"If science can't be questioned, it's not science - it's propaganda" - Aaron Rodgers
An advertisement-free blog about motorcycling, Northern life, home improvement, power plants, submarines, nuclear stuff, and a few other off-beat subjects. Comments are welcome. (Image is the Selway Crags in Northern Idaho)
Showing posts with label android. Show all posts
Showing posts with label android. Show all posts
Monday, November 28, 2022
Mercedes Stereo Upgrade
Monday, October 12, 2020
Cool or Useful Phone Apps
"Don't seek to have events happen as you wish, but wish for them to happen as they do happen, and all will be well with you." - Epictetus
Recently I was forced to replace the old Android phone, and I have been going through the new one, force-stopping the pre-loaded bloatware. I'm pretty sure it's now impossible to get root access to a modern phone and delete the bloatware from it. While I was deleting their apps and adding my preferred ones, I thought it would be a good idea to share ideas for cool apps. Please suggest good ones or favorites in the comments!
First of all, I'm still lamenting the loss of my beloved NEXT 3D Launcher. Below are screenshots taken from the previous phone, the Droid Turbo. Gorgeous interface. The most-often used apps are on these screen shots.
Friday, October 09, 2020
A bunch of random stuff
I had a busy set of days off. I somehow managed to get a lot done, considering that one day was lost to church, and another to overtime. The overtime is a good thing, because I had to spend a lot of money this past week.
I was forced to purchase a new phone last week. I'm *not* fond of replacing stuff - especially stuff that I've gotten used to, but there wasn't much choice in this case. The power button on the phone had mashed all the way in, and it wasn't waking up any more. I had to plug it in to wake it up and then enter the password to use it. Not good.
So I transferred all the files off the six year old Droid Turbo, and then it got wiped.
Sunday, June 02, 2019
Sunday, February 23, 2014
Slick android launcher
One of the cool things about android devices is how you can change the interface. I recently came across a cool new app called the "Next 3D Launcher", which I have installed and am still learning.
In this video the phone starts out with a typical android interface, then moves to the Next Launcher, where every swipe moves the screen in 3D. Slick!
In this video the phone starts out with a typical android interface, then moves to the Next Launcher, where every swipe moves the screen in 3D. Slick!
Friday, February 21, 2014
Rooting the Android Phone
I like to dabble with technology. I've built the last several computers that I have owned, and managed to troubleshoot them and make repairs when things conked out.
I used Blackberry phones for several years, but recently decided that it was time to own a phone with a bigger display and more options. A year or so ago, I bought a Droid Razr Maxx HD. I chose that particular phone because it has a massive 3300 milliamp hour battery. I wasn't keen on having to recharge a phone more often than once per day. I have now had the phone for about a year, and found it to be pretty useful and also very robust.
I spend a lot of time reading techie websites like Ars Technica, and learned a little about "rooting" Android phones. I never gave rooting my phone much thought (it seemed risky), but for one reason or another I recently decided to try it. The idea I might turn my phone into an expensive paperweight didn't seem too awful now that it's a year old. Turning the phone into a brick was definitely a possibility, because I am not any kind of hacker.
This past week I set out to root my phone, but it wasn't nearly as easy as I had been led to believe. I had done a lot of reading about it, and watched several videos of people rooting their phones. It all seemed very simple: Download the exploit script, set up your phone to accept it, then run the script. Rooting android phones requires using an exploit to trick the phone into thinking a developer is debugging it, then installing a different file for the phone to read when you re-start it.
There were three tools I tried to use, and they all failed. All the videos I watched and all the information I read was valid for an older version of Android. My wireless carrier recently updated the version of the Android Operating System that my phone uses. This update locked the phone bootloader, which prevented the exploit from loading the file that would grant root access.
Finally after a lot of additional searching, I located an exploit that claimed to work on the Samsung Galaxy 3, and "should work" on all other droid devices. I took a gamble and used that exploit, called "Saferoot", and three days of failure and stumbling around the internet finally paid off! I managed to root the phone and get "Superuser access".
"Yeah whatever", you are probably thinking.
Well there are some *very* cool things you can do when you have root access.
Without rooting your phone, when you install an app, you either have to accept all the permissions that it requires, or do without the app. Why would a simple flashlight app need access to my contacts list?
With root access, you can install Titanium Backup, which allows you to make a backup image of your phone, freeze apps, and most importantly, deny them permissions that you don't want them to have.
You can install Cyanogenmod, an open-source operating system that contains no bloatware apps and due to the transparency of open-source software, is free of spyware.
You can install AdFree, which mostly eliminates ads from showing up on your phone, by blocking data requests to known advertising hosts. Interestingly Google removed this app from the Google Play Store a year ago. It was probably getting between advertisers and a big pile of cash, and they weren't happy about that. To install this app, you have to sideload it by downloading the .apk file onto your PC, and then installing it into your phone, then activating it from a file manager.
You can install Permissions Denied, which, Like Titanium Backup, allows you (the owner of the phone) to restrict permissions that apps request.
The TOR browser app for android (known as Orbot) can also take advantage of root access, although it also works without it. This allows a user to use the web anonymously.
Needless to say, rooting your phone is very much frowned upon by the government and also by your wireless carrier, which are both excellent reasons to do it! Also, bear in mind that it is your phone, not theirs. As with anything that belongs to you, you should feel free to do with it as you please.
On a less tech note, I have found a use for used toilet paper tubes, which helps make life a little less cluttered. Lots of loose and frequently tangled-up USB and earbud cables now have a home.
I used Blackberry phones for several years, but recently decided that it was time to own a phone with a bigger display and more options. A year or so ago, I bought a Droid Razr Maxx HD. I chose that particular phone because it has a massive 3300 milliamp hour battery. I wasn't keen on having to recharge a phone more often than once per day. I have now had the phone for about a year, and found it to be pretty useful and also very robust.
I spend a lot of time reading techie websites like Ars Technica, and learned a little about "rooting" Android phones. I never gave rooting my phone much thought (it seemed risky), but for one reason or another I recently decided to try it. The idea I might turn my phone into an expensive paperweight didn't seem too awful now that it's a year old. Turning the phone into a brick was definitely a possibility, because I am not any kind of hacker.
This past week I set out to root my phone, but it wasn't nearly as easy as I had been led to believe. I had done a lot of reading about it, and watched several videos of people rooting their phones. It all seemed very simple: Download the exploit script, set up your phone to accept it, then run the script. Rooting android phones requires using an exploit to trick the phone into thinking a developer is debugging it, then installing a different file for the phone to read when you re-start it.
There were three tools I tried to use, and they all failed. All the videos I watched and all the information I read was valid for an older version of Android. My wireless carrier recently updated the version of the Android Operating System that my phone uses. This update locked the phone bootloader, which prevented the exploit from loading the file that would grant root access.
Finally after a lot of additional searching, I located an exploit that claimed to work on the Samsung Galaxy 3, and "should work" on all other droid devices. I took a gamble and used that exploit, called "Saferoot", and three days of failure and stumbling around the internet finally paid off! I managed to root the phone and get "Superuser access".
"Yeah whatever", you are probably thinking.
Well there are some *very* cool things you can do when you have root access.
Without rooting your phone, when you install an app, you either have to accept all the permissions that it requires, or do without the app. Why would a simple flashlight app need access to my contacts list?
With root access, you can install Titanium Backup, which allows you to make a backup image of your phone, freeze apps, and most importantly, deny them permissions that you don't want them to have.
You can install Cyanogenmod, an open-source operating system that contains no bloatware apps and due to the transparency of open-source software, is free of spyware.
You can install AdFree, which mostly eliminates ads from showing up on your phone, by blocking data requests to known advertising hosts. Interestingly Google removed this app from the Google Play Store a year ago. It was probably getting between advertisers and a big pile of cash, and they weren't happy about that. To install this app, you have to sideload it by downloading the .apk file onto your PC, and then installing it into your phone, then activating it from a file manager.
You can install Permissions Denied, which, Like Titanium Backup, allows you (the owner of the phone) to restrict permissions that apps request.
The TOR browser app for android (known as Orbot) can also take advantage of root access, although it also works without it. This allows a user to use the web anonymously.
On a less tech note, I have found a use for used toilet paper tubes, which helps make life a little less cluttered. Lots of loose and frequently tangled-up USB and earbud cables now have a home.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)