Ask NerdGirl: How to Install Android Apps, Increase Developer Exposure, Moving Apps to SD Card in Froyo
by n3rdg1rl
Jun 5, 2010 12:17 PM –
So, a few weeks ago I updated my friend Alan’s Samsung Moment to 2.1 for him. Now he was nice enough to let me use his laptop to write today’s column. This helps solidify my notion that Android users are good people! On to the questions!
Hey. I’m all new to this site. I’m wondering, how do i put apps and all that stuff on my Xperia X10?
Thanks in advance.
There are a few ways to put apps onto your phone. The simplest way is to go to the Android Market on your phone and search straight from there. You can install and update your apps all through the market. The icon should be on your phones home page.
Another way is to use AppBrain Market Sync. This website allows you to search and queue up apps that you want to try out straight from your computer. You put the app on your phone and link the accounts. I find it easier to use than the Market straight on the phone. The review of AppBrain will help explain it a little clearer.
You can also use the barcodes found on AndroidTapp. You use a barcode scanner (which you can grab for free from the Market) and scan the barcodes next to the app you want to download. Tons of websites use the scannable 2D barcodes now so that barcode scanner will come in handy.
The last major way you can put apps on your phone is to find the actual .APK file for the app. The .apk is like an .exe file on a computer. There are two ways to install an .apk with your phone.
You can go to the Market and download an app called “Apk Manager.” Install that. Copy the .apk file for the app you want onto your SD card. Run Apk Manager and you will see a list of the .apk files that it finds on your SD card. Then just click on the app you want to install and there it goes!
The other way is to use the Android SDKwhich is the developer pack for Android based phones. It’s a little more tedious than any of the other methods. You would have to install the Android drivers onto your computer as well as the SDK. Then you open a command prompt on and type in “adb install path/file.apk” where the “path” is the full path to where the .apk file is on your computer and “file.apk” is whatever that .apk file is called.
Yes, it can get a little over whelming, but start with the Market and see how that works and you’ll be a pro in no time!
Hi NerdGirl,
I’m a developer writing small apps for Android and I’ve published a few on the market, but I don’t see a large number of downloads for them even though I think they’re awesome.
What’s the best way to get the word out on my indie apps?
Thanks,
Vince
Well, Vince, this is my suggestion. First and foremost really good and great apps stand out and almost market themselves, so if you’ve created something of great use… people will find it and virally promote it. Otherwise, I would suggest you send your .apk file directly to a few review sites and ask them to do reviews for you on it. AndroidTapp has a place just for you to ask for your app to be reviewed. We even Interview rock star developers and their firms on the site. Most of the bigger sites get pretty high rankings on Google and get Tweeted, Digged, and Facebooked. People will start noticing your app and you should see an increase in your downloads.
Also, if your apps are paid apps, if there’s a way to make a free Lite version, people will be more inclined to download your paid app. They will try the free version and if they like it they will pay for the full thing.
Lastly, getting active and social in the community via Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, in forums, and on review websites can help increase exposure. For the latter, we always encourage developers to subscribe to the comments of the review we’ve done for their app. Subscribing to the comments are easy as the checkbox option is located with the comment form. The beauty in this is that it sends an email to you when someone writes a comment… usually it’s a question on how to operate the app. You can see it and easily link back to the site to write an answer, plus you can easily unsubscribe at anytime. The best use case we have is with our review of Exchange by TouchDown, people ask hard core complex mail server and app configuration questions we may not have the answers to, yet NitroDesk, the developers receive it and answer it… thus possibly converting a sale and new customers. P.S. you can always advertise too. 
G’day,
I’ve recently updated to 2.2 on my N1 and now I want to free up my phone some by moving some of my apps. I have heard that there are some other issues with this like whether or not the apps will support this but I don’t even really understand the process of re-formatting and partitioning my SD Card.
Could you also please give me some advice on how big the partition should be? I have an 8gig card and would rather err on the side of caution give technologies ability to grow and take up more and more memory. I would rather not have to go through the whole process again just because one 3D game needs extra space.
Cheers in advance for clearing this up for me!
Thanks
DaveK.
Congrats on Froyo, Dave. I’m jealous! As far as I know, you don’t need to partition your SD card. The issue you may be seeing is that not all apps can be installed to the SD card. This is up to the developer so right now 90% of the apps you’re going to have and see out there will not have the option to install to the SD card. I’m sure there are going to be a ton of updates to the more popular apps enabling this feature very soon.
The only way to install all of your apps to the SD card would be to root your phone, and with your phone running 2.2 all by itself, unless there’s something you REALLY need, I wouldn’t recommend you taking the time to go this route.
Now that the hype of Froyo has turned to a dull buzz, what would you guys hope to see in Gingerbread? And as always, keep sending those questions to
nerdgirl@androidtapp.com!
~n3rdg1rl