It's always the same, big shocking announcement, public outcry, pushing forward with a less shocking version, public acceptance, and then rolling out the rest of the initial plan. Why do we keep falling for it?
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Good, but I still don't trust Google and I really want Linux (you know what I mean) on my next phone.
I've been eyeing Volla for a phone with Ubuntu:
https://volla.online/en/devices/
Unfortunately, not so cheap that I could just go for it for fun, so it'll have to wait until I actually need a new phone ...
That'd be nice, but Linux on phones is still a pipe dream.
AFAIK Faiphone 4/5 and OnePlus 6 are in a very good state on PostmarketOS and continually improving. I don't think it's unrealistic to say we'll have fully working devices in half a year - year with the amount of progress that's happened since the PinePhone and was boosted again by the original Google announcement.
Fairphones are probably not daily-able for now, sadly. E.g. on FP4 GPS doesn't work at all and there are issues with charging/battery reporting AFAIR. OnePlus 6 is definitely more promising ATM, but there are camera issues and you need to do a weird reflashing dance to get GPS to work. Otherwise it's... passable as a daily phone.
Battery fuel guage is almost ready for FP4 at least:
https://fosstodon.org/@z3ntu/115435804332775702
And there has been recent successes by the same guy (employed at Fairphone) on getting cameras working (main post of the thread linked above).
These are recent improvements, and I really hope they can solve the audio stability and GPS stuff so I can move. Thinking of trying out Ubuntu Touch before a mainline distro is ready.
Having no call audio on FP5 is a dealbreaker to me, but if it's only 4g/5g calls and BT audio and mic works I'll gladly use IP comms only. Need to dive a bit deeper I suppose, and the incentive will come from Google.
Isn't oneplus 6 a phone from
2018???
It's almost like technology doesn't actually need to be a conveyor belt of spending thousands of dollars on new products that turn into literal e-waste after a year or two. The money-printing treadmill for these trillion dollar corporations would be in immediate jeopardy!
Imagine! Using an old device that still works and performs all its functions perfectly! You'd have to be completely nuts!
/s
Nothing wrong with it, if you just use it for music listening/youtube/light browsing/satnav/messaging, snapdragon845 is more than enough. Consumables like batteries and back glass can be bought new from AliExpress for like $10. The screen is OLED and so prone to burn-in, but will probably last at least a few more years before cacking it completely.
Probably not good enough for modern gaming and stuff, but passable for most tasks.
I mean, you can run a Linux phone now:
Downside is that aren't going to have a large software library optimized for touchscreen use. The hardware options are pretty disappointing compared to Android. Not all hardware functionality may be supported, if it's on a repurposed Android phone. Android or iOS software is mostly designed to expect that it's on a fast/WiFi connection some of the time and on a slow/limited mobile data link some of the time and be able to act accordingly; most GNU/Linux software is not. Battery life is often not fantastic.
I still haven't been pushed over the edge, but I'm definitely keeping my eye on it. I'm just not willing to develop software for Android. I know that GNU/Linux phones will stay open. I am not at all sure that Android won't wind up locked down by Google at some point, and over the years, it's definitely shifted in the locked-down direction.
My current approach is to carry around a Linux laptop and try to shift my usage more towards using the Android phone as a tethering device for the laptop, to get Internet access everywhere. That's not always reasonable
you need to sit down to use the laptop
but the only thing that the phone really has to be used for is dealing with text messages and calls. If you really wanted to do so, as long as the laptop was on, you could run SIP to get VoIP service off the Internet from a provider of that from the laptop over the phone's data service, not even rely on the phone's calling functionality. The laptop isn't really set up to be able to idle at very low power the way a phone is, be able to wake up when a call comes in, though, so it's not really appropriate for incoming calls.
If I need to access something one-handed without sitting down, I can fall back to using the phone.
And it does have some nice benefits, like having a real keyboard, a considerably more-powerful system, a much larger library of software, a better screen and speakers, a 3.5mm headphones jack (all those phone space constraints go away on a laptop!) and so forth. You can move the phone to somewhere where its radio has good reception and just have it relay to the laptop, which isn't an option if you're using the phone itself as the computing device.
You can, though I don't, even run Android software on the laptop via Waydroid.
I don't presently use it in this role, but there's a software package, KDE Connect, that lets one interface a phone and a Linux desktop (well, laptop in this case), and do things like happily type away in text message conversations on the laptop, if one has the laptop up and running.
I'm thinking that that approach also makes it easier to shift my use to a GNU/Linux phone down the line, since mostly, all I absolutely need from a GNU/Linux phone then is to act as a tethering device, handle phone calls and texts. It's sorta the baby-steps way to move off Android, get my dependence down to the point where moving is no big deal.
I saw there is pine phone that is supposed to have Linux or it doesn't? Didn't look much into it but was thinking about trying it out.
I have a pine phone - they're super neat because linux on a phone! but... not really usable yet. Not getting texts, random bugs (they fixed the one where you could only receive calls, not make them, but that took a year or more), incredibly laggy UI even just trying to navigate,the battery life is abysmal, the battery management hardware is lacking and the software is even worse, the UIs that exist are poorly supported, basic apps are decently represented but anything not built for mobile is going to be godawful to get working (esp. through something like waydroid), the UI stabbed my puppy, the devices are so underpowered you're gonna be unable to do things like have two apps open at once or have a video playing in one tab while trying to navigate in another...
The pro phone has supposedly improved the hardware issues, but it's new and niche enough that I haven't seen much of a consens emerge (or hardly any in depth testing at all, really). Fairphone is much more usuable, still not without it's glitches but much better than the pinephones.
It's great that smart people are working on this, but I don't think we can expect hobbyists to make a useful OSS implementation of smartphones. Especially since there is so much dependence on the hardware. We either need a company that can throw some weight behind it, or just straight up governments that value it (e.g. from a sovereignty point of view).
The Linux phones that exist today (including Pine Phone) are more like early dev kits. They have really weak specs, are incredibly buggy, lack all sorts of features you'd expect, and I'm not totally sure if you can even make calls through them because phone carriers require a verified device and proprietary tech to work.
There are efforts to get things in order but these will take maybe 10 years at this rate.
I can absolutely make phone calls with both my One Plus 6T and my PinePhone.
Linux on phones or desktops suffer from one major problem as I see it, too much choice.
You make a Windows app it has to work with the latest couple versions, same with Mac.
Make one for Linux and you have to test it against dozens of popular distros, package it in multiple ways, and hope the dependencies are gonna match.
It's an awesome system for IT people and server admins, but for the end user, ehhh... That seems to be the problem things like snap and flat packs are aimed at fixing, which could transition to phones but first you gotta herd the cats into an agreed state.
Why would multiple distros be a factor? A Linux phone would be its own unique distro.
The issue is device firmware. The OS has to fit the phone, not vice versa.
In itself true, but if you have several competing distros then you run into the problem of attracting developers to the platform if none have a solid market share. It's a bit of a chicken and egg thing, if a platform doesn't have a sizable user base it's hard to attract developers and it's hard to get a user base without readily available apps.
You don't have that many competing distros in mobile linux.
That's not good enough. They're just going to keep lightly pushing against the bad publicity until everything not controlled by Google on your phone goes away.
We need an alternative made without googles shitty hands in the mix. This forced duopoly between Apple and Google sucks. No phone competition in the US also sucks. Overpriced Samsung or a Google phone, while companies Like Red Magic have fan and liquid cooled phones with huge batteries, more ram, and more storage, for less than a grand being sold around the rest of the world outside the US.
Stop it. You're reminding me why I want to move my family out of the US. Its not just phones, everything is a facade here.
Oneplus had great success but then enshittified. Raised prices to match Samsung and Google, outsourced support to some place that didn't sound like they were even in the same dimension as any English speakers and took away their ability to help customers even by accident and finally quality of their phones went to shit.
They could've sucked the Chinese government subsidy tit for another few years and would've established themselves as legit competition, but that would only delay inevitable enshittification by a few years.
They're a descent phone right now with their OnePlus 15. Huge battery, good and bright screen, top of the line processing and 16GB of the fastest ram you can get in a phone, and less than $1,000.
My issues with it are that their potential unlocking and rooting is a bit up in the air, and that they only offer up to a 512GB with no SD card.
I'd buy a damned Red Magic 11 pro if they didn't block root and supported band 71.
Nah, I'm not doing back to OP. I hate to say it, but If you're going to use android, nothing beats pixels. Not even close.
If GrapheneOS manages to actually work with a decent hardware maker to get a phone to the market, I'll get that next, but only if Android auto and banking apps work. Phone's useless to me without those.
Only reason I'd give those up is if I can get another Linux phone as polished as Nokia N9. Still the best phone I've ever owned.
Not a popular opinion, but if those two options are unavailable, I'd rather switch to iPhone than use a non pixel android.
It's looking like pixel may be planning on locking down root access as well, soon. Really, pixel has never done anything very great. No SD card, ok, screen, ok apu, pretty good cameras, meh battery, and meh storage and ram. Never anything special. Sony phones had potential but they're always priced high and their software support sucks. I wish LG had kept making phones
I completely agree, but despite OP or Samsung looking better on paper, overall experience is just so much smoother. Shit just works. And at some point I began to value that over specs.
Just for some perspective, I'm basing what I'm saying on OP 3T, 5T and 8Pro, Samsung S21 and Pixel 8 pro and currently 9 pro fold.
We need an alternative made without googles shitty hands in the mix. This forced duopoly between Apple and Google sucks.
That goes for MS and Apple on the desktop too, and allegedly Google is trying to enter that space as well for the umpteenth time.
At least as far as PCs are concerned, they're still unlocked at the bootloader level, despite MS' attempts to lock that down, and there's nothing stopping you from installing Linux or BSD on your PC still. Mobile devices outside a handful which aren't locked down, unfortunately don't have that luxury.
So I just read what they are going to do and this article is just clickbait. Basically they still want you to dox yourself but it'll still work like iOS Test Pilot. Google is still full of shit and lies but hey at least you don't have to pay them money until enough users download your app if you want more.
So it'll basically still kill apps like F-Droid or you downloading an app from the internet to run on your phone. You'll basically have to signup to install third party apps on your device per app in general and alot of the convenience and developer community will still just leave android as a whole.
All in all really bad decision on Google's part while also extending this to things like fireOS or whatever the fuck the Quest 2 and 3 will run as a skin of android. This will make sure they would be forever stuck on older versions of android; lest they have to contend with the new upcoming android features that will enforce this that will be baked into the operating system next year. Even without Google Play Services like I read.
Personally I don't think developers should have to sign up to Google and provide ID cards to basically have a limited amount of users use their specific app outside the app store.
Google obviously is feeling threatened by better apps that more people are using on platforms like F-Droid compared the outright subscription based shitware and adware on the playstore. Which is why they are doing this. But like platforms before like inturn Symbian. I personally think it'll fuck them over so hard that'll they'll never recover while China or whomever else makes a new platform for you to run android apps on for a time before going all proprietary fucked up Linux. Just like Android again.
They'll probably also release a new API to allow apps to check if user have enabled sideloading. Then overzealous apps like fucking mcdonalds will throw a hissy fit about it and refuse to work unless you turn it off. Also your bank too, just to really make it as hard as possible to include sideloaded apps. Sideloading will remain available, but so painful, most people just give up.
Just recently mcdonalds app stopped working when installed in a secondary profile. Long history of them trying to detect root hiding methods too. Fuck them. Once this sideload block thing arrives, mcdonalds would be the first to block it.
Let em all shut me down. If they don't need my business, I don't need theirs. I just found out that Casio makes a g-shock with Bluetooth and you can screw with it using python and an unlisted API.
One more nail in the coffin for my smartphone footprint. I just want an 8" linux tablet, a watch that can give me messages from signal and a battery powered access point.
The biggest problem are the banking apps. If you're standing at checkout and your payment app says
"Unverified apps have been detected on your phone. Please uninstall and try again."
99% of people will delete FDroid and never sideload anything ever again.
Please tell me there is a video about this that is not on youtube.
To be honest, it's probably the last thing that doesn't exist properly on YouTube.
But like 99.999% of everything else, it's not on peertube either.
If you hit a Google search, there are probably a handful of projects for Bluetooth, Casio, Python.
There are a bunch of videos of people reviewing the watch, but they're watch reviewers. Other than the Android or iOS app, they hardly touch that it supports anything.
You know it's kinda funny that I can't even run the MC Donalds app without doing some fuckery. But my banking app will throw a hissy fit if I try to sign into my account without a rooted or custom ROMed phone because that's how they know it's me apparently. Also shame that my banking app stopped supporting Android 8.0 a few years back. I miss my LG V20.
Why the fuck would a McDonald's app care?
Who knows. Maybe they have that one dev on the app team that's on a crusade to detect every single abnormality.
He might also be following the rooting/magisk scene. Back then whenever magisk updates its root hiding system and successfully bypasses apps, mcdonalds are the first to detect it again. He's so fast that back when I was still using a rooted phone, I've never successfully bought a meal with the app.
Now they're blocking work profiles on non-rooted phones, which is a native android feature and not a security risk. But they're still blocking it anyway because it's slightly abnormal lol.
Google also extending this to things like fireOS
it would not, because fireos was based on ancient versions of android like android 11 or earlier, and the block is enforced via google play services which isn't present on there.
but new fireos doesn't run android apps at all. New devices temporarily run android apps on a VM hosted on AWS servers and then stream the video, but only if those apps are distributed on the amazon appstore, and it's a stopgap until the devs make their apps compatible with the new OS.
And old fireos devices will start to gradually uninstall "dangerous" sideloaded apks
You'll basically have to signup to install third party apps on your device per app in general and alot of the convenience and developer community will still just leave android as a whole.
Leave android and go where?
Degoogle now before they install their malware on your device(s).
If you can get your hands on a pixel, get grapheneOS. If not, get LineageOS or degoogle your phone. With LineageOS you'll have to make do with internet banking instead of banking apps.
This is what I'm struggling with. I use an app-only challenger bank, so I feel a bit stuck unless I change everything...
Well some thing is going to change no matter your struggles. :(
So true. I'm loathed to lose the interest rate, but needs must when the devil drives, and boy is he driving right now.
I had one bank like that but when I called them they were able to disable the app challenge and use text/email instead. The catch was that if I ever opened the app again it was re-enabled.
It's literally ONLY got an app. No web, no branches. They've become quite common and popular in the UK (like Revolut).
Eh I don't think that's an actual bank. There's a lot of unregulated banking adjacent entities that are popping up without regulations or government backed security. Be careful when putting your money in any of these.
Nope, it is FCA/Prudential registered bank. These fintech solutions are very common in the UK.
I've discovered I can access my account online, but cannot send money from there (Zopa).
Monzo and Revolut now have some barebones web implimentation (over a decade after launched).
Atom has no web access at all.
Chase UK doesn't have web access as far as I can tell.
All of the above are registered banks.
That's crazy to me. I only use my local bank at their physical location. I feel like the fact that they exist in close proximity to their customers who can put hands on them gives them a little extra incentive to not do corrupt bullshit.
My joint account with my partner is with a local building society, but branches are shutting left and right in the UK...
I have and continue to move around a lot. Many banks don't have physical locations outside of their region. I continue to bank with them though if they're good otherwise.
Aren't there challenger banks that have website interfaces?
Not to be that kind of guy, and I upvoted your comment, but isn't it 'make due'? I might be wrong, however.
I'm glad banks around these parts don't require an app to function.
Google: “Based on this feedback and our ongoing conversations with the community, we are building a new advanced flow that allows experienced users to accept the risks of installing software that isn’t verified.
I've been side loading apks since I bought my first Android phones and am much more concerned about malware "safe" apps from Google's Play store. Google's quality control is shit.
Yes. I wonder how many people unknowingly updated Simple Mobile Tools apps after the new owner's buy-in.
Quality control is not the words. They are unethical garbage pieces of shit who make the world a worse place. These big companies buy smaller ones just so they have the good devs and no competition. Then they make everything in the market insufferable as fuck.
No freaking way this was because of "feedback". This was because the European Commission will keep escalating their fines if Google keeps at it with the monopoly bullshit.
Quite some time ago, the messaging I was getting from Microsoft was that Windows 10 security updates were going to end this year. I didn't really keep up with the news on that front, but I did notice that there was some kind of law suit in the EU that from what I recall basically came down to the fact that MS would have to continue to provide security updates to Win 10 free of charge for EU users.
Literally within the last week, a buddy of mine asked me to look at his computer and see if I could upgrade it to Win 10. I could not, as it doesn't have a supported processor. But what I noticed is that MS now offers the option to extend security updates until 2026 with the click of a button.
So, thanks EU folks! Already knew ya'll were awesome, but I assume this change of heart from Microsoft was a result of that suit. I appreciate it.
The EU is just a bit behind being maliciously lobbied to death (eyeroll).
(See Digital Omnibus Act)
Users only need to eat half of a shit sandwich!
This is less terrible news, not good news.
Don't consider this a win, guys, this is more of an 'Oh shit, we're screwed if we follow through with this right now' moment, there's nothing stopping them from walking this back at a later, less turbulent date when no one's paying attention, and locking Android down anyways, as this directly reminds me of the situation which caused WEI to be scrapped.
Also, the EU pushing Chat Control through the back door might embolden Google to both try an Android lockdown just like was going to roll out before, and try WEI again, and get both actually pushed through somehow.
I wouldn't even be surprised if MS were emboldened to try to lock down PCs... Again....
I mean, sure, but there was never anything stopping them from doing this in the first place except public pressure. Large companies changing tracks due to public demand is a good thing, and definitely a win.
I think its better to simply realize that a win doesn't mean the fight is over. It's okay to be happy about a success. Just don't let up on the pressure.
Straight from the playbook. Announce something terrible, then back off with something bad. Everyone calls it a win.
See: Wizards if the Coast, Unity
And 5 years they'll try it again.
Do terrible thing A to test the sentiment, probe the reaction, backpedal a bit, admit caveats and facilitate pre-planned option B, try again after a few days and gocus on it died down.
At one point we'll need diff monitoring on the TOC and all other legal imprints :|
Easing is not removing.
Anything more than a warning and disclaimer popup is too much.
I'm OK with jumping through more hoops – once.
Once I told the device that I know what I'm doing, it shouldn't be more than a pop-up per install.
Uh-huh, sure, just about protecting the users. Nevermind that actual malware is regularly found on play store, and exactly 0 times -- on f-droid they're "protecting" the users from.
Check your sources, we have had issues on F-Droid. Better than google play store though, because the average F-doid user is more tech savvy than the average GPlay user.
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