Help Android 6.0. No way to unlock the phone (password) after uninstalling the Gboard update

[MartinFe]

Steps to reproduce:
1. Settings. Security. Screen lock. Password. Require password to start device. Continue. Set password.
2. Settings. Apps. GBoard. Disable. Google app has been disabled to use internet connection.
The latest GBoard update will be uninstalled. The GBoard version delivered with the phone is now active.
3. Power button
The phone is now locked
4. Unlock the phone
It is not possible. The dialog tap to speak appears. Taping on X, settings or delete have no effect at all.
It is not possible to unlock the phone.
I suppose the only option left is to reset the phone to factory settings...

 

[KBU2]

Try this but Note this method may very from device to device.

Use Volume keys to scroll to Wipe Data/factory resetoption and then use the power button to select this mode. Step 5. Under Wipe Data/factory reset select "Yes" and then reboot your android device. Once your phone is powered on you can do the settings and set another password, pin or pattern for you lock screen.

 

[MartinFe]

Thank you for your answer.
I already did that yesterday.
I did first a backup of the user data though, but that didn't help, because the offending GBoard version was also backed up.
I ended up reinstalling all apps from scratch and reconfiguring the phone.
Now it's up and running and I haven't lost much, except some time.

 

[Hadron]

I'm slightly surprised that it allowed you to disable the system keyboard app (I assume that Gboard is the pre-installed keyboard on your device from what your first post said).

The "uninstall updates" option would remove all updates to the app without doing anything else. Disabling an app also removes all updates (and data) for it, but it also stops the app running at all. That's why I'm surprised your phone allowed it to be disabled, because this is a predictable result of disabling the keyboard and so you'd hope the manufacturer would have thought of that and disallowed it (as Google have on my Pixel - I can uninstall updates, but without rooting I can't disable the stock keyboard).

Yes, I know you got the message "The GBoard version delivered with the phone is now active", but if it were active then the app would not be disabled. So I think the manufacturer screwed-up twice here, once in allowing it to be disabled and again by putting out a misleading message.

 

[MartinFe]

Thank you for your answer Hadron. I suppose you're right and that's what happened.
But I wouldn't put all the blame on the manufacturer (Lenovo).
I have automatic updates in Google Play disabled. I update only the apps that I use, leaving almost every Google app except for Google Play, GMail and Google services as they were delivered with the phone.
I left the phone unattended with WIFI switched on and when I came back I discovered that Google Play was updating all Google apps. I suppose Google Play updated itself and "decided" that the user didn't know what he was doing not updating all those important apps and did the job itself.
I am looking forward to the Librem 5 phone. That will certainly solve the problem and bring back control to the user.

 

[Hadron]

I've never allowed automatic updates on my android devices (or my computers for that matter). I always want the option of declining an update if I think it might be a retrograde step for me (though usually after some period of it cluttering my updates list in the Play Store app I'll eventually get fed up seeing it and find an alternative app to do the job). And in 8.5 years of using Android I've never had the Play Store decide for itself that it's going to ignore me and install the updates itself.

So I don't know what happened there, but I've often gone months or even a year or more with an app update pending and have never known the phone to just install it anyway (and of course there will have been many Play Store and Play Services updates in that time). And I know that my wife rarely updates her apps and they don't get updated for her. So whatever happened there was abnormal, though what it was I don't know.

Of course if you are prepared to root and ROM (assuming that's an option for your phone) you can take control anyway, including removing everything Google from it.