OT: Android management

[newshound]

Apologies for OT subject, but there are some smart and helpful people here!

I've managed to get something on my Moto G5 (android 7) which mucks around with power management in the background when I open the phone from standby. Apart from also popping up adverts for other (useless) apps, it turns off bluetooth and wifi when it thinks the battery is a bit low, which can be a PITA.

Can anyone recommend an app to help me find what is doing this, so that I can uninstall it?. The couple of startup managers which I have looked at seem to be useless.

As a supplementary, are there benefits from rooting Android devices or is it risky? My IT experience goes back a long way, but I'm not really up to date with modern stuff.

I run Ccleaner and Malwarebytes (on W10 as well) but have never dug very far into Android.

[Andy Burns]

Checked Dad's android phone at xmas, he'd managed to pick up all manner of shit in the course of a year, just uninstall everything you don't recognise, bearing in mind there can be some "convincing sounding" apps that do what it doesn't say on the tin.

8 years I did root my first android phone, in order to get it to do stuff I wanted to do, haven't rooted any of the last three phones or two tablets because stock android has improved now ... some I have put non-stock firmware on, but not rooted. You're more at risk from dodgy apps when rooted and some e.g. banking and tv streaming apps won't run.

[Chris Whelan]

Why not just reset it to factory defaults and start again?

Chris

[newshound]

I didn't *think* I could see anything dodgy in the apps list, but just uninstalled one called "Installer" which had the same gearwheel logo as "Setup", perhaps that was it!

Thanks, that was just the sort of feedback I was looking for. Currently

*don't* run banking apps on the phone, only from my (large) desktop machine.

[Bill Wright]

What does rooted mean?

Bill

[Andy Burns]

Runs as the underlying root user (full linux admin) letting you bypass restrictions including shoot your own feet.

[newshound]

It's gaining access to the root directory (which you don't normally have in Android), at which point you can screw up the device completely. Like being a Superuser.

But it means you can remove all the crap that the manufacturer foists on you.

[Adrian Caspersz]

ES File Explorer?

That got my order of the boot, when it became unbelievably spammy.

[Martin Brown]

Turning off Wifi, GPS and bluetooth when the battery gets down to the last 5% seems a fairly standard default Android mobile behaviour - it extends useful battery life although talk time becomes very limited.

My MotoG4 definitely had the drop all other non phone connectivity when battery level reaches 5% behaviour from new and by default. YMMV

It shows as a sharp bend in the battery discharge curve extending the time it will survive on standby considerably until you try to use it.

You want one of the task manager or file manager programs to let you see what is actually running in the background. Otherwise you may be able to catch it when it next tries to update and/or asks for permissions.

Most well behaved programs have an icon somewhere.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Yeah I installed that lasy night on te basis iy allowed NFS file mouinting according to someone on thenet.

It didnt. Its gone

[newshound]

Thanks, removed! Also ES Task Manager (just in case).

ISTR finding them useful on my first Android tablet (but that was some time ago).

[Mark]

and here, but it was originally very useful is there any alternative now that works as well ?

-

[me]

What do you use in the place of ES File Explorer?

[AnthonyL]

I gave up on ES and now use Total Commander which seems to let me access my NAS and shared Windows drives and transfer files between them.

[JoeJoe]

There is a modified version of ES File Explorer Pro on the net that has all the rubbish/spam/etc removed... ;-)

[Graham Nye]

Ooh, top tip there, thanks. Installed on my phone and tablet which can now both chat to my SMB NAS unlike a stream of products which claimed to but couldn't (including the increasingly useless ES file manager and its never-ending plug-ins).

[Bill]

In message , JoeJoe writes

I apologise for coming late to the party here and sort of hijacking, but I have had no response to my similar question on the main Android ng. The problem does relate to my lack of understanding or ability in Android management.

My cheapo Android 6 phone, badged THL and using a 32GB SD card as the main memory, has been putting up messages about the launcher for some months now. A couple of days ago it apparently stopped launching altogether. The front screen called it Launcher 3. The phone appears to start and displays a top line on the screen showing wifi, bluetooth etc., and makes occasional noises as would be expected from a running phone, but after the splash screen the whole display becomes blank apart from the top line.

I can get into the phone's 32GB via usb and see the launcher's crash logs (calling it lqlauncher) dating back to last June and I've now sideloaded a basic Google launcher via a PC. However, this announces that it needs an update to the "Google" app to run. Every attempt to install this update tells me that the download has failed.

I've not found a way into Settings without launching. Does anyone know of a way to poke it back to factory default state?

[Andy Burns]

in settings, apps, select launcher3 (or whatever) and clear the launch by default action

then next time you press the launch icon, it;ll as you again which launcher you want, and you can select the factory one (either for a one-off, or to remember it)

maybe try a different launcher there are plenty to choose from.

[Reentrant]

Can't speak for your exact model but on many Android phones if you power off, press and hold volume-down, then power on, you'll get into service/recovery/"BIOS" mode and should have a factory reset option.

[Bill]

Thanks. That does put me into a "Factory" menu which, after clearing eMMC seems to have put me back into some pre-original settings mode that allows me to "launch" the phone.

Interesting in that "Settings", for example, now only seems to have a small subset of the normal settings menu, just showing Wireless, Bluetooth options.

Now to try to set it up from scratch! Thanks again, I've learnt something today.