If I mention an app in this post, I will link to the Android Market for download. If you're not viewing this with your Android phone, then the links will not work. You can always open Market on your phone and search for these applications.
Memory Management!
The first thing you'll notice as you play with your new phone is that over time (often a short period) the phone will become slower and slower to respond. This is due to all of the apps you've run recently still being open, utilizing more and more of the phone's memory as you go. Some applications provide a nice "quit" option, usually access by hitting the menu key at the bottom of the screen, but most do not. So to handle this, you'll need to install a "killer" app.
- Advanced Task Killer - My current favorite.
- TasKiller
Use one of these apps to manage your phone's memory by killing the applications you're not currently using (or all of them to start fresh). Advanced Task Killer does the better job of hiding essential processes and remembers apps you've unchecked from killing.
Getting Around
The Eris runs the Sense User Interface on Android 1.5 (currently. Hopefully 2.1 will be here soon!). Your phone comes with a default scene, which you can change to other preloaded scenes by hitting Menu -> Scenes from any of the phonetop screens. To move icons around to different locations of the screen or to different phonetops, simply press and hold the icon. All of the screen except for the current icon will darken. At this point, simply slide your finger around the screen to the location desired, then lift your finger. If you wish to remove the icon, just drag it to the bottom to the "Remove" button. NOTE: This does not uninstall that application or widget, but simply removes it from the phonetop. You can access all applications installed by touching the up arrow at the bottom of the screen. To add new icons from the list of all applications installed, simply click and hold, then the phonetop will appear, onto which you can slide and place the icon.
Android applications and HTC also provide widgets for your phone. These are basically tiny applications that provide information at a glance, like calendar information, the weather, etc. To add widgets to your phonetop, tap the + at the bottom left, and choose from the lists. One option you'll see in this list is Shortcut. This allows you to create shortcuts to popular actions you may perform frequently. My personal favorite in this category is a shortcut to a person (+ -> Shortcut -> Person). With this, you can create a shortcut to an action based upon contact information, ie - shortcut to call your wife. Place this icon on your phonetop, then one click will open Phone and dial her. You can also create shortcuts to email a contact, message a contact, etc. Other useful widgets provided by HTC on your Droid Eris are "toggle" widgets which allow you to tap an icon to enable or disable WiFi, Mobile Network, Bluetooth, GPS, and Airplane Mode. All of these can be very handy when attempting to maximize battery life. They can be accessed via + -> HTC Widget -> Settings.
A quick way to get back to an application that you've used recently and is still open is to hold down the Home key. After a few seconds, a box will pop up in the middle of the screen with a list of recent applications. Simply tap an application to switch to it.
Should you have the problem of your touchscreen becoming non-responsive, you don't have to remove the battery to reset the phone. Using your best Twister fingers, hit the Send Call button, the End Call button, and Volume Up simultaneously. This will force a hardware reset of the phone.
Applications
Of course I have apps that I use often, but that doesn't mean that you would. I can only tell you that you NEED to have a memory management program as described above. Here are some apps that you may WANT:
- Astrid - nice task list and time management app complete with a slick-looking widget
- Facebook - Duh. I will say, though, that if you've used the Facebook application on iPod Touch or iPhone, you'll be disappointed in this port by the folks at Facebook.
- Handcent Sms - Sweet Texting application that gives your messages a chat feel, popup notification with quick reply, and even speech to text conversion.
- iheartradio - streaming radio from Clear Channel. Over 350 stations available. Links to lyrics and song tagging.
- Listen - Google's podcasting and audio search application.
- Shazam - Listening to a song, but don't know what it is? Shazam listens, then tells you the song, artist, and album. It works WELL!
- ShopSavvy - Scan a barcode at the store, then let Shop Savvy look up information, reviews, and prices (both local and on the web) for that item.
- Twidroid - My Twitter app of choice.
As I think of things, learn of things, or find new apps that I wish to recommend, I will edit this post. Feel free to leave comments with feedback and tips/tricks you wish to add!
