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Ask HN: Android or iOS for a Linux and FOSS user in 2024?

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Re: Ask HN: Android or iOS for a Linux and FOSS user in 2024?

#11

Post by al_borland »

I’ve been an iPhone user since day 1 and have been happy with it. Any time I look at Android it feels like managing my phone would need to become a hobby, which I don’t want.

On the iPhone…

- The built in camera app is pretty good. If you don’t want to use Apple to store your photos, there are likely options that can upload them where you want… or plug it into a computer and copy them off like a camera.

- GPS, the usual suspects are there for maps or other GPS needs.

- Web. All browsers use WebKit on the backend (for now), but then if you have a particular browser of choice to sync bookmarks and things, it’s probably there. I did this with Firefox for a while, and it worked fine.

- RSS. NetNewsWire is open source and has been around forever. It’s what I use.

- Chat, again, it’s all there, plus iMessage, which is not available elsewhere. And RCS is coming later this year, which should make things better between iOS and Android, instead of SMS.

Re: Ask HN: Android or iOS for a Linux and FOSS user in 2024?

#14

Post by ActorNightly »

>Because I'm fed up with changing smartphone for the sole reason that there are no more software updates!

There are android phones out there (namely Samsung and Google) that have long time span security updates. S24 for example should be updated for 7 years, which is about the same time as any Apple Phone

Even then, this is a very very niche thing to be concerned about. The vast majority of security "flaws" require an insane amount of frontload work to exploit to the point if you are ever hit with one of those, you are most likely are targeted by a government agency.

Re: Ask HN: Android or iOS for a Linux and FOSS user in 2024?

#15

Post by runjake »

I don't have a good answer for you, but I am dogfooding both.

One thing I've noticed is that, paradoxically, Google apps tend to be more polished and reliable on iOS, rather than it's own Android platform. It's as if those app developers care more about the iOS versions. That kind of leaves a sour taste.

Re: Ask HN: Android or iOS for a Linux and FOSS user in 2024?

#16

Post by meiraleal »

nextos wrote: post #8

I think for a FOSS user 2 options are worth considering. Option 1, get a Pixel, wipe it up and install GrapheneOS. Then try to live on applications from the F-Droid ecosystem. If a Pixel is too expensive, look into ROMs that support other devices, like CalyxOS. Option 2, get a Sony or any other device supported by Sailfish OS. Use native applications, but whenever needed you can always fall back to F-Droid or Google…

any cellphone that runs sailfish and still available to buy?

Re: Ask HN: Android or iOS for a Linux and FOSS user in 2024?

#17

Post by nextos »

meiraleal wrote: post #16
nextos wrote: post #8

I think for a FOSS user 2 options are worth considering. Option 1, get a Pixel, wipe it up and install GrapheneOS. Then try to live on applications from the F-Droid ecosystem. If a Pixel is too expensive, look into ROMs that support other devices, like CalyxOS. Option 2, get a Sony or any other device supported by Sailfish OS. Use native applications, but whenever needed you can always fall back to F-Droid or Google…

any cellphone that runs sailfish and still available to buy?

Jolla is releasing a new official device: https://shop.jolla.com/details/91eb91d3-c3de-41d0-b3c0-7075a...

A few Sony Xperia are officially supported, e.g. 10 III: https://docs.sailfishos.org/Support/Supported_Devices

Community ports are also available for some devices, Volla is quite popular in this category:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailfish_OS#Community_enthusia...

https://forum.sailfishos.org/t/community-hardware-adaptation...

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