Question Locked apps on tablet

[johngrey]

Hello,
Before I close my tablet after use, clicking on the square icon at the bottom right, offers to close apps I used.
But then there are always apps, that cannot be closed that way, or as it seems any other way. They seem to be locked, as at the top right corner, there is an icon of a closed lock.

Protonmail is one of them, QR code is another.

How do I unlock and close these?

Thanks

 

[VidJunky]

Welcome to Android Central forums.

What tablet do you have?

Is the tablet running the stock UI? You haven't installed something like Nova Launcher or anything on this device, correct?

Do you have any "saver" apps running on this device? Memory saver, Data saver, Battery saver, Anti-virus, Malware or similar apps.

Have you ever gotten these apps to close from the multi-tasking screen? Have you tried tapping Close All Apps more than once? If it looks like all of the apps have closed, you leave the page, return and find a refreshed app list, have you tapped Close All Apps again?

Is it always the same apps not closing? How many apps are there that do not close? If not always the same apps, is it always the same number of apps not closing?

Please attach a screenshot of the multi-tasking screen before closing all, after closing all, after closing and reopening from an empty list, and any others that help show/explain what you're seeing. Please redact any personal or identifying information from your images.

Have you tried force closing any of these apps from their app page in settings? To do this navigate to Settings>Applications>(the apps you feel are not closing)>Force Stop

Are these apps, that you feel are not closing, pre-installed apps?

Has the behavior of this table changed or has it always been this way? Was there a time when you able to close everything with one tap and now it has stopped working? If the behavior has changed, about how long ago would you say it was since it started?

While I could imagine how an email app might keep reopening itself, not that I believe it is, but email is at least important. The stick in that is the other apps. I mean the QR app has no importance.

Troubleshooting
The first thing I would want to do would be to figure out exactly how many and which apps are not closing. To figure this out open some random apps, maybe 8 to 10 of them then go in and look at the list. See if all of the apps are displayed on the same multi-tasking page. I've seen some devices split the multi-tasking list after so many apps, older apps are pushed to a second or even third page, where the system only displays 8-10 of your most recent apps and everything over that is actually on another page. This is when I personally have tapped the Clear All Apps button only to reopen the multi-tasking page and finding it repopulated with apps that weren't in the original list. This is why I asked if it's always the same apps and the same number of apps. If you open 12 apps and find 2 that don't close, did you see those two apps in the list when you pressed the clear all button? If you open 15 does the number change to 5 apps that didn't close? Do you notice if the apps that remain are the first apps opened, or it doesn't matter it's always the same ones?

Let us know what you find for better advice.

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! In addition, I would also suggest that you not be particularly concerned about apps not "closing." Android isn't like Windows, where it's advantageous to keep RAM as empty as possible. Android prefers to keep apps cached in RAM in a paused state, because that allows for quicker and more efficient opening and switching of apps. There's no detrimental effect on battery or performance (unless a particular app itself is misbehaving.

 

[johngrey]

Welcome to Android Central! In addition, I would also suggest that you not be particularly concerned about apps not "closing." Android isn't like Windows, where it's advantageous to keep RAM as empty as possible. Android prefers to keep apps cached in RAM in a paused state, because that allows for quicker and more efficient opening and switching of apps. There's no detrimental effect on battery or performance (unless a particular app itself is misbehaving.

As it is usually the same files, protonmail in Firefox and the QR app itself, I must have locked them.
Where in Android can files be locked, which means of course, where can they be unlocked? I suppose things like that do not happen onn their own?

 

[mustang7757]

As it is usually the same files, protonmail in Firefox and the QR app itself, I must have locked them.
Where in Android can files be locked, which means of course, where can they be unlocked? I suppose things like that do not happen onn their own?

When you go into recent apps tap at the top of the card icon see in the option if they are locked ?

 

[B. Diddy]

As it is usually the same files, protonmail in Firefox and the QR app itself, I must have locked them.
Where in Android can files be locked, which means of course, where can they be unlocked? I suppose things like that do not happen onn their own?

Show us a screenshot of what those apps look like in the Recent Apps interface.

 

[johngrey]

When you go into recent apps tap at the top of the card icon see in the option if they are locked ?

Thank you...
Yes, exactly, that is what I am talking about. I have NEVER locked anything, have no idea how to do that, which means that I also do not know how to unlock it, which is what I am asking about...

 

[B. Diddy]

Can you show us a screenshot, as I previously suggested?

 

[johngrey]

Can you show us a screenshot, as I previously suggested?

What exactly will a screenshot tell you, except what apps I use? IT will show you you the page, a little smaller, and with a small lock icon at the top right corner. I want to know why it got there and how do I change to an icon that shows an unlocked icon?

But... if it makes you happy... let me know what you know now, which you did not know before...

 

[mustang7757]

Thank you...
Yes, exactly, that is what I am talking about. I have NEVER locked anything, have no idea how to do that, which means that I also do not know how to unlock it, which is what I am asking about...

See my screenshot for recent apps at the top tap , what options are there?

 

[johngrey]

See my screenshot for recent apps at the top tap , what options are there?View attachment 371623

When I tap it, there are the options of "App Info" and "Split Screen"

 

[B. Diddy]

What exactly will a screenshot tell you, except what apps I use? IT will show you you the page, a little smaller, and with a small lock icon at the top right corner. I want to know why it got there and how do I change to an icon that shows an unlocked icon?

But... if it makes you happy... let me know what you know now, which you did not know before...View attachment 371622

The reason I ask is that UIs differ depending on the manufacturer and the version of the particular UI. There may be features that you see that others don't have, or vice-versa, and those features may be accessed differently. For example, here's the Recent Apps interface on my Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 FE+:

For Samsung's OneUI, tapping the icon at the top of each thumbnail gives options, and the one that's analogous to the lock icon would be "Keep Open."

You never mentioned which tablet you have -- this can help us understand how your UI is supposed to work and therefore give advice. In addition, we could also use that information to search the web to see if there's a special process to do what you want, or perhaps discover that maybe you can't "unlock" certain of these apps since maybe it's coded into the system to keep them in RAM.

 

[johngrey]

It is a Teclast M 40, runs Android 10 and I have had it for many years. I basically use to read pdf and similar files with Sumatra, when I sit away from home, maybe in a cafe. This phenomenon did not start until 2 or three months ago, and happened never before. The QR app has been installed for maybe half a year, but protonmail from day one, and the lock on both appeared, as I wrote maybe a few months ago... " The Keep Open" does not exist, and of course no "Close"...

 

[B. Diddy]

Ok, thanks for that info. Teclast is an off-brand Chinese manufacturer, so unfortunately there isn't a lot on the web about its interface. Go to Settings>Apps, select one of those locked apps, and see if there's an option for battery or memory optimization, or something similar. If so, see if there's an option to make it "optimized" or "restricted." If you don't see an option there, look through your system settings to see if there's a menu for something like that.

Also, I assume you've already tried tapping directly on that lock icon, correct?

 

[johngrey]

I have of curse done that long before I started searching in Forums...

 

[B. Diddy]

I never make any assumptions about what someone may have already tried, because this forum welcomes users of every level of experience.

So you're saying you already did all of what I mentioned in my previous post, or are you only referring to one of the things?

 

[VidJunky]

So trying this on my device, I do not get the lock symbol, but as B. Diddy so patiently explained, different devices and different UIs present differently. For me, when I touch the app icon I get the options of, App info, Open in split screen view, Open in pop-up view, and Keep open. When I select Keep open it behaves as you've described, the app is always in the quick change/app swap window. It changes Keep open to Stop keeping open. Is it possible that your wording is just different than expected, and doesn't say Lock, Locked, or Pin, Pinned? Could it be a mater of verbiage?

Not everything they do makes sense but it would stand to reason that if your apps appear with a lock symbol and are "pinned" to this view that they would release from this view while you're in this view. If you have an aversion to posting a screenshot of the options given when you touch the app icon, would you please list all of the options presented when the app icon is touched in the quick change window?

 

[johngrey]

I have solved the problem very quickly, by simply uninstalling both and re-installing both.
I was simply wondering if there is a way to do this in a normal way. I checked through anything that could be relevant to the problem, without finding anything, I posted a question. But if it is indeed done by clicking on a (on my tablet) non-existing (stop keep open), then my question was answered.

Thank you all again for trying.

 

[B. Diddy]

I have solved the problem very quickly, by simply uninstalling both and re-installing both.
I was simply wondering if there is a way to do this in a normal way. I checked through anything that could be relevant to the problem, without finding anything, I posted a question. But if it is indeed done by clicking on a (on my tablet) non-existing (stop keep open), then my question was answered.

Thank you all again for trying.

Ok, glad what you did worked for you. So you're saying that nothing that was suggested worked?

Chances are that this is going to happen again, and uninstalling and reinstalling an app would not be an ideal way to keep addressing it. In situations like these, I always wish I could have the device in hand, since it can be difficult to explain how to test things by forum replies only ...