Hangouts is a great cross-platform messaging service from Google that works with almost any device, making it one of the few messengers that can be installed on Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android gadgets alike. With its many useful features, one of the few debatable downsides is its not-so-attractive color scheme.
Applications like Apple Maps, Google Maps, and Waze save every location you visit or search for as a way to speed up future searches and to find commonly-frequented places. But what if you go somewhere unsavory and don't want anyone knowing?
Android Lollipop still doesn't have a simple way to add a custom lock screen wallpaper, so when I came across Corgi For Feedly from developer Stan Dmitriev, I had to check it out. What sets Corgi apart from other lock screen replacements is that it connects directly to your Feedly account to display top stories from your favorite RSS feeds as your background.
Google inconspicuously announced an Android update yesterday, and while it's not quite the overhaul that the initial Lollipop release was, version 5.1 brings plenty of bug fixes and new features.
As technology continues to advance, we as consumers are privileged enough to be able to take higher quality photos and videos and listen to clearer and better-sounding music on our mobile devices. But sometimes we forget that there's a price to pay for that awesome content—enormous file sizes.
Keeping expensive mobile devices safe and secure is a priority for most of us, but the process of repeatedly unlocking a phone or tablet can seem like a pointless task. This leads to disabling the lock screen altogether, especially when in a safe place (e.g., home, office, car, etc.).
When you think of an online music service nowadays, Spotify is probably near the first that come to mind, and for good reason. Being able to create, share, and take all of your playlists anywhere, across all of your devices, is something that I couldn't live without. Unfortunately, nothing this good is free, and with Spotify Premium, users of their free service are left with very limited features when streaming on their mobile devices.
Google Play Music is one of the best streaming services out there. It allows users to upload as many as 20,000 of their own songs for free, then stream them all to any device without ever paying a dime. If you upgrade to their All Access subscription, you get these features in addition to an expansive on-demand library of songs (and beta-access to YouTube Music Key).
Happy hour is a great way to wind down after a long day at work or school, to relax with friends and enjoy a well-deserved drink. While the experience of this on-the-cheap imbibing promotion is great, the hours usually aren't.
The lack of Xposed support on Android Lollipop has left modules like GEL Settings incompatible with my Google Play Edition HTC One, so I've had to find a new launcher to meet all of my needs. While I can safely say I will never find the perfect launcher for me, Blinq comes pretty damn close.
Are you stranded in a hotel room with no kitchen, but craving the comfort of a home-cooked meal? Fear not, I have found some interesting ways to cook food without the luxury of an oven, stove, microwave, or even a toaster!—also known as "hotel room cooking."
After utilizing Spotify's My Year in Music tool, I came to realize that I listened to over 30,000 minutes of music in 2014. Most of that was played while working from my Mac using the desktop version of the service.
One of the few areas where Android lags behind iOS is a comprehensive backup solution for apps. Root tools, such as the popular Titanium Backup, are capable of backing up all of your apps and their data, but not everyone wants to root their device and potentially run into issues with voided warranties.
You wouldn't send your GPS coordinates to a completely random stranger just because he or she asked you for it, right? So why are you constantly sharing your location (and other data) to apps on a daily basis?
This is the first installment in a new series that I am calling "Hacker Hurdles." These are things, methods, techniques that make our job as hackers more challenging and difficult. Don't misunderstand me, these items don't make our task impossible, but rather more challenging and, therefore, more gratifying when we are successful. One of the most important new hurdles for hackers is DEP and ASLR. Data Execution Prevention (DEP) and Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) are designed to pre...
With all of the different websites we use in our day-to-day lives, keeping track of our numerous login credentials can start to become a hassle. This has created a market for password managers that aim to centralize these account credentials and generally streamline the process of logging into our favorite sites.
While the adoption of Apple's newest mobile operating system, iOS 8, was smoother than its predecessor, there were still a lot of bugs and features that needed ironed out. There were lost cellular signals, missing Camera Rolls, a confusing iCloud Drive, and no functioning Apple Pay yet, among other things. Now it's just over a month later from its first release to the public and things are finally looking pretty good.
If you're anything like me, you rely heavily on your calendar to keep on track throughout the week, month, and year. While Android's built-in Google Calendar provides an excellent cloud-based solution for keeping our schedules properly maintained, it's not perfect.
Ah, the age-old problem of sharing pictures with friends and family. Ten years ago, the best method available to us was passing around duplicate photos printed out at the local drug store. As easy as smartphones have made this act, you'd think we'd be satisfied by now.
Losing your phone is a much bigger ordeal today than it was just 10 years ago. Our smartphones carry with them lots of sensitive data that, in the wrong hands, is capable of being used for identity theft and fraud.
Your phone's volume panel is one part of the user interface that usually goes unnoticed to themers and developers. With themes capable of changing the look and feel of the fingerprint scanner, keyboard, and other system apps, this central aspect of the UI seems to get lost in the shuffle.
Apple just announced the iPhone 6, and no matter whether you've been with Android for a few months or few years, there's a good chance you're enticed by the idea of switching over to the other side.
I don't know of a pain greater than of the one felt after cracking the screen of your phone. After I managed to crack my screen, rendered unusable, I immediately began to panic as to how I was going to recover all of the photos, videos, and documents stored on my device. After a few hours of searching, I came upon a thread by Mohamad Sabra that showed exactly how to alleviate my problem.
We've already shown you how to free up internal space on your iPhone, and now it's time to tackle another problematic storage issue—your iCloud account.
While we now know that iCloud was not exploited by hackers to steal private celebrity photos, Apple did admit that guessed (aka brute-forced) passwords and/or iCloud security questions were to blame for the breach.
There are tons of good reasons that you might want to use Android on your desktop. Perhaps your favorite game is only available on Android, or maybe you use a messaging service that doesn't have a Windows companion app.
As the largest wireless service providers in the United States, AT&T and Verizon Wireless carry some serious clout. Sadly, they use some of this power to heavily modify the Android phones that they offer.
Before your carrier got its grubby little hands on your Galaxy S5, there was less bloatware installed and more functionality offered by the Samsung flagship device. Case in point: the GS5 that Samsung designed was capable of recording phone calls, yet the one that you own probably isn't.
The biggest hurdle faced when text messaging (besides more convincing lies) is accurately communicating our emotion and tone. Anything we say can be interpreted in various subjective ways by the recipient, and that's why we have emoji—to illustrate what we actually want to say.
Google's text-to-speech engine is getting pretty good these days. In a recent update, the computerized voice that reads on screen text (like Google Now search results) got an audio quality bump that brought its clarity up to its highest level yet. And with each update, that robotic voice becomes a bit more human.
Of the sixty or so "must-have" apps that are installed on my Samsung Galaxy Note 3, there's only one that I need to use and hate with a passion. Skype. Whenever using it, I'm consumed by dropped calls, mic issues, poor quality, and random crashes, among other things—and I'm not the only one.
One of the most feature-packed camera suites out there resides on the Sony Xperia Z2. Along with the regular camera and video modes, it comes with Motiongraph, AR Effect, and Social Live.
Google Play Music is one of the best cloud music services out there. Without ever paying a dime, you can upload as many as 20,000 songs to Google's servers, then use the app on your smartphone to stream these songs without taking up any of your storage space. And if you're willing to shell out $9.99 a month, you can even play songs from the massive All Access library.
When it comes to playing music at parties, the whole process can be a bit like a dictatorship. One person, usually the host, chooses all of the music and controls playback, essentially forcing everyone else to listen to the songs that they like.
I have the AT&T version of the Galaxy S5, so every time I start my phone I get the pleasure of hearing AT&T's lovely jingle. Actually, that's sarcasm—I absolutely abhor this sound. I haven't had the chance to play around with a Sprint, T-Mobile, or Verizon variants of this phone, but I imagine they have some sort of equally annoying boot sound.
Imagine that you're the last person alive. After losing all of your loved ones, you thought you'd never see another human being in your life. Then, they arrive. The hoard of 15-year-old zombies looking for a cute British YouTuber so they may feast on his brains.
Google's Calendar service is one of the best out there. Just because of Google's web presence, your Calendar is available to you on almost any platform, so you never miss an appointment.
Multitasking has always been one of Android's strengths relative to other mobile operating systems. As the first cell phone OS with "true" multitasking, Android's been ahead of the game in this department for quite some time.
It used to be easy to hack tethering—root your device and install a third-party or modded tethering app. But snuck in amongst the changes in Android 4.3, a new data-monitoring service of sorts made its debut. There used to be a time when your data connection was yours. You paid for it, so you were free to use it for whatever you wanted. Unfortunately, those days are long gone.
With a root bounty of over $18,000 up for the taking, developers were highly motivated to get the AT&T and Verizon Wireless variants of the Samsung Galaxy S5 rooted. Legendary hacker George Hotz, aka Geohot, has won the race and can now step up to claim his prize.
