Be Excellent To Each Other

Google Keep has been released, which was the missing app in the android suite. A simple note taking app, synced to your google account.

I got my Xperia Z today, and went to Irvine to buy a case for it.
The sim is not active yet, but I really like the phone. I like the UI compared to almost all androids, it's so much faster than my iPhone 3GS was, and it's got a brilliant display. So happy I got it

To save me searching (not sure what I am looking for)

How do I root and update the phone (Galxay S2) with Jelly Bean.

I am fed up of waiting.

Dunno if you Android folk are interested or not, but iOS zombie-themed endless runner Into The Dead is now in the Google Play store. It's a free download with IAPs, but I never spent a penny on it when I used to play it on my old iPhone.

Secondly, Minter has released an Android port of Gridrunner - you can gets it here: http://minotaurproject.co.uk/Minotaur/donate.php

It's 'donation-ware', so you're welcome to download it for free and then chuck him a couple of quid if you like it.

I got :-) a nexus 7.

Well, thoroughly underwhelmed so far. Nothing seems to be compatible. Sim City, not compatible, The sims, not compatible, Tekken Card Tournament, not compatible. i know Google do not define the compatibility, but it still spoils their flagship product somewhat.

Apparently the Tekken Card Tournament compatibility is because the game has augmented reality functionality so requires a back facing camera.

What does that even mean?

So how come it works in a browser?

u can play on your sofa.

The psp does it, Ive never used it

I don't need a camera in the back to sit on my sofa.

It means that some aspect of the game will use the camera on your device to show whatever the camera's seeing with game object overlayed over the top. I've never actually played it so I don't know, that's just what someone on a comments thread said about it.

There's a video of it in 'action' here.

That's pretty cool, actually. Fucking pointless, mind.

The game itself happens on your sofa. Not you.

yes,it does sound pointless.

Aye, augmented reality, on phones and such like anyway, has always seemed to me like a solution looking for a problem and I've never really found any use of it that struck a chord with me.

Facial recognition technology doing an image search of faces you see and comapring them to dating website mugshots overlaid as you walk through a nightclub would be good.

I've not had much of a problem with the compatability on the N7. SimCity is no longer available from the Play Store anyhow... can't get it on either my N7 or S3 and even just looking for it on the web version of the Play Store brings no results, so I'm presuming EA have pulled it. Unless you're trying to sideload the .apk? I did try that on the N7 and it loaded up fine, but then needs to download further files from EA and - unsurprisingly - fails to do so.

I really, really like my N7. Currently giving very serious thoughts to rooting my S3 and shoving the Supernexus ROM on it to give it stock Android a la the N4.

It certainly doesn't seem like a good enough reason to stop me from using the program.

@ Zio, i have Sim City on my phone, so I could in theory re use, but it isn't compatible. How do you do this side loading thing?

Agreed. If its not there, just use a generic background

or the front camera and play on your face

You'd need to ask someone with a bit more experience with Android than me. At a wild guess, I imagine a backup app like Carbon might let you pull the app off the phone and 'restore' it to the N7, but I'm almost certainly talking completely out of my arse here.

So I decided to take the risk and try rooting my Galaxy S3 and putting a custom firmware on there and found the process to actually be fairly trouble-free. As a result, I'm know rocking a Samsung Galaxy S3 with the Supernexus firmware, effectively giving it the same stock Android 4.2.2 firmware that you'd normally get on the Nexus 4. I've got to say, I'm really impressed with it! Stock Android is so much nicer than the horror Samsung inflict on their customers with TouchWiz, yet at the same time I get the marginal benefits of the Samsung hardware.

Very happy, I am.

I should do this with my s2, as the official jelly bean is not available

How do I root it?

I was fairly fortunate in that I found a complete toolkit for the S3 that did the whole rooting part for me. After that it was simply a case of installing the ClockworkMod custom recovery thingy on it, putting the zip containing the Supernexus firmware and the Google Apps set on the internal SD card, rebooting in Recovery Mode and telling it to install those two zip files.

Have a look online and you'll find tonnes of instructions for the S2 I'm sure. You might want a different custom firmware like Cyanogenomod or something for your phone though, as I'm not sure if Supernexus is available for the S2.

As an aside, the little animation you get when you turn off the screen on a Nexus 4 is lovely, isn't it?

Anyone tried LMT Launcher (which isn't really a launcher)?
It's lovely - XDA Thread here.

Ooh, I've got an S3 coming tomorrow. I might try this. If it goes wrong it's all your fault.

I am looking to customise my Nexus 7, eg I would like the HTC style swipe from the top to bring down recently used apps list. Is there any way to do this without modding the hell out of it, or installing HTC stuff?

The new HTC One is the best smartphone ever according to PC Pro, and has usurped the iPhone5 on the PC Pro 'A List'.

A mate at work has got one on order so I'll have a good shufty at his before making my mind up.

I'm really enjoying my S3 so far. I know it's a year old and so positively ancient but compared to the Wildfire S I had it feels like something that just fell through a hole in time.

Put the Supernexus firmware on it and it'll seem even more amazing!

Seriously though, I can remember jailbreaking iPhones I've had in the past and feeling very 'meh' about whatever advantages doing so may have given me, but rooting my S3 and flashing it with what is basically stock Android 4.2.2 has felt like the best move ever. Confirmation if I ever needed it that I probably should've got a Nexus 4 in the first place.

A guy at our work has one. I'm not sure about the aspect ratio of the thing - it's a bit 'long'.

After a couple of weekends of overtime cash from my current Project From Hell I finally gave in to the nagging voice in my head that wants me to buy some kind of tablet and ordered a Nexus 10. Apart from reading comics on the thing I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to do with it that my laptop isn't already managing perfectly well but I'm looking forward to getting it nonetheless.

I'm sure it's nice. But twice the price nice of a Nexus 4?

I am pleasantly surprised by the out of the box niceness of my Nexus 4, I must say. I don't feel a pressing need to customize anything, which is how I prefer things.

That's not a question that's specific to the HTC One mind, Google have effectively undercut the flagship phones for all companies with their pricing of the Nexus 4 given that other devices like the Galaxy S IV are in the same price range as the One. There will come a point when the spec of the Nexus 4 falls far enough behind the curve enough that any other new phones could be considered easily worth the extra money, but for a while at least the answer to "Why shouldn't I just get a Nexus 4 instead?" isn't at all obvious.

The vanilla look and feel of Android has been pretty nice since about Ice Cream Sandwich and, ironically, most of the people I see customising things these days is to actually get shot of the various pointless overlays all the companies insist on adding to their phones so they can have an experience closer to the vanilla look. Some of the third party launchers do add nice features (e.g. Apex's selection of home screen scroll animations and ability to change icon spacing) but the default launcher is perfectly fine.

I was using Nova Prime on the S3's stock firmware to rid myself of TouchWiz and have something close to the look and feel of vanilla Android, but I'm not missing it now I'm on a stock Android ROM. Like the Apex launcher you mention, it does give you some natty features like the ability to add & remove home screens, change scroll animation, change the icon grid size and layout, enable notification labels (like the little red numbers you get on iPhone icons when that app has unread messages for you), but I haven't felt the need to reinstall it.

Android as intended by Google has a fantastic UI and it seems a shame the manufacturers feel the need to tinker with it so much. I had a little play around with a friend's Xperia T the other day and I really didn't like the Sony UI at all, despite it apparently being one of the better ones.

Every 'premium' Android handset is twice the price of a Nexus 4. I'm really not sure why anyone's buying them.

It's most certainly nicer than the equivalent Samsung.

I think it's very obvious.

No 4G
No replaceable battery
No expandable storage.

About the only things I can think of. Not that I'm particularly looking for reasons to hate my phone.

No 4G
No replaceable battery
No expandable storage.

About the only things I can think of. Not that I'm particularly looking for reasons to hate my phone.

It seems to double post a lot, too

I'm not sure 4G is worth the money it costs each month, personally.

Yeah, that's rather annoying.

I didn't think the forum allowed such double posting.

Indeed. Speed isn't the issue for me, and I suspect the majority of people. Coverage and capacity is the real issue.

lulz

Is it Dimrill?

It's stopped me in the past.

It stops you if you're using the "normal" style and the "proper" reply box (ie. not the quick one).

I think.

I'm using the only one available (that I can see) on the mobile skin.