Android

Android updates are undergoing a revolution as we speak. Is it a positive thing, though? We will see. Google’s focus on N+3 for everyone might make it more common for OEMs to provide 2 or 3 platform updates, but on the other hand, in the cases where they want to provide more updates than it’s expected of them it gets way more complicated than before. It might also cause a feature stagnation, stripping users of useful improvements.Where is Google leading us? I don’t know, but I think we will find out very soon.

I was doing some research on putting a custom GSI ROM on an older device and stumbled on this article. It's from 2022, but should still be accurate.

If you've ever wondered about how Android updates work and why some devices seemingly have arbitrary cutoff points for updates, this article explains why.

I won't spoil the read, but things are actually better than they used to be with one glaring regression in the form of GRF (Google Requirement Freeze)

I recently bought a Wireless Android Auto box for my car which only had Wired Android Auto before. It works perfectly when I'm driving. That part I'm very happy about, coupled with a wireless charger/holder it's easy and convenient.

What's not so good is that whenever my car wakes up to charge the 12V battery (my car is an EV) the Wireless Auto box wakes as well and my phone tries to connect to it. Last night I was talking to my mother on the phone in my living room and suddenly the call was transferred to my car outside.

I'm recently moved from IOS to Android, so I'm unsure what the best way to remedy this is. I've thought about a few possible solutions:

• Use Tasker to shut off Android Auto when I'm at home with geofencing or Wifi network (Don't know if this is possible)
• Unplug the Wireless Auto box when I park at home (Not ideal)
• Make a physical switch that connects/disconnect the Wireless Auto box depending on whether someone is sitting in the front seat (Seems like a loot of work)
• Ask here to get an instant reply with the one setting on my phone I need to toggle to fix this (I do hope this is the one :) )

Have any of you had the same problem, and if so, how did you fix it?

Technical details: Pixel 8 Pro running GrapheneOS. Car is a Hyundai Kona 2020.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/19594581

Here's a video preview of how the upcoming Files by Google ZIP creation tool will operate once the feature's available.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/19576371

Google is changing up the look of the account switcher on its apps. We have now managed to activate this new UI.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/19576153

I don’t need it to be with zero effort, but most of the instructions I find these days on XDA forums are extremely ambiguous and assume the reader is someone who does this every day and therefore knows most of the steps and what the terminology means.

Years ago when I used to do stuff like this more, directions were written meticulously and without abridgment of any elements. Seems today it’s not common for someone to go to the effort.

I’m extremely proficient, that’s not the issue. It’s just most instructions say stuff like “Step 1: root the phone. Step 2…” I’m like “whoa excuse me… how do I root this phone?”

Anyway, so all I’m asking is are there just comprehensive directions for any of these.

I have degoogled but I find myself missing Google Wallet/Pay despite it being the worst spyware there is. I would like to have both my bus pass and card available on my phone in case I ever get stranded with out either. I've found this app but when trying to emulate a MiFare Classic, it emulated a MiFare Plus and when attempting to emulate a Visa or MasterCard, it just errors out and says to please insert the card.

I presume I need some sort of sniffer hardware like a Proxmark3 to get as much data off the cards as possible, though I'm not really sure how to get the data from there to an emulator on my phone with the intention of out and about.

Please only reply with genuine answers. Any shit about ToS or poor security etc. will be ignored.

Firefox, something Firefox based or something entirely other?

Google has rolled out cross-device instant hotspot and call transfers to Android, but they have to be manually enabled. Here's how you do it.

What's the best way to restrict my Android devices to only use approved apps? I want to manage the whitelist remotely.

Bonus points if I can keep everything in-house, on my home server or similar via my existing VPN.

This is for my kids' future phones. Ages 12 to 16.

I'm looking for a way to dump raw data from an entire phone or at least the sda block to a PC, using a method other than adb pull.

When I run adb pull /dev/block/sda sdaDump.img, it creates a dump file. To find what I need, I have to search through this raw data using a Hex Editor. If the dump comes from a fully functioning phone, I can usually find what I’m looking for because all the data is still intact.

However, I accidentally wiped the metadata partition on my phone, so the decryption keys/files are gone. Now, because of that, some folders appear empty when checked with TWRP's File Manager, even though the actual files are still there.

If I create a dump now, the raw data in the file won't be the same as when the metadata was present, and those folders weren't showing as empty.

Running adb pull /dev/block/sda sdaDump.img now results in a dump where the Hex Editor shows zeroes (no data) where these files should be.

Is there any alternative method to create a raw data dump of the sda block or entire phone storage, that will capture that data as it is (not empty folders, but the data in them), even if it's encrypted?

I don't want to create the raw data dump onto the phone storage and then transfer it to a PC, but something that works like adb pull, in the sense that it pulls the data from the phone directly onto a PC.

Thanks a lot in advance to everyone!

My brain or whatever gets accustomed to the same alarm in the mornings and I wont wake up. I currently point my alarm clock to a spotify playlist so that it will play a random some from said playlist. I no longer use spotify and instead store local files or my plex/jellyfin server.

I have tried what seems like tons of alarm clock apps but non of them can do this. Is there one that does this.

While not seemingly relevant at first glance, turns out they are using Android under the hood Specifically, BlissOS 15 which is Android 12L.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/19456945

Google is working on a redesign of Quick Settings that might launch with Android 16.

Hey all,

I want a firewall app for just basically to enforce restrictions on outgoing communication based on service or app. It is mostly to block data harvesting. For reference, if anyone remembers there was one for iPhone called Firewall IP and it was just perfection. That was back when we could jailbreak.

Anyway, so that's all I need. Free is best, of course, but I would pay a bit if it is an exceptionally good product. No problem paying for quality. But I will have no interest in anything that's subscription based, nor anything that I need some kind of backend "approval" or login in order to install and use it. In other words, I want to know that if in a hundred years I happen to have a working phone from today, and the apk file, then I can install it. Obviously that's reductoi ad absurdum but you get my point.

Thanks for any recommendations. P.S. I'm not rooted, if that matters. Although I am still interested in possibly getting a replacement ROM for my device.

I need to ask a small favor from the good people of Lemmy World Community.

In short, I accidentally wiped the metadata partition on my Poco F3 and now I can't boot into the OS and access my data. I have a lot of pictures, videos and other stuff that I would hate to lose, because of a mistake. But all that is still on the phone, I just can't boot the phone to access it.

Thankfully, there is a way to fix this by creating a full backup of the phone with adb, then using a HEX Editor to manually look through that gigantic file and try to find the files that were in that metadata partition.

A huge thanks to bluet33th, a user from XDA Forums, without whom I would be helpless and couldn't do any of this. It might be a bit complicated and manual process, but it is possible. He explained everything in great detail here, so check it out, especially if you are facing the same problem, this will help you tremendously: https://xdaforums.com/t/how-to-recover-data-if-metadata-partition-was-deleted.4686789/

In order to find these files and put them back where they belong, I need your help, because I have to know their names, exact sizes and at least part of their content, so that I can search for it. Because I'm searching for a specific text in a text file that is 128 GB in size.

I have already tried this on another Xiaomi phone, to make sure this procedure works on Xiaomi phones and it does, but that phone had HyperOS with Android 14 and since every phone and android version is probably different, in order to be sure, I need this information specifically for Poco F3 with Android 13.

It doesn't take long, but if you don't have the time to look inside your metadata partition and tell me which files are inside of that partition and their sizes in bytes, you can just make a backup of the metadata partition and sent it to me, and I'll do the rest of the work.

Here are the steps on how to create a backup:

1. Turn on your phone and boot into TWRP, then connect your phone to a PC, type cmd inside Windows search and run cmd, then position cmd into your platform-tools folder (if you flashed your ROM, you should already have the necessary drivers installed for the next steps to work). For example, if your platform-tools folder on Windows is inside C:\platform-tools, all you need to type into cmd is: cd C:\platform-tools

You can also just go inside your platform-tools folder and type cmd in the address bar and the cmd will start already positioned inside that folder.

2. Then type adb devices and you should see your device, if you do, that means that all the drivers are successfully installed and your phone is detected.

3. Type adb pull /dev/block/by-name/metadata

4. After that, you should see a file named metadata inside C:\platform-tools. That is the file that I'm looking for and as you can see, it takes just a few minutes to get it.

You can skip the next steps (5 and 6), but I'll explain them, just in case someone wants to extract these files for themselves, so that you have them in case something like this happens to you. Of course, you can also proceed to extract the files and tell me their names and sizes.

Here is what you need to do:

5. Extract the content of the metadata file, you can use a software like 7-Zip. Go inside that extracted folder, then into vold > metadata_encryption > key

6. Inside of that key folder, you should see a few files. These are the important files and save them somewhere safe in case you ever need them. Since I don't have them anymore, in order to recreate them, I need to know their exact names and sizes in bytes. You can check the size of every individual file by right clicking on the file and choosing Properties. Then look under Size, not Size on disk, and in parenthesis, you should see the size in bytes.

Please, if you could check the size of every file and write down which file has what size. I would really appreciate it.

I'm specifically looking for someone who has a Poco F3 with Android 13 and MIUI, because I'm not sure if HyperOS changed something, so maybe the number of files or their size is different. But feel free to post the information even if you have HyperOS, but please mention that, so that I am aware of it.

Thanks a lot for your help, it really means a great deal.

It would be good if it had a function to limit brightness by time or by battery level and was Foss (but being Foss is not necessary if app is good and don't want too much permissions). Current screens are too bright for me.

Woke up early today and the first thought through my head was ... Hey, the Pixel 9 Fold Pro is going to be available today. So I jumped on the site and found it... backordered until mid October.

Anyone else able to get one on T-Mo or another service or are they backordered from Google themselves?

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/19387476 Plus, one of Android's most essential accessibility features is also getting an update with Gemini infusion.

I keep getting this notification on my phone (S22, but had it on my S9 aswell). No matter how I address this, it keeps popping up.

Is there a reason for this?

I pre-ordered a Pebblebee and finally received it in June. It's now September and it's just as useless when it's farther away from me than I can throw it as it was back in June.

Are there plans to improve the network? Is it happening anytime soon or will my trackers remain worthless?

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/41310855

F-Droid

If anyone knows why I'd be interested too

I've looked for a bit and I cannot find which version stopped support, just that it stopped for seemingly no reason.