Windows 10: What is App Connector...?

Windows 10 Settings have this mysterious item.

What does the App Connector do and why does it need access to my location, camera, etc....?


Thanks,
BBDS

:)

 

Apps not closing, still running in background

Thanks for the response. I am not looking for a "close all" function. Sometimes I intentionally want to leave an app running. In windows phone 8.1, I could exit and close th app by merely selecting the arrow/back button, I am looking for that same functionality.
When I'm in an app, I want to be able to exit directly from there and not have it continuing in the background.

 

Apps not closing, still running in background

I just got my Lumia 950 phone. On my prior Windows phone, when I pressed the arrow/back button on the bottom left screen, I would exit the app. On Windows 10 phone, I've been doing that and I just realized I'm not exiting the apps. I had intentionally not
exited an app (because it had my boarding pass). Instead of back button, I pressed the middle window button. Later when I went back to call up my airline app, I pressed the arrow/back button and held it. Similar to my old windows phone, it showed me all the
apps that were open. SURPRISE! unlike my previous phone, no app had been closing. Right now, I can't seem to find a "one click" way to exit an app. The only way is after I've done a few things, I hold the back button and click the "X" on each of the open items.

Can someone tell me how to exit an app with one click or swipe so that it is not still running, i.e. when I press the back button I will not see it? I'm sure this is something simple. I search the instructions that came with the phone and looked in the
forum but haven't found the answer.

thanks in advance the assist.

 

Have a look at this article. It won't answer your question though.

Source
exceprt :
Microsoft allows you to uninstall App Connector, which seems to support the idea that it doesn’t do anything super important. If uninstalling this app caused problems with Windows 10, Microsoft wouldn’t let you do it so easily.

 

More for you to read if you have the time....................

http://superuser.com/questions/10032...-want-need-acc

There are many more if you google for it. But, seriously, nobody seems to have an answer, at least not an answer that everyone can understand.

 

There doesn't seem to be an official definition from MS on the App Connector.

Here's my educated guess (and there are lots of them out there *Wink)

This seems to be a canonical UWP App that enables 3rd party Apps to access various pieces of a system.
Call it a bridge, call it an API
... but it's an App that provides services other Apps

A few things have happened with Windows 10.
The Store (MS wants more developers writing Windows Apps)
Visual Studio (Makes it easier to write Apps for different Hardware and port code to run on Windows)
Android app porting (see 1 & 2)
and there's this: Windows App Studio | Microsoft

I exorcise the UWP Apps desktop/laptop machines - at least until they become more robust and feature rich.

 

Thank you Slartybart,

I am just a regular PC user, not a developer.
Web, Skype, FB chat, some light gaming, some light photo/video editing.
Can you give a simple example of how you think this App Connector impacts my PC activity.....?
Do I even need it.....?

-BBDS

 

As far as I myself is concerned, as a regular user, I wouldn't give that feature a second thought.

 

Right, you might not be a developer but at some point you might use a 3rd party UWP App.

The UWP Skype App needs access to your camera and your microphone ... while not a 3rd party App, Skype might not have access to those without App Connector - not sure, just an example.

The Google App (Ok Google) needs to access your microphone.

Instead of everyone writing their own access, getting permissions, etc, their Apps ask the App Connector to service their requests.

This approach is nothing new to Android users, when an Android App gets installed, it lists the permissions it requires. You either accept them or cancel the install. Most people accept and install the App. MS might be trying to get past that one install step by granting the permissions to the App Connector. The permissions are listed on the App page in the Store - nothing nefarious, just eliminating a step.

Keep in mind - this is all conjecture on my part - no hard evidence did I find *Wink

 

Thank you Slartybart.

I will keep the App Connector and allow it access my Camera, Mic, etc..


-BBDS