Apps Tasks/Uninstalling System Apps/Nearby Devices Android 17 Update

carldrogo

The new app task enabled by default for all apps can this not be off by default without having to go through every app manually?

Also uninstalling system apps such as android.egg, with adb uninstall commands is no longer allowed permitted only for root user, if this is a permanent move going forward, it's a dealbreaker.

And nearby devices permission is being set to allowed by default for all apps, including those installed which is a big privacy compromise to be honest.

Will these changes be made in an upcoming update so I know whether to switch to another OS or not. Thank you

ClickClickDrone

carldrogo Also uninstalling system apps such as android.egg, with adb uninstall commands is no longer allowed permitted only for root user, if this is a permanent move going forward, it's a dealbreaker.

Why is it a dealbreaker?
Enabling ADB on your device increases the attack surface of your device by a lot, and uninstalling system apps -- even ones which look safe to remove -- will harm the stability of your system in unexpected ways down the line.

I am very glad that this is no longer permitted.

Johnnyloans

carldrogo The new app task enabled by default for all apps can this not be off by default without having to go through every app manually?

It's a toggle that does literally nothing.
https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/37018-continue-on-feature-handoff-new-setting/12

carldrogo if this is a permanent move going forward

This command:
adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 <package name>
removes the app for that user. For an app like WhatsApp that only exists on user 0 (owner), the app is completely removed.

For a system app, where the apk data exists in a system partition that you cannot touch, all app data still exists on your phone after the "uninstall".
After the "uninstall", The app isn't available for user 0. It's like disabling the app. This is how Android works now. Root your phone if you want the opposite of GOS security.

will it be permanent? Probably. Google made this change FYI

carldrogo nearby devices permission is being set to allowed

The only thing that is being allowed by default is for apps to communicate to local IP addresses if you allow network -- it's the same as the network permission essentially.

If you don't want this, deny. It does not allow anything with Bluetooth or nfc. Change nearby devices to allow to add ble nfc into the mix.

carldrogo switch to another OS or
carldrogo dealbreaker

You should switch to one that let's you disable system apps but all data stays on the phone.

Novaliss

carldrogo uninstalling system apps such as android.egg,

If the egg is your redline, there's very little support to expect.

GrapheneOS

carldrogo

The new app task enabled by default for all apps can this not be off by default without having to go through every app manually?

It doesn't do anything without the OS providing an implementation of syncing apps to another device. If it did provide one, you'd need to explicitly set it up for it to do anything. Why do you feel the need to configure which apps can use a feature which you do not have enabled and isn't present in GrapheneOS?

Also uninstalling system apps such as android.egg, with adb uninstall commands is no longer allowed permitted only for root user, if this is a permanent move going forward, it's a dealbreaker.

That's simply not true and is a misunderstanding of how apps bundled with the OS work. They can technically be uninstalled from profiles, but it isn't a good idea and doesn't have any advantage over disabling them. They cannot be removed from the verified OS images where they're still available for profiles to have installed.

And nearby devices permission is being set to allowed by default for all apps, including those installed which is a big privacy compromise to be honest.

You're completely wrong about this. Android 17 added control over local network device access which didn't exist before. No additional permissions were granted to any apps. You should read what it says at the bottom of the Nearby Devices compatibility mode. It did not grant any access which didn't exist before.

Will these changes be made in an upcoming update so I know whether to switch to another OS or not. Thank you

The 3 things you listed are each misunderstandings of how things work. Moving to another OS without proper updates would avoid the Android 17 changes including losing having the current privacy/security improvements and patches for vulnerabilities which are largely not backported to older releases. Giving up having any decent privacy or security due to changes which didn't reduce privacy in any way doesn't make sense.

GrapheneOS

Johnnyloans

It's a toggle that does literally nothing.

Even if GrapheneOS did provide the feature, the toggle wouldn't do anything without someone explicitly setting up syncing to other devices. It does not make sense to go through apps disabling a toggle for a feature that's not being used even if it was supported. We could remove the toggle since we don't support the feature but we'd be fine with having support for a variant of it at some point. It would have to be explicitly enabled just as it has to be for the stock OS although it would work differently.

Fay_Wilmont

carldrogo Also uninstalling system apps such as android.egg, with adb uninstall commands is no longer allowed permitted only for root user, if this is a permanent move going forward, it's a dealbreaker.

It's a change in AOSP, eventually every Android variant will get it. Use disable-user instead of uninstall.

ClickClickDrone uninstalling system apps -- even ones which look safe to remove -- will harm the stability of your system in unexpected ways down the line.

I am very glad that this is no longer permitted.

Yes, it's dumb to uninstall all kinds of normal system packages like some people do, or label them as bloatware like App Manager does.

However, this feature is sorely needed on most commercial Android distributions to disable pre-installed spyware like the three Meta packages present on about every Android phone in existence apart from Google's. Luckily disabling them is still permitted with the aforementioned package manager command.

bylukas

GrapheneOS Android 17 seems to have changed sth. I used this method before for a really long time and never had problems. I have the main account (parent) and a second user for my child. I uninstalled vanadium using adb only for the child user. Using this method i could only allow the child to use a controlled browser which only allows safe websites. App installs are disabled using the regular user setting in the main account. Stability also wasnt affected since vanadium was still present on the main user.

Starting since android 17 one cannot uninstall apps anymore for specific users.

For example the following command results in the output below it:
adb uninstall --user 13 app.vanadium.browser
Failure [only root can delete system app for a particular user]

This worked on android 16 and previous versions. I think it has sth to do with the sideloading ban

This is really annoying and leads to the need to install shizuku or different apps for running the adb command on the device itself as root. It would be nice if this could be patched in grapheneos so one doesnt need to install third party software like shizuku do do this

Disabling isnt an option because the child can just activate vanadium in the settings

other8026

bylukas This is discussed here https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/37681-issue-with-adb-commands-on-a17-gos-is-it-just-me-or-did-things-change-from-a16 and in earlier posts in this thread, including the one before yours.

Fay_Wilmont

other8026 @bylukas presents an interesting use case that is actually affected by this change though (the difference betweendisable-user and uninstall actually matters here). However, they were using an unsupported/developer feature to achieve their goal in the first place. Can blocking access to Vanadium in the second profile be achieved in a better way, i.e. with parental controls?