Google introduces Project Loon

Google introduces Project Loon, hoping to bring the entire world internet access via balloons

Google is no stranger to outlandish ideas, and it appears they will stop at nothing to make sure the whole world is connected. In that tradition, Google has announced Project Loon, a crazy (hence the name Loon) idea that plans to bring the world internet via high-altitude balloons. The idea is that in many parts of the world, internet access costs more than rent and is out of reach for the average citizen. The plan is to launch a ring of balloons orbiting the globe on stratospheric winds, broadcasting an internet signal comparable to that of most 3G connections. On top of connecting rural areas and other parts of the globe that previously didn’t have internet access, it could also aid in disaster relief, providing a means to stay in contact with devastated areas. Hit the break for videos breaking down how the technology will work.

Best Android keyboard

Best Android keyboard replacements for phones and tablets [January 2013]

Keyboards are important. They’re easily the most used application on your Android phone, so having one you actually like can go a long way towards enjoying your phone. Sometimes, you’ll get stuck with an OEM keyboard that you don’t really care for; that’s where this guide comes in. We’ll go over all the best keyboard replacements for your device to help you pick one the right one for you.

 



Swype

Swype came along and really turned text input on its head. Instead of tapping out letters, you simply trace those letters along the keyboard and Swype fills in the words for you. It’s a weird concept, and it takes some practice to get used to it, but it can be a much faster input method than traditional typing, especially with one hand. At first, you might be a little skeptical about how well it works, but the prediction and recognition is excellent and is usually better than most stock keyboards. Swype is also constantly adding new features to keep that prediction and recognition up to par with the competition, too.

Is this the keyboard for you? If you type one handed often and don’t mind trying out new things, Swype is one of the best keyboards available. It’s unfortunately not available on the Play Store, so if you’re weird about installing third party applications, you may want to pass on this one. (Although as long as you’re only installing trusted applications, this should never be an issue.) If you’re trying to use Swype on a tablet, it does offer a moveable keyboard and split keyboard layout for tablets larger than 7 inches, but unfortunately for tablets like the Nexus 7 or Kindle Fire, the keyboard mirrors the phone layout, which can be uncomfortable depending on how your hold your device. The same application works on both phones and tablets, and it’s free, so it’s worth at least testing the water to see how you like it.

Swype Beta Website



Swiftkey

Another extremely popular keyboard that’s constantly on top of Google Play’s best selling charts, SwiftKey boasts insanely accurate text prediction and correction. It learns from your text messages and emails and adapts to how you type to help correct your mistakes and even predict the rest of your sentences for you. And, believe it or not, it’s extremely accurate with its predictions, almost to the point of being creepy. If you type certain phrases often, after typing the first word or two, SwiftKey will automatically suggest the next few words to fill in the rest of the phrase. SwiftKey has also encroached on Swype’s territory a bit by introducing some text-swiping features called SwiftKey Flow.

Is this the keyboard for you? If you’re a fast typer who relies on autocorrect and word prediction, SwiftKey is going to become your new favorite app. After a week or so of using it, it almost starts to read your mind and speeds your texting and tweeting way up. Again, though, if privacy is a big concern to you,  you  may want to pass on SwiftKey. It does collect quite a bit of information to learn about your typing style to better tailor predictions and corrections, and some people may not want a company to have that much information. There are also two separate applications Swiftkey offers; one is for phones, one is for tablets. If you’re looking for a single keyboard with one install to use across devices, you may want to look at other keyboards on this list.



Play Store Download Link



Play Store Download Link (Tablet Version)



Go Keyboard

The Go Dev Team makes arguably the best replacement applications and widgets for Android phones, and their popular Go Keyboard is no exception. It doesn’t do the swype input quite as well as Swype, and it doesn’t do predictions quite like Swiftkey, but it beats them both by a mile in another category: customization. The Go Team brags that there are over 60 themes for their keyboard, and it supports several different languages and keyboard sizes. There’s even dedicated Emoji support baked in to the keyboard, if that’s your thing. It’s absolutely full of features that you won’t find in another keyboard.

Is this the keyboard for you? If you’re a constant ROM-flasher who wants everything customized a specific way, or if you’re just tired of the aesthetics of traditional keyboards, the Go Team has you covered. No other keyboard gives you the kind of options that Go Keyboard does, from the colors to picking between QWERTY keyboards of T9 keyboards. It also supports several different tablet sizes, designed specifically for 5″, 7″, and 9/10″ tablets.



Play Store Download Link



Ice Cream Sandwich Keyboard

Maybe you don’t like fancy keyboards. Maybe you’re the kind of person that wants what Google intended, plain and simple, with nothing else complicated on top of it. The freely available Ice Cream Sandwich Keyboard on the Play Store is exactly what you’re looking for; no unnecessary bells and whistles, just the plain keyboard with Google’s standard predictions, options, and attractive holo theme.

Is this the keyboard for you? If you want a keyboard that just works, that’s easy to figure out, and doesn’t require twenty minutes to set up, then yes. There’s a few tweaks for autocorrections and punctuation and things like that, so technically it’s a little more featured than Google’s AOSP keyboard, but it stays true to what Google intended. There’s no gimmicks here, and no privacy issues. Type away.



Play Store Download Link



Perfect Keyboard

Perfect Keyboard takes a different approach to typing. Instead of the traditional landscape keyboard layout, it splits itself into three separate pieces with half the keyboard on one side, half on the other, and a numpad in the middle. The thought behind it is that it reduces the strain on your thumbs to stretch to some of those hard-to-reach keys in the middle of the keyboard, which is especially useful on some of the larger phones we’re beginning to see. It does also offer quite a bit of customization, including setting different keyboards for both landscape and portrait, different themes, and being able to set a picture as a custom background.

Is this the keyboard for you? If you have a hard time reaching some of the keys on your keyboard, definitely give Perfect Keyboard a try. There’s a learning curve at first, but after playing with it for a few days, it’s will easily speed up your typing. It’s also pretty handy for typing on a tablet, since it lets you type just like you would on a phone without having to reach your hand halfway across the screen. That customization across devices is where Perfect Keyboard really shines over the rest of the keyboards on this list.



Play Store Download Link

There are enough keyboards to try out in the Play Store to keep you busy for months. Some of them offer a few niche features that may appeal to you, but these four offer the biggest features better than most other keyboards available. Did we miss one of your favorite keyboards? Hit us up in the comments section and let us know what you’re using.

How to backup apps

How to backup apps and app data on your rooted or non-rooted Android phone or tablet

 



We’ve all been in a situation before where we needed to either factory reset our phone, send it in for a warranty replacement, etc. Not a big deal by itself, but you’ve got 3 stars on 80% of Angry Birds levels, and who would want to lose that accomplishment? You want to be able to keep that data forever. Fortunately, it’s pretty easy to do, and this guide will help you get started. You’ll even be able to start transferring some app data to new phones when you upgrade.

 



Carbon – No Root Method

Carbon is an application by popular developer, Koushik Dutta, who has also developed ClockworkMod Recovery, ROM Manager, and a recent Superuser application. Needless to say, he’s made some extremely useful applications that are very widely used. Carbon is no exception, and it allows any device running Android 4.0 or higher to back up their applications and data without root. All you’ll need is your device, a computer, and your USB cable. (It’s worth noting that according to its Play Store page, Motorola devices are not supported due to a bug on Motorola’s part.)

First off, you’re going to need the free companion desktop application to use the backup features (for non rooted users only).  There are versions for Windows, OS X, and a Linux shell script, so regardless of what kind of computer you’re using, you’ll be able to take advantage of Carbon. If you’re using Windows, you’re also going to need specific drivers for your phone. There’s a link on the download page (above) with a list of drivers for easy access and installation, and just about every major OEM is covered. OS X and Linux users don’t have to worry about the driver issues.

Once you have that all set up and running, start the Carbon desktop app, connect your device via USB to your computer, and start Carbon on your phone or tablet. Wait just a few seconds, and Carbon will be fully enabled so you can start backing up your apps. You can now disconnect your phone/tablet from your desktop and utilize the app itself. You won’t have to reconnect your phone/tablet again, but if you reboot your device you will have to connect it again to re-enable the app. It’s an inconvenience, but a minor one when you consider this is the only option for backing up app data for non rooted devices.

There’s a few cool features and tricks you’ll probably want to take advantage of while using Carbon, though, so poke around and look at some settings before you back up your massive stockpile of apps. Let’s say you really only want to back up your Angry Birds data, but you don’t mind re-downloading the app from the Play Store first. If you swipe up the bottom tab in Carbon, you’ll see a check box that gives you the option of backing up only the app data, and it does exactly that; your bigger apk will not be saved, but the data that goes along with it will be saved. You’ll have to download the app from the Play Store before you can restore that data, but if you want to save some storage space on your phone or SD card and don’t mind the extra step, that can be a pretty helpful option. There are also quick options to select and deselect all available apps in this window.

If you don’t mind going for the paid version of Carbon ($4.99), you’ll get a really cool feature; the ability to back up your data to cloud storage. Carbon supports Dropbox, Box, and Google Drive, and it can seamlessly get your data on your favorite cloud service. That’s extremely helpful if you’re switching over to a new phone without an SD card, or just to make a backup in case you were to ever lose your phone.

So let’s fast forward a bit and say you’ve got your warranty exchange, you’ve finished your factory reset, or you just brought your shiny new phone home after upgrading. Restoring those applications is quick and easy, and all you’ll have to do is download Carbon from the Play Store. After downloading, run Carbon, connect it to your computer again, and you’ll be able to restore all of your apps and data. That precious Angry Birds is still completely intact. You’ll never have to worry about losing data again.

You can also use Carbon as a rooted user  and you don’t need to bother with the desktop companion software. Everything else works the same, but I prefer the next option, Titanium Backup because it’s more feature rich, but Carbon is still a great app.



Play Store Download Link



Play Store Download Link (Premium)



Titanium Backup – Root Method

Carbon is useful, and if you can’t or don’t want to root your device, its backup capabilities are fantastic. If you are rooted, however, it’s hard to beat Titanium Backup’s extremely rich feature set. It essentially works the same as Carbon but with a bit more flexibility and automation. It also works on any device that can be rooted, regardless of manufacturer or OS version.

First off, with Titanium Backup, you must be rooted. There’s no way around it. If you need some help on that, we do have a guide to rooting to get you started and answer most of your questions. If you’re already rooted, just download and install the app and start it. It will prompt you for root permissions, which you will want to grant, of course, and you’re ready to start backing things up.

Titanium Backup has three tabs you’ll be looking at; an overview page, a backup/restore page, and a schedules page. For this guide, we want that middle tab to start backing up applications. You’ll see a long list of every single application that’s installed on your phone, including system applications and data. This is the biggest difference from Carbon, and it’s extremely important to remember. Backing up and restoring system applications and data can cause serious problems. As a general rule of thumb, it’s much safer to manually sign back into accounts and adjust settings instead of restoring a backup for those settings. In some cases, restoring system data will be fine, but more often than not it will cause problems. Restoring system data from one device to another will definitely cause problems.

Now that we’ve got that friendly disclaimer out of the way, tap the “Click to edit filters” button above your app list. For safety, we want to uncheck the boxes under “Filter by type” except for the User option. Only the User box should be checked, and the System and Uninstalled box should be blank. Tap your green checkmark at the top right of the screen to go back to your app list that’s been completely filtered to only user apps and no system apps. Here you can manually select which apps to backup and restore, so if you really only wanted to keep data for your games when moving to a new device, it’s easy to do so.

Now let’s say you want to run a full backup for your apps. That button on the top right of the screen, next to the magnifying glass, is your “batch” button in Titanium Backup, and that’s where the magic happens. Tap that and it will give you a long list of actions you can take. For this backup, we want to run the “Backup all user apps” action. This pulls up a list of your user apps where you can individually check each app you want to back up, or you can simply select all of your apps. After figuring out what you want backed up, tap the green checkmark at the top right and the batch action will run in the background.

Restoring your apps again is pretty much the same thing. When you go to your batch actions list, scroll down a bit until you find the action for “Restore all apps with data.” This list will show each app you’ve backed up so you can batch restore everything you need, data included. The free version of Titanium Backup will make you press a yes dialog box for each app you want to restore, so it’s not totally automated, but the paid, premium version does it all behind the scenes. And, like Carbon, you can set up schedules to back up at specific times and, if you opted for the paid Pro Key, sync your local backups to cloud storage. So if you’re in one of those situations we mentioned earlier, like moving to a phone without an SD card or just making backups in case your phone is lost or stolen, Titanium Backup supports the same three major cloud storage services for backing up your data.



Play Store Download Link



Play Store Download Link (Premium)

Like always, there’s plenty of Android apps available that do what Carbon and Titanium Backup can do, (although Carbon is the only app that can fully backup nonrooted devices) so if neither of these seem like your cup of tea, it’s easy to find an alternative. Both of these apps have relatively simple, easy to use designs that most users can figure out to do something that we’ve all needed to do once or twice with our phones.

How to boot your Android phone or tablet

Android is a relatively stable mobile operating system, but every now and then, performance issues arise. Safe mode is a great tool that you can use to troubleshoot these issues. Safe mode boots your phone running only the apps that came with the phone – that means no third-party apps. Therefore, if your phone runs without an issue when you’re in safe mode, it’s a pretty good bet that the problem isn’t system related, and instead a third party app you downloaded.

Click through the break to see how you can enable safe mode to test if it’s a system problem or a third-party problem.

Unfortunately, not all phones have the same method to enter safe mode. Most Jelly Bean devices use the first method below, but some devices with older versions of Android and some newer devices (like the Galaxy S 4 and HTC One) use the alternate method further down the page.

Method 1 (most Jelly Bean devices)

1. Hold down the physical power button on your device.

2. Long-press the “Power off” option that appears.



3. A dialog box asking you if you want to reboot to safe mode may pop up. Tap OK.
(Note: If the box doesn’t appear, go on to the alternate method.)



4. When the phone reboots, you should see a “Safe Mode” watermark at the botom left of the screen, to let you know that you are in fact in safe mode.



Alternate Method (some older versions of Android and some Jelly Bean phones)

1. Turn off your phone.
2. Once your phone is off, turn it on by pressing the power button.
3. As your phone is booting, hold down both the volume up and volume down buttons (yes, both) and keep them held.
4. Once your phone has booted, you should see a “Safe Mode” watermark at the botom left of the screen, to let you know that you are in fact in safe mode.

Note: If the alternate method also doesn’t work, you can try holding down menu instead of volume up and down while booting.

In safe mode, while you can’t use third party apps, you can uninstall them. So if your phone is giving you problems as bad as freezing and not letting you uninstall apps, you can uninstall the problem app/apps in safe mode. In addition, if you need to, you can backup your data or factory reset your device in safe mode .

To exit safe mode, you just restart your device as you normally would.

Happy troubleshooting!

How to boot your Android phone or tablet