App Highlights: Twilight

According to research, exposure to blue light near bedtime is bad.

Twilight is a simple app that makes your device screen adapt to the time of the day. Using the app is like applying a red filter to the screen, filtering emitted blue light from reaching your eyes. The app uses your location, to adjust the filter intensity to the sun cycle, based on local sunset and sunrise times.

App Highlights is a recurring series. From time to time, I highlight one Android app that I found useful. Feel free to suggest apps for me to highlight, but be advised that I focus on apps that I actually use.

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App Highlights: Yatse, the XBMC / Kodi Remote

Yatse is my Kodi (formerly XBMC) remote Android app of choice.

Kodi is a free and open source media center application. It’s what I currently use on my dedicated HTPC computer in the living room (via OpenELEC).

The Yatse Remote app allows me to control the media center from my phone. It’s so good doing that, that ever since I installed it, I never needed to pull out the HTPC keyboard / mouse!

There are plenty of alternative Kodi remote apps, including an official one from the XBMC team. I briefly used the official app a while ago (maybe early 2013?), and got quickly frustrated.

The Yatse app is free, with a $6.99 unlocker for extra features (and developer support). I never had any need for the extra features, so I purchased the upgrade only to support the developer.

Yatse also has various plugins for even more features!

App Highlights is a recurring series. From time to time, I highlight one Android app that I found useful. Feel free to suggest apps for me to highlight, but be advised that I focus on apps that I actually use.

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App Highlights: Pushbullet

Pushbullet is the missing link between your mobile devices and other computers. With its various mobile apps and browser extensions, it finally allows you to move between mobile and desktop with ease.

The features that make Pushbullet one of the first things I install include:

  • Notification sync: the mobile app sends notifications to the desktop, so I don’t need to pick up the phone while working on my laptop.
  • Push links (and files, and notes): push something from the desktop to the phone, instantly. no more emailing-to-self nonsense!
  • SMS from desktop: send and reply to SMS messages from the laptop, without picking up the phone!

App Highlights is a recurring series. From time to time, I highlight one Android app that I found useful. Feel free to suggest apps for me to highlight, but be advised that I focus on apps that I actually use.

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Restoring My Apps, Settings & Configuration On Lollipop

I love a clean start. There’s nothing like the feel of a smartphone (or PC) after a factory reset.

I’m using my Nexus 5 for almost a year now. For a while, I’ve been wanting to do a factory reset and start clean. The upcoming Lollipop upgrade is exactly the push I needed to do it.

My game plan:

  1. Before upgrading:
    1. Perform general app cleanup, so I upgrade only with the apps I want.
    2. Document my settings and configuration (system and apps), so I can re-apply it if needed.
    3. Backup data.
  2. Upgrade.
  3. After upgrading:
    1. Restore apps, data, settings and configuration, as needed.
    2. Explore what new built-in features can replace 3rd party apps I’m using. I always prefer built-in over 3rd party.

After I upgraded my Nexus 5 to Lollipop, it’s time to set up the device the way I want it. Since my upgrade process involved full data wipe, I’m starting clean.

In this post, I describe how I use the preparation steps I’ve taken before the upgrade. Not unlike the previous posts, this process is highly personalized and detailed, so the post is just a description of the method with some highlights.

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Upgrading My Nexus 5 to Lollipop

I love a clean start. There’s nothing like the feel of a smartphone (or PC) after a factory reset.

I’m using my Nexus 5 for almost a year now. For a while, I’ve been wanting to do a factory reset and start clean. The upcoming Lollipop upgrade is exactly the push I needed to do it.

My game plan:

  1. Before upgrading:
    1. Perform general app cleanup, so I upgrade only with the apps I want.
    2. Document my settings and configuration (system and apps), so I can re-apply it if needed.
    3. Backup data.
  2. Upgrade.
  3. After upgrading:
    1. Restore apps, data, settings and configuration, as needed.
    2. Explore what new built-in features can replace 3rd party apps I’m using. I always prefer built-in over 3rd party.

Initially, I planned to wait for the OTA update. I figured it would simplify the process, and should reach my device soon enough. Google started rolling out the OTA on November 12th 2014. Like most Android updates, this rollout was in “waves”. 3 days later, the waves still didn’t reach my Nexus 5.

With the factory images already available, I started wondering why I’m waiting for the OTA over going manual. I figured that the only downside of going manual with the factory image is having to perform full wipe to unlock the bootloader. That doesn’t bother me, since I want to factory reset any way!

I decided to pursue the manual upgrade route, which I describe in this post.

Warning: This process requires using the fastboot tool over USB from a terminal. While not too complicated, it does require being comfortable with doing such things. Also, enabling USB debugging and unlocking the bootloader exposes your device to extra security risks (even if for a short time). Proceed with caution, or prefer going the OTA route.

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Preparing My Nexus 5 For Lollipop: Data Backup

I love a clean start. There’s nothing like the feel of a smartphone (or PC) after a factory reset.

I’m using my Nexus 5 for almost a year now. For a while, I’ve been wanting to do a factory reset and start clean. The upcoming Lollipop upgrade is exactly the push I needed to do it.

My game plan:

  1. Before upgrading:
    1. Perform general app cleanup, so I upgrade only with the apps I want.
    2. Document my settings and configuration (system and apps), so I can re-apply it if needed.
    3. Backup data.
  2. Upgrade.
  3. After upgrading:
    1. Restore apps, data, settings and configuration, as needed.
    2. Explore what new built-in features can replace 3rd party apps I’m using. I always prefer built-in over 3rd party.

I have lots of data on the sdcard. My Nexus 5 is the 32GB model, and before going through with factory reset & upgrade, I have about 24GB used. In this post, I describe what I backup, and how I get it off the sdcard over to my MacBook.

I performed this backup procedure right before going through with the upgrade, so the backup is as up-to-date as possible.

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Preparing My Nexus 5 For Lollipop: Settings and Configuration

I love a clean start. There’s nothing like the feel of a smartphone (or PC) after a factory reset.

I’m using my Nexus 5 for almost a year now. For a while, I’ve been wanting to do a factory reset and start clean. The upcoming Lollipop upgrade is exactly the push I needed to do it.

My game plan:

  1. Before upgrading:
    1. Perform general app cleanup, so I upgrade only with the apps I want.
    2. Document my settings and configuration (system and apps), so I can re-apply it if needed.
    3. Backup data.
  2. Upgrade.
  3. After upgrading:
    1. Restore apps, data, settings and configuration, as needed.
    2. Explore what new built-in features can replace 3rd party apps I’m using. I always prefer built-in over 3rd party.

In order to be able to restore all of my set up, layout, customization, etc., I want to document in detail my starting state. This documentation should include anything that I might need to re-apply after factory reset & upgrade. It’s OK to skip things that are restored automatically (cloud-based, etc.). If I’m not sure about something, better be safe than sorry…

The method: Go over everything, and write down and/or take screenshots of anything I want to document.

This process generated a lot of data. Some of it includes sensitive stuff that I don’t want to document publicly (like account names on various services). All of it is highly personalized, and is probably of little interest to most readers. So instead of writing a post with 425 screenshots (really!) (and pixelating out many of them), I decided to just keep a few highlights, and describe the method. Feel free to ask for more details if you’re interested in something specific.

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Preparing My Nexus 5 For Lollipop: Apps Cleanup

I love a clean start. There’s nothing like the feel of a smartphone (or PC) after a factory reset.

I’m using my Nexus 5 for almost a year now. For a while, I’ve been wanting to do a factory reset and start clean. The upcoming Lollipop upgrade is exactly the push I needed to do it.

My game plan:

  1. Before upgrading:
    1. Perform general app cleanup, so I upgrade only with the apps I want.
    2. Document my settings and configuration (system and apps), so I can re-apply it if needed.
    3. Backup data.
  2. Upgrade.
  3. After upgrading:
    1. Restore apps, data, settings and configuration, as needed.
    2. Explore what new built-in features can replace 3rd party apps I’m using. I always prefer built-in over 3rd party.

In this post, I document the app-cleaning step. Over time, I installed more than a few apps (112 to be sort-of-exact). I’m sure many of them go unused, or even worse – unused and also run in the background. Before upgrading, I want to cut down the installed apps to those that I actually want installed.

I’m sort-of relying on the Google Play feature that reinstalls apps after a factory reset. If it works, I get only the apps I want restored. If it doesn’t work, I have a list of apps I want to reinstall.

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App Highlights: Our Groceries

Our Groceries is a super-useful app that keeps multiple lists synchronized between multiple devices and users.

The obvious use-case, as hinted by the name of the app, is sync’ing grocery lists between family members. This apps does it in a simple and intuitive way!

App Highlights is a recurring series. From time to time, I highlight one Android app that I found useful. Feel free to suggest apps for me to highlight, but be advised that I focus on apps that I actually use.

Continue Reading…