TouchWiz: Safe To Delete If Running Nova Desktop?

[PeteCress]

I'm guessing the answer is "No Way Jose'"...

But, for a device running Nova Desktop, not having TouchWiz on the device would seem to avoid that occasional moment of confusion when, somehow, TouchWiz becomes the desktop.

I'm thinking specifically about a stone technophobe's Tab3 that I set up with Nova... and I'm kind of dreading the day that they call up wondering what happened to their desktop.

 

[Rukbat]

TouchWiz is more than just the launcher. I''d leave it on and set Nova to always be the launcher.

 

[funkylogik]

You could remove Touchwiz Launcher but i dont recommend it unless youre rooted and make Nova into a system app.
Imagine you have a problem where you have to go into safe mode or even factory reset... you need a system launcher to fall back on.
you could disable it though (if possible) :thumbup:

 

[Digital Controller]

I wouldn't since as funkylogik states, that if you ever happen to need to boot into safe mode then the phone is going to want to revert back to touchwiz, and if it's disabled the device won't work.

 

[Mr. Lucky]

I know it's tempting for freeing up space, but I wouldn't do it. From XDA Developers:

Basically there are two known ways to enter Safe Mode:

1. Android detects a problem with a newly installed app and force-closes it while entering into Safe Mode.

2. A combination of key presses at power application
​

That said, if you ever find yourself in a safe-mode situation, your phone will boot to a blank screen, as it looks for the factory ("safe") configuration, which the Touchwiz GUI is very much a part of.

 

[funkylogik]

I read of an app by Teslacoil that helps at keeping Nova default in one of these forums. Cant find it now though. Ask chanchan if u know his full name..... is it chanchan05??

 

[chanchan05]

@funkylogic - It's HomeSmack. It basically is able to control default apps for various options, not just the launcher. This includes browser and search engine/app.

Anyway, no, it's not adviseable to uninstall TouchWiz on a phone running stock Samsung ROM because it's not just a launcher, it's baked into the ROM in a way that there are several dependencies of TouchWiz apps together. For example, the notification bar is part of TouchWiz (obviously since it's not the standard Android notification bar). Uninstalling TouchWiz may give you errors regarding some things unrelated to the launcher. The only way to be safely rid of TouchWiz is to use a ROM that doesn't have TouchWiz in the first place.