Android users gather here for a few tips you can adopt in order to get the best out of your Smartphone. Apple users can go along with their usual business we shall call them later.
Let’s dive straight into it.
Track data usage
Smartphones are known to be big data consumers and our telecom companies are known to charge us the highest rates on data in the region. In order to use your Pakalast data bundle all through the 24 hours or the duration of your subscription time, you need to track your data usage.
Android phones come with a pre-installed option to set a data limit. Go to your network settings and you will find it. Alternatively, disable background data for apps you don’t use, same way you switch off lights in a room you are leaving.
Set and clear default apps
You have probably seen the notification “Open with..” when trying to open a file downloaded from the internet like photos, music, videos, and documents. The prompt further asks whether you want to use that app as the default app for opening such files. It’s better to choose “Always” to that prompt, such that you don’t have to be asked the same question every other time. It’s kind of annoying.
In case you have installed another app you want to use instead of the one you set as the default, go to your settings, and select Apps. You will see those that are set as defaults and just clear them. The next time you open a file, it will ask you to set a default app and you can select the newly installed app. Easy peazy.
Battery life
Battery life makes or breaks a phone, literally. In the past, Android phones were known to have weak batteries, which might have influenced the invention of power banks. That seems to be a thing of the past now that batteries can have up to 5000mAh.
That’s pretty good but you can save it further by turning off data, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth whenever you are not using them. Android phones running versions 6.0 and later come with a battery management app which can be accessed in the drag-down shortcuts menu, or through the main Apps menu. Make use of that to save your battery, save energy, save the world.
Storage
If you told computer users in the 50’s operating at 5MB of storage that in 2019 a person running on 64GB of phone storage would run out of space, they would probably laugh their lungs out and take you to Butabika for mental checkup.
Fast forward to 2019, millions of apps, HD videos and audios, crystal clear photos are all over and we are running out of space. Consider moving your files to the cloud, use an external memory card, delete APK files after installing apps, delete unused apps, and clear cache memory. You’ll have more space to work with.
Tethering
A lot of you don’t know that your Smartphone is a whole hotspot device. You can use it to provide wireless internet to over 8 other devices and the quality of connection is not affected. So you can be liking Facebook posts from People Power fans while your friend is double-tapping pics of his crush on Instagram and another is arguing about who is better between Messi and Ronaldo on Twitter, all connected on your phone internet. Cool huh?
Go to settings, network and connection, Hotspot and Tethering. Set it up and choose a password for security.
Security
In the event that you lose your phone or it gets stolen along Mutaasa Kafeero and Kikuubo, you can have people access your sensitive information and use it to hurt you. That information can be as less important as your bank PIN, or as important as nudes. You don’t want any of that to be released to the public!
Set up a strong PIN for security. Use third party Anti-theft apps like Avast that can even help you track and wipe everything on your phone remotely. Google has Google Protect that scans your apps so you don’t install spy or malware. Security is key, people.
Autocorrect, typing
Ever since phones introduced autocorrect and predictive typing, typing speed increased and spelling mistakes gradually decreased. Fine-tune your phone’s text capabilities by adding vernacular words to your dictionary so your phone doesn’t have to struggle to autocorrect them, sometimes embarrassingly.
As we wait for Windows to intoduce predictive typing to ease our work, make use of the above tips for your Android tips.
Changing the look
Android is a customisable operating system so you can literally change its skin, without even having to root it first. You can download a launcher, which can change the look of your display, the homescreen, and manage apps.