Developer Options Android

Everyone's favorite Android modding tool is finally available for the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge. Thanks to some hard work by Wanam and a few other developers, we can now install the Xposed Framework on Samsung's latest mid-sized flagship phones. But there are a few stipulations—m ...more

Boasting over 800 million users a month, WhatsApp has quickly become one of the most popular messaging services available today. Thanks to its low price, ease of use, lack of ads, cross-platform functionality, and great features, its popularity is well-deserved. While there's ...more

The Galaxy S6 might just be the best Android phone on the market right now. From a hardware standpoint, Samsung truly knocked this one out of the park with its finely-crafted build quality and amazing screen. But the lone drawback here is that TouchWiz is still as intrusive a ...more

On-screen navigation buttons offer many distinct advantages over physical buttons—they can change orientation along with your device, they're capable of visually morphing to indicate secondary functionality, and the user experience is more consistent when buttons and app eleme ...more

One of the few areas where Android lags behind iOS is a comprehensive backup solution for apps. Root tools, such as the popular Titanium Backup, are capable of backing up all of your apps and their data, but not everyone wants to root their device and potentially run into issu ...more

If you're anything like me, you rely heavily on your calendar to keep on track throughout the week, month, and year. While Android's built-in Google Calendar provides an excellent cloud-based solution for keeping our schedules properly maintained, it's not perfect. If you wan ...more

If you have a custom recovery installed on your Nexus 5, you're able to flash custom ROMs and lots of other cool Gadget Hacks. But when it comes time to receive and Over-the-Air (OTA) update directly from Google, having a custom recovery installed can be a fairly big hindrance ...more

Depending on who you ask, the OnePlus One smartphone has so far been either a bit of a letdown or a rousing success. New to the industry, manufacturer OnePlus has been unable to keep up with the high demand for its first flagship device. Even today, a few months after the lau ...more

Midway through 2013, a popular custom ROM called Paranoid Android introduced their multitasking feature "Halo." Bubble-style notifications inspired by Facebook chat heads pop up near the top of the screen, and you simply tap on them to bring up the app in a floating window. I ...more

Starting on Android 4.2, a new feature called Quick Settings was integrated into the Notification tray, which allows you to quickly turn on and off certain device features such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS, etc. These toggles also provides a shortcut to the feature's more advanced ...more

HTC's Sense 4 may be leaner and faster than previous versions, but one thing my EVO 4G LTE sorely lacked was the "Quick Settings" option that Sense 2 and 3 had. Developers were able to port it to Sense 4 for Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich), but the only way to get this featur ...more

Bloatware remains one of the biggest problems with Android, especially when tied to a carrier. Removing bloatware usually requires you to take extreme measures like rooting. Unfortunately, the Galaxy S10 falls under this annoying umbrella, but there's an easy workaround. Pack ...more

While iOS 11 was famous for its instability, performance issues weren't the only factor holding it back. The OS overhauled the notification system on iPhone, but not necessarily for the better. iOS 12, however, improves upon these changes, bringing critical features that make ...more

Binance, a China-based cryptocurrency exchange, is rapidly gaining popularity thanks to the sheer selection of digital currencies you can purchase — Ripple (XRP), Tron (TRX), IOTA, and Stellar (XLM), to name a few — using both Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH). Binance has an i ...more

With technology giants like Apple and Google finally entering the fray, the move toward mass adoption of augmented reality is ramping up. Apple's ARKit and Google's ARCore will allow entirely new categories of apps to be made. Unfortunately, in a world of heavy competition, ge ...more

Google's Pixel and Pixel XL flagship phones are a rousing success, with consumers praising the fluid user experience and overall performance as two of the devices' biggest strengths. But even though Google may have knocked it out of the park with a set of Apple-like smartphone ...more

Augmented reality began on smartphones but technical limitations have prevented further development. Google's Tango (formerly Project Tango) aimed to change all that, and with Lenovo's help, they now have their first device. Check out the features in this video from Lenovo: V ...more

Even with today's high-powered devices, battery life is still an issue. We, as users, have to almost habitually check the current battery percentage, because otherwise, we might end up draining too much in the morning, then get stuck with a dead phone at night. There are seve ...more

Using the overview screen (aka recent apps) is a simple way to jump back to a previous task to continue where you left off, but as you use more and more apps, jumping back to that initial task isn't really that "recent" with all of those new tasks stacked on top of it. Now, th ...more

If you've ever taken apart an electronic device that uses physical buttons, you already know why these types of input methods are destined to fail. The rubberized contacts used in physical press-and-release buttons like those of a gamepad or keyboard are incredibly frail and c ...more

Stock Android is a great experience, and it's probably one of the biggest reasons that people purchase a Nexus device over other Android phones. Without carrier or manufacturer modifications to the core software, the entire user interface feels a lot more clean and snappy, and ...more

It seems like gesture controls are all the craze these days. From camera-opening gestures to "Air Gestures", it's getting to the point where we hardly need to touch the screens on our phones to control them. With music players seemingly being left out in this recent trend, de ...more

For the first time ever, iPhones will be getting live panoramic wallpapers in iOS 7, but it's something Android devices have always embraced. On your Samsung Galaxy S3, you can have anything as your Home or Lock screen background, from a static wallpaper, to a live interactiv ...more

Higher-fidelity 3D content and next-generation AR experiences take more computing power than most modern AR headsets and mobile devices can handle. But Nvidia is introducing a new cloud-based solution to address that need that will stream AR content to modern devices. During ...more

Smartglasses maker Vuzix made a big splash at CES 2018 with the inclusion of Amazon's Alexa voice assistant among the AR superpowers of its consumer-centric Blade smartglasses. Now, it's time to tell Alexa to make room, as Vuzix is bringing Google Assistant support to Blade. ...more

The home bar, that tiny sliver of color at the bottom of the screen on Home button-less iPhone models, is helpful when first getting used to an iPhone X or newer's gestures. It helps you learn how to swipe up to unlock, go to the home screen, view the app switcher, and so on. ...more

While there are many awesome features in iOS 12, there's one that has got the best of me and my patience. Sending photos and videos in a text or iMessage. Yes, there are a few ways the process remains the same, but if you select pics and vids right from within the Message app, ...more

Two-factor authentication (2FA) is a great way to add another layer of security to sensitive third-party apps and websites like Venmo. However, before iOS 12, to log into a particular 2FA-secured app or site on your iPhone, you'd have to memorize or copy the SMS code from Mess ...more

If you love to hear yourself talk, you can now enjoy seeing your words materialize in augmented reality with an ARKit-compatible iPhone or iPad. A new app called Word Vomit 3D uses the speech recognition API of iOS to take in what the user says and regurgitate it into the rea ...more

Just yesterday, Google announced that it is banning all apps that contain any form of lock screen ads. Today, they posted a list of the Best Apps of 2017 for the Play Store. Given the new policy of cracking down on apps with advertisements on the lock screen, you wouldn't expe ...more

Emoji, emojis, smilies, or smileys—whatever you want to call them, those little yellow icons have firmly implanted themselves in the human lexicon. However, just like with localized languages and dialects, emoji can be very different from one another depending on the device or ...more

The internet has officially been taken over by GIFs—they're everybody's favorite method of communication these days, and nary a meme would exist without them. But even with the abundance of GIF-sharing websites, and even GIF keyboards, we're still a bit lacking in regard to cr ...more

It looks as though Samsung will continue to tone down the look of TouchWiz, according to a leaked look at the newest "Grace" user interface for the upcoming Galaxy Note 7. HDblog, who acquired the leaked UI, shows off the beta version of the new skin in their video below. Don ...more

AMOLED display panels like the one found in most Samsung Galaxy devices, including the Galaxy S6 models, are known for their deep blacks and vivid colors. The downside here is that the colors tend to be over-saturated and not very realistic. Samsung countered this issue by of ...more

For some strange reason, not all variants of the Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge have a menu option for changing the backlight timeout for their capacitive keys. According to user reports, only the AT&T variant of these phones has such an option. But thanks to an app from devel ...more

The Nexus 6 has an AMOLED screen that uses virtually no power to display black pixels. To take advantage of this feature, Google included an Ambient Display notification system that shows a black and white version of your lock screen when you get a new message. As a result, th ...more

We live in world where it is hard to stay positive all of the time. I know at times it gets hard to see the bright side of things and sometimes you just want to give up and let life pass you by. This kind of thinking is usually indicative of a deeper psychological problem whic ...more

Back in the '80s, recording live radio was as simple as popping a cassette tape into your boombox and pressing the record button. While we've come along way with regard to accessing radio stations thanks to websites and apps that stream live broadcasts over the internet, it's ...more

I once had a collection of over 300 different wallpapers for my MacBook, set to randomly change every 30 minutes. Needless to say, my desktop never got boring. Wallpapers can facilitate a mood, imply a political stance, or just add aesthetic appeal, so having to manually chang ...more

For those of you who have been taking full advantage of the jailbreak for iOS 8 that's available, you can understand and appreciate what this really offers iPhone users—sovereignty. Unlike Android, iOS is not as easy to manipulate or control, which is why people love to jailb ...more

The attention to detail and build quality that Motorola put into the new Nexus 6 is amazing. Its curved backplate fits the hand like a glove, and fingers slide effortlessly across the rounded edge of its glass front, making the swipe gesture for side navigation menus feel more ...more

Ever wanted to communicate with another driver on the road, but just didn't know how? Sure, you could flag them down by waving or honking at them, but that assumes that they're in close proximity, that you have a unobscured path, and that they're paying attention. And if you'r ...more

Since the days of Friendster and MySpace, social media platforms have taken leaps forward, revolutionizing how we live our lives by changing the way we communicate with others. Not only has social media become a catalyst for major uprisings around the world, but on a personal ...more

Placing widgets on your device's home screen is a quick way to gain instant access to shortcuts or to specific aspects of an app, like music controls or weather forecasts. As more and more developers create various types of app drawers and shortcuts, many overlook widgets and ...more

The problem with striving to be on the bleeding edge of what's new for your smartphone, or really anything else in life, is having to constantly check websites and forums for new content. And with lots of that browsing happening on our phones, the aimless page loading and refr ...more

There are so many mods we can apply using a custom recovery. From themes to bug fixes and feature ports, a typical rooted user spends a decent chunk of time in TWRP Recovery. As often as we use TWRP, it's high time we showed the ZIP-flashing software a little love itself. Usi ...more

How many times have you witnessed a beautiful moment that you would have loved to capture on film, only to watch it slip away as you struggled to unlock your phone and open your camera app? Developer Jam Works decided he'd experienced this letdown far too many times, and crea ...more

Even with the highest-tiered data plan available, there are times that your phone or your carrier might downgrade your connection to 3G or even lower. This usually occurs when you've made a phone call, or you've switched cell towers while traveling. And after that downgrade o ...more

Most alarms just make noise to wake you up, and it can be a bit jarring coming off of a deep sleep to suddenly being woken up by a blaring sound. On the flip side, if you're a heavy sleeper, this might not even be enough stimuli to snap you out of your 8-hour coma. While ther ...more

It seems like every cloud service out there is offering tons of upgrade options and free promotions to give people as much space as they need to store their files online. I personally have over 100GB of Google Drive space which is shared between multiple computers, phones, and ...more

Lock screen apps are a dime a dozen, but every now and then one pops up that defies expectations. We've already covered some good ones for the Samsung Galaxy S4, including Picture Password Lockscreen (which gives you secret unlock gestures), SlideLock (which improves notificat ...more

On more than one occasion, I've wanted to check out the Google Play page for an app I was currently using, whether it was to get contact information or read recent reviews to see if others were experiencing issues that I was. To do so, I'd have to hop out of my current app, g ...more

Recently, I offered a guide detailing how to run two separate windows on a Nexus 7 tablets for better multitasking. While extremely useful, that mod was limited to only two windows, and you also needed root access to use it. Today, I'll be highlighting a non-root Android app ...more

Update January 27, 2014: Samsung has released a statement to address the flip cover issue, claiming it as a bug with a "fix" coming soon: "We have currently identified a software compatibility issue with the Galaxy Note 3 update to Android 4.4 (KitKat) and select 3rd party ac ...more

Customization of our Android devices, outside of what Google and mobile carriers allow us to do, used to mandate that our devices were rooted and running a custom ROM. While rooting is fairly easy for the Nexus 7, many people don’t like the idea of writing over their core sys ...more

NetGuard is a well-established app known for its highly secure firewall, which blocks unwanted web activity from individual apps that can take up both precious bandwidth and battery life. Not quite as well known, however, is the fact there's a second official version of NetGua ...more

Starting with Marshmallow, Android added a built-in theme engine called "Runtime Resource Overlay," or RRO. This theme engine was intended to be used only by smartphone manufacturers, not end-users, so unlike Cyanogen's CM Theme Engine, owners can't use it to change the look a ...more

Samsung has been on a tear with its flagship devices since the release of the Galaxy S6; The S6 edge, the Note 5, and this year's Galaxy S7 models have all been met with universal acclaim, and even the staunchest of critics have almost nothing negative to say. Almost. Critics ...more

Over the course of the past year, a lot of Android apps have added pull-to-refresh functionality. It's a very useful and intuitive gesture, because all you have to do to refresh the page you're viewing is scroll to the top of the screen, then slide your finger down one more ti ...more

With a slab-style touchscreen device, butt dialing is always going to be a problem. While you're moving about, your phone can unlock itself and give your most recent contact a ring, leading to an awkward one-sided conversation where the other person gets to eavesdrop on everyt ...more