yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Android Apps and Games] yazayad:
Same issue. Tried adding a different google account now and it worked just fine. Clearly the original account, which disappeared when fiddling with the different versions of GmsCore.apk, is still seen as present, although it doesn't show up under account settings.

Anyone know how to clear the account data on LOS? On ROMs with actual google framework stuff installed I'm sure you could just clear the data for Account Manager and related apps (play store, services, etc.) if you encounter this "problem communicating with Google's servers" error.

At any rate, for anyone playing around you should remove the google account from the account settings before changing GmsCore versions, and then add it back.

The original 0.2.4-111 made some apps ask for an updated google framework; the second version I tried, -118 I think, made the same apps crash (although I may have missed a reboot or something, since it seems to work for other people); with the one I'm using now, -126, those apps are working just fine with no errors.

I had another problem with the 0.2.4-111 version and Google Play Music. My account was added and recognized just fine, but I couldn't play or download music, and got the error message that I had reached the maximum of ten devices connected to the same Play Music account - I only have two devices connected to it. Has anyone using Play Music with microG experienced this?

As I haven't been able to add back the google account associated with my Play Music subscription while using the -126 version of GmsCore, I don't know if it will fix that problem or what. I'm holding off on a wipe to see if there's any way to completely clear the accounts settings first so I can re-add the account.

(btw, if you get 'play music exporter' off of F-Droid you can extract, with full tags and artwork and no DRM, the music files you've cached/downloaded in the Play Music app and use it on any player you like, just fyi for anyone interested who didn't know - do it at your own risk, terms of service, etc etc).

EDIT:

Update: nothing worked except a wipe and reflash. Clearing cache, specific app data, removing and re-adding all microG components, flashing from shadow53 did not help, couldn't add back the google account.

After wipe and reflash I set up microG (enabling google registration and GCM), rooted, replaced the GmsCore.apk (0.2.4-111 with -126) and rebooted. After that the account added fine and I got no google framework update errors.

Since I'm on a fresh install I will play around and see if apps restored from titanium backup play well with push notifications (as they are meant to be installed after GmsCore).

As for Play Music, for whoever is interested, I still get the same error, so I've contacted google support to reset my device limits.

EDIT 2:

To anyone unable to add back a missing account after manually replacing GmsCore.apk: Go to Settings>Developer options>Development tools>Account tester and try to remove your ("missing") account from there. Might Work.
[Android Apps and Games] marcdw:
Hmm, wonder if that's similar to my issue. Main account disappeared on my long-running AospExtended/microG setup. Two weeks on and I haven't been able to recreate it. I too was messing around with different GmsCore builds at the time. Might have to start over on that one.

Oddly, after a session of trying and failing to create the account, I find that after switching to another ROM or device I get a notification that I need to login. Got logged out.

Moto G5S Plus XT1806, GZOSP_PixelExperience, MultiROM, TBO Tapatalk 4.9.3
[Android Apps and Games] Exabyter:
Can you share how you are using Tasker on a device with microG?

I just looked into that app and it looks like they stopped direct licensing quite a while ago and it can only be licensed via Gplay now. Do you have a modded version of Play store installed on that device?
[Android Apps and Games] Nosepull:
For me Tasker, bought on the PlayStore years ago, is the one and only app that always worked (and still works) flawlessly on MicroG / no PlayStore phones. However, with several other paid apps I have strange issues with the licenses (e.g. apps on one Google free phone and on another with basically the same setup it doesn't work, sporadically license problems etc.). This is one of the reasons I gradually switch my device to GApps, unfortunately.
[Android Apps and Games] d1n0x:
Yes I have Play Store installed. It used to work if I downloaded it via Aurora while logged in to my account I bought it with. Don't know about the recent update though
[Android Apps and Games] Oswald Boelcke:
By my personal experiences, applications restored from a Titanium backup won't register with GCM. My personal best practice: "Clean" istall those applications (from Play Store, F-droid, directly as apk etc.), ensure in µG-settings they've registered in GCM, and only restore their data from TiBu.
[Android Apps and Games] Exabyter:
It wouldn't surprise me that recent versions do the typical periodic online Gplay license verification thing (which would fail without real Gplay support), but I read somewhere that Tasker in particular may have a relaxed checking regime, eg if you have the paid APK installed it assumes you have a valid license. Have no idea if that's true or not.

I have no problem at all paying for apps - in fact I've "double-paid" for apps which I had initially bought the Gplay version of and then decided I wanted to install a Gplay-free version - I just don't want all the other snoopery G nonsense just to have certain apps that are really important to me working.

And since this device is currently running LineageOS for microG, installing the real Gplay store I assume requires removing blank store or fake store first. (Not sure how feasible that is if every update of LOS for microG tries to put it back)
[Android Apps and Games] yazayad:
Yes, you are right. GCM apps I restored from a backup didn't even register in the microG settings. The apps I installed from f-droid and yalp did register, but unfortunately I'm not consistently and reliably getting push notifications (except for an exchange account in the AOSP email app and a gmail I added in K-9 Mail, but that has nothing to do with microG). Instant messages, e.g. in Signal, sometimes arrive immediately, sometimes delayed, and sometimes not until I manually open the apps.

Has push always worked reliably for you? Granted that the app in question has registered in microG of course. Any other settings you changed?

---------- Post added at 01:00 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:38 PM ----------

I'm also curious about this. There's an app (Drastic DS emulator) which needs the real play store to do a one time activation, then it should stay activated unless cache is cleared. Also want to see if the trouble I'm having with Google Play Music is because of the lack of a real play store.

I'm gonna try flashing shadow53's standalone patched play store and see what happens

EDIT:

Yup, all good. Used the real play store to activate/verify my purchase and also got Play Music working, then replaced the real play store with the fake store apk from the microG website, updated permissions and rebooted. App is activated, and Play Music is workin, microG self-check all good. Good to know that there's a slightly cumbersome but nevertheless quick way to solve these problems.

[MENTION=8128690]Exabyter[/MENTION] I guess I should've tried it with tasker while I was at it since I had purchased it (but no longer use it). You should fetch it through Yalp or something if you've already purchased it, and if that doesn't work, try temporarily using the real play store if you're not too averse to having an actual google app on your phone for a quick minute.
[Android Apps and Games] Exabyter:
Thanks for the report, but don't forget that most Gplay paid apps do periodic online license checks now. The fact that your paid app(s) work now is most certainly not a guarantee that they will all continue to work.

If I am going to be forced to deploy some form of Gplay to get important paid apps working, I do not want to discover after all that work to install, migrate configs and attempt to neuter the worst of its privacy transgressions, that paid apps that seemed to be initially working started failing later.

I've already spent literally years at this point trying to come up with a daily driver phone that doesn't either exploit my privacy (Google) or insult my intelligence (Apple) in this mobile platform duopoly era. I'm tired of carrying around the old Blackberry but I'm still not happy with anything I've come up with yet to replace it. ?
[Android Apps and Games] chris42too:
I am using microG for a few years now. When the apps registered with GCM it always worked flawless. You only have to look out how to handle backups.

Nowadays of course more troubles due to the change to FCM... Hope that I can fix that.

Regarding the PlayStore stuff. I have several paid apps from PlayStore, However I use FakeStore with microg and do all installs and updates via Yalp store. Never had licensing Problems. Just In-App purchases won't work.
[Android Apps and Games] Mynacol:
Please elaborate the "exploit my intelligence (Apple)" part. Do you have something to read for me?
[Android Apps and Games] Exabyter:
I accidentally left a word out of that line. Fixed now.

---------- Post added at 09:27 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:18 PM ----------

I guess I'm not yet completely clear on the difference between "fake store" and "blank store" but I thought the usual default configuration used one of those to simply convince apps that Play Store was present on the device since its mere presence is a common dependency, but I didn't think either of them had any ability to actually validate Gplay app licenses. (Or do anything, actually, except sit there and appear to be a Play Store installation)

I have a couple of apps paid for via Gplay that seem to work regardless (eg if one simply transfers the paid APK and app data from a previous installation running Gapps), but those seem to be the exception for paid apps these days rather than the rule.
[Android Apps and Games] Shadow53:
Fake store is the app you were talking about that convinces apps the Play Store is present. Blank Store was supposed to be a replacement Play Store that you could download apps from, but development on that has stopped and Yalp or Aurora are recommended instead (with Fake Store if using MicroG).
[Android Apps and Games] maybeme2:
I have a couple of questions about Yalp.

1. I have apps initially downloaded and installed from the official Playstore. When I go to Yalp and search for updates, Yalp shows me numerous available updates, almost all old updates (by date). None of these updates appear in the playstore because they were updated long ago. Why is that? Why the discrepancy?

2. If I accept the (redundant) Yalp updates, does that mess up the update sequence in the playstore?

Thanks
[Android Apps and Games] Oswald Boelcke:
Out of the about twenty applications that requested permission for GCM pushes, I only granted it to the three I require to do so - and I haven't had any issues so far. Obviously and gratefully, they haven't changed anything in their code (yet) towards FCM. Two of these three applications are NOT greenified 'cause I'd like to ensure to always receive their notifications in time. Although using Greenify as Xposed module, I haven't trusted the Xposed-based functionality "GCM push for greenified apps" (which additionally requires the donation package) yet but I'm going to explore as of today; just greenified the two ones. Additionally, both applications are not battery optimised, and I don't recognise any excessive drainage due to this fact.

Remark: If a ad blocker is used (as I do with AdAway) it's important by my information that "mtalk.google.com" is whitelisted in the ad blocker to ensure seemless GCM pushes.

Neither using K-9 Mail or Signal nor having experiences with them. My email client is R2Mail2, which doesn't depend on GCM to receive push emails; my messenger Conversations and SMS client Silence also don't use GCM. R2Mail2 and Conversations are neither greenified nor battery optimised.
[Android Apps and Games] yazayad:
Oof, it was AdAway. Thanks. Working well now. Strange though, I always used it without whitelisting mtalk.google.com without problems before I switched to microG.

About FCM and GCM, are apps able to keep using both or will they use only FCM if and when they start using it? Difficult for a project like microG to implement? Maybe off topic.

As for Greenify, I haven't been using it lately, but I'll set it up again. I bought the donation package way back so I'll test how the xposed module does with pushing for greenified apps. Btw, do you recommend using Smart Hibernation in greenify?

Yeah, well said. The way I did it is flawed in principle. We will see how long it takes until the apps in question want to re-check their license. Looks like greenify is the same, it won't activate without the real play store. I'll see if it keeps working after verifying once.
[Android Apps and Games] Exabyter:
For what it's worth, I have a couple of devices I run AdAway on and I haven't noticed any particular impact on push notifications from it yet.
[Android Apps and Games] n76:
K9 Mail does not use GCM. Accounts setup with POP use polling. Accounts setup with IMAP seem to keep a connection to the server. At least the IMAP accounts on my phone give me the beep notification around the same time as the mail app on my laptop, often a trifle earlier.

By default Signal uses GCM but can work without it. If no GCM is available, then it maintains a connection to Open Whisper Systems (I think) for notifications.
[Android Apps and Games] Exabyter:
For what it's worth, the component of IMAP that gives near-realtime inbox notifications is the IDLE component, it's an optional component but most IMAP servers enable it.

If the client is doing native IMAP on the device side, there's no need for GCM to notify of a mailbox state change because the client is keeping a long-term persistent session open with the server. (You might have to disable battery optimization for the client tho, so it can maintain that persistent session)

Similar situation applies to email clients that use Microsoft's Exchange ActiveSync protocol.

Where something like GCM comes in handy is with server-based or proprietary communications networks like various "instant messenger" systems, where for efficiency reasons the client does not necessarily keep a long-term open session/socket to a server and waits for a server-initiated notification using one of the push notification services like GCM.

Some email clients (like Blue Mail) do all the communications with the source server in the cloud and just send status updates to the client on the device, those may use GCM to facilitate that.

I believe that Signal resorts to polling if GCM is unavailable or blocked. The downside is battery efficiency is probably worse in that mode.
[Android Apps and Games] Oswald Boelcke:
Just took the hint with AdAway and "mtalk.google.com" from the OP:
[Android Apps and Games] Exabyter:
I have 61 apps installed on this device that use GCM and 31 of those are registered with microG.

It's certainly possible that I will notice a problem at some point, just haven't noticed it so far. I don't use most of them on a regular basis and tend to disable a lot of notifications on apps anyway.

Perhaps I'll try whitelisting that host and see if I notice a change in the other direction.
[Android Apps and Games] :
Does the number of gcm registered apps affect battery life?
[Android Apps and Games] Mynacol:
Theoretically no, so probably no.

The idea behind GCM is that your device has an active link with google servers and apps' servers can (if registered) contact the GCM service and this can give your device some message and info through the link it has with google servers.

You only maybe get more GCM notifications and the according app wakes up through this
[Android Apps and Games] chris42too:
Something seems off here. Yalp is not its own store, it uses a play store implementation (I think some apkdownloader code originally) to download apks and then installs them. Hence it uses the information out of the playstore and not different ones.

If you now see differences in the versions, you should check with the yalp developer and possibly open a ticket there.
[Android Apps and Games] Setialpha:
Might be because of mismatching signatures and stagged update roll outs. Example: an apps is on F-Droid and Play Store. You have the F-Droid version installed and then it gets updated on Play Store. Play Store will not report an update because of the signature mismatch, Yalp Store will.

Also Play Store does not propagate updates to all users at once, instead it's announced in stages one bunch after another (ever wondered why certain apk updates appear on apkmirror first and a few hours or even days later on your Play Store?). This does not apply to Yalp Store.

I don't know how or if Yalp Store handles beta channels, but might add up to the previous two.
[Android Apps and Games] myshyak:
Badly need your help.

Found on internet the pack of microg made especially for my device (nook glowlight plus, Android 4.1) https://1drv.ms/u/s!AlBgZahcgzeIkHIQjZrUvvsOA9A_

But the problem is that play store there is not"patched" and Google play books keeps showing that play services needs to be updated. Can someone make a version of the same pack, but with that patch applied?
[Android Apps and Games] Oswald Boelcke:
Did you try to flash the patched play store by @Shadow53 @Setialpha from here?

And consider to update your microG Gms Core by the one linked in this post by @kurtn.

EDIT: The always latest patch to apply to an unpacked Play Store apk is available here
[Android Apps and Games] myshyak:
Can I just unzip this file and change one apk to another? Or something else is needed?
[Android Apps and Games] Oswald Boelcke:
The Play Store-zip is a flashable zip i.e. flash through recovery.

For the linked apk, download the apk and rename it to GmsCore.apk

With a root explorer, at /root/system/priv-app/GmsCore, delete the current GmsCore.apk and move the downloaded, renamed one to this location. Ensure, it has "644"-permissions. Reboot.
[Android Apps and Games] maybeme2:
That's what's confusing me. Here are 2 screenshots that demonstrates the problem. This happens consistently.

So far, to avoid breaking something, I have never yet accepted updates from Yalp and only accepted them from the playstore. If I thought the Yalp updates were correct, I could do away or freeze the playstore, but this discrepancy does not give me confidence.
[Android Apps and Games] chris42too:
More meaningful would be each application version, not the date. However I guess you should head over to Sergey (https://github.com/yeriomin/YalpStore/issues) and file an issue, if the versions are different as well. Yalp store has multiple configurations, that could influence this, like using the Yalp store account for apps, different device IDs, etc. He can probably help best.
[Android Apps and Games] Setialpha:
Actually the Play Store is patched by me, and shadow53 uses it, too.

Not that it actually matters, but still.

You can find the latest patch to apply yourself to an unpacked apk yourself here.
[Android Apps and Games] myshyak:
Thanks, that worked perfectly
[Android Apps and Games] 2phazt:
What to do if microg is installed as a user app and I want to switch to a forked version?

Since it works fine as user app and is only limited by the new play services version number I would prefer keeping it this way.

Even official playstore let's me buy new apps and inapppurchases.
[Android Apps and Games] kurtn:
Just deinstall, get the forked apk and install and setup. Maybe you have to do the same with dependent apps.
[Android Apps and Games] Oswald Boelcke:
No, it actually and definitely matters! Credits must go to those who earn them.

I really apologise, also for obviously haven't searched well enough who has ownership on the patched PS. And I promise I will remember.

You are doing such a superb job! Thank you very much for that. For me personally, it has never been so easy and convenient to patch signature spoofing and to install µG than by your great modules.
[Android Apps and Games] chris42too:
GCM -> FCM Upgrade

Hi all,

I checked with a Freelancer on upgrading the GCM to FCM. The quote he gave me is 500€, which translates to roughly 2 days in his hourly rate.

Hence now it would be interesting, if someone is willing to contribute to this and organize this with me. I would be in with 100€.

Would be nice if you could let me know either way here or via a PM.

Pros I see here:

- We would get back a core functionality for microg

- Code will be added opensource and can be pulled into microg original repository as soon as it is available and maintained again

Cons

- Never know if it will play out like we want to, with a person that is doing it for money instead of interest on the project

- Quality assurance and further maintenance will be at question

Any other feedback is welcome of course!

Regards

Chris
[Android Apps and Games] Exabyter:
I assume this is because there is no obvious contributor with the required knowledge/expertise/time to do this? And this person has a deep experience with FCM and creates well-documented, easily supported code?

One way or the other since this is a critical feature I would be willing to contribute something to the pot.

---------- Post added at 12:19 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:17 AM ----------

This part sounds a little disturbing - are you saying the project was abandoned up until now, or ??
[Android Apps and Games] chris42too:
This person is just a Java/Android developer, completely new to me. As stated in the Cons it might lead to bad code and if anything is wrong getting bugfixes will be harder. I will try my best to set it up to get the best outcome.

But this is how it is. I would prefer a dedicated person, that is focused on this, however as such is not available this seems the only option.

The only project associated person has been very silent lately. You can check the github and there are no meaningful changes by Marvin for a year. A few minor pull requests have been added, but issues are piling up. My GCM issue is open since November and I think there are 20 others. The only bigger contributions are by Adam for the Cast API, but he is not part of the project, hence his pull requests are hanging.

Multiple forks have come up, including my own (Mainly to allow direct build with AOSP), to keep the status quo in functionality running on current systems. But new functionality like FCM is missing.

As said before in this thread, this is no accusation to Marvin. I understand that he is very busy with work. I like this project a lot, hence I try to find ways to keep it up-to-date.
[Android Apps and Games] Exabyter:
Thanks for the perspective, appreciated.

I did notice other people making a few commits on some of the UnifiedNLP backends, and even input from Mar-V-in on some those (like how to calculate the best result from a group of network location sources), but you're right that it seems very quiet otherwise. Which is particularly worrisome for a core component of Android that Google is rapidly updating, leaving what we have behind.
[Android Apps and Games] ale5000:
It is an interesting idea to speed-up FCM support.

I suggest to split up development (and payments) of this in sub-steps, so the code can be verified after every step.

I may contribute with money (well not so much) but not immediately.

Instead I'm working on other (much smaller) changes but I'm a bit busy so no ETA.

PS: I haven't got time to look at your changes but I will read and reply when I have time (hopefully soon).
[Android Apps and Games] devrruti:
Maybe use this to setup a FCM crowdfunding?

https://www.bountysource.com/teams/microg/issues

https://github.com/microg/android_packages_apps_GmsCore/issues?q=label:bounty