Samsung Galaxy A7 (2018) Tips and Tricks

Android 8 (Oreo)
Phone: Samsung Galaxy A7 (2018)
Factory OS: Android 8 (Oreo)

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Then view tips for the most recent OS version(s): Android 9 (Pie)
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To quickly close Apps, press the Home key

This will display your currently running Apps. From here you can simply swipe the Apps off the screen by dragging your finger left or right. This is a very quick way to free up some memory.

Google have hidden a clone of an Octopus inside of the Android Oreo OS.

To access this follow these instructions:
Drag down the notifications screen and go to Settings. Then scroll down to About device. Then tap on the Android version option 5 times.

You should now see a Lollipop on the screen or a double layer Oreo for Android 8.1.

Keep pressing the Lollipop/Oreo and after awhile a flying Octopus will appear.

You may need to long press on the Lollipop if multiple presses doesn’t work.

You can drag and fling that Octopus all around your screen. The eight tentacles represented 8.0

To copy files between your phone and PC, go to the Android Play Market and download an app called Air Droid.

This is an extremely useful App that connects your phone to your PC wirelessly, allowing you to move files and many, many other things.

Alternatively if you just want to copy using USB then simply plug a micro USB cable into your phone and it should appear as another drive on your PC.

Some phones do not allow data transfer to PC, to enable this feature go to Settings – Developer Options – Networking, and then tap on USB configuration and change it from ‘Charging’ to ‘MTP’.

Note: Developer Options is not always enabled by default. To enable, go to Settings – System – About Device. Then tap on Build number 7 times to enable this secret option.

Sometimes while typing long text or SMS messages you will get a message saying Converting to multimedia message. This won’t normally cause a problem, however some users do not want to send a MMS message.

There are a number of different settings to deal with this, however there isn’t really a way to prevent the phone from converting to an MMS. The reason for this is that any message over 480 characters cannot be sent as an SMS message. They must be sent as an MMS. The is a restriction of SMS messages in general, similar to the original limit of 160 characters.

What you can do however is ensure you get alerted when you have reached 480 characters. Then you can decide to send the message as an SMS and continue your conversation on a second message.

To check this setting is on, open your Message App and press More – Settings and More Settings – Multimedia messages. Then select Set restrictions and choose Warning. You will now be told when your message is being converted to MMS.

You can also change the settings for Creation mode which lets you restrict messages that go over a certain size. If you select Warning or Restricted, you should get further warnings when your message is really large and may not be handled by the network.

Note: This availability of this feature depends on your device.

If you want to setup new email accounts, like Yahoo or Hotmail, go to your list of Apps.

Find the Email icon and press on it. A setup wizard will then be launched.

Enter you email address and password into the fields. You can also change the settings after this step.

Once you’re happy with the settings, give your account a Name and you’re done.

By default, your phone will recognise swear words, but insert x’s instead of the word. To change this, go to Settings – System – Language and input – Virtual Keyboard- Google Voice Typing

Then you may need to select your voice input system. Then toggle the Block offensive words option.

To enable or disable the vibrate function when you receive text messages go to the standard Messaging App and press More. Then Settings and then Notifications. Then select Vibrate.

To use your phone as a WiFi hotspot, tether it via USB or via Bluetooth, then go to Settings – Wireless and Network – Mobile hotspot and tethering.

You can then choose from three options:

1) USB – connect your phone via a USB cable. The phone should automatically configure the correct settings.

2) Mobile/WiFi Hotspot – To turn your phone into a WiFi hotspot, press Configure WiFi hotspot. You will then be asked to enter a Network SSID (this is your own name for the WiFi hotspot). Then choose Security and lastly, choose a password (this is password for your WiFi hotspot which you will enter on your computer).

3) Bluetooth – With this option, you will need to pair a Bluetooth device with your phone. On the other device, ensure you search for Bluetooth devices and your phone should show up.

The Play store contains thousands of great Apps, but there are time that you want to restrict access to these Apps for whatever reasons. This can easily be done.

First, open the Play Store App and swipe from left to right to see the settings. Then press Settings and Content Filtering.

From here you can chose settings for Low/Medium/High maturity levels. Great for preventing access for young people.

When browsing on your phone you may notice images are quite blurry. This is because your telecom provider is compressing the images before they are downloaded on to your phone.

There is no way to prevent this, but if you have a WiFi connection nearby, then you can turn that on. This will mean that all browser downloads come through the WiFi connection, rather than the carrier, and your images will appear normally.?

This also depends on your service provider and data package.