Storage management / app data / bad design

[uzicafe]

I have a Moto G, which as you may know only has a few GB of storage, with no option to expand. Twice so far, I have gone into each individual app in the apps list to clear extraneous data. The major flaw I've discovered is: every time I do the data clearing, it Really clears the data, like makes it as if you never opened the program before. Really inconvenient, bad programming idea.

Yes, I read the prompt that pops up that says "do you really want to delete all etc etc" but I would have never assumed from that info that it would seriously undo all my settings as well. So my question is:

Why? WHY would you ever design a "clear data" option that clears out unnecessary data, but also resets settings that the user obviously would not want to have to switch back every time Android claims their device is "running out of storage"?? At least this time I understand why it happened, but now once again I'm going back trying to figure out how to (for instance) make the phone stop vibrating when I'm using the keyboard.

I get the impression that there are data management apps, but I don't like the idea of spending 18 hours setting that up, trying to figure out what deletions will undo my settings, etc. And I'm only assuming that's how such an app would work. Maybe it doesn't even work that way. And then, I have to add yet another app to the very limited storage on my phone, using who knows how much battery...

Not looking for a solution here, just dreaming that this post will be seen by some Android developer, who will go "duh, that is kind of a stupidly broad way of clearing temporary data".

 

[Slug]

WHY would you ever design a "clear data" option that clears out unnecessary data, but also resets settings that the user obviously would not want to have to switch back every time Android claims their device is "running out of storage"??

Because that's what it's supposed to do. The Clear cache option is the one to use if you wish to eliminate "temporary data"

 

[uzicafe]

I get that. The problem is with how much/what manner of extraneous data is eliminated by a particular function. Just by reading what the app manager says when I'm in there, I can see that Clear Cache never comes close, in terms of total volume, to the amount of data indicated next to Clear Data. Yet, there's no way that Clear Data is strictly about settings. Why else would many of my apps accrue up to 50MB of random data that's totally ok to delete? Plus, for some apps, I fear I can never hit Clear Data, based on the type of app and the warning I get when you hit the button - I'm talking calendars, the camera/photos, etc, which, apparently, would be wiped of literally everything if I hit that button.

Point being, the functions of those buttons aren't divided up sensibly.

Why not this way: one button reverts your app to original settings, period, and the other button clears all your temporary whatnot, period? Doesn't seem it would be that hard to add a third category, as well, for even more specialization and control. Plus, show the user Exactly what they'd be losing with a particular button. A detailed list with check-boxes would work too.

With a couple dozen apps, a couple dozen music albums, and a few photos, I'm usually left with less than half a GB of free space on my device (again, this device has no micro SD slot or anything). That free space gets quickly eaten up by app data that the device clearly does not require to function. It shouldn't be that complicated that I can delete all such data without resetting core functions. That's silly.

 

[Crashdamage]

What you are asking for would require the cleaner app to recognize which data must be kept and which can be deleted, and to be able to do so for hundreds or thousands of apps. Simply impractical, if not impossible.

 

[uzicafe]

I disagree that it's so impractical. I edited my previous reply a little. Neither the device nor the OS need to recognize anything. I don't rely on my phone to do everything for me. If provided with a checkbox, I could do that work myself.

 

[lunatic59]

Doesn't seem it would be that hard to add a third category, as well, for even more specialization and control. Plus, show the user Exactly what they'd be losing with a particular button. A detailed list with check-boxes would work too.

That would only be an option at the system level if developers were restricted how and where their apps could store data. And the apps would have to maintain some sort of live file inventory so you know exactly what each file was for. IF you were clearing data for a navigation app and the file name was "maps.dat" you'd be pretty sure what was there, but if it was gps coordinates like 12364002~55.coo or something equally cryptic, how would you know to check or not check?

I think the better (and more Android-like) solution would be to let developers know that file economy and management are important to end users (aka customers) and vote by using or not using their apps.

 

[uzicafe]

I think the better (and more Android-like) solution would be to let developers know that file economy and management are important to end users (aka customers) and vote by using or not using their apps.

Totally agree.