Q: IRC app that runs in the background - Windows Phone 7 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hi, I've been trying to find a decent IRC app for wp7. Sadly no luck to date. There's a number of fairly great ones in the marketplace - WPirc looks great and most of the time works great as well.
But it has one problem that I've currently noticed in all other apps. It doesn't have a background agent so when I switch out of it, it automatically disconnects me from the network I'm on. Same thing when the lockscreen goes over it.
Does anyone know an IRC app, even paid, that doesn't do this? Not talking about disconnecting on the lockscreen if connection over wifi. Just disconnecting when not in focus.

No luck on this one
Unfortunately, the current 'Mango' version of Windows Phone does not allow 'true' background processes to give you real time updates of anything. So don't expect anything like you are asking to appear in the marketplace soon.
The best any developer can do at this moment is to create an app that checks for new messages every 30 minutes for a very brief time. And even then, the app is only allowed to give you a small toast message, but never open (or put in focus) the application by itself.

Well, it is permissible for apps to continue running under the lock screen (although MS is very strict about when they allow an app to use that permission, I think chat apps qualify). Real background processing is actually possible - the phone runs a fully multitasking OS - but the official APIs don't allow it.

GoodDayToDie said:
Well, it is permissible for apps to continue running under the lock screen .... Real background processing is actually possible - .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, but to stay on-topic I read the question as 'Are there any apps in the marketplace that allow me to run IRC in the background, supporting multitasking (staying connected) even if I use other apps'. From that perspective the answer is unfortunately no.

You can use ZNC and keep a persistent connection going on a remote computer, which will save and replay the conversation when you lose connection. You can also couple SuperToasty with the ZNCPush plugin I've forked at github (I have to update my branch and poke the dev to pull the fork.) to push alert you when someone mentions you, PM's you etc.
Any of the IRC clients in the market should work fine with this setup... though, I haven't tried.

Related

[Q] Transitioned to WP7 - ex iPhone/Android/Symbian power user

Hi everyone
I have been a cell tech freak for about 10 years now, and have owned almost all the smart phones that have come out. Although am not a programmer, but I try to use the phones to the fullest, and have recently decided to share my experience with you all by writing my first in-depth review on the lines of 'a day in the life of...' for each of the current hot phones - HD7, Vibrant and iPhone 4. However, before I begin on that review, there are a few questions that I need clarity on (could not find through search):
1. What does the option 'run behing lock screen' mean? In my case, I turned it on with autoupdate on 10 mins for facebook app, but when I reopened the app hours later, it was not updated.
2. Notification system - is there a system to collect notifications, similar to android? or this is more like iphone where the popup comes and goes away?
3. Push notifications - how does it work? for example, I use task lists with reminders set for online services like rememberthemilk.com, however even though I have alarms on, nothing happens on the device.
4. Is there an official website/etc to give feedback to wp7 team or vote on new features? Would love to aid in the development.
5. I normally guage the suitability of a platform by assessing how many of the good developers on other platforms are planning or have started developing for a new platform as well. For example, seesmic client on WP7 is good and has seen consistent improvement. What other major developers are we sure about that have / have not begun work on WP&? (examples: tweetdeck team, hootsuite, nimbuzz, trillian, etc)
Would be great if I got your feedback on these. Cant wait to share my review on all three phones
1. It means the app will continue running even if you "lock" the screen. It has nothing to do with multitasking - which the OS does not currently do (for third party apps).
2. It comes and goes. Unfortunately. IMO it goes away too fast as well, I hear the notification sound but by the time I've picked up the phone all I see is the notification sliding away.
3. Depends on how the developer has implemented it. However, you cannot get an alarm going off without having the app running - and since you can't multitask, well...
4. No
5. From what I've seen pretty much all the usual suspects have already or are planning to deploy on WP7. Both the marketplace and developer uptake is higher than what it was for iOS/Android. There are a few well-knows devs holding out, but that's their loss really.
for 4. no official way but read this article http://www.wpcentral.com/how-provide-microsoft-feedback-about-wp7
2. Collected notifications are displayed on the bottom of the lockscreen.
Thanks for the answers. I have a couple of other things though:
1. I have assigned a custom ring to my wife's number from the people hub, however whenever she calls me from her number the generic ringtone rings...what gives?
2. When u mean it runs under the lock screen, does that mean exactly this: If I open an app that has the option to run under lock screen and autoupdate after x minutes, and if I lock the screen while the app is still running in the foreground, it will continue to autoupdate in the background..?
Thanks people appreciate it

[APP] Task Identifier [Android 2.1 and up!!!]

!!!If you have Android 2.1 the app now is in the market!!!
Android 2.2 and higher are also still supported
This is not another Auto Task Killer, no.
Thanks for all the help from everyone! We've moved into a lite and full version now on Android 2.2 and 2.3 phones.This is a new program which allows the user to specify alert levels to phone tasks and give you insight into what your phone is really doing. Make a call, ever wonder what apps may be listening? What's going on when you phone is in standby? In creating this, I will say that I've been surprised a few times at what is really going on. I want any and all feedback as well as we are trying to make this into something special. I am the actual developer of this app.
The full version has:
-Common Names and Actual Application Icons
-No Ads
-Access to all App Settings
-Ability to change alert level from List Tasks
-Removed Internet and Location Permissions
And we have a slew of other features planned for only the full version, but we don't want to spill the beans on those quite yet, but they will enhance the tool greatly!
Both versions now have the new UI as well.
Anyone who had the beta should be notified to upgrade to the lite version now.
Download Task Identifier Lite from your phone:
market://search?q=pname:com.task.identifier
Download Task Identifier Full from your phone:
market://search?q=pname:com.task.identifier.full
I've also attached a QR Code to scan for both versions. Or just search for Task Identifier in the market.
I hope you all find this useful and enjoy!!
smart work
notowork said:
smart work
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks!
10
Hehe, I like how the only comment for the app (5 stars and "awesome" as comment) is currently by a user named 'x2k'. Hmmm.
I've just installed it and it's been less than a minute and I got an alert from an app that no longer needs to sync...So I disabled it (every little bit of non-sync means longer battery life!).
So far it's looking very promising! I'll definitely report back on my experiences!
Okay, first big thing...
Can you please resolve the cryptic app names to their more friendly name variants?
It's hard to read and make out the com.blah designations.
Thanks!
So far it seems like a cool app. I've been using WatchDog for ages to alert me when an app misbehaves.
But I'm confused about this app. When would you want to be using this? Can you give an example?
I'll keep it installed and see how it goes. Thanks.
Paul22000 said:
So far it seems like a cool app. I've been using WatchDog for ages to alert me when an app misbehaves.
But I'm confused about this app. When would you want to be using this? Can you give an example?
I'll keep it installed and see how it goes. Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for trying. This is more of an app to alert you as to what your phone is doing, ie what loads at a given point in time on your phone.
x2kjosh said:
Thanks for trying. This is more of an app to alert you as to what your phone is doing, ie what loads at a given point in time on your phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks. I'm playing around with it and actively trying to make notifications pop up I opened Facebook and Google Reader started, as did Maps. Weird.
Which brings me to a question: how do we know whether the task started was CAUSED by the current app I'm using, or Android just randomly started it?
For example, it's possible Facebook opened Maps in order to try to get my location, but I don't see the connection between Facebook and Google Reader. Which is why I ask if it's random, or the app I'm using is causing other tasks to run.
Paul22000 said:
Thanks. I'm playing around with it and actively trying to make notifications pop up I opened Facebook and Google Reader started, as did Maps. Weird.
Which brings me to a question: how do we know whether the task started was CAUSED by the current app I'm using, or Android just randomly started it?
For example, it's possible Facebook opened Maps in order to try to get my location, but I don't see the connection between Facebook and Google Reader. Which is why I ask if it's random, or the app I'm using is causing other tasks to run.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've found when you start doing things you see patterns. On my old Eris while I was testing this, every time I made a phone call, ebay would start! Glad it seems to be working for you! Thanks!
Great thanks
wael0x said:
Great thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're welcome.
Sounds like a great troubleshooting tool. Nice work!
I'm liking this app more and more. A few more comments and requests.
Comments
* I like the main app window. Large fonts, long-press to get quick-help or short press to go to the item. Nice
* Screen off app start notification, nice!
Requests
1. Possible to get more detail about why or how an app was triggered? Like, was it triggered by a service? another app? etc. And did the triggered app take any actions? Like sending network traffic or queried the GPS and such?
2. The 'Setup Alerts' window is hard to read through, could you maybe add color so all the status 'Green' items have the word 'Green' in green font and so on?
Just added a 5 star rating on Market, keep up the good work!
Namuna said:
I'm liking this app more and more. A few more comments and requests.
Comments
* I like the main app window. Large fonts, long-press to get quick-help or short press to go to the item. Nice
* Screen off app start notification, nice!
Requests
1. Possible to get more detail about why or how an app was triggered? Like, was it triggered by a service? another app? etc. And did the triggered app take any actions? Like sending network traffic or queried the GPS and such?
2. The 'Setup Alerts' window is hard to read through, could you maybe add color so all the status 'Green' items have the word 'Green' in green font and so on?
Just added a 5 star rating on Market, keep up the good work!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the suggestions. Those are features we truly will consider adding as it will just make the tool even better. Thanks!
There will probably be updates from time to time through the market
Sent from my ADR6300 using XDA App
First of all, thanks for a great app.
I really like the fact that it reports on tasks/processes started while the screen was off!
I have some suggestions though:
1: When I click the icon in the app list to open the menu, it just shows the "Starting monitor" message and nothing else. I have to open an app to get the message in the pull down bar and click on that to start the application it self.
2: On my Samsung Galaxy S i9000 the layout of the application is just a bit to long for a full screen. We are talking about 1 cm or something.
3: I would very much like a log, so that I can check back, what applications started during screen off, and at what time/date.
4: The way the Android memory management works, I guess it's normal for Android to start and application/process to memory by itself from time to time. Is it possible to show this somehow? For what is interesting here is when an application is launching another application or process, and not when Android memory management is putting an application in memory.
Thanks for your great work, I'm looking forward to further updates to the application!
Just saw this on the front page and thought it looked pretty interesting. Installed a few minutes ago, but so far I like it. Not too intrusive with the pop-up.
As Namuna posted though it would be nice to get more detail.
Also to have the actual app name rather than com.xxx.
Really good work.
Installed.
I like the idea that we can see what tasks are really doing in the background. But as noted by some above, the notifications are a bit cryptic at the moment.
After installing and running the app, I started updating some of my other apps in App Market and my phone crashed. This has not happened before and I seems from my layman eyes that too many things might have been running in the background.
When the phone restarted, it too forever for anything to be displayed and the 3 widgets I had on the homescreen refused to load up. Again it seems to me that this app is popping up too many notifications - I have now stopped the app from starting up and running on start up.
I don't know whether this is unique to me or not though. I am running the app on Samsung Galaxy S (international) on stock Froyo with LauncherPro.
Still, I like this app and will use it more. Keep up the great work and many thanks.
Edit : just checked app settings again, and although I explicit unchecked app running on phone startup, the box is checked again. I unchecked the box and pressed save again. Re-entered app settings and the box is checked again. Am I missing something?
This looks very interesting.. So it's installed and ready for testing
Thank you very much for that app, it's awesome. I agree with the recent posters that the name of the app in addition to the com.blah.blubb would be a great help to identify the task. Also I'd like to see a possibility for a logfile.
Keep up the good work!
EDIT: I can hardly read the small, dark font when setting task levels since I use almost the very darkest display settings to save battery. So being able to chose the font color would be great but has absolutely no priority. Again: great app!Using it all day long now and I am surprised what tasks are being started!

[Q] running background application in mango 7712

applications are not running in the background
it stops when the screen locks
when it opens again it reloads and shows resuming
is there any way to run the application even when it is locked
Apps have to be recompiled for mango before they can use the benefits of mango. The market place will begin accepting such apps later this month. Also not all apps will "run" in the background. They have to be specifically coded to do background tasks. However apps may benefit from fast resuming which at face level it might appear the app is running but really it was dehydrated.
dont think its possible with current apps
Yeah theres a video on wmpu that goes for about 20 minutes where a guy from the windows phone 7 team discusses multitasking in depth. He pretty much says the last 5 apps you have used will not need to "resume" but will jump straight back in. Background task using apps that will give you toasts, live tiles etc can run an agent for 30 seconds every 30 minutes so battery is not used up.
Something else thats very good is in the settings you can choose to disable specific agents that you dont want the app in question to use, and then the app cannot force it back on, so you wont get annoying toasts etc from apps you dont want.
http://wmpoweruser.com/page/2/
I think its the 3rd video down
sambaman009 said:
Yeah theres a video on wmpu that goes for about 20 minutes where a guy from the windows phone 7 team discusses multitasking in depth. He pretty much says the last 5 apps you have used will not need to "resume" but will jump straight back in. Background task using apps that will give you toasts, live tiles etc can run an agent for 30 seconds every 30 minutes so battery is not used up.
Something else thats very good is in the settings you can choose to disable specific agents that you dont want the app in question to use, and then the app cannot force it back on, so you wont get annoying toasts etc from apps you dont want.
http://wmpoweruser.com/page/2/
I think its the 3rd video down
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i dont think current apps can do this,correct me..
it needs mango specific apps?
Magpir said:
i dont think current apps can do this,correct me..
it needs mango specific apps?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Apps need to be recompiled with the Mango dev tools and resubmitted to the Marketplace, but the Marketplace is not accepting Mango submissions yet, so there are no applications on the Marketplace that support Mango multitasking at the moment.
i got a feeling the multi tasking isnt the same in mango beta as in the final version.
ok, seems the official wp7's multitasking is a crap - if I need to get the real background execution (constant socket listener), I cannot do this even with dehydration hack
but can I perform such background processing in an unmanaged code, through interop service?
Is there a way to use wifi in background cuz he turns off with screen? Anyone know for some fixes? I use Mango. -.-
@author:
if you developer, use this code lines:
Microsoft.Phone.Shell.PhoneApplicationService.Current.UserIdleDetectionMode = IdleDetectionMode.Disabled; // disable screenlock
Microsoft.Phone.Shell.PhoneApplicationService.Current.ApplicationIdleDetectionMode = IdleDetectionMode.Disabled; // disable to diactivate application
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
its works only with Mango.

Recommend me some Apps, Please

I'm swapping from Android to Windows Phone, and was hoping if anyone is bored enough to read this they might suggest some Windows Phone Apps that might suit my needs.
In no way do I expect anyone that hops in to respond to each type, or google around for me, but I expect I'm not the first person to make the Android -> Windows phone swap, so maybe some of you will have a quick idea of ones to try out. You don't need to spend a lot of time explaining every app, if you're busy. Every platform is different though, so rather than spend 10 hours looking for something that everyone in the community already knows, I thought I would just toss out some quick questions.
1. RSS feeds. On Android I use gReader Pro. It's a pretty basic app that allows easy setup for RSS feeds and syncs them with your google reader account. Not very exciting, but it's easy to use because my feeds are already set up via google, so a decent app that can do the same would be nice.
2. Google Voice. I'd like to make and receive texts, as well as make calls on wifi (receiving calls isn't a big deal, but would be a plus). I downloaded GoVoice, which seems like it will be pretty decent, but am open to suggsetions.
3. Podcasts. I used Doggcatcher on Android, which allows you to stream, download + save, and sync podcasts. It has a decent search function to help you get started.
4. Tasker. This one is more difficult to explain, but essentially it allows you to program a set of tasks, like a macro function. Essentially I have it set up for "Off" (as in data/wifi/bluetooth/gps/gsm disabled), "Data" (same as off but wifi enabled), "Loud" (same as data but with notifications and media volumes all the way up), and "Car" (same as Loud but wifi off and speakerphone and GPS enabled). Basically I use this to change the state of the GPS, WIFI, and volumes, so that I can quickly switch a number of settings at once. Great app, if you have some patience and have an Android kicking around.
5. Astrid Tasks. A pretty basic reminder app. I'm sure there are plenty of these for Windows Phone, but any suggestion would great. If it can store backups to the computer, or sync with a cloud based system, that would be a plus.
6*. Something to show running applications quickly. I'm not sure if this is actually an issue for Windows Phone, but sometimes apps go "rogue" on Android, so being able to make sure that a particular app isn't a battery drain would be nice. I was using System Panel on Android. If this isn't needed, disregard the question.
7. A good alarm app. I was using Gentle Alarm on Android, which has a widget to show you the next alarm that will go off, and allows easy creation of various alarms, which can be set for audible, vibration, specific days of the week to repeat on, etc. You can also ensure that alarms will always be audible, regardless of if everything else is muted, which is nice for at night when you don't need an email waking you up, but need to make sure the alarm is at maximum volume in the morning.
8. Anything else you can think of that is a must have for daily use. I'm a student and don't really have a lot of time to play with the phone for games, but hey, we all have to pass the time every once in a while.
9. Onenote. I like how this app syncs easily, but I can't view my handwritten notes that I write on my tablet. Is there a workaround that allows you to see these?
------ I'm only using this Lumia 710 on WIFI, essentially as a PDA + GPS, so anything handy that can prevent battery drain is a plus, as I don't require GPS to constantly be on, and I certainly don't need phone/data(non-wifi) to constantly be on.
In short, I appreciate any input you might have, even if it's only for one of the things I have listed. The phone seems great in general, and had most of the important things already installed (the email, calendar, navigation, office, etc., is fantastic as is, which is a great bonus compared to Android, where I had to use 3rd party apps for most of the core aspects).
Regards,
--bb
Weave
Skype
Music and Video with Zune
Not possible
Ask Ziggy
not needed
Default alarm
Board Express Pro
Sent from my HD7 using Board Express
---------- Post added at 06:16 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:14 PM ----------
Nokia Drive
Crackle
Nokia Creative Studio
Contract Killer
Sent from my HD7 using Board Express
---------- Post added at 06:18 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:16 PM ----------
Box
SkyDrive
MetroTube
Sent from my HD7 using Board Express
pvt_nemesis said:
Weave
Skype
Music and Video with Zune
Not possible
Ask Ziggy
not needed
Default alarm
Board Express Pro
Sent from my HD7 using Board Express
---------- Post added at 06:16 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:14 PM ----------
Nokia Drive
Crackle
Nokia Creative Studio
Contract Killer
Sent from my HD7 using Board Express
---------- Post added at 06:18 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:16 PM ----------
Box
SkyDrive
MetroTube
Sent from my HD7 using Board Express
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for all of the suggestions. That should keep me busy for quite awhile. :good:
Try also fantasia painter for photo editor. Is awesome and free. The only app i am missing since switching from wp7 to android
Sent from my HTC Explorer A310e using xda app-developers app
Before I get into my list, I'm just going to run down how apps and multi tasking work on WP7 in case you don't already know.
#1: No app can truly run in the background. The only way to get an app to continue running is either to have it up and prevent the screen from turning off, or (if supported by the app) allow it to run under the lockscreen, which means when you press the power button, only the screen turns off, the phone does not enter a sleep state.
-----------------The exception to this rule is when an app is playing music. If the app dev has done it correctly, he should have handed the music playing off to the system, so once you set up the music source in app, you should be able to minimize it and use the next/previous/play/pause controls. In fact you can even go to grooveshark's beta html5 in internet explorer; HTML5 can plug in to this system media playback! I was very excited to learn that. But at least on grooveshark, next/previous controls don't work.
#2: HOWEVER each app can have a "daemon" which is essentially a set of tasks that are run periodically by the system (minimum of every half hour). So if you use google latitude, latitude apps will only be able to update your position every half hour (or at longer intervals, but no shorter). This system of background daemons is actually very very good as it encourages unique thinking from the developer side, and still gives the user the benefits of true multi tasking without the battery drainage. What a daemon can do isn't that limited, but it's the fact that no internet connection can remain active in the background that poses a lot of problems (for example, IRC clients cannot have multi tasking for this reason). Since things can only run every half hour, you don't have to worry about things like turning off your gps, since nothing is allowed to just turn on the GPS and keep it on.
#3 : Also there's still push, of course. Lemme break that down for you: push notifications can either be through the live tile (rather than having a background daemon update the tile, things are pushed to it immediately as they arrive), or push can be used through statusbar notifications. One unfortunate oversight in this system is that if you have an app that you do not pin to the start menu, and if it has a notification and you did not hear it... there is no list of missed notifications. This doesn't come into play that often; for me it only happens with eBay, where I don't want to bother having that on my start screen but I might miss some alerts.
#4: Battery Saver mode is YOUR FRIEND. You can get nearly another day out of your phone (or I can with my Titan) when battery saver kicks in. You can enable it so that it turns on when the battery is low (%20), or manually. However, it disables all background daemons and push notification in order to save battery.
#5: Multi tasking and switching between apps. Hold down the back button to see the list of the last several apps you used (or in the case of my unlocked ROM, all of the apps you have used since boot). When you minimize an app (press the start button), it gets "dehydrated" which means it's just suspended to RAM. It works like you'd expect; start typing something in one app, switch over to another to look something up and switch back to the first to resume typing. To remove an app from the list, or "exit" the app (since it isn't actually running the only thing this does is remove clutter or perhaps free up some slots), you "back" out of them. Press the back button until the app goes away.
One of the reasons, in my opinion, that windows 8 is getting a lot of negative flack is because people don't know that live tiles are good. It doesn't help that, last time I checked, there were no useful live tile apps in the 8 marketplace yet. So frustrating! People hate what they don't understand, because hating on the internet is the standard state of existence. I encourage you to think about what you do on the internet every time you sit down on your computer, and see if you can find an app with live tile to do it for you. For me, I had a routine of checking my email(s), going through a lot of webcomics, reading news feeds, etc. That was my daily routine. Now with WP7, I have each aspect of my routine as a live tile, so I can literally replace that entire process with just looking at the start screen.
The other thing about live tiles and metro that people fail to understand is that active push notifications, where unnecessary are BAD, for a few different reasons. Push notifications are "active" and live tiles are "passive". This is because live tiles do not make any noise or otherwise prompt you to look at them; they are simply there and deliver content when you pull out your phone. Let me put this in perspective: say I pull out my phone to look up something on wikipedia. I can see that I have 2 new emails, some new RSS articles and a facebook notification. Number 1: I don't feel the urge to go and clear the unread count of all of these things, as I would if they were all aggregated in the statusbar like on android (because you need that statusbar for things, and if it's cluttered and you don't keep up on it, it quickly fills up and becomes overwhelming). I can leave them alone for now and go to wikipedia. Now if this were an android/IOS device, I would have gotten an audible notification for each of those three things, and I would have taken time out of whatever I was doing IN LIFE to tend to my phone.
Some points about stressors here (and when I say stressors, I don't mean overwhelming stress you can feel, but stress in the clinical sense, which is objective): having your phone beep at you constantly stresses you; for most people it's difficult to put their phone out of their mind until they have seen what the notification was. This is not good.
Moreover, feeling the need to go and clear unread counts/managing your statusbar is also somewhat of a stressor; if it starts overflowing you'll either learn to not use things that create notifications (somewhat limiting your experience with a smartphone), give up all hope and never look at the statusbar again, or just clear it out and miss out on things you wouldn't have if the information was presented in an orderly fashion.
Live tiles, being passive, are also more efficient in terms of time spent on the phone and your phone's battery life. Notice how in my example, I observed the new content only when I was already pulling out my phone to do something else. With things aggregating in bulk, I can view them in bulk at points of the day where I was already on my phone. This is opposed to pulling out my phone every 15 minutes because something new happened... which wastes time pulling your phone out of your pocket many times a day, wastes battery when turning the screen on/off many times a day, and if you use wifi; wastes even more battery when the wifi radio is turned on/off sporadically many times a day.
So yes, live tiles are an objectively less stressful approach to mobile devices and less distracting from tasks at hand. The same concepts can be applied to windows 8; rather than having popup notifications for all your facebook, email, rss, etc bombard you while you're trying to write a paper... all of that information is silently aggregated for you in the background.
------------The List-------------------
For alarms,
627.AM
Built in Alarm app.
For task / project management
Tasks by telerik
Or just use the built in calendar app
Or use Onenote and Pin your task list to the start screen.
For RSS
Wonder Reader hands down, none of the other google reader clients are quite as fully functional and polished.
Fuse is pretty but I never got the hang of using it.
For Wifi Video calls
Tango. It's pretty limited in that the android and IOS client are updated with better features, and you can only call other people with tango... but the service itself is more efficient and more reliable than the skype app was last time I tried it. Moreover it supports push for accepting calls, something skype doesn't. Also I like the concept of not having "online / offline" states. You call someone, and they choose to answer it or not. Why would I need to log into a phone...
I used to take notes on a tablet at school, and ran into the same problem as you. Only solution I know of is to print your notes back into onenote. You'll have duplicates of everything unfortunately.
Podcast functionality is built in.
For random recommendations...
das Image (Better image search)
Image Map (Renders all of your pictures on a map based on GPS loc info)
Dynamic Background (Unlock) (Updates the lockscreen picture every half hour choosing randomly from a pool of selected images)
Battery Status (Unlock) (Live tile for current battery percent, also tracks battery usage and graphs it for you)
EnClock (there is no stopwatch built in to WP7, and you never know when you need one)
eBay
HandyScan (Helps you take good pictures of papers, backs up to skydrive. Better to keep documents in here than with regular pictures).
Keep Alive (by jaxbot, it prevents wifi from turning off)
Nokia Drive (Unlock unless you get a nokia device)
MetroPaper (Read it later / pocket)
Metrotube + Supertube (youtube apps. 1 is awesome, 2 lets you download videos and even create offline "music" playlists)
Photo2cloud (back up full res photos to skydrive independent of PC)
Supreme Shortcuts (Unlock) (Lets you pin any setting page to the start screen)
WeatherLive (There are plenty of other weather apps... but weatherlive works, it's incredibly thorough, updates live tile using GPS location, is pretty, etc)
Zite (Gives you news articles based on google reader feeds and who you follow in twitter, good for every time I go to the toilet )
If you use IRC or SSH
The SSH Client Pro
TinyIRC
And now that you are a part of the WP community, you should invest in AND pin the live tiles of each to your start screen:
WPCentral
WMPoweruser
Games! I Don't like to play serious games on my phone; I like something I can whip out at any time and turn off at any time, no consequence. That said, I make an exception for the Final Fantasy updated / rerelease for WP7
COLLAPSE (Probably my favorite mobile game. It's an easy puzzle game, but satisfying to plow through at ludicrous speed. There are some very hard rounds with special conditions though.. story mode is dumb but it has unique challenges and you need to play through it to unlock all the quick play modes).
Final Fantasy
Wordament
Fruit Ninja
Dodonpachi Maximum (Genre: Bullet Hell. If you don't know what that means then try it before you buy it. If you love bullet hell; buy this. It's by CAVE).
Wizard's Choice (A casual text adventure).
link68759 said:
Lots of good info
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you for the detailed response!
I've started using Onenote as a to-do list, but I made a recent post as to why that's causing me problems (or so it seems).
I seem to be syncing everything from onenote, and my device has basically filled up overnight as it downloaded my files. Microsoft told me to contact Nokia about it, and then disconnected?
It seemed like a good plan to me as well. I don't really need to see detailed graphs and notes on the phone, just a couple simple folders.
I may just reset the phone and give the other apps you suggested a shot, and not connect with my microsoft live ID at all. I went from plenty of space on the device to none, in a matter of days.
I'm not sure if podcasts were an issue as well, and how it saves and deletes them. I only stored what I would consider a small amount, maybe 200 megs or less.
Nokia drive works great. It takes up a lot of space, but I have it on my feature phone as well, and the GPS acquisition time on the Lumia 710 blows away my E5-00, and my Droid X. It's just incredibly fast at locking in.
I'll do a reset tomorrow and give the other apps a shot, and try to avoid anything that could be crushing my storage. All I really need for storage is email, nokia drive, and basic apps/news/podcasts, which on my android (nav aside) shouldn't really take more than 1 gig of space. A few small games to pass the time, and some apps for productivity, and I should be back in business.
Unfortunately I can't seem to find a way to determine what is using X amount of space, so I'll have to do a full wipe and install items slowly, to sort it out.
There isn't a proper app to view this kind of thing, is there?
Regards,
--bb
I'll reply to your other thread about one note.
You can't not connect with your live ID if you plan to download apps unfortunately.
For viewing used space, Zune does divide it up for you, I don't remember how specific it gets but it should be divided into space used by music, videos, podcasts, apps. I don't think it's possible for an app to view usage, because each app is sandboxed; that is they have their own folder on the device and they are not allowed to leave it.
Nokia Drive shouldn't need to take up a lot of space; you can just download the maps of where you live and where you might possibly go spontaneously, as opposed to your whole country XD. Yeah I've had good luck with my phones and GPS, WP7 in general does an excellent job with GPS.
Oh I forgot to mention in my first post; WPCentral and WMPoweruser are good because they do a lot of app/game reviews, usually the reviews are on new apps in the market. This is pretty much the only way I discover new apps
link68759 said:
I'll reply to your other thread about one note.
You can't not connect with your live ID if you plan to download apps unfortunately.
For viewing used space, Zune does divide it up for you, I don't remember how specific it gets but it should be divided into space used by music, videos, podcasts, apps. I don't think it's possible for an app to view usage, because each app is sandboxed; that is they have their own folder on the device and they are not allowed to leave it.
Nokia Drive shouldn't need to take up a lot of space; you can just download the maps of where you live and where you might possibly go spontaneously, as opposed to your whole country XD. Yeah I've had good luck with my phones and GPS, WP7 in general does an excellent job with GPS.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Gotcha!
I will look into setting up a new windows live account for OneNote to-do type lists. I know Office sometimes used to have issues with multiple live accounts on the same computer, in Windows 7, but I think that's mostly fixed now. I use google calendar anyways (to sync), so realistically it's not the end of the world for me to keep the accounts disconnected from my school Onenote live account.
I guess I synced all of Nokia North America at once (1.9 or so gigs of a download). I certainly don't need more than 20% of it. In fact, my whole state, now that I look at it, is only 36 megs.
Now that you've given some ideas of how to approach it, I'm liking this more than any of my other previous phones (iPhone, BB Bold, Droid X, etc). It needs some time to grow as an operating system, and Nokia really needs to put an LED notification light on future models [shakes tiny fist], but I think they're back in the game!
Thank you very much for all of your help.
//Edit: I read your other post responding to mine. I think you're right. I could probably do a wipe, use the same account, but move the basic to-do lists to a separate folder, pin them, and make sure to never ever open the school folder itself in Office on the phone. That sounds like it would work ok as well, as I must have opened a school folder that overwhelmed it and just started syncing massive amounts of pdf's, inking, and so on, along with the simple things.
I just wanted to also mention that all that you typed out would make for a great sticky. That's a ton of great info.
Thank you again for all of the feedback.
You made some excellent points about how smartphones add lots of unnecessary stresses when they're constantly distracting us with notifications, as well as how live tiles really help ease you into information you need, and information you might not, but are willing to take a brief glance at. I'm a big Windows 8 fan, and have used RP, RTM Pro (currently), and RTM enterprise. I think Live Tiles are fantastic, whether it's on my phone, my convertible laptop, or my desktop. I think you're absolutely correct about how people just don't quite understand how handy it will be yet.
//BTW: I bookmarked your post as a sort of "zen" explanation I can refer back to, or link to a friend, so they understand the unity and purposes in the next stage in Windows products.
///Afterthought: I still would like a notification LED on the phone, as long as it's customizable. On Android and Blackberry I would always disable the light for all of the nonsense things, but keep it enabled for things like a missed call (because that could be my son needing a ride, or something else that's important), or for a severe weather alert. Random emails would just have to wait until I turned on the screen.
Sorry to bump my own thread again, but I have a question about three of the apps that link68759 mentioned.
"Supreme Shortcuts (Unlock) (Lets you pin any setting page to the start screen)"
"Battery Status (Unlock) (Live tile for current battery percent, also tracks battery usage and graphs it for you)"
"Keep Alive (by jaxbot, it prevents wifi from turning off)"
By "unlock" I'm assuming he meant an unlocked bootloader, and not locked to a cellular carrier? I did the basic test today, and mine appears to be locked, which is a shame because both of those functions would be great.
As far as "Keep Alive" goes, I can't seem to find that specific app/dev combo in the market. I don't use 3g/4g data on this phone, or any phone anymore, so is that an app that is better than keeping the scanning on, or is it a battery drain? I'm just not sure I follow the concept, because I can't find a description of it.
Regards,
--bb
bladebarrier said:
Sorry to bump my own thread again, but I have a question about three of the apps that link68759 mentioned.
"Supreme Shortcuts (Unlock) (Lets you pin any setting page to the start screen)"
"Battery Status (Unlock) (Live tile for current battery percent, also tracks battery usage and graphs it for you)"
"Keep Alive (by jaxbot, it prevents wifi from turning off)"
By "unlock" I'm assuming he meant an unlocked bootloader, and not locked to a cellular carrier? I did the basic test today, and mine appears to be locked, which is a shame because both of those functions would be great.
As far as "Keep Alive" goes, I can't seem to find that specific app/dev combo in the market. I don't use 3g/4g data on this phone, or any phone anymore, so is that an app that is better than keeping the scanning on, or is it a battery drain? I'm just not sure I follow the concept, because I can't find a description of it.
Regards,
--bb
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You'll need to flash a custom ROM, which you can luckily do on your 710.
The a wifi radio turning on/off takes more power than one that is idly connected. So if you use the phone frequently, it's better to stay connected. If you aren't going to touch it for many hours at a time, better to let it disconnect and turn off.
But if you aren't using cellular then you'll need wifi to update information in the background.
Some more here
Dialpad7
Handyscan
Photogram
Skype
Sleep Bug
Tango
UC Browser
whatspp= messenger
Yelp = to find nearby things

Coming from Windows Phone & need advice...TIA

Coming from a couple years on the Windows platform mandated by the office but now they allow Android & I chose LG G3 - but there are some things on the Windows phone I miss and can;t find solutions for on the LG...
1 > The Nokia 920 had a great way of displaying the time on the time out screen - can't get that to work at all on the LG with any app..
2> The Windows platform will read texts to me while in the car on Bluetooth. There is an droid app called ReadItToMe but it is awfully inconsistent. I had heard the Samsungs come with svoice that do this well...anything similar for the LG?
3> Windows had a way of killing apps automatically in the background and keeping just 5 or so open...this allowed the battery to last for an entire day for over two years. I can not figure out how to do this on the LG. I dl Advanced task killer but it seems more manual than auto...maybe my fault.
Thanks for any productive input!
DPLOY said:
Coming from a couple years on the Windows platform mandated by the office but now they allow Android & I chose LG G3 - but there are some things on the Windows phone I miss and can;t find solutions for on the LG...
1 > The Nokia 920 had a great way of displaying the time on the time out screen - can't get that to work at all on the LG with any app..
2> The Windows platform will read texts to me while in the car on Bluetooth. There is an droid app called ReadItToMe but it is awfully inconsistent. I had heard the Samsungs come with svoice that do this well...anything similar for the LG?
3> Windows had a way of killing apps automatically in the background and keeping just 5 or so open...this allowed the battery to last for an entire day for over two years. I can not figure out how to do this on the LG. I dl Advanced task killer but it seems more manual than auto...maybe my fault.
Thanks for any productive input!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Welcome to android and in answer to your questions:
1. What you are referring to is a feature of some Nokia Lumia Windows Phones called Glance Screen and I have not seen any android phone with this feature. Sorry but I don't know of any apps that can do this as this currently appears to be hardware specific to the Lumia line of phones.
2. I believe the phone has the capability built in under "System Settings" "Sound", "Message/call voice notifications". There is an option for it to read text messages it loud. I think once you turn it on, it is on all the time though and not exclusive to bluetooth. If you are willing to buy an app and learn how to use it (depending on your knowledge it may be a steep learning curve), Tasker may be able to create a profile that sets the conditions under which this turns on.
3. This is an area of contention. I personally will no longer use Task killers. For the most part, various research and tests I have found states that it has no positive impact on the battery, and in some cases, actually makes worsens it. Android does a good job of managing memory and many of the active tasks should be left running (i.e. google services, weather, and/or any app you may want to keep in sync or have widgets for). In my opinion, ATK's only potential "good" use would be to kill a rogue app but you can do that without the program. I would focus more on the apps syncing in the background and how often they do so, along with other common things such as screen brightness, to get better battery life. For me, I will swear by Greenify over task killers (I am rooted so it is very effective) because certain persistant apps can be hibernated and can be set up to do so automatically when the screen shuts off. With Greenify, the apps remain hibernated while the screen is off and for the most part when the screen is on, unless I open the apps. An example is Facebook for android. I personally do not care about notifications received on my phone for my FB account. Even though I have chat, notifications, and contact sync off, FB persists to run as an active background process (not to be confused with cached background processes which get dumped as android needs active RAM). With Greenify, this is not an issue.
Thanks aybarrap1! I see you are in Jax near me - thanks for helping a local out!
I will try Greenify asap. Also - in the stock contact app how do you copy (or forward) someone's contact information & text it to someone else? WP made this easy but I can not figure it out...
THANKS AGAIN aybarrap1!
DPLOY said:
Thanks aybarrap1! I see you are in Jax near me - thanks for helping a local out!
I will try Greenify asap. Also - in the stock contact app how do you copy (or forward) someone's contact information & text it to someone else? WP made this easy but I can not figure it out...
THANKS AGAIN aybarrap1!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Open messaging, open the thread of the person you want to send TO (or create a new message), tap the paper clip button to the left of the text box to get a list of things to attach, then tap contact and select the contact to forward
DPLOY said:
Thanks aybarrap1! I see you are in Jax near me - thanks for helping a local out!
I will try Greenify asap.
THANKS AGAIN aybarrap1!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Glad to be of assistance. I don't think you will be disappointed with Greenify. Keep in mind you need to be rooted to be able to hibernate system apps.

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