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[IcebergSlim3000]

Quickdesk is pretty nice for enhanced multitasking.
Basically, it's like the "hold home to open recently used apps" action, but you double tap home and a whole app screen overlays on top of what you're doing that is fully customizable. Even widgets. I like it quite a bit.

+1. I just found this yesterday. Awesome awesome app. It's basically the equivalent of adding another home page so instead of having 7 I now have 8. The fact that you can use widgets is what really puts it over the top.

I also checked out Gpad. It's an app that lets you control your computer from your from your phone. It works via wifi or usb, although Im not sure how much I would use it. It does seem like a great way to pull a practical joke though.

 

[bathala]

Quickdesk is pretty nice for enhanced multitasking.
Basically, it's like the "hold home to open recently used apps" action, but you double tap home and a whole app screen overlays on top of what you're doing that is fully customizable. Even widgets. I like it quite a bit.

can u customize the button rather than home button

 

[Zozz]

can u customize the button rather than home button

The only other button is th search button, long press.

 

[bathala]

The only other button is th search button, long press.

that's fine. double press home for DX brings up voice command.

gonna add quickdesk on my appbrain account on things to DL

 

[zoku88]

Can't find Amazon MP3 Store app on my Incredible's Marketplace. Any ideas what I can do?

Here's an apk

http://content.modaco.net/dropzone/com.amazon.mp3.apk

I'm not sure if after you install that, if you'll be able to see updates for it on the android market though. I think that apk is old...

 

[Zozz]

Seriously though, thanks for the quickdesk mention. This makes multitasking so much better, works so well. Wouldn't be surprised if Google implemented this, don't care because this app exists.

 

[SimleuqiR]

http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2010/07/07/ars-technica-android-2-2-javascript-performance-destroys-that-of-ios4/

Ars Technica just pitted Google’s Android 2.2 against Apple’s iOS 4 in a JavaScript benchmark test…and Ars isn’t mincing words with their results. In a post titled ,”Android 2.2 demolishes iOS4 in JavaScript benchmarks,” Ars quipped: “The results show that the Android device delivers significantly faster JavaScript execution than the iPhone, scoring over three times better on V8 and almost twice as fast on SunSpider.” If you’re an Android fan you can go ahead and gloat, but this is exactly why a health mobile ecosystem is good for everyone. When companies — especially two with the resources of Google and Apple — compete, the consumers win.

The last statement is so true. The more Apple and Google compete the better products we get, regardless of preference.

 

[Miggytronz]

The new v0.6.6 version of LauncherPro Beta is now available on the Android Market and it brings some highly requested features!

Here’s what’s new:

•The dock notifications have been disabled by default. They were causing delays when returning to LauncherPro from another app.
•Improved code to reduce delays when returning to LauncherPro from other apps when dock notifications are on.
•Enabled notifications when using custom icons for Handcent SMS, CompSMS, Stock HTC phone, and HTC Call History shortcuts.
•New: Gmail dock notifications. They should work with both custom icons and the LauncherPro Gmail icon. Option to choose from multiple Gmail accounts will come in a future update.
•New option to have only one homescreen (Preferences > Homescreen Settings)
•New option for Home key action. You can set your phone’s Home button to either do nothing, show screen previews, open the app drawer, open notifications, or show/hide the status bar. There’s still the option to have it take you to your default screen if you’re not in it instead of triggering the selected action. This also means that you can now disable screen previews when pressing the home key.
•New: options to backup and restore your LauncherPro setup. This includes your settings, homescreen icons, and dock setup. Due to limitations in the Android system, we cannot properly backup widgets, so these will show “Problem loading widget” when you restore them. You’ll need to manually re-add your widgets.

 

[CrayzeeCarl]

The new v0.6.6 version of LauncherPro Beta is now available on the Android Market and it brings some highly requested features!

Here’s what’s new:

•The dock notifications have been disabled by default. They were causing delays when returning to LauncherPro from another app.
•Improved code to reduce delays when returning to LauncherPro from other apps when dock notifications are on.
•Enabled notifications when using custom icons for Handcent SMS, CompSMS, Stock HTC phone, and HTC Call History shortcuts.
•New: Gmail dock notifications. They should work with both custom icons and the LauncherPro Gmail icon. Option to choose from multiple Gmail accounts will come in a future update.
•New option to have only one homescreen (Preferences > Homescreen Settings)
•New option for Home key action. You can set your phone’s Home button to either do nothing, show screen previews, open the app drawer, open notifications, or show/hide the status bar. There’s still the option to have it take you to your default screen if you’re not in it instead of triggering the selected action. This also means that you can now disable screen previews when pressing the home key.
•New: options to backup and restore your LauncherPro setup. This includes your settings, homescreen icons, and dock setup. Due to limitations in the Android system, we cannot properly backup widgets, so these will show “Problem loading widget” when you restore them. You’ll need to manually re-add your widgets.

So awesome!

 

[Dead Prince]

can you Lock Launcherpro so it doesn't add anymore widgets? i filled it up. and when i started add other widgets it just gets placed behind it.

 

[Miggytronz]

can you Lock Launcherpro so it doesn't add anymore widgets?

wut do you mean?

 

[Dead Prince]

wut do you mean?

i filled my whole screen with app icons.

and i was trying to place the Power Control on another screen it got placed on the one with all the apps. So it ended up showing behind the icons. and only way to remove it was to remove one of the app icon so i can click on it.

 

[jiien]

i filled my whole screen with app icons.

and i was trying to place the Power Control on another screen it got placed on the one with all the apps. So it ended up showing behind the icons. and only way to remove it was to remove one of the app icon so i can click on it.

Sounds weird, and sounds like a bug? You should send the developer an email, and provide the exact sequence you took to do it, so that he can reproduce it on his own. Given his typical developing speed, he'll have a fix for it in the next update or so, which should happen within a week or two. He's fricking fast.

 

[Miggytronz]

i filled my whole screen with app icons.

and i was trying to place the Power Control on another screen it got placed on the one with all the apps. So it ended up showing behind the icons. and only way to remove it was to remove one of the app icon so i can click on it.

Sounds weird, and sounds like a bug? You should send the developer an email, and provide the exact sequence you took to do it, so that he can reproduce it on his own. Given his typical developing speed, he'll have a fix for it in the next update or so, which should happen within a week or two. He's fricking fast.

yeah that def sounds really really really weird. Iv yet to experience that issue.

 

[Tonza]

Hmm.. I downloaded TweetCaster so I could try it and compare to Twitter official app but it doesn't let me login. Always says "Login failed". :\

Anyone else have this problem or is it my settings or something? Phone is Galaxy S btw.

 

[besada]

Anyone know of a good SMB client for Android? Got a friend who just wants to be able to see and move files from his Windows shares.

 

[skybaby]

Anyone know of a good SMB client for Android? Got a friend who just wants to be able to see and move files from his Windows shares.

Astro has a good smb module as a separate download. Estrongs explorer has a built in one too (but the app is like 10mbit big)

 

[jiien]

Hmm.. I downloaded TweetCaster so I could try it and compare to Twitter official app but it doesn't let me login. Always says "Login failed". :\

Anyone else have this problem or is it my settings or something? Phone is Galaxy S btw.

When I get home, I'll download/install it and try it out for you.

 

[Tashi]

So apparently the Justin.tv viewer and broadcasting apps are in beta right now for Android. Anyone in or know how to get in?

 

[Jamesfrom818]

So apparently the Justin.tv viewer and broadcasting apps are in beta right now for Android. Anyone in or know how to get in?

I've been streaming from the website but then again I'm on Froyo.

 

[Tashi]

I've been streaming from the website but then again I'm on Froyo.

You mean you go to Justin.tv and hit broadcast and it works just like that? I NEED FROYO

edit: Just went to the JTV help channel and was given an email to someone I guess can help. *crosses fingers*

 

[jiien]

Hmm.. I downloaded TweetCaster so I could try it and compare to Twitter official app but it doesn't let me login. Always says "Login failed". :\

Anyone else have this problem or is it my settings or something? Phone is Galaxy S btw.

I added an account and logged in just fine. Sorry!

 

[Hilbert]

If anyone is as big a star trek fan as myself, give the tricorder app a try!

 

[Tashi]

Woot! Got the invite.

 

[Tonza]

I added an account and logged in just fine. Sorry!

Thanks for the information.

So it's something in my settings probably. I'll need to try it again.

 

[SimleuqiR]

There might be a silver line down the road for Android and a proper Facebook app:

Android Facebook App Alternative Bloo Going Open Source
by Kevin Krause on July 7th, 2010

If you are a fan or user of Bloo, an alternative to the official Facebook app for Android, you may be saddened to learn that development for the app has ceased. But there is a silver lining to this news. Due to time commitments working with Logitech on their Google TV endeavors, Dimitris Coutchell, creator of Bloo, is rebuilding the basic app from the ground up and then open-sourcing the code to all who wish to create the most functional Facebook app on Android possible.

The new version, dubbed Bloo Too, is only in its conceptual stages now, but it will be built up using the Android Facebook SDK with Facebook’s Open Graph API. Before the app is handed over to the open-source crowd several improvements will be built in including a new login mechanism. new home screen, enhanced notifications, and an overall faster, more reliable, and accessible user experience.

If you want to get involved in the development of Bloo Too, you can head over to the announcement post to get a better idea of where things are headed and learn more about the project. For now you can grab the original Bloo in the Android Market, but act fast as changes in Facebook’s policies may result in the app getting yanked from the market before work on Bloo Too can be completed.

Hopefully open source means faster updates and full Facebook integration.

 

[jonnybryce]

Have you guys tried Lithium music player? It's UI is based around gestures, so you swipe left or right for a next song, or touch a button to have the Album/Tracks/Playlist menu appear and swipe to the one you want. It's fun to use.

http://www.appbrain.com/app/com.haramitare.lithiumplayertrial

It has a pretty cool look, widgets, and didn't have any trouble recognizing all my music right off the bat. You can also specify want folders to look for music, so it'll ignore game files or any other random stuff.

It's not perfect (it could be a little laggy when I did the next song swipe from the play button and it didn't stop playing when I pulled out my headphones) but it's in solid shape and has tons of potential.

 

[andycapps]

Have you guys tried Lithium music player? It's UI is based around gestures, so you swipe left or right for a next song, or touch a button to have the Album/Tracks/Playlist menu appear and swipe to the one you want. It's fun to use.

http://www.appbrain.com/app/com.haramitare.lithiumplayertrial

It has a pretty cool look, widgets, and didn't have any trouble recognizing all my music right off the bat. You can also specify want folders to look for music, so it'll ignore game files or any other random stuff.

It's not perfect (it could be a little laggy when I did the next song swipe from the play button and it didn't stop playing when I pulled out my headphones) but it's in solid shape and has tons of potential.

That is a horrible looking UI, to me. Looks like some crappy Winamp skin someone made in the 90's. As far as fitting the Android platform, that's about as far as you could get for UI, IMO. :lol

I've gone back to the default music app, but Doubletwist is quite good as an alternative.

 

[kaching]

There might be a silver line down the road for Android and a proper Facebook app:



Hopefully open source means faster updates and full Facebook integration.

So, due to a lack of time, he can't update the existing app, but he can rebuild it from scratch and make it open source? Say what?

More power to him, but that just seems...masochistic.

 

[Tonza]

After testing few of the twitter apps, I ended up with Twicca. The UI is really great and colortagging users is awesome.

The widget doesn't have any tweets in it but I'll just use notifications.

 

[giga]

It has a pretty cool look

Son...:lol To each his own I guess.

 

[Jayge]

After testing few of the twitter apps, I ended up with Twicca. The UI is really great and colortagging users is awesome.

The widget doesn't have any tweets in it but I'll just use notifications.

Touiteur is a paid app but it does have good widgets (and a bitchin interface) if you haven't checked that out yet.

 

[jayb]

Are there any Twitter and Facebook apps that have push notification? my wife's ipod touch facebook app has push notifications, but as far as I can tell, the Android version only has pull.

*head-scratch.gif*

 

[SimleuqiR]

So, due to a lack of time, he can't update the existing app, but he can rebuild it from scratch and make it open source? Say what?

More power to him, but that just seems...masochistic.

Dude, I don't know. I'll take anything at this point.
The Facebook app was made by a Google employee (I believe). Google needs to scrap the whole app and start from zero. The Twitter app was also made by Google and is a much better app.

 

[kaching]

Dude, I don't know. I'll take anything at this point.
The Facebook app was made by a Google employee (I believe). Google needs to scrap the whole app and start from zero. The Twitter app was also made by Google and is a much better app.

Sorry, I just thought it was odd that he seems to be setting himself up for more work not less when he claims he has to stop due to time constraints...but maybe it's just that he has a chunk of time now to bang something out, but won't have the time to continue to maintain it later on.

As for GAFer Android users continuing to jones for a "good" FB app, I'm of the belief that's an oxymoron.

 

[Suite Pee]

The new v0.6.6 version of LauncherPro Beta is now available on the Android Market and it brings some highly requested features!

Here’s what’s new:

•The dock notifications have been disabled by default. They were causing delays when returning to LauncherPro from another app.
•Improved code to reduce delays when returning to LauncherPro from other apps when dock notifications are on.
•Enabled notifications when using custom icons for Handcent SMS, CompSMS, Stock HTC phone, and HTC Call History shortcuts.
•New: Gmail dock notifications. They should work with both custom icons and the LauncherPro Gmail icon. Option to choose from multiple Gmail accounts will come in a future update.
•New option to have only one homescreen (Preferences > Homescreen Settings)
•New option for Home key action. You can set your phone’s Home button to either do nothing, show screen previews, open the app drawer, open notifications, or show/hide the status bar. There’s still the option to have it take you to your default screen if you’re not in it instead of triggering the selected action. This also means that you can now disable screen previews when pressing the home key.
•New: options to backup and restore your LauncherPro setup. This includes your settings, homescreen icons, and dock setup. Due to limitations in the Android system, we cannot properly backup widgets, so these will show “Problem loading widget” when you restore them. You’ll need to manually re-add your widgets.

Really important to me; I can finally uninstall HelixLauncher as a back-up. While I would love to finally go through with my plan of having dedicated home screens for music, games, social networking, calendar, news, etc., I'm much too picky when it comes to layout.

 

[Alex Dee]

New to android as of last night, what's a good thing to get apps straight from my mac to my phone? I'm not too keen on eating up my download limit on my phone getting things from the market.

 

[th3dude]

New to android as of last night, what's a good thing to get apps straight from my mac to my phone? I'm not too keen on eating up my download limit on my phone getting things from the market.

AppBrain is a pretty cool sync service.

 

[Macho Madness]

New to android as of last night, what's a good thing to get apps straight from my mac to my phone? I'm not too keen on eating up my download limit on my phone getting things from the market.

your only option is to download apps by using your phone

 

[Alex Dee]

Brilliant. I was kind of hoping for an itunesish style system, but I guess this will have to do. I'll just have to wait until i move to a place with wifi or something.

 

[OriginalThinking]

Quickdesk is pretty nice for enhanced multitasking.
Basically, it's like the "hold home to open recently used apps" action, but you double tap home and a whole app screen overlays on top of what you're doing that is fully customizable. Even widgets. I like it quite a bit.

What an awesome app! Great find. I'm actually not a fan of using lots of widgets on my desktop as I much prefer a clean, minimalist look. But using this I can have the power control, spotify and music widgets all on one screen, hidden away for when I need to quickly switch Wi-Fi on/off skip tracks etc. If Google are really focusing on UI enhancements for Gingerbread, they should have a chat with the Devs from LauncherPro and Quickdesk because these are some really neat ideas which really help make Android 2.2 even better.

 

[jonnybryce]

Son...:lol To each his own I guess.

It's not gorgeous but at least it has a style, unlike the default music app which looks like a generic player from 2000. It looks better in motion with the light circling the play button or the gestures in action.

I don't get how Google can design come nice stuff, like the new Youtube mobile page, and then have such hideous "designs" elsewhere. I guess that's what happens when you have so many divisions, kind of like Sony.

 

[OriginalThinking]

your only option is to download apps by using your phone

Not entirely true. You can find android apps online (albeit from non official sources) which you can install on your phone. Just pop them on your micro sd card after downloading them onto the computer, make sure to untick the box in settings which only allows you to download from the marketplace and away you go (be mindful of downloading any app from a non official source, make sure it's a site you trust). I've downloaded a few apps using this, some from xda, some other places. It's not as elegant as iTunes mind. When Gingerbread makes an appearance we might see some sort of cloud downloading for apps officially, as they have demonstrated for the upcoming Google music. (Check this link!)

Google Music!!

 

[andycapps]

New to android as of last night, what's a good thing to get apps straight from my mac to my phone? I'm not too keen on eating up my download limit on my phone getting things from the market.

What is your download limit? Most apps are pretty small. So yeah, have to be downloaded via your phone's mobile connection or wifi.

 

[Macho Madness]

Not entirely true. You can find android apps online (albeit from non official sources) which you can install on your phone. Just pop them on your micro sd card after downloading them onto the computer, make sure to untick the box in settings which only allows you to download from the marketplace and away you go (be mindful of downloading any app from a non official source, make sure it's a site you trust). I've downloaded a few apps using this, some from xda, some other places. It's not as elegant as iTunes mind. When Gingerbread makes an appearance we might see some sort of cloud downloading for apps officially, as they have demonstrated for the upcoming Google music. (Check this link!)

Google Music!!

I get where you were going but that's a process I would generally avoid at all possible. Especially because apps get updated all the time. An iTunes like sync feature would be best for app installations from the PC.

 

[Jayge]

Brilliant. I was kind of hoping for an itunesish style system, but I guess this will have to do. I'll just have to wait until i move to a place with wifi or something.

50 apps takes up less than 50 megabytes, on average. Is it really that much of a problem?

 

[kaching]

What is your download limit? Most apps are pretty small. So yeah, have to be downloaded via your phone's mobile connection or wifi.

This. You're far more likely to eat into whatever your limit is by streaming media or just heavy web browsing.

 

[jiien]

What is your download limit? Most apps are pretty small. So yeah, have to be downloaded via your phone's mobile connection or wifi.

Or, as someone else mentions right above, get a USB connection (from your charger maybe? I guess it depends on the phone), hook it up to your computer, and your phone with the microSD card should be recognized as a drive. Unless the Apple platform is radically different, but I don't see why it would treat your phone any different. If it does work...

Drag and drop, disconnect from the computer (or change the connection type to Charge Only or something, depending on your phone, so that the microSD card is remounted by your phone), and use a file explorer (I recommend EStrongs, but people like Astro too) to navigate and install the apk.

But, in many cases, and I assume you're not a pirate, you'll need to get it from the market. The method I just mentioned is for apk's released outside of the market.

Any apks installed this way do not tie to their equivalents on the market.

 

[IonicSnake]

Is there a "best" web browser for android phones?

 

[th3dude]

Is there a "best" web browser for android phones?

Pre 2.1 I favored the xScope browser. However, the 2.2 stock browser is the tits.