June 2, 2014

9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Android’s Battery Life

Getting more out of less — that seems to be the way of the world right now. There’s only so much of anything, and we want to make it last, right? Can we get more life out of our phones so we don’t have to charge them as often? Can we make them run longer so we don’t get stuck without them?
The short answer is a resounding YES, but how much more we can get out of a phone battery is still up for discussion. Still, no matter how long your phone’s battery life lasts, there are ways that you can definitely make it last longer. Let’s take a look at some different ways.

Limit Apps Running in The Background

Any app that is running in the background is using processing power. That means it’s drawing electricity from the battery. Often, when we “close” an app we aren’t really exiting it and closing it out. It just sits there in the background, continuing to run, checking for signals, watching your compass, pinging servers, and goodness only knows what else. Android is pretty good at managing these apps and automatically closing out ones that aren’t used for an extended period of time. But you want total control.
active apps   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life
How do you kill all these power-sapping apps? You could use an app killer, but app killers are a bit controversial. If the app is something you actually use frequently, killing it all the time will consume more energy, because it takes more energy to start it from scratch, instead of just firing it up while it’s still the device’s RAM. So, let’s look at the built-in method instead.
On non-Samsung devices, simply tap the multitasking button and swipe the offending apps to the side. Some manufacturers will have a Kill All button of some kind along the bottom of the screen. For Samsung devices, the process is a bit different.
Press and hold the Home button on your Samsung Android smartphone — or if you’re on a newer device like the Galaxy S5, tap on the multitasking button where the menu button used to be.
You’ll see a list of apps, like in the picture above, and you’ll also see a button that looks like a pie-chart. Tap on the pie-chart. Now tap on the Active applications button at the top of the screen. There’s the list of all the active applications on your phone. To end any of them, just tap on the End button. A warning screen will ask you if you want to continue because you may cause errors. The odds of that happening are quite slim. It’s that easy!
active applications screen   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life
You may want to use an app like Tasker or Llama to turn apps off and on depending on the time of day or where you are. Yes, it means Tasker or Llama is always running, but if it can shut off two or more apps, that’s a net gain. For more information on Tasker, Erez has some things to say in, Tasker For Android: A Mobile App That Caters to Your Every Whim. Llama is a little less powerful, but still a very capable app. You can learn more about Llama from another article by Erez.
For those apps that you want to keep running in the background, make sure you update them when needed. Sometimes, these updates include improvements in energy usage, making them more efficient.

Don’t Phone Home

Apps like email and contacts are going to be the apps that you allow to continuously run. You can save energy by tweaking these apps, though. Go into your settings and change how often they sync with your email service. Instead of every 5 minutes, maybe you only really need it to sync every 30 minutes. Or change what is synced. When you do this, it’s like you’re eliminating surfing a number of websites in terms of power savings.
Tap on  Settings, then Accounts, then select the account you want to adjust. In this picture, we’re adjusting what Google services are synced. I don’t use Google+ on my smartphone, so why should I sync it?
sync settings   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life

Only Use What You Can Use

Major phone functions like WiFi, Bluetooth, and GPS all consume battery power when running. If you’re somewhere and there’s no WiFi, or you aren’t using Bluetooth or GPS, turn them off! These services are constantly polling for routers, nearby Bluetooth devices, and GPS satellites — whether these things are available or not. That uses power.
To shut these functions off, most Android skins allow you to just swipe from the top of your screen to show the all the functions like WiFi, NFC, and such. If the function is highlighted, that’s means it is on. Just tap it to turn it off. If your device has a Power Saving Mode, try turning that on! Newer devices likely have a Quick Settings panel adjustable by pressing the icon in the upper right corner of the notification bar. Shown below, it is three squares with an arrow-like icon for Samsung devices. If all else fails, head into the Settings menu.
turn off services   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life
Your phone is an even worse offender when you’re in an area with no cell service. (I think they call that the wilderness.) Your phone will constantly poll — or call out — to try to find a cell tower to which it can connect. This takes a tremendous amount of energy! If you want to test this, next time you go camping (or to most of rural Canada) go ahead and leave your phone on. On standby, I guarantee it will die in just a few hours, compared to maybe the day or two you get out of it in an urban area.
Apps that use Location Services can use a combination of GPS satellites and wireless networks to estimate your location. If you don’t need your apps to be location aware, you can shut the Location Services off for your Android. Go into Settings, More, and then Location Services. When you get there, uncheck the box that reads Access to my location.
location services   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life

Paint It Black

Your phone uses power to run programs and services, we’ve established that. An even bigger consumer of energy is the screen. Screens take light and light, even from a touchscreen, takes a lot of power. By adjusting the brightness of your screen to be just a few notches lower, you can add many precious minutes to your battery run time. Change the brightness by swiping down from the top of the screen to show the brightness bar. Uncheck the Auto box, and slide the slider to find your preferred balance of brightness and power saving.
screen brightness   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life
Another tip is to use a simple black screen for your lock and main screen. This works only for AMOLED (Active-Matrix Organic Light-Emitting Diode) screens, which many Android devices have. The way that the screens work is to light up different pixels that are one of 3 colours – red, green, and blue – to create the impression of a specific colour. When the device wants to show a certain shade of black, it simply does not light up any pixels. Less light equals less power. Here’s a close-up of an AMOLED screen:
close up of amoled screen   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life
You can download a black wallpaper I made for you here. To install it, make sure you move the file to a folder on your phone. Go into Settings, My Device, then Display. Tap on Wallpaper.  Here you have a choice of changing the Home screen, Lock screen or both. Tap on whatever suits you. Navigate to where you saved the black wallpaper and choose it.
change wallpaper to black   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life
Look at how much of your screen does not require lighting now!
On the same train of thought, lower the time for your screen to automatically turn off. If it’s set to 5 minutes, maybe set it to 1. That’s a dramatic saving right there.
It should be obvious, but it has to be said, live wallpapers and screen widgets suck energy like a leech. By constantly changing, they are constantly turning pixels on and off and using processing power. Don’t use them if you want to save power… just don’t.
Even worse is the flash or LED light on an Android phone. If at possible, don’t use it. You can literally watch your battery drain if you turn it on and leave it for any length of time.

Stop Motion

Another huge power sucker is the vibrating motor in Android smartphones. Electric motors are terribly inefficient with power usage, having to create motion against friction and also wasting some energy as heat. If you don’t need vibrations on, turn them off. This includes for notifications such as the phone ringing, and haptic feedback. Haptic feedback is when your Android twitches a little when you touch a button.
turn off vibrations   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life

Keep it Cool, or Warm

Did you know that temperature can affect the life of a battery? If you live in the northern climes, you know that. There’s something you can do about it. Don’t allow you battery to get too hot or too cold.
room temperature thermostat   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life
Being cold increases the battery’s internal resistance to electricity flow. This decreases the battery’s capacity or run time. Heat, while it decreases internal resistance, causes undue wear and tear on the battery. It’s like how heat breaks things down. Frequently being in warm temperatures will break down the battery and it will take less and less of a charge, decreasing the run time. Eventually the battery will just completely fail. Room temperature is an ideal operating temperature for batteries.

Bigger Is Better

There’s only so much energy you can squeeze out of the battery that came with your Android. If you can’t fit more gas in the tank, get a bigger tank! There are many types of battery boosting packs out there, some which also act as a phone case, so you don’t have to carry two devices around. With some of these boosters you could easily double or triple your runtime on a full charge.
qtech battery pack   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life

Fill’er Up Please

Whenever you can, plug your Android in to charge. That old story about how you should drain a battery completely before recharging it just isn’t true for the batteries you’ll find in modern electronics. You can top it up anytime and not damage your battery at all.
android charging in dock   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life
Although this doesn’t necessarily add battery life to your Android, it can easily make the difference between having a phone you can use and an expensive paperweight.

Turn the Phone Off

This is not the answer you are looking for. However, when your phone is completely off, the draw on the battery is very little. Infinitesimal even. Unless you’re expecting an emergency call in the middle of the night, turn it off when you go to bed. Or just turn it off whenever and enjoy the people that are right there with you.
power off android   9 Proven, Tested Tips To Extend Your Androids Battery Life

Keep Stretching Out That Battery Life

Applying any combination of these power saving measures is going to make a difference to how long your Android will run on battery power. Like driving a car, the more you learn about how it works, the better and more efficiently you can use it.
Do you have any battery saving tips for using an Android? Which of these tips do you get the most out of? Let’s us know, we’re all in this together.

Source: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/9-tips-extend-androids-battery-life/

June 1, 2014

How Do I Avoid Getting Tracked While I am Online?

Question: How Do I Avoid Getting Tracked While I am Online?
If you are in a position where your computer's address needs to be concealed from external eyes, then the Tor-Privoxy solution is one service that you may want to participate in.
Answer: There are two groups of choices for hiding your online identity.

1) Choices for P2P File Sharing: if your objective is to download/upload files anonymously, then there are services that will mask your computer's internet protocol (IP) address for a small fee, while still allowing you to use large bandwidth. The cost is usually a monthly fee or the purchase of a special software product.

These P2P-friendly services include Anonymizer.comThe Cloak, and A4Proxy. There is even a special non-profit project dedicated to P2P downloading anonymity: Mute Anonymity.

2) Choices for Web Surfing and Email Anonymity: If you are looking to avoid retribution for your political ideals, or wish to bypass the controls of an oppressive government in your country, there are free proxy and VPN servers available around the Web. But the most reliable anonymity choice is a special two-part freeware solution by the EFF to protect the democratic freedoms of private citizens. When combined, these two items "scramble" and conceal your online identity as a free public service. This anonymity platform is made up of Tor and Privoxy:

"Tor" and "Privoxy" is a combination "anonymizer" platform you install on your own machine.Tor is a special network of web servers run by the EFF and many volunteer server administrators. Privoxy is the software you need to connect to this Tor network.

The Tor Network and the Privoxy software work together to hide your computer's IP address. They accomplish this by bouncing your signal around several Internet servers called Tor "onion routers". Much in the same way Hollywood spy movies depict a telephone call being routed around dozens of false phone locations, so is your online identity when masked by these special Tor servers. Your true IP address is effectively hidden when you surf/email/download through the Tor onion network.

The Privoxy and Tor products are still imperfect, and they do not guarantee your anonymity. But as a start, Tor and Privoxy do reduce your exposure to surveillance, and make you 80% or more difficult to track.

Download and Configure Tor-Privoxy here.

Download Privoxy here.


If you are looking to add a layer of anonymity to your surfing/ emailing life, then try Tor-Privoxy. You will likely experience a somewhat-slower connection but your identity will be significantly more protected.

Remember: no masking of your address is 100% foolproof. And if you download/upload P2P files, remember that in any other country outside of Canada, downloading copyrighted movies and songs puts you at legal risk for copyright infringement prosecution.


P2P Downloaders, please note: the Tor Network was designed to protect private citizens personal privacy, especially in the important areas of Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Conscience, and Freedom of Democracy. Tor and Privoxy were not designed to help people download megabytes of movies and songs. Please do not abuse the Tor-Privoxy system by turning it into a P2P downloading avenue.
Furthermore, while the About Network actively promotes freedom of expression and the democratic use of the Internet, the About Network does not condone the illegal downloading of copyrighted files. If you are going to participate in P2P file sharing, please take the time to educate yourself about the legalities and consequences of such activity.
Favorite Articles at About:
P2P Downloading:


Warning to corporate/government users: if you hope to hide your unethical surfing habits from your own I.T. department, think again. The Tor Onion Network and Privoxy platform do NOT conceal you from internal surveillance at your office. 

Next: How to Install and Configure Tor-Privoxy

Related: Understanding P2P and its Legalities

"How Do I Install and Configure Tor-Privoxy Masking Software?"

Question: "How Do I Install and Configure Tor-Privoxy Masking Software?"
(continued from "How Do I Conceal My Online Identity?")

Here is how you install and configure your Tor privacy software for Windows.
Answer: As of February, 2010, the latest Tor release is version 1.3.1

1) For Windows Users:
  • Download the Tor Onion Network connection for Windows software here. It will come bundled with "Vidalia", "Privoxy", and "Torbutton" utilities, which are useful to many users. For the most part, you will want to use the version with the highest number (most recent).
  • Installation for Windows: the Tor programmers recommend that you follow specific instructions for installing your Tor on Windows computers. Those instructions are here.


2) For Mac Users::
  • Macintosh Tor software is available here.
  • Installation for Mac: instructions are here.


3) Connecting to Tor Network Using the Privoxy Web Proxy Platform:
  • FAQ's on Privoxy are here.
  • Privoxy User's Manual, version 3.0.3 is here.


Important Note: Tor-Privoxy is intended for legitimate privacy purposes only, not P2P downloading. The Tor Onion Network and the Privoxy connection platform are designed to protect legitimate web page browsing and emailing, particularly in the areas of social conscience, political free speech, messaging from oppressive countries and non-democratic countries, private blogging, and anonymous researching.

P2P Downloaders: There are other options for you to conceal yourself from MPAA and RIAA surveillance. There is Anonymizer, A4, Mute, and The Cloak. Please use these other solutions and not Tor-Privoxy for your P2P file sharing.

How to Stay Anonymous While Using Bittorrent

Most anti-piracy outfits and other organizations that track BitTorrent users rely on information they obtain from BitTorrent trackers. This is an easy and convenient technique to gather info, but also one that can be circumvented.

Let’s assume you want to download ‘Steal This Film’ without being spied on by third parties that monitor the download. Impossible? Not really…

Pretty much all BitTorrent clients allow users to remove the trackers from a torrent before downloading. In uTorrent you can do so by clicking the advanced button in the torrent opening dialog box. You’ll then see the trackers included in the torrent plus some other info.

If you want to go tracker-less you’ll have to delete the trackers and make sure that the DHT, Peer Exchange and Local Peer Discovery boxes (see screenshot) are checked otherwise you you won’t be able to download at all.

That’s it…

We have to note that it’s by no means impossible to track people who download without a tracker. It’s just harder to do so and thus far we haven’t seen evidence that DHT tracking is being used.





  • Stay Anonymous While Using Bittorrent Step 3 Version 2.jpg
    3
    Choose properties from the options list.





  • Stay Anonymous While Using Bittorrent Step 4 Version 2.jpg
    4
    Click on the General Tab.



  • Delete all the URLs in the form under Trackers (separate tiers with an empty line).Stay Anonymous While Using Bittorrent Step 5 Version 2.jpg


  • Source: http://www.wikihow.com/Stay-Anonymous-While-Using-Bittorrent