Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Allcast is pretty spiffy. Basically, you gain the ability to screencast your Android to anything that can act as a DLNA receiver. It's not free, but it does specifically work with the Xbox86, PS3, Roku and FireTV.
This is the thread for the discussion of interesting apps.
- Thread starter Mercutio
- Start date
Stereodude
Not really a
I got to plug Yatse here. It's a remote app for XBMC, but it totally makes XBMC a compelling media playback platform via the cray level of integration it has with XBMC.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Some of the Metro-ified XBMC remotes for Windows 8 are pretty drool-worthy as well. For the all one of other SF members who will admit to having a WinRT device. 
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Suremote is awfully handy as a universal remote app. I like the UI and ease of setup. Way easier than dealing with a Harmony remote.
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
I tried it with my LG G3 and couldn't get it to control my Samsung TV or Denon receiver.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Does the S3 have an IR emitter?
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
The G3 does have an IR blaster, I've just never gotten it to work.
I've had good luck with the IR blaster and included "TV" app on the HTC One M8. I added in my cable service and it was able to get all the right channels and program listings through the app. It supports multiple rooms, reminders, channel deletion/customizations, recommendations, and more. I haven't tried other devices beyond my FiOS cable box and Samsung TV, but it works pretty seamlessly.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
That the standard Amazon (store) app for Android can now download and install apps on its own. We don't need the App Store app now.
ddrueding
Fixture
That statement is really confusing. I have no doubt that it is as concise and clear as possible, as your grasp of English exceeds mine on many levels. I still can't figure out exactly what it means.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
There was/is an Amazon App Store app for Android. Updates to the regular Amazon App for Android have added the functionality of its App Store to the app that's most often used for Shopping; the App Store for Android is functionally obsolete now.
sedrosken
Florida Man
What I find really funny is just how easy it is to get cracked apps for Android online. Even getting cracked programs for PC isn't as easy as this. Just Google "x apk" where x is the app you want, and you find an appropriate package, download it, and install it. You do have to enable installing of programs from unknown sources, but just think: Why isn't Google trying to shut down these sites? There are a few of them that are really big and I've seen around for several years. Perhaps they're using the excuse that it's for backup? Hell, you could probably use that excuse to justify sharing of programs in general. It's not that much of a stretch, I mean I used to use torrents for that as well as testing games to see if I liked them before I went and begged my parents for them. Free trials are bullcrap, on games they either limit content (not necessarily a bad thing) or limit how long you can play (see, there's my issue). Not only that, but they aren't offered most of the time anymore. What happened to downloading a demo? You used to usually be able to judge how fun the game was or how useful the application was just by trying the demo or free trial.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
That's true - you can find anything you want, and the file sizes are so trivial, right? The problem is that you're explicitly working outside the chain of trust. You have no earthly idea what's being installed along with those .APK files, whether they come from something that purports to be an app store or a torrent or just some random dude's Skydrive account. Safe sex analogies work really well here, and what you're doing by installing indiscriminately is pretty much exactly as safe as getting boned by an anonymous bisexual, heroin-addicted Haitian rentboy with open sores about the perineum, sans prophylactic.
There are very few mobile games or apps that cost more than $4. Once you have some kind of income, that's pretty trivial. For now, you're probably willing to tolerate internet herpes if you can play Plants vs. Zombies for free, but this is a problem that will eventually fix itself, either by you getting a job or by you getting internet HIV and having to re-set your tablet.
There are very few mobile games or apps that cost more than $4. Once you have some kind of income, that's pretty trivial. For now, you're probably willing to tolerate internet herpes if you can play Plants vs. Zombies for free, but this is a problem that will eventually fix itself, either by you getting a job or by you getting internet HIV and having to re-set your tablet.
sedrosken
Florida Man
No, I never said that's what I did - just that I see these sites all the time and that I'm surprised that Google hasn't shut them down.
Internet herpes could refer more to the viruses/malware/everyone calls the whole shebang a virus so I might as well too that are mere annoyances, while some of the more serious ones that actively disable any sort of antivirus could be referred to as internet AIDS.
Personally I find the fact that Android apps are so easily crackable hilarious.
Internet herpes could refer more to the viruses/malware/everyone calls the whole shebang a virus so I might as well too that are mere annoyances, while some of the more serious ones that actively disable any sort of antivirus could be referred to as internet AIDS.
Personally I find the fact that Android apps are so easily crackable hilarious.
Do you want to sync content between your devices and PC? Then Pushbullet might be the right tool for you.
CamScanner is a neat utility for capturing your info via your phone and turning it into a Scanner/Fax machine.
Do you hate calling customer service or support? You might want to try FastCustomer to call on your behalf and wait in the phone queue until your support agent is ready to talk to you. It'll call you when they're ready to talk to you so you don't have to wait on hold.
If you're in a strange mood and want to try a bizarre app that's used as a social alarm clock, trying Wakie might make you smile for the day.
Are you one to check the weather but be dissapointed because you live in an area that's always crappy? FuckingWeather might brighten your day with its simplistic view on the weather report.
CamScanner is a neat utility for capturing your info via your phone and turning it into a Scanner/Fax machine.
Do you hate calling customer service or support? You might want to try FastCustomer to call on your behalf and wait in the phone queue until your support agent is ready to talk to you. It'll call you when they're ready to talk to you so you don't have to wait on hold.
If you're in a strange mood and want to try a bizarre app that's used as a social alarm clock, trying Wakie might make you smile for the day.
Are you one to check the weather but be dissapointed because you live in an area that's always crappy? FuckingWeather might brighten your day with its simplistic view on the weather report.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
X-Com: Enemy Within for Android is probably the best big-studio game I've played on Android, to the point that I'd even like to play it on my PC now that I've played it on my Kindle.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
A Soft Murmur is a really nifty white noise generator. There's also an Android version.
What is the best app for the Androidic slideshow? The default ones in the tablet have limited controls. At least I need to control the intervals, e.g., 7.5 seconds and sort order, e.g., date/EXIF timestamp/alphabetic and numeric. Ideally I could select specific images as a set or to exclude. TIFF support, would be best, but I could live with the jpegs. Thanks.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
One of my favorite tabletop games is Sentinels of the Multiverse, which I bought through my Kindle, but is only available on PCs through Steam. I've really been enjoying it, but boy does it kill my battery.
That was a bit of a drag, so I started messing with Android Emulators again. Unlike a lot of Android Emulators, Andy seems to be fully functional. It appears to be a fully functional set of scripts for setting up a vanilla Android system using Virtualbox, but it runs some of the software that Bluestacks was puking on.
It seems to be basically trouble free as long as you have an i3 and at least 2GB RAM to dedicate to the VM. My NUC and especially my Surface Pro manage everything as smoothly as my Fire HDX does, notwithstanding the irony of both being vastly more expensive machines.
It's happened often enough that I've wanted to test sketchy software or run a tool that isn't available for desktop platforms that I think this is a useful tool.
That was a bit of a drag, so I started messing with Android Emulators again. Unlike a lot of Android Emulators, Andy seems to be fully functional. It appears to be a fully functional set of scripts for setting up a vanilla Android system using Virtualbox, but it runs some of the software that Bluestacks was puking on.
It seems to be basically trouble free as long as you have an i3 and at least 2GB RAM to dedicate to the VM. My NUC and especially my Surface Pro manage everything as smoothly as my Fire HDX does, notwithstanding the irony of both being vastly more expensive machines.
It's happened often enough that I've wanted to test sketchy software or run a tool that isn't available for desktop platforms that I think this is a useful tool.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
The latest Firefox for Android update killed all my settings on all my devices, but Adblock Plus for Firefox mobile now has feature parity with the desktop versions - you can subscribe to multiple lists now and and you get the same post-install UI on it that you do on desktop Firefox or Chrome.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Is anyone else having weirdness with attaching files via Gmail? I'm finding that everything is fine in K9 but not the most current version of Gmail on Android.
I get a message that says " Permission denied for the attachment" when I share to Gmail from an external app on both my phone and on a Nexus 7.
I get a message that says " Permission denied for the attachment" when I share to Gmail from an external app on both my phone and on a Nexus 7.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Seriously? No one else has this problem?
Here's a step by step for demonstrating the problem: Open the Google Drive app. Open a File. Choose Send File. Choose Gmail. When I do this, I get an error.
If I choose to "Attach Using Drive" from within Gmail, what's shared is a link rather than actual data.
If I use K9 instead, both ways work as intended and what's mailed out is the source file. I've been using both to maintain a certain amount of distinction between personal and professional identities, but this might be the last straw for Gmail.
Here's a step by step for demonstrating the problem: Open the Google Drive app. Open a File. Choose Send File. Choose Gmail. When I do this, I get an error.
If I choose to "Attach Using Drive" from within Gmail, what's shared is a link rather than actual data.
If I use K9 instead, both ways work as intended and what's mailed out is the source file. I've been using both to maintain a certain amount of distinction between personal and professional identities, but this might be the last straw for Gmail.
I was able to reproduce the issue using the steps you outlined. I opened a txt file from my google drive in POLARIS Office 5 and from there I tried to share via email. I got the same error message of permissions being denied.
ddrueding
Fixture
I did not encounter the error.
What do you consider a viable alternative to Google's mail service?
What do you consider a viable alternative to Google's mail service?
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Anything that does IMAP is at least viable, in my opinion. In this case, I'm specifically dealing with GMail the Android app rather than Gmail as a platform. Android/Gmail was recently updated to support non-Google mail services with the idea of replacing the admittedly rather crummy unbranded Email client.
I'm fairly annoyed with Gmail as an Android application because I don't like the Lollipop theming and now because it's specifically broken the Share functionality that does work in other mail applications.
Gmail as a platform really doesn't add anything to my E-mail experience other than good antispam controls that I don't have to maintain. My actual E-mail actually sits on a server under my actual administrative control, though I typically bounce messages through it for filtering purposes. Between threaded messages, the recent limitations imposed on Gchat (which used to just be standard XMPP) and the frequency with which messages have delayed delivery, I'm not nearly as enthusiastic about it as I once was.
I'm fairly annoyed with Gmail as an Android application because I don't like the Lollipop theming and now because it's specifically broken the Share functionality that does work in other mail applications.
Gmail as a platform really doesn't add anything to my E-mail experience other than good antispam controls that I don't have to maintain. My actual E-mail actually sits on a server under my actual administrative control, though I typically bounce messages through it for filtering purposes. Between threaded messages, the recent limitations imposed on Gchat (which used to just be standard XMPP) and the frequency with which messages have delayed delivery, I'm not nearly as enthusiastic about it as I once was.
ddrueding
Fixture
Gotcha. The functions that I specifically consider irreplaceable are the spam and virus(ish) filters, along with threaded conversations which I love. I remember having to administer Exchange servers as the dark ages of e-mail.
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Fatwah on Western Digital
Threaded messaging is an abomination, as is quote-after-reply messaging. These are things that should at the very least be controllable user preferences and platforms that get those things wrong or force one behavior (Gmail/Android handles BOTH incorrectly) are at best misfeatured.
ddrueding
Fixture
I can respect you decision, but I actually prefer both as Gmail handles them
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Fatwah on Western Digital
I want my messages displayed in simple chronological order by time received. I don't like messages moving around. I ALSO don't like accidentally deleting whole conversations because a cat stepped on my phone.
Reply-after-quote is only a reasonable format if you expect all email conversations to be short and only directed to a single point in much the same way one might now write a line in an IM or send in SMS. It dictates a writing style that forces the reader to guess the points being addressed or to re-read whole paragraphs to ensure correct context. I'm not going to condense my every message into an executive summary and there's no good reason to not provide the direct context for replies when need be.
Reply-after-quote is only a reasonable format if you expect all email conversations to be short and only directed to a single point in much the same way one might now write a line in an IM or send in SMS. It dictates a writing style that forces the reader to guess the points being addressed or to re-read whole paragraphs to ensure correct context. I'm not going to condense my every message into an executive summary and there's no good reason to not provide the direct context for replies when need be.
ddrueding
Fixture
Most of my users are such poor typists that 160-character e-mails are all I get. I've also trained them to include only one topic per e-mail and have that be the subject. I consider this the only effective way to use e-mail, particularly once multiple parties are involved.
mubs
Storage? I am Storage!
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
I spent a while looking for an 802.11 tethering application that actually works the way it's supposed to. The "free" ones are universally scams or trigger a "You must subscribe for wifi tethering" message on my phone, but the $3 Wifi Tether Router does indeed work as intended if you've rooted your phone.
Howell
Storage? I am Storage!
What device you have does not do it natively?
Will Rickards
Storage Is My Life
Most carriers in US block tethering unless you've paid for it. So you need to root and use that app or similar.
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Fatwah on Western Digital
Sprint actually goes a step further and has marked a lot of tethering apps as incompatible in the Play Store. So even if the app would work with your device, you can't install them on your handset. Almost all the apps I tried that don't require root will trigger a "Hey, you're not subscribed to our extra $30month tethering plan and you can't use this app until you are" message. If you need that functionality, that's a very good reason to root.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
A thing that I really, really like is the RCP Ringtones pack. It's $6.50 and it includes a huge selection of inoffensive but distinctive beeps, whistles and chimes.
I found an app, along the lines of glympse, but more for runners, hikers or cyclists.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.roadid.ecrumb.app&hl=en
You set the time you expect to be out, an emergency contact, and go. They can check your location as you go, and if you stop moving for (I think it's 5 minutes) it will request your input, and if you don't stop it, it will notify your contact.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.roadid.ecrumb.app&hl=en
You set the time you expect to be out, an emergency contact, and go. They can check your location as you go, and if you stop moving for (I think it's 5 minutes) it will request your input, and if you don't stop it, it will notify your contact.
ddrueding
Fixture
I've found several that I prefer to the stock options. For those interested, it comes with a 15 minute refund window.
This looks particularly interesting. I'm currently using Glympse when I ride alone, and this looks much better. You should all be riding/running with a RoadID bracelet as well...