4 ms·

The need to press back multiple times to get back to where you were before entering an app seems to be becoming the norm in many apps of late. I'm pretty sure i

by acka 4y ago

The need to press back multiple times to get back to where you were before entering an app seems to be becoming the norm in many apps of late. I'm pretty sure it is yet another 'engagement trap': the app makers don't want you to leave so they can show you more ads, collect more data about you to sell on, etcetera.

nfriedly 4y ago
Yeah, I usually uninstall that shit. I keep Instagram around specifically because my wife likes to send me things and is disappointed if I don't notice them. But I ignore basically everything else in the app aside from what my wife sends me.
NikolaNovak 4y ago
Hmm That seems a valid and desired behaviour. If I want to exit app, I press home button. But if I want to go back one step... I press back button. It takes me back one step. It's like the Go-mode of undo :-). Previous page or form in a browser, back several layers of menu in app or game. I may be writing an email then press back to go back to main mail screen. Etc Basically for me, Android back button does exactly what I want it to do, in OS, games, programs and Web, zero sarcasm. And home button to "take me to where I was before I entered the app". The back and share pipeline of Android are like it's super powers as far as I'm concerned (and I say this as somebody forced to use iPhone for work last 4 years, so get to experience both daily)
- acka 4y ago
  Ah, I see now that I didn't make myself clear in my previous comment. I am not criticizing the back button functionality per se, but rather the way that many apps have things set up so that it requires more, sometimes a lot more, presses of the back button to back out than it took actions (taps, swipes, whatever) to get somewhere. While this may perhaps be useful in some cases, in my opinion it is often done in a classic 'nagware' fashion, to make it more difficult to leave the app. When I press the home button, this often doesn't close down the foreground app entirely, so after a while of doing this I will end up with lots of apps running in the background, which I don't like because often they keep consuming power even when backgrounded and may also continue gathering data about me that way. I am aware that apps can also install and run background services separately from the app, but in my experience, the apps that I use tend to also shut down these services, as long as I exit the app entirely, using the back button.

by acka 4y ago

nfriedly 4y ago

Yeah, I usually uninstall that shit. I keep Instagram around specifically because my wife likes to send me things and is disappointed if I don't notice them. But I ignore basically everything else in the app aside from what my wife sends me.

NikolaNovak 4y ago

Hmm That seems a valid and desired behaviour. If I want to exit app, I press home button. But if I want to go back one step... I press back button. It takes me back one step. It's like the Go-mode of undo :-). Previous page or form in a browser, back several layers of menu in app or game. I may be writing an email then press back to go back to main mail screen. Etc Basically for me, Android back button does exactly what I want it to do, in OS, games, programs and Web, zero sarcasm. And home button to "take me to where I was before I entered the app". The back and share pipeline of Android are like it's super powers as far as I'm concerned (and I say this as somebody forced to use iPhone for work last 4 years, so get to experience both daily)

acka 4y ago
Ah, I see now that I didn't make myself clear in my previous comment. I am not criticizing the back button functionality per se, but rather the way that many apps have things set up so that it requires more, sometimes a lot more, presses of the back button to back out than it took actions (taps, swipes, whatever) to get somewhere. While this may perhaps be useful in some cases, in my opinion it is often done in a classic 'nagware' fashion, to make it more difficult to leave the app. When I press the home button, this often doesn't close down the foreground app entirely, so after a while of doing this I will end up with lots of apps running in the background, which I don't like because often they keep consuming power even when backgrounded and may also continue gathering data about me that way. I am aware that apps can also install and run background services separately from the app, but in my experience, the apps that I use tend to also shut down these services, as long as I exit the app entirely, using the back button.