Android 4.2 (Jellybean) Tips and Tricks

If you have just purchased an Android device, then you may want to copy your contacts from your old tablet. The easiest way to do this is to Export your old contacts to a CSV (Comma Separated Values) file and save this to your PC. You may need to install the correct software for your tablet first in order to do the export.

Then, if you don’t have a Gmail account, sign up for one.

Once that’s done, open Gmail. Go to Contacts, then press More – Import. Then import the CSV to your Gmail contacts.

Then on your tablet, open the Contacts App. Press Menu and then Sync Contacts. This will pull the contacts from Gmail to your tablet.

To delete or remove homescreen widgets, simply press and hold. Then drag the widget to the top-right corner of the screen and into the Trash icon.

Go to Menu – Settings – Display – Screen Time Out.

Then chose the screen time out duration.

While in the Camera App, there are two ways to zoom in or out.

First, you can use Volume Up and Down keys.

Secondly, you can pinch your fingers on the screen to zoom in and out.

If you are watching a movie or video, it is a good idea to lock the screen orientation and buttons. Simply press the Power/Lock button.

This can also be used while recording videos, which is handy if you’re prone to accidentally pressing buttons while recording.

When you pull down your notifications bar, they will appear expanding or contracted, depending on how many you have.

If you want to toggle between states, you can pinch out to expand a notification and pinch in to contact it.

If you don’t want the Tab bar at the top of the browser, then you can remove this which will use the whole screen while browsing.

Open the standard browser and press Menu – Settings – Labs. Then put a check mark under Quick controls.

To get access to the controls that are now invisible, there is now a neat hidden menu. Position your finger on the right side of your tablet, just off the screen. Then slide it onto the screen in a left-ward direction. A circular menu will appear with various options.

If you are viewing a website and you see a URL, you can long press on it and then choose to open the site in a new tab

If you would prefer the Desktop view of websites, rather than the Mobile view, then there is a way to change it. This may not work in all regions or on all carriers however.

Open the standard browser and type about:debug into the browser’s address bar. Then go to Menu – Settings. You should have a new option called Debug. Press Debug, then on the right side press UAstring and change the option to Desktop.

Websites should now be displayed as they would on a computer desktop browser.

Another alternative is to install a third-party browser like Dolphin, Firefox or Opera which have options to surf in Desktop mode.

Go into Settings – Location and security. Then under Screen unlock settings press Change screen lock. Then chose None.