Database Users

Doing a clean uninstal of apps

Galaxy S is my first Android device, so please excuse my noob-question:
I just try alot of apps and most of them will be uninstalled by me a few days later. Does Android do a "clean" uninstall, or are there still bits and pieces in something like a registry (yes I am a windows-user ;-)). Or does that depend on the uninstall-method which is provided by the individual app-developer?
Due to the fact that there is no "General Android" - Forum I will post my question in this forum which at least corrsesponds to my current device.
Thanks for your insight.
quicky

This is funny because I also wonder everytime I delete if there are registry pieces missing lool. but I'm sure that doesn't matter.. There are however SOMETIMES folders IN the SD card or the external Drive of a phone (like the 8gb/16gb partition of the Galaxy).
All android phones are like that, sometimes they leave a folder with settings or sometimes empty folders, and sometimes no folders at all.
I think it's just to keep cache or settings.. you can simply delete those when you enter your sd card.

In Android, every app has his own "sandbox". This is like a exclusive folder for the app, where it stores everything and other apps can't access.
When you remove an app from the phone, android removes this "folder" so there is nothing left behind.
There is just one exception to this: the SD card. Some programs will store some information (for example heavy games store maps, voices,...) to a folder in the SD card. So when uninstalling just look if your SD card contains some folder with the app name and safely remove it too (unless you plan reinstalling the app later!).

Apps on SD Card Sometimes Disappear

I'm having an intermittent problem where the apps which have been moved to the SD card often (but not always) disappear. They do not show up on my launcher (ADW) and I am also unable to install or update any apps. I haven't seen anyone else reporting a similar problem, but the weird thing is that the same thing happens on my daughter's Epic. Here's what I do know:
1. This only happens with Froyo ROMs. It was happening on my phone with SFR 1.1. I installed a Gingerbread ROM (Swiss Cheese Samsprint) and it went away. However, my daughter is on stock (but rooted) EC05 and the same thing is happening with her phone. Additionally, I installed Urban Inception (a GB ROM) and did not have the problem. But I missed the speed of the custom kernels, so I returned my phone to Froyo (this time SFR 1.2) and the problem is again recurring. So, it seems to be 2.2-specific.
2. I have used Odin to return to stock several times, that has not resolved the problem.
3. I have formatted my SD card (once using Windows and again using the format option on my phone) and that has had no effect.
4. When I boot my phone, the apps on the SD card do not show up in the app drawer. After a few minutes, they often appear, but not always. Again this is true on both my daughter's phone and mine, but only with a Froyo ROM.
5. The phone will usually get through two or maybe three new app installs or updates, then all the rest will fail until I reboot. Again, this occurs on both my and my daughter's phones, and only with Froyo. It doesn't matter if these are market apps or Amazon appstore apps. Once one update or install fails, nothing else will install or update until I reboot the phone.
I suppose I could solve my problem by going with GB, but those ROMs are so much slower than the Froyo ones with custom kernels. Also, I like my daughter being as stock as possible, because she won't mess with her phone and can't always give it to me to fix. I doubt it's a hardware issue because we both have it. But, it also doesn't appear to be a ROM issue, since we have different ROMs. Since it's obviously not common, it must be related to either an app we have installed or something strange that I have done (though her phone has nothing done to it but the one-click CWM 3.0.0.5/6).
Anyone have any ideas for me? I suppose my issue will resolve once we have official GB and custom kernels start appearing for it, but I thought it was very strange that I have two phones that both exhibit a problem that nobody else seems to have.
Thanks for reading all this.

This had been happening to me for a while too. I don't have as many apps anymore and keep it all in the phone and noticed better battery life but still want to be able to use apps2sd
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA Premium App

Stock sd's?
cd's or tapes?

schnowdapowda said:
Stock sd's?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, on both phones.

I just noticed this yesterday. I saw Angry Birds had updated but I didn't get notified in my market. The app was still in my launcher though. Don't know if it matters but I hadn't played it in a long time.
Reinstalling worked and didn't lose any data.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App

I've had this problem too on the MidnightRom v5.2. It's especially annoying when my kids want to play Angry Birds and they are all installed to the SD card. I have "fixed" the apps not showing up in the App drawer by creating shortcuts on one of my home screens to the apps I have on the SD card. When the apps don't show up in the App drawer, the icon on the home screen looks like a generic "Android installed app". The apps I have on the SD card are: apps that came with my Rom (Video Editor), Apps installed from the Market and Apps installed from the Amazon App store.
*I've noticed* it's more common the icons don't show up in the App drawer or have the wrong icon if I unlock my phone before it completely boots (finishes the Scanning Media twice in the status bar).
edonnelly- if you are "missing" an App, try creating a shortcut for it to see if it's in the Applications list. That way at least you can launch it if you reboot and the app isn't showing up in the app drawer.
schnowdapowda- I'm also using my stock 16gb Samsung microSD card, and I've also formatted it with the same results.

Fast Boot option may be the culprit
This is actually a long-standing problem in Android OS, going back at least two years (donkey's years in this technology!)
Something about the interaction of the OS and an sdcard formated for holding apps creates odd behaviours.
Lots of complicated suggestions have been made, including reformatting sdcard, reinstalling ROMs, changing launchers (the one suggested here) and such.
None of these approaches seems really to solve the problem even in most cases.
What seems to be working for me (at least for the last week or so) is the following very simple tweak.
CUT TO THE SOLUTION BELOW -- SEARCH FOR ////
Some (not all) of my apps moved to SD (all by Titanium Backup Pro) have begun to disappear and (sometimes) reappear without warning after I began to add and delete large Virtual Machines created in QEMU from my 16GB SanDisc class 10 microSD card on my HTC Droid Incredible running rooted stock Verizon Android Froyo 2.2.3. I know this thread is far from my phone's "home base", but from what I can tell this problem with disappearing apps located on an sdcard is NOT determined by hardware or even Android version.
I also happen to use LauncherPro by Federico Carnales instead of the built-in HTC Sense launcher. I noted elsewhere on XDA that a user had suggested that because at least some (maybe all) launchers start before the SD Card that this may be a problem, especially if changes are made to the sdcard that the launcher did not perform, or was not active during their performance by other apps such as Titanium Backup. That fits my situation, because I unmounted the SD, physically removed it to a PC, and added/deleted large VM files to save (lots) of time. No problems of this sort before I did this, so there must be some connection.
I noted that other users have tried reformatting SD, substituting different brands of SD, using newer/older SD etc. None of these reliably helped. So I skipped these options.
//// The (simple!) solution I tried that SEEMS to work (only time will tell!) is buried in the main Android Settings (accessed from the Menu button while in Home screen). Under "Applications" there is a setting "Fast Boot" that I checked long ago and forgot about (it seemed like a good thing to do at the time). The text warns "Turn off to use some Market apps" (that shows the age of my 2-yr old used phone and Android OS -- ohmygosh!-- because it refers to Market rather than Google Play Store!) Anyway, I unchecked the option and rebooted the phone.
Yes, it took a bit longer to boot (maybe a whole minute!), but after waiting about another minute ALL my home screen apps had normal icons and loaded properly. Titanium Backup Pro batch scenarios confirmed there were no apps in a forced uninstalled state (i.e. I had not done the deed, the system somehow had done it or at least rendered the apps "invisible" to Titanium, which decided they needed reinstallation).
The only odd behaviour was that auto brightness was turned off after I unchecked Fast Boot and rebooted. Going into Android Settings > Display and rechecking "auto brightness" took care of that. No other oddities or strange behaviours thus far (but it has only been about an hour).
I will report anything further on this thread only (Samsung Fascinate > Fascinate Q&A > What just happend? apps on sdcard) if anything else requires reporting. Silence implies success!
link: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1873670
(I am copying this post to other relevant threads, but will not post anything further elsewhere -- only there. This is a bit arbitrary (especially now that the chosen thread no longer is the most recent active one on this topic), but I hope this approach pleases the XDA sysops/admins) :angel:

app folders or short cuts

I have a stupid question? My wife's a500 is all stock not rooted but problem is all her app folder shortcuts stop working. Then her different screens where she setup short cuts is like they are all gone? Almost as if it is fresh out of box. Real weird. She is at hc3.1 , kernel very 2.6.36.3. Build #4.010.13com Gen 2. Anyone got any idea what may have happened it like Fri in weird none of the shortcuts were working then she shut it down restarted dida reset then it like it lost all her personalization settings.........

I've had that happen to me several times when I tried to organize my apps with the Acer organizing folders. Especially the game folder. While I don't really know the why's, I do know it happens when the folders are at full capacity. At least in my case this occurred. I didn't know if it was caused by a shortcut that peeked a specific size limit or just a shortcut that caused a glitch in general since I wasn't able to isolate the cause. Sometimes a shortcut added to the folder would eventually end up missing leaving a void that couldn't be filled, leaving me no option but to clear data for the game or media folder and start over with only the same result.
I eventually resorted to 'app organizer' on the marketplace with no problems since. Much better anyway since I can customize the icons and quickly label apps to appear for each folder.

I do believe I read that this happens when an app in the folder gets updated, then the apps disappear and the problems start. I also switched to app organizer because of this.

Anyone else notice this strange behavior

Anyone else notice that when you update an app, you download the update (which is the complete app, not an update to the existing app) into a new folder, and the replaced app is not deleted. Many apps already have multiple instances of themselves, and I have only had my tablet for 2 weeks. (Most apps have at least 2 versions, but the worst (vclibs.110) already has 8 versions of itself!!!)
This may not seem like much yet, but I have auto update apps turned off, and still using at least twice the space I should be using. I also have 22 garbage apps that are complaining about wanting an update, which would add another 22 copies of uslessness to an SSD that is already too small (128GB)
Currently, these mostly useless apps are consuming just under 3 GB of space, at least 1/2 of that is not required, and that is after only 2 weeks. What kind of disk usage after 2 years of auto updates? (I also have not installed any new apps, the 3 GB is just junk MS and Acer put on already)
So I see from here http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2102160 that others have indeed noticed this.
Update 2:
Apps are placed in "Program Files\WindowsApps"(all apps) I have removed the older versions with no noticable issues. To delete a current App, simply flick up on the app tile, (be it on the start menu, or in all apps) and select "uninstall". Note that this will only uninstall the latest version of the app. You will still have to go to "Program Files\WindowsApps" to delete any prior versions.

>Anyone else notice that when you update an app...and the replaced app is not deleted. Many apps already have multiple instances of themselves
That's the default behavior for Windows since Vista, aka WinSxS,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Side-by-side_assembly
The problem is the "DLL hell" dependencies, and MS' solution was to keep old DLLs so dependencies don't break. The downside is that Windows keeps getting ever more bloated as time goes on. This was of minimal concern when we all had big honking hard drives, but became glaring on mobiles with limited storage.
Windows has always been a pig for space, including Win8. It espouses redundancy, hence the multiple layers of backup--reserved/recovery partitions, restore points, file history, trash can, WinSxS, etc. A minimum install for Win XP was less than 2GB. A Win8 x64 bare install is 13-14GB before updates, not counting the various dedicated system partitions. Updates will eat up a few more gigs, and it continually goes up from there.
Win8 did manage to optimize for power. One hopes that MS will discard the "unlimited storage" mindset and likewise optimize it for space. I'd like to see a Tablet Edition that dispenses with the abovementioned redundancy features. Backups can go to cloud or NAS.
Win8 has a commandline tool to remove Windows packages from the install ISO, called DISM. A how-to, to remove Metro apps, is here,
http://www.edugeek.net/forums/windows-8/104332-removing-metro-apps-windows-8-image.html
Metro apps have no dependencies with the desktop side, and removing them should be safe for desktop users. I'll try out the above to slim the oinker down some. It won't save that much space, but there'll be less crapware to delete.

Suggestions and thoughts about external sd card issues

After updating my n900 to 4.4.2 KitKat and facing the horrible problem of failed external sd card write, i read alot about that situation, i found alot of complains of users all over the world, i imagined a bad future to my beloved android system, i imagined that i will someday be forced to abandon the plateform and go to windows phone or jolla or tizen phone (no apple phone forever !!!), i managed to solve the problem by the workaround posted for rooted phones, but then i thought that every phone and tablet of the billion activated android phones on earth should be rooted to solve the problem and their users should be technically good to be able to root their phones and be ready to lose warranty which i thought was impossible, ability to have a file system that we could do whatever we want just as our Pcs was one of the major advantages of android operating system to the extent that some of us do not need a pc anymore or at least use it less than the past, they are killing the media editing and creation abilities of the system (just like Pc) and moving the Applish way towards only media consumption, they are removing a function that we paid for , i thought about lawsuits for this, i thought also about suggestions as making five folders by default in external sd card pictures, sounds, videos , documents and others as public folders so for example two third party apps can share the same media on pictures folder etc (not a complete sandboxing) also if app is uninstalled the media on public folders not removed with the main app, i think this solution is better than that posted by google so we prevent media generated or edited by apps to be removed when app itself is uninstalled and also prevent mirroring the same media in two different app private folders of similar purposes also no clutter as apps are allowed to write only to this public folders and their private folders, i think it is a solution in between Google wishes and users wishes and avoid most problems caused by external sd card fail write by third party apps brought unexpectedly by the KitKat update, Also a tick box in setting for allowing write access of third party apps to external sd card just as unknown sources will be more than welcomed !!!