The Official Android Thread

[AcidLameLTE]

About Android 3.0's release date:

https://www.engadget.com/2010/10/20/android-3-0-due-to-start-hitting-tablets-in-december-ahead-of-ja/

A holiday tradition? Making things out of gingerbread, and Google is doing its part to keep that practice alive according to a report stating Android 3.0 is set to hit some tablets this December. Those will just be early samples destined only to light up the eyes of engineers who've been very, very good this year, but the rest of us naughty boys and girls will get to see those slates when they launch to the public in January. We hear there's a little electronics show happening that time of year, and supposedly HTC, Samsung, and Motorola will be showing their Gingerbread tablets there, amongst others (but not Lenovo, apparently). We can't wait to get a taste.

Update: Thanks to James for pointing out that it's still unclear whether 3.0 is going to be Gingerbread or, indeed, the truly tablet-minded Honeycomb release we're really waiting for. This report states specifically that 3.0 is hitting tablets in December, with 4.0 later in 2011. Is that Gingerbread and Honeycomb, or Honeycomb and Ice Cream? Also, is anyone else hungry?

[AcidLameLTE]

SWEET:

https://www.engadget.com/2010/10/21/winamp-comes-to-android-one-of-our-childhood-dreams-is-realized/

Here's a blast from the past: Winamp, that mainstay media player of college dorms and LAN parties since time immemorial (er, 1997 or so) has made the leap from PC to handset with the release of Winamp for Android. This bad boy is available for Android 2.1 and up, and features a playback widget for the Android desktop and Last.fm integration. But that ain't all! If you install Winamp 5.59 beta on your PC, you can sync and manage your libraries via USB or WiFI. Pretty sweet! We only have one questions, really: will it still whip the llama's ass? Check out the QR code after the break (or search the Android Market) for the mobile app. Winamp 5.59 beta is available in the Winamp forums (More Coverage link, below).

[lateralus88]

As a fellow Winamp enthusiast, that interests me.

[Dimitrius]

Downloading.

[zerogravityfat]

did anyone order and use batteries from seidio?

[AcidLameLTE]

https://www.engadget.com/2010/10/22/android-2-3-next-major-release-says-anonymous-google-engineer/

Who knew a support thread on corporate WiFi login issues would lead to anything we'd care about? Cut to Google code's Android forums, where an anonymous Google engineer confirms that this problem will be patched in the "next major release" of Android, specifically version 2.3. So... does this mean Android 2.3 is the oft-discussed (and close on the horizon) Gingerbread? Not necessarily -- while possible, there isn't any indication to that effect, and logic doesn't arbitrarily equate the two. After all, recall that Eclair was both 2.0 and 2.1, so there would be some historical precedence to this 0.1 leap being nothing more than sprinkles on frozen yogurt.

[Dimitrius]

So my parents come home and what do I find? They've both gotten a G2 while I'm stuck with the fucking Cliq!!!!

I raged.

[AcidLameLTE]

Ouch.

Anyway, there's been a lot of Android news lately and here's some more:

https://www.engadget.com/2010/10/22/google-catches-giant-gingerbread-man-mounts-on-front-lawn-vide/



"Cupcake, donut, eclair, froyo. That's not just a list of Android iterations, it's also an inventory of all the giant decorations (along with a large green robot) that cover the GooglePlex lawn. And today marks the introduction of a large gingerbread man. Historically, such tasty statues have been in honor of its related milestone's completion, so we're wagering that Android 3.0 (or is it 2.3?) will be officially unveiled in the very short future. Run, run, as fast as you can to the video after the break."

[Dimitrius]

Looks like the PSP Android phone has been leaked.

https://www.engadget.com/2010/10/26/the-playstation-phone/

[millahh]

did anyone order and use batteries from seidio?

Got the massive one for the DInc from there; happy with it.

[Elsydeon]

I just got a new phone last week. Got the Android Xperia x10, so far am loving it!

[AcidLameLTE]

Looks like the PSP Android phone has been leaked.

https://www.engadget.com/2010/10/26/the-playstation-phone/

I saw the article they did about it in August but now I'm even more excited

[Dimitrius]

Looks like the PSP Android phone has been leaked.

https://www.engadget.com/2010/10/26/the-playstation-phone/

I saw the article they did about it in August but now I'm even more excited

I'm guessing the final product will have that joystick-like thing the PSP has, but I'm with you! DO WANT!

[zerogravityfat]

looks like the metal circular area in the middle is a touchpad joystick, though i'm speculating.

[Dimitrius]

looks like the metal circular area in the middle is a touchpad joystick, though i'm speculating.

It's a multitouch touchpad, yes.

[zerogravityfat]

btw, the gingerbread is official, but it may be android 2.3, honeycomb being 3.0. I'm guessing we will see the ginger in a few weeks.

[Chino]

So I bought myself a Droid X yesterday and absolutely love it. I can't find anything that I really dislike other than the notification system. I get an emails like crazy, and my phone gets an alert every time. Anyone know how I can prevent this?

[Dimitrius]

Sign your email off in your phone.

[Chino]

Sign your email off in your phone.

I couldn't figure out how to do that, but I found the option to stop email alerts. However, now my phone is saying my SD card is full...... It came with a 16 gig. What gives?

[Dimitrius]

Sign your email off in your phone.

I couldn't figure out how to do that, but I found the option to stop email alerts. However, now my phone is saying my SD card is full...... It came with a 16 gig. What gives?

I don't know about that second part, but was the email notification coming from Gmail? If so, the app for it should be in the app drawer.

[Chino]

Seems to be working now. I love the swype feature. I just made this post with it. Much faster than typing.

[Elsydeon]

I really wish they would update the Xperia soon. It's still on 1.6

[emindead]

https://www.the8pen.com/index.html


Writing on small devices, in a fast and natural way

"The 8pen allows for the replacement of the conventional keyboard on all devices capable of detecting gestures, in particular mobile phones with touch screens, modern remote controls or game controllers. Its advantage lies mainly in the fact that it is possible to input text faster than using conventional layouts on small devices, while at the same time mimicking human hand-writing. Moreover, the simplicity of the gestures involved greatly reduces the problem of mistyping that frequently occurs with the classical layout due to the lack of space. For the same reason, it is possible to write without viewing, as only the central region is needed as a reference for starting and ending a movement."

How it works

The basic movement

Producing a character is easy, fast, and feels like hand-writing. Once familiar with the position of the letters, writing can even be done without viewing.

Special and uppercase characters

Special characters, such as é, ø, ß or § are produced almost like the standard ones, but by pausing the movement in the appropriate sector. For uppercase characters, there is a little trick.

Custom gestures

Gestures started outside of the central region can be used to quickly produce custom character sequences, such as your name or a commonly used phrase.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3OuCR0EpGo (video demonstration)
At first you'll think that this won't work. People are now writing really fast just using their thumbs (ask any BlackBerry user lol). But at least these people are trying to find a much better solution for typing faster on small devices such as iPhones and Android phones.

It seems that tomorrow this software will be available for download on Android 2.2. Anyone here interested in giving it a go?

[Fiery Winds]

This looks very intriguing.  It definitely won't be as easy to learn as Swype, but neither was learning how to type on a keyboard.  I'll be downloading it tomorrow.

[Adami]

Looks like a horrible idea.

[cthrubuoy]

A characters is produced by pressing down in the centre, entering any of the 4 sectors, and then passing through either 1, 2, 3 or 4 adjacent sectors in either clockwise or anti-clockwise direction, before returning to the centre. The order of the letters along the edges, and the side on which they are placed, indicate the number of sectors to be passed through, and the direction of the movement, respectively.

For example, the placement of the letter "a", as the innermost letter on the top edge of the right sector, indicates the associated signature "Centre-Right-Top-Centre", while to the letter "r", the second letter from the centre on the same edge, is associated to the signature "Centre-Right-Top-Left-Centre". Thus words can be entered in a continuous motion; moreover the "space" character is inserted whenever the pointer is released from the centre.

Reminds me of

[ReaperKK]

I want to give it a shot but I don't have 2.2 on my phone yet as I'm waiting for the official release.

I don't know how I'll like it, I'm pretty accurate just typing on the android keypad, I don't use swype at all since I'm slower with it, but this could be a lot nicer for single hand writing.

[Fiery Winds]

I want to give it a shot but I don't have 2.2 on my phone yet as I'm waiting for the official release.

I don't know how I'll like it, I'm pretty accurate just typing on the android keypad, I don't use swype at all since I'm slower with it, but this could be a lot nicer for single hand writing.

It's available now for all devices 1.6 and up.  They removed voice recognition for now to have it on those devices.  It's ~$1.58.

[Chino]

Anyone have any good apps they would recommend for the droid X?

[cthrubuoy]

I want to give it a shot but I don't have 2.2 on my phone yet as I'm waiting for the official release.

I don't know how I'll like it, I'm pretty accurate just typing on the android keypad, I don't use swype at all since I'm slower with it, but this could be a lot nicer for single hand writing.

It's available now for all devices 1.6 and up.  They removed voice recognition for now to have it on those devices.  It's ~$1.58.

£0.99 UK

Decided to buy it for a laugh. I'll let you know what it's like

[cthrubuoy]

Well this is complicated...

When typing, you can't see where the next letter is because your finger is in the way. Taking your finger off is the 'gesture' for space so you can't do that either. Maybe I have fat fingers, or there's something I'm missing with the letter positioning but it seems completely random.

[Fiery Winds]

Yeah, I feel the same way.  Either there's a huge learning curve, or this is just lame.  Swype isn't perfect when it comes to entering numbers and special characters, but it's a lot easier and faster to pound out a sentence than with this thing.

[emindead]

Well this is complicated...

When typing, you can't see where the next letter is because your finger is in the way. Taking your finger off is the 'gesture' for space so you can't do that either. Maybe I have fat fingers, or there's something I'm missing with the letter positioning but it seems completely random.

isn't it intuitive? I dunno, lol, imagine where the letter is and start typing. I want to play with it.

[Chino]

The 8 pen thing is really neat. I bought it a few hours ago. I find that I am able to type on it very quickly, that is when I plan ahead my steps. Once you learn the arrangement I can see typing extremely fast with it. I really don't like how the letters are laid out though. They appear to be too random. I know in the video it was stated they were arranged based on how commonly used they were, but I find it too confusing. With a little tweaking, I think this could be really useful. It would be nice if the input are was larger and semi transparent.

[cthrubuoy]

You can set it to transparent.