Instead of shelling out ~$600+ for an unlocked Android development phone device can you use a used phone that is not connected to any wireless carrier?
I see Android phones for sale on Craigslist all the time that people want to get rid of whenever they get an upgrade. They are usually a year old at least but as long as it is in working order that's okay with me.
Are there any downsides to this? Can you use these phones as legit development devices? Are they crippled or anything if they are disconnected from a carrier? They can't make calls or send/receive text messages obviously. But as long as you can use them with a WiFi connection it seems like you'd be able to test quite a bit.
Precisely what you said. You can't make calls/receive texts, but for development it's good enough. Don't know actually if Market will work, but you will find out soon enough.
The only thing that comes to mind is that locations are often provided by carrier networks. You will then need to be connected with WiFi or use GPS to find your locations.
The emulator works pretty well and then you wont need an actual phone. Unless of course you want access to the sensors. Even then you could use the monkey tool to simulate sensor input.
You can use any android phone for your development. So far all the phones I have ever seen has a development menu under preferences. As long you enable debugging and installing unknown apps it should be fine. For full system access you would need rooted phones, it does not matter if the phones is locked to a carrier or not.
Although you can develop on the emulator, you might fail because of the mobile network speed, device io and touch sensitivity. It is best to at least test on a device before publishing. Meanwhile most modern phones run faster than the emulator so if you are ok on emulator you should more than ok on the real device.
I work with several no-contract/no-sim phones with no problem. My first dev phone was a used T-Mobile myTouch 3g (that I bought on Craigslist). The great thing about T-mobile is that you can pop in a pre-paid SIM and get 3g data when you need it for $1.49 per day.
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I am self teaching my self android and making an app for a mobile application contest. I have all my code working on an emulator with the correct permissions and for a sms text being sent to user specified contacts as well as a link to the google maps position of the user. I will be demonstrating the app on a tablet that only has WIFI and doesn't use cellular data.
My question is will I have to make any additions for the app to be able to be used on this tablet or would it work just as the emulator does?
There are not some ultra big difference between real device and emulator but still there are some :
You can't test onTouch events on Simulator I mean you can do it via mouse clicks but it's not the same
Emulator use your computer CPU ram and things and application will probably run much faster on Emulator then on Real device (You should be aware of that)
Regarding GPS and location you can simulate that on emulator almost the same as on Real Android device
You can't get the real performance result on Emulator because it will ignore all apps running on real device, battery etc...
But generally if app is working correctly on Emulator it should work on Real device also but i suggest testing on Real device if possible.
From #Spirit answer below:
Emulator use your computer CPU ram and things and application will
probably run much faster on Emulator then on Real device (You should
be aware of that)
all of my experience has shown that testing on a real device is actually leaps and bounds FASTER than using any emulator. it's much easier to debug as well.
i really recommend using a real device to test on.
I've developed a couple of Enterprise iOS apps for our users in the field. Some have expressed a preference for Android devices over Apple, and I fully understand. I do not have an Android phone, nor do I want to get one and have a second account to maintain. I'm wondering if I can use an inexpensive Android tablet to reliably test an application that will ultimately be running on an Android phone? The app will need to communicate via internet to a server via cell connection or wifi.
Also, any advice for an Android newbie developer would be appreciated.
Yes you could test on a Android tablet but it would be hard to see how it render on a phone.
You could also use the Android Emulator to test different size and android configuration.
Yes. I developed my first major Android app using only a couple of cheap tablet devices. It's fine; the only thing you can't really test is "what happens to my app when a phone call comes in." Plus if you can get the emulator working under HAXM, or some other similar setup where it doesn't work like a tortoise trapped in amber, you can test on a variety of simulated devices perfectly well.
Other things to consider:
You'll probably want to test your app on a variety of different hardware and Android versions, in particular I'd recommend testing on older devices. This means that you friends' old Android phones are a great source of cheap test devices. I regularly gather phones from friends that would otherwise just end up lingering in the back of a drawer as a "spare" that will never actually get used. Bear in mind that you can use all the features of a phone apart from the actual phone bit without a SIM, including a WiFi-based data connection.
You may find that you can find good, contract-free "pay as you go" phone SIMs. I use a provider whose "credits" don't expire, so I have a phone connection for my test devices where there's no ongoing cost, apart from the actual calls I make when testing.
I have an idea for an but I am not sure if it's even possible. I ran into an issue the other day where a phones touch screen was barley working and I needed to get the contacts off of it. I have a cellbrite machine but anyone who has ever used one knows how finicky they can be.
I would love to develop an android app that will connect to any phone via bluetooth and force pull all the contact from it, this would be handy if you have a troublesome screen. My question is this even possible based on the different phone types, and the different level of bluetooth protocols supported on the phones. If anyone has any ideas on how this might be accomplished hat would be great.
Any app with the necessary permission can read a phone's contacts and send them over Bluetooth (or Wi-Fi).
I think the main problem would be that people don't think to install your app until they need it. Then, you can't install your app onto their broken phone unless the phone has a network connection, and if they have a network connection then there isn't really any need to use Bluetooth in the first place.
Actually, one of the basic ideas of Android is that everything on your phone is sync'ed - so you don't have to worry if your phone gets crushed.
I have been researching the Samsung Galaxy Prevail for Android development. This phone is meant to be used on the Boost network.
Will the phone be usable as a test device if it is never activated on the carrier's network? Will the device be able to connect to the internet through WiFi if it is never activated?
What is to stop someone from buying the device and using it as a glorified MP3 player?
http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/samsung-galaxy-prevail-boost/4505-6452_7-34629355.html#reviewPage1
http://www.amazon.com/Boost-Mobile-BMSAMM820/dp/B004Z7HYUI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1312915398&sr=8-1
Will the phone be usable as a test device if it is never activated on
the carrier's network?
Yes. I have a Nexus S that's never been activated which I use for development.
Will the device be able to connect to the internet through WiFi if it
is never activated?
Yes.
What is to stop someone from buying the device and using it as a
glorified MP3 player?
Nothing, really.
Edit: If you're simply looking for a real phone to develop on, you might want to scrounge around on eBay and look for people who have upgraded, and no longer need their phones. As long as they have been cleanly removed from the carrier's network, they should work just fine. Could be a good way to pick up a cheap phone.
For testing apps on an android device, is it possible to test on a phone that isn't connected to a data network like 3G or Edge? Basically, I want to test the app, but I dont want to buy another line to test on the phone. The emulator is too cumbersome to work with. Also, if that is possible, can I still connect to wifi? Thanks!
I have had good luck buying a used, off-contract T-Mobile phone (mytouch) for testing lower-end performance. I use it with a pay-as-you-go T-Mobile SIM card, no data plan, with no problem.
Sure, that's possible. WiFi is available on virtually all phones.
You should be able to use wifi without a data contract -- there are tablets out that are "wifi-only". You could also just tether the phone to your PC and get connectivity that way.
The Android emulator that comes with the SDK definitely does not have any actual 3G data connectivity, and it works fine.
Yes, it's possible.
But some phones sold through carriers require substantial effort to initially get operational if they aren't on a service plan to run through the carrier's setup wizard.
Google the specific model you are interested in in conjunction with "no sim" or "no service plan" in order to research other's difficulties and potential solutions for that.