Disabling play store?

XxTriviumxX

I disabled play store (it is still installed) and all my apps work great. Will disabling play store prevent play services/framework to be updated? Will this break anything in the future?

mythodical

XxTriviumxX If your apps all work as expected with Play Store disabled, including notifications, then you simply don't need the Play Store installed. However, you may install an app down in the future which does require the Play Store and/or Services in order to function, at which point you could reinstall it, or install it and the problematic app to a secondary profile as some others do.

Play Services and GSF are dependencies of the Play Store, but not the other way around. They should update fine even if you uninstall the Play Store.

GrapheneOS

XxTriviumxX Our usage guide explains that Play services and the Play Store are interdependent. Play services needs the Play Store in order to properly install and update dynamite modules in the Play services app data. If you want to use Play services, you should have the Play Store too.

[deleted]

I have it disabled as well. It probably wont break anything. As services and framework are separate apps, they should be able to update independent from the store.

XxTriviumxX

[deleted] Do you get any issues after uninstalling play store? I'm under the impression that having a disabled play store make my protonmail notifications work, and uninstalling it would break the push notifications

Schiller

XxTriviumxX I installed Play Store just to get things running, after that i uninstalled it.
I run GooglePlayServices with no premissions enabled and GoogleServiceFramework only with network premission for notifications.
At the moment i use an extra profile for Proton, because i'm not sure if GSF in that case is a privacy threat.
For convinience i would like to change that.

XxTriviumxX

I tried again. I need play store disabled and installed in order for push notifications to work with proton mail.

edit: im kinda out of patience for now to try everything again with play store uninstalled

Schiller i thought i needed network with play services...

Schiller

XxTriviumxX At first i thought that as well, but some how i still get notifications for ProtonMail.
I've got the message: This app needs GooglePlay services which are not installed on your device, but except of that it works without any flaws.

dcd-graphenediscuss

For the Google Play Store (GPS), as stated in the GrapheneOS instructions, you can install it, initiate the login process, but do not provide credentials, and simply exit the app. This initializes the GPS libraries to allow for Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM), which allows for encrypted push messages between the app and its provider, for example, a push message from McDonald's to your McDonald's app. I have two apps that will not run without FCM: myParish - the app actually displays a message that it will not run without GPS; and Toyota - I need this to access remote control features of my car. Aside from those two, I have no need of any Google services.

My guess is that if you remove network permissions, FCM won't work because it must have access to the network to function properly.

If you want timely Push messages, then Google Play Services has to run with Battery set to Unrestricted: Settings > Apps > Google Play Services > Battery > Unrestricted.
Auto-fill the SMS Validation Code. Some apps, like Chase, Signal, and others send a validation code to the phone, and Google Play Services has the ability to auto-fill the validation code from the SMS. To enable that, do the following: Settings > Apps > Google Play Services > Permissions > SMS > On.

If your apps work without GPS, my suggestion is this: don't install it(!). American Express and Chase complained that they wouldn't work without GPS, but they worked just fine, and interestingly, I received push messages from them without GPS installed! However, I discovered an anomaly.

CAVEAT
On a fresh install of GrapheneOS, I installed 1Password, Signal, and some other apps, then installed Google Play Store and initialized it. When I realized I didn't need GPS, I uninstalled it but then I ran into a problem: those selfsame apps stopped push messaging!

It seems they enable their built-in push messaging unless they find FCM at some point and then they switch to FCM. But when I removed GPS, which includes FCM, the apps stopped pushing messages, not only that, they stopped messaging - period! I had to uninstall them and reinstall them to get them back to their original messaging status.

GrapheneOS

dcd-graphenediscuss You don't need to open the Play Store and go to the sign in page anymore. It's not in the instructions anymore. Play services depends on the Play Store and you should install both if you want to use Play services.

GraphyGraphy

I have an App, that only runs, if Play Services are installed. Installation of Play Services is enough in that case, I have network blocked for Play Services (and for Service Framework as well; Play Store is not installed).
So without network permission, no data can be send from Play Services or Service Framework, right? And Google push notifications will not work, right?

Thank you!

dcd-graphenediscuss

I've tried limiting the installation of GPS to only Google Services Framework and Google Play Services, but the apps complained that the Play Store wasn't installed. UGH! So, I reluctantly installed the Google Play Store, initiated the login sequence, but did not login. That enabled FCM, which is what the apps really wanted in the first place.

As for network services, each of the apps has a Permission for Network Services, so if I understand you correctly, here's your setup:

Google Services Framework: installed, but no network services permission
Google Play Services: installed, but no network services permission
Google Play Store: not installed

Without network services permission, the application is unable to access WiFi, Cell, Bluetooth, and NFC.

XxTriviumxX

Schiller once, that message appeared on proton mail after uninstalling play store. the push notifications of proton mail would not work (didnt check the other apps though). I don't know if i was just unlucky... i never dared re-uninstalling it again out of sheer lazyness (and lack of patience too). now play store is simply disabled and everything is sharp.. i may try uininstalling plat store after gathering a lil bit more patience LOL

dcd-graphenediscuss

Push messages are a special category of messaging where the OS receives an encrypted message from Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM) to a specific app. Android "wakes up" the app and hands off the message to the app, which reads it and then displays it as a notification.

There are apps that still deliver messages even though Google Play Store (GPS) is not installed(!), which means they weren't Push Messages in the first place, but instead, they are app-delivered messages. Let's assume that GPS was never installed. These apps still gave me messages: Signal, Chase (banking), American Express, Firefox, Messages, most restaurant apps, and some others. One way to check is to see if your app supports Push Messages (it usually says Push Messages in the settings). If not, your app probably delivers its own messages to you without FCM.

I haven't Protonmail notifications without Push Messaging because I don't want to be bothered all day with those you've-got-mail notifications; I'll check e-mail when I'm good and ready(!). That said, Protonmail says it won't push notifications without FCM available.

GrapheneOS

dcd-graphenediscuss Please read https://grapheneos.org/faq#notifications and https://grapheneos.org/usage#sandboxed-google-play. Any app can implement push messages and Google Play is not used by GrapheneOS and not granted any special privileges by GrapheneOS. It has no unique ability to implement push messages on GrapheneOS.

XxTriviumxX

GrapheneOS Is it bad practice to keep play store installed AND disabled?

dcd-graphenediscuss

In my personal usage, I've only found three apps have difficulty without GPS installed:

Protonmail - complained that since I didn't have GPS installed, I wouldn't receive Push messages
MyParish - wouldn't even start without GPS
Toyota - It will run as an app and connect to the Toyota server, but it won't connect to my car, and it won't allow remote lock, remote unlock, remote start, and some other stuff.

dcd-graphenediscuss

So, I just did an experiment and I uninstalled Google Play Store, Google Play Services, and Google Services Framework, and here's the results (which shouldn't be a surprise).

The apps stopped complaining that Google Services wasn't installed, but they still failed to work properly. MyParish app doesn't complain, but it doesn't finish loading. Toyota doesn't deliver a message that my doors are now unlocked or locked, and Protonmail doesn't complain when I enable Push messages, but I receive no messages upon receipt of a new mail.

So yeah, you could install these two, but all it does is stop the app from complaining, but it's no better than if they weren't installed at all.

And I learned something from doing this experiment. I used to uninstall/reinstall the app to get it to "work" after removing GPS/FCM so the app would use its own internal push messages without relying on FCM. This time, after installing the entire GPS suite (Framework, Services, and Store), I enabled the apps, and they and they started working again with FCM! Yeah!! No more uninstall/reinstall. YES!