Actually, a refresh of my old phone. For the last month, the battery in my T-Mobile G1 has been really flaky. It didn’t hold a charge for long and would shut down the phone if I was using some power-draining apps. Then Cyanogen released version 5 of his cyanogen mod (Android 2.1) but I couldn’t install it because I didn’t think my battery would last through the update process. Finally I had enough and ordered a new battery. I found a deal on ebay for two more powerful batteries for only $9.19, with free shipping. How can you beat that? Yesterday they arrived in the mail and I charged one of them up to full. Then I went through the update process to install the latest and greatest cyanogenmod and am now up and running with Android 2.1. It’s so fast and smooth. I think it’s extra snappy because I wiped the phone during the upgrade process and installed the apps from scratch. Probably cleaned up a lot of crap. Everything is running nicely and it’s like I have a new phone. Too bad the update didn’t give the phone a 3.5mm headphone jack, but I’m used to it.
Android Reviews
I was reading Gina Trapani’s Smarterware site and she posted her list of apps on her Android phone. I thought I’d do the same. So here it is:
One of the strengths of the Android OS is its ability to run apps in the background. However, this can also be a weakness because sometimes you can feel the OS bogging down after you have been using it a while. It’s supposed to automatically shut processes down as needed, but it doesn’t always do a great job. That’s where the task manager app Close Everything 2 comes in. This app will basically shut down any processes and services that you don’t want running any more. To use, just click the icon to launch it.
You’ll then be presented with a list of running apps. From here, you can choose to close everything in the list, or you can tap an individual app to close it, or select multiple apps to close using the checkboxes. One really nice thing about Close Everything 2 is that you can choose to exclude certain services from being closed. Just long-press on a service in the list to set it as excluded. It’s a good idea to exclude things like weather widgets, otherwise their auto-refresh will be disabled.
Finally, there is a Close Everything 2 widget that you can put on your desktop. It indicates the number of apps running in the background (that aren’t on the exclusion list) and you can just tap the icon to shut down the background processes. Whenever I feel that my phone is running a little sluggishly, I just tap the widget and voila, my phone is running at top speed again!
Problem: My Android phone’s screen dims after a set period of time. I am able to keep the phone from sleeping when it’s plugged into the charger, but still, after a set amount of time, the dimming happens. This is an annoyance when I have the GPS on in the car. If I want to undim the screen, I need to tap on the screen which will move the map (and disable the My Location centering). Or, I can tap on one of the zoom buttons, but then I have to click on the other zoom button.
Solution: KeepScreen Lite. What this app does is keep your screen from dimming when certain apps are running. It’s just what I needed!
After you install KeepScreen Lite, open it and select Applications.
Just click on the apps (max. of 2 at this time) that you want to link to KeepScreen Lite. I selected Google Maps and My Tracks (sometimes I like to see the live GPS stats like speed, distance, elevation, etc.). After saving the settings, click on Start/Stop Service. This toggle persists even if you turn off your phone.
When you are using an app that is linked to the KeepScreen Lite service, you will see a little desklamp icon in the status bar to show you that it is active. It works great. Highly recommended.
To get this app, just head to the Market on your Android phone and search for KeepScreen Lite or go to the app page at Androlib.com and point your camera at the QR code using Barcode Scanner.
Here’s a screenshot of the current wallpaper on my G1. It’s from the upcoming MMORPG from NCsoft called Aion. I haven’t played the game yet, but the artwork is very cool. They have a bunch of other wallpaper at their website and all of them are really nice!
Amazon.com recently released their native Android app and it’s a keeper. With it, you can check your account, cancel orders, view recommendations, and of course buy stuff. But what is really cool about it is that you can use it to save products or “Reminders” for later purchase. Here’s a quick run-through of the application.
First, launch the app and then you’ll find yourself at the home screen, with your recommendations that are pulled from your previous activity associated with your Amazon.com account. (The first time you launch the app, you can sign in) From here you can search for a product or if you are in the store and standing in front of the product but don’t want to buy it right then, you can click on Search using barcodes or photos. This will take you to the Amazon Remembers screen where you can view your saved items.
To add an item into your list, you can take a photo of the product or scan its barcode. The G1 has a really nice camera that can auto-focus within a few inches making it perfect for barcode scanning, but I prefer to use the photo-mode since it’s pretty cool technology. After clicking on the photo button, you just need to line up the product and then click the on-screen shutter button.
You’ll then be asked if you want to use the image or take another one. Once you are happy with the photo, the app will add the photo to your “Amazon Remembers” list.
If it found a match, you can click on the item to see more detail, such as price, ratings, reviews, and the option to Buy Now, Add to Cart, or Add to Wish List. If you’ve enabled the optional “Mobile 1-Click Ordering” feature, you can purchase the item that way as well. Besides the Amazon Remembers feature, you quick access to the Goldbox specials page and your Wish List.
I’ve been using the wonderful SnapTell app which uses the same camera analysis technology as the Amazon.com app, but I’m not sure if I will keep using it. The advantage of SnapTell is that you will get links to a list of retailers besides just Amazon.com, online and local prices (it uses your GPS fix), and also links to other information about the item such as Wikipedia, Yahoo search, and Google reviews. However, with the Amazon.com app, I can save these items to my Wish List as well, which I can access on any computer. For now I will keep both since they each have their plusses.
The only complaint I have with the Amazon.com app is that it is not really built for browsing. You can search for an item, but there aren’t categories to browse. Hopefully they can add something like that in the future.
T-mobile has been releasing a ton of new goodies in anticipation of the launch of their second Android phone, the MyTouch. Us old G1 users can also take advantage of the slew of new apps, including T-Mobile’s Visual Voicemail. It’s pretty cool, and something that we’ve been waiting for a quite some time. IPhone users have had visual voicemail from long ago (my buddy Mikey replied to my tweet by saying “@barron Welcome to iPhone 2007! 
(Happy for you, though!)”. Fair enough. Android still has a way to go, but it’s definitely picking up steam.
The app itself is pretty straightforward. You just launch it from the icon, then your inbox opens up and you can see all your voicemails in a list, with phone #, time called, duration, and Name and Icon of the person if you have that listed in your Contacts. From there, just select a message, and you get the message screen where you can listen to the message. You can also delete it from here or call back the person. There’s a handy button to switch over to speaker phone as well. Other features that can be accessed via the Menu button are Add to Contacts, or Reply via phone or Text Message. All in all, it’s a really nice feature to have, and it’s free! All you have to do is call T-mobile and tell them to activate it. It won’t cost anything, and you can stay on the plan you are on, without losing any of the features you already enjoy.
It’s so nice that new features are added to the phone with pretty good frequency. The fact that Google can update core functionality to their phone via Market updates is also really neat. Seems like a quick and easy way to deploy cool stuff to Android users.
You can get the T-Mobile Visual Voicemail app from the Android Market on your phone, from the T-Mobile AppPack bundle, or you can visit Cyrket and point your camera at the QR Code (use the free app “Barcode Scanner”.
One of the apps that I have had on my G1 for the longest time is Locale by two forty four a.m.. It’s a really nice utility that lets you customize your phone based on certain dynamic situations. It’s really easy to do.
First you add a new Situation and give it a name, then you add at least one Condition. You can see the list of Conditions in the screenshot above. Then you select what Settings you’d like to have changed when that Condition is met. All of the Situations I have set up are based on time, but you could specify something to happen based on Location. For instance, when the phone is 100’ or more from your home address (using the phone’s GPS to pinpoint your location), you could have it turn off your wi-fi to save battery. Or when the battery drops below 20%, you could set the screen brightness to 10%.
Like I said, all of mine are simply time-based. The Situation named “Quiet Time” has the Condition of 11PM - 7AM, and the Setting is to turn the Ring Volume down to it’s lowest audible setting. The other Situations I created just change the wallpaper at certain times throughout the day. It’s very basic, but it adds a bit of fun customization to the phone.
As with most Android apps, just go to the Android Market on your phone and search for Locale, or you can visit the Twofortyfouram website for more information.
