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Help I am forever clearing cache and it really has become a ballache.....

Vicdude

Vicdude

Android Enthusiast
I have a bog standard Desire and as a phone it is great however, I am growing weary of forever having to clear down the cache in order to retain space in the memory.
Like most people, when I first got the Desire, I went app mad and filled my phone with rubbish. I quickly hit the memory limit and had to learn the art of deleting stuff that, although cool, I never really used (Google Goggles, Sky View, etc etc etc)
After about 14 months, I now have the phone with the absolute minimum on it as far as apps and features that I actually use are concerned but still the cache fills up randomly.
The biggest culprits are:
Google Maps (Used every day as I am a salesman and I use it to navigate to my appointments)
Facebook (Used everyday because I'm such a popular guy ;) ) and
Dolphin Browser HD (I have since replaced this with xScope as it uses far less)

My question is this, Currently I clear my cache about once every 1-2 hrs (Using App 2 SD Free) and each time it'll clear between 1-2mb.... is there a way of the cache auto clearing? About once a week, I un install Facebook and maps and re install. This clears up about 7MB but within a week it has become clogged again.
If I didn't regularly clear cache and re install apps, would the phone just fill up until it became totally useless?

Regards

Mikey :cool:
:confused::confused:
 
Usta said:
Try 1Tap Cleaner for scheduled auto cache cleaning.
Click to expand...

Gotta pay unless you are happy with a 3 day schedule :D I installed it and the cleaner is the same one as is found in the App 2 SD Free. Not point me installing it, The problem remains, cache overwhelming the phone. Even the guys who have rooted or the phones with huge internal memory must suffer from this problem. Isn't it a bit of a design flaw? :confused:
 
I don't understand the obsession with clearing the cache. I've never done it once, not ever. Its never caused me an issue. Is it actually causing you one?

Cache is a transient datastore that apps use. Whatever you delete will get rebuild the next time the app runs. It does not store persitant data there, that goes in the Data partition which is what we see as internal memory. If internal memory fills up we're fubar'd. If cache fills up the phone simply deletes the oldest unused data automatically (I could of course be completely wrong. Android might be different but that's how cache works in general).

Clearing cache therefore will not affect the internal memory available to store apps. Its not the same storage. Are you sure you're not actually clearing the app's data?

Have a look at this. It explains the different types of storage. Then download FreeSpace (assuming you have space ;)). It'll show you where that storage is being used. You can see that Cache and Data are different.
 
speedycolzalez said:
Cache is a transient datastore that apps use. Whatever you delete will get rebuild the next time the app runs.
Click to expand...

Some app cache will rebuild when the app runs, but the cache accumulates over time. Just like the browser on your PC, the android browser will hoard cached websites until cleared. many other apps will do this too.

speedycolzalez said:
Clearing cache therefore will not affect the internal memory available to store apps. Its not the same storage. Are you sure you're not actually clearing the app's data?

Have a look at this. It explains the different types of storage. Then download FreeSpace (assuming you have space ;)). It'll show you where that storage is being used. You can see that Cache and Data are different.
Click to expand...

Unfortunately that link is not entirely accurate. The only real regular use of the /cache partition on my desire is /cache/downloads, used by the market to temporarily store the .apks. I occaisionally witness other cache that is of undeterminable origin.

In fact app caches are /data/data/<appname>/cache.

As you mentioned earlier, /data is what is seen as "internal storage" or "Internal Memory" and this does massively impact the amount of apps you can install / run etc.
 
I run a little app called memory status and it displays via a widget, how much memory remains in the Internal, External and Ram sections of the phone. An example is that at the moment it shows:

Int: 20.8MB
Ext: 2.4GB
RAM 117MB

If I do nothing, by this evening the Int figure will have decreased to maybe 15.5MB and if I left it until the morning after using say a bit of facebook and browsing a few things, I'd have about 10.4 and the low memory warning would be all over the place.
The thing is that even if I leave the phone unused, various background activities continue to eat into my available memory.

I have just cleared the cache with App 2 SD and my figures now read:


Int: 22.9MB
Ext: 2.4GB
RAM 101MB

I swear blind that I havent done anything with the phone for well over an hour.

I guess that you could be right and it is the actual app that is just feeding naff information via the widget and it is the app and not the phone that is triggering the low memory warning. The phone might be fine, like you say, administering the cache by auto deleting the oldest information. I should maybe try a different widget/app. The data displayed on the widget matches the data found in the SD & phone storage part of settings. Could it be the app "telling" the phone what it has left rather than the phone telling the app?

If I just left it on charge and on for a week, would it just fill and fill until it was full and then become useless? :D
 
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