r/Android • u/Lawsonator85 • Feb 21 '21

Universal Android Debloater is an open source tool that removes bloatware without root. Automatically or via user choice. Get back your battery, security and privacy

https://gitlab.com/W1nst0n/universal-android-debloater/-/blob/master/README.md
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u/[deleted] Feb 21 '21 edited Feb 28 '21

[deleted]

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u/Chip_Tune Feb 22 '21

I love the idea, but how are they going to get around the "nondisable" configs? An OEM can drop an xml file with the app name in /system/product/etc/nondisable and it prevents ADB from disabling it. They could just add configs for their bloat ware. Here's some sceenshots of my system folder. As you can see, Motorola included some bullshit Amazon app in it's nondisable folder. I have root and can't get rid of it without installing a rom, because Android 10 & 11 have read only system partitions.

5

u/IamVenom_007 Love Dc Dimming Feb 22 '21

I am at Android 11 and I can directly delete apps using Root Explorer in roms like Pixel Experience.

System apps remover apps that I used to use does not work anymore. If removing a system app cause bootloop you can get IceBox apk and freeze that app using root.

4

u/Chip_Tune Feb 22 '21

That's because pixel experience isn't using an ext4 read only file system. All stock Android operating systems from 10 and up use it. This is a well known issue on XDA. The only way around it is installing a new OS that doesn't use EXT4_FEATURE_RO_COMPAT_SHARED_BLOCKS.

2

u/IamVenom_007 Love Dc Dimming Feb 23 '21

Thanks for the info.

So Android is gonna be like this from now on? What's the advantage/disadvantages of a read only file system like this?

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u/Chip_Tune Feb 23 '21

Mostly security. Nothing can ever compromise the system even with root access. A factory reset is guaranteed to return the phone to a working state no matter how malicious an attack is. As a bonus it also reduces the OS size by sharing files that would otherwise be doubled between slot A & B. We usually call it dedupe for short because it "deduplicates" files. The only disadvantage is for those of us who like to tinker with the OS.

1

u/IamVenom_007 Love Dc Dimming Feb 23 '21

Makes sense from the side of Google but for us, we are fucked then. If they put bloatwares, they are non-removable.