Hi,
I just wanted to update everyone about a new issue effecting Monitor Dot.
Please see this other post for the details:
I like the solid green idea, but the red should happen so rarely that it seems even with OCD, the flashing might be preferrable?
Another issue with a static (non-flashing) dot would be the drastic increase in the chance of screen burn-in (even on LCD displays).
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I want to make one very important point here: simply âopening your VPN appâ to check whether itâs disconnected can be misleading. On Android, the VPN might have been disconnected because the OS killed the app in the background to free up resources. If the app isnât running, opening it effectively restarts it â and once it starts, it may immediately reconnect and show âConnected.â This gives the false impression that the VPN was active the whole time, when in fact it wasnât.
I am not attempting to start an argument here, but thatâs not how paging works, paging is how memory is freed and the details are a long discussion. The OS wonât kill a running application.
While there are other reasons a process or thread can hang and no longer function it not because the OS killed it.
So what your saying can be true, that part about the OS killing a running process isnât.
Will a background app not be terminated if the OSâs memory management system determines that memory (RAM) is critically low, it may terminate less essential background tasks to free up resources? At least this is my understanding, which will evolve with added info. Not sure if the Monitor Dot is a running background process.
Thatâs actually not accurate. Android does kill processes when memory is low â itâs a fundamental part of how the OS manages limited resources.
The system ranks processes by importance (foreground, visible, service, background, cached), and when memory pressure hits, it starts killing from the bottom up.
Even foreground services, like a VPN, can be killed if resources are critically low â itâs rare, but possible.
In fact, around 30% of the code in Monitor Dot exists specifically to detect and recover from this scenario if it happens.
Official documentation backs this up:
Process Lifecycle â Android Developers
Memory Management & Low-Memory Killer â Android
So yes, the OS will absolutely kill running processes when itâs under pressure â itâs not just paging.
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There is a lot of things at work to relieve memory pressure, as you know Android is based on Linux and uses the kernels memory management code, however a full Linux system and a custom Android TV system makes this a trick thing.
Linux uses a swapping model, sort of, actually the original concept of swap hasnât been used by any modern OS for a very long time.
Android uses zRAM which kind of acts like swap, Android does use a OS process called LMK (Low Memory Killer) but not to stop user processes, it will stop OSs processes but the truth is by the time the system is that starved for memory you will likely see what appears to be hangs of the system although processes are going crazy in the background to clean up memory, most user will reboot rather than wait.
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Thank you for your reply. I am still learning but it does seem that your initial assumption is indeed inaccurate. Again, this is my understanding based on my present learning level, and if RAM is critically low, the Android OS can shut down unused, or least used, background apps in order to complete any present task. This apparently is very rare but can happen. Obviously I have more reading to do. Again thankyou for your contributions. This is what I have found while researching. So far every source has echoed the following almost to the letter.
Yes, Android has a mechanism called the Low Memory Killer (LMK) daemon that automatically manages background processes when memory is critically low. This daemon monitors memory usage and proactively terminates less essential background processes to free up resources and prevent the system from crashing or becoming unresponsive.
Hereâs how it works:
Memory Pressure Detection:
The LMK daemon constantly monitors the systemâs memory usage and detects when memory pressure is high.
Process Prioritization:
Android assigns a priority level to each running process. Less critical processes, typically those in the background, are assigned lower priorities.
Process Termination:
When memory becomes critically low, the LMK daemon identifies the lowest priority processes and terminates them, starting with the least important ones.
LRU Cache:
Background processes are also stored in a Least Recently Used (LRU) cache. When memory is low, the system may kill processes from the LRU cache based on how recently they were used, with the least recently used ones being terminated first.
Garbage Collection:
In addition to killing processes, Android also utilizes garbage collection to reclaim memory used by objects that are no longer in use within the active processes.
This automated process helps ensure that the system remains responsive and functional even under heavy memory load, preventing the user experience from being severely degraded due to memory exhaustion.
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Actually it is possible that LMK will kill a user process, there is no guarantee that it wonât so, technically it is possible.
This is pretty unique to Android. Itâs still more likely the user will reboot as the system becomes unresponsive and basically unuseable but I was wrong.
Oh I agree. Anyone who has used a multitude of diverse streaming devices should be able to tell when performance degrades and rebooting the streamer and the modem will fix that.
Update on my Monitor Dot. I got it re-downloaded on my ONN 4K Plus and added bypass VPN on SurfShark and that seems to have solved the constant âcanât updateâ issue due to SurfShark.
The only weird thing it now does is that it boots up and opens its homepage whenever I turn on the box. I use Projectivy so all I do is hit home button and it takes me to the main screen of Projectivy.
If there is a tweak to stop Dot from opening its homepage each time, please advise.
Itâs working GREAT besides that. Many thanks.
Thank you for reporting that the Bypass VPN fixes the update error issue.
I will look into the new issue of the app being displayed when you boot-up. Since this is a side-project, it may take a little time to fix it, but I promise I will.
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Many thanks. I wasnât complaining, only updating everyone. Nobody else seems to be having this issue but me.
I just got home and fired up the ONN 4K Plus, the Monitor Dot homepage pops up and at the bottom of the screen, a quick pop up (and back down) says something about waiting at least 2 seconds before checking for an update. No mention of the SurfShark update issue from before so thatâs fixed.
Again, not complaining but sharing experience so it can be the best it can be.
Is Monitor Dot supposed to check for updates every time it opens?
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The Monitor Dot works great for me. the only issue that I seem to have is that it randomly pops up, stopping what is being watched, to notify that it wants to check if there is an update available. Iâve tried to search for the update, with no success. So now I just close it and restart the program that I was watching. Itâs a bit annoying but I do really appreciate the little dot.
When you manually run the app, it will check for an update and also display the welcome screen, which I sometimes use to display a new message, like the one about the surfshark issue.
This is a known issue.
Please see the bottom of this page for a possible fix:
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Engineer, what is the latest version of the DOT? How often does an update come out? Does it always update on its own or is there a way for us to manually update? Thank you. Mine works great and I appreciate it.
The version for Amazon devices has not changed.
The only change I have done recently is create a new version specifically to be compatible on Android/Google TV devices that are running Android 14.
It will not auto-update - it will only display an âUpdateâ button when a significant version is available.
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