Android app force close

[sanjitchak]

Describe the issue
Android force closing every few seconds, after running in the background for an hour.

To Reproduce or Feature details
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Open the app
2. Keep it on the background
3. Keep doing other stuffs on your phone like browsing web.
4. See error

Expected behavior
No force close

Screenshots

**Smartphone (please complete as much of the following information as possible):
Device: Asus max pro m1
OS: Android 9

Additional context
Maybe add a log collector in the app.

[chirag-jn]

Stacktrace file

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nToecy7L3JVP7pjjQqD-bGw-i5zEULtn/view?usp=drivesdk

[chirag-jn]

The issue seems to exist with the UploadService which keeps on forcing the app to restart even after it crashes. @Akash-Ramjyothi

[chirag-jn]

@cpg Suggestion Needed.
Starting Android Oreo (v8) Android implemented a lot of restrictions on Background services, hence, any service remaining in the background gets suspended automatically, hence the app crashes as the service converts to a Null reference.
https://medium.com/exploring-android/exploring-background-execution-limits-on-android-oreo-ab384762a66c

Can we instead move the task of uploading files to a foreground service? That's a small and easy fix. To continue uploading files in the background, we can use a notification to show that files are uploading (a common scenario in other popular apps like Whatsapp too)

[cpg]

Your proposal sounds like a good approach.

[chirag-jn]

Relevant discussion: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/46445265/android-8-0-java-lang-illegalstateexception-not-allowed-to-start-service-inten

[chirag-jn]

Changing startService() to this

if(Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.O) {
    startForegroundService(intent);
} else {
    startService(intent);
}

It does solve the issue but it lands us in another issue:
android.app.RemoteServiceException: Context.startForegroundService() did not then call Service.startForeground()
This is something specific which was introduced after Android 8 and it is a pretty common issue:

https://medium.com/pongploydev/why-start-the-service-on-android-o-and-encounter-a-problem-record-context-startforegroundservice-3c8ddd8969ef

[chirag-jn]

This issue doesn't exist in Android 7 and below.