The beauty of Android lies in the myriad ways it can be customized. A reliable and ready backup is a must when one wants to thoroughly utilize their Android device – whether by installing loads of apps or using custom ROMs. Titanium Backup is considered by most users to be the most comprehensive and reliable app which simplifies the process of taking apps backups and quickly restoring them when needed. Titanium Backup is unique in that it is not only capable of taking backups of individual apps, or all installed apps (including system data), SMS / MMS but it also takes complete backup of system settings as well (this requires Root access).
Google’s latest Android iteration – Android 4.4 KitKat – has been endowed with an experimental runtime, simply termed as Android Runtime (ART for short). Android is now close to being 5 years old and though almost all other aspects of it have been modified or updated till Jelly Bean 4.3, Dalvik runtime – the virtual machine which runs all apps – was more-or-less unchanged.
ART has being designed as a replacement to Dalvik. Through ART, Google aims to enhance app performance and battery life in Android. For those running Android 4.4 KitKat on their phones (or those who are rocking the Nexus 5), ART can be enabled from Settings > Developer Options > Select Runtime. Be warned though, since ART is currently labeled as ‘experimental’ by Google, third-party app compatibility is limited. Most, if not all, third-party apps are currently ill-equipped to be run with ART enabled, resulting in frequent freezes and crashes. Learn how Dalvik vs. ART impacts the user.
It comes as no surprise that Titanium Backup users, who had enabled ART, reported that the app was crashing continuously, to the point of being unusable. The developer was quick to respond and the latest update to Titanium Backup takes it to version 6.1.4.1 which essentially enables the app to run on both Dalvik and ART. Translations have also been updated. If you have not enabled automatic updates in Google Play, the update can be manually triggered from Google Play > My Apps > Titanium Backup > Update.
If you haven’t tried out Titanium Backup, you can download it from the Google Play Store (Link Below)