Android 5.0 (Lollipop) Tips and Tricks

Android has a feature allowing you to update Applications automatically. This is turned off by default, but you can turn it on.

Open the Play Store App and press the Menu icon in the top left of the App. Then select Settings and Auto-update apps.

From here you can chose to do this over WiFi only or using your Data connection.

To open a web page in a new tab, find a link on a web page. Then press on it and then choose to open the site in a new tab.

To stop the Photo App or the Music player from indexing your files, place a blank text file called .nomedia in the folder containing your photos or music.

The best way to do this is to connect your device to a PC and then navigate to the relevant folder via your PC.

Rather than having to locate the hang up icon on the screen after each call, you can quickly end a call by pressing the Power button.

To enable this feature, go to Settings – Personal – Accessibility – Answering/ending calls. Then tick The power button ends calls.

First open your Contacts App and select a contact. Then press Edit at the top of the screen.

Then should then see some options to either take a photo or select a photo from your Gallery.

If you would prefer not to be told every time an Application has been updated, open the Play Store and swipe from left to right. Then select Settings and untick the Notifications options.

Android has an interesting new feature called Talkback which is designed for blind and low vision users.

The feature is an interesting way to navigate your phone however.

Simply go to Settings – Personal – Accessibility – Talkback to activate it.

Then your phone will give you an ongoing narration of its various functions.

While viewing your list of Contacts you can swipe from Right to Left to send a text message to the selected contact.

This might not work on all models.

Recent Android versions use a special mode that hides all Android related visuals. The mode is called immersive mode and it essentially means certain Apps have the whole screen available.

Sometimes this can be annoying however and you want to see the time, signal strength or batter indicator.

To temporarily leave immersive mode, simply drag down your notifications screen and the phone will exit immersive mode so you can see other features.

If you want to find your phone’s WiFi MAC address (for improved WiFi security), then go to Settings – System – About device – Status.

Then scroll down until you see WiFi MAC Address. The address should be a series of Hex numbers and letters.