Help Questions about running tasks

[samalex]

I've had my DroidX for a few weeks now and a few days ago upgraded to Froyo. The phone is pretty much stock from Verizon, so no rooting and Froyo was from OTA update.

My question though is with running tasks. When I first got the phone it was commonly suggested on the forms to get a task application to kill unwanted tasks, but now I'm reading the contrary where people are saying to stay away from these types of applications. Why? I had Advanced Task-Killer installed which seemed to work, but I'm still unsure why so many applications are showing as running even though I haven't started them. For example the BBC News app is almost always running even though I've turned off all the auto-notification stuff. Skype is another one that seems to be running as a task even though I haven't launched it since restarting the phone.

Question 1 -- is there a good way to kill tasks that are running behind the scenes?
Question 2 -- is there anyway to view these start-up applications in Froyo and tell it not to run them?
Question 3 -- do such apps drain battery life or performance?

Thanks to anyone who can clear the air on this as I'm fairly confused on the whole matter.

Take care -

 

[norseraider]

I'd like to know some answers to these questions too. Why do I get gallery running (or, loaded in memory, anyway), and Social Hub, etc, when I have never tapped these icons? What's going on here?

Btw, I have stopped using task killers, and put my faith in the 'Droid.

 

[Deleted User]

Lots of reasons.

Some tasks execute at startup (social networking, skype).

Some tasks are called by other tasks (e.g. the gallery app can be called by a wallpaper selector, the camera app, etc.)

Most of them don't matter. If you use the app, leave it alone. If you don't use the app, just uninstall it.

In Android, apps running in memory are not necessarily consuming any processes or wasting battery life. They are in a sleeping state, so that they can be called when necessary without wasting the CPU cycles to start the application. It is not necessary to kill apps simply because they are running.

If you have problems with your phone (poor battery life, abnormal slowness, etc), then you should investigate what apps are running - but I wouldn't worry about them until that point.

 

[scary alien]

Question 1 -- is there a good way to kill tasks that are running behind the scenes?
Question 2 -- is there anyway to view these start-up applications in Froyo and tell it not to run them?
Question 3 -- do such apps drain battery life or performance?
Take care -

I'd like to know some answers to these questions too. Why do I get gallery running (or, loaded in memory, anyway), and Social Hub, etc, when I have never tapped these icons? What's going on here?

Btw, I have stopped using task killers, and put my faith in the 'Droid.

First off, its my opinion (and that of many, many other folks) that you don't need a task killer app. I haven't used one since I was running 1.5 on my Droid Eris. Android 2.x and above have a very good memory and process management algorithm where he will autokill old, unused tasks in the background that do not resources that are needed by more newly-launched ones. If you do have an issue with an app that needs to be killed, you can always use the Settings -> Applications -> Manage Applications, select your app and force close it there.

That being said here are my answers to the questions above:

Question 1 -- is there a good way to kill tasks that are running behind the scenes?

Settings -> Applications -> Manage Applications, select your app and force close it there.

Also, more and more apps these days are including an Exit button, but many do not. For apps that don't have an Exit button or feature, the proscribed method for exiting the app is to use the back key/button until you have "popped-out" of the app in question.

Question 2 -- is there anyway to view these start-up applications in Froyo and tell it not to run them?

If you are rooted, you can use Titanium Backup to "freeze" your apps (I believe this function removes the execute permission bits on the app so that the system cannot auto-start it--its still there, but unable to run). You could also remove (delete) said apps. Note, I have not done either on my Droid X--haven't felt that it was needed.

Question 3 -- do such apps drain battery life or performance?

Background apps that you have not interacted with (i.e., launched) or do not do any syncing or processing do not drain batterly life or performance. I'm sure there's a very small penalty for having to launch and manage these processes at boot time, but unless its a total piece of badly-written bloatware, it shouldn't cause any problems.

Just my two-cents... Hope that helps. Cheers!

 

[&roid]

Read this...
Android Developers Blog: Multitasking the Android Way