I'm developing an app that will be run by an Android phone without touch screen (something like an embedded system then) and I need to make the system discoverable by other devices. As said I won't have the touchscreen, then everything should be done without user interaction.
I was reading this other question here but I can't make it work. As already said here a NullPointerException comes out.
Is there a more detailed guide for setting up the discoverability without the user confirmation? Are there other ways to do so?
Related
I'm trying to provide certain functionalities for an android phone that could help people in times of emergencies. (These functionalities are dependent on the phone's sensors.) The only/main approach to achieve this seems to be that of developing an app (and I am currently in the process of developing one). But, what concerns me is that the number of people using an application specifically for emergency purposes is quite low. Even if they do install, when "Insufficient Memory" pops up, an emergency app is very likely to be booted out of the phone.
Are there other ways of providing the functionalities/features of an emergency app, without the users having to explicitly install the app? Or should I just stick with the app?
Certain OEMs provide emergency features as part of their settings. Like for example, in a Samsung phone you can toggle to enable the "Send SOS messages", and then, in case of an emergency, press the power button thrice. In what way could I achieve the same?
Any help would be much appreciated...
Thanks in advance!
Without a proper application installed in user device, you cannot provide the functionality you want.
OEM's also have their applications build and packaged with the system image. If you want it, you need to be in contact with them to include your application in new devices.
I've noticed some apps allow to record what the user touch on the device (all touch events and characters being entered) globally, to be later saved in macros you can launch (meaning emulate) ?
This could really be useful for performing the same test on multiple devices and on multiple versions of apps, especially apps that have a lot of steps to check.
How do such apps do this?
Is it possible to achieve it even on non-rooted devices? Maybe by using ADB (and connected to a PC) ?
My guess about emulating the touches is that they do use ADB as shown here, but how can you record touches and keys, especially globally ?
What worked for me was to turn on SHOW TAPS in the developer settings.
I'm planning to deploy an app on my android smartphone which is supposed to be used by multiple other persons. Now of course I do not want them to do things with the device they are not supposed to do so I informed myself about several different ways to make it as safe as possible (Lock-down apps, Kiosk mode, Mobile-device-management, Code-tweaks and so on).
I found some solutions that look really promising but they all share the same problem that a user could just restart the device and boot it in safe-mode where those helpful apps won't be started. However, there is one exception: I've installed a MDM app called maas360 which somehow manages to apply the restrictions that I defined even in safe-mode, for example by blocking access to the menu settings. How is that even possible? The thing is just that this is not a free app and it offers a huge variety of functions - overall it seems to be a bit excessive for my goals.
So my general question would be: is it somehow possible to restrict access to the safe-mode somehow? Maybe like a password? From what I understand it is not even possible to set a system password for Android devices that you'd have to enter once it boots (except if you set up a password for unlocking the screen first which would then be the same one... very redundant).
Disabling physical switch of volume down (in case of samsung devices) will stop access to safe mode on device. I dont find any other way to do so.
Every now and then, the radio of my android phone silently dies because of some network related issues.
On the Nexus 4, it shows the empty triangle as if there where no service available in this area. On other phones it does not even do that. It looks like signal is fine.
Anyway, after the radio died silently no phone call / text message / data is going through in any direction.
The only hint I get from the System is the android.net.conn.CONNECTIVITY_CHANGE broadcast fired when the signal dies and wifi is not connected.
The only thing, that fixes the problem is restarting the phone.
Finally my question:
Does anybody know how to restart the radio completely by code?
I mean, it is a separate image running on a separate CPU. There must be a way to reboot it without rebooting the phone.
Maybe there is something, I can path into the Android ROM. I'm running CM here and be happy to patch it (again).
I tried fixing it by launching a system app by pressing *#*#4636#*#* on the dailer and stopping the radio and starting it again. But it did not help at all.
I recently made an app that checks the radio every time the connection changes. It shows a simple notification that tells me, I should reboot my phone. [1]
Issues reproduced on:
LG Nexus 4
Samsung ACE 2
multiple Apple iPhone 4*
Issues not reproduced on:
Apple iPhone 5
All phones running in the Dialog.lk network.
[1] https://github.com/felixb/network-checker
On a rooted device, one can issue the pkill command for all processes running as the user radio. I tested this on a Oneplus 3. The system seems to immediately restart the service:
pkill -u radio
Yes it is possible, but it will be difficult to perform on device without a deep understanding of the modem communications code of which multiple versions exist and even that will be dependent on if the system will permit you to even perform the communications on device.
The only one I am aware of that you can fully manipulate on device at this time is Qualcomm's (Qualcomm is standard in the majority of devices, but Samsung has used VIA in some cases which is a whole different monster, and even still another chipset or two exist), but to even be able to perform what your asking with Qualcomm's chipset, the following must be true:
The device must be rooted.
The application must have root access.
The system ROM must have the ability to place the cellular radio into modem diagnostics mode.
The device must have the appropriate permissions to permit the access.
At this point most people would connect their computer to their device and manipulate the cellular radio using QPST, CDMAWare, or QXDM. Options available to those users include everything from manipulating cellular subscriber data to restarting the cellular modem.
But, this is where things get tricky, you need to be be able to access this from the device side, which depending on the device, the operating system, and the configuration of it...may very well not be possible.
Also your application must be able to communicate with the cellular radio using the special protocol that the applications above use to do their communications which will require you becoming intimately familiar with that specification. The whitepaper for the Qualcomm diagnostics protocol is floating around on the web if you look hard enough for it.
Also on the not so cool side, if your application has access to the radio...so does any other rooted application (or even non-rooted, if you don't set the device permissions correctly) thus enabling rouge applications the ability to change your radio's configuration data potentially even bricking your device (which I have seen people do using the applications named above).
So my answer is Yes, you can do it, although:
Depending on your device you may not be able to, you should be well prepared to study and develop the needed tools to perform what you are wanting to do
No quick-start guide exist to be followed
Remember that you do so in the knowledge that your device could potentially be bricked either by a mistake in your coding or by a rouge application.
Rebooting the radio, as you have done in the device menus, may not help your problem, you may still require a device reboot
My advice is to use a much easier method and include a timer with automatic reboot in your current application, it is much safer, won't brick your device, and you won't have to become a cellular engineer to figure out how to accomplish it.
Your timer could begin counting down when the radio dies, and provide you an option to stop the reboot if your doing something important, otherwise it would restart your device and all would be ready when you reached for it to make a call or check your email.
Hopefully I was able to help, even though I know this is not the answer that you wanted.
Side note, if you could hijack Android's system configuration menus from an outside application you could potentially manipulate the radio state using the same methods used in Android...but you already discovered that restarting the radio in this method does not help your situation. Plus Android is designed to prevent such manipulation to prevent malicious applications from overtaking the UI of other apps and the system.
I'm wondering if it's possible to develop an android app that will be run in sort of a kiosk mode. The idea is that the user should only be able to interact with the phone through this app.
I understand that an app can be auto-restarted, and things like avoiding incoming calls, could be implemented via a service that would subscribe to the telephony events and would hang up when an incoming call is received. The downside of this is that the usual "answer call screen" would pop up for a short period. The reason behind this is that the stock android app that receives the incoming calls will still be there.
I also understand that, by design, this custom app could be killed at any time by the OS if memory usage gets too low. Although this should only happen if there's a memory leak in any of the running apps.
I'm not sure either if it would be possible to disable the behavior of the physical buttons to access home or settings screens.
I understand that rooting the device and/or creating a custom ROM with modifications would be a safer approach, but also more complex. I'm wondering if a good-enough kiosk mode could be implemented with an android app.
P.S: I'm sorry for reposting these questions, but answers to similar questions are not clear enough.
Make your application be a home screen. That can still be bypassed unless you make your own custom firmware where your application is the system default home screen. We cannot tell you whether being a home screen alone is "a good-enough kiosk mode".
I've been searching for this for days now, nearly every answer is not a complete solution at all (and it's doing my head in)
This link though has the best answer so far
http://thebitplague.wordpress.com/2013/04/05/kiosk-mode-on-the-nexus-7/