Help Programs end randomly?!

[mikegaudiello]

All programs on my phone recently seem to want to randomly end from time to time. All apps seem to be experiencing this issue, IE stock apps (SMS, Browser) and a variety of apps from the market. It's happened before and after the 2/2 OTA, and obviously a restart did not fix this issue.

This doesn't seem to discriminate if other apps are running. I've had this happen on the SMS app with the stock KB, shortly after a restart without anything else running.

Is anyone else having problems like this?

 

[James Bell]

I had an automatic task killer app (I forget the name) that caused this symptom, perhaps you have something similar?

I would definitely do a factory reset and see if that helps, then add apps back slowly to see if one is the culprit.

 

[mikegaudiello]

Hmm.. I do use Advanced Task Manager, which does auto-kill but only on background running apps. I've had it since 1/7 and it hasn't caused issues until maybe 2-3 days ago. I may try a different task manager app but I paid for AdTM.

 

[FLT]

Killing apps is not necessary!!

Why would you slow down your phone?

Task killers are only good if an app is not working properly anymore and you want it to stop, nothing else, stop using them

 

[James Bell]

I think the android OS's task manager does not do a good enough job killing apps in the background. I think it doesn't weigh the COST in energy of each app either.

Anyway try deleting the advanced task manager and you'll see your apps stop closing for no reason. Pretty sure that was the app that did it to me. I remember the browser and facebook seemed to close particularly often, and when I put them on the no-kill list the random closings stopped. If that is the culprit, write the author and explain for a refund or fix.

 

[FLT]

I think the android OS's task manager does not do a good enough job killing apps in the background.

Why the heck should it be killing apps if there's plenty of memory? As soon as you don't use an app anymore Android pauses it but keeps it in the memory for fast access to it.

If the memory gets full it'll kill apps that aren't needed anymore.

So the best way to use an Android device is to keep the RAM loaded with apps, not to kill them every time you've used one.

 

[James Bell]

Sure, if the only issue is memory. But I see apps in the background still running all the time (chewing up CPU cycles, kicking on the GPS, etc) and that costs battery.

No one turns to a task killer-type program because they are anal about memory usage, it's because their battery is at 40% at 12 noon!

 

[hondamx525]

The task killer apps havebeen proven to not signifigantly help battery life. Nobody understands that android is linux, not windows, and because of this, tasks do not need to be killed all the time.

But i know itll be debated anyways.

 

[mikegaudiello]

I use the task manager for one reason only, to be able to tell, and switch amongst programs that are already open. I don't end programs this way, I don't use it for battery life. Switching programs is easy for me, and in 5 taps I go from sleep to whatever program I want open without swiping through the program drawer over and over (I'm still exploring the Market; right now I have 100+ apps that I don't remember the names of while I'm still figuring out what I'll really want or use).

1 Power
2 Slide
3 Adv Task Mgr
4 Whatever program I want
5 Switch To

FWIW, I actually just check AdTM, it had auto-kill turned off.