Android 15 could add built-in support for app archiving
Android 15 could add built-in support for app archiving
Google Play has an app archiving feature that lets you uninstall apps without deleting their data, and it's coming natively to Android 15.
What we need is a more reliable ability to restore data to apps, particularly across phones. This used to be possible with 3rd party apps, but they borked it a long time ago.
Scoped storage (only one app has access to its own data folders) is the heart of the problem. Not saying it's wrong, as I understand the rationale.
This makes root necessary to permit a different app to write to those folders.
And then apps need to be coded in a way that doesn't cause problems with restored data. Because even with root, this can sometimes happen.
Nah I don't think that's it, rather the app data is tied to that specific phone via a number Google assigns to it. So, if you go to a new phone, or even factory reset your phone, you cannot restore data - even using root and apps that would backup the app data folder. Like I say, it used to work, it hasn't for years.
Another reason to root. Then Neobackup.
Neobackup, thanks, I'll give that a try. I've used Titanium Backup back in the day, and maybe one or two others, but not had any luck with restoring into a new install.
What would be the point?
I could see it maybe being useful for certain large games that you only play occasionally, but...
That'd mean redownloading right when you actually want to play, which is a pain. Also, in ability to tell it to archive or un-archive something manually makes that situation even worse.
It feels like those "ram doublers" back in the day... Neat in theory, but just painful in reality. It puts a check mark on a sales pitch, but doesn't actually help anyone.
Yeah. For persistence and cross-device stuff, it makes more sense for it to be stored server-side. Either by the app author, or maybe Google could offer a few kB free for each app, like how Chrome provides a bit of storage for extension settings.
Just like Nextbit!
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@FragmentedChicken If you have a device with less than 32 GB of storage, App Archival could do little to help you reclaim space (and I'm telling it from my experience). 60% is too little space saved when you use multiple apps. But otherwise, if you like to download apps because they seem interesting, and then you forget about them, this is a nifty feature indeed.
Uhm. Newsflash. My Vanilla Android 9.1.0's vanilla Play Store already does... 🙄
Edit: Apologies for the tone above. I deserve the downvotes. 😅
What "vanilla" play store do you have? I have Android phones running android 4 through 13 and none of them natively have something like that built in.
First off, my apologies for the tone of my first post. I am cyclothimic and sometimes (in bad moments) shouldn't be on social media. Hard to draw that line sometimes, though.
Secondly, in a more positive manner and admitting my error in comparing native in Android to the Play Store: I had this message popup on a full phone in the Play Store if I wanted to enable it. It is now also in my Play Store settings underneath "Google Play Feedback".
I have Play Store v39.4.23-21 [O] [PR] 599960585
It also only sometimes does Archiving, but not often. Usually it'll just still pop-up the uninstall-other-apps popup as usual.