{"id":82,"date":"2012-07-22T12:53:00","date_gmt":"2012-07-22T17:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/?p=82"},"modified":"2023-07-26T12:40:36","modified_gmt":"2023-07-26T17:40:36","slug":"android-uninstall-factory-applications","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/?p=82","title":{"rendered":"Android: Uninstall Factory Applications"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">After I rooted my Android phone, via the steps <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/chrystalsander.blogspot.com\/2012\/07\/android-root-your-device.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">here<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">, my first task was to un-install the bloat-ware.&nbsp; Before removing apps, I made sure to Google my phone to see what apps were safe to remove.&nbsp; Here&#8217;s a sample <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/androidforums.com\/ally-all-things-root\/185526-android-2-1-application-safty-list-retain-market-when-sliming-down-w-ti.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">list<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\"> I referenced.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">Though there are GUI apps available in the Play store, I chose to use&nbsp;<\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/github.com\/jackpal\/Android-Terminal-Emulator\/wiki\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">Android Terminal Emulator<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\"> (ATE).&nbsp; &nbsp;This is a command-line tool for entering Linux commands.&nbsp; Here are the key commands to use:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">1.&nbsp; Open ATE and give yourself administrative\/super user access by typing:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">su<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">2.&nbsp; Navigate to the&nbsp;application directory and list the currently installed applications (Note that *.apx are the main&nbsp;application files):<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">ls \/system\/app<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div>\n<span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">3.&nbsp; To remove an app, type the following command variant:<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\"><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\">&nbsp;<\/span><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\">rm \/system\/app\/(APPNAME).apk<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div>\n<span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">Note:&nbsp; There is no resulting prompt identifying that the file was deleted.<\/span><\/div>\n<p>\n<span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">4.&nbsp;It is likely that you will receive the following message:&nbsp; <\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">rm failed for \/system\/app\/com.amazon.mp3.apk, Read-only file system<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">If this occurs, you need to mount your \/system as&nbsp;read-write before you can delete.&nbsp; This is the command I used for my ROM:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><\/span><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">mount -o,remount -t yaffs2 \/dev\/block\/mtdblock4 \/system<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">5. &nbsp;Many .apk apps have a related *.odex file.&nbsp; It is beyond the scope of this post to explain the filetypes but you can remove them after you remove the *.apk :<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">rm \/system\/app\/(APPNAME).odex<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">Once you&#8217;re done with the app removals, you may notice that you have not acquired more free space.&nbsp; This is because the applications&#8217; space&nbsp;are still being held in the Dalvik&nbsp;cache.&nbsp;&nbsp;<span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\">This cache&nbsp;is a temporary space used by the Java virtual machine to run Android applications.<\/span>&nbsp;No worry, you can reclaim this space by utilizing the ATE:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">1. Again, open ATE and give yourself administrative\/super user access by typing:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">su<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><\/span><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">&nbsp;<span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\">2.&nbsp; Navigate to the Davik cache:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">cd data\/dalvik-cache<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">3.&nbsp; Clear the cache:<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">rm *<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">4.&nbsp; Leave ATE by typing:<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">exit<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;\"><span style=\"font-family: inherit;\">5.&nbsp; Reboot your device.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After I rooted my Android phone, via the steps here, my first task was to un-install the bloat-ware.&nbsp; Before removing apps, I made sure to Google my phone to see what apps were safe to remove.&nbsp; Here&#8217;s a sample list I referenced. Though there are GUI apps available in the Play store, I chose to &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/?p=82\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Android: Uninstall Factory Applications&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[60],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=82"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":200,"href":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions\/200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=82"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=82"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chrystalsander.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=82"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}