Use android device with mac

How To Use Android With Your Mac

As Mac users, we’re often expected to fit within the lines of the Apple «ecosystem» — a Mac, iPhone, and maybe even an iPad. But the fact of the matter is that for many people, using something other than an iOS device just makes sense.

With that in mind, I’m going to try to break down those preconceived notions and help you get the most out of your Android device by using it in conjunction with your Mac. Read on and I can almost guarantee you’ll be surprised by what «Droid Does», with the help of your Mac.

Manage your Media

Gone are the days where carrying anything but an iPhone meant you needed an iPod of some sort. In fact, many Android phones such as HTC’s «Beats» branded line offer an arguably better media experience than the iPhone. If you’re on the cutting edge of web technology, and you already use a service like Rdio or Spotify for your music, setup for an Android device with your Mac is about as easy as it gets — just install the respective app on both devices and let the Internet’s syncing abilities work their magic. If you’re like most people, though, your media library is filled with good ol’ MP3s and any number of video formats. In that case you’ll probably want to look into one of two solutions.

The first is to install a great (and free) app called DoubleTwist on both your Mac and Android device (link). DoubleTwist is best summed up as iTunes for people without iPods. You’ll get access to Google Play (née Android Market), a huge podcast library, and Amazon’s full MP3 Store. This solution works really well if you don’t want to change the way you’ve managed your media. It’s a traditional style «Jukebox» app, which is beginning to feel antiquated. Moreover, you’re still on your own for buying anything outside of Music and Podcasts.

The second solution is what I’d recommend for most people; and that’s to jump into the Google «ecosystem». Google’s Play store offers music downloads on the cheap (with a free digital locker service), movie purchases and rentals, apps, and even eBooks. Google’s Music player works great with the Mac — it doesn’t have it’s own app, but the web based solution should be more than enough for most people.

Additionally, if you already have a Music library you’d like to store with Google, you can install the free Music Manager tool (link) to upload it seamlessly to the Google Cloud.

Tip: If you miss the feel of a native app, consider a solution like Fluid to make your own in seconds.

For Movies, Google offers a similarly simple solution: rentals and purchases can be made from either your computer or Android device and they play back on both perfectly. Of course, you’ll probably just use Netflix (link) anyway.

As far as TV shows, you are basically out of luck. Apple has a stranglehold on the cheap-day-after downloads market. You could try Hulu Plus, but be warned, the selection is almost as limited as the price is high (zing). If you already have video files on your Mac that you’d like to put on your Android device, just use the free Miro Video Converter to make the formats play nicely. It has Android presets built in, so conversion really is as easy as one click.

As for eBooks, although Google’s solution works just fine, Kindle is still king. Your Kindle books are readable almost everywhere, on almost every device. In addition the Kindle catalog puts Google’s to shame, and as if you weren’t already convinced, Amazon offers a free Kindle app for the Mac. The choice really couldn’t be more black-and-white.

If you’re looking to purchase apps, your two best choices are the Amazon Store and Google Play. You can manage your purchases using web interfaces on both, and the difference really comes down to price, selection, and of course, your personal preference. Either way, it’s not like you’re going to be running Android apps on your Mac.

Finally, since Android Phones store all their photos in an industry standard «DCIM» folder, your Mac should detect it as a digital camera as soon as you plug it in. From there you’ll be able to manage your pictures in any program you’d like, although iPhoto is always a great place to start. If you cringe at the thought of ever having to plug your phone into your Mac, consider using Dropbox’s «Automatic Upload» feature to wireless beam photos to your Dropbox folder on the desktop.

Email, Calendar, and Contacts

Now that we’ve covered all that media nonsense, let’s get down to business with your email, calendar, and contacts. While there are just about a million ways to do this, I’m going to show you how to hack Apple’s iCloud into working with Android and get Google’s apps working nicely on your Mac. Be warned, though, iCloud calendar is not available through Android, and everything else requires some trickery.

First off, if you’d like to use your iCloud email, contacts and, calendar on your Android device, you’re in luck. On the Mac end of the equation, just set up your iCloud account in System Preferences and be on your way. On the Android end, the solution and setup isn’t as seamless as it would be to use Google’s just own services, but hey — there are some things worth working for.

To use your iCloud mail, go into Mail account setup on your Android device and enter your credentials laid out in this guide. For contacts, use a free CardDAV app like this, and use «http://contacts.icloud.com» as your server. From there, just enter in your username as usual and don’t forget to check «SSL». As I mentioned before, there still isn’t a way to use iCloud’s calendar with your Android device.

For most people, though, Google’s services should be more than enough. They’re much more friendly across platforms and work great with your Mac. Setup is surprisingly simple , just go into System Preferences and add your Google account. You’ll have options to sync your email and notes, calendar, and even your Google Chat. For contacts, just follow this Apple guide.

Bonus Round

I’ve covered quite a bit in this article, but this is really just the tip of the Android and Mac iceberg. If you want to push compatibility between the two even further, check out some of these apps and tools below. I won’t go to in-depth on them here, but we’ve covered most on either Android or Mac.AppStorm.

1. AirDisplay — Wouldn’t it be nice to add another display to your Mac? How about if it was wireless? If that sounds like something you’d like look no further.
2. DroidCloud — This app is the answer to many a CloudApp fan’s prayers; a native Android client.
3. AirSync — This app does quite a bit, including giving your Android Phone the ability to stream content over AirPlay. That’s worth every penny.

Final Thoughts

I hope this article has been filled with almost as many useful tidbits of information as it has been with bad puns. In all seriousness, though, it’s always important to take a step back and see what amazing things you can do while not fitting directly into the image of an ideal Apple user.

If you own an Android device or are in the market for one, I hope this article opened your eyes up to the things you can do with just an Android device and your Mac. If there’s something (on the Mac or Android side) that I missed, that you use to keep the two working nicely together, feel free to leave it in the comments below. I always love to find some cool little things I didn’t know about!

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Как «подружить» Mac с Android-смартфоном

Одно из главных преимуществ продукции Apple — прекрасная работа разных устройств в рамках одной экосистемы. Mac, iPhone, iPad, и даже Apple Watch — всё эти гаджеты превосходно работают по отдельности и в связке. Никто из конкурентов пока не предлагает ничего подобного. Но технологии не стоят на месте: уже сейчас с Mac можно связать не только iPhone, но и любой другой Android-смартфон. Как это сделать? Сейчас расскажем.

Силами нескольких энтузиастов была разработана специальная утилита для синхронизации KDE Connect. Данное приложение предоставляет различные возможности для интеграции и тесной работы Android-устройств с настольными операционными системами.

Первоначально программа была доступна только под Windows и Linux, однако буквально на днях в Сети появилась тестовая версия и под macOS.

В настоящее время приложение KDE Connect поддерживает следующие функции:

• Запуск команд на Mac при помощи смартфона;
• Просмотр уровня заряда подключенных устройств;
• Подача звукового оповещения для поиска потерянного устройства;
• Передача файлов и общий буфер обмена;
• Управление громкостью и мультимедиа.

Также утилита позволяет просматривать полученные уведомления прямо на Mac. Однако, эта функция работает в тестовом режиме — её необходимо включать вручную в настройках.

Как установить KDE Connect

Для стабильной работы утилиты необходима версия macOS 10.14 и новее.

• Распаковываем образ и переносим ярлык программы в «Приложения».

• Запускаем утилиту. Нам будет предложено подключить Android-устройство к Mac.

• Перед непосредственной установкой соединения, необходимо загрузить и установить соответствующий клиент и для Android-смартфона.

После завершения процедуры настройки, на верхней панели появится иконка KDE Connect. Здесь мы сможем просмотреть все синхронизированные устройства, а также управлять ими. Конечно, подобное решение сложно назвать альтернативой Continuity, однако опробовать приложение стоит в любом случае. Тем более, программа распространяется совершенно бесплатно.

Разработчик обещает, что с течением времени утилита будет «обрастать» новыми функциями. Верим на слово.

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How to Use an Android Smartphone With Your Mac

Year upon year, Android has proven its value as an alternative to Apple’s iOS. Android’s 79-per cent marketshare worldwide means a fair number of Mac users also use Android phones. This tutorial covers what it’s like to be in that camp, and what apps and services are available to help make these obverse devices work together.

Managing Files

Early in Android’s iterations, working with files was on an Android device from a Mac was next to impossible. You’d have to hope against odds that either the phone’s manufacturer had built a specialized driver or the phone would be recognized as a storage medium by the generic driver included with Android’s developer toolset.

More recently, Android File Transfer has become a handy tool for interfacing with your phone from your Mac. It’s very basic, but it allows reliable access to the files on your Android device from your Mac and the ability to drag-and-drop files from your computer to the phone. It does require that your phone be on Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) or newer.

It’s no iTunes, but the Android File Transfer tool can provide a basic interface between your Android phone and Mac computer.

Because Android does not come with an all-in-one application to manage your media and data in the way that Apple does, Android File Transfer serves an important role. It’s a decent way to do things like add music or other media files or backup your phone’s contents by copying its files to a folder in Finder.

Once the files are on your Mac, you can use the respective format-friendly apps to modify or save them (ex. iPhoto for photos, iTunes for music, etc.) or move them to a different device.

Pictures, Wired

Understandably, dragging folders from your phone to computer, then importing them manually into iPhoto is not exactly a beautiful solution. Thankfully, if you are running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich or newer, iPhoto should automatically recognize your phone as a camera when connecting via USB; it just requires changing a USB setting on the phone.

If you are on Android 4.0+, check your settings menu for the USB protocol or USB computer connection. If you choose Camera (PTP), iPhoto should recognize it automatically.

When you connect an Android 4.0+ device (Ice Cream Sandwich) to your computer, it typically defaults to Media Transfer Protocol (MTP), the Windows equivalent of the Android Transfer Tool.

Change that USB connection to Picture Transfer Protocol (PTP)—either in the Settings > USB computer connection or by selecting it from the status bar while connected to the computer—and iPhoto should open automatically with a prompt to import the images shot from your phone as it does when recognizing a camera.

Tip: This may not work on all stock Android builds as the default camera application uses a naming convention for image files that is not recognizable by iPhoto. Most manufacturers have remedied this in their builds. Alternatively, you can use a different camera app as a workaround.

Pictures, Wireless

If you don’t have a USB cable handy, Dropbox is your best bet. The service’s Android app offers the option to automatically upload photos taken on the device to the cloud every time the phone connects to a Wi-Fi network.

Set the Dropbox app up on your Mac as well, and you have a consistent folder from which to import into iPhoto. There is even a (mostly) painless way to have Automator regularly tap into the Dropbox folder to do the importing for you.

Dropbox for Android has an option to allow automatic Camera Upload over Wi-fi. This can be useful as a wireless way to get your photos onto your Mac desktop, if you already use Dropbox for Mac.

iTunes, Meet Google Music

You can use Android Transfer Tool to drag music to your phone, but assuming you have a data plan, you’d probably be better suited using Google Music Manager. Google freely offers the ability to upload up to 20GB of music to the cloud for access anywhere via your Mac or your Android phone.

The Google Music app makes it easy to navigate your library, and songs can even be made available offline.

Google Music Manager can make moving your music to your Android phone an easy process. It allows for up to 20gb of free song storage and can even automatically upload newly added songs.

Tip: This will not work with older DRM-protected music. If that affects a lot of your library, follow this tutorial about using iTunes Match to remove the DRM.

Bon Voyage, iCloud

If you choose an Android device, you can give up on using iCloud for most-everything except Find My Mac.

You will, however, find alternative solace in Google’s ecosystem for most of iCloud’s functionality, and Apple has largely added Google services to its two core productivity apps: Apple Mail and Calendar.

You can sync each app to Google’s services—by adding Gmail and Google Calendar as new accounts within the app—and in doing so, can live in relative harmony amidst your competing platforms.

To do so, click the respective app’s menu, then click Accounts. and choose Google. After adding your account, if you add an event using Apple Calendar, it is immediately added to the calendar app on your phone and vice-versa. In mail, deleting an email from your Android device will move it to the Trash on your Apple Mail app. It’s refreshingly un-tedious.

Sync your Google Mail and Calendar with your Mac’s Apple Mail and Calendar by adding your Google credentials in the Accounts area of each app.

Web Browsing

It may seem obvious, but if you’re using an Android phone, you should use Google’s Chrome browser on both your Mac and your Android phone (the default Android browser is not Chrome). Doing so unlocks a few features that can make your life easier between ecosystems.

First, your bookmarks, browsing history, and autofill passwords will automatically sync between devices.

Second, you can use the Chrome to Mobile extension to push websites directly to your mobile device from your computer.

Chrome to Mobile is an innovative Chrome extension that can push webpages directly from your Mac desktop to your Android smartphone.

The Future of Cross-Platform Bliss

Apple has recognized the Google users among its customer base and made strides to support them. Using an Apple computer and an Android phone will likely never offer the seamless experience as using an iPhone, but it’s now easier than ever.

Moving forward, be wary of the apps where you plan to invest your time to ensure each has a cross-platform mentality. Some popular ones include Dropbox, Google Drive, Evernote, Simplenote, Wunderlist, and Google Chrome. Hopefully, the future continues toward platform-agnostic apps so users can switch their OS at will. Until then, use this guide to make your Android more collaborative with your Mac.

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