Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Android P

blog.google

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 316 posts

Re: Android P

#111

Post by smilekzs »

angry_octet wrote: post #51

Lots of slick UI stuff, but no meaningful updates to things that are well overdue: - Encryption of specific secrets for each app. - Fine grained control of what information is shared with apps. - Ability to selectively deny particular data (and have the app keep working, e.g by giving it an empty contacts list, fake phone ID, etc). - Ad and js blocking capable browser. Why should installing e.g. the facebook app, all…

Denying / delivering fake data is #1 on my wishlist. Wechat (and pretty much all apps from China) needs to have absolutely minimum permissions. Currently I have to put them on a separate phone...

Re: Android P

#112

Post by dgudkov »

Machine learning in smartphones is all great and cool, but when can we get easy "undo" in text editor? Really.

Re: Android P

#113

Post by lern_too_spel »

kuschku wrote: post #110
lern_too_spel wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Pixel 2 is not an AOSP device, just like the Galaxy 8 is not an AOSP device. Why would you think you get the source for all the third party apps? > Im the days of the G1, the actual Google Talk and Google Search apps were open, the Google Books app was open too! Those apps as they were are still open (the Google Talk app was/is actually a multiprotocol messenger), though I don't remember a Google Books in AOSP. E…

Because the G1 was an AOSP device, and so was the Nexus One, and so was the Nexus S. I was barely in middle school when the G1 came out, I saw Android morph from the promised solution as entirely open source platform to what we have today, where the platform and base apps are all proprietary.

No, none of those were AOSP devices either. They all included Android Market and Gmail, as the most obvious examples.

The platform remains entirely open. That's how Chinese people are able to use Android even though Google does not do business there. You confuse the platform with the apps and services that run on it.

Re: Android P

#114

Post by taneq »

airlocksoftware wrote: post #96
angry_octet wrote: post #51

Lots of slick UI stuff, but no meaningful updates to things that are well overdue: - Encryption of specific secrets for each app. - Fine grained control of what information is shared with apps. - Ability to selectively deny particular data (and have the app keep working, e.g by giving it an empty contacts list, fake phone ID, etc). - Ad and js blocking capable browser. Why should installing e.g. the facebook app, all…

Location tracking requires specific permission from the user, not as part of installation. I think you're a bit out of date. https://developer.android.com/distribute/best-practices/deve...

And this is a perfect example of the bait-and-switch: Location now goes through Google's location services, so you're not saying "FindMyKeysApp may use my GPS location", you're saying "FindMyKeysApp AND GOOGLE may use my GPS location."

For most apps (unless I'm wrong?) there's no way to let the app use my location without it going through Google's location services and sending data back to the Borg Cube.

Re: Android P

#115

Post by djajshgsjja »

mintplant wrote: post #92
rtpg wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know, I'm pretty sure anyone could have built these apps on Android You can overwrite the screen in Android. You can replace the home screen in Android. You can scrape running apps in Android. There's a high degree of flexibility Unfortunately this is probably one of those problems where the cost of building the app is relatively high (because the domain is complicated to get right!) and it would be hard to make…

CF.lumen can do this on rooted devices. I have it set up to apply a gradually-increasing f.lux-like effect as the day turns to night, and then switch to a red-channel-only color mode past midnight.

Twilight app can do the color shift without root.

Re: Android P

#116

Post by ams6110 »

airlocksoftware wrote: post #96
angry_octet wrote: post #51

Lots of slick UI stuff, but no meaningful updates to things that are well overdue: - Encryption of specific secrets for each app. - Fine grained control of what information is shared with apps. - Ability to selectively deny particular data (and have the app keep working, e.g by giving it an empty contacts list, fake phone ID, etc). - Ad and js blocking capable browser. Why should installing e.g. the facebook app, all…

Location tracking requires specific permission from the user, not as part of installation. I think you're a bit out of date. https://developer.android.com/distribute/best-practices/deve...

Even on older phones, you can turn location services off, which I do at all times unless I'm actively navigating.

Re: Android P

#117

Post by ucaetano »

kuschku wrote: post #77
izacus wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Treble requires SoC vendors to provide drivers with explicit support. SoCs from Nexus devices aren't supported by Qualcomm so they simply can't be upgraded.

And yet Google managed to get Treble support on the Pixel devices over a year after release... With enough money, it was apparently possible.

Because the SoC is supported.

Re: Android P

#118

Post by kuschku »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #113
kuschku wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the G1 was an AOSP device, and so was the Nexus One, and so was the Nexus S. I was barely in middle school when the G1 came out, I saw Android morph from the promised solution as entirely open source platform to what we have today, where the platform and base apps are all proprietary.

No, none of those were AOSP devices either. They all included Android Market and Gmail, as the most obvious examples. The platform remains entirely open. That's how Chinese people are able to use Android even though Google does not do business there. You confuse the platform with the apps and services that run on it.

> The platform remains entirely open.

That’d be an argument, if Google removed all of those APIs that were in AOSP and forced people to use their proprietary solutions.

If you want to do WiFi Geolocation, you now need to use Google Play Services.

If you want to use shared library of openssl, you now need to use Google Play Services.

If you want to use background notifications, you now need to use Google Play Services.

This is an official Google diagram describing which parts of Android are open source, and which are proprietary: https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/plays... That was 2013, since it’s gotten even far worse. This was 2016: https://www.googlewatchblog.de/wp-content/uploads/android-st... Since then, it’s gotten even worse.

By now you can’t access the stepcounter, or movement data, or most raw sensors, you can’t run in the background, you can’t access location (except for raw GPS, not even A-GPS) without proprietary libraries.

Hell, you can’t even use the latest OpenGL without proprietary libraries.

Re: Android P

#119

Post by kuschku »

ucaetano wrote: post #117
kuschku wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet Google managed to get Treble support on the Pixel devices over a year after release... With enough money, it was apparently possible.

Because the SoC is supported.

Then Google is free to give me an alternative device for development.

With the emulator broken, and the Nexus 5X unsupported, I am unable to assure that my apps work on Android P, and therefore I have no idea at all if they’ll crash or not.

But if they’ll crash, Google will punish me by downranking my score. A punishment for something I can’t do shit about.

It’s absolute madness.

Re: Android P

#120

Post by Groxx »

smilekzs wrote: post #111
angry_octet wrote: post #51

Lots of slick UI stuff, but no meaningful updates to things that are well overdue: - Encryption of specific secrets for each app. - Fine grained control of what information is shared with apps. - Ability to selectively deny particular data (and have the app keep working, e.g by giving it an empty contacts list, fake phone ID, etc). - Ad and js blocking capable browser. Why should installing e.g. the facebook app, all…

Denying / delivering fake data is #1 on my wishlist. Wechat (and pretty much all apps from China) needs to have absolutely minimum permissions. Currently I have to put them on a separate phone...

xprivacy is the single reason I continue to root my phone :|
Post reply on HN