Nice indeed ! Thanks @marcdw.
I know that you like to use App Manager. So what do you think about this one: Inure App Manager (Trial) | F-Droid - Free and Open Source Android App Repository ?
Havenāt tried it yet. When I first saw it I wasnāt too interested. Beta app that wasnāt on par, feature-wise, and cost money. Lumped it between App Manager and Advanced Tools Pro.
Now it is time I give it a go. Thanks for the reminder.
Oh, the money part is not a problem. I donate monthly to various devs/apps. Just initially thought it was much for a new (unfinished?) app.
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I have just bought AirMusic - https://www.airmusic.app/
I have Sonos speakers, and as well as using the Sonos app, was using AirPlay on my Apple devices(sorry - I still have some, so still using for audio, video and browsing). Airplay, has been getting very flakey for me lately, and trying to play media outside of the Sonos app preferred media was getting to be a PIA.
This app works extremely well (but not perfect). You can select multiple sets of speakers to play and it works, but you canāt control their volume as one, you need to manually adjust each set. I found a work around, add one set of speakers via this app, then add additional speaker sets to that set, using the Sonos app. Volume of all selected speakers is then controllable via your phone/tablet buttons, on the app itself or via a remote that controls Sonos devices (Symfonisk remote).
Sometimes the app doesnāt connect to the speakers, just go into your phone/tablet settings- Apps and notifications - select AirMusic and Force stop. When you reopen, app works well.
The only improvement I would like to see, would be a button to set linked speaker sets to the same volume.
This developer will allow you to buy direct, currently you pay via PayPal and then supply the Mac address of your device to him. He is looking for an easier method. But in the meantime, its a great app to have.
havenāt seen it linked yet in this forum
https://github.com/ImranR98/Obtainium
Obtainium allows you to install and update Open-Source Apps directly from their releases pages, and receive notifications when new releases are made available
If you want to keep track of releases at different sources. For me primarily Github release pages to use beta releases.
There is no category Appstore interface with icons yet that youād be used to. Goto āAdd App ā (second field) Search ā enter app titleā, maybe add āandroidā if you get too many results. Optionally select āInclude prereleasesā. Once done, you can export the Apps you track as json and reimport later.
PocketCasts that got open sourced late 2022 is a good example to get updates for this way. Itās not in F-Droid nor at Izzy.
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One great app Iāve recently discovered is NeoBackup (got it on F-Droid). As a 10+ years Titanium Backup user and believer, I got frustrated that many backed up apps couldnāt be restored. Iām not an expert Android user, but Iāve read that since A11 it has to do with some splitting of files.
TB want updated since 2019 I believe and canāt handle this. Now, with Neo I can make scheduled backups just as TB, and reinstall apps also on other devices including all data etc.
Note that there will always be apps were it doesnāt work die to security reasons (for example banking apps). Neo is a bit less intuitive to my opinion, but, hey, it works!
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Nice, but Neo Backup require root permission.
Not an expert here: may be that all the apps under ābackupā category require rootās permissions
Definitely if you want to backup app data. But Iād never be without root as long as possible. No adds on my phone, even more privacy due to TrackerControl and XPrivacyLua, and be the boss over my device. It just adds a ton of options.
Personal Database for Android
I would like to recommend āEasy Databaseā to all those who have an affinity for databases,
even if the interest for personal databases on Android does not seem very big.
I have been using āEasy Databaseā for quite some time. The APP is very flexible configurable and
usable for many requirements, just due to availability of table join. But database knowledge
is absolutely necessary.
The APP works with or without server/ftp connection. In the second case completely offline without any
dependencies. Nevertheless the data stock is very easy to refresh via CSV tables, by attention of several conditions.
Unfortunately, the APP is officially available via PlayStore, but has, as far as I can recognize,
otherwise no google dependencies.
There is an online description, but it only provides a structural explanation.
https://sites.google.com/view/easy-database-app-en/home
The interface may not suit everyoneās taste, but it serves its purpose.
If you have the experience, you shouldnāt have a big problem with generating the corresponding
structure for filling with data later.
TIP: for offline operation most data fields can be left in text format.
However, adjustments are possible afterwards (i.e. fields for files or calculation, ā¦).
My goal is to have my complete music archive constantly available for reference.
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Iām a fan of structured data too! Easy Database has good management functions, but data-entry could be quicker. Memento Database is a solid commercial product and beginner friendly with its templates, but you also get that little bit of lock-in. It does alot though. MobiDB is pretty similar, but falls short in direct comparison.
Yeah, but what data do you hack in there? Iām skeptic, I would not have mass data on a mobile phone. The day you lose or drop it is never far. And what then? - I have also structured data, everyday, continuously, but I use my phone only for mobile input. The data are then sent to a MySQL database on a PC.
@irrlicht the mentioned Apps offer backup / sync. I didnāt settle on one of them. I use it for remembering inventory or to do structured Note taking, think Zettelkasten. Airtable clones are interesting but heavyweight, letās see, will start a thread if I find something good and relevant for Android users.
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The following is not an app but an Xposed module (not made clear in their description).
Starting several Android versions back Settings sections have an Advanced drop-down that has to be tapped to reveal more options.
This module gets rid of that, exposing all settings.
Originally discovered via the IzzyOnDroid F-Droid repo.
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Just to mention: In /e/OS S (Android 12) this is no longer the case.
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Ah, cool. I wasnāt on A12 long enough to notice.
Just found this one:
Sapio on F-Droid:
Sapio is the anagram of Open Source API.
Sapio aims to provide an estimation of how Google-dependent an Android application is, informing the community of how it behaves on bare Android Open Source Project (AOSP), coupled or not with microG.
Evaluations in Sapio are given to the community by the community.
Here the gitHub page
Itās seems like Plexus app or complementary.
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This isnāt recent and it is pretty well known but. rethinkdns. this is pretty much the only firewall application that solved my issue of having to choose between it or something to hide my ip with cause it allows for easy orbot setup. but aside from that the enhanced control it gives over your apps connections and the wide variatey of ads, tracking and malicious domain blocklists makes it a really strong and compatible privacy tool. and also itās designed in a way where it has a decent amount of options for power users while having a user interface user friendly enough to where itās not too hard for any person to understand
So in short i think itās a gem due to how powerful it is while being able to appeal to both experienced and inexperienced users
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@Nicolas_Sas Sapio is a good find, havenāt seen this yet - jonathanklee, creator of Sapio, develops for microg and /e/ - the App takes user submissions from and to its own API, not from Plexus (you didnāt imply, just to clarify). Users can contribute through the interface after selecting which App they want to give feedback on. Good proof of concept.
Plexus sources data from a csv (now json) that you could contribute to through git. They want to move to an API too. They have a bit different test criteria / scores. Putting user feedback on aosp/microg compatability into an App store client would be pretty great.
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Hi,
Just curious, have you tried NetGuard (which probably inspired RethinkDNS on some aspects)?
I hate to say it, but Iām thinking of stopping Netguard and switching to RDNS due in large part to Marcel Bokhorst stopping development of the application 
(last version 2.303 added on 2022-11-12)
Donāt make me say what I didnāt say, Netguard does the job but, being on standby and comparing with RDNS and the number of updates (last version 054a (27) added on 2023-03-20) and the involvement of the developers on this app I now think that RDNS surpasses Netguard on many aspects.
I had made donation for the Pro version of NG and thatās why I hesitate to switch to RDNS. I still secretly hope that Marcel will take over this by far essential applicationā¦
What do you think about it?
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I have actually tried netguard before. I definitely would say itās still pretty good but i can understand the concern of updates.
Now as for rethinkdns yes it pretty much has nearly every feature that netguard has and does while having more to offer. Such as instead of blocking an app entirely you can opt to only block specific connections that it makes or the other way around where everything is blocked by default and you pick which connections to allow.
Sadly if you want to use any blocklists they donāt allow imports of any kind right now and you have to deal with the preset list. the good thing is that the preset list of blocklists is pretty good and plentiful of lists.
You can also use orbot as a proxy to hide your ip and itās really easy to set it up. only catch is that itās tied to the dns mode so if you ever want to turn off or pause the dns your connections will no longer be routed through orbot until the dns mode is back on. also just fyi the exclude option excludes the whole app from rethinkdns which can be used to stop certain apps from using orbot.
I was just listing some of the big features in more detail. There are smaller features too
But hereās what i say overall. iād say before making the switch just try rethinkdns out first. Cause like with every app there are some tradeoffs, the main one i can think of at this moment is that rethinkdns is considerably more buggy in the work profile which may never be fixed.
So donāt uninstall netguard yet, see if rethinkdns works good enough for you and you like it
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This. ā¦
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