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Why does my homescreen keep needing to be redrawn

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DGalt

Android Enthusiast
I thought this was an issue that would go away with any new phone (I was on a droid 2 that died on me, so was forced to upgrade, etc.), but apparently not?

Basically, if I'm in a particular app for a long time (browser, gchat, whatever) or I leave that app open and the phone goes to sleep, when I try to go to my homescreen the homescreen needs to be redrawn

Only uses the default launcher with 5 screens, one of which doesn't even have anything on it. My home-home screen is full of apps / folders, while the ones next to it each have a few widgets, but that's it.

I guess this is more me complaining since this used to drive me nuts on my old phone but I figured it would have been fixed by now...
 
shouldn't matter i just wanted to verify.

has it been doing it since you got the device? If not did you recently install a new app or update an app about the time it started doing it?
 
Only had it for about 3 weeks. It's not ever time (or even all that frequent), so I can't say if it's been happening since I got the phone. My inclination is that yes it has.
 
I use nova launcher and get occasional redraws, especially when rotating, but figure that is absolutely necessary unless the launcher were to keep that orientation in memory constantly. It's gotten better with nova launcher updates. I don't remember how often I got redraws in the stock launcher.

But as suggested, think about any recently installed apps or other changes in usage. Maybe check running apps to make sure nothing is hogging lots of memory.

First try a reboot (or two). Then maybe try logging out of any running services (like facebook app) other than the stock stuff, and turning off non-stock but constantly running apps. Doing a clean reboot or two. Give it a few days to see if the redraws get worse, better, or stay the same. Could do this by process of elimination with any running apps.
 
Under nova options, go to check for updates, select settings from that menu, check beta.

The latest beta supposedly fixes the redraw issue

Edit: or.... try the v6 supercharger and get rid of redraws for any launcher you use. Root required.
 
You can also look under the labs tab in Nova for the 'Preload Widgets' option, make sure that is unchecked.
 
This is a problem with the android operating system...not any particular phone. and i STILL dont see why we are having this problem.

basically android OS sees you home screen launcher as an app (well, technically it is an app) and it keeps it in memory. however, when RAM starts to run low, the OS kills off apps as needed....unfortunately, it kills off the home launcher. so when you are in an app for a while, you launcher gets killed, and when you hit home, it has to load the launcher from a closed state...causing the redraws.

there really isn't much you can do about it without root...however there are some launcher out there (apex for sure) where you can "lock homescreen in memory" this helps, but is a backwards way of doing it, and you still may notice it some.

to really fix it, you have to modify the build prop. as shown below.
basically the android OS has the home screen as priority level 6 (not sure of the scale but the lower the better)
modify the build.prop file like below puts the priority level of the launcher at 1, keeping it in memory longer and killing off lower level priorities.

you must be rooted. custom rom not necessary
open up a terminal emulator
type :
su (hit enter, a # sign will appear if you are rooted)

echo ro.HOME_APP_ADJ=1 >> /data/local.prop

i have been doing this since the original droid days and it has helped tremendously with redraws....i am rooted and on a custom ROM, but i havent noticed any on my nexus in Some time. just got done watching a movie on netflix and went straight to my fully loaded home screen right away.
 
Turdbogls said:
This is a problem with the android operating system...not any particular phone. and i STILL dont see why we are having this problem.

basically android OS sees you home screen launcher as an app (well, technically it is an app) and it keeps it in memory. however, when RAM starts to run low, the OS kills off apps as needed....unfortunately, it kills off the home launcher. so when you are in an app for a while, you launcher gets killed, and when you hit home, it has to load the launcher from a closed state...causing the redraws.

there really isn't much you can do about it without root...however there are some launcher out there (apex for sure) where you can "lock homescreen in memory" this helps, but is a backwards way of doing it, and you still may notice it some.

to really fix it, you have to modify the build prop. as shown below.
basically the android OS has the home screen as priority level 6 (not sure of the scale but the lower the better)
modify the build.prop file like below puts the priority level of the launcher at 1, keeping it in memory longer and killing off lower level priorities.

you must be rooted. custom rom not necessary
open up a terminal emulator
type :
su (hit enter, a # sign will appear if you are rooted)

echo ro.HOME_APP_ADJ=1 >> /data/local.prop

i have been doing this since the original droid days and it has helped tremendously with redraws....i am rooted and on a custom ROM, but i havent noticed any on my nexus in Some time. just got done watching a movie on netflix and went straight to my fully loaded home screen right away.
Click to expand...

yeah I knew this was the underlying issue with my old phone using LauncherPro. I didn't realize that the stock launcher itself was also considered an app and therefore could be killed...that just seems like a major oversight.

I'm also amazed that I'm still having issues running out of RAM, although I guess eventually that's going to happen no matter what unless you're periodically killing apps.

Thanks for the info :)
 
quickaudi said:
looks like it uses the "lock home in memory" setting, so yes
Click to expand...
Like hell it does.
I created SuperCharger because lock home in memory isn't good enough.
SuperCharger has BulletProof, Die-Hard and Hard To Kill settings... all of which are stronger than "lock home in memory"

Oh... and there is no such thing as "ro.HOME_APP_ADJ=whatever" on ICS.
You need a patched services.jar to change ADJs
 
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