Database Users

[Q] Optimizing your phone?

Hi all,
I have owned my Nexus 4 for about 4 months now, and while I love the ability to customize my experience, I am always looking at ways of customizing that streamline things instead of adding more functionality. Rather than having 12 ways to do one thing at all times, I'd rather have the single best way to do 12 things at my disposal. I don't need HALO, the notification shade, and a notification widget all running at once to inform me about new notifications. When I look at the ROM scene on XDA, it seems like people are really interested in adding things to the standard android experience, but nobody seems to be working on trimming the unnecessary features away while adding things that work better/look and feel more elegant. I don't just mean debloated GApps packages, I mean ROMs that use Android's customizability do things better than Google intended.
To give a personal example, I am running stock Android on the Matr1x kernel with the Xposed framework installed to enable Pie Controls so I don't waste screen space, change the battery indicator to a circle/percentage, quick settings to get easy access to torch, settings, wifi, etc in the notification shade, and unicon to enable custom icons in the Google Experience Launcher so all my icons are uniform. This way I have as much information as possible easily accessible at all times, and my phone has a standardized look throughout. However, I feel like I am sticking it all together with tape and strings, and I am still stuck with some of stock android's bloat. It would be great if there were some people out there who shared a similar desire for streamlining the Android experience. Do any of you at XDA have any advice for me as I look for such a ROM, or is this about as good as it's going to get? If I could code I'd just do it myself .
Anyway, thanks for your time!

Downloaded7 said:
Hi all,
I have owned my Nexus 4 for about 4 months now, and while I love the ability to customize my experience, I am always looking at ways of customizing that streamline things instead of adding more functionality. Rather than having 12 ways to do one thing at all times, I'd rather have the single best way to do 12 things at my disposal. I don't need HALO, the notification shade, and a notification widget all running at once to inform me about new notifications. When I look at the ROM scene on XDA, it seems like people are really interested in adding things to the standard android experience, but nobody seems to be working on trimming the unnecessary features away while adding things that work better/look and feel more elegant. I don't just mean debloated GApps packages, I mean ROMs that use Android's customizability do things better than Google intended.
To give a personal example, I am running stock Android on the Matr1x kernel with the Xposed framework installed to enable Pie Controls so I don't waste screen space, change the battery indicator to a circle/percentage, quick settings to get easy access to torch, settings, wifi, etc in the notification shade, and unicon to enable custom icons in the Google Experience Launcher so all my icons are uniform. This way I have as much information as possible easily accessible at all times, and my phone has a standardized look throughout. However, I feel like I am sticking it all together with tape and strings, and I am still stuck with some of stock android's bloat. It would be great if there were some people out there who shared a similar desire for streamlining the Android experience. Do any of you at XDA have any advice for me as I look for such a ROM, or is this about as good as it's going to get? If I could code I'd just do it myself .
Anyway, thanks for your time!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Plus one for this. Are you running KitKat 4.4.2?

4.4.1 at the moment as I haven't found the time to flash the update manually. Glad to see someone else gets where I am coming from .

When will Nougat update be out for Tab A 10.1

Any updates or ETA on when the update will be released?

Very misleading title.

NinoBrown1911 said:
Very misleading title.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
sorry about the title

NinoBrown1911 said:
Very misleading title.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah!! You eagerly click the thread hoping for news only to get a question with an obvious answer. If there were news, someone would have posted it. Is it just me or shouldn't that be obvious to anyone?
edit: And here I am perpetuating the thread.

Based on estimates I've seen, the first to second week of June is a high probability. Looking forward to Nougat for the Tab A 10.1 (2016).

Twisted_Samsung said:
Based on estimates I've seen, the first to second week of June is a high probability. Looking forward to Nougat for the Tab A 10.1 (2016).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's rolling out now

It is indeed rolling out now. Push notifications will easily take this to early June, and I will wait on the upgrade until I see early reports on user experiences. The Nougat update for the S2 has caused havoc for some people.

today i've received nougat update

SM-T580 hopefully soon...
Nice to see the Pen version receiving Nougat, but there are MANY of us still waiting for our update. The estimate was early June, possibly the first week.

Got it today. Germany dbt

Updated today
My model is a T580 wifi only that I bought from italian Amazon. I could upgrade to Nougat because it is a model coming from Germany. The update lasts less than an hour and changes the firmware from T580XXU2APL4/T580OXA2APL4 to T580XXU2BQE4/T580OXA2BQE4.
It seems that installed applications work well all, even the overall look seems more enjoyable.
I had followed the adb method (without rooting) to enable the adoptable storage using a 32GB micro sdhc, it seems that the update did not change this memory setting.
For now I am very satisfied.

I've a problem with the Samsung keyboard with nougat. When I select English keyboard I've the symbols over the letters while when I use the Italian keyboard the symbols don't appears and I can't activate it in the settings

james202 said:
I've a problem with the Samsung keyboard with nougat. When I select English keyboard I've the symbols over the letters while when I use the Italian keyboard the symbols don't appears and I can't activate it in the settings
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Normally I use SwiftKey, after updating I tried the Samsung keyboard and they all work well.
Symbols on english languge and Samsung keyboard are displayed after pressing the face key (right of Ctrl) and are divided into two pages that change by pressing the 1/2 and 2/2 keys.

paolo57 said:
Normally I use SwiftKey, after updating I tried the Samsung keyboard and they all work well.
Symbols on english languge and Samsung keyboard are displayed after pressing the face key (right of Ctrl) and are divided into two pages that change by pressing the 1/2 and 2/2 keys.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, when I select english language on Samsung keyboard I have not problems but when I select italian language the symbols don't appear

dasich82 said:
Got it today. Germany dbt
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That was fast. German firmware isnt even on updato or sammobile yet. I wonder when it will be.

What additional features are gained by the update? Did it break any previously working features?

afblangley said:
What additional features are gained by the update? Did it break any previously working features?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The things I noticed:
Positive:
The bluelight filter is certainly a very nice addition when using the tablet at night. Contrary to some apps which claim to do the same, this works much better and does really filter blue light without heavily affecting overall brightness.
Officially Google made this only available in 7.1. Seems like Samsung did port this as well as some other things down into our 7.0 based ROM.
Security level is May 1st. Well, that's not a feature but still an important reason to upgrade.
All apps I had installed before the upgrade still work.
Battery runtime seems to be a bit better. But this could be the usual effect after flashing a new ROM. So let's wait and see if this is a permanent improvement.
There is a new device management overview for removing unused data, analyzing memory and battery usage etc.
Also some kind of (fortunately optional) security scanner from Intel is included. I have not yet decided if should I consider this as a small improvement or if I just don't care.
Multi window feature now seems to work for more (all?) apps. At least in Marshmallow if an app didn't support multi window mode (and most don't) you were not able to put it in multi window mode. Now on Nougat I just get a warning that the app doesn't support multi window and might behave strange. But for most apps it works just fine.
Neutral:
Performance seems to be the same.
Pull down/notification menu now looks and behaves a bit different than before. But imo overall it's neither worse nor better than before.
Various smaller UI changes. E.g. app icons can now have some kind of canvas. Imo nothing exciting.
Some new connectivity settings. E.g. "Nearby" feature which claims that you can more easily connect to other device. I deactivated it and didn't have a closer look as I don't need this. might be helpful for some people.
Negative:
The settings are now grouped and sorted differently than before. Not more or less logical but different. So you have to get used to it which is annoying.
Google Chrome crashes if you resize/shrink the window. Which is a pity as I'm using the multi window feature a lot. This did work in Marshmallow. Seems to affect only Chrome. Other apps resize just fine (e.g. YouTube).
Gesendet von meinem SM-N9005 mit Tapatalk

Small correction to my statement above about the issue with Google Chrome in multi window mode:
With Nougat all apps I did try so far seem to work fine in splitscreen mode where you can display two apps side by side. Including Google Chrome.
With Marshmallow this did work only with some apps.
With Nougat most apps can be resized and shown on top of other apps. Both, apps which officially support this, as well as apps which don't support this. In addition for apps which don't support this a message is displayed that that they might not work properly in this mode. With Marshmallow resizing was only possible for selected apps. So far I found only one app which cannot be resized at all (Hidrive) and two apps which crash when being resized (Google Chrome and Google Earth). With Chrome resizing did work in Marshmallow.
So overall I like the multi window mode in Nougat more than in Marshmallow. And the bug with Chrome is not so bad as at least in split screen it does work.

Thanks for taking the time to compose such a through review!

Nougat for SM-T580:
ODIN:
https://www.sammobile.com/firmwares/galaxy-tab-a-101-2016/SM-T580/DBT/download/T580XXU2BQE4/168096/
:fingers-crossed:

Nougat Screenshots

anyone who did the nougat update, can you post some screenshots? i am debating whether to do the upgrade or leave well enough alone. one post mentioned that th recent apps window was sub-standard. any other good and bad?

mark2573 said:
anyone who did the nougat update, can you post some screenshots? i am debating whether to do the upgrade or leave well enough alone. one post mentioned that th recent apps window was sub-standard. any other good and bad?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, I'm curious as well..i want to know if this update is going to be worth it

I did update to Nougat. My use is very limited but I find battery timing much improved and multi window is way better.

first of all - if you're satisfied with your device as it is don't update! It (unfortunately) doesn't get any better. They removed two important features - at least for me. There are no floating apps anymore - so if you want to use the small version of (for example) the google play music player while you're browsing you will have to use the splitscreen with dramatically decreased space for your browser left. So basically this means less convenience for you. The other thing is the (absolutely) useless "recent apps" view. In the past the whole screen was used by displaying the apps as tiles - now you only see them in the (for big tablet screens) useless card view.
Sorry - i always hate it when something really good just gets abandoned and replaced by something far inferior
I also found out, that manufacturers of 10"+ Tablets are encouraged to implement the native Android N freeform mode - so why has lenovo left this out of their update? I hope it gets back on the device with a later update.
P.S.: Android 7.0 CDD states that:
Device implementations with screen size xlarge SHOULD support freeform mode.
In the parlance of this CDD, there appear to be three levels of endorsement: SHOULD, STRONLY ENCOURAGED, and MUST. SHOULD is the weakest of the three, but it is still an endorsement.

NiffStipples said:
first of all - if you're satisfied with your device as it is don't update! It (unfortunately) doesn't get any better. They removed two important features - at least for me. There are no floating apps anymore - so if you want to use the small version of (for example) the google play music player while you're browsing you will have to use the splitscreen with dramatically decreased space for your browser left. So basically this means less convenience for you. The other thing is the (absolutely) useless "recent apps" view. In the past the whole screen was used by displaying the apps as tiles - now you only see them in the (for big tablet screens) useless card view.
Sorry - i always hate it when something really good just gets abandoned and replaced by something far inferior
I also found out, that manufacturers of 10"+ Tablets are encouraged to implement the native Android N freeform mode - so why has lenovo left this out of their update? I hope it gets back on the device with a later update.
P.S.: Android 7.0 CDD states that:
Device implementations with screen size xlarge SHOULD support freeform mode.
In the parlance of this CDD, there appear to be three levels of endorsement: SHOULD, STRONLY ENCOURAGED, and MUST. SHOULD is the weakest of the three, but it is still an endorsement.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks buddy. I think I'm better off skipping this update.

Wrong, wrong, wrong
NiffStipples said:
first of all - if you're satisfied with your device as it is don't update! It (unfortunately) doesn't get any better. They removed two important features - at least for me. There are no floating apps anymore - so if you want to use the small version of (for example) the google play music player while you're browsing you will have to use the splitscreen with dramatically decreased space for your browser left. So basically this means less convenience for you. The other thing is the (absolutely) useless "recent apps" view. In the past the whole screen was used by displaying the apps as tiles - now you only see them in the (for big tablet screens) useless card view.
Sorry - i always hate it when something really good just gets abandoned and replaced by something far inferior
I also found out, that manufacturers of 10"+ Tablets are encouraged to implement the native Android N freeform mode - so why has lenovo left this out of their update? I hope it gets back on the device with a later update.
P.S.: Android 7.0 CDD states that:
Device implementations with screen size xlarge SHOULD support freeform mode.
In the parlance of this CDD, there appear to be three levels of endorsement: SHOULD, STRONLY ENCOURAGED, and MUST. SHOULD is the weakest of the three, but it is still an endorsement.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
First of all, updates are really important for android devices in general. And especially for manufacturers like Lenovo which is known to let their product outdated pretty early. Personally, I'm impressed this time they updated to Android N even before schedule, and I'm hoping they continue releasing updates not to let this amazing product die.
As for the features you talk about:
1) floating windows in freeform is natively supported in android N and just need to be enabled in developer options (one of the last entries under App category). You can install "Taskbar" app to launch all of your apps in window mode by using the native method, and resize them as you like by dragging on the bottom-right corner (which previously was not possible).
2) It is true that Task manager with tiles view was a more clean way to switch between apps on this device, but the needing of double-pressing the TAB button when alt-tabbing beween apps, always made it uneffective and uncomfortable to me. Now ALT-TAB switch between apps just flawlessly as in a standard computer. Hence, i'm really happy with that.
3) I find overall performance have gotten slightly better with the recent N update: i can notice that in the UI and in games too! other users on other threads are talking about a slightly better battery performance too, so it seems like they optimized the hardware support somehow.

morrolinux said:
First of all, updates are really important for android devices in general. And especially for manufacturers like Lenovo which is known to let their product outdated pretty early. Personally, I'm impressed this time they updated to Android N even before schedule, and I'm hoping they continue releasing updates not to let this amazing product die.
As for the features you talk about:
1) floating windows in freeform is natively supported in android N and just need to be enabled in developer options (one of the last entries under App category). You can install "Taskbar" app to launch all of your apps in window mode by using the native method, and resize them as you like by dragging on the bottom-right corner (which previously was not possible).
2) It is true that Task manager with tiles view was a more clean way to switch between apps on this device, but the needing of double-pressing the TAB button when alt-tabbing beween apps, always made it uneffective and uncomfortable to me. Now ALT-TAB switch between apps just flawlessly as in a standard computer. Hence, i'm really happy with that.
3) I find overall performance have gotten slightly better with the recent N update: i can notice that in the UI and in games too! other users on other threads are talking about a slightly better battery performance too, so it seems like they optimized the hardware support somehow.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the suggestion of taskbar - i've already tried it before and imho it's just not that convenient as a rom included solution. Beside the fact that you would have to use an unnecessary extra app for a native android function, it's not really intuitive in it's handling - but i have to admit, that every user will see that different depending on their needs My question is just why lenovo hasn't implemented this standard feature in a neat and handy way?
Speaking of different user needs/requirements - i've personally never used the Alt-Tab combi on my tab. In my daily use i use it most of the time in tent mode without the keyboard.
As to the performance - i didn't really noticed a change here. But in my opinion it was already really snappy before the update so maybe i can't rate that improvement. Maybe the animations between app switches got nicer but it's possible that i deactivated them before the update by myself - so nevermind

Guys, can somebody upload Noughat update otapackage?
I do not have a device but i need this to borrow graphic drivers.

After update to Nougat, battery drain in idle status doesn`t happen anymore. After a day idle, it takes only like 1-2% of battery. At least it is worth to me.

[Discussion] OxygenOS vs. LineageOS

Background story: I've been an enthusiastic lineage (and cm) user for years. The first thing I did after unboxing any new phone was installing lineage (without even testing the stock rom) because I knew what I got. Few month back I bought two OP5T (one for my gf one for me) and installed lineage. Mine was quite fine but my gf's phone kept having issues (e.g. front cam not working). After a while I had a look at oxygen and I realized that it is not that different or at least not second to none but on the other hand has some advantages two.
Anyway after using OxygenOS for some weeks now I created my list of dis-/advantages:
Advantages over Lineage
- Overall better functionality/ availibility of sensors
• Better camera
• No issues with frontcam
• Faceunlock availible
• No microphone noise on headset during calls
- Gesture navigation (pie control)
- Round battery icon
- Less smaller bugs
- Excellent performance and battery life (prob. Better than lineage even without all those tweaks and possibilities of adjustment)
- Update to Android 8 was faster than lineage itself (if I remember correctly)
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Disadvantages vs. Lineage
Annoying:
- Double tap to wake doesn't work during calls
- Double tap on taskbar to sleep not availible
- Switching songs while display off with Vol up/ down not availible
- Vibration at screen on can't be disabled
I can live with it:
- Change Keyboard notification can't be disabled
- Shifting cursor in text with Vol up/ down not availible
- hold back button to kill not availible
- hold home button to switch to last app (can be worked around by swiping up and hold and then being directed to the recents menu on navigation control)
- Some spam apps
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
What are your thoughts/ experiences? Do you have something to add to the lists that I forgot?
And the most important question: do you have solutions or work arounds for the disadvantages that I listed.

Advantage LOS over OOS:
1. Left and Right keyboard arrows appearing on Navigation Bar when keyboard is out.
2. ???

Hi,
I'm in the exact same situation. Using Lineage for years until i tested it on my OP5t!
Honestly, my main concern was to keep my smartphone up to date. But now, we have security updates less than a month late, and may be quicker now that OP5t have trabble project...
Codename Phoenix was for be the best custom rom, but I must say i've nothing to criticize about OOS.
I stick with the betas and have no issue, camera is great, face unlock too, battery life is very good and the phone is very smooth (way better than my colleague s8+).
Not to mention the full screen videos and the gesture mode.
You can just desactivate the spam apps and it's very fine for me!

Advantage LOS over OOS:
1. Trust (Data protection)
2. Compatibility to Google Dialer
3. Switchable Root
4. Untill now faster Update
5. Better , adjustable gestures via xposed edge
Disadvantage LOS over OOS:
1. Camera better on Stock rom
2. Better Voice microphone quality on Stock if Bluetooth headset connected

Completely agree with OP. Finally I am using a stock rom even without rooting it (OB11) and completely satisfied.

Wish I would have read this thread before installing Lineage on a 5T. Same experience. Huge waste of time.
I am a big fan of Lineage and it has always been awesome. My Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 is simply awesome and so has every other device I have ever used it on. Love it.
The 5T is a huge disappointment.
1 - the camera sucks. Even the google hacked camera sucks. - slow and welcome to crash city. HDR+ is second rate.
Front camera crashes
google photos crashes
3rd party cameras are terrible. They take pictures like its 1999. No HDR. If you do install a hacked camera with HDR or 3rd party, get ready to take pics like its 2008 - seconds between the 3 exposures. Time to carry a tripod again.
2 - no face ID. could not get it to work by flashing a hacked face id.
3 - Google Pay - it works if you put the time in to hack it with Magiks.
Those are the 3 main issues. #2 and #3 are important so #2 is the main deal breaker.
I should have tested Oxyogen OS first before installing Lineage. Oxyogen OS is very similar, it has many of the enhancements you are used to. Think of it as a commercial Lineage - it has not lost its roots.
The big deal is the Camera. It is great stuff. Go ahead and test other camera apps and then go back to the one plus camera app. Wow its like coming out of the dark ages.
Just like the post above, stock rom without root is actually fantastic! Dare I say - even better (software) than Vanilla android on a pixel 2XL.
I did open up the boot loader so you can push stuff via adb if for some reason you get stuck in a boot loop.
I hope this post helps someone. I wasted at least 6 hours messing around with hacks trying to get this to work for no reason! Oxogen OS is the rom of my dreams.

avongil911 said:
Wish I would have read this thread before installing Lineage on a 5T. Same experience. Huge waste of time.
I am a big fan of Lineage and it has always been awesome. My Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 is simply awesome and so has every other device I have ever used it on. Love it.
The 5T is a huge disappointment.
1 - the camera sucks. Even the google hacked camera sucks. - slow and welcome to crash city. HDR+ is second rate.
Front camera crashes
google photos crashes
3rd party cameras are terrible. They take pictures like its 1999. No HDR. If you do install a hacked camera with HDR or 3rd party, get ready to take pics like its 2008 - seconds between the 3 exposures. Time to carry a tripod again.
2 - no face ID. could not get it to work by flashing a hacked face id.
3 - Google Pay - it works if you put the time in to hack it with Magiks.
Those are the 3 main issues. #2 and #3 are important so #2 is the main deal breaker.
I should have tested Oxyogen OS first before installing Lineage. Oxyogen OS is very similar, it has many of the enhancements you are used to. Think of it as a commercial Lineage - it has not lost its roots.
The big deal is the Camera. It is great stuff. Go ahead and test other camera apps and then go back to the one plus camera app. Wow its like coming out of the dark ages.
Just like the post above, stock rom without root is actually fantastic! Dare I say - even better (software) than Vanilla android on a pixel 2XL.
I did open up the boot loader so you can push stuff via adb if for some reason you get stuck in a boot loop.
I hope this post helps someone. I wasted at least 6 hours messing around with hacks trying to get this to work for no reason! Oxogen OS is the rom of my dreams.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OOS cam exists on custom ROMs too
I don't use pay so I can't speak on that
AOSP is the way to go imo, but I respect the OOS experience as long as I have RZ kernel installed. Currently on CNP and I am very happy.

First of all this should have been Custom roms vs OOS
you can get better everything than OOS on custom roms thanks to google camera port.
so I would say this setup would rekt OOS(Latest Pixel Experience Oreo official+ firmware 5.1.3+RedFlare Kernel)
and you basically have everything out your 5T

Does lineageos or any custom rom have 16:9 app compatibility mode like in OOS? If not then all custom roms are useless to me.
And I'm not talking about full screen support, that doesn't do anything but stretch non working apps to full screen, further making things worse.

musashiken said:
Does lineageos or any custom rom have 16:9 app compatibility mode like in OOS? If not then all custom roms are useless to me.
And I'm not talking about full screen support, that doesn't do anything but stretch non working apps to full screen, further making things worse.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lineage has that option
also it has expanded desktop feature
most feature full custom roms havethat feature

AlMaghraby said:
lineage has that option
also it has expanded desktop feature
most feature full custom roms havethat feature
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can you confirm? I'm not talking about full screen support. I'm talking about 16:9 mode where there are 2 black bars at the sides. Not full screen mode where the app gets stretched to fill up the screen.
I have games that cannot work in 18:9 aspect ratio. They have to work in 16:9 ratio. I tried a rom once with a full screen support mode and it does not add 2 black bars at the side.
Only OOS has that option of proper app scaling. I'm pretty sure lineageos does not have that option of app scaling to 16:9.

I was using Xiaomi Mi 5s before OP5T, with Lineage OS on it... Miui was not option for me... So when I looked for phone with Lineage OS experience, but on stock rom, I could buy some budget Android One device, or I could get some OP phone with OOS which is way better. So now, after years of rooting and installing CM/Lineage OS, modding stuff to work properly, I'm using stock rom witout root and it is great.

advantage of oos over any lineage or aosp based rom
1. sensors and networks are better.
2. no hi res audio and usage of DAC on any custom rom. oos uses the DAC to its fullest capabilities while the same phone on lineage or aosp sound poop. when selecting hifi option on uapp, neutron, poweramp custom roms don't even playback audio let alone sound good. FLAC files on headphones like beyerdynamic dt770, ath m50x, fiio fh5 on custom roms sound so bad.
3. fp scanner slightly slower on all custom roms.

I recently got the 5T and used OxygenOS for two days, then switched to LineageOS.
I disliked not been able to set the notification light to always be on when I got a notification on OxygenOS, I also missed the privacy guard feature and other minor customisations which are possible on LineageOS. However other than that OxygenOS is not bad at all to be fair.
I've personally found LineageOS to be very stable, everything works for me as expected. I wouldn't say the sensors / network is any better or worse personally. My 5T's current up-time is 12 days.
You need to pass safteynet to use Google Pay, which most custom roms will not out the box. This is not just a OnePlus 5T issue, its an issue on most custom roms for most devices. Simply install Magisk and any apps that check against safteynet will work fine. I've been using Magisk for years on my OnePlus One, both for Google Pay and Pokemon Go.
My only complaint is the camera, unless you use HDR the image quality is bad and looks like a water painting when you zoom in. This is somewhat better on OxygenOS, however it's far from perfect regardless of the rom.
However with HDR+ on the Google Camera photos are great. I'd say this applies to both OxygenOS and LineageOS, however with OxygenOS you can record 1080p @ 60fps, which is currently not an option on LineageOS. 4k @ 30fps looks great with Google Camera on LinageOS however.
I can't really comment on face unlock as i don't use it.

[Request] KitKat GSI

Android KitKat was a pretty hecking good android version and it's such a distant memory. Someone should make a GSI of android KitKat to get nostalgia on times when we weren't depressed bois looking at memes. Tell me you didn't like the little house in the navigation bar and the light grey tone of the settings menu.

Run it in a VM

Treble is supported since Android 8.0. We cant make a GSI of android versions lower than 8.0

Useless thread.

Maybe, but a KitKat theme and icon set would be eminently do-able.

I actually did some testing of Trying to boot an android image in a VM, Ive tried an x86 cm14 image in limbo_x86, got to the bootloader then nothing, I've got limbo (non x86) installed, but just need to find an arm android image to see if it will boot, if anyone has a link to one, it can't be a GSI though, needs to be a bootable iso

Twisted Prime said:
Android KitKat was a pretty hecking good android version and it's such a distant memory. Someone should make a GSI of android KitKat to get nostalgia on times when we weren't depressed bois looking at memes. Tell me you didn't like the little house in the navigation bar and the light grey tone of the settings menu.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You cant run an android version which is older as the android version as the device was released.

matze19999 said:
You cant run an android version which is older as the android version as the device was released.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You actually can. I managed to successfully boot 7.0 on a phone that was running 7.1 out of the box ?. Or even lollipop on MM device although everything was constantly crashing.
But booting KitKat on Oreo device etc. Not gonna happen. We would need probably a lot of kernel changes and new vendor made specifically for KitKat.
And don't forget that only Oreo has GSI support. Adding it to KitKat would require millions of lines of code changes. And even if some Dev wanted to do that.. he wouldn't be able to do it by himself.
There are more reasons why it won't happen but yeah.
I'd love to see it too and sometimes I work on porting some older apps to newest Android versions. If You PM me on Telegram, I can send You Android Donut (I think) Settings app that works (60-70%) even on Android P
I could even probably release a hybrid rom that would contain most Android 1.x apps and it would be based on Phh rom so that it would work on most devices. But there would be things that would most likely never work.
Those are:
System UI
Settings would be kinda broken.
And lots of other bugs that would annoy an average user.
What should work:
Settings(basic functionality + UI)
1.x Apps like camera, calendar, calculator, browser etc
Ringtones
Wallpaper
Maybe launcher
Themed Status bar and navigation bar with some old icons
Maybe system in general could be themed slightly to look more old.
Old Android Market and old YouTube etc but they could be buggy because of server changes etc.
I think I'll try it tomorrow just for fun and will post screens to my group.

ProtoDeVNan0 said:
You actually can. I managed to successfully boot 7.0 on a phone that was running 7.1 out of the box . Or even lollipop on MM device although everything was constantly crashing.
But booting KitKat on Oreo device etc. Not gonna happen. We would need probably a lot of kernel changes and new vendor made specifically for KitKat.
And don't forget that only Oreo has GSI support. Adding it to KitKat would require millions of lines of code changes. And even if some Dev wanted to do that.. he wouldn't be able to do it by himself.
There are more reasons why it won't happen but yeah.
I'd love to see it too and sometimes I work on porting some older apps to newest Android versions. If You PM me on Telegram, I can send You Android Donut (I think) Settings app that works (60-70%) even on Android P
I could even probably release a hybrid rom that would contain most Android 1.x apps and it would be based on Phh rom so that it would work on most devices. But there would be things that would most likely never work.
Those are:
System UI
Settings would be kinda broken.
And lots of other bugs that would annoy an average user.
What should work:
Settings(basic functionality + UI)
1.x Apps like camera, calendar, calculator, browser etc
Ringtones
Wallpaper
Maybe launcher
Themed Status bar and navigation bar with some old icons
Maybe system in general could be themed slightly to look more old.
Old Android Market and old YouTube etc but they could be buggy because of server changes etc.
I think I'll try it tomorrow just for fun and will post screens to my group.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1.x GSI

dylanneve1 said:
1.x GSI
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hybrid 1.x GSI.
But hey! Every Dev project is a fun project!
Edit: 1.6 was kinda buggy and boring so I decided to make a "Hybrid KitKat GSI" If anyone's interested, check my group for screenshots .
Edit2: Posted an early alpha in my group. (Not going to post it on XDA just to avoid breaking rules, if there are any)

ProtoDeVNan0 said:
Hybrid 1.x GSI.
But hey! Every Dev project is a fun project!
Edit: 1.6 was kinda buggy and boring so I decided to make a "Hybrid KitKat GSI" If anyone's interested, check my group for screenshots .
Edit2: Posted an early alpha in my group. (Not going to post it on XDA just to avoid breaking rules, if there are any)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Link?

MAME Arcade said:
Link?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
XDA doesn't allow posting Telegram links anymore. So just find one of my rom threads and it hopefully still contains a link to my group. But I think that we can get best kitkat experience by buying some older phone for cheap. KitKat launcher doesn't even support 19:9 aspect ratio so it looks kinda ugly on some devices. I know it would be cool to run KitKat on latest smartphones but Android has changed so much that even theming it to look like KitKat is pretty difficult. And some images need resizing cause they were designed to work on let's say 720p screens and lower. So when You use them on 1080p or 1440p device, icons look tiny.
You could probably create AVD with KitKat, install VNC on it and stream it to Your smartphone.

Twisted Prime said:
Android KitKat was a pretty hecking good android version and it's such a distant memory. Someone should make a GSI of android KitKat to get nostalgia on times when we weren't depressed bois looking at memes. Tell me you didn't like the little house in the navigation bar and the light grey tone of the settings menu.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I SUPPORT UR iDEA!
btw,i miss the xperia's UI of ICS 4.0.4

ProtoDeVNan0 said:
You actually can. I managed to successfully boot 7.0 on a phone that was running 7.1 out of the box . Or even lollipop on MM device although everything was constantly crashing.
But booting KitKat on Oreo device etc. Not gonna happen. We would need probably a lot of kernel changes and new vendor made specifically for KitKat.
And don't forget that only Oreo has GSI support. Adding it to KitKat would require millions of lines of code changes. And even if some Dev wanted to do that.. he wouldn't be able to do it by himself.
There are more reasons why it won't happen but yeah.
I'd love to see it too and sometimes I work on porting some older apps to newest Android versions. If You PM me on Telegram, I can send You Android Donut (I think) Settings app that works (60-70%) even on Android P
I could even probably release a hybrid rom that would contain most Android 1.x apps and it would be based on Phh rom so that it would work on most devices. But there would be things that would most likely never work.
Those are:
System UI
Settings would be kinda broken.
And lots of other bugs that would annoy an average user.
What should work:
Settings(basic functionality + UI)
1.x Apps like camera, calendar, calculator, browser etc
Ringtones
Wallpaper
Maybe launcher
Themed Status bar and navigation bar with some old icons
Maybe system in general could be themed slightly to look more old.
Old Android Market and old YouTube etc but they could be buggy because of server changes etc.
I think I'll try it tomorrow just for fun and will post screens to my group.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow!
Have u build it?
Btw, i also like this idea!