How do you use Android for productivity?

Previously on Lemmy: Emulators

Past Discussions:

For the last couple of weeks, it was all fun and games. This week, we are going for a more generalized topic on how you use your Android devices for work.

I'm boring in regards to work apps, so I very much favor using Microsoft apps over Google apps for work, as overall I feel Google apps work better on iPhones than on Android (to my great frustration). Office and Teams work exactly how I expect them to, while their desktop version are a bit bloated, on Android they work super well, and there really is no replacement that's as good as Microsoft Lens for scanning printed documents into PDFs.

But, I understand my use for Android for productivity is fairly limited, so, I'm interested to see if we can put our head together and find some interesting ways to use your Android devices to help us all be more productive.

37 comments

@MargotRobbie
As a fully remote/flexible/async SW developer contractor paid by the hour, I have a different situation than most.
Personally I do not install any work apps on my phone because I could easily end up "doing work" that I don't really get paid for.
When I work, I sit down at my actual PC intentionally, I start a timer, and I bill for my time that I take doing work only.
I avoid any work that I need to respond to outside of that and I make this fact known to anyone I work with.
- It's good to set boundaries between your work and your life. I respect that.

I only have one app that I got & use specifically for work stuff. It's great for many things beyond just work, though.
It's called Auto Text, formerly Do It Later. Don't even bother with the free version, the paid version is much better & if you need it you will love Auto Text.
Got a message you need to send out, daily, & to multiple contacts in individual SMS text messages/not a super annoying group chat?? Auto Text is for you. Set up a message, the frequency, and how long you want the cycle to repeat. You can even customize it to address EVERY SINGLE CONTACT by their name, or spit out various dates. !

.
Don't need to send timed, scheduled, customizable individual SMS text messages? Auto Text can also send smart auto replies, for when you're sleeping, on vaca, driving, etc.
Once you get it set up, it really is a great & versatile app.
- Don't really text much for work, but will keep it in mind.

I use the hotspot to connect my laptop to the internet.

Well I run GrapheneOS on a Pixel 5, and I use Shelter to isolate my work apps from my personal apps. I have sandboxes google play within shelter, the apps I have in my work profile are:
MS Outlook
MS Teams
MS Azure
WhatsApp
Word
Excel
Adobe Scan
I dont use my phone very much for myactual job, but its good for maintaining connectivity and checking/responding to emails and calling into meetings as needed.
- what is the benefit of sandboxing your work apps?
  tangible, mental, or otherwise?
  
  Mostly mental, and ensuring separation between my real life work identity and my online/whatever identity. I'm sure that's mostly in my head but peace of mind is peace of mind.

I generally don't, android just isn't all that conducive to productivity for my uses.
I use my ~11in tablet to read PDFs, highlight documents with a stylus and touch up images in Krita with said stylus. Beyond that I use my laptop.

To be honest, not.
my employer gives apple mobiles out
anything usefull can't be done on those small screens
screens that are large enough to show anything useful aren't portable
when I'm out of the office/not working from home, I'm not available for work, so I don't need to use android for productivity
Privately, I have an email client for emergencies (used aqua, but with the subscription junk now introduced, looking for a good FOSS alternative) and a calendar which I need to check more. That's about it peoductivity wise.
- K9 Mail or FairEmail.
  I'm still on Aqua but only because I stopped updating it when the shenanigans started (v1.18). Email is not exactly a fast moving field anyway.
  
  Thanks, I found K9 on F-droid. I used that years ago, no clue why I switched...
  Now to find a foss alternative for Business Calendar that works on Android 13. Calendar specific notification sounds are great, but not when they are played hours after the scheduled item.

I don't really think phones have a real use (yet?) for productivity aside from as a marketing gimmick. Only for looking stuff up.
- Well, there are people whose entire workflow can be and is done on a phone. It's just not the best method for you and me.
  
  Do you know what they do? I seriously cannot imagine anything where at least a tablet wouldn't be much better and more efficient.

Maybe only tangentially related but I love MoonReader to read eBooks away from a computer. Of course, how productive this is comes down to which book you read. Even if I'm reading a programming book and I can't write any code or follow along, I can still read ahead on the concepts and then come back to it on a computer and give my brain a better chance of absorbing the information.

I'm going to take a slightly different approach of what productivety means here; for me it's literally just making my things in my life less time consuming, easier to access and return to.
With that in mind, I use Google photos to automatically back up my photos, this could be anything from wiring diagrams, patio brick layouts, a quote in a book, to a mushroom I'm wanting to identify.
I use the app plantnet if I'm wanting to identify a plant.
I use the app seeker to download music from soulseek
I upload any research papers/books downloaded from scihub/libgen to gdrive for easier access in the future.
This is of course ignoring all of the notes/timers/reminders I use my phone for as well

I personally don't use it for my actual job at all, but a lot of productivity-focused tasks can be done through Termux.

I use YAMF for having proper floating windows on my tablet. https://github.com/duzhaokun123/YAMF

I set up the automation for everything, Samsung routines are really good. Other than that, the evening is normal, but I really like Samsung software features.

CamScanner for scanning documents and straightening them/cleaning them up. It's still the best tool (Microsoft Lens included) for that. Granted, the app got shittified at some point so I'm on an older version (5.9) which I keep without internet access.
Firefox for reading tech articles; it can send tabs to my PC and has a nice reader mode. Similar-purpose apps are Harmonic (HackerNews client) and Feeder (RSS reader).
DroidcamX for using my phone as a webcam.
Calengoo for calendar events and tasks (todos).
A small app called Agile (com.sauce.agile) for focused tasks with multiple steps. It's simple but very efficient — you create a topic and tasks, then flick tasks from todo - doing - done. Sort of a very basic Kanban. Works for anything from learning to shopping.

For time management, there's the Pomodoro technique where you basically break your work time into small sessions of 20~30 minutes where you work on just one thing at a time separated by short 5 minutes breaks. If you vibe with this approach, on Android there's the Goodtime app. It's FOSS and you can find it on F-Droid.
I also maintain to-do lists using the Quillpad app, also on F-Droid. You can also take Markdown notes with it.
For my work emails they're obviously in our work computers and you can't access them outside our intranet, so not accessible on my Android phone, but I still mark important meetings on my phone's Google Calendar as I pay attention to my phone much more than my work PC's Outlook calendar.
Also not sure if we can count this as a productivity app, but whenever I'm under too much stress there's also the app Smiling Mind I turn to for some meditation and breathing exercises.
Finally, for all these things I find that a phone stand is also very useful. I'm using Tonyhoney (you can find it on Amazon, it's very cheap, or someone well-versed in these things can 3D-print something similar) and it does its job very well (though not very practical if you want to charge your phone).
- I've seen companies here like Belkin make wireless charging stands, so I'm sure there has to be a practical one somewhere.
- I see you're into FOSS, and know how to install from F-Droid. How come you're using the Google Calendar app?
  
  it's simple, I'm not exclusively into FOSS 😁

Spark
The one Email App that made me from not seeing trough my emails at all, to managing all of them easily. I can only recommend it. Is also available for almost all other platforms, except Linux :(
HiPer Calc
Really good calculator, that can also do a lot of scientific stuff (Matrices, plot Graphs, solve for values, etc. Everything I needed in maths at university). I study and teach maths and it is really great for both.
Calender
I have all my events and schedules in the standard Samsung Calender App. Sadly they are spread on various accounts and some only saved locally.
If I could save them all in one place would be great, since if I look up my Calender in for example my computer, I cant be sure if everything is in there.
I have a huge calendar widget with a monthly and listed view on a side of my home screen, which is very useful.
Quillpad
My current go to Markdown Editor for Android. I would like to switch to Obsidian to have everything in one place, but not the case yet.
Firefox
Use the install or whatever called feature to have websites as app like Icons on your homescreen. Very useful. 👍
Feem
Transfer Files between devices quickly. I would be glad for open source Alternatives, but I am mostly settled on Feem now.
PDF's
I have a few Apps for opening and viewing PDF Files, which is really useful. That way I can open different Documents in each and switch between them very quickly.
I also use the Zoom and Moodle App, since I am a Student and they are ok.
- Your Samsung calendar app seems to defeat the purpose of an online calendar. I use the Google calendar and everything is syncing across all devices.
  
  I like the Samsung Calendar (especially the widget) more. The main problem is that I dont know how to move all my calendar events to for example Google.
- Check out LocalSend for sending files between any device running it in your local network, it's also FOSS 😁

Forgot to mention this one, and this will probably be the first non-free app I'll be recommending, but Genius Scan is simply great for scanning documents with your phone. I paid like $10 for it in 2017 and I've been since then using it all the time to scan my receipts to claim my expenses whenever I go on a business trip as I sometimes end up losing them.
There probably might be a FOSS alternative for that one? On PC there's ScanTailor (https://scantailor.org/ ) which is open-source, so maybe an app using the same libraries could be on Android too? But yeah you could also just take photos of your documents and wait until you get home to your PC to post-process them with ScanTailor.

37 comments