I lost a draft post in Voyager on Android while I was a few apps away doing research and looking for a photo to add to the post.

That brought to me an understanding that Android will just kill apps for memory purposes.

Then I thought back to Windows 98 and how it had a page file that would write RAM information to the hard disk and use it as RAM. It was slow af, but it worked.

So I’m wondering: it’s 2026; why is Android just killing apps instead of writing them to a much faster drive for recall when needed?

  • schipelblorp@sh.itjust.worksOP
    2·
    2 days ago

    The one time I did lose my draft, I couldn’t get it back. There’s no setting for memory on Android on Voyager.

    So you’re saying there is a swap file (I’m on a cheapier Samsung Tablet A right now), but even that’s too small to hold much memory. I know in Windows you could set the size of the swap file; honestly, I’d much rather wait an extra second to get the program back into RAM than lose a draft, so I think there really must be a good technical reason it’s not happening.

    • unitedwithme@lemmy.today
      1·
      2 days ago

      Idk the Samsung tablet. And yeah it might be device dependent, too. I guess I didn’t think of that being the case.

      • schipelblorp@sh.itjust.worksOP
        1·
        2 days ago

        I’m guessing it’s more a matter of having a cheaper product with less RAM than it is about the manufacturer. I’m guessing the behavior is standard across all Android devices.