Auto detect

Jacob L

Moderator (Lawsonator)
I have a feeling most of the errors in the forum could be solved by MacroDroid auto detecting configuration. For example, root vs no root, helper vs no helper (shell script action), assistant/ADB/root for the airplane mode action, mobile data method. If these were auto detected then these would require less configuration or debugging when moving between devices.
 

Endercraft

Moderator (& bug finder :D)
I have a feeling most of the errors in the forum could be solved by MacroDroid auto detecting configuration. For example, root vs no root, helper vs no helper (shell script action), assistant/ADB/root for the airplane mode action, mobile data method. If these were auto detected then these would require less configuration or debugging when moving between devices.
And with ADB hack change automatically if something is not correctly set.
 

FrameXX

Well-known member
There are already features in MacroDroid that are trying to warn users about misconfiguration like actions becoming pink when they are not setted up right or warnings in troubleshooting section or errors in system log.

MacroDroid automatically fixing stuff for dumb users in macro run-time sounds great but it can lead to further confusion. Yes it can! For example an user downloads a macro that has a shell script action that is setted up to use MD Helper. The user doesn't have MD Helper installed and so MacroDroid automatically doesn't use it and the output is different and the user doesn't have a clue what is happening and doesn't understand why the output is what it is.

What I want to point out that MD doing stuff automatically in behind, by what it thinks is best for the user makes it behave unexpectedly and can make the output different on every device. Then when you are creating a macro there's no way you can predict how MacroDroid will react on different device, because the device is configured differently and MacroDroid has different permissions.

What MacroDroid could do is to warn the user that MD Helper is not installed on the device althoght the action is setted up to use it or generally warn the user that MacroDroid is missing the permission the action is setted up to use, which I think MacroDroid already does.

This of course can sometimes make it harder for the macro creator to handle all these different permission setups rarther than MD doing it automatically for you, but it gives you more freedom and you know more precisely what will the outputs be like.
 
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MacroDroidDev

Administrator
Staff member
I certainly have done a lot over the years to try and detect configuration problems, missing permissions etc. The troubleshooting section will identify a lot of issues and list them clearly usually with a route to fix. Also there are various highlights in the macro edit screen that should indicate when things need fixing.

No doubt there is more than can be done and many things I have missed, so I welcome specific examples of common problems that are not currently flagged.
 

Endercraft

Moderator (& bug finder :D)
I certainly have done a lot over the years to try and detect configuration problems, missing permissions etc. The troubleshooting section will identify a lot of issues and list them clearly usually with a route to fix. Also there are various highlights in the macro edit screen that should indicate when things need fixing.

No doubt there is more than can be done and many things I have missed, so I welcome specific examples of common problems that are not currently flagged.
Maybe you can warn users in the app to go look at that section before coming to the forum ?
 

Jacob L

Moderator (Lawsonator)
Airplane mode. MacroDroid can tell it's not assistant, so instead of throwing an error, it could use the ADB hack method as a fallback.

Or

Shell script action: it knows if it's a rooted device or not and know the helper installed or not so it should be able to perform its action and detect errors and try another method without user interaction. So it fails without the helper, then use the helper method or it tries to get root and fails, try no root. Again without users needing to tick options - it will help with portability between devices
 

FrameXX

Well-known member
So it fails without the helper

How exactly you think MD should recognise that shell script failed? Sometimes the shell will output Error while accessing..., other times Permission denied or it won't return a thing. Should MD search for some keywords in output? And what if these keywords were in output not because of a failed shell script action?

I know I am overly pessimistic, but I am just mentioning possible problems that I thing should be mentioned.
 
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