Accessibility service disabled upon each debug run

Question

Each time I start a new debug instance, my accessibility service resets to the disabled state.

Is there any way to keep it enabled across successive debug runs (as it is quite long & boring to enable it each time in order to debug the service)?

I have the same behavior on real device and emulators.
There is no exception in the service, I tried event with no code in the event handler.

There are suspicious lines in my logs:

10:47:32.801 31669-31669/? E/AffinityControl: AffinityControl: registerfunction enter
10:47:32.821 3650-3690/? I/ActivityManager: Force stopping com.test.testaccessibilityservice appid=10241 user=0: from pid 31669
10:47:32.821 3650-3690/? I/ActivityManager: Killing 31271:com.test.testaccessibilityservice/u0a241 (adj 1): stop com.test.testaccessibilityservice cause from pid     
10:47:32.821 3650-3690/? W/ActivityManager: Scheduling restart of crashed service com.test.testaccessibilityservice/.MyAccessibilityService in 1000ms
10:47:32.821 3650-3690/? I/ActivityManager:   Force stopping service ServiceRecord{3f5e1fc4 u0 com.test.testaccessibilityservice/.MyAccessibilityService}

So the service is force stopped and never restarted.

Notes:

• If I reboot the phone, the service is started.

• I have the same behavior with the ApiDemos sample and ClockBackService (QueryBackService too):

  18:07:15.871 3523-4251/? I/ActivityManager: Force stopping com.example.android.apis appid=10242 user=0: from pid 19382
  18:07:15.871 3523-4251/? I/ActivityManager: Killing 16542:com.example.android.apis/u0a242 (adj 1): stop com.example.android.apis cause from pid 19382
  18:07:15.871 3523-4251/? W/ActivityManager: Scheduling restart of crashed service com.example.android.apis/.accessibility.ClockBackService in 1000ms
  18:07:15.871 3523-4251/? I/ActivityManager:   Force finishing activity 3 ActivityRecord{2f907c7b u0 com.example.android.apis/.ApiDemos t8248}
  18:07:15.881 3523-4251/? I/ActivityManager:   Force finishing activity 3 ActivityRecord{190ca05c u0 com.example.android.apis/.ApiDemos t8248}
  18:07:15.881 3523-4251/? I/ActivityManager:   Force finishing activity 3 ActivityRecord{27ada6e8 u0 com.example.android.apis/.accessibility.ClockBackActivity t8248}
  18:07:15.881 3523-4251/? I/ActivityManager:   Force finishing activity 3 ActivityRecord{51f4c32 u0 com.android.settings/.Settings$AccessibilitySettingsActivity t8248}
  18:07:15.881 3523-4251/? I/ActivityManager:   Force stopping service ServiceRecord{113bf024 u0 com.example.android.apis/.accessibility.ClockBackService}
  18:07:15.891 19382-19382/? D/AndroidRuntime: Shutting down VM
  

I've tried to return START_STICKY by overriding onStartCommand without any change.

It is very closed to this old unanswered question How to debug accessibility service?, but in my case, the service appears disabled, and I do not need to stop it and start it again.

I filled out this bug report on AOSP.

Answer 1

This might go some way to explain and mitigate your problem (but not what causes your Force stop).

After Android 3.1 " the system sets FLAG_EXCLUDE_STOPPED_PACKAGES on all broadcast intents." So after 3.1 , all apps are stopped on boot. Why ?. For security reasons.

There are RULES to turn the flag off FLAG_EXCLUDE_STOPPED_PACKAGES.

(1) If the app get's a Force stop from settings OR unresponsive app button, the flag is set.

(2) Your app needs to be in Phone Storage, NOT external storage (e.g. sdcard) otherwise the flag set. The BOOT_COMPLETE is sent before external storage is mounted. So, if app is installed to external storage it won't receive BOOT_COMPLETE broadcast message.

(3) If the application has never been run, the flag is set (never is relative to current boot state ;O) NEVER means in THIS boot OR you invalidated the flag in the last boot state).

A quick way (scripted if you like) to re-enable your service after Force stop assuming BOOT_COMPLETED receiver (I'm guessing you have this, because your fine after reboot):

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.RECEIVE_BOOT_COMPLETED"

adb shell am broadcast -a android.intent.action.BOOT_COMPLETED

See launchcontrols