XDA Android

Friday, June 1, 2018

Samsung Galaxy Note 9 reportedly launching in August with upgraded camera

Samsung announced the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ earlier this year, which means the next major flagship will be the Samsung Galaxy Note 9. Samsung traditionally launches the new Note phones in late Summer/early Fall. A report from Bloomberg claims the Galaxy Note 9 will be announced at an "Unpacked" event on August 9th.

Bloomberg doesn't get into specifics, but they do say the device will include an upgraded Qualcomm processor and an upgraded camera. We're probably looking at the Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 and the camera from the Galaxy S9. Not exactly mind-blowing information, but the event date is still important. Surprisingly, there haven't been many rumors about specs for the Note 9. The last bit of information we covered was about Bixby 2.0 launching on the device.

The report doesn't say anything about the in-display fingerprint scanner. That has been a topic of much discussion for the last several Samsung flagship phones. First, they ran out of time with the Galaxy S8. It missed the Galaxy S9 as well. Then a report claimed it would be absent from the Note 9, but that was quickly flipped. So who knows what will happen with the Note 9. With devices like the Xiaomi Mi 8 launching with in-display fingerprint sensors, it seems inevitable that Samsung will figure it out.

There's still not a lot to go on, but at least we have a date to mark on the calendar. The event will take place on August 9th and we can expect the device to be released by the end of the month. The report did say that plans could still shift, so these dates may change.

Source: Bloomberg

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The Lenovo Yoga Book may be getting a successor

In 2016, Lenovo launched a convertible laptop called the Yoga Book. The device was more than your typical convertible laptop. It had a completely flat touch-sensitive "keyboard" dubbed the "Create Pad." You could type on the virtual keyboard and draw with a stylus. Lenovo offered the Yoga Book is both Android and Windows 10 flavors. Now, it looks like the Yoga Book 2 is in the works.

Regulatory filling from the Bluetooth SIG website mention two new Lenovo devices: Lenovo Pen Pro and YogaBook2 Pro. That's really all we know at this point. Screen size, operating system, chipset, and everything else is still unknown. The 2016 model was available with Android and Windows, but Lenovo was planning to release a Chrome OS version. That never happened, unfortunately.

The original Yoga Book had a 10-inch touchscreen display, Intel Atom processor, and 4GB of RAM. Those specs would obviously be upgraded, but we'd expect the overall design to be similar. 2018 would be a perfect time to announce a Chrome OS Yoga Book as we've seen the platform really take off with the addition of Android apps. Plenty of Chromebooks have touchscreens and stylus' these days.

The original Yoga Book cost $500 for the Android version and $650 for Windows 10. Lenovo also released a more budget-friendly version with downgraded specs for $299. Those prices still seem pretty reasonable for 2018, so we'd expect similar pricing. Would you be interested in a Lenovo Yoga Book 2? What operating system would you want on it?

Source: TabletMonkeys

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Huawei announces the EROFS Linux file system intended for Android devices

A file system is a technology that outlines how data is stored and retrieved. There are many different kinds of file systems, each with their own benefits, to pick from. You've probably heard of file systems like exFAT, F2FS, ext4. Choosing one file system over another can have profound impacts on storage performance and stability, so the decision isn't taken lightly by device makers. Most device makers settle with the popular, well-tested file systems like ext4, but that doesn't mean companies aren't willing to experiment with alternatives. That's exactly what Huawei is doing with an open-source Linux file-system called EROFS, which is intended to be used on Android devices at some point.

The announcement was made by Huawei engineer Gao Xiang. EROFS is short for "Extendable Read-Only File System." EROFS, which is still at a very early stage of development, features an improved compression mode which pursues a different design approach than other file systems, focusing mostly on performance and speed. Huawei engineers promise that EROFS will be offering improved disk performance and speeds when compared to other read-only file systems while still saving up on disk space. The compression numbers disclosed during the announcement for both server hardware and a Kirin 970 processor sound very promising. Sadly, not a lot of information has been disclosed due to its development status.

EROFS is still pretty much a work-in-progress. The end goal is to include it in Android devices, but it will probably be several months, if not more until Huawei even considers the inclusion of the file system into the mainline Linux kernel. It's quite likely we'll be seeing that number increased to years if we talk about the inclusion of it in actual, consumer Android devices. We've seen OEMs experiment with, and subsequently abandon, F2FS on their devices, so don't be surprised if EROFS adoption never actually happens. If you want to have a look at the current code, you can check it out on the kernel mailing list here.

Via: Phoronix

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Xiaomi Mi 8 and Alcatel 1X forums are now open

Earlier this week, we saw a couple of interesting devices get announced. The Xiaomi Mi 8 is Xiaomi's newest flagship phone, bringing a screen notch with infrared face scanning hardware, similar to what we saw in the iPhone X, to their current formula. The device also has as an in-display fingerprint scanner on the higher-end Explorer edition and MIUI 10 out of the box. And then we have the Alcatel 1X, Alcatel's take on Google's lightweight Android Go operating system.

If you get your hands on either of those devices and you're interested in modding, the official XDA forums for the Mi 8 and the Alcatel 1X are now open to discussion and contributions. Hop to our forums and get the best out of your device now!

Xiaomi Mi 8 Forums Alcatel 1X Forums

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Battery Charging Animation shows custom animations while your Android device charges

Animations are becoming more and more popular these days on Android. We have devices with hardware now that is powerful enough to handle them at a smooth 60 frames per second. So XDA Junior Member neelam.bhanu has whipped together an application called "Battery Charging Animation" that shows custom charging animation on the screen with your current battery percentage. Along with the eye-catching animation indicator that shows when your device is charging, you can also create multiple battery alarms for different battery levels as a way to keep you informed.

The developer does want you to know that task killer and RAM cleaner applications can make this application's service stop, so you will want to add it to a whitelist if you want it to continue running in the background.

Battery Charging Animation Features

Cool battery charging animations.
Full control over charging animation size, position and transparency level
Battery percentage text with charging animations
Charging indicator widget
Keep battery health in good condition.
Save mobile phone battery from being overcharged and being dead.
Charge Alarm notify you with alarm and vibration when your mobile phone battery fully charged or goes beyond or below the level you specified.

Check out Battery Charging Animation in our Apps and Games forum

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Floating Volume lets you quickly adjust your Android’s volume levels on any screen

It can be very important for some people to have quick access to all of the different volume sliders that Android has to offer at the same time. Stock Android tries to give the best of both worlds by letting you tap a down arrow after you press a volume button, but that requires an extra step, and in some instances just isn't quick enough. So XDA Senior Member Adam Myczkowski has put together an application called "Floating Volume" that takes the idea of floating heads for messages and uses it as a way to quickly access all three of your volume sliders.

Floating Volume is developed to work on Android devices running Lollipop or higher. It places a floating music note on your screen when the service has been activated. Tap on that music note and you'll see your volume sliders appear along with a way to quickly mute the device. You'll find the XDA Labs link for the application down below, but the project is also up on GitHub right here.

The app was not found in the store.

Go to store Google websearch

Check out Floating Volume in our Apps and Games forum

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Nokia Camera with Pro Camera mode has been ported to other devices

Most people will agree that Nokia's Lumia smartphones were well-known for their picture quality. This is why the company has made a lot of headlines lately with the introduction of Pro Mode in their Nokia Camera application. This new update was released for the Nokia 7 and then again most recently for the Nokia 8. Thanks to the dedicated developer community, you don't have to own a Nokia smartphone to take advantage of this new camera feature. If your smartphone supports the Level 3 Camera2 API then you can use the latest port of the Nokia Camera with Pro Mode enabled.

Not many people automatically know if their device supports the Camera2 API out of the box. I know there are some Xiaomi devices out there that don't include support for it on MIUI and there are likely a number of other modern Android devices that don't as well. So while you can assume that most new smartphones will support it, that isn't always the case. This is where the Camera2 API Probe application comes into play. The application simply shows if your device supports the Camera2 API and at which level.

As long as your Android device supports the Level 3 Camera2 API, you can take full advantage of this recent port of the Nokia Camera application. This is thanks to the work from XDA Recognized and Social Contributor linuxct and their port of version 8.0260.50 of the Nokia Camera. Ports of applications don't always work 100% as intended and that is the case with this release of the Nokia Camera. The developer is aware that it will sometimes crash on OnePlus devices and the Shutter Speed control doesn't have any visual effect on the viewfinder.

The Shutter Speed control will produce the desired effect on the photograph you take, you just won't get any visual feedback in the viewfinder when changing this setting.

Check out this port in our Apps and Games forum

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