Android maintenance apps and tips?

[Perd Hapley]

I'm setting up a new Android phone, and just wondering what security programs folks are using, and also wondering whether apps like CCleaner are recommended for Android. I've never used CCleaner on my previous Android phones. Then again, they also tended to get buggier and buggier as I used them, so...

I thought encryption sounded like a cool idea, but I gather it's not really worth it for most of us.

The phone is a Droid Mini.

[AJ Dual]

CCleaner for Android is fine.

None of them are really critical. Cleaning your cache is pretty easy from the control panel items for programs or storage. The benefit of the apps is they clean a few other kinds of orphans that the basic cache wipe doesn't get, but it's generally the "long tail" of wasted space etc.

[RevDisk]

There's only one very good 'cleaner' program. "Wipe and reload". Every year or two, wipe your device (whether Android, PC, Linux, whatever) and restart from scratch. With modern stuff, it's dead simple and virtually always works fine. Various apps for Android (or iOS or Windows or any other OS ever written) may or may not work. May make things better, may make things worse. Better than a coin toss, but not by much in my opinion. Wipe or 'format', and restart from scratch? 99.999% of the time works perfectly.

Apps like CCleaner do offer one absolute advance, placebo effect. They are almost the TSA of the electronic world. 


Some useful security related apps:

KeePass2Android - probably most useful app I've ever used in my life. Plays perfectly with desktop KeePass2 files.
Wifi Analyzer - Useful for seeing what wifi networks are around you and at what strength
KeySync - PGP/GPG key sync utility
Android Privacy Guard - GPG client
CSipSimple - SIP client that can handle encrypted calls (aka a softphone)
Signal - Used to be called Redphone, does secure calls and text
Crypt4All - AES utility
Wolfram Alpha - Of course.
K-9 Mail - Can handle secure email
Any voice recorder widget
TagMe - second best geotag software I've used. Footprints by HTC is much better but only comes with HTC phones, I miss the heck out of it.
Osmand - Offline map utility
Torque - Combine with a cheap $20 Bluetooth OBDII dongle, all kinds of useful telemetry from your car

ANYTHING by Guardian Project
https://guardianproject.info/apps/
Orbot - Tor proxy for your phone
ChatSecure - XMPP chat standard
Orweb - secure web browser
Pixelknot - Stenography app

If you want to install an AV on your phone, here's some reviews:
https://www.av-test.org/en/antivirus/mobile-devices/android/january-2016/

The testing is not perfect, but it's pretty good. AVs get better or worse. And the free ones are worth as much or more than what you pay for them. But paid ones aren't always worth their cost.

[lee n. field]

There's only one very good 'cleaner' program. "Wipe and reload". Every year or two, wipe your device (whether Android, PC, Linux, whatever) and restart from scratch. With modern stuff, it's dead simple and virtually always works fine. Various apps for Android (or iOS or Windows or any other OS ever written) may or may not work. May make things better, may make things worse. Better than a coin toss, but not by much in my opinion. Wipe or 'format', and restart from scratch? 99.999% of the time works perfectly.

I second.

My Asus Memopad has an known problem that develops with DHCP.  The first time it cropped up I spend a bunch of time trying to finesse it.  It happened again Sunday.  Backup, factory reset, restore all apps, copy back in pics&stuff, all in about 45 minutes.

Some useful security related apps:

KeePass2Android - probably most useful app I've ever used in my life. Plays perfectly with desktop KeePass2 files.
Wifi Analyzer - Useful for seeing what wifi networks are around you and at what strength
KeySync - PGP/GPG key sync utility
Android Privacy Guard - GPG client
CSipSimple - SIP client that can handle encrypted calls (aka a softphone)
Signal - Used to be called Redphone, does secure calls and text
Crypt4All - AES utility
Wolfram Alpha - Of course.
K-9 Mail - Can handle secure email
Any voice recorder widget
TagMe - second best geotag software I've used. Footprints by HTC is much better but only comes with HTC phones, I miss the heck out of it.
Osmand - Offline map utility
Torque - Combine with a cheap $20 Bluetooth OBDII dongle, all kinds of useful telemetry from your car

ANYTHING by Guardian Project
https://guardianproject.info/apps/
Orbot - Tor proxy for your phone
ChatSecure - XMPP chat standard
Orweb - secure web browser
Pixelknot - Stenography app

If you want to install an AV on your phone, here's some reviews:
https://www.av-test.org/en/antivirus/mobile-devices/android/january-2016/

The testing is not perfect, but it's pretty good. AVs get better or worse. And the free ones are worth as much or more than what you pay for them. But paid ones aren't always worth their cost.

noted

[zxcvbob]

Was gonna start a new thread, but this one is close enough. 

Any way to block calls from an entire area code on an LG android phone?  (a really cheap one)  I can't find one in any of the settings.  I'm getting multiple calls a day from 612, and they never leave a message.  If I answer it, it's either a political pollster or a "congratulations you just won" scam.  The actual number seems somewhat random, there's only been one repeat.  I don't know anyone in Minneapolis.

[bedlamite]

Was gonna start a new thread, but this one is close enough. 

Any way to block calls from an entire area code on an LG android phone?  (a really cheap one)  I can't find one in any of the settings.  I'm getting multiple calls a day from 612, and they never leave a message.  If I answer it, it's either a political pollster or a "congratulations you just won" scam.  The actual number seems somewhat random, there's only been one repeat.  I don't know anyone in Minneapolis.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GleEIvjA1-M

This works on my LG Volt

[zxcvbob]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GleEIvjA1-M

This works on my LG Volt

Thanks!  My phone had that too, I just couldn't find it.

[K Frame]

"There's only one very good 'cleaner' program. "Wipe and reload"."

Bull scheizen.

Det Cord.

Obviously.

[Perd Hapley]

There's only one very good 'cleaner' program. "Wipe and reload". Every year or two, wipe your device (whether Android, PC, Linux, whatever) and restart from scratch. With modern stuff, it's dead simple and virtually always works fine. Various apps for Android (or iOS or Windows or any other OS ever written) may or may not work. May make things better, may make things worse. Better than a coin toss, but not by much in my opinion. Wipe or 'format', and restart from scratch? 99.999% of the time works perfectly.

I'm with you on that. I just haven't learned how to do that with phones. Does that require the phone to be rooted/unlocked?

[mtnbkr]

I'm with you on that. I just haven't learned how to do that with phones. Does that require the phone to be rooted/unlocked?

No, there's a reset function on every phone I've used that will wipe all data from the phone, resetting it to factory default (but still tied to your number).

Chris

[RevDisk]

Oh, someone just recommended me two good apps. Both work offline, which is excellent

ERG 2012 - HAZMAT identification, and a host of other transport related stuff
WISER - Ton of medical, chemical, etc info. Has a nifty diagnostic tool for identifying chemical exposure

[K Frame]

The app I find to be the most useful is Out of Milk, a shopping list app.

You can set it up for various stores, have standing "pantry" lists, etc. VERY useful.

[Phyphor]

For phone maintenance, I'd suggest appmgr to help you move all possible apps from the phone's internal storage out to the SD.

You do NOT want to allow internal storage to become too full.

[Perd Hapley]

For phone maintenance, I'd suggest appmgr to help you move all possible apps from the phone's internal storage out to the SD.

You do NOT want to allow internal storage to become too full.

Mine has only internal: ~ 11GB.

[lee n. field]

Mine has only internal: ~ 11GB.

no slot for a microSD?

[K Frame]

For phone maintenance, I'd suggest appmgr to help you move all possible apps from the phone's internal storage out to the SD.

You do NOT want to allow internal storage to become too full.

Tell me about it. I've had that happen a number of times and it's REALLY annoying.

[K Frame]

Mine has only internal: ~ 11GB.

What phone do you have? Most Androids have a place for a supplemental SD card...

[Ben]

I didn't think there were any Android phones anymore that don't have a MicroSD slot.

Regarding moving apps to the SD card, that's something I do, but discovered something a while back: some apps, when they update, reinstall themselves in onboard memory. Netflix and Firefox are a couple of examples. I find I have to go back through apps every couple of months and move apps back to the SD card.

[mtnbkr]

What phone do you have? Most Androids have a place for a supplemental SD card...

I didn't think there were any Android phones anymore that don't have a MicroSD slot.

The Motorolla Droid Mini does not (has 2gig RAM and 16gb storage).  What do you expect for $108 MSRP.

FWIW, they seem to be decent devices otherwise.  I'm looking at getting them for everyone on my plan as they're a whopping $8 after our $100 upgrade promotion (upgrading from "dumbphones" and will be the first smartphone for most of the folks getting them).

Chris

[Ben]

The Motorolla Droid Mini does not (has 2gig RAM and 16gb storage).  What do you expect for $108 MSRP.

FWIW, they seem to be decent devices otherwise.  I'm looking at getting them for everyone on my plan as they're a whopping $8 after our $100 upgrade promotion (upgrading from "dumbphones" and will be the first smartphone for most of the folks getting them).

Chris

Hey, thread drift to a previous discussion -- are you keeping Verizon, or did you find a better deal?

[mtnbkr]

Sticking with VZ.  Never found anything better that offered equal service.  Plus, with the new plans, I was able to cut about $20/month from our bill and increase the data allowance.

Chris

[K Frame]

My first smartphone was a Droid X2. I liked it at first, but it kept getting slower and slower and slower, and nothing, not even full wipes, ever cured that. Some days it would take, literally, 3 to 5 minutes from the time I pushed the phone icon to where it would pop up and I could dial.

I did my two years and went to a Samsung S4 Galaxy, which after two years I still LOVE.

[Ben]

My first smartphone was a Droid X2. I liked it at first, but it kept getting slower and slower and slower, and nothing, not even full wipes, ever cured that. Some days it would take, literally, 3 to 5 minutes from the time I pushed the phone icon to where it would pop up and I could dial.

I did my two years and went to a Samsung S4 Galaxy, which after two years I still LOVE.

I firmly believe that all providers have inserted a virus in all phones that causes them to start getting crappy three months before your contract is up. 

[K Frame]

I firmly believe that all providers have inserted a virus in all phones that causes them to start getting crappy three months before your contract is up. 

My contract is up on my Samsung in about 15 days, and it's still working great.

The Droid started stinking at about month 6, and kept getting more and more annoying.

[Phyphor]

Still wondering what Fisty's got for a phone.... That would suck if it was incapable of accepting a SDCard...