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Android vendors, don’t kill my app

dontkillmyapp.com

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Re: Android vendors, don’t kill my app

#141

Post by scarface74 »

nbzklr wrote: post #85
sudhirj wrote: post #58

This is the Android multitasking lead finally coming fully circle. Android had multi tasking much earlier and in a more powerful way by allowing apps to start their own serivices and do pretty much whatever they wanted, but this is the unfortunate logical result - apps that agressively kill other apps, installed by the handset manufacturers, to protect users from badly written apps that drain the battery in the servi…

This isn't about protecting the user from badly written and battery draining apps. Almost all of the mentioned manufacturers ship their devices with a long list of pre-installed and whitelisted services, including Facebook and other spyware. As a developer myself, it is just annoying do deal with and just not scalable if you have to explain each user individually how to turn of these "optimizations" (if that's even p…

It’s also not scalable if every app starts running background processes on an operating system without “virtual memory” - yes, I know there is a difference between virtual memory and swapping to the disk.

Re: Android vendors, don’t kill my app

#142

Post by kda26 »

gambiting wrote: post #130
yason wrote: post #129

Killing apps is a good thing . There have been battery saver programs since the very beginning of early Android versions to kill of connectivity and clean up running apps. When Android now supports some of that natively and vendors too, even more aggressively, this is just responding to users' needs. There is a quite clear usage pattern to support this behaviour: unless I explicitly say so, I don't want apps on their…

I mean sure, but at least give me a way to override it. On my OnePlus 5T running Android Pie, the system will keep killing my VPN client when in sleep mode, even though I have selected that I don't want to optimize it under battery usage. With the VPN client restricting all unprotected access, it means that once the phone goes into sleep, I stop getting all notifications for anything because there is no internet conn…

On my phone, if I go to the apps list>tap app I want to run in the background (VPN app for example)>battery>allow background usage.

I have a galaxy S9 but there should be the same or similar setting on yours.

Re: Android vendors, don’t kill my app

#143

Post by scarface74 »

whouweling wrote: post #126

We are running a (very niche) platform + app for people with special needs, where accurate and offline alarms are necessary: this is a big problem for us. I think about 1/3 of all our support requests are about the app being killed in the background on specific phones. The part of the app that does the actual scheduling of the alarms is a big mess with lots of device & API level exceptions. Debugging alarm problems i…

Does Android not have the concept of “local notifications” where you can tell the OS to schedule a notification to be sent to the app to wake it up instead of being in the background the whole time?

Re: Android vendors, don’t kill my app

#144

Post by kda26 »

simias wrote: post #73
sudhirj wrote: post #58

This is the Android multitasking lead finally coming fully circle. Android had multi tasking much earlier and in a more powerful way by allowing apps to start their own serivices and do pretty much whatever they wanted, but this is the unfortunate logical result - apps that agressively kill other apps, installed by the handset manufacturers, to protect users from badly written apps that drain the battery in the servi…

Isn't it also the consequence of taking the control away from the user? Why can't I whitelist which applications I want to allow to run in the background? Why do I still have to grant an application all the permissions it requests when I install it instead of being able to turn them on or off individually? By dumbing things down that way Google created this situation IMO, it's bad from a quality, usability and privac…

On my phone (android), going to apps>selecting app I want to run in the background>battery>background usage I can allow the app to run unrestricted in the background.

All android phones I've owned had this option.

Re: Android vendors, don’t kill my app

#145

Post by scarface74 »

GeneralTspoon wrote: post #54
xupybd wrote: post #3

I actually like the move to kill background tasks. Don't get me wrong I think they're great when they're needed. But if I only installed the app because the mobile site is crippled I don't want it to destroy my battery polling for content changes when I only open the app once in a blue moon.

The right way to solve this is with explicit permissions (similar to iOS). Rather than arbitrarily and sporadically crippling apps with opaque limitations. Google & manufacturerers have gone too far in the quest for the Holy Grail of extending battery life. To the point where it’s negatively affects the user experience quite often (there are quite a few examples in these comments). It makes Android overall seem more…

It makes Android overall seem more buggy (for example, not receiving notifications for an instant messaging app is pretty ridiculous, assuming I’ve opted in and want these notifications).

Do instant messaging apps really need to be running to listen for notifications? Why isn’t listening for notifications being handled by one central Android process that then dispatches it and launches the app if necessary?

Re: Android vendors, don’t kill my app

#147

Post by pedrocx486 »

kda26 wrote: post #142
gambiting wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean sure, but at least give me a way to override it. On my OnePlus 5T running Android Pie, the system will keep killing my VPN client when in sleep mode, even though I have selected that I don't want to optimize it under battery usage. With the VPN client restricting all unprotected access, it means that once the phone goes into sleep, I stop getting all notifications for anything because there is no internet conn…

On my phone, if I go to the apps list>tap app I want to run in the background (VPN app for example)>battery>allow background usage. I have a galaxy S9 but there should be the same or similar setting on yours.

It's exactly the same thing he's talking about. The issue here (I also own a OnePlus 5T) is that OnePlus' implementation of memory saving is too agressive and often ignores user configs.

Re: Android vendors, don’t kill my app

#148

Post by adrianhon »

For our Zombies, Run! run tracking/audio adventure app, "battery management" is turning into our most consistent customer complaint, to the point where it's impacting review scores, active users, and probably subscriptions. The result of the changes made by Huawei, OnePlus, Xiaomi, and Samsung mean that our app is killed during runs, and people interpret that as the app crashing.

We're trying to figure out the best way of telling users how to change their battery settings (which, for the avoidance of doubt, are usually on by default; and sometimes revert back to default on OS updates); some kind of annoying modal popup in the app before they begin a run, perhaps.

What can I say? These Android manufacturers are prioritising numbers they can put on a spec sheet over the end-user experience on entire categories of legitimate fitness and audio apps. We have no recourse and no way to get on their whitelist. Maybe Google could threaten the manufacturers, but that would be a nuclear-level response.

Yet another thing third-party app developers have to deal with.

Re: Android vendors, don’t kill my app

#149

Post by veeti »

scarface74 wrote: post #143
whouweling wrote: post #126

We are running a (very niche) platform + app for people with special needs, where accurate and offline alarms are necessary: this is a big problem for us. I think about 1/3 of all our support requests are about the app being killed in the background on specific phones. The part of the app that does the actual scheduling of the alarms is a big mess with lots of device & API level exceptions. Debugging alarm problems i…

Does Android not have the concept of “local notifications” where you can tell the OS to schedule a notification to be sent to the app to wake it up instead of being in the background the whole time?

Yes, and these manufacturer optimizations often break them.
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