yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Galaxy S III General] DeadSOL:
I have a 16GB phone and an 8GB card and, as of yesterday, they were full to the brim.

So- yes! People can have that much data. :P
[Galaxy S III General] delsus:
Just one question................. Do I need to do a full wipe?

I'm sorry I just had to, but pretty much the rule is if the Android version is the same a full wipe is not needed, if it's an upgrade to the same android version ex 4.0.1 to 4.0.2 there is a chance you will need a full wipe, if the android version completly different ex 2.3.6 to 4.0.1 or 4.0.4 to 4.1.1 there is a good chance you will need a full wipe.

The exception is stock ROMs are usually designed as no wipe, therefore they have been designed so you shouldn't need a full wipe, but if there are any problems, like lag, or bootloops you should wipe, but it is not always needed.
[Galaxy S III General] nodstuff:
Aughhhhh.

I've been quiet for a while and nice and peaceful.

Feel.....anger.....rising.....must....resist....temptation......
[Galaxy S III General] irish-sid:
Check Rom 5.5

I have my music, pics, nandroids, titanium backups and the Rom I'm about to flash on my exSd. I pull the card out, wipe the phone clean, Stick it back in, flash rom, restore apps. Very quick easy process.

If you're that anal then you should save up and invest in a 32gb sd card or whatever bigger is available. We'll all need one eventually
[Galaxy S III General] UncleBeer:
Developers sometimes label their ROMs as "No wipe". Whether you feel this is accurate or not, don't be surprised when folks don't wipe.
[Galaxy S III General] slaphead20:
well I certainly applaud the OP for having the audacity to lay down the law (in a manner of speaking)-and then disappearing in a cloud of dust...........Will continue to do as I have always done! Works for me! .... no!... .it's a secret!:D
[Galaxy S III General] Arsaw:
I think people are asking about full wipe not because they don't know about the benefits of full wipe. It is just because psychologically they were hoping for a 'no wipe flashing' which will save them tons of time trying to backup files and restoring later. So this thread will not stop people to continue asking about full wipe requirement.
[Galaxy S III General] slaphead20:
when a developer labels a Rom "no wipe" as I understand it, it means there is no data wipe script included in the Rom.......it is not an instruction to not wipe
[Galaxy S III General] DSA:
exactly this

Again, it all boils down to people refusing to read and educate themselves....it will never change
[Galaxy S III General] uberNoobZA:
Ok..... but what if you forgot to buy toilet paper and are down to the last roll? Can you do a quick wipe and then come back later and do another quick wipe when you been to the shops?

Swyped on my Galaxy S3 using xda premium
[Galaxy S III General] UncleBeer:
In this situation, hopefully you can agree that the label "no wipe" is ambiguous at best. Hence the confusion. No excuse for crappy instructions. ;)
[Galaxy S III General] slaphead20:
that is rather unhygienic and in hot weather may lead to soreness, I suggest always doing full wipe, even if you have to use kitchen roll or newspaper.....although the latter may lead to force close!......think about it;):D
[Galaxy S III General] DSA:
ahahahahaha!! :laugh:

My two favourite posts of the month. Time to edit my sig methinks....:highfive:
[Galaxy S III General] kilrah:
32GB phone + 32GB card already :D

As a matter of fact I spent most of the day finding a solution to disable the media server process that was always eating all my battery endlessly trying to catalog media.
[Galaxy S III General] slaphead20:
Hell and damn, you really did edit your signature! :highfive: :D
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
Exactly my point. If it's labeled no wipe why people keep asking?
[Galaxy S III General] JJEgan:
Problem is simple .

The OP was badly labeled it should have read something like A full wipe is better rather than its incorrect heading .

Telling users to stop asking and do a full wipe always is plain wrong information . Posted by someone who really has not helped the novice user .

Plus the instructions are at best misleading in the given process .

We start by formatting then wiping the bits we have just wiped by formatting .Is senseless for starters .

Then we restore the Data we have just wiped after flashing the rom even if this data will corrupt the phone . So why wipe the exact same as you put back again does not make sense .

jje
[Galaxy S III General] nearlygod:
One question.

If I do a full wipe, what does that do?

My Understanding is that it formats the internal sd card. That keeps me from wiping, because with the new cwm backup format, backing up that data takes ages.

Why needs the sd card to be wiped anyway. I need that stuff on there.

What else does a full wipe?

thx
[Galaxy S III General] slaphead20:
a wipe in cwm just wipes system data and user apps+ data

A wipe in 3e recovery wipes sd card as well

A wipe in the phone settings does the same...I think...anyone confirm?
[Galaxy S III General] gee2012:
A full wipe for me is: data/factory reset, wipe cache and dalvik cache and format system and cache in mounts and storage. This is sufficient :)
[Galaxy S III General] jetbruceli:
As long as its stock or same base you don't have to.

Just wipe cache, dalvik and do it before and after.
[Galaxy S III General] gee2012:
Wipe in 3rd recovery only wipes user data afaik and wipe on the phone wipes all, also the external sdcard.
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
Ouch! That was arsh.

Well I took my "misleading" informations from Memnoc

Source-> http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?p=16808932

and from DarkAdrien

Source -> http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=937080

I'm just trying to pass this information and reduce repeated post at the same time.
[Galaxy S III General] ghostofcain:
I'd love to think your thread will help, but the people who ask page after sodding page are generally too lazy to read anyhow so won't read this.
[Galaxy S III General] gee2012:
+1 most are lazy, spoonfed spoiled brats :(
[Galaxy S III General] nodstuff:
Yup.
[Galaxy S III General] ansariiqbal:
I am on rooted stock ics on s3. Now to flash the rooted JB nandroid from the other thread, do I have to do complete wipe? Please let me know as I m new to this. Thanks
[Galaxy S III General] SlimJ87D:
I think it should be absolutely mandatory for a person to perform a full wipe and try their rom again if they were having problems before they wine and complain and find someone or something to blame.
[Galaxy S III General] w1nter456:
Bro are you mad?
[Galaxy S III General] SlimJ87D:
Are you?
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
OMG! All I'm trying to do is pass the information that by doing a full wipe YOU CAN'T GO WRONG! It takes 15 minutes to do and it is the best way to make sure your ROM is installed as intented by developpers. People don't read the instructions, don't follow the guides and then complain that their phone have problems. How many times can you see someone on the forum asking question that the answer is right there on the OP. So if you're too lazy to read the instructions just go with the wipe.

If you don't want to do a wipe, don't do it. But if your phone have problems( battery or memory leaks, etc...) don't waste other people time on the forum that your ROM is buggy.

This thread was intended for new comers who are not sure. Not sure = Wipe. It's that simple.

P.S. yes I'm a little bit mad.
[Galaxy S III General] Kangburra:
I am just about ready to give up here, so many posts without reading anything, we have pictorials and videos and for flashing and yet still people are asking how to do it. I am waiting on DLID and then I might leave them to it! :(

How you guys have the patience to keep answering, I don't know! :)
[Galaxy S III General] Febreze:
+1 kremata

Gesendet von meinem GT-I9300 mit Tapatalk 2
[Galaxy S III General] Striatum_bdr:
I'm sorry but even if I agree largely with OP I must point out that step 10 cancels nearly all the wipe process.

If data wiping is necessary (that's the full wipe most important part, as cache and dalvik are usually wiped by update scripts) it's because many system settings are stored in data in fact.

So restoring data will restore also those settings.

A correct full wipe is to format/wipe system (because if a file from previous Rom isn't changed or replaced by New one it can cause problems), data, cache, then flash the new Rom and restore your apps with titanium (and only app with their data, not system data !) or any other similar app.

Titanium can also save sms, call log, Wi-Fi settings (must be done manually).

The only concern is launcher customization settings if it can't save them.
[Galaxy S III General] pec95:
Thanks, I did not know it's able to restore just data.
[Galaxy S III General] Poker gypsy:
Ok here is probably a stupid question but do I have to be rooted to do this?
[Galaxy S III General] ghostofcain:
No, just a custom recovery.
[Galaxy S III General] jinosong:
I don't have a Wipe Restore function, do you mean the factory reset option?
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
I was told to not use Titanium Backup for this kind of task. Even on a lot of Custom Roms installation instuction it is written not to use TB. I think CWM is really well done for this because I personally flash from AOSP to AOKP to MIUI to Sammy all in different orders constantly and using the 10 steps procedure I never had any problem (except the one already on the bug list). It just a personal experience not an advice.
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
You need to have Clokwork Mod Recovery install( CWM) and you need you restart your phone in recovery mode. If you donn't have this you can look here ->http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1695238
[Galaxy S III General] jinosong:
Re: Always do a full wipe! Stop asking.

I just did this and the results were fantastic. My phone has become fast again. Funny thing is I was on stock ics and the results of wipe were really tremendous even for stock. Many thanks.
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
I updated the first post for better reading. Hope it helps.
[Galaxy S III General] VulguM:
Let's say I wanna flash the ROM with ODIN.

Following the instructions from the OP, should I reboot the device to download mode at step 8, flash, 1st boot, then root and follow up from step 9?

I'm thinking about this for the moment Samsung decides to roll out BTU Jelly Bean, I'm running DLI6.
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
If you want to flash with Odin you probably want to flash a stock ROM, right? Just do all the steps until the ROM flash part. Replace it with reboot in download mode and flash with Odin. But I think when you flash a stock ROM with Odin it makes a wipe out anyway (not sure 100% as I never got the use to flash a stock ROM)
[Galaxy S III General] Chef_of_Sweden:
"5- Go to Main and do a Wipe Restore"

Great post for a newbie like me. One question though:

In CWM 5.5 (1.5) where do I find "Main" and Wipe Restore" as in step 5- "Go to Main and do a Wipe Restore"?
[Galaxy S III General] uf21:
So can someone explain to me something. If I go back to recover and then restore data what will it restore?

Will it restore all the settings like phone settings and email/gmail account (so I dont have to sign into everything again), apps and their data, pictures, videos?

Is it like titanium backup?
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
It's the main menu of the recovery, then you choose "wipe data, restore"
[Galaxy S III General] mustang2012:
It doesn't matter how BIG is your data as the OP who created this thread is giving YOU and everyone good advice.
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
Are you using Lucky Patcher with Titanium backup? If yes, that's probably your problem.
[Galaxy S III General] Delzina:
China Android S3 lookalike

I am a newbie so please excuse my lack of knowledge and thanks again for your info.

Can I just confirm that this process is good for the China Android S3 lookalike? (I have one of these devices - got it in Shanghai.)

How do you backup your existing ROM?

Can you use any S3 ROM on it (.....50 Roms) ? Can you use Cyanogenmod ROMS?

Would you mind recommending a ROM (for good battery life) that you have used and a link.?

Thank you.

My Device:

China SIII

GT-I9300

Android version

4.0.4

Baseband version

MAUI.11AMD.W11.50.SP.V20,

2012/08/08/10:59

Kernel version

3.0.13

1212V2

Thu Aug 23 16:41:34 CST 2012

Build number

IMM76D.I9300ZSALE9

Custom build version

1345711303
[Galaxy S III General] hghazal:
he is right

well I have been around the different forum section regarding flashing ROMs and I can assure you that many people always asks whether they need to full wipe or not. so I think I am with the OP if you are not sure if you need a full wipe or not just go ahead and do a full wipe:good:
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
Well if it is a real Samsung i9300 it will work. This is what I have.
[Galaxy S III General] Kremata:
I'm using UltimaRom and its excellent for me.
[Samsung Galaxy Mini] wilcocsjr:
If I create a partition on my SD, how can i use it as internal memory?

I tryed Darktremor Apps2SD, but the app didnt work. Then I tryed just installing s2e, but I actualy dont know how to work with it, and I'm not shure if it recognises the partition as internal storage...

I wonder if I can use like Link2Sd, and make the partition be recognised as internal storage, or if there is a simple way to work with s2e and meke it also recognise the sd partition as internal storage.

Can someone help me?
[Samsung Galaxy Mini] dheeraj (dhlalit11):
these things are just made to see secondary partition as internal memory and link2sd will also work
[Galaxy S III General] dodgebizkit:
I'm just wondering, with all the top devices now being on ICS or JB, or having updates in the near future, is there a conscious effort from developers to start recoding their apps in native code to keep them fast, bugfree and light? And if not, what would it take, as an online community to try to get them to do so?

Now, I am not a dev so I realise that anything I say here may be inaccurate, but to the best of my knowledge:

Most android apps are currently programmed in HTML5 or Java, both of which are easy to port and run on all android versions with the power to run them, as they have some kind of virtual emulator to run them, but that means they bottle-neck the phone, they run slow, they force close, these scripts are often buggy and unstable and they don't run or look as good/well as they should. This was great in early days when phones were slow anyways so you wouldn't notice the difference, but iOS and Android (and perhaps WP7, Rim and Symbian) apps would all get the same update in a relatively close timeframe and all be almost the same. In the current world of ultraphones such as the S3, iPhone 5 and Lumia 920, regardless of how you feel about their manufactureres or firmwares, are all powerful and fast phones, all capable of running native coded apps on the latest firmware versions and they are kick-ass all round. Now, native coded apps, as far as I'm aware, no longer need to be emulated, there is no program running to handle them, they are being read as if part of the system itself, kind of a synthetic arm attached to a person rather than a robot being operated by remote control (???), and therefore are faster and more efficient and if coded well, stable.

Apps currently seem to be the bottle neck on my s3, I can make the phone speed through the internet like there's no tomorrow, but if I open, for argument's sake, the YouTube app, it takes 2 or 3 seconds to open. The Facebook app (yes, Suckerberg has confirmed a native app for Android similar to the native iOS app for this one) is still kind of slow though I think it isn't as bad as people say. Lots of apps crap-out and die or load much slower than they should when 4 cores are pumping pure mobile testosterone into them, so we really need the boost.

A lot of iOS apps are natively coded now, they load up so fast on the 4S, and they are more reliable, which is a shame, because for obvious reasons I love the S3 much more but I find myself still reaching for the 4S for certain actions because I know that the apps will be ready quicker and wont decide they've had enough and die half way through use.

What do you guys, many of whom know more about this kind of stuff than me, have to offer in terms of this subject or what are your opinions?
[Galaxy S III General] Theshawty:
This is specifically development related how? Wrong section.
[Galaxy S III General] graffixnyc:
OP, Please read the rules about posting and the proper places to post.

If you need to revisit the rules the link is in my sig. Please do NOT post non development threads in the development section.

Thread moved to general
[Galaxy S III General] dodgebizkit:
Sorry, my logic was that 3rd party apps talk was to p do with developers and development, my apologies.

So, any answers?
[Galaxy S III General] pnetherwood:
There is a very simple reason to use Java for apps - write once run anywhere. If apps were native then they would have to be recompiled for every phone. In the Apple world this is not such a big problem but in the Android world this would soon become impractical. Your view on native vs emulated is not correct and probably a relic from Java version 1.0. Native apps do not necessarily run faster than Java apps and in most cases there is not difference in speed. People make a lot of assumptions that because its a virtual machine that it will be slow. The Davlik VM uses highly optimised byte code and is simply not the case. Most Android apps are UI and I/O bound and not CPU bound so you will not see any performance improvements by making them native. You mentioned loading times. Most apps are Odexed to optimise loading so its as fast as possible. Also bear in mind that many CPU intensive tasks are often handed over to specific chips i.e. graphics is handed over to the GPU e.g. a native call to OpenGL will be the same speed as a Java call to OpenGL. Games are the most CPU intensive apps you get on a phone but Android provides hardware acceleration pipelines to handover the workload to the GPU and not the CPU. So for significant majority of applications you will not notice a speed difference between a Java app and a native app and this applies to many other platforms and not just Android phones. This is of course not true for the kernel. Since that has to deal with multiple apps all accessing resources possibly simultaneously then that has to be as fast as it possibly can be. This is why the kernel is native but all of the apps that sit on it are not. Since there are a limited number of kernels usually one per version of Android, each manufacturer has no trouble porting that since that's much easier than porting millions of apps.

Also, your assumptions that non Java code is bug free is also not true. Apps in C/C++ are just as likely to have bugs in as Java code. In some cases they are more likely because you don't have to worry about memory management in Java because of the Garbage Collector in the VM. It sounds like you experienced some poor performing apps but this will be to do with poor coding and not because its written in Java.

So deploying apps in native code would be a major headache when when testing and debugging on multiple hardware platforms and the unlikely speed benefits of native are likely to not be visible to the end user. We would not have the rich world of apps on Android and multiple Android hardware vendors that we do today if apps were native.

I hope this answers your query.
[Galaxy S III General] sebarkh:
Amazing answer.

Sent from an electronic device.
[Galaxy S III General] JAMIE1000UK:
If your reaching for your 4s you should be on medication....
[Galaxy S III General] ahacker:
I don't buy that "native apps need to be compiled many times so it's a major headache" argument. The compilation can be done as a part of the deployment to store process. Play store knows the phone it installs the app on so can substitute a right executable. It can all be done behind the scene. Linux is C++ and yet is deployed on many various platforms.

Google should rather encourage people writing native code for performance critical applications rather than discouraging it, what they are doing now. Things like launchers, maps, browsers should be native. Java is often a lot slower than c++. If you want to see this try comparing map rendering in native and java in OsmAnd for example.

Adittionally, apps performing fast drain proportionally less battery, as they use less cpu cycles to do the same job. This is an important factor on mobile phones.

I've been professionally coding for 13 years both in c++ and java and have a good clue what I talk about. Also java coders tend to be less organized than c++ ones, which can explain the fact that we see more fc's on android than crashes on windows. A friend of mine likes telling "java is a language for programmers who cannot program".

"Smartphone is no longer a phone"
[Galaxy S III General] Marsbar:
I call troll.

If you'd been a professional developer for 13 years you would know full well that both those statements are utter tosh.

Geoff (professional developer - not java - for 17 years)
[Galaxy S III General] qwerty12:
If by "Linux", you mean the kernel then no. Linux is written in C. The GNU coreutils are also C. (Though the GCC people do want to make GCC a C++ program. But I digress.)
[Galaxy S III General] pnetherwood:
If you do raw speed benchmark tests to CPU intensive apps then a compiled app will always beat a VM app. Benchmarks do vary widely based on the type of benchmark and what compiler optimisations you turn on. This adds a complexity to your idea of letting the Play Store do the compilation. As a developer I'd hate to be in the situation that my compiled app worked fine on my phone and emulator but didn't work when compiled by the play store. How would you debug that? However despite native being faster the speed benefits are almost entirely hidden in most apps because they are interacting with the user, downloading from the web or offloading to the GPU. In my last mail I didn't even touch on security. Using a VM is a very neat way to give an app a limited security sandbox which is very secure.

I think you're maybe being a little harsh on Java programmers. You get good and bad programmers in any language. I think the reality is with a language as open as Java you get more "have a go" programmers which can result in some very dodgy apps on the Play Store. However, the developers of the core Android apps do not fall into this category and its the core apps that we really care about here.

I myself have over 20 years experience coding an Java, C/C++ and a variety of different platforms but rather than descend into a Java vs C++ war and focus back on the original question. The efficiency gains using native are not enough to warrant having to support native apps. If they were, a tech savy firm like Google would have done it. I think the security, support and deployment advantages far outweigh the performance gains for most applications. Sure there would some parts of a few apps that may benefit from the optimisation that native would provide but to facilitate native development Google would have to provide two APIs. Instead Google has ONE platform for all apps, theirs and everyone else's which is very sensible. If Google had to support a native API and a Java API then the doubles the support and development work which would increase time to market and increase cost. For a commercial company the right solution is always a balance between the right technical solution and practicality and cost considerations.
[Galaxy S III General] ahacker:
I call an aggressive idiot, who instead of arguing against my points attacks me personally.

"Smartphone is no longer a phone"