Who Killed the Android Launcher?
Android users often rely on 3rd-party home screen replacements to:
(a) Get rid of clumsy GUI customizations (Samsung’s TouchWiz, Motorola’s Motoblur)
(b) Escape Vanilla Hell (or Heaven!)
(c) Get a performance boost
LauncherPro, ADW, Zeam and the recent SPB Shell 3D and Regina Launcher are the popular choices among Android users, especially LauncherPro and ADW. Most are paid, some are free, but all share the same fate: to be eventually killed by the OS with no advance warning.
It’s a familiar sight. Happily multitasking the way God intended (not faux-tasking like on iOS or WP7), we suddenly feel the urge to get back to the home screen. That’s when it happens — unbeknownst to the user, the phone or tablet has run out of memory. It can be 10-15 seconds before the launcher fully recovers.
Now, this will never happen to Apple. Both iPhone and iPad only have the native launcher to worry about. I don’t know what happens on WebOS or BlackBerry OS either. But on Android, the kernel always manages to kill the launcher when you need it the most. I don’t need to explain why there’s something wrong with this picture. If we want non-geeks to truly appreciate Android, we need to fix it. Fast.
Since Little Green Bastard is all about making Android better, here are a couple of suggestions:
(a) Google could make sure to have 3rd-party launchers in mind on the next version of Android. Let’s avoid having the launcher automatically killed, shall we?
(b) Android devs need to anticipate the issue. LauncherPro has a special menu setting to keep it in memory at all times. However, due to (a) it eventually makes the phone or tablet unstable (not enough room to move things around)
(c) Increase the minimum amount of RAM for all future devices. Yes, 1 GB should be the minimum. Memory is cheap now — there’s no reason why a phone should ship with less than 1 GB — or even 512 MB.
How about you? Did you ever have to deal with a moribund launcher? Share your thoughts in the comments :)
He eats launchers for breakfast
