SLOWLY free coins – solving 'N/A' ad problem

A few things have changed over time

I have written before about the basics of getting free coins by watching short video ads in SLOWLY. That Blog post is the most viewed page here, at about 4,250 views currently (Jan 17, 2022 stats).

Now, here is a new, supplementary post to add more info. Specifically, on how to deal with the occasional 'N/A' (no ads available) problem.

This post explains what we could do to make sure we have ads to watch, when needed. 😉

Some recommendations?

Based on my experience over time, using the methods described in the original blog post works. But we might come across the 'N/A' messages ( meaning 'no ads available') here and there. How many of these errors we encounter varies as well.

I prefer to use the older and tested, stable and faster versions of SLOWLY in general. On my mobile, the current version is 6.0.11, which is a nice one for daily usage.

However – there have been changes in the Ads in Slowly and in other apps as well; starting with Apple imposing some new policies to safeguard user privacy.

Slowly Team was forced to adapt, and has made changes to their ad servers. Older versions might or might not get ads consistently now.

More recent versions receive ads better

The SLOWLY app mobile version packages include libraries to connect and use different ad services companies. With this version, I see a lot of ads provided by Unity Ads - which is popular both in iOS and Android markets.

Older versions like my fave 6.0.11 work well in general – but don't get ads as reliably as the newer v.7.1.x ones.

So, for collecting the free coins, I DO recommend using a recent version. So when chasing coins, I am using v.7.1.20, which is currently the latest one. (released on January 8, 2022).

Dealing with N/A problems?

In the original blog post I outlined two steps :

  1. Exiting Slowly and clearing Memory : this frees up memory that could be locked by one or more applications, some that you might have closed, or intended to. This recommendation still stands, and I believe it's good practice to clear memory and inactive tasks frequently.

    A simple step if you have a little app installed, I see 300 to 800 MB of RAM being freed when doing this. The Reddit mobile apps for example uses large amounts of RAM, and your device does benefit from this cleaning.

  2. Resetting Advertising ID : this would be a second step, and how to do it varies, different for Android and iOS users. The original Blog post contains detailed steps to do it for either one.

    Further down in this post, you will find some suggestions to make this easier and faster (for power users, and for users with rooted mobile devices).

But it's time to introduce a new idea we haven't mentioned yet.

Additional Step - Reset SLOWLY's app cache all together

In many cases, this is the only way to remove the 'N/A' problem. Do this if resetting the Advertising ID did not solve the issue.

This will not cause any harm – just make sure you are deleting the CACHE, not the APP DATA.

Even if you made a mistake here, it isn't a big deal – you will need to login to Slowly again, provide the email or Google, FB, etc account info, then validate it. Your data, letters, pen pals list are all safe. So, no need to panic. 😎

Took a few snapshots to document this for your convenience. How to do it ?

  1. In the home screen on your mobile device, Long Press the SLOWLY icon. You will see a window pop up with some options. Select 'App Info'.

  2. A new window loads. Here we select 'Storage' option.

  3. And another new panel offers choices – you want the 'Clear Cache' one :

    Do that and the Cache will reset, Byte size drops to zero or a small number. Done! 😎👍

Combined with Advertising ID Reset, this should clear most 'N/A' error messages. Tested and working. here. Enjoy!

Keep the Reset Cache panel open for reuse ?

I use the very nice Nova Launcher in my Android mobile, and enjoy the ease of Task Switching using it brings.

As this is a needed operation if you are serious about coin gathering, it's possible to keep this open and easily accessible from the task manager.

As shown, I have Nova Launcher running, with a few tasks – including SLOWLY and 'Settings' which is the name of the panel we opened in the previous steps above.

With the task manager, I can quickly move between these tasks, and I do reset the Cache every few hours, even if there's no problems with N/A ads yet. It's just handy.

Reseting Advertising ID - Power Users can do it easier

This other Blog page contains some suggestions - including how to create a Shortcut to Reset ID that can work even with unrooted devices.

The post contains detailed, step by step instructions, and at the end you will have a new shortcut that takes you quicker to the Reset ID screen.

And if you have a rooted device

...the Advertising ID reset can be done very simply. With one simple command which will delete the existing Advertising ID file. Android will re-create it automatically, so this is fool proof and very fast.

We can create a home screen shortcut, which will execute that command, with a single touch to its icon.

The needed command is simple – copy and paste it all in one line :

rm -f /data/data/com.google.android.gms/shared_prefs/adid_settings.xml

To delete this protected file, our command MUST run as Root (SuperUser account), so we check that option ON.

Once saved, this shortcut is very easy to use and effective. A results popup will confirm success :

This is explained in detail on another Blog post – Running Android SLOWLY in Windows system . The source for this idea is from StackOverflow.com.

It's Winter here in the Northern Hemisphere

And with the cold weather out there, it's a good time to be inside, reading and writing some Slowly letters, plus chasing some coins for some new stamps.

Good luck to you all! 😎👍🌟✔

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Special thank you to all the folks behind the SLOWLY app.

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