I'm rooted running stock 2.1... 5 and I have removed some unwanted apps. I imagine the system/app folder is located on a different system partition which has so much room. Since removing aps from the system folder doesn't free up any memory I figured why not move some apps in there so that I don't take up my regular app folder. Is this possible?
Since those apps will then be in the read-only partition you will have to update them manually instead of through the market.
Yeah, I have some apps which have never been updated nor do I want them to be updated. So it will work huh. How much room is there on the system partition and what will happen if I go over?
obsanity said:
Yeah, I have some apps which have never been updated nor do I want them to be updated. So it will work huh. How much room is there on the system partition and what will happen if I go over?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
download Quick System Info from the Market....it will tell you how much room is left on your system partition. Going over the limit will cause your phone to bootloop on a restart.
Got it. I assume its the system storage? It says I got 16mb free.
Related
Im using the Fresh .04 ROM. I understand Apps2SD is installed and functional. I did format my SD card correctly before installing and I suspect it should be working.
My question is:
I have been pushing a few apps to my /system/app directory using adb.
Is that on the SD card now or am I just pushing to the system RAM area and not taking advantage of Apps2SD.
I noticed my available space is at 90MB and with the Modoco ROM I had 104 available with most of these apps.
I feel like Im doing this wrong.
Apps2sd is not functional in 0.4. It was a bug that was discovered after the fact. You aren't doing anything wrong.
0.5 is being tested by about 10 people right now and all are saying it's working fine. So be patient and 0.5 will be out later.
What apps are you pushing to /system/app?
No, /system/app is not on the SD card. But it's not on the data partition either. The internal memory is partitioned as follows as far as I can tell:
/system 174MB total, generally around 10-20MB free depending on ROM and so forth
/data 163MB total. This is what reports as "phone storage" in the OS. Starts at around 140MB free.
/cache 133MB
I'm not sure how the rest of it really works but that's the gist of it.
AppsToSD moves the /data/app and /data/app-private folders (and nothing else) to the SD card. These are the folders that contain your Market and downloaded .apk files. Other things in the /data directory that use "phone storage" are the boot cache, dalvik cache, and app data (browser cache, preferences, saved games, etc).
jonnythan said:
What apps are you pushing to /system/app?
No, /system/app is not on the SD card. But it's not on the data partition either. The internal memory is partitioned as follows as far as I can tell:
/system 174MB total, generally around 10-20MB free depending on ROM and so forth
/data 163MB total. This is what reports as "phone storage" in the OS. Starts at around 140MB free.
/cache 133MB
I'm not sure how the rest of it really works but that's the gist of it.
AppsToSD moves the /data/app and /data/app-private folders (and nothing else) to the SD card. These are the folders that contain your Market and downloaded .apk files. Other things in the /data directory that use "phone storage" are the boot cache, dalvik cache, and app data (browser cache, preferences, saved games, etc).
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Ok, I was pushing a few of the Original Sprint Apps and some of my purchased apps. Unfortunately, I had to download a couple apps from a "not so legit source" for the short term due to the Market screw up. However, dont look down on me, I only got the apps I legitimately purchased and couldnt download again after I formatted my card and such going from Modoco to Fresh.
Anyway, I just adb push "app name" /system/app after a mount from
a command prompt.
Once the Apps2SD is fixed, should i be doing this process a different way to take advantage of the SD card space.
Yeah, push to /data/app. There is a limited amount of free space in the /system partition.
jonnythan said:
Yeah, push to /data/app. There is a limited amount of free space in the /system partition.
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Easy enough. Thanks.
jonnythan said:
Yeah, push to /data/app. There is a limited amount of free space in the /system partition.
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Click to collapse
Ok, so I loaded the Modoco ROM and pushed to /data/app. It seemed to push fine, but I dont see the app.
What am I doing wrong.
Did you reboot after you pushed it there?
jonnythan said:
Did you reboot after you pushed it there?
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Yes, a I get a loop at the Sprint logo. I have tried doing a Nandroid Backup 2x and then upgrading to the new Modoco and pushing. Everything works fine until I push an app to the /data/app directory, then I get a loop.
Im going to try pushing to the sdcard and move to data/app using SU file Manager.
What file are you trying to put there?
jonnythan said:
What file are you trying to put there?
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The "test" app im pushing is the Droid Facebook app. Facebook.apk.
I tried pushing Sprint_TV.apk too, with no success.
Its odd. If I push anything to that directory, it loops the startup at the Sprint logo. I just ended up pushing to /system/app and decided to forget about it. Im a neophyte and was getting ready to throw the phone out the window.
Sprint_TV might need to be in /system/app, which is wher it normally is. The Droid Facebook app might simply not work on the Hero. So...
jonnythan said:
Sprint_TV might need to be in /system/app, which is wher it normally is. The Droid Facebook app might simply not work on the Hero. So...
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Click to collapse
After alot of trial and error, I finally got the apps in the right place and to work correctly.
I pushed to /data/sd/apps
That appears to be where Apps2SD is setup to throw the apps.
Thanks for hanging in there with me on this thread.
Both apps work great in that directory. In fact, I moved alot of the stock apps to that directory and they worked fine. None of them got moved automatically. It seems the only time Apps2SD moves the apps is upon installation, so pushing or for apps that were previously installed, they didnt get moved.
Hey, it works for me, hopefully someone else will find this useful.
Lappie2010 said:
After alot of trial and error, I finally got the apps in the right place and to work correctly.
I pushed to /data/sd/apps
That appears to be where Apps2SD is setup to throw the apps.
Thanks for hanging in there with me on this thread.
Both apps work great in that directory. In fact, I moved alot of the stock apps to that directory and they worked fine. None of them got moved automatically. It seems the only time Apps2SD moves the apps is upon installation, so pushing or for apps that were previously installed, they didnt get moved.
Hey, it works for me, hopefully someone else will find this useful.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Apps that are in /data/app (the default location without apps2sd) will get moved to /data/sd/app and then a sym link is created that points from /data/app to /data/sd/app. Anything that is in /system/app (all default system apps) will not get moved. Modaco's rom had moved a few of them there but people were receiving FC's and moving them back.
Ok I had memory issues when I went from the Backflip to the Flipside. But thankfully links2sd made a huge difference and i was able to get all the apps I wanted using that nifty little app. Now however after this update I can't even get half the apps I had on 2.1, and that is with using Links2sd. I've tried getting rid of ATT bloatware, moving some apps to systems apps, and clearing davlik cache using Titanium Backup but it only does so much. Anyone have any solutions to get more internal storage or a better way to get apps onto the SD card because this is making the update almost not worth it...and what's worse is that we cant even revert back to 2.1 without bricking the phone....sad day!
I'm having pretty much the same issues, but I'm wondering how you moved apps to the system apps? This would be helpful to me.
How much internal memory do you have free? I have about 45mb which is less then half of what I had before the update. Im not sure what is taking up the memory. Ive removed what I can and feel is safe with Ti Backup and moved my apps with Link2SD to my SD card.
boazjuggalo said:
I'm having pretty much the same issues, but I'm wondering how you moved apps to the system apps? This would be helpful to me.
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Click to collapse
This is done via titanium backup. Long press on the app and the menu gives you the option to convert to sys app.
pre4speed said:
This is done via titanium backup. Long press on the app and the menu gives you the option to convert to sys app.
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Yea that's how I moved it to system.
And I have about 20MB after moving a few apps and moving some to system....ugh this is frustrating
I have my wife's phone running on 60mgs free...
HiloDB1 said:
How much internal memory do you have free? I have about 45mb which is less then half of what I had before the update. Im not sure what is taking up the memory. Ive removed what I can and feel is safe with Ti Backup and moved my apps with Link2SD to my SD card.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have 2 or 3 apps installed (Facebook and whatnot) and I have roughly 32mb after clearing davick (or whatever it's called)
telegraph0000 said:
I have my wife's phone running on 60mgs free...
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Really, how? How many apps do you have? I have about 17 apps
JBallin4life27 said:
Really, how? How many apps do you have? I have about 17 apps
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Click to collapse
Just basics
Adfree
Adobe flash
Adobe reader
Adwlauncher
Fruit ninja
Pandora
Jorte
Jw reader
Lik2sd
Maps
Market
Palmary weatherb pro
Pure messenger widget
Quick boot
Titanium backup
I also added opera, and that brought it down to 50megs
Tadaaaaaa.....
Hey, I just posted the SBF in the Flipside Android Development part of the forum and I flashed that and it appears that this version of 2.2.2 runs better with links2sd and has significantly made a difference in freeing up memory. I'm gonna play around with it some more but it appears to have links2sd running as well as it did when I had 2.1. Some of you may want to consider backing up and reflashing the update. Just something to consider. I'll post an update again soon after I play around with it a bit.
Do you know how much space was available on /data when you fresh flashed it?
(edit)
So, I ended up breaking something, as usual, and had to reflash, so I used the fresh 2.2 sbf. Turns out there's roughly 74mb free on /data when you first flash, although that quickly drops as the system apps (maps, market, and flash offhand) are brought up to date.
You're right!!!
My wife's phone is down to 55 megs!!!
Sorry, I meant to post again after my last post but my phone kept freezing on the red Moto screen everytime I flashed the update and I took my phone back to AT&T 3 times this past weekend only to find out it was my SD card causing the problems. Just FYI if you partition your SD card to use link2sd make sure your second partition is set as primary otherwise the 2.2 Froyo update will completely shutdown as soon as you put your card in and will not let you do ANYTHING!
That being said, you definitely have better memory after flashing the SBF as opposed to the other methods i've tried for the update. I was able to install almost all the apps and games I had previously (some I didn't add just cuz I hadn't been using em). Everything runs smoother for me and I havent had any freezing or anything. Hope this update is running well for you guys
I'm reluctant to move many things over to system apps, personally... Don't forget that link2sd won't link the dalvik-cache of system apps, so you'd actually have more free space in /data by leaving it as a user app and just linking app/dalvik/lib. I'm at roughly 95mb free currently, with a pretty reasonable amount of stuff installed, so I'm much happier now.
Another space-saving trick I've found: Titanium Backup has a folder in /data that it uses as a temp file storage, any time you restore a backup it moves the .apk over there then installs it. It's located at /data/data/com.keramidas.TitaniumBackup/files, and also contains busybox, sqlite3, and your license file. If you're restoring a backup of a large app, this means you need a pretty large amount of space free to do so, which can be difficult on our phones. You can move this folder over to the second sd card partition that link2sd uses and symlink it without problems. Here's a (probably ugly) method:
Code:
cd /data/sdext2
mkdir tbfiles
cp /data/data/com.keramidas.TitaniumBackup/files/* ./tbfiles
rm -Rf /data/data/com.keramidas.TitaniumBackup/files
ln -s /data/sdext2/tbfiles /data/data/com.keramidas.TitaniumBackup/files
Actually....
If you have auto-link on... and move it to system with tibu... it will link the cache...
Why are you linking lib files... when you reboot... they go back to internal... you'll have memory issues at reboot that way...
Sent from my MB508 using Tapatalk
The file I manually link isn't a lib, or at least it doesn't get linked by Link2SD when you link TitaniumBackup's libs. The link stays through a reboot and hasn't caused me any issues so far, it just makes less free space required to restore backups.
As for linking libs in general, while they do tend to get unlinked on reboot, I have plenty of free space to let them exist in /data, and the newest Link2SD has a one-touch option to relink them all again to recover that space. It's not an issue unless you're linking libs and also filling your /data partition near the max.
Do you win anything by making your apps as system apps?
Apps
If you user apps become moved to the system partition, it'll take the space on your system partition instead of your data partition. If you flash the system partition again, the user app that was moved will be overwritten and removed. It won't actually make any difference in speed.
So, the ones in /data/app stays after flashing new rom?
Agaith. said:
So, the ones in /data/app stays after flashing new rom?
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As long as you don't factory reset, usually they will stay there.
Good to know when getting updates (at least of some roms).
Ive found a way to install apps on my desire even if it says that im out of memory. When it says that its almost out of memory it means that it isnt so much space left in the data partition of the phone.
However i have seen that i have like 130 mb space left in my system partition.
The system partition is much like the data partition. The difference is that this partition holds the system apps like contact app, camera app, gallery app, settings app and so on...
Data partition unlike the system partition holds apps that are install/uninstallable. Still if you have root and have root explorer installed then you can see if you have much storage left in your system partition. I would recommend that you have about 100 mb storage left cuz then you can surely use this method.
NOTE:
This isnt garanteed 100% that it will work and for that i recommend that you do a backup of your current rom. And leave a bit space in system partition incase it needs some space. I leave 20 mb space and its working out for me fine.
So what we are gonna do is that we are gonna move our apps or games to the system partition as if it would be a system app and we are gonna use that extra space.
Requirements: Root, S-OFF, recovery, root explorer installed, the apk files of the apps you wabt to move (use a apk manager to make a apk file from your installed apps)
1. Backup your current rom using a recovery.
2. Open root explorer and grant the root access permission.
3. Go to sdcard/ and copy the apk files of the apps that you want to move
4. Go back out of the sdcard and go to system/app/
5. Here make sure you tap on the button in the upper right corner that says Mount R/W
6. Paste the apk files here and rename them to some simple name for example rename com.imangi.templerun.apk to TempleRun.apk
7. After youve done everything in the right order just reboot and your apps should appear in your apps list and you wont be able to move them to sdcard or uninstall them. Incase you have the apps that want to move already installed then uninstall them before the restart.
Only way to remove these apps is to remove the apk files from system/app folder using root manager while the system is mounted as r/w. After a restart the apps should be gone.
If anything goes wrong then just format the system partition and restore it using recovery.
Hope some of you find this helpfull
BTW: this does not work with viber so done even try or you will get unlimited crashes that wont stop viber from trying to start.
Sent from my HTC Desire with R2 ZM4.3 ICS Themed GB Rom using xda premium
Quick question:
I'm on a MIUI based rom, and my /system/app only has 11Mb free. I'm assuming that I can't increase that without losing some important apps?
Well i have never encountered a rom that has less than 50 mb space there. I assume that you have too many apps there. See if you can clean that folder up a bit by searching for apps that you think arent necessary. Like for example i have a app called adaway.apk. I dont need it nor does the system need it. If u cannot do that then change rom.
Btw more apps that donr work with this: SetCPU, Viber
Sent from my HTC Desire with R2 ZM4.3 ICS Themed GB Rom using xda premium
i finaly managed to root my nexus.
i swiched from the Motorola droid. back then i had to be careful with every MB my apps used.
can i move the system app updates to the system to save the space? did something change in 4.2 since 2.3 i have to look for?
thanks
You're not saving space by moving them as a system app.
Sent from my Nexus 4 using xda premium
zephiK said:
You're not saving space by moving them as a system app.
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How so? When a system app is updated, is only the updated portion stored outside of /system and not the whole app?
Rod3 said:
How so? When a system app is updated, is only the updated portion stored outside of /system and not the whole app?
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The system folder is on the same internal storage than the rest of your phone. It makes no sense to move downloaded apps to the system folder to "save space." that's like saying, I want to save space on my computer let me put this file in my windows folder to save space.
It just doesn't make any sense. The only reason why someone would want a app in system would be a app to stay there after flashing a update to your rom such as a security app such as cerbereus
Sent from my Nexus 4 using xda premium
are you sure i would not save space?
lets take Gmail.apk as exmple.
Gmail came preinstalled with my phone, this means there is a Gmail.apk on the "virtual" system partition.
now i install the google play Gmail update. this means the gmail.apk update will be installed in the "virtual" data partition, i could be wrong here because i am new to 4.2 and the nexus 4. anyway now i can uninstall the updated and go back to the preinstalled Gmail version.
titanium backup shows me "the integrate update to system" option for 16 Google apps i am sure that is about 200mb.
United is talking about moving the apk's to the system ROM. This will save space on the internal/SD card storage, as it is a separate partition (I believe).
You will save space by integrating to the roms system via titanium.