Androme

Snake Extreme is a game of Snake developed by mToy. You might be...

Sun, 18 Apr 2010 14:23:00 -0400

Classic

Classic Score (Not My Best)

Extreme

Extreme Score (Maybe My Best)

Snake Extreme is a game of Snake developed by mToy. You might be thinking that every snake game is alike, but you’re sadly mistaken. This game has two gamemodes, four speed levels, and customizable controls. It’s currently rated 4 stars in the Android Market. The two gamemodes in this game are very similar, though they have to be because it’s still a snake game. It has Classic which is the standard snake game we all know and love. Then there’s Extreme. Extreme is weird because every time you pick up a bobble, not only does your trail get longer but a green block randomly appears. Now, green blocks are ones that kill you when you hit them, blue blocks are the ones you pick up, and red blocks are your trail. So for every blue block you pick up, a green one randomly appears and a red one adds itself to your trail. This eventually becomes a challenge if you’re either unlucky or get too far. I often find myself picking one up and immediately flying into the newly spawned green block and losing. This is probably only because I play on crazy fast. Now the speeds are pretty simple, there’s slow, medium, fast, and crazy fast. I find myself thinking the game is too easy if I play anything but crazy fast. The only bad part about this game is the high scores. They’re only remotely, not locally, and the submission method for scores is terrible. I’ve had so much trouble getting their server to load and so I just stopped trying to submit my score to them. Other than this minor inconvenience, the application is probably the best snake game on the Android Market and it was the first application that I ever got for my Droid. I’d have to agree with the Android Market rating of 4 stars, only because of the terrible high score system.

- Aaron Weiss

Download :

CyanogenMod 5.0.6 (N1 and Droid) Released

Fri, 16 Apr 2010 21:06:52 -0400

Just a quick update to mention that CyanogenMod 5.0.6 was released today for the Nexus One and Droid. This release features various fixes and a few new features including a 5 column app drawer, auto-rotating home screen via accelerometer, a few new camera features, and animated GIF support in the browser (what did we ever do without it?).

Nexus One users may also notice a slight improvement in 3G performance. In my tests, I’ve seen a roughly 500 kbps increase in speed after the update on the AT&T network.

You can view the full changelog here.

You can grab the update using the previously reviewed CMUpdater app or with ROM Updater (available on the Android Market - QR code at the end of this post) or you can download it manually using the following links:

Nexus One
Droid

- Brad Hoagland

Download ROM Manager:

App Review - doubleTwist

Mon, 05 Apr 2010 01:22:53 -0400

It goes without saying that every smartphone on the market today is compared to Apple’s iPhone. One point often made is the ease of media syncing on the iPhone via iTunes. Apple has vehemently disallowed third party devices from working in iTunes. As a user of both an iPhone and a Nexus One, I definitely initially missed the ease of use and one-stop syncing that iTunes offered on my Android device.

However, an excellent solution exists for the shortcomings of iTunes called doubleTwist. The goal of doubleTwist is to provide a universal media syncing solution for a wide range of devices. It features the ability to read your existing iTunes library and sync media from iTunes to your non-Apple device. It also supports the ability to import playlists from iTunes into the doubleTwist application. As with iTunes, you are able to specify specifically which playlists you would like synced to your desired device. doubleTwist has support for syncing music, video, and photos. New features include an integrated podcast search (with podcast subscribing and syncing on the list of upcoming features), integrated Android Market search, and access to Amazon’s music store. The Android Market access from within doubleTwist is a nice feature, however, you must currently scan an app’s QR code using your Android device to access and install the app on your device. Downloading/purchasing and queuing functionality similar to that of the App Store within iTunes would be a welcome feature.

doubleTwist supports a large number of devices in addition to Android including, Palm Pre, Blackberry, and current Windows Mobile devices (Windows only). Apple’s iPod and iPhone devices are also supported for those that may feel that iTunes is bloated and slow. There is even planned support for the Nintendo DSi.

doubleTwist also includes some social networking features such as Twitter and Facebook integration.

The developers of doubleTwist seem to be very actively improving and expanding the application. I have found this application invaluable for managing the media on my Nexus One. With it I am able to keep the media on both my iPhone and Nexus One identical and up-to-date. The application is fast, lightweight, and very stable. I recommend it for anyone wanting to expand their iTunes library to non-Apple devices or simply start a completely separate media library and break free of the “walled garden” of Apple.

- Brad Hoagland

Download:

PC or Mac

Replica Island is a game developed by Team Replica in which you...

Fri, 02 Apr 2010 21:41:00 -0400

start screen

an enemy

falling after flying and another enemy

death

another death

Replica Island is a game developed by Team Replica in which you play as a small green android. Your goal is to locate a mysterious artefact known as The Source. The game boasts 40 levels and 3 endings as well as a decent control scheme. You control your android with the directional pad and jump/fly with the blue button seen on screen. The red button can be used to crush or control enemies. On each level, you collect pearls or golden bobbles similar to rings from Sonic. However, these are not dropped when you get hit and don’t act as health. Instead, you collect 20 of these and you are awarded with temporary invulnerability. Your health is essentially 3-hits and after that you die. To complete a level, you must gather 3 red gems in the level. Each level is referred to as a “memory” and the game isn’t entirely linear in that you occasionally skip around between the levels. The levels can be challenging but some are also very easy. The game is given a 4.5 stars on the Android market and I have to say that I agree with this rating. It’s a very fun game with a unique storyline and lots of gameplay.

- Aaron Weiss

Note : Please ignore any clipping in the screenshots, the game doesn’t look like that.

Download :

Androme Updated

Fri, 02 Apr 2010 01:03:00 -0400

After about an hour or so of hard work, we’ve added some new features to our theme. We added in DISQUS comments which originally caused some problems but now they’re working. They load on all the pages and work perfectly. We also changed link colors to white over blue/purple. So go ahead, leave us a comment or two. Enjoy the new features of Androme and expect some more updates on Android very soon! If you’re wondering about the comments being too far down in relation to some posts, don’t worry about it. We currently find that it isn’t a big deal but it’ll most likely be fixed at a later date. You should again be expecting more posts about Android very soon including application reviews, news, and more. Happy commenting!

- Androme Team

Terminal Emulator (Cyanogen)

Thu, 01 Apr 2010 21:39:41 -0400

Terminal Emulator is, quite obviously, a terminal emulator that comes bundled with Cyanogen Mod. It comes with all of the standard stuff for a Terminal in terms of commands. The stock version comes with Bourne shell but has the ability to use others such as bash. It works with the Android implementation of root user where the pop up appears asking the user if they wish to give permission to said application, which I find pretty neat. A nice contrast from the iPhone’s terminal emulator which comes with the default root password “alpine” as this is very insecure. Having had worked with both this terminal and the iPhone’s, I can truly say that I prefer this one. Though it lacks some of the cool gesture and menu features of the iPhone terminal, it makes up for it with customizability. It has a few options for both text and background colour as well as the option to change the font size. Though the colour choices and font sizes are relatively limited, it’s still very nice. It also operates, at least on the Droid, with various options for the Control key. As the device is not equipped with a control key, it provides a few options for substitutes. The default being the @ key, you can also choose from the job ball, the left alt key, and the right alt key. You can also specify initial or start up commands for the emulator to run when you launch the application. This could be pretty much anything, though I’d recommend using a shell script to save the actual commands and just have the settings execute the command. It also comes with the ability to email the contents of the terminal, including outputs, to either yourself or a friend. This can be quite useful for saving ls outputs or anything of that sort. I would definitely say this is one of the better mobile terminals, though it has it’s draw backs with the limitations on customizability.

- Aaron Weiss

CM Updater, or CyanogenMod Updater, is an app that checks or and...

Tue, 30 Mar 2010 19:22:00 -0400

CM Updater, or CyanogenMod Updater, is an app that checks or and applies updates to CyanogenMod. This app provides an easier way for users of Cyanogen’s ROMs to stay up to date with the latest builds. It features the ability to automatically check for updates at a configurable interval. It also has support for theme updating. The app has a simple, clean interface and is easy to configure. CM Updater is a must have for all fans of CyanogenMod.

- Brad Hoagland

Download:

Rooting

Tue, 30 Mar 2010 14:38:00 -0400

Rooting, in this sense, is the practice of gaining root access on a device especially one that doesn’t normally grant root access to any individual. To be more specific, we’re talking about rooting Android phones. The process does differ across Android phones but they’re all pretty simple. But first some warnings and legal jargon, I cannot be held responsible for any damage to your phone that may occur and anything you do to your phone is entirely your decision and only you are responsible for it. As for some warnings, I haven’t experienced any issues with phones breaking or anything like that, nor have I heard of anyone with said issues but it’s supposedly possible. So, if you’re really that afraid, please don’t do this. Otherwise, we’ll move on.

Droid Rooting :

Download the update.zip package from the links section.
Place the update.zip package onto the root of your sdcard.
Turn off your device.
Hold x while turning your device on.
Select apply sdcard:update.zip
After it is complete, reboot your device.

Congratulations, you’ve now got a rooted Droid! One thing to be wary of is that the update.zip I have hosted is only for 2.0.1. However, if you’re reading this at a time where newer firmware is available, it is possible to make your own. Simply download a zip of the latest firmware from somewhere on the Internet as well as the droid-superuser.zip from the links section. Place both zips in the same folder and use the following command “copy /b firmware.zip+droid-superuser.zip update.zip” by replacing firmware.zip with the name of the firmware archive. Then you go through the process above. Note that said command may only work on Windows, it has not been tested by me anywhere else.

Fastboot Rooting :

Download the fastboot package from the links section.
Extract the archive where ever you want it.
Open up your Operating System’s terminal.
Navigate to the location of the extracted archive.
Rename the fastboot for your OS to fastboot (or fastboot.exe)
Turn off your device and restart while holding the trackball.*
Enter the command “fastboot oem unlock” (or “fastboot.exe oem unlock”)
Confirm on your device that you wish to unlock the bootloader.
Download the necessary recovery image from the Recovery Images link.
Place the recovery image into the same folder as the extracted fastboot.
Enter the command “fastboot flash recovery recovery.img” with recovery.img replaced with the name of the recovery image.
Download any custom zip you wish to flash, for the Nexus One, you’ll use N1 Add-On.
Copy the zip to the root of your sdcard.
Reboot your device into recovery mode: Hold down trackball while pressing power (with phone powered off), once bootloader comes up, press power once (with BOOTLOADER highlighted), you should now see a screen labeled HBOOT, press the volume down rocker once to highlight RECOVERY and press power, your phone should reboot into recovery mode.
Select flash zip from sdcard and select the downloaded package.
Follow any on screen instructions to flash the zip.
After it is complete, reboot your device.

Congratulations, you’ve now got a rooted device. Please note that for step 6, the method of booting into the bootloader may differ from this but the process otherwise should stay the same. This method only works on Android devices that accept fastboot. If a recovery image is available from the recovery images link, you should be able to use this method.

Links :

Package hosting provided by Deviant Core Ltd. through the Open Hosting service. Deviant Core Ltd. was founded and is run by myself. Please visit our website to show support for both Androme and myself. Thanks for reading and hopefully you’ll enjoy your now rooted device!

- Aaron Weiss (Droid Rooting) and Brad Hoagland (Fastboot Rooting)

ShootMe is an application developed by Johan Cloetens allowing...

Mon, 29 Mar 2010 22:20:00 -0400

Runtime Dialogue (Can Be Hidden)

Screenshot with Dialogue Hidden

Screenshot with Dialogue Hidden

ShootMe is an application developed by Johan Cloetens allowing users to take screenshots of the device. This application provides functionality similar to the power+home button combination on the iPhone and iPod Touch. The application has an average rating of four stars on the Android Market. Basically, you launch up the application and a prompt appears over your home screen. It asks you to agree or decline to a Terms of Use that basically spells out an “available as is” status with no warranty and that any damage to your device is not the fault of the application developer. Pretty standard stuff, sadly you’ll have to agree to it every time you boot the application. After accepting it, the message will give instructions on how to take a screenshot. The two buttons for agree or disagree will change to quit and hide. Quit will quite obviously exit the application and hide will hide the prompt. To see the prompt again, simply try to launch the application again from the app drawer. Now, here comes the bad news. To take a screenshot through this, you have to give the phone a “good > 0.5 second shake” which I find quite obnoxious. Perhaps a better interface such as making the user press menu and home, or even the power and home buttons. Since the application already requires root, this really shouldn’t be a problem. Getting to that, the application requires root access. This means that in most cases, your warranty will be void. This is because on the phones by HTC, you root through fastboot which also unlocks the bootloader. Unlocking the bootloader voids your warranty. For Droid users, this is good news. You can run this application simply by installing an update package. I’ll write an article about rooting on the Droid soon, probably including a short bit about fastboot, and of course download links for the necessary programs and packages. Anyway, back to ShootMe. Although you may be wondering why this application requires root, the Androme Team has thought of some possible reasoning. Android as is does not include any API for screen grabs of any sort. To work around this, the application grabs the current frame from the frame buffer and saves it as an image. To do this, it needs root access. It’s as simple as that. So, this application has a nice way of grabbing images though it sadly requires root with a crude interface for actually taking the screenshot. All in all, I’d give this application 3.5 stars out of 5. The crude shaking method is annoying and becomes even worse when you’ve got your media volume off and you can’t tell if it’s taking the picture or not. The requirement of root access sucks but as far as I know is the only way to do it. Despite the average rating, I would recommend this application above other similar applications.

- Aaron Weiss

Download :

Androme is here! Androme will be providing all sorts of news,...

Mon, 29 Mar 2010 00:13:00 -0400

Androme is here! Androme will be providing all sorts of news, images, videos, and application reviews about Android. Application reviews will probably be once a week or around that and news will be posted as it rolls in. If it’s happening in the world of Android, you’ll probably find it here! If you’ve got a question about anything, you can ask it here. We’ll respond as soon as possible to questions. Expect to see some Android goodness very soon!

- Androme Team