yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Nova Launcher] GalaxyA325G:
Can someone who knows Nova launcher better than I do help explain what caused Nova to grow in size by almost 150% in a single day?

The file sizes of the Nova Launcher APK jumped astoundingly TREMENDOUSLY hugely disproportionatly the day after when Branch acquired Tesla Coils Software, it seems.

Nova went from about 8MB to 12MB in a single day.

That's big.

Really big.

But why?

Nova aside, the fact is that when an APK, for no apparent reason, grows by almost 150% in size in a single day, "something" really big is going on.

But what?
[Nova Launcher] Anarchist77:
Um 🤔 8mb to 12mb? "That's a150% jump" ?....... A 150% jump from 8mb would result in 20mb, no? 😂
[Nova Launcher] GalaxyA325G:
I don't want to quibble over a puny 5% so I will AGREE with you that the Nova free APK jumped in size not by 150% but only by 145% since Branch Analytics acquired it.

However, I think your complaint about the minor 5% difference between 145% & 150% is completely besides the point, but to answer your MATHEMATICAL question faithfully (since you brought it up)...

You are correct I was quoting roughly the order of magnitude... (145% being close to 150%) given the number of sig figs we're dealing with...

But if you truly want exact numbers this is the size of the version of Nova free that I am currently using which is from TeslaCoil Apps, LLC compared to the latest version in my wget archives (which has the Branch Analytics code duly inserted)...

NovaLauncher_7.0.57.apk, Size: 8687535 bytes (8483 KiB)

NovaLauncher_8.0.2.apk, Size: 12580956 bytes (11 MiB)

Mathematically, we can ask the same percentage question two different ways... namely...

12,580,956 bytes is what percent of 8,687,535 bytes, or,

8,687,535 bytes is what percent of 12,580,956 bytes.

While that boils down roughly to the difference between 13 & 9 (with roundoff), the precise mathematical answer which you seek is as shown below.

12580956 times 100 divided by 8687535 = 145%

8687535 times 100 divided by 12580956 = 70%

Given these byte numbers will surely change a bit and given the point is the astoundingly huge difference in size between the older TeslaCoil LLC APK and the newer Branch Analytics APK, you can accurately appreciate the change mathematically in two ways:

The Branch Analytics version is 145% larger than the TeslaCoil version, or,

The TeslaCoil version is 70% smaller than the Branch Analytics version.

Given we're dealing with orders of magnitude and sig figs here, and given byte sizes will change over time, I'm summarizing that as:

The Branch Analytics Nova free APK is about 1-1/2 times larger,

Or, the TeslaCoil Nova free APK was about 3/4 smaller.

No matter which way you choose slice the math, that's a sudden and ASTOUNDINGLY HUGE size difference, is it not?

The Branch Analytics APK is ~1-1/2 times the TeslaCoil size, or,

The TeslaCoil APK was ~3/4ths the BranchAnalytics APK size.

That sudden size difference is

ASTOUNDINGLY HUGE

, is it not?

Hence, the logically sensible question to ask is what on earth has so suddenly been added to Nova free to cause that ASTOUNDINGLY HUGE difference in size to occur after the ownership switch.
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
Nope. Blame material you design. Tons of extra code is needed for that crap to work. Every app that uses Google's material you code as a base grows by leaps and bounds. Go look at size comparison of Gmail from 2 years ago and the bloated crap it is now. Since phones have larger capacities in storage and RAM, and companies make more loot on cloud storage, they need not worry about app size no more...
[Nova Launcher] Anarchist77:
My point simply was that going from 8mb to 12mb is a 50% increase. Half of 8 is 4 (50%)...8+4=12. There is a big difference between the actual 50% and 150% that you claimed.
[Nova Launcher] GalaxyA325G:
I never disagree with facts (only fools disagree with facts - that's why they're fools in the first place).

Hence I agree wholeheartedly with you when you bring up the point that there are not two but at least THREE ways of saying the exact same math.

There might even be more ways to say the same math for all I know.

These are all mathematically correct statements:

1. The TeslaCoil APK is ~75% the size of the BranchAnalytics APK.

2. The BranchAnalytics APK is ~150% the size of the TeslaCoil APK.

3. The BranchAnalytics APK grew by ~50% over the TeslaCoil APK.

Which can also be said using quarters...

1. The TeslaCoil APK is 3/4ths the size of the BranchAnalytics APK.

2. The BranchAnalytics APK is 1-1/2 times the size of the TeslaCoil APK.

3. The BranchAnalytics APK grew by 1/2 over the TeslaCoil APK.

The math is the same math no matter how you

describe

that math.

Either way, the instantaneous growth is ASTOUNDINGLY HUGE.​

And to say it's due to "material design" without a single fact backing that statement up might as well be the same as saying it's due to aliens who infested the source code for all that it's worth without a single fact backing up that statement.

I am nothing but logical.

And factual.

The logic to ask is related to the fact that the APK grew in size by an ASTOUNDINGLY HUGE amount soon AFTER the Branch Analytics acquisition.

Why?
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
Well I backed it up with facts. Look at any size of any Google app from 2 years ago and any Google app now. Material you design and libraries makes the app bigger. The Branch analytics has absolutely no bearing on Nova's size jump. Don't believe me? Grab Nova 7 apk from apkmirror and Nova 8 from apkmirror decompile or extract and look at differences in files. Most notable changes will be in libs, resources.arc and dex which both apps will have, but the difference in sizes are due to implementation of material you code. Still are a skeptic? You probably also think Trump won the election, we never landed on the moon, Tupac is alive and well, and Democrats kill, rape, and eat babies... Not all do, just some of us.

Edit- sorry I have to add an ammendment, languages also add to size of apps.
[Nova Launcher] IronTechmonkey:
My APK is geting bigger just reading this discussion. :D

But seriously, my Nova APK is about 8MB on each of 2 devices, A 10 and 11, and I must agree that sizes of these things have grown... as such things have in just about any operating system going all the way back to DOS 6.11 which was the souped-up version that required additional diskettes, which is analogous to a larger APK.
[Nova Launcher] mkhcb:
It is in the most recent beta release.
[Nova Launcher] IronTechmonkey:
[EDIT This seems to have been caused by tasker and Google and not a Nova issue but I'll leave the description as is.]

Has anyone seen an issue like this recently:

After display is turned off and back on the system requests each time that default launcher be set. After each instance, in Nova none default is not set even though it was set for Nova before the power cycle of display.

Details:

Android 10 stock Moto G7 power rooted with Magisk, having run nova launcher fine for a few years, started doing this immediately after some manually applied Play Store App updates were installed (but nothing which should affect the launcher). Occurs regardless of how display is powered off (power button, timer) and regardless of how it is powered on (power button, peek display.)

- Reboot does not fix.

- Occurs in a backup of nova settings from 1 month ago thereby eliminating recent nova settings changes as suspects.

- Does not occur on an Android 11 device which received the same set of Playstore updates.

- Disabling native Moto App launcher prevents prompt to select launcher but causes other functions such as recents to fail in nova.

Installing an additional launcher did not trick the system into retaining the default, and this seems to occur regardless of which launcheris set as default so it's not specifically a nova issue. That being said the only reference I can find to "default" in this thread is quite old and any advice would be appreciated.

[EDIT] This issue is avoided by disabling Tasker and might or might not relate Google shenanigans and Tasker's ability to intercept assist application requests via long press of the home button, and it is that home button which is connection to nova although nova is not cause. Apologies for the off-topic, I left the note in case others see this and think it is a launcher issue.
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
@IronTechmonkey NOOB. 😹😹😹😜
[Nova Launcher] IronTechmonkey:
Believe it or not I may be able to get this train back on the rails with a question about Nova and launchers in general but first please allow me to finish derailing the train. The issue was straight up Google, any time an alarm was toggled on or off the symptom would occur. Tasker's work around to prevent being app-killed is to run a perpetual alarm 10 minutes in the future and reset it with every display power cycle. Any time the aforementioned occurred or any time an alarm was enabled or disabled manually in clock app or anytime the screen is powered off and on symptom would occur. Possibly related to Google messing around with the clock application recently. Foogle!

Back to Nova and Launchers. During testing it became apparent that different buttons in the Navigation bar seem to be controlled by different parts of the system or different third-party utilities. For example, when the native Moto launcher was disabled, in Nova the home button and back button still worked OK but the recents button did not. Is that dependency of Nova (or any 3rd party launcher) upon the native launcher for some but not all navbar functions normal or typical?
[Nova Launcher] Ghisy:
Since Android 10 (I think but not entirely sure), the recents screen has been tied to the stock launcher. So you shouldn't disable your original launcher completely.
[Nova Launcher] nyorbee:
Hi, on Poco x4 couple times a day I have strange issue, after unlocking the screen I have one icon kinda marked, sometimes the same, sometimes different one. I've been messing with different settings, but can't figure this out. See picture
[Nova Launcher] Adilsonmsf:
Hello it's a pleasure to be here.

You creators are amazing.

I realy love the Nova Launcher.

.

Please If possible can you add the possibility to copy the home screen (place where ALL normal apps stay in screen) with all the apps and not only create another one fully empty?

.

Thank you...

Love
[Nova Launcher] Adilsonmsf:
Omg. Iam so Sorry tô boter everyone.
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
No worries. Look in Nova settings for their Discord group.
[Nova Launcher] the stranger94:
Hi guys, I don't if I'm the only one but I still use tesla unread for badge notification and never update to nova 7 so I can still use it.

I recently change phone but now testla unread has problem with some apps (telegram and Samsung mail for now) not showing any badge.

Have you some tips to fix it?
[Nova Launcher] Dayuser:
With Nova 7 and newer you don't have to use tesla unread to get everything working. Tesla unread are pretty much dead.
[Nova Launcher] the stranger94:
you don't have the same functions either. i didn't stick to unread because i'm nostalgic but because without it when you swipe a notification you also lose the badge, and the badge for me is the most useful exactly when i don't have the notification and the icon on the top
[Nova Launcher] IronTechmonkey:
Revisiting the odd issue I reported here which was not a Nova issue but which turned out to be a google issue which probably affected Nova launchers on many devices. Initial report here https://xdaforums.com/t/app-4-0-nova-launcher.1389071/post-87297465

The reason I'm doubling back to explain the answer even though it's not a Nova problem is that the experience to users was as if it was a launcher problem. Any time any app invoked the alarm (in particular with the status bar alarm icon) the launcher would then request to be set as default at next run even if it was previously set as default. This happened with anything that touched that alarm including Tasker, third-party alarm clocks, and native Google clock, eg toggling an existing alarm on or off would induce the issue.

I restored the device to its factory Android 10 condition, then installed Nova, and then allowed it to update the various native apps and services while testing at various points along the way. The issue did not occur until the latest batch of Play Store updates (as of a week ago) were installed so it was clearly a Google issue. The final proof is that a round of updates to a few key Google services this week corrected the issue.

Apologies for the off topic but, again, it really is easy to see this as a launcher error and I was wondering if Google had thrown another restriction at us so I mentioned it.
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
How many years are you on Android? Your 1st instinct should always be to blame Google. Whenever something breaks, stops working, or just goes wonky on your device it is 99.9999% Google's fault. I just bought a new car with all the bells and whistles and it is pretty dependent on Android auto, I have nightmares about Google pushing some shoddy update that dumps fuel while I play music and catch fire on the George Washington Bridge in NYC. I keep seeing these Tesla nightmares where back ends and bumpers just fall off or the car is just engulfed in an atomic mushroom cloud because it rained too hard on the car. Lol.

But you should know to start with Google and then double back after exhausting every other option and just wait until Google fixes it. At least when Dirty Unicorns was around you knew to blame Alex.
[Nova Launcher] IronTechmonkey:
Preach Brother Bear but fear not, I suspected Google immediately and I share your concerns about the type of breakdowns that can occur when the services on which these critical utilities depend are not properly maintained or when the universe that they are attempting to maintain has gotten too complicated for them. BTW, I was a late adopter to android considering IT profession and experience but I knew about Google and when I saw that I had to create a Google account to get full functionality, not even full functionality but critical functionality, from the device I knew they couldn't be trusted. They've lived up, or lived down as the case may be, to that lack of trust many times. As to this particular issue, they had been fooling around with the native Google clock for a while, attempting to make it theme sensitive but managing to get everyone on the same color combination which many people did, not like, and also they messed up or removed full-screen alarm with snooze and stop buttons except when device is locked. This means attempting to snooze or stop the alarm in a small button in the middle of the screen with a greater likelihood of invoking something you don't want to (I've reverted to older version of clock). It was not long after that that the clock issue affected default launcher. In any event, apologies for the off-topic but I can say it's nice to be able to use the nova launcher without having to continually reset default launcher.

BTW, I'll be crossing the GWB sometime in the next couple of days. Please don't catch fire on the bridge this week. :D
[Nova Launcher] HippoMan:
I'm using the latest Nova release under Android 11 on a rooted Pixel 5.

Is there any way to get Nova to hide app shortcuts? I know how to make Nova hide app icons, but I am specifically wanting to hide a shortcut, and I don't see any way to do that.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.
[Nova Launcher] Teracotta:
I want to odex Nova Launcher but the file is RO so I can't delete the classes.dex.

Aside from decompile/recompile the entire thing, is there a way around this?
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
Deleting the classes dex file does not odex an app. There is absolutely no benefit to odex an app on a device after kit Kat android 4.4. if you must odex the app for whatever reason, there are guides, programs, and scripts to run that properly odex or deodex apps available on XDA and elsewhere online. Never delete dex files from apps or folders they create.

Latest Nova most certainly has a classes.dex file within the app.. I just checked...
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
Not sure what you mean, maybe a screenshot? But for me to get shortcuts I need sesame shortcuts installed, or I don't get them.
[Nova Launcher] HippoMan:
Thank you.

There are apps that create shortcuts, and by default, they already do show up on my home screen under Nova, and I have never installed Sesame Shortcuts.

Yes, screenshots are often realized as these kind of shortcuts. Also, a number of other apps create them, such as the LSPosed manager. In certain cases (and LSPosed manager is one such case), if I delete the associated shortcut, the app will behave differently, and I do not want this different behavior. What I want to do is hide but not remove such a shortcut, so that the associated app still sees that the shortcut exists, but so that Nova does not show the shortcut.

And I want to do this hiding for one, specific, chosen shortcut, not all possible shortcuts.

Based on what I see in this screen, it looks like Sesame Shortcuts gives an "all or nothing" choice: in other words, to show all shortcuts or to show none of them.

As I mentioned above, I'm looking for a way to select one, specific shortcut and then hide it.

But it looks like I'm probably out of luck with Nova.
[Nova Launcher] Teracotta:
I am on Android 4.1 and cannot delete classes.dex from the Nova APK because it is RO.

I have already odex the file. There is no need to worry

I think you can hide it by including it in a Group, and putting that app in a folder for Group, but not having that Group visible on the main drawer.
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
Try latest lsposed. They did away with the manager and now it is an annoying notification in your qs panel notifications. I hate it. Lol. Unfortunately apps create shortcuts and most view them as features. I don't. But launchers don't usually handle shortcuts from apps. Might be able to block permissions on a per app basis in system settings...
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
Is it a data or system app? Either way, use a program or script to try to temporarily gain access to odex the app. I never liked odexed apps or ROMs but I do remember people getting a false sense of quicker app responses and quicker reboot times since the dalvik cache wasn't recreated every boot. None of my business, but I loved ICS, Holo, and Jellybean. I just can't even think how those would be usable now. Sorry if I wasn't more help
[Nova Launcher] HippoMan:
Thank you.

Unfortunately, LSPosed 1.8.6 (the latest version) is refusing to display that annoying notification on my Android-11 device, even when I disable the shortcut.

If that notification was present as documented, I could hide and manage it via Tasker and AutoNotification.

Oh well ...

I have reported this behavior to the LSPosed people. So far, no one has responded.

Yes, it looks Nova is indeed one of the launchers that doesn't handle shortcuts very well.
[Nova Launcher] HippoMan:
Thank you, but it unfortunately turns out that Nova does not allow shortcuts to be moved into groups or folders.
[Nova Launcher] Teracotta:
There is an option in my Nova that says "Hidden Apps", some shortcuts for Google Maps like "LOCAL" and "NAVIGATION" can be hidden there.
[Nova Launcher] HippoMan:
Unfortunately, Nova's "hidden apps" option doesn't work with most other shortcuts.
[Nova Launcher] Teracotta:
It might just be a system app issue, if you have root, try to move the app from /system/app/ or /system/priv-app/ to /data/app using link2sd or whatever that magisk module is that does the same thing (I forget)

might surprising, but is possible on some androids to do this with play services and playstore. for all google complaint of spying, it needs root to hook into android OS so removing play services from /system/ means many analytic breaks (break gps, probably)

please backup nandroid first in case this bricks something,
[Nova Launcher] HippoMan:
The LSPosed utility which created one of the shortcuts that Nova can't hide is not a system app.

But perhaps this is a special case, because there isn't even a normal app for that utility. It's invoked solely via either a shortcut, a click on a special notification, or a USSD sequence. The shortcut is probably not created in a "standard" manner.

Nonetheless, the Nova launcher definitely "sees" the shortcut, because I can move it around the Home screen using Nova's normal facilities. And this means that Nova is totally aware of the shortcut's icon, and therefore, Nova software could be written to conditionally not display that icon.
[Nova Launcher] vurtomatic:
It'll nice for Nova to be able hide the LSPosed shortcut so it's accessible in an "all apps" drawer.
[Nova Launcher] HippoMan:
I totally agree!
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
Mine is in all apps. The setting is in lsposed and not a nova thing.
[Nova Launcher] HippoMan:
I'm running lsposed 1.6.8 under Android 11 (riru version of lsposed), and I'm running the latest Nova. All lsposed offers is whether to create a shortcut or not, and not where the shortcut appears in the launcher.

The only thing that Nova shows me in "all apps" is the lsposed app itself that's downloaded and installed, not the lsposed-created shortcut.

The lsposed-created shortcut can be made to appear (see the lsposed "Settings"), and the lsposed app itself can then be deleted, and that lsposed-created shortcut will remain. That shortcut only appears on the Nova Home screen.

PS: The reason for the lsposed-created shortcut is to allow us to delete the downloaded lsposed app itself in order to make it more difficult for root-detecting utilities to discover the existence of lsposed on the device. I have deleted the downloaded lsposed app for that reason, and I want the lsposed-created shortcut to **not** be forced onto Nova's Home screen.
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
So you deleted the app that includes the drawer shortcut. I think lsposed calls it parasitic manager, did it ever cause problems before while hiding root? Never did for me, so I keep it instead of having the notification(worst) or the home screen shortcut. I suggest just moving the shortcut into a folder , like I have a favorites folder in my app drawer, put that folder on homescreen, then add the shortcut to that folder, then delete the folder from homescreen. Lsposed shortcut will remain in folder in app drawer.
[Nova Launcher] HippoMan:
Yes, that's indeed the parasitic manager shortcut.

Nova won't let me move that parasitic manager shortcut into any folder, nor into any other app drawer. That is the reason for why I posted this question here in the first place.

As I mentioned above, Nova lets me move that parastic manager shortcut around the Home screen, and Nova also allows this shortcut's icon to be changed. This means that Nova can indeed "see" this kind of shortcut. It just doesn't seem to be able to manage it in the way that it manages other kinds of shortcuts.

I think that I'm out of luck unless there will eventually be some sort of Nova enhancement which allows it to manage that kind of parasitic manager shortcut in the same way as it manages other shortcuts.
[Nova Launcher] Thebear j koss:
Put the folder on your homescreen and move it into the folder. Then delete the folder off your homescreen.
[Nova Launcher] HippoMan:
I already tried that, and it doesn't work, sadly.
[Nova Launcher] vurtomatic:
I think the challenge is we want to keep the shortcut in a drawer, not the homescreen or a folder on the homescreen.

Moving the shortcut to a folder and deleting the folder off the homescreen would lose the shortcut completely?