Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I lost the ability to record calls Is this applicable to all Pie phones or just your particular one? I wonder why did they do it.
https://www.firstpost.com/tech/news-analysis/google-removes-...
What an outrage!
Android updates are getting slower and slower, despite Google's best efforts
131–140 of 161 posts
Re: Android updates are getting slower and slower, despite Google's best efforts
#132Earlier quoted context omitted.
> there wasn't much meaningful difference in the experience between my Nexus 7 running Marshmallow and my S8+ phone with the Pie update. Reading this on a Nexus 5, running marshmallow. I stopped upgrading when I stopped seeing a reason to, now I just get the old models on the cheap and only occasionally wonder if I'm missing out. In those moments I'll remember your comment, stop wondering, and continue treating my ph…
Reading this on a Nexus 5X running Oreo 8.1.0. Formerly happy owner. Now, after accidental pocket-tap on "Update All", seeing glacial performance in core apps e.g. Gmail, Maps. No "revert" option in GUI of course. Maybe possible with ADB ... Where you write "stopped upgrading", do you mean hardware only -- allowing Google system plus apps to push all software updates? How do you assure yourself that your Nexus 5 has…
Not the parent, but you don't. I run a Galaxy S9 but as far as I'm concerned, the phone will be a paperweight in 1 or 2 more years.
iPhones have better longevity, hence their higher resale value.
Re: Android updates are getting slower and slower, despite Google's best efforts
#133This is definitely a problem but in practice it's not as dire as this article makes it sound. So many of the essential pieces have been factored out into the support libraries and independently upgradable components that Android devices actually get more regular updates in some respects than iOS devices do. For example, I have to update my entire iPhone OS to get an updated web browser or photo library or keyboard. G…
>As an iOS developer I can't use new OS features until all my users have upgraded. As long as what I need is in the support library I can adopt the latest and greatest for Android right away. I don't know about the rate and speed of support library from the Top 5 Android manufacturers, which is Samsung, Huawei, BBKs, Xiaomi. I know they do get some regular update, but on all devices? And do those user actually update…
The support library is something that is statically compiled inside of Android apps. That's the reason why it exists - to circumvent the usual Android OS update process to bring new APIs to developers faster.
Re: Android updates are getting slower and slower, despite Google's best efforts
#134Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Adaptive Battery, in a nutshell, is about figuring out which apps you use frequently and keeping those apps in memory, while the apps you don’t use often are purged once you’re finished with them. Put another way, Android Pie can adapt to your usage patterns so that it only spends battery power on the apps Adaptive Battery thinks you’ll need. https://venturebeat.com/2018/08/28/how-android-pies-adaptive... I don't k…
Fully-closing apps requires them to re-initialize them from scratch after each re-open, which is cpu-heavy (thus also battery-heavy) and slow. A frequent usage pattern, also, is quickly switching between several apps. There's no definite “close” on mobiles apart from force-quits, which are unhappy for all apps, too.
> Fully-closing apps requires them to re-initialize them from scratch after each re-open, which is cpu-heavy (thus also battery-heavy) and slow.
Thanks for the explanation, I didn't know starting from scratch was so expensive. I had always wondered (and fumed) about that but it makes more sense now.
Re: Android updates are getting slower and slower, despite Google's best efforts
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Adaptive Battery, in a nutshell, is about figuring out which apps you use frequently and keeping those apps in memory, while the apps you don’t use often are purged once you’re finished with them. Put another way, Android Pie can adapt to your usage patterns so that it only spends battery power on the apps Adaptive Battery thinks you’ll need. https://venturebeat.com/2018/08/28/how-android-pies-adaptive... I don't k…
Android is designed so that users never "close" an app (there's no close button); instead, they switch between apps. The system closes apps in the background when necessary to free memory, but all apps are supposed to save and restore their state so that the user is presented with the illusion that the app never stopped running.
This is untrue. You can close an app manually by pressing the bottom right software button, which shows your foreground apps, and then swiping the app window off the screen.
The state is lost and, for most apps, background processes are killed.
Re: Android updates are getting slower and slower, despite Google's best efforts
#136This is definitely a problem but in practice it's not as dire as this article makes it sound. So many of the essential pieces have been factored out into the support libraries and independently upgradable components that Android devices actually get more regular updates in some respects than iOS devices do. For example, I have to update my entire iPhone OS to get an updated web browser or photo library or keyboard. G…
Hi, author here You're right about platform features used within apps, many (most? all?) are made available to developers with the support libraries. However, users will get none of the following until they get Pie (for example) * ML adaptive battery * App actions (ML predictive app shortcuts) * Digital well-being dashboard and limits * A lot more, as shown on this page (there's a lot of smaller items in the collapsi…
You could say the same thing about iOS and browser technologies. Every iOS device is 5 years behind in web standards support. Every Android device has access to the latest Chrome or Firefox.
Re: Android updates are getting slower and slower, despite Google's best efforts
#137Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hi, author here You're right about platform features used within apps, many (most? all?) are made available to developers with the support libraries. However, users will get none of the following until they get Pie (for example) * ML adaptive battery * App actions (ML predictive app shortcuts) * Digital well-being dashboard and limits * A lot more, as shown on this page (there's a lot of smaller items in the collapsi…
> Digital well-being dashboard and limits Whenever a for-profit company introduces a new feature, one must ask himself, what is the business case for it. Personally, I see this feature as a way for Google to legally track which apps people use, and how often. Essentially, it does for Google what Onavo VPN did for Facebook. From the data collection point of view, whoever came up with this idea at Google must have been…
They can and do already track your app usage (you can see this if you check your usage history on the Google data dashboards).
This specific change is pretty much just a good thing, unless you want to get meta-cynical.
Re: Android updates are getting slower and slower, despite Google's best efforts
#138Earlier quoted context omitted.
They will not be able to force their crap in my future Librem 5 phone.
I appreciate the independent thinking behind this comment, but seriously, what completely broke the carrier model was the iPhone. When we started discussing customisation with Apple, all they ever allowed us to do was add a default bookmark to Safari. Period. Finito. Looking back, that was the sanest thing any handset manufacturer ever did for the entire industry.
How did carriers incentivise customisation for manufacturers? Did Apple essentially turn down "easy money" to maintain product integrity?
Re: Android updates are getting slower and slower, despite Google's best efforts
#139This is definitely a problem but in practice it's not as dire as this article makes it sound. So many of the essential pieces have been factored out into the support libraries and independently upgradable components that Android devices actually get more regular updates in some respects than iOS devices do. For example, I have to update my entire iPhone OS to get an updated web browser or photo library or keyboard. G…
To add to this, I have a 6 year old iPad. There are no issues with it except the operating system itself. Hulu won't install since it needs iOS 11 for some reason. iOS won't update to 11 because it's too old. Netflix works and updates just fine.
The iPad is in perfect condition with no hardware issues. It's the software that will make it an ewaste soon.
My Android phone updates all the apps (even many OS services) without any problem.
Re: Android updates are getting slower and slower, despite Google's best efforts
#140Earlier quoted context omitted.
The replaceable launcher is a big one. Tasker was another (though I heard Google Play was cracking down on non-accessibility uses of accessibility features for security reasons?) I switched back to iOS when the SE came out, but I still miss Nova Launcher. Especially being able to put two actions on each dock icon, one for tap and one for swipe up. So if you have something like friends split over two main chat platfor…
Alt launchers are cool but Android doesn't give them full support for widgets. Accessibility still matters even if you aren't blind, and apps for blind users can still be malicious. Android has been steadily removing user control features to be more locked down like iOS but without privacy controls.
Apps for blind people could still be malicious, but that’s not a reason to justify random bullshit apps claiming accessibility permissions.
A real address book app could still harvest your contact data and sell it for marketing purposes, but if google cracks down and says “Hey flashlight apps, you aren’t allowed to scrape Contacts information anymore” that would be entirely reasonable.
Abuse of android’s accessibility services is particularly dangerous, hence the push for tighter controls on who can use it.
https://www.zdnet.com/article/this-android-banking-malware-s...