Help Memory Management - A feature, not an error

[meangene]

I've seen lots of comments on this forum about not being able to close an app and haven't seen anyone explain how memory is managed on Android devices so here's a quick explanation (sorry if it's redundant):

All Android apps are written in Java. Java, unlike other programming languages, does not require any coding to allocate or deallocate memory and handles all memory allocation/deallocation through a "feature" called automatic garbage collection. The garbage collector kicks in whenever an app no longer has any active threads pointing to it. By design, the garbage collector will not remove apps that are actively being used; but there may be a bit of system degradation while things are being cleaned up (usually a very fast process). This is not an error that the Android creators accidentally left out, it's a standard "feature" of Java.

As for the process killing apps out there, this programmer's opinion is that they are unnecessary and could possibly do more harm than good (especially if you kill the garbage collector task).

If you want a more indepth explanation, you can read about it here:
Understanding Automatic Garbage Collection — Developer.com


Cheers

 

[duckthehobo]

SOMEONE in SOME forum posted an explanation earlier, but yeah, its pretty cool to look into. ALSO there's a thread floating around this forum *search the truth about task killer* or similar.

Personally, I used a task killer for the first week i had my phone. Then tried without one. If there was a change in battery life it was an improvement.

 

[latinmaxima]

I happen to use Astro manager but not for killing apps. I use it to find other things on the phone. I have fine battery life based on how I use my phone.

 

[AndroidSPCS]

Thanks for the info.

I use taskkiller, only because I don't like the NFL app, and I don't like apps that use GPS or other power hungry features working in the background when I don't need them to.

 

[dkjones96]

I've yet to have a GPS program do anything while the phone is asleep. My weather widget doesn't even update until after I've woken the phone up.

 

[meangene]

I haven't had my droid long enough to test "power draining" apps but I haven't seen any battery problems on my unit, and I still have all the default Sprint apps cranking away. Maybe I'll chart average battery longevity over the next few days and then again after I root and remove default apps and see if there's any major differences.