4 ms·

Basically the phone detects that the app is locked up, and brings up a dialog asking you if you want to Force quit or Wait. If you force quit, it kills it (pro

Basically the phone detects that the app is locked up, and brings up a dialog asking you if you want to Force quit or Wait. If you force quit, it kills it (probably something along the lines of kill -9)

potatolicious 17y ago
I wonder why this is even necessary - I understand on the iPhone this is an immediate kill -9, no user intervention required. This seems like the correct way to do this - to expect your average phone user to operate this like a PC power user is absurd. "Force quit" should not be in the vernacular for operating a phone.
- davidw 17y ago
  I can think of some sort of hypothetical scenario: I'm using my Android phone loaded with some sector-specific application that's, let's say, not written so well. Occasionally, when I go scan something at the factory with it, it takes a while to process because there's more data than the author thought there would be (or something like that), and the application hangs for a few seconds before returning an answer that I need to do my job. I'm just playing devil's advocate though, I have no idea how common that sort of thing is or if it should be the default behavior. Just that in an open environment, there might be some less than stellar applications that the user should be able to control, rather than the phone.
  - yardie 17y ago
    Devs don't work in a vacuum even though some think they do. If the app was released through the normal app store it probably wouldn't see the light of day in that state. The reviewers would reject it until they fixed it. If they are distributing through enterprise than they would be hauled in to the office to fix it. No application should be so busy that is consuming all the resources.
    - davidw 17y ago
      > If they are distributing through enterprise than they would be hauled in to the office to fix it. Because big companies never, ever get by on annoying, but functional software?
- DrJokepu 17y ago
  The iPhone doesn't have to deal with this because it doesn't support multitaskeng, hence an app becoming "unresponsive" isn't such a problem. To be honest, I would be rather angry if the OS shut down my browser process just because some image-heavy website slowed it down for a few seconds. One of the reasons I like Android is that I got more control over stuff and I know I'm not alone. Some people don't like the Apple "we know what's right for you" mentality. My point is, people are different, there's no "average phone user". This is not a question of technical skill as there's really nothing technical in "wait" and "force quit". Some people like to be in charge, some people don't, personally I do.
  - allenbrunson 17y ago
    actually, the iPhone OS does support multitasking, and it's used quite heavily. you can start a call, then the phone app continues to run in the background while you start something else. the iPod app runs in the background playing music while you're running other apps. and so on. even if iPhone didn't allow multiple apps to run at once, it would still have to deal with crashes. it handles them by unceremoniously quitting the dead app and sending you back to the home screen. claiming that an average user should be able to know what to do with a dialog box that gives the options 'wait' or 'force quit' ... man, that sort of thinking by competitors is exactly why apple keeps winning all the time, isn't it.
    - DrJokepu 17y ago
      If an app crashes on Android, of course there are no questions asked. We're talking about unresponsive apps, not crashes. And as far as I know, the iPhone only allows "system" apps to be background apps. You can't listen to Spotify while browsing. About the other issue: I think Apple "keeps winning all the time" because of the combination of the consistent experience they deliver bundled with a competitive line of auxiliary services (such as iTunes or the App Store) and very strong branding. There's nothing wrong with that, but I don't think that artificially limiting the choices available to the user is a huge contributing factor.
      - 17y ago

potatolicious 17y ago

I wonder why this is even necessary - I understand on the iPhone this is an immediate kill -9, no user intervention required. This seems like the correct way to do this - to expect your average phone user to operate this like a PC power user is absurd. "Force quit" should not be in the vernacular for operating a phone.

davidw 17y ago
I can think of some sort of hypothetical scenario: I'm using my Android phone loaded with some sector-specific application that's, let's say, not written so well. Occasionally, when I go scan something at the factory with it, it takes a while to process because there's more data than the author thought there would be (or something like that), and the application hangs for a few seconds before returning an answer that I need to do my job. I'm just playing devil's advocate though, I have no idea how common that sort of thing is or if it should be the default behavior. Just that in an open environment, there might be some less than stellar applications that the user should be able to control, rather than the phone.
- yardie 17y ago
  Devs don't work in a vacuum even though some think they do. If the app was released through the normal app store it probably wouldn't see the light of day in that state. The reviewers would reject it until they fixed it. If they are distributing through enterprise than they would be hauled in to the office to fix it. No application should be so busy that is consuming all the resources.
  - davidw 17y ago
    > If they are distributing through enterprise than they would be hauled in to the office to fix it. Because big companies never, ever get by on annoying, but functional software?
DrJokepu 17y ago
The iPhone doesn't have to deal with this because it doesn't support multitaskeng, hence an app becoming "unresponsive" isn't such a problem. To be honest, I would be rather angry if the OS shut down my browser process just because some image-heavy website slowed it down for a few seconds. One of the reasons I like Android is that I got more control over stuff and I know I'm not alone. Some people don't like the Apple "we know what's right for you" mentality. My point is, people are different, there's no "average phone user". This is not a question of technical skill as there's really nothing technical in "wait" and "force quit". Some people like to be in charge, some people don't, personally I do.
- allenbrunson 17y ago
  actually, the iPhone OS does support multitasking, and it's used quite heavily. you can start a call, then the phone app continues to run in the background while you start something else. the iPod app runs in the background playing music while you're running other apps. and so on. even if iPhone didn't allow multiple apps to run at once, it would still have to deal with crashes. it handles them by unceremoniously quitting the dead app and sending you back to the home screen. claiming that an average user should be able to know what to do with a dialog box that gives the options 'wait' or 'force quit' ... man, that sort of thinking by competitors is exactly why apple keeps winning all the time, isn't it.
  - DrJokepu 17y ago
    If an app crashes on Android, of course there are no questions asked. We're talking about unresponsive apps, not crashes. And as far as I know, the iPhone only allows "system" apps to be background apps. You can't listen to Spotify while browsing. About the other issue: I think Apple "keeps winning all the time" because of the combination of the consistent experience they deliver bundled with a competitive line of auxiliary services (such as iTunes or the App Store) and very strong branding. There's nothing wrong with that, but I don't think that artificially limiting the choices available to the user is a huge contributing factor.
    - 17y ago