Yet in Tasker, you can create widgets and individual applications, and you can extend the functionality with plug-ins. There are plug-ins for voice control or remote control of the device, they are all available on the network, and they are inexpensive. With their help, you’ll even more improve your tablet or smartphone on Android.
Note that plug-ins are added to contexts and tasks – it all depends on what kind of chain of actions you want to create.
As you can see, the application’s capabilities are simply stunning, and it’s not for nothing that Tasker is called the best service for automation. Yes, at first, you need to understand the interface of the program but the elapsed time will completely pay for itself when you can fully configure the device for your own purposes. Therefore, the Tasker tool is definitely worth the installation and will significantly expand your knowledge of the system and your gadget.
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I have developed an application which is a simple task manager.
I noticed my tasks were numerical in nature. In order to study for this exam, I had to review 16 lectures, hence the name. Because tasks are incremental and decremental in nature, this application also serves as a bean counter. You can use this application to keep balls and strikes in a baseball game.
I have a personal todo list on this application, but I want to know if this would be useful for anybody and what features you'd like to see. This is still a work in progress: I started Android development two days ago.
Menu to Add tasks / Save data (not sure if this is necessary)
Single press on task to edit
Long press on task for context menu
Hey guys,
I'm in the very very early stages of my masters work and I was toying around with the idea of using an Android tablet for part of it. I want to ask you devs what can be done when modifying the Android OS itself specifically in terms of a few things.
1. Logins - I would like to implement a classic user/password combination with levels of access for user, administrator, and some sort of superuser.
2. Restriction of User account - I would like to lock the user into one particular application. It must be relaunched when the device is booted and if the application crashes (hopefully not!) it must be restarted. Additionally, no market access, web access, etc.
3. Remote management if possible
4. Data encryption if possible
5. Prevent anything from being introduced from USB ports, SD slot, etc if unwanted.
I guess this brings me around to - is Android even the most suitable platform for such an endeavor. I'm not sure, to be honest, but I would love to get into development myself and this seems like a great way to learn. This is all just one part of a much larger project that I don't want to discuss just yet so sorry for being lax on details.
Thanks guys!
Android runs a virtual machine system called dalvik, in which each application gets it's own insuranceof the machine. It's implemented in such a way that each application gets assigned a user id, which unfortunately for you means each app is a different user, at least to the system. That's going to be a major wrench in the multi user plans. taking that into consideration, to have the same level of control over your tablet you'd have to give even the most basic user level "root" access or else the apps will start crapping their collective pants. As far as unwanted usb, there are a few apps that implement this functionality freely available through the market. Same with remote management. What I haven't seen yet is total encryption and I don't know enough about it to say it's possible or not. Seems feasible though.
My advice: write a custom login screen widget and then bake all these features into a pretty rom.
I have been using Android since the G1 launched, I took one break from it about a year ago to give the Nokia N9 a try (great phone, poor battery life). I am considering switching to Windows Phone 8 (Lumia 920) after it launches. There are two apps that are really important before I make the switch though.
- LBE Security Equivalent. This is a 'firewall', but for application permissions. You can have it prompt you that application 'x' is trying to read from contact data, for instance. If something this exact isn't readily available, is there at least a network based permission firewall? Some applications are fine to use, but I don't necessarily want them to connect to the internet.
- Tasker. This is the bigger of the two that I need to have. If you're unfamiliar with it, Tasker lets you change any device settings, based on any other condition. E.g., if it's between 8am-5pm and I can see the wireless network, "Work", then put the phone on silent... if it doesn't meet those conditions put it back on loud. Very basic example, but I need something like this because it makes my life a lot easier.
I searched around and couldn't find anyone really talking about either of these options too much, can anyone help me out?
Neither one of them is possible with the current SDK, maybe when wp8 pops up.
Windows Phone does not allow any Apps to interfere with System Settings or other Apps. All Apps are sandboxed with only certain interaction points to exchange data or embed themselves into the Hubs. Having looked through the leaked SDK this is not changing with WP8, although there are additional interaction possibilities other Apps functioning as well as system settings are still off limits.
You can look at what permissions certain Apps request before installing them but the only thing youncan do then is to decode not to install them (aside from using background processing and using location data - those can be configured separately).
Hey guys, random thoughts/rant for a software idea.
I was thinking of the next evolution of the Intent system on Android. I always thought OSs seemed to spend almost no effort on integrating softwares on it. It was almost like an afterthought every time. Android was a huge step in the right direction. The next step would have to be very definitive, and backwards comparable of course. It would have to be something users want, and make it easier on the developers as well.
This system would be called something along the lines of 'Sentence'. It evolves with developer and end-user choices and, if I'm right (here's the big pitch, would have the potential to make software measurably more stable, secure, efficient, and user-oriented without really changing any behavior on the developer's side. Of course it has the same potential to be stagnant, but I think the users would punish (unwittingly) developers who lagged behind or didn't put in the effort.
The sentence system allows a user to build a sentence to discover not only the correct application, but an infinitely specific task before ever encountering UI. It is reminiscent of auto-completing sentences in Google Search. An example is the quickest way of demonstrating. The [] specify user interaction and ** specify user choice (probably a button press):
I would like to
[*send*] [search] [open][...
[a][*multiple*][...
[2][*3*][4][5][CUSTOM][UNTIL...
[files][emails][smss][*pictures*][...
[*to*][GO][...
[emily][drake][*george*][...
[*and*][GO][with message][...
[emily][*drake*][george][...
[and][GO][*with message*][...
[CUSTOM][*check this out*][...
[*GO*][and]
this immediately opens the camera app for exactly 3 pictures. Once the 3rd picture is taken, the UI informs the user that the next action is about to take place. After a short time out, the 3 pictures are sent to George and Drake. After the first shot, the user can shut off the screen or pocket the device knowing the timeout will occur and then the task will continue. Being an OS-level function, the user can trust it regardless of the app.
Unless the app task fails. If Apps that use this system can't provide tasks that don't fail, they will become unpopular far quicker than the tasks that do fail that users just deal with anyway.
Furthermore, many apps can be published virtually without any UI at all, significantly cutting down on development time and allowing the dev to focus on the task and functionality.
This could turn around voice activation as well, since the user quickly understands the routine task format to get the best results, and would be more confident to provide far more complex long-winded sentences that the OS could understand perfectly to the detail.
While some sentence lines will be defined by the OS, the developers and users alike will be able to define the evolution of the sentence tree. Developers will make the smart decisions, while the users will crowd-source the popularity of each possible route. The most logical and/or common sentences would quickly be the norm. If the OS prioritizes specific routes over general ones, then developers will be incentivised to make their apps as task-specific as possible as well as as task-plentiful as possible.
The losers in this quickly become apps that use ads, apps that rely on 'convincing' the user of something with UI, and of course utility apps. Of course, this brings back the main reason for 'pro' apps: functionality. The pro version will have these features. The free version will only have these.
There wouldn't be a way to exploit the system or flood it. If the functionality doesn't work, the app becomes not only intrusive and annoying, but offensive to the user as it promised a specific task and performed something else entirely. Those apps simply wouldn't survive.
Of course, application for this kind of thing would have to be imposed by Google et all for it to exist, but there is another way. It can be implemented as a shared library that provides the necessary interfaces and cache all the necessary information for other compatible apps. That would work for a full implementation, and I can't see any features that would be missing. Backwards compatibility would still work just fine, as the app would simply fit existing intents into this sentence tree as well as it can. The sentences would simply end up being smaller. The best part is that with the right effort, this sentence tree could act as an 'Intent builder' for existing android apps. I bet I could build a handler for the tree that would get me through the above demonstration with the standard Gmail app using known intents. See where I'm going with that?
I would build it myself if I had more time, but I'm def interested in helping (or instructing) anyone who would like to take a crack at it. I think if someone got this idea into Cyanogenmod, we'd have a pretty huge win, and Cyanogenmod would have an incredibly unique UI gem to show off to stock users.
Honestly, I see no way that a system similar to this won't be built and become the standard within a decade. It would be trivially easy to build as well although some of the decisions to be made might not be so easy. So yeah, that's it. Rant over.
Hey guys just wanted to share some tips I've found.
1. If the action you're looking for isn't within Taskers list of actions. There's a good chance that "Custom Setting" will accomplish what you're trying to do. You can control almost anything with Custom Settings and control settings that usually requires ADB to accomplish. Check it out.
2. If you're unsure how to do something, check out other projects. Usually you can find new and complex patterns that help make sense of a situation.
3. To make your dialogs and fonts look good and stand out, use html tags.
Example: <b><font color=green>This text will be green and bold</font></b>
4. AutoTools and AutoInput is a must have plugin for any Tasker enthusiast, however the rest can be ignored as most of them have been implemented into Tasker over the years except maybe AutoNotifications if what you're trying to do involves Notifications.
5. There's a 99% chance anything you want to accomplish can be done using Tasker. You just need to dig deep to find the method of accomplishing it.
6. Be sure to give Tasker WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS permission and any other adb specific permission. It's a one time thing and gives Tasker tons of power.
7. When creating open source projects you intend to share publicly, try to use as few plugins as possible. If there's a native Tasker method, use it. Use as few permissions as possible. Use Tasker's native command options instead of AutoApps.
8. The better you understand variables and arrays, the more you'll be able to do. Once you understand loops (if, for, etc) and variables, you're ready to start making projects. Always use local variables unless a global variable is required. Use project variables instead of global variables if the variable in question is only used within the same project. Global variables should only be used when you need to use it's value universally across Tasker. Take note, that once you start using an action that requires dynamic monitoring, Tasker will always monitor that action requiring more memory use.