I mean, getting verified as a developer is a similar pain in the ass in other ecosystems. I recently got an LG smart TV and the developer mode there automatically runs out and deletes all unofficial apps after 9999h if you don’t manually go into the developer app and extend the time.
My hot take is that you shouldn’t have to claim that you’re a developer to sideload content. It should be allowed for normal users 🤷
Confirm with biometrics… WTF?!
People should have the universal right to live a cellphone-free life. In my country, it is assumed that everyone uses an iPhone or a Google Android phone as if it was part of your own self.
I’m confused by this comment. The outrage is that if you want to use your phone, in the modern smartphone sense of the word which uses apps, then you have to do so by Google’s rules which excludes a lot of apps you might want to run, or jump through ridiculous hoops apparently including biometrics to do so with your own device. That’s terrible, but, this particular outrage is quite separate to one’s ability to live a cellphone free life. I’m not going to pretend like that’s not increasingly unfeasible, but this issue with identified developers doesn’t have much to do with it since it’s only an issue for you if you’re even using a phone in the first place and then it just makes using it a much shittier time then it ought to be, it doesn’t lessen or increase the dependency upon phones in general.
It’s about control, in the end. Citizens are now linked by the governments to their phone numbers, as well as companies make it a priority to get your phone number and data.
Somewhere in the middle of not using a mobile at all and having a device that monitors everything you do, non stop, are owning a dumb phone and having some control on the apps you install in your smartphone.
They used to publish a whole book that had your name, and often address linked to your phone. B don’t perfect that this fake outrage by you is anything but disingenuous for what phones and any other hundred identifiers of you as a person to the government or anyone else. Your argument is infantile in it’s temper tantrum for it’s argument.
If you are fine with it, more power to you. You can call me whatever you want, I don’t know you and couldn’t care less. But when I see older people struggling with bank representatives demanding them to comply with ridiculous policies, well, I’ll keep myself damn angry as long as it takes.
Wouldn’t that just mean enter your lock code if you don’t have thumbprint lock enabled?
I welcome this shit as I hate having an app forced on me for every web service available. Use the web. Or another OS
When have you ever had an app that needs to be sideloaded forced on you? This isn’t going to affect any of the apps on the play store that big companies try to push you into installing.
I’m with the other guy here. Have you run in to web services that ask you to sideload apps from outside of the play store?? I hate that Google’s doing this but even I find that idea an inherently sketchy security nightmare.
Are you sure you’re not just referring to apps generally including those from the app store? Because web services redirecting you in to using their unnecessary and unwanted apps on the play store is very much still going to be happening. These new measures just make it so you can only get apps from the play store and not elsewhere.
I haven’t used Google anything since 2010. What’s your struggle lmfao
I feel like you don’t understand what we’re taking about here
Oh?
There are two options for mobile phone operating systems and now both of them restrict their users freedoms to install software as they see fit.
So you either don’t care about software freedom or don’t understand the problem.
banking.
public transport.
government anything.
…
Google banking? Google transport? Google government?
When you don’t have a real response, responding as if you’re a moron doesn’t help your point.
Is this your first day on Earth?
Those apps are all only avaible through the Google Play Store and downloading the banking app from somewhere else is likely causing serious trouble.
Name a bank without a website lmfao.
what have you used then? the only other option thats really viable as a complete daily driver solution is iphones and iOS and that has all the same issues just without pretending to be open source
Lmao you’re never going to get a genuine reply from this
good linux phones can’t come soon enough
For anyone reading this, donate to PostmarketOS if you can so we can escape google forever!
they dont ship to the us. also the mobile-focused software is still early on linux, but as long as it is daily drivable I can handle that.
Unfortunately, Sailfish OS uses a proprietary (closed source) android compatibility layer, as well as a closed source UI. They also have a CLA that contributers must sign. It’s the HA-CLA-I-ANY license, which specifically allows them a perpetual Copyright and Patent license, and to relicense your code contributions to sell or package into a closed-source proprietary app.
Personally I’d be more comfortable supporting the development of PostmarketOS instead, since it is completely open-source with no CLA, meaning no chance of any rug-pulling in the future.
Having a CLA like that just screams “Were going to monetize all of this one day” lol
Exactly, it’s like a corporate wolf in FLOSS clothing, and huge red flag.
Disclaimer: yes, SFOS is made by a (small) for-profit company. Always has been.
For the parts they have open-sourced, they implementrd a CLA that contributers must sign.
Just to clarify, this applies only to previously closed core components. Not app developers. But thanks for the info.
I love the constant comparison to PMOS, which has exactly 0 daily-driveable devices. SFOS has been usable since 2013, and honestly I don’t see a rug-pull coming up. Call me naive.
It’s a European company btw.If you’re comfortable with it being a private company that has proprietary software and utilizes a CLA for its own components, then by all means, use them.
Personally I’m at a point where I distrust any essential software that isn’t GPL licensed, as that’s the only way to ensure that it’ll always be in the community’s hands. Otherwise, we’re just hedging that Sailfish won’t someday potentially be sold to a different larger publicly traded company, and utilize the potential lock-in factor that the proprietary parts of Sailfish and the CLA’d components bring.
PMOS is certainly not in a usable state for the average person yet, which is why I suggest people donate to it so it can become more polished and support more phones.
Is it just me or do Linux phones not support 5g
I heard they cause aids too
It’s just you. I can’t really disprove a negative, but e.g. SailfishOS supports 5G.
You can’t prove a negative. You can disprove a negative simply by showing an example. Which you just did.
The new Jolla phone does support it
Still worth it for revanced!
I know I’m in the minority, but I find acceptable. I haven’t sideloaded anything in a while, but this just means waiting a week when I get a new phone. Usually it takes me longer than that to fully migrate, so it’s like a non issue.
But the main problem is if we give Google an inch they are gonna go a freaking light year.
It’s google’s platform, there’s nothing to give them. They have shown for the last 2 decades they take decisions based on money and whiny powerusers and tech reviewers are not their main concern. Downvote all you want, obviously it’s not what people want to hear, but it’s the reality.
Yeah the only thing we can do in this relationship is NOT give them our business. Which I, ironically, say as a Google pixel owner.
It’s their restaurant they get to make their food however they want and if we don’t like it we just don’t eat there.
Personally I’m looking to change os but when it comes time to replace my phone I’ll be buying European or Asian. If I can rid myself of American businesses in my life, I’ll feel much better.
Yep, I agree. However, the only other viable option is even worse. When I was younger I had time to play with Linux phones, I even dailyed two of them for over a year each. Nowadays I just don’t care that much.
Nah fuck that, I’d like to install the apps I use on day one not wait a week, most things I use come from F-Droid.
A non issue for you, but extremely annoying and privacy invasive nonetheless, you’re just fine with annoying privacy violations.
It’s not an issue for me and for 99.998% of users out there. I know it’s hard to believe on lemmy, but the average user doesn’t even know what sideloading is, let alone needing it.
Well then why make it harder and more invasive for those who do use it? You work for google or something?
To avoid scams and security problems, pr disasters if it happens, revenue loss… Same reason iOS doesn’t allow it.
Whether I work for Google or not shouldn’t matter, but glad you think that, I’ll take it as a compliment.
Graphene os is a good alternative to android. Its privacy and security focused, and also does not come with google serviced preinstalled. The only problem is that its only supported on google pixels, and porting it to other devices is impossible.
Didn’t I hear that they’re planning to release graphene on Motorola?
Really hope they’ll have an alternative to Google Wallet. One thing I’d miss.
Thats it, planned, and not yet released. But its good that at least in future there will be more options for a smartphone with foss operating system.
Also, while in practice it would propably never happen, i hope that in the future, more smartphone makers will put alternative operating systems on their phones, or at least make it easier to install third party operating systems on their phones, like it is done on googles own pixels.
Yes, that will be my next phone provided the price is decent and it has a headphone jack and everything else I need
I’m hoping for a MicroSD card slot. I’m on a Note 20 Ultra which I planned to run for far longer but it got the infamous “random green line out of nowhere” problem. I think Sony is the only one who still puts it in flagships
Shoot I also recently got the freaking green line a few weeks ago. Yeah I also refuse to have a phone without a microsd option, why TF are they doing away with that?
To sell cloud storage.
Pretty much. On a Sony Xperia 1 V and it works great (best phone I’ve ever had). Downside is that the bootlocker for the US version is locked (AT&T thing) so I can’t just put lineageos on it or something, so I’ve been on the lookout for a replacement recently, and the pickings are pretty sparse.
I’m probably gonna have to ride out the stupid Google bullshit for a few months until there is a decent alternative, as the graphene phone from Motorola probably won’t be released this year (and even then it probably won’t have a headphone jack and a micro SD card slot) and pretty much all of the Linux phones available now don’t really meet my needs (also no headphone jack on something like the jolla phone, which as someone used to Linux for years, I know Bluetooth headphones aren’t much of a solid option).
With these steps, you might as well unlock your bootloader. WTF.
De-googled Android ROMs:
- GrapheneOS
- LineageOS
- /e/ OS
- Volla OS
Non-android, non-apple smartphones:
- Pinephone
- Pinephone pro
- Librem 5
- Volla Phone 22
- Jolla Phone
- FuriPhone FLX1s
And pretty much every feature phone out there (way too many to list)
I love my Pinetime watch. Really rooting for that company.
De-googled Android ROMs:
Aren’t most of them de-googled? Usually you install gApps separately, unless that’s changed
Non-android, non-apple smartphones:
Not non-android out of the box, but just to add to your list: Ubuntu reports that nearly everything except VoLTE works on the Fairphone 4 and 5, but sadly they don’t support the 6 yet. PostMarketOS shows more issues
I would guess that most Android ROMs are OEM ones that are not degoogled (and have the added spyware of Cellular Service Providers or phone brands), I’m not familiar enough with AOSP Stock Images to make a judgment on those, and the rest that I know of—which are actively maintained and have been around long enough brand-recognition that I trust them to be non-glitchy and spyware free—comprise the above list.
If you got more suggestions, I will gladly add them to the list though.
Ubuntu reports that nearly everything except VoLTE works on the Fairphone 4 and 5
Oh snap, so is that UBPorts? I’m not sure how to classify that tbh, I might need a 3rd category that’s Linux Phone OSes that work on Android-focused phones. Actually, just looking at it rn and it looks like PostMarket claims to support over 700 devices…
FuriLabs mentioned 😲🥹
I absolutely love my FLX1s
I don’t have them, they just come up in a search for “Linux-based Phone.” Please share your experience if you have the time! People need to know what they’re getting into!
It seems reasaonable though except the one day wait, but in the end it’s still fine.
Openness was the primary reason I always stuck with android. Without that, fuck them. If I have no options I’m just gonna use Huawei.
Linux or Graphene?
Both actually
Graphene if you give a damn about security and privacy.
I say Linux.
I read Linux phobe first and got so confused.
Stolen from elsewhere:
You are not getting screwed on this. Google is just applying lube.
