Android Workz

I just found out a few minutes ago that one of my friends released a kickass mod based on Cyanogen ROM 6. Please check it out and show him some love.

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=824160

Everyone needs tutorials… I don’t care who it is. Here are a few of the best tutorial sites I have found for Android. These sites have stood out among the rest for some of the best android development tutorials available and lots of them. I hope this list helps you.

• http://www.bogotobogo.com/android.html
• http://www.anddev.org/
• http://androidwizard.net/
• http://developerlife.com/
• http://www.helloandroid.com/
• http://www.droidnova.com/
• http://www.androidpeople.com/
• http://blogs.sonyericsson.com/developerworld/

Special Mention -
While this next site isn’t a free tutorial site… I highly recommend it. I have learned an incredible amount about Android Development from Mark Murphy at Commonsware. He is well known for being the author of Beginning Android 2 and other books. I bought Beginning Android 2 when I first got started and read the whole book in a day. That alone says something… who can read a development book in a day? Well… Mark makes the book so easy to understand that you can do it. In addition, you can get that same book under a different title at his website CommonsWare.com and 2 others for the same price you would pay for one.

• The Busy Coder’s Guide to Android Development
• The Busy Coder’s Guide to Advanced Android Development
• Android Programming Tutorials

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED! Get a subscription at CommonsWare for only $40 and receive book updates and new titles for a full year. This means that whenever there is a new version of the book you get it for free. (2nd Edition, 3rd Edition, etc)

Get Help -
Lastly, I can’t say enough about StackOverflow as a resource for help. If you have a question or a problem with your application that is just driving you nuts… you can ask at StackOverflow and get an answer in a short period of time. There is a very active community of developers who answer questions. Just make sure you give credit where credit is due! Vote up and accept answers!

I have never owned an iPhone because I have tried AT&T and was never satisfied with the service. I live just north of Charlotte, NC and it seems their coverage is spotty here because I had alot of dropped calls or bad connections. It has been rumored for months that Verizon would get the iPhone at some point… but so far that has proven to be mere speculation. I can honestly say that having played with my friends iPhone that it is an impressive device that has snappy response and a nice looking interface but it is my opinion that Google has the iPhone coming and going for a few different reasons and Gizmodo seems to agree with me. Here is a short top 10 list of reasons that Android is dominating the market that Gizmodo has posted.

1: Android can Run Multiple Apps at the Same Time

Starting with version 1.0, Android has been able to run multiple applications at the same time regardless of whether they are system apps or apps from the Android Marketplace. The current version of iPhone OS does offer limited multitasking, but only allows native applications such as Mail, iPod and Phone to run in the background. Android users benefit greatly from this discrepancy, as they can receive notifications, listen to music, or even record GPS data without keeping the application open. Apple will try to level the playing field with iPhone OS 4, granting developers access to a small and limiting list of APIs that can run certain services in the background, but it’s a long way from the true multitasking that Android has.

2: Android Keeps Information Visible on Your Home Screen

One of the key features Android has is a customizable home screen keeps active widgets right at your fingertips, always accesible and always visible – without having to launch an application first. There are widgets for just about every app in the Android Marketplace from playing music to checking the weather and keeping up to date on Facebook. Meanwhile iPhone users are force to flip through their app list to locate and launch each app. If you wanted to check the forecast, for example, you would have to find the app, launch it, and then wait for it to load. With Android, all of that information can be displayed directly on your home screen, never more than a finger swipe away.

3: Android Has a Better App Market

It’s true that Apple’s App Store has over 180,000 applications, while the Android Marketplace has only just broken the 50,000 mark but Android’s rapid growth and adoption give it the potential to catch up to the iPhone App Store. Android also has another advantage: a completely open market. Apple receives around 10,000 app submissions per week, yet many apps are overlooked because they appear too simple or denied because a similar app already exists. The Android Marketplace is driven entirely by its consumers, so the best app is the one that succeeds – not the first one to reach the market. In addition, the Android Marketplace doesn’t censor its apps, so the possibilities are truly endless.

4: Android Gives You Better Notifications

The iPhone has some trouble with notifications. Because it’s restricted to pop-up notifications, it can only handle one at a time and because it lacks multitasking, applications must be open in order for them to make notifications. Android, on the other hand, has a convenient notification bar which displays an icon for every notification you have waiting. The notification bar can also be pulled downward to reveal more detail about each notification. Android also allows app developers to make notification details viewable from the lock screen, something the iPhone can only do with native applications.

5: Android Lets You Choose Your Hardware

Apple users are encouraged to “Think Different” but when it comes to the actual hardware, they don’t get much choice. You can pick the color, either black or white, and you get to choose between the 16GB or the pricier 32GB version. Other than that, you’re stuck with the 3.5-inch, 320×480 pixel display, 256MB of RAM, and 600MHz processor. Because Android is an open platform, manufacturers have the freedom to pair it with any hardware they want, like the Nexus One (with 3.7-inch, 480×800 pixel display, 512MB of RAM, and 1GHz Snapdragon processor) or the Motorola Droid which has a physical keypad. Obviously, available selections will vary by carrier – speaking of which….

6: Android Lets You Choose Your Carrier

AT&T truly is the iPhone’s weakest link. The iPhone’s success turned the country’s fastest 3G network into a staggering mess of dropped calls and dodgy data connections. If you lust after an iPhone and live in an area with poor AT&T coverage, you’re stuck struggling with low signal quality, slow data speeds, and missed calls. Android devices are available on every major cellular carrier (although AT&T only offers a single, somewhat underpowered, Android phone). Verizon has the Motorola Droid, Droid Eris, and Droid Incredible to start. T-Mobile has the Nexus One, MyTouch 3G, Behold II, and will soon carry the MyTouch Slide. And Sprint has the Hero, Moment, and plans for the very promising Evo 4G. No matter where you live, Android lets you pick the carrier that’s best for you.

7: Android Lets You Install Custom ROMs

The iPhone can be Jailbroken for some additional functionality, like installing apps that aren’t available in the App Store, but the overall experience is the same. You’re still stuck with the same exact interface. Similar to the Jailbreaking movement, Android has a small community dedicated to building custom ROMs for Android devices. Not only do Custom ROMs bring the same functionality Jailbreaking does, but they also bring an additional level of customization to your phone. There are ROMs that port custom UIs from one device to another. Other ROMs strip down bulky features and optimize for speed. With Android, nothing is out of reach.

8: Android Lets You Change Your Settings Faster

Smartphones have been gaining more and more functionality over the past few years: Wi-Fi, GPS, 4G, Bluetooth, etc. While these are all great and necessary additions, they have very adverse affects on battery life. In attempts to counter poor battery life, users have taken to toggling system settings like turning on Wi-Fi or 3G on only when they are needed. iPhone users are stuck digging around in the system settings every time they want to use the internet or a Bluetooth device. Android lets you use widgets to manage your settings directly from your home screen – and for those lesser-used settings that might not have dedicated widgets, you can also create shortcuts on your home screen to take you directly to the setting you want to change.

9: Android Does Google and Social Integration

With Smartphones giving us constant connectivity, it’s not surprising that the majority of our computerized lives are moving online. We have email for our messages, Flickr for our photos, Google Docs for our documents, and Facebook and Twitter for our social lives. Android offers the ability to integrate all of this natively. Your Gmail account can be automatically synchronized with your phone. Photos taken with your phone can be automatically uploaded to Flickr. Your phone can even be linked to your Facebook account and can sync your phone contacts with your Facebook friends – complete with profile images, email addresses, and phone numbers. The iPhone can do this only through use of third party apps, and is nowhere near as seamless to use as the Android alternative.

10: Android Gives You More Options to Fit Your Budget

If you’ve ever thought about buying an iPhone, you have probably noticed the price tag. The older iPhone 3G costs $99 with a two-year commitment and performs sluggishly with the latest OS updates when compared to the 3GS (which will run you a whopping $199 with two-year agreement). Because Android is an open source platform, it is very cost effective to implement which means savings for the end user. Every major cellular carrier (except for AT&T) has at least one Android phone available free with two-year agreement. Of course these are lower end Android devices, but they are still comparable in performance to the iPhone 3GS. The most expensive Android phones (which significantly outperform the iPhone 3GS) are $199 with two-year contract.

I am not slamming the iPhone… it has been a revolution in smart phones and there is no doubt. However, I prefer to have control… iPhone users don’t have it and won’t for the foreseeable future.

I found this tutorial on a blog called Droid Life and I thought I would repost it here since he has used download services that won’t allow you to download all of the files if you are a free user. Since I have my own dedicated server, I can host the files here so you don’t have to deal with that. Additionally, I want to go through the steps that I took to root my phone and what applications and mods I am using. I want to thank Droid Life for the video tutorials that they have created… it made this process very painless.

First, we should talk about why you might want to root your phone and weigh those against the risks.

I think the main reason that anyone would want to root their phone is to be able to use the additional features that rooting provides. The number one reason I chose to root my Motorola Droid was to enable wifi tethering which essentially turns my Motoroal Droid into a wifi hotspot that uses the 3G internet connection. Some apps will even allow tethering through bluetooth. Secondly, I wanted to be able to make my phone look cool. Here are some shots of my phone taken with an application called ShootMe. I am running a Mod called CyanogenMod v5.0.7.1 with the Blue Energy Theme v1.0.3, Beautiful Widgets and setCPU to allow for overclocking the phone. I will go into detail about how to flash your phone with these mods and provide links to the applications in later posts.

The first thing you should think about before you root for phone is whether or not you want to take the risk. You will most definitely void your warranty while your phone is rooted and you will not be able to upgrade your phone with provider updates while the phone is rooted (such as the upcoming Froyo 2.2 update). However, the mod community tends to update their roms to whatever version of Android is the newest… so I am certain that all of the features of Froyo 2.2 will be available. Another thing to consider is that the rooting process will completely wipe your phone… so you will have to backup all of your applications and contacts before you attempt to root your phone. To do the application backup you can install Astro File Manager click the menu button >> select Tools >> Backup and backup your applications to the SD card. You can later install Astro File Manager again when the rooting process is complete and use it to reinstall your applications. If you are using Gmail as the primary account on your phone and syncing your contacts, you won’t have to backup your contacts. When you reactivate your phone after completing the rooting process you can just sync Gmail again and it will install your contacts. If you are not using Gmail you can download Lookout Mobile Security and use it to backup your contacts, pictures and calls. I found that it sometimes didn’t work very well for pictures but you can get those from your phone via USB. NOTE: I did encounter a problem with one of my paid applications. I had purchased Dungeon Hunter and when I reinstalled it from the backup it told me that it was an invalid copy… so I had to purchase the application again. I suspect that if I had purchased the application through an account on the site that I would have been able to reinstall it… but I had purchased it from my phone with no account.

NOTE: The following process is risky and may result in your phone being “bricked”… which means that it will be gone and useless if anything goes wrong. I am NOT responsible for any damage that you cause to your phone by attempting to root your phone. You have been warned! Secondly, This process is only for the Motorola Droid (not Motorola Milestone) running the stock 2.1 ESE81 from the manufacturer and only details the steps for a PC user running Windows.

Ok… let’s get to it.

Step 1:
The first step to root your phone is to make sure that you have the USB drivers installed. If you can connect your phone to your PC and access the SD Card then you have the driver installed. Otherwise, download the correct Motorola USB drivers and install to your PC [32-bit] [64-bit] OR download and install the Motorola Media Link and it will install the correct driver (NOTE: I was prompted to upgrade my driver after I installed Motorola Media Link. After install you should see a little icon with an M on it and if you hold your mouse over it you should see “MotoConnect”. If you right click on that icon it has an option to check for device driver updates.) If you don’t know how to do that… I suggest you don’t attempt to root your phone.

Step 2:

• Create a folder on your hard drive called root
• Download these files to that folder RSD Lite | SP Recovery | ESE81 Update
• Extract RSD Lite and SP Recovery (if you don’t know how to extract a zip… stop now… do not continue)
• You should now have RSDLite4.6.msi and SPRecovery_ESE81.sbf in that folder
• Install RSD Lite
• Rename ESE81_update.zip to update.zip (make sure that it’s not named update.zip.zip) – We will use this later

• Connect your phone to a USB and your PC and turn it off.
• Open RSD Lite (run as administrator – Go to Start >> Run then paste C:\Program Files\Motorola\RSD Lite\SDL.exe into the run box and hit enter).
• Slide open your keyboard, hold up on the d-pad, then the power button for 2-3 seconds and release.
• You should now see a black screen that says BootLoader at then top
• Go RSD Lite on your PC
• Click the … next to the filename box and browse to where you saved the SPRecover_ESE81.sbf file.
• Double click and open the file.
• Click “start” and allow the SPRecovery SBF to flash. This should not take long.
• Allow for your phone to reboot and for RSD Lite to show that you are 100% and completed.
• Disconnect your phone and close RSD Lite. You now have SPRecovery installed on your Droid.
• Proceed to STEP 3.

Step 3:
NOTE: Make sure that you have backed up whatever you need backed up before you continue…

• Place the update.zip on the root of your sdcard… not in a folder.
• Reboot into recovery mode (hold the power and “x” button at the same time).
• Using the volume up/down switch highlight “Wipe data/factory reset” and select with the camera button.
• Choose “Wipe cache partition.”
• Choose “Install.”
• Choose “Allow update.zip installation.”
• Choose “Install /sdcard/update.zip (deprecated).”
• The update.zip will now be installed.
• When it finishes, select reboot.
• When your phone boots up you will have to reactivate your phone and re-add your Google accounts.
• You are now the proud owner of a rooted Motorola Droid.

Now that you have a rooted phone I highly recommend that you slide over to Droid Forums and check out the custom roms section. >>