To do: find replacement to do app

Being forced to replace an app to which you've grown accustomed is, on the one hand, a first world problem, and on the other, a genuine frustration. Particularly so if the app works just about perfectly for your needs. Exhibit A: Google Reader. It wasn't that long ago I made the move to feedly, and whilst it wasn't all smooth sailing I've adjusted to the post-Google Reader/feedly way of life. Now it's Astrid's turn for retirement, and the hunt begins for a suitable replacement.

Features I was looking for:

• free
• support for recurring tasks by due date and completion date 
• notes for tasks (ie separate notes field / additional to the task title/name)
• reminders independent of due date
• sync to cloud / PC / other devices (I currently sync between Google Tasks and Astrid on two devices)
• automatic backup, restore, and export (see next point) 
• data compatibility with other similar apps (ie in case need to transition again) 
• (optional) priority levels

Some of my research:

• http://www.androidauthority.com/astrid-alternatives-201278/
• https://sites.google.com/a/umich.edu/going-google/top-faqs/task-managers
• http://alternativeto.net/software/astrid/?platform=android
• https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0At4J5a3i2zW8dDhUeGFJbFFORFhNQU5vRW8xZmRxX2c#gid=0

My shortlist of candidates and selected findings:

1. Gtasks
• syncs with Google Tasks 
• does not support recurring tasks in free version
• the above limitation pretty much killed it for me, so I uninstalled Gtasks after installing TickTick and importing from Gtasks to TickTick
2. TickTick
• based on/evolved from Gtasks? No longer tied to Google Tasks.
• can import from Gtasks, but sync is with own cloud
• reminder/alarm is tied to due date
• cannot set recurrence by completion date (only due date) 
• cannot set recurrence by more than 2.5 years (30 months) - I currently have one task that I want to recur every 5 years
• overview screen/list only displays 1/1st line of task title
• the combination of the above few limitations meant my search was not yet over
3. Wunderlist
• can only import from Astrid.com
• I wasn't using Astrid.com, but could do a one off sync from Android to Astrid.com, then use astrid.wunderlist.com to do the import into Wunderlist - this produced duplicates of everything, but otherwise worked fine
• sync is with own cloud 
• can maintain multiple lists 
• can set reminder separate from due date 
• email notification setting done via website seems to apply for normal reminders as well as what the website suggests (other things)
• cannot set recurrence by completion date (only due date) 
• overview screen/list only displays 1/1st line of task title… (but at least this is denoted by "…" cf no indication of more text in TickTick)
• selected sort order (eg by due date) does not autorefresh after changing a task's due date (or it might take a minute or more, which is a bit off-putting)
• reminder notification cannot be persistent (as Astrid's could be) 

I liked the cleanness and simplicity of TickTick, but it was lacking in some features I wanted. Wunderlist is in some ways more complex/more bloated than what I need, but it offers some features that TickTick doesn't. Wunderlist also has a much larger user (and fan?) base and potentially greater likelihood of sustained future support.

I also briefly considered how I might extend my use of Evernote, or play around more with Google Keep, but they're notetaking apps and not to do apps. I also subsequently found out I could keep using Astrid offline / syncing only to Google Tasks (which was my syncing regime in any case), but figured I didn't want to be 'stuck' with old and frozen software.

So, Wunderlist it is... but I am going to miss Astrid.

migrating your whatsapp message history

i've had to change/use a different phone a few times since becoming rather dependent on whatsapp, "a cross-platform mobile messaging app which allows you to exchange messages without having to pay for SMS." in the past, i've considered it "too hard" to move the message history with a new installation. this time round, in preparing to send my currently primary phone in for repairs, i tried to figure it out on my own. it didn't work... the correct solution is actually pretty easy but dependent on a specific order of steps. nobody will keep using the same phone forever, so this will come in handy sooner or later.

swype beta - now my keyboard of choice

i posted about the flexT9 android keyboard earlier, noting some issues i had while using it. i had a few other gripes which i did not write about, so when i found out about the swype beta, i immediately signed up and installed swype.

it's good! the current version (v3.25) introduces gestures and personal dictionary management, which i think are great improvements. there are also a number of tips/tricks in using some shortcuts to do various things, which make using swype much more pleasant than flexT9 - basically i installed swype about a month ago and haven't looked back.

plus it handles Chinese text entry (pin yin) pretty well too. (there are other language options which i haven't looked into/tried)

find out more about the swype keyboard here.

Nuance responds to flext9 bug reports/enhancement requests

i decided to contact flext9's technical support about some of the things i'd found from using their keyboard (see previous post). it wasn't quite the 48 hours suggested by their submit a ticket page, but they did eventually reply after about 2.5 weeks, and with some detail:

Hi,

Sorry for the late response.

Our software engineers' investigation points to WhatsApp text buffer management as the culprit. Here's how they explained it:

For this particular app, this problem happens only if we're trying to recapture the only word in the text buffer. It works fine if there are more than one words in the text buffer. Seems there is bug in this application’s text buffer management.

Notice that when the problem occurs, the inline word does not have the underline. This is because to recapture a word, we first copy that word into our text buffer, delete that word, call core recapture function, build the word list, then display the word list and the inline word.

But for some reason, WhatsApp does not delete the word and did not render the inline word. And if we press the delete key again, it then displays the inline word after the word that should have been delete but it was not.  So we believe this is a bug in WhatsApp.

Moving forward, we suggest:

1) As a workaround, long-press on the delete key to delete the only word in this text buffer.
2) Report the problem to the WhatsApp development team.

About trace mode in URL entry box: The fact that you cannot use the FlexT9 Trace feature in the URL entry box is intentional by design since it was discovered that tablets maximize the input buffer when the URL is in focus. As a consequence, the entry box fills the entire viewable area of the screen -- you would no longer see any part of the webpage you were on.

Note that our engineering team is following closely this situation with tablets and will look into findind a workaround or improvement for it.

As for the case toggle and trace shortcuts, we have received similar suggestions and feedback from other users and we have forwarded them to our Product team.  These features will be considered in future releases.

Thanks for the feedback!

FlexT9 keyboard for Android

tapping away with thumbs/fingers at an on screen keyboard for data entry is not my favourite thing in the world, but it's pretty much what you have to put up with on smartphones without a hardware keyboard. whether you call it sliding, swiping/swyping, tracing or whatever, the concept of keeping your finger on the screen while you move over the relevant letters of a word is a much faster way of "typing". i had been using an old version of shapewriter (from here) which was working out pretty well given that it was no longer available on the android market, i didn't like slideIT that much, and i couldn't get swype.

and then multi-input flext9 came along. i first saw it via gizmodo, followed by ausdroid (and subsequently on ozbargain also). i've been using it for a few weeks now and have been finding it pretty good - at least as good as shapewriter (which should be expected, given that shapewriter was recently purchased by flext9's makers, nuance communications). my thoughts on flext9 so far:

• PROs
• Versatility: can trace, tap, draw or speak straight from the keyboard - the latter two cannot be done in Shapewriter (no draw option, and need to switch to another keyboard to be able to access microphone key)
• Voice recognition seems to work better than Google's
• CONs
• Bug in whatsapp application: deleting (backspace) sometimes doesn't work properly
• Can't trace in URL entry box in browser (tried with Dolphin and stock browser) - could be feature
• Can't change case easily with entered words (cf. Shapewriter's case toggle key)
• Can't trace shortcuts/commands (cf. Shapewriter's command strokes)
• Can't add new/custom words to recognition dictionary
• NEUTRAL
• Voice recognition requires network (this is also the case with Google's voice recognition service), and uses own server side processing (not Google)

the australian english version is free until september 14, so try it out while you can do so at no cost.

android: remote protection from malware

i'd like to think i'm reasonably careful about the apps i install on my phone, but it's good to know that if i were to ever download malicious apps from the android market, and google found out about the app and removed it from the market, that they also have the ability to remotely remove the application from my phone, as they did in the march 2011 security issue.

google shows me where to go!

as reported by gizmodo & android australia, and announced on the official australia google blog itself, google maps navigation has arrived in australia as of today. and thanks to the recent gift of a 1GB/month mobile data on my current Telstra plan (who would've thunk it right?), i tried it out tonight on the way to dinner, as well as for the trip home where i went the "wrong" way a few times to see how it copes with rerouting on the fly. i'm happy to say it works pretty well, and seems to do a solid job of delivering turn by turn navigation. while i don't have a great need for a GPS/satnav unit, this new feature of my android phone is a most welcome addition. i'm liking android more and more :)

the long awaited Froyo update (for Telstra Desire owners)

After being a "coming soon" item for what seemed an eternity, Froyo (aka Android 2.2), or more precisely the ROM upgrade customised for Telstra Desire users, was finally released on 26 October 2010. This comes about 3 months after Froyo was available to those who chose to root their phones. Was it worth the wait? Let's see...

For one, after all this delay with Telstra customising the ROM to fit in their software (some of which has its uses, others of which are just bloatware), and testing by them then testing by Google, they still can't get it right! I don't know whose fault it is, but it was with a sense of "I'm surprised but then again I'm not really" that I read of the many problems people had in getting the update to work, particularly those running Windows 7 - see comments at Gizmodo, Ausdroid including a followup post, and Whirlpool. I'm glad I didn't try the upgrade at close to midnight on the 26th - it probably would have been a long/sleepless night of frustration.

[BTW, I just read that the update is now available OTA... though that too may not be working properly... yet?]

I installed the update a day later using a WinXP machine. It went pretty smoothly and was done within 10 minutes. However there are some things (that I've identified so far) that didn't go as smoothly:

• Inescapable blank screen after first run of setup wizard
  After the update completed successfully, the phone restarted and I went through the setup wizard. At the end of this the screen went blank/black. The only thing it seemed to respond to was the power button (to enter standby/wakeup) - and the only way I could tell something was happening was that the hardware buttons would light up / turn off. After a few minutes of this impasse I removed the battery, reinserted and powered on the phone. Things seemed to go ok from there.
• Automatic data backup failed to restore
  I had automatic backups enabled, and according to the user manual, "after you do a factory reset or update your phone, you will be asked if you want to restore the backed up data after you turn on your phone." This did not happen, ie I saw no such "Restore my data and settings" dialog box. This might be related to the blank screen issue, but that's purely conjecture. Whatever the case, there seems to be no way to manually invoke the restore process, which is a pretty big fail in my books. Fortunately (and thanks to the various comments I had read up on), I installed MyBackup from the Android Market to do a backup of applications and data before attempting the update. This was not without its own issues, but for the most part it worked well and was much much better than nothing!
• Lengthy restore times using MyBackup
  Backing up with MyBakup was a lot faster than restoring - we're talking minutes vs. hours here. The whole restore process took about 2 hours; contacts and calendar data took particularly long to restore. In hindsight (see below points), I probably should have skipped these two and relied on OTA syncing instead. On the plus side reinstalling apps was fairly quick and easy (though this probably could have been achieved using AppBrain as well, and not everything was included in the backup/restore - see ShapeWriter keyboard below).
• Calendar backup/restore anomaly
  I have/had 3 calendars visible, my google calendar, wife's google calendar, and PC sync calendar. The MyBackup process appears to have saved/restored everything under my google calendar, so now my google calendar has a lot more entries and I'm showing a lot more duplication. I'll probably go through them and clean it up sometime when I feel sufficiently motivated. Oh and it's made my Outlook to/from Google calendar sync pretty screwed. It tells me there are some 2-300 entries to delete, and I'm not sure I want to do that big a batch at once.
• Contacts backup/restore anomaly
  As with the calendar issue, it looks like MyBackup has saved/restored all my contacts (phone, google, and facebook) under my google contacts. Again, plenty of duplication to sort through. My contacts were already in a bit of a mess from when I first wrestled with the immature process of syncing contacts using HTC Sync, so I guess this hasn't really made it that much worse in comparison...
• Strange Google Calendar behaviour
  I received an email this morning from myself for a calendar event from a few months ago. It was an event someone else created, and invited me to. My manager received an email this morninng from me for another calendar event from a few months ago, for an event that I forwarded from work to myself as a reminder (as I would be on leave the few weeks immediately prior to this event). I have no idea whether any other strange emails have gone out... This is probably the most unexpected side effect and I'm yet to figure out how this got triggered.
• Lost ShapeWriter keyboard
  Would have been a lot more annoying if I didn't find a copy of the apk online - the app has been off the Android market since June 2010 and I couldn't recall how I installed it the first time round in July. May well have been via this link, from which I did the reinstall (v3.0.9). I should probably keep my own local backup copy...
• Lost Credit Usage configuration
  Not a huge issue - rekey data from memory / check against rates stored on wife's phone/app. There doesn't seem to be a way to backup/save the configuration to a file, so the next time I'll just have to write the info down or rekey from memory.
• Lost Timeriffic configuration
  Minor annoyance. There doesn't seem to be a way to backup/save the configuration to a file, so the next time I'll just have to write the info down or rekey from memory.
• Lost mobile data usage information
  Mildly annoying but not a huge issue - I know that I'm way under my quota this month and only have a few days before a new month begins.
• Lost Dolphin HD bookmarks
  I thought these were saved to SD, but it seems that I didn't actually set this up (had the add-on installed, but not configured). Something to play with later.
• Photo numbering reset
  Photos taken by the camera are restarting at IMAG0001 for the filename, rather than picking up where the last one left off. There should be a config file that you can change to fix this, but I can't find it. Not a big problem as the photo gallery displays photos in time/date order, however I also discovered that all the pictures I took on 27/10 before the update are appearing with datestamps in the future! One has today's date (and a future time), the rest tomorrow's date... weird.
• Lost UPM data
  UPM data doesn't get backed up by MyBackup. I restored off an old backup I had on SD, and so now need to try to remember what I've changed in the last few months since that first and only manual backup... and I'll look at setting up a remote sync for the data to eliminate this problem in the future.

Lessons learnt

• Don't trust Google/Telstra/HTC/software developers for things to work the way they should / you expect.
• Don't be a pioneer - let others try the updates first and learn from their mistakes/experiences!
• Don't rely on Android's built in backup feature to restore correctly (or at all??)
• Don't use MyBackup to restore contacts or calendar items. It would (probably) be better to resync with Google/Facebook/PC.

Changes/improvements in Froyo

• Apps to SD - yay! This is the main feature I was waiting for. Now I can free up some space on the phone / install Angry Birds :p Having said that I'm running out of space on my 8GB SD, what with my MP3 collection and various GPS related maps... but that's a problem for another day.
• Additional options for screen unlock (password / PIN, in addition to existing pattern)
• Screen lock delay option means AutoLock app is redundant (notwithstanding that AutoLock doesn't appear to work for Froyo users in any case).
• Another consequence of the changed security settings is that the Curvefish LockPattern OnOff widget no longer works / just acts as a shortcut to the security settings screen. On second thought this might not have worked for a while... in any case a similar shortcut is available via QuickSettings, so LockPattern is redundant.
• HTC App Sharing widget - I don't think this is necessarily part of Froyo but it's new to me, and seems a handy way to share applications with friends.
• HTC Flashlight app - again not sure if it's a Froyo thing, but offers a bit more versatility compared to, and hence has replaced, the LED light widget.
• Wifi hotspot - saw this on a friend's imported Desire last month - looks handy.