Root Strange thing about Market and two devices

[mariel9898]

I have two Android devices, both the NC which is rooted, and a Droid 2 Global which is not rooted. I only have one gmail account.

I wanted to have certain apps like games, readers and anything that would be better on a larger screen on the NC and apps that need the camera, GPS or a microphone on the phone. I've downloaded apps accordingly.

Last night I noticed something strange. It seems that when an app is updated it puts the app on both devices. Is this normal? Is there any way to pick which device you want the app on and have it stay only on that device?

 

[bgrutter]

Never seen that. I have about 150+ apps on my rooted DInc and probably only about 40-50 on my NC. Haven't noticed any recent additions to my NC even though in the last week, I've probably had to update 20-30 of my DInc apps.

 

[oldweasel]

I believe that most phones are set to auto-download most apps that you have purchased / selected in the market.

When I put a new ROM on my droid the market auto-downloads all the previously installed apps without any prompting by myself.

Did a similar experiment with my wife's nook by linking it to my gmail account and it also auto-downloaded the apps linked to that account.

Not sure how to change this behavior, seems like a default market setting.

In fact, yo can now browse the market online (https://market.android.com/), select apps, and then have them auto-download to a device of your choosing.

 

[bgrutter]

I believe that most phones are set to auto-download most apps that you have purchased / selected in the market.

When I put a new ROM on my droid the market auto-downloads all the previously installed apps without any prompting by myself.

Did a similar experiment with my wife's nook by linking it to my gmail account and it also auto-downloaded the apps linked to that account.

Not sure how to change this behavior, seems like a default market setting.

In fact, yo can now browse the market online (https://market.android.com/), select apps, and then have them auto-download to a device of your choosing.

That's true. I forgot about that. WOW, what a dummy. That IS a new feature that happened when they recently released the new Online App Market. When I first loaded CM7 onto my NC, it began installing a TON of apps I didn't want on my NC. I waited and then just uninstalled them.

But, it doesn't seem like it's done that since the first time. I guess I'll have to check to confirm.

 

[stinky]

I think this feature got implemented in 2.1, or 2.2+ versions of android. When you set up the phone, it asks to backup data to google account, and there is also a Check box in your Settings.

Menu > Settings > Privacy > Back up my Data

Enabling this makes Google automatically install your apps in case you have to hard reset your phone, but in your case, is auto installing to both devices since it thinks they are missing them based on the setting.

hope that helps.

 

[LBPHeretic]

I remember wondering about this a few months ago. My concern was if I uninstalled an app on my B&N Nook Color that I also had on my Sprint HTC Hero, would it NOT automatically download and reinstall itself on my Sprint HTC Hero the next time I flashed a new ROM and vice versa?

I was sort of under the impression with the new Web Android Market you could have different profiles for different devices. It would be really nice to be able to have the apps automatically download again between flashings of ROMs on a per device basis.

 

[stinky]

I wouldn't have even thought about that unless getting 2 devices, but now that I am awaiting shipment of my NC I can see the problem of having certain apps that you dont want on each device. Like I plan on using soft keys for my NC but not for my Hero, and things like that.

With the amount of tabs coming out lately, I am sure this is something Google is getting an ear full of, so maybe its being worked on, or will be worked on, who knows?

One thing I have noticed, side loading apps, or apps installed not through the market, do not backup this way. So if you really were picky about not sharing certain apps between devices, you could always just find the .apk online and install it that way. This wont allow a built in backup from Google, but Titanium backup should work fine for this, as it stores on the device IIRC.