Help New user lots of questions.

[dcooterfrog]

OK I got my ally yesterday of ebay ( its in much nicer shape than expected) used win ce / pocket pc/wm2003 wm5/ wm6 /wm 6.1 before

I have doen the following
root with z4
clockwork mod and a backup (after using if for a couple of hours)
installed touchdown for exchange support ( i coulndt get basic the male app to connect)
installed pure widgets calendar
a couple of other widgets
titanium backup.
how much can I remove safely where do they go how do I reinstall them if I need to

installed astro
installed dolphin is dolphin hd better how much?
installed dropbox
installed keepass
installed juice defender
installed adfree
installed ebay


tried a couple of launcher apps and settled on lg home for now.

what else should I do to make it great... befor I try out different roms and or kernals

my current sd card is either class 2 or 4 so no apps to sd yet I wil lprobably be getting a faster on esoon.

 

[PowerBomb]

Sounds like you're off to a good start. I would give Launcher Pro a try. Different Launcher "theme" with really good speed and lots of customizing options.

 

[Cl8rs]

Yes, LauncherPro is amazing.

 

[k.c.cole]

Launcher Pro is very nice. If you want more "look" custimization, and downloadable themes ADW is pretty decent. Not as quick as launcher pro, but certainly better than stock.

This is what I have done to mine. Heavily customized! It is now to my liking.
http://androidforums.com/ally-all-things-root/157942-home-screenshots-post2037135.html#post2037135

 

[dcooterfrog]

Yes, LauncherPro is amazing.

I i did play around with the various launchers
zeam launcher pro home ++ adw android home
in the end I said I liked llg home for now it was fast and clean if not pretty

right now it is more important tha the phone is fast, stable etc.

i started to use ti backup to freeze a lot of apps to see what I can remove later.


hey another question any way to get widgets on the lock screen
i had my agenda an number of emails missed called etd on my saga before I unlocked with s2u2 from xda

 

[PowerBomb]

Hm... never heard of someone experiencing the LG theme as being faster than other third party launchers. The LG Home theme is actually a pretty heavy resource-hog from what I've heard.

You can remove pretty much any apps you want, except Google services. One time I removed Google Voice because I never use it, and then my maps and market stopped working. So apparently Google doesn't want you screwing with their apps, they share permissions and once you remove one the others may not work.

A safer way to get rid of some of the garbage apps on the phone would be to just try one of the ROMs we have like Velocity, the guys who create our ROMs know what can be safely removed and usually get rid of 99% of it for their ROMs.

 

[dcooterfrog]

more questions

I have removed a bunch of stuff from the phone .
visual voice mail
city id

freezing the apps with Tib and waiting to see what happens.

do I need to wipe the dalvik cache to regain the space.

before I start playing with new roms I want to have a really clean 'nearly stock rom'

I know that I can do that with clockwork once I get things where i want them

 

[DJAlmix]

LauncherPro is the best for the LG Ally.

 

[darkxsun]

I have removed a bunch of stuff from the phone .
visual voice mail
city id

freezing the apps with Tib and waiting to see what happens.

do I need to wipe the dalvik cache to regain the space.

What does "freezing" do exactly?

On stock roms, system apps are *usually* odex'd, meaning they have an optimized version of the classes.dex file from the app already, and therefore they don't need to be kept in the dalvik-cache (I believe the dalvik-cache is full of odex files for apps that don't come with it). So, clearing that won't give you any space. Keep in mind this is not true in a de-odex'd custom rom (as all the ones around here are) because the system apps then need to store the odex file in the dalvik-cache again.

Uninstalling an odex'd app won't actually save you any space, really (unless their running in the background), because system apps are stored in a different partition than you can store apps in. The only thing you can hope to gain is to stop them from running in the background.

 

[dcooterfrog]

What does "freezing" do exactly?

On stock roms, system apps are *usually* odex'd, meaning they have an optimized version of the classes.dex file from the app already, and therefore they don't need to be kept in the dalvik-cache (I believe the dalvik-cache is full of odex files for apps that don't come with it). So, clearing that won't give you any space. Keep in mind this is not true in a de-odex'd custom rom (as all the ones around here are) because the system apps then need to store the odex file in the dalvik-cache again.

Uninstalling an odex'd app won't actually save you any space, really (unless their running in the background), because system apps are stored in a different partition than you can store apps in. The only thing you can hope to gain is to stop them from running in the background.

Freezing makes the phone think you have uninstalled them. So you can seem if removing them causes problems.


What's odex?. It did make a low system memory alert go away. Somit must do something. If not why are the removed from a custom rom?

Some of the stuff was running services I did not need.

 

[darkxsun]

Freezing makes the phone think you have uninstalled them. So you can seem if removing them causes problems.


What's odex?. It did make a low system memory alert go away. Somit must do something. If not why are the removed from a custom rom?

Some of the stuff was running services I did not need.

odex is an optimized version of classes.dex from the apk. It allows the app to run faster (like a cache). If the app is never expected to change (like system apps), they usually come with an odex so the system doesn't need to generate one all the time, and store it in the /data partition.

Custom roms are almost always de-odex'd so that you can theme (it is mandatory to use themes). Therefore, it makes a bigger difference there, because these de-odex'd system apps end up generating an entry in the dalvik-cache, taking up space in /data.

And, yes, if these apps are running services in the background, removing them will free some memory.

 

[ludeawakening]

I would think about using the Velocity V0.4 ROM. It has most of the unnecessary garbage apps removed already. Then you have the freedom to ad the apps that you would actually use, and not worry about messing anything up. And yes Launcher Pro is a very good add on for the Ally. It's even worth buying Launcher Pro Plus IMO.

 

[Zoandroid]

Dcooterfrog, I read above you moved "up here" from a Saga. We are kindred spirit, pal, because I did too! And when I say UP here, I do mean it!! This Ally is the phone I only WISHED the Saga could have been.

I'll also vote that Launcher Pro is a good app, but there are a couple things you might want to keep in mind if you are headed for Velocity 0.4 (which I just did).

First, consider switching to Amon RA recovery before you flash Velocity. I didn't switch beforehand, and had to spend an hour on IRC with Dots fixing the Ally when I subsequently tried to switch to RA using ROM Mgr. AFTER Velocity was running, and everything went south. it failed to flash RA correctly, and then failed to re-flash ClockworkMod Recovery back. For some reason we never figured out, Velocity and ROM Manager don't play well together on my phone. Dots, bless his soul, talked me through a manual acquisition and flash of Amon RA to fix things.

I liked ClockworkMod Recovery, so in all fairness I'll mention why I wanted to change. The biggest reason is that Amon RA can actually mount and format/wipe the EXT partition on the SD card. ClockworkMod can MAKE that partition, but it can't access it afterward, which I found a bit odd. Another reason is that I have been told Amon RA by itself can do the things I needed both ROM Manger and Clockwork to do. Finally, I had to do something to deal with ROM Manager's malfunctioning under Velocity. I tried reinstalling it several times, but it kept showing the spinning circle icon (Velocity's equivalent to a Windows hourglass when busy) when I ran it, and would not stop, even when I tried waiting 20 minutes. So when I went looking on the Ally IRC for an alternative suggestion to ROM Mgr., they all told me to try RA and I wouldn't need ROM Mgr. anymore.

Another thing to keep in mind, if you do decide to try Launcher Pro. I lost all the settings in that when I flashed Velocity. (I had not yet realized Launcher Pro has a back up settings option in its prefs.) So I had to rebuild Launcher Pro from scratch after I got Velocity running. Launcher has some nifty things you can do adding a 'shorcut' to the home screen, and then selecting one of its "actions" from the shortcut building menu. It opens a list of most of the apps installed, and each one has (sometimes several) sub-listings for things that I had never seen using the default launcher. One of the cool ones is that you can switch the camera's LED on and off (a 'real' flashlight widget) which I had previously believed not possible on the Ally. I haven't tried the Plus version, but it has even more cool stuff you can do.

 

[dcooterfrog]

Zoandroid
you seem to be showing up in a lot of places.
I had a treo befor the saga and on paper it looked worlds better. but i found it felt cheap etc. it does work ok and it will keep my desk drawer happy until I brick my saga.

I ended up swithcing to launcher pro but I haven deleted lg home or android home yet. I like it after a second try and it its is faster if you move the slidres around.

I already switched to amen ra and did apps to sd ( from the other thread)
not sure if I care about velocity .4 if I can upgrade the kernal for over clocking and tun turbo4 for JIT I am not sure what velocity will give me in that case. watch for that as a new post coming up.

 

[Zoandroid]

I find the Ally to be more responsive under Velocity 0.4, and also I did it so I could OC as well as loose some trash default apps running when I never needed them. It also brings options to the Ally which it doesn't have with the stock Rom, but I am still discovering them so can't really name them yet. There is a long and conprehensive list on Trident's thread for Velocity's release. One I just discovered today is WiFi Tether (makes the Ally a hotspot connection).

 

[Oblivious72]

hey another question any way to get widgets on the lock screen
i had my agenda an number of emails missed called etd on my saga before I unlocked with s2u2 from xda

widget locker

 

[dcooterfrog]

widget locker

thanks.

 

[k.c.cole]

I already switched to amen ra and did apps to sd ( from the other thread)
not sure if I care about velocity .4 if I can upgrade the kernal for over clocking and tun turbo4 for JIT I am not sure what velocity will give me in that case. watch for that as a new post coming up.

I'm not an expert, those guys can correct me if I am wrong. My understanding, what you get from a custom ROM is just that. It has been tweaked and optimized to squeeze every bit of performance out that possibly can. The system files, memory management, transition, cpu settings, memory settings, etc. are tweaked to give optimum performance. Velocity 4 is better than stock. It is better than just flashing an OC kernel and TurboIV; mostly because it incorporates those and optimizes them.

Again, anyone feel free to correct anything that I have misstated. The really great thing about andriod and the community of pro-am devs is all of the options that become available.

I would recommend before flashing any new ROMS, learn how to use the nand backup and restore feature of Amon-Ra of clockwork, they will save you hours of heartache.