Database Users

G1: Tips and Tricks

How about a thread for little tips and tricks for working this new toy? Has anyone found a way to increase the text size in the calendar? Cant read it without glasses...
Scott

I don't take credit for all these.
How to Increase Battery Life
Turn off GPS
Lower screen brightness
Turn off Wi-fi when you are not around any wifi networks
If you are not in a 3g area do the following to save battery life!
Settings--->Wireless Controls--->Mobile Networks and check the box that says "Use Only 2G Networks"
General
Holding down the home key will bring up your programs running in the background.
Adjusting the volume will adjust volume all the way to muting sound.
Clicking down the End key will place your phone in sleep mode.
Holding down the End key while bring up the "reset" feature.
Turning off the GPS saves battery life to do so go to Menu, Settings, Security and Location.
To rename a folder on the homescreen click and hold the dock at the top of the folders name. *AnyCut is needed*
Long press the phone key for voice dial.
Press the menu button once to bring up the menu, then press and hold the menu button down to view the shortcut.
To make ringtones, alerts, and notifications make a folder inside your memory card each one containing there own name such as "ringtones" "alarms" "notifications"
To forward picture and text messages: Press and hold the message.
When Typing, If you want to delete a word at the time press menu and delete and will erase a word at the time instead of one character at the time...
Pressing alt+del it deletes everything
Reboot
Press the Green Call Button + Menu + Off (Red) Key
Hard Reset
(THIS WILL REMOVE ALL APPS BUT NOT YOUR PICS AND MUSIC!!)
Turn the G1 off. If it’s frozen on, take the battery out and put it back in the unit.
Hold the Home and Power keys down at same time for about 25 seconds. You will see a yellow triangle screen with exclamation point in the middle.
Now to wipe the device clean:
Press Alt+L.
Press Alt+W for a factory reset.
Press the Home and Back keys again for about 25 seconds. Let go of the keys.
The device should then reset again and the hard reset is complete.
This will wipe your device to factory reset. You will need to log in to your gmail account like you initially did.
Browser
To Copy All, press Menu and A or Highlight text, press and hold TRACKBALL, select Select all
To Cut, press Menu and X.
To Copy, press Menu and C.
To Paste, press Menu and V or Press and hold TRACKBALL, select Paste
Saving pictures from the web:
Press and hold the image for 3 seconds, a selection will pop-up either to save image or view image. It may contain more selections if the image contains a link.
Faster scrolling in the browser:
Hold down ALT key and roll trackball for fast scrolling.
Press space bar for a fast scroll down.
Shift+Space goes up
Browser General
Long press trackball on image to bring up "save image/view image"
Long press trackball over url to bring up "open/open in new window/bookmark link/save link/share link/copy link url"
Press menu to bring up browser menu (go to url/search/bookmarks/...etc); long-press menu to temporarily flash the shortcuts.
To activate the magnify glass on the browser click the trackball twice.
Clear your Cache!
If you’ve been using streetview or the browser alot, the cache can quickly get big. I’ve only had the phone for two days and got 20MB back by clearing the cache on these two.
Settings > Applications > Manage Applications > Browser > Clear Data
Settings > Applications > Manage Applications > Streetview > Clear Data

Hold down Menu when powering on goes into safe mode
THIS WAS POSTED ELSEWHERE AND IS VERY IMPORTANT IF YOUR PHONE CRASHES.

Awesome list

getting rid of icons on your home screen
Here's a cool one I just learned. Hold and press the icon you want to get rid of. you'll feel a short vibrate. after the vibration you can move the icon around or delete it by dragging it to the little gray trashcan that appears at the bottom of the page. This won't delete the program, just the icon.

Great tips! Where do you get this information? I would like to
access even more information.
Also, how do you shut down particular programs running in the
background? Thanks.

Bradley1865 said:
Great tips! Where do you get this information? I would like to
access even more information.
Also, how do you shut down particular programs running in the
background? Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Option isn't available at this time. Hopefully someone comes up with a solution soon

folders on home and menu????
I see mention of renaming folders but I can't even figure out how to make a folder. Anyone know how?

jimtc said:
I see mention of renaming folders but I can't even figure out how to make a folder. Anyone know how?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The easiest way is to:
1. On home screen press and hold
2. when the menu pops up select "shortcur"
3. select the first option "folder"
4. done.
To rename the folder (only cause I didn't understand the first post):
1. open the folder
2. press and hold the top bar of the open folder, otherwise known as the 'dock'
3. type in name and change it.
4. Done.

the ringtone tip doesnt work
or what format do they have to be in?
ive only tried MP3

Mikey1022 said:
To rename a folder on the homescreen click and hold the dock at the top of the folders name.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Has anyone tried this? I cant get it to let me rename- a short click opens it and a long click moves it....

gospeed.racer said:
Has anyone tried this? I cant get it to let me rename- a short click opens it and a long click moves it....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Click on the folder, once is you are in the little window then tap and hold the top bar of the window

Z51 said:
the ringtone tip doesnt work
or what format do they have to be in?
ive only tried MP3
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Create a folder on your memory card names 'ringtones' and place your .mp3's in there.
First, unplug your phone from the USB port, then edit a contact. You should see your new ringtones in the list.

Save pictures from messages?
This possible? I can't figure it out?

Yos025 said:
Click on the folder, once is you are in the little window then tap and hold the top bar of the window
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I guess I should say that I am trying to change the name of the shortcut icon, not a folder- wasnt really thinking it mattered but it must

Only folders can be renamed

gospeed.racer said:
I guess I should say that I am trying to change the name of the shortcut icon, not a folder- wasnt really thinking it mattered but it must
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't think there is a way to change the name of a shortcut once it's made. Also I think only Any Cut gives you a choice about the name at all.

gospeed.racer said:
I guess I should say that I am trying to change the name of the shortcut icon, not a folder- wasnt really thinking it mattered but it must
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Download anycut and you can rename any app shortcut as well.

While using the web browser, double tap the trackball rapidly to zoom out with a magnified area. Press again to zoom into that area

music?
When doing the ringtones memory card trick, will the ringtones stay out of the music list? For example
, in the music player app... I am hoping that ringtones will stay out of the music app. Can anyone confirm or deny?

Two Opera Questions/Issues (HD2)

Searched but didn't find anything on these two Opera questions:
1. In Opera on my TouchPro, there is a button to close the current tab (just to the right of the location field at the top of the window). On the HD2, I have to go to the tab menu to close a tab. What happened to the close tab button? I found it much more convenient...
2. The "big scroll bar" (I don't know what it's actually called, but the large button that pops up in certain applications to allow you to easily grab and drag the scroll bar with your finger) doesn't pop up in Opera. So if I'm at the end of a very long web page, I have to swipe 20 times to get back to the top since I can't "grab" the scroll bar with my finger. Is this how it works for everyone?
Thanks for any help you can offer!

I would like to know that, too.
The first one, I think, is a change from Opera 9.5 to 9.7.
A scrollbar would be nice!

Another annoying bug in Opera is whenever there is a Drop-down menu on a webpage with over 20+ options to select from there is no way to scroll within the drop-down menu.
To give an e.g. visit fring.com and from Download click the drop-down menu for Country or Brand... there is no way to scroll down or up. The entire page starts scrolling but specifically the menu portion doesn't.
This works very well on IE6.

iphoneresister said:
Searched but didn't find anything on these two Opera questions:
1. In Opera on my TouchPro, there is a button to close the current tab (just to the right of the location field at the top of the window). On the HD2, I have to go to the tab menu to close a tab. What happened to the close tab button? I found it much more convenient...
2. The "big scroll bar" (I don't know what it's actually called, but the large button that pops up in certain applications to allow you to easily grab and drag the scroll bar with your finger) doesn't pop up in Opera. So if I'm at the end of a very long web page, I have to swipe 20 times to get back to the top since I can't "grab" the scroll bar with my finger. Is this how it works for everyone?
Thanks for any help you can offer!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1. if you click on the tab button (middle button), you get the option to close the tab.
2. scrolling works very fast for me

i want to know the solution for question 2 too! it is very annoying to swipe many times to the bottom!

mouki_9 said:
1. if you click on the tab button (middle button), you get the option to close the tab.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, but that's two taps - what I miss is the "close tab" button that was right there in the browser window.

casekiller said:
i want to know the solution for question 2 too! it is very annoying to swipe many times to the bottom!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Apparently this is not a high-priority issue for xda'ers... no love so far...
Is the big pop-out scroll button HTCScroll or is it part of WM6.5? Wondering if there is a registry tweak to enable it for certain applications.

having just checked through the opera preferences editor there's no options for either of these, shame....

mouki_9 said:
1. if you click on the tab button (middle button), you get the option to close the tab.
2. scrolling works very fast for me
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Worlds most helpful post! lol

Jibreil said:
Another annoying bug in Opera is whenever there is a Drop-down menu on a webpage with over 20+ options to select from there is no way to scroll within the drop-down menu.
To give an e.g. visit fring.com and from Download click the drop-down menu for Country or Brand... there is no way to scroll down or up. The entire page starts scrolling but specifically the menu portion doesn't.
This works very well on IE6.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Zoom the area where the scroll bar is in the drop down menu.
Just single tap and hold over the scroll bar for 2-3 seconds. Don't take your hand away. Slide your finger now and it will scroll the menu instead of the opera window as a whole.

Favorites

I accidentally put some favorites on my favorites screen and now I am unable to remove the ones I don't want.
Is there a way to remove only one? When I try and drag one to the remove button, the whole screen in included.
Thanks.

I am also having that problem. The thing came with many default favorites I don't care about.

press and hold the contact you want to remove. You can also unitary them in your Google profile if they're a Google contact.

Press and Hold
Press and Hold does not do it. This deletes all.

kubla1 said:
Press and Hold does not do it. This deletes all.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry, I know there's a way to long press a contact to remove from favorites, but it's not directly from the widget.
Go into the People app (click the triple bar icon on the favorites widget gets you there). Slide to the second option from the left on the bottom slide menu. That gets you to your groups. One of the groups is "Favorites". Long press that and Edit the group. There you can remove people by touching the X.

How to load "Home Page" in default browser???

Don't scream at me!
I have searched, but I can't seem to find this anywhere?
On my HTC Desire, when I have the default browser open and press menu and choose more, the top item is Home
On the SGS, under default browser settings, I have set my Home Page no problem, but when I choose menu and more, there is no "Home" option on the list?

As far as i can see, you press Menu button (while in browser) then New Window but it keeps the old window open as well so you need to close that with the 'Windows' button (in Menu)
I've only had mine a few days so there may be a quicker way but that does work

Thanks for that stickfinger
I had been doing the same and assumed I was missing something really obvious, but it appears not??

Three dot menu help

My thumb is not long enough.
The 6P is big, as we all know, and one-handing it can be a challenge. I find this particularly annoying when web browsing because in order to get to the bookmarks, you have to hit the three-dot menu, and it's way up in the top right of the screen, out of reach of my thumb.
Without rooting, is there a way to move that menu to the bottom? Gave a floating three-dot menu? Assign the square softkey to call up the menu or long-press on it or back key bring it up, like on older phones?
Someone please help. I really want to like this phone.