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Why do apps stop supporting older Android versions after some time?
My mother had a shopping app on her old smartphone which runs Android v6. Recently I noticed that the app on her phone was no longer supported. I've seen such things happen on old phones generally with many apps. I just wanted to know, why do companies drop their support to older OS versions after few years? Does it cost them a lot to continue the support to older OS versions as well? Does it require a whole team to be hired to just keep managing the support for older OS? Just being curious about this. Thanks.

you can install old app version from apk mirror

"Does it cost them a lot to continue the support to older OS versions as well?" - Yes, it costs money. The developer has decided that their Android v6 user-base is so small that dropping support would not affect their usage stats in any noticeable way.

Could you look at that the other way round, and consider how much effort should be put into making new versions of Android support old(er) apps?

you can go to xda to see if there's a custom build of a newer Android version for your phone

Supporting something old costs money and limits time and effort that can be invested into improvements without having any real benefits from it so people tend to drop support if the user base falls below the point of being worth keeping support. Besides that, the changes in Android versions are usually requiring changing how things work, so you need double the work - once to make the old version work, and for every new version possible the same thing but just in a different way - all that costs a lot of money just to maintain without any additional improvements or investments.

We live in a throwaway world

It's been about 10 years since I retired, but the last few years of my career I worked on smartphone apps, on a couple of different OSes.  I can tell you that one difficult problem with developing complex apps was that the OS would change the details of its features quite often, so that you'd have to spend several weeks about every 6 months upgrading things.  And you had no way of knowing if a change to the OS affected one version different from a later one.  It was easier to just drop support of old OS versions, rather than have to test them.

There are two ways to support old Android versions:

Build one app that makes use of compatibility patches to supports old Android versions (down to a specific version) but also support all modern Android versions.

Build two or more apps each for a set of Android versions.

The second option is of course very costly as you have to develop maintain each app app version independently (or at least large parts of the app). This way is often not used or only if the app has been completely rewritten for new devices and for old devices the old version remains with minimal to no support.
Therefore the common way is option 1 – one app that has all compatibility fixes included. The main problem is that newer Android versions include interesting new features that are not (fully) available using the compatibility system Google provides. Therefore if you want to make use of them and the functionality is not optional in your app, app developers may decide to drop support of older Android versions in favor if being able to use new features of new Android versions. Decreasing the number of supported Android versions simplifies the app as old workarounds can be removed and don't have to be maintained anymore. And of course it removes the necessity to test the app on such old devices which can be a problem if you want to test your app on physical devices (not emulators) as old devices break and are more and more difficult to get.

In addition, Support of anything has costs.  If I have create a new app and a new version of Android comes up, I now need to run tests to make sure that the app (and any changes I make) run on two versions.  When a third version comes out, I need to run tests on three versions - and so on.  If I say I support an older version, but I don't actively support that old version and old version users notice a bug, I'll get dinged in reviews. It just costs more to support more versions.

Also, if you can't support newer features on older platforms, then you will be getting reviews from people who can't enjoy those newer features. They may even complain in the reviews about their absence.

Option 3: Provide parallel implementations inside the app for features that require APIs that are either not available in oldest supported Android version or have been deprecated in new Android versions. Another point is that to actively support vintage Android versions, you need a collection of vintage phones. If you don't already have them or they break, buying them is going to be difficult.

"if you want to test your app on physical devices (not emulators)" — emulators for older Android versions also provide worse emulation. More things that work on emulator which then break on a physical device or vice versa. I've a gut feeling that older OS versions are also tinkered with more by vendors, so you get further away from a vanilla Android that with newer OS versions.

It’s possibly worth noting that this is no different from any other platform. All major software eventually stops supporting old platforms, it just comes down to when they stop supporting specific versions.

The Android SDK (software development kit) sets a minimum version of Android that it supports, as explained by another Q and A:
https://stackoverflow.com/q/24441178/1836461
https://stackoverflow.com/a/61087797/1836461
Developers/companies (referred to as just "developer" from now on) can choose to support older version, but it gets hard to maintain that code. Speaking as a developer, it can be difficult to remember what settings or commands mean to different versions of an OS. Some of these differences are even deprecated (disapproved of) or completely removed from the newer SDKs, which makes it difficult or impossible to maintain backwards compatibility. And sometimes it's removed because of good reasons, usually meaning that it has significant security issues.
And just because the app is dropped, it doesn't mean that there isn't a newer version available. Some companies may rewrite their software completely (for various reasons including getting rid of large amounts of unnecessary legacy code), then post it as a separate app, leaving the previous version available as their idea of backwards compatibility.
In fact, most non-mobile software development is done like this. The old version is still available somewhere when a new version is released. Mobile stores like Google and Apple don't have an easy way for a user to get older versions, even though the developer can still see those old versions.
Other reasons
A company may also decide that their method of communication (protocols) need to be updated to newer specifications that aren't available in old versions of the SDK. If you have an app written in an old SDK that works with old phones, but you need/decide to upgrade those protocols to a security version the old version just doesn't support, you may have to remove some backwards compatibility to get access to the newer standards in a newer SDK. And if you're going to completely rewrite an app, it makes more sense to do it in the latest SDK, rather than one that'll be completely out dated again in 1-2 years.
Even just rewriting an app to clean it up, remove unnecessary functionality, redo the user interface/user experience (UI/UX), or 100 other reasons, using the most recent SDK also makes the most sense.
The Answer I linked to above talks about 25% of Twitter users being ignored because of platform changes due to an upgraded app. Well, those 25% are the older phones that will likely be the fastest shrinking group of phones around. They will eventually be broken, dropped, the battery ruined with no replacements available, or a 1000 other reasons, including other apps ceasing to support them. I'm not saying it's a good move to remove that many users from using your app all at once, but evidently they thought they could survive it.
Parallel example
In the desktop browser market, Chrome is the vast leader in usage.
https://netmarketshare.com/browser-market-share.aspx
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers
As Internet Explorer (IE), Edge, Gecko, Firefox, Safari, and others have fallen out of use, developers stop doing as much cross-browser compatibility. As someone who's done that as well, it's a total PITA, especially when a requirement is pixel perfect compatibility, which is pretty much impossible. I have 5 browsers installed because of this reason, yet I only use 1 for browsing.
Some companies will insist on supporting IE and Edge, because "it's installed as the default on computers and most of our users don't know to install something else". It doesn't matter how few people actually use IE or Edge, because "the statistics are taken from sites where most users are devs or higher level computer users". But the reality is that the majority of browsers aren't worth the time to support. People don't support Netscape Navigator anymore, even if there is someone still running Win 3.11 for Workgroups, Win 98SE, or Mac OS 8.5.
Conclusion
What I'm saying saying is at some point, you have to draw a line as to what you're going to support, as older versions cease to be useful or usable by both the user and the developer.
Spending time, money, and effort on old versions that aren't heavily used isn't usually a good use of resources.
Sometimes this is strictly a "make more money" ideal, in that the developer wants to force you to buy the new version, but that's not always the case. It makes more sense to developers to spend more time on new features and relevant bugs in a new version than new features and bugs in the old version.

I think your browser example is a bit too extreme. Netscape isn't supported because its EOL was 2008. Edge/FF/Safari/etc are still actively developed. According to your first link, Edge has a marketshare of 11.4% (and a constant upwards trend). Firefox has 6.5%. That's still pretty significant. Chrome has 68%, so if you only support Chrome, you exclude 32% of users. Your second link has very different percentages (safari rises to a significant 19%), but shows the same problem (only supporting Chrome excludes 37% of users).

To get back to Android, only supporting Chrome would be akin to only supporting above Oreo. Oreo is still not EOL and has a marketshare of above 15%. Deciding not to support it would be an odd decision which imho justifies questioning why that is. Marshmallow (OPs example) also still has significant usage (around 6%), but it was EOL in 2017. Not having security updates for 3+ years would imho be a good example of a valid reason to drop support.

The other answers are great, and they respond to the question directly; let us try a slightly different approach.
Why do people still have phones running such old versions of Android in the first place? Usually it is because their manufacturers no longer support those models. Why not? Surely part of the reason is that the Android developers no longer support old versions of Android.
So not only is it inherently costly to develop apps for old versions of Android, such developers would have to put up with a platform full of known bugs that will definitely not be fixed. Who wants to do that?
Maybe developers will put up with it for a while, if their users demand it. But when there are not many users using an old Android version anymore, it is likely to be dropped.
The issues discussed here and in the other answers also explain why some websites only support the “latest versions” of the major web browsers.

TL;DR answer:
Because programming for each version of Android is slightly different and thus supporting each of them costs extra money. When a particular version is generating less profit than necessary to justify maintaining it, the support is dropped.

That calculation is oversimplistic, though. It could very well be the case, that only the fact that an app is available for a platfrom that is not financially viable in itself is the reason that the other platforms are viable, especially if they interact. - Removing support for a financially unviable platform may get other users to stop using the app, making more platforms unprofitable, and so on...

@I'mwithMonica Well, it's a TL;DR answer ;) My intention was to post a brief answer that gives a reader the general idea of the situation, without diving into details.

There is more money in forcing users to upgrade to newer versions of Android, which in turn requires buying new hardware to run the newer version of Android.
To make this happen, the developers of Android change the programming APIs little by little as new versions come out. New ways of doing things are added, and old ways of doing things are removed over time. Bugs in the APIs that older software depended on are fixed, and no effort is put in to maintaining the old behavior to maintain compatibility.
Doing this forces app makers to constantly maintain their software and release newer versions of it with minor changes. It costs more money to tweak the software so that it works on older versions of Android as well as the latest release at the same time. To maintain compatibility across major versions differences of Android, multiple versions of the app may have to be maintained and distributed separately. This would become quite costly, and since most everyone has a newer device, the market to justify the extra expense just isn't there.
Microsoft's traditional approach has been to go to great lengths to maintain compatibility with older software. Large numbers of applications were tested on their next version of Windows prior to release, and many tweaks were done to ensure compatibility. Because of this, software developers can just make one version of the software that works on an older version of Windows, and it will work on the newer versions as well. With the release of Windows Vista Microsoft began to move away from this business strategy, and is now developing Windows 10 in a way that more resembles Android, but Windows compatibility with older software is still better than the mobile operating systems and even Mac OS X.

Judging from the Android documentation, Android also goes to great lengths to maintain compatibility. Although, in some respects, that seems to be changing now, in the interests of “privacy”.

Microsoft maintained backwards compatibility because their bread and butter market at the time was government+businesses who are notoriously sensitive to the price of upgrading software. Android's primary market is home users who would rather have new features and forget about the old stuff.

The answers given thus far are factual, but I question the principles behind them, and would like to briefly address the question of "why..." in a deeper sense.
It makes sense that developers would upgrade apps and release new versions -- but in my opinion the release of new versions should not require retirement of older versions.  Simply identify them as "unsupported" and let them remain available for those users who cannot run the new version.  (Personally, I blame Microsoft for inventing, and making seem "natural," the "forced upgrade" business model in the computing industry...)
Actually, I also take issue with the very idea of "dropping support" at all.  One can never be certain that nobody is still using something; I myself am just now getting around to looking at, and trying, some CD-ROM games for Windows 98... (Fortunately, I have never found it necessary to contact Microsoft for support, but somebody else out there may wish to.)  Personally, as a software developer, I continue to support everything I've ever written, and have in fact taken support calls well into the 2000s for software I wrote (by which I mean parts of the turnkey host computer for a commercial product) between 1988 and 1997.  In effect, this means supporting everything, forever.  I reject the claim that this will cost any significant amount of money, because the number of users making demands on that support will decrease (probably inverse-exponentially, but never to zero, mathematically) and require less and less expenditure as time goes on.

The problem with this admirable position is the availability of development tools and test hardware. What development tools did you use in 1988, and can you still run them? What operating system(s) did your 1988 products run on, and can you still run those?

I work on software (math libraries) for quite a few platforms, including Android. I can describe our decision-making process for Android version support. It is not entirely typical, because we only produce native code, and don't touch Java or Kotlin.
We started on Android in early 2018 (so we were late-comers) because an existing customer who used other platforms wanted Android. They wanted to offer apps that dealt with data from their Windows products.
After some exploration and prototyping, we did an implementation, and shipped it in early 2019. The minimum Android version that the customer wanted support for was 5.0, and they only wanted 64-bit native code. Not needing to produce 32-bit native code was welcome, since the software has a lot of automated testing, and avoiding the need to test both 32-bit and 64-bit versions was welcome.
The main problem with needing to prepare in 2018 to support Android 5.0 was getting a 5.x device, since they were getting hard to find. We considered it obligatory to have a device on the oldest (or nearly so) version that we supported, so that we could reproduce version-specific bugs if they happened. If you try hard to ensure things like that won't be a problem, they usually don't happen at all.
We got an Amazon Kindle Fire with an OS based on 5.1, and found some incompatibilities with the 7.0 that we were using on new devices for the main testing. By early 2019 we were in production, testing on 5.1 and 7.0, and claiming support for 5.0 onwards. The newest released Android at the time was 9.x, but 8.x was the newest with any market share.
Android devices don't last forever, especially if they aren't being used regularly. Leaving them unused and unplugged for months is a bad idea, because sometimes they won't wake up again. To make sure that your software works on newer versions of Android, you need to test it on them, and you also need to preserve some devices on old versions, so that you can reproduce customer bugs. The simplest way to do this is to buy new test devices, approximately annually.
At that point, dropping support for older versions of Android was a good idea, because it enabled us to trim what would otherwise be an endlessly growing collection of old devices.
In mid-2020, we updated to a newer NDK, to get a newer C++ compiler, and made Android 7 our minimum supported version. Android 10 was the newest version in circulation, but we'd got some nice fast test 'phones  with 9.0, and settled for that.
At the end of June 2022, I changed to Android 9 as the minimum supported. Android 12 was then the current version, and 13 was approaching release. The native code environment doesn't change nearly as fast as the app presentation layer, so updating every two years should be OK.
As of June 2022, according to the data at GlobalStats Statcounter, I'll be compatible with just over 82% of the worldwide Android market, heavily biased towards newer and faster devices. (88.6% of the North American market, 87% of the European market) My ISV customers (my employers don't sell end-user apps) are happy with this.
Update: GlobalStats Statcounter was unreliable for May and June 2023 but seems self-consistent again as of July. This was due to privacy changes in Google Chrome. GlobalStats compile their figures from web browsers that visit a wide range of websites, and updates to Chrome meant that the user-agent strings defaulted to Android 10, irrespective of the actual Android version. There are ways of getting the actual version, but they don't work for devices where the manufacturer has not implemented getHighEntropyValues(). That meant Android 10 was overrepresented.


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Galaxy S20: Access sdcard/Android/data
I'm using apps e.g. Autoguard and others that record files to their directory (e.g. sdcard/Android/data/com.hovans.autoguard) and I'd like to back them up locally. Unfortunately due to the disastrous Android 11 update I no longer have access to that folder. Neither the phone explorers (also including Files by Google and the Shortcut app to Samsung's explorer) nor a USB connection helps to gain access to those files on the sd card. The Android/data folder on the internal storage can be viewed using USB or the Samsung explorer but NOT the one on the sd card. The only thing I can see is that the data folder is empty (because only root has the rwx rights).
How can I access those files nonetheless without rooting the phone? I'm getting frustrated after researching for hours with no solution.

Have you tried to access those files via adb? If this works you could use it for creating a backup via tar. Save everything to a tar file on the device and save the created archive on your PC (e.g. by streaming it using adb exec-out tar ... > backup.tar.

@Robert at least on stock Android 11 adb doesn't have access to apps' private directories in shared storage. A new GID 1078 has been introduced to make these directories accessible. And adbd doesn't have this GID.

There must be some file explorer apps which still have full access to /sdcard because it hasn't been fully restricted in Android 11.

@Robert Thank you very much, the creation of the tar archive did not work. However, just pulling the files via adb seems to work. Let me see if all files can be carried over but I'm optimistic.

@beeshyams I tried the SD Maid explorer and it did not work. The internal storage/Android/data can be accessed over the Samsung explorer (i.e. the internal system app), just the SD card is the problem and no explorer can access it.

There is something wrong here. Android 11 actually supports ext. SD better //can you try replacing that card with another and checking?

@beeshyams I've tried that 3C Explorer and it demands permissions for sdcard/Android/data which I cannot give since that folder won't appear in the system explorer (to be able to give those rights). So, no, it doesn't work.

@beeshyams Why would I want to replace the card if I need to get files from it and it has been working prior to the update? I can access every file except the ones in that locked folder and for some reason the adb file transfer also works (takes way too long though). I might try another one later (probably not earlier than tomorrow) but I doubt that it makes a difference.

As I pointed out earlier, Android 11 has made things easier for using SD card, so logically, this shouldn't happen. If on changing the SD card you are able to files on it, it means the problem is with card and the solution may be different //Just ruling out a possibility. I understand your need of using this card

@Peter and Everyone. I ran into this exact issue. After spending a few hours befuddled by the nonsense that Android 11 has created with all of this...I decided to take a step back, look at this from a different perspective and had a tada moment :) The best solution sometimes is the most simplistic and one that was right in front of me the whole time. Well, actually, sitting in my laptop bag that's been parked for about a year.
Long story short, I ejected my SD Card, placed it in my previous S9 which was running Android whatever...anything other than Android 11. As soon as I fired it up, checked my Android/Data folder...everything was there, I simply copied it to my Internal Drive, ejected it, returned to the S10 and was back up and running. Thus, I didn't need to Root my device, test over 10+ File Manager Apps, read article after article, etc...I just had to go back in time before Android 11 and I didn't even have to revert my current S10 back to Android 10 or earlier. I just had to take Android 11 out of the picture.
So, while I've seen all of these press releases, specifications, justifications and reasoning for what Android 11 was supposed to do...it just doesn't compute. Never in my 30+ career have I seen a supposedly new solution lead to a 100% non operative solution against a given. In other words, accessing your Android/Data directory was as easy as 1+1, after Android 11 the only number that matters is 0...the number of items you can access :(
I think the moral to the story here is that always having a contingency plan... in this case an older backup phone pays off. I will not bore you with old stories of how my previous phone(s) helped in other situations...but I think today's result sums things up :)
Take care and I hope this helps everyone with this waste of time nonsense. It's OUR data sitting right in front of us that we NEVER had an issue with prior to Android 11.

in https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/241018/how-to-access-hidden-area-of-sd-card-in-android-11 similar aspects are touched

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


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Are contacts stored in Contacts Provider under one application's account visible to all other applications?
I have read about the Contacts Provider API, but it is not clear to me how applications interactions are regulated. If an application stores contacts in an account specific to that application, can any other application given permission to access contacts still read the information of those contacts (i.e., of the other application)? Or does each application have access only to its own accounts and any contacts manually entered via the (default) Contacts application?

Yes, all data stored in Contacts Provider is visible to all apps with READ_CONTACTS permission and if the user has given the permission. From the official documentation of Android Developers - Retrieve a list of contacts,

Request permission to read the provider
To do any type of search of the Contacts Provider, your app must have READ_CONTACTS permission. [...]

This is why contacts apps can generally show multiple account types for the same person (e.g. Google, WhatsApp, Microsoft), and also why social messaging apps (e.g. WhatsApp) and social media apps (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram) can detect registered accounts based on phone numbers and/or emails stored in the Contacts Provider.

Whenever you start using an app, it asks you for permissions to perform the tasks the app is supposed to do - like access to camera, to contacts, and so on. Those permissions are app specific. You can view the permissions when you go to your phone's configuration -> privacy -> manage permissions.
If you wish, you can revoke permissions of any app you think it shouldn't have that specific permission - it will not harm the app itself, and when the app needs that access again, it will ask you.

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


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Can multiple user profiles see each others' data or photos?
Some specific cases:

What about browsing the drive when connected to a computer via USB?
Is the owner profile able to see other users' data or photos?

In my basic tests, it seems that the user data and photos are isolated when using USB MTP connection. But what if a user installs a File Manager app? Or is there a way to do USB Mass Storage that would expose all the data for all users?

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


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Self replicating worm in sd card
I have a Samsung Galaxy Grand with a 16gb micro-sd card. For some inexplicable reason, I am losing data on the sd card. Folder names are being changed to start with the character "μ." For example, my_music was changed to μy_music (this does not happen on the device's internal memory). There are more than 960 files with the name "μ" and it is replicating itself. Is it a problem with the Micro SD card or something else such as the phone itself? Is there any way I can fix this other than formatting?

I have read on some forums while searching for your issue that it can be caused by a corrupt sdcard. Is the card a SanDisk? Check in LOST.DIR folder and see if there are "lost" files in there.

@Ryan: I checked the LOST.DIR folder and i found all my media and other lost files, though in an unreadable/unopenable format..
kindly suggest what to do next!
thankx in advance

It might be time to try another SD card. That would be the quickest way to check. It could well be corrupt, especially if it is old. Borrow one from a friend, or buy a new one and see how you get on.

Related: 'µamera' problem on S3

Check for suspicious applications you may have installed recently. Also this behaviour is very weird as it should usually do that on the internal sd card where it could harm your device and not on the external one where it only annoys the user.
About the "self replicating": If you know in what file the worm is located and checked if all files are the same then deleting that file and formatting your sd card may be the solution to your issue.

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


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Unable to access Google Play because of account verification problem
My dad has a HTC desire A8181 and he has a problem where he can't log on to google play.
It happened like this: 2 years ago my dad got a message that he had to log in to google play on a Google account but he forgot his password so he did nothing and just didn't log in. Now he wants to log back on to his play store and download an app so I installed another Google account and that worked. Now his phone gives a popup every time i try to install an app that says

Verification required, you have to log on to your google account (translated from dutch)

The app does not install and it says that every time. How can my dad log in to his account to verify it and solve the problem? Or is there another solution to solve this and install apps?

Because this account is the primary account on the device, Google Play tends to use it as the default. You can switch which account to use by opening the side drawer:

You can see the other account icons that are there, and I have a dropdown next to my primary account. Clicking on that allows me to choose a different account.
But since you don't know the password for the primary account, I would suggest the following options:

Log in to the Google account on the computer and reset the password. There you can click on helpful links like "forgot password". Once you reset the password you can change the password on the device and then the account will be verified.
Remove the account completely from the device. If the account isn't used for email and such, which since the phone is not logged in to the account, I would guess this is the case. Go into Settings => Accounts and remove the account that you do not know the password for.

my dad does not know what he had put as recovery questions so he can't recover it  2. he can't delete the account without using a full reset reset

Then switching users is really your only other option. Or reset the device. Resetting the device won't affect any data on the sdcard. And since it's not logged in to the primary account, there isn't anything sync'd to that account, like contacts. It may take a little bit to set the device back up, but in the long run, it is the best option. Just make sure you export contacts and such, to be safe. Then you can import them to the new account so they stay in sync as well, in the future.


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Where can I download the stock clock apk for LG G3?
I deleted the stock clock app on the LG G3 (Model D855) without knowing that I need it for the Quick Circle Case to correctly display the Clock Faces when the lid is closed.
Do you know a place where I can download the stock APK file, it goes something like "com.lge.alarmclock", the easy access from Google Drive is not longer working:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3dApvWjgNoKVmU5cjlUMFdwbW8/edit?usp=sharing
not working
I tried doing the hard reset but the app did not get back.
Or if anyone would be so kind to back it up for me, I would deeply appreciate it.
Thank you in advance for your time and help.

did you actually delete the app from /system/priv-app or did you just remove the circle clock from the lock screen?

A "hard reset" would not change the /system partition, which is where the .apk originates. Since you deleted the system app, I'm going to assume that you have root access. After installing the .apk, I recommend manually pushing it to /system/priv-app/ (command: adb push LGAlarmClock.apk /system/priv-app/, replacing LGAlarmClock.apk with the full path to the .apk. Alternatively, you can change it from a user app to a system app (via an app like Titanium Backup if you install it from PackageInstaller, but I highly recommend pushing it to /system/priv-app/ from adb. Here is a link to LGAlarmClock.apk, pulled from the latest stock lollipop 5.0 build on XDA.

Hi, just a note that the link to the Drive is dead now. It'd be better if you could fix it. Thanks.


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update failure galaxy core 2
well first of all, my phone is rooted. the phone notified me about an update I accidentally pressed update and now its in an endless loop where it will update then fail and update again. please help, I'm getting desperate

Take a look at Where can I find stock or custom ROMs for my Android device?. You will need to flash a "stock" version of the ROM. You might even find one that is stock, but also contains root if you want that.

The update should have stopped as soon as it found that the phone was rooted and not updated it. (Boot-looping is one of the mildest problems if you update a rooted ROM with a non-rooted update that hasn't been modified to update the modifications done to the rooted one.)

Go to SamMobile Firmwares and find the stock ROM for your device (use the model number, not "core 2")
Download Odin and install it on your computer
Download the ROM to the computer (you'll have to create a free account on SamMobile to download anything) and flash the stock ROM to your phone.
Then update it. (If the latest stock ROM is a couple of versions old, you'll have to update more than once to get to the latest version, and you can only update once every 24 hours.)

Flashing the ROM is simple:

After installing Odin, unzip the downloaded ROM.
There will be files starting with AP, BL, etc. Load the files into the appropriate slots in Odin (the AP file goes into the AP slot, etc.)
Plug the phone in and one of the boxes at the top of Odin should show COM and a number after a short time. (You have to have the SAMSUNG_USB_Driver_for_Mobile_Phones installed in the computer.)
Once you see that (the number doesn't matter) and you have the files, run Odin and wait for the phone to restart.

If the ROM isn't the latest version, you'll start getting "there's an update ..." notices. If you want the update, press OK (make sure the battery is up to at least 75% and keeping the charger plugged in isn't a bad idea either) and the phone will download the update and install it.
If that's not the latest update (some are cumulative - they include all changes since the version you have, others aren't and you have to update a step at a time), you'll get another notice the next day, and so on, until you're current.
Then root the updated ROM.
The next time you want an update, you're going to have to do the same thing - revert to stock, update, root. (If being rooted is important to you, make sure there's a current rooting method for your phone for the updated ROM version before you update.)
By the way, the 0.95MB update is probably the "get the phone ready for the next update" update. They do that every so often - some things have to be changed before an update. Or it may be a minor bug fix.
In any case, if the phone is rooted, something wasn't where the update expected it to be, so the updated software is crashing. It's possible to successfully update a rooted phone, it's also possible to hard brick it (it acts the same whether there's a battery in it or not - like a brick). What happens depends on what happened while the phone was rooted and what the update does. Since there are so many variables that winning every throw of the dice in Vegas is a sure thing by comparison, the updating process checks 2 things - that the ROM is the stock one and that the phone has never been rooted. If either test fails, it's supposed to stop with an error message (to the effect that the update failed, even though that's not really true). Evidently, for some reason, yours failed to stop.


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LG G3 proximity sensor half working
The past couple of days my proximity sensor has been playing up and after using CPU-Z to check if it's working I can see that when looking at my phone at a normal distance it shows 5cm, and if I wave my hand at any distance (within reason) it instantly jumps to 0cm.
The problem though is that it does not then return to 5cm for about 30 seconds to a minute which makes it very difficult to use the phone. I can't end a phone call until this resets itself. Additionally, I can't unlock my phone until this resets either. I don't know why this occurs, but if I wake the phone the screen shuts off after about one second making it impossible to unlock it until the sensor resets.
So it seems as if the sensor is faulty - or there's something else going on. Any ideas? I've not had any major drops, a few very minor but nothing that would cause any scratches or other damage.
p.s. I do have a screen protector, however removing this makes no difference, and I've had this on for weeks and not had a problem until now.

Take a look at this video LG G4 Proximity Sensor Calibration (No Root,No App needed) - YouTube.
Go into the secret menu of the phone and do as explained in the video. It worked for me. Good luck.


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Desktop Firefox on Android
Is it possible to run the full desktop Firefox on Android somehow?
Since the UI rewrite, Firefox Mobile is lacking quite a few features and is really bad to use on a device with a bigger screen (tablet), since they completely scrapped the tablet UI.
I don't really want to have it running in a Linux container (which I already have), but recompiled natively.

Even if Android bases on Linux and theoretically could be able to execute the ARM v7/v8 version of Mozilla Firefox for Linux
there are multiple problems:

the libraries available on Linux and Android differs a lot
The whole UI system on Linux using Wayland/X-Window manager is non-existent on Android. So Firefox would be unable to present you an user interface nor render web pages to the screen.

Especially the second point explains why you can run Desktop Mozilla Firefox in some sort of container but not directly on Android.


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Battery Protect Mode: On or Off?
I have a Lenovo Android tablet that I intend to be plugged in 24/7. I have either two options:

Battery protect mode OFF: the device will occasionally discharge to 99%, then be charged back to 100%.
Battery protect mode ON: the device charges to 60%, then stops, discharges down to 40%, then charges back up to 60%.

Which method actually will prolong my battery life/health in the long-term?

Lithium-ion batteries are best kept around 50% charge. The number of charge cycles is not that important if you only charge/discharge it around 50%.
Especially in your case as you want to keep it connected 24/7 the battery protect mode is a perfect match, I strongly recommend to enable battery protect mode.
Because without this battery protect mode the phone would always charge the battery from about 90% to 100%. Then charging would stop and the battery would drop to 90-95% where charging starts again.
Charging a lithium-ion battery between 90% and 100% is the fastest way to degrade and even destroy it. I also has some devices connected 24/7 which is a real battery kille. I already has quite a few devices with blown-up battery in a way that the device disassembles itself from the inner because of the swollen battery.

You say the battery will drop down to 90% to 100%, but in my case it's going to be charging 24/7, so wouldn't the battery only very rarely ever have to be used? (only to recharge it periodically after it naturally discharges 1% or so)

@EH Most devices can not be powered directly via USB, they can only draw power from their battery even while they are powered via USB. So they continuously switch between charging and discharging. Some modern devices at least slow down the charge process if they detect a high number of charge cycles higher than 90% but in the end they are also caught in the charge/discharge cycle.


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Installed magisk after LineageOS upgrade and now wifi doesn't work
I have a OnePlus 7 Pro. I had LineageOS 17 (Android 10) with microG, magisk, and vanced on it running just fine for almost a year. I upgraded the Android version to 11 first (which LineageOS documentation says is a pre-requirement) then I upgraded to LineageOS 18, and everything seemed to work just fine. I can confirm that my recovery and wifi worked.
A few days later I wanted to open Vanced YT, but it was no longer installed, then I noticed that magisk was no longer installed. So I installed it according to it's instructions which was basically using the app to patch the boot.img I got from the extracted files (from a payload-dumper) and then installed the produced magisk_patched-24200_Y0Qmv.img.
Ever since then is my problem. I can no longer turn on my wifi, I no longer have recovery mode, and every time I turn on/reboot the device I am greeted with a "System UI Crashed" error message. I can hit ok and everything else seems to work as expected. With the exception to my wifi not being able to turn on
What I've tried:

re-flashed the original boot.img
re-flashed the recovery image
uninstalled magisk
I tried re-flashing other images from the payload dump (modem.img, etc) the same way the LineageOS documentation said to upgrade and I get the following error

fastboot flash --slot=all modem modem.img
fastboot: error: Could not check if partition modem has slot all

I have no idea what that error means. Nothing changed. I'm still greeted with the same crash message. I still can't turn on my wifi. And I still can't boot into recovery mode.
To make sure I'm clear, my question is; "Where should I go from here? What things can I tell you in order to help me get my wifi working again, and to fix this 'System UI Crashed' error message?"

So I figured out what I did wrong. I basically patched the wrong boot.img so the kernel was mismatched. I patched the one from the OnePlus OxygenOS. Instead I needed to patch the one from LineageOS.
The steps I took in order to fix it was:

unzip the LineageOS zip
extract the payload with a payload dumper
copy the boot.img to my device
patch that boot.img
copy the magisk patched image which was produced from the magisk app
to my computer with adb and fastboot on it
booted my android device into fastboot mode
flashed that magisk patched boot image to my device

After that when it rebooted, everything worked as expected with one exception; GCam. But I think this is related to the LinageOS upgrade. I was able to fix this by re-installing microG and upgrading to a newer version of GCam. All other original issues where cleared though. Wifi, phone, etc.
I hope this helps someone.


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Game install and android thing
Why is my Android phone adding these android symbols when ever I install a new game from Google play and can I remove them ?

Bug with Realme UI/ Color OS ... No proper solutions so far...


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Update to ICS makes Firefox fonts look awful (Eee Pad)
My Eee Pad TF101 auto-updated to ICS today. After the update, all fonts in Firefox changed to some dreadful-looking Times Roman-like font, in which the accented characters don't show right. Stock browser and Opera look fine and use the newfangled ICS sans serif font. Deleting data and reinstalling Firefox didn't help.
Maybe it expects the old 3.2 font? Is there a way I can install the old fonts in 4.0?

Got same problem. Here's a fix. Go to the advanced settings by typing "about:config" in the url string, filter settings by "font" substring and change the values of font names corresponding to your codepage from "sans..." (NOT mono) to "Roboto". Restart firefox


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Do external booster antennas help with 4G reception?
I have a Sprint HTC-EVO 4G.  Today it's snowing, I'm in a downtown high-rise, and I'm only getting 3G.  Would a booster antenna help (either now, or in general)?

Was there anything in particular you were looking at?

No I was googling for 4G antenna, etc... and this is what I saw: http://www.thepocketsolution.com/PSI-73175/Sprint+Epic+4G+Antenna+Signal+Booster.html?gclid=COCFyu7mxq4CFUJN4Aodt3xK-g (but it is geared for cars and car windows).  Most of the time I get 4G, but when I don't, it's very frustrating.

By the way, I took out the battery, rebooted, and the 4G came back.  False assumption on the bad weather I guess. But it still seems to make sense to have an antenna if it would help at all.

It's hard to say without knowing what specific model(s) you're thinking of, but by and large the antennas you're thinking of are probably designed for 3G/EVDO, in which case the answer is no. Sprint's WiMAX network operates on a completely different frequency than it's 3G network, so the antenna for one will not work for the other. The EVO itself has two antennas in it for this very reason. Basically, if it doesn't support the 2.5-2.6 GHz frequency range, then it won't work.
There are WiMAX repeaters/antennas out there, but I've never seen one from a major manufacturer (or Sprint/Clear). Someone over on Android Forums also managed to make his own WiMAX antenna.

I'm short-term renting a high-rise condo, so would need to have something to put in the window, if anything. Also travel a lot, so if such things exist, ideally I would need something to carry with me on business trips.


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How can I set up email (mostly yahoo) so that no matter which device I delete an email on, it will be deleted on the other?
I finally switched to Android from Apple, and I've tried setting the email account as both premium and not, and it either stays independent when deleted (not deleted on the server), or it's just downloaded again. K-9 seems to make them stay independent, but there's a lot of settings. Is there anything I can do so that if I delete a message on either the mail site or the app, it will be deleted on the other?
Basically, if you're aware of how the mail app works on the iphone, etc, I want it to behave like that.
EDIT: I found out how to do it in K-9 (change the 'when i delete a message' setting), but is there a way to do it stock?

Use IMAP instead of POP.

@roxan: that should be an answer; OP: your email client is configured using POP, which is just a glorified message downloader; if using IMAP instead, deleting, reading/unreading, changing folders, etc will be automatically synchronized to the server across multiple devices. The stock Android Email client and K9 supports both POP and IMAP. IIRC, Yahoo Mail does not support IMAP for free account, so you'd either have to get the paid one or use the official Yahoo! Mail Android client (not stock Email or K9), which does provide an IMAP-like experience.

As roxan already pointed out: What you want is IMAP for all your E-Mail accounts, configured with an Android client (e.g. K-9 Mail).

You can simply download Yahoo! Mail and manage your e-mail as you want.


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How to retrieve Android contacts from Galaxy S3 to Windows 7 on a non rooted phone
I am hoping someone can help me with this. My brother passed away yesterday and we both have the same phone a Samsung Galaxy S3 on the Sprint network. I was wondering if there is a simple way with adb or some software on Windows 7 that I can use to get a list of his contacts off of his phone as I need to try to contact all his friends and let them know when his funeral is going to be as I don't have any of his friends phone numbers. I am familiar with rooting phones and installing roms as I have my xoom rooted but I have not rooted my Galaxy S3 or my brothers phone either since we had both just got it and dont want to void the warranty just yet.
Can anyone help me? I am not a programmer and really just want to get a list of his friends to contact to let them know what has happened. Please help me if you can time is of the essence as I am making funeral arrangements today with my mom and would really like to let his friends know that he is no longer with us.
Thank you all and hopefully you can help me!

Just wanted to add his phone has been locked so I can't open the phone or I would just of course look at his contacts that way.

Do you have access to his Google account?  If he was syncing his contacts to Google it might be easier to get them from Gmail web interface.

Thank you Chahk and thank you very much Richard Borcsik, I am going to see if I can go to my mothers and get a copy of the death certificate from the hospital today. I have his wallet with his license and stuff so I have his ID. Maybe google will help me. God bless you both for your quick replies.

The thing is I am not sure what his google account is since he didnt have one until two days ago when he setup the phone. He always emailed me from his Yahoo account maybe I should contact Sprint to see if they will help me also to find out what was the new gmail account that he created with google on the phone...he didn't even get a chance to send me an email from his google account so I don't know what it is.

I don't think Sprint will be able to help you, as they have nothing to do with on-account phones AFAIK. However, if you attempt to lock yourself out from the phone ("guess" the password many times), it should prompt you to log in with the account.

Yahoo must have some similar policy for accessing accounts of deceased relatives, so you may want to check with them also.

Jeff, you could search for some past invoices and go through the (if recorded) calling lists on it. Else, here's a guide how to root it. After that you might be able to 'adb shell' into the device and 'sqlite3 /data/data/com.android.providers.telephony/databases/mmssms.db .dump' to show all stored phonebook entries. Alas, the VZW S3 model has a locked bootloader which complicates all this.

I had the same problem trying to get contacts off my broken galaxy s3, and the solution was a program called "My Phone Explorer" from http://www.fjsoft.at/en/
I had tried everything, but couldn't find a solution that worked for retrieving contacts AND SMS messages.

This is an old question and my answer may be of little help. Since you know your brother's number, just call. Then answer the phone your self and viola! It is unlocked.access the contacts from there.
I have always wondered why this security hole is overlooked.

Answering the phone doesn't unlock it.  Do you mean you can browse contacts via the Phone/Dialer app while in a call?

You may find the contacts have been uploaded to Google Contacts. From there, you can click "Export", download the file to the device you wish to upload them to, and reimport them. Unfortunately, this only works if you can get access to a device that has his Google password saved on.


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my google play uninstall by itself.. how can i install it again ?
I have just reset my Samsung Galaxy Ace and now Google Play doesn't shown up. I've already restarted my phone but nothing happens, and I've downloaded a different Play Store but it doesn't seem to open.  Before I reset my phone I read that nothing will be un-installed from my application, but how does it come that Google Play doesn't shown up ?

Here http://www.androidpolice.com/2013/02/22/download-latest-google-play-store-3-10-14/ you will find download links to the play store in this site


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Differences between OsmAnd and OsmAnd+
What is the difference between the free version of OsmAnd and the Plus version?
The only info I found seems to be outdated. While using the free edition the only limitation I noticed was the hint that I can only download 10 different maps.

As of today (24/03/2016), OsmAnd has 3 versions publicly available. This is possible because OsmAnd is GPL software, and therefore can be freely compiled and distributed.
1: Developers' free version, crippled to 10 downloads and no Wikipedia capability.
2: Developers' paid version, uncrippled.
3: F-Droid version, uncrippled but has slower updates than the paid version.

There's also the nightly build, available here. http://download.osmand.net/latest-night-build/ I don't think it has any limits on downloads etc. And it is the most up to date, though may be unstable/buggy.

As of 28/03/2013 the difference is that with the free version is limited to a total of 10 downloads (maps, voice packages, etc) and does not support offline Wikipedia content.
I know because I tried the free version and then buyed the plus one to be able to download entire european countries. Also I think is a really good application for 7 euros.

10 downloads: Do you mean that when you have downloaded 10 times you are done, and can't download anymore even after deleting downloaded data?

There exist 3 Versions of Osmand
The Market free Version: full featured
The Market Plus version: full featured, used as a way to donate to the developers as incentive to keep on improving.
The F-Droid Version: A source compiled free software version by fdroid with almost no changes to the normal version. Not so frequent app updates. The maps are updated the same way as in the offical build.
Do not under any circumstances install two versions at the same time, it will seriously destroy both of the apps, the map files on sd, your sanity and your battery power.

Didn't know of the conflicts between different versions. Don't taking any chances anyway, thanks!

The Market free version has both the 10 downloads limitation and the offline wikipedia content limitation mentioned above. Do you know if the f-droid version has neither of these limitations?

I know the F-Droid version does not have the download limitation. I downloaded all 50 states with no problem. However, I don't know if it uses wikipedia, since I've never used that feature (and didn't know about it until seeing this question). I would guess that it doesn't have that limitation either.

This answer is incorrect. I just downloaded the Market free version and it had limited functionality described in the other answer.


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Different notification sounds for sms and email?
Is there a way to use different sounds for a sms text alert and an email alert? I can't find the setting. I'm on HTC Hero, Android 2.1

You can customize the Notification settings for both Gmail and Messaging in each of the apps separately.
In Gmail press menu and go to More->Settings and look at the Notification settings section.
In Messaging press menu then Settings and look at the Notification settings section.

Sorry for the lack of description, I'm using Exchange and Handcent SMS. I'll check Handcent a little deeper

It's important to understand the differences between a platform like Android and the traditional "dumb phone" platform.
With Android, very few applications are "special".  By special I mean the OS is aware of them and treats them differently.  In Android, an application actually has to manage notifications themselves, there's no way for the OS to somehow figure it out and expose a setting for it.  Notification sound customization has to be exposed by the individual application developer, not through Android itself.  When an application creates a status bar notification, by default Android will play the sound that you set in the default Notification setting.  But the application can explicitly provide a different sound to play.  The application would have to manage that themselves (it would be nice if Android allowed apps to register for custom notifications and then it could provide a central location for all of them, but I'm not aware of a facility for doing this).
If a particular application doesn't provide support, contact them and ask them to add it.  Take away a star or two from your rating in the marketplace and explain why you did so.  Many developers actually listen.
Compare that to the traditional "dumb phone" platform where everything is tightly coupled and controlled.  The OS can easily expose settings for individual "apps" because they're baked in and don't really change.

But, sadly, Skype does not allow one to customize their notification sound.
Does anyone know how to customize the notification vibration ?

I use SMS Popup to manage notifications for text messages, and leave the email notifications to be handled by the default notification settings. This allows me to set custom sounds, vibrations and LED flashes (hardware allowing) for SMS text messages that separate them from emails and other notifications.

Sorry for the lack of description, I'm using Exchange and Handcent SMS. I'll check Handcent a little deeper

In the messaging app, click menu button, Settings, scroll to the bottom and click Select ringtone.

See below how to change your email notification sound, or how to disable it. My android is 2.3.5, gmail is 2.3.6.
You open the gmail app, menu > more > settings, tap in the account; in the very bottom there's an option "Labels to notify". In my case I have "Inbox", which I'm assuming is default; when you click on it, you have a few options:

"Email notifications" - notifies in the status bar
Ringtone - this is what you're looking for, you can set any ringtone or silent
Vibrate - well, it vibrates ;)

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


text:
If I try a new email client like K9-mail, can I go back to my original email just by uninstalling it?
Before I try something I cannot easily reverse ( and to confirm something I think I already know the answer for ): if I install another email client ( like K9-mail ) on my Samsung phone of even more on my Archos 101 tablet, can I revert back to the email client I already have just be uninstalling the new email client ?
Will I get a choice of email clients ( like you have now when you install Opera or Firefox ) ?

When you first install an application that can handle the same intent as another application install (for the sake of this example, let's say a home launcher, but this works for any similar apps), then the first time you'd press the home button (which calls an intent to go to the home screen, which you now have 2 apps that could handle it), you'll get a selection screen of applications that can fulfill that intent and you'll have the option to set one of them as default.
If set an application as default and you no longer wish to use that application as default you can either uninstall the application OR you can go to Settings --> applications --> manage apps --> go to the app in particular --> and click on "clear defaults".  This will reset the default application for that intent, so the next time you'd press the home button you would again get a selection of home launchers to choose from.

To clarify somewhat here: you do not even need to remove K9 mail to go back to the stock mail application and ... yes, you will see a choice of email clients.

Second clarification: Whenever installing/uninstalling/updating an app which handles an intent also handled by another installed app, the "default" is reset (i.e. the popup to chose which app to use will re-appear then). So no worries :)

Short answer Yes.
It should act exactly like having a second browser... until you set it as your default Android should prompt you to pick what client you want to use.  If you choose K9 as your default and then delete it Android will be smart enough to revert back to the default client.

Can you please explain the down-vote?

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


text:
Is there a sound picker app with file browser and audio previews?
In android (at least in Xperia) when you want change a ring-tone (SMS, call, ...) it show you a list of all available audio files in your mobile and SD memories. Choosing a ring from a list of thousands of files is not easy at all. Some apps make it a little easier but not prefect.
Is there any app that:

Let me choose ring-tone via a file browser
Audio clips can be previewed quickly in its file browser.

On Samsung Galaxy S II (and possibly other similar phones) the stock Music Player app can do this. Just open the MP3 in any file manager, choose to play it with the stock Music Player, hit menu and select Use as... and Ringtone.
Another option is to use doubleTwist Player to show the music by artist/album and long-press the song you want, then select Use as ringtone. This way you don't have to select from one long list, but the downside is you can't use your file manager to browse, you're stuck with artist/album grouping.
Also, you could check out Ringtone Maker, you can browse files in menu -> Browse.... This also has the ability to play, chop and edit volume/fade.

Yep can do this in stock ICS as well.

Thanks, I am looking for app similar to "Ringtone picker", with mentioned abilities.

Ringtone Maker is feature-rich. I prefer a simpler app that just can be used for setting sound by browsing. For now I check your answer accepted. Thanks.


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How do I import a KML route into OsmAnd?
I created a route using Google Maps and exported it as a KML file. I would like to import now this KML file into OsmAnd so I could check where I am.
So far I found out that it is possible to create a map from a KML file with theOsmAndMapTileCreator program. However, I cannot find one, all I have is OsmAndMapCreator -- and this program does not allow me to import KML in the first place (at least I don't see such option at all). Thus, I cannot prepare a map for OsmAnd (from KML; in general I prepared regular OSM map for OsmAnd using this program).
Since I didn't find any working solution with true off-line KML route imported, I use Google Maps with a pre-loaded route. There is a catch though - if I forget it is cached, and I switch anything in Google Maps I will lose this route when biking. So it is not reliable enough -- just workaround.
The bottom line is -- I have KML file, I have OsmAnd, I would like to import the former into the latter. How do I do it?

Sorry, but arbitrary bolding and italicizing make posts harder to read. There is no reason to do it all over the place like you did, especially having an entire paragraph in italics. People are perfectly capable of reading and understanding normally formatted text just fine, but if you're going to use formatting at least try to be a little judicious. Please also refrain from posting commentary/discussion in your question.

@eldarerathis, "arbitrary bolding and italicizing make posts harder to read" -- any hard data to back up this statement?

I don't know about "hard facts" but it's generally accepted convention to avoid using large areas of italics since it doesn't aid the reader (it's not marking key phrases, it's purely stylistic) and it's often particularly more difficult for visually impaired individuals to read. One opinion, second opinion...

...and from Wikipedia: "Regular upright type (roman type) is found to be more legible than italic type". I wouldn't be surprised if there's scientific research regarding this, but you might have to pay for the info since many researchers and publications require subscriptions or other fees.

I almost forgot about my own question, meanwhile I found perfectly working solution -- simply converting KML into GPX with GPSBabel: http://www.gpsbabel.org/
It is open source, which is great plus for me.

Does your resulting .gpx have accurate trackpoints every few meters or is it very sparse (containing only basic turn-by-turn points and such)? I thought this might be the case with Google's regular kml export.

@ce4, I am not an expert, however I went on a ride on my bicycle and I was 100% fine with me. It helped me navigate in  forest (almost no marks on trees), and on regular roads.

I'm OK with this answer! Seems like the default export is accurate enough or Osmand handles it just fine (by locking the the missing parts of the route to its internal database ways). I'll try it myself and post my findings...

I use GMap2GPX.
It loads some JavaScript into the running tab to do all the work. It's fairly easy to use, just follow the instructions on the site.  Use "extract full" to generate a reasonably accurate .gpx file (the basic file just has turn-by-turn instructions and little data besides).
Note: Only use it in an incognito instance for added privacy. You must not be logged into Google using Chrome (or it won't work for security reasons). Just launch an incognito instance via "ctrl+shift+N" and do it again there.

Try using JOSM and OpenData plugin. To install it just go to preferences(F12)->plugins->search "opendata" and install. After importing you can (as far as I know) save it as *.osm, and then use OsmandMapCreator

Since osmand is about offline maps, I'd like to provide an "offline" solution as well.  Basically, you want to convert the kml file to gpx format, and make the gpx file available to osmand.
You can use gpsbabel to convert the kml file to gpx, which is free/open-source, and is available for most platforms, and is probably in the main repository of your favourite linux distro.  On linux, it's as easy as running the following command, changing out file.kml and file.gpx for your filenames:
gpsbabel -i kml -f file.kml -o gpx -F file.gpx

You can then put the gpx file in the /sdcard/osmand/tracks/ directory on your Android device, and osmand will make it available to display, etc.

This is the same as the accepted answer from three years prior

That response did not provide an example command or tell where to put the resulting file.  I.e., it was incomplete, and since I had to work out the rest on my own I figured I would record the results for others.

I just tried Globalmapper v17 to convert KML to GPX.
How to do:
Open KML file in Globalmapper.
Then go to "File > Export > Export vector/lidar format"
Change options as needed.
Save to a desired directory.


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Remote activate android app
I have an OUYA with XBMC installed, and watch films using the remote app on my Android phone. To watch a film I have to use the Ouya controller to launch XBMC. How can I remotely start XBMC on my android device (the OUYA) so not needing the controller?

Have a look in the OUYA store for an app called AutoPilot, that allows you to specify an app that will run on boot.


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HTC One recommended Cyanogenmod ROM?
I have HTC One (model PN07100 - 801n) which I've unlocked and rooted. However I'm having an issue with booting Cyanogenmod, and the boot screen seems to loop endlessly.  At my last attempt I left for half an hour. I'm using TWRP to install the ROMs, and doing a cache/dalvik cache clean before attempting a reboot.
The Cyanogenmod website lists many roms (not sure which ones apply to my model) and I've tried two;

m7tmo & m7ul.
cm-10.1.3-RC2-m7tmo
cm-10.1.3-RC2-m7ul
NB: I'm on T-mobile but T-mobile in the UK.

Go here and follow the steps: Official CyanogenMod thread for HTC One
Download latest version from here: Official CyanogenMod downloads for HTC One
Regarding your problem, getting stuck in a bootloop may mean that you forgot to flash the kernel(boot.img) or didn't flash it properly. Do that again.

Thanks for that, running through official instructions I noticed Cyanogenmod suggest using ClockworkMod-Recovery rather than TWRP. It worked and Cyanogenmod boots without problem.


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K-9 Email App Not Finding All Folders - Labels/Folders
Quick question, I have a problem in that my K-9 mail application is not finding any of my Google Mail IMAP folders/labels.  Now I can send and receive messages without problem, however I'm curious as to why K-9 cannot find any of my folders such as [Google Mail]/-Poeticemails
Any ideas?  Am I getting confused between labels/folder and the two aren't interchangable?

Have you enabled the visibility of these labels/folders from the IMAP section of options in the main Gmail web interface. Advanced IMAP controls were recently rolled out to all users, so certain labels/folders may have been deemed hidden.
Click SETTINGS and then within the LABELS section, check mark those boxes whose labels you want shown as IMAP folders by selecting SHOW IN IMAP.
===========
UPDATE: Also check within K9 ACCOUNT SETTINGS > FOLDERS and make sure certain folders aren't hidden.

Yeah, checked that.  All my folders except "Chat" are enabled.  Tried unchecking them, then re-enabling to no luck.

In that case, try wiping everything from K9 and setting up your account again.

That finally did it, thanks!  Something must of gone wonky the first setup.

What in particular worked? Clean re-install or folder settings?

Changing the folder settings didn't work.  So from the accounts page, I brought up the Accounts Options page, then clicked on Remove Account.  I re-readded the account this time, and made sure all the settings where correct.  My hunch is last time I used the automatic setup for my gmail account and this is where things went wrong

I went to the folder list. I then hit my menu button & a new menu popped up that said "refresh folders" on the bottom.  When I did that, it grabbed the new folders I created & removed the ones I had deleted (from using previous webmail programs).

I was having the same problem (with a non-gmail IMAP account), what worked for me was to monkey with it. Set all the folder settings to display only subscribed folders. Then refresh folders. Then change it to display all folders. Now I can see my newer IMAP folders.
So ... if you're loathe to re-install your account, try just changing the folder display settings around and then changing them back.


text:
Web based Google Talk chat notifications sent to my device
When I chat in Google+ through my desktop, my two android devices get the conversations as well. Anyway to stop that from happening? I don't want to necessarily log out of the Apps since I can walk away and I want to still receive messages, but if a conversation is occurring via website, can I have the Apps ignore it?

I don't think there's really any way for the app to know this. All it sees (I assume) is that you got a message, and it probably has no idea that you responded via the web client.

I get a notification when I have gmail or google+ chats open sent to my device, but as soon as I continue the conversation in the browser, the notification goes away on my device.

@RyanConrad: Hm, interesting. I didn't know it would do that (I don't really use Google's chat service).

@eldarerathis Yeah, each client has a specific ID and I also see the same behavior as Ryan where only the last-used client receives messages.

yeah, I'm not. I just had a convo with someone on G+ and the entire convo is on my Asus Eee Transformer, with a little notification it's going on..... wait a second. I wonder if the alert is just the initial talk request, and I'm viewing the history of the item... I think that might be it. Can someone confirm?

Uhm, just clear the alert then close G+ on your phone, then you should see if you get another one for each message.

Someone write an answer so I can mark it

It appears the message is initially logged to my phone, and tablet, as Google says "Hey there's a new mmessage fofor you." Once I start in on the convo it only runs on the one device.


text:
Dialer screen doesn't come up when making or receiving calls
When I receive an incoming call the phone doesn't show the dialer/answer screen. If the screen is off already the phone rings but the screen does not come on. If the screen is already on and already dim the brightness will come back up, but the screen doesn't change. So if I was already on the home screen it just stays there. I cannot answer a call unless I use my Bluetooth headset to do so. It does this with or without the headset connected. If the headset isn't connected I cannon answer the phone.
If I hit the phone icon it comes up to the screen asking me if I want to return to the call in progress. I also noticed if I make a call it never comes up to the in call screen, so there is no way to mute, go to speaker phone, put the call on hold, or more importantly end the call.
This started shortly after upgrading to 4.4 from 4.3.
Android 4.4 Nexus 4

I disabled the Dialer app, cleared the cache, and the data.
Rebooted the phone and enabled the Dialer app.

Now all seems to be working well.

I just have had an issue that matches the OP description: on incoming calls the screen remained blank.
I am having it on Android 5 - Lollipop, but should be worth a try on a KitKat phone.
Solution:

Open "Google Dialer" (a.k.a. "Phone")
Open the : menu.
Select "Settings"
Choose "Call settings"
Choose "Phone account settings"
Tick the "Receive incoming calls" checkbox

Cause:
The option was turned off when the phone was in the "battery saving mode" due to low battery charge. After recharging the battery the option was not restored automatically.
Device details: Nexus 5, Android version 5.0.1-Lollipop.

download dialer app.
disable default dialer, clear app data and cache
restart phone (notice there is no dialer app)
install downloaded call dialer app.

Done. Works 100%. Tried it on my phone
p.s., search for "nexus 4 call dialer app"

Go to Settings>Sounds & notification>App Notification then unblock the Dialler App then everything will be normal again.

I had this problem after doing a factory reset and reinstalling apps on 7.1.2 (Lineage 14.1). I couldn't answer incoming calls and outgoing calls wouldn't show the call in progress. The notification settings were fine. Clearing cache and booting in safe mode did not help.
The problem was the Phone app was not set to be the default application for phone calls. Not sure why because there were no other apps installed that can handle the calling intents.
To fix, go to Settings->Apps-> ⚙ ->Default Apps->Phone app. If it doesn't say Phone immediately under Phone app, then tap and choose the Phone app.


text:
Nexus 4 won't upgrade to Lollipop
Bought a factory refurbished Nexus 4 today. It started with jellybean on the first boot, a few updates later it gets to 4.4.4. Now it tells me that my system is up to date. I have another Nexus 4 running Lollipop 5.0.1. I am on T-Mobile if that maters.

It's pushed out in waves and with 5.0.2 out now, you may not get it for another while. See https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/nexus/f1EOEtihDxI%5B1-25-false%5D for more information

@NiallC. I thought it rolled out by carrier/area so I thought if one Nexus 4 on my carrier in my area had it all of them did. I didn't even realize it was still rolling out. I've had Lollipop on my other nexus 4 for a couple months I believe.

Have to admit, I observed the Lollipop OTA is kinda... chaotic, for reasons Google only knows. I suggest you to wait around 1 month. Meanwhile, since it's possible that the update is controlled by the carrier, you might want to contact T-Mobile customer service regarding the OTA. (Sorry, we're not their customer service)

Not matter. But not a sw upgrade uploaded on nexus user center for nexus 4. All u can do that is wait for sw release

The 5.0 update was released, though. The factory images are right here. What is this "nexus user center" you're talking about?


text:
How to uninstall Quickoffice from HTC Nexus One
Quickoffice 2.0-GEP is listed in my manage application lists and I want to uninstall it. It's not listed in my programs list. I am not even sure what it's used for.
When I click on it from the manage apps list all the options (force stop, cancel, clear data etc.) are greyed out.

Are you rooted?

@matthew note rooted

Closely related: http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/50/how-to-remove-pre-installed-apps-like-peep-and-friend-stream-from-my-htc-phone http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/408/how-can-you-uninstall-an-app-that-you-didnt-install-on-your-droid http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/6851/how-can-i-uninstall-applications-that-are-locked-by-phone-vendor http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/9417/trying-to-uninstall-a-keyboard-uninstall-grayed-out-no-root

To remove any system default applications your phone must be rooted. And using this system app remover you can remove the system added applications. But you have to do this on your own risk.
I have been doing a lot of research on Android mobiles, I can tell that your system might not work properly if you remove any system added applications.
But most of the applications work fine without any issue.
Updated
System App Remover is a paid application. There is one free application called Root App Delete. Have a look at this..

Quickoffice is a pre-installed app that handles previews of popular file formats created with desktop office applications (e.g. word, excel, etc.)  You will not be able to uninstall it because it's installed as a system app.
You will only be able to uninstall it if you root your Nexus One, thus gaining write privileges to the /system partition.  You can then use a number of root-only apps to remove Quickoffice and other pre-installed apps that you don't use.


text:
Radio problem with Nexus 4
It seems I have always had some sort of radio connection problem with this phone, however since the most recent updates it's gotten really bad. My blue tooth headset (sometimes) constantly connects, a few seconds to a few minutes later disconnects, followed by a reconnect soon after. Sometimes I have to manual connect under the Bluetooth settings as it sometimes doesn't connect when the headset is turned on. Also sometimes at the same time I am having the Bluetooth problems, and other times when I am not having Bluetooth connection issues, I have issues with the WiFi connection. It just drops the connection, in my home in a very good signal area, both on the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz. I can manually connect, it will connect sometimes others it won't, even when it does it disconnects a few seconds to minutes later.
Sometimes a reboot fixes it, others it does not. About a week ago while I was having these problems the phone just rebooted on it's own and when it started back up I got the "Android is starting, Optimizing app x of n" as if it had just installed an update, it did this a second time today but after I restarted the phone.
While I only have one Bluetooth headset Jawbone Era it works fine on another phone and on a PC. I have the WiFi problems on more than one Router.
Nexus 4, 5.1.1, build LMY48I
Any idea where to start?
Update
Still doing this, even after another Update now on build LMY48M
It's only done it a few times over the last week or so, but this morning my headset has disconnected and reconnected 40 or 50 times.
Possible related my phone randomly forgets all the stored networks and I have to reenter WiFi passwords.

authors: Михайло Оліфіренко


text:
Shortcut to switch profile on CyanogenMod
On my Android, I was looking for configuring profiles and under Settings found that I can configure profiles and there are some pre-existing ones like Home, Work, Silent, etc, with further settings to customize each of them. I'm assuming that this is a feature of my CyanogenMod installation and not part of Android itself.
Now, my question is what is the easiest way to switch profiles (say switch from 'Home' to 'Work'). I tried to find an option in the notification bar widget buttons in the CyanogenMod settings but couldn't find. Is there something that I can do that is quicker than going to Settings > Profiles > Select profile, may be a widget or something that works with the above mentioned CyanogenMod profiles and preferably not a new application with new profiles.
PS: I can see an option to 'Toggle Sound' but that's for switching Sound/Vibrate/Silent modes, whereas I need to switch profile.

Holding the power button brings up the "power options" menu. In there you can choose the profile.

wow! can't believe I missed that! Thanks @Ryan!

There is now (confirmed with 10.2) a Profiles tile in the Quick Settings panel, which is quite handy.

I had basically the same question. I noticed the option via the powers button, but wanted to have some kind of shortcut on the homescreen.
I found a solution using the app CyanogenMod Profiles Shortcut. Works for me on version 6.


text:
How to remove leftover files after an application download?
I don't have a lot of space on my phone (an HTC Aria).  When I download an app from the market, I usually move it to SD immediately, but I've noticed that the "Internal space" amount doesn't change for a little while.
I'm assuming that before installing the apk, it keeps a copy of it in a location on the internal drive, then garbage collects or cleans up the space sometime later.  My question is, is there any way to force this cleanup?

You are completely right with your assumption: Whenever an app is installed, it is first copied to /data/local. You can check that directory if either you've got a file manager permitting you to go there, or have the Android SDK installed. No root needed, as this directory is readable and writable for the shell user.
But to your last question: No, I'm not aware of any mechanism to control that delay (never saw a corresponding setting). If it can be configured (and is not hardcoded in some place), this will most likely involve root privileges.


text:
How can I send a file wirelessly without bluetooth or a Wi-Fi network in ICS?
I know that one of the new features is WiFi-direct for ICS (noted at the very bottom of the page in the link).  Is there a way to leverage this new feature to transmit files from one ICS device to another?
This would be useful because the WiFi speeds would be greater than bluetooth, and you wouldn't need to be connected to a WiFi network or create a hotspot.
The Samsung Galaxy S II apparently has this feature built in pre-ICS (go Samsung!). Is this same method available in ICS? Or is there an app for it?
EDIT:  Because the galaxy nexus is made by Samsung, and is the only device out with ICS right now, I'm not sure if this "WiFi Direct" sharing (per the link and Ryan's answer below) is built in to ICS vanilla (Samsung did have WiFi Direct sharing pre-ICS, after all).
As such, I've added a vanilla tag, so I'm asking, is in the vanilla source code to allow a way for users to share files using WiFi Direct?  If not, is there an app for it in the market?  I want to know how to do this on all ICS phones, not necessarily just the galaxy nexus.

Android 4.0 introduces WiFi Direct in to the core of android. it basically creates an adhoc connection between one device and another using WiFi by creating what I guess could be considered an Access Point. You do not need a wifi access point to use WiFi Direct, and actually, if you are connected to wifi when turning on WiFi direct, it will disconnect you. You cannot be connected to both an Access Point and enable wifi direct.
The host device acts as an access point for other devices to connect to, then through other pieces of software, files and other data can be shared or streamed to the client device(s).
To use Wifi Direct, in settings -> wireless & networks you have to enable it. Then you should have an option to "share" via wifi. This works a lot like bluetooth sharing, where the other device has to be "ready to accept" your files. You will only be able to do wifi direct with devices that have explicit support for wifi direct. Android 4.0 is the the first version of the OS to have built in support for wifi direct. The Samsung Galaxy S II does have support for wifi direct as well. This was an added feature Samsung put in to their TouchWiz version of Android. While the settings for it are a little different then in Android 4.0, they basically work the same.
There are other devices, like some TVs by Sony, that also have wifi direct support.
Wifi Direct is not hardware specific, its part of the OS. If the device supports wifi then it supports this. It is part of the CORE OS in Android 4.0. Any device that has Wifi and is running ICS, this will work with. Some Samsung devices (I think only the Galaxy S 2) have support for wifi direct even though they are not running ICS. This is because Samsung added the support for it in to their version of Android.
While the Galaxy Nexus is manufactured by Samsung, it does not run the Samsung modified version of Android. It runs a completely "Google Experience" version of Android. The WiFi direct that exists on the Samsung Galaxy S II is different then the one built in to Android 4.0.
Here is the android SDK docs that talks about support.

Wi-Fi Direct allows Android 4.0 (API level 14) or later devices with the appropriate hardware to connect directly to each other via Wi-Fi without an intermediate access point. Using these APIs, you can discover and connect to other devices when each device supports Wi-Fi Direct, then communicate over a speedy connection across distances much longer than a Bluetooth connection. This is useful for applications that share data among users, such as a multiplayer game or a photo sharing application.

Here is a screen shot (taken from this video) showing wifi direct setting available on a Nook Color running CM9. The video is at the location where it shows wifi direct working.

Here are 2 screenshots from my viewsonic g-tablet that is running ICS (this is not a CM9 Kang, it is vanilla AOSP android). The first shows the setting, the second shows that i turned it on.

To show that WiFi Direct is actually part of the core of android and not just CM9, here is the source code for the WiFi direct settings. This is the github mirror of the AOSP. You can compare it to CM9 source too.

Just a heads up -- I edited the question to directly ask how to transfer files with Wi-Fi Direct.

I adjusted my answer to hopefully explain how to use wifi direct.

I can't find anything like "Wifi Direct" under settings -> wireless & networks.

@offby1 are you using an emulator?  I looked in my friend's galaxy nexus and the setting was there.  Come to think of it now though... it is a samsung device.

@RyanConrad can you provide a source showing that this will work on all ICS phones?  I've updated my question.

@John i modified my answer to cover your last comment.

It is a part of ICS and not only Gnex...

I added screenshots of wifi direct working on a viewsonic gtablet that is running ICS.

@RyanConrad, while the information you've added is related to WiFi Direct, it still doesn't fully answer the question... having WiFi direct in the API doesn't necessarily mean it is available as a feature of the OS settings, and while it is present on CM9, CyanogenMod is still a ROM, and it is possible the feature was incorporated... unless you can show that CM9 used the vanilla android settings source code?  Also the gtablet is also running a ROM, I believe it's native OS was 2.2.

my tablet is not running CM9, it is running VANILLA AOSP android. But here is the cyanogen code and here is the android code. They are the same.

@RyanConrad do you have a reference for saying that WiFi Direct is not hardware dependent? The Nexus S running vanilla ICS does not have that feature enabled. The Motorola Xoom on vanilla ICS does not have that feature either. The code might be there, but I'm pretty sure there's some kind of hardware dependence, or all ICS devices would have it.

@RyanConrad thanks, that answers my question :)  I'd be interested to know the answer to davidbb's comment too, but it's not my question.

Answering the above question: no, I'm not running an emulator; I have a Nexus S with stock Android 4.0.3, and there is no "Wi-fi direct" menu item anywhere.

I have Nexus S running CM9. I don't have it either. I think I read from somewhere it is hardware dependent after all. (Most of the newer phones have this though)

Yes, it is hardware dependent, to an extent. Most recent devices have wifi chips that support it, in my post I do initially say that it is not, but later I quote the docs that say that it is.

Can you please elaborate on Then you should have an option to "share" via wifi. ? Where should this option be?

There's a new app on the Android market called FileBeam that lets you Beam DropBox files from Android to Android. Maybe that can help you too ;)
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.filebeamapp.android

The link is eventually dead. An update is required here.

There is a reference to the feature in the source code, but with a different name: WifiP2P. Just did a search in GrepCode and found the package android.net.wiki.p2p.
Wifi Direct itself is located in com.example.android.wifidirect, so I don't think it's necessarily included in vanilla OSs, this is just an example on how to use the Wifi P2P API. Someone with more experience in Android source may know better.

it is included in vanilla android. I have ICS installed on my viewsonic gtablet and tried it with a friend that has the galaxy nexus. The like to wifidirect you posted is the example code on how other applications can integrate with the protocol to launch the intents that are part of the OS.

For Samsung G-Note users (possibly SII and SIII users too), go to Settings, then under the Wireless and Networks section select More..., and you will see the option there.

The question is about stock ICS, and it's not about whether you can turn WiFi-Direct on, but if you can use it for file sharing.


text:
Dismiss messages on lock screen on cyanogen
When your phone is locked and you receive an update which you don't want to unlock your phone for. Is there a setting to make it possible to dismiss it without unlocking the screen? Would even be better to only make certain apps dismissable without unlocking.
using android 6.0.1 cyanogenmod 13.1.2

You can slide down when you get a type of message, press it for 2 seconds and press the info icon, and than you can disable persistent notification on lock screen.
When looking at this question(Why are some lollipop notifications able to be swiped away on lockscreen?) Doesn't seem like you can change the type of notification.

The way I see it, it doesn't exactly answer your question ("dismiss without unlocking"), rather it's a workaround that simply disables all notifications for what you don't want. Still, as long as it works fine for you...

Indeed it doesn't actually does what I want but I don't think 'make persistent notification swipeable' is a feature. Too bad though. It should be up to the user and not the app whether or not you can swipe away a notification on the lock screen


text:
Force an app to be able to auto-rotate in Android 12
I have some apps, like Spotify for example, which for some inexplicable reason do not allow me to rotate some activities (like the player) into landscape.
I am looking for an app or method that can force these apps to follow my device rotation despite that.
Up until Android 12, I used to use rotation manager for this purpose. It wasn't perfect but it did the job.
It no longer seems to function however: Turning on "Forced Auto" still works but it now prevents touches from being registered in any other app which is obviously bad and unusable.
(I have a feeling this might be a new security "feature".)

"prevents touches from being registered in any other app" that looks like a bug with apps that have "draw over other apps" permission. Anyway, have you tried other rotation manager apps? Do they show the same issue?

Tap 'n' turn does not exhibit this behaviour. The app did not have this issue before Android 12 however. What could have caused rotation manager's implementation to fail but not Tap 'n' Turn's?

Apps that can draw over other apps, can also intercept touch, but it has been like that for a very long time, so I don't think it's an Android 12 issue. That possibly leaves with how the overlay is drawn over the apps, which might change accidentally due to an Android update. Need to check and debug the app's source code to be sure though, since looks like the app hasn't been updated since 2014.

I achieved what I personally want (always SCREEN_ORIENTATION_UNSPECIFIED) using a crude patch to android_frameworks/base:
https://github.com/Atemu/robot-config/blob/282f7bbf6477dc4c6677ece77d528eff5b833d86/0001-always-have-screenOrientation-SCREEN_ORIENTATION_UNS.patch
I'm not 100% sure all of these hunks are necessary or even complete but what it's supposed to do is stub any write access to an activity's in-code representation of its screenOrientation preference such that it's always on the default SCREEN_ORIENTATION_UNSPECIFIED.


text:
Why is fast charging unreliable?
I have a variety of fast charge plugs and cables as well as an Anker power bank and a Nitecore NB10000. They support up to 3A @ 5V, 2A @ 9V and 1.5A @ 12V (i.e. 15W-18W). I believe the S10e is limited to 15W charging speed (1.67A @ 9V).
No matter what I use (even using the official Samsung plug and cable) on my S10e, the charge speed seems completely variable. I'm testing with both 3C Battery Monitor and an in-line USB power meter.
The fastest speeds I see at 5V are about 3W-5W with all power sources. Every now and then by plugging and re-plugging I can get it to switch to 9V and then it will charge at 9W. How is the charging voltage negotiated by the phone?
Another issue is every now and then the phone thinks it has moisture in the charging port (using exactly the same bone dry connector as the last 30 mins) and will be stuck like this every time I plug it in for 5 minutes. How is the moisture determined and how do I reduce the false positives?

The reason is simple: Samsung still uses the outdated proprietary charging methods "Qualcomm Quick Charge 2.0" respectively Samsung "Adaptiv Fast Charge" instead of using the standardized USB-PD (Power Delivery) which is included in  "Qualcomm Quick Charge 4.0".

I wasn't aware that many phones had started using USB-PD. And what are the metrics for it choosing what voltage to charge at?

USB-PD uses a special communication channel between charger, cable and device to negotiate the capabilities and calculate the possible charge modes.

I meant how do QC chargers negotiate this?

As I said the method is proprietary. Not sure if it is fully documented. As far as I know they measure the resistor between certain USB connectors in the cable. And based on the result assume if the other side supports QC and which version.

This is Samsung's fault but also potentially the fault of the charging bricks.
Samsung implements outdated and disallowed proprietary charging methods "Qualcomm Quick Charge 2.0" respectively Samsung "Adaptive Fast Charge" instead of using the standardized USB-PD (Power Delivery) which is included in "Qualcomm Quick Charge 4.0".
These methods are slower and less reliable than USB-PD.
The issue is that some chargers also attempt to support disallowed proprietary charging protocols instead of supporting USB-PD as they should be according to the USB-C spec. For example Anker's PowerIQ3 technology cycles between PD, QC 3.0/2.0, Samsung, and Apple modes in an attempt to fool older phones to work with it. This doesn't actually work.
This means that when a charger is connected to a Samsung phone, it initially negotiates USB-PD first and charges at full speeds according to the spec. However the phone will then decide to check the D+ and D- lines for a proprietary charging method, and that causes the charger to drop out of USB-PD mode.
This is why you are getting slow speeds.
When the power brick and the phone implement multiple proprietary charging modes in addition to USB-PD everything goes wrong. Proprietary methods were disallowed in the USB-C spec for this very reason. If the phone simply stuck with the spec and implemented USB Type-C current, USB PD, and USB BC 1.2, you'd get consistent and correct behaviour all of the time and not have to wait hours for your phone to charge.
USB-PD should always win but the way the complicated proprietary charging mode switching Anker have built into these chargers you end up losing out. If the phone simply did not implement these disallowed proprietary charging methods and only used followed the proper spec you wouldn't have these issues.


text:
How to connect Xiaomi 12 with Mac?
I just recently bought a new Xiaomi 12 (MIUI 13.0.17 Global) and I cannot connect with USB to my Macbook Pro (OSX 12.1)
The issue starts with the prompt (selecting between MTP, File transfer, charging, etc) not even showing once I connect with USB, the cable should be fine, even an old PC recognizes it perfectly.
USB debugging is enabled. What am I missing?
Thanks!

Found the issue, it was the adapter I was using with my Mac. Tried a different one and no problems after this.


text:
Most of the pages show "insecure connection" in Opera
I have changed some security settings in my Android yesterday (I don't remember which one). Today most of the pages show "insecure connection" in Opera. I cannot even go to youtubel.com
Everything opens as normal in Firefox.
I've reinstalled Opera, but the problem remains.
How can I undo this?

If Firefox works and Opera shows errors then the date of the device seems to be correct. May be you have changed the DNS configuration?

Would it be in Opera settings or in the phone settings? Does not seem like an Opera setting (I've reinstalled Opera, but the problem remains). How to check it?

You wrote in your first line that you changed Android settings so guess what settings could be changed...

You must have disabled "Trusted credentials" in Security settings. Firefox works because it doesn't use Android's SSL certificates but has its own database. All apps relying on Android's CA database for HTTPS connections will stop working.

@IrfanLatif Make your comment an answer, so that I can accept it.

I've fiddled with the problem for a couple of days.
My working solution was to backup my files, reset to factory defaults, reinstall apps (took 1-2 hours).

Update: @Irfan Latif is correct. These were indeed the security -> trusted credentials. That comment should have being the accepted answer.

I'd say the reason re-installing Opera didn't fix it is because your probably still using the same profile.  Let me put it this way, when you re-installed you still had all your bookmarks still without having to import them again... ergo same profile.
Did you try going into Settings, Advanced and then click on Reset Settings (which restore settings to their original defaults)?
If you don't have that option or that doesn't work for you, do a backup of your bookmarks, et cetera and then create a new profile. Try entering opera:about in the url bar and then see if it tells you where your profile is located, close Opera, navigate to that location and delete everything.  Upon re-opening Opera it should create a new profile.
I assume this is regular Opera and not Opera GX, you may want to have a look at this if switching between profiles sounds good to you.