I’ve been a very happy iPhone user since I bought my first one back in 2011, when I replaced an Android phone with which I had neither been happy nor impressed. I have had a number of iPhones, each with more capabilities than the last, and am currently using an iPhone 7, with which I am very happy, and which ties in nicely with my setup at home and on the go, as I use a Mac, an Apple Watch, and Apple Airpods.
Tag: Android
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Platform agnosticism and my preferred platform
The debate over ones preferred platform has for a very long time felt more like a religous discussion more than anything else. Whether it’s PC vs. Mac, iOS vs. Android, or Windows vs. Linux, proponents of the various platforms tend towards an almost religious level of zeal for their preferred platform, and against the other platform.
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Another feature I’d love to see on the iPad
The iPad is great, and iOS is, well, neat. However, there are a few features from Android, that I would love to see on the iPad. Chief among these is widgets.
On my Android phone, I have widgets telling me how much power is left on my phone, the number of days until my wedding, and a photo of my fiancée, to mention a few. Others include widgets to turn on and off various services on the phone, set the sound profile, and turn airplane mode on or off:
On my iPad, the only things that could fall under the header of widgets, are the little numbers on apps like Things, Mail and Newsrack, telling me how many outstanding tasks, and unread emails and blog posts I have:
So having established that I want widgets, what do I want them to do? For one, I’d love to have a widget for toggling airplane mode, a countdown to my wedding day and one to toggle sound and rotation lock.
I’m sure there are other things you guys would want to see; feel free to use the comment field to share them! -
My number one wanted feature on Android
Lately, I have been writing quite a bit about features I’d like to see on my iPad. I do also have an Android phone (my second one, as a matter of fact), and, while it usually does most of what I want, there is one feature which is not built into it – screenshots.
On my iPad, and apparently also on the iPhone, you simply press the home and power buttons, and hey presto, you’ve got a screenshot. On Android phones, you have to either root the phone, or install the SDK, both of which are unsatisfactory solutions to me.
Now, apparently, this will come in Android 2.3.3 (Gingerbread), but frankly, it should have been a feature since day one. -
BGG apps for Android – a review
Note: I’ve been a BoardGameGeek user for a few years now, but only after I got my first Android phone did I really start using the features the site has to offer, as I got an app that uses its API. These tests have been performed on an HTC Desire, running Android 2.2 (Froyo).
Crossposted to Boardgamegeek.
At the moment, there are two apps for BoardGameGeek available for Android phones. One is called BoardGameGeek, and is developed by Dennis Bond, the other is called BGG Mobile, developed by Skulupus.
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Mobile multitasking – Android versus iOS
The two main contenders in the mobile OS world today have two vastly different approaches to multitasking. Both have merits, and potential drawbacks. Let’s have a look:
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Android – Choosing apps
Like the iPhone and its app store, Android offers a market for download and purchase of apps for the Android phones. They’ve cleverly called this market the Android Market. It is directly accessible from the phones, and you can find it on the main menu.
The only problem with the Android Market, as I see it, is that navigating it tends to get tedious. Luckily, there is a website from which you can browse apps and see what rating they’ve got. The first is called Cyrket, and you can find it here. Unfortunately, Cyrket has a spotty record as far as uptime goes. An alternative to Cyrket is Androlib, which can be found here
There are basically speaking two ways of installing apps. The obvious one is using the Android Market to download and install them automagically. You can also get the installable package (Android uses .apk-files for installable packages) and install it directly from the file manager.
To do this, you first need to Allow installation of non-Market apps. In the main view, click the “Menu” button, then click “Settings”. In settings, choose “Applications”, then activate “Unknown sources”.