Autostarts: Which system apps are ok to disable? - EVO 4G Themes and Apps

There are so many random HTC apps that I don't know which will totally screw things up. Does anyone else use Autostarts who can provide some info?

No one uses this app? So far it has been awesome! It isn't an auto-killer or anything, so you don't have to worry about it running in the background. It actually changes the permissions of when things can launch, and it has a TON of options. I really recommend it.

I use Startup Manager and have disabled a ton of crap with it. However, i'm unsure if it's a task killer or a permissions setter like this program is.

Related

Startup Auditor

Anyone having problems with this app?
I've disabled certain apps from starting up, for instance my app called "app control". I don't see why that would need to startup with the phone.
The app is disabled from startup but then everytime I use the app, it will randomly quit. Every time.
The same thing happened with the gallery app, messaging app, & maps. Unfortunately I cannot uninstall/refund it so I hope this thread helps someone looking for a good app to stop startup processes and/or motivates the dev to do something about it.
You might want to look into autostarts, but it is just as bad, with its own quirks.
I'm basically down to advanced task manager and a seperate task killer.
ya i was using it for a while, but then I decided that it's better to simply use a task killer app instead of trying to use this app. especially because the startup auditor takes up memory to run in the background anyway =X

Apps randomly starting in the background?

I use advanced task killer and minutes later I see MP3 Store, and Messages running. Before I saw a few others. Are they set to start running in memory for some reason? Not sure if they eat up much juice, but I wonder if I can make a list of certain ones and disable their start up somehow. Is there a task killter that blocks startups?
same here we need something to block these apps
Messages is required to recieve MMS (Even if you use handcent or chomp or something else as your main client). We tried removing that once in the hero forums and it caused ALL sorts of problems and force closes)
The mp3 store is usually ok to remove though.
thecodemonk said:
Messages is required to recieve MMS (Even if you use handcent or chomp or something else as your main client). We tried removing that once in the hero forums and it caused ALL sorts of problems and force closes)
The mp3 store is usually ok to remove though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks codemonk,
Do you know that setting in advance task killer is that says "auto kill level"? It is set to disable now, but what does it do? Thanks.
jeffrimerman said:
Thanks codemonk,
Do you know that setting in advance task killer is that says "auto kill level"? It is set to disable now, but what does it do? Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not sure...I avoid task killers as a rule (I installed one earlier to test something for an earlier thread and uninstalled afterwards once I got my info).
http://geekfor.me/faq/you-shouldnt-be-using-a-task-killer-with-android/ - This should provide some good info on it.
The better solution, especially for apps that you don't intend on using, is uninstalling the app (there's a whole thread talking about which ones are safe to remove).
thecodemonk said:
I'm not sure...I avoid task killers as a rule (I installed one earlier to test something for an earlier thread and uninstalled afterwards once I got my info).
http://geekfor.me/faq/you-shouldnt-be-using-a-task-killer-with-android/ - This should provide some good info on it.
The better solution, especially for apps that you don't intend on using, is uninstalling the app (there's a whole thread talking about which ones are safe to remove).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yeah, that is a great idea. I imagine if I wanted it back I could just install it again. Thanks Codemonk.
Why do you need those apps not running? Android will kill them if it needs more memory.
Why are people obsessed with killing stuff? It's not like your phone runs better with 192mb of free memory vs 163mb...
it actually does, as well as lets the battery last longer since it isnt using as much processing power
Nagrom Nniuq said:
Why do you need those apps not running? Android will kill them if it needs more memory.
Why are people obsessed with killing stuff? It's not like your phone runs better with 192mb of free memory vs 163mb...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Let the phone run for a good 12 hours. I was down to 42MB free basically idling and only using Handcent. Killed a few tasks and back up to 175 and everything is snappy again.
I don't like having to use a task killer, I didn't have to with my N1.
maybe there will be an app like Scotty for windows 7. I check and a bunch of bloatware starts on it's own. It's all marketing bs. When there is a nice root stripped down, with all the nice stuff enabled I'll do that.
download startup auditor from the market. great little app to select and unselect which apps you want to load when the phone powers up. only costs $0.99 usd
pyr0path said:
download startup auditor from the market. great little app to select and unselect which apps you want to load when the phone powers up. only costs $0.99 usd
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So if I leave it to no apps, will it load up with 0 apps running? Will it also prevent apps from randomly starting after phone is already on? Sounds like a nice app.
Unless startup auditor disables the service there is a list of apps that will randomly start up at times. I went into the application settings and apps like MP3 store don't have an option to uninstall.
I have used task killer to kill all apps and within minutes some start again.
"thecodemonk" why do you not use a task killer. I have only had an Android phone about 24 hours now and got a lot to learn.
First thing being how to enable tethering.
I have mine set to "safe" and it auto closes things when screen goes black.
Make sure you "IGNORE" certain apps... like the clock or else your alarm wont work... I almost over slept
I have the following set to ignore:
Messages
Handcent
clock
gmail
Mort Music player
Fastbright
Check out the application "Autokiller." This comes with preset values (optimum, moderate, aggressive, etc.) so that apps will be killed off once your free memory drops below a certain point. This app works great, but it does REQUIRE root to function and must be rebooted to finish applying the settings. Also lists all apps, processes, and services which can be killed off manually as well.
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Sent via the XDA Tapatalk App on the HTC EVO 4G!
[email protected] said:
Check out the application "Autokiller." This comes with preset values (optimum, moderate, aggressive, etc.) so that apps will be killed off once your free memory drops below a certain point. This app works great, but it does REQUIRE root to function and must be rebooted to finish applying the settings. Also lists all apps, processes, and services which can be killed off manually as well.
-------------------------------------
Sent via the XDA Tapatalk App on the HTC EVO 4G!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've been trying to find AutoKiller, yet I can't find it in the market. Is it here on the forums?
Fixter said:
I've been trying to find AutoKiller, yet I can't find it in the market. Is it here on the forums?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is in market, search "autokiller". Requires root access, but I can confirm it is working fine.
Wanted to add that I am annoyed by programs that I never intend to use running in the background. From recovery I used Android Commander to quickly select and delete every .apk in /system/app that I never wanted to see again.
Helo guys saw this topic and was over at androidcentral and saw this article which talks about an app that would kill any app that autostarts.
won't let me post links as i'm a new user, but go to androidcentral and look for the article about the app autostarts or just google "autostarts"
using task panel to kill the "junk" like amazon and mp3 store- also any program that doesnt attach itself to things like facebook or messages - i use skyfire so i have set that to autokill but leave the "internet" running..
i also use this to switch between apps running.. having to hit back back back or even going to home then program list then finding it is a long process.. for example ...
i get a handcent message - go into the threaded sms- type and im done - holding down the home screen doesnt pop all the programs up - therfor i set task panel up to stay on my status bar and hit it then go to the program i want.

Im Rooted!... Now my apps are always on?

So I rooted this sucker yesterday and have noticed that once I have rooted my apps are always opening on their own... What gives? When I say opening on their own, every time I open task killer their are a ton of apps that are opened that i never even touched. And after I kill them they start showing back up automatically. Also advanced task killer will not kill itself any more I have to manually close the program... anyone else experiencing this? Anyone know how to make it stop?
Stop using task killers would be a good start. You are actually slowing your phone down
Sent from my ADR6400L using Tapatalk
Yes sir, task killers are a joke. Android is the best task management you can have.
___
Sent from my HTC ThunderBolt 4G LTE VIA XDA Premium
Task killers are a bad idea. Let android deal with the memory management itself, there is no need for an app to do this. The apps you are seeing aren't really "apps," they are services, and they were designed to run in the background to deal with certain things. Ditch the task manger and don't worry about the running services unless something is misbehaving.
please listen to these 3...
K sweet thanks guys
Another task killer bites the dust... Sweet!
Our work here is done boys, we can go home now.
Lmao @^ lol
Android has always opened your apps in the background when it feels it wants to. Nothing to do with root, just the way android works.
RogerPodacter said:
Android has always opened your apps in the background when it feels it wants to. Nothing to do with root, just the way android works.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not when it wants to lol, when an app starts a background service. If you want to disable auto run apps on startup check out autostarts. A root app which can stop apps from opening on their own at boot. Some things you don't need to run on boot, if it doesn't have push notifications and it's not something you use regularly no need for it to open and you can disable it to speed up boot.
mjones1052 said:
Not when it wants to lol, when an app starts a background service. If you want to disable auto run apps on startup check out autostarts. A root app which can stop apps from opening on their own at boot. Some things you don't need to run on boot, if it doesn't have push notifications and it's not something you use regularly no need for it to open and you can disable it to speed up boot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
no actually android loads up groups of apps at one time, when it thinks it might be needed by the user. open system panel and go thru and check, i have 5-7 apps, all started at say 5:07pm, and were never opened by me. but they are cached in the background. its been this way for a long time.
Stop using a task killer, android... oh wait...

How can I disable apps from autorunning instead of constantly killing them?

Can I disable qwikvid, market, and all the otherstuff that seems to run on its own without having to constantly go into a task manager to kill those apps?
Depends on app, if system doesn't use it, use titanium backup to freeze it.
I think this should be in the Q&A section. But answering your question, I don't think there's a way to stop an app from running randomly, except in events such as boot. You may wanna check out the app called Autostart in the market. You should keep in mind though that task killers do more harm than good. Android's memory management on 2.3 and up is very efficient.
Sent from my LG-P999 using XDA App
I wouldn't recommend AutoStarts, never worked for me.
Anyways, to answer your question, there should be settings within those apps to disable them from auto-running. If there isn't and the app is misbehaving you can either determine if you want to keep the app, and freeze it, or uninstall it.
As far as I know, market will autorun if you have apps set to update automatically, or if you have background data enabled it will run to check for updates. Haven't figured out how to stop that one yet.
And I don't personally use qwikvid, but isn't that the wifi calling app? If so, it's probably autorunning to make sure your phone is available to handle calls, probably used as a push notification type thing.
donatello88 said:
I think this should be in the Q&A section. But answering your question, I don't think there's a way to stop an app from running randomly, except in events such as boot. You may wanna check out the app called Autostart in the market. You should keep in mind though that task killers do more harm than good. Android's memory management on 2.3 and up is very efficient.
Sent from my LG-P999 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So am I to assume that freezing those apps wont give me any tangible benefit?
DerangedGoose said:
So am I to assume that freezing those apps wont give me any tangible benefit?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Depends. If you want to use those apps, than freezing will sort of uninstall them (it actually sort of deactivates them). They are unusable once frozen and can only be used again if you unfreeze them. This is used usually for apps that come pre installed on the phone that you are not gonna use.
I don't think there's a way to stop an app from randomly starting. It's just how it works on Android. I wouldn't worry about this too much. As I said, Google has done a good job on memory management.
Sent from my LG-P999 using XDA App
You can revoke start on boot permissions for the app if you're on cm 7. That should do the trick.

Speed improvements

Hey! tl;dr? Click here to go directly to the fast improvements post and disable some unwanted services.
Still want more fun disabling services? Read the second post.
Hi all,
I improved the speed of my G2 recently and felt that the community might appreciate this as well. It's probably not the "best guide" for everybody, but this is what I've done and it's worked nicely for me so far.
I recently got irritated at my phone being occasionally sluggish. So, when it was sluggish one time, I went to Manage applications->Running Applications, and saw that Facebook decided it wanted to start itself up in the background.
Now, I'm as big a fan as the next guy for having multi-tasking, but randomly starting an app in the background without my consent is not what I consider to be useful or resource-friendly. I decided to "freeze" the app using SD Maid (you can do this with Titanium Backup as well). Facebook is now in a frozen state so it will not launch itself at all. Ha!
What do I do about having no Facebook now? Well, there happens to be a great app on the Market called Fast for Facebook. This is quite an improvement over the sluggish and buggy Facebook app. I installed that and am having a blast with it so far.
I wanted to check for other apps that were dawdling in the background. So I looked again in Running Applications and found that Maps decided it wants to be running too. I went to the settings for the Maps application, and turned off Location reporting. Why would I want an app sucking my resources dry to alert the world where I am? I'm not that much of a socialite or stalker prey. I also turned off Automatic check-ins.
Previously, I'd gone through a few other apps and turned off automatic sync. Things like DropSync (to sync Dropbox), Tumblr, Google+, and Twitter are not necessary for me to have reviving themselves in the background. I should be the authoritarian ruler of all of the apps over my phone- no freedom here to run around as you please.
I set up a couple apps to run at odd hours of the night. I only need to have photos and documents synced probably once a day, so I set up Tasker to do it automatically while the phone is charging and connected to Wifi at around 4am. I've set up Titanium Backup to do backups something like every Tuesday night, Friday night, and Sunday night, each at like 4am as well; and upload those backups to Box. I want to use my phone fast when I use it during the day, and at night time it can take its time with these lesser-priority tasks while I'm asleep.
Email/Gmail and Messages still have notifications and syncing, as well as the occasional Pulse RSS feed notification. All else seems to be shutting up though, which is good. What I would really like to do is have Market update its apps automatically at like 4am, so it won't spend resources checking for updates in the background. I can't find how to do that though.
One app that really gets under my skin is Amazon Appstore. This guy runs in the background too- I've turned off its notifications but I'm pretty sure it'll still sit there sapping my resources. This one's a toughie because I want to uninstall or freeze it, but I want to still be able to get good free apps from it once a day. There have been some really good apps and some really bad ones, but the good ones are worth it to me.
I might add in more things to disable. It's been faster so far, so I'll see how it goes over a couple days. One last thing I did was install SetCPU. I use that now instead of CyanogenMod 7's built-in CPU stuff. I don't know if it's a placebo or not, but I seemed to notice a boost in performance from it (not instantly, but in general I see less lag).
Hope this helps someone, best of luck with all of your phones.
-Proxin
use watchdog to spy on what apps are actually running and using cpu in the background, lots of apps can be open in the background and not using anything cpuwise
demkantor said:
use watchdog to spy on what apps are actually running and using cpu in the background, lots of apps can be open in the background and not using anything cpuwise
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Watchdog is a great idea too, I forgot to mention that.
If anyone else has recommendations they are all welcome!
Proxin said:
Watchdog is a great idea too, I forgot to mention that.
If anyone else has recommendations they are all welcome!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For speed improvements, i usually use titanum backup to remove alot of useless apps i dont use (which frees up alot of ram). then i supercharge my phone and set it to agressive. And i also change up the build prop.
I need to post my additions.
I realized that by disabling Facebook, I lost my contacts that I had from there. That's no good. So I re-enabled it.
Now, Facebook has a few select services it likes to let run in the background. One specific one is MediaUploadService. This runs even when you are Not uploading anything, which is ridiculous because it hogs your resources.
However, if you disable this service completely, you won't be able to upload any photos to Facebook from your phone.
SO, I set up a script to disable all of Facebook's services like this at once, and I use the app called Llama to execute this script every time Facebook exits. I set it up to call my enable script once Facebook is started, then 5 minutes after Facebook closes it disables all of the Facebook services.
Here is what I used...
Enable Facebook services:
Code:
su -c 'pm enable com.facebook.katana/com.facebook.katana.service.MediaUploadService; pm enable com.facebook.katana/com.facebook.katana.service.FacebookService; pm enable com.facebook.katana/com.facebook.katana.service.BackgroundDetectionService; pm enable com.facebook.katana/com.facebook.orca.push.mqtt.MqttPushService; '
Disable Facebook services:
Code:
su -c 'pm disable com.facebook.katana/com.facebook.katana.service.MediaUploadService; pm disable com.facebook.katana/com.facebook.katana.service.FacebookService; pm disable com.facebook.katana/com.facebook.katana.service.BackgroundDetectionService; pm disable com.facebook.katana/com.facebook.orca.push.mqtt.MqttPushService; '
With this new ability to disable services, I took a look at Amazon AppStore's annoying service, and disabled it using this script with Llama like I did with Facebook:
Amazon Service Disable script
Code:
su -c 'pm disable com.amazon.venezia/com.amazon.venezia.service.UpdateService'
Proxin- note: old code said:
Next, I noticed SwypeConnect was keeping itself active, so I disabled it too (Swype never gets updates anyway, so I didn't see anything bad with doing this):
Code:
pm disable com.swype.android.inputmethod/com.swype.android.connect.ConnectClient
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There's an app on the Market called StartupManager, I used that to kill off extra startup services that were not necessary. Things like Youtube, MyTracks and Maps were starting up. My view is, why do these things start when I don't start them myself? I stopped the services and have seen some pretty good responsiveness so far.
Go to the market and search for an app called gemini manager. It needs root but you can disable autostart for all apps with it.
Also get LBE privacy guard- it will block apps from using gps/data which can also increase battery life
redspeed said:
Go to the market and search for an app called gemini manager. It needs root but you can disable autostart for all apps with it.
Also get LBE privacy guard- it will block apps from using gps/data which can also increase battery life
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Great, I'll look into those too- thanks
@proxin:
Amazing post! how do you find the path for each of those components inside a package?
I use the same method with Tasker (instead of llama). Perform a task (run shell command) on the exit of a App profile
Also, the .Mqtt. should be all lowercase (figured out after that service would not disable), like this:
com.facebook.katana/com.facebook.orca.push.mqtt.MqttPushService
file2mail said:
@proxin:
Amazing post! how do you find the path for each of those components inside a package?
I use the same method with Tasker (instead of llama). Perform a task (run shell command) on the exit of a App profile
Also, the .Mqtt. should be all lowercase (figured out after that service would not disable), like this:
com.facebook.katana/com.facebook.orca.push.mqtt.MqttPushService
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you, hope it has helped! I found them by looking up their Running service name on Google, and seeing people's logcat errors on there elaborated them for me. So I'd try a search for "com.facebook.katana*MqttPushService" and Google would direct me to the proper one.
You're spot-on with the Mqtt needing to be lowercase, I found the same issue on mine and got pissed off when I saw that the Mqtt service was still running forgot to change the post to reflect it though. Thanks for the notice
Seems like the best method for using your phone properly is to do like we're doing, otherwise applications with poor choice in how they handle resources, will clutter up the phone.
Btw, I tried Gemini App Manager and it works well for disabling autostart in apps. LBE Privacy Guard is intense in how much it locks down your phone, but that's locked down it's even a bit too much for me haha. It's a great app and will work for many people though.
I've noticed maps running in the background many times. I didnt know you're able to switch this off, thanks for the info!
Killer1desireZ said:
I've noticed maps running in the background many times. I didnt know you're able to switch this off, thanks for the info!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No problem, I don't recommend killing off the Maps service though as it's probably needed for some location service (in my case I need the cell tower location service for some Llama profiles)
That's just my case though. Before you disable the service, maybe see if you can turn off automatic location reporting in Latitude? Go into Latitude settings->Location Settings and change Location reporting and Automatic check-ins to be Off.
Hope this helps. It shouldn't disable the entire Maps service but maybe it will reduce the amount of check-ins that Maps does without your consent.
Perhaps one of the biggest performance hits in an Mid Spec Android phone is how many App's it's carrying.
It is generally a good idea to keep the App count low. A general rule of thumb is to have no more than 40~ user apps on your Device. Since you have less apps installed (some of which could be idling or actively operating in the backround), you'll have more free RAM/space in the internal storage which in turn will mean more speed/battery efficiency.
Hope this can be of help
crestofawave said:
Perhaps one of the biggest performance hits in an Mid Spec Android phone is how many App's it's carrying.
It is generally a good idea to keep the App count low. A general rule of thumb is to have no more than 40~ user apps on your Device. Since you have less apps installed (some of which could be idling or actively operating in the backround), you'll have more free RAM/space in the internal storage which in turn will mean more speed/battery efficiency.
Hope this can be of help
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've heard this said too, but I've never seen evidence that the more apps you have installed = the more apps are actively running. It's definitely a good idea to have less installed, but I don't think they'll run in the background unless they have autostarting capabilities like you can monitor with Gemini App Manager.
This is just me without even a Bachelor's degree speculating and relaying my experience though, so don't take my word for it
I notice a definite lag once I go above a certain amount of apps. I uninstall 10 or so and its a rocket! But then again I have waaaay more then 40 probably like 100 or something
Maps doesn't have that option for me. Anyways uninstalled 20 apps
New fun things to try...
I enjoy GO Launcher Ex just as much as the next guy who uses it as the default Home application, but I don't enjoy it making multiple services of itself that do, literally nothing. What I noticed specifically was a service called GOMusic, taking up about 4MB of RAM which could be used for other, more useful things.
What I did to fix it was:
Code:
pm disable com.gau.go.launcherex/com.jiubang.ggheart.apps.desks.appfunc.mediamanagement.musicplay.MusicPlaybackService
My Google Music widget still works fine, so apparently the GOMusic thing was just a waste of RAM (unless someone can explain a good reason to leave it be?)
One more addition I did was that, I keep seeing SwypeConnect as a service and I don't like it. It shouldn't need to constantly connect, for me to simply use Swype whenever I do.
I tried two things, pretty sure the second fixed this:
Code:
pm disable com.nuance.swype.input/com.nuance.swype.input.SwypeConnect
pm disable com.naunce.swype.input/com.nuance.swype.connect.ConnectClient
And next, I saw that Google Voice had a Widget service that liked to hang out and sap my resources. This would be useful but I don't have a widget set, so I disabled it:
Code:
pm disable com.google.android.apps.googlevoice/.widget.WidgetService
That worked for me. I can still send and receive messages with Google Voice, so I still have the same functionality I need without having an extra service in my list.
Note that, as usual, these are easily reversible by using using "enable" instead of disable in that code block.
Hopefully this will help someone else as well.
New experimental service disabled; I had noticed multiple Maps services running whenever they pleased. I can do with a NetworkLocation service from Maps, because I use Llama for location profiles and all, but not a Prefetcher service for it.
Here is what I used to disable the Prefetcher service...
Code:
pm disable com.google.android.apps.maps/com.google.googlenav.prefetch.android.PrefetcherService
I haven't seen any negative effects from this so far, but I will update this if I do.
@Proxin
Hi there,
I'm realy like your entries here, but i cant get through with the scripts killing facebook services. Can you be more specifc pls how to set those scripts you mentioned in Llama?
i've just tried to do things you say with facebook background services and for maps' prefetcher, but it says Segmentation Fault, as far as i know , segfaults are not normal linux program response, right? without super user privileges it just says 'Killed' [i tried both because 'pm set-install-location' worked for me only without super user]
EDIT:
ok, i'm noob, i just had to export LD_LIBRARY_PATH, now pm doesn't segfault for me as superuser
hi can any ody guide me how to use those su commands with llama?? thanks

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