How To Droid tips, tricks, and easter eggs

[drumtrucker]

This maybe be obvious but while typing using the "virtual" keyboard, suggested words will scroll at the bottom of the text box you can just double click the space bar to insert the highlighted word.

actually any punctuation or single tap on space bar will choose highlighted word

 

[lemodular]

actually any punctuation or single tap on space bar will choose highlighted word

You are right, I do it all the time but somehow thought of double tap as I typed it. Thanks for the clarification.

 

[jims]

This is the name of an incredibly good GPS app. Tap on it and it brings up the settings menu for you to turn on the GPS. Then it quickly changes to the status screen which shows it acquiring satellites and getting a fix on your location, which it then displays. On the same screen is a beautiful compass. Once the GPS is fully operational you can go to maps or whatever, but anytime you tap on GPS Status it will bring back that screen with the compass and satellites. There are lots of settings for the app - just tap on the menu button. I think it is a must have. Highly recommended.

 

[lemodular]

OK, did anyone noticed the 3rd and blind (unmapped layer) on the physical keyboard? For example, the "p" is caps when you hit shift - "p", and it is a "0" when you hit alt -"p" but if you hit shift - alt (or vice a versa) you get a "]".

I am not sure if this is documented anywhere or if the layout is mapped. I have not tried all the characters.

 

[may2700]

Yahoo Mail On The Motorola Droid | Android Phone Fans

anyone know if the itunes sync software cancels the DRM on the music in itunes so it will sync with the droid? or is it just for the non DRm msic?

 

[writhum]

Android market has a crappy search function, let's admit it. However, to make it better, you can use google search filters within the market. For example, if I wanted to search for 'betterkeyboard', but didn't want the ridiculous amount of skins to come up in the search, I would type 'betterkeyboard -skin'. This helps filter out a lot of unwanted apps that come up.
Also the quotation modifiers work for specific text.

 

[bdal1]

I have about 12gb of mp3s on my ipod and i stopped keeping the files on my pc to save space.

Since the droid understands id3 tags: All i did was put my ipod in removable disk mode->unhide all hidden files and move the mp3 folder to the droid sd card. Even though the title of the track isnt shown in the file name, (itunes renames it to some ridiculous name like grfe.mp3) the droid knows what the song is and displays the name in the media player.

Saved me a bunch of time.

 

[RgnKjnVA]

#1 you don't need to shut down programs in the background this is not a windows operating system where everything in the background is sucking up resourses. This is like a linux system and your actually hurting performance because you just have to wait until the programs starts all over, the programs in the background are not using any resourse, i've tested it and it works, i ran everything and the battery life and speed never slowed down.

#2 Task Killer will interfere with email accts when the go to automaticly refresh, i wasn't recieving any of my Yahoo or Hotmail until i uninstalled Task Killer and rebooted the Droid(i found this out through another Droid site)


Hope this helps

I can confirm point #2 with an AOL account too.

Thanks to this thread I was able to purge two apps and replace them with Power Manager widget, figure out I don't need TasKiller AND that it was the reason I didn't get email updates today, learned about GPS Status which is a great tool when exploring unfamiliar cities on foot (or hiking I suppose), learned about Screen Mode widget to rid myself of two challenges to wake up from sleep mode. Very valuable thread! I didn't see this mentioned yet so hopefully I can add a little bit of value in return. Not as cool as some of those things listed above but I wanted to have instant access to my favorite NFL message board and figured it out.

Add web page shortcut to Home
1. Use browser to navigate to desired web site
2. Click Bookmark icon
3. Add bookmark
4. Long-press it
5. Scroll down in the resulting menu and select 'Add Shortcut to Home'
Result: Booyah, one-press access to your favorite site(s) right on your Home!

 

[AngieB1210]

I use funformobile.com for all my ringtones and pics it's a great free site. I was trying to download and save ringtones and wasn't able to save them. The picks work fine but not the ring tones . Any ideas thanks

I had a similar problem with a ringtone that was sent in a text message from Verizon. If your ringtone was sent in a text go a couple menus in and hold down the body of the message and eventually you should get to a menu that will allow you to set it as a ringtone. Hope that helps!

 

[ladybadger2007]

Thanks the MMS ringtones I can save no prob, sadly the ones on funformobile.com I am still unable to save even if I send them as a MMS from the site it just sends a link back to the sight. So I just have my husband downlaod them on his BB Tour and send them as a MMS.

 

[AZDroid]

Thanks the MMS ringtones I can save no prob, sadly the ones on funformobile.com I am still unable to save even if I send them as a MMS from the site it just sends a link back to the sight. So I just have my husband downlaod them on his BB Tour and send them as a MMS.

Why can't you save them, will it not let you click the download link? I was just able to click download and it went straight to my download folder...then I used Astro File Manager to move it to my ringtones folder.

 

[Redflea]

I wonder how they can make an app for something as easy as swiping down the notification window and clicking a button?

Hey! That's one of my favorite apps! Why would I want to complete a task with two actions (swipe and tap) when I can do it with one (for free).

 

[Crush_Buds]

Hold down the spyglass and say "Navigate to" to start a turn-by-turn navigation route. Such as "Navigate to Sushi Wave." And the phone will do the work. If it is something common like "Navigate to Wendy's" it will pull up a list of the nearby locations to choose form starting with the closest.

Try other things like "Navigate to a movie theater with alcohol," or an example I saw on a google nav video "Navigate to the museum with the egyptian exhibit," something like that I believe.

Kinda fun to mess around with and explore with this feature.

 

[dgerst]

I turned off the flash, covered the lens with my thumb, and took a picture. I set the black photo as my wallpaper. Looks nice and saves a bit of battery.

 

[dep]

Nice tip on "Navigate To".

I didn't know this, but all paid apps have a 24-hour trial period. If you remove it within 24 hours of purchase, you will not be charged.

Take THAT, Apple.

 

[Manigma77]

I'm sorry but I can't keep my mouth shut anymore. All this talk about not receiving emails with a task killer is wrong. I use an app called "Advanced Task Manager". All you have to do to receive your mail is go to the Applications tab and long click on the app that you do not want to close (for example: Gmail, email, etc) and select EXCLUDE.
You can also auto close applications at a specific interval, 30 min, 60 min, etc. To do this go to menu/preferences/ and check Auto-end running apps. Also make sure you go to auto-end excluded list and ADD the programs you do not want to end such as email programs, maps, open home(or equivalent), etc.
If you take the time to set this app up properly it works great, and IS a battery saver. If you don't believe me then try it.

For other battery savers, go into each individual mail app, weather app, etc and set the updates to a longer period, rather than updating every hour or 30 minutes.

Also set backlight to a low setting, or use auto adjust, and select a shorter backlight timeout value, like 30 seconds.

I have done all of these and my battery life is awesome. I love the Droid, my fav phone yet.

Sorry to be rude but using a task killer or any other app is left to the discretion of the user. No one should be told what to use or what not to use. Try them out and see for yourself if it is for you or not.

 

[gwlaw99]

In the Dolphin Browser, when you click on a youtube video, it gives you the option to download it.

 

[El Blacksheep]

In the Dolphin Browser, when you click on a youtube video, it gives you the option to download it.

Does it save as .flv? Or does it actually get converted to a playable format?

 

[gwlaw99]

It is converted to .mp4 which is playable.

 

[joneee]

With Google Voice, under settings you can select to make all your phone calls, choose between phone/google voice, or don't use google voice at all. Kind of neat since I decided to use google voice with all my calls.
Also free transcribing of voice messages sent to either your regular phone number or google voice number!

I've an advocate for google voice

 

[PridgNYC]

I turned off the flash, covered the lens with my thumb, and took a picture. I set the black photo as my wallpaper. Looks nice and saves a bit of battery.

This is a pretty common misconception, setting a black background on an LCD screen doesn't save any battery. The backlight is still on, but the pixels are set to black to prevent transmission of the light. Therefore, no battery savings.

 

[shaggymatt]

Added by Jacqueline:
THIS THREAD IS FOR POSTING INFORMATION YOU KNOW, NOT FOR ASKING QUESTIONS.

If you have a question and do not want to start your own thread or cannot decide which thread it should go in, use the thread below. This is also where you will find the questions that have been removed from this thread.
http://androidforums.com/motorola-droid/16097-various-q.html

Edit to Add: I am continuing to remove questions from this thread. DO NOT POST QUESTIONS IN THIS THREAD!

Just to reiterate this.... I performed a lot of cleanup on the thread this morning. PLEASE post only tips/tricks in this thread. We do not need "great tip" "Works great" "thanks" posted all over the place.

 

[Deleted User]

Being new to Android, it took me a while to figure out how to mount the USB drive in Windows/other OS's: You need to pull down the notification menu, select the USB Storage option, and select "Mount". Hope that saves someone some time.

After you eject it from your host machine, you can pull that back down to dismount it, too, without having to unplug the USB cable, in case you want to keep charging it.

 

[Deleted User]

That actually shows running apps

Actually, it just shows your six most recent apps. Your list of running apps is likely much longer. Go to Settings > Applications > Manage Applications. From there you can filter to show running applications. You'll be surprised how long the list really is.

 

[Deleted User]

tip for GV:
Make sure your contacts and pad dialing is in the format 1(555)555-1212 or just the numbers.

If you omit the "1", or the area code, even for local calls, GV won't work! This is not android, it's how GV works!

My contacts are all listed in the format: (XXX) YYY-ZZZZ and I've had no problem with Google Voice. I do see how leaving off the area code could be a definite issue, though.

However, when I see a list of recent calls, they show up as XXX-YYY-ZZZZ in that list.