Fine grained permissions do exist, your phone is simply not being updated to that version.
You can update permissions on types of notifications, location, storage, contacts etc. all independently of each other. O is great for that and I assume P will only be better.
There is not fine grained permissions. There is something that is better than it used to be, but fine grained is not what I'd call it. For instance, I believe the following should be possible for photos alone.
* Give an app access to only save, not read my photos
* Give an app ability to read one specific photo (think upload a photo to facebook)
* Take pictures without always having access to the camera.
This is actually untrue for about half of all Android users. Being able to granularly adjust permissions is fairly new, and of course, if you aren't buying the latest phone every year, it'll be a long time until you get this.
Older, incompatible apps still default to asking for permissions at install time. There are two problems with this - first, I suspect most folks won't know that you can go back and turn those off. That's a relatively new feature, and not really something people will explore on their own.
. Second - if it's an app you already installed that has required new permissions, that app can run (via BroadcastReceiver) when it is updated and before you have a chance to alter the fine-grained permissions.
Separately, the interface for managing fine-grained permissions in Android is weird. You get most of them in one place, but then it seems you have to check a couple of other places for 'special' permissions?
edit: never mind this - it seems like the old version is the one that will get notified, and the permission change only applied ot the new one.
Unfortunately we can't do fine grained permissions like that on any common smart phone OS. You'll have to either take their word for it, or decompile the app and make sure they are telling the truth.
The original poster asked about _fine-grained permissions_. Not about _runtime permissions_. Details matter.
Android did have very fine-grained permissions since first betas. Yes, they were install-time - a policy was generated at install time by the system, and the app itself was unable to change anything about it. Technically, it was a nice system, but users didn't understand that, they were asking for simplified model from iOS, so they got it in Android's 6.0 _runtime permissions_.
In the end, neither of these system (or: original Android did have it, but the simplified 6.0+ doesn't) has the most important permission: can an app talk to the network?
I think this highlights more of a fundamental problem with android's system for updating permissions. lots of the permissions that apps have to request permission for, they will only use a small part of.
What about on iOS with fine-grained permissions? Messenger works just fine for me. I've revoked everything except background updates to get notifications.
When will these fine-grained permissions come to Android?
Looks like no fine-grained control of app permissions, either dynamic/on-demand or manual. This approach (all or nothing) is one major issue that cripples Android usability for me. :(
That was long a differentiating factor between iOS and Android: Android's permissions were granted at install, iOS asked for each one individually, allowing much greater control.
But, I thought that was changing. Is Android not moving to the more granular model?
I just checked the iOS version, and it requires none of those permissions. The only ones I have noticed were access to use cellular data + background app refresh. No contacts access, no location access, nothing. I guess the devs must have just went all out on the Android version.
You can update permissions on types of notifications, location, storage, contacts etc. all independently of each other. O is great for that and I assume P will only be better.
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