Anyone used a package disabler? (Samsung in particular)

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swee'pea99

Legendary Member
Samsung's 'Change keyboard?' prompt popped up once too often, sending me off to find

1602512282374.png


Apparently it produces

1602512363930.png


Then you just 'Tick the check box to disable the package'. No more Samsung keyboard, no more prompts. Sounds good. Has anyone actually used it? Any thoughts on what else I should get shot of while I'm at it? (I hate Samsung bloatware & would love to get rid of all of it. At a glance Samsung Gear can go for starters. But what ese? ...I'm nervous of disabling things I do use. Transfer settings etc to a new Samsung easily, eg.)

Any thoughts appreciated.
 

twentysix by twentyfive

Clinging on tightly
Location
Over the Hill
Doesn't seem so does it @swee'pea99 ?
 
OP
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swee'pea99

swee'pea99

Legendary Member
Doesn't seem so does it @swee'pea99 ?
^_^

When I'd recovered from the deluge, I decided to go ahead and....so far so good.

Most important thing, it's stopped nagging me to change from my google keyboard to the samsung one, which always really pissed me off. I've said I don't want it, leave me alone. So it was worth the money just for that - saving me that irritation half a dozen times a day. But as a bonus, I went through getting rid of a shitload of other samsung garbage. VR headset stuff? Don't want it. Samsung Pay stuff? Don't want it. Samsung health stuff? Don't want it. Wearable Samsung stuff? Samsung weather/stocks/news/shop, don't want any of it. And I resent you trying to nail it to a phone I've paid for, when I DON'T WANT IT!.

I'm told this clearup will make my phone faster, and the battery last longer. It's too early to say, but it certainly felt good to ditch all that crap. Should have done it a year ago. Certainly I'll do it straightaway on any new Samsung I get. (I love their hardware, hate their software.)

So, 'Anyone used a package disabler?' - yes. Me. ^_^
 
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OP
swee'pea99

swee'pea99

Legendary Member
Update...

All came to grief :sad: - app worked once, Samsung has steadily reinstalled all the stuff I uninstalled, presumably via auto-updates, tried to restart the app to re-clean, but it won't work. Suggests I email them. Which I do, to get a near-instant 'how to uninstall' message, and another offering me a 30% discount if I buy it again.

So, don't waste your money on Package Disabler Pro (Samsung) - it's rubbish sold by thieves. Not that anyone will care, but I thought just in case...
 

Profpointy

Legendary Member
Update...

All came to grief :sad: - app worked once, Samsung has steadily reinstalled all the stuff I uninstalled, presumably via auto-updates, tried to restart the app to re-clean, but it won't work. Suggests I email them. Which I do, to get a near-instant 'how to uninstall' message, and another offering me a 30% discount if I buy it again.

So, don't waste your money on Package Disabler Pro (Samsung) - it's rubbish sold by thieves. Not that anyone will care, but I thought just in case...

I may be misremembering but I think I had package disabler pro when I had a Samsung. It was pesonally recommended to me by a technical security guy I worked with at a major UK telco ie a real expert. It did what I expected of it, but you do need to be careful you don't delete stuff you actually need
 

keithmac

Guru
I've never seen the need with any of mine (S5, S8 and S20). My son's got my old S8 and he's had no bother either.
 

a.twiddler

Veteran
It would be nice to have an Android phone that isn't infested with Google but hey ho it's set up as the course of least resistance. In the world of Google it's inconceivable that anyone could want anything else.
 

ColinJ

Puzzle game procrastinator!
It would be nice to have an Android phone that isn't infested with Google but hey ho it's set up as the course of least resistance. In the world of Google it's inconceivable that anyone could want anything else.

Given that Google produced Android, it isn't surprising that there is a lot of Google-ness about it!

It is the phone manufacturers like Samsung that infest their products with most of the software bloat. Pure Android is not infested to anywhere near the same degree. My Google Pixel phone is lovely and simple.

If you think Google/Android are bad for restricting your choices, take one long hard look at Apple devices!
 

a.twiddler

Veteran
It's a bit tough these days if you just want a telephonic communication device with maybe a capacity for taking pictures and texting. Ooh, and a battery that lasts more than a couple of days. Though when I'm out on my bike I carry a quaint old fashioned thing called a c-a-m-e-r-a. You turn it on and it just works. No pratting about with its functions until you press the right screen icon, or accidentally turning it off by touching some part of the screen or edge by accident. It even has a hand hold and a viewfinder if you want. (And wireless, but I've never used it).

Why not a basic Nokia? I hear you all chorus.

Even though I try my worst, peer pressure ensures that you have to have something with internet connectivity and capacity to share stuff via Signal or some such. Even a technophobe such as Mrs T can't live without her Twitbook but that's a step too far for me. I'm not in the least interested in sending people pictures of my dinner, even less interested in theirs. I currently have a thing called a Motorola which was recommended to me as a least worst option. I can't remember what my previous smartphone was called, apart from the fact that I didn't like it very much. It's in a drawer somewhere. Maybe a basic Samsung. I dislike this current one a bit less than that one but they all share a similar drawback. Supposedly a communication device, they are so needy. Updates. Antivirus. You need to do this. Do that. You have not used this or that non Google app for xxx days. Do you wish to delete it? I generally use my laptop for internet stuff, but just rarely I would like it to be available on the phone. You cannot break wind without having to sign into Google for some totally unrelated function. Apparently I have a Gmail account which I was sucked into when setting up the first smartphone. It just gets used for phone related stuff. I use my main email account for real life stuff. It's a phone but it has a life of its own.

Good news! You've got a discount on the new all singing all dancing whizzbang Motorola mega wossname phone. Why would I be interested? This one still works. I don't use all its functions. I just put up with it because it's a necessary evil. I just wish I could send such a reply to these irritating promotions. For some people their lives are on their phones. I can see the relentless pull. Even though I try to resist there's more of my stuff than I would like on it.

The worst thing about it all is that just to be able to talk to someone you have to be invested in a device developed by some megabucks corporation whose main business is harvesting people's information and selling it on. No matter how anonymised it allegedly is, you can't escape that notion that some unaccountable entity knows where you are and what you are doing, what your interests are, your buying habits, and who your friends are. and are commercialising this information. Unless you go completely and eccentrically off grid, there's no escaping it.

No doubt you can turn off location, use Firefox and Duckduckgo maybe even a VPN on your internet but why should you have to? It's a PHONE for goodness' sake!

Well, I think that was a pretty good rant, even if a bit off topic.

Having said all that, it might be worth looking into a Google Pixel if it's "nice and simple" but its main drawback might be its very Googleness.
 

ColinJ

Puzzle game procrastinator!
Having said all that, it might be worth looking into a Google Pixel if it's "nice and simple" but its main drawback might be its very Googleness.
Its camera is so good that I don't bother using my actual camera any more!

As for simple... Even when the phone is locked, just double click the power button to open the camera app. Click the volume button to take the picture. These pictures were taken indoors and outdoors in different lighting conditions. They have been cropped and/or resized but I didn't change any settings on the phone and haven't otherwise touched the photos...

Stuck pedal.jpg


Bikes Craggies.jpg


New Planet X saddle.jpg


SS on Calderbrook Rd landslip.jpg


Imperial Spoons inside.jpg


Lizard from Hell.jpg


Not professional camera quality, but easily good enough for me.
 

FishFright

More wheels than sense
It would be nice to have an Android phone that isn't infested with Google but hey ho it's set up as the course of least resistance. In the world of Google it's inconceivable that anyone could want anything else.

That's as likely as an Iphone without Apple
 
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