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Help How do I stop this Home button popup?

I've also seen instances where another app's 'draw other over apps' permission interferes with the default launcher setting as well, but not sure why. Check to see if the survey app has a draw other over apps setting and try turning it off. That would be in the application manager's listing for the app, and in the 'special access' category (Android 6.0-under) or the 'draw over apps setting' (Android 7.0+)

Game Mode (or Game Launcher) is built-in, and shouldn't be interfering like this. I'm guessing this is a Samsung phone? However, if that service recently got updated it might have caused some issues. See if you can find Game Mode in the app manager and see if there's a three dot icon on the upper right corner when in the app's settings, and try tapping 'uninstall updates' if it's there. You might have to tap the same three-dot menu when in the main app manager list to 'show all system apps' first.
Lots of useful advice there. I've checked as you suggest: both Bv Launcher (which seems to be the built-in, uninstallable launcher from the phone's maker Blackview) and Game mode have 'Not Allowed' in their 'Display over other apps' setting.

Anyway, this is hardly important in the grand scheme of things. Maybe it will fix itself at some point. Thanks for helping.

Help Factory reset [android phone] data retrieval

What do you think a 'factory reset' is? It warns you like three times that it will ERASE ALL USER DATA (in all caps). Sadly, Android never got the equivalent of iCloud where all your data syncs up soon after you login to your Apple ID (or in this case Google Account). That used to be a chief complaint in my transition away from Apple to Android; that all my games had to restart from level one, no progress saved, no apps backed up with the same version I used last, etc.

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Move AF Community To The Top Of The Forum

We could also require new members introduce themselves, but at that point, I think we're creating too large a hurdle for participation.

However, I just noticed the "Welcome E-Mail" for new members was WAYYYY outdated so I turned it off and the "Welcome Private Message" was turned off. We should definitely utilize these, too.... not only to urge people to Introduce themselves but also to give them the run down of the site and how to get the most of it.

I think we're still very much trying to reconfigure the site so I don't want to craft something just yet, but I'd love to hear opinions!

Are you a vegetarian?

I never will understand the appeal of shows such as Duck Dynasty, Swamp People or 'Hillbilly Handfishin'' (please don't look up 'noodling' unless you got vore fantasies!!!) and that last one was on Animal Planet of all things...

Hunting is non-negotiable with me. I don't want to know you or talk to you if you're a hunter. I have a zero tolerance policy for anyone who dares hurt my antlered and hooved friends.

Transfer files from Nook to Nook

Neither is SMS for me. It's also not reliant on having internet/data available, never forces you to update the app, and never forces annoyances like typing indicators or reading your message statuses. I love the basic, AIM style of send message, wait for 'DING!' read response. All in a nice, lovely conversational view. Why fix what ain't broke?

Would Samsung get rid of the A series in the future and no longer have a budget or mid-range lineup?

Their A series is just a lag time for feature creep (or in this case, removal). For example, we got headphone jacks and expandable storage in A-series for now, but give it a few years they'll be where the S22+ are today. It just takes longer. Plus they're still too darned big. I don't want as 6.5" screen that barely fits my hands (or gesture controls that are horrid for those who've had early onset arthritis since their 20's like me...for the love of deer, please stop getting rid of buttons)

Believe me, if something worth upgrading to existed I'd be all for it. I'm not that closed minded. I just ain't seeing any real upgrades. As I said, in 2010 we had more companies, more mobile OSs and more people catered to. Today they seem to be chasing an even more narrow margin of users that they see as the 'future' and we older folks just accept it or stop using it. Just get the rapid progress and features back. We've been stuck in this stagnant rut since 2015 for crying out loud.

As for why Apple ditched PowerPC, there are plenty of theories/assumptions but none confirmed. Only Steve Jobs knew the answer and it died with him. If I had to guess, it was the last bit of the Sculley era and Steve wanted to get rid of everything he had a hand in (he took things really personal like)

Disappearing Contacts

If you don't actually want to sync your contacts online on your Tab S7, just go into it's Setting menu and disable syncing for Contacts.
At that point it will be your responsibility to keep the Contacts app on your Tab S7 and your online Microsoft 365 account data in sync with each other -- each time you add new or edit existing contact entries in your Contacts app you need to use the Export feature and then import that file into your Microsoft 365 account, and do the same vice-versa.

Logitech Keyboard

My phone doesn't recognise the dongle when I insert it. Apparently, I should download and install software but I cannot find the relevant software.
Unless Logitech provides an app to enable your Android phone to interact with this keyboard, it's not going to happen. You're possibly equating Android with Windows -- with Android you won't be able to just manually install the necessary external device driver(s), that's done by a manufacturer-supplied app. With this particular keyboard, when you plug that USB dongle into a USB port on a PC, the Windows OS will be using the stock USB drivers to detect and interact with the keyboard. That dongle is the wireless interface between the two. With Android that requires an app and in this instance there isn't one.
Quit trying to force it do something it's not designed to do and just buy a Bluetooth keyboard that will just work as is.

Remote Control from PC

I don't know about a mouse (I hate those things), but you can use a wireless keyboard (~$20 USD) via bluetooth with tablets and phones.

I use one for my phones, but also do not think that a virtual keyboard has to be a pain.

There are many keyboard apps that can give options that make using them very easy.
In fact, as I am typing this, I am using the virtual keyboard on my screen- using only the index fingers on both hands.
I actually can make reasonable time doing this after just a little bit of practice, and finding the keyboard that cooperates the best for that situation.

Also, the keyboards that I use are small and secure.
The small size allows for me to have multiple options available on a single device.
Things like GBoard and others are not so small, keep growing, and are not secure at all- and generally are not very user friendly.

Here are links to the ones that I have on my devices.

https://f-droid.org/en/packages/com.vlath.keyboard/
https://f-droid.org/en/packages/dev.patrickgold.florisboard/
https://f-droid.org/en/packages/org.pocketworkstation.pckeyboard/
https://f-droid.org/en/packages/rkr.simplekeyboard.inputmethod/
https://apt.izzysoft.de/fdroid/index/apk/rkr.tinykeyboard.inputmethod
https://f-droid.org/en/packages/com.simplemobiletools.keyboard/

Personally, I find that Florisboard is the best overall, although for some things I still prefer Simple Keyboard.
Florisboard offers the most options, even allowing custom spacing between keys (which also controls the size of the keys), and there are more features in the works from the developer.
Awesome man ! thanks for sharing. Florisboard worked like a charm.

Still confused about Permissions

If you've never opened it it can't do anything: an app needs to be opened at least once after installation before it can run.

Once you've granted the permission the app can use it whenever it runs, except in some cases where you have the option to grant the permission "this time only".

Some apps can run in the background (some have to do so to do their job). Others only run when you run them. Some permissions also have the option to only be available when the app is run, which I understand to be "when you are running it in the foreground".

Apps like browsers should not be doing anything in the background, and in general the sort of thing you describe should not be happening when you aren't using the app. But yes, in principle if an app is malicious and you grant it access to some data it could abuse that in the background. Of course if the app is malicious it could also abuse the permission when you are running it, e.g. if you download a flashlight app that wants access to your contacts it doesn't make a huge difference whether it uploads them somewhere else when you are sleeping or does it when you turn the flashlight on. And if you think "surely nobody would grant a flashlight access to their contacts!" that's actually why the system asks you to grant the permission: in the old days an app got all permissions it requested automatically, and many people were too uninformed, lazy or dumb to check what permissions it wanted before installing or running it (and yes, you really did get flashlight apps that wanted access to all of your sensitive data...).

By the way, the browser asks for those permissions because there are some websites for which they are needed (I never grant any of those actually: I don't want shortcuts to websites on my homescreen and have no interest in letting a website access my camera or mic). I take the attitude of "do I need this particular app to have access to these particular things?", and if the answer is "no" then I don't grant them (e.g. some people might want a weather app to show the weather in their current location, but if I don't care about that then I don't give it that access). However it's sometimes not immediately obvious why a permission is necessary, e.g. to go back to my example of the flashlight app, that probably will ask for camera access not to snoop on you but because it needs it to control the flash.

Current versions of Android now remove permissions from apps you don't use for a couple of months (so if you run them again they'll ask you to grant them again).

Apps Worker thread will update an EditText in the UI thread

When I get stuck in this stuff is I like to spend some time writing a question, like above, and I leave it until the next day before posting. Last night I was tired and just hit the post button. And as usual, trying unsuccessfully to get to sleep, it occurred to me what was the problem/solution.
"this cannot be done" is correct in this circumstance...
I am running 3 loops. 2 of which access the internet and require a background thread which returns a result. The solution, at least in this case, is to take out the loops, put a couple of buttons on the UI, and let the user activate the process directly. The result can then be simply deposited into a TextBox or a global variable using runOnUiThread. I know this works because it did in the test case, simple subset program of my larger App code.
Happily, life goes on :)

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