On new installations, Android rebinds the power button to open up Google Assistant
Who would need to press the power button to actually turn off or restart the device, right?
The setting to change this is also pretty much buried under Settings -> Special Features -> Gestures.
(Yes, I have no idea why the Assistant is in German when the phone is set to English either 🫠)
It was annoying having to change that setting so I could shut down the phone and install GrapheneOS.
Maybe Google is learning from Samsung how they bind Bixby to the power button.
Just one big incestuous sewer orgy of anti-consumer practices!
I heard Google sent out emails to outlook customers suggesting they switch to Gmail when azure went down last week. A tongue in cheek response to edge asking folks to leave chrome.
This timeline blows.
How is this anti consumer? Just because you don't like a thing doesn't make it anti consumer.
Edited to add, everyone hated that.
Well luckily you can change this on Samsung phones. I'm assuming phones with the default bound to Google Assistant will be similar. Annoying and stupid, for sure, but at least you're not locked in. I'm sure a lot of the general population won't have the basic know-how to change it though, unfortunately.
yeah
Or Apple. It’s the same way with Siri.
It's mad that I have to search for how to turn my iPad off every bloody time.
Another in a long line of messing with user interface things on updates, without any prior warning to the user. And if you even get a changelog at all on the update prompt it's always just vague bullshit like, "Bug fixes and usability improvements," without explaining what those "improvements" are supposed to be.
In unrelated news, the last major update on my Moto G changed the incoming call screen from swipe up to answer, swipe down to reject to swipe left to answer, swipe right to reject. What is this, fucking Tinder now? And don't come at me about the "gesture" setting in the dialer app options, either. Yes, I am aware of it. The only options listed there are now "horizontal swipe" and "single tap to answer." Why any rational individual would want to inflict the hell that is the latter option on themselves is unknown to me.
This kind of horseshit is why boomers and old people are terrified of updates and drive us IT nerds up the wall by perpetually ignoring and dismissing them. Because when you change the user interface choices people are used to behind their backs and without warning, as far as they're concerned you just broke their device.
Cut it out.
The best explanation I saw several years ago: Large tech companies drive change through competing individual teams and projects. So some manager pitched a half-assed idea, somehow convinced upper management to go with it, got developers to heroically implement it, and might have gotten some bonus for doing so. It doesn't matter if there was no value as long as some decision maker thinks there is (or does not care, or numbers were fudged anyway).
It is literally change for the sake of change.
Android is getting really terrible in general, whoever they have designing the UI is not good at their jobs. The thing I hate the most is now you have to open the side menu to open your contacts in the contacts app. It's so annoying. Add several seconds to every instance of making a call.
That dialer change was evil. I have switched to Fossify Phone now and use that as a dialer. The Fossify apps are amazing, they also have a gallery and messages app, so Google's proprietary BS isn't neccessary.
Samsung just improved my user experience by removing "silent" from the available options when pressing the volume down button for notifications/ringer — now I need to open a menu to press a touchscreen button a couple times, instead of being able to quickly set my phone to silent through tactile feel without looking.
thank you so much for improving my user experience for me, Samsung, this is really what I've been missing for the past decade
i really liked that swipe up to answer too
Last update changed the phone buttons around for no reason I can discern. Not sure that's ever happened because I was shocked, never had to relearn the buttons.
Came default on pixel for me. Also can't remove or move the Google search bar.
aahh, but GrapheneOS
That's been around for a while sadly, you need an alternative launcher. I'm grandfathered into Nova but most people are moving towards Lawnchair, I think.
I use Lawnchair for that.
There's a PC program called Android Debloat, gives you a list of apps on your Android with comprehensive information about what they do, and you can blitz the shit off your phone. Tip 1: Always install a keyboard before removing Gboard. Tip 2: Removing the Google app that forces the search widget also removes Gemini usability, the news sidebar, and others. I know - what a loss
Not just new installations. It also happened on my phone when Android was updated. Thanks OP for also posting where to fix this!
you can change it
My post literally says so :D It's still a dickhead move to put the assistant in there as the default when setting up the device and hiding the option under "Gestures".
It’s all fuckin stupid shit but I love that it’s in German. That’s the icing on the cake.
I noticed that and also noticed how they swapped out the assistant for for Gemini AI bullshit that doesn't work right so you can't tell it to turn on a light or generally to do anything and have it actually do it correctly.
Every time my phone gets an update I have to go and switch that shit back. I honestly believe they're trying to get me to buy a Linux phone.
Going full in on the anticompetitive bullshit now? But why? Does Google have a deal with the orange Nazi against EU or what?
I've changed it to launch Firefox and double press to turn on/off flashlight. I have a Samsung phone
How do you turn off your phone then?
On Samsung phones, you can turn off your phone via the notification bar drop down.
That being said, I still prefer to have my power button bound to...well...power options lol.
At the top of the quick settings panel there is a power button.
On my S25U you just hold down the down volume button and the power button at the same time. That's how it came for me stick our of the box, have not touched it. I did set my power button to be one long press for my wallet app instead of Gemini tho
I don't know what everyone's on about. I'm pretty sure this is explained in the first launch tutorial. You press power and volume up at the same time.
If only they could break the bastard Bixby button instead.
I loved how at first, I was able to rebind that stupid button to anything I wanted. Then that stopped and it became only Bixby. Horrible decision - Having a button that can launch any app you want is a beautiful thing that more phones need to get behind.
Current gen of samsung phones has removed it entirely, fwiw.
Technically it opens your default assistant. Mine is set to Dicio, so it opens that. Also, it wasn't default for me, but just an option I found while exploring settings.
It seems like they haven't changed the setting retroactively for existing users, but I just reset my Nothing Phone 1 to factory settings and then it got set by default.
I just got a OneUI update to V7 on my Samsung and it remapped the power button.
why the Assistant is in German when the phone is set to English
Because Google just has no idea how to deal with multilingual people. Google Assistant's ability to understand and respond to prompts that are in either of my languages is completely unpredictable, even for the language the UI is displaying in. Another issue is that you apparently just cannot in any way control what language call screen will use to talk to a caller. Such a good feature rendered entirely useless for me because of that.
Not just new ones. Last month my mom asked for help because she could no longer turn off her phone. I checked the settings and the power button had been assigned to the assistant.
Same. On my stock Pixel it defaulted to hold the power button for assist. Which I immediately disabled and never looked back.
This was coupled with the power menu being added as a button to the notification shade.
I imagine it was in response to Apple when they switched to having the Siri button.
On the Nothing Phones is it just a press?
You should install GrapheneOS and never have to fuck with Gemini again...
I want to. Literally the only thing stopping me is !147
Since when is pressing a button a gesture.
Oh, you can change that? I thought this was just how it is now.
How do you people lock your phone if not by pushing the power button? You just put it in your pocket like that?
Double tap empty space on the home screen
That's just extra steps, cause you need to go to the home screen first. Maybe I'm misunderstanding.
Screen button, turned on in settings, under accessibility. Two taps, screen is off.
Google and languages is its own clusterfuck anyway. To this day, I don't think it properly supports using multiple languages.
First, English YouTube titles were (often badly) auto-translated to German and I found no other option to disable it but to set my entire profile's first language to English. Then it began translating German stuff into English instead.
Is it so hart to implement an option to say "I speak both English and German perfectly well, please stop trying to accommodate some primary language"?
Bonus: Technical terms being translated one way or the other, usually without awareness of the technical, semantic context that would require a specific translation (or none at all).
Anyway, that's tangential.
I agree, the forced auto-translation is really annoying. There's a browser extension called "YouTube No Translation" that fetches the original titles and descriptions from the YouTube API and replaces them.
It's ridiculous, I already need three extensions to make YouTube useable again. YouTube Row Fixer, YouTube No Translation and YouTube Enhancer. And it's still garbage in some places.
Plus SponsorBlock, but that's not a Google issue. I just can't stand hearing people say "without further ado" before "but first". Also, skipping the extra bit at the end of music videos where you get treated to five-second-bits of other songs you didn't ask for.
I currently don't have the patience and spare energy to degoogle, but I admire anyone who does.
It just asked me what it should do when I press the power button. Pretty painless, 🤷. End of the day it's just another win for GrapheneOS though.
Next step of their Always On (always spying) wet dream.
I turn off my phone every night, so I changed that back as soon as I found out.
They also messed with the navigation bar... Before, instead of having three buttons, you could have it display three lines at the bottom that you used by swiping upward. They did away with that, so now your only options are 1) the three regular buttons that are too easy to accidentally press and take up too much screen real estate, or 2) one line that is harder to use combined with a back functionality enabled by swiping from the left ir right sides of the screen. It's not only slower to use than the three lines, but it also results in accidentally going back when trying to scroll horizontally.
They could have left an option to keep the three lines, but no, they love reminding us we don't really own the devices we pay for >:|
If Samsung, install Good Lock and use the Navstar plugin to bring the functionality back.
That's what I did.
This is so cool. You showed me a whole new world
Thank you, I will definitely check those out.
It also seems I can root my phone, but I'd rather not go that route until absolutely necessary (e.g. some future update that breaks side loading).
Is that a nothing?
Yes, the Nothing Phone 1. I reset it, because I switched to a Unihertz Titan 2 now and only use it as a USB webcam. :)
Just hit it today when setting up my brother's phone. It is so stupid to do it this way.
Yes took me a while to figure this out. Was months ago after an update.
Thanks.
On xiaomi, search for "gesture shortcut" in the settings menu to get to the right option menu.
i turned it off and set it to a swipe from the bottom corners of the screen, which makes a lot more sense
Yup.
It's annoying.
That was a feature two years ago I thought, long press for the "assistant". I switched to grapheneos as soon as I got a pixel so I don't follow Google's actual releases
To be honest I like this behavior. I haven't enabled the hot word, so this is a really convenient way to launch the assistant. (It doesn't has to be the google assistant btw)
I'm more than okay with options. I'm even okay with changing the default on new phones. I'm not so okay with changing it on existing installations without giving the option to the user.
Be nice while driving since I refuse to look at a screen, let alone type on it.
I own an nothing phone too, and I had the same thing. Same thing had my dads phone, Samsung device. Everyone is doing it, it's not just nothing.
As others have said Samsung has been like this for a while so they may be copying it from there.
If its the same as Samsung, holding power + volume down should bring up the power menu.
I actually like the button being mappable to something else, gives me more options, I do think they should have the default be the old behaviour though, maybe with a popup on the first activation to tell you that you can change it.
I have mine set to Bixby so I can quickly set timers and reminders without needing the always on voice detection, double press opens camera.
More options and customisation possibilities is always better, but using it to force another peoduct is scummy :(
So the shortcut that's always been for screenshots is now for power, but only for powering it down. That makes total logical sense and isn't inane at all.
If its the same as Samsung, holding power + volume down should bring up the power menu.
On my NP1, it's Power and Volume Up. So much for consistent behaviour between different Android devices...
it's almost like they should have just gone with both volume buttons, that way it doesn't matter if one manufacturer uses volume up and volume down and the other manufacturer uses volume down and volume up
What the shit? Pressing and holding power and a volume button used to be for force shutdown. It's been that way for over a decade! Fucking hell.
I hope everyone who works for google gets turned into tadpoles by a witch
Or preferably by us pressing the power button
I hope much worse things happen to them.
And Sundar Prichai has to watch as it gets progressively worse, with him being the worst of all.