Madcap57

I don't think it is the truck. There have been updates on the S8 itself and other phones. It will work if you have recently opened the app on your phone or recently paired the phone. For now you could try unpairing your phone and making sure it is erased on the truck and the truck erased from the phone. After repairing see if it works again....albeit my experience has been a day or two. Also be aware that the newer android versions like to force apps to sleep to save battery power and I suspect this is causing the issues even after telling it not to monitor the applink apps.

jp2012

Thanks for the ideas, Madcap57. I'll try unpairing and repairing, but I'm skeptical. Everything used to work with no intervention on my part at all, and I haven't changed anything on the phone or on Sync. I've tried starting the linked apps on my phone just before getting in the truck, but nothing changed.

On the Sync Mobile Apps screen, the apps' real icons are no longer displayed, and opening any of them just gives a screen with the app name and a menu button. Selecting the menu button gives only one option: Exit <app name>. Another Sync 3 Apps screen tells me my apps need to be updated, but after touching the 'Update Apps' button I just get an endless spinning circle. The update never happens.

Anyway, I'll trying the unpairing and see what happens...

jp2012

So I tried unpairing and repairing the (Android) phone and the truck. No change. Sync 3 still shows the mobile apps with generic link icons, but they don't function. I also tried doing a reset on Sync 3 (power button + >seek). After powering back up there was no change. I did this with one of the apps forced off on the phone, and that app did not show up on the Sync Mobile Apps screen (as expected). After starting the app again on the phone, it showed up on Sync, but it still didn't function.

Pretty frustrating.

I guess the next step is to uninstall the associated apps completely from the phone and then reinstall to see if anything changes. I'm not very hopeful about that working, and I don't know what to try if that doesn't help.

Incidentally, re-pairing the phone with Android Auto installed is a PITA, since AA pops up with its "driving optimized" interface on the phone as soon as a BT connection is made, even though the connection still needs to be confirmed by pin # in order to make it stick... and AA makes it difficult to access anything else on the phone...

jp2012

Uninstalling the apps from my phone and reinstalling didn't change anything. I even installed the relatively useless FordPass app to see if it acted any differently with Sync, but it's the same situation. In fact, most of the time FordPass doesn't even show up on Sync as a connected app, and even with it running on the phone, after telling Sync to search for apps, Sync doesn't find it. Seems like I've run out of non-destructive things to try.

Ford's web site advises doing a master reset, which I've been avoiding because I'll then have to set up everything again. I've seen people advise pulling the Sync fuse or the battery cables as a possible fix. Does that do the same thing as a master reset?

LoneWolfTrucker

You need to disable AA in Sync settings. You can reenable later.

jp2012

I appreciate the reminder, LoneWolfTrucker. This time I remembered to do this, and re-pairing was easy as could be.

Ultimately, I bit the bullet and did the Master Reset from Sync. For anybody else experiencing the same issues (and probably for my own memory when this happens again), the Master Reset did fix the issue. I can now access all my mobile apps again. Re-setup wasn't nearly as bad as I expected. For some reason, even after a master reset the system remembered my radio presets, which was a pleasant surprise.

Husker

iTrader: (4)

I'm not geeky smart but I'd of thought ya had to start over as though it was new??

If this is the case I won't hesitate to do the master reset in the future.

jp2012

I'm sure it's a little more involved if you have factory Nav, because a Master Reset supposedly deletes your saved destinations and such. I don't have Nav, and for me it was simply re-pairing the phone, re-enabling AA, and re-entering my wifi stuff. Pretty straightforward and easy. I doubt it took more than 5 minutes for me to restore things to how they were before.

The radio has a separate fuse from the Sync system, so I suspect that those two things are not as connected as they seem to be.