Two More Useful FOSS Android Apps

It’s easy to forget that free and open source software (FOSS) doesn’t just live on the desktop or the server. It can also run on those little devices many of us carry in our pockets. The ones that are powered, for the most part, by Android (or some variant of it).

As I’ve noted in this space before, there are more than a few useful FOSS apps for Android. Let’s take a look at more two of them.

While you can probably install most, if not all, of these apps from a certain tech giant’s app store, I’ll be pointing you to F-Droid instead.

Quick Weather

For the longest time, I didn’t see the need to have a weather app on my phone. While seriously house hunting in another part of New Zealand a couple of years ago changed my mind. After trying a few FOSS weather apps, I settled on Quick Weather.

Quick Weather is easy to use. There are a few options that you can set, like units for temperature and wind speed as well as the app’s look and feel. You can also set a location. Once you’ve done that, you’re ready to go.

The seven-day forecast for any location that you choose comes from a service called Open-Meteo. Here’s an example of a forecast:

You can get more information about forecast by tapping a day, as shown below:

For additional information about the current conditions, tap the chevron beside day’s temperature. Here’s what that looks like:

You can also set up multiple locations, which is good when you’re travelling. You can easily switch between them by tapping the stacker menu and selecting a location. Here’s an example:

FairScan

Every so often, I need to scan a document or something like a receipt, a bill, or an invoice. Any number of mobile apps can do that, but FairScan got and held my attention because of its simplicity.

How simple is it? Here’s the app’s main screen:

Aside from the main screen, there are only three settings. You can change:

• The folder into which to save a scan.
• The image quality.
• The format (PDF or JPG).

When you’re ready to scan something, point your phone’s camera at it and tap the New Scan button. FairScan blocks out what you’re scanning with a thick green outline. Here’s what that looks like:

Then, tap the round, green button on the screen. FairScan takes a photo. Tap the photo’s thumbnail then, on the screen that displays, tap Save. Here’s what that looks like:

FairScan saves the scan (which it converts to grayscale) to the folder that you specified in the app’s options.

Before you do save a scan, you can also give it a more descriptive file name rather than the default of Scan YYYY-MM-DD HH-MM-SS — for example, Scan 2026-02-26 17.41.03.

FairScan is nothing fancy, but then again it doesn’t need to be to meet my needs.

— Scott Nesbitt