Archive for the ‘Guide to Android’ category

Best of 2011 – App Publisher: Google Inc.

January 1st, 2012

It may seem cliche to name Google, the company that created Android, as the best app publisher in 2011, but if you look at it from a broad perspective, it’s hard not to. If there is one company that has control and influence on Android, it’s Google. Google has been making apps for Android since the beginning, obviously, but in the ways it has this year. Google put a huge g-shaped footprint in the Android Market with their latest apps and app updates, and really set an example to third-party developers on how to get it done straight from the Plex.

First off, Google has updated a TON of apps with complete redesigns this year. This list includes apps like Google Talk, Google Voice, Google Maps, YouTube, Gmail, Google Books, Google Docs, Google Shopper, Google Reader, Google Music, and more. If you think about just how many things Google pushed this year, there’s really no other contender. A lot of these apps got their own special re-makes throughout the year, and then got the notion again with the release of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, in which Google gave all of their core apps a makeover. The list above doesn’t even mention the overhaul the calendar app received with ICS, sporting a nifty pinch-to-zoom feature that is sure to gain lots of love. A lot of these apps were originally phone-only apps, and examples such as Google Voice and Google Books getting a makeover to support tablets running Honeycomb. Google has really stepped up their game this year with app updates, and while some , such as the Google Reader update, fall short of expectations, overall Google has done a fantastic job in 2011.

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Best of 2011 – Carrier: T-Mobile

January 1st, 2012

Call me absolutely ridunkulously crazy but for our Best of 2011′s we’re giving the carrier award to T-Mobile.

T-Mobile has undoubtedly been through a lot this year. After it was announced in March that AT&T was planning to buy T-Mobile for $39 billion dollars the news rocked the country and cleared out T-mobile stores nationwide.

Despite all this T-Mobile kept pumping out great Android phones like the MyTouch 4G Slide, The HTC Sensation, The HTC Amaze and the Samsung Galaxy S II.

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Best of 2011 – Manufacturer: Samsung

January 1st, 2012

Without a doubt 2011 was the year of the Samsung Android device. They didn’t care if Apple wanted to sue them over patents in Pluto it was full steam ahead for the Korean based Samsung Mobile.

The year started off with an interesting phone in the Samsung Continuum for Verizon Wireless. The Samsung Continuum brought out the Samsung ticker, a secondary display that gave quick access to relevant, short form information. Unfortunately the ticker was almost as unpopular as the Samsung cube from the Behold II the previous year, but it was their first device of 2011.

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Guide To Android: Why Root?

May 1st, 2011

Many Android users may be asking themselves “Why root my Android device?” and there are many reasons behind this.

First and foremost “rooting” givers users complete and total control and freedom of their Android device. By “rooting” your device you not only gain complete control over the system, but you get the added bonus of deciding on how you want your device to run and are able to tweek it to your liking.

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Battle of the Apps: Tablet Edition

April 9th, 2011

So what I’ve done with this is instead of doing just an App review is put different Applications up against each other on the Xoom. In this first installment I’ve choice 4 categories in which to put 2 different applications in each section up against each other and have them fight it out to the death to see which prevails in… BATTLE OF THE APPS: TABLET EDITION!!!

Reviews After the break…

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Posted in Angry Birds, App Battle, Apps, Features, Google, Guide to Android, Guide to Android, Guide to Android, Honeycomb, tablets

Guide To Android: Glossary

March 17th, 2011

ADB: Android Debug Bridge

AMOLED: Active Matrix Organic Light Emitting Diode

Android: Google’s open-source mobile operating system

AOSP: The Android Open Source Project

.apk: The file extension of an Android application.

Bluetooth: A short-range radio that lets you connect headsets, speakerphones or computers

Bootloader: An internal mode that helps in flashing ROMs

CDMA: One of two standards for cell phone communications. Code Division Multiple Access, it can be found in US Carriers Verizon Wireless and Sprint.

Cupcake: Android 1.5

DLNA: Dynamic Living Network Alliance allows wireless transmission of content from your Android device to your television or other DLNA equipped device

Donut: Android 1.6

Eclair: Android 2.0-2.1

Factory Reset: Wiping all data, settings, and apps from a phone to make it stock a.k.a “out of the box”. In most versions of Android this can be found under Settings>Privacy.

FC: Short for force close

Froyo: Android 2.2

Gingerbread: Android 2.3

Google: Largest search engine company in the world and the company that created Android.

GSM: One of two standards for cell phone communications. Global System for Mobile communications, this is the system that requires the use of a “sim” card.

Hard Reset: Wiping all data, settings, and apps from a phone to make it stock a.k.a “out of the box”

Honeycomb: Android 3.0

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Guide To Android, The T-Mobile Sidekick

March 15th, 2011

Many of you have probably heard of the Danger Hiptop, also known as the T-Mobile Sidekick. The Sidekick is a GPRS/EDGE/UMTS smartphone produced by Danger Incorporated from 2002 to 2010.The Hiptop 2, 3, Sidekick iD, Sidekick 2008 and Sidekick LX were are all manufactured by Sharp Corporation in Japan and designed by Danger. All versions of the Hiptop were developed in close partnership with T-Mobile, and since the release of the original T-Mobile Sidekick we have seen many new Sidekicks released, along with different partnerships. Danger provides the Hiptop OS software and services for the Sidekick. These include a list of downloadable software applications, email hosting, and instant messaging. The Hiptop was sold by T-Mobile in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany and Austria.

T-Mobile Sidekick (Danger/Flextronics)

Released on October 1, 2002, the original T-Mobile Sidekick was unique compared to other phones at the time. All the Sidekicks had featured “Menu”, “Back”, ”Jump” and other keys accessible even when the phone was closed. The T-Mobile Sidekick also featured a speaker which was used for device sounds. The headset jack served a dual purpose, as it was also used for the accessory camera. The screen on the T-Mobile Sidekick was a monochrome LCD.

T-Mobile Sidekick 2 (Danger/Sharp)

Danger and Sharp partnered together for the Sidekick 2 that was released in 2004. On the Sidekick 2 the D-Pad was moved to the left side of the Sidekick 2, along with volume up/down and power on buttons on the bottom of phone. The Sidekick 2 also featured a VGA camera, along with the addition of page-up/page-down buttons on the top and bottom of the scroll wheel. The line-by-line scrolling feature is notable to the Hiptop brand of products and is not a feature of most other multi-function cell phones.

T-Mobile Sidekick 3 (Danger/Sharp)

2 years after the release of the Sidekick 2 Danger and Sharp partnered up once again for the T-Mobile Sidekick 3. Released in July 2006, the Sidekick 3 was smaller than the previous Sidekick versions, measuring 130 mm x 59 mm x 22 mm. Unlike the Sidekick 2, all the features on the Sidekick 3 stayed the same.

T-Mobile Sidekick iD (Danger/Sharp)

The Sidekick iD is a smaller version of the Sidekick 3 and was released in April 2007. The Sidekick iD was aimed at the younger crowd. To reduce the cost of the Sidekick iD, Sharp removed some of the features of the Sidekick 3, including the 1.3 megapixel camera, Bluetooth capability, and the media player.

T-Mobile Sidekick LX (Danger/Sharp)

The Sidekick LX was released in October 2007. It came in two different colors, Midnight Blue and Espresso Brown. The LX included a wider, higher-resolution screen, the ability to flip the screen with a button on the top of the phone, upgraded keyboard, blue LED mood lights on all four corners, a Micro SD card slot with a 128 MB card included, and an updated operating system. On July 16, 2008, T-Mobile released a limited edition Tony Hawk Edition Sidekick LX, which included video recording.

Sidekick Slide (Danger/Motorola)

T-Mobile released the Sidekick Slide in November 2007. The Sidekick Slide offered many of the same features and services as every other Danger device and an update to Danger’s latest OS version. Also included were upgrades such as 128MB RAM, 225 MHz TI OMAP 850 processor and a second speaker which is located on the back of the device. On November 16, 2007 T-Mobile suspended sales of the Sidekick Slide, after Motorola confirmed that some devices would inadvertently powered off when the slide door was opened or closed. On November 21, 2007, Motorola stated the failures were triggered by poor battery contacts. On December 6, 2007 the Sidekick Slide was once again available for purchase. The Sidekick Slide was officially discontinued on August 8, 2008. It was available for sale again on December 12, 2008, since then T-Mobile has once again discontinued the sell of the Sidekick Slide.

T-Mobile Sidekick 2008 (Danger/Sharp)

In August 2008, Danger and Sharp partnered up once again to release the T-Mobile Sidekick ’08. This Sidekick had improved features such as a high resolution 2-mega pixel camera, video functionality, and AIM. The Sidekick ’08 also went back to the swivel Qwerty design and had the ability to change the faceplate and backplate.

T-Mobile Sidekick LX 2009 (Danger/Sharp)

Danger and Sharp partnered up to make the last T-Mobile Sidekick, the Sidekick LX ’09 which was released in May 2009. The new Sidekick supported 3G and HSDPA, along with various changes to the hardware which included a 3.2 inch F-WVGA display, 854×480 resolution and a 3.2-megapixel camera with autofocus and flash. Support for Facebook, Twitter and MySpace was also added to this Sidekick, allowing notifications to be displayed in the notification bar. YouTube streaming playback is also became supported. The Sidekick LX 2009 offered synchronization with Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Exchange.

Sidekick platform discontinued

T-Mobile announced in July 2010, that the Sidekick LX 09 and Sidekick 2008 would no longer be available through T-Mobile. In September 2010, Danger also notified its development community that they would no longer be accepting submissions for its application store. This was followed by the closure of the Danger Developer Zone forums and any related archives.It has been reported that Microsoft will discontinue Danger’s cloud service on May 31, 2011 after that date, Sidekicks will no longer have access to any data services, however the voice services will still function so the Sidekick can still be used as a phone.

The Future of the Sidekick

Since the beginning of this year we have heard rumors of an Android Sidekick coming to T-Mobile in the future. Well, T-Mobile has updated their site to include a sneak peek at their new upcoming Sidekick. The T-Mobile Sidekick 4G made by Samsung is rumored to be released sometime this spring with no definite date as of yet. It will be the first Sidekick to have a touch screen, Android 2.2, 1GHZ processor, and dual cameras (3mp in back and front facing camera for video chat).

Danger, INC. and Android

Andy Rubin is both the co-founder and former CEO of not only Danger, INC but also Android. He came to found Danger, INC. back in 2000 with Matt Hershenson and Joe Britt. In February 2008, Microsoft acquired the company and Andy Rubin went on to develop Android, which was later acquired by Google and led to Rubin’s current position with the firm as VP of Engineering. Since both Danger, INC. and Android were co-founded by Rubin it is not unlikely that we will see many interesting Android/Sidekick phones in the future.

Sources:

T-Mo News

Wikipedia

T-Mobile

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Posted in 4G, Android News, Guide to Android, Guide to Android, Misc, Samsung, T-Mobile

Guide To Android: Custom UI’s, Touchwiz

March 14th, 2011

Samsung’s first attempt at an Android phone with a custom UI was not the best one. Many Behold 2 owners were disappointed with the user interface. However, when Samsung introduced their Samsung Captivate running Touchwiz 3.0 many people were happy with the new and imporved ui.

You can find Touchwiz on several Samsung Android phones such as the Captivate, Galaxy S, and the Epic. Touchwiz is a custom user interface similar to HTC Sense. There is no need to create an account like MotoBlur and you are not forced to use it.

With the ability to be able to “turn off” Touchwiz you can enjoy both “Vanilla” android and Touchwiz. Touchwiz also includes many unique widgets to keep up on your social networks and the people important in your life. Buddy Now is one of the unique widgets that Touchwiz brings with it. You have the ability to place this widget on your home screen and be able to easily view your most recent contacts along with their social status updates. I find this widget to be very appealing for some users since you can easily choose the most recent contact you want to view and easily stay in touch.

With Touchwiz you are also able to link your social networking accounts such as Twitter, Facebook, and Corporate emails. By doing this you are able to easily view feeds and comment on status updates along with being able to re tweet anything you find important right from your device using the scrollable widgets. These options are found on nearly all custom UIs for Android.

A unique feature on Touchwiz is the ability to toggle your settings directly from the notification bar. This feature makes it much easier and faster to be able to switch on or off settings like bluetooth and wifi. Also you can easily change your devices display brightness by using the notification bar. Another nice design is Touchwiz’s unique app drawer. Unlike the regular app drawers on most Android devices, this app drawer is horizontal. There are ways to customize the app drawer if you prefer not to have the horizontal one. You can also choose from an alphabetical list and the regular grid style seen on most Android devices.

The phone book implemented in Touchwiz has many different tabs for your contacts info. You can view a contacts phone number, email ect., along with status info on their social networks, and any media you may have linked to them. I find the ability to link media such as pictures and videos a great idea and I hope to see other versions of custom UIs implment this feature in the future. Overall, Samsung’s custom UI, Touchwiz, is a simple and easy to use interface that can make staying in contact easy even for someone new to Android.

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Guide To Android: Custom UI’s, Motoblur

March 12th, 2011

Since the first Android phone was introduced back in 2008, the HTC Dream, we have experienced many new flavors. From Vanilla (stock Android) to Motorola’s MotoBlur and HTC’s Sense UI, there are now many choices out there that can open up the Android experince.

Motorola’s first Android phone, T-Mobile’s Cliq, released in 2009, brought with it a new Custom UI. Now Motorola has 10 Android phones running their custom UI. 5 of these phones are on the T-Mobile network (Cliq, Cliq 2, Cliq XT, Defy, and Charm).  While the other 4 are on AT&T (FlipOut, FlipSide, BackFlip, and Bravo) and Verizon has the Devour.

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Posted in ATT, Guide to Android, Misc, Motorola, T-Mobile, The Droid Guy, Verizon

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Guide To Android: Apps

March 12th, 2011

Welcome, to all new comers to Android or any smartphone for that matter. Android phones are an amazing thing, but for those just starting out figuring out how to use the thing can be a bit overwhelming. Luckily, here at TheDroidGuy, we know how you feel, and we’re here to help.

Now that you have your smartphone one of the main things you’re going to need are apps. Some might not know how to get them, or what they even are, so we will start from the very beginning.
What is an app? An app is basically an extension of your phone. The human body, for example, wouldn’t get much done without arms and hands. Arms are an extension of the human body to help you do things. In this same way, apps are an extension of your Android phone to help you get things done. Whatever it may be, there is most likely an app that can give you some assistance. Mobile applications or apps are just like programs that you run on your PC or Mac to do things for you. Word processors and web browsers are things we use every day on a computer, and without them we couldn’t search the web or type documents. Just like a computer, Android has hundreds of thousands of apps available in the Market ready and available for you to download to help you with your everyday life.

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Guide To Android: The Players, Motorola

March 12th, 2011

Motorola has been a leading driver in the electronics game for many years. They finally stepped into the Android game with the debut of their Motorola Cliq in November 2009. Since then Motorola has produced many new and exciting devices from the Droid to the Cliq 2 to their newest addition, the Motorola Xoom.

At the beginning of this year. January 4th, 2011 Motorola split into two companys, Motorola Solutions and Motorola Mobility. Sanjay Jha is the chairman and CEO of Motorola Mobility, and their focus is on mobile devices so people can stay connected on the go. As time goes on we will see how well the company does being split into two segments.

Motorola is also one of the founding members of the Open Handset Alliance (OHA), which was founded by a consortium of OEMs and Carriers in conjunction with Google,  to create and promote openness and choice through operating systems. There has been much speculation on whether Motorola should continue being associated with the OHA due to their attempts to “lock” their devices. Android is designed to be an open source operating system and by Motorola locking these devices it defeats the purpose of having an open source. However, Motorola’s reasoning behind “locking” their devices is to prevent loading custom ROM’s which have not been officially signed by Motorola and saving consumers from possibly bricking their Android phone. As time goes on however, we have seen Motorola start to offer the option of unlocking these devices starting with their first Android Tablet the Motorola Xoom, so developers can access the hardware for development.

Our Guide to Android: The Players, Motorola continues after the break
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Guide To Android: The Players, Andy Rubin

March 12th, 2011

Andy Rubin, VP Mobile Platforms, File Photo: Thedoidguy.com/Thedroidguy LLC

For many of you this may be common knowledge but to those of you that are new to Android or just seek more knowledge we are starting a new segment called guide to Android.

Andy Rubin (Vice President of Engineering/Android at Google)

Andy Rubin is no stranger to phone operating systems.  His experience before Android is actually an important part of Android and smartphone OS’s as we know them. Rubin began his career at Apple in 1989. After apple he went to work on WebTV.

Andy Rubin left WebTV which was acquired by Microsoft. After which he,  along with partners Joe Britt and Matt Hershenson founded Danger.  Danger was the company that developed the Danger Hip Top device which most of us know as the T-Mobile Sidekick. Danger was founded in 2000 and the original Sidekick debuted in 2002. T-Mobile officially retired the Sidekick as we know it in 2010 and announced that Microsoft would stop supporting the Sidekick servers this spring.

The T-Mobile Sidekick (also known as the mobiflip elsewhere) featured a quick release slide out qwerty keyboard for which the phone took it’s name.  In terms of software, operating system and performance, with it’s release in 2002 it was actually ahead of it’s time. You see while everyone is fighting for the best cloud based this and cloud based that, the Sidekick stored everything in the Cloud.

In 2003 Rubin founded Android with partner Rich Miner with  the goal to create “…smarter mobile devices that are more aware of its owner’s location and preferences.” In the early phases of Android, Rubin kept it more secretive than an Apple release only telling people they were working on software for mobile phones.

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Guide To Android: Custom UI’s,HTC Sense

March 11th, 2011

Sense is another custom UI for Android. Like MotoBlur and Touchwiz, it brings a new and different flavor to stock Android to enhance user experience. Many of HTC’s Android power phones include the Sense experience to make it easier for user to stay in touch on the go. Sense is described by HTC as three main principles ”Make It Mine, Stay Close and Discover the Unexpected”. All three describe different areas to the Sense experience that gives the user more power and control over their device to make it theirs. HTC released the Hero to Sprint in October of 2009. It was the first HTC phone to use Sense and give users a new experience with Android. Since the release of the Hero we have seen several HTC Sense powered phones such as the Desire, Legend, and Evo.

Sense, unlike Blur, does not have you create an account upon starting up your new Android phone, by doing so you are not forced to use Sense on any device that offers it. However, it does give you the options to link to several different social networks to make it easier to stay in touch on the go. With their include applications such as Friend Stream and Peep users have many options when it comes to personalizing their phone with what is important to them most.

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