text:
What are the privacy downsides to using Google's Gboard keyboard for Android?
For several reasons, I do what I can to avoid using Google products.  But I do currently use the Android OS (at least for now).
One thing I like about Android is being able to use any keyboard app you want.  I've done everything I can to avoid using Google's Gboard keyboard.  I've tried more than a half-dozen keyboard apps, but the one I like the most is Gboard (and I only looked at it after being dissatisfied with the other keyboards I tried).  It's word swipe recognition seems more accurate than the other keyboards I installed.  Also, I find the ability to search for emoji by name to be a useful feature.
But Google hasn't earned my trust, and my lack of trust in them is largely based on their historical behaviors as well as statements made by some of their top executives.
What are the privacy downsides to using Google's Gboard keyboard if it is allowed data access through a firewall?
What if data access to Gboard is denied via a firewall (but connections to Google are still mostly allowed for the rest of the Android OS, Google Play Services, and the Google Play store)?

I'd like to know this, too! It seems there is an option to disable sharing statistics with Google, but is that really all of the potential leaks? Does it still share any data with Google Play Services?


text:
How to record video with mic off?
I am using a Samsung S10+. How do I record a video with no mic input ?
I have tried to put my finger over the mic, but I could still hear some background noise. I am looking to make a video in a heavy noise setting and would like to cut out the sound completely.

If you are ok with a different camera app, then please try the following-

Install Open Camera

Go to Settings (Top right settings icon) -> Video settings...
-> Toggle Record audio option to disable audio.

Now you should be able to record Video without Audio. Cheers :)

@happybuddha If this answer helped, please accept this. Thanks

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
WhatsApp chat restore from file msgstore.db.crypt12 on the internal storage
I tried to setup WhatsApp for my friend’s phone number and restore “msgstore.db.crypt12” from phone’s internal storage and it worked. But the same step isn’t working for my phone number. In my phone number’s case, WhatsApp always looks for a backup in Google Drive to restore from, even if I’ve deleted the google account in the phone and the internet connection is switched off.

check this previous answer and see if it does the trick: https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/133066/i-dont-want-my-whatsapp-media-to-restore-google-drive-backup?rq=1

Try copy all whatsapp folder to your new phone

WhatsApp will first search for your logged in account and look for any WhatsApp backup files in your Google Drive with the same phone number. If you’d like to prevent WhatsApp from backing up using your Google account, simply delete the WhatsApp backup folder (instead of logging out your Google account from your device).
If your local “msgstore.db.crypt12” are using the same phone number on your new WhatsApp, the setup will then use your local file to continue restoration.
Hope this helps.

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


text:
Getting all MP3s on Android and be able to listen to them
I'm an avid music lover, and over my long life collected many rare CDs.  I made MP3s of these CDs and had happily listened to them on my iPhone using iTunes.
This week I switched to Android (Samsung Galaxy s10e).  I painstakingly uploaded all of my Music folder from my Windows 10 PC onto Google Play Music using the Chrome extension.
Only 3/4s of my MP3s successfully uploaded.  Under Google Play Music > Settings> Music from My Computer, there's no mention of any failures.
After a quick look, it seems that the rarer recordings were the items skipped.  These recordings are not in Google Play Music's library, so now I'm fearing that I can only upload MP3s that are in Google's database.
Questions:

Can anyone confirm this theory?
If it's true, what can I do to get all my MP3s, as they are, onto this Android phone and be able to organize them into playlists and listen to them?

How many MP3s are in your collection?

I don't know about Google Play Music because I don't use Google products as much as possible. But playing MP3 isn't a tricky thing. Just copy the MP3 files to Android device over MTP or through SD card or any other way you like (many questions on this site will help you with that). Then any media player like VLC would auto scan all mp3 (and other media) files. Android itself scans and categorizes files on their file (mime) type which the media player and gallery apps can query. So you don't need any special setup.

@Morrison Chang I have about 10,000 MP3s

@Irfan Latif.  Thanks, I can try that, but will it allow me to organize the MP3s into playlists?  I need more that just a file browser to be happy with this phone.  Already I'm seething over the fact that Android Spotify doesn't work wi-fi only.  I'm trying to determine if I need to try to return this phone before my 15-day cancellation period ends.

@MarnieA. I don't personally listen to music very much but there is a huge collection of (free, paid, open-source) media players which can help you organize music based on metadata or on your choice. I quoted VLC because it's completely free, open-source, feature-rich and cross-platform. But you may find better options. And I feel that your problem is that you aren't used to Android, which may take some time.

@MarnieA I would also double chexkt that the files that Google Music had problems with are actually MP3 and not some DRM format that iTunes uses.

@MorrisonChang Definitely were MP3s. I had ripped them from original CDs.

While I can't confirm it, I'm pretty sure Google Play Music needs to recognize the song to be able to show it in its web interface, much like Spotify does.
So instead of using Google Play Music, I plugged my phone into my Windows PC with its USB-C cable.  Here, I could see the phone as a drive on the PC.  It's a Samsung Galaxy s10e, and fortunately both the phone and the SD card were formatted to show some typical folders, including one called Music.
Using File Explorer, I copied my MP3s from my PC to the phone into the Music folder (on the SD card, but the Internal Music folder would have been fine as well).
Then I chose one of the many MP3 player apps.  I did try VLC first since I've used it for years for other purposes and trust it.  Because I wanted to do more with the music (e.g., create playlist), I opted to go with Musicolet.  Both apps offer to scan your phone and SD card.  When you give the app access, it pulls in the files, and then you can go from there.


text:
S6: Folder is empty when trying to view the files on PC, display broken
So my phones display recently died and trying to view it on my PC leaves me with an empty folder...
The phone is still on and running though, only the display is broke
There are different solutions to this, I link them below:
Galaxy S6 Folder is Empty on PC
There must be a way to operate the phone from my PC, right?
Would be happy if someone could help

S6 supports no MHL but OTG, connect keyboard and press space + pin + enter to unlock, this should bring up your files. if you have pattern, set temporary lock screen pin from https://www.google.com/android/devicemanager (secure device)

untested, but if it works you can use scrcpy to fully remote control your device from usb-debugging https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/159551


text:
"Device is reachable" SMS without SIM
I'm using a Huawei Honor P9 Lite with a German carrier and SIM card. My carrier offers the option to send SMS to me, whenever I miss a call. The other way round, whenever someone does not reach me (due to missing network connection or powered down phone), they get an SMS as soon as I come back online, telling them that my device is now reachable again.
Now, something very strange happened.
My touchscreen recently broke (I think, due to temperature stress on a very cold day) and I had to send my phone to repair. Before doing that, I removed my SIM card, SD card, backed-up my phone and made a factory reset.
Today, I was contacted by a friend, who tried to reach me during that time by calling me. A day later, he got a message, that I was reachable again. My question now is, how that is even possible with a factory resetted phone without a SIM card? I cannot rule out that the phone has been switched on by the repair contractors, but I wonder how this service actually works without a SIM card and without my number being physically tied to the phone?

Guessing - you activated call barring and your carrier was authorized. In the process your carrier linked the request with IMEI number and not SIM. You can check with your carrier

@beeshyams that's a good one, I will check.

@beeshyams So I just called my carrier and they insisted, that my number is not connected to my IMEI in any way. I will double check the issue once I have my phone back with another mobile phone.

Another possibility is that your friend himself got a delayed message - delayed because of poor coverage or something

I can rule that out, because he called me yesterday - 3 days AFTER I took out my SIM card.

Probably a fault with your carrier's backend which sent a text in error. What you are saying is not possible since SIM is the only thing that tells the phone as to which carrier to connect to and the customer identification. No SIM should mean there was no connection to your number.

@singhnsk I 100% agree and this is why I asked the question. My next try (as soon as I got my phone back) is (without the SIM in) calling it from another device and then switching it on to see if I can reproduce. If yes, I might need to call ghostbusters ;)

don't trust carrier 1st-level-support. they are not qualified to know technical information (and they are most likely not employee at that company at all)


text:
Disable Chromecast audio interrruption/autopauze when using camera, microphone or receiving phonecall
I know some people like the auto-pauze function when receiving a phone call so so they are not interrupted by their own music playing. But I am personally very annoyed by that function. When I'm listening to the radio (streaming trough Chromecast audio) I do not want my live stream to be interrupted because I make a photo or video, ask something to my phone or receive a phone call. When I'm listening to a podcast it doesn't even resume after using the camera, the podcast just restarts from the beginning. Very annoying.
After some trial and error I discovered it is the app who plays the audio that interrupts it on an event, not Android itself. Yes it's a bad app that does not offer options to disable that function but its the only one available as it is from the national government. So my question to the community is if there is a way to block the events (camera, microphone, phone call) from being noticed by the app streaming to my Chromecast.
ps: the app(s) I'm referring to are the ones from VRT/RTBF (Belgian national radio).

Possible if your device is rooted

good news, my device is rooted, with magisk. soo tell me how?

You need to install EdXposed (see https://android.stackexchange.com/q/218179/131553) and then Xprivacy Lua module and deny that app those permissions. If you have issues ask in the Xda thread of module. But note that it will work only if the app is using Java and not some obfuscated code


text:
Add usb to ethernet support to tablet Teclast t20
i would like to allow my tablet Teclast T20 to connect to ETHERNET via USB.
I already own a USB to ETHERNET ADAPTER, that i use succesfully with my windows 10 laptop.
It is an ASIX AX88772 USB2.0 to Fast Ethernet Adapter, and i found that for this adapter is available a driver (source) in ASIX website
ASIX AX88772 USB2.0 to Fast Ethernet Adapter Drivers
that should work for Linux and Android.
But when i connect the adapter to my tablet using an OTG Usb to microusb cable, and connect the ethernet cable to the adapter, nothing happens.
Searching on the web, i found that with Teclast T10, that is and older version of my tablet (that was without 3G module), was possible to connect to ethernet via a similar adapter with same chipset as mine : UtechSmart USB 2.0 to 10/100 Ethernet Network Adapter (Model US-USB2-E100).
Take a look here (min 5:55)
Video
My tablet Teclast T20 has cpu MT6797X (X27) and runs on Android Nougat 7.1 and has connectivity WiFi + LTE
The Teclast T10, instead, has cpu MT8176 and runs on Android Nougat 7.0 and has only WiFi connectivity
So perhaps the kernel is different and the drivers pre-built in the kernel are different.
How can i check if an USB to Ethernet driver is already built in the kernel of my tablet?
And, if it is not available, how can i add the driver to my tablet? I know that i should have the sources of my kernel, but i think it will be difficult to get them from Teclast.
Any suggestion?
Thank you!
Lodovico.

Usually you should see in the kernel messages (dmesg) when you plug in the USB Ethernet adapter if it has been loaded correctly. The main problem is that usually you would execute the dmesg command via ADB/USB but the port is required for the Ethernet adapter. Therefore I would try to use ADB over Wifi to establish an adb connection that does not block the USB port. Then connect the USB Ethernet adapter and check the dmesg messages. I did this just for testing and was able even to see the link up/down messages.

Thank you for the information. What i can say for now, is that installing an app 'Usb device info' i can see that the adapter is recognized when i connect it (because the app shows correct informations about brand (Asix) and model).

The problem is that the leds are not blinking and there is not data connection...

How to make Ethernet work on Android over OTG?


text:
Emergency Notifications
Good Afternoon All,
I can't seem to find a solution to my problem when I do a google search so I'm hoping you all can help me.
I have an app on my phone which alerts me to nearby first aid incidents (GoodSAM), what I would like is to enable notification from that app to override any do not disturb or sound settings, I typically have my phone on silent or vibrate and in this instance it would be good to have it screaming out.
Any help would be most welcomed.
Kind regards,
Ollie

Your question seems to be about this app named "GoodSAM". In this case please edit the quest and add the link to Google Play Store as there are multiple apps with that name.

@Robert that shouldn't depend on the app, see my answer.

Solutions might depend on the Android version you're on. Take a look into Settings › Apps & Notifications › GoodSam › Notifications (available at least in Android 8+ – looks a bit different in Android 7 but is also there). In that place you should be able to define if it shall override DND.


text:
Mathematical symbols issue in displaying
I'm having a strange issue on my android device. Oh, this is mathematical:
On my android device, using Brave, Opera, or DDG browsers I cannot see many symbols in mathematical pages on wiki. The symbols do not show up or are showing up as white. It seems to be just a few symbols but it can make it very difficult to follow what is going on. The symbol p usually is missing(but q show sup).
e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neighbourhood_(mathematics)
All the p's and V's are missing(but they take up space).
I have no idea what is going on and I don't know where to look for to ask. Is it a wiki problem? MathJax? These browsers? My device? This is making it very painful to use the device to read wikipedia. I haven't seen it on other sites but I don't go to many other sites for math.
Any ideas?

A screen shot would be good that demonstrates the problem. And also please add the Android version and the device model you use.

Unlike the usual suspect of "missing font", this looks like an SVG rendering issue on browsers since Wikipedia uses SVG images for Maths symbols, or those images are blocked by the network. Could you mention the device model and the Android version? Also, are those images shown using different Wi-Fi/mobile data?

@AndrewT. I thought it might be related to SVG. I don't have mobile data. Android 6 Lenovo. Although I don't know why it would matter.  Do you have any idea what I can do to figure it out? Is SVG rendering external to the browsers? Would there be a possible browser I could try that could help narrow down the possibilities?


text:
Is there a setting to blank the screen when the on/off switch is pressed for lockscreen?
I"m running Android 10, and I've not had this problem/issue with the lock screen on any previous iterations of the OS.
The problem
In the past, When the on/off switch is pressed, this enables lockscreen and the system goes into a wait state. The screen blanks and stops monitoring gestures or taps. It needs the on/off switch or the finger recognition scanner to come back on.
What I'm looking for
A setting that will switch the screen off until I hit the on/off switch, preferable not the finger scanner

I think you are trying to disable double tap to open...? You can disable it in Gestures/Moves in the settings.

No, Double tap is resolved. The Accessibility problem arose because I put my hand in the laptop bag in the front pocket (where stuff is kept) and touched the finger scanner. Because the screen remains active during lockscreen, it switched on and then (as chance happens) bounced about  unseen until it hit talkbalk. I've had every iteration of android since that first Motorola (remember that one? with the sliding keyboard?) and the most recent was the Nexus 5X. All of them blanked the screen when the off button was depressed. Problem is as stated.

This issue pre-dates the TalkBack. Having an 'active' screen means that whenever the phone is bumped (in the pocket, laptop bag etc) it momentarily responds with an unlock screen, this drains battery, and can't be good for the phone. The inadvertant  finger scan is an escalation of all this, of course.

Resolved after a factory reinstall


text:
How important is "Gorilla glass" in a smartphone?
My phone's glass has cracked over time, and I'm planning to replace it. I've noticed that a lot of the models I'm considering to replace it with (and my current phone itself) don't feature "Gorilla Glass".
My question: How significant is the lack/presence of "Gorilla Glass"? Are other covering glass types simply unbranded and not as well known, but similar in resistance to shocks/bending - or does "Gorilla Glass" really have a significant advantage?

It depends on the usage of your device. It's just a extra layer of protection and comes with some advantages over others (Like scratch resistance, splash proofing).

If your phone has a soft back cover and a glass protector on top of
  the screen then dropping it from a table or bed won't hurt that much
  but your phone will get some scratches on the body. Mild pressure like
  carrying your device inside your pocket or under the pillow or inside
  a bag won't affect. Corning Gorilla Glasses actually passed several
  drop tests, tension tests, scratch tests.

You can trust Gorilla Glass because they don't make glasses only for smartphones. They also make glasses for industries. Corning is the company who manufacture Gorilla Glass.

So, answer to your question is it's not significant at all. You must
  replace it with other unbranded screen protections. You must have to
  check the relaiabilty of that product before using it. And that's
  where brand recognition comes into place. Corning will provide you
  warranty on specific products. And because many users already used it
  so you can obviously trust them.
Choice will be yours. If you able to make the right purchase no matter
  it's branded or not it'll always worth.

Can you be more specific about what you mean by "usage"? I carry it around in a soft shell and a screen protector, but it does take some pressure, rubbing, and once in a while - a fall from tabletop-level or lower.

I corrected the answer and if it helped you then upvote it.


text:
Can I charge my Galaxy S9+ with a laptop charger
I was wondering if i could charge my Samsung Galaxy S9+ safely with a USB C laptop charger.
here's what is says on it:
INPUT:100-240V~1.3A 50-60HZ
OUTPUT:20V--2.25A/15V--3A/9V--2A/5V--2A

For Lenovo information equipment use only

Theres a lot more stuff on it but I'm pretty sure thats the only stuff thats important.

The data of the power supply indicates that it is compliant with the USB Power Delivery Standard (USB-PD). If it has an USB logo there should be some sort of "power flash" within that logo to indicate that it supports USB-PD.
The USB Power Delivery standard defines backward compatibility, this means that by default the charger will output 5V and only switch to 9V, 15V or even 20V if the connected device has signaled by the USB PD protocol that it supports this mode.
Based on the information I found the Galaxy S9 / Galaxy S9+ support USB Power Devlivery, however they don't make use of the modes with higher voltage.
Therefore connecting it to the described charger it should charge with 5V 2A.


text:
Which one has lower latency? HDMI to Type-C or HDMI to HDMI or the same?
I wonder if Android smartphones with HDMI port has advantage versus without if they have USB Type-C. If I have Type-C, I can use Type-C to HDMI adapter.

I don't believe there exists a smartphone with HDMI? All the phones I know need an adapter. I think you mean to compare MHL with USB-C.

Is this not HDMI?

Wow...there's one that exists. But it's 10 years old and Android 2...so people wouldn't use it nowadays. Virtually no name branded phone from the last 5 years have hardware HDMI afaik. It's just too big to fit on a phone.

If the phone supports output of display signal via USB-C alternative mode (Displayport signals) you should get the lowest latency if you don't convert the signals and connect a monitor via Displayport. For example using an USB-C to USB-C cable and an monitor with USB-C input port. Or an USB-C to Displayport adapter plus matching cable. HDMI signals are always converted and may therefore have a small latency.

@Robert Thanks, I have LG V20. Is DP Alt mode support is the same as MHL support? I found that my device support MHL but didn't find info if it supports DP Alt Mode. I'm planning to buy this. Will everything work on my device?

@vasik988 No, MHL is the ancient Micro-USB based version of transmitting. It seems that there is also a version that uses the USB-C alt mode but the data is according to the spec different to Displayport via USB-C alt mode. Therefore you need special USB-C MHL converter that output e.g. HDMI: http://www.mhltech.org/usbtype-c.aspx

What specs are saying that it isn't compatible with my device? I also took a look to Microsoft Display Dock and I saw a video in Youtube that can be used with LG G5 and in specs there is nothing about MHL. I think, item from Aliexprees, should function the same like this Display Dock. Do you see any difference?


text:
Malware automatically installing unless I disable the play store
So I have been working on my brother's Elite 6.0l+ Sky device. This poor thing has been struck by the xhelper virus which auto installs firedoor, firemyn and an app that likes to hide itself by appearing to be settings.
I have been chasing this malwares source for a couple of weeks and through a ton of trial and error I've discovered that disabling the playstore seems to keep the malware from being reinstalled. However, if I re-enable the playstore so I can grab a game or check for app updates, the malware is immediately re-installed on the device.
I have also discovered that the device itself is apparently known to come with pre-installed problems (SKY/x6069_trx_l601_sky/x6069_trx_l601_sky:6.0/MRA58K/1482897127:user/release-keys) but what I can't find any where is solutions!
While disabling the playstore does keep the malware off the device, it's not exactly a perfect solution and if it's at all possible I want to remove this malicious pest at the roots so the phone will actually be totally functional.
does anyone know how to deal with this? I'm tech savvy and completely comfortable in command prompt, and I'm not afraid to work with code if need be as long as I have instructions.
Thank you in advance for any and all help!

boot in recovery mode and run system integrity check. delete everything that not passes this check

https://www.xda-developers.com/mediatek-su-rootkit-exploit

regarding xHelper

unpack firmware247.com/sky-elite-6-0l-plus-firmware
install VCOM preloader usb drivers
install Mediatek SP Flash Tool
load the scatter file, DESELECT all checkboxes (especially preloader)
switch off device completely
flash boot, system (click Download only, Download, then connect usb-cable)
flash cache, userdata (= factory reset if you wanna be 100% sure)

regarding OTA updater
readback boot.img with SP Flash Tool, patch with Magisk Manager, flash magisk_patched.img into boot, root the device and disable the OTA updater from terminal or adb shell
su
pm disable --user 0 com.adups.fota
pm disable --user 0 com.adups.fota.sysoper
pm disable --user 0 com.fw.upgrade.sysoper

after this, restore the original boot.img (unroot device) and uninstall Magisk Manager
(Note: unlocking bootloader is most likely not required for this old device, SP Flash Tool can flash with locked bootloader. However, be aware unlocking bootloader will perform factory reset)

If the device has already been rooted, I find it better to suggest  nuking the malware instead of merely disabling it. Since you have already provided flashing instructions, if the device fails to boot after nuking malware than OP can just reflash everything. Otherwise, a factory reset would bring up those malware apps again if they only disable them.

@Firelord it's not malware it's the official Firmware OTA and should therefore not deleted. i have disabled and it's fine (can't even remember if disabling requires root at all). the malware of course should be deleted, but do you know how to identify xHelper package?

https://www.symantec.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/xhelper-android-malware


text:
Re: Internal storage space
I had a LOT (100+) apps installed on an LG Stylo 3+.  Never had any problems as far as storage space (no error messages about space running out, low memory, anything like that.)  Recently I upgraded to an LG Stylo 5.  In the course of setting that one up, I installed EXACTLY the same apps, EXACTLY the same # of apps, as I had had on the 3+.  The next thing I know, the 5 is refusing to download  email and popping up messages about "not enough storage space". Both phones are supposed to have the same amount of internal storage space, so why is what worked on the 3+ too much for the 5?

Hello, and welcome to Android StackExchange! It does seem like you have a perplexing issue, but more information may be needed to help figure out what's wrong. Have you started taking more photos or downloading more music or podcasts? Could you provide info or screenshots about the storage on each device and maybe the largest apps?

Is it possible you had an SD card in the old phone...?

The new device might use more storage for preinstalled stuff (and the newer Android version possibly). You could compare the output of adb shell dumpsys diskstats of both devices (see our adb tag wiki if you don't know what ADB is and how to use it).

As Izzy has already surmised, via comment, the new device likely comes with a lot more space taken by the pre-installed apps and system data. That is what I believe is the problem. If you want to save space by stopping the default apps from updating, you can try to disable them in the apps portion of your android configuration menu, or, if that doesn't work, then this guide explains how to force disable apps using adb from a computer, though to get rid of the pre-installed versions' files, you need root.
https://www.xda-developers.com/disable-system-app-bloatware-android/


text:
ADB dumpsys batterystats - How does one read it?
Why on earth does the adb shell dumpsys batterystats command not print regular timestamps? (Like usagestats does for example, or literally anything else on the planet.)
Instead, it gives you a "RESET TIME" within the file, and the lines after that show how much time has passed since that time. "RESET" times mostly appear just once at the beginning, sometimes however they appear multiple times within the log, sometimes even skipping hours, seemingly at random.
And as if that isn't bad enough.. Let me just show a real-life example:
adb shell dumpsys batterystats

Gives me (among other things of course) this:
                0 (9) RESET:TIME: 2020-01-29-01-37-39

Good. So the time starts at 2020-01-29-01-37-39. Alright. Only reset time in the output.
I just turned the screen on. Here is the entry in the log for that:
      +21h44m19s484ms (4) 057 +wake_lock=1000:"PhoneWindowManager.mPowerKeyWakeLock" +screen screenwake=1000:"android.policy:POWER"

Great. +21h44m19s. It is now (well, it was when this happened) 2020-01-30-00-16-00.
"RESET" time of 2020-01-29-01-37-39 + 21h44m19s = 2020-01-29-23-21-58.  ?????

Okay, down to my actual questions:

Why does dumpsys batterystats not use normal timestamps?
How does one read those timestamps? They seem beyond broken.
Is there a way to change it to "normal" timestamps?

(My goal is to track when exactly the screen (and optionally WiFi) was on and when it was off. If there is any other way to do that besides batterystats, please leave a comment.)

The energy consumption by Android devices is estimated based on the amount of time certain hardware components are residing in different states (e.g., WIFI ON, WIFI OFF, etc.). For each hardware component, there is a power value for each state of the component provided by the manufacturer. So with the amount of time a hardware component resides in a certain state times the power value, the actual energy consumption is calculated.
Each time a state change is triggered, an event is recorded in the batterystats tool. The batterystats tool collects the events based on a timestamp starting from 0 at the mentioned RESET event.
Your questions:
(1) The timestamps in the batterystats output start from the last reset of the batterystats tool. You can manually reset the timestamp with then batterystats reset command. I don't know what are the exact triggers within the Android system to reset the batterystats, probably when the battery is fully charged.
(2) As you mentionend you have the system time of the RESET event. You read the example +21h44m19s: 21 hours 44 minutes and 19 seconds since the RESET event.
(3) Whatever you mean with "real timestamps" you transform them to any date format you like by adding the batterystats timestamp to the reset time. The batterystats output cannot be changed.

I did try the adding the timestamps to the reset time, but many many times this does not yield accurate results (e.g. sometimes a timestamp ends up in the future or completely off)

This is a partial answer that needs more details through the full dump to understand whats the and read the output of what the system is trying to convey.
The data unit is a number taken from the following list:
 1: Number of objects
 2: Number of bytes
 3: Number of milliseconds
 4: Number of allocations
 5: Id
 6: Percent
 s: Number of seconds (monotonic time)
 Default value for data of type int/long is 2 (bytes).
Breaks down to what I think is:
The data unit is a number taken from the following list:
1: Number of objects = (4)
2: Number of bytes {057}
3: Number of milliseconds. +21h44m19s484ms wake_lock=1000 screen screenwake=1000
4: Number of allocations wake_lock=1000, screen screenwake=1000
5: Id. android.policy:POWER
6: Percent
 s: Number of seconds (monotonic time)
 Default value for data of type int/long is 2 (bytes).
https://android.googlesource.com/platform/system/core/+/master/logcat/event.logtags
The time value starts at boot to current breaking the time down to.
+21h44m19s484ms
First the time since thw device was bopted and reads like:
21h is 21 hours.
44m is 44 minutes
19s is 19 seconds
484ms is 484 milliseconds.
However there is more going on since it reads line by line meaning one line is not the complete story. In order to understand whats going on the full log or dump is crucially needed.

My question's solely about the timestamps used (I must admit I'm confused by the first part of your answer, but that's not really what I'm asking about anyway). It would indeed make sense if the time value starts at boot (equaling the RESET TIME), but as I said in my question, that can't really be the case. It might be accurate at the beginning of the log, but as in my example it goes off a lot towards the end.

It not complete it presents like the broke part of the brain reads but gives enough info to tell you what's going on. you can pull more verbose or detailed information through variety of options or log types. I believe you have a bit of tunnel vision preventing you from seeing the how the syntax is presented in a simple way expecting a more complicating answer or reason.

I think you do not understand my question.. I'm not really asking about the syntax of the log, or the verbosity, or anything like that. My question is all about "Why does batterystats use +*h*m*s*ms instead of an actual DATETIME stamp?" and why the times it uses doesn't match up.
See, it'll say for example boot and reset time was at 1am, then it will say +5h in the log, which would be 6am, right? Except for in reality it was, let's say 6:40. That's what my question is about. The times in the log do not match with the real time.

Do you have an example of that? Leading to the syntax is very important to the meaning.


text:
Dual booting android x86 with LineagOS x86 on external hard drive
I an installing on an internal notebook HDD that I use as an external dribe from the USB
The drive is a 500 GB HDD but has 50 GB, 50 GB, 50 GB partitions on it and the rest is unallocated at the moment
I have android x86 (android-x86_64-9.0-rc2.iso) installed on the first partition (sdb1) and I also installed EFI GRUB2 while installing android
I then installed LineagOS x86 (cm-x86_64-14.1-r2.iso) to the second partition (50 GB) and I also told it to installed EFI GRUB2 while installing LineagOS
The GRUB from LineageOS seems to have overwritten the GRUB from android-x86 and now I can't boot into android-x86 from the BIOS boot screen, even though it's files are all there in the first partition
Is there any way to edit the GRUB for LineagOS and add an entry to boot android-x86 from the first partition?
I also have in internal SATA HDD inside the notebook with Windows 10. I do not want the bootable installations on the external hard drive to affect this windows installation or the internal drive in any way, but it seems the EFI GRUB2 that got installed while installing android-x86 and LineageOS got installed on the internal HDD. This is still still acceptable because it doesn't seem to have affected the windows installation or it's booting procedure in any way, but I am not experienced with GRUB and whatever it is that I have to do, I want to make sure it will not affect the Windows 10 installtion on my internal hard drive.
To summarize:
sdb1: android-x86
sdb2: LineageOS, bootable using it's GRUB (this grub menu shows up when I select the entry for it in the BIOS boot menu)
How do I edit this GRUB menu to also point to the android-x86 installation? Is it possible to do this from Windows?

The speed is not going to be ideal if I understand your question correctly.

@William why would the speed not be ideal?

it's just typically slower that is all

To start it would help if you could provide some logs with adb. The x86 firmware to get a dump of whats going on just simply throw the command adb logcatfrom an elevated command prompt. Making it simpler to read though it should be a dump and pretty straight forward you can try to add -v (verbose) long looking like: abd logcat -v long
hopefully the adbd daemon has started since thats part of the init job.
However, if it has not and cannot get a logcat then you can try to skip part of the boot process to get thing farther along within the boot process by stopping the zygote by:
From the x86 developers website:

Stop zygote to run automatically:
Go within the the vendor/whatever_device_oem/eeepc/init.rc, change following lines:

service zygote /system/bin/app_process -Xzygote /system/bin --zygote --start-system-server
socket zygote stream 666
onrestart write /sys/android_power/request_state wake
onrestart write /sys/power/state on

to:

service zygote /system/bin/app_process -Xzygote /system/bin --zygote --start-system-server
socket zygote stream 666
onrestart write /sys/android_power/request_state wake
onrestart write /sys/power/state on
disabled
oneshot
At this point hopfully stopping the zygote will get things communicating once the davlik starts going since that is what gets things in the virtual machine going.
Try to pull logs through the above mentioned logcat command.
When you want to start zygote manually after you get or if it fails then throw the command from an adb shell start zygote or if unable to get an adb shell you could just try from a terminal emulator start zygote if that fails then stop and revert the changes to the vendor/whatever_device_oem/eeepc/init.rc from the booted is is, or within the iso, or before re-compilation.
Hopefully by this point you can post a dump output so we can get to the nitty gritty of what is going on.
Though it sounds like a boot order issue from the primary bootloader to the secondary bootloader and so on. It could also be any of the other pertinent paths needed to boot.
With that, after going through your long detailed steps that you have tried for debugging. Leading to my long detailed winded answer to state logs are key to debugging. Of the top off my head I say that it is most likely a path issue that can be corrected using the set command from a linux based system or linux like system command prompt or emulator. (Key by the way when saving a brick from grub-recovery).
Throw the set command to see what the system recognizes and see as the way to the chosen path.
See what's shown and compared to what's needed such as set root, cmdpath, kernel, boot, grub, vmlinux or aboot, and many more things required for boot but not the same let device and OEM, OS version, or variants.
The syntax is:
set {envvar=value}
Simplified:
Set option = (Value)/the/chosen/path
To delete/remove an environmental variable just us unset instead of the set command.
GN'U technical manual explains what's appears to be your asked issue:
https://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/grub/html_node/set.html#set

GRUB’s normal start-up procedure involves setting the ‘prefix’ environment variable to a
  value set in the core image by grub-install, setting the ‘root’ variable to match, loading
  the ‘normal’ module from the prefix, and running the ‘normal’ command (see Section 16.3.51
  [normal], page 77). This command is responsible for reading ‘/boot/grub/grub.cfg’, run-
  ning the menu, and doing all the useful things GRUB is supposed to do

Start your debugging solutions with the set command to get the proper boot variables in order. If you have to delete a variable that's been set then use the unset command.
If not that than we need logs to find out what's going on with the boot process.


text:
After update to Android 9, moto g6 vibrates on home button press even though vibrations turned off
My phone just updated and now every time i press the home button i get a vibration. How do i turn off vibrations?

here's a photo of my vibration settings.

Do you use "One Button Nav" to replace the "Back, Home, Recent" buttons? Please read your user manual; it mentions haptic feedback as part of this mechanism.

I do not use one button navigation.


text:
Google assistant triggers in hindi language
Whenever I trigger google assistant using bluetooth headphones, it starts speaks in hindi and I need to ask in hindi. But when I start assistant from mobile directly it works normally (in english).
How can I fix this to always work in english ?

Could this problem be solved by going into keyboard settings and update the language feature? Android keyboard that came with the phone vs. app keyboards can vary greatly.Google assistant is in the input method of Android settings....it depends on your phone model but i would check there .hope it helps


text:
Are there (developer) tools to remove files from Android "Rom" cache, if the smartphone doesn't start properly?
(I have also asked on stackoverflow, as I assume the use of developer tools is neccessary, but I would be very glad to get any working help on here also.
The Google Photo App filled up the 16 GByte "Rom" of my Motorola G5: Google memory overview showed around 6.5 GByte of "Google Photo" data, whereas real (not deleted) photos and videos were only 4 GByte and I had moved those 4Gbyte to the SD card. To be on the save side before hitting "delete" of the 6.5 GByte, I removed the SD card beforehand. But now, when trying to restart, Android is stuck in the booting/start sequence. (I still can enter the pin, then the normal boot/start screen appears, but that only disappears shortly each 5 to 10 seconds. Stuck there.)
Question: Could I access in any way the "Rom" of the smartphone, so I could remove all or part of the 6.5 GByte occupied by "Google Photo", using for example adb?
I have Android 8.1 on the G5 and Win 10 on my computer.

microSD card is readable in windows card reader?

The smartphone doesn't start, regardless which SD card is in it, or if there is none at all.

I ask reformulated: microSD card is formatted as adoptable-storage (bonded to internal storage) and you tried re-insert the same already, but doesn't start?

Yes. (And usually it started with or without SD card, formatted or not formatted.) Though I'm not sure anymore, if I tried another SD card beside the original. Should I try with another SD card??

then you are left with OEM backup tools and factory reset. be aware if microSD card is formatted as adoptable-storage, you will lose this content too

which backup tools?

And what should I do to prevent being asked for the google account password after a factory reset? I can't exclude, that I sadly have associated some randomly generated google-account with some more or less random password. I read, I can't use the smartphone anymore else.??

Could the recover logs of the recovery menu be of any help? Could I apply a helping update from SD card? (via the recovery menu's "Apply update from SD card")

maybe you can figure out google account from logs

How should there the password be in? Let's hope not.

once you remember the google account you can try https://www.google.com/accounts/ForgotPasswd

it is possible to dump (encrypted) userdata partition with QSaharaServer by using the read tag with readbackverify="false" (experts only). for FBE you could then just delete some files. sadly your device uses FDE. the only (unrealistic) chance is to downgrade bootloader in order to make bootchain vulnerable, disable avb and flash twrp (which decryptes userdata). this will take several days for research. you can start with figuring out how to boot in EDL mode via test point

https://android.stackexchange.com/q/220648

https://www.motorola.com/us/lenovo-motorola-smart-assistant


text:
Read the URL of currently open tab in a browser, every time it changes
I use Logitech media server (LMS) to play my music on a DLNA device. The server also has a youtube plugin and can play the sound of youtube videos if a specific url, which contains the youtube video id, is opened. For example http://myLMS:9000/status.html?p0=playlist&p1=play&p2=youtube://wS1drVzZPmw&player=myPlayer.
But it only plays back a single video this way. And I'd like them to autoplay, the way they do when youtube is accessed with a browser.
One way to do this, would be to open a browser and read the youtube url every time it changes, somehow, extract the video id from the url, and then forward it to LMS by generating a link, similar to the one I posted above, but containing the id of the video, that was extracted from the youtube url.
The generating and opening of the custom link for the LMS should not be too difficult, by using tasker, I think. But I suspect getting the url from the browser and constantly checking if it changed, would be more difficult.
So - is it possible to read the URL of currently open tab in a browser, every time it changes, and store it as text somewhere?
Or maybe the youtube app on android stores the id of the video it is currently playing somewhere. That might work also, if we could read it somehow. I think the youtube app also autoplays the videos.

I am a bit confused here. This logitech software seems to be supported on Windows, Linux and Mac, so I assume you are running it on a non-Android device. Your DLNA client is probably an Android device though where you listen the music. So, you want to keep sending a YouTube URL from that client on your Android to that server. Did I get this correctly? Which DLNA client are you using?

Yes, the server is running on a NAS device, and I would like to send the server custom links, that would be generated on an android device. I'm not sure what exactly is a "DLNA client", but the music is streamed from the server to a Yamaha device, which then outputs analog signal. I can use any device that is connected to LAN and has a browser, to control the server.

Apps on Android can't access data of other apps. Therefore you can't just read the current URL of a web browser like chrome.
If this would be possible every app with advertisements would do so and report all the URLs you are visiting in the web browser back to some ad network. As you can see such an interface would be a privacy nightmare.
Hence the only chance to get what you want to do it inside of a browser-plugin.
However I don't think that there is any browser-plugin for Chrome, Firefox or another web browser on Android that would do what you want. Hence you would have to develop your own web browser plugin (please note that development topics are off-topic on this site).

I thought that by having root we could access the intents of other apps, or something, and maybe the info about URLs could be stored in these intents, but I don't have enough knowledge yet to try to find them myself. And of course I would not like 3rd party apps analyzing my browsing history, it's enough that google does that already. And software development is over my head, but I think I had googled something about a firefox plugin that can copy the urls of open tabs, and I think android was mentioned also, so will have to try that for myself.


text:
Cannot disable safe mode by restarting, how to disable safe mode?
My Android 10, Nokia 7.1 phone ended up in safe mode. How do I disable this?
Tried restarting and turning off/on as per instructions I've found online but it always starts up in safe mode.

Is your volume down key responding correctly? Have you had possibly liquids get inside the buttons?

You could try booting to recovery and clearing cache from there. If your battery is removable, shutting down, removing it and the SIM card for a few minutes, and putting everything together again is also reported to help in some such cases.


text:
ADB Root Grant Root Permission to App or Package
I am having a little trouble with my Development Board it is Orange Pi 4B, running Android 8.1
Currently I have access to ADB root and also can modify the system folder or even place files inside the system folder but I want to grant Root Permission to my Application which the OS is not allowing. It also has SU placed in xbin folder but when I install SuperSu it says root undetected.
The commands that I try to gain root access to system were
adb root
adb disable-verity
adb reboot
adb root
adb remount

These all commands execute with success and I have access to modify the system folder but after trying everything I am still not able to grant SU access to my Application.
Even I tried to flash TWRP but the board is not entering Bootloader with the following command.
adb reboot bootloader

the shell starts running as Root. But i want to grant my app permission to have root access

In terminal Emulator SU says Permission Denied. Using Terminal via USB Cable it turns into #.

The issue is that supersu never pops up asking for permission. It grants permission to adb shell running via usb cable and denies all apps that are installed on the board.

Let us continue this discussion in chat.

Just to make it clear: even with the su binary the app(s) will not run with root permissions, they just have the possibility to execute other binaries with root permissions (just like you on a adb shell), but the app itself will still run with regular user permissions.

I ended up building custom image of android and then making the app system app

@UmerKiani right. Marking duplicate for future visitors' reference.

Does this answer your question? How to grant certain apps root permission through ADB?

No this doesnt work on newer android versions

@UmerKiani what doesn't work?


text:
Can I save system app data from being erased?
I have app that is installed in the system , my question if there is a way to prevent factory reset from erasing app data , no need to change the settings again ,without using backup app , atomic process after the phone has started working after factory reset

App data is saved on /data partition which is completely erased with factory reset. So there is no way to retain data except backup/restore (backup app isn't necessarily required) or devise some way to make data available on boot from some other source which is not erased with factory reset e.g. external SD card or some partition on internal storage.

Can you explain more? if there is a specific way that i can restore data without using backup app it would be so helpful

Use adb backup, create tar file from commandline, manually copy paste data directory of the app from custom recovery, create a flashable zip to backup/restore data easily etc. Possibly other approaches too.


text:
Recovery my data on internal storage (deleted permanently 1 month ago)
Does software like Dr. Fone, MiniTool that required "root" on android really work 100% for recovering my lost photo?
First of all my phone is not rooted.
I've lost my important photo (deleted permanently) which I kept in internal storage. And recently i always keep my phone clean that is always using cleaner app like CCleaner for cleaning my DCIM folder, thumbnails, and cache. And i've tried a lot of app like DiskDigger and another app in playstore for recover my photo, but they didn't work.
And my last hope is rooting my phone and use software like Dr. Fone, or MiniTool. (If these gonna work)
And i'm really really searching the accurated answer here which will advise me for rooting my phone or not. Because as you know, rooting is very dangerous cz i have bad experience with rooting. I mean if there is no way to recovery my data so i oughtn't to root my phone.
Please help me.
Thanks in advance!

Sorry for your loss but it's almost certainly impossible to recover deleted data if your phone is not already rooted. Rooting usually requires unlocking bootloader which is supposed to erase whole internal storage permanently. Also 1 month is a long period, data must have been overwritten several times by now. See How to make a complete factory reset, without anyone being able to retrieve my data?. Apps claiming data recovery without root mostly make false or ambiguous claims.

@IrfanLatif Thanks for the answer before. And actually that doesn't answer my question either. So actually i've heard about someone losing his data for 6 months, and somehow it still can be recovered. I don't know how, but certainly it requires root. I'm here for convincing myself to rooting is wise as a way for recovering my photo.

no, these tools don't work 100% for recovering your lost photos. Furthermore it is IMPOSSIBLE please READ linked questions

https://android.stackexchange.com/q/219346


text:
I have an old Xcover 3 and want to access all files as there are 3 GB I cannot access
Is there a way I can access all or nearly all files including the operating system files?
I would like to see what is eating up space in it. I kept deleting files and without downloading anything or taking photos and more and more space was taken up until the phone was full again.
I ended up installing an SD card and removing a lot of apps I don't use much.
It only has 8GB internal memory, 4.53 GB of space shows up when connected to a PC which makes sense with the system memory being 3.13GB.
I have now deleted and removed as much as I can and it shows 1.38 GB free. When I first got it there was much more free space than that.
It is running 6.0.1 and shows:
system memory 3.44GB
used space 3.13GB
available space 1.38 GB
which adds up to 7.95 GB.
I would like to know what is in the 3.13 GB used space as all the files and folders I can see with a PC is 24 MB.
dialing *#9900# (Delete dumpstate/logcat) has no effect

See my answer to How disk space is used on Android device?

Thanks, I loaded a terminal emulator and found Knox is using 3.2GB. On the app info it just shows a few MB. It looks like I will have to root it to see what is in there.

Without root you can't be 100% sure where space is being used. But in most cases it's possible to get a close estimate.

I have seen that rooting it may cause a problem with Knox. As this is a work phone I don't want to mess too much with it as I am sending it back soon as I have a new one. What could Knox be storing that woud take up over 3 GB?

If it is a work phone the admins of your company may use the work profile feature. In that case all apps that run inside the Knox protected area may be included in that 3.2 GB storage size calculation. Therefore check all your work apps for their data usage. Especially mail and browser app usually cache a lot of data. In the end it is like Irfan said, if you don't find the causing app(s) by chance you will never know it without root - hence you have to live with it. And complain at your company buying 8GB phones - 16GB+ is the minimum today for a usable phone.

The phone was supposed to be temporary, I have had it 3 years. We have had a change of manager and now have Samsung A50's

There was talk that the old manager was monitoring our calls and possibly controlling the microphone and maybe the camera.
There were a few people who said he knew things they had not told anyone else at work or just one person by phone. He put live (by 4G) cameras in our vehicles and trackers that analyze our driving. Glad he's gone.
I was wondering if there was any data hidden in the phone that would prove this.


text:
Android automatically makes a call after connecting to audio bluetooth device
After connecting to my bluetooth headphone, my phone automatically calls my friend(let's call him Bob), when i reject the call it calls again, this issue only happens with my new bluetooth speaker, my device doesn't have this issue with any other audio or bluetooth devices.
P. S:Android version:8:0:0
Emui version:8:0:0:0

Does the Bluetooth headphone have buttons/functions to accept a call/turn volume/etc.? Have you tested on other phones? Might be a defect on the headphone.

@Andrew T., the bluetooth headphone doesn't have any buttons/functions, i have tested it on several devices, on windows 10 it automatically changes volume to 100 after connecting, on some android devices it makes a call, in some other android devices it makes a call and automatically plays a song.

Is there a way to reprogram the headphone or any option to prevent the bluetooth headphone from making call, playing music, changing volume?

There might be a way... I've done a quick research and came with Reddit thread that mentions Button Mapper app. I haven't tried it, and you probably need to do a trial & error on determining which keys are pressed and need to be disabled...

Actually the app doesn't work very well, it doesn't detect call button, also sometimes it doesn't bypass the button function.


text:
Cannot unlock Motorola C following the instructions from Motorola
I have:

Created an account with Motorola
Enabled developer mode
Enabled "OEM unlocking"
Enabled USB debugging
Disabled the lock-screen PIN

I then connected the device to my PC with a USB cable and booted the device while holding volume down.
The device is visible to fastboot:
$ fastboot devices
ZY322V73DQ  fastboot

However, I cannot run any "oem" commands:
$ fastboot oem get_unlock_data
...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.002s

How can I unlock my Motorola C?

Here is everything else:
$ fastboot getvar all
(bootloader)    max-download-size: 0x8000000
(bootloader)    partition-size:flashinfo: 1000000
(bootloader)    partition-type:flashinfo: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:userdata: 32000000
(bootloader)    partition-type:userdata: ext4
(bootloader)    partition-size:cache: 19000000
(bootloader)    partition-type:cache: ext4
(bootloader)    partition-size:system: c0000000
(bootloader)    partition-type:system: ext4
(bootloader)    partition-size:metadata: 2480000
(bootloader)    partition-type:metadata: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:nvdata: 2000000
(bootloader)    partition-type:nvdata: ext4
(bootloader)    partition-size:frp: 100000
(bootloader)    partition-type:frp: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:efuse: 80000
(bootloader)    partition-type:efuse: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:tee2: 500000
(bootloader)    partition-type:tee2: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:tee1: 500000
(bootloader)    partition-type:tee1: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:keystore: 800000
(bootloader)    partition-type:keystore: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:secro: 600000
(bootloader)    partition-type:secro: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:oemkeystore: 200000
(bootloader)    partition-type:oemkeystore: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:seccfg: 80000
(bootloader)    partition-type:seccfg: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:expdb: a00000
(bootloader)    partition-type:expdb: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:logo: 800000
(bootloader)    partition-type:logo: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:recovery: 1000000
(bootloader)    partition-type:recovery: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:boot: 1000000
(bootloader)    partition-type:boot: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:para: 80000
(bootloader)    partition-type:para: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:lk: 80000
(bootloader)    partition-type:lk: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:protect2: a00000
(bootloader)    partition-type:protect2: ext4
(bootloader)    partition-size:protect1: a00000
(bootloader)    partition-type:protect1: ext4
(bootloader)    partition-size:nvram: 500000
(bootloader)    partition-type:nvram: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:proinfo: 300000
(bootloader)    partition-type:proinfo: raw data
(bootloader)    partition-size:preloader: 40000
(bootloader)    partition-type:preloader: raw data
(bootloader)    ro.carrier: 3gb
(bootloader)    radio: 5
(bootloader)    kernel.version[0]: Linux version 3.18.35+
(bootloader)    kernel.version[1]: (zhaopan@dell-PowerEdge-R730)
(bootloader)    kernel.version[2]: gcc version 4.8 (GCC)
(bootloader)    kernel.version[3]: 1 SMP PREEMPT
(bootloader)    kernel.version[4]: 2019-03-26:11:19:45
(bootloader)    ro.build.fingerprint[1]: motorola/namath_54/namath:7.0/NRD
(bootloader)    ro.build.fingerprint[2]: D90M.009/1553569854:user/release-
(bootloader)    ro.build.fingerprint[3]: -keys
(bootloader)    ro.build.version.mtk[1]: alps-mp-n0.mp1-V1.0.2_wt6737m.65.
(bootloader)    ro.build.version.mtk[2]: .n_P109
(bootloader)    ro.build.version.full[1]: Blur_Version.25.41.09.namath_54.
(bootloader)    ro.build.version.full[2]: 3gb.en.US
(bootloader)    imei1: 000000000000000
(bootloader)    boot reason: wdt_by_pass_pwk
(bootloader)    hwrev: M11
(bootloader)    CID: 0x0032
(bootloader)    SKU: XT1754
(bootloader)    CPU: "MT6735"
(bootloader)    serialno: ZY322V73DQ
(bootloader)    off-mode-charge: 1
(bootloader)    warranty: yes
(bootloader)    securestate: no
(bootloader)    hwsecure: yes
(bootloader)    kernel: lk
(bootloader)    board: WT98736B32_BB8
(bootloader)    product: WT98736B32_BB8
(bootloader)    Ram size: 1GB
(bootloader)    emmc: KMFE60012M_B214
(bootloader)    storage-type: emmc
(bootloader)    version-preloader: 0.1.00
(bootloader)    version: 0.5
all: Done!!
finished. total time: 0.006s

might not be unlockable. i have seen some tuts recommending mfastboot instead of fastboot, give it a shot. rooting with locked bootloader might possible if you set keep force encryption and keep avb verity in Magisk Manager advanced settings, find the right MTK_AllInOne_DA.bin and auth_sv5.auth and flash patched boot-verified.img

https://blog.hovatek.com/so-whats-all-this-talk-about-meditek-secure-boot-and-da-files

only if SP Flash Tool fails as descriped above: suboot script (not for noobs)
https://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=79626434&postcount=135
or as app (untested)
https://github.com/JunioJsv/mtk-easy-su


text:
Can a System-App read the data of other apps on Android 9?
I want to know if a system-app is able to read the data of other apps (the data stored in /data/data.) on Android 9.
Thanks!

welcome to Android Entusiasts site, and while you are surfing on the site don't forget to check: https://android.stackexchange.com/tour for more details about questions and answers!

Yes! System Apps with the protection level signature (the System APK must be signed with the same key used to sign the ROM/Firmware), can read/write/execute/delete all data stored on  /data/data or other folders on the device.
Note that third party apps (OEM custom apps) found on system/priv-app with protection level signatureOrSystem (Deprecated in Android 6.0). may not be able to do this unless they have signature protection level which means signed with the same key as the ROM/Firmware.
Examples: I've seen some chinese manufactures with their built-in data clone solutions which can make a backup to the whole APK and it's data in another phone, and IMO, this is a security risk which should not exist at all on android devices.
EDIT 1: As i've mentioned before let's take a look at an Android APK which is able to copy other APKs data/data folders, it's called Amiclone "com.gionee.dataghost" from the Chinese smartphone manufacturer Gionee (which BTW, faced bankruptcy and liquidation on 2018)

We have the following information, from version 2.1.0w_pub build 20100022

Permissions:
android.permission.ACCESS_COARSE_LOCATION
android.permission.ACCESS_MTK_MMHW
android.permission.ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE
android.permission.ACCESS_SUPERUSER
android.permission.ACCESS_WIFI_STATE
android.permission.BLUETOOTH
android.permission.BLUETOOTH_ADMIN
android.permission.CHANGE_NETWORK_STATE
android.permission.CHANGE_WIFI_STATE
android.permission.GET_TASKS
android.permission.INSTALL_PACKAGES
android.permission.INTERNET
android.permission.KILL_BACKGROUND_PROCESSES
android.permission.MANAGE_DOCUMENTS
android.permission.MODIFY_PHONE_STATE
android.permission.MOUNT_FORMAT_FILESYSTEMS
android.permission.MOUNT_UNMOUNT_FILESYSTEMS
android.permission.READ_CALENDAR
android.permission.READ_CALL_LOG
android.permission.READ_CONTACTS
android.permission.READ_EXTERNAL_STORAGE
android.permission.READ_LOGS
android.permission.READ_PHONE_STATE
android.permission.READ_SMS
android.permission.RECEIVE_BOOT_COMPLETED
android.permission.RECORD_AUDIO
android.permission.UPDATE_APP_OPS_STATS
android.permission.WAKE_LOCK
android.permission.WRITE_CALENDAR
android.permission.WRITE_CALL_LOG
android.permission.WRITE_CONTACTS
android.permission.WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE
android.permission.WRITE_MEDIA_STORAGE
android.permission.WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS
android.permission.WRITE_SETTINGS
android.permission.WRITE_SMS
com.gionee.youju.statistics.permission.READ_PROVIDER
com.gionee.youju.statistics.permission.WRITE_PROVIDER

Signature:
Number of signers: 1
Signer #1 certificate DN: EMAILADDRESS=gionee@gionee.com, CN=Gionee, OU=Gionee, O=Gionee, L=ShenZhen, ST=GuangDong, C=CN
Signer #1 certificate SHA-256 digest: c2d992c8a4cda2eed55f69357d6759937878e9a0f0b629524e88aa81ed65f802
Signer #1 certificate SHA-1 digest: 1bb8b4f46eafc2a06a46ba68fd8de543a5c65cbd
Signer #1 certificate MD5 digest: b49792a5687b641492e10a29152f7454
Signer #1 key algorithm: RSA
Signer #1 key size (bits): 2048
Signer #1 public key SHA-256 digest: 858b75200e11e0e62f6377b0b56beb728085823bddc31669d8348ee28b651815
Signer #1 public key SHA-1 digest: c780dfb20637a7cedcaf78298ec1bfcb7b069da1
Signer #1 public key MD5 digest: ceb817433cbe5a6a3c42cc7a562617ab

Also, this APK has a built-in busybox binary, and it's able to dump the whole user data from /data/data folders while transferring Apps from a Gionee device t o another.
Conclusion:
Yes,  a system APK can copy other Apps and their data, but it's not only about signature as @Irfan has pointed out in his comment, there are permissions of different levels (some of them require signature level protection) etc...
But, as Android Enthusiasts replies are generally for end-users, the full details are not required to answer a question.

No they can't. It's not only about signatures.


text:
How to reset the USB Mode selection after accidentally selecting 'Always' instead of 'Just Once'?
I have an LG-H700. When I plug it in to a computer it typically would should a pop-up asking which type of USB connection mode I want to use. This pop-up would have two buttons "Always" and "Just Once" along with a list of modes including charging and MTP. But not including anything like "Always Ask".
I accidentally clicked on the always button once and now I can't figure out how to get it to reset back to asking every time the device is plugged in.
How do I clear the default USB mode setting so that it will ask each time the device is plugged in?'

Usually there is an option in the Android Developer settings for changing the default USB mode.

@Robert There is Select USB Configuration in there. When I click it I get a pop-up with all of the various types and a cancel button. But there is no setting for "always ask" or anything like that. And when I change this setting it seems to be only temporary until the device is unplugged / re-plugged. The entry in the notification bar on the other hand does save if I choose always again. Though I trying to get it back to asking every time.

Try revoking USB authorization and then connect again. Maybe you get that option back

@beeshyams gave it a shot clearing the authorizations and then reconnecting but still it won't show the dialog on plug in any more.


text:
Automatic Power On and Off
Is it possible to configure a smartphone with Android 8.1.0 to power on and off at specified times?

not exactly what you want, but you can schedule airplane mode with automation apps like MacroDroid. disable SIM PIN protection if you want to receive calls. for kids control there are several other solutions

Some OEM ROMs offer such a functionality, most do not. You can check your device's settings, if there is such an entry. If there is none, then it is not possible. So, the answer to this question will be a yes and no together. It will depend on which smartphone you have.
You can certainly not achieve this with 3rd party apps.

Thank you. I have checked the smartphone's settings and have not found the option to schedule powering on the device. Are there custom-made Android ROMs which have greater functionality?


text:
Which physical remote controls work with android-tv?
I have an old ADT-1 dev kit laying around at home. I want to bring it back to life to use for Netflix and other streaming stuff.
It came with a game controller, which is fine for gaming, but not so convenient for TV.
What specifications should I look for to get a physical remote control? I searched AliExpress for "android tv remote" and got all kind of things, many using dongles.
Would any "bluetooth" controller work? I want to know what I should be looking for ...

Before buying stuff I would first evaluate if Netflix or your preferred streaming service really works in the preferred resolution on this device, because that a streaming service works may just mean you can get SD-TV resolution (no HD streaming)...

My Netflix subscription is SD. You have easy test for HD?

I probably will try popcorn time as well. I haven’t researched how yet


text:
Forcing a minimal font size on Android Chrome without any exceptions
Is it possible to truly, no ifs or buts, force a minimal font size on Android 9, Chrome 78?
Yes, it may break the layout, but that's another problem. I don't even get that far to get Chrome consistently apply text zoom and not to run in certain situations where it refuses to increase the font size.
An example website would be this one: with accessibility options you easily get the font size of the text outside of the beige boxes scaled, but the text inside of the beige boxes simply stays small.

Question is for Chrome ,  my answer of Firefox is not relevant, hence deleted


text:
Applications don't recognise internal storage partition 2 mounted as external sd card
So I have a Chuwi Hi10 Plus running RemixOS 2.0 (Android 5.1.1). This was originally a dual boot tablet, but I deleted Windows, so now the device has 45 gigs of storage free on the drive. I formatted this part as Fat32, because I wanted to mount it as an sd card. I modified the fstab file in the boot image, to mount this new partition where normally an external sd card would get mounted. The partition gets correctly mounted, I can read and write it with Root Explorer, but the applications don't see it, so I can't really use it. What else do I have to do so that all the applications on the device recognise it?
The original fstab file (I included only the relevant part):
##############################################################
# Source: device/intel/mixins/groups/storage/sdcard-mmcblk1-4xUSB-sda-emulated/fstab
##############################################################
*/block/sda*                            auto             vfat    defaults                                   voldmanaged=usbdisk:auto
*/block/sdb*                            auto             vfat    defaults                                   voldmanaged=usbdisk2:auto
*/block/sdc*                            auto             vfat    defaults                                   voldmanaged=usbdisk3:auto
*/block/sdd*                            auto             vfat    defaults                                   voldmanaged=usbdisk4:auto
*/block/mmcblk1*                        auto             vfat    defaults                                   voldmanaged=sdcard1:auto
/dev/block/mmcblk1p1                    /sdcard          vfat    defaults                                   recoveryonly

The modified version (last 2 lines):
##############################################################
# Source: device/intel/mixins/groups/storage/sdcard-mmcblk1-4xUSB-sda-emulated/fstab
##############################################################
*/block/sda*                            auto                 vfat    defaults                                   voldmanaged=usbdisk:auto
*/block/sdb*                            auto                 vfat    defaults                                   voldmanaged=usbdisk2:auto
*/block/sdc*                            auto                 vfat    defaults                                   voldmanaged=usbdisk3:auto
dev/block/mmcblk1p1                     /mnt/media_rw/usbdisk4    vfat    defaults                                   defaults
dev/block/mmcblk0p12                    /mnt/media_rw/sdcard1     vfat    defaults                                   defaults

As you can see, I also modified the second to last line, because I wanted to have the actual external sd card mounted at usbdisk4, since the new partition would be mounted in its place. I set the flag to defaults, because the voldmanaged option wasn't working. Below you can see a screenshot of the partition succesfuly mounted:

App see only voldmanaged partitions.

But it didn't mount in that mode, so I don't know what else I can do.

it's stupid behaviour of stock android (and windows) to mount first partition only, maybe try another rom (if there is any alternative to RemixOS)? for example LineageOS does mount all partitions (not sure about the voldmanaged stuff)

Try /dev/block/mmcblk0p12 auto vfat defaults voldmanaged=sdcard2:auto or /dev/block/mmcblk0p12 auto vfat defaults voldmanaged=sdcard1:auto or */block/mmcblk0* auto vfat defaults voldmanaged=sdcard1:12 etc. But storage configuration before Android 6 was a bit complex. So you may additionally need to define an sdcard init service and modify framework-res.apk. See references here: https://source.android.com/devices/storage/config-example. An easy but limited way is to not rely on vold and mount the filesystem with correct permissions from fstab or init.d script or init service


text:
missing 3gb of internal storage on samsung galaxy grand 2
I have a samsung galaxy grand 2 which uses android version 4.4.2.
My phone says that i am running out of space and it keeps notifying me about it which is quite disturbing. In settings > storage tab, it says in somewhere there are 2.37 gb of misc file but i cannot find them.

I have nearly tried every cleaning apps in google play and i am sure that my problem is not just simple as removing junk files or cleaning caches. After that , i used DiskUsage app to analyze and things get more interesting. It says there is only 5.17 gb internal storage in my phone, including system data.

There are no more photo to delete or no more app to clear. I just wonder where is my nearly 3gb of internal storage or what is this 2.37 gb of misc file. How can i regain that 3gb ?
Can the reason of all this thing some sort of physical damage on my phone that i could never fix instead of software problems ?

See my answer to How disk space is used on Android device?

Files like downloads are included in misc. Try to click on misc the to view them. The misc items can also be seen from any file explorer. In the second image attached, the total storage is more than 5.17 gib. If you add the values visible, the total is 5.78 gib. From what I have seen, there is no missing storage.


text:
strange message from phone number but it was not sms
Today I received strange message. My phone vibred and on locked screen on top bar I saw identical icon like when I receving a traditional text.
When I unlocked screen than I saw something like popup (or modal) but fixed to bottom. In header was a phone number. In center was a text but not all it was truncated. In bottom section was two buttons cancel and save.
unfortunately i pressed cancel button and now I can't find this message in system.
I thought that it traditional sms so I didn't save this.
there was something about the administrator of my personal data in the content, so it's important to me
Anybody can tell me where I can found this message or what kind of message it is? From network operator?

That's called a flash SMS.

https://www.guidingtech.com/53398/view-android-notifications-history


text:
Stopping auto upload to dropbox for specific folders
From the dropbox android app you can select folders to monitor and auto upload to Camera Roll folder in dropbox. Now I selected other folders besides the camera photos (e.g. screenshots). How can I select again which folders to auto sync so I can remove some folders from the list? I do not seem to find it

Are you on Dropbox plus?

This app let's you chose what folders you want to sync with more options than Dropbox. It's very good - I have been using it for many years till I moved away from Dropbox recently. Only catch is free version let's you sync one folder whereas paid version can sync entire Dropbox

Use rclone if you don't mind CLI. Free, open-source and with a lot of flexibility.

@beeshyams yes I am

I only have free Dropbox so can't help with settings or how to. Anyway, you have a couple of alternatives proposed above

@beeshyams why use another app?

It's because I don't know how DropBox Plus works. Maybe some one who has that can answer


text:
Can an android phone be tracked on find my phone app etc if the sim has been removed and had an factory reset?
Can an android phone be tracked last location on find my phone app etc if the sim has been removed and had an factory reset?

Google help says

To find, lock, or erase an Android phone, that phone must:
Be turned on
Be signed in to a Google Account
Be connected to mobile data or Wi-Fi
Be visible on Google Play
Have Location turned on
Have Find My Device turned on

After a factory reset, your account is removed from the phone and without SIM it's not connected to internet.
So no, it can't

is this true for FRP where google account remains bonded after reset?

My understanding is that all conditions need to be met. After a factory reset, wifi credentials are wiped, you can't enter the device to activate wifi, no SIM, so I think the logic holds that find my device won't work. But yes to be sure one needs to test @alecxs

@alecxs Í assume you mean factory reset protection. After resetting the device, you are not really logged in the Google accout, probably just the connection between phone ID and device ID is remembered somewhere (on the phone or at Google). Maybe Google could implement Find my phone even for your case, but this assumes that the thief in quite inexperienced, so the impact is questionable. Also, it could bring some negative PR like “Google tracks you even after factory reset”, regardless of good intentions.


text:
How to delete some files on unbootable phone with low memory?
I had been ignoring low memory on my android phone (Nexus 6P running copperhead OS) for some time.
OS suddenly crashed out of no where and started booting up infinitely. After forcing it to restart and entering the password for decryption, phone never finishes the boot procedure. Seems that due to zero or very less space, some error must be occurring, which doesn't let the OS finish the boot procedure.
It's my assumption that low memory could have been the issue, so trying to find a way to delete files and let OS have some space to boot up.
(1) Bootloader is locked. I can see "Device is LOCKED." at bootloader screen. So, unable to boot latest TWRP via fastboot boot twrp.img. Receiving error FAILED (remote: unlock device to use this command)
(2) ADB sideload option available in copperhead OS recovery doesn't allow any random update.zip. Tried to run an updater script but it fails. It seems that recovery is validating the package. Errors are E: footer is wrong, E: Signature verification failed, E:error: 21 Installation aborted
(3) Tried to find some vulnerabilities which let bypass security features, but didn't find any except this which has been fixed in bootloader angler-03.79 being used.
(4) Phone is running an old android OS : 8.1.0 June 2018 AOSP build, and since then there could be security vulnerabilities being introduced. So are there any vulnerabilities or exploits which can be helpful here?

ask copperhead support if they can provide update.zip for wiping app cache

How did you install the Copperhead custom rom without unlocking the bootloader?

@alecxs I have asked. Let's see what reply I receive.

@Robert Earlier I had the ability for OEM unlocking as stock android was working. I used the official docs to first unlock bootloader and then lock it post installation of copperhead OS.

it seems there already exist OEM solution. ask for update recovery mode with new option "Lacking storage booting"
https://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=3885938

I'm struggling with the same exact issue on CopperheadOS now. I just want to get rid of it and install Lineage after this is over. Did you ever have any luck with this issue? I'd hate to have to just ditch the phone because of a full disk and locked bootloader.

You can ask the OEM developers if they can help with an official solution. Problem is the 1st Level Support will always deny such requests. You can request the source code instead (in compliance with the GPL) and if you are lucky you will get direct contact (email address) to any developer this way instead.
OEM could easily provide (signed) emergency-update.zip containing following files

META-INF/com/google/android/updater-script
ifelse(is_mounted("/data"), ui_print("deleting cache files..."), abort("ERROR: Data not mounted"));
package_extract_dir("tmp", "/tmp");
set_perm_recursive(0, 2000, 0755, 0755, "/tmp");
run_program("/tmp/rmcache.sh");
ui_print("done");

tmp/rmcache.sh
#!/bin/sh
/tmp/busybox find /data/data -type d -iname cache -exec /tmp/busybox find {} -type f -print -delete +

tmp/busybox
use the busybox binary (toybox segmentation fault):
  www.busybox.net/downloads/binaries/1.31.0-defconfig-multiarch-musl

this would free up storage space by deleting some unimportant cache files only. this way it will neither harm the device nor create vulnerability for exploits
this emergency-update.zip can be applied via the recovery menu's "Apply update from SD card"
after this you should be able to boot at least once and get the availability to immediately enable airplane mode (prevents data usage), usb-debugging (for adb uninstall in case system_server crashes) and backup/clear your Internal Storage via MTP USB (or adb)

Appreciate for providing the updater-script. I have a question here. How updater-script will be able to decrypt the /data. Shouldn't there be a command as well which uses the decryption password to first mount /data and then delete some files?

Fortunately, I have received reply from the copperhead, but it suggests towards adb backup which I am unable to figure out. I have tried adb backup -all in recovery mode, but that spits out adb: unable to connect for backup: closed. It should mean, backup is not available. I see only adb sideload <update.zip> to be enabled and a message in recovery mode : Supported API: 3. Among 3 APIs, sideload is one, what could be other two?

I have asked for either signed zip or key for signing the zip, as copperhead says Nexus 6P is out of support. Don't know about key unless it is being used somewhere else, but hope to receive at least the signed zip.

for sure they won't leak signing key, that would vulnerable all devices


text:
Do I need to factory reset?
I have downloaded a bunch of apps on my 3-year-old Lenovo Android tablet. Lately, several of the app icons have been turned into little green android images. Also, the books I've downloaded to Acrobat Reader are inaccessible. Do I need a factory reset? If I do, how can I get back the great books that I was looking forward to reading?

Did you remove your micro Sd card from the device?


text:
Is it possible to access speech-to-text audio clips for debugging?
Is there a way to access the audio clip that gets used for Google's speech-to-text transcribing?
I've been getting increasingly inaccurate output using Google's speech-to-text output. After discovering my Samsung phone has more than one microphone, I'm  wondering if perhaps this could have to do with either which microphone is getting used, and/or if there's any audio processing being applied which is affecting accuracy.
If I could debug these waveform/recordings myself, I could at least see whether the input itself is the source of the inaccuracy, or whether it's something else.

Issues relating to programming is off-topic here. You can just run any number of audio recording apps to see what is being recorded to check if there is a device problem.

https://myactivity.google.com/myactivity?restrict=vaa

https://myactivity.google.com/myactivity?restrict=vaa suggested by  alecxs
will let you access audio recordings from Google assistant but Gboard  voice typing:

Tested with  Android 12 with a Google Pixel 6.


text:
Root - patch/change installed application's smali code
I want to modify an existing android application, but I want to have it keep its original signature, or at least its capabilities of auto updating and using Google Play services.
I am aware of Lucky Patcher being able to be used to patch the system to disable signature verification, however, there must be another way. Lucky Patcher itself is also capable of patching installed application's code, without invalidating any checks in any way. How is this achieved?
I have also thought of a custom apk installer, ran as root, that just forces the apk install by bypassing the package manager, but I can't find the low-level install process to execute this.
Is there any good solution to modifying an installed Android application and have it still have access to Google Play Services and the like, without patching the Android system?

not possible, thats what the signature is designed for. installing apk and receiving updates from Google Play are two different things. you can install ANY apk to device (with loosened security settings, no root required)

@alecxs But Lucky Patcher does it? Do you know what causes Google Play Services to work or not work for an application then?

Google Play Store (not related to Google Play Services) identifies apps by it's signatures. the signing requires certificate (only author have it) and can therefore not be spoofed. I don't think that Lucky Patcher does recompile apks with it's original signature, i believe this is not possible per design. https://android.stackexchange.com/a/218161 Google Play Services is a core component providing all kind of APIs to give apps availbility to interact with android. if it does not work for an application, the app is outdated and needs maintenance from developer


text:
Called 112 (emergency) but no record in call log?
Last week I called 112 for an emergency. Later I saw that this call was not logged. In the past these calls were logged. Any ideas why this happens?

guesswork: it only appears in call logs when screen is unlocked and called from regular dialer app


text:
Browsing play.google.com without opening Play Store
When I try opening play.google.com in Google Chrome, it redirects to the Google Play Store app. I want to access the Play Store from my browser so I can easily get links to different apps for sharing. Thanks for being such a helpful group!

Use an alternate browser such as Firefox or the Samsung browser?

Thanks. I had thought of this, but hoped not to resort to it. I guess I have an excuse to install Opera Touch again. Cheers

qblueRed, I thought I had already tried that, but it just worked. I guess my problem was trying to tap links to apps


text:
How can I make the Firefox menu bar dark?
How can I make the Firefox menu bar dark?
The dark reader add-on doesn't change the Firefox menu color which is still white :

Any reason it needs to be Firefox? I personally recommend the Samsung Internet Browser for a dark mode. No need for addons.

@NatsuKage thanks good to know! On my side I'm using Opera, which also have a built-in dark for both the web pages and the user interface. I have some account on Firefox so I'd prefer to keep using it.

The bar you are targeting for dark mode can be changed via a theme. Head over to Addon store for Firefox, pick a theme of your liking and install/enable it. Do note that many themes listed there won't work on Firefox for Android even though they would install just fine.
But even after this, the menu bar or whatsoever that is called when you press the three-dots line is still gonna remained unaffected.


text:
Factory Reset without Factory Reset Protection
I've sold my old phone and perform Factory Reset to secure my data. After this the new user found that it's necessary to unlock phone with previous account.
Now, I've this user living nearby so I can perform a login of my account. But after that I want to reset my phone again to not allow him to recover my account/data.
If I perform again Factory Reset probably it will block again. How to perform a reset without enable this protection? (just for this phone and not all phone connected to this account)

remove google account before factory reset https://youtu.be/HTuoE33Kmp4


text:
preview a vCard without adding it to the contact list
Is it possible to preview a vCard (placed online, as a file or QR code), the same way it's done for NFC?
How it works for NFC: https://youtu.be/NCkBAELTODk
Firefox just saves vCard silently, without asking any questions. Trying to open it with contacts asks where to import it.

vCards are plain text files, so you can directly open them with any text editor. There you will find details like Name & Number.

This question is not about how to read vCards, but how to preview it the same way as for NFC.


text:
How to record calls and store on a central server?
Not sure if this should be asked on Software Recs Stack or not, but here goes nothing....
One of my coworkers needs to record calls whenever a call comes through on his premise cell phone. The issue is not recording the calls, instead, the issue comes from actually storing the calls, as the phone that is being used does not have a lot of onboard storage (i.e. has 8GB total storage).
Is there an app or some sort of configuration that we can use to store the recorded calls onto a central server, which has a lot of space? Or at the very least on a very large SD Card (i.e 64GB)?
As you would imagine, the premise cell phone deals with a lot of incoming and outgoing calls, so space is a critical concern.
Thanks for viewing!

Saving to external SD card is simple if the recording app supports. For online backup use any sync app with any cloud storage you want. With root access you can run rclone as a background service or scheduled job.

I'm not sure, but I think YouMail (https://www.youmail.com) could possibly have this functionality.


text:
How do I empty trash bin on phone?
Please help. When photos and videos ef is are deleted,  where do they go? I'd like to delete everything in my " trash", as my storage is always full.
Thank you.

See my answer to How disk space is used on Android device?. May help you understand how space is used and why it gets full.

Android does not have the concept of trash bin or recycle (unlike windows).
When you delete a file, it is not actually deleted but the space it occupied is marked as free and therefore can be used to store data (that's why file recovery is possible using apps).
So, your storage being always full is not because of files in trash. It can be for a bunch of other reasons like remnants of uninstalled apps, system logs, duplicates etc. I would suggest you use this app SD Maid to clean your phone. Pro version allows you to schedule cleaning.
I have no affiliation with the app and recommend it strongly

Some file explorers and galleries etc. provide trash bin as their internal feature. So the files - if deleted using those apps - are moved to some hidden directory on external or app's internal storage. Just to mention :)

@IrfanLatif Yes. I thought of mentioning ES and MX that do this but left it out as the focus here is on cleaning :)

Moreover, even the free version of SD Maid allows to index the installed apps and list them according to their size, so that one can then wipe their data via Android itself.


text:
HTTP/HTTPS Transparent Proxy on Android
So on linux, I use transparent mode of mitmdump (mitmproxy without interaction) to build a websites filter and I run it as root on startup so that it cannot be killed if the user does not have sudo permission.
So I want to setup a similar thing for smartphone. It should be standalone rather than say, connect to Internet through PC and let PC does all the work. I am new to Android so forgive me if I am asking stupid questions. My questions are

Many apps like Orbot seem to have HTTP/HTTPS transparent mode (Please recommend if you know something more similar to mitmproxy). But they are GUI based. How do I convert them (or if there exists already) to a silent background service like mitmdump?
Do any of them allow me to add codes like https://docs.mitmproxy.org/stable/addons-scripting/ either directly in the source code or as an automatically called add-on? (Basically, each time a request/response arrive, my function should be triggered to decide whether or not to replace/block it)
If there is no apps similar to mitmproxy, what tools do I need to create such an environment (assuming that I only want to deal requests/responses at HTTP/HTTPS level)?

I do not need to assume any particular Android versions. I just need to make things work first on some version. Please point me to the correct background materials if you feel that they take too long to explain.
Thank you.

If you have a rooted phone simply setup mitmproxy as a native init service. You need to build it with Android NDK (which is a hectic task usually for non-Android projects) or compile/link statically. This answer may help understand how proxy works on Android: https://android.stackexchange.com/a/217801/218526. Also have a look at HttpCanary.

There are apps working as "local VPN" (effectively the same as a proxy) for filtering traffic. Mostly those apps are developed for ad filtering, but you can also use it otherwise. In combination with an device admin profile that can be removed/disabled you could enforce this VPN profile to be always active.


text:
Detect adb connection from the phone side
I want to know if the phone is currently connected to a host that can run adb commands from within the phone, no matter if it's using an app, a shell command constantly running, or any other method that doesn't require the host or an external server.
From the host, I can just run adb devices. Ideally, I would like to have something equivalent inside the phone, say adbdaemon host-info that let's my phone know that there is an existing adb connection with a computer.

Host side (adb) initiates the connection, phone side (adbd) responds to the received commands. You are looking for the inverse. adbd doesn't keep track of the connection, the host side does. Neither adbd provides a method to query current connection status. All that you can know is that phone is connected to a PC and adbd is running. // Btw why do you want to do that? It doesn't make sense normally. Isn't adbd configured to authenticate the connections?

I don't know a way to check if adb is connected to a PC. Using netstat (and filter of lines with adb) you could only check if adb is active, but it does not show if it is connected via USB (adb over Wifi connections should be displayed).

@IrfanLatif I have a setup where my adb connection is a bit dodgy and the phone disappears from adb devices. I've seen that disabling and enabling usb debugging from the phone when that happens solves the issue, and I want to automate it, preferably without relying on an extra server. My phone is rooted, so I have full control of it.


text:
Can't change stock bootanimation to something else on my Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge
So I rooted my device and I downloaded this app called "Boot Animations" https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.jrummy.apps.boot.animations&hl=en
I found one I liked and installed it. From what I've seen the bootanimation.zip is in system/media. Which is where mine got installed so I placed the right permissions for it and rebooted my phone but my provider's animation keeps playing. So I don't know if I'm doing something wrong or if it is located somewhere else? My phone model is SMG935.

Many EOMs put the animation just as an executable in /system/bin or /vendor/bin which is run as an init service on boot. Your custom animation would play only if it's the stock /system/bin/bootanimation service.

But how would I make it work in such case? since mine is a zip file. Since yeah you're right I have a bootanimation there.

I don't have your device to provide a step-by-step guide. But in theory you have to enable bootanim init service and disable any other which shows boot animation.


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How to make spotify play all songs in the search results
On the Windows desktop version of Spotify, when you search and start playing one song in the search results, Spotify will play all the subsequent songs in the search results when the song ends. It even shuffles the results if you have shuffle turned on. The Android app used to have this function as well, but it appears it was removed because it annoyed people sometime in 2018 (really, if you just want the one song, add it to the queue and skip once; it's not hard). Is there a workaround to still have this feature? Someone on the Spotify forums claimed that Spotify now creates a playlist based on search results:

The overhaul follows Spotify’s recent update to song search; now when you search for a song with a common name, Spotify will create a playlist, an actual list, based around the song instead of playing every version of that searched song in order.
  You can learn more by reading this blog post and this article of what's new with Spotify Premium.

The blog post in question was vauge and had no instances of the word "playlist" on the page, and the article concerned something about the artists radio, so I'm going to assume that person has no idea what they're talking about, but it's my only lead so I posted it in case someone can clarify this feature
The main question is: Is it possible, in any way, to make the Spotify android app play all the songs in the search results?


text:
How can I lock device on a particular network frequency using android kernel sources?
Motivation
My goal is to select or lock LTE frequency bands on mobile devices with Qualcomm chipset. On some devices like Samsung Galaxy S5, we can access hidden menu: *#2263# to select the radio bands, but this secret code is not available for other devices from other vendors, so a more generic way to do this task is needed. Using Qualcomm proprietary tool (QXDM) is another choice but it requires connecting your device to a PC. I want an in-device solution.
I am referring diag_qcdm for achieving the goal but this source is out of date and not working. I have a rooted device whose kernel sources are available.
Is there anyone who has experience in capturing the communication between the Qualcomm chipset and the ril daemon that are responsible for network selection.
I want to lock a device on a particular

RAT
Band
PCI
EARFCN

for testing their strength in the field.
Please suggest the ways to do it..

Kernel hacking for modifying the radio is IMHO a very rare topic. I would be surprised if you get here any answers. In my opinion the chance to find a way that works for you is by using e.g. QXDM and try to decompile/sniff/hook what these tools actually do on your device. Then you may be able to develop an on-device variant.