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samedi 31 octobre 2015

Customize Doze Parameters With Doze Settings Editor

Doze Settings Editor Lets You Customize Doze Parameters

Now that more people are starting to get their hands on Android 6.0, we’re starting to see some interesting apps and modifications that take advantage of Marshmallow’s new features. One in particular comes to us from XDA Member p0isonra1n, called Doze Settings Editor. With DSE, you can tweak the various rules that Doze follows to completely customize how it functions on your device.



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Create Your Own Boot-LED Sequence On Sony Xperia SP

Xperia-SP-light

The Xperia SP has a beautiful LED bar on the device. Now, with XDA Senior Member Raienryu‘s help in the form of this guide, you can modify the illumination sequence of this LED bar during boot, allowing a greater level of personalization for the device!



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Oppo Releases ColorOS v2.1.5i Stable Version For Find 7, To Now Focus On AOSP

Oppo-ColorOS-2.1.5i-Find-7-and-7a

Oppo has released a stable version of ColorOS ROM for the Find 7 and Find 7a. This update, marked as v2.1.5i, will the last ColorOS update for the Find 7 phones, with the team now shifting focus towards AOSP development.



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The Importance of Open Source in Root

Honor 7 XDA Review: Polished Hardware, Unfinished Software

vendredi 30 octobre 2015

Who’s Down is a New Social Application by Google

Who's Down is a New Social Application by Google

Google has just quietly released a new social application into the Google Play Store called Who’s Down. This is a simple concept where you can instantly check to see if any of your friends are ‘down’ to do something. It does this with an on and off switch, but you can also customize it to say you are down to study, get lunch, etc.



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XDA/Android Podcast Episode 5: “Battle of the X Phones, In Virtual Reality!”

podcast

The XDA/Android podcast will bring you the best news each week from the perspective of the XDA team, r/android mods, admins and users. Each week you can find our latest episode here, on Youtube, Pocketcasts and on your favorite podcast app through the RSS feed: http://ift.tt/1QXeF8c

On this week’s podcast, the few survivors of scheduling horrors discuss YouTube Red, the OnePlus X, Virtual Reality and the dreaded victory of form over function.

The winners of our Nexus giveaway are: Nate Meadows & Gabriel Fritz, we’ll be in touch over the weekend!!!

Today’s cast includes:

Mario Serrafero: Twitter
Daniel Marchena: Youtube
Mishaal Rahman: XDA Writer

Check Out XDA on Social Media. Twitter, Facebook and Google+

and don’t forget to pay a visit to r/Android!



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Restore IMEI, Wifi & Bluetooth MAC on Xiaomi Redmi Note 2

813201552518PM_635_xiaomi_redmi_note_2

XDA Senior Member Xmister has put together a guide on restoring the IMEI, Wifi MAC and Bluetooth MAC on the Xiaomi Redmi Note 2. Take a look and keep yourself prepared for any eventualities that may befall your device, or fix any that may have already!



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Re-Unlock SIM and Stop PRL Updates on Sprint-based Moto X 2013

Moto-X-Phone-Shoot-at-Mashable-5-of-19

If you purchased a Moto X 2013 from Sprint, but used it unlocked on a different carrier, you may have received a recent update which SIM locks your device. To help such issues, XDA Member flopadmi has posted a guide based on his experiences which should help you to re-unlock the device and stop such PRL updates in the future.



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Xperia Z5 and Z5 Compact Updated With Full Stagefright Fixes

Xperia-Z5_32.0.A.6.152_2-315x560

Sony’s Xperia Z5, Z5 Dual and Z5 Compact have received a new firmware update which provides the full set of Stagefright fixes. The updates is ~281 MB in size, and also contains fixes for camera performance, heat management and increased accuracy from the fingerprint sensor.



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OnePlus Announces Reflexion, a Photography App to Create Reflections Images

OnePlus Announces Reflexion, a Photography App to Capture Reflections

To help promote the OnePlus X, the Chinese OEM has just released a photography application called Reflexion for both Android and iOS. The application lets you take two photographs, one with the front camera and one with the back, and then it compiles the two photos into one single image with an ‘X’ type reflection effect.



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Fabric Mobile Development Platform Introduces 8 New SDKS

Fabric Development Platform

Fabric, Twitter’s mobile development platform, allows developers to easily integrate third-party frameworks and libraries into their application. Although most commonly used for its Crashlytics support, Fabric maintains and updates a whole host of SDKs for use by mobile app developers. Fabric recently announced the introduction of 8 new SDKs to join the developer toolset. If you’re looking to develop an app and haven’t used Fabric before, check out their webpage to get started.



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Learn How to Implement Material Design

materialdesign_introduction

Material Design, Google’s newer UI introduced in Lollipop, features colorful icons and beautiful animations. It’s a great design language for any developer to implement without having to spend much effort developing your own UI. But how do you implement Material Design for your app? Code-Labs has written up an excellent guide that will fill you in on all the basics and should only take around 2 hours of your time.



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HTC Continues Struggling in Q3, Resulting in $137.63 Million Loss

HTC Continues Struggling in Q3, Resulting in $137.63 Million Loss

2015 just has not been a great year for the Taiwanese handset maker HTC. Quarterly financial reports have been going out lately and HTC has just joined in with their numbers. In the third quarter of this year, HTC ended up losing $137 million dollars. This, compared to the $18.5 million in profit they had in Q3 of last year, is just not a good sign at all.



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The LG V10 is Now Available at Verizon Wireless

The LG V10 is Now Available at Verizon Wireless

If you’re a Verizon Wireless customer and you’ve been wanting to get the LG V10, then wait no more. The V10 is available on Verizon’s website as well as in most of their retail stores, and it is available in both Black or White color options. You can pick this device up for either $28 per month, with 0% APR financing, or you can pay $672 up front.



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Google Executive Says They Are “Very Committed to Chrome OS”

Google Executive Says They Are Very Committed to Chrome OS

Yesterday there was a report from the WSJ that said Google had plans to merge Chrome OS with Android. This was independently confirmed by both re/code as well as The Verge but the newly appointed head of Android and Chrome, Hiroshi Lockheimer, sent out a Tweet late last night saying they are still very committed to Chrome OS.



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Chainfire Releases Root For Android 6.0 Without Modifying /system

marshmallow chainfire

If you have ever rooted a device, then chances are very good that you may have heard of Chainfire, XDA Senior Moderator and Senior Recognized Developer. In case you haven’t, Chainfire is the developer behind popular works like SuperSU, CF Auto Root, TriangleAway and CF.lumen, making him one of the most influential developer in the Android modding community.

We recently had reported on Chainfire’s decision to hand over SuperSU to Coding Code Mobile Technology LLC (CCMT), but noted that Chainfire will continue on SuperSU, eventually phasing himself out over the course of two years.

True to his word, Chainfire is still involved in SuperSU, and he has just released root for Android 6.0 Marshmallow without doing modifications to /system partition. This is being labelled as an experiment as the idea behind it has a few caveats, the major of which is that factory resetting the device will remove root.

To have root on modern Android versions, we need our files to be executable and our daemon to be started on boot. We normally do this by making modifications to /system, tapping into binaries and scripts executed by init. If we’re also modifying the boot image, then we should be able to do all this without modifying system at all.

So what benefits can we expect from a systemless root? We reached out to Chainfire, and the benefits of this over the traditional SuperSU include:

  1. A cleaner approach and design
  2. Easier unroot
  3. An unlittered /system partition
  4. Excludes things like “sugote”, which are not needed on Android 6.0 Marshmallow
  5. OTA’s are slightly easier now, as reflashing boot image is usually a lesser hassle than reflashing an entire /system.
  6. Most importantly, this does not soft brick your device if you do not have the correct kernel installation. Previous methods to root Android 6.0 required a SELinux policy patch in the kernel, without which, the device would not boot. With this method, if the supporting kernel is absent, you won’t have root but the device will boot.

This new method, as expected, does not work in cooperation with older root methods as the new method does not clean up old root files. Because of this, you need to reflash your stock /system partition to make sure you have a clean slate before starting off.

For downloads, please head on over to the forum post. The dev requests that discussions should happen over at the SuperSU Beta thread, so head on over there for general talk. Keep in mind this is experimental, and there will likely be bugs, so proceed at your own risk.



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New Standards: Diving into the 6.0 Compatibility Definition Document

Marshmallow CDD

Marshmallow has seen the light of day on most Nexus devices already, but we’ve yet to see any third-party OEM update their phone to Marshmallow. How exactly will they incorporate Marshmallow’s new features into their specific flavors of Android?

It’s hard to say for sure, but thanks to the Compatibility Definition Document (CDD), we can be assured that OEMs won’t stray too far from stock Android’s implementation of the new 6.0 features.

Properly Roasting a Marshmallow

With each new version of Android, Google updates its compatibility guidelines to ensure a consistent user experience of all the new major features. From a user standpoint, it is vital that OEMs abide by the compatibility guidelines so that their favorite applications work consistently across all of their devices. Similarly, the developer benefits from having to expend less effort in targeting multiple devices if each device operates consistently on any given Android version. Finally, the OEMs benefit from the growth of the ecosystem as more users can justify buying their devices if more developers can justify developing for their devices. It’s a win-win situation for every party, and it’s in Google’s best interest to require any manufacturer building an Android device to abide by their compatibility guidelines.

How do they do that? Well, by controlling who gets a license to use Google Mobile Services (GMS), which consist of Google’s proprietary applications. OEMs looking to get their hands on a license for GMS have to abide by all of the requirements listed in the Compatibility Definition Document and pass the Compatibility Test Suite. Without access to applications like the Google Play Store, an OEM would have a very difficult time convincing people to invest in their ecosystem when the competition is so stiff.

Ouya Store

The Ouya Game Store

Remember the Ouya Android gaming console? A large part of its failure can be tied to the lack of applications. Ouya just couldn’t convince enough developers it was worth investing their resources into porting their games, when they could instead continue targeting the lucrative Google Play Store. A few weeks after launch, Ouya revealed its “modest” sales data. After many months of unsuccessful attempts at penetrating the market, Ouya eventually sought to be bought out and was finally picked up by Razer in June.

Ouya instead sought to market to China, where Google has had trouble fighting the bureaucracy to get its services accepted by the country. Good timing, too, given Google’s recent push with Android TV.

In essence, OEMs depend on Google giving them a license to run Google Apps in order to compete with other Android devices. This has given Google an iron-grip on the Android ecosystem, and ensures that OEMs won’t stray too far from each the basic functionality of each new Android version. Even the mighty Samsung, who has invested heavily into Tizen, just can’t seem to dislodge the dominance of Android.

That being said, let’s dive into the Compatibility Definition Document for Android Marshmallow. It is absolutely packed with to the brim with useful information. Huge thanks to the team over at AndroidPolice for digging through and finding some of these, which I’ll use to summarize only the most pertinent bits.


Android Auto…motive? Google Drops Hints for the Future

First up, something interesting from the “Device Types” defined in Section 2.0.

Android Automotive implementation refers to a vehicle head unit running Android as an operating system for part or all of the system and/or infotainment functionality. Android Automotive implementations:

  • MUST declare the feature android.hardware.type.automotive.
  • MUST support uiMode = UI_MODE_TYPE_CAR

You might read this and think, “what’s the big deal? Don’t we already know about Android Auto?” And you’re right, we know plenty about the already announced Android Auto. However, Android Auto is just an app that anyone can just download. Google is referencing something entirely new here, and it’s referring to smart devices inside the car actually running a full version of Android. Many 2016 car models already run Android Auto, so who knows how long it will take for cars to ship with fully-fledged builds of Android OS.

Searching through the CDD, we can find multiple other references to Android Automotive, and piece together how Google intends the platform to function.

  1. In Section 3.4.2 describing Browser Compatibility for instance, Android Automotive devices are listed as an exception to the rule requiring Android devices to ship with a standalone web browser. This makes sense, given the potential safety ramifications of users surfing the web while in a car.
  2. According to Section 3.10, Android Automotive devices are strongly recommended to include Accessibility settings consistent with stock Android. This is likely done to allow consumers to enable the TalkBack feature (which I would guess most auto manufacturers would heavily emphasize anyways). Section 3.11 “Text Speech” further corroborates this notion by requiring the support of Android Text-To-Speech (TTS).
  3. Next up, in Section 5.1.3 “Video Codecs” we see that Google strongly recommends any Android Automotive device support h265 High-Efficiency Video Codec (HEVC). This is interesting as it suggests Google is hoping for Android Automotive devices used as video consumption devices. Parents with kids will definitely find the ability to watch downloaded videos a boon.
    Android "Auto"

    Android “Automotive” – Using a Nexus 7 (Credits)

  4. In Section 7.1.5, Google states that Android Automotive devices are the only devices not required to support legacy compatibility mode, meaning that any application designed without screen density independence will not be supported. You can imagine the frustration of any passenger trying to deal with a poorly scaled app while moving around in the car.
  5. Android Automotive devices are not required to implement a soft keyboard, as mentioned in Section 7.2.1. Not surprising given that most people would expect to navigate such a device via touch or voice.
  6. Under Section 7.2.3 “Navigation Keys”, Google states that the “Recents” and “Back” keys are not required, while the “Home” key is. You’re not likely to be navigating around the device very often, so I think Google was smart to not force OEMs to design their UIs around those two keys.
  7. Android Automotive is not required to support OTA updates, as listed in Section 11. Since an Android Automotive device would only be able to update while the car is on, it makes sense not to require OTA support. It’s not like you can plug your car into the dock on your nightstand while it updates!

Professional Audio Devices – How Google seeks to reduce Audio Latency

We’ve covered previously how Marshmallow has reduced Audio Latency on most devices, but now Google had laid out a set of guidelines that if met, will easily allow developers to target certain devices sporting low latency audio.

5.10. Professional Audio

If a device implementation meets all of the following requirements, it is STRONGLY RECOMMENDED to report support for feature android.hardware.audio.pro via the android.content.pm.PackageManager class.

  • The device implementation MUST report support for feature android.hardware.audio.low_latency.
  • The continuous round-trip audio latency, as defined in section 5.6 Audio Latency, MUST be 20 milliseconds or less and SHOULD be 10 milliseconds or less over at least one supported path.
  • If the device includes a 4 conductor 3.5mm audio jack, the continuous round-trip audio latency MUST be 20 milliseconds or less over the audio jack path, and SHOULD be 10 milliseconds or less over at the audio jack path.
  • The device implementation MUST include a USB port(s) supporting USB host mode and USB peripheral mode.
  • The USB host mode MUST implement the USB audio class.
  • If the device includes an HDMI port, the device implementation MUST support output in stereo and eight channels at 20-bit or 24-bit depth and 192 kHz without bit-depth loss or resampling.
  • The device implementation MUST report support for feature android.software.midi.
  • If the device includes a 4 conductor 3.5mm audio jack, the device implementation is STRONGLY RECOMMENDED to comply with section Mobile device (jack) specifications of the Wired Audio Headset Specification (v1.1).

And there you have it. If an OEM wishes to build a device aimed at music lovers and music professionals, they can report that their device meets the “Professional Audio” requirements and signal to developers that their device is suitable to create music on.


Google Outlines Fingerprint Sensor Requirements

Android Marshmallow introduces system-wide fingerprint authentication, allowing you to secure your lock-screen and purchases using your finger. In order to be considered compatible with Marshmallow’s fingerprint implementation, OEMs must ensure that their fingerprint sensors follow specific requirements:

7.3.10. Fingerprint Sensor

Device implementations with a secure lock screen SHOULD include a fingerprint sensor. If a device implementation includes a fingerprint sensor and has a corresponding API for third-party developers, it:

  • MUST declare support for the android.hardware.fingerprint feature.
  • MUST fully implement the corresponding API as described in the Android SDK documentation.
  • MUST have a false acceptance rate not higher than 0.002%.
  • Is STRONGLY RECOMMENDED to have a false rejection rate not higher than 10%, and a latency from when the fingerprint sensor is touched until the screen is unlocked below 1 second, for 1 enrolled finger.
  • MUST rate limit attempts for at least 30 seconds after 5 false trials for fingerprint verification.
  • MUST have a hardware-backed keystore implementation, and perform the fingerprint matching in a Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) or on a chip with a secure channel to the TEE.
  • MUST have all identifiable fingerprint data encrypted and cryptographically authenticated such that they cannot be acquired, read or altered outside of the Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) as documented in the implementation guidelines on the Android Open Source Project site.
  • MUST prevent adding a fingerprint without first establishing a chain of trust by having the user confirm existing or add a new device credential (PIN/pattern/password) using the TEE as implemented in the Android Open Source project.
  • MUST NOT enable 3rd-party applications to distinguish between individual fingerprints.
  • MUST honor the DevicePolicyManager.KEYGUARD_DISABLE_FINGERPRINT flag.
  • MUST, when upgraded from a version earlier than Android 6.0, have the fingerprint data securely migrated to meet the above requirements or removed. SHOULD use the Android Fingerprint icon provided in the Android Open Source Project.

Google is addressing some very important security concerns in this section of the CDD. With a maximum false acceptance rate of 0.002%, you can be rest assured that nobody’s finger but your own will be able to access your device. In addition, to ensure your fingerprint data is kept secure, developers can only access your fingerprint data using an API, and will not be able to tell the difference between multiple stored fingerprints. However, it’s a bit concerning that they only strongly recommend fingerprint sensors have a short latency between when the fingerprint sensor is touched and when it’s recognized, given how some devices seem to slowly react to your fingerprint.


Unmodified Doze Mode

Doze ModeDoze mode is Google’s answer to the plague of battery-destroying wakelocks. No longer can apps wake up in the background whenever they want to ping for new notifications, at least until you give it permission to. By default, Google sets most apps to be “optimized”, which means Doze mode will kick in when the device enters sleep mode. However, you’re free to prevent the app from being “optimized” if you wish to continue having the app ping for new notifications or sync data. To prevent any OEMs from messing with Doze mode (perhaps, to stop them from allowing you to disable Doze on any bloatware), Google is requiring OEMs to leave Doze mode entirely intact:

8.3. Power-Saving Modes

All apps exempted from App Standby and/or Doze mode MUST be made visible to the end user. Further, the triggering, maintenance, wakeup algorithms and the use of Global system settings of these power-saving modes MUST not deviate from the Android Open Source Project.

So you can be rest assured that you’ll have full control over what apps can trigger wakelocks on your device, no matter which device you purchase. In addition, you can be sure that Doze mode operates in the same exact way it would on a Nexus device thanks to Google laying down the hammer here.


Unmodified Battery Stats

Checking your battery stats under settings is a time-honored Android enthusiast tradition. It often served as a useful way to quickly find out what user apps were eating up most of your battery. However, in many cases you wouldn’t be able to figure out what hardware component triggered by certain apps was draining your battery. To do that, you would have to rely on apps like BetterBatteryStats which requires root to function properly. Now, Google is forcing OEMs to track and lay out the power consumption of all hardware components. No longer will a rogue system app hold a GPS lock without you knowing:Battery Stats

8.4. Power Consumption Accounting
A more accurate accounting and reporting of the power consumption provides the app developer both the incentives and the tools to optimize the power usage pattern of the application.

  • Therefore, device implementations MUST be able to track hardware component power usage and attribute that power usage to specific applications. Specifically, implementations:
    • MUST provide a per-component power profile that defines the current consumption value for each hardware component and the approximate battery drain caused by the components over time as documented in the Android Open Source Project site.
    • MUST report all power consumption values in milliampere hours (mAh)
    • SHOULD be attributed to the hardware component itself if unable to attribute hardware component power usage to an application.
    • MUST report CPU power consumption per each process’s UID. The Android Open Source Project meets the requirement through the uid_cputime kernel module implementation
  • MUST make this power usage available via the adb shell dumpsys batterystats shell command to the app developer
  • MUST honor the android.intent.action.POWER_USAGE_SUMMARY intent and display a settings menu that shows this power usage.

Developers, too, should rejoice, as Google requires this same information to be available via dumping the batterystats log. This should make debugging battery drain on applications much simpler.


Pre-Installed Apps can’t Bypass Permission Management

If you’ve already updated to Android Marshmallow on a Nexus device, you might be wondering why apps like Google Calendar need to request permission to access your calendar. Can’t that just be granted by default? Sure, it might make sense, but you have to remember that Google can’t go around pre-granting crucial permissions to each and every app that you think should be “trusted.” And Google can’t exactly afford to play favorites with any OEMs. Plus, it pays off for permission management to be so transparent. You’ll be training consumers to look out for permissions by introducing them to the concept from the very first apps they’re likely to interact with. From the CDD:Permissions Management

9.1 Permissions

Permissions with a protection level of dangerous are runtime permissions. Applications with targetSdkVersion > 22 request them at runtime. Device implementations:

  • MUST show a dedicated interface for the user to decide whether to grant the requested runtime permissions and also provide an interface for the user to manage runtime permissions
  • MUST have one and only one implementation of both user interfaces
  • MUST NOT grant any runtime permissions to preinstalled apps unless: the user’s consent can be obtained before the application uses it or the runtime permissions are associated with an intent pattern for which the preinstalled application is set as the default handler.

Google is being very strict here. Any apps which target SDK 23 and above (ie. apps made for Marshmallow) must provide an interface to grant/deny permissions on runtime. The only time a permission can be granted without user consent is if the user sets that application to be the default for that specific action (basically, if you set Google Calendar to be the default handler for Calendar events, you’re giving it permission to access your Calendar).


Full-Disk Encryption is Now a Requirement

When Lollipop was announced, Google unveiled support for full-disk encryption and shipped the Nexus 6 and Nexus 9 with encryption enabled by default. Yet, Google did not truly require device manufacturers to enable full-disk encryption, until now:

9.9 Full-Disk EncryptionFull-Disk Encryption

If the device implementation supports a secure lock screen reporting “true” for KeyguardManager.isDeviceSecure(), and is not a device with restricted memory as reported through the ActivityManager.isLowRamDevice() method, then the device MUST support fulldisk encryption of the application private data (/data partition), as well as the application shared storage partition (/sdcard partition) if it is a permanent, non-removable part of the device.

For device implementations supporting full-disk encryption and with Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) crypto performance above 50MiB/sec, the full-disk encryption MUST be enabled by default at the time the user has completed the out-of-box setup experience. If a device implementation is already launched on an earlier Android version with full-disk encryption disabled by default, such a device cannot meet the requirement through a system software update and thus MAY be exempted.

What’s interesting is that Google has exempted devices sporting low amounts of memory, which makes sense as it would affect performance. According to the reference for the ActivityManager class, Google does not have a strict definition as to what constitutes a low RAM device, but leaves it up to the OEMs to determine. You’re unlikely to ever find a Marshmallow running device with such low end specs that it cannot support full-disk encryption, but Google does provide such an exception.

Another thing to note is that Google does not require full-disk encryption on any device upgrading to 6.0, only devices launching with 6.0.While unfortunate from a security standpoint, it can be somewhat justified given that many older devices do not support hardware based encryption and thus may suffer a performance hit if implemented. Many Nexus 6 owners opted to disable encryption in order to improve performance, after all.



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How Would You Recommend Your Phone to Others?

recommendphones

Those who carefully plan a purchase often end up loving it. And those who are convinced they received the best bang for their buck, or the best experience, often want to share that, especially with those they deem worthy. How would you recommend your phone to other enthusiasts or to casual users? And to who would you recommend it?



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OnePlus X Unveiled! 19″ Samsung Tablet?? Motorola Announces Droid Maxx 2 and Turbo 2 – XDA TV

Jordan1030

OnePlus has unveiled the OnePlus X. That and much more news is covered by Jordan when he reviews all the important stories from this week from DroidCon in London. Included in this week’s news is the announcement of a new 18.4 inch tablet from Samsung called the View and be sure to check out the article talking about Motorola announcing the Droid Maxx 2 and Turbo 2. That’s not all that’s covered in today’s video!

Jordan talks about the other videos released this week on XDA TV. XDA TV Producer TK released an interviews with Swappa, Vinli and Chainfire with IonVR from the Big Android BBQ 2015. Then TK gave us a quick recap of the whole event. Also, Jordan gave us the next video in our Best Phones Under $100 series, this time talking about performance. Pull up a chair and check out this video.

Be sure to check out other great XDA TV Videos.

 

Stories mentioned:

Check out Jordan’s Tech Channel and Jordan’s Vlogging YouTube Channel



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Win a Trip to China With Honor and XDA!

China

To celebrate Honor’s 2nd birthday in China, they are inviting two members of XDA to fly out to a fan party! The event will feature a showcase from Honor, fans and official partners, however also on the itinerary is a concert and extreme sports show! Winners, will fly out on the 11th of December and return on the 14th (subject to minor alterations), flights and accommodation are included and entrants must be from the UK. To enter simply fill out the form below.

  Enter here:

Do you have any questions? Leave a comment below!



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jeudi 29 octobre 2015

Why Developers Shouldn’t Worry About App Standby

App Standby in Marshmallow

App Standby was introduced alongside Doze to improve user’s battery life. The feature intelligently restricts battery intensive background syncs and radios whenever an app is not in use. However, in contrast to Doze mode, App Standby still honors an app’s wakelocks and alarms. How is the feature triggered? The Android Developers Google+ page has laid out a general flowchart of when your app will enter standby and why you shouldn’t worry.



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Using a fingerprint to Authenticate to Remote Servers

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The release of Marshmallow brought with it the ability to use fingerprints to authenticate a user’s identity. If you’re a developer making an application that features online purchasing, then you might be interested in learning how to implement an asymmetric keypair in order to grab a public key to store in your server’s backend, allowing you to authenticate future purchases using only the customer’s fingerprint.



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Report Suggests that Google Will Fold Chrome OS into Android

Reporst Suggests that Google Will Fold Chrome OS into Android

Multiple sources have told the Wall Street Journal that Google is planning on absorbing Chrome OS into Android and only having one operating system before the end of 2017. Microsoft has been doing something similar when it released Windows 10 that runs on both mobile and desktop device. This means that Chromebooks, which will get a new name, will eventually run Android out of the box.



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OnePlus Icons are a €49.99 Pair of Earbuds

OnePlus Icons are a €49.99 Pair of Earbuds

OnePlus is in business to make more than just smartphones. We’ve seen the company create a power bank, cases, their own cables and today we learn about a new accessory product. The OnePlus Icons are to be sold for €49.99 and they are said to bring a lot of value for your money with the build and audio quality of the product.



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TWRP For Samsung Galaxy Star Pro & Plus

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Low budget devices tend to not receive much developer love due to their generally low adoption amongst developers. However, if you own a Samsung Galaxy Star Pro or Plus, you are in some luck as XDA Member FireLord has posted a working build of TWRP for these devices. This should open the device to receive some custom ROM love!



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Amazon’s Scary Good Deals Gives You $70+ Worth of Apps and Games for Free

Amazon's Scary Good Deals Gives you $70 Worth of Free Apps and Games

Amazon is known for giving away lots of Android game and applications for free as long as you are willing to manually install their AppStore application. This holiday season we have a select of over $70 worth of apps and games including LEGO Star Wars Microfighters, Photo Lab PRO, Halloweenistry, Bloons TD 5, Runtastic PRO and more.



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Samsung Galaxy View Forums Live!

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If you are amongst those that wish to get their hands on Samsung’s massive tablet, you’d be pleased to know that it has now got its own forum at XDA. Check out the forums and discuss various use cases for the tablet with fellow buyers!



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Blackberry Highlights PRIV’s Features

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The Blackberry Priv is an interesting phone with an expensive price line. To hopefully sway the people who are having second thoughts on plopping down so much cash, Blackberry is highlighting the features of the Priv in this video, including the Blackberry Hub and DTEK.



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Huawei Hires Ex-Apple Creative Director as New Chief Designer Of User Experience

Huawei Hires Ex-Apple Creative Director as its New Chief Designer Of User Experience

Apple ex-employee Abigail Sarah Brody hasn’t worked for the company since 2011, but she was one of the key designers of the original iPhone. She also helped make applications like Aperture and Final Cut Pro what they are today. Huawei wants to put her talent to work for them as she has just been made their new Chief Designer Of User Experience.



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Moto X Force To Reach International Markets in November

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Motorola’s Moto X Force is scheduled to reach Latin America, Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia Pacific (including India) in November. The Moto X Force is the international variant of the Droid Turbo 2, which is a Verizon-exclusive in USA, featuring a shatterproof display.



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OnePlus Unveils The OnePlus X – Specs & Pricing!

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In today’s reveal events, OnePlus made the OnePlus X official, a smartphone aimed at one of the key areas that the original OnePlus One aimed at, that cheap can be good. But is it good?

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Image 003Design wise, the OnePlus X takes a leave from the design language we’ve seen from previous OnePlus devices. Instead, it adopts the metal and glass approach making it appear closer to the Nexus 4, iPhone 4 and the Xperia Z lineup than to its OnePlus brethren. For the frame, you have anodized metal making an appearance in brushed form, with two variants dictating the other shareholder of the body. There is a glass variant, called OnePlus X Onyx, which is fashioned from black glass and boasts of a smooth and glossy finish. The other is the ceramic variant, called the OnePlus X Ceramic, is made out of ceramic. It boasts of being scratch-resistant, but is expectedly heavier at 160 gms compared to the 138 gms for the Onyx variant.

Apart from their build materials, price and availability, the rest of the specs and features remain same across both variants. Occupying most of the front is the 5″ AMOLED display with Corning Gorilla Glass 3, with capacitive buttons below it. For the rest of the design, you have the volume rockers and power button on the right of the device, with the Notification Slider on the left, an addition carried over from the OnePlus 2. However, the OnePlus X does not sport a fingerprint reader anywhere on the device, a decision that is most likely to be attributed to keeping the price of the device down.

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For the specs, the OnePlus X sits firmly in the mid range. The phone sports the Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor, clocked at 2.3 GHz along with Adreno 330 GPU. This is a very interesting choice as the processor is a slightly underclocked version of the same one found in the OnePlus One. The Snapdragon 801 continues to hold its own ground in current phones as it is perfectly capable of doing most smartphone tasks without breaking a sweat. Flanking the processor is 3GB of LPDDR3 RAM and 16GB of internal storage. The phone also features expandable storage of up to 128GB as long as you do not mind losing dual-SIM capabilities as the device gives you an option of either using a second SIM or a microSD card.

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For the camera, the rear setup comprises of a 13MP ISOCELL CMOS sensor with a f/2.2 aperture and PDAF, capable of 1080p video recording and slow-mo 720p at 120fps, along with a single LED flash. The front camera is a 8MP OV8858 sensor with a f/2.4 aperture.

The OnePlus X runs on Android 5.1 Lollipop with Oxygen OS on top of it. NFC continues to be missing from this device as well, but it is pardonable in this instance as the phone targets the mid segment of spec sheet. There is also a multi-colored notification LED on the device. The X is powered by a 2,525 LiPo (non removable) battery, which is quite good when taking into account the smaller 5″ AMOLED display and a power efficient SD801 chipset. The device also trades in the USB Type-C port for the traditional micro-usb slot, capable of charging at 2A current.

The OnePlus X will cost $249 for the Onyx variant and will be available on November 19th in the USA. Europe will receive the OnePlus X from November 5th for €269 ($295), with the limited edition Ceramic variant to cost €369 ($405) and will be available from November 24th. India will receive the OnePlus X Onyx on November 5th as well, for a price of Rs. 16,999 ($260) with the Ceramic variant being available from November 24th for a price of Rs. 22,999 ($350).

The OnePlus X ticks a lot of boxes, but it has the inevitable “But” attached to it, as most devices in 2015 have had. The OnePlus X follows along the OnePlus invite system, albeit only for the first month. After that, the device can be purchased without invites through open sales in the same fashion as the OnePlus 2 was. If you are looking to get your hands on the Ceramic variant, there is another “But” with it as purchasing this variant will require a specific Ceramic-only invite. The OnePlus X will also be available in limited invite-free sales at Pop-Up stores.

The OnePlus X (Onyx) offers a very decent package at a very decent price, aiming to be the OnePlus One’s spiritual successor. When looking from OPO to OPX, you get a newer device with a smaller yet adequate display, something which a lot of people want. Granted there are a few subtractions too, but the OnePlus X is aimed at the market segment that is occupied by the likes of the Moto G 3rd Gen. But can it succeed at providing a better experience? Stay tuned for our hands-on, coming soon!

What do you think about the OnePlus X? Did OnePlus finally manage to deliver a device that stands up to where it aims? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!

Check Out XDA’s OnePlus X >>

Read on for related content:



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Sony Reports $230 Million in Profit as Smartphone Division Still Loses Money

Sony Reports $230 Million in Profit as Smartphone Division Still Loses Money

Sony’s latest quarterly reports show a modest profit of $230 million, down from $780 million in the previous quarter. While it doesn’t seem like much compared to other corporations, it is a great sign considering they saw a $1.5 billion loss last year. Sony Mobile’s revenue saw a drop of 15% down to $231 million with divisions like gaming, semiconductor and image sensors helping to prop up their overall profit.



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Nexus 6P Receives a Repairability Score of 2 out of 10 from iFixit

Nexus 6P Receives a Repairability Score of 2 out of 10 from iFixit

iFixit had a lot of nice things to say about the Nexus 5X, but the same cannot be said about the Nexus 6P. With a score of 2 out of 10, iFixit says the external construction helps its durability but it also makes it difficult to open. Once the “arduous opening procedure is complete”, the battery is right there, but it is also held in by some “tough adhesive”.



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NetGuard Gives You Back Control Over Apps’ Internet Access, Without Root!

XDA Forums Now Available For The OnePlus X!

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OnePlus unveiled their latest device today, the OnePlus X. OnePlus devices tend to have very good community support, and the OnePlus X seems to follow along the same path. Catch up with other forum members while you wait to receive your invite for this mid-ranger!



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LG Reports Quarterly Losses as Smartphone Division Slumps

LG's Quarterly Profits Drop as Smartphone Division Slumps

In the 3rd quarter of 2015, LG’s mobile division saw it’s first operating loss in over a year. The company’s smartphone business lost $68 million dollars even though they were able to sell 15 million devices. Their overall revenue also dropped by 48% compared to last year coming in at just over $127 million. Most of LG’s profit came from home appliances, but their TV division also helped out too.



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Guide to Configuring Android Studio

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Are you an Android developer? If you are, there’s a good chance you use Google’s Android Studio, and you use it quite frequently. By default, Android Studio disables some features that you would expect to appear in any modern IDE. Thankfully, Dmytro Danylyk has compiled a short guide on how to configure Android Studio to be more useful for any developer.



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mercredi 28 octobre 2015

How to Add Dual Window Support to Any App Without Root

Flashable Android 6.0 Firmware Released for the H815 LG G4

Dual Window is LG’s version of multi-window. By default, only certain apps that have implemented a specific flag in the AndroidManifest.xml file support Dual Window. If you’re unrooted and looking to add Dual Window support to an unsupported app, you can follow this guide by a redditor to manually add support. Ideally, you can ask the developer behind your favorite app to update, but this will work regardless.



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Samsung Sees Profits Increase in Q3 Thanks to Chips and Displays

Samsung Sees Profits Increase in Q3 Thanks to Chips and Displays

Samsung just published their quarterly report for Q3 of 2015 with things looking pretty good for the South Korean tech giant. Firstly, revenue was up by 9%(to $45.1 billion) and profits were up 29% compared to last year. While sales were up in their smartphone division, it wasn’t what the company has expected and most of the profit has come up an increase demand in chips and displays.



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Speed up Fingerprint Sensor on Samsung Galaxy phones

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If your Samsung Galaxy device is reacting slowly to your fingerprint, you might just be able to fix it thanks to a discovery by a redditor on /r/Android. The general idea is that instead of adding multiple fingerprints, you’ll instead set up only one fingerprint profile and mix and match fingerprints. Be warned however that there’s a slight possibility that doing this will make fingerprint unlocking less secure.



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Google Play Games Can Now Record Your Mobile Gaming Session

Google Play Games Can Now Record and Share Your Gaming Session

A new update to the Google Play Games application will let you record the game you’re currently playing in 720p or 480p. All you’ll have to do is launch the Google Play Games app, find the game and then hit the record button. The front facing camera can record your reactions and then you can edit the footage before uploading it to YouTube.



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