Photon: The case off the missing apps! (homescreen)

[vnmous1]

Plugged my Photon into my PC for the first time today, using the Phone Portal app (stock). As it popped up, it looked like any other Android/smartphone in that I could "see" it as a drive on my PC....look at/add/delete/manage data and folders. No biggie.

But....

Up pops the Motorola Media Link app for install on the PC (assuming the file to do so was on the phone and did this once it was connected to a computer). OK, so I install it to take a peek. Install was clean....it looked for and installed an upate of the Media Link app...and I saw that it was nothing more than a sync conduit for music/photos/etc.


Not wanting to sync anything, I simply "safely removed hardware" on the PC...unplugged and went to lunch. It was then that I noticed a bunch off icons missing from the home screens.


My HTC Evo used to do that whenever you'd disconnect, because you'd been using the SD card as a drive. It would then re-initialize the card and poof, your icons would reappear. Not this one! They're gone-ski!


They're still in the All Apps view....and certainly still on the phone/card because I can see them in settings>apps. If I look at the SD card view, they're all there.

I did some rooting (sorry....snooping) around and found a few threads about this regarding Droid X, but none of the questions had been answered.


I called Moto and they don't know what it is; "oh, it could be 3rd party apps, the software, maybe even the phone". Yeah, thanks, Einstein.


So...I'll go pop them all back on, but I'd like to know WHY it happened.


Any thoughts?


Thanks.

 

[jbuggydroid]

Plugged my Photon into my PC for the first time today, using the Phone Portal app (stock). As it popped up, it looked like any other Android/smartphone in that I could "see" it as a drive on my PC....look at/add/delete/manage data and folders. No biggie.

But....

Up pops the Motorola Media Link app for install on the PC (assuming the file to do so was on the phone and did this once it was connected to a computer). OK, so I install it to take a peek. Install was clean....it looked for and installed an upate of the Media Link app...and I saw that it was nothing more than a sync conduit for music/photos/etc.


Not wanting to sync anything, I simply "safely removed hardware" on the PC...unplugged and went to lunch. It was then that I noticed a bunch off icons missing from the home screens.


My HTC Evo used to do that whenever you'd disconnect, because you'd been using the SD card as a drive. It would then re-initialize the card and poof, your icons would reappear. Not this one! They're gone-ski!


They're still in the All Apps view....and certainly still on the phone/card because I can see them in settings>apps. If I look at the SD card view, they're all there.

I did some rooting (sorry....snooping) around and found a few threads about this regarding Droid X, but none of the questions had been answered.


I called Moto and they don't know what it is; "oh, it could be 3rd party apps, the software, maybe even the phone". Yeah, thanks, Einstein.


So...I'll go pop them all back on, but I'd like to know WHY it happened.


Any thoughts?


Thanks.

i had this happen to me too. don't remember what i did exactly. did u reboot?

 

[wynand32]

I seem to remember this happening when I had apps saved to the media area (not the SD card, of course, because on the Photon that's not possible). I moved all my apps back to the phone (plenty of app storage, really) and I haven't seen the problem again.

 

[wubbie075]

I always switch the USB setting to "Charge Only" before unplugging the phone. I've never had that issue with my Evo or MoPho

 

[MacBook]

It only happens with the apps you move to the SD card..Its happened to me too and it was pissing me off! I moved everything back to my phone since it has 16 gigs of on board storage.

 

[vnmous1]

OK....update. It is a hiccup that happens not just on the Photon but other Moto Droids.

Then I found out about the whole "oh...it has a buttload of memory so many apps don't see your external SD CARD as the SD CARD. It sees the partition on the 16 g that Moto CALLS "SD CARD". Gee, that was a smart move!

bj