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Taking a speech class and had a chance to write about the Android platform. Figured I'd share here. Enjoy and comment as you will.
I wish to start off by saying welcome to the future. A bold proclamation yes, but with such experiments and ongoing research by numerous scientists today, technological breakthroughs are vast and epic. One of the many platforms so to speak that is having phenomenal breakthroughs is in the mobile systems department. Here lays a couple companies with R&D plans that carter towards certain parties promising slick user interfaces, application channels, and a complete web experience. Couple that with feature rich phones that allow one to text, call, global positioning (GPS), and well, you have a product to sell. Google has done just that. Taking bits and pieces of everything one could ever ask for, and merging it all into its mobile operating system titled Android. Represented by a green round-headed robot figure, Android is passing its two year anniversary, and has surpassed other prominent mobile architectures like Apple’s iPhone software. But what exactly is Android? Why would one desire to chuck away their limited iPhone, or stray away from the Blackberry Enterprise lineup? One word: Open source. Couple that with the experience (the art of customizing your device), and the synchronization aspects of the device for virtually any account you have on the net, and you have a total package.
Having a total package within arm’s reach, and inside your pocket is quite a powerful tool. With Google’s Android platform, there is never a point where you can say No. Any and every idea can and could be coded into the device if you have the means to do so. Open source is the ticket. Asking yourself what this means is actually a very simple question. Open source is the definition of computer code that is freely available to anyone who wishes to find it. Google has opened up the software to all who have a spirit to create and provide applications (Apps) and programs to others. Hackers, coders, and all techy guros have created a plethora of net-libraries ranging from support groups, forums and websites to further help noobies in the process. Sounds like a lot, but in reality, the experience is quite easy going. Competitors like Apple and Blackberry have limited their system to developers by safekeeping some of its computer code. This limits creativity, as it puts restrictions and limitations as to what exactly what one can create. Add to the fact that companies like Apple also screen apps to a much higher caliber, halting smaller apps without much bang in the beginning to be choked to death. It seems as if anything is available for pleasure with Android though. If it doesn’t exist, pop into a forum and jot down a reply on a thread. If that’s not enough, I’m sure you have one friend that has already found solutions in the “Green-Guy”. There is always someone there who has the tools necessary to create it, or rather has already created it in the first place.
From forums and coders who have the know-how and tools to create a mind-blowing experience, the customization factor of Android is truly one of its largest selling points. To be quite honest, each and every android device could be considered a work of art. It’s all in how the user desires it for themselves…how deep the user wants to venture; how deep goes their rabbit? From changing backgrounds and wallpapers, to adding widgets to your home screen, the android spectrum allows one to make the phone their own, morph it into how they see fitting. But how is this different from other products? Surely other phones allow their users to alter what they see on screen. Yet I assert, the android experience is different. Almost, if not every aspect of android is customizable. Icons can be altered, the font can be changed, dates, times, anything can be tweaked. Sites like XDA, AndroidSpin, and AndroidandMe provide great reviews, heads up, and forums to browse through numerous applications, both beta and final. The options are endless, and it’s open in the air to anyone who desires a bit of change. Many new phones come preinstalled with newer software, as you might here Froyo, Éclair or Gingerbread tossed around. These are simply codenames for newer versions of software from Google. If your carrier doesn’t support the newer software, chances are a coder has already made it available for you. Convenience without a price attached!
Free in price is seemingly synonymous with freedom. Freedom to choose. Freedom to enjoy. Freedom to experience. Freedom from a stationary computer. Android is a thriving system that allows you to constantly stay on the up and up. Synchronization appears a mystery as your Facebook, Twitter, email, and numerous other accounts are integrated into the system via apps or at stock. With live widgets that monitor in real time your accounts, any and all social networks, social feeds, and business/personal accounts are updated instantly. No more carrying around a tiring laptop, or waiting to login the networks at any given campus. 3G speeds and now 4G on some carriers are making mobile devices the in crowd, as speeds are comparable to standard net speeds. As many people day are on the up and up, or rather, out and about, a mobile system that constantly allows access to ones desired feeds is grand. Couple that with ability to alter documents on the fly, listen to your favorite music (via Pandora, or from the Phones Internal Memory…think iPod), you have a complete package. It’s not just a Media Device, a Business Device, a Cell Phone, as it truly lives up to the name of Smart Phone.
For me the choice was easy. I thrive off customization, the ability to make my phone a tad different, even faster, or more efficient then what the original company did for me. But as Android ages, everything looks bright and promising. To proclaim dark clouds linger would be insanity. From its initial creation of being open-sourced, to customizing features and its ability to be versatile, Android has shattered the mobile systems realm. As it races to the top, Android allows users to update on the go, with synchronization from virtually every social feed. When people ask me about phones and what should be right for them, there is no question for me. It’s never been a question about what Android can’t do, but what Android does.
<- Laughing Out Loud.
It's full of grammar faux pas, by the way.
Still very well written *only read first paragraph* but I was impressed, not bad Also maybe a bit many commas...
BTW, shouldve been posted in the off topic section
Nice Speech. I Enjoyed reading it.
Sent from Conical. 07
I'm new to Android development, mainly because I've been trying to find a small enough project that was reasonable to bite off as a first foray but interesting enough to keep me engaged. I finally found something I think would be a reasonably sized project for starting out and would also actually be useful to me. Unfortunately, in researching it, I ran in to the fact that there is no API for Google Now.
To back track a bit, the app/functionality I want to implement is a modification to cards, or to one of the data feeds Google pulls from to populate Now cards. I commute in and out of NYC via Metro North, but walk to and from the station on both ends, so what I really need is the information for the next 5 trains scheduled inbound in the morning and outbound in the evening between Grand Central and my home stop, along with the track number the train is slated to leave from. This data is available from a datafeed provided by the MTA (and already utilized by an Android app I already use). The transit and commute Now cards don't provide me the information I need.
Since there's no Google Now API, the direct root is not available to me, so I started to try to look in to alternative methods. I came across the Places API and was thinking of trying to use it as a back door to populating the data I'm interested in in to Now (by having a service that pulls the train info I'm interested in from the MTA feed and pushes it to Now as Events at the stations I'm interested in), but since custom Places data is tied to an app ID and only made available to requests from that app, it seems to me that that angle is a non-starter, since I'm not going to have the Now app ID.
I've been trying to poke around for any other viable approaches to the problem, but my search has thus far come up dry, so I have come here. Has anyone come up with any ways to feed info in to Now cards? Are there even any promising areas of investigation, short of hacking Now itself?
Edit: I also considered trying to push the train schedule data to my calendar so it would bubble up in to Now, but that is just a bit too clunky and spammy, imo.
Does anyone know of anything interesting being done in this area? I'm thinking some sort of integration with calendar is the only way to go...
tl;dr I'm new, I'm not a very knowledgeable developer, I have an idea that I want your opinion about.
Heyo Peoples,
I'm new and I like to think a lot about cool new stuff with mobile devices (web, software, hardware, etc). I've been thinking a lot recently about how people like to use mobile devices, and how we might use them in the near future--thinking past what's being done now, and into what comes next.
I've been wondering for a while why there isn't an existing piece of functionality on mobile devices that allows a user complete control of the device and every piece of information on it. Imagine a GUI except instead of graphics, it's like interacting with a person. (aside: first person to say Siri should be shunned like an Amish girl who went to a movie theater).
Is it outrageous to say that you should be able to pick up your phone and have it find anything, from anytime in the past that you have done with or on it? I know that would take mountains of data, but is it silly? In it's most basic form, this would just be a search feature. In it's most eloquent form it could be an operating system. Imagine being able to ask your phone what you did last Wednesday, or maybe where you were. What if it could recall emails or documents based on date, time, location where you were when you wrote it, keyword, or contact, based on verbal interaction? What if it tracked data usage by application, or allowed you to measure and optimize system performance with a verbal command (ex. "Shut down all apps except for Google Maps" or "How much data am I using per minute").
Is it too early to start wishing for an interface like that computer on Paycheck (horrible movie with Ben Afleck) or Cortana in Halo? Is this type of interface impractical or implausible?
If you were to make something like this, would it have to be a new operating system built from the ground up, or could you develop an app to do this, or could you hack Android to do it? I welcome all of your feedback.
Lots of questions, and I have very few answers.
Jujubes said:
tl;dr I'm new, I'm not a very knowledgeable developer, I have an idea that I want your opinion about.
Heyo Peoples,
I'm new and I like to think a lot about cool new stuff with mobile devices (web, software, hardware, etc). I've been thinking a lot recently about how people like to use mobile devices, and how we might use them in the near future--thinking past what's being done now, and into what comes next.
I've been wondering for a while why there isn't an existing piece of functionality on mobile devices that allows a user complete control of the device and every piece of information on it. Imagine a GUI except instead of graphics, it's like interacting with a person. (aside: first person to say Siri should be shunned like an Amish girl who went to a movie theater).
Is it outrageous to say that you should be able to pick up your phone and have it find anything, from anytime in the past that you have done with or on it? I know that would take mountains of data, but is it silly? In it's most basic form, this would just be a search feature. In it's most eloquent form it could be an operating system. Imagine being able to ask your phone what you did last Wednesday, or maybe where you were. What if it could recall emails or documents based on date, time, location where you were when you wrote it, keyword, or contact, based on verbal interaction? What if it tracked data usage by application, or allowed you to measure and optimize system performance with a verbal command (ex. "Shut down all apps except for Google Maps" or "How much data am I using per minute").
Is it too early to start wishing for an interface like that computer on Paycheck (horrible movie with Ben Afleck) or Cortana in Halo? Is this type of interface impractical or implausible?
If you were to make something like this, would it have to be a new operating system built from the ground up, or could you develop an app to do this, or could you hack Android to do it? I welcome all of your feedback.
Lots of questions, and I have very few answers.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is probably not as far off as it seems. The developers of "Utter" have come along way in the right direction. You should maybe approach them with your ideas. Not all of them of course . Save some for yourself.
One problem I see is semantics. "Shut down all apps except for Google Maps" sounds good - but do you really mean ALL apps ? The line that would be walked is one where the developer must train the program to not necessarily do what they ask, but do what they WANT. It gets trickier when you realise that some people who aren't your average users might want to test things and shut down an app (in this case) that an average user would never want shut, where they might mess up their phone beyond their ability to repair if they did.
I think speech is a great tool to interact, though I'm not going to be a person to use it. I don't think speech will ever become a default unless there are other technological advances that change how we interact with the world. It's annoying enough to hear someone gabbing loudly to another human on the phone, do we really want people gabbing AT their phones as a default interface ? I think privacy is a driving factor that will keep sound from being a major interface - perhaps it could work for in home applications, but out in public people may not want to announce to the world who they are calling, what they are looking for, or what site they're logging on to, et cetera. Until there's technology to make voice and sound less "public", I don't see this being the future of phones - it's more of a nice thing to have as an "extra" for when a person is comfortable using it.
But, hey, maybe we'll get used to wearing Google Glass and talking to ourselves all the time - or we'll get in-ear buds or implants where we can choose to hear the outside world or not. Just exploring the possibilities here.
I do think it's a big "outrageous" to have infinite backup. Just take a look at how much data companies like Amazon and Facebook acquire on a per-day basis. Think about how much data you use on a daily basis. I don't have the money or desire to be buying new HDDs every other week. Maybe in the future there will be a technological revolution that allows for mass amounts of data to be stored in even smaller spaces. But current technology in that regard is still very expensive and persnickety - read about high capacity SD cards and how fragile they can be and about data needing to be "refreshed" or they can become corrupt. There are lots of issues that make backing up everything you do impracticable.
And, again - privacy concerns. Do I really want my computer to know what I did last Wednesday and who I was with ? What if someone stole my computer or phone and had access to that information ? If we had the technology to do that, who's to say that current encryption would be "enough" - or that someone wouldn't go ahead and try to hack it anyway if they felt finding out basically everything about you was worth brute-forcing your phone or whatever they'd do in the future ? And have no password or a crappy one - even easier for them to know EVERYTHING about you, now.
Highly visual and talk-activated computers are absolutely great for games, movies, and TV. Why ? They function as narrative devices. They allow the actor to say or explain things they otherwise wouldn't have said out loud for personal, practical, or security reasons. They can become characters in their own right. People like those big screen computer displays where the characters are poking things all over and up and down - it looks cool. But not so cool is having your arms get tired from reaching up and around all the time. Not so cool is having to tell the computer out loud what kind of special images you want to search for when you have house-mates living in the next room over.
Just some thoughts. If you have other or counter ideas, go right on ahead.
Good day community,
Over the past several months, a few of us have been working on a projerct some may be familiar with. We have bundled an add-on to specific BlueStacks versions to allow for a complete Operating System environment, full of communications tools.
We didn't "develop", any of it. We have taken the time to scour the internet and primarily this site to garner the education, information and knowledge to actually bring it to fruition. We would like to say a big THANK YOU to the entire community here. We feel this is am important piece to a software life-cycle where developed information is compiled into a fully functioning system, exposing your people's craftsmanship.
The motive here is a moral one. I have been a communications engineer for 22 years and have seen and done things I thought weren't possible. I have been tasked with trying to develop an education platform technology matrix for schools. Specifically using my innovation abilities to solve problems. I am not a coder, I am more of a script writer. I have found success in making disparate hardware and software work together, and producing middle-ware scripts and functions to technologically solve challenges. In every sector.
I believe I have identified one of the major issues related to student success rates. Basic communications is hindered in many schools, internet cut out, and dictator like classroom regime. I feel communications is the king of industry and whomever has the information the fastest, cheapest, and accurate, wins. This is proven time and time again in capitalism. I feel students should be able to sms, or exchange pictures and peruse social networks, both to each other and their teachers. These are real-world tools, and the primary back-bone of a child's social life. But students need to learn to be accountable for they digital actions,
This "OS" changes things ever so slightly., not every student can afford the gear required to have that type of communication. If every kid could afford an iphone and ipad, than I don't need to do this project. Android on the other hand, little or no cost at all.
I will be deploying Android for Windows across the board. Students will have to setup a Google account and online storage. Copies of AW can be had for their home computer. The environment is the environment kids all love and use, the emulated touch interface is "cool" and the kids can support it and maintain it mostly themselves, and sync it to their PC phones or other devices, but those are NOT required. And no need to upgrade the PC's for a while, BlueStacks is Linux(ish), it's hardware demands are low, and I can keep the PC's at there current level.
I distribute it on thepratebay, another long story for another day, but this is the best way to ensure it stays out there, and the price is right to be able to push it out to the world. We have tirelessly worked to ensure compatibility with the apps the devs release and I know this particular release of AW has restored many of the items BlueStacks cripples
We have started a mini marketing campaign to drum up interest, although modest. And for you devs, this open an ENTIRE new revenue stream you didn't even have before. Making Android the primary OS used.
---------------------------
That's the agenda, I would like to open a support thread for it somewhere on here. I have an armada of info, tools, rootkits, tricks and troubleshooting information that we feel can be valuable to the community. I'll get things posted here ASAP. Anyone that has played with this at all before will be able to appreciate all of the challenges we had to solve.
We did not knowingly disassemble or modify any of the original distribution files of any applications, staying in accordance with about every license agreement on earth.
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Looking for some feedback, questions, thoughts, ideas.. have to get 10 posts or something anyway...
Thank you to everyone!
-js
What's the difference between your project and the Android x86 project?
syung said:
What's the difference between your project and the Android x86 project?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
AFAIK Bluestacks has its own VM, so you doesn't need to install Virtual Machine any more.
I used this for a several months and it helps me to try an application without to send it to any Android device.
If you use Android x86 project, yo need to install it inside a Virtual Machine or make a USB Bootable, and as far I know it has limitations in the Play Store. Only some application that supports the architecture can be downloaded..
The Android x86 project is a piece of this absolutely. What BlueStacks is and what they have done is this:
Taken x86 gingerbread and ad an arm translator inside there. This is very unique, all of the other arm emulations fail out there after you even try to put them to the test with heavier use or apps. Basically the compatibility is just not there.
BlueStacks then added the vm player which is the most sophisticated player there is. Network mounts to shared fordler without installing drivers, and opengl support for limited HD graphics.
What we did
BlueStacks also crippled the hell out of the original ROM. All kinds of things missing that had to be put back in piece by piece, and still ensure compatibility. Some things fine to leave out, other maybe useful.
poring over the information, rooting bluestacks came easy, so we rooted every single v7.x of bluestacks, and began the mountain task of building compatibility. The winners are 7.4 for SD and 7.8 for HD. 7.8 handle the interface scrolling operations WAY better than later revisions. I can tell it was after this rev they forced on Surface Pro support, not back checking compatibility. And 7.4 installs on any machine but drops the arm translator. Still a nice product to put on an old machine, but little support for modern apps, and there won't be
Then doing a fair assessment of applications to do all the tasks one needs, file manipulation, printing, music, calling etc, We've spent over 200 hours trying to get a reliable lock screen, failed on that But we got most of it.
Finally adding and getting gapps to fully function was about like trying to drink a beer while standing on your head, it was like a marathon game of whack mole, we'd fix something, then something else friggen slam us over the head. Then we got to writing script, and adding widows apps like virtual keyboards and mouse to basically be able to run the entire OS with 1 finger as if you were Stephen Hawking.
We had an excellent response to the initial concept stuff version 1.1. It held on to around 400 seeders and 1000 user swam for about a week then began to fizzle. We expect that to triple and estimate 100,000 downloads in the first week. It is my opinion thepiratebay is the most accurate source for demand of anything digital, people that keep a copy and seed, actually really like something, versus an artificial "like" that other sites have and profit from. That's all Trip9d0zen stuff, about removing fake values and replacing it with real information exchange freedoms, so actually all financial can get to a creator, don't want to digress to far in this thread, but there is an ideology we have in common with thee twitters and thepitatebay's who have just the extreme basics of censorship, only to ensure safety, but never manipulated the information. We have evidence and models to change current businesses, and put the devs out in-front of these projects (or the artist selected agents). The more systems Android runs on, more success one can have. And Windows being the biggest, hands down, why not?
We feel this is by far the most compatible Android environment one can use, and can actually be used by anyone as an effective tool.
We know full well that once released, the ungodly amount of app work requests will be at its highest, but that's why I am here, where the devs are.. is this a revenue stream they want to suppport,?
I am personally using it exclusively for all my communications, social media and document creation, I only use windows for video playing files.
Hope that helps answer, here is the info to commercials for it, as our lil-1337s eloquently cranked out, smartasses...
youtube search for js99912
-js
It looks interesting, i'll check that up!
Dexcellium said:
It looks interesting, i'll check that up!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Me too. Thanks
Android for Windows 2.0
new version just went live..... can someone reply with a hot-link, thanks
thepiratebay.sx
/torrent/8440340
Adding Game Data / Mount SDcard.sparse BlueStacks
Ok, I have been asked about this more than anything,
Used to be the SDcard was a .fs file and could be manipulated easy, now it's a bit more involved, but none to difficult.
You need to download:
thepiratebay.sx/
torrent/8453985
This will get you to be able to mount the SDcard.sparsefs as a drive letter in windows... Nothing new, just consolidating info as I have been requested for this more than anything else. Enjoy!
-js
This might seem like a really weird topic to some but its becoming one that I feel will benefit many in discussing:
Since 2010, I've remained on the fence about Google and to a lesser degree Samsung and Apple. Some days I'd wake up and they would be the company I LOATH and HATE because of some thing they did that had bad optics (Hello Google's purchase of Boston Dynamics). Other days, I'd wake up and think they were the best company in the world because they did something that really pushed the envelope of technology or did something that had fantastic humanitarian potential or something that was just genuinely felt altruistic in nature.
As time went, those days of "evil" creped closer in to being the daily status quo and those altruistic events have been diminishing. 2016 marked the year where we saw a huge uptick in the unethical usage of data Google and companies who could claim close affiliation (either by direct partnerships or making use of their technology) began to absolutely abuse the information they've gathered on us over the last 10-20 years depending how early of an adopter you were.
Events such as PRISM, Harvard Analytical and Fusion GPS all illustrated the unethical use of data gathering techniques and has inspired the application of the Jellinik Curve and other addiction methodologies into applications.
It's been my goal in 2019 to get myself as much out of this "game" as possible. The big realization I had a number of years ago (which, I'm sure many others have had) is that if you aren't paying for something with money, you are paying for something through some other means; usually through information. This doesn't necessarily preclude that paying for something means they aren't ALSO doing stuff with your data too to some nefarious end (Hello False Dichotomy).
After all this background, my usecases are pretty simple:
- Any application I use on my phone has to be front someone or someplace (company) that, with some research, seems like they have ethical standing.
- My information going through their network needs to be encrypted in some way. Obviously the higher the better within operational tolerances (IE I doesn't bog down the equipment into unusable).
- It has to be cloud based with the same information being accessible across multiple devices.
- A mobile webapp is highly welcomed (it's harder to mess with your on phone data if you can use a webapp as opposed to an APK, but, of course that comes with usability and potentially security problems).
Insofar, I've tested/played with the following apps that are starting to become my daily drivers.
- Protomail to replace Gmail. (paying for yearly subs)
- Timetree to replace Google Calendar (Still not sold on this one)
- Cryphon to replace Hangouts/Messaging (kind of, sort of)
- Waze to replace Google Maps (Sure, Waze is owned by Google now, but its lacking some the issues --- I'm very open to another long term solution)
The one that's personally killing me is Google Voice. It's been my daily driver since 2008. I have 8 different Google Voice numbers I use for various things.
- 1 is for personal
- 1 is a "business personal"
- 5 are for business
- 1 is a spam line
I can't find any solution to Google Voice that allows for the number of phone lines without it costing an arm and a leg.
All this said, I'd like to see what the XDA community thinks about this topic in general and what app suggestions people may have.
At the end of this year, I'd like to be at a place where I can use an Android and have absolutely zero Google apps installed (including Play Services).
99.9%+ of people don't care about going non-Google. Even after many privacy abuses over the years. Even after a Play Store filled with 99.99%+ adware, trackers and malware & where clean apps are the very rare exception rather than the norm. Most people simply don't care about this stuff. Congratulations on caring enough to make changes.
Google is a filthy company, much like Microsoft and Apple. CIA /NSA partners. No different in other countries. You get exactly what you expect from such State Mafia pairings. Android only gets worse and more restrictive as time goes on.
F-droid.org for all open-source apps that aren't reliant on any Play Store spyware. F-droid.org forums for any help. Probably the best way to start on your journey. I use Osmand on the odd occasion I need GPS. It is OK. I am looking into hosting my own ejabberd server for chat. I have some way to go...it's all new to me.
Removing as much Google spyware on a new device (after rooting) is essential, IMO (If not flashing with new Google-free firmware). That means all the stock Google apps and more - gone
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0G6mUyIgyg
https://qz.com/1145669/googles-true...nd-nsa-research-grants-for-mass-surveillance/
https://exodus-privacy.eu.org/en/
I feel like over the next few months we're going to start to realize this as a society, especially as we close into the 2020 election in the US and Directive 13 and 15 close closer in at the EU.
To me, its important to get ahead of the game a bit.
Ideally, from my perspective, I don't see the need to have the newest phone on the market. This ecosystem has taught us that we'll see a new product every year no matter what but that newest product will always interface the buyers as abused beta testers. The technology never seems to be good until the a generation or three later.
That being said, a phone a few years back usually has a good development group around, especially thanks to XDA.
Besides dealing with the information that's on the company's servers, however, I have a learning concern that even inside Android, without GAPPS installed, there is still some potential for abuse of person's information stepping from the various repositories designed for call logs, calendar, GPS data etc that, in theory, every Android going back to 1.0 has.
Part of my hunt for good apps are ones that don't rely on that underpinning technology.