src/devices/tech/admin/managed-profiles.jd

page.title=Employing Managed Profiles
@jd:body

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    <h2>In this document</h2>
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<p>A <em>managed profile</em> or <em>work profile</em> is an Android <a
href="multi-user.html">user</a> with additional special properties around
management and visual aesthetic.</p>

<p>The primary goal of a managed profile is to create a segregated and secure
space for managed data (such as corporate data) to reside. The administrator of
the profile has full control over scope, ingress, and egress of data as well as
its lifetime. These policies offer great powers and therefore fall upon the
managed profile instead of the device administrator.</p>

<ul>
  <li><strong>Creation</strong>. Managed profiles can be created by any
  application in the primary user. The user is notified of managed profile
  behaviors and policy enforcement before creation.</li>
  <li><strong>Management</strong>. Management is performed by applications that
  programmatically invoke APIs in the
  <a href="http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/admin/DevicePolicyManager.html">DevicePolicyManager</a>
  class to restrict use. Such applications are referred to as <em>profile
  owners</em> and are defined at initial profile setup. Policies unique to
  managed profile involve app restrictions, updatability, and intent behaviors.
  </li>
  <li><strong>Visual treatment</strong>. Applications, notifications, and
  widgets from the managed profile are always badged and typically made
  available inline with user interface (UI) elements from the primary user.</li>
</ul>

<h2 id=data_segregation>Data segregation</h2>
<p>Managed profiles use the following data segregation rules.</p>

<h3 id=applications>Applications</h3>

<p>Applications are scoped with their own segregated data when the same app
exists in the primary user and managed profile. Generally, applications act
independently of one another and cannot communicate directly with one another
across the profile-user boundary.</p>

<h3 id=accounts>Accounts</h3>

<p>Accounts in the managed profile are distinctly unique from the primary user.
There is no way to access credentials across the profile-user boundary. Only
apps in their respective context are able to access their respective accounts.</p>

<h3 id=intents>Intents</h3>

<p>The administrator controls whether intents are resolved in/out of managed
profile or not. Applications from the managed profile are default scoped to
stay within the managed profile exception of the Device Policy API.</p>

<h3 id=settings>Settings</h3>

<p>Enforcement of settings is generally scoped to the managed profile, with
exceptions for lockscreen and encryption settings that are still scoped
to the device and shared between the primary user and managed profile.
Otherwise, a profile owner does not have any device administrator privileges
outside the managed profile.</p>

<p>Managed profiles are implemented as a new kind of secondary user, such that:</p>

<pre>uid = 100000 * userid + appid</pre>

<p>They have separate app data like regular users:</p>

<pre>/data/user/&lt;userid&gt;</pre>

<p>The UserId is calculated for all system requests using
<code>Binder.getCallingUid()</code>, and all system state and responses are
separated by userId. You may consider instead using
<code>Binder.getCallingUserHandle</code> rather than <code>getCallingUid</code>
to avoid confusion between uid and userId.</p>

<p>The AccountManagerService maintains a separate list of accounts for each
user. The main differences between a managed profile and a regular secondary
user are as follows:</p>

<ul>
  <li>The managed profile is associated with its parent user and started
  alongside the primary user at boot time.</li>
  <li>Notifications for managed profiles are enabled by ActivityManagerService
  allowing the managed profile to share the activity stack with the primary
  user.</li>
  <li>Other shared system services include IME, A11Y services, Wi-Fi, and NFC.
  </li>
  <li>New Launcher APIs allow launchers to display badged apps and whitelisted
  widgets from the managed profile alongside apps in the primary profile without
  switching users.</li>
</ul>

<h2 id=device_administration>Device administration</h2>

<p>Android device administration includes the following types of device
administrators for enterprises:</p>

<ul>
  <li><em>Profile owner</em>. Designed for bring your own device (BYOD)
  environments</li>
  <li><em>Device Owner</em>. Designed for corp-liable environments</li>
</ul>

<p>The majority of the new device administrator APIs added for Android 5.0 are
available only to profile or device owners. Traditional device administrators
remain but are applicable to the simpler consumer-only case (e.g., find my
device).</p>

<h3 id=profile_owners>Profile owners</h3>

<p>A Device Policy Client (DPC) app typically functions as the profile owner.
The DPC app is typically provided by an enterprise mobility management (EMM)
partner, such as Google Apps Device Policy.</p>

<p>The profile owner app creates a managed profile on the device by sending the
<code>ACTION_PROVISION_MANAGED_PROFILE</code> intent. This profile is
distinguished by the appearance of badged instances of
apps, as well as personal instances. That badge, or Android device
administration icon, identifies which apps are work apps.</p>

<p>The EMM has control only over the managed profile (not personal space) with
some exceptions, such as enforcing the lock screen.</p>

<h3 id=device_owners>Device owners</h3>

<p>The device owner can be set only in an unprovisioned device:</p>

<ul>
  <li>Can be provisioned only at initial device setup</li>
  <li>Enforced disclosure always displayed in quick-settings</li>
</ul>

<p>Device owners can conduct some tasks profile owners cannot, such as:</p>

<ul>
  <li>Wipe device data</li>
  <li>Disable Wi-Fi/Bluetooth</li>
  <li>Control <code>setGlobalSetting</code></li>
  <li><code>setLockTaskPackages</code> (the ability to whitelist packages that
  can pin themselves to the foreground)</li>
  <li>Set <code>DISALLOW_MOUNT_PHYSICAL_MEDIA</code> (<code>FALSE</code> by
  default). When <code>TRUE</code>, physical media, both portable and adoptable,
  cannot be mounted.</li>
</ul>

<h3 id=dpm_api>DevicePolicyManager APIs</h3>

<p>Android 5.0 and higher offers a greatly improved DevicePolicyManager with
dozens of new APIs to support both corporate-owned and bring your own device
(BYOD) administration use cases. Examples include app restrictions, silent
installation of certificates, and cross-profile sharing intent access control.
Use the sample Device Policy Client (DPC) app
<a href="https://developer.android.com/samples/BasicManagedProfile/index.html">BasicManagedProfile.apk</a>
as a starting point. For details, refer to
<a href="https://developer.android.com/training/enterprise/work-policy-ctrl.html">Building
a Work Policy Controller</a>.</p>