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Android Q to warn users running apps targeting Android Lollipop or older
Android Q may warn users that try to run apps that target Android Lollipop or earlier. Android Pie warns on apps targeting Android Jelly Bean or earlier.
It's usually in the best interests of a developer to update their apps to support the latest Android platform features. Each new Android versions offers new APIs and features that earlier versions of Android don't offer. However, each new Android version also adds new restrictions to what apps can do, which some application developers aren't a fan of. For example, many apps avoided bumping their target API level to Android Marshmallow or later so they could avoid having to implement runtime permissions. Google finally started to crack down on this behavior with new restrictions imposed on apps uploaded and updated to the Google Play Store, but they also added a warning in Android Pie to shame apps that still haven't updated past Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. According to a recent commit in the Android Open Source Project, it seems that Android Q will warn users if the app they're running targets Android 5.1 Lollipop or earlier.
For most people, this is an old tune, one to which they have danced before: the eternal promise of extending battery life, making your device smooth and silky as the time it was taken out of the box. We have had these programs such as task managers, app killers, RAM savers, and so on for a very long time. The truth of the matter is that Android is actually quite capable of handling apps in a very efficient manner, and more often than not, these are not normally needed. Also, the available RAM on most newer devices certainly makes them obsolete (for newer gen devices anyways). Furthermore, leaving programs in RAM (when available) prevents the need to relaunch them the next time you open them. However, when a new approach is tested, it is always worth looking into it, and that happens to be the case with Greenify by XDA Forum Member oasisfeng.
As mobile devices have evolved, so have the tools for performing every day tasks. What used to require Microsoft Office on a standard computer can now be accomplished with various mobile applications that can create, edit, and view Office documents (because Microsoft still can't figure out how to mobilize their mammoth, memory-hungry, piece of... oh never mind). Further expanding the analogy, we used to use apps like Notepad to edit text files, and now we have a bevy of apps on the desktop that allow you to not only edit a text file, but also features color-coding for different programming languages.
It would seem that Google has a bug in their AOSP code that was introduced around Android 3.2, which affects how the OS handles USB Storage and can prevent write access to SD cards and USB sticks. XDA Elite Recognized Developer, Senior Moderator, and News Writer Chainfire sums up the issue in his blog post:
Do you wear glasses? Is your vision not as good as it could be? Do you like seeing huge pictures of your friends so you are reminded of what they look like when they call? Do you have “friends” who use iPhones and brag about their awesome answer screen? Well, XDA Senior Member lowveld has a solution for you. Lowveld has created the Ultimate Call Screen HD call screen replacement. What can we say about Ultimate Call Screen HD other than it is, well, ultimate. It allows you to customize each contact’s call screen. You can select a different High Definition picture for each contact. That picture will then be displayed in full screen when he or she calls.
XDA forum member GameGod72 is an avid user of the Aldiko eBook reader app and recently got himself a tablet. The dev wanted to be able to read his books on both his phone and tablet but could not find anything, and decided to do something about it himself!
Android device owners who use Tasker, may be interested to learn of a new plugin from XDA forum member intangibleDroid.
It´s almost impossible not to miss a great app published on our big community, and because of that, from time to time we bring you an article that may not be so new but sure will be of interest for some of us. XDA member MixToMax presents AnimeWatch, which allows you to catch up with your favorite English subbed animes on your Android device, check the latest releases, and also provides you with a database of over 1200 series to go through.
Merely days after its release earlier this month, Acer's Iconia A500 Android Honeycomb tablet has been rooted! The tablet, which features a unique Acer UI skin, front and back facing cameras, and a 1GHz dual-core Tegra2 processor, will now allow superuser permissions as a result of some clever work from XDA member monki-magic (original post here)
Do you like Android's stock app manager? If the answer to that question is no, then you should certainly take a quick look at what XDA member leducbao has prepared for you. AntTek App Manager Root is an app manager replacement for rooted devices that is packed with extra options not found in the regular app manager. This will allow you to not only do basic functions such as add/remove apps, but will also allow you to freeze/unfreeze apps, clear cache's, backup and restore data, and much more. In case you are wondering what freezing an app actually is, it is the process of hiding it from Android's memory, so that no resources are used on it. The inverse process of this? Yup, you guessed it... defrost.