ubuntu-phone team mailing list archive

[Selene Scriven <selene.scriven@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

* Fabio Colella <fcole90@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> The advantages of not allowing background services are mainly 
> longer battery life and better overall performances.
> ...
> I think we should find a compromise that allow the user to use 
> apps that need background services but also makes him/her free 
> to stop/resume them.
> ...
> My consideration is that the user should always end up being 
> able to decide what he/she want's to use and when. We put 
> conventions (like stop on low battery) over user configuration, 
> but the user should still be free to change
> it.

On Android, it seems to be a cultural norm that there is no 
difference between having an app installed and having it running 
all the time.  It seems like practically every app has a 
background service, even when completely unnecessary or unwanted.  
Because almost every app developer views their app as the single 
most important thing on the phone, and it needs to be running all 
the time.

On Ubuntu Touch though, we can actually close apps...  and they 
stay closed!  This is a major selling point, an awesome feature 
compared to the competition.

On my Android phone, the battery lasts about 4 to 6 times as long 
when I can prevent the zillions of unnecessary background apps 
from running.  And when I run an app, it starts and responds much 
faster without all that other junk taking up RAM and CPU time.

I'd very much like it if we put control over this in the end 
user's hands, and give them the ability to override obnoxious 
decisions made by the app developers.  I really don't want 
Facebook running in the background, pinging the server every few 
minutes...  I just want it available on demand for the rare times 
I need to use it on the go.  And the same goes for pretty much 
everything else on the phone.


-- Selene