text:
Is it possible to replace the dock (but just the dock)?
I have a HTC Desire HD and I like Sense (and the apps provided by HTC) a lot. But I really hate the default launcher (specifically the dock).
The problem is that if I change my launcher, I will lose the ability to use HTC Sense widgets. Is it possible to replace just the dock, but leave the rest of the launcher intact?

Unfortunately, No. The "dock" is part of the entire launcher and "home screens". They are, all the "same application". But there are widgets like most of the widgets that HTC Sense has. If you really don't like it that much, you should be able to find replacement widgets for the ones you like that work with other launchers like Launcher Pro, GO Launcher, or ADW Launcher, for example.

That's unfortunate. Yes I have tried pretty much all of the other launchers, but something is always missing. Usually the notifications don't work, or they just work only for Gmail and SMS (not regular email), plus I simply wasn't able to find replacement widgets (and I have tried a lot of them).

Have tried LauncherPro?  The paid version has widgets that look a lot like Sense' widgets.
As far as I know, you can't just change the dock of Sense and keep the rest of the launcher.  You'd have to completely change to a new launcher.

You can change the Sense 'skin' (Menu -> Personalize -> Skin), which at least changes the dock's style, but I'm afraid if you want to keep the Sense widgets you're stuck with the Sense Launcher and its dock.


text:
Does Chrome Mobile on ICS support extensions?
I saw Google just released the beta for a mobile Chrome browser. They say they brought all the features over from the full browser, or at least they want to. Does anyone have an ICS device with the beta Chrome on it and can confirm if they support the extensions?

It does not, and Flash is also not supported as of now. Information Week reports (and I can personally corroborate):

Web apps and extensions, including Adobe Flash Player, are not
  supported in the initial release of Chrome for Android Beta.

Trying to visit the extensions Web Store page on my Xoom results in a page which simply says the following:

Sorry, your operating system is not supported just yet. The Chrome Web
  Store is available on Windows, Mac and Linux. Why don't you send a
  reminder to yourself to try it out later?

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
Display the reason I just got an alert?
My phone makes a noise when I get a text or email.
Can it also display a line of text saying what the text or email is from? I hate having to check all my apps to see which one wants my attention.
I also want to know why it wants my attention, as in, who just texted me? Who just emailed me? what did they say?

You should see a notification icon in the bar at the top of the screen.
Swipe down and you can click on the notification to load the application that generated it.
In addition you can install SMS Popup or something similar to display the details of the SMS on screen immediately. I haven't found anything like this for email though.

Thanks. For some reason, I see nothing. The small icons at top let do not even turn red...
The iPhone, when you return to if after an absence, displays a list of calls and texts received on the main screen...nothing like that for Android?

Voice Notify may help as well. It is not necessarily practical in every situation (i.e. meetings), but can be handy at home when your phone is charging across the room and you don't want to have to get up to look at it every time it buzzes.

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


text:
Transferring files between PC and Android Sony Z1 Compact (KitKat) without needing app (i.e. via standard USB mass storage)
When I plug my Sony Z1 Compact Android phone into my Mac or PC, the phone prompts me to install a program on the PC/Mac.
Can I not just have the phone behave as a standard, common USB Mass Storage class (i.e. like a USB pen drive, hard drive, or SD card), without having to install a program on the host PC?
This is an inconvenience as if wanting to transfer to a PC that's not my own, I may not be in the position to install such a program.
Update
This was so easy on Android 2.3 on a HTC Desire Z - plug it into a Mac, PC or Linux desktop (i.e. the host), phone asks which mode it should be in, select the USB storage / harddrive option and then the phone appears as an ordinary external disk on the host machine.

The program that your phone ask to install is PC COMPANION. You can skip the PC Companion installation.
If you need to connect in MSC mode
In Settings-> Xperia Connectivity->USB connectivity->USB Connection Mode-> MSC

Still unlucky so far: If I select cancel when it asks to install the PC COMPANION nothing happens on the PC - no drive appears. But the phone says it's charging. (but thanks for offering advice)

Check your device manager. Right click on your device and select update driver. Windows should automatically install Xperia mtp driver

I am always able to connect my Xperia Z1 without pc companion

Regarding "Xperia mtp driver" - I couldn't understand why a specific driver is needed - if the phone presents itself as a common-all-garden generic basic USB mass storage device then the host machine should recognise that without any need for any other drivers.

In Settings-> Xperia Connectivity->USB connectivity->USB Connection Mode-> MSC

@therobyouknow is the setting available for you?

Thanks - this works - MSC mode means that the phone now appears as a drive on my machine - no need to install anything on my Mac, for example. +1 and Accepted answer. Thanks! Upvoted your last 2 comments as well.


text:
Swype for Kindle Fire?
Now that the latest update has been pushed, is there a way to install Swype on the Kindle Fire without rooting it?

It's not currently possible unless you have root.

It's my understanding that you can no longer root with the latest update 6.2.1?

Right, so if you've been updated to a stock 6.2.1 it's currently impossible to use Swype. It will install, but there's no way to enable it in the settings (at least, nobody has yet found one and made it public).

Still no way without root. (
But I'll post some quick links for root users.
The old method (need to edit settings.db with SQLite Database Browser):
http://blog.pathany.com/2011/12/swype-on-kindle-fire.html
New easier methods:
[Guide] Get Swype working without having to edit settings.db
Four simple steps to use alternative keyboards
With Kindle Fire Utility it's rather easy to obtain and revert root.

I wound up going with BurritoRoot and then "Get Swype working without having to edit settings.db". Worked like a charm!


text:
Froyo - Gmail - Can you delete by message, or only by thread?
Running on a out-of-box, unupgraded T-Mobile G2, which is running Froyo, if I'm correct.
This version of the Gmail application has a delete button, which is undocumented in their web help.
When I use it, it appears to delete the entire thread/conversation, rather than a single message. Is this the expected behavior?
UPDATE:
Found the verison number -> "Version 2.3"

I'd say it's expected behavior. I mean, the big "Delete" button in the Gmail web app tosses the whole conversation to the dust bin. You have to dig a little deeper on the individual message to delete it out of the conversation. (Also, unlike the web app there is no option to view individual messages like a classical e-mail client.)
By the way, have you downloaded the latest Gmail app from the Market? There are quite a number of significant improvements over the stock app.

It would be really nice if they added this feature though!

I couldn't find a way to get the delete button to target one message in the thread, and when you actually press the button it does say:

Don't leave us in suspense!

(eek...) Confirm Deletion -> Do you want to delete this conversation?

I updated to 2.3.2 from the market, and it still behaves the same. So I checked this as the answer.

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


text:
how to sync phone memory with pc?
Before Jelly Bean forced us to use MTP mode (mass transfer protocol) instead of Mass Storage Device, It was dead simple to backup my phone to my pc, because I only needed to plug it in, and sync the contents of the SD card to my PC.
I used an app called "Free File Sync", which basically just syncs any two folders in windows.
The problem now is, that MTP mode doesn't assign drive letters to the phone's memory (internal and SD), which causes that my syncing program simply doesn't recognize the device.
I have the same problem with other programs that I use to manage my phones SD card, namely "TreeSize free", which analyses any folder or drive and gives you an oversight of the space consumed by folders, etc. Again, since the phone is not assigned a drive letter, the program simply ignores it, as if it wasn't there.
So what are my options? Is there a default way of syncing MTP drives with Windows?
I also have tried to enable Mass Storage in my phone, but it doesn't work (the option is simply no longer there in Jellybean 4.1.2, or at least in my model)
Note, I don't want apps to make backups of my stuff (apps, pictures, etc), I already have them (Titanium Backup, etc), what I want is to be able to SYNC everything in my phone (backups included) to my pc automatically.
I could simply copy ALL files from Windows Explorer every single time, and then manually syncing it to the destination backup folder, but obviously is not convenient and loses the point of SYNCING.
So what can I do? I just want to once in a while sync everything in my phone to my pc as a backup.
Thanks!

For readers: This answer of mine can be extended to OP's case as well.

UPDATE, I've added my own answer, read it below, the solution is the same app I was using Free File Sync, since version 7 enables MTP device synching.

I am posting this as an answer to my own question, instead of just a comment, because I've found a solution.
In fact, the solution is to use the very same tool I was using, because they have recently updated it (version 7) enabling syncing of MTP devices.
Free File Sync
It works just as expected, and it's extremely easy to sync. The only downside is that comparing the folders (your local "backup" folder, vs. the devices memory) is slower than if it was a Mass Storage Device, but it is a more straightforward solution than the others.
As a side note, I’ve also used ES File Explorer successfully as a way to sync files (as suggested by gibfahn), but the advantage of FreeFileSync is that it works with just about any MTP device, being Android or not.
And the best of all, it's free!

And thanks to @Firelord for the comment, be sure to check his answer to another question since he gives a very detailed explanation on how to use FFS

I just downloaded FreeFileSync and tried MTP sync with it: far too slow! It seems it would take the whole night for comparing my 60 GB MP3 database between phone and PC (even if only 100 MB have changed!)

@Basj Yeah it can be really slow. I guess it's one of the shortcomings of the MTP protocol. But take in mind that after the initial compare, subsequent ones will be faster, because FFS makes an index-like file or something.

The easiest way probably is to turn the mechanism around: instead of letting Windows do the sync, let the Android device take care. From there, you should have full access at least to your SDCard (internal as well as external). So all that's needed is a possibility for the Android device to access your Windows PC.

On your Windows PC, create a "share" (i.e. share a directory to the network)
On your Android device, install an app like e.g. FolderSync
in FolderSync, setup at least one account (in your case, an SMB account pointing to your Windows machine) (thanks to arberg for pointing out this missing step!)
In FolderSync, configure your "folder pairs": which directory on your Android device should get synchronized with which directory on the Windows share.

You can sync manually, or in time intervals. You even can restrict it to WiFi, so it wouldn't eat your data plan (I'm not sure wether you can restrict it to a specific WiFi network, so it would e.g. only sync at home -- but that's possible to do as well at least with some similar sync app).

The bad news is there's no obvious/direct way to get a drive letter assigned to an MTP device. The MTP protocol operates at the file level rather than the filesystem/FAT cluster level, which is supposed to protect in some ways users from accidentally doing things that could be really destructive to their phone's filesystem (eg: reformat in a different format, corrupt the filesystem, making your phone appear to not work right when the sd card unmounts to remount on the pc, etc)...so you're not going to have the level of detailed info about the filesystem necessary for a program like treesize to accurately display the usage of the drive.
There are a number of different threads I found online about ways to make windows trick a MTP device into being treated as a mass storage device, but most of them appear to be false leads, or something that might (or might not) work on XP but is unlikely to work on a newer os like windows 7. Nothing I could replicate on my own machine. Most of those hack solutions seem to rely on such things as tricking windows into using the mass storage device driver instead of the MTP driver.
There do appear to be programs that attempt to sync over MTP mode as best they can (ie: the apps can compare the files by size, but it can compare by date/location/filename. Here's one for mac: http://www.sync-mac.com/mtp-sync.html and one for PC: http://mobiletechpundit.blogspot.com/2012/02/syncing-mtp-devices-like-android-based.html (PureSync).
Another option is to look into apps that run on your phone that manages the syncing as Izzy suggested.
Additionally, if your phone is an HTC phone, it may come pre-installed with an application called HTC sync which can sync files between the phone and PC.
Another less automated way to get copies of "everything on your phone" onto your PC would be to just use ADB to backup your entire device filesystem regularly. Not quite as nice as a direct sync app since restore using ADB is all or nothing, however, if you have the right apps installed on your PC you can manually extract a specific file of interest from a specific backup archive (presuming you remember your backup password).

If MTP transfers are unstable, you can try using FTP over a local network (Your home WiFi router, USB tethering)
Possible example. (For security, use this guide only on home networks)

Install an FTP app on phone - install Amaze File Viewer (free, lightweight, FTP available with a good file viewer)

-- Connect both mobile and the PC into the same network. (E.g.: below 2 or 3 steps)--

Connect the phone to the PC using USB -> Enable the "USB tethering" option in phone settings. (Usually faster)

Connect both phone and PC to the same router using WiFi or cables. (Fast with a good router and a good phone)

Open FTP Server from your FTP app on your phone - Open the Amaze app -> Open the left pane by clicking the menu icon on the top left corner -> Select "FTP Server"->

Configure FTP server settings -> Click the options icon on top right of the FTP server page of Amaze app -> Disable secure connections, Read only access, etc... -> Click logins and disable anonymous login -> fill in some user detail (eg: username="abc", password="bcd")

Click start to start the FPS server. -> It should display an URL address like "URL - ftp://192.168.42.129" and a port (such as port- 21). It should be ftp instead of ftps. Otherwise, disable the "secure connections" option or any other advanced option.

--Use free file sync on PC to sync files. Files can be viewed by Windows Explorer just by typing in the URL in the address bar and pressing enter. Fill out the credentials in the popup that appears next.--

Configure Free File Sync (free, open source) to use FTP -> click the cloud icon placed after the sync address bar and the browse button. -> Select FTP option from the top toolbar -> type in the details given in the FTP server app of the phone (Eg - IP = 192.168.42.129 , port=21, Username = "abc", Password = "bcd" )
Click browse below the "Directory on server:" field.

If everything went fine, a window will pop up and will let you select the folder you want to sync.
Make sure you recheck the details every time you change the connection. After changing any setting on the Amaze app, try stopping and starting the FTP server again. You can also change the "shared path" of your phone in the Amaze FTP server settings.
This is way more stable than MTP. With a good router, you can even do wireless transfers.

The only way I've found to do this is by using the FTP protocol over a shared WiFi network. Apps like ES File Explorer have the ability to run as an FTP client or server on the phone, and then you can use an app like Filezilla as a server on the computer.
This works for folders, and Filezilla does give you some options ("Overwrite if source file newer", or "Overwrite if size differs", or both), so you can get it to sync selectively.
I found this post detailing a quick way to get ftp working on ES File Explorer, then you just run FileZilla, type in the ftp address, press connect, and drag and drop. It'll ask you about overwriting.
I sync my music with this method, and it works pretty well. It's slower than wired syncing, and occasionally it will decide that it needs to overwrite all the files, but in general it works well.

Here two years later, Goodsync has added an option to sync through MTP, and it works like a charm. Its a beta feature in v9 and will probably be in Goodsync 10, and it costs money. Be noted though that Goodsync support is bad in my experience. Goodsync can also sync the dir through wifi.
MTP requires a cable so in not automatic. Using wifi it can be automated, but the goodsync android app would use far too much battery, so if you want it fully automated you need to turn it around is suggested earlier, and use eg FolderSync on the android device.

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


text:
Changing contact to canonical form (adding + country_code)
I am using Samsung Galaxy S2. Is there any automated way or app to change all my contacts with appropriate country code into canonical form.
I just found that lot of my contact are there without the country code. And few apps like whatsapp, viber etc does not recognize the contact unless + is appended with country code.
Is there any better way to do it than editing all my contacts?

You can try syncing your phone contacts with Gmail, preferably into a group.
Then use Gmail's web interface to export that group into a Google CSV format, use a text editor to replace ",00xxx" with ",+xxx" (and do any other editing while you're at it) in the CSV file, and reimport into Gmail.

+1 for export>edit>import. The 'replace all' function of text editors is about as easy as it gets.

In case you want to append country code to your contacts or append +91, here is best way to do and be sure of it done:

Open the CSV, XLS, or XLSX file as Google spreadsheet
Edit > Find and replace
Select the option Search using regular expression
Find ^91 will search all numbers in sheet beginning with 91. In replace, put +91
Similarly, do for all contacts of yours with other country codes

I'm afraid that method doesn't work to add the appropriate country code, as the OP needs. Unless the appropriate code is already there, and just the "+" is missing -- the question indicates rather otherwise (country codes completely missing). However, if all contacts are from the same country, and the code is missing everywhere, replacing ^([0-9]) with +91-\1 (assuming "+91" as the appropriate country code) would do it :)

How about Easy Prefix Country Code?. This adds country code to all contacts selectively.

There is an Android app called Right Number (source available) to do exactly what you want. It reformats all the numbers to a canonical form, and then automatically adds the local prefixes whenever you do a call.
Disclaimer: I know personally one of the authors of that app.


text:
Not able to connect USB or gamepad through Type-C adapter
I'm trying to connect a gamepad with my mobile but it is not connecting.

On mobile 1 (Xiaomi Redmi), I connected the gamepad it was not working. I found that the gamepad works only with applications that request USB permission. So I installed an app that asks for USB permission, and it worked. I installed a game, cast the screen on the TV and everything was working fine. After a few seconds, it stopped working. And now it is not connecting anymore. Before connecting, I tried to read an SD card through a USB port and it was working fine. Now even that is not working.

On mobile 2 (another version of Xiaomi Redmi), it shows that the gamepad is connected as the light is not blinking but always on. But nothing works.

On mobile 3 (OnePlus), did a few attempts, but it didn't work. But then it started working automatically. Without giving any additional permission. Probably it was trying to download some driver in the background, no idea.

Additional info

USB tethering is disabled. It says the USB is not connected. But if I connect the data cable with a laptop then it's connected.

How can I debug or fix this issue on Xiaomi mobiles?
Update
It seems weird. But when mobile battery is less than 15% then it automatically connects.

What's the gamepad model? Does this happen for all gamepads or just one? Does it still time out with a Bluetooth-connected gamepad? Based on the description I'd guess this is a problem on the device's side.

It is happening with all devices like USB, microsd card through OTG, gamepad, c port headphones. Etc. Ideally OTG option should be developer option, I believe. But not in my case.

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


text:
Oneplus one is not starting as expected
My OPO(One plus one) with cyanogenmod (last update in August 2016) purchased 2.5+ yrs back, is not starting when it is connected to USB or starting to fastboot mode when it is not connected. It is happening from last 3 weeks only.
When it is in fastboot mode, I connect it to my PC and run command fastboot continue to resume the boot and it starts. But I need to do it everytime.
So I have wipe cache partition and then full factory reset. But I can see that the problem still persist.
I have installed TWRP now. But it din't solve the problem too.

If I install some custom ROM, would it solve the problem?
Why fastboot mode comes everytime while there was no update happened
recently?
Can it happen due to some hardware issue? (I actually put a cup of hot tea on back of my mobile for a min .... :( )

:: Update ::
I have installed LineageOS. But still facing the same issue.


text:
Prevent HTC Tattoo from losing its mobile broadband connection
My HTC Tattoo loses its mobile broadband connection after a couple of days without a restart. Calling and SMS still work but no data connections. Disabling and reenabling the mobile data connection does not help. Only with a restart the data connection can be used again. Is there a solution to this problem?

Smartphones, like any computerised device, need to be power-cycled regularly in order to function properly. Lots of things get cleaned up by this. If you leave your phone on overnight to use the alarm to wake-up, just power-cycle your phone as soon as you're up. It will be fresh for the day.

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


text:
Applications keep restarting
Whenever I'm done with an application, I always exit using the back button. Somehow applications like Viber, WhatsApp, Facebook, Videos, Email, Google Maps, etc keep restarting on their own.
I have tried:

Using a task killer
Force stopping the apps in the settings menu
Killing them using watchdog

...but they still restart. Any idea how to solve this problem?

Why do you want to exit the app in first place?

If im done with facebook or whatsapp, would it not be better to exit the app.

Let me first say: Do not use task killers. You are only making the problem worse.  Why?  Let me explain how the Android OS works.
Unlike normal OSes, Android does not actually let you "close" an application.  You can leave the application, but that doesn't mean it has "closed" or "killed" it. This is because of multi-tasking: when you leave an application, you can come back to it as you were previously.
Instead, the Android OS handles the "killing" or "closing" of applications for you.  It keeps track of a) how much free memory there is and b) how long it has been since you've opened that app.  When memory is running low, Android will garbage collect and kill any unused applications.  Android's OS task killer is very smart and can handle these situations far better than an Android Task Killer app that just kills apps left and right without any "logic" behind it.
Now, when you leave an application via back button or home, this doesn't mean the app is necessarily still running, just that it remains in memory. The only time an app will run is a) it is in the foreground or b) it has a background service.
In your case, it sounds like you are trying to kill background services. When you do so, the app will just go "oh hey, my background service is running any more, let's start it back up!"  And you will then be playing a game of whack-a-mole.  You'll be wasting resources and battery life because applications will be re-starting themselves.  And if an application was writing to disk (your SD card) at the time you killed it, then you could end up with corrupted files and other issues.  Rare, but it could happen.
The only need for a task killer is to stop an erroneous application in one-time situations.  That's what force stop is for. You shouldn't need to force stop every X min.  ONY when the app is misbehaving in rare occasions.
If you don't want all those apps running background services, check to see if they have settings to disable them.  Look for things such as disabling background notifications or other "polling" for information/updates.  Otherwise, uninstall the app.
You can find even more info over here in this thread and this thread.

oh yea...another thing.. do i need to clear the memory occasionally under the task manager? the RAM usage seems to be really high and not going down.

Clear which memory?  Do you mean the "clear data" for certain apps? That will only temporarily fix a problem if an app is using a lot of data (typically a cache or database).

If you mean the memory used up by all the active services.... the only way to get really get that to go down is to uninstall those background services or disable their background services (notifications, etc.)

to uninstall the background services I have to use the app itself right

To keep an app from using a background service you either uninstall the app or tell the app to stop polling for updates/send notifications.

Some of the applications (e.g - facebook, maps) are like services.. they keep restarting always. If other applications like Browser, Messaging are exiting fine then there is nothing wrong. It's just that some applications always want to run in background. Best option is to uninstall any of the applications which you don't use. If there is an application which you require, better let them run. Using task killers is not a good idea.

Thanks.. so its normal for apps like facebook, whatsapp and map to keep running ?

Yup! Don't worry much about them.


text:
What's causing my games to sometimes exit to the homescreen?
I have a Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray.
When i first bought the phone, it came with a 4GB class 2 microSD without a brand name.
I could play games without problems and it was pretty stable.
Then I bought a cheap 32GB microSD without any class. I moved my files from the old card into a new one by copy-pasting them. When I play games (mostly big-sized games) the games will sometimes suddenly crash to homescreen without any "force close" option.
Then I thought it was maybe because of the cheap microSD so I bought a new Transcend  32 GB class 10 microSDHC.  It is fast enough for HD games, and I'm satisfied with it, but the same problem happens - games will sometimes crash to homescreen.
Is this because of my storage space? Maybe I installed too much stuff on it? I have 80 MB free space. Maybe this is the cause?
My phone condition:

Rooted
No other modifications applied.

Please limit your question to be a single question. Your query about voice calls should be a separate question.

Get a logcat viewer off of Android Market (Catlog is decent) and launch it immediately after a game crashes.  See if you can find the actual error message associated with the crash.

The Android version might be helpful to know as well in this case: when it comes to logcat viewers, due to changes in the security regulations, they got trouble with Jelly Bean which need to be considered (if not updated then, they were no longer able to read logs). Also: How much RAM does your device have? What are the RAM conditions when the error occurs?

If your foreground app is being closed without warning, the suspect is no other than Kernel. It generally happens when Kernel runs out of memory. In such case, Kernel reclaims memory by killing other apps, otherwise the device would be crashed. In such situation, Kernel doesn't respect multitasking (apps with background services, apps having icon in status bar etc) and in some cases, even foreground apps (when its very critical). When Kernel fails to do it due to CPU unavailability etc, the device really get crashed. This is how it works.
In your case, one or more reasons are responsible:

You've a load of lots of background running apps which draw lot of memory even during game play.
The game requires more resources than your device hardware provides. Its less likely because game runs most of times, but its possible that game does a lot of memory caching which outruns currently available memory.
There's memory leakage bug in atleast one of your installed apps.

When it comes to fully filled big storage, system requires somewhat more resources to locate a file in it, but it doesn't cause this type of problem. You can reduce memory card size or files in it to lower down performance impact, but its not recommended. Its better to hunt down and remove always-running apps which are not extremely useful. Even if its useful, you should find its alternative which doesn't always run in background.
In the last, you can always install CatLog to see what happened after game crash. If you find it as alien language, Google it or ask here.

thank you so much, i will definitely try that. Currently downloading it.  :)

In such cases I would highly suggest to try to replicate the problem while usb debugging is enabled. Install the android sdk which will give you the necessary tools to "logcat" what's happening. The messages might give you a clue what is causing the sudden shutdown of your application.
After having installed the sdk you can simply start the logging through Terminal/cmd by

adb logcat

A picture for illustration (click to enlarge):

As suggested it might be a problem with low ram. Sony Ericsson Xperia S Phones sometimes feel sluggish especially if you use a lot of "widgets" such as the timeline and media player widget on your homescreen as they are quite ressource intensive. This might be indirectly linked to the shutdown of your games if there are many background services running there just won't be enough free ram for the game.

Thanks for the suggestion. But i will try the catlog app first as i dont have android sdk on my computer.  My computer's performance is worse than my android lol.  But thank you so much, i might try it.

oh someone edited my question and actually changed the meaning a bit.  I was asking "is this because of my RAM?", yes i made a mistake that i said "RAM storage space" before, but what i meant was my RAM.  I still have about 14 gb of storage space.

Actually, you don't need to install the entire SDK for that -- all you need is the adb executable (I use it this way; it ships e.g. with root-exploits intended for Android 4.x).

Download Advance Task Killer from Android Market. Then, open it, go to Settings and select auto task kill.

If possible, please provide a link to the app. :)

How shall a task killer be helpful here? "Auto-task-killing" is a very bad thing (enough posts about that, so I do not go into details here as they are not related to the question). In short: Task killers are only good for killing hanging tasks which hog resources and cannot be closed otherwise.


text:
How to display cell info display (CID) on screen?
Does Android OS have an option for showing Cell Info Display (Name of the cell Tower) on home screen ? (Without using external apps)

You will not be able to display this on the Home screen without 3rd party apps.
You can use this app called CellID Info from Google Play Store, you may find other apps that display this info too. The CellID Info doesn't say if it has a widget (i don't think it does) but some of the other ones might.

Thanks but this is not the solution i am looking for. I want the Cell ID info to be displayed on the home screen, not in an app. Like how it is shown on Nokia mobiles.

and you wont be able to do that without using an app. It isn't possible.

Just download OpenSignal from Play Store.

Can you elaborate on that? How/why does this app solve the OP's problem?

Try Cell Info Display app available on Google Play.

Cell info display will be useful to know about the locality information in case of any travel to new location.
Limitations: This application works only if there is an Internet connectivity

Its possible to read the Cell tower info since its one of the BroadCast messages. But it does not come up on screen automatically! It is possible to get this as notifications in SMS, once you enable Cell BroadCast messagess (CB) usually in the native SMS application settings.


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My Galaxy S II is not properly allowing me to use USB storage mode - how can I fix this?
My phone Samsung Galaxy S2 is giving me issues with 2 removable drives(Drive E and F) shown on my computer. It also doesn't allow me to connect to USB mode.
Has anyone had this issue before with Samsung Galaxy S2?

Can you be more specific about what the problem is?  It's supposed to show two drives.

Yeah, that happens to me with my Galaxy Ace. I had to download Samsung Kies. I just run Kies and then works great as USB storage (you don't need to use Kies, only run it).

I found that Kies installed the proper USB drivers on my Galaxy S, but the Samsung USB Drivers package did as well.


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Why is my Huawei IDEOS X3 (U8510) not appearing in the Device Manager list?
I have just written my first Hello World app for Android using the Eclipse plug-in. As I understand it, I can run the app from within Eclipse so that it will be automatically downloaded to the phone. I should be able to select whether the emulator or phone should be used.
So far I have not been able to run the app on the phone. There are no connected phones to deploy to. When I look in the Device Manager (Windows 7), there is also nothing there that looks like a phone and nothing in the 'Other devices' group either.
Can anyone suggest what I can do?

Have you installed the USB drivers for your handset on your PC?

@chahk - do you mean the drivers which can be downloaded from Huawei? If so then I'm in trouble. The web site seems to be down :-(

Strange, the site and the download work fine for me: http://www.huaweidevice.com/worldwide/downloadCenter.do?method=toDownloadFile&flay=software&softid=Mzk1MzA=

Alongside installing the correct dirvers, I've found that you may need to also do a bit of manual setup so that your computer can recognise the usb device.
Try this: find the .android folder in your home directory, and replace the adb_usb.ini file with this one. this tells your computer to let adb work with a load of different usb devices. You may need to restart ADB via the command line:
adb kill-server
adb start-server

and now adb should show you your device
adb devices

I had the same problem few days back. I discovered that device drivers were not installed correctly on my PC. I installed the device drivers and snapPea.
Hope this helps.


text:
Download files with Chrome for Android
Is there a way to download media files directly from the Chrome browser? In the stock Android browser I can long-click a link and select "Save link" to accomplish that, but Chrome doesn't offer that option and opens a media player instead.

In Chrome, keep your finger pressed on the link, and you will see an option "Save Link".
Hence, the file(s) will be saved in the Downloads folder.
To access it and (perhaps) other folders in the future, I recommend downloading a File Management app.
The best ones are said to be ES File Manager and ASTRO File Manager.
While generally, ASTRO is said to be better, the free version has ads.
Your choice!

The option 'Save link' doesn't appear in the context menu.

Solution found here.

Click on the link and close that tab or go back once it tries to play that media.  Go to your chrome history from the menu and long press the link and save it.

Very helpful indeed! +1

Chrome on Android has the "save link" now when long pressing on files (such as media) which when just pressed regularly play the content.
the funny thing was that I thought save link would have copied the url or created a bookmark, not download the file...so your question text helped me :)

Download an app named Turbo Download Manager.
With one click on the file in Chrome, the option comes for this app. Thus, it downloads the files required.


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Home screens maxed out (oops)... now I can't edit?
Someone was playing with my coworker's Samsung Galaxy Gio (Froyo), and added an eighth home screen. Now hitting Settings->Edit makes the phone crash, as does minimizing (pinching) on any home screen - in other words, there is no way to jump between home screens or delete the four or five screens she has no use for.
I'm thinking a home screen launcher app would be a workaround, but is there any way to actually recover her original home screen setup?

Adding additional home screens is not a stock Android feature so I can't comment specifically, but clearing data for the launcher application should work.
Settings → Applications → Manage applications → Launcher (might be named differently) → Clear data
You will lose your current home screen configuration, of course, but this should take care of the crashes and allow rebuilding it.
Any method for fixing the actual problem without losing the data will necessarily be specific to that particular launcher application, and it sounds like you've tried to find that sort of thing already.

It'll almost certainly be called "TwLauncher" on a Samsung (short for TouchWiz their customized launcher that allows you to change the number of home screens).


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How to change country?
I want to install this application
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.scoompa.callrecorder.open
but I can't, because I'm in a wrong country. I would like to change country. Do I need to travel to another country to install this application or can I somehow pick a right country ? what is the right country for this application?

To answer your question, see this previous question for options on changing the country that the Market think your phone is in: How can I circumvent regional restrictions in the Android Market?
For the second part of your question about which country to change to, from the app's description:

Currently for U.S. and Canada based phones only.

But from this description:

The application dials to our service, which dials to the other party,
  showing your phone number as the caller ID.
The service then records
  the call at the telephony level, and sends a very high-quality
  recording straight to your email box.

I think that even if you get it to install, it will only work properly if you are currently in the US or Canada, as it seems to work by redirecting your call through a landline call forwarding service, which either won't work in other countries, or will be using a hideously expensive international rate call for that purpose.

I had the same problem and asked Google to help me.
This is their answer:
We use the billing address of your default payment instrument in Google Wallet to help determine your home country for accessing the Play Store. Our collection of content can vary by country, so your view of the Play Store may differ from what others are seeing when you travel outside of the country listed on your default payment method's billing address.
Please note that you must have a valid payment method with a billing address located inside a country in order to access that country's Play Store.
If you're having issues viewing your intended country's Play Store and would like to change your default payment method or update an existing billing address in Google Wallet, please use the following steps:
1) Sign into your Google Wallet account to manage your payment methods (https://wallet.google.com/manage/paymentMethods)
2) Add a new card or change your default payment instrument to one with a billing address located inside your desired country
3) Open the Play Store and navigate to any item available for download
4) Click to begin a download until you reach the "Accept and buy" screen (no need to complete the purchase)
5) Close the Play Store and clear data for the Google Play Store application (Settings > Apps > Google Play Store > Clear Data) or clear your browser cache
6) Re-open the Play Store. You should now see the Play Store that matches your default payment instrument's billing country.
If you haven't yet added a payment method to your account for the first time, please add a card directly from the Play Store with a billing address that matches your intended country location. Then, follow steps 3 through 6 to show your intended country's Play Store.

Just attempted this procedure in a US to Australia move, it didn't work.

I had the same problem and got over it by doing following

go to Samsung website, login and then delete the account. Did this from my PC.
go to Android settings, accounts and then delete the account associated with Samsung app
go back to Samsung app store on Android device, create new account.


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A calendar with powerful alerts
I just bought a Samsung Galaxy 2, coming from a Nokia 3600.
My old cell phone had a quite simple calendar app but when it was supposed to alert me it kept ringing and vibrating until I dismiss it.
I could quietly use an alert as a morning alarm if I knew, for example, I'll have to wake up at 6:00 on next 12/25.
In new one calendar just beeps once and I already missed a ton of appointments this way.
Moreover I started using alarms but there's no vibration available and it's limited in time setting.
I'm looking for an app to suit my needs, possibly syncing with Google Calendar, not too much bells and whistles but not mandatory.
Any advice?
Thank you
Edit:
As a note to who, gently is answering how to set calendar notification:
Please let me know also how to set it the way I need i.e. to make it ring until dismissed (or after, say, max 1 minute in case I'm far from the phone).
Otherwise changing from blip to din don won't help that much because I already tested it losing some appointments. :)

My standard Clock app plays the alarm and vibrates. Rather obnoxiously I might add. You can change the notification sound that gets used; have you tried that?

@AlEverett: I'm using Clock alarm but it does not vibrates nor I can see any setting anout it. However it comes hard to put a note far in time, for example birthdays alerts and so on. I can't fill it with tens of alarms just 'cause the calendar alerts suck...

Ok, sorry, I found vibration setting for alarm but I'm still unable to set a proper alert for an appointment, say, coming in 10 days.

Calendar Snooze can repeat reminders until you acknowledge them, forever. It works with the default Calendar app, and will let it keep syncing with google.
You can customize how often the notification repeats, how many times (including "Keep Repeating"), and you can customize two sets of reminders, for example repeating every minute for 5 minutes, and then ever 5 minutes for an hour. It can also use notifications, the LED, text-to-speech, and alert popups.
It also (as the name suggests) allows a very powerful snooze mechanism, with completely customizable snoozes.

Thanks, I will try it! Anyway: 700Kb for adding just a simple snooze seem to me overkill but if it works I'll be happy of installing

A Galaxy S 2 has 2 GB of storage for apps (/data). That's four times what I have, with about 200 apps installed. I wouldn't worry about it. ;)

I accept your answer even if I went with another app CalendarAlarmHelper (primarily because it's cheaper and lighter) but I found it thanks to your link so... thank you ^^

Open the Calendar App. Press MENU > SETTINGS > scroll down to NOTIFICATION SETTINGS.
You can then choose your desired ringtone and whether an alert should pop up or merely a notification bar update shows along with Vibrate options.
As a calendar alternative, check out Jorte.
The Galaxy S2's alarm interface has options for recurring alarms as well as preset Snooze modes.
UPDATE: Nudnik and Calendar Event Reminder are calendar nag apps that seem to offer the functionality you're looking for.

About Notification Settings please see my comment to KalEl answer. Again about alarm, I already use it with multiple alarms and snooze but, again, see my answer to  Al Everett in question comments... I wonder why my 100€ Nokia was able to alert me in a way I was sure to get it and a 600€ android is not. Maybe android engineers was thinkin' I'd passed my whole day looking at the phone screen holding it in my right hand... I'll check your suggested alternative.

I saw your update and try apps you suggest

Im trying now CalendarAlarmHelper that's way cheaper than TREE suggestion.
Free version expires after 7 days but has full functionalities.

Now that Astrid has stopped,trying out TicTac. Working quite well and seems reliable

A link to the app would make this more useful for the OP

And some information on how, specifically, it fixes the OP's problem would be good, too.

You could try Astrid, I find it very useful as a task manager

Who asked for a task manager?

Calendar -> Settings -> Notification Settings -> Select Ringtone.
Also set "alerts and notifications" in the same menu to Alerts.

I already saw it, all sounds last no more than a second and I don't find any option to tell it to ring until dismissed, that's what I asked. I see there's an option for always vibrating and it's on but if it just vibrates once for a second, as the alarm, then I know why I never felt it...

Here's an idea - if you use an alternate SMS app like Handcent or GoSMS pro or RingDroid - they have an alternative music picker which can be used to select songs from your media/audio folder. That'll give you a loooong ringtone.

Yes it would be a long ringtone, but once again, it does not answer the question that is asked.


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Several general questions about Sony Ericsson Live View
First does it have an acceleration, compass, or "gyroscope".
Second can it make noises?
Third does it work for HTC Sensation?
Thanks ahead of time.

From the Sony Ericsson website, the Live View specs page has no mention of a compass, gyroscope, accelerometer or similar. It doesn't mention anything about speakers either but does mention controlling phone calls and music playback on your phone, which would suggest its not designed to make noise itself but to control the music/sound on a phone (or other compatible device) that it's connected to.
The compatible phones page (other brands) lists a number of HTC phones, but not the Sensation. It does however say:

Compatible with most other brands on Android 2.0 and up that are
  equipped with Bluetooth™ 2.1.

According to HTC's Specs page for the Sensation it has Bluetooth v3.0 compatibility, so it is likely that it will work with the Live View.


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How can install a Hindi font in Android 2.1?
I have a Samsung Galaxy S GT-i9000 and I want to install a Hindi font on it. How can I do this?

Unfortunately SAMSUNG has not installed Hindi font on the Indian variant of the Galaxy S. But there is a workaround. For this you will need root access. You can replace the DroidSansFallback.ttf file which is located in /system/fonts/ on your phone with the font mentioned in the first post of this link http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=798380.
Restart and enjoy. :)

There's NO support for Hindi or any other Indian languages built-in, in all Android versions up to and including FroYo (2.2). Gingerbread (2.3) does support Hindi as a language according to this post
If you're looking for a Hindi keyboard, you'll need the HindiIME APK from Samsung - they're usually installed on phones that Samsung sells in India. As a workaround, use Opera Mini for Android - it renders Unicode Devanagiri fonts correctly.

Actually i have some sms in Hindi font which i cant read, so how to read them

@Jeevan The new Google Translate has a feature to translate SMS.  I haven't tried it myself but I did notice there was Hindi available.  You may want to try that.
Once you open the app at the bottom left there should be the option for "SMS Translation".  From here you can select the correct message to translate.
Hope this helps

Your suggestions in last paragraph are pointless as there's no system font installed.

@SachinShekhar - are you referring to my answer? At the time of writing it, the Galaxy I7500 and the Galaxy Spica did indeed have Hindi keyboards.

You don't need to install fonts, if you want Hindi to browse Hindi websites.
Use SETT Hindi Browser: https://market.android.com/details?id=lk.bhasha.sett.hindi
It's an exclusive browser for Hindi & it displays Hindi well in any device having Android 2.2 or above.

As others have noted Android does not support Hindi (or any other language that requires Complext Text Layouts, except for Arabic). Here is the relevant bug post for Hindi on GingerBread:
http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=12981
You can achieve some form of readability by installing a Hindi font, but it will not shape properly. If you can't live with that, than you will need to install third party apps that support Hindi. That said, the Galaxy 5 and Galaxy 3 sold in India (the Indian Variant) does have support for Hindi, but not the Galaxy S! Bug Samsung about it.

This XDA post has instructions, summarized below:

Install HinKhoj Dictionary and then Go SMS Pro.
Open Go SMS, go to "Appearance Settings"

Hit "Scan Fonts Packages"
Go to "Conv. List Customization" from "Conversation List appearance", choose "Time and message font" and select "Hindi Hinkhoj Dictionary". It will automatically choose the "Mangal" font.
Press the back button 3 times and choose to save the settings.
Now go to "Conversation Customization" from "Conversation appearance" and change "Incoming font" and "Outgoing font" the same as above, and save this setting with different name.
Finally from both of "Conversation List appearance" and "Conversation appearance" apply the User Defined Settings as your saved name.

Exit the application and reboot your phone.


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Android Market - Want to see Best Applications
Is there any way to see "Top Best (i.e. Top 10/50/100, etc.) applications" in Android Market as we are looking in AppStore ?
I means to say which applications/Games are famous amongst the people as "Angry Bird" is famous game in Appstore, applications may have either higher ratings or higher viewer, how do i come to know about applications in android market?

The web Market and the Honeycomb tablet Market app now have a whole set of pages listing the "Top X Apps" for a whole set of definitions of "Top". I can't see any way to get to all of these categories in the current Gingerbread phone version of the Market app, presumably they have less screen room to show all of these different views.
Here are some direct links to the web Market's pages, if you're on a tablet most of these should show up as links on the Market app's home page:
Apps

Top Free Apps
Top Paid Apps
Top Grossing Apps (see this question regarding confusion over what defines "top grossing")
Top New Free Apps
Top New Paid Apps

Games

Top Free Games
Top Paid Games
Top Grossing Games
Top New Free Games
Top New Paid Games

Apps & Games Combined

Editors' Choice
Trending Apps

To directly answer your question I would guess that most of the "famous" and "must-have" apps and games would show up in the "Trending" and "Editors' Choice" areas.

Appbrain.com allows you to view the android market and which apps are most popular, most downloaded, hottest... all within different time frames.

thanx for the answer, i think this kind of rating, ranking facility should be on Android market , what you say!!

I agree, plus you should be able to browse the market from the cpmputer.

If you go into the Market on your phone, then navigate down to a category (e.g., games | Arcade & Action) there are three tabs: Top paid, Top free, Just in (i.e., new)
I don't know what they use for their algorithm beyond the star ratings, nor if it varies from how things are presented on the official Market website, but it does appear to be offering the top-rated/popular apps in each category.

@AI E. but overthere the applications which are listed at top, are also having 4.5 stars and below that the application has the 5 stars, same as you i am also knowing which algorithm they are using for listing the application in Top Paid, Top free and just in category.  Btw, thanx for the answer

The answers above work, however I want to add another fact. All those results are limited based on your accounts "country setting".
If you want to see for instance, the app overview for Germany,
modify the URL like this:
https://play.google.com/store/apps?hl=de&gl=de
There you can still navigate, top, free, bestseller based on the country parameter
Top Charts, Games, New Zealand:
https://play.google.com/store/games?hl=en&gl=nz
where "hl" would be language in ISO language code ( works on all Google sites btw)
and "gl" is the country you want to load


text:
Do all Android phones have a GPS receiver?
That's pretty much it. I am developing an application which is utterly useless without receiving a GPS signal, so I was wondering if there are any phones which do not possess this feature.
Thank you

Just a clarification: Not every device with Android is a phone, and some of the low-end tablets (e.g. some Prestigio models) definitely don't have a GPS receiver.

The current Android Compatibility Definition Document says:

7.3.3. GPS
Device implementations SHOULD include a GPS receiver. If a device implementation does include a GPS receiver, it SHOULD include some form of "assisted GPS" technique to minimize GPS lock-on time.

So "SHOULD" does not mean "MUST". [Edited because I messed things up. Apps that require GPS show up in the market regardless of whether the device supports it or not.]

How do you know apps that use GPS won't show up?

Woops, maybe that's not completely correct. But the FAQ says: "[For] example, an app that manages SMS text messages would not be useful on a media player, so Android Market allows the developer to restrict that app exclusively to phone devices." So, I assumed you can do that for stuff like GPS too.

Hmm. It would make sense for them to allow you to filter by GPS-or-not.  But they didn't have filtering by device until recently, and if they're assuming everything has GPS then they might not have bothered.

I am almost positive that all Android phones will have a GPS receiver in them. Cnet reviewed the first Droid in 2009 so chances are they will all have GPS.

At least one - fly iq 431, and few cheap tablets.
here we can see that 93% of (all smartphone) owners use some geolocated stuff.
Another fact that sort "having GPS" returns 15218 from 16144 ("having touchscreen") unfortunately there is no reverse filter to see specific models, so this could be caused by not filling needed field by seller

Considering that E911 requires all cell phones to provide location information to emergency services (Wiki Link), nearly every cell phone contains a GPS receiver for E911 services.
Given that information, I'd expect there to be very few cell phones (Android or otherwise) that don't have a GPS receiver built-in.  With it already built in, and the OS already having to support it (since the phone system is simply an Android application), it'd be silly to not let other apps take advantage of it (if the user prefers).
One thing to keep in mind: GPS location is a user-controlled option in Android, so it may very well be disabled.

"nearly every cell phone contains a GPS receiver for E911 services" That is pure misinformation, plain and simple - the majority of cellphones do not contain a GPS receiver, especially not the older and/or low-end models (smartphones are a different thing altogether). The "location information" required by E911 is provided from cell phone base station identifiers, on phones lacking GPS. (What you'd expect is somewhat irrelevant to what actually exists out there)


text:
Can tablets differentiate between regular wi-fi and mobile hot spot?
There are a lot of apps in Android which act differently depending on the internet connection.  Such as apps which auto-upload photos to the could only when connected to Wi-Fi, and not when connected to broadband on a smart-phone.
Unfortunately, when such apps connect to a mobile hot-spot (limited data; tethering), they think it is regular (unlimited data) Wi-Fi, and work accordingly.
Is there any way for a tablet to notice when a Wi-Fi connection is from a mobile hot spot, and act as if it was connected to broadband?

If your tablet (or phone) devices are Android version 4.1 (or newer) then you can tell them that a particular wifi connection is a hotspot rather than broadband, which will let apps know that they should limit the traffic they use.
On the Android 4.1+ devices, if you go into Settings -> Data Usage and then press Menu (or press the "..." overflow button) you should see an option called "Mobile Hotspots".

In here should be a list of all the wifi networks that the device has connected to recently, with a tickbox alongside that you can select to say that the network is actually a mobile hotspot. This tells your phone to treat that wifi network as if it is a mobile data (eg 3G) network instead of a broadband connection.

Sorry for O.T... but ooooh... American Airlines do Wifi on board? :o Since when? :D

Just to "unconfirm": I checked with 4.0.3, the option described is not there. So it really seems to have been introduced with 4.1. @t0mm13b that could also be the boarding area on some airport. Or the network for pilots who are tired sitting in the cockpit, wanting some comfortable first-class seat, and decided to remote-control the plane #D

@Izzy LOL! "oops I banked too hard, pressed to hard on remote control - whoops, sorry, at least sick bags are present!!!!" :D

@t0mm13b that'll be from an airport lounge (probably the Admiral's Club lounge at Heathrow as it looks like it was supplied by BT), I've got a lot of those sort of saved connections on my phone, done a lot of business travel in the last year... but I haven't been on a plane with wifi yet, unfortunately, so no liveblogging of pilot's mistakes from 40,000ft!

In addition to the explicit option GAThrawn points out, Android 4.3 devices can automatically tell that a hotspot generated by another Android 4.3 device is a mobile hotspot, with the same effect as ticking that box yourself. Note that both the hotspot device and the receiving device must be running 4.3 (or later).

I connected my Nexus 7 tablet [Android 4.3] to my Galaxy S3 [i747; Cyanogen 10.1.2; Android 4.2.2] and the mobile hotspot was already selected.


text:
HTML5 games for OUYA?
I'm not sure if this is the right place to ask, but since OUYA is shipping with android 4.0 I'll try.
Anyway, for those of you who are familiar with the platform I'm wondering if it will be possible to launch HTML5/Javascript games wrapped in app for OUYA?

This will be the right place for OUYA questions, but since it hasn't launched yet any answers are going to be speculative at best, and thus not a good fit for the site.

It works.
Game Closure (which is HTML/Javascript) runs on OUYA. There are some posts by staff members on the mailing list. It takes some work to get controller support as of writing (they're working on making it available out of the box).


text:
Why is voice-to-text input not working when disconnected from the Internet?
As you know, on Nexus One you can use voice input to enter text by speaking.
Unfortunately, if you are disconnected from the Internet (even temporarily), this feature is unavailable.
Why?
On my Windows laptop I can do this without being connected to the Internet.
Can you explain?

The Android implementation of Talk-To-Text sends your voice to Google's servers, parses your speech into text, then sends the text string back to the handset.  Without access to the internet, it's unable to transmit your voice data to their servers.

That's a great answer, thanks. Do you know why can't Android parse speech internally (just like Windows does) without sending the voice to Google's servers?

My guess would be that the required libraries, software, etc would just bloat up the phone unnecessarily, so they decided to offset the parsing onto Google's servers.  Text-To-Speech may be trivial for a laptop/desktop, but I'm sure the technologies behind it require a fair amount of processing power and storage space, which are somewhat limited on phones.

I believe that the phone could do it, because I was using Dragon on a PC back in the day. That PC was slower than my phone.

Phone can actually do it. But whether to do it on phone or on a server depends on the implementation decided by the parent company (in this case Google). There are advantages and disadvantages of both implementation - When implemented through server, then phone doesn't need to download entire language DB, doesn't need to do heavy processing. But the biggest advantage is that server can improve with every processed word and result of that improvement will reach to user without he doing anything.


text:
Does MMS support PNG format images?
I'm just wondering if android mms supports png files? I've tried sending an image, a png format, through mms. Sending is successful. However, the recipient recieves an error image. My question is, does android mms supports sending and receiving PNG format images?
Samsung Galaxy 5

I've heard some MMS implementations will rename PNG files to .jpg while leaving the MIME type intact, which confuses/breaks some messaging apps.  Not sure if this is the case with Android however.

Yes MMS can send png files. Even if they change the extension, it shouldn't matter as long as the mime type is in tact. and even if that is different, the image has a specific "header" that should be read by the MMS app. AFAIK, android does not change the extension, or the mime type. (at least the stock MMS app, and the Galaxy S app)
But that doesn't mean it will work with other phones. They might not have the ability to view the file type.


text:
Is Android 3.0 Honeycomb only for tablets?
It wasn't long time since Android 2.3 Gingerbread was released and so for only a few phones has 2.3. And already a beta version of Android 3.0 Honeycomb is released.
What does this mean, is Android 3.0 only for tablets? If not, I guess that 2.3 will be very shortlived. If 2.3 is for phones and 3.0 is for tablets, that sounds like a fork of Android.

@noir_11: Android 3.0 hasn't been released yet. Even so, you don't download an OS upgrade in the Market.

I think the conventional wisdom is that Honeycomb is a fork for Tablets only but this post suggests otherwise.  It says that in an interview with Engadget, Matias Duarte claimed that Honeycomb would be for all form factors.

They don't mention Tablet devices only... but I've seen them mention many times larger screen format devices. So I believe they could potentially use Honeycomb for the larger devices like the Dell Streak (which Dell calls a Tablet, but at the same time has phone functionality).

Google spokespersons have made it a point multiple times that there is not hardware requirements or restrictions for Honeycomb, and that it's as open and available as any other version of Android.  It's neither restricted to dual-core or tablet devices.  It's redesign and new features are to enhance it's ability as a tablet platform, not restrict it to a tablet platform.

Duarte confirms it again: http://mobilized.allthingsd.com/20110201/exclusive-googles-android-design-expert-outlines-the-vision-behind-honeycomb/

Looks like Honeycomb will be Tablet only - http://mobile.slashdot.org/story/11/02/03/224231/Google-Says-Honeycomb-Will-Not-Come-To-Smartphones

Keep reading through the source links and you find that the source of the slashdot thing originates with the BGR post (http://goo.gl/mAz4Z) that has been updated with a Google clarification that Honeycomb is coming to tablets first (e.g. the Xoom), but the changes are the future of Android. In fact, parts of Honeycomb will come to Android versions as early as 1.6 (the Fragment API, specifically, http://goo.gl/Evbrr).

Yes, that is what it looks like. The UI doesn't seem like it will work on the smaller devices like phones. We will probably see 3.0 iterations for tablets and 2.x / 4.x for phones. I don't like that this is like a fork. hopefully they can merge it together for 3.1 and just have a different launcher for tablets.

Just having a different launcher is a good idea.  I'd actually prefer a scalable interface though, since there's no clear line between a minitablet like the Dell Streak and some of the larger phones.

It was mentioned on TWiG last week, and there's a handful of photos floating around the net, but when the recently released Honeycomb source is put on a device with phone's resolution/screensize it changes to a much more familiar and small screen friendly phone-style UI.
See it in this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LMcBo7uKKw
So it looks like Honeycomb is the first version specifically designed with Tablets in mind, but it still retains all of the phone friendly features and swaps between them depending on the settings/screen size.

It is a short term fork to get ahead in the tablet market.
There is a future release planned merging them back together into what is called the Android Icecream Sandwitch.
Refer wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_(operating_system)

I don't think a formal announcement has been made, but while Google's YouTube video about Honeycomb said it was "entirely for tablets" [1], it has been confirmed multiple times that it is for other devices as well [2].

There's no reason to believe that Honeycomb is just for tablets. It's been designed with large screens in mind, but on the developer side of the documentation there's clear indication that it's for all screen sizes:

Android 3.0 brings a new UI designed
  for tablets and other larger screen
  devices, but it also is fully
  compatible with applications developed
  for earlier versions of the platform,
  or for smaller screen sizes.

Source: http://developer.android.com/sdk/android-3.0-highlights.html#compatibility
My emphasis.

I ran a release under an emulator, and it struggled on my machine, as a guide, 2.3.1 is a tab slow on the emu but usable. HoneyC is practically unusable on the emu, and seem to display many issues.
This could all be down to the development stage of the code though


text:
Weight tracking app
I'm looking for an app to help me track my weight. Ideally, I would tell it my weight each day (and perhaps my age and height), and after a while I could use it so plot a graph of my progress but also get extra informative statistics.
I've seen a lot of health related apps on the market, but a lot of them are payed and come with tons of extra features. I don't need diet guidance, exercise reminders, etc. I just need something to track my weight, preferably free.
Thanks

What apps have you already tried?

@aleveret: simple weight loss resolution (which is too simple), and diet 2go (which has a lot of stuff I don't use and doesn't seem to have graphing).

See this:
http://www.appbrain.com/app/lifetracking/com.lifetracking
LifeTracking application allows you to track any value that is important to you like your weight, blood pressure, or number of pushups you do a day, as well as any time-consuming activities like sleeping, working, watching TV, etc. You can also graph the data to see it visually and use the application to analyze it.
The goal of the application is to help you know yourself and your schedule better. Hopefully, when you graph things side-by-side you'll understand yourself and your life bette

Took me a while to test it, but it's exactly what I was looking for.

Weigh Weight Lite did the trick for me.

MyWeigth is a promising app for that purpose, but not yet released to android.

myWeight puts the retina display to work with beatuiful hi-resolution graphics. Interactive controls and dials will have you looking forward to tracking your weight each day. Our elegant Sync feature will guarantee your data is safe and accessable anywhere. Available now in the iTunes App Store and soon to the Android market.

FatSecret has a Calorie Counter App that keeps track of your weight.  You can also use it to keep track of calories consumed and exercise on a daily basis.  Information can be backed up to the FatSecret site online if you choose to do so.

And the reason for a downvote is?

Maybe they don't like that app.


text:
Is 150 MB / month enough for limited use?
I've been thinking about getting a pre-owned Samsung Fascinate from Verizon for $40. I can't afford a $30/month unlimited data plan, but I was considering the $15/month 150MB data plan.
I'm planning on using it primarily as a phone/PMP, without heavy use of internet-related features. Most of my data usage will probably come from these things:

Downloading apps
Occassionally checking weather, maps, etc.
Texting through Google Voice. I plan all cancelling my texting plan and moving all my texting activities to Google Voice. I only use around ~300 texts (sent and received) per month.

Is it reasonable to expect these activities to remain within 150MB/month? On a related note, I am usually on my university's campus, which has wi-fi. Can I use the wi-fi network to avoid suffering data charges?
Update: Verizon ran a promotion this weekend. For upgrading to a smartphone with unlimited data plan, you got a $10/month credit for the next 24 months. So the $30/unlimited data plan effectively becomes $20/unlimited, and I went with that instead of the $15/150MB plan.

It looks like you might need to make a decision on this soon; Verizon may be doing away with the $15 opotion - http://www.engadget.com/2011/01/24/verizon-tweaking-low-end-data-plans-using-3g-distinction-to-u/

Just an FYI, Google Voice does SMS but no MMS so not photo or video texts.  It also can't receive texts from email gateways, so no texts from websites and services that send you text updates through and email gateway.

Keep in mind that you can shut off data when you aren't using it, so that background processes don't use it.

@shambleh: That's good to know! If I get it before they change the price, will I get to keep the $15 option after they get rid of it?

@Matthew I can't be totally sure, but if you are in a contract I believe that they will at least honor pricing throughout the contract period.  Check with a rep first before committing to anything, of course.

@Matthew you can also use something like Juice Defender to only make data calls once every 15 minutes, etc.

@shambleh: I called Verizon, and they said I can keep the $15 a month plan for the duration of my contract, even if the promotional offer is removed in the meantime.

Yes. I agree with everything that Bryan has said but want to add...
You can use an app like Phone Usage that helps you monitor your network traffic.  The Pro version ($2.35) also allows you to set data limits that will send you a notification if you go over.  So you could set it to 125 MB and you'd know when you are getting close and you can throttle down your usage.  Verizon has a 30 day return policy (although I think they are changing it to 15 days) so you can monitor your traffic and if you find that you are using waaay too much you can always cancel and go back to what ever you had before.
Another useful app (if you've rooted your device) if DroidWall which lets you set which apps can access your 3G connection.  This would be useful if you identify that an app that requires background sync and uses a lot of data.  It would also be good if you are getting close to you 150 MB limit and want to lock down your data usage.
Finally, many apps let you set a wifi only rule.  For example BeyondPod has a setting in the apps that says "Only download podcasts when on Wifi" but if you really want to take control of your phone you can download Tasker and set an almost unlimited set of rules for how your phone operates.

Using wifi == not using your data plan.  So that will help reduce data usage from your provider.
So long as you are not streaming (music/video/youtube/etc) or downloading large amounts of data (podcasts, for example) then you should be fine.  Or at least save those activities for when you are on wifi.
Downloading apps: each app can be anywhere from 100kb to 10mb+ in size.  Save these for your wifi unless it is an update you really need then and there.
Weather/maps: shouldn't be too heavy of data.  Same with Google voice.

NetCounter says I've used 170 MB of data in the past month over cellular, and more than 2 GB over wifi. And I haven't tried to limit anything.

I tend to use around 100-200Mb a month while checking email, weather, Foursquare & maps on 3G.

Get a prepaid and leave your phone with no credit most of the time (if you hunt around, you might be able to find operators that will keep your number for a year after expiry). With no credit, you can still receive calls. Carry a recharge card in your wallet (or in a Notes app in the phone) just in case you really need to make an urgent phone call.
If you're almost always in a Wifi covered area (in home and in school/work), then you can do all your messaging using Google Voice, IM, VoIP, etc. You should not need to download apps over data connection, download them over Wifi. Check your weather before you leave, and if you want to use Google Maps, cache it in the phone before you leave a Wifi-covered area (alternatively, find a mapping software that uses offline maps).
With this, your phone can live off electricity almost exclusively.


text:
Can "adb remount" be used on a stock phone (unrooted)?
Is it possible to use adb remount with a standard firmware and without having rooted the device? If not, is there another way to force the system to make /system writable without rooting the device?

I believe this is the purpose of rooting...

Wait, actually... while I'm installing an app, /system has to be unlocked, right? Because there are .apk files of all installed apps at /system/apps...

No, those are only the system apps.  User apps are stored in /data/apps/.

@MatthewRead: Oh, right.

even updated versions of '/system' apps don't overwrite their original versions in /system/app

Without root: No, for security reasons this command is only accessible for the superuser.
Standard firmware, rooted: Yes, if the partition you like to remount is not in a locked flash region (HTC calls that S-on/S-off)

Thanks. Well, I guess what I was trying to do won't work. :(


text:
Is there a way to make the battery level easier to see on some Android phones such as Xiaomi?
I looked at the battery level on Samsung A32 and it was easy to look at, but on Xiaomi it looks like this:

Is there a way to make it easier to look at?  Right now I have to go to Settings -> Battery to get a better idea.  We might be able to change the theme to make it easier to look at, but it'd be a overkill to change the theme for the whole phone just for the battery level.
For example, down below the status line, it says
4:41                             Clear 21°C
Friday May 28

in big fonts.  Is it possible to add the battery level display there?

Battery, time and such elements in the status bar are decided by system UI properties and can't be changed on isolation. Two options I know of - one is rooted means to change the appearance, second is battery monitoring apps that add their own icon which may be more legible but you still end up displaying the system battery, which can be quite ugly. Rooting is the preferred option if nothing offered by OS is preferred option

What is for you "easier to see"? For myself I prefer the batter percent value or are you referring to the battery color (white on light blue background)? In the latter case have you tried to change the background image to one that has a dark area in the upper part?

I can't really tell if it is 36% vs 96% or 26%... the percentage background is not that apparent


text:
How to let 2 split screen apps run at top performance?
I noticed that on my Xiaomi 11i with the Snapdragon 888 processor, it is supposed to be one of the current top Android phones, with 8 cores and that only the Apple A14 Bionic has slightly higher performance than it.
However, if I run two Pokemon Go using its Dual App split screen, then I noticed, if we look inside a gym, and a Pokemon (Venonat or Exeggutor) is swinging left and right, then every few seconds, on the top or bottom screen, the Pokemon would have a slight 0.2 second pause, so both apps are choppy every few seconds.
If I use the app Activity Monitor, right after I boot up the phone so that no other app is running, I did see that every 6 to 10 seconds, all the cores of the processors would ramped up to 100%, so it looks like it is doing some work in the background.
I noticed if I run one single instance of Pokemon Go, then it is smoother.
But my question is, how can 8 cores not able to handle some slowing animating graphics. If anything, the swinging left and right repeatedly can even be "set it and forget it" -- everything done by the GPU (Adreno 660).
So trying to solve it, I tried to tap the Version number of the system for a few times and went to Developer's Options, and from there, I set the background app to be: Running only 1 process at a time.  So that should mean I have 7 cores running now for the 2 apps on screen? But after rebooting the phone and trying again, the same issue was still there.  Is there a way to make it able to take 2 cores (or 3 cores) for each app, or just make them run at top performance and let any background process run with the remaining 2 cores?  Or another way is, if there is a way to set the background processes only use up to 50% of the cores, so the main apps can always have 8 cores to use.
Update: an insight to finding a solution: I noticed if we tap on a Pokemon and try to catch it, the Pokemon, if it is a flying Pokemon with their wings constantly flapping in the dual app, has really smooth animation and there is no tiny pauses ever.  It may appear that when we look inside of a gym, usually six Pokemon are shown inside, so if both apps are looking inside of a gym, there can be 12 Pokemon moving inside.  Even if 10 Pokemon have tiny movements only and two Pokemon have more apparent movements, it seemed it was possible that 12 threads were used, and so if there are 12 threads and 8 cores, maybe that's the reason that there can be tiny pauses.  I am not sure if we can change the Settings on the phone to solve this, as these movements are very lightweight.

You don't have "8 cores" you have 1+3+4 cores, so you have three different categories of cores each of them with different speed and power consumption (extended BIG-little concept). So some of your cores are designed to be slow bet very battery saving.

so can app one take core 1 & 2, and app two take core 3 & 4, and let the other cores handle other background processes?

Apps don't "take" cores, the Linux part of Android does the process scheduling and assigns processes to cores based on it's internal rules (don't know how the scheduling rules for an Snapdragon 888 look). And that you can't run two games at the same time may simply be because it has never been tested. Usually fore-ground apps assume they don't have to share resources. But other reasons in the Android graphics system may also have an influence on this. I don't know Pokemon Go but if it allows to change graphics settings e.g. to reduce quality do so.

I mean, running split screen app has been possible since Android 7... and Xiaomi has this dual app mode before that.  I do have a OnePlus Nord N10 and Samsung A32 and they have no Xiaomi Dual app on them so I had to use the Android 7 split screen with Pokemon Go and the Galaxy store version, and similar situation is happening. That's what I mean. The OS should be smart enough to know 2 apps are running and dedicate one or two cores to them so that they run smoothly


text:
How to manually disable or hide the system bar (menu bar) at the bottom of the screen?
I am using an ASUS Transformer TF300 with Android 4.1.1, and there is an app that shows the playing cards at the bottom of the screen, and show the "Continue" button when the card game is finished.
But the playing cards are half hidden by the system bar, and this "Continue" button is hidden by the system bar mostly, except about 2mm is showing, so it is kind of difficult to press the button.
Is there a way to tell the system bar / menu bar to hide itself?  I also went to the settings and set the "System bar lock" to off, but somehow the bar is still showing.

Its a bug in the application, it should know the difference between the "soft" height and the physical height.  (Or in Android, if you want to blame the platform for making bugs in applications like this possible).  Sometimes rotating your device may work better (the layout bug may be less noticable, etc).

this system bar is part of Android, and is used when the device doesn't have any hardware buttons to press.
As such, it cannot be hidden.
It shouldn't, however, impact upon gameplay - this is an issue with the app, and you should contact the app developer to have it fixed.

hm... I wonder... it seems like a popular game and it looks high resolution to be a 10 inch tablet game... and the TF300 is fairly standard 1280 x 800... so I wonder why the game is designed such a way...

I also wonder would it make sense if Android somehow let the double click (or even single short click) of the Power button let the system bar slide out, and slide away after 5 or 10 seconds...

Some Custom Rom's have a feature which will disable Navigation Bar and Status Bar, one well-known is ParanoidAndroid with it's feature "Expanded Desktop".
Apart from that I don't know about any other ways to hide the navigation bar.
New CyanogenMod-Versions will also contain this functionality: https://plus.google.com/u/0/117962666888533781522/posts/dYSseZeQ8Sf


text:
ADB constantly disconnects, shows device offline
I'm not 100% sure if this should go here or the main Stack Overflow, but I decided to go with this area in hope I might catch someone with more specific experience with a similar problem.
I have a Samsung Captivate (love it minus it's crappy GPS). I do development for it from 2 different computers, one at home, one at work. The machines are both Windows XP, Service Pack 3, 32 bit. I have the same Samsung drivers installed, same versions of Eclipse, etc. The phone is currently rooted running the Serendipity mod, though this issue was exactly the same on the stock firmware.
My home machine (the problem one) is an Athlon 64 2.2 Ghz.
My work machine is a Core 2 Duo, don't recall the model.
At work, I can do anything, mount the sdcard on the phone and copy easily, use adb to push, pull, uninstall, install. I can debug in ddms, install through Eclipse, etc, etc...
At home, if I reboot both the computer and phone and pull up a command prompt without having Eclipse open, I MIGHT be able to see the device by typing adb devices. Usually then, I can clear the logcat or run the logcat fairly stable. If I open Eclispe (my development IDE) and try to run a new build of an app, I'll generally lose the connection. The same thing happens if I try to copy files either via mounting or using pull with adb. Some files will copy, and suddenly the connection will be gone and the device will show offline to adb, or not in the list at all, or listed offline twice. Rebooting the phone sometimes helps, but not always. There are times I close Eclipse and every other app, reboot my phone and still end up having adb completely unable to detect the device. I'll use adb kill-server and adb start-server but this generally doesn't help. I use Avast for my anti-virus at home, but have tried without any anti-virus installed at all and it's the same. I've recently reinstalled Windows due to a hard drive crash and it was the exact same. I've tried every different USB port on my tower.
I hope VERY much someone can tell me what's wrong as I've been dealing with this for a year and a half now and it's about to make me lose my mind.
-Jeremiah

I have a similar problem, but it's just a loose connection on the cable I use at home

When I detach and reattach my usb cable, the problem goes away. Don't know if this is a cable problem or some kind of timeout problem. Any clues ?

This happens to me all the time but, for whatever reason, only when I'm debugging in the car. Weird.

Same issue with Pixel 2 and Macbook Pro 15 inch 2018. My USB C to USB type C cable is the original one from Google

Switching from USB 3.0 port to USB 2.0 solved the problem for me.
Most laptops come with both port types these days.

you saved my day. Old phones keeped disconnecting on usb 3 when installing APK

Same issue for me. It was a newer device too ... However, it constantly disconnected when plugged into a 3.0 port. Moving it to a 2.0 port worked great.

It's amazing, I never think that the problem lies on usb port.

Yep.  Had the same problem as @Climbatize.  Had to swap USB ports around until I found one that the device liked.  Newer devices have no issues on the same port(s), but the older device would disconnect every time Android Studio tried to install an APK.

tried a different usb-port and it works!

Connect your device through a powered USB hub. Some machines, including new apple macbooks, do not have enough power in the USB ports causing ADB to constantly disconnect.
If your device is rooted, you can connect it to adb via wifi. This is very comfortable, much more than wired USB. Of course you don't always have a rooted device.

Interesting.  Anyone else out there have problems with macintosh portables not supplying enough power to connected devices?

You don't need WIFI for tcp ip adb.  only need to have a working usb adb first to make the adb on the phone listen on tcp/ip.
with it connected on usb adb, type adb tcpip 5555 , disconnect usb, type adb connect your.phone.ip.number

I can’t believe I only came across this today. I have a MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Late 2013) and I’ve had this issue for months and searched all over the internet. My Galaxy S6 would randomly disconnect (often within a fraction of a second, always within about a minute of connecting). I just plugged it in via a powered USB hub and bam! It just works. Thanks, @grebulon.

Not sure if that's related or not, but simply switching from the left USB port to the right USB port on a MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, 2012) apparently solved the issue!

This solved the issue for me and I am running a PC with 8 USB devices.  I added the powered hub and everything worked great.

This was annoying me for ages. Logcat would disappear or the phone would need to be reconnected to the USB for ADB to see it properly.
What worked for me was using one of the rear USB ports on my PC. The front ones probably were going through a dodgy hub or perhaps dodgy USB hub software. So if you are using front USB ports, try the ones on the rear.

I'm using an LG G3 marshmallow. I don't know why, but when I go to Developer options > Networking section > Select USB Configuration > MTP fixed it.
Before that, whenever I plug my phone to my PC, the driver installation window always froze at the start, but when I changed to MTP connection, the driver installation window immediately recognized it and the phone icon changed to an LG phone icon and finished installing.

Awesome! I Try all the hell of comments here and nothing fix it. This was just a charm!  I put the option ""Charging" and fix it, must be some weird issue, but for now works! you safe my life Daniel!

I found a very easy solution. Same happened to me in Ubuntu 16.04 system. I applied following command.
adb kill-server
sudo adb start-server

When adb is running as admin it will not throw any error.

To me it sounds you have some bad hardware or drivers at home. Make sure you don't have anything related to Kies running; Kies + Samsung Windows Drivers seem to cause erratic behavior on USB connection that differs between machines...
Try different USB ports and cables first, tho.

I tend to agree here... I feel there basically has to be something up/incompatible with my home computer (board/cpu/usb ports). I've had no trouble with any other usb devices though... I use the same cable in both places... so well... I think I'm just screwed. I've been a hair away from upgrading my home machine with a new mobo... so I think that's going to just have to happen. It sucks though, I honestly don't have a need for a faster machine, the development I isn't particularly intense...

I was having this disconnect-reconnect problem.
I solved my problem in the Windows USB settings :
1- Open device Manager.
2- Human interface Devices.
3- Right click in one of them or double click.
4- go to power management.
5- Uncheck the option of "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power" than OK.
Note* try to use step #3-5 on all available option*

(from http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/answers/id-1783536/usb-ports-disconnecting-reconnecting.html)

The following two solutions worked for me.
You can try either of the two or both of them.

Restart device.
Free some internal storage space (Works in most of the cases).

Free some internal storage space - surprisingly this worked for me

It might be because of a windows setting that is (rather stupidly) turned ON by default

Click 'Change advanced power setting' on your chosen plan and expand
'USB Settings'. Under 'USB Settings' section, expand 'USB selective
suspend setting' and change it to 'Disabled' for On battery and
Plugged In.

All the glory to thewindowsclub

Holly cow, I was having this issue on my desktop computer just by starting adb server and without devices connected (don't even talk about debugging) and this setting fixed it

I used to have the same problems and also my logcat would clear and stop updating in Eclipse, the difference is I was on an official Samsung ROM then. After I switched to Darky's ROM the stability has been much better. Still, every now and then the device disappears, but usually it reappears after reattaching the USB. My PC is a bit different from yours (Atom D525, Win7) so I can confirm it's not restricted to a single device/OS.
I'd suggest reflashing the ROM or updating if possible. Or you could try it with another phone to see if it's an error specific to your phone. On the other hand, ADB isn't the stablest of software, so it could be just annoying hiccups.

I might try a buddies Vibrant... that is a thought... still, I'm not sure about the Rom being an issue since everything has behaved exactly the same on both the stock firmware and Serendipity... though I have been curious to try Firefly... we'll see.

I was having the same issue with my Nexus 4, running Cyogenmod 11 on Windows 8. I was plugging in using a USB splitter and my phone would keep disconnecting within seconds of being recognized by LogCat / DDMS. Switching to a physical port on my machine did the trick. In my case the front USB ports worked fine.

Find the location android-sdk-windows\platform-tools.
Open Command Prompt and then run these commands:

cd c:\android\sdk\android-sdk-windows\platform-tools
adb.exe kill-server
adb.exe start-server

These steps may solve your problem.

dont forget, your android-sdk-windows directory maybe different. so you must change string  by yourself => c:\android\sdk\android-sdk-windows\platform-tools

OP wrote: "I'll use adb kill-server and adb start-server but this generally doesn't help".

This is a workaround, not a solution.

Same issue here; I use adb on gnu/linux with no additional drivers.
Workaround Solution: unplug and replug USB
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=17111464#post17111464

Currently, my working method is to (and I still think this sucks) is to build, close Eclipse and plug and unplug till entering adb devices shows the device. If I have more than one showing, adb kill-server, then plug in and adb devices. Extremely tedious.

Frustratingly, this link goes to a forum, which has a link to another stack exchange site, which links to this thread.

Here's my answer with adb pull emulation workaround based on adb and dd. It continuously retries and resumes download when disconnection happens.

adb on Debian/Ubuntu is currently as 1.0.29 connecting to android 4.2.2+ devices requires 1.0.31 which causes this error
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/android-tools/+bug/1131163
you can either manually install the latest android development kit or wait until the debian folks upgrade teh package

A different issue with the same symptoms when updated to MacOS Sierra.
Here's a workaround script:
#!/bin/bash

cat << EOF
###########################################################
# Workaround adb disconnecting issue on macOS Sierra
#
# More info:
# https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=219085
# credits to: hans...@meetme.com, vs...@google.com
###########################################################

EOF

function monitor_adb () {
  adb start-server
  echo "[$(date)] adb started"

  while [ "$(adb shell echo 1)" ]; do sleep 5; done

  echo "[$(date)] adb is broken, restarting"

  adb kill-server
  adb start-server || adb start-server
  adb reverse tcp:8081 tcp:8081
}

while [ true ]; do time monitor_adb ; done

This doesn't work for me. The kill/start just loops with no luck. MBP Retina 2015 Yosemite with S6 Edge FYI.

This should no longer be needed. Bug is fixed in 24.0.4 or later. As seen here: https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=219085

I had same issue but only with Android 6/7 devices and Mac host. Solution was...switch device from  'Charging' to 'File transfer' mode.

This will happen each time you leave adb connection open, need to disconnect after using adb session, to disconnect simply run
adb disconnect <ipaddress>

you replace ipaddress with ip of android device, same as adb connect.


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

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

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

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

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

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