't think it's possible. I see no way to do that even on a rooted device using Vance Magisk module

Hello Franck. Given the screenshot I believe you are looking for a solution targeting YouTube app. If not, feel free to add the term "mobile website" too. Also, I added relevant link to provide more context about the banner.

@Firelord got it, thanks for the edit!


text:
How to prevent file corruption in SD card during unmount?
I have a custom device running Android 8.1. I am mimicking a partition of the internal flash storage to be used as a removable storage.
At boot vold mounts the storage and creates the mount points.
From an android app, I am able to use storage manager APIs to access the storage and perform operations such as mount, unmount, etc.
Problem is, occasionally, I am getting file corruptions on the SD card when unmounting. I am saying 'on unmounting' because I see the files corrupted when the same partition is enumerated to computer as USB mass storage after unmounting.
I do make sure the files written to the card are 'flushed' and later a 'sync' is done on the shell as an extra precaution before unmounting the volume using the android storage manager APIs
Storage is available in android app at /storage/D80A-0F16.
/dev/block/vold/public:179,27 on /mnt/media_rw/D80A-0F16 type vfat (rw,dirsync,nosuid,nodev,noexec,noatime,uid=1023,gid=1023,fmask=0007,dmask=0007,allow_utime=0020,codepage=437,iocharset=iso8859-1,shortname=mixed,utf8,errors=remount-ro)
/mnt/media_rw/D80A-0F16 on /mnt/runtime/default/D80A-0F16 type sdcardfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,noatime,fsuid=1023,fsgid=1023,gid=1015,mask=6)
/mnt/media_rw/D80A-0F16 on /storage/D80A-0F16 type sdcardfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,noatime,fsuid=1023,fsgid=1023,gid=1015,mask=6)
/mnt/media_rw/D80A-0F16 on /mnt/runtime/read/D80A-0F16 type sdcardfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,noatime,fsuid=1023,fsgid=1023,gid=9997,mask=18)
/mnt/media_rw/D80A-0F16 on /mnt/runtime/write/D80A-0F16 type sdcardfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,noatime,fsuid=1023,fsgid=1023,gid=9997,mask=18)

Can anyone think of a scenario I might be missing here which causes the file corruption?
Edit:
Another observation I have is, if I restart the device the filesystem seem to not get corrupt, which makes me think that for some reason the files  are not getting synced to disk correctly when unmounted?
What can I do to make sure the files are getting synced to disk when unmounted?

Please do not post console/text output as screenshot. You can simply mark the text and copy it to clipboard. Then edit your question and paste the text in it.

External storage is exposed as emulated filesystem in isolated mount namespace for every app. So you need to take into account mount propagation. Filesystem must be un-mounted from all namespaces. Or all apps (their native processes) must be killed before un-mounting in root mount namespace. Usually vold handles all of this nitty-gritty automatically. You can verify, however.

Irfan, Its only one app that does the mount/unmount using storage manager APIs. but other apps which have permission to read /write  are notified with a broadcast to let them know of the storage and a 'sync' is performed before actual unmount.Is that a clean way to do it? At the moment I am looking at corruption of one set of 4 files written by one application, they are small files and disk is not unmounted when app is writing them. but still once in awhile I am finding one or more of the files getting corrupted, pars of one fie ends up in another or parts of file is missing.. etc


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

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

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


text:
Can SMS be received by Samsung's smart watch if a third-party SMS app is used?
I own a Samsung S7 and the phone is connected to my Samsung Galaxy Watch Active.
Is it possible to use another SMS app in order to get the SMS on my watch rather than the default Samsung application?

Yes.
I have a Galaxy Note 9 and a Galaxy watch and I use Yaata SMS.
You don't get any extra features that you would get in the 3rd party SMS app but you can still read and reply to text messages the same as you can with the default app.


text:
Does lockscreen widget still supports in compatibility mode on Android 5 and above?
As per the documentation here:

https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/appwidgets
https://developer.android.com/about/versions/android-5.0-changes.html#lockscreen-widget-support-removed

Google has removed support of lock screen widget from Android 5.0 and above then how this app is still showing widget on lockscreen?
Phone is running on Android 8.

Are you sure this is a widget and not just a notification of the "Medical ID" app?

I don't think this behaviour can be achieved by notification. It is showing in widgets for home screen and the same thing is showing in lock screen also. It can be customised to floatable icon, or floatable window and it is draggable to anywhere in the screen. It shows everytime screen gets locked and removes when unlock the device. The app is free, you can try and check.

The app seems to rely on accessibility service to display that widget like object on the lock screen. If you disable the service you don't get to see that object on the lock screen at all. I, however, have failed to find how the app is using that service to show that object without necessarily relying on overlay permission.


text:
Samsung galaxy s3 driver problem on win7 ult 64 bit machine
The Driver Problem.
When I install the drivers and restart my system it will not pick them up, I have tried USB debug mode and normal mode it still won’t work. Even multiple installs of Kies_2.5.0.12094_28_8 and it still well not pick it up?
It’s a gt-i9300 if that helps from UK Vodafone.
Any help would be great thanks and would be very thankful.

Have you tried installing the drivers from the Android SDK?

I have just tried that it is still not working and i also clicked the windows 7 driver opt when I installed the Android SDK. its still saying: USB Not Recongnized, Unknown Device Windows has stopped this device because it has reported problems. (Code 43), i also tried debug usb mode and normal mode. Also the laptop i am using is a Dell M5040 machine just in case if theres anymore problems with this system in the future.

Interesting.  Have you been able to try a different PC?

I have tried it on an windows media center 2005 laptop and it also gave the same error, i have also tried it on a VM of windows server 2008, windows xp home with the same problem. I'm starting to think is it the encryption opt of the phones android system and micro sd that is making it to not connect as i have encryption turned on?

This is the stock USB cable.

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


text:
How do I root Sony Ericsson Xperia Pro (MK16a/i)?
I am kind of new to Android and smartphones.
Phone: Sony Ericsson Xperia Pro
Model number: MK16a
Android version: 2.3.4

So far, I have been able to find the following sources:

I first saw this XDA-Developers thread. It seems relatively complicated. (And I haven't had much experience with the Linux shell either, so I shy away from this...)
The previous thread linked to this thread, which was 'easier'.

However, reading the instructions, I need ADB drivers or something. No clue how to get these.
Also, avast has blocked parts of the file from downloading. (Zerg rush...?) I can disable avast's web shield temporarily, if you guys recommend this method.

This article which mentions a thread similar to the previous one.
Android Forums - Sony Ericsson Xperia Pro: All Things Root Guide.

I would rather do this using as foolproof, easy, and unlikely-to-brick method as possible.

Enable USB debugging from Settings->Applications->Development.
Install SuperOneClick on your PC.
Connect the phone to the PC via USB.
Run SuperOneClick and click Root.

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


text:
v6 Supercharger with Multitask Manager and Tag Home Launchers
I would like to make both launchers Hard To Kill.

Tag Home takes way too long to load from cold start because it has to load ~200 app tags from a database into memory. However, it only occupies 8MB itself. However, it usually dies after a while.
Multitask Manager is also lightweight, and I need it to switch from app to app. I use this as my 'default' launcher. I open up Tag Home from Multitask Manager.

The problem is, v6 supercharger seems to only recognize Multitask Manager as my Homescreen Launcher. The actual launcher -- Tag Home -- is ignored.
Is there any script/method to make Tag Home 'Hard To Kill' while maintaining Multitask Manager as my default launcher?

That sounds like a funny counter-ad. The XDA page you linked says about the product: "It rearranges and fixes the OOM Groupings and Priorites and lowmemorykiller values." Looks like it forget about its own -- or the OOM would not kick it out. The only way I know of has to be done by the developer: He could have the app causing to (optionally) run a background service, thus moving it to the category of "less likely to be killed" apps. I'd suggest visiting the quoted link and ask there.

The script you mention also offers an option to make additional apps 'bulletproof'.
Since I don't know which version of Supercharger you're running, I can't tell you the correct number of the mentioned option, but it's labeled BulletProof Apps {Hit or Miss}.
It scans the current process list and gives you the option to name the app you want to make immune (or rather "resistent") to being killed by the low memory killer. You don't have to be very precise with the naming, any 3 following letters matching your process should suffice. It will then prompt you to acknowledge the choice.
That's it, you're done!


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Tethering an Toshiba AT100 to a Nokia E71
I want to tether an Toshiba AT100 tablet to my Nokia E71. Have installed JuikoSpot on the Nokia which creates an ad-hoc hotspot. It appears the AT100 only looks for infrastructure hotspots. Is there an app or other method of getting the AT100 to look for and connect to an ad-hoc hotspot?
Alternatively, is there a cheap Android phone I could get that supports being an infrastructure wi-fi hotspot?

Try bluetooth tethering instead.
Benefits: Consumes less power, you can leave bluetooth enabled 24/7. Works out of the box.
Drawback: BT 2.1 may cap your maximum UMTS speed (usually not an issue on the go).

There are two profiles for this to tether via bluetooth:

Bluetooth PAN:
Supported by Android 3.0+ out of the box. See Wikipedia entry for more info on PAN profile.
Bluetooth DUN:
Needs 3rd party app like BlueVPN (ICS version here). See Wikipedia entry for more info on DUN profile.

Stock Android 3.0+ and custom roms like CM should support Bluetooth PAN. Your Nokia E71 supports only DUN profile (Archos users can enjoy added DUN support out of the box however) .

I have paired my tablet and phone but they will not connect to each other.

does it show 'internet access' on your at100?

No. It says "Paired but not connected" in the bluetooth settings against my phone. There doesn't seem to be any other options.

Can you try https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.bluevpn or https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.bluexvpn (Seems I missed an important part: Android needs an app for DUN client and E71 and other older Nokias don't support bluetooth PAN profile)

I have installed BlueVPN and inserted the settings as the instructions state. It gets stuck at the "Opening VPN" step. I must have missed a setting or something, probably in the phone or for the Access Point (Telstra Australia).

Yes, it's a missing setting: APN for Telstra data plan. Sadly you have to know this (by looking at your e71 settings). See more details at http://bluedunapp.blogspot.de/2012/06/bluevpn-connect-your-android-device-to.html?m=1 . If all that doesnt work and, :-) yeah, you still don't give up by frustration we can meet in chat and I'll try to help you there. Besides this: the developer is really responsive and helpful, got an answer within 5 mins last time i contacted him

Just got a responce saying the firmware on the AT100 (3.2.1) is not supporting the teathering feature. He recomended upgrading to ICS, not sure if it is possible on this tablet.

Have finally managed to get the tablet connected to the internet, but it involved buying a Samsung Nexux S (upgraded to ICS) and using WiFi Hotspot.

Nice to know! Have you tried the bluetooth tether method yet? That's easier on the battery and you could leave bluetooth on 24/7. It's not as fast though, only 0.8Mbit/s real speed but thats sufficient for me most of the time


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Can we use an Android phone as a Wi-Fi repeater?
Can we use an Android phone as a Wi-Fi repeater?
Imagine situation when you can access a weak Wi-Fi signal from a free hotspot (coffee shop) signal near window, but want to work in the middle of the room. Then we can put the phone on the window sill to spread the signal over the entire home.
Is it feasible?

How to use Android in Wi-Fi repeater mode by bridging Wi-Fi with Access Point?.

The answer is yes, there is an open-source project available that does exactly that.
To quote:

It is a software designed to help you by-pass Great Firewall of China
  (GFW). Different from similar softwares, it is designed to run as
  router instead of running as a client installed on some device. Being
  router means, you can have one thing (Android mobile phone, for
  example) running fqrotuer, then other devices can just connect the
  wireless network created by fqrouter.

Blog: fqrouter
Source: fqrouter

From the linked page: "Wifi repeater is a unique feature, however it requires hardware/driver support", so the answer is, "It depends on your device." Also, that feature requires Android 4.

Early 2016 update: the app requires root, and does only work on some devices.  The worst news is that it currently seems broken - as it's main function is to be a VPN - and the servers have been shut down - so it does not start up.  I managed to extract the Python wifi.py code from the project and kind of get it working - on a Nexus 5 with Android 4.4 and a couple LG Android 4.4 devices I have.  But it requires python and other binaries that do not work on Android 5.0 due to PIE requirements.   If anyone else is trying to revive it, post here :)

@RoundSparrow hilltx do you still have the modded apk hanging around? I'd like to try it on my rooted LG G2 KK

No. To do this would broadly speaking require multiple Wifi interfaces (or specialized software) which is not readily available (or easily installable) on Android.
In general this is done on Linux using something like hostapd in master mode: I don't believe that is easily setup on any Android phone.

Just found one solution that I can end up with: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1065652 but it assumes usb cable connecction between the lapton and the phone.

Yes. I wrote VPN Hotspot that is able to do this if you have a rooted Android 5.0+.

Well yes, there is an application that I tested with this functionality
NetShare tethering (no root) application is  a solution to the problem addresed.

Now this application uses a vpn proxy to route traffic from device
  connected to Wi-Fi network to another client via a p2p connectivity.

Thus allowing to "share wi-fi over wifi" or act as a repeater
 through Wi-Fi direct

Essentially, it uses a HTTP proxy to route traffic to the client and configuring the connection is fairly easy:

Go to connection settings of any device e.g PC, Iphone etc (but in this case used a Symbian device)
Add the wireless access point if not done already, and input the Wi-Fi direct Group password.
Under advanced settings change proxy settings:

Server: 192.168.49.1
Port: 8282
(remember to allow this port on firewall settings for other devices)

As of Android 10, there is an option called “Enable Wi-Fi Coverage Extend Feature" in Developer Settings to turn on the WiFi extender/repeater feature.

Looks like this option is not a standard Android feature and is only available on some manufacturers. Preliminary research shows that OnePlus, Xiaomi, and Nokia has this, but not AOSP (ref: XDA Forums)

Yes. The Alcatel One Touch Glory 2s has this function. You can choose to tether wi-fi via wi-fi or mobile data. You can create the SSID and password too. I used this phone as repeater to my home wifi router.


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How can I create a settings shortcut for always on data?
I have always-on mobile data set to off most of the time to conserve battery, but I find the need to switch it on every once in a while - using Pandora, the odd large file to/from Dropbox, etc.
The question: Can I make an easy on/off icon (much like the WiFi or 4G widgets preloaded by HTC) so I don't have to go through the settings menu every time? App recs or how-tos appreciated.
I've got an Evo with 2.2.

HTC doesn't have a data one for that?  They used to.  I believe CurveFish has one on the market.  I think it is APN OnOff.  Or search for other APN widgets.

Close, but not quite (thanks for that app though; also useful) - I'm looking to enable/disable the "always on" part, not manually shut the whole thing on and off. The setting in question on the Evo is under Settings > Wireless & networks > Mobile Networks > Enable always-on mobile data (toggle).

Yes the APN widgets turn on and off the data to conserve battery.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/


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Motorola Blackflip Clock Doesn't Update when its Screen is off
My Motorola Backflip (Android 1.6) doesn't update its clock until the screen is turned on.  This wouldn't be a problem except that the alarm won't go off in the morning unless I'm already up and checking my phone.
This problem does not occur if the phone is charging.
Is this a setting? How can I correct this?

This actually sounds just like an issue that would be in MotoBLUR, especially MotoBLUR v1. This issue may have been fixed in the later releases of MotoBLUR, but initially this was a very buggy product.
If you viewed the log that android writes for any errors that occurred with the first version of BLUR (which is what is on the backflip) there are tons of errors that happen at any given moment. It seemed like Motorola rushed out the product before they were actually ready.

I've long since upgraded my phone, but if someone can verify this I'll mark the question as answered.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/


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Can I have notification sounds repeat every few minutes?
Is it possible on a Droid X to repeat the notification sounds on a regular basis (perhaps every 5 minutes or so)? When I get a voicemail, I want it to beep every few minutes to remind me to check it.

Missed Call will do repeat vibration patterns/notifications for SMS (per contact), missed/incoming phone calls (per contact),  Battery, Calendar events, device storage, etc.
Unfortunately this doesn't do voicemails, but if a missed call is good enough for you, then give it a shot.  You can also set it up to do different patterns/notifications per contact for missed calls (so alert you differently for a VIP than everyone else).


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Moto Droid - Screen Going Crazy / SD Card Contents
So about an hour ago I was texting and noticed that when I would try to hit certain letters using the on-screen keyboard that it would think I pressed the keys to the left or right of a certain area.  It seemed like a deadspot to me and already I was disappointed but it wasn't a giant issue as I could just use the hardware keyboard til I got it fixed.  Now, however, after ~1 minute of being booted up, the screen just starts going crazy, loading random applications, zooming in on stuff, flickering left and right like I was swiping it.  I was wondering if anyone had any experience as to what can cause this (other than hardware failure) and if you think doing a factory reset will help at all (assuming I can get through the options fast enough before the screen goes nuts).
Also, before trying a factory reset, I was wondering what all is stored on the SD card by default.  I'm not really worried about apps (I'll just re-download them) or contacts (synced with Google I believe), but more media (pictures / videos [both that I took and downloaded] / music).  Now common sense would suggest that media items would all be stored on the SD card, but I know from experience not to assume things like this.  If you could fill me in it would be much appreciated.

Very strange but something very similar started happening on my Moto Droid 1 close to the same time (11:47 EST).  Rebooting didn't seem to do anything, but I pulled the battery and then when I started it up things were back to normal.  I don't see how they could be related but it is a strange coincidence.

This just recently started happening to me as well (OG DROID, first run from the initial release in Nov. 2009). I'm running CyanogenMod with the freeform pattern lock; because of this, I noticed that the screen seems to think something is swiping back and forth along a line that matches up with the top edge of the hardware keyboard when it's slid out.

Pictures, videos, downloads, and music are all stored on the SD card by default. You can get at them by popping your SD card into any card reader. (probably have to get an adapter)
App settings are stored on the phone. But if those apps support google's backup service those settings will be restored on your new phone.

Thanks.  App settings I can fiddle with as need be to get them right, I'm not terribly worried about that.  My major concern was losing all the pictures and stuff I took.

I had a Droid 1. Screen got very jittery when I used a non-OEM charging cable, unless I held the back of the phone in a certain way. Also noticed this when running Cyanogen ver 6.0 .
Went back to the stock ROM. Finally starting doing it again. I ended up sending it back and getting a warranty replacement. Factory reset did not fix it. Warranty replacement works fine.

I decided "F it" and pulled the SD card and did a factory reset.  The problem still persists so it is most definitely a hardware issue.  I guess I'll have to take it in :/.

Yep, definitely hardware.  Too bad :(


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Low Signal Strength after Firmware Upgrade
When I first bought my Samsung Galaxy S (GT-I9000) phone a month ago, it had it's factory installed 2.1 Eclair running. Despite many 'Android Market' apps not being compatable with it, my signal strength was half to full 3G signal wherever I went.
I then upgraded to 2.3 Gingerbread. My signal strength was lucky to get higher than half strength and often had an E or H next to the signal indicator instead of a 3G ledgend.
I have since upgraded again to CyanogenMod9 (4.0 ICS) with no change to signal strength. In the locations I got full 3G signal only a month ago, I still struggle to get over half signal strength with an H ledgend. The bars are usually grey but occationally turn blue.
I am wondering if the factory Eclair install had a preset setting making it suitable to work in Australia with the specific frequency bands we have here, and upgrading has over written these settings. If this is the case, my phone may be looking for frequencies used in Europe or America that arn't used here or are the 2G frequencies.
My googling has found many forum threads where people have lossed signal quality after upgrading, many blaming the carrier or ICS. Several people have subsequently downgraded to default Gingerbread to fix the problem, for me this would mean going back to Eclair. I don't really want to do that.
Is there anything I can do, changing settings or installing an app, that can bring me back to full strength?
UPDATE 26Aug12
I think I have deciphered the signal strength bars. E denotes EDGE (2G) signal, H is for HSPA and 3G for UMTS fast 3G connection. The signal bars are grey normally, and turn blue when you have an active data link (and little up/down arrows show data transfer).
I wonder if my phone is having trouble with UMTS and therefore not connecting at 3G speeds after the upgrade.

Chances are that Samsung simply changed the visualization algorithm from linear to logarithmic.

I agree with Flow, ICS did change the algorithm for signal strength, and it was a bug in the ICS 4.0.1 source, it should be fixed in ICS 4.0.4 or in JB for that matter :)

A logarithmic display only means that the indicator showing 3 out of 5 bars of strength is not 50% strength, but probably twice as strong as 2 bars etc. It won't affect the signal I am recieving, just how I see it. I also think having 2 blue signal bars is better than 4 or 5 grey signal bars. I just don't often get blue ones.

Blue signal bars is when there's background data or using google apps.

Flashing your Phone probably also changed your Modem/Baseband. Flashing another might give you better Signal.
Here you can download Modems for your phone:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1158783

How do I know which one to flash? I assume it doesn't matter the modems are listed as CM7 modems, and they should work on CM9? Looking in my 'About Phone', I currently have JVT installed.

They work on CM9. Look around in the thread users share their experience there. (JVT works best for me/in Germany)

After much googling as well as trial and error, I have settled on KG3 as the modem for me. I think is it unfortunate there isn't a more formalised way of determining the correct modem files. Maybe the community will improve this in time.


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Phone gets extra hot and connection problems with replacement ROM
Ever since I upgraded my Galaxy S4 to Lollipop (CM12.1) I have had problems with the SIM card 'being removed'. It usually happens after a bit of use and the phone gets hot. I get a 'SIM card has been removed, please restart' error and I cannot connect to my carrier until I do (Wi-Fi and Bluetooth still work, as well as the SD card reader). I have tried an upgrade to Marshmallow (CM13) but the fault remains as well as inducing Bluetooth problems so I have rolled back to Lollipop. I have also tried replacing the SIM and SD card holder with no change.
I'm wondering if there was some power management Samsung had in their ROM that CyanogenMod hasn't implemented.
Is there a way to control the power consumption so the phone doesn't get too hot and possibly cause problems with the SIM card holder?

Flashing the stock firmware should solve the issue.

That would mean rolling back to Jellybean. I'm hoping to avoid that. But if I did, is that stored internally or will I need to find a Samsung ROM online?

The custom ROM often are full of bugs, you should know that. If the issue is not hardware related, flashing the stock firmware should resolve that. No you have yo download online.

Have you gotten a replacement SIM card from your carrier? Also, try removing the SIM and putting a layer or two of scotch tape on the back side and reinsert it, might help maintain the connection.

I have tried a new SIM and padding the card in the slot with no effect.

So far, I can only find *.tar.md5 ROMS which TWRP does not recognise and fails to install.


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Brutal bug "android.process.acore has stopped" doesn't solve after factory reset
Apparently this bug is prevalent and some are lucky enough to solve it by simply clearing data of Contacts storage but not me. I believe I have tried it all. Even after factory reset (via stock recovery) this error appears immediately after first boot and it keeps popping up non-stop making the phone very hard to use.

Does anyone know a solid fix for this brutal bug?

It's usually caused by a modified system app going hey wire , Or a simple permission fix is required

@user157947 okay but how exactly to fix it?

I wasn't lucky as well, and I needed to reflash the stock firmware on a S3 Neo.

@DeathMaskSalesman This is some crazy shit. I feel for those people who doesn't have a clue on how to flash roms.


text:
How to recover personal data on an Android phone which is in a bootloop?
Is there a way to recover the internal storage (images, video, photos, notes, app data, music, etc) of an Android phone which is currently in a bootloop?
Additional info:

Wiping the cache partition in recovery mode does not solve the bootloop issue.
The phone is not rooted.
USB debugging (hopefully) has been enabled prior to the soft-bricking.
The bootloop occurred after the battery run out of power.
The phone is SAMSUNG Galaxy Note 4

Bootloader unlocked? Can you boot to a custom recovery e.g. TWRP? Encryption enabled on device? If yes, can TWRP decrypt it?

How do you check if the bootloader has been unlocked? I haven't installed any custom recovery. I can only get access to the normal/regular/stock recovery. Is there a way to install TWRP through there without wiping out my files?

See some rooting guide for your device to get answers to all of your queries. In short, it seems you haven't unlocked bootloader, which if you do now, will wipe everything. With locked bootloader you can't recover data.

pretty dire sounding... Do you think there is any way to recover at least some well known file formats like images, S-note files, audio files, etc.?

You mentioned usb-debugging check if adb detect your device during boot/loop. another option: cf-auto-root seems to support your device which means you can inject recovery with locked bootloader. not sure about details check your model is not verizon first https://forum.xda-developers.com/note-4/help/sm-n910-cf-auto-root-t2897428

As our boot-loop tag wiki suggests: have you tried booting into safe-mode? You might be lucky enough to use ADB while in there.

try to install PhilZ Touch Recovery CWM 6 from stock Android system recovery <3e> (apply update from sdcard) trlte/xx
https://mega.co.nz/#F!oZ1QDDbC!Ko20UNhowwIlXLVFjJsyKw

check for cloud backups https://photos.google.com or https://drive.google.com/drive/backups

I will try both of your sugestions, alecxs. Thank you.


text:
how to store all mobile data in computer without touch mobile screen?? H
How to get my all data(Like contacts,messages,files,etc) when my mobile screen was broken.
I am used Galaxy j7.And I loss my mobile display by some reason.
My phone still working,but i see all things on screen but dont touch on scrren
call was incoming.
But when I connect my phone with my pc via samsung component .then
Please help me
How can I get all my data.

Please suggest me....it's needful

There are numerous ways for you to fetch the data.
A very easy way for you to control the screen is to use a mouse.
If you are familiar with Android Debug Bridge (ADB), you can use it as well.

i dont know about ADB, so can you please tell me something about it?

But sir, for what you say, I have to touch the screen ... And, my mobile touch is damaged.so how to do this.

@priyapatil If you are not familiar with ADB, I suggest you to buy an OTG adapter and a mouse. Connect the mouse to your phone using the adapter and you are good to go.


text:
Can a malicious application running in a container root the Android?
Can a malware root the Android when running in a container such as when running through VirtualXposed or Parallel space, or when a person is using the Guest user or any other secondary user in Android?
My device is not rooted so I can't check this on my own. If the answer is yes, how to ensure protection from such malwares that want to root your Android?

Guest Users cannot root the phone separately from the main user. If a phone is rooted it is rooted for all users. If your Recovery is not password protected anyone can easily flash Magisk and get root access on his Guest Accout. If the recovery is PW protected it will just take a few more minutes to flash the recovery again/a new one which won't have a password then. That's the big disadvantage of having an unlocked bootloader. The only way to prevent Guests from getting root access to your phone is to install MagiskManager and disactivate root access for Guest-Accounts. I don't know if this also work if the Manager is installed before rooting. If not you need to root your device first obviously.
Or just don't give your phone to someone who would root it to get access to your data or whatever lol


text:
How do I change the country/region in Google Play Store?
I live in Israel. My Google Play is set to USA. I want to change it to Israel. The need to change that had arisen when I tried setting up Family Link on my kid's phone, which fails due to" country setting being different on parent and child phones". Sure enough, his country is set correctly in Google Play settings.
How can I change mine when the account->country and profile setting appears unchangeable?
Edited for clarification: I have never lived in the US and don't recall setting the country to US. I have no US based payment methods defined , but I do have Israeli payment method defined and used.

Have you seen our google-play-store tag wiki and checked with its links – like, How do I change the Google Play country? and Problems with changing the default country in Google Play Store? Do the answers to those questions solve your problem?

Yes I have. Same for the recently updated instructions by Google.


text:
"Device Admin" apps are asking for permission to erase my data after failed login attempts! How can I confirm?
I was about to install the Outlook app on my phone, when it asked me to activate it as a device admin. (See image below):

I'm sure few people read the whole warning. One part greatly concerned me:

Monitor screen unlock attempts
  Monitor the number of incorrect passwords typed. when unlocking the screen, and lock the phone or ease all the phone's data if too many incorrect passwords are typed.

Well shoot, if there's risk of all data being erased, I'm not really not that interested anymore! I often accidentally swipe patterns while I'm holding my phone in my hand. Plus a friend or young family member may be fooling around with my phone, unknowingly creating me a very long restoration process and lost data I can never get back.
What I'm wondering:

Is this just a generic warning given for any app requesting admin privileges? Perhaps it's possible that Outlook doesn't use the erase feature?
Is there a way to verify how many incorrect login attempts will trip the erasure?
Can I override the ability for it to erase my phone? (I'm guessing not.)

Is this just a generic warning given for any app requesting admin privileges? Perhaps it's possible that Outlook doesn't use the erase feature?

Only the operations which the app can perform are shown to the user. If the device admin screen shows an operation like "Monitor Screen Lock Attempts", then rest assured, the corresponding app does have that feature.
I am sharing an image from an app named Tasker which employs only one device admin operation and is asking only for it. This should be sufficient that the device admin screen doesn't show generic operations but only app-specific ones. This can further be tested against the list of maximum operations that can be shown from here.

Is there a way to verify how many incorrect login attempts will trip the erasure?

Developers might be able to see it by analyzing the code from the APK using special tools. You could test this using trial and error on your own by using android-x86 and running your app on it. Try incorrect passwords and count for yourself. I'm not aware of an easy way.

Can I override the ability for it to erase my phone?

I do not know as of now. An Xposed module like Bypass Exchange Policies might be able to do this.

Good idea, using Android x86 to find the failed login threshold. I'll report back if I find some useful data.

I tried it myself with a Google account in Outlook. Didn't do anything even after 11 failed attempts.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2015/02/17/pin-lock-updates-outlook-ios-android/
"this is an app-level wipe, not a device wipe. The Outlook app will reset and Outlook email, calendar, contacts and files data will be removed from the device, as well as from Outlook’s cloud components. The wipe will not affect any of the user’s personal apps and information."
Phew! wish they said that in the install process TBH.

I wish that page were more explicit. To me, it's only referring to manual reset issued by the company. It doesn't mention incorrect password wipes.


text:
How can I choose which contacts to sync from Facebook to my HTC Desire HD?
In relation to this question, I asked if there is a way to choose which contacts get synced and got a suggestion to post this as a new question.
So here it is. How can I manually choose which Facebook contacts should be synced with my Android ones?

The Facebook app doesn't have an option for it, so basically: You can't.  Facebook also provides no way to easily export contact information, so you'd have to do it manually (or with some crazy script/app that scrapes the info from the website).

Download Facebook Contact Sync. I had this same problem and found this tool. Its not foolproof as the name in your contacts has to pretty much exactly match what they have in FB as their name. So people using weird names so they can't be found will not allow them to sync. Otherwise it works well.


text:
Is a Class 10 MicroSD overkill or is a Class 6 adequate?

Possible Duplicate:
Is the class rating of my MicroSD card relevant?

I don't see any speed class or × rating markings on the 2GB card that came with my phone. Is a Class 10 card going to be noticeably faster (in apps that use the SD storage) than a Class 6? I know that it's theoretically 40% faster but I'm not sure that my Flipside would even be able to take advantage of the higher speeds.

It is most likely overkill unless you are doing a lot of write/reads to your SD card for some particular reason.  The only reason I've known to buy a faster SD card is for photography, when you want to be able to reduce the time it takes to write photos from the memory buffer to the SD card so you can take more pictures at a higher FPS.

This, of course, assumes that the phone can actually take advantage of the additional performance.  Other bits (controller, CPU, etc.) might end up becoming bottlenecks or reduce the utility of a Class 10 card.  It might be more useful for the OP to get a larger card instead of a faster one.

Thanks for confirming my suspicions. The Class 10s seem to have a more limited availability and less reliability so I'll definitely be getting a lower speed, and higher capacity card.


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Unread messages not bold in Gmail on Chrome (Nougat)
Gmail on Chrome on Lollipop (unread in bold messages are fine):

Gmail on Chrome on Nougat (unread in bold messages looks thin):

As you can see in the second image, the unread message is thinner than the first image. It's probably on bold too, just not as bold as the first image.
Anyone knows how to fix this on Nougat?
Update: This appears to be due to the default font used by Chrome on Nougat. Any ideas how to change that? Changing the Android system fonts didn't affect Chrome.

well that will work but I want to use the mobile version

Chrome Settings > Accessibility> Text scaling - see if that helps

@beeshyams I don't see "change visiblity" in the settings

You can also try typing chrome://flags and in the search bar reader-mode. You can try changing those settings , if it helps

@beeshyams Text scaling doesn't help and I don't see any relevant setting in chrome://flags. For now I am using Firefox which renders the bold fonts perfectly.

After typing chrome://flags and in the search bar reader mode I see three  flags, reader mode triggering , reader mode in CCT and reader mode for accessibility . I was suggesting playing with those flags, since I am not in Nougat.  . Also try updating Chrome to the latest version , if not done already

@beeshyams I tried playing with those settings, still no luck.


text:
Recieved an SMS that deleted all my SMS
A weird thing happened to me today. I received an SMS and upon opening it from the notification bar on top, my SMS are all gone. I didn't even get to read the message. I have my SMS backed-up from a week ago so it's not much of an issue. But then how can this possibly happen? I am using GoSMS and CyanogenMod 7.2 btw. Any thoughts on what could've caused this?
Update
Okay now 5 days later, all my contacts have disappeared on it's own. I wasn't doing anything at all. I just notice my contacts are all gone. I did re-sync from Google and they're all back but what could possibly cause that?

maybe if you had a copy of the SMS and it's properties that would help a bit

@ThaSaleni unfortunately when clicked the SMS it pointed me to an empty inbox so there's no record of it at all.


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Headset works on music but not on call
I have a weird problem. My headset works with music, but not with calls. The headset icon shows, but the sound still comes from the phone (instead of the headset) when I make a call. Music works fine with the headset.
This is what I'm using:

What do you mean by headset? Earphones?

@LiamW edited my question with a picture of what I'm using

The built in earphones, I see. This is strange, and I'm not sure on the answer so will post as comment first: Have you checked the dialer settings? Open the dialer, then press Menu->Settings.

@LiamW There's not much setting about it there. I am using Cynogendmod 7.2 on Galaxy Ace BTW.

Weird problem of the month! :) Suggestion: did you try using another set of headsets?

Could be audio-routing bug when plugged into headset when in-call?

Somebody reported this, here might be best to star the issue... be aware, that even though the issues show different models, the code remains the same across devices


text:
Google Contacts - only My contacts, not Others
I have Samsung Galaxy Note II, Android 4.3
I have synchronized it with my Google Account. The problem is that when I search for a name, it also searches all the contacts I have ever send an email to. I want it to search only My Contacts (the name of default group in GMail of contacts I have saved manualy), not Other Contacts. Is it possible? Thanks
EDIT:
I'm not looking for how to display only certain group. I'm looking for how to search only in certain group.

I'm having the same issue. The search feature is basically unusable (I have tried several Contacts apps, they all search through ALL the contacts...)

On my phone (moto x) I had to go to the People app, touch the three dot icon, and touch "contacts to display" option. Then select the "back up assistant" option instead of any other option in order to only display those contacts that are stored on my phone.

But I have only displayed My Contacts. The problem is that when I search for contact, it searches all of them, not only My Contacts

This wasn't the answer to the question that was asked, but it was the answer to the question I was searching for.

found solution for this.
tried with my Samsung s4..

Go to Contacts -> press Menu Key -> Contacts to Display -> Customized
  List -> Tap the setting icon beside it --> Tap arrow icon beside your
  gmail account --> select the contacts to display

In the menu go to "Contacts to display" then in "Customized list" under gmail account deselect other groups. Also you can select "only contacts with phones" in options.

No, this is only for contacts to display which I have properly set. But contact search displays all...

You can use other contact apps like ExDialer.

It works.
Do not forget to switch to the contacts "old version", then select "other accounts", then check the box, then "add to my accounts".
NB. everytime it adds 250 accounts displayed (if you have >205 you need to select and add again, until over

Go to google.com/contacts and group all your contacts. On the phone, use contacts to display and choose the group you wanted to display.

Edited the question as this is the third wrong answer :) Check my other comments. But thanks for effort.


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VPN doesn't work on HTC Desire over WiFi
My phone is HTC desire, Android 2.2.
It seems to connect to the VPN server while using WiFi, but the browser and other applications can't be access the Internet any more.  The connection is disconnected after minutes automatically. However, the same VPN settings work well while using 3G.
Update: The router allows VPN connections -- My PC and a Milestone 2 can use the same VPN over the WiFi network.
Update 2: It doesn't work over all WiFi connection! My phone could access the Internet when connecting the same VPN over the WiFi network of my office. It looks like the VPN only doesn't work over the WiFi network of my home.
Update 3 - solution After updating my phone to HTC official desire 2.3.3 dev ROM, it works. So it looks like there is a bug fixed by Android or HTC rom in 2.3.3.
Does anyone know how to resolve or diagnose this issue?

@xavier_fakerat have you tried always on VPN? and disabling miui optimisations (or whatever it's called) in developer options?

After updating my phone to htc official desire 2.3.3 dev ROM, it works. So it looks like there is a bug fixed by Android or HTC rom in 2.3.3.

Perhaps, its a bug that can only be solved by upgrading/downgrading ROM since no other answer has clues, I will award your answer bounty for a good question and thorough research. Hopefully this bug will be resolved :)

A complete article on VPN on HTC Desire is present on the HTC Europe portal. Hope this will help you out.

Connecting to a virtual private network (VPN) From your phone, you can add, set up, and manage virtual private networks (VPNs) that allow you to connect and access resources inside a secured local network, such as your corporate network.
Depending on the type of VPN you are using at work, you may be required to enter your login credentials and/or install security certificates before you can connect to your company’s local network. You can get this information from your network administrator.
Also, your phone must first establish a Wi-Fi or data connection before you can initiate a VPN connection. For information about setting up and using these connections on your phone, see Data connection and Wi-Fi.
Setting up secure credential storage
If your network administrator instructs you to download and install security certificates, you must first set up the phone’s secure credential storage.

From the Home screen, press MENU, tap Settings > Security, and then tap Set password.
Enter a new password for the credential storage (at least 8 characters without any spaces).
Scroll down and confirm the password, and then tap OK.
Select the Use secure credentials check box.

You can then download and install the certificates needed to access your local network Your network administrator can tell you how to do this.
Adding a VPN connection

From the Home screen, press MENU, tap Settings > Wireless & networks > VPN settings.
Tap Add VPN, and then tap the type of VPN you want to add.
Tap the VPN settings and set them up according to the security details you obtained from your network administrator.
Press MENU, and then tap Save.

The VPN is then added to the VPNs section of the VPN settings screen.
Connecting to a VPN

From the Home screen, press MENU, tap Settings > Wireless & networks > VPN settings.
In the VPNs section, tap the VPN that you want to connect to.
When prompted, enter your log in credentials, and then tap Connect.

When you are connected, the VPN connected icon  appears in the notification area of the title bar.
You can then open the web browser to access resources such as intranet sites on your corporate network.
Disconnecting from a VPN

Press and hold the title bar, and then slide down your finger to open the Notifications panel.
Tap the VPN connection to return to the VPN settings screen, and then tap the VPN connection to disconnect from it.
When your phone has disconnected from the VPN, the VPN disconnected icon  is displayed in the notification area of the title bar.


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Lan local ip address of Android phone is constantly changing?
I believe I am a victim of malware on my phone.
I have already flashed a new ROM and reset my Samsung Galaxy S3 phone many times. Using a network logging app and a "network connections" app shows me the live connections coming from my phone.
My local wireless LAN is 192.168.x.x but I see the IP address change to 10.0.8.1and then reverting back to my local WLAN IP address.
I do not even route that subnet in my network so how am I getting that address? Using network ping apps, I can ping that 10.0.8,1 address from my phone. It's even happening to my other android phone (Gamsung Galaxy Note 3). The S3 is rooted and the Note is not.

Welcome to the Android Enthusiasts! That must not necessarily mean something wrong: your device can have multiple IPs, e.g. one for WiFi, one for your mobile data, and one "local" (in case there's no network available). So a shaky network connection would exactly look as you describe: when the network connection drops, the device reverts to one of its alternative IPs.

is there an open wifi access point or a network you've connected to previously nearby? 192 and 10 are both private IPv4 blocks, so it doesn't make sense that your connection is bouncing between wifi and mobile data connections. mobile data connections normally lease public IPs using IPv6. your situation sounds like the device is bouncing between 2 WLAN connections.
hop into Settings > Wifi > Advanced. make sure that "Avoid poor connections" is enabled. this might help the device ignore the weaker connection. back in the Wifi menu, you can also choose to forget the network that's causing the problem by tapping on the SSID and selecting "Forget."


text:
Google contacts party deleted, how to restore?
My phone has since this morning forgotten about a part of my contacts: it only displays some of them in my contact list, or only displays their email address and not their phone number. I don't know what triggered this and there doesn't seem to be a logic behind it: I see and don't see contacts related to different accounts.
Now luckily my WhatAapp conversations with many of the deleted people are still there, so I can re-add them to my contact list manually, but this of course doesn't work for people that I have not talked to on WhatsApp recently.
The thing is, in my phone, contact sync with my main Google account is turned off (has to do with my limited data plan). This means that I sometimes sync manually, but I had some contacts in my phone that weren't synced with Google and part of them are now gone. Is there any way to restore these?
Also, which of the following will syncing my Google contacts do?

Overwrite the contacts in my phone
Add to my phone the contacts that are in my Google account without deleting any contacts in my phone that are not in my Google account
Delete all contacts that are just stored on my phone and not in my Google account?

Any other suggestions are also appreciated, but please be very clear because I'm new to this.

If you sync your google contacts it will add the contacts present in your google account to your phone, without deleting or modifying the other contacts (option b).
The reason might be that, you accidentally deleted all the contacts in your phone and restored the partially synced contacts from your google account.
How to restore? - I think you already restored the available contacts using your google account. You can't restore beyond those contacts, unless you had the other backup source (like you can backup your contacts using inbuilt option for contacts backup)


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Strange WiFi battery usage on Marshmallow Nexus 5
I have a question about the WiFi battery usage on the Nexus 5. In the first screenshot you see my battery/WiFi usage. The second screenshot shows the battery/WiFi usage for the Nexus 5 of a colleague of mine.

Strangely enough, my WiFi is disabled. Why is this so?

Google has an option that it can scan for WiFi networks, even when turned off.

Okay, but then the next question rises; why does the Nexus 5 of my colleague  use 81mAh over 23+ hours and mine w/o using it 1257mAh over a period of 2+ hours?

There is a known issue on Nexus 5/6 with Marshmallow and wifi. This wifi drain has been noted by many users, me included.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/google-nexus-5/help/wifi-plaguing-android-marshmallow-t3220031

Yeah I already searched on the internet for other solutions. I came across a few answers that also include to go back to the latest Lollipop (5.1.1.) and OTA the upgrade. A few had already good experiences with this. I will try that.

So today I had finally the time to do the above thing and surprisingly my battery drain over WiFi has stopt immediately. It's even not showing in the list at all, at the moment. My screen is now the 'normal' drainer again. :)

Same here. So weird.

A few days back I had the same problem and I was able to fix it!
Now all you need to do is go to Settings → Location → options (3 Dots top right corner) → Scanning → Uncheck Wi-Fi Scanning. This is for Marshmallow update.

I have done that to no avail. I have also wiped the cache partition [1] and nothing happened. Drain continues even with Wifi off and Wi-Fi scanning option disabled.
[1] https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=189018#c123

@VenomGT rightly pointed out the 'new feature' which affects the battery.
You might also want to adjust your settings to not use wi-fi when your screen is black/off. To do that, use:

Settings -> Wi-Fi -> Advanced -> Keep Wi-Fi on during sleep.

As I have found out, the problem lies in the 'Location' settings. After a while and some reboots, I found out that the Wi-Fi drain suddenly came back. Now I have set the location 'mode' to do the determination as device only.
(Click image to enlarge)

And now after about 3 reboots and 3 full charge cycles the Wi-Fi problem is gone.
(Click image to enlarge)

Battery by the way is now capable of lasting at least the work hours but after 12 hours I already do need to charge.
Hopefully, this is the final solution that I can give.

This should help but sometimes I need wifi for location especially when indoors.

SEE MY OTHER ANSWER, THIS ONE ONLY HELPED FOR A FEW DAYS BUT NOT PERMANENTLY
I reverted my Nexus 5 by downloading the lastest 5.1.1 Android Factory image and after 'downgrading' I let the device update OTA to receive the 6.0 update. From this point on my Wi-Fi issue is not occurring anymore.
So my workaround after I upgraded to 6.0 by the factory image and had the Wi-Fi drain issue:
Go to: Factory Images for Nexus 5 and download the latest 5.1.1 (LMY48M)

I did it through a Linux distribution (UbuntuGnome) so my steps were
  slightly different from the Windows users. Follow these steps for flashing through Windows

Extract the downloaded 'hammerhead-mra58k-factory-52364034.tgz' and also extract the 'image-hammerhead-lmy48m.zip'within the extracted folder; 'hammerhead-lmy48m'

BACKUP ESSENTIAL STUFF FROM THIS POINT
  Next steps will erase all settings and data on the Nexus 5

Connect your Nexus 5 to the PC/Laptop where you downloaded the files to and open a terminal or command prompt.
In Terminal:
$ adb reboot bootloader to get your phone into the bootloader screen.
(Sometimes this doesn't work and you can still do it by using the keycombo for the Nexus 5: Turn the device off, then turn it on and immediately hold down Volume Down + Power, as the device begins booting up the Nexus 5 ("hammerhead") will go into fastboot mode.)
When the Nexus 5 is in fastboot mode type in the Terminal:
$ fastboot oem unlock
Beware, if you select yes by selecting it through the Volume+Up button and submit it by clicking the power button, ALL DATA WILL BE ERASED
after the 'oem unlock' is successful, go within the Terminal to the folder where you extracted all the necessary files for the flashing of your Nexus 5.
To flash the files:
hammerhead-lmy48m$ ./flash-all.sh
This took me about 4 minutes until completion and after that the phone rebooted into Android 5.1.1 (Lollipop), almost instantly I got the notification about updating to 6.0 (Marshmallow) and I upgraded immediately without playing or configuring the phone at all.
After all this, no drainage of Wi-Fi anymore and over a period of 7h Wi-Fi 'on' overnight, a battery usage of 26mAh (instead of the 'normal' 700+mAh)
Hopefully this also works for you!
SEE MY OTHER ANSWER, THIS ONE ONLY HELPED FOR A FEW DAYS BUT NOT PERMANENTLY

I did just that and it didn't fix my problem at all.
I also found that post http://forum.xda-developers.com/google-nexus-5/general/guys-call-wifi-battery-drain-6-0-t3219870 so I tried that and I hope it will finally fix my issue !

Hi, for whats it worth I also tried that solution but made no difference at all. For a moment I thought that it resolved the problem but after 2 hours the Wi-Fi was on top of the ranking again. Now with what I wrote, my Wi-Fi has a consumption of 19mAh over a 5h 36m 6s period of time at this very moment.

Actually, this has fixed my problem and also seems to have fixed the same issue on a colleague's Nexus 5.  The battery is still quite poor : currently 84% charged and 9 hours left estimated; but the WiFi is not showing as main battery eater anymore. I would suggest people to first try this solution before wiping their phone ;)

One reason for this could be the amount of signal/strength of your Wi-Fi as this can have an effect on battery usage.

Could be, but the WiFi is turned off all along.

Right, the only thing I can think of is that i could be a glitch in the update as the Marshmallow has only recently been released. They could update it later.

And I also thought about that but my colleague was also updated to Marshmallow. So in that case it wouldn't be a glitch in general...

I guess so. does this actually affect the battery life, as it could be that you need to get a new battery for the mobile.


text:
What is the real used space on data partition of my phone?
When selecting data partition on my phone (HTC One M8), TWRP says it's going to back up 5448 Mb. But 'df' command says there are 8319 Mb used from 10934 total. And ES Explorer displays the size of /data directory as 11.32 Gb.
How are these figures related? I'm at a loss trying to explain that.
Here is the screenshot of DiskInfo:

Here is the screenshot of Diskusage:

Give us the screenshot of Diskinfo's default page.

@Firelord, done.

Great. Would you tell us how much space is used by Internal SD card the moment? Perhaps tapping that Data (userdata) would provide insights. Otherwise, see if Diskusage tells you that. Do give us the screenshots of course. Out of 5.448GB at least 2GB is confirmed from the screenshot. We just now have to confirm how much /data is consumed by apps  and misc files.

@Firelord, done. System is another partition and doesn't count in 5448 Mb. Okay, I'm starting to see the answer to my question. It seems that ES File Explorer is wrong about the size of /data directory.


text:
Security implications of remote (Meterpreter) shell to device
An attacker who uses an exploit for e.g. CVE 2012-6636 can use a Metasploit exploit to open a Meterpreter shell in the context of the stock Android browser.
But what are the implications of such an attack?
As far as I understand the sandbox prevents the attack from accessing contacts, the microphone, the camera or other apps. He is limited to the data of the browser and the SD card.
Even if a device is rooted, there is no way to gain root privileges from within such a shell, or is there?
So the only way to escape from the sandbox would be to tamper the app's memory and make use of another exploit, that leads to privilege escalation, right? Therefore the impact of such an attack would be very limited.

That's right. An attacker can only create a shell with this tools/exploits. But if kernel has a vulnerability like privileges escalation, he (attacker) can gain root access then. (This  only exists when kernel has a vulnerability. This is so important.)
But  maybe attacker can execute malicious code with shell/interpreter then gain root access. Something like localroot.  Exactly what you said :

So the only way to escape from the sandbox would be to tamper the
  app's memory and make use of another exploit, that leads to privilege
  escalation, right? Therefore the impact of such an attack would be
  very limited.

your question = your anwser


text:
Now On Tap is missing from Marshmallow
I recently flashed the stable version of Cataclysm onto my Nexus 5 (Cataclysm Oct 27, 2015 Stable release). Cataclysm adds several features including AppOps over a mostly stock system.
However, Now On Tap is missing from my system. Holding down on the home button just brings me to the Google Now cards screen. This happens on the Google Experience Launcher, the 3rd party Nova Launcher, and various apps including Facebook, Inbox, Telegram and WhatsApp.
In case I accidentally disabled it during setup, I've looked through the settings to try to re-enable it but haven't been able to find the option.

As far as I know, Cataclysm doesn't disable Now on Tap or affect it in any way. I previously flashed the stock system image for 6.0 where Now On Tap was present.
Just in case, I checked: the Google apk version is 5.4.28.19.arm, which was updated on 22 Oct 2015 so that's probably not the issue.

According to this post on the Cataclysm XDA thread, "System language have to be set to English (UK or US)"

Yeah I did make sure it was set to US in the Google App, but apparently System Language is a separate thing. Thanks for the tip. Resolved!

Apparently (as of current writing), Google Now on Tap only available if the System language is set to English.
From Official Google Support for Search,

What languages is this feature available in?
Now on tap is currently only available in English.

Perhaps an understatement, since setting the language to English in Google Search app doesn't show the option for Now on Tap.
According to Reddit,

Now On Tap only works with English system language.
Just a heads up.
I tested it, and it checks out - with system language set to English, you'll find a Now On Tap toggle under Settings - Google - Search and Now. In another language, that toggle isn't there.

As for the follow-up, it seems any English language is accepted, not only English (US) or English (UK)

Any English (UK, AUS, India)? Or just US English?
  I guess I could try it and find out but goggle wont gib oats!

US and UK worked for me.
Working fine on English (India)
English AU works fine

There are other factors that might disable this feature, such as using Google Apps/Business account, will expand/write as another answer if necessary.


text:
LG Escape 2 - bricked
I tried running a script that I got online. I downloaded the whole file which included the .bat file. I tried running the .bat file while forgetting that I needed to download the drivers (from the same website). I canceled the script, got the drivers and tried running the script again - all the while messing around in developer mode (I hadn't known of the feature).
It ran successfully, but since it was running on my old family PC with Windows 7 running, it froze in the middle of installing the drivers, and I had to install them a second time. This time, the installation finished, but a notification popped up saying that the drivers were not successfully installed.
Since then, my phone will not move past the black start up screen, and I have to take the battery out in order to turn it off. I would like to return the device in any condition, whether it be data free or not. Thank you for your time.

I have updated the post. Thank you for your advice.

May be your phone is bricked.
Try downloading the StockRom or some CustomRom that is compatible to your phone and flash it. This might help you.
If you are wandering about all these terms Bricked, StockRom, CustomRom and flash. Here is a good article that might help you to understand.

Link to firmware - the download is a bit complicated, though.

Translated with Google in light of the Non-English policy. Do note that the majority of the people who read this QA strip expects English. If you have any qualms about my translation, feel free to further correct it.

See if you can go to xdadevelopers.com (it's the most popular forum for Android developer news and downloads) and go to your phone subforum. Grab the firmware of your model number and version of the phone. Go into download mode in your phone (don't know how to get there on the LG), flash the zip. Not sure of the last step because in a Samsung you just have to use Odin to flash the firmware, so I'm not sure of the program used in an LG phone.
You'll probably lose root though. Also, this is assuming you're soft bricked (meaning you can go to fastboot/recovery mode. If you can't and you've tried all possible ways, you're hard bricked and need to go to your carrier store to fix it).

authors: وسيم العبادي


text:
Is there a way for a website or app to view the contents of my internal storage without my permission?
I see there are a lot of articles about the restrictions imposed on JavaScript in Windows Chrome. It can't access the filesystem of a user without the user himself uploading it to the server of the PWA. But I see none about JavaScript running on Android Chrome. Are there the same restrictions on JavaScript in Android Chrome as that of Windows?
For example I open a PWA on my Chrome, suppose Telegram, so will Telegram be able to access my files like my photos, videos, documents etc. without my permission?
Concisely, if I grant storage permission to browser X and open a web application Y in that browser, does that mean that Y can also access my media, files etc?
JavaScript aside is there any other way for any PWA or web app or website to view the contents of my internal storage without my permission?

Are there the same restrictions on JavaScript in Android Chrome as that of Windows?

Apps on Android are already containerized in multiple sandboxes, be it a web browser or some other app. There's Linux kernel's robust Discretionary Access Control (DAC); UIDs / GIDs / modes, supplemented by Mandatory Access Control (MAC); SELinux. Every app's Java virtual machine (the native process) runs with its own unique UID and SELinux context. Android also makes use of Linux namespaces, capabilities and seccomp. See Application Sandbox.
In addition to that Android has it's own permission control framework. Access to system resources, devices and filesystems is governed by a long list of manifest permissions like Storage, Camera, Contacts etc. which have different protection levels. See Permissions.
So any further restriction put on apps' internal code (like in JS) provides no significant improvement on Android.
From your comment:

But if all Android apps are sandboxed then how can a person upload a file to a website.

It's achieved through Android's external shared storage which is accessible to apps only after user grants permission.

Concisely, if I grant storage permission to browser X and open a web application Y in that browser, does that mean that Y can also access my media, files etc?

Definitely yes. There's no restriction from OS side. A web application runs inside a web browser. A web browser is an ordinary Android app. When an Android app starts, a native UNIX process is forked which is subject to all DAC, MAC and other restrictions at kernel level. A web application running in the same native process isn't a separate entity. From OS's view, the whole native process is a single unit. So the same restrictions apply to the whole code in that process, whether it's written in Java, JS, C, Python, or any other language.

JavaScript aside, is there any other way for any PWA or web app or website to view the contents of my internal storage without my permission?

Well, we first need to define my and internal storage.
DAC on desktop OSes (at least on Windows and Linuxes) is different than on Android. On desktop OSes files belong to human users. So when you say my files, that means they all are assigned an identifier (UID/GID) which represents a human user. And all programs run by a human user also run with the same UID, so they can access each other's files. That's why additional restrictions (such as JS improvement in Chrome as you mentioned, and Firefox's use of Linux namespaces etc.) are put on programs, particularly those interfacing the internet e.g. web browsers. Also check firejail.
But on Android, it's the apps which are isolated from each other, not human users. Every app is assigned a unique UID/GID and files belong to apps. For more details see my answer to Are multiple-users protected from each other differently than apps?.
Coming to storage, Android stores configurations, apps and data to partition mounted at /data which is not accessible without rooting (Why are superuser permissions needed to acess /data partition?). Apps have their private storage (in /data/data/) which isn't accessible to any other app because every app's directory has its own UID/GID which belongs to its owner app (that's how DAC works).
In order to share files among apps, Android provides a permission-less emulated filesystem called external shared storage. It's a physically internal storage (/data/media directory) accessible at /sdcard/ (primary), or additionally can be a physically external SD card (secondary). External shared storage contains private directories which belong to individual apps. These directories are available to apps without requiring any permission. The rest of the public directories are only accessible to apps which are granted Storage permission (READ_EXTERNAL_STORAGE and WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE) by the user.
However the filesystem level access to whole /sdcard is very much deprecated in Android 10 and 11 due to its broad nature. Now there are MediaStore and Storage Access Framework (SAF) which provide apps even limited access to files on external shared storage. For more details see my answers to Where Android apps store data?, Android's Storage Journey and What is the "u#_everybody" UID?.
So:

Access to files created / downloaded by an app in its private storage or private directories in external storage is never restricted.
Access to the files of other apps in private storage is never possible.
Access to the files in public external storage or private external storage of other apps is subject to permission granted to the app by the user.


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Searching Call Logs in Android 10 Dialer app
Had a query-
I've been trying to find out how to search for numbers in the Dialer app (Android 10/Nokia 6.1). It searches only contacts & places.
Eg- Let's say I received a call today from a number say 535-555-5555.
Since the number isn't saved as a contact, if I try to dial the number, the number does not show up at all (barring similar numbers from my contacts).
As you start entering the digits, it would narrow down the choices and show you the correct number, when you dialed it (or received a call from). In my previous phone (Vivo /Funtouch OS), this was a very well organized function.
I've tried a few dialer apps but all look only through contacts.
Is there a setting in the native Android 10 dialer app that I can change to allow it to search through call logs? OR Is there a Dialer app in the Play store that can do this?
Sharing links of those who have had similar issues.
https://support.google.com/pixelphone/thread/7169712?hl=en
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/53268297/android-how-to-search-through-call-logs-for-a-specific-number
https://forums.androidcentral.com/samsung-galaxy-s7-edge/698950-how-can-i-search-my-calls-log.html
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/53268297/android-how-to-search-through-call-logs-for-a-specific-number

Hello. It is good that you were finally able to find a solution on your own. That said, because we are a Q&A site and not a forum the correct and the only way to answer here is post your solution as an answer post below. That way, question remains a question and an answer remains an answer, and the format is preserved. :)

@Firelord, got it.
Found an app (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.qohlo.ca) that does what I was looking for. However, it feels so strange that one can't search through the Recents in Android 10 native dialer. Shame.


text:
How to list system packages uninstalled (for a user) via ADB?
I want to research the bloatware that I disabled using pm uninstall -k –user 0 <package> and I just realized that I don't know how to make a list of those specific apps. I can list the file names stored in /system/app but it would be very tedious to find which ones are disabled and also to figure out their package names. pm list has a -d option to display disabled apps, but it only works for apps disabled from within the android menu.
If it helps, the phone in mind is not rooted and it is running Android 6.0.1.

pm list packages -u

This lists all such 'uninstalled' packages in the system.

Note that pm list packages -u also includes installed packages (help says "also include uninstalled packages", so you need to diff it against pm list packages without the -u). Further, somewhere around Android 7, pm list packages was replaced by cmd package list.

Like @Izzy said you need to diff both commands: diff <(adb shell pm list packages) <(adb shell pm list packages -u)

Right, thanks for the diff command.

This should be put on the  answer area.

I also encountered the same, what I did was export the list of packages to files and then automate the process of getting only all the uninstalled system packages using Python. Here is my Python script:
from pathlib import Path

downloads = Path("/storage/emulated/0/Download")
all_packages = downloads / "all_packages.txt"
debloated_system_packages = downloads / "debloated_system_packages.txt"
third_party_packages = downloads / "third_party_packages.txt"
bloatwares = downloads / "bloatwares.txt"9

def get_all_packages():
    with open(all_packages, "r") as f:
        all_packages_lines = f.readlines()
    return {line.strip() for line in all_packages_lines}

def get_debloated_system_packages():
    with open(debloated_system_packages, "r") as f:
        debloated_system_packages_lines = f.readlines()
    return {line.strip() for line in debloated_system_packages_lines}

def get_third_party_packages():
    with open(third_party_packages, "r") as f:
        third_party_packages_lines = f.readlines()
    return {line.strip() for line in third_party_packages_lines}

def get_bloatwares():
    with_bloatwares = get_all_packages() - get_third_party_packages()

    return with_bloatwares - get_debloated_system_packages()

def write_bloatwares():
    with open(bloatwares, "w") as f:
            for i in sorted(list(get_bloatwares())):
                f.write(i + "\n")

write_bloatwares()

Hint:
pm list packages -u > all_packages.txt
pm list packages -3 > third_party_packages.txt
pm list packages -s > debloated_system_packages.txt  # as the name suggests this gives all the current packages without those bloatwares that I uninstalled.

I used the Pydroid app to run the code and all the text files are saved on my downloads folder.
Obviously, it needs a little bit of coding, but I hope this will give some idea in the future if anyone would need it.
Note: I used the Package Manager app from F-Droid to uninstall those bloatwares, aShell You app also from F-Droid to run adb commands which both require Shizuku app to run properly. You can search on how to set it up. You don't need a PC for Android 11 and up.


text:
How to fix a bricked K20 Pro?
I did something incorrectly to my Xiaomi Redmi K20 Pro, and it's now not turning ON, no bootloader or recovery mode. I found something on XDA developers forum and my phone is currently in EDL mode. It is detected only on COM-port 10. I don't know how to recover it.
How do I fix my phone?

no worry, just flash official ROM/firmware with MiFlash or QPST

1 year ago I also faced the same problem on my Redmi 3S Prime. It wasn't even detected by MiFlash. After lots of research and 3-4 months I thought to take to a repairing shop. The man at repairing shop just removed back panel and touched at a point on motherboard with screwdriver and inserted the usb cable in the mobile. The computer detected the phone. I don't know what the software he used to flash the device this can help you in your further research.

that is called test point to get device in EDL mode (where you can flash with MiFlash or QPST)

But now they came one more step, they now added new one, which is only work authorized person. Now they called it like FRP. i didn't find a way

When we are connecting display port we can access EDL(Emergency Download Mode). Now MI Flash tool also need authorized person login to flash. i tried edl flash also