8 AMAZING THINGS YOU CAN DOWITH ANDROID

Don't be satisfied with what you have on Android. You can change, push, pull, ripapart and tweak almost anything to your heart's content

Don't be satisfied with what you have- on Android. You can change, push,pull, rip apart and tweak almost anything to your heart's content.

However, because of some limitations of other operating systems, these arehacks that will only work on Android, explain Karan Bajaj and Hitesh Raj Bhagat

1. Have multiple accounts on one device

A lot of us have moved on - from

having just one email or social media account to multiples. Some of you withmultiple phone numbers may also have multiple WhatsApp accounts. But you can'thave these on all the same device - unless you use virtualisation that is.

Based on MultiDroid (a virtualisation engine), Parallel Space lets you keepmultiple accounts (all online simultaneously) on the same device. To start with, youshould have all the apps you want to use (Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter and so on)already installed on the device. Once you install Parallel Space, you can select whichones you want to run in the virtual space of this app.

You can also password protect this area so that only you can access thisvirtual area. With Parallel Space working, you can then sign in to your alternateaccounts. -It's that simple. Make sure that your phone has at least 3GB of RAM sothat this transition works smoothly.

2. Make messaging work for you

You'll always get spam text - no matter how many services you try tounsubscribe from and no matter how many times you register for the Do Not Callregistry. Once you accept this, you can do something about it if you're on Android.True Messenger (from True Caller) uses the company's vast, global database ofnumbers, crowdsourcing plus a list of known spammers to keep your inbox clean. Itwill just automatically filter out all the junk.

On the other hand, if you're bored with the plain old SMS app, try ChompSMS (it's ad-supported but you can upgrade to remove ads permanently). You needto install and make it default SMS inbox for your phone in return, you get a passwordprotected inbox, 100's of free themes, SMS scheduler, lots of emoji, blacklisting,automatic signatures, quick reply (you can also reply from the lock screen), bettergroup SMS features, better dual SIM messaging features and unlimitedcustomisation for notification icons, LED colours and vibrate patterns.

3. Drop the screen size down

Larger screens are all the rage on Android devices - they can be very usefultoo, but if you're always struggling to reach all corners of the screen, you shouldcheck if your device has a one-handed mode in settings. This feature brings the sizeof the screen down to a more manageable size so that you don't have to adjust yourgrip to reach all four corners.

If your phone doesn't have this feature built in, you can add it in if you'reprepared to root your phone. Once your device is rooted, you can head to the PlayStore and get an app called Niwatori - this adds the Xposed module to your phone to

enable one-hand use. If you prefer not to root, try making the large screen moreuseful - with something like Lazy Swipe. This free app allows for simpler one-handeduse by using a small app launcher.

It stays on top of the existing Android interface (or any other third-partylauncher that you have installed).All you have to do is slide out the Lazy Swipe fromthe screen's left or right bottom corner.It has three main sections: Toolbox (whichhas toggles for all the often used settings like GPS, Bluetooth and data), Recents(which automatically gets populated with all the recently used apps) and Favorites(which you can customise with a simple drag-drop).

4. Make animations faster or switch them off

This little hack works on almost any Android phone and you don't need tohave a rooted phone. Head to settings > about Phone and tap continuously on theBuild Number. Usually, after about 7 or 8 taps, you'll get a little pop-up informingyou that developer options have been enabled. Go back a level in Settings and you'llsee developer options.Head here and scroll down till you see settings for Windowand Transition Animation scale.

The default values are 1x (or normal speed). You can reduce this to 0.5x (halfthe time taken, or twice the speed).Head back to the home screen and give thedevice a whirl for a few minutes. If you like what you see, you can also turn theanimation off completely . This can even make an older or bloated phone feel fasterthan before.

5. Backup text messages, transfer them or view on PC

Over time, you will unwittingly build up a database of 1000's of messages youcan't delete them because there's some important info there - you just don'tremember where, when and from whom. They'll slow down your messaging app too.Get the free SMS Backup & Restore app - it offers the easiest one-touch backup,transfer and restoration of your messages from one device to other.

You can choose the folder where you want to create a backup and it supportssaving directly to external storage. Once a backup is created, you can just email it toyourself and open them on a computer (they get saved in an XLS format which willopen with Excel or any spreadsheet viewer). This way, your messages will besearchable too.

6. Automate daily or mundane tasks

IFTTT (IF This Then That) is an ingenious solution that helps you get the moreboring tasks done with little to no intervention. It's all about the recipe: this is astatement that triggers an action in response to events that you specify. For instance,a simple recipe could be - when I leave home, turn off phone WiFi.

Recipes can be more complex and you don't even need to create themyourself - IFTTT has a vast library of recipes that you can browse through anddownload. Everything is free and the community of global users are always willing tolend a helping hand if you get lost.What's more, you can stack recipes and automatedaily activities. For instance, if you upload something to Instagram, you can have itautomatically saved to your DropBox. Or if you star an email in Gmail, it canautomatically create a reminder to follow up about it.

7. Move stuff To external storage

On any Android device, you need to keep a certain amount of free space onthe internal memory for proper functioning. If your device has a memory card slot,you're in luck. MicroSD cards are cheap and most phones support cards up to 32GBin size (a 32GB micro SD goes for as less as `700). You can get 64 or 128 GB cards ifyour phone supports these sizes.

Once the card is installed, you can start moving photos and videos to it. Nextstep is to move apps from the internal memory to the memory card to free up space.To do this, get the free App2SD by Sam Lu. It clearly shows you which apps are

movable and which ones aren't. If you don't want a bunch of apps, you can uninstallthem all in one go (batch uninstall). It will also show you a list of apps that can befrozen (to stop them from working and eating up more space) and those that can behidden (they'll disappear from the app drawer).

8. See how well your charger & cable are doing

A free (ad-supported) app called Ampere by developers Braintrapp aims tomeasure the amount of current that your charger supplies to the phone. All you haveto do is start up the app and it displays the current on screen. When not connectedto a charger, the app will display the rate of discharge.

Discharge rate will change based on screen brightness, number of runningappsprocesses. The aim is to find out which charger and cable combination worksbest for your device. It only works on Android 4.0.3 devices and above but there isanother catch - not all devices are supported. On the Google Play page for the app,they have a complete list of supported devices. For this reason, on some devices, youmay not even find the app when searching in the Play Store.