Tag Archives: app

Override DNS for KitKat – first release

Android, Override DNS, Programming, , , ,

Override DNS for KitKat has been released

Override DNS icon

Override DNS is the easiest way to force your rooted phone to use custom nameservers on mobile networks.

Many things dealing with name resolution have changed in Android 4.4 KitKat and so all the current Play Store apps stopped working.

The problem I found with this release of Android (4.4) is that, apparently for caching reasons, the system behaviour has been changed to redirect all DNS queries to a system daemon called netd (here’s a link to a presentation related to Android networking before 4.4 which, however, covers part of this topics).

The getprop/setprop method used by all the DNS changer apps does not work anymore. Those values, when changed, get simply ignored by the netd daemon.

It’s necessary to communicate directly to the daemon via the /dev/socket/netd socket.

The app automatically guesses the network device name and applies the right commands each time a mobile network gets activated.

Postphone v1.1.0

Android, Featured, Programming, , , ,

There’s a new version of Postphone. Huge list of things, here’s the full changelog:

    Improvements:
      New feat Google Android Backup Service (settings and database)
      Issue-001 now app keeps alarms upon reboot
      Hotfix-002 now when you receive a call with unknown Caller ID, 
           no popup is shown
    
    Application workflow:
      You must check or dismiss notification to remove alarm
    
    Code:
      Min SDK change from 7 to 8 (drop support for Eclair)
      DatabaseHelper class replaces DBAdapter
      Allow to upgrade from db v0 to db v1 and allow future upgrades
      Remove old code doTheVibration() and playSound()
      File rename popupcallback => popupcallback.xml
      Fix some typos
      Lower the number of events logged
    
    Developer side:
      New utility emulate-reboot
      New utility insert-fake-passed-calls with support for TZ
      New utilities for backup
      Change tmp path in sqlite-postphone-db utility
      Publish notes
      Backup notes
    
    Debug menu:
      Is disabled by default
      Can now be enabled via multiple taps on version name
      New menu entry "clear alarms table"
      New menu entry "test PopUpAfterCall"
    
    Design and blog:
      Blog featured banner
      Official logo.png
Postphone icon

Postphone Android App 1.0 release

Android, Programming, ,

Today version 1.0 of Postphone has been released. Nerver forget to call back again!

You can find the promotional page here.

Technically speaking:

  • it has been fully developed under Ubuntu 12.04 64bit
  • it has been written entirely using vim
  • everything has been tracked by git
  • the icon has been edited using SketchUp under wine
  • main and other icons, banners and featured images has been edited with Gimp
  • beta devices were all running CyanogenMod

 

After-root Android tip #2: AdFree

Android, , , ,

This is part of a series of posts about useful apps to use on a rooted Android device.

AdFree
AdFree removes most ads in the browser and other apps. It does this by nullifying requests to known host names in the system hosts file.

Tested version: 0.7.7

What problem does it solve?
Do you hate advertisement as I do? Get rid of it!
Technically speaking your hosts file will be modified to make apps requests to ad servers go to null pages.

The Good

  • speed up browsing (less data to load)
  • save some bandwidth
  • save you from unwanted flashing banners
  • prevent accidental touch on ads

The Bad and the Ugly

  • many free apps programmers live with ads, so make your choice
  • some apps will recognize the hack and they will refuse to start
  • you have to start the app to check for updates
  • you’ll find some black area in apps where there would have been ads
  • sometimes in apps, you’ll get spinning gif waiting for banners