Thursday, April 19, 2012

Update - 306



Posted: 26 Mar 2012 05:55 PM PDT
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HTC is going big in 2012. After introducing their world to their more focused line of One devices, new slimmed down Sense 4.0 software, the Taiwanese manufacturer continues to overhaul their services. Next on HTC’s list? Their cloud service, HTCSense.com. HTC began sending out emails today, letting users know that they have until April 30th to download all their user data, or be faced with losing it forever, as they transition to an all new cloud service for their customers.
Saved contacts, messages, Footprints and call history will all be wiped clean but customers can download all their data in a handy zip file via HTCSense.com. Not exactly sure how many users exclusively use HTCSense to back up their data, seeing how Google already backs up most of these items to your Google account. It will be interesting to see what HTC will come up for the all new HTCSense.com but if their recent partnership with Dropbox is any indication, users will have plenty of storage for their pics and media if a shiny new HTC device is in their future.
Thanks, Bob!
[HTC]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 05:16 PM PDT
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If you hurry, you could snag yourself this fun — very limited edition — Star Wars themed Android shirt being featured today on TeeFury.com. If you’re new to TeeFury, this is a site that offers up one of a kind designs for only 24 hours, slaps it on a t-shirt, and throws it on sale for $10. That means, once they’re gone… they’re gone forever. If this one tickles your fancy, you may want to get moving. Only 3 more hours before it’s gone forever.
[TeeFury]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 03:59 PM PDT
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We’ve got a couple of pieces of Google Play-related stories for you today. First of all, some of you should begin to notice a new addition to the Google toolbar (not the extension for browsers, but the persistent black strip you see at the top of all their sites). It’s a link to the Google Play Store. It’s simple, yet effective. Modest, yet bold. It’s there if you need it.
Secondly, there seems to be a weird bug plaguing handsets of the Samsung variety. It seems a Russian company by the name of OJSC Mobile Telesystems has a  mail app that is automatically appearing on some Samsung handsets.
The name of the app is “MTC Мобильная Почта” and many are puzzled as to how it got there. It seems there’s a plausible explanation for it, and it doesn’t seem to be malicious nor intentional.

The company seems to have given the app the same package name that Samsung gives their email app. As the Play Store uses these package names to identify apps, and since the Play Store can automatically update those apps, the device, by mistake, is downloading an update which replaces the app it shares its package name with. As it is being mistaken for a system app, users are finding it impossible to remove without the use of root.
It’s understandable that users are cautious and assuming, what with all the stories about mobile malware lately. But signs are pointing to this being a simple, honest mistake. XDA developers examined the APK and first signs show that there is nothing malicious inside the app.
This presents an interesting new problem for Google. This is a very, very bad security vulnerability which can be used by malware developers to infect devices who have automatic updates installed. The Google Play Store couldn’t detect a duplicate package name because Samsung’s email app was not in the Play Store – it never has been.
Seven, the company who provides these apps for OEMs and carriers to use, must also reconsider their practice. They’re giving partners apps with the same package name because it’s not intended to be used on the Google Play Store. Simply providing their partners with unique package names for each distribution of the email app would do the trick to ensure nothing like this happens.
We’re not sure what Seven’s policy is on their OEM-tailored clients being uploaded to the Android market, but we want to guess that they’re not quite fond of that. That’s just a guess, though. And, for what it’s worth, OJSC has removed the application from the Google Store, but that still doesn’t help users without root who have no other way to remove the app from their phones. Some phones do have an “uninstall updates” option for apps so be sure to try that if you’re affected by this problem. [via The Verge]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 02:45 PM PDT
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Time for your whacky story of the day. It’s no secret that Android manufacturers are probably struggling to come up with names for the dozens of smartphones they release each year. Just take HTC and Sony, for instance – they’ve already taken a liking to a new ultra-simple naming convention whose phones’ names are only differentiated by a single letter (carriers’ names pending).

Well, it looks like some of these phones share names with brands of a rather… peculiar product. Let’s stop being awkward: if you were to look up condoms with the same name, you’d find that many do exist.
Out of 20 phones on the chart above, 8 share names with the sexual protection product that is so necessary in today’s society. If you count the fact that a lot of companies like to use “ultra-thin” as a marketing bullet point, make that 9. I imagine any of you won’t look at your phones quite the same. At least for the rest of the day, anyway. [via What's in a Name]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 02:24 PM PDT
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It’s easy to forget that Rovio has more games than Angry Birds Space in the shadow of thenew game, but they do. Angry Birds Rio just got a pretty nice update in the Android market. They’ve added twelve new bonus levels for players to unlock. As usual, you get the bonus levels by beating all the levels in a particular episode, or by collecting all of the fruit in a particular episode. You’ll need to sacrifice 22MB of your data to get the update, but if that’s no problem then make no delay.

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 02:13 PM PDT
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At last year’s fall CTIA show in Orlando, Sprint had a nice shindig to announce a big deal of a phone (you may have heard of it – the EVO 3D), but that wasn’t all they showed up to The Orange State with. Google and Sprint teamed up to show off Google Voice carrier integration, a feature that was made available to Sprint customers only.
The integration allowed users to use their existing phone numbers as their Google Voice number.It was a huge convenience as you could switch over to Google’s SMS and visual voicemail service without having to give people a new number. At the time, it wasn’t clear why Google only nabbed Sprint, but it’s a bit more clear now.

Google has to work with carriers to properly implement the technology, but there are also a lot of logistics to consider. For instance, most companies probably wouldn’t appreciate people being able to bypass their own visual voicemail services, something many carriers do ask customers to pay for. Sprint’s smartphone plans includes the feature at no cost, with voice-to-text transcription features available for an added fee. It’s easy to see why they were an easier carrier to work with.
The same issue also applies to text messaging – it would allow people to bypass any limit they have (carriers usually offer tiered messaging with an unlimited option). Again, Sprint’s smartphone plans include unlimited messaging, making them an ideal carrier for this integration. It’s tough for Google to sell carriers on their product because it loses money for the latter.
Unless these carriers force every smartphone owner to have unlimited messaging and data like Sprint, seeing Google Voice integration for others likely won’t happen anytime soon. Google wants you to know they’re still working on it, though, as discussions with other carriers (who and where wasn’t mentioned) were ongoing. Anyone still looking forward to this feature or are you over it by now? [via CNET]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 11:34 AM PDT
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Humble Bundle fans get a nice surprise today as the second edition of the charity-driven Android game bundle has added a new game. Users now get Snuggle Track as part of the bundle, bringing the total possible amount of games to six. (You get an extra game for buying it for more than $5.) Snuggle Truck is a racer that has you transporting animals from the start line to the finish line.
With an awesome community of user-created maps, you probably won’t need developer-created DLC for a long time. Those who have already purchased the Humble Bundle will get this game at no extra cost, and new buyers will be getting in on the fun, as well. Head to the Humble Bundle site for the details. Find gameplay from a similar game, Smuggle Truck (a less kid-friendly premise, but pretty much identical) above.

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 10:56 AM PDT
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Since first hearing that Carbon, a highly regarded Twitter app which originated on webOS, would be coming to Android, I was excited out of my shoes. Unfortunately, all we got at that point were a couple of rather unrevealing shots of the app – it was a Twitter client designed for Ice Cream Sandwich. Today, we get a lot more.

A video hands-on was posted to Google+ showing off a few of the app’s features. It’s pretty much a Twitter client, but a lot more beautiful than we could have imagined. The app makes extensive use of Android 4.0′s new animations library.
I’d liken the work done on it to the work done on the Google chrome for Android app. It’s best to watch for yourself, though, so be sure to take a look at the video above. It’s said to be getting an alpha release soon so we’ll all get an early chance to see how it’s shaping up before too long. [via Android Police]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 09:41 AM PDT

Leading into the new year HTC preached a strategy that would see fewer new handsets from the manufacturer coming to market in 2012. Three months in and it’s starting to seem like that might not be the case. While the introduction of the One series seemed like a move in the right direction, several new handset have surfaced since then to suggest that HTC isn’t quite ready to slow down. The latest is a phone which takes a few design cues from the HTC One S and packages them with dual-SIM capabilities.
The HTC Wind was recently unveiled in China, a region where dual-SIM devices continue to thrive. It features a 4-inch Super LCD display at WVGA resolution, a 1GHz single-core processor, and 512MB of RAM. Perhaps most intriguing is that the Android 4.0 device also comes skinned with a variant of Sense 4, a version of the custom UI said to be reserved for devices bearing HTC One branding. The Wind doesn’t look to come with a One tag. That’s a big mixed message considering the range of devices from HTC that will receive or launch with Ice Cream Sandwich but only see Sense version 3.6.
All things considered, we don’t see the Wind launching outside of China, where it should retail for about 2,000 yuan.
[via UnwiredView]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 08:49 AM PDT

Though attention has shifted to Huawei’s quad-core devices since January, the Ascend P1 still looks to make a splash. The handset, which was first unveiled at CES, looks to make its debut in April according to news out of a recent Huawei event. The phone will launch first in China and follow up with releases in Europe, Russia, Japan, and Australia. A potential North American release was not detailed.
The Huawei Ascend P1, though specced with a dual-core processor and 4.3-inch qHD display, is lacking in wow factor compared to the ultra-thin Ascend P1 S (featuring near identical internal hardware) and the quad-core Ascend D Quad. It still looks to be among the best Huawei has ever offered. Considering the manufacturer’s history of entry level devices, that’s not a hard mark to meet.
[via UnwiredView]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 07:35 AM PDT

In their quest for smartphone relevancy Microsoft has resorted to one-upping the competition through the presumptuously-titled “Smoked by Windows Phone” challenge. And while most would find it hard to name more than a handful of reasons why the latest Windows Phone release “smokes” the competition, the reality is that no one has bested Microsoft’s platform in a series of head-to-head challenges that aim to prove Windows Phone is faster than the rest when it comes to things like taking pictures and checking the weather. According to Microsoft, the OS remains unbeaten, but that’s not the story being told by one Galaxy Nexus owner.
Yes, the Galaxy Nexus “smoked” Windows Phone, and here’s how. Sahas Katta took his Android 4.0 smartphone down to a local Microsoft store where he was challenged to show the weather for two different cities faster than an employee of the store could do the same with a Windows Phone. The employee already had two tiles pinned to their homescreen for finding weather in two different locations, but Katta was himself not unprepared. In advance he disabled the phone’s lockscreen and placed two weather widgets pointed to different locales on the homescreen of the Galaxy Nexus. The Nexus easily won.
But the employees of the Microsoft store didn’t see things the same way. Reaching into their bag of excuses, Katta was told that in order to qualify as a winner he needed to show the weather for two different cities in two different states. Given advance notice there is no doubt Katta could have met this criteria, and he isn’t buying the bull that MS is throwing. He took to Twitter to voice his complaints and sure enough, Ben Rudoplh, the Microsoft man pushing the “Smoked by…” campaign, has apologized for how things were handled and offered a rematch. Katta’s response? “I would be happy to smoke a Windows Phone with Android, again.”
[via The Verge]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 06:12 AM PDT

With the launch of the HTC One series right around the corner, Vodafone UK has begun taking pre-orders for the two handsets in the line. The HTC One X and One S can be reserved for as cheap as free depending on the accompanying service plan.
The One X is available in both its white and grey decos at no cost when packaged with a £41 per month tariff (900 minutes, unlimited text, and 1GB of data). Cheaper plans see the phone’s on-contract price rise to £299. The One S also comes in at free when coupled with a £36 per month tariff affording 600 minutes, unlimited text, and 1GB of data.
Folks in the UK looking to other service providers or a chance at an unlocked One device have plenty to choose from.
[Vodafone via AndroidCentral]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 05:43 AM PDT

And here we were thinking the Angry Birds craze had somehow died down. Rovio dropped some stats on us via Twitter to reaffirm their flying birds as the royalty of smartphone gaming, revealing that Angry Birds Space has reached 10 million downloads after only three days of availability. The exact split between operating system, paid, and free versions was not detailed so we can’t say how many of those downloads originated with Android. Regardless, it’s quite the feat.
I’ll assume quite a few of you reading this have been flinging birds in zero gravity throughout the weekend. How are you liking the latest from Rovia so far?
[via SlashGear]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 05:24 AM PDT

Square is relaunching their Card Case app, reminding us all that the company not only allows users to accept payments, but also to make payments of their own. What will from here on out be known as Pay with Square provides hands-free, NFC-free payments via a newly updated app for Android that brings its feature set in line with that of iOS. The app gets a complete overhaul in the process.
The refreshed UI now provides a list of nearby merchants sorted by relevancy along with the ability to search among the over 70,000 retailers accepting Square payments. Users can even find locations on a map or share them among friends via text, email, or Twitter. The revamped app provides plenty to work with, but it doesn’t stop there. Pay with Square now offers geo-fenced payments, a task which involved the creation of new location APIs. With geo-fenced payments tabs are automatically created based on location.
If you’re ready to let Square make your mobile payment dreams come true, head over to Google Play to snatch the download now.
Google Play Link: Pay with Square
[via Engadget]

Posted: 26 Mar 2012 05:01 AM PDT

While the world’s attention is turned to the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S III, it’s easy to forget that a whole boatload of Galaxy S II devices are still waiting for an update to Android 4.0. OK, so it’s not that easy to forget. Though Samsung has started pushing Ice Cream Sandwich for the international GSII it hasn’t exactly been a quick process. The wait will continue for many, but in the meantime owners of the Galaxy S II Skyrocket on AT&T are now getting an early peek at what to expect thanks to a leaked Android 4.0.3 build.
According to RootzWiki, the software is “fully functional” and ready to go, though it may not be the final build. We suspect users are bound to run across a few bugs that still need hammering out. Does this mean we can expect the official update soon? If only I were clairvoyant. Your guess on that is still as good as mine.
[via RootzWiki]

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