
VLC is blacklisting recent Huawei devices to combat negative app reviews - Wingman4l7
https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/25/17614014/vlc-blacklisting-recent-huawei-devices-negative-app-reviews
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r3vrse
I work in a role where a bunch of Huawei devices have been deployed to non-
technical end users for a particular business purpose (against my advice).

This doesn't surprise me in the slightest -- the overzealous and frankly
capricious changes in their Android firmware are ridiculous and difficult to
mitigate.

Sure, let's issue a comm. that says "everyone change this setting so your
device will work properly". What level of adoption can be expected from that?
(hint: not much)

The scenario listed here is exactly why we need to promote and support efforts
toward open firmware for Android devices, or at the very least, don't
compensate vendors/manufacturers that use the Android platform to slather crap
across an OS that works fine without all the additional and superfluous BS.

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wemdyjreichert
Another clickbaity title not giving the whole story... "Huawei killing apps;
devs blamed" would have been better. If a phone was crashing your apps and
users blamed you (and rated your app as such), what would you do?

~~~
williamscales
I trust the VLC team so I gave them the benefit of the doubt before even
clicking, I completely agree. The title should reflect that this is in
response to Huawei firmware changes.

I think the only other reasonable thing that could be done is automatically
responding to the one star reviews. Maybe work with Google to remove the
reviews, but these things take time and may not work. I have a hard time
finding a problem with what the devs have done here.

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scarface74
How much of this should be blamed on Google? iOS only allows certain types of
apps to run in the background unfettered - audio, navigation, Bluetooth
communications apps (like the Pebble) and third party calling apps. Other
types of apps can be periodically awakened by the OS (background app refresh),
but the OS decides how often they can be awaken based on the frequency of
interaction and a few other heuristics. In low power mode, apps that do
background app refresh don’t get CPU time(?) and you can control which apps
allowed to run in the background.

This allows the OS to distinguish between apps that always need to work in the
background and those that don’t. The only drawback is server type apps. While
VLC will keep playing audio in the background, I don’t believe the http server
that allows you to copy media over a web interface to your phone will work
over an extended period of time unless you’re playing audio at the same time.

~~~
basch
Android 8 adopted this style of backgrounding a year ago.
[https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2017/09/android-8-0-oreo-
tho...](https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2017/09/android-8-0-oreo-thoroughly-
reviewed/9/)

~~~
scarface74
The issue with Android, is that Google never breaks backwards compatibility.
Android also has improved security permissions but it’s voluntary for apps to
adopt it.

~~~
jbk
VLC follows all Google recommendations, including for Oreo 8 compatibility. We
rewrote our background service exactly for that.

~~~
scarface74
That wasn’t meant as a knock against VLC at all. But it does say more about
Huawei that they indiscriminately kill background apps without taking simple
things into account like - is the app playing audio and is it being a good
citizen.

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_bxg1
Wow, what a terrible strategy for saving battery. Let's just send our
customers back to 2009, when you had to keep your Pandora app open so your
music wouldn't stop.

Making a mental note to never buy a Huawei.

~~~
Wingman4l7
Especially ridiculous considering the advancements in fast chargers that we
have now for newer phones.

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Hasknewbie
Ha, I had the same problem on a Lenovo phone, except I knew it was not a VLC
issue because the process-kill would happen with any app I would leave running
in the background. The most annoying part was that even after tweaking the
battery/power settings this would still happen. Lesson learnt, don't buy
Lenovo.

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zamadatix
I'm not sure how much of it was about the 1 star reviews as much as it was
anger at Huawei's "optimization".

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dz0ny
I am observing the same "killing" of background service for Signal app too.
Basically any app with a long-running session which you don't whitelist. And
it seems that it whitelist the Spotify for example on its own. I don't think
the blocking install by VLC team is the right way, communicating the issue to
a user is a much more reasonable way. Look at Garmin Connect app, which had
the same issue but they implemented notification and how-to disable
management.

~~~
AstralStorm
That is normal. An application that requires the background "foreground"
service to run is obligated to display a notification and call an Android
foreground service API in the service itself. Unless it is lower target SDK
than 23 (number may be wrong).

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konraditurbe
Android 8 has doze but it's not a problem for VLC:

Android 8 Doze: apps can be blacklisted so that they don't get killed, API:
[https://stackoverflow.com/a/42651399/3422837](https://stackoverflow.com/a/42651399/3422837)

Huawei adds a very aggressive background app killer, this means that apps like
VLC and WhatsApp don't work in background. I have a low end Huawei device for
testing purposes (hint hint), there _is_ a setting to whitelist apps from
huawei's appkiller but they get killed anyway.

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xster
This is on iOS but their app definitely went downhill pretty severely in the
past year.

If any sort of bluetooth or background playback is involved, the previous
playback position will almost always be lost. Video/audio in a playlist skips
and don't play sequentially. Reordering items manually will have their order
re-scrambled as soon as you start scrolling the item list in the playlist.
Playing an item to completion even in foreground will show a random amount
left on this item when you moved onto another item.

It's hard to say Huawei is exclusively to blame when their primary video
playing features (including background playback) is already so buggy.

~~~
protomyth
Also on iOS, and I wonder if anyone else has experienced a weird bug. Open
VLC, make sure it’s showing your videos as a grid, then drop your iPad about 3
feet onto a bed or other very soft surface (I am not responsible for you not
picking a soft enough landing area). VLC gives me the “Report a bug” dialog
box.

~~~
MarkyC4
This is probably a shake to report a bug feature (Android users are probably
more used to this, I remember Google Maps on Android having this feature)

~~~
protomyth
Is there some reason to implement it on iOS? It also is really damn touchy.

~~~
shakna
Smaller codebase? I expect the iOS and Android branches share a fairly decent
amount of code.

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yAnonymous
I completely agree with aggressive background killing, because too many apps
are abusing their permissions and try every trick in the book to siphon user
data at all times.

That being said, killing an app that is actively playing audio is not the best
idea and an open source app with 100 million installs should probably be
whitelisted anyway.

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edf13
Blacklisting or just not supporting those device types and therefore
preventing users using it?

~~~
unsignedint
Tweet says users can download apk so it's just they can't get it off Google
Play. Users basically will get a message it's not compatible with their device
hence they can't review the app.

~~~
shakna
Which sounds exactly like 'We won't support that device'. You can work around
it, but you're on your own if anything goes wrong.

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loeg
It does not sound like "therefore preventing users using it," though.

~~~
shakna
Yep. Unsupported, but not 'blacklisted'.

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verrecken
Just code it right ? I don't find those negative reviews on other background
music players like spotify, so I imply that they work fine on those devices. I
don't think they pushed an update just for two devices, I think it just worked
with huaweis background killing. If VLC is not working on those devices, they
deserve the negative reviews.

~~~
kec
or huawei has a whitelist of apps not to mess around with, and spotify is on
it but vlc isn't.

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lovelearning
Rather than blacklist, I think a better approach is for VLC app to inform
Huawei users about its quirky behavior on first run after installation and
after every update. That way, Huawei users are unlikely to take the trouble of
leaving a low rating for an app, and are better informed to choose a device
next time. If background audio is something you can't do without, don't choose
Huawei - that should be the messaging. That can help kick the company too into
improving its firmware.

On a different - but related note - Huawei recently announced that they won't
provide bootloader unlocking anymore for any device[1]. Although I own an
Honor and like its hardware and software, I think Huawei is setting itself up
to become an increasingly "bad player" in the device space in future. I'm wary
of buying a Huawei again.

[1]: [https://www.xda-developers.com/huawei-stop-providing-
bootloa...](https://www.xda-developers.com/huawei-stop-providing-bootloader-
unlock-codes/)

~~~
NeedMoreTea
Could just as easily be counter productive. Some user who's just spent a few
hundred on a new Huawei installs VLC and all their other old apps. VLC tells
them their choice will lead to strange behaviour. User leaves 1 star review
that VLC told them their new phone was crap.

Users barely read error messages and dialogues so there's no scope for any
nuance in explaining and informing.

Blocking seems the only rational approach to take. Those who can understand
sideloading can likely decide if they want VLC warts and all on their Huawei.

~~~
eropple
You aren't kidding. Users are shitty and capricious in the mobile space
(sometimes everywhere, but very frequently the mobile space). I've had users
leave one-star reviews for my mobile app--which controls OBS, a video mixer--
with the reason "it works for 20 minutes [ed.: there is a very visible timer
the entire time] and then stops [ed.: it goes readonly, it doesn't kill a
stream or recording] and asks you to pay [ed.: five whole dollars]."

