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Do you have any idea how much utter garbage Google forces vendors to ship with a phone simply to have access to a web browser and the Play store? Or perhaps yo
by james412 6y ago
Do you have any idea how much utter garbage Google forces vendors to ship with a phone simply to have access to a web browser and the Play store?
Or perhaps you're one of the lucky few who haven't been woken at 4am to an urgent notification:
"YOUR PHONE HAS TOO MANY MEMES. WOULD YOU LIKE TO DELETE MEMES?"
Prohibitions on bloatware, my arse!
- viraptor 6y agoWhich apps specifically do you classify as "utter garbage"? Looking at my OnePlus, I can't see anything I'd call that. The most annoying part is that I can't completely uninstall Duo and Chrome, but neither one is on a garbage level, I just prefer alternatives. Otherwise... I think I used pretty much every other default app.
- james412 6y agoI've disabled the vast majority of Google apps that ship with the phone: - Chrome: privacy related, not necessarily garbage, but if the OS were Chinese we'd effortlessly call Chrome's behaviours spyware. I use Firefox - Photos: random single-touch dialogs offering to enable sync. This is upsell and another opt-in data grab. Also the source of the aforementioned ITS 4AM WAKE UP AND HAVE A DELETE MEME PARTY notification. I use f-spot but I'm not a huge fan of it - Messages: can't remember. Probably another notification thrown up without warning. I use Pulse now - Maps: where to even begin? The app has about one UI element left that actually relates to navigation and the rest is some disguised Google Shopping link. I use the paid version of OsmAnd where possible - Gmail/Accounts: phone book data-grab. I use Outlook - Gboard: still using this. Still very aware its forwarding my keystrokes to the mothership for "contextual prediction" or whatever you call it. If Gboard were published by TikTok rather than Google we'd have sent some folk to the electric chair over it already - Play Services: mandatory back channel to the mothership with root access on your phone. Can wake it up, force install something that listens to you, or update itself to force you to click on WHO adverts^W^W^W^W participate in informational and beneficial COVID-19 contact tracing, so much more Probably forgotten quite a bit. Mandatory Games app IIRC? That would have been disabled on the first day
- ineedasername 6y agoI've had Android phones exclusively for at least 8 or 9 years, use Photos, and have no idea what you mean by the DELETE MEME thing. What is that?
- james412 6y agohttps://old.reddit.com/r/MotoX4/comments/ao45og/files_message_memes_are_taking_up_space_press/ https://old.reddit.com/r/MotoX4/comments/ao45og/files_messag... Turns out it was Files not Photos
- gpm 6y agoPixel 3a. Google assistant. You can't disable it without breaking other things. You can't disable the shortcuts that open it without unnecessarily regressing the rest of the UI. It's bound to "swipe up from a corner" which is an action you accidentally perform on a semi-regular basis. It's utterly and completely useless (to me).
- izacus 6y agoYou can literally disable it by setting the assistant app to "None".
- gpm 6y agoReally? Where do I find that setting? I've looked, hard. Edit: Found it - I wonder if this is new or if I missed it when I got the phone - thanks! Doesn't stop it from being bloatware...
- brian_cloutier 6y agoThis feature has been around since Ice Cream Sandwich, released 2011 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_Ice_Cream_Sandwich https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_Ice_Cream_Sandwich > Certain "System" apps (particularly those pre-loaded by carriers) that cannot be uninstalled can now be disabled. This hides the application and prevents it from launching, but the application is not removed from storage.
- gpm 6y agoDisabling google assistant broke various unrelated features. What I just found out I can do above is change the "Assistant" default app from being "Google Assistant" to being none - which stops the stupid swipe in the wrong way and it grabs focus and the bottom half of the screen "feature". Edit: And to be clear this doesn't remove all the places Assitant pops up, just the most annoying one. It still has prominent placement in the "system" settings for instance.
- ineedasername 6y agoMy experience with the stock Android experience from Pixel phones is a dream of zero bloatware. What I hate is the bloatware that nearly every handset maker puts on their phones, and the additional bloatware wireless providers add on to it, almost none of it uninstallable.
- nitinreddy88 6y agoHow its dream of zero bloatware when Google itself adds tons of Bloatware starting from Play Music, Books, Duo, Drive what not. I am even ok shipping them by default and giving an option to uninstall. Any app which I cant uninstall is Bloatware.
- posguy 6y agoDon't forget that Google embedded Duo into the Google Play Framework so even if you disabled or uninstalled the app, people could still call you via Duo.
- xyzzy_plugh 6y agoGoogle did this with Google+, immediately rendering my Nexus One obsolete because I didn't have enough storage for the framework :( the update basically bricked the phone. Even uninstalling literally everything possible wouldn't fix it. I miss that phone so much.
- izacus 6y agoYou mean Google enabled E2E encrypted calls to every Android device? That sounds like a good thing. Duo is still pretty much the only E2E encrypted video call app that also works on the web.
- dleslie 6y agoStock Pixel, at the very least, is _packed_ with Google apps that you cannot fully remove.
- 6y ago
- TheSpiceIsLife 6y agoPeople often seem surprised when I tell them I sleep withy phone on silent and / or in flight mode. I believe I can even set some numbers to ring through silent, haven't tried it though. Sleep is precious.
- jessaustin 6y agoTypically I sleep with the phone charging in a different room. Is that weird?