Mobile

A slew of free texting apps are out there right now, and they have the potential to cut your phone bill by enabling you to bypass your phone carrier's SMS functions. These third-party solutions take advantage of data networks, including the Internet, to send and receive texts, and they let you text ...

Of Facebook's 800 million active users, more than 350 million of them currently access Facebook through mobile devices, according to the company. October saw Facebook's updated Messenger app, labeled 1.5, rolling out to iOS, Android and BlackBerry with updated features, including the ability to see ...

Verizon Wireless has disabled the bootloader unlock feature in the software on the Droid Razr, the Android smartphone that Motorola unveiled last week. Motorola had shipped the Droid Razr with a bootloader that can be unlocked and relocked, company spokesperson Becki Leonard told LinuxInsider. "Whet...

Anyone who's gone through the painful task of buying a new smartphone knows that the process of re-installing apps and getting the phone configured just-so is a major job. While the Android Market does keep a list of your apps in its library, automatic syncing is hit-or-miss. You can manually send e...

Google unveiled Android 4.0, aka "Ice Cream Sandwich," in Hong Kong on Wednesday. The presentation was accompanied by Samsung's announcement of the Galaxy Nexus, the first smartphone running Ice Cream Sandwich. Ice Cream Sandwich is a redesign of the Android OS. It has a highly visual interface, a f...

Quanta Computer has agreed to pay Microsoft a license fee for devices that run Google Android or Chrome. It is the latest deal in a series that Microsoft has inked with manufacturers using Android, and more lately, Chrome, in their products. Other notable wins for Microsoft have been Samsung and HTC...

My first experience with trying to consume news on-the-go was back in the eighties using the original CompuServe text-based online service -- the first commercial online service. The process generally involved trying to connect a laptop to the hotel phone system through a combination of alligator ...

The proliferation of smartphones has created headaches for security-minded IT departments everywhere, but a Motorola subsidiary aims to give system administrators more peace of mind with a solution for managing Android phones in business environments. Three Laws Mobility, purchased by Motorola eight...

Amid continued traction for Android, there have been a number of other developments for mobile operating systems based on Linux. Given my support for and belief in Linux and open source software, you might expect me to be bullish on the prospects for all of this mobile and device Linux. However, bas...

The Android community is abuzz with speculation about Samsung's plans for its Unpacked event on Oct. 11 at the upcoming CTIA Enterprise & Applications Conference to be held in San Diego. Some rumors suggest Samsung will unveil the latest item in the Android Nexus family of smartphones, while oth...

A vulnerability in a logging tool that HTC has installed on some of its Android devices poses a serious security problem for users. The devices at risk are the Evo 3D, Evo 4G and Thunderbolt. The vulnerability allows hackers to collect a great deal of information about the device and its user -- inf...

Orb Network's media server software has been around for years; in fact, Orb and TVersity are the grandparents of current media-everywhere apps. However, this is the first time Orb has officially been available in an app for Android phones. Orb functions by grabbing indexed media content from your ...

Google's recent plan to buy Motorola Mobility has the potential for reshaping the entire Android landscape. If it wins regulatory approval for the purchase, Google may only have a short time span to connect its marketing strategy. When and if this happens, it could further fracture the open source A...

"Strike while the iron is hot" -- and the usual suspects have made Android licensing a hot issue. However, the title of the FSF article, "Android GPLv2 termination worries -- one more reason to upgrade to GPLv3," gives the game away. This is about politics, not licensing. About pushing a specific ...

Where did this "you are permanently barred from distributing" stuff originate? In digging around, I found a post titled "A Practical Guide to GPL Compliance" at the Software Freedom Law Center dated August 26, 2008, written by the team of Bradley M. Kuhn, Aaron Williamson and Karen M. Sandler. It st...