Opinion

A while back I read about the Paid App Pledge over at Android Guys. I didn’t want to sign up to that – the last thing I want to do is encourage more hidden source code.

The intention is a good one though – encouraging more high quality software on the Android platform. Not that I think there’s a shortage of it, but more is better.

With that in mind, here’s my alternative pledge:

Any time I can afford to do so, I’ll take a look at the FOSS apps I’m using on my phone that I haven’t donated to yet. Then I’ll make a donation to the one I use most.

As well as financial donations I’ll make the effort to contribute in other ways too. That can include reporting bugs, suggesting features, or contributing code. Everything helps.

Care to join me?

I always think popping up a “Battery Low – Connect Your Charger” message is a very thoughtless thing to do, and with battery life being what it is it’s something I get to think about quite a lot.

For one thing, if I was able to connect my charger I wouldn’t have ended up 5% battery in the first place, would I? And for another, if I’m desperately trying to get those last couple of things done before the power goes completely, the last thing I need is to be interrupted by a pop-up message that I have to clear before I carry on. I can see the battery is low – it’s right there in the status bar, that ominous looking red battery with a line through it. Every Android user’s worst nightmare.

Luckily I have several spare batteries, along with a stand-alone wall charger to make sure they’re always ready for action. They’re very cheap, if you know where to look, so long as you’re not hung up on brand names. So I might be about to run out of power again, but only for the time it takes to stick the next one in.