[General Topics] tashev2078:
First off - I'm a hater, okay? And this topic is complete hatred against what's called 'upgrade/development' of Android OS.

Second - I don't care at all if you disagree with me. I express my personal opinion and whoever feels the same – you’re welcome! For the rest - I just disagree with you! Totally, full, absolutely disagree and insist my opinion is right from my standpoint. Also I need to express what I think as this just helps me dissipate my anger which is a lot nowadays.

I'm going start like this: something wrong happened between Android OS ver. 4.4.x and 5.0.x and on... something terribly wrong! Why? -A 100 reasons... I'll give a few:

The total change of the background color from dark to light in App Menu/Settings, most stock applications: Dialer, Messages, etc. I simply don't get it! How on earth is it possible to completely transform the outlook of a system from one spectrum of the color to the other without giving a chance to choose between just two options, making my eyes hurt facing this bright display each time I turn it on, especially at night; and -please pay attention - almost all high-end Samsung device is equipped with AMOLED Display, and everybody knows, that this type of display consume power for emitting light for every pixel light up. It is a battery killer sentence!

Basically this change does only two things:

- Hurts my eyes

- Kills the battery

Why should it be necessary to spend time on unlocking bootloader, rooting phone and installing third-party applications just to be able to change the background color of the menus? This is complete non-sense to me!!! Seriously, guys, I'm not a programmer, but as far as I know, it's just a differences from #ffffff to #000000 - should it be that damn difficult? Really?

Recent Application List - Now if you compare the two designs on 4.4.x and 5.0.x you'll notice how neat and easy is to navigate on 4.4.x and how hard it is to distinguish between apps on 5.0.x. Simply by making a space between the apps, the mind can easily separate the information and quickly choose. Making an animated rolling stack of screens on 5.0.x is really confusing and not practical for me, period.

Melting the Wi-Fi and Network Signal bars as one - there used to be a distinguishable number of bars on both Wi-Fi and Network Signal on 4.4.x. It was very easy to tell if you have 2, 3 or 4 bars coverage. On 5.0.x they are just 'more' or 'less' - total stupidity. Moreover, the Wi-Fi had two arrows under the bars, which showed whether there is Download/Upload activity - very clever, very useful! Again - no (easy) option to choose between what I am used to; what worked well for me, and what the new design is.

Battery percentage - almost invisible - on 4.4.x. there was an option to choose between Battery in Bars or as Percentage. As I have never ever in my life thought I could use Bars for this purpose, the size of the text showing the Percentage was big enough, readable and clear. Now, on the 5.0.x the text is inside the battery icon, making it so tiny, I have to gaze in the screen. And since I'm using a phone with e-ink display as secondary display, it is almost impossible to read from it, making the presence of the e-ink display practically pointless in this regard. Again - I am forced to install third party app to have a regular size text, thus giving the phone's resources away!

Trend in Stock Applications Development - beside the white backgrounds, basic Google apps like Calendar, Clock, Maps, YouTube, Chrome, Drive, Gmail and so on, are ever more heavier, complicated, less responsive, more resource-consuming, more ads-annoying.

-The Calendar is totally messed-up.

-YouTube is full of sh't.

-So is Maps - should I drive or should I response to the hundred questions I've been constantly asked, Google Maps?

-Clock/Alarm has a funny colors, disproportionally big digits – total design flaw! (I actually had to pretend to be a programmer as I did decompile of the Clock 5.2, edited the code and recompile, using Apktool 2.3.0 (credits to iBotPeaches))

-And, guess what - I still use the Calculator, but I had to install ver. 1.0.6, because I simply can't stand how the buttons are melted together on ver. 6.0.1, so the fingers don't know where is the end of one button and the beginning of the other. And the History option is omitted (ARE YOU KIDDING ME?)! Total insanity!

-Google Search bar has a persistent presence on 5.0.1, so I was forced to Destroy it using gsb destroyer within Xposed Module Repository - why should I have to do that anyway, damn it!?

-Every update of Google Play services requires more space and RAM.

-Location, Wi-Fi usage and Statistical information send to the Google Servers are ever more hidden in the background, less accessible - total control of the Giant.

The list goes on and on and on…

//Slight off-topic: I have to admit that years ago I was freaking mad on having the latest version of every piece of software I got on my computer or on my smartphone. At one point I realized it's just pointless to 'repair something that works' and it is more or less like this with the current updates. So now I don't update something which serves its function.//

I believe the following philosophy applies to any business - if you sell a product on the market, which people like and are used to, a sudden change; a complete change overnight, will let many people down. Those who used to buy your product will be disappointed and might as well reorientate their interest to another brand. Constant supply and steady quality is vital!

If we have a look in the Nature - the changes/mutations aren't happening too fast; everything evolves step-by-step! Using the successful features of the predecessors, adapting and evolving gradually.

Google has a different approach - in my opinion they shoot in random directions, regardless of what has been achieved so far; regardless of the successful features; changing everything overnight. Well, I don't like that! It simply doesn't fit my needs. And I don't understand why should I change from soothing dark background to hurtful to my eyes light.

What I embrace and need is OPTIONS! I need to be able to choose what and how I want my device to look and act like. This gives me freedom to satisfy my preferences and be happy with MY choices. But this should not come with the price of countless hours of modifying and customizing by tedious programming. I'm not a developer, I'm not intending to become one, but that doesn't mean customization shouldn't be available for me. It's simple as that!

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There's probably a lot more to share on the topic, but I feel what I've said so far is giving me some sort of relief, so I'll stop here.