The HTC Magic aka Sapphire that I use for 6 months now, is now running on CyanogenMod 5.0.7, a cooked Android 2.1 ROM, replacing the original OS Android 1.5 with HTC Sense. The CyanogenMod ROM is trouble free ROM, run almost perfectly with just couple of screen freeze during that period. But when Froyo comes in, it is normal as human that you tend to want something newer and better, but you gotta wait because HTC doesn’t care about that.
CynogenMod is again the lifeline for Android users especially those that using the older model. So If you’re like me, still using this old model phone, you gonna love this news. The Cyanogen 6 which carry cooked Android 2.2 aka Froyo is almost ready! The newer phone should have no problem running the cooked ROM.
But the greatest of all at least to me is, the fact that it is also almost 100% working on HTC Magic/Sapphire model except 1 issue, that’s quite technical to many. I put trust the issue could be rectified pretty soon, by ever hardworking Android dev out there. It is just matter of time before the ROM would be released. So you see here, except probably for better processor, better screen, everything else available on new Android OS could also be ported to older phone, well, that’s one of many reason I stay with HTC Magic. The next Android phone I will buy probably Nexus One, but not now.
source: cyanogenmod
After I switch from Blackberry to Android is, I have without email application/client to read my Yahoo Mails. The only way to do that is from browser as the free Yahoo Mail account that I have doesn’t support neither POP no IMAP . But frankly speaking, I’m very happy now that Yahoo Mail app for Android is now available. Thank you so much Yahoo!!
Wait, stop, that’s not the only thing that Yahoo release today. Yahoo also release Yahoo! Messenger apps for Android as well as a Yahoo! Search Widget for Android. It’s 3 app simultaneously. Well done Yahoo. I love that as well. So you want the app now, head to Android Market from your phone and install it. Oh yeah, it support on Android 2.0 and above only.
What the Yahoo Mail app can do, or hit the source link at the bottom for more info.
- Receive push notification of new email messages
- Send emails to contacts from the Yahoo! Address Book as well as to contacts in the native phone address book
- Search email messages by sender, recipient, subject and keywords
- Upload photos as attachments directly from the phone’s camera or the photo gallery
- View and download attachments
- Insert emoticons and rich text formatting into emails
- Effectively manage and organize their Yahoo! Mail messages, folders, and spam
- Easily toggle between the Yahoo! Mail and Yahoo! Messenger apps
Main Menu – Clean and simple
Inbox - Ad supported, it’s pretty slow compared to Gmail app
Email composer : again, it’s clean and neat
source: Yahoo
Google has announced that Android 2.2 or Froyo will be officially available for all Nexus One smart phone beginning yesterday. The update notification will be sent to all Nexus One phone over-the-air (OTA) from which the update can be downloaded and installed. You also can try check the update from the smartphone manually, via WiFi connection if you don’t have data plan.
We have seen how certain bloggers and media has received an update to Android 2.2 as early as last month, fueling speculation that Google is prioritizing power user to be the first to have the update. But this news should end whatever speculation out there. Google Nexus one users is definitely cheering this update, but for the rest of Android users, you gotta wait the news from the phone provider.
source: Nexus One Blog
I have long wanted a screen capture application in Android that works on its own. One of earliest methods of taking screen shots using DDMS is such a pain in the **s. Its lack of simplicity and mobility that you expect from ‘smart’ phone.
So when I found Drocap2 after doing little homework and reading some reviews on the net, I think this is the best (or one of the best) screen capture app for Android phones. But not every phone will be able to use this app because it only works on rooted phones as this app need root access to work.
I said best as other apps that I’ve tried are simply not working or crash. Dropcap2 works as expected without unexpectedly closed (crashed) so far. For the record, I use HTC Magic with Cyanogen rom (Eclair). However, Dropcap2 is not really as simple as taking screen capture from iPhone or Blackberry (use CaptureIt) which has pre-defined hot keys.
1. First, you need to open the Dropcap2 and click the ‘start’ button
2. The timer starts to capture screen image. But if you wait here, it will capture the app screen!! You need to capture other screen image, correct? So press your phone’s ‘back‘ button.
3. You should see Dropcap2 icon (camera icon) in the notification bar. Now you’re ready to capture screen image from any program. Shake your phone to capture the screen image. The Dropcap2 icon will disappear and replaced by 1 message notifying that new image was captured successfully. To capture another screen capture image, repeat steps 1 to 3, it’s annoying right?
If you use Android smartphone, you may already familiar with QR Code which widely used as one of the method to access and install app from Android Market. QR Code offer fast and convenient way to access information such as URL, price, account no and etc with existence of QR Code reader app for smartphone.
Most QR Code scanner application available only in Android Market, but if you don’t have Android Market in your smartphone, Beetagq QR Code Reader is what you need. It’s free of course. Beside Android, it also support wide range of mobile phone from iPhone, Blackberry, Symbian and etc, the only thing you need to do to install it is, to browse the download page from your smartphone.
It will detect your smartphone type automatically and suggest appropriate download. The installation process should be a breeze and now ready to test it out. One thing to remember is, your camera phone must have ‘auto focus’ function in order for the app to scan the QR COde effectively.
Here is how Beetagg QR Code Reader looks like.
Point to QR Code, camera phone’s auto focus will try to focus and scan the code.
Yey, successful! Depend on the value encoded into QR Code, it may show static data like this or URL link that point to any webpage.
