Welcome to the first episode of our short form Android show, Breaking Android! I’m Mat Lee, and I’ll be your host. 

Link: http://www.breakingmodern.com/breaking-android-episode-001/

Breaking Android Broken Down
Smart Lock

More Android devices are getting the 5.0 lollipop upgrade. With it, CNet is reporting a cool tip for using Smart Lock. If you don’t know, when you turn on Smart Lock your device will not require a pin or pattern to unlock it as long as you’re connected to an approved Bluetooth device or NFC tag.

Want to lock your device real quick but not completely disable smart lock? Go to the lock screen, and long press on the lock icon. If you press correctly, you’ll get a little vibration and a message letting you know the device is locked. Once that’s done you’ll need your pin or pass to unlock it. Once unlocked, it’ll revert back to normal smart lock settings. Very handy.
Bloatware

Some unsettling news is being reported by Forbes. I’m sure you’re all familiar with bloatware? I recently got to experience a little of this myself. I spent a solid hour going through a new Lenovo all-in-one tablet, uninstalling a large handful of crappy malware. Malware might be strong, but then my browser got click-jacked when I was doing a quick search for malware bytes. So yeah, this device came with malware.

Anyway, the point is a lot of carriers do this with cell phones. They make money selling you the device and service, but want more, so they install a bunch of software on the phone out of the box that is trial based. Of course, they get paid by other companies for this service — essentially free advertising, and the hopes that everyone can make more money … except you.

Forbes is reporting a company called Digital Turbine has a “new” service called Ignite. I watched its promotional video and it’s quite disturbing. Basically, all the carriers and all the device manufacturers are down with this. And, of course, it’s a chance to squeeze more money out of the customers, so why wouldn’t they?

They should really find a better way to be greedy. It’s never OK to install apps on someone’s device without the user specifically knowing or wanting it installed. I don’t know about you, but I definitely don’t need carriers and in turn the spying eyes of big brother and every ad agency under the sun having this type of access to my device.

It doesn’t look like it’s being used on a large scale yet, but Forbes is reporting that some users have been pushed updates called DT_Ignite for “Performance Enhancements.” I guess if we needed a reason to root again, this is a pretty good start.
Android Auto

Are you excited for Android Auto? If you remember, this was announced back in January 2014 as part of the Open Automotive Alliance, a joint effort with over 20 automakers and Nvidia. Supposedly the first cars with Android Auto will be released in late 2014. Right now it’s December, so it can’t get much later than this.

This is really cool though, and pretty much what I’ve been wanting in a car system. I have a smartphone that will be able access all these great features. Just give me a dumb head unit to display the information in a nice, easy to deal with interface so I’m not completely distracted while hurtling down the road at 88 miles per hour.

Hopefully this works out well and becomes a default in all new cars. Not that I’ll be buying a new car anytime soon, but I will definitely put a head unit in the Neon once they’re available. Well probably not first generation, but I’ll definitely get one once the bugs are worked out, second generation style. Check out the story here on Digital Trends.

That’s going to do it for Breaking Android. Follow me on your favorite social network and say hello. Also make sure to check out our weekly Android long-form podcast over at AttackoftheAndroids.com.

Did you know you can also listen and subscribe to audio only versions of Breaking Android? That’s right, tap that little play button below, and if you want to subscribe, the RSS feed can be found here.

Breaking Android Episode 001

Breaking Android Broken Down

Link: http://www.breakingmodern.com/breaking-android-episode-002/

Chrome for Android was recently updated, and with that update a cool new flag feature was introduced. The flag feature makes sites easier to read on mobile devices. Now keep in mind, as it says on the flags page, “careful, these experiments may bite.” Open chrome and type in chrome://flags in the address bar and hit enter. There’s going to be a TON of stuff in here, so make sure you are careful not to mess with anything unless you explicitly know what it does.

You’ll definitely want to use find in page option, and search for “reader.” Find the flag named “Enable Reader” with the mode toolbar icon. Relaunch after enabling you should see a little reader icon on pages that are able to be reformatted for your device. Pretty cool right? Check out the article here on Lifehacker.
Lollipop Gallery

Some of you on Lollipop might be wondering, where the heck did my gallery go? As Android Central puts it, the gallery is gone, but that’s probably a good thing. Personally, I thought it was kind of convoluted to have two photo gallery type apps. I get what was happening: You use gallery for device pictures and photos, which is part of Google+, for your web pictures.

At least, that’s how I used them. As time went on the gallery app was updated less frequently, while the photos app was updated more and more. I started using gallery less until I almost never opened it. I’m glad they’re finally cleaning up some of this leftover redundant nonsense from the great merge. There’s not a whole lot of love for the Photos app in comments around the Android blogs, but that’s probably people hating just to hate on something huge. Check out the article here on Android Central.
80 Days

Droid Life is reporting that 80 days will soon make its way to Android. This looks like a pretty cool game from the trailer and what I’ve read. It sort of reminds me of Oregon Trail, only you get way more control of your course, and you are racing other people to get around the world in 80 days. We’ll see how much fun it actually is when it comes out, which should be around December 16th.

That’s going to do it for Breaking Android. Follow me on your favorite social network and say hi. Also make sure to check out our weekly Android long form podcast over at AttackoftheAndroids.com.

Did you know you can also listen and subscribe to audio only versions of Breaking Android? That’s right, tap that little play button below, and if you want to subscribe, the RSS feed can be found here.

Breaking Android Episode 002

Breaking Android Broken Down

Link: http://www.breakingmodern.com/breaking-android-episode-003/

Lots of devices are getting the Android 5.0 Lollipop treatment. The next in this list is the first generation Moto G. Phandroid is reporting some versions of the Moto G in India have already seen the push to 5.0. Personally, I’m still waiting on my first generation Moto X to get lollipop.
Google Play Update

Speaking of updates, Android and Me is reporting a Google Play update is hitting devices. 5.1.11 brings lots of nice visual tweaks to the UI, and a new My Account page. I’m still sitting on 5.0.38, which had some nice visual enhancements as well, but I’ll be interested to see what it have in store for the account page.
Nanoport

Talk Android has a cool report on the Nanoport. Nano Magnetics is introducing a concept possessing multiple small devices that can turn into a larger, connected device. You might remember this from CES 2014, where the company debuted a Nanoport example device. Slashgear reports that Nano Magnetics will show off a fully functioning Nanoport device at CES 2015. They might be on to something if this actually works well. Snapping screens together for a larger display would be great. Be sure to check out the YouTube video here on the Nanodots YouTube channel.
Wish list

Finally, there’s that Android wish list for 2015 from Android Authority. What do you want to see in upcoming Android versions? Let’s talk about it in the comments.

That’s going to do it for Breaking Android. Follow me on your favorite social network and say hello. Also make sure to check out our weekly Android long form podcast over at AttackoftheAndroids.com.

Did you know you can also listen and subscribe to audio only versions of Breaking Android? That’s right, tap that little play button below, and if you want to subscribe, the RSS feed can be found here.

BreakingModern