- cross-posted to:
- technews@radiation.party
- cross-posted to:
- technews@radiation.party
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We really need a compelling alternative to the Play Store, both as users and developers.
F-Droid
Yeah, I have it, but I can’t install 3/4 of the apps I use on a daily basis from there.
Wouldn’t that be the same for any other alternative? That’s what a monopoly does.
It means 3/4 of the apps you use aren’t free software which is not an issue with F-Droid.
The security model or lack of same concerns me.
That’s valid. In theory, because you’re downloading open source on there, you could audit the apps you download, but don’t know anyone who does that unless it’s their job.
My main issue is everything signed with the same key, and the way updates can go through without review.
Obviously Play store isn’t safe or wonderful, but it does have better review policies.
You can download directly from the repo with Obtainium.
That actually looks useful, particularly since github has a clearer security policy than f-droid.
In what ways do the existing alternatives fall short of compelling?
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Can you elaborate on “limited”? Surely that is what we want. One of the problems with the Play store is certainly not that it does not have a wide enough selection, but rather that it is full of harmful, hostile, dangerous, exploitive software. Any solution to that problem is necessarily going to limit (or one might prefer to say curate) its contents. That is exactly why I use F-Droid. It is limited to software that is not trying to hurt me.
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Those products that you “need” to function as professionals are never going to be available in a way that does not exploit you and put you at risk. You’re always going to be trapped with the incumbent marketplace’s shitty practices until you take steps to meet those needs in some other way.
You do not have to personally audit every application you use. After all, you DON’T audit closed applications, and neither does anyone else. At least with an application with code available under a public license, other people have the ability to review it and raise concerns. I can’t see how you can cast that as a disadvantage, just because you don’t personally want to audit the software yourself.
Personally, I’m not comfortable predicating my very livelihood on closed, commercial software that somebody else owns and leverages with the specific intention of exploiting me. That sounds like fucking madness to me.
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I guess F-Droid is limited in the sense of low user awareness? Similar to lemmy in the sense that its just not that popular atm, but maybe its gaining popularity?
Sure, but that’s not going to be helped by making something new that’s “compelling” – which is the topic at hand
I would prefer to see a wider embrace of PWAs.
This is what really, really pissed me off about the iPhone. When it launched and they gave it a desktop-class web browser engine and told people they were going all-in in PWAs (though I don’t think the term existed at the time). Then v2 came out and they went sike! native apps, must be developed on our PCs, must be distributed by us, you must pay us to be allowed to develop, we take a cut of your income, and we’re going to cripple the PWA engine to make universal, open apps all but unusable.
Dicks.
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Can PWAs perform just like native apps when it comes to smoothness and optimization?
Yes, if the underlying engine is designed to support it. There are standard web APIs for accelerated graphics, compute, offline storage, Bluetooth, push notification, environmental sensors, phone book access, camera, local storage access, and so on… A decent PWA is indistinguishable from a native app.
Is there any way of “installing” PWAs to the app drawer rather than been limited to a shortcut on the home screen?
Depends on the PWA, if they have the manifest setup properly it should give the option by itself and even the add to desktop button should change to install the app, but very few sites support it (among the ones I use)
I’d probably agree if I didn’t work as an Android developer. :-)
You can build webapps in kotlin :)
I do love Kotlin, but I work extensively with audio playback on a low level (Oboe, native) so a web app just won’t work for me.
Also, I can’t really justify rewriting my company’s entire app because I don’t like Google’s monopoly.
Accrescent is in early alpha, but it looks like it’s on its way to be a great, modern app store.
checked it out and it needs a lot of time to become a proper competitor
Aurora store worked well but google got their way recently
It still works, you just need to search for things in the browser then open the links with Aurora
I wish someone would make a companion app that handles this automatically
I’d love to do it but I have no knowledge about kotlin. However, I’m still down if someone has a solid plan
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The only hope here is that EU will force google to allow other stores.
Since when are third party apps disallowed?
We’re talking about stock android having 3rd party app store with permissions to install apps in the background. Yes, you can install f-droid but on a stock android it can’t update apps automatically. It’s not an alternative for normal users. And as long as 3rd party stores are not used by normal users app developers will not care about publishing apps there. What needs to happen is that EU needs to force google (and apple) to allow alternative stores, some heavy weights have to support it and developers need to start publishing apps there.
Ok, I see what you mean.
Droid-ify can install apps in background (or at least without the package installer popup. The main f-droid app is still targeting too low of an android version to do it.
f-droid can install app in the background on my iode OS. It’s not a technical problem, it’s a legal issue. Google and apple don’t allow 3rd app stores preinstalled on the phones.
Thats because the fdroid extension is installed. By default it cant do that. Google added the ability for app stores that target android 12 and above to update apps that also target android 12 or above without the package installer.
Probably not the first degoogled android, but maybe one of the first ‘just works’ degoogled phones Edit: yep I misread but still true
Lineage OS by default comes DeGoogled and works just fine. Both phones I ran it on had absolutely no issues. It must be more niche than I thought though because no one here is talking about it.
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The supported list of devices is a who’s who of 2015. Finding anything more modern is reminiscent of digging through XDA back in the modding day.
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At no point does the article claim it is “the first degoogled android”.
I see the confusion by op. It says privacy-first, as in privacy is its core function not a first in its class. I think they just misread the title.
I have some deeply tech unsavvy people in my life who will fuck up their phone trying to “uninstall Google” - and thus disable all their keyboards - that would probably benefit from a “just works” degoogled phone. I love GrapheneOS, but it assumes the end user is the sort of dork that is capable of installing it in the first place - people who struggle with tech deserve privacy too.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
First up, instead of the usual Google gubbins, replete with the adtech giant’s commercial trackers, /e/OS users will find a set of native open source apps and services Murena has developed to replace all that.
Murena also bakes a set of “advanced” private browsing features into the OS, including a tracker blocker; a location faking option; and the ability to hide your IP address.
On the flip side, when all the switches are set to off each one displays a one-word warning — either “Vulnerable” or “Exposed” — giving users a visible nudge to think about how their online activity might be compromising their privacy.
And this tension between locking everything down (to achieve perfect privacy) and opening select hatches (to boost utility) remains the core confounder for such an ambitious against-the-mainstream-grain tech endeavour.
The wider question is how much highly motivated demand there is to put in the small amount of extra effort required (and possibly also shell out some additional cost) to tread an alternative, less feature-rich path — if, at the end of the day, all you get for your effect is a product that won’t look or feel especially thrilling.
So its conviction of where the mobile puck is headed must be that there’s a growing pool of mainstream Android users with an appetite for iOS-style ‘low friction’ privacy delivered outside Apple’s walled ecosystem.
The original article contains 2,593 words, the summary contains 228 words. Saved 91%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Good bot!
I built that ROM back in june and honestly, i don’t recommend it, the interface and apps are just terrible and they take almost a year to release a new android version.
Do they at least provide regular security updates?
Yeah, as long as Lineage does which is better than other ROMs.
No problem then!
So basically this is ANOTHER company trying to resell Linage-s work? This is getting laughable now.
It’s just a Lineage based ROM like crDroid.
Yes, they do
Ah, well that’s the important thing. Actual new major versions are mainly just bells and whistles these days!
yes, the apps are mediocre, but there are alternatives. (Also, its the only ROM with official support for my device)
I hope more newer phones get supported by them.
I have a samsung galaxy s23 and I need to scratch my de-google / custom rom itch.
I’m pretty sure graphene os has been doing this for a while now, check them out
GrapheneOS only supports modern pixels though. LineageOS is the one with the largest compatibility with both modern and older devices.
This article really highlights all the fears I have of moving away from stock Android. I value my privacy but when I pick up my phone I want it to work, I don’t want to have to use some weird app store and another phone to get apps I need. I know Google maps sucks for privacy but it works so well, that’s obviously how they plan to keep you there, but nothing else can offer such a close experience.
I’ve actually been enjoying OsmAnd / OsmAnd+, which was recently recommended by someone here. It’s open source and runs more fluidly than Google Maps (which is locked to 60 hz). With that said, it doesn’t have live traffic built-in (and while you can add Google live traffic overlays, it doesn’t seem to get used for routing).
Sucks that the one feature that would get me to use (Android auto) is locked behind a paywall.
The fully unlocked OsmAnd+ is available via F-Droid for free (dev welcomes donations though).
Use magic earth
Checking it out!
Have been using it for a while on my Fairphone 3, just works nicely :)
Been using it on my Oneplus 6t and been liking it so far
I’m using iode which is very similar and I’m happy with it. It’s a good compromise. It doesn’t have any google apps, have some additional security and privacy protections and ‘it just works’.
Wish I could try it out but couldn’t successfully install it on my device. So I’m sticking with LOS. LOS is already good enough (if not great) as it’s stable and gets update more often.
a modified lineageOS, craaaazy innovation
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Any reason to believe Graphene pings google?
Can you expand on why? I’m not very well versed on Android OS or their firmware.
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But it does have an app store, one that functions similarly to Aurora. Also nothing is forcing you to use that cloud storage, use whichever you want!
Man they really want to try and sell iPhones here.
