AppBrain's New App Adds OTA Install for Android
AppBrain, which we've written about before, is a great place to search online for Android apps, and then select them to install to your device. In the past, however, you'd have to install the AppBrain App Market application, then "sync" your device with it. You would then see a list of apps to install manually. With the release of their Fast Web Installer, however, the apps are now pushed to your device.This is something that's expected to come later from Google. It was shown at Google I/O; it's the ability to select an app from the Android Market and have it sent to your device OTA. However, we now don't have to wait for the feature to come in the next Android release (or whenever).
This only works with free apps, but it is really cool, once you download the app and enable its functionality. How do you get it set up?
- First, of course, you'll need an AppBrain account.
- Next, install the "AppBrain App Market" app on your phone. Once that's done, open the app, go to "Manage my apps" and click the "Sync with AppBrain" button.
- Download and install the "Fast Web Installer." Run it so you can enable its ability to install apps on your device.
- Go to AppBrain, pick a free app, and click on the Install button. You'll see an app start downloading to your device, as shown in the notification bar.
Unfortunately, uninstalling an app is not automatic. There you still need to do the sync with AppBrain and manual uninstall process.
As you might imagine, this app needs to run in the background. Therefore, if you have a task killer that auto kills, you need to make sure the Fast Web Installer is excluded.Need more help? Here's a demo video:
