How to get 'Usage Manager' app back in Galaxy S7 Active ?=(

mustang7757 · Jul 19, 2019

winmod21 said:
Wow, thanks a ton, Galactic Zoo ! Looks interesting and informative. Got in too late to read & try it, so will it tomorrow. Looking forward to checking it out. And thanks to you I've just learned what an apk file is !=)) Really appreciate your help.

You have 2 threads open for this issue?
https://forums.androidcentral.com/showthread.php?t=969087

winmod21 · Jul 19, 2019

mustang7757 said:
You have 2 threads open for this issue?
https://forums.androidcentral.com/showthread.php?t=969087

Yes, thought it might be good to launch a few threads, so added the thread in the S7 Active sub-forum after originally posting here in the 'Ask a Question' thread, since an ambassador told me that threads get buried rather quickly here in the Ask a Question thread.
Hope I wasn't violating any rules. If so . . . *embarrassed* . . . I haven't read the reg's since back in 2012.

Laura Knotek · Jul 19, 2019

winmod21 said:
Yes, thought it might be good to launch a few threads, so added the thread in the S7 Active sub-forum after originally posting here in the 'Ask a Question' thread, since an ambassador told me that threads get buried rather quickly here in the Ask a Question thread.
Hope I wasn't violating any rules. If so . . . *embarrassed* . . . I haven't read the reg's since back in 2012.

I've merged the 2 threads.

mustang7757 · Jul 19, 2019

winmod21 said:
Yes, thought it might be good to launch a few threads, so added the thread in the S7 Active sub-forum after originally posting here in the 'Ask a Question' thread, since an ambassador told me that threads get buried rather quickly here in the Ask a Question thread.
Hope I wasn't violating any rules. If so . . . *embarrassed* . . . I haven't read the reg's since back in 2012.

Yeah it's better to keep it in one place , but a Mod wil come take care and probably keep in s7 forums instead of ask help or merge them .

winmod21 · Jul 19, 2019

Oh yeah, makes sense. I guess I was a little stressed. :-! After waking-up this morning and seeing that AT&T was continuing the ruining of my phone, by forcing the v.8 Oreo update (I've been on v.7 Nougat up til now) — which deleted the very useful & constantly used 'Usage Manager' widget — that was present in v.6 & v.7, and one of the main reasons I purchased the S7.

I'd like to sue them, if I could. :-\ But I'll try to calm down.

Thanks again for your help. It looks like both threads are now here on the S7 Active thread, so I'll ask Galactic Zoo if they wouldn't mind migrating over here, if they're still commenting.

mustang7757 · Jul 19, 2019

winmod21 said:
Oh yeah, makes sense. I guess I was a little stressed. :-! After waking-up this morning and seeing that AT&T was continuing the ruining of my phone, by forcing the v.8 Oreo update (I've been on v.7 Nougat up til now) — which deleted the very useful & constantly used 'Usage Manager' widget — that was present in v.6 & v.7, and one of the main reasons I purchased the S7.

I'd like to sue them, if I could. :-\ But I'll try to calm down. Thanks again for your help. It looks like both threads are now here on the S7 Active thread, so I'll ask Galactic Zoo if they wouldn't mind migrating over here, if they're still commenting.

No problem , it would just lead him to here so it's all good now

Mooncatt · Jul 19, 2019

Android Central Question said:
Since purchasing the Galaxy S& Active, I used it continually to enable/disable mobile data, as well as kill all running apps.

If these are the only two reasons you want that app, I'd like to suggest something else.

First, it's not a good practice to indiscriminately kill apps in the background. Once in a while an app may misbehave and need to be dealt with, but most of the time those apps just sit there doing absolutely nothing. They use no battery or processing power until called upon again. Android does this by design for more efficient task switching and battery use, and manages RAM on its own very well. When you kill off a bunch of apps like that, the OS is only going to re-initialize various apps again in the background to refill the now empty (I.e. Wasted) RAM. Every time you kill apps and let it fill RAM again is using extra power, not saving it.

That leaves just the mobile data switching part of the app. There's a lot of stand alone apps and widgets in the Play store that do this. Considering they are only doing one thing and not a full suite of abilities, they should use less power than the Usage Manager app. Then again, does your phone have the quick toggles in the notification pull down? Many phones have those nowadays, including a mobile data toggle. If you have some toggles but not one for mobile data, check your settings for a way to edit/rearrange them to see if you can get it added.

winmod21 · Jul 19, 2019

Mooncatt said:
If these are the only two reasons you want that app, I'd like to suggest something else.

First, it's not a good practice to indiscriminately kill apps in the background. Once in a while an app may misbehave and need to be dealt with, but most of the time those apps just sit there doing absolutely nothing. They use no battery or processing power until called upon again. Android does this by design for more efficient task switching and battery use, and manages RAM on its own very well. When you kill off a bunch of apps like that, the OS is only going to re-initialize various apps again in the background to refill the now empty (I.e. Wasted) RAM. Every time you kill apps and let it fill RAM again is using extra power, not saving it.

That leaves just the mobile data switching part of the app. There's a lot of stand alone apps and widgets in the Play store that do this. Considering they are only doing one thing and not a full suite of abilities, they should use less power than the Usage Manager app. Then again, does your phone have the quick toggles in the notification pull down? Many phones have those nowadays, including a mobile data toggle. If you have some toggles but not one for mobile data, check your settings for a way to edit/rearrange them to see if you can get it added.

Thanks for that information, Mooncatt. I did not know that about killing apps with the 'stop all apps' function of the Usage Manager. And here all this time—3 years—I've been thinking I was saving RAM and battery power !:~\ So I appreciate the heads up.

As for the Play Store stand alone apps, I read the reviews on the top 15 or 20 or so, and all or most of the ones I read had multiple reviews saying that the apps either didn't work for Android 8, or didn't work on the Galaxy S7, or had major bugs and crashes and/or annoying amounts of ads, etc etc.

To mustang & Galactic Zoo: I'll try to test your suggestions of yesterday later this afternoon as work permits. Thanks again for all suggestions.

mustang7757 · Jul 19, 2019

We glad to help

anon(10614692) · Jul 19, 2019

I'm still around to help if I can. Hope you get good luck!

anon(10614692) · Jul 19, 2019

Laura Knotek said:
I've merged the 2 threads.

Tarkus says thanks!

The Stripey one

Mooncatt · Jul 20, 2019

winmod21 said:
Thanks for that information, Mooncatt. I did not know that about killing apps with the 'stop all apps' function of the Usage Manager. And here all this time—3 years—I've been thinking I was saving RAM and battery power !:~\ So I appreciate the heads up.

The way it basically works is RAM uses the same amount of power whether it's empty or full. Android is able to hold apps in RAM in a dormant state that use no processor while in the background. When you switch to that app, it simply "un-pauses" the app to pick up where it left off, which takes way less time and processing/battery power than to bring it back from scratch. That's why when you kill apps, Android will initialize them or others again to fill that RAM again.

winmod21 · Sep 10, 2021

Re: Is there any way to get 'Usage Manager' widget back-- after AT&T forced v.8 Oreo software update

Been awhile for this thread but, 2+ years on, my S7 Active is still puttering along fairly well...

... and although I never was able to get the Data Usage Manager back, with its sorely missed Mobile Data on/off toggle

, the v8 Devise Maintenance widget has of course provided all the other battery - app power monitor, memory, storage & performance optimizers.

In spite of Samsung's & AT&T's & Android's persistent updates— that definitely diminished the speed & performance of my S7 Active; eg with the inexplicable loss of apps (SMS w/colors + customizable background &c), widgets (Data Usage Manager =() and others with the forced migration from android v6 thru v7 to v8 —along with the forced Samsung/AT&T updates in between.

Worst of all—over the last 4 years of using the S7 Active—has been Samsung's & AT&T's & Android's persistent updates of which all/or some caused a dramatic loss of processor speed and battery performance that was immediately noticeable upon each forced software update. I don't know how much, as I never tried to measure it, but it was very noticeable, even with the S7 Actives' Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 MSM8996; 4-core CPU: 2x 2.15 GHz Kryo, 2x 1.6 GHz Kryo; Qualcomm Adreno 530, 624 MHz; RAM: 4 GB, 1866 MHz; Storage: 32 GB, 64 GB; and 4000 mAh battery.

If I'd been given my druthers, I would've actually stayed at v6 Marshmallow. But c'est la vie with mobile technology.
Nonetheless, I'm starting to research possible replacements, so as not to get rushed into doing so if/when my S7 Active gives up the ghost or suffers from overload &c.

With that said, I totally agree with @Protonus 's Site Feedback thread re: "Requesting subforum for: Samsung Galaxy XCover Pro" ! There should be a subforum for this Samsung Galaxy phone, as it is heavily marketed by Samsung as a "midrange" mobility solution for and towards: retail, public sector, transportation, healthcare, manufacturing &c, plus commercial-industrial-infrastructure-gas&pipline-electrical-enginerring-construction-development-and large corporations of all sorts, plus the general public consumer's who want a tough yet powerful, near top-of-the-line performing phone.

So I think AC should establish a subforum for the Samsung Galaxy XCover Pro !

mustang7757 said:
I'll leave the link for you to try it see if it works?
APK is a package for download Apps if don't want to wait for their update , or other things . I've used APK mirror for lot of things so it's safe .
https://www.apkmirror.com/apk/samsu...ta-usage-manager-2-1-03-android-apk-download/

Thanks again for all your help, mustang7757

Regarding that APK download, I was able to download it, but once it downloaded, even though it showed in My Files and Google Files, and then installed successfully....I could never find or see that app; it never appeared anywhere; not on a home screen; not in widgets &c. :~\ It did appear under Settings > Apps, but with no apparent way to open or see the app !:~\ So after awhile I gave up trying. :~\ But thanks again for your suggestions !;-)

mustang7757 · Sep 10, 2021